Picking up the throw, I placed it over Saryon’s shoulders, and rousing him from his bleak reverie, I persuaded him to go to bed. We walked together down the dark hallway, with only the lambent light of the stars to guide us. I offered to make his tea for him, but he said no, he was too tired. He would go straight to bed.
Any doubts I had about concealing my knowledge of the listening device vanished. It would only worry him to no purpose, when he needed rest.
And if that was a mistake, then it was the first of many to be made that night. Still another mistake, and perhaps the most drastic, was that I neglected to keep an eye on “Teddy.”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
“Wrap the sword in these rags. If anyone stops you, tell them you are carrying a child. A dead child.”
JORAM; FORGING THE DARKSWORD
I woke up, thinking I heard a sound, but unable to place what the sound had been. Lying in bed, trying to recollect what it was and not making much headway, I heard the creak of hinges, as of a door being either opened or shut very slowly, so as not to disturb anyone.
Thinking perhaps it was Saryon and that he might need me, I left my bed, pulled on my sweater and jeans, and went out into the hall and down to his room. Listening at the door, I could hear his gentle snoring. Whoever was up and wandering around in the night, it was not my master.
“Joram,” I thought, and though I had been angered by his obduracy and his show of disrespect for Saryon, I felt sorry for the man. He was being forced to leave a home he loved, a life he had made.
“Almin give him guidance,” I prayed, and returned to my room.
Restless, knowing I would not be able to go back to sleep, I walked to the window and parted the curtains to look out upon the night.
My window opened up onto one of the many gardens with which the Font was surrounded. I have no idea of the name of the flowers which grew out there; some sort of large, white blooms that hung heavy on their stems and seemed, to my imagination, to be hanging their heads in sorrow. I was thinking to myself that this would make a good metaphor to use in a new book I was then planning. I was about to turn away, to note it down, when I saw someone enter the garden.
Of course, Joram has taken his worries outside, I thought. I felt uneasy about disturbing his privacy and also about the possibility of him seeing me through the window and thinking I was spying on him. I was about to draw shut the curtains when the figure stepped out into an open walkway, almost directly opposite me, and I saw that it was not Joram.
It was a woman, wearing a cloak and hood and carrying a bundle in her arms.
“Eliza!” I said to myself. “She’s running away from home!”
I went cold all over. My heart constricted. I stood bolted to the floor in that terrible indecision which sometimes comes over one in a crisis. I had to do something, but what?
Run and wake Saryon and have him talk to her? I recalled his weariness and how ill he had looked and decided against that.
Wake her parents?
No. I would not betray Eliza. I would go to her myself, try to persuade her to stay.
Grabbing up my jacket, I threw it on and dashed out into the hall. I had only the vaguest idea where I was going, but on reflection, I seemed to remember passing the garden on my way to the outbuildings. I found the door after only one wrong turn and stepped out into the night. The creak of the hinges, as I passed through, was the same creak I’d heard earlier.
The night was bright and it was easy to see the shadowy figure ahead of me. She had been moving at a fairly rapid pace when I first saw her from my window, and I was afraid she might have already crossed the garden and disappeared over the wall before I could reach her. As it was, she had reached the wall, but the bundle she was carrying had slowed her down. She had placed the bundle on the top of the wall and with it something else, the sight of which gave me another cold chill—Teddy.
Teddy, a.k.a. Simkin, sat on the top of the wall beside the bundle while Eliza vaulted over the wall, in a flurry of cloak and skirt. Turning, she reached for the bundle with one hand and Teddy with the other. She saw me.
Her face, framed by its night-dark cloud of hair, was pale as the heavy flowers; pale but resolute. Her eyes widened when she saw me, and then narrowed in displeasure.
Frantically, I waved my hands, though what I hoped to accomplish by this gesturing was beyond me. Whatever it was, it didn’t work. She snatched up the bundle, and it was obviously heavy, for she had a difficult time managing it. She was forced to drop Teddy—on his head, I hoped—and use both hands to grasp the bundle.
