The Sable Moon

by Nancy Springer

  “He set sail, wandering like the evening star that leads in the mother moon.” Emrist stirred the fire, prodding old embers into new flame. “There are many such tales. Sometimes the star-son weds his mother, and her love destroys him. Or sometimes he has a dark twin with whom he quarrels. But he always leaves, and only his seed returns.

  “Bevan was one who left Isle. He was born of a goddess, Celonwy of the Argent Moon, sister of Menwy, of whom we have spoken, and also of the maiden Melidwen. His father was Byve, once High King in ancient Eburacon, where fountains flowed and golden apples grew. His hands could command any element, bend steel, open locked doors, scale smooth towers.… Sometimes they shone with pale fire. People stood in awe of him. He never learned to be entirely at home in the sunlit world. He would roam the night like the chatoyant moon every night, singing across the reaches of the dark; it was said to be good luck if one heard him. The loveliness of his voice has become legend. When Hal sang so beautifully at Caerronan, that was Bevan’s legacy in him, that silver voice of mystery and the moon.”

  Trevyn started. How could Emrist have known of that night at Caerronan? But Emrist, eyes focused on depths of time, seemed not to notice his discomfiture.

  “Cuin left his legacy to your father. A warrior by blood, he traced his lineage to the ancient Mothers of Lyrdion. He loved sunlight and sport and the sweep of a good sword. He knew a fine horse and a fine hawk. And he loved a golden maiden to whom Bevan was betrothed. Still, he followed Bevan into Pel’s Pit.…”

  “Why are you telling me this?” Trevyn whispered. The tale dismayed him, though he could hardly say why, and Emrist brooded strangely over the flames.

  “I must show you the pattern,” Emrist murmured, “if I can.”

  “What pattern?”

  “The one that leads back to Veran, the seed of Bevan, and to Bevan himself and beyond. A pattern of strange binding between two distant islands, and between men.… Think, Alberic. Cuin could not follow his comrade across the western sea.” An odd catch had taken hold of Emrist’s voice.

  “You are leaving,” Trevyn breathed. He saw the flash of foreboding in Emrist’s eyes and scrambled to his feet in alarm. “Emrist, what—”

  Emrist rose quietly to face him, placed a light hand on his shoulder. “More likely it is you who will sail away from me. It seems to me that you are needed to round out the pattern, and the larger pattern, the greater tide. An age of ages may come to end and beginning if you fulfill prophecy—Ylim’s prophecy—and rid Isle of the magical sword.”

  “I have always known I must return to Isle someday,” said Trevyn shakily. “Bindings of rank on me … but I’d hoped to serve you yet a while. I’d follow you to world’s end, if that were your pleasure. I wish we could always be together. You are my friend.…”

  Emrist met his eyes, unsurprised, accepting. “Who is following whom, Alberic?” he asked whimsically.

  “You are he,” Trevyn whispered. His throat ached, as if something fluttered in it, caught. “You are the one I have yearned for … and now our journey’s done.” Bewildered, he sank to the ground, hid his face in his cupped hands. He felt Emrist’s warm touch follow him. The magician settled beside him.

  “Freca, I have been happy traveling with you, happier than I have been since I was a child. I know you have felt it too, good friend—and there was little enough time left to me for happiness, wherever I spent my days. I am truly grateful to have known you and to be of use to you. Can you understand?”

  “Ay.” Trevyn forced out the words. “You have foreseen your death. And you have journeyed to your death, and you would not tell me.… Why have you told me now?”

  “Because I need your promise, Prince.”

  Emrist’s tone had turned calm and faintly challenging. Steadied in spite of himself, Trevyn lifted his head to face him, puzzled. “All right. What?”

  “In regard to a certain power of Wael’s, the cruelest trick of the Wolf. Wael loves to drive out the soul and replace it with that of a criminal, in the same body. He has done it to the wolves in Isle, and he is likely to try to do it to us. And I am frail, as you know.… So if he should change me in that way, Freca, please use the sword on me, and quickly. It will not be myself that you kill. Do you understand?”

  “Nay!” Trevyn swayed as if he had himself been struck; swords of fear ran through him.

  “You will understand tomorrow. But you must promise me now, if I am to rest tonight.”

  “Is that all I can do, then?” Trevyn asked bitterly. “Endure, and be a slayer with the sword?”

