by Mel Odom
“We saved them,” Craugh said.
“Only partially. Only for a time. Those people on the mainland have become frozen. They don’t grow and they don’t develop. They exist and they die. With the encroaching goblinkin, they exist with harder and meaner lives, and they die much sooner. They need what they once had. History is like a river to a civilization. It comes from one place so the people living now will have momentum, a map of where they have been and vague ideas of where they will go next.”
Full dark steeped the gardens now. Dozens of soft glows from the lanterns gathered inside the Library courtyard burned against the soft, sable blanket laid over the land.
“Stop anywhere along a river,” Juhg continued, knowing he had Craugh’s full attention, “and you can pick up residue—sand or flotsam—from other places the river has touched. Put something in the river there, and someone else downriver later may find it. Even when the river runs into the sea and passes out into the deeper oceans, the sun evaporates the water and clouds carry it back to the land to begin the journey all over again.”
Craugh scowled. “I don’t need a lesson in the life cycle of water, apprentice.”
“It’s not about water,” Juhg said, feeling bad and frustrated that the wizard somehow couldn’t see what was so plainly in front of his face. “It’s about knowledge. The life cycle of water was just the best representation I could think of for what I’m trying to explain.”
“Well, your explanation is hardly necessary. Despite your beliefs, I am not thickheaded.”
“No,” Juhg agreed. “I know you understand everything I’m talking about. What I want to call to your attention is the fact that you are so blind to what I am trying to explain.”
He took a deep breath, surprised at how tense he was. But surprised, even more so, that he wasn’t a toad.
Craugh pinned Juhg with a wary eye. Grumbling beneath his breath, the wizard turned and gazed over the garden. “You pose a compelling argument, apprentice.”
The term of address galled Juhg. After everything he’d just said, the wizard still insisted on stripping him of rank or respect.
“It’s more than an argument,” Juhg said. “It’s the truth.”
“As you see fit to view it.”
“Craugh,” Juhg said, “the dwarves, elves, and humans are losing the mainland. More and more dwellers get chained as slaves every day. The goblinkin have forced the settlements of the dwarves, elves, and humans to spread out of the South, where the better farmlands are. Their lives are becoming more hardscrabble and desperate. And the goblinkin press on to the north. Soon, very soon, the clans will control all the coastal lands. Once they control the land they will control access to the sea. Do you know what will happen then?”
“We will fight them back.”
“And if we can’t? There is no one to raise a mighty army now. No single foe to unite all of those races.”
“The human, dwarves, and elves will retreat to the center of the mainland,” Craugh said. “There still remain places where they can live and prosper.”
“For how long?”
“You vex me, apprentice, with your constant badgering of what may come to pass.”
Normally, the wizard’s protest would have given Juhg pause. But he somehow couldn’t stop himself, now that he had opened the matter up. “But don’t you see what will happen if the elves, dwarves, and humans retreat to the interior of the mainland?”
“They will live and grow again,” Craugh said. “And they will probably band together to battle the goblinkin.”
“By then it will be too late.”
“Too late for what?”
Juhg opened his hands to take in the immediate area. “For this place. For the Library. For Greydawn Moors. For the island.”
Craugh said nothing, but Juhg could tell the wizard was bothered.
“Greydawn Moors has come to depend on trade from the mainland,” Juhg said. “The population here, although the elven warders have done everything within their powers, has grown beyond the ability of the island’s farms and fishing beds to provide for. If you take away the trade with the mainland, everyone here will starve.”
“Especially the dwellers.” Craugh scowled then shook his head. “I mean nothing personal, apprentice.”
Juhg nodded and tried very hard not to take it personally. When the Founders had first laid down the design for Greydawn Moors and the Vault of All Known Knowledge, they had made allowances for the populations inhabiting the island. Humans took to the seas and seldom stayed. Only the elves and dwarves needed to manage the defenses and the lands remained.
