“There, my dear friend,” Rin said, kneeling to take the trader into her arms. Lakanta sobbed for a moment, then pulled herself together.
“Ah, well, what’s done is done.”
“And our parents?” Tildi asked.
“We have not found them,” Gosto said. “We knocked on the door of every cell, but there are few occupied by the living. I am sure that they must be dead. It has been such a long time, and they did not have hope to live upon. We will try to find which of these cells contain their bones and take them home for a decent burial in Daybreak Bank.”
Tildi bowed her head for a moment. Just for a moment, she had hopes that they would be somewhere safe, but it had been too long.
“Ahem.” Olen cleared his throat.
“Oh, yes,” Tildi said, abashed. “This is Master Olen. Master Olen has been my teacher. He lives in the most wonderful place.” As if she was presenting the most precious treasures in the entire world, she said, “Master, these are my brothers. This is Gosto, Pierin, Marco, and Teldo.”
The Summerbee brothers nodded politely as they were introduced. Olen raised a shaggy eyebrow.
“Teldo, eh?”
“Yes,” Tildi said proudly. She took Teldo’s hand between hers and squeezed it fondly. “Our mother always said we were like twins separated by a year.”
Olen bowed to them, hand on heart. “My pleasure. I am happy to know the family that Tildi treasures so greatly. May I present Master Calester?” The Guardian did not look up. Tildi frowned. Ah, well, he was not important. She was surrounded by those who were dearest to her in the world. Only Serafina was missing, and Prince Eremi, if she could be so bold. She clasped her hands in delight.
“Oh, this is the best day of my life!”
Teldo grinned at her. “I’ve heard about a magic book you have. May I see it?”
Tildi couldn’t wait to display the treasure. “Master Calester, may my brother see the Compendium?” Calester did not look up. Impatiently, Tildi stretched out with a thought, and the book lifted straight out of the Guardian’s hands. He looked up, startled.
“What is it?” Teldo asked avidly, reaching for the large white scroll.
“Wait, young man, don’t touch it!” Calester exclaimed.
“My friend,” Olen said, holding him back, “he is perhaps the one other person on all Alada who might be able to touch it.”
“What, more smallfolk wizards?” Calester asked. He studied them all with curiosity in his deep-set eyes.
“Perhaps,” Olen said mysteriously. “Go ahead, Teldo Summerbee.”
“Ow!” Gosto said. “Curse it, it burned me!” Tildi looked at his fingers, but they were just a little pink at the ends, instead of burned black, like the abbess Sharhava. “What about you three?”
“No, thanks,” Pierin said. Wide-eyed, Marco just shook his head.
Teldo put his hand on the parchment. Tildi held her breath, but it only turned pink. He clenched his fingers a little as if his skin pricked, but he didn’t draw back.
“Why, it’s just like the bit of a book that Mother bought for us,” he said in wonder. Tildi felt in her belt pouch and produced the scrap.
“In truth, this is a bit like the book. It’s a copy.” Proudly she touched the Compendium. “This is the real thing.”
All the brothers stared in admiration as she turned it from one page to another, showing them the moving and changing runes. She found even more delight in it than she had before, in spite of the deep, croaky voice that had joined the original three inside the pages. Firmly, she ignored Knemet, and displayed the wonders of his creation to her brothers.
Teldo whistled. “It’s a wonder. What will you do with it now?”
“We must take it away and bury it,” Olen said.
Teldo shrugged. “Seems a waste to do that. I would think there was so much we could learn from it. Why can’t you keep it?”
Tildi took a deep breath, realized it was too big a story to tell him all in one sitting, and let it out again.
“We just can’t,” she said. “You’ll have to trust me on that.”
May we depart now?” Lakanta asked. “There’s nothing in this terrible place I wish to see again. I want a glass of beer and ten days of sunlight before I ever want to go into shadow again.”
Olen put his hand on her shoulder.
“Gladly. Sergeant Morag, if you will lead us?”
