by Ian Irvine
Llian lay sleeping in an out-of-the-way corner of the cave when he felt a sharp pain in his temple. It was a strange, spiky ache like nothing he had ever felt before. He sat up, gasping, to see the edge of a dark cloak swirl out as its wearer disappeared around the corner. On hands and knees, for the headache was growing steadily worse, he peered after it. No one was visible.
“What’s the matter?” Karan asked sleepily.
“A pain in my head. It felt as if someone was trying to prise my skull open.”
She ran around the corner but soon reappeared. “I couldn’t see anything unusual. It’s this place—the heat gives me headaches too. Try to get some sleep.”
She dozed then woke again, taking a stroll up to the door. The canvas was still booming in the wind. Someone had plugged most of the gaps around the door frame, though dust still came through.
Osseion was playing a game with Shand, using dice carved out of rock salt. Mendark lay snoring in a corner. Yggur and Basitor had spent most of their time at the rear of the cave, talking together. A group of Aachim sat in an embayment, reciting an epic poem in an eastern dialect that Karan did not know. It went on all day with never a pause. Malien accompanied them on a small instrument with many strings. To one side Asper was manipulating Tensor’s back, as he did every day, though so far it had effected little improvement. All was calm, save for the shrieking wind.
Karan ambled down to check on Yggur. At the rear the cave was scalloped into a number of cubicle-sized recesses. Yggur and Basitor were in the furthest. Creeping along the wall she was able to get quite close.
Looking over a knob of rock, Karan saw Basitor with his back to her and Yggur facing him. The fading glow of one of the Katazza lightglasses illuminated the gravelly floor between them. On it sat a curious device, constructed of wire and chips of crystal, in the shape of a round basket. A larger crystal in the center winked ruby-red as she moved. One of the offcuts from the ill-fated ampliscope, she supposed.
Karan felt a pang of alarm, a warning from her talent. As she moved the gravel rolled underfoot. Basitor closed a meaty hand over the light.
“Go away, little snoop!” he said roughly.
Karan turned back to the lighted end of the cave, more worried than ever.
Much later, her sleep was ripped apart by the most horrifying screech that Karan had ever heard. She sprang up, looking around frantically, sure that it had been Llian. The cave was dark, for it was not long till dawn. Her heart was pounding furiously. No one else looked to be awake, or even to have heard what she had.
She fumbled out her own little lightglass, the one Maigraith had given her at Fiz Gorgo. Tallia had carried it all the way from Thurkad. By its light she saw Llian lying asleep. It must have been a dream, she thought, and lay back down.
Shortly she was disturbed again by a whistling hiss like a steaming kettle. She sat up. Llian lay on his side, apparently still asleep, but as rigid as a rod. The sound was air being forced through his clenched teeth. His eyes were staring; his fists knotted.
“Llian, what is it?” she whispered. His fingers clenched round hers so hard that it brought tears to her eyes. Then suddenly she understood.
Karan wrenched her hand out of his. “Malien! Shand!” she shrieked. “Quickly!”
Karan raced toward the back of the cave. Behind her lights appeared as everyone scrambled out of their bedrolls.
She rounded the corner. Basitor loomed in front of her, twice her size. Without thinking she lowered her head and butted him below the ribs. With an explosive gasp he doubled over.
She ran round him to where Yggur squatted, trying to get up. On his head was the basket of wire and crystal, now lit up like a chain of fairy lights. The ruby at its center glowed like the scorpion nebula in the night sky.
Yggur was still mouthing words. Behind her Llian cried out, audibly this time. Snatching Yggur’s walking staff, Karan brought it down hard on the basket. It bent slightly then sprang back into shape.
Yggur flung out his fist. Salt exploded off the wall beside her. Master of the Secret Art that he was, Karan knew that he could kill her with a single blast, if he could find her in the dark.
She ducked sideways then drove the end of the staff into his belly. As he doubled over she struck at the basket again, trying to knock it off his head. She gave it two good strokes, but without dislodging it, then she was seized from behind, two long arms went around her chest and began to squeeze.
