Eye of the Labyrinth

by Jennifer Fallon

  He stared at Neris, not sure if he believed the madman. “But how? ...”

  “How does she do it? It’s painfully simple, Dirk. If Belagren has a gift at all, it’s that she understands man’s baser instincts. She understands what it means to strip away our veneer of civilization, our thin human skin, even if only for one night of the year. You’ve no idea the power that gives her. You’ve no concept of how seductive that can be.”

  “If that’s the case, why is it only the unmarried men and women who take part in the ceremony?”

  “Bah! Unmarried! Why do you think the participants are masked, Dirk?”

  He thought about that for a moment, not completely convinced. “When I drank the Milk of the Goddess all it did was convince me I never want to touch the stuff again.”

  “Did you sample the delights of a Shadowdancer while you were under its influence?”

  Dirk hesitated before he answered. “Yes.”

  “And what was that like?”

  “It was the stupidest thing I’ve ever done.”

  “You say that now. But what was it like at the time, Dirk? What was it like when you didn’t care? What was it like to let out that animal that resides within us all? Don’t you remember what it felt like? Don’t you recall how intoxicating it was? Don’t you sometimes wake up at night, dreaming of her ... dreaming of recapturing that feeling?”

  “No,” he declared emphatically.

  “That’s a lie. Of course you do. It’s why the Milk of the Goddess works so well—because every man and woman who takes it hungers for that release. They hunger for that one night of the year when they can delude themselves into thinking that they are masters of their own destiny. Only a few of the very strong can resist it.”

  Dirk thought about it, consciously trying to remember a night that, for two years, he had quite deliberately blocked out. “It was like a nightmare,” he admitted finally. “Like I was someone else. It was like ... I don’t know ... I mean ... I knew who I was, but it wasn’t really me ... It’s hard to explain.”

  “You don’t need to explain. I’ve been there.”

  “Is that what drove you mad?”

  Neris stared at him for a moment and then shrugged. “I’m not mad, Dirk. I’m far saner than I want to be. Actually, I would love to be truly insane. I wouldn’t have to care, then.”

  Dirk nodded in understanding. How much easier life would be, how uncomplicated, if he could simply do what Neris had done and give himself over to the dark side of his nature, rather than face the consequences of what he had done.

  “That night ... I recall every detail. But after the Landfall Festival, nobody remembers anything. Why?”

  “They remember, Dirk. But how many of them are willing to admit it?” Neris studied him closely. “You hide dark secrets, Dirk Provin, and my daughter despises you for them. Is it that you’ve tasted the Milk of the Goddess? Is it that you’ve been in the arms of a Shadowdancer? Is that why she doesn’t trust you?” When Dirk did not answer, he chuckled. “I’d not boast about having slept with a Shadowdancer to anyone else in Mil, if I were you. Tia wouldn’t be the only one to look at you askance if they realized how close to the heart of the beast you’ve lain.”

  “And how close is that, exactly?” Tia asked from the cave’s entrance.

  Dirk jumped to his feet and turned to stare at her, appalled to think she may have overheard their discussion. She met his eye for a moment, then turned and stalked off.

  “Tia!” he called after her.

  Neris chuckled softly and began to sing softly, “You’re in trouble now ... you’re in trouble now ...”

  Cursing the madman, Dirk ran after Tia, scrambling down the perilous goat track to the beach. “Tia!”

  She stopped when she reached the beach and turned to face him. Her small dinghy was pulled up beside his on the sand. He slithered to a halt on the beach in front of her, but before he could say anything, she tried to hit him with her clenched fist. Dirk saw it coming and dodged. Tia drew back her arm for another attempt, but he caught her wrist before she could do any damage.

  “Let me go!” she snarled.

  “Tia, you didn’t hear all of it. It’s not what you think ...”

  “It’s exactly what I think, Dirk Provin!”

  “It didn’t happen the way—”

  “Don’t bother explaining it, Dirk. I know what happened. I saw you.”

  Dirk let go of her wrist with a shove.

