by K. J. Parker
“Did you see them?!” Gil asked.
“See who?” Tarr replied, blowing into his cupped hands. The tower was cold, and empty, and all the torches were out.
“I … thought … I saw two men standing there,” Gil pointed towards the orb in the floor. Sela stepped forward, resting her hand on Gil’s bicep. He turned, startled.
“Are you OK?” she asked. Gil stared back with a blank expression on his face. Carmine walked around the lobby, staring up, it was dark and his heavy boots echoed with each step. He whistled a high pitched arc, which reverberated endlessly against the smooth walls.
“Just shadows buddy …” Carmine chuckled. Gil shook his head, he didn’t think so, he didn’t believe in coincidences, not anymore. Gil sighed, glancing at his friends, and stepped towards the enormous marble orb set in the floor. There were no footprints, no men, no sign of anyone, ever.
“Why are we here?” Sela said softly. Gil paused, then smiled, shaking the thoughts from his mind as he walked across the lobby to one of the torches along the wall. He open the book, drew the quill and inkpot from his pocket, scribbled a quick word, then turned to show it to the others. Fire. He tore the page from book, smiled wide, and slapped it against the torch. Nothing happened. Tarr, Carmine and Sela all stared at Gil, Gil stared at the torch, then flipped the book open again and pulled out the quill.
“Stop! What are you doing!” Carmine yelled.
Gil shrugged. “That should have worked …” he mumbled, scratching his chin. Sela walked to Gil and took the book, and the quill, from his hands. She smiled, standing next to him, tapping the quill against her lips, thinking. She wrote, tore another page from the book and slapped it against the torch, which burst into flames. Gil raised an eyebrow.
She smiled. “Wrong word …” they glanced at the page in Gil’s hand, Fire, was still written. “Ignite …” She winked.
“OK, Sela keeps the book …” Carmine waved his finger at Gil and Tarr, “No more idiot’s wasting pages!” He pointed to the book, they glanced at it, it was already thin. Gil and Tarr shrugged in agreement.
“So why are we here, exactly?” Tarr asked.
“For that …” Gil pointed to the orb in the floor.
“What is it?” Tarr asked.
“A globe … a map. I didn’t realise it before … but it is. It’s blank like the book …”
“Why?” Tarr asked again.
“To show things … unknown … ” Carmine added, catching on.
Gil nodded. “It’s blank so it can be marked, like the book, that is, if one knows how to use it, it could, show anything …”
“So how do we use it?” Tarr asked one last time. Gil and Carmine stared at each other for a moment, then everyone turned towards Sela holding the book.
She smiled, softly, and winked, “So what do we want to find first?”
CHAPTER 20: WINDFALL
Three pages were wasted. The four friends sat, staring at the orb in the floor, thinking. Though they didn’t know why, they understood at least, how the rules worked. One spell per page. No more than three words per page, and only commands. No questions, no descriptions, only simple straight forward orders. Even so, the rules were tricky, commands could be interpreted in several ways, and you had to match the right spell to the right object. The first wasted page read, reveal the wand, the spell was valid, the words stayed on the page, but when Sela slapped the paper against the orb nothing happened. The second page read, locate shards, but again nothing happened when she applied it to the orb.
After the second page they paused, thinking for a very long time about what to do. Sela penned one word at a time, slowly, testing. She wrote, show, and it stayed. She wrote, us, which also stayed. She then wrote a dozen different things, none of which remained on the paper. She tried, weapon, and, wand, and, shard, and she tried variations on each. Nothing would stick. Perhaps, she thought, there was something else to this magic, something they still didn’t understand. As they sat staring, chatting, trying to think what would work, Sela stood, tore out the page and slapped it against the orb. A moment later the words faded, and the orb began to spin as Sela stepped back. It moved slowly, pivoting and rotating and turning about, vibrating the whole room. They smiled, watching, as small lines began to extrude from the surface of the orb, edges, then forms, plateaus, oceans, valleys, rivers, outlines of the known lands, the Huu-Di Kingdom, the western mountains, the icy lake outside, and in more detail the lip of the butte and the castle of RavensKeep.
“YES!” Tarr shouted jumping up and down, his voice rattling and echoing about.
“Shut up!” Gil snapped as softly as he could. Tarr grimaced apologetically. “Sela, how did you do that? What did you write?” Gil asked.
“Just … show us,” She smiled softly, somewhat proud. Gil sighed. At this rate they would use up the whole book, trying, and from the looks of it, there were less than thirty pages left.
“Now what?” Tarr asked.
“We can’t waste anymore pages,” Carmine said, scooping up the the written but unused spells and folding them into his pocket. “This book, this magic could be used for so many things … think about it, and we’ve already spent what? A quarter of it? Doing what? Breaking two tables, starting a torch, and showing us a map of where we are, which we already know.”
“That’s not fair …” Sela replied, indignant. Gil glanced between the two of them. They were both right. They were wasting pages, but, they were learning.