Tildi had never seen the craggy sergeant so erect and proud as he stepped out down the corridor. Demballe, at his side, held a wizard-light to guide their feet.
Tildi felt she could never fill her eyes enough with the sight of her friends and her brothers. She kept looking from one to another, as if she feared they would disappear if she kept her gaze off them.
“How did you reach us so swiftly?” Rin asked as they walked. “It seems as though not that many days have passed, although it felt like an eternity.”
“We are half a day’s sail west of Tillerton,” Olen said. “It seems that Knemet’s lair was close to where Nemeth came ashore. Both he and Calester missed the arrival of the Compendium.”
“There’s no need to mention that again,” the Guardian said, a trifle miffed.
“Tillerton!” Gosto exclaimed. “Do you mean we were a few days’ walk from home, and we never knew?”
“That must be why there were charnives here,” Marco said. “I never heard of them haunting tunnels anywhere else.”
“That’s right,” Gosto said. “Tildi, you ought to hear how your friends faced off two score of them all by themselves.”
“I look forward to it,” Tildi said, “if you tell it before you go on shore.”
“I want to go home right away,” Pierin said. “Heaven only knows what Lisel will say when she sees me like this.” He flipped the ends of his beard with his fingers.
“She thinks you’re dead,” Tildi said, her face flushing scarlet. “They all think you are dead, after the thraiks carried you away. That’s why I’m here.” She shook her head. “It’s too much to tell you now.”
Gosto patted her on the back. “We will want to hear all your adventures, Tildi. Later seems time enough. The wonder is that we are alive to hear them.”
Lakanta guided them to the remaining cells in which they had heard voices. Sadly, only two other people remained alive of those the thraiks had stolen. Tildi’s brothers refused to allow her into the cells where the dead were found. To Olen’s delight, they located a scholar from the wizards’ college named Vibun, who had kept himself sane by working out magical conundrums in his head, and a ragged man who threw himself at Tildi’s feet, crying out about “mir’cles.”
When at last they emerged from the cave mouth, the sky was pink with the light of a winter dawn. The ships were not in sight.
“There they are!”
Tildi heard Sharhava’s voice, and looked around for her. No one was waiting on the stony beach.
Suddenly shadows began to drop from the sky. She cringed, fearing the thraiks had returned, but Olen smiled up at the sky. She followed his gaze.
Coming toward them were some of the strangest figures she had ever seen. They had the wings of thraiks, but instead of black they were pink or brown or golden. Their bodies were clothed in flapping lengths of bleached cloth. It took Tildi a moment to realize those were habits of the Knights of the Book. They hovered off the edge of the stone ledge, cheering. The first of the figures landed on before her.
“Welcome back,” said the abbess Sharhava. It was she, but not as Tildi remembered her. Her face was misshapen, and her teeth, especially the pointed ones at the corners, were larger and longer. Her fingers seemed longer and more knobbly, with curved talons in place of fingernails.
“It seems that there are those with greater tales to tell than we have,” Olen said, eyeing her curiously.
Sharhava frowned at him, resenting the familiarity. “Never mind that. I see you have succeeded in your quest.”
“In more than you know, dear lady,”
Calester said. He patted the Compendium proprietorially. “It was a great success.”
More normal figures hovered into view: men and women on horseback who galloped toward them in midair. Prince Eremi was at the head of the pack.
“You are alive!” he cried. “Serafina promised you were all right, but seeing is believing.” He scanned the group, beaming. “It is good to see you all back again.”
Lakanta took a great breath and let out a gust of white clouds. “It is good to be here. You’ll have a whole feast’s worth of songs from what we have to tell you.”
“And we,” Magpie said, grinning. “But who are these others?”
“My brothers,” Tildi said proudly. The minstrel-prince’s eyes widened in wonder.
“Then this is a day of rejoicing,” he said. Inbecca caught up with him, astride a different horse than Tildi recalled her riding before.
“Abbess, what is the meaning of this?” Lar Vreia asked at last, horror on her face.