There was a muffled clang—steel wrapped in cloth striking stone.
I knew then what she carried and the knowledge knocked the breath from my body. I faltered, came to a halt.
She saw that I knew, which served only to increase her haste. Securing her burden, she turned away from me and I heard her footsteps slipping on the rocks of the hillside.
I came to my senses and hurried after her, for now it was more imperative than ever that I catch up to her.
The Technomancers were listening. But according to Mosiah, the Duuk-tsarith were watching!
Expecting to see their dark forms leap out of the shadows any moment, I scaled the wall, scrambling over it clumsily. I have said that I was not very athletic. I could not see the ground beneath me in the dark shadow cast by the wall. I misjudged the drop and fell heavily, bruising my knees against the wall and scraping away the skin on the palms of my hands.
“Oof! Zounds! Oaf! You’ve knocked the stuffing out of me!” came a voice.
I was too busy trying to regain purchase on the steep slope to pay any attention to the lamenting Teddy. My feet scrabbled on a loose rock, which bounded down the hillside and started a small avalanche. I slipped and slithered and then she hovered over me. The folds of her cloak settled around me. Hands grasped my arms and pinched my flesh.
“Stop it!” she whispered furiously. “You’re making enough noise to wake the dead!”
“Happened once,” said a doleful voice, somewhere near my elbow. “The Duke of Esterhouse. Dropped dead, sitting in his armchair, reading the paper. Everyone afraid to tell him. Knew he’d take the news frightfully hard. So we left him there. And then one day cook forgot and rang the dinner bell—”
Startled, Eliza let go of me and sat back on her heels.
“You can talk!” she said to me in a tight voice. She was not carrying the bundle.
I shook my head emphatically. Reaching underneath my scraped rump, I pulled out the alleged stuffed bear and gave it a -shake.
Eliza looked at the bear and bit her lower lip and the sudden inkling of the truth formed in my mind.
“Are you hurt?” she asked in a grudging tone.
I shook my head.
“Good,” she said. “Go back to bed, Reuven. I know what I’m doing.”
And without another word, she snatched the bear from my hand and was up and gone in a flutter of skirt and cloak. She stopped some distance on the hill below to pick up her heavy bundle, and then I lost her in the darkness.
She knew where she was going. I did not. She was accustomed to climbing and walking these steep hills. I was not. I could not shout after her, although I wouldn’t have, in any case. The last thing I wanted to do was call attention to her and what she carried. I hoped to be able to persuade her to return home before any harm was done. But first I had to catch her.
It would cost more time in the long run, I reasoned, if I stumbled blindly down the hillside. There had to be a trail; she could not be moving so fast otherwise. I took time to search, my knees stiffening and my palms burning. My patience was rewarded. Not far from where I had fallen I found a crude trail, half-natural, half-man-made, carved into the hillside. It was an old trail; the feet of many catalysts had trodden it before me. The trail was formed of deep gouges in the hillside, reinforced here and there with large embedded rocks or exposed tree roots.
The rocks gleamed white in the starlit night;
the tree roots, worn by the passage of many feet, were slick and shiny. I made my way down the trail, wondering as I did so where it led.
The way was steep, and despite the help from rocks and other foot and handholds, my going was difficult and slow. I could no longer hear Eliza’s footfalls and knew she must be far ahead of me. My taking this route was a foolish idea. If I slipped and fell, I would probably break my leg or my ankle, and be forced to lie out here all night with no hope of rescue.
If only I could move faster! I could see, in my mind, those catalysts who had once made this trail and walked it every day, bounding down it like goats… .
I was bounding down it, if not like a goat, at least swiftly and easily. Brown robes hiked up to my waist, sandals flapping, a bag of scrolls flung over my shoulder, I ran down the trail in the bright sunshine of a fine day. All the young catalysts and occasionally some of the old ones took this route when they were late for classes, for this trail led straight to the University.