But the dwellers had stayed and multiplied and packed the town till it burgeoned. Dwellers had big families, big appetites, and tendencies not to think beyond the current day.
The dwellers, those folk who had been given the purpose in life of maintaining the Library, of reading and writing and caring for the books, had become the internal threat to the island.
“Yes,” Juhg said. “The dwellers have become a liability.”
“Yet without them, there are no Librarians.”
“Few Librarians,” Juhg corrected. Although humans had generally served as Grandmagisters in the past, few wanted a life spent among books. Fewer still of the dwarves and elves wanted that kind of life. Dwellers lived long, cautious lives.
“You pose a great number of problems, apprentice.”
“Yes,” Juhg replied, “but they are real.”
Craugh paced back and forth, his staff thumping the ground and squirting green embers. “You should have told Wick.”
“I tried. I brought it up in conversations. I wrote monographs on the subject. He denied the problems and he filed the monographs without reading them.”
“And no one else read them?”
“No.” Juhg grimaced. “As you may have noticed, I am not well liked here. That was another reason I had decided to leave.”
“You are not well liked by your fellow Librarians for one reason only,” Craugh said. “You are Wick’s favorite. And he chose you to take over this place in the event of his death.”
Craugh’s pronouncement surprised Juhg. He didn’t know what to say.
“Close your mouth, apprentice,” Craugh growled. “You’re going to draw flies.”
With effort, Juhg closed his mouth. Then he opened it again and said, “The Grandmagister never mentioned anything like that to me.”
“Of course not. Wick always assumed that you were smart enough to figure that out on your own.”
More guilt heaped upon Juhg as he realized how much his departure aboard Windchaser must have hurt the Grandmagister.
“Wick gives you a lot of credit, apprentice,” Craugh said. “I am not so lenient. I still think you have a lot to learn.” He paused and stopped in front of Juhg. “However, I have to admit that you’ve given me a lot to think about here tonight.”
“It’s all true,” Juhg said. “All of it.”
“I have a feeling, a strong feeling, that you are correct.” Craugh took a fresh grip on his staff. “That feeling makes me even more certain that now—or whenever Windchaser’s captain prepares to set sail—is not the time you should be leaving Wick.”
“Staying here won’t do any good,” Juhg protested.
“Staying here is exactly what you should do,” Craugh said. “It is what you will do.” He turned and walked away, bringing the conversation to an abrupt end.
Juhg couldn’t believe the gall Craugh exhibited. Even for a wizard, Craugh had gone too far.
“You can’t make me stay here,” Juhg called after him.
“I can and I am.” Craugh never broke stride as he headed back to the magical steps leading to the top of the Library’s courtyard wall.
“If you prevent me from leaving, you’re no better than the goblinkin that enslaved me.” Juhg prepared to duck into the bushes. He’d strategically located himself near a sizable clump that would surely turn away most magical spells. A transformation
spell required that the wizard see what he was affecting. If Craugh chose to pursue him, he felt certain he could vanish into the garden.
“You’re staying, apprentice. And that is the final word I have to say on the subject.” Craugh walked up the shimmering magical steps.
Before Juhg could think of anything else to say, Craugh disappeared over the top of the courtyard wall. Resolutely, Juhg screwed up his courage and walked toward the shimmering steps.
That’s not all I have to say on the subject, he thought vehemently. I’m not going to be ordered about and shoved around willy-nilly. You will listen to me, Craugh, and when the time comes that I want to leave, I’ll—
He had just started up the stairs when the magical step disappeared from underfoot. With his momentum going forward and his anger and frustration pushing him along at a furious, heavy-footed pace, he sprawled and went facefirst into the ground from three feet up when the spell ended. He had time for a single yawp! of surprise before he struck the ground with enough force to daze him.
Ruefully, realizing again why so many people of all races hated and feared the vagaries of wizards, Juhg rolled over on his back and stared up at the scudding clouds lashed by lizard-tongue-quick flashes of lightning. He made himself stay calm, but only through intense effort.