  “I saw you! That night in Avacas. The night before you killed Johan. I saw you with a Shadowdancer. Goddess! How could I forget about that! I was so right about you! You’re so deep in the Lion of Senet’s pocket they even let you have a Shadowdancer of your own!”

  “She claimed I raped her!” he shouted at her, stunning her into silence. Then, in a much more reasonable tone, he added: “It’s why Kirsh put a reward out on me. It had nothing to do with Antonov. The Shadowdancer in question isn’t even Senetian. She’s a Dhevynian thief Belagren recruited in Elcast. She spiked my drink with the Milk of the Goddess out of nothing more than spite because Alenor and I found her in the woods fooling around with Kirsh. The next day she turned up covered in bruises claiming that I raped her. Kirsh nearly killed me over it.”

  “Why would she claim you raped her?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “You didn’t think to ask?”

  “Well, I didn’t really have the time to launch a full investigation,” he snapped. “You see, the very next day I killed my own father and things got a little hectic after that.”

  Tia didn’t say anything for a while; she just stared at him, her suspicion and distrust so tangible Dirk could almost touch them. He sighed helplessly. “Look, I’ll go. Why don’t you go up and visit with Neris?”

  “Has he told you anything useful?”

  Dirk shook his head. “More of the same. He keeps talking about the Eye, but other than that ...”

  Tia nodded. “I’ll see you later then.” She pushed past him and began climbing the goat track up to Neris’s cave.

  “Tia!” he called after her.

  She stopped and turned back to look at him. “What?”

  I’m not what you think, he wanted to explain. I’m not a monster. I’m not a murderer. I’m not a rapist. If I’m guilty of any crime, it’s the crime of being a fool. But he could not find a way to say it without sounding like he was just trying to compensate for his own guilt. “It doesn’t matter,” he said.

  Tia studied him thoughtfully for a moment then turned back to climbing the track up to her father’s cave.

  Chapter 10

  Dirk returned to Neris’s cave the following morning only to find it empty. There was no sign of the madman, the fire was cold and his bed was neatly made. Neris was not the type to make his bed when he got up in the morning, so it was a fair bet that Tia had made it for him the day before and he had not slept in it that night. Dirk walked back outside and looked up at the overhanging ledge. As he suspected, Neris was sitting there, still as a lizard, staring up at the second sun. He had probably been up there all night.

  “Neris!”

  The madman looked down at him, not surprised to find he had a visitor. “Hello, Dirk.”

  “What are you doing up there?”

  “I was considering doing my Deathbringer routine,” Neris told him, sounding quite reasonable. “Haven’t done it for a while. People might start to think I’m not crazy if I don’t give them a show every now and then.” He looked thoughtful, rather than maniacal, which was a good thing. “I don’t think I’ll bother now. It doesn’t seem to have the same effect on you as it does on Tia. Is that because she’s a girl? Or because you couldn’t really care less if I jumped off this ledge or not?”

  Dirk smiled. He had learned very quickly that the more you tried to coax him down, the more Neris liked to pretend he was going to jump. The first time he had come to visit Neris without Tia, the madman had threatened to throw himself off the ledge. Dirk had shru
gged disinterestedly and headed back down to the beach. A few moments later Neris had scrambled down the path after him, begging him not to leave. There had not been any trouble with Neris threatening suicide since, although he’d had no luck trying to convince Tia she should stop reacting to her father’s threats by panicking. They’d had a rather heated argument about it, actually. Tia was not impressed that after a few days, Dirk thought he knew more about handling her father than she did.

  “Well, if you are going to jump, can you wait until I’ve gone? I don’t need Tia blaming me for your death as well as ...” he stopped himself before he could say anything to incriminate himself.

  Neris stared at him cannily. “As well as who?”

  “Nobody,” Dirk shrugged.

  “You’re never going to win this fight if you can’t learn to lie better than that, Dirk Provin.”

  “Who says I’m trying to win any fight?”

  Neris did not answer him. He climbed to his feet and stood on the edge of the precipice for a moment, as if considering whether to throw himself off, and then, with a shrug, he turned and disappeared from view as he headed for the small path that led down to the cave and the lower ledge where Dirk waited.