The vision was eerie and startling, just like the other vision I’d had before—of myself in brown robes, of Eliza my queen… . Of course, as an author, I was accustomed to living in my imagination and my fancies and dreams are very real to me. But not as real as this. Again, I lifted a curtain to look out a window and saw myself on the other side, looking back in.
But—could I use this to my benefit? Did I dare?
I was light-headed from exhaustion and the thin air of the high altitude. Plus I was desperate, fearful for Eliza’s safety. Otherwise I do not believe that I could have done what I did. I let go of myself in this life and gave myself to the other life, if that’s what it truly was. I became that catalyst, late for class, certain to be in trouble with the master, and I plunged down the hillside.
My feet knew where the stones would be, my hands knew where to grasp. I knew where I could safely slide and once I even jumped from one ledge to another. It was madness, it was exhilarating. If I had stopped to think about what I was doing, I would have frozen in place and been unable to move another step.
When I finally reached the bottom, I gasped for breath and stared up the hillside and the catalyst that I was vanished. I realized what I had done and my stomach turned within me. Quickly, I looked away and started to search for Eliza. I had a final image of the catalyst running in the opposite direction from the one I was taking and part of me was sorry to let him go.
I had reached a broad, flat, white-stone-paved road. It must be the main highway, leading down from the Font to the foothills and the long abandoned city below, a city whose sole reason for being had been to support the Font and the University. This road must have been clogged with wheelless carts that floated on the wings of magic and the exotic and fanciful carriages of the nobility coming to pay their respects or to ask for favors or visit sons and daughters attending the University.
I stared down the road’s bending, winding length, shining like a white ribbon in the night, and after a moment I saw a dark shadow moving along it, keeping to the side, but not taking any other precautions. She was not far ahead of me and moving slowly. I guessed her burden must have weighed more than she’d imagined when she started. I was thankful to see that she was still alone, not counting Teddy, of course.
I hastened after her, my way comparatively easy now. She heard my footsteps, when I drew near, and made a halfhearted attempt to increase the speed of her pace, but that didn’t last long. Realizing the futility of trying to escape, she stopped and turned to face me. Her extreme pallor made her face ghostly in the starlight; her black eyes beneath their thick brows were bright with anger and defiance. But I saw that she was tired, too, and perhaps a little frightened, and that there was something in her which was glad she was no longer alone.
I caught hold of her arm beneath her cloak and started to draw her into the shadows of the trees that lined the road. “What are you doing?” she demanded, breaking free. I pointed to the shadows, then to the gleaming white road, and shook my head.
“He’s trying to tell you that we stand out like a mole on the Countess D’Arymple’s backside. She had a very white, smooth backside,” Teddy added helpfully.
“I don’t see what difference it makes,” Eliza said petulantly. She held the bear tucked under one arm, the heavy bundle awkwardly in the other hand. “No one is around to notice us, anyway.”
“From your mouth to the Almin’s ear,” said Teddy, which was, more or less, exactly what I had been thinking.
I took hold of Eliza’s arm again and this time she allowed me to lead her off that gleaming highway and into the shadows of the trees. She carried the bundle. I did not try to take it from her. Once in the deep shadows, she dropped the burden on the ground, in a pile of leaves. Then she sank down on a low, crumbling wall and stared at the bundle at her feet.
“I didn’t know it would be so heavy,” she said. “It didn’t seem heavy when I first picked it up. But now it weighs more and more. And it’s awkward and difficult to carry.”
I pulled out my electronic notebook from the pocket of my jacket; thanking the Almin that I’d put it there earlier, for such had been my haste at departure that I had not thought to bring it along. I typed the words. The Darksword.
“Yes,” said Eliza, looking at what I’d written.
What are you doing with it? Where are you taking it? I asked.
“To the army base,” she replied.
I was so astonished, I stared at her and forgot to type.
“My father is wrong,” she said in a low, determined voice, looking down at the sword at her feet. “It’s not his fault.” She defended him loyally, glanced at me defiantly, as if I’d accused him. “You don’t know him! If he finds it hard to trust people, can you blame him? Time and again he was betrayed by those he trusted.”
It was not quite as simple as that, but I honored her for defending him.