  “Times to come, you shall be worth ten of me. There is sky in you, and also deeps where dragons dwell; bring them to light, and you shall master us all. You shall be Sun King, Moon King, Star-Son, and Son of Earth.… But for now you must trust me in this. Promise.”

  Trevyn only nodded, for unshed tears swelled his throat. Emrist saw him bite his lip to contain them.

  “Grieve later,” he said gently. “I can’t be sure even of doom.”

  “What of Maeve? She knows?”

  “She knows I have need to be a man. She is strong.” Emrist’s face went bleak at the thought of her, and he turned away, toward his blanket. “Let us get some rest.”

  “Wait,” cried Trevyn, clutching at hope. “We could go now, take him in his sleep—”

  “With the city closed and the castle guard doubled? Nay, it must be in the morning. Courage, Prince.” But Emrist faced toward the dark, not meeting his comrade’s eyes. Trevyn longed to go to him and embrace him, but he could not bear to weep, or to make Emrist weep, just then. Instead, he spoke numbly.

  “Let me prepare you a draught.”

  “Nay. I must not be slow-witted in the morning.”

  “Then let me rub your legs to ease you.”

  Emrist lay on his makeshift bed, still hiding his face, his whole body tense and aching. Trevyn rubbed until the knotted muscles relaxed, until Emrist lay quiet and deeply breathing under his hands, shoulders sagging into sleep. Then he covered him with his ragged blanket and sat beside him with all that they had said turning and turning in his mind. His father.… He could not have let Emrist face Wael if it were not for Alan’s sake. A heart’s love, newly found, to be as quickly lost.… Suddenly, like a stab, Meg entered his whirling thoughts. Trevyn knew that her sunny bantering would have lifted the leaden weight from his heart, but the memory afforded him no comfort—he had cut himself off from her. Anguish struck him. He longed for Meg more passionately than he had ever wanted anything, far more than he yearned for life itself. Pain twisted his face and bowed his head. By his own doing she was lost to him, even if he survived the morrow.

  Chapter Six

  “Did you not sleep at all?” Emrist asked in the morning.

  “I’ll sleep tonight,” Trevyn answered. “Perhaps.”

  They could not eat. They took their horse and went. The city gates were just opening when they reached them, and they entered Kantukal amid a throng of farmers bringing their wares to the morning market. The towers of Rheged’s court rose above the shops and temples, so they found it easily. They paused at a distance and looked in through the iron bars of the gate. Slaves scurried about the courtyard tending to early morning chores. Burly guards watched, lounging. Emrist squared his narrow shoulders, straightened his spine, and sent his nag forward at a fast walk, with Trevyn trotting at his side.

  “Who goes?” inquired the gatekeeper lazily.

  “Sol of Jabul, on the king’s business. Open up.”

  “Come back after midday.” The fellow began to turn away, but he was seized by Emrist’s glance, held motionless like a pinned insect. Emrist’s eyes flashed like jewel stones in a face turned diamond hard.

  “Open up,” he ordered softly, “or I will skewer your head for a present to your king, and he will thank me.…” Emrist’s hand went to the sword he wore and slid it in the scabbard. He had no need to show that he did not know how to use it. At the sword sound, the gatekeeper jumped to let
them enter. They passed in without a word or a glance. Emrist urged his horse across the courtyard and flung himself down from him as Trevyn tethered him. Then he strode off headlong, with Trevyn trotting after. But once within doors he stopped, and Trevyn came up to him.

  “Well done, my lord!” Trevyn whispered, with mischief edging at the awe in his eyes.

  Emrist grimaced. But before he could speak, Trevyn’s eyes narrowed in warning. A guard was studying them from the shadows at the far end of the corridor.

  Emrist tightened his lips. Then, as suddenly as lightning, he smote Trevyn across the face with the back of his hand. For love of him, Trevyn did what the whips of the slavers had never made him do: yelped and flinched from the blow.

  “Churl!” Emrist grated. “You shall bow when you speak to me, sirrah!” He beckoned imperiously and strode off again with Tervyn at his heels. The guard let them pass without comment.

  “Again, well done, my lord!” Trevyn whispered when they came to a large open hall.

  “I am sorry,” Emrist murmured.

  “No need; I’ve taken worse in sport. Which way?”