  “If you don’t want to fight, then why are you here?” Neris asked a few moments later, as he squeezed himself through the tight gap in the rocks that gave access to the upper ledge.

  “I thought you wanted to play chess.”

  “I don’t mean here and now, you idiot boy. I mean, what are you doing here in Mil?”

  “I don’t really have much choice, Neris,” he pointed out, following the madman into the cool dimness of his cave.

  “Not at first, perhaps,” Neris agreed, as he picked up the kettle, peered inside to see if there was enough water and carried it over to the fireplace. “But it’s not as if you’re a prisoner here. You’ve been in Mil long enough to call yourself a Baenlander. Why do you stay?”

  “Why do you stay?” Dirk asked in reply.

  Neris poked around the dead coals with a frown. “That’s easy. They feed me and they keep me supplied with poppy-dust. What’s your excuse?”

  “Well ... they feed me ...” Dirk said with a smile.

  Neris scowled at him. “So for the sake of a few regular meals, you plan to waste the rest of your life playing chess with a madman? And they say I’m the crazy one.”

  Dirk was not sure he liked what Neris was implying. “What should I be doing then?”

  “Righting the wrongs of the world.”

  “That’s a bit rich, coming from the man who caused most of them.”

  “But I didn’t cause them, remember?” Neris retorted, straightening up from the fireplace. “You told me that yesterday. You said I should stop blaming myself.”

  “So now you’re blaming me?”

  “I’m not blaming you. Not yet, anyway.”

  “Not yet?”

  He smiled. “You’ve a little while to go before I decide it’s all your fault.”

  “I don’t follow your reasoning, Neris.”

  “That’s because I’m mad,” the older man replied cheerfully, squatting down by the kettle and tossing a few sticks on top of the charred remains of the previous day’s fire. He began to strike the flint, but seemed more interested in the sparks and the noise than actually lighting the kindling.

  Dirk shook his head in confusion, wishing Neris would find something else to talk about. The madman’s logic frequently left him with a headache. “Did you want me to light that?”

  “Just because I’m insane doesn’t mean I can’t use a flint,” he snapped defensively.

  “I was only trying to be helpful ...”

  “If you want to help, why not do something really useful?” Neris suggested, still striking the flint as if he was tapping out the rhythm for a dance. “Save the world. Go back to Avacas and bring that bitch Belagren to her knees.”

  “Then tell me when the next Age of Shadows is due.”

  “You don’t need to know that to bring Belagren down.”

  “It would help.”

  “Yes, but that would be taking the easy way out. I’d rather see you use that mind of yours for something really challenging.” He suddenly tossed the flint to Dirk and stood up. “Here, why don’t you light it?”

  Dirk caught the flint and squatted down beside the fire, arranging the kindling so that it might actually burn.

  “Do you know what would happen if Belagren dropped dead tomorrow?” Neris asked as he watched Dirk light the fire.

  Dirk didn’t answer. He had gotten the kindling smoking and was blowing on it gently, coaxing the tiny flame to life.

  “I’ll tell you what would happen,” Neris continued in a lecturing tone. “Not a damn thing. The world would continue on, just as it is today. Both suns would still rise, the rain would still fall, the volcanoes would still erupt and I’d still want my blincakes made just the way I like them. Nothing would change but the name of the person perpetrating the lies. The lies themselves would continue. They have a life of their own now.”

  “Then what’s the point of killing Belagren?” Dirk asked.

  “There isn’t one. And you don’t need to kill a person; you need to kill an idea. That’s a much harder thing to do.”

  Dirk sat back on his heels and looked up at the madman thoughtfully. “How do you kill an idea?”

  “That’s the challenge,” Neris replied with a smile. “Haven’t you got that fire going yet?”

  “It’s coming. Don’t be so impatient.”

  “I could make it not burn.”

  “What?” Neris’s inability to stay focused on the one subject for long drove Dirk to distraction.

  “I can make the wood impervious to flame,” the madman announced.

  “How?” Dirk asked skeptically.

