The wizards and the warriors tcoaaod-1

by Hugh Cook

  Miphon allowed himself a sigh of relief. A trial might take months. That would leave plenty of time for negotiations, diplomacy, explanations – or escape, if escape proved necessary. The greatest danger had always been that wizards, discovering a Rovac warrior in their midst, would be tempted to instant murder. Now – or so Miphon thought – the moment of greatest danger was past.

  But Brother Fern Feathers was continuing: 'Meanwhile, leaving aside this matter of murder, we must call on these newcomers to make their contribution to our present debate.'

  Til not be debated over by Rovac warriors!' shouted Garash.

  This roused another chorus of angry murmurs, which Brother Fern Feathers quelled with difficulty.

  'Only Miphon will speak to our debates,' said Brother Fern Feathers. 'The Rovac warriors will be given no voice until the trial, which is another matter entirely. Miphon here is our fellow wizard. He's the one I'll ask to speak.'

  'Speak on what?' said Miphon. 'What are you debating?'

  'The propriety of certain actions – quite aside from the question of killing – which have been undertaken by Garash,' said Brother Fern Feathers. 'For days we've debated whether to accept the tales and excuses Garash has given us. Let me review his claims, for your benefit – and also to clarify our own thoughts on…' i protest!' said Garash. 'I -' i have ruled for your silence!' said Brother Fern Feathers. 'Now hold your tongue, while you still have a tongue to hold!'

  He stared at Garash until Garash dropped his eyes. A few wizards coughed and muttered, then, when they had settled down, Brother Fern Feathers began: 'Garash says that last autumn, in Stronghold Hand-fast, he fought the wizard Heenmor, strength against strength, power against power. He claims that Heenmor fled, escaping. Garash then went to the eastern coast of Argan and took passage on a ship southing from Brine.

  'His winter southing took him to the Dry Pit. Knowing Heenmor was loose in the world, he took a source of power from the Dry Pit. The death-stone, he calls it. He says Heenmor has one so we must have one. He claims Heenmor represents a danger giving him the excuse to take power from the Dry Pit.

  'Garash arrived here at Summerstart with this death-stone. He tempts us with the prospect of limitless power; he speaks of the conquest of the world; he wishes to be made our leader.

  'Since Garash came into our midst, many have died. I will not speak of what happened in the Castle of Ultimate Peace. We had thought such feuding over centuries ago, but all the old conflicts and schisms have been renewed by this… this death-stone.

  'We cannot say what danger Heenmor represents. We have only Garash's words to go by. But this I do know: what Garash has done has led to killing amongst us already. It threatens to end our unity, such as it is.

  'Though we have debated for days, nobody has been brave enough to prosecute Garash for entering the Dry Pit. But now Garash has been accused of murder, which suggests his tale may need revision.

  'We have talked enough. Indecision will destroy us as surely as anything else. If nobody else will act, then I will. I will prosecute. I accuse! Hear me well, for in this matter -'

  Then the wizard of Seth broke off, for Garash had taken out his death-stone. His face betrayed his purpose.

  'No!' shouted Brother Fern Feathers.

  Garash cried out in the High Speech. Hearst lunged toward him, but too many old wizards were in the way. A grinding sound began to dominate the chamber. The death-stone was beginning its work. Miphon remembered the battle with the wizard Ebonair. He remembered the Ultimate Injunction that enemy had used against him. If anything could stop the death-stone, it had to be the Ultimate Injunction. In desperation, Miphon cried out: 'Segenarith!'

  Even as he shouted, Blackwood managed to close with Garash. The woodsman drove a blade hard and home. Garash gave a squeal of panic and agony. Blackwood stabbed him again, again, and he fell, dropping the death-stone. Blackwood crushed his throat, stamping down on it, making sure.

  The sound of grinding had stopped.

  Men drew back from the death-stone, as they might from a poisonous snake. It was Brother Fern Feathers who first dared approach it. He picked it up: and dropped it immediately. it's hot!'

  Even as they watched, the death-stone began to glow. First blue, then red. Hot as a furnace. Wizards stepped back. Miphon realised the Ultimate Injunction had not conquered the power of the death-stone, which was now beginning to manifest itself in another form: heat.