  Emrist shrugged in vexation. “I can’t tell. The Sight doesn’t work that way; it’s not a map! Just keep moving.… You tied the horse?”

  “Only loosely. He can free himself with a jerk and go where he will. But he will wait for us yet a while.”

  They moved through the labyrinth of the palace purposefully but at random. The council halls stood empty, for the court officials were still in their rooms. Slaves sped by with breakfast trays, taking no notice of the strangers. Presently Emrist and Trevyn reached a rear courtyard serving the kitchen and slave quarters. They stopped, for they could not expect to find Wael there.

  “We must go back,” Trevyn said, “and try to find some stairs. I should think a sorcerer would be lodged in one of the towers; that is customary, is it not?”

  Emrist had no chance to answer. From behind them came a startled exclamation and a clatter of pottery. Trevyn whirled. An old man sat with scrub rag in hand, his mouth agape and suds dripping unheeded down his arm. Trevyn went to him swiftly and knelt beside him.

  “Peace, Grandfather,” he warned softly, “for my life’s sake.”

  “What is it, Freca?” Emrist came up beside them.

  “He was a slave with me in the pit and in the string where you found me, and he was a good friend to me.”

  “All that flogging,” the old man gasped, “and ye never spoke or squeaked—”

  Trevyn pulled a wry face at the memory. “Ay, for I am a king’s son, Grandfather. I could not let them master me.”

  “Ye’re the one they seek!” the old man breathed.

  “Ay, and come to beard Wael for it, if we can. Where is he to be found?”

  “In the tower, as ye said. The farthest one. But ye’re mad to face him. He is terrible!” The old man spoke with trembling earnestness.

  “I have no choice,” Trevyn told him quietly. “You’ll not betray us?”

  He wordlessly shook his head.

  “Freca,” asked Emrist worriedly, “can we trust him?”

  “Ay, I think so. Anyway, what else can we do? Do you have a way to silence him?”

  “I’ll quiet yer fears yet a while,” said the old man with dignity, rising stiffly to his feet. “I’ll come with ye, to show ye the way.”

  “You’re likely to get a drubbing, if you’re missed,” Emrist said.

  He shrugged. “I am an old man and thick of hide; I do not mind.”

  “Then, many thanks. And let us go quickly.”

  The old slave took them up the back stairs that the servants used. They met no guards. They climbed up flight after spiraling flight, till Trevyn lost count. Their guide stopped at last at a landing leading to a corridor.

  “He’s within,” he murmured. “I can feel it. The first door. I’ll go no farther.”

  “Get yourself to safety,” Trevyn told him. “A thousand thanks for your help.”

  “May yer gods defend you,” the old man breathed, and hurriedly stumped down and away. Emrist and Trevyn looked at each other.

  “Rest a moment, gather your strength,” Trevyn whispered. He reached for the sword that hung at Emrist’s side, drew it silently from its scabbard. The two steadied themselves for the count of a hundred. Then they wordlessly touched hands and walked to the fateful door. Emrist reached out, and it swung open beneath his fingertips. They entered Wael’s chamber.

  The room, in the properest tradition of the sorcerer’s tower, surrounded and confounded them and hemmed them in with shadows and shadowy apparatus. Amid all the confusion, Trevyn’s glance picked out one thing at once: the gilded form of a wooden figurehead, a wolf leaping with bared teeth of pearl. The shaggy object beside it, however, he was slower to recognize. He blinked as the grayish form turned and rose to a meager height to face them. A bent old man stood before him; yellow eyes stared at him out of a face covered with bristly gray beard. Trevyn had seen those eyes before.

  “Greetings, Wael.” Emrist spoke sedately.

  “Little Emrist the Magician!” Wael made the name into a yelp of triumph. “Well met! And you also, Prince of Isle.” His voice turned crooning. “How fortunate for you that you have come to me at last! I can make you the most powerful of Kings, King of Sun and Moon, if you let me.”

  Trevyn felt his heart jump at the echo of Emrist’s words. But he took a tighter grip on his sword. “Is that how Rheged comes to be under your thumb? A promise of power?”