Karan struggled and kicked, but Basitor was far stronger. The staff fell from her hand. She began to feel an intolerable cracking pressure in her ribs.
Yggur reached out to her, the device on his head glowing brighter than before. Pain erupted behind her eyes. She could feel her ribs about to break. Desperately she tried to take a breath but could draw no air in. She tried to make a sending to block the device Yggur was using, but she could no longer think straight.
Colors appeared behind her eyes. One of her thrashing feet touched the wall. Karan pushed against it with all her failing strength. Basitor lurched backwards, off-balance, and Yggur’s blast ripped pieces out of the cave wall. The pressure eased.
“Hold her still!” Yggur grated. He felt around for his staff, found it, and began to raise it above her head.
Karan could feel the strength running out of her. She tried to protect her head with her arm, but was too weak to move.
Basitor went “Ugh!” and crumpled up.
Osseion and Shand stood there. Osseion was rubbing his fist. Shand tore the device off Yggur’s head, hurled the staff into the back of the cave, then they all went back to the light.
17
* * *
RESOLUTION
FROM DESPAIR
They never did learn what Yggur had been trying to do—force the truth out of Llian, possess his mind, or destroy it. Despite Mendark’s threats, Yggur refused to say. He was warned to keep away from Llian, and Malien spoke to Basitor, but that was all they could do.
All Llian knew was a memory of bright pain that had seemed to come from all directions. The attack had so shaken him that he would not even talk to Karan about it. The device—a primitive sensing tool—was destroyed and its components dropped down cracks in the salt.
“If Yggur ever gets control of a sensitive, watch out!” Malien said to Karan.
She knew they would try again—only her vigilance protected Llian now. But the constant attacks on Llian were undermining her faith in him. What had he done during those five days with Rulke?
* * *
Another dreary day went by. The storm howled outside, unabated. They were all demoralized, stuck helplessly in the middle of nowhere while their enemy had the world to himself. Both food and water were dwindling rapidly.
“How much left?” Mendark called. Asper was counting the waterbags yet again.
“Eight days, at most.”
“And how far to the lakes, Tallia?”
“The same as the last ten times you asked!” she snapped. “Eight or nine days!”
Malien called the company together. “We’ve still enough water to get there, if we go now.”
“We can’t go out in a saltstorm,” said Shand. “We won’t last a day.”
“If we stay here any longer we won’t make it either,” she replied.
No one spoke for a long time.
“If we weren’t so encumbered…” said Yggur.
“Oh?” said Mendark. “What are you suggesting? That we leave behind Tensor or Selial?”
“Or Llian!” said Yggur. “The weak will probably die anyway. They may as well help the strong to survive.”
“I would put blind men in the dispensable category,” Mendark said ominously.
“We leave no one behind,” said Malien. “Not Tensor, not Selial, not Yggur…” Her eyes searched through the faces, settling on one up the back. “Not Llian either.”
Llian shivered. Karan did too. “Not while I’m alive!” she whispered.
“We’re wasting time,�
�� said Mendark. “Since we are stuck here, I propose that we make plans to combat Rulke. We may yet survive, and if we do, we must have a weapon to put up against this construct. Bring out the Mirror, Shand, and let’s see what it can tell us.”
Shand looked reluctant, but he withdrew the Mirror of Aachan from its case and held it out, a tight coil of black, like a metal scroll. It began to unroll, then stuck and he had to ease it open with its fingers. With an audible snap it formed a hard plane, a sheet of black metal scribed around the edges with silver glyphs. In one corner was a symbol made of three golden balls grown together, set in a circle enclosed by a triplet of crimson crescent moons. Within the written frame was a reflecting surface like stiffened quicksilver. Peering over Mendark’s shoulder, Karan saw only the reflection of his face.