  'Run for your lives!' shouted Miphon, his voice commanding the chamber.

  A tongue of flame twisted from the death-stone. Dragon-dangerous, it lashed out. A wizard was engulfed by a roar of flame. He spun round, burning, screaming..

  Everyone – almost everyone – panicked.

  Screaming, shouting, they trampled their way toward the exits. The death-stone began to spin, shooting off bolts of flame. Wizards jammed the major exits, pushing, jostling, clawing for freedom.

  Hearst swore.

  'We'll never get out!' he said. 'This way!' cried Miphon.

  And, running, he led the way to a squeeze-gap in the wall behind the throne. They forced their way through the gap, breaking out into a deserted corridor.

  'Follow me!' shouted Miphon.

  And fled, the others hot behind him.

  Blackwood and Hearst had no idea where Miphon was taking them. He led them through twisting corridors, down stairways, over bridges, until ahead they saw daylight. They came out onto a low battlement where.the air was hot, hot and gasping. A sea of flame lay beyond the battlement: the flame trench, Drangsturm. Looking across the flame trench they saw the barren countryside of the Deep South, habitat of the Swarms. The heat so distorted the air that the countryside wavered like an unstable mirage.

  'Where now?' said Hearst, sweating.

  'This way,' said Miphon, hoping he remembered correctly.

  He led them through an archway then down stairs 485 spiralling into darkness. Only an occasional ochre firestone lit their panting shadows. Then they saw light. Daylight! A gateway! Running through the gateway, they gained the open air.

  They had exited from the castle at the western end of Drangsturm. Here a buffer of basalt rock, two hundred paces wide, separated the flame trench from the waters of the Central Ocean. The buffer was guarded only by a low parapet: it was designed as a killing ground in which wizards could destroy any attack by the Swarms.

  'Come on,' said Miphon, taking a few steps toward the buffer of basalt rock.

  'You're crazy!' said Hearst. 'We can't go south! We'd die!'

  From behind them came a deep, prolonged roar of falling masonry.

  'The death-stone's destroying the castle,' said Miphon. 'But hundreds of wizards will escape. How many-friends do you think we've got among them now?'

  'We are doing well,' said Blackwood. 'First Veda, now this.'

  'The Deep South is dangerous, but it gives us a chance,' said Miphon. 'To stay here is certain death. So follow me!'

  And, having little option, they did.

  CHAPTER FIFTY-SEVEN

  Morgan Gestrel Hearst, warrior of Rovac, woke from sleep and for a moment thought he was in hell. The ground shook; the air roared with dull, continuous thunder; the sky was suffused with the colour of blood; above him loomed a monster with huge underslung lobster claws. The monster had eight legs.

  For a moment – and he suffered a lot in that moment – he stared aghast at what he saw. Then he remembered.

  Of course.

  Hearst lay back, breathing in the smell of cinnamon. He was in the transparent chamber of a keflo, a creature of the Swarms. The red glow filling the chamber was partly from the clouded sky, lit up by the blaze of the flame trench Drangsturm, which was responsible for the thunder and vibrations, and partly from the fireball where the Castle of Controlling Power was melting down.

  Hearst remembered how Miphon, quite calmly, had led them into the Deep South, saying the Swarms kept clear of the castle because of Southsearcher raids and the powers of wizards. Toward evening
, they had sighted the tall minar housing a colony of keflos; Miphon had led them inside at night, when the keflos were asleep. Finding the hatchery, they had killed embryonic keflos. Miphon had dissected certain sacs from the limp dead bodies; smearing themselves with the contents of these sacs, they had given themselves an odour much like cinnamon.

  The keflos, so Miphon said, recognised each other by smell. The Southsearchers used tricks such as this to penetrate the kefio colonies; safe inside a keflo minar, they would not be bothered by any other creatures of the Swarms.

  Come morning, they would find out if Miphon was right. How did he know? Hearst suspected Miphon had been a Southsearcher before he was a wizard – but Miphon did not choose to talk of his past. Looking at the monstrous beast bulking over him, Hearst wondered if it really would spare him when it woke. He had his doubts: but there was nowhere to run to. All he could do was trust.