“It was necessary in the defense of the Great Book,” Sharhava said imperiously. “That is all you need to understand.”
“It was amazing!” Lar Colruba exclaimed. Her plump face was alight with joy. “It has been most exciting to fly free. Blessings upon the sacred writings that made it possible!”
Tildi was struck by the faces of the knights who had accompanied her through the caverns. Two of them wrinkled their brows in concern, but seemed to decide that what their abbess decreed was so. Not Lar Mey, he who disapproved of anyone who was not human. He looked from one of his fellow knights to another, unable to form a word.
“And what are you staring at, brother?” Sharhava demanded.
The knight goggled at his brethren breathlessly, then collapsed in a heap at their feet.
Serafina greeted them all on their return to the ships with more effusiveness than Tildi had ever seen her display. It seemed that the time they had been away had changed everyone they had left behind in ways it would take time to understand. The werewolf crew was torn between wanting to hear all the stories and needing to guide their vessels out of the rocky waters. Olen decreed that anyone who had a tale to tell would be given full hearing. He and Prince Eremi worked it out between them to record all for the archives of the three kingdoms who had had a part in the rescue of the prisoners and the defeat of the Shining One known as Knemet.
Morag and the others who had been wounded in the caverns were restored to wholeness by means of the runes inscribed upon the metal sheets. To the great relief of those who had guarded Tildi, and not a few of those who had been transformed, the Scholardom returned to full humanity. Morag looked wistfully at the runes etched in metal. Tildi’s heart went out to him. There was no healing for him there.
Services were held for all the dead, then the bodies were given to the sea. Tildi mourned for those she had known. She gave thanks to Mother Nature and Father Time for their valiant service, but she also had a private prayer of gratitude. Though there had been death, life had been given back. She did not take that for granted.
Tildi spent every moment she could with her brothers. She saw to it that they were the first to be given use of the wooden tub in the captain’s quarters, even ahead of the kings and her fellow wizards, with copious hot water furnished by means of her talent. Teldo admired openly and without jealousy the growth in her skills.
“You’ll have to give me lessons now,” he teased her.
“Anything,” she promised him. It was so good to have her brothers back—from the very dead, or so it had seemed! She was happier than she could ever recall being. With their well-being in mind, she persuaded the werewolves to give her some of their children’s clothes to replace her brothers’ ragged garments, and she gave all four boys haircuts, as she had been accustomed to doing in the kitchen at Daybreak Bank. In a way it felt as if she had never been away from them, but in others, nothing could be farther from normal. Even as the ships brought them closer to the Quarters, she felt she had never been more distant from her old life. She hated to lose touch with her brothers again, even for a few weeks for the journey to Sheatovra, but she knew that she would never return with them.
In Tillerton, they left off Vibun and the man from Walnut Tree.
“I will see him home on the way back to the college,” the scholar promised cheerfully. “We will have plenty to talk about. I am interested in his definition of miracles.”
“We can let you off here as well,” Haroun offered. “You’re only a few days’ walk. We will trade for supplies to get you there. It would be my privilege. You will want to get home and set your affairs right.”
“We may never go into those tunnels again,” Gosto said with a rueful grin. “I’ve had my fill of them. But if you don’t mind, Captain, we’d like to see our sister’s journey through with her. I don’t see as another few weeks will make any difference. We’ll send messages with anyone going toward the Quarters to start the process of getting our property restored to us. Better if we’re not there, to let them debate all the sides of having people return from the dead. If you knew what smallfolk were like, a year might not be time enough.”
“That, too, would be my honor,” Haroun said with a grin. “I think I can find room for you on board.”
Tildi beamed.
Chapter Forty
ith the passage of each day, she knew the Compendium would soon be out of her hands and out of her sight forever. She wondered how she could possibly let it go.
Calester allowed her to have custody of the book as long as she wished during those days, to allow her to prepare for the separation. It was kindly meant, and Tildi appreciated it. She kept it hovering by her while she served her brothers or ate her meals. The voices had calmed down from their initial fierce arguments. Were they enjoying that mental concord that she had experienced when she and the other wizards had unwound the Madcloud? They had so much knowledge. It was a terrible waste to put this beautiful thing, this endless resource, out of reach. She knew she would miss it greatly.