Mendark laid the Mirror on the floor of the cave and brought it to life with a touch of his finger. It showed scenes that Karan had seen on it before—gloomy landscapes of the world of Aachan: sooty grass, black hills, endless bogs, mountains like shards of glass, strange towers of fibrous iron leaning over bottomless gulfs. Nothing more. The Aachim gathered round, jostling one another the better to glimpse their home world that few of them had ever known. There were tears in Malien’s eyes, and in many others.
“Can anyone here use it?” Mendark asked softly.
“Alas no,” said Malien. No one else stirred to take it up.
“Fat lot of use it is!” Karan said acidly. “Or your Secret Art for that matter. Why did you fight over it so long if none of you even know what it’s for?”
Giving her a bitter glare, Yggur reached across with an arm as long as an oar and plucked the Mirror off the salt. “I used it to spy on my enemies,” he said. Mendark scowled at that. “Though it was not always reliable.”
Yggur peered myopically at the Mirror, felt up the edge and touched the symbol. The Mirror went blank, then showed the salty plains and wind-sculpted mesas outside. The view shifted but, though he strained until one side of his face began to freeze, Yggur could extract no scene from it but the Dry Sea.
Mendark called on Tensor to tell them all he knew about the device, but Tensor, still huddled down the back of the cave, did not acknowledge him.
“Here is your chance to redeem yourself, chronicler,” Mendark said. “What did you learn from Tensor while you were collaborating with him so eagerly?”
Llian shuffled forward. The boyish extrovert had been cowed; he just wanted to hide in the shadows. “I learned that it was made in Aachan in the depths of time, as a seeing device, and Tensor himself smuggled it here to Santhenar at the risk of his life.” He paused, seeming, for the first time in his life, self-conscious in front of his audience. “Despite what was always believed, it is not a thing of power—”
“So they would have you believe!” Yggur spat.
“But it contains many, many secrets,” Llian went on, “if anyone can unlock it. Most are hidden—even Tensor couldn’t find them.” He paused, trying to remember something. “Hold on! Faelamor said she had a key to the Mirror in Thurkad!”
“In Thurkad?” said Mendark.
“What, an actual key?” Tallia interjected.
“That’s all she said.”
“What else did you learn?” asked Mendark.
“Well,” said Llian, gaining confidence, “we know that Yalkara stole the Mirror from the Aachim at the fall of Tar Gaarn and eventually took it back there when she built Havissard. She added these characters around the border.” He touched them with a finger. “Though none of the Aachim knew what they meant. That’s right isn’t it, Malien?”
“It is so. She must have added this awful moon symbol too.” She shuddered.
“Faelamor was sure that Yalkara had done something to it,” said Llian. “That it was part of her purpose. I suppose that’s why Faelamor wanted it so badly.”
“Well, Shand,” said Mendark. “You were quick enough to snatch the Mirror up after Rulke was gone, and quick to spout incomprehensible prophecies. What aren’t you telling us?”
“I know that I can’t use it!” Shand said vehemently. He paced back and forth, the salt gravel crackling underfoot. “The Mirror is like a book of history. It has many tales to tell, and some of them great ones, if you can put them together from the fragments that it allows you to see. But it’s a clever, cunning thing, this Mirror of Aachan, and I’m not strong enough to force the truth out of it. None of us are—not even you, Mendark.”
There was a long silence. The heat grew ever more oppressive. Tensor huddled in a corner, head bowed, eyes closed. No help there, Karan thought, eyeing the ruins of the Aachim with pity tinged with contempt.
Shand limped over to the entrance and eased the curtain ajar. Salt dust blasted in, and air as hot as a furnace.
“Shut the door!” they all cried together.
Shand’s thin hair, white with salt, was outlined against the light, then he pushed the canvas back in place.
“So the whole business has been for nothing!” Karan burst out angrily. “All that I went through, and Llian too! The destruction of Shazmak. Yggur’s stupid war! All the dead. Poor Rael. How he loved Shazmak…” Her voice trailed away.