  After a while, he went back to sleep.

  When Hearst woke in the morning, the keflo was gone. He had expected something that large to make enough noise to wake him when it moved. Miphon and Blackwood were gone. Where? Perhaps the keflo had eaten them – yet surely, if it had started eating people, it would have had appetite enough for three.

  Through the transparent curve of the keflo chamber, Hearst studied the landscape. A few keflos were out and about in the countryside. From this height, they looked like discs, for their legs, jaws and organs of sense were slung beneath their domed and multicoloured carapaces. Keflo shell, a valuable product, was traded along the Salt Road; Hearst could see that keflos would not stand much chance against determined Southsearchers.

  About three leagues to the north-west was a glowing mass of slag: the molten remains of the Castle of Controlling Power. The death-stone, which still blazed amid those ruins, had melted the ground around till it ran like lava. Clouds of steam were billowing up from the ocean.

  'Good morning,' said Miphon, entering the chamber. He held a collection of little sacs.

  'More perfume?' said Hearst.

  'Yes,' said Miphon. 'For those who don't want to be eaten.'

  'What's there for us to eat, while we're on the subject?'

  This,' said Blackwood, coming into the chamber and dropping an armful of eggs. They bounced.

  Hearst, picking one up, found the skin hard and flexible.

  'These are keflo eggs,' said Miphon. 'Properly nourished, they develop into the embryos we killed last night and that I've been killing this morning. I think -'

  He was interrupted by an explosion which set the chamber shaking. To the north-west, steam was rising, not just from the ocean, but from Drangsturm itself.

  'There's a breach from the ocean into Drangsturm,' said Miphon quietly.

  When the sea entered a small flame trench like the 'steamer' on the southern border of Estar, the water seethed and boiled. But, when hitting the superheated rock of Drangsturm, cold seawater exploded instantly into steam.

  Another explosion shook the world.

  Hairline cracks crazed the transparent surface of the keflo chamber. Out on the plain, the foraging keflos stood quite still. High in the sky, flung by the explosion, huge chunks of rock turned lazily in the sunlight. A massive rock, big as a house, crashed to earth near the minar. The floor shook.

  'The end of the world,' said Blackwood quietly.

  'Maybe,' said Hearst, cutting open one of the keflo eggs. 'But let's not die hungry. Dig in.'

  So they breakfasted on raw keflo eggs – which were a thick dark rubbery green, hard work for the jaws. As they ate, the ground near Drangsturm split open. Cracks extended for a league north and south. Flame surged into the cracks as the walls of the flame trench began to collapse.

  'Look,' said Blackwood.

  They saw, dimly through the crazed walls, a Neversh 489 wheeling high in the sky in the distance, circling the area of devastation. An updraft from the flame trench caught it and flung it upwards, out of sight.

  'The Skull of the Deep South will know,' said Miphon. 'The Swarms will start to march. Soon. Today. They'll forge around through the sea – or their legions will labour rocks to bridge the ruins of Drangsturm.'

  There was no stopping it.

  They would march north. All of them. Stalkers, keflos, Engulfers, Wings, tunnellers, green centipedes, the Neversh, the blue ants and the others. Hell-creatures from the worlds of nightmare, smashing their way through human civilizations, hunting, catching, killing, eating.

  'We have to stop them!' said Hearst. 'If we can get a death-stone, we can stop them!'

  'Could we?' said Miphon. 'Remember the effective radius. Two leagues. That's not much. There's few places we could stop them before… well, before Estar. We could halt them there, at the Southern Border.'

  'Then that's what we'll do,' said Hearst. 'Now how do we get our death-stone?'

  'We don't!' said Blackwood. 'After all this time trying to lock away that horror for good and forever – '

  'Yesterday was another world,' said Hearst, cutting him off.

  'But he's got a point,' said Miphon. 'To let loose that power -'

  'That power is loose already,' said Hearst. 'We won't be the only ones making for the Dry Pit. It may bring the world to destruction – but the world will be destroyed in any case, unless we halt the Swarms.'

  'From here, it's a fair stretch to the Dry Pit,' said Miphon. 'If we go east, eighty leagues takes us to the Inner Waters. Then another two hundred leagues or so takes us to the Stepping Stone Islands. Then, if we can contact a Southsearcher patrol, we might get passage north to the Chameleon's Tongue.'