She was aware that others watched her from a distance, concerned about what was in her thoughts, particularly Serafina, whose dark eyes were often fixed upon her. Tildi knew she was listening to the turmoil in her heart, but she couldn’t bring herself to discuss it with anyone. She didn’t know what she would do, nor would she until the moment came.
At the edge of a plain so ancient and isolated it was nameless, Calester called the procession to a halt.
“There it is,” he said. “I thought I would never see it again in all eternity.”
Tildi glanced up over Rin’s head at the grand mountain peak before her, set alone in the heart of the valley against a brilliant blue sky. The mountain was so perfect in shape, it looked like the way the surface leaped up after a drop fell into a glass of water. Snow decorated the top third, but the rest was covered with brilliant green vegetation.
“Like the Mother just put it there,” Pierin said. He and Gosto rode pillion behind Captain Teryn and Sergeant Morag. Teldo and Marco shared saddles with a couple of the guards.
“Is the sanctuary up there?” Serafina asked.
“No, we felt that would be unsafe. The Compendium had been laid to rest beneath the mountain’s root.”
He urged his horse forward. A guard of honor, consisting of a dozen each of Halcot’s guards and scholar-knights, followed him, but it was scarcely needed. The plain was deserted except for plants and animals. Tiny, dark brown monkeys with faces like men but covered with hair hung from branches and screamed at them as they went by. Rainbow-colored birds flashed past over the path that opened up before the Maker as if it had been waiting for him. Tildi took in all the scenery with wide eyes and an open mouth. For all the beauty of Niombra, Sheatovra offered sights that were unlike anywhere else, or so Magpie told her. The werewolves, in their moon-touched form, trotted alongside the riders. In this place, they fit in as much as the gorgeous birds and exotic creatures. Tildi realized that smallfolk and humans alike were strange in that l
andscape.
“Of all five continents, this is the most beautiful,” Magpie said, leaning over to speak to her. His jitar was strapped to his back. As the Compendium was to her, his instrument was never far from his hand or his thoughts. “I have often traveled here to meet the people, but also to gain inspiration for my work.” He glanced at his father, who pretended not to hear his son speaking as if he were truly a common troubadour.
“It is wonderful,” Inbecca said, looking around with shining eyes as she spurred her horse up next to Magpie. “I wish I had been as free as you.”
“Duty comes first,” Sharhava said imperiously. “Lar Inbecca, back in line, please!”
“Yes, Abbess.” Dropping her chin mulishly, the young woman pulled back her steed. It was yet another borrowed mount; unfortunately there had been several riderless horses to choose from after the fight against the thraiks. Tildi was grateful that the winged monsters had not been seen since they vanished from Knemet’s chamber.
“By the Void, look at that,” Olen said as they neared the foot of the mountain. Beneath the canopy of spread fronds and green crowns of trees, the ground was torn up as though a terrible battle had been fought there. Scorch marks as wide as a house stretched hundreds of yards up the slope. Trees that still stood on either side were bent away from the empty patches, their hunched sides blackened as though from a powerful fire. Enormous rocks, entire chunks of the mountainside, were thrown up like a child’s building blocks.
“Such devastation,” Halcot said. “Who did this?”
“Nemeth,” Olen said.
“What? My inept court magician couldn’t light a candle.”
“With the help of the Compendium he could,” Olen pointed out. “With the copied pages that you gave him, he had enough power to destroy—and to kill.”
He pointed to blackened heaps half grown over with jungle vegetation that Tildi had not noticed before. She realized that they were bodies. When Rin drew nearer, they could see that they were the huge skeletons of winged beasts, but ones as unlike thraiks as Tildi could imagine. Even without flesh, there was something noble about the faces of the creatures.
A Forthcoming Wizard Page 58