  “Ever seen the stuff they use to clean mold off old stone?”

  “I never really paid much attention to what the servants were cleaning.”

  “That’s because you’re highborn. You think these things happen by magic.”

  Dirk sighed. “I still don’t see what cleaning mold has to do with making wood impervious to fire.”

  “That’s because you keep interrupting me before I can explain.”

  “I’m sorry. Please explain it to me.”

  “There’s nothing to explain. If you soak a piece of wood in sinkbore, it won’t burn. That’s all.”

  “Sinkbore?”

  “That’s the stuff they use to clean mold off the stone. They make it in Sidoria, up near the salt lakes ... foul-smelling place that it is. But sinkbore works a treat. A little bit of zinc ... a little bit of boric acid ... a few other goodies thrown in for luck ... remarkable stuff.”

  “When did you become an alchemist?”

  “I dabbled in it for a time. When you’re addicted to something like poppy-dust, it pays to have a bit of knowledge about chemistry. You never know when you’re going to need it. Anyway, I grew up near a zinc mine. There’s nothing quite like the smell of burning calamine and wool.”

  “And exactly what does this have to do with Belagren and the Shadowdancers?”

  “Absolutely nothing. Although haven’t you ever wondered how they get the wicker suns at the Landfall Feast to burn in different colors?”

  “They treat the wood,” Dirk answered. “The red flame comes from pinewood pitch, doesn’t it?”

  “How should I know?”

  Dirk smiled and moved the kettle over the flames. “You never answered my question.”

  “What question?”

  “We were talking about killing an idea. At least we were ... until you decided to give me a chemistry lesson.”

  Neris stared at Dirk for a moment and then shrugged. “I don’t think you can kill an idea, Dirk. You can change it, maybe, but I don’t think you can actually kill it.”

  “And while ever we believe that, Belagren will keep on getting away with what she does,” Dirk pointed out.

  �
�And that’s why Johan failed. He was fighting an idea as much as he was a battle. Even if he’d had the strength to defeat Antonov, he still had Belagren and her religion to contend with. I tried to point that out to him, of course, but people tend not to take you very seriously when you’re foaming at the mouth.”

  Dirk smiled thinly. “By the time he’d had his arse kicked by Antonov until it bled, I imagine he’d figured it out. And he never tried again because he couldn’t find a way to kill the idea.”

  “There may be hope for you yet, boy,” Neris remarked.

  “Why didn’t you figure out how to do it?” Dirk asked him, a little peeved by Neris’s patronizing tone.

  The madman shrugged. “Not my area of expertise, I’m afraid. Ask me how much the world weighs and I’ll figure it out for you, Dirk, but to destroy a whole religion ... that takes a special sort of skill that I don’t have. It takes political cunning, not mathematical ability. And nerves of solid steel,” he added with a grin. “I’d rather face an army of trained killers any day than a handful of religious fanatics. Anyway, it wasn’t my job. The one who should have killed the idea, the only person with the power to nip it in the bud, did absolutely nothing about it.”

  “Who was that?”

  “The Lord of the Suns, Dirk. Paige Halyn.”

  “His brother, Brahm, was our Sundancer on Elcast when I was a child. I met Paige Halyn in Avacas once. He seemed a harmless old coot.”

  “He is,” Neris agreed, “which is largely the problem. Remember, the Shadowdancers are a part of his Church, and subject to his authority—in theory, if not in practice. If he’d denied Belagren’s visions when she first claimed to have them—if Paige Halyn had denounced her prophesies as heresy from the outset—Belagren would never have become as powerful as she is.”

  “Why didn’t he?”

  Neris shrugged. “I don’t know. But I tried to tell him what she was doing. I even explained about the ruins in Omaxin ... I told him all of it. But he didn’t do a damn thing.”

  “Maybe he was afraid of casting doubt on the validity of his own beliefs,” Dirk suggested. “If Belagren claimed to speak for the Goddess and he publicly denounced her visions, where does that leave him? How could he prove the unprovable, when Belagren had the second sun poised to reappear to back up her claims and he had nothing but his faith?”