“One more …” Gil said, almost whispering, “we can’t give up, but he’s right …”
“So what do we do?” Sela shrugged.
“I don’t know … we need … we need to write something that will show us everything at once, that will show us what we need to find, and where to find it, in one simple command …” Gil puzzled.
“How in the hell are we supposed to do that?” Carmine snapped, huffing.
Gil shook his head, pacing back and forth, thinking, “We need it to show us … to show us …”
“Hope.” A voice called from behind them. It was Archmage Valik. “To show us hope …” Valik spoke as he walked forward amongst the group. Everyone turned and stared at him, unable to read his expression, even though he smiled. Sela paused, then turned to Gil, who nodded, and she wrote.
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“NO.” Aldrin was almost shouting again. “Absolutely not. This is a bad idea. We don’t know anything about that book, or the orb in the tower, or why it wants you to go. Hope? Hope? Hope could mean a great many things … good or bad. Hope could be for a good meal, or hope for quick death, or …”
“A weapon to kill demons?” Cassandra interrupted. Though she was extremely pissed that Gil and the others hadn’t told the archmages of their discovery before they had wasted so much of the book, she still agreed with them. The final page had worked. When Sela placed the command page on the orb, the words faded and on its surface an island had appeared. It was a small island, far to the west, with a single steep mountain at its center.
“Even if it is … they shouldn’t leave the castle. Sama could be out there, waiting for them. We can’t protect them if they leave on some idiot’s quest …” Aldrin huffed.
“You wouldn’t come with us?” Sela asked, almost angry at the thought. Aldrin and Cassandra exchanged a strange look. Cassandra opened her mouth to speak but then Valik came back into the room.
“Found it!” He called, carrying a large map under his arm. Valik walked to the table, shoved all the books and objects atop it to the ground and flicked open the map, as its leather flapped loudly against the table. The others gathered and peered down. It was a map of the Sea Kingdoms. The islands of the Sea Kingdoms lay far to the west and slightly north of the coastline nearest the castle. Comprised of a hundred different islands of various sizes, most were tiny clumps of carpeted brown earth, lush jungles or sometimes bare rock. Many were inhabited, many were not. There was no one single king that controlled it all, rather dozens, of great trib
es, and leaders, which followed old gods of the sea, and the air, and which warred, constantly. They liked fighting. They excelled at it. They were pen-cu.
Valik’s eyes darted across the map. It was there. The island that had appeared on the orb, the island with a mountain, sharp and steep and alone. “Here …” he said, pointing, with worry straining his voice. The tiny island lay across the entire Sea Kingdom, farthest to the west, and near the edge of the dark ocean, where great storms gathered, and screamed, and tore apart boats like paper toys, and men, drowned.
“This is a bad idea …” Aldrin said, unheaded one last time.
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They left that night, a cold cloudless starless night. The wind was gone, and the small boat oared silently to the shore, across black water, and far from the castle. They turned only once to look back, the Keep shadowed in darkness from the mountains above, and ahead only forest. They travelled south, following the road, following moss covered boulders and quiet glens, following remnants of burnt inns and farms that smelt of bacon and memory. The four travelled sullen, and silent, and alone, for the archmages, not one, had come.
At times a strange sound in the woods would startle them, scare them, and they would gather back to back ready and able to fight. But no demons jumped from the dark, only shadows flickering and branches creaking with the weight of snow and ice. When morning came, a dull blue hue painted the forest, and drifts, waist height, slowed them. They packed light, taking nothing, taking less than nothing, only their clothes, only thick furs of mink and bear and otter, only their weapons, the Elder Sword, the ebony bow, and daggers of silver, and steel. The book, they left, not by want or choice, but by order. The archmages requested it, required it, they locked in a vault, deep in the castle, safe from those who would use it, or take it, or might otherwise lose it. It was a sour point.
Five days. Of walking. Of treading and tracking and slumming through thick downs of snowy cold, and ice, and muck. Their boots soaked through, were heavy. Snow came then, lightly, falling with a quiet sadness, flakes, small and numerous, blanketed the sky. They moved on, past a small brook, steep and rapid, patched with clumps of snow fallen from bows overhead, patched with icicles thin and trembling, scattered at banks, and edges, and a great frozen stone face, where water, cold and dark still flowed.
They headed south to the nearest port, a small village hidden in a narrow bay, edged with dirty cliffs and in warmer days grassy green downs. An old wooden staircase creaked, and cracked, as they made their way down each step, slippery, covered in thin black ice unaccustomed to such cold. The mud flats below stunk of seawater and brine, and great black mussels stuck to rocks, and pilings, under the tall and narrow wooden shacks that were crammed together atop a wide flat dock. Low tide held no secrets, only dinghy stuck in the mud, begrudged and waiting once more for the sea. They crossed the flats to the wooden, rotting huts atop the dock, where thick salty smoke rose from two chimneys, hazing blue-grey against the sky.