When the time came, he was going to leave. He would not be trapped. He was not going to live a life of futility. He had done that in the mines, and he’d done it again at the Library before he had realized all the truths he’d told Craugh. He didn’t know what else the world might hold for him, but he was determined to find out.
* * *
“Are ye certain this here’s what ye’re wantin’ to do, Juhg? Just sail away with yerself like this? Ye done up an’ tried to leave this place oncet, only to find yerself right back here.”
The leaden morning sunshine that barely broke through the heavy layer of swirling fog that lay over Greydawn Moors painted Raisho’s dark features with grave concern and doubt. A chill hung in the air, coming from the south and seeming to blow down from the Knucklebones Mountains as if something had put spurs to it.
No, Juhg thought as they crossed Windchaser’s gently rolling deck as the sea retreated from the shore with the outgoing tide. Around them, the crew was seeing to the last of the preparations Captain Attikus had assigned. Rigging popped against the masts and the ’yards as he went belowdecks to the waist and forward to the crew’s quarters. I don’t know what I want to do. What I want to do apparently has no bearing on the events going on. Things have gotten too confusing. This place has gotten too confusing.
But he took a deep breath, shifted his pack from his shoulder to the sailor’s chest at the end of the hammock that he’d claimed as his own—to be shared, of course, with two other sailors who worked other shifts than the one a day he did—and said, “Yes. I’m certain.”
Raisho leaned against the door, filling the small area with his size. He rubbed his smooth chin with one hand while the other gripped the cutlass belted at his waist.
“Well, if’n ye were to ask me how I thought ye were feelin’ about everything—”
“I’m not asking what you think. I’m capable of thinking for myself, no matter what you or Craugh or anyone else believes.” Judging from the way Raisho stiffened, Juhg knew the reply came out more sharply than he’d intended. He blew out a breath of air. “I apologize, Raisho. I didn’t mean to sound angry with you. I’m exhausted from all the work that I was doing at the Library, and from everything that happened there. Leaving that place … was not easy. Only the thought of staying makes leaving more possible. I can’t stay here.” He looked at his meager possessions in the chest. “I think—no, I know—there is nothing in this place for me. Not any more. And I believe I was fooling myself to feel otherwise at all. I was never from here. These past few days have done little else than remind me of that.”
“Aye.” Raisho nodded good-naturedly. “Not bein’ natural born to this place meownself, I can understand that. Every dweller in town has been suspicionin’ me, an’ every other sailor what lives aboardship an’ doesn’t have a true home or family here. But I been up the Knucklebones no few times these past few days. An’ I know there’s a lot of work left for the doin’. One thing I’ve gotten to know about ye, ye ain’t one to walk away from work.”
“It’s not my work.”
“So ye’re leavin’ it all behind. Again.”
“Yes. I told the Grandmagister a few days ago I would be leaving when Windchaser was ready.” Unable to bear the searching and concerned look his friend was giving him, Juhg turned his attention to the hammock. Whoever had tied the knots that bound the swinging bed to the masts hadn’t been careful.
He took his time to untie the knot, rewrap the rope, and tie it off again. His knot was much better than the one that had existed there previously. He could be a good sailor. He knew he could. And he was smart in the way of trading. He’d already proven that before Windchaser had reached Kelloch’s Harbor.
It was going to be difficult. The only solace lay in the fact that leaving a second time came a little easier.
“I can’t help but mention that I’m findin’ that hard to believe,” Raisho said.
“It’s what I believe that matters, and I believe I need to leave.”
Raisho remained quiet for only a moment. “Ye was good up there, scribbler. I watched ye workin’ up there sometimes. I saw the care ye took with them books an’ that assignment the Gran’magister give ye. I know ye love them books as much as any person up in them mountains, probably as much as the Gran’magister, an’ more than most of them what stayed.”