  'And then?'

  'Sand,' said Miphon. 'A long beach runs about three hundred leagues east to the Elbow, then about two hundred leagues north to the mountains at the end of the Chameleon's Tongue. There's a harbour there: Hartzaven. If we can get passage to the northern coast from there, we'll still have to march about a hundred leagues inland to reach the Dry Pit.'

  'Another journey…' said Blackwood.

  'You sound 'Weary,' said Blackwood. 'Leagues of wind and rain. Foraging for meals. Travelling by night, waking to foreign suns. Lurking, hiding, skulking, stealing. After all this time…'

  'I know,' said Hearst. 'We all want to rest.'

  'And we tried so hard,' said Blackwood. 'For what? Our best wasn't good enough to stop this… this ending.'

  'We're not dead yet,' said Hearst, though he did not fancy their chances for survival. 'Come on, man! Maybe it's at the Dry Pit that you'll find your destiny.'

  Blackwood shook his head.

  He no longer believed in destiny.

  Back in the castle, in the moments of combat, the fate of the whole world had been resolved by the timing of a knife-thrust. If Blackwood had managed to kill Garash just a little sooner, Miphon would never have used the word Segenarith; the death-stone would have fallen harmlessly to the floor, leaving the way open for the future to be resolved by diplomacy between wizards.

  Instead: disaster.

  It was true: chance did attend to all things. The fate of the world could be changed by the tiniest hesitation at a critical moment.

  'We're dice,' said Blackwood. 'And we're rolling. How we fall is not up to us.'

  'The will is free,' said Hearst. 'We can act as we choose.'

  'No,' said Blackwood, heavily. 'Chance settles everything. There's no such thing as free will.'

  Hearst smashed him across the face with the back of his hand. Blackwood staggered backwards.

  'Draw on me if you like,' said Hearst, his voice cool. 'Kill me if you like. I'll accept the punishment. I performed an act of unadulterated free will. On the other hand, since you don't believe in such a thing, what's your motive for punishing me?'

  Blackwood hesitated.

  Hearst drew a blade.

  'Enough!' roared Miphon, startling himself with his own ferocity. 'We'll go to the Dry Pit. We'll get a death-stone. We'll try. It's our only chance.'

  'So you think chance comes into it, too,' said
Blackwood, rubbing his smarting face. 'So is the will free or not free?'

  'If someone had clouted me over the face, that's the last question I'd be asking,' said Miphon. 'But the answer, since you wonder, is both yes and no. Let me explain.'

  ***

  It was later in the day. Miphon was still lecturing on the nature of free will; Hearst, bored beyond belief, reminded himself never again to raise philosophical problems in the presence of a wizard.

  Hearst watched another Neversh high in the sky. Scanning. Scouting. On the ground, the keflos were moving north, picking their way over the shattered landscape.

  It was starting already. The Swarms were moving north for the first time in four thousand years. And, his own faith in free will steadily eroding, he thought:

  – We are prisoners of history.

  An odd thought for a Rovac warrior. Not bitter, but melancholy. Almost philosophical. Almost. He would have to snap out of this mood. He would have to unlearn some of his painfully-acquired wisdom, and think himself back into being a hero, for that was what the age demanded: a man prepared to dare all in a desperate race to the Dry Pit to gain a weapon powerful enough to contend against the Swarms.

  Despite himself, he recalled his many failures. He did his best to suppress them, but one memory still surfaced. It dated back to the time at Ep Pass. Durnwold had worked his way behind the wizard Heenmor, had stood at the top of a cliff, had raised a rock… had died.

  Should Hearst blame himself for that death? Alish had thought up the attack plan, but should Hearst have accepted it? Maybe there had been a better way to do it. The fact was, a man had died, trusting Morgan Hearst. So many men had died trusting him.

  Miphon was still talking: '… so you see, the question of free will, is, to a large extent, a purely epistemological question. You do see that, don't you. Don't you?'

  'What?' said Blackwood, who had a rather glazed expression on his face. 'Yes, yes. Indeed.'