Inside it was warm, and steamy, and a great noise rustled about. For they found that the half dozen narrow shacks were in fact, one. Holes rather than doors, were cut through adjoining walls, tarred in places where sea water splashed in, giving passage between spaces, and rooms, where tiny cubbies crowded merchants, each selling what they may. Some, sold goods of the sea, nets and rope and oars, dried fish, dried kelp, and stone weights in many sizes. Others, brokered oddities from foreign lands, pale birds with curved beaks, rare oils and herbs, and a great many things that had washed ashore. Strange foamy rocks that were lighter than air, signs, aged-worn painted with odd words in a language no one spoke. And bottles. Hundreds of them. In every shape size and color. Great long necked purple bottles with tiny stoppers. Short fat bottles of brown, and green, stamped with their makers mark, though worn smooth with time.
The four stood at a narrow counter, where a great iron cauldron boiled thumb crabs, in handfuls, swirling the tiny creatures in a broth of red salt and wine. They ate, famished, and chewed through the tiny salty shells with zeal, waiting for the tide to return. When it did, it was near evening and they bought passage aboard a single masted scow. It was laden with cod, and heading south, to the city port of Antwyk. In Antwyk there would be massive sea going vessels, giants, able to brave the waters of the open ocean, and take them where they needed to go. In Antwyk they could find passage to the Sea Kingdoms and to the isle of the jagged mountain.
As they sailed south, the sun had set and the waters around them were dark, icy and still. Beyond the bay the coastline of the mountains was a faint shadow against the sky, a thin line, black against grey, a ridge in the night looming far above them.
Gil sat atop the deck of the boat as the others slept. His mind raced, worried, confused. Sama had told him not to trust the archmages, but he couldn’t trust a demon. Yet, Monith had told him the same thing. In his last moments, under the broken ocean glass, the archmage had whispered to the boy, trying to help. Don’t trust them. Any of them, for they follow the dark. Gil wished very much that Monith had complimented his jacket, or had told him not to worry, or had told him it was his fault. Anything would have been better than this. The constant doubt, wondering which archmage was against him, which wanted to kill him, to trick him, to take the shard. Gil didn’t want to believe it, he couldn’t, but now?
The archmages hadn’t come. Not one. They stayed in the castle because “they had to” they said. They took the strange book from Sela to “keep it safe” they said. They said a great many things, and did little. But perhaps they weren’t all against him. Aldrin, despite his dislike of Gil and everything Gil had done, seemed at least, concerned. Worried. He didn’t think the four should go on their own, he didn’t think they should go, he was against it. He tried to save them, then, and now. But what about Valik and Cassandra? Gil thought over his time in the Castle. Much of it, he thought wouldn’t have happened if it wasn’t for Valik. The test, using to learn the shard, even finding the island. Still, Valik trained him, taught him magics he shouldn’t know, supported him, protected him. Was Valik on his side? Or a follower of Sama?
There were others in the castle who were. Gil was sure of it. Servants of the dark. Not just Master Oal, but others, guiding, spying, steering him to do what they wanted and when. Perhaps the two men he kept seeing, the two he was sure he had met before, were among them. They were there, at each moment that mattered, passing the test, freeing Sama, discovering the island. He didn’t know who they were, but their faces were familiar. Were they part of this blood cult? Or something worse? Gil’s stomach turned at the thought. How many were already against him? How many more, would be?
Lastly, there was Cassandra. She blamed Gil for Monith’s death. She had said many times, to Gil, to them all, that a “boy” shouldn’t have the shard. She blamed Gil for everything, and she hated him for it. Still, she had protected him in the cavern from Sama. And though she wanted it, she made no attempt to take the shard from Gil, though she could have, many times. Her powers were great, as were all the archmages, and even with the shard Gil wasn’t a match for them, not now, not yet. So why hadn’t she tried to take the shard? Why hadn’t any of them? Perhaps Monith was wrong. Perhaps it was a slip of the mind, a dying man often says things he didn’t mean to say. Gil wanted to believe that was the reason. He wanted to believe that the archmages, all of them, were on his side. He wanted to believe. But somewhere, deep down, deep inside him, a gnawing gut wrenching question grew in his mind with doubt.
He didn’t tell Sela, or Tarr, or Carmine, of what Monith had said. He didn’t want them to worry. Knowledge would only bring them pain, and danger. And besides, they already had enough to worry about. They had to find a way to undo their mistake. They must. To kill Sama, or, at the very least put him back in that coffin for another thousand years. Sama and his kind would not destroy the world, not if he could help it. His gift and his burden. They would travel across the sea, to this strange island the book had shown them. They would go on their own,
to the island, and they would seek answers, or weapons, or perhaps even shards. They didn’t know what they would find, and couldn’t. But, sailing now in the dark, to a land they didn’t know, for a reason they weren’t sure of, they had at the very least, found hope.
Yet hope was a fickle thing, and though they didn’t know it yet, and couldn’t, nothing ever happened by chance, not ever. As the scow continued on, Gil sat quietly watching the stars, and wondered a great many things.