That statement increased the guilt that Juhg felt. Over the past few days, with all the destruction growing more and more apparent and the barefaced fact that the Library had lost too much to ever be the same, some of the Librarians had returned to the town and the lives they had there.
Not even the Grandmagister had the heart to accuse them of desertion. Putting the Vault of All Known Knowledge back even into a semblance of working order was a monumental task. Dwarves and elves worked to haul buckets of ash, all that remained of a number of collections that once held whole rooms, from the Library. Despite everything they had to do, all of the Librarians had taken note of the ash dumping from every filled wagonload that was taken to the southern face of the Knucklebones and dumped over into the Blood-Soaked Sea. Histories, music, art, literature, science, and other fields of study poured down the barren stone mountainside. A flurry of fine dust had drifted back over the Library
“An’ I’ll lay a gold piece against a square knot that ye’ve got the makin’s of a quill an’ ink and—like as not—an empty book or two in yer pack there.”
Juhg said nothing. Raisho’s accusation was true. He did carry quills and ink and three empty books he’d made himself from the Library’s supplies after getting the Grandmagister’s approval.
“When are we getting under way?” Juhg led the way back through the waist to the stern cargo hold.
“Cap’n Attikus says soon. Have you eaten?”
“I’m not hungry.” Since getting up before cock’s crow that morning, Juhg had felt sick to his stomach. He’d known he was leaving that day since the last three, when Captain Attikus had sent word out for the crew that they were to tidy up their business and report back to the ship.
Things had gotten decidedly worse when Juhg learned that the Grandmagister had to travel to the town on an urgent matter that morning as well. Reluctantly, Juhg had tried to discover what business could possibly take the Grandmagister from the salvage of the Library. But he had failed because he wasn’t privy to the quiet conversation the Grandmagister and Craugh passed between them. Both the wizard and the Grandmagister spoke in vague references. Juhg only knew that it was important. If anyone at the Library knew, no one was talking.
Still, accompanying the Grandmagister down the Knucklebones Mountains while driving the team hadn’t been exactly the most relaxed of endeavors. H
e had said his goodbyes the day before, not wishing to have to endure them that morning. Instead, the Grandmagister had appeared only a short time after Juhg had loaded his belongings onto the wagon and had informed him that they would travel together.
“Ye gotta eat,” Raisho said. “Got to keep yer strength up. We get out on them waters, why, it could be a long time betwixt meals an’ the comforts of home.” He grimaced. “With this foul chill wind a-catchin’ the island broadside as it is, there might not be no warmth to be had out on that salt neither.”
Juhg nodded. “Maybe a little something.”
Raisho dropped a hand on Juhg’s shoulder. “Good. Cook has got some fresh bread this mornin’. Not all of it his. The cap’n wanted to set a nice bill of fare afore we went out, so he traded out fer some of the fresh-baked goods the island’s bakeries put out.”
Together, they went belowdecks again and made their way to the galley.
Twenty-three sailors, nearly a third of the crew, sat around the tables and benches attached to the gently rocking galley floor. Almost half of those were new faces, men brought onboard to replace those who had died during the battle with the goblinkin ship. All of the sailors fell silent for a short time when they watched Juhg come among them. Then they pointedly turned away from him or left.
Maybe coming here wasn’t a good idea, Juhg thought morosely. His welcome among the sailors seemed about as warm as his return to the Library. Ignoring them as best as he could, Juhg joined Raisho in a quick trip through the serving line at the galley. Raisho piled his wooden platter high with breads, fruits, and fresh cuts of meat. Juhg took only a few pieces of bread, some cheese, and an apple. He truly wasn’t very hungry to begin with, and the cold reception aboard the ship whittled away even that.
When Raisho guided Juhg toward a small table in the back where two other sailors sat, the two sailors got up and left without a word. Juhg took his seat and sat quietly, not at all sure of what he should do with himself.
“It will get better,” Raisho assured him in a gruff voice. “By the Old Ones, it will. Else I’ll be yankin’ on a few men’s beards meownself to make it right.”