“I’m taking the sword to the army base, to give it to the Border Patrol to take back to Earth. Then people will leave us alone and our lives will be peaceful once more. And when the sword is gone, no one will hurt Father, ever again.”
I saw the tears shine in her dark eyes that were looking forward to that life, a life that would be empty for her, isolated and alone on this deserted world. I saw her generous, noble spirit in that moment and I loved her. I could not tell her. It would not be fair to take advantage of her. But silently I pledged my heart and my soul to her service, as I knew in that other life the catalyst had pledged his heart and soul to serve his queen.
How do you know about the army base? I typed.
“I’ve been there,” she said with a smile at my surprise. “Simkin showed me. It was his idea to take the sword there tonight.”
She fondled the bear, rubbing his head.
“Oh, no one at the base ever saw me,” she said. “I made certain of that. Simkin used his magic to keep me invisible. I would sit on crates and watch the people come and go and listen to them talk. I’d do that for hours, when Mama and Papa thought I was in the library studying.” She grinned impishly. “I used to watch the skyships take off, blasting fire and roaring like thunder. Simkin said they were traveling to Earth. I would imagine what it would be like to be on one. Yesterday, when you and Father Saryon came, I thought—”
Her smile faded. Resolutely, she buried her dream. “I was wrong,” she said, and started to stand up.
I stopped her. I had a great many questions, mostly concerning Simkin. I thought it extremely odd and perhaps even sinister that he was suggesting giving the Darksword away. But those questions could wait.
The army base is a long distance from here, I told her. Many miles. You could not reach it tonight or even tomorrow by walking. Certainly not carrying the heavy sword.
“We weren’t planning to walk all the way,” she said, avoiding my eyes. “We can’t use the magical routes we normally travel, because of the Darksword destroying the magic. But Simkin said that you … um … had an air car. We were only going to borrow it. I would
have brought it back. I know how they operate. I’ve even ridden in one before, though no one knew I was there.”
So much for Prospero’s daughter. The brave new world was old hat to her.
Please come back home, I wrote. This burden is not your burden. That is why it seems so heavy. It is your father’s and he alone can cast it off or choose to carry it. Besides, you could be in danger.
“What?” She stared at me, amazed and disbelieving. “How? There is no one here beyond the Border but Father Saryon, my parents, and ourselves!”
I did not feel that I could offer adequate explanation. Come back. Talk to Father Saryon. Besides, I added, your mother told us that, by morning, Joram will have had a change of heart. He is reacting out of hurt and anger. When he thinks about things, he will do what is necessary. You shouldn’t take that decision away from him.
“You are right,” Eliza said, after a moment’s thought. “It was only by accident I found the sword. We missed Papa one afternoon—it was the day after that horrible Smythe-man came. Mama was worried and sent me to look for him. I searched all over and no sign of him. When I finally found him, where do you think he was?”
I shook my head.
“In the chapel,” she said. “I came in the door and there he was. He wasn’t praying, like I thought at first. He was sitting on the stair beneath the altar and this—the Darksword—was across his knees. He was staring at it as if he hated and loathed it, but yet as if he loved it and was proud of it.”
Eliza shivered and drew her cloak more closely around her. I pressed my body a little nearer, to warm her and warm myself both. The picture she painted with her words was not a pleasant one.
“The look on his face frightened me. I was afraid to say anything, because I knew he would be furious. I wanted to leave. I knew I should leave, but I couldn’t. I sneaked into a little alcove near the door and I watched him. He sat for a long, long time, just staring at the sword. And then he gave a great sigh and shook his head. He wrapped the sword up in this cloth and opened up a little hidden door inside the altar itself. He put the sword in there, inside the altar, and he shut the door and left. I waited until he was gone before I dared move. I felt ashamed. I knew I had seen something I shouldn’t have seen. Something that was secret and private to my father. And now he’ll know.” Her head drooped. “He’ll find out I was spying on him. He’ll be so terribly disappointed.”
Legacy of the Darksword Page 14