“Less than nothing,” said Tallia, and even her voice was drear.
“Had I left the Mirror in Fiz Gorgo none of this would have happened,” Karan said miserably.
“Perhaps,” said Mendark. “Or perhaps you just allowed Rulke to advance his plans a little.”
“You who have not had Rulke in your mind have never known fear,” said Yggur with a shudder.
“I have known fear!” said Karan.
“And will again! I never forget an injury, Karan!”
Karan looked up sharply. Yggur was staring blackly at her. “Oh really!” she snapped. “How many people did you kill, trying to get it back? Ten thousand? Twenty? No one could count the people you’ve injured. If I were to cut your throat right now I’d be doing the world a service.” She raised her little fist.
Yggur kept staring right through her. “You won’t,” he grated. “You’re too soft!”
She shivered and turned away to Llian.
“But after all,” Yggur said quietly, “your part was only a little part. The criminal folly was Tensor’s.”
Outside the wind roared. The canvas boomed. Tensor’s sagging frame was wracked by a spasm that made him seem boneless. Slowly he raised his noble head to peer at Karan. In this light his huge eyes showed violet, but they were lifeless. Then the shutters came down, to Karan’s relief, and he lowered his head again.
Another pause, an even longer one. Karan ended it. “Then what are you going to do now, you who have the power to move the world?” There was a fierce icy ring to her voice, and she glared at Mendark, at Yggur, at Tensor, at Malien, even at Shand, though Shand was at the entrance again and had his back to her. None met her gaze. “Do we meekly beg to become his slaves? Or do we creep into some dark hole and wait for him to have his will with our world?”
Shand turned away from the entrance, with the hint of a smile on his blistered lips. “There is one thing you could do, though I cannot imagine it would succeed.”
Every eye, save Tensor’s, was on him.
“Speak then,” said Mendark irritably, when Shand made no move to do so. “It’s about time you took some responsibility for this mess.”
“The Forbidding came about after Shuthdar destroyed the golden flute. Nothing can move between the Three Worlds any longer.”
“Ancient history! Have you anything to tell us that we don’t know?”
“Rulke will never stop looking for a way to break the Forbidding,” Shand continued equably. “To do so he must remake the flute, or something that can do what it did—maybe this construct. How can we stop him? There’s only one way—build our own device, banish Rulke back to Aachan and seal Santhenar off from the other worlds forever.”
“That is your proposal?” Yggur said incredulously.
“A suggestion humbly put,
” grinned Shand, “from a village woodchopper to the mighty.”
Yggur turned away in disgust. “Stupid old man. If that could be done it would have been done long ago.”
His response seemed to sway Mendark the other way. “Really?” he breathed. “That is very interesting, Shand. Go on!”
“The genius of Shuthdar,” Shand began, “was not only that he made the golden flute, but that he knew how to use it. For though the making of the flute was a great task, learning how to use it was a far greater one.” He turned and began poking the rags back into the cracks around the door frame.
“It seems that a particular talent is required,” he went on. “A rare ability. One that is seldom found in the powerful. It is anti-mechanistic, anti-intellectual. A…” he sought for the right word “… a kind of empathy. The Ways between the Worlds are ethereal, complex, ever-changing, and so the player must seek out and tune himself or herself to the destination, and play a melody that is keyed to the Way that exists at that moment, and no other.”
The whole room stared at him. Karan wondered how he came to know such things.
“Rulke designed the flute and helped Shuthdar at the making,” Shand concluded. “So it is said in the Tale of the Flute. But Rulke never learned how to use it, for when it was completed Shuthdar stole it. Personally, I don’t think Rulke would have been able to use it, by himself.”
“I don’t understand,” said Karan. “Rulke brought Shuthdar from our world to make the flute in the first place. If he could do that, why did he need to make the flute at all?”
“That was a summoning,” said Mendark. “The most perilous of all the Secret Arts, for half the time it kills the summoner, or the one who is summoned.”
“Or both!” Yggur said gruffly.