  “Rheged!” Wael let out a single harsh bark of laughter. “Rheged is leaden of nature. Nay, worse than leaden; he is dross, and you could be pure gold. What, Prince, have you not yet learned the first quality of magic? I should think even Emrist might have taught you that.” Wael shuffled closer, hunched and glaring with what was meant to be sincerity. “It is power, the power of perfection. Just as sorcery can raise the nature of metals, it can raise the nature of men, firing away what is base, freeing the rest to fly like the eagles, lending power like a god’s. You are young and beautiful, and you could be anything your power and vision can encompass.” Wael had crept to within three feet of Trevyn’s staring face. “Think of it, Prince of Isle.”

  “He knows you well,” Emrist remarked.

  “Too well for honesty. He has been spying on my dreams. Picking at my thoughts with his soiled hands—” Trevyn slowly swung his sword up until it rested against Wael’s gray-robed chest. “Your words sound fair, old man, but your face is the color of vomit. Get away.”

  Wael sprang back with surprising agility, his face ugly with rage. He abandoned his caressing tone. “That was discourtesy,” he snapped, “and I will punish it as I am accustomed to punish those who cross me.” A clawlike hand left his sleeve with serpent speed, and power snapped across the room. The sword fell to pieces, clattering to the floor. Pain shot up Trevyn’s arm; he dropped the hilt with a gasp. “Thus,” Wael added. “You see?”

  Trevyn did not glance at the useless weapon. “You have a brooch of mine,” he said flatly. “This causes me some discomfort. We have come to get it back.”

  “Indeed?” Wael mocked. “I am the master here.” He fixed his jaundiced gaze on Trevyn. “I am the master here,” he whispered in dreamy, hypnotic cadence. “Come to me, Trevyn of Laueroc.”

  Trevyn matched his stare and did not move.

  “Come to me, Trevyn of Laueroc.” Wael recited a spell in the same silky whisper, ill suited to the guttural language of his magic. He thinks the brooch pulls me, Trevyn thought, and ached inwardly for Alan. But Wael’s efforts were ludicrous, just the same, and Trevyn felt his thoughts swerve to Meg, her teasing, her smile. He could almost hear her exclaim, “Silly old man!” Hugging memory to himself like a talisman, Trevyn threw back his head and laughed the sweet, healthy laugh she had taught him. Wael stopped his chanting abruptly, and a faint frown shadowed his eyes.

  Emrist quickly pressed the advantage. “Let us see that brooch, Wael!” he cried, and pow
er flickered through him. Wael’s coarse gray garments parted like wings, and Trevyn glimpsed the sparkle of Alan’s brooch within them. Excitedly he stepped forward. But in an instant Wael clapped his arms down over his robe, and Emrist was jolted as his spell was severed. Wrath crawled across Wael’s face.

  “Fool,” he hissed, “you shall pay for that.” He snapped both hands forward like spitting snakes, and Trevyn saw Emrist reel from an unseen force. “Stop that!” Trevyn shouted, and once again started toward Wael. But then the blow struck him in his turn, blinding him with the magnitude of its malice. He stopped where he was, clenching himself in helpless wonder that anything could hurt so hard and yet continue without abatement.

  “Take no notice, Prince.” Emrist’s voice, though labored, was composed. “It’s only pain.”

  “Very true.” Trevyn forced his sluggish tongue to move, trying to match Emrist’s tone.

  “He drains himself of power with the making of it,” Emrist went on. “When he stops, he will be the weaker.”

  “Still strong enough to deal with a dozen such as you!” shrieked Wael. Nevertheless, the pain stopped. Trevyn shook his head to clear the haze from his eyes. Then he stiffened. The leaping figurehead leered into his face, scarcely a foot away.

  “Ay, you remember him well, do you not, Islendais Prince?” Wael gloated. “You will be his, you who have spurned me!”

  Trevyn could not move or speak. Some inexplicable horror of the thing bound him immobile. Its glass eyes took on a saffron sheen from the gilded wood and held his sickened gaze. Beyond them, shielded from his reach by the wooden wolf, another pair of yellowish eyes entered his narrowed view. “Look at me, Trevyn of Laueroc,” Wael whispered.

  Behind Trevyn, Emrist spoke tightly, forcing words from his frail, anguished body. “Do not heed him, Prince!”

  “A fine wolf, is it not?” Wael went on. “But this is only a toy. Since you will not join me, you and all yours shall be a sacrifice at the altar of the Very Wolf. Would you care to see him? Look at me!” Wael’s voice rose to a hiss. “Can a Prince such as yourself not withstand the gaze of an old man?”