The End of the Game

by Sheri S. Tepper

  “By the Eye of the Star,

  Where Old Gods Are!”

  On the altar stone something blazed up, a quick blue flame, sputtering into silence. Above us our words gathered like a flock of birds, circling, making rings of color on the sky. In the center of that widening gyre something spread great wings.

  “Jinian,” it called down from the height. “Jinian.”

  “I am here,” I cried.

  The earth shuddered beneath us, cracked, opened to admit the gigantic form of the Gobblemole. The fall opened like a curtain and D’bor Wife came forth. Around us the greenery rustled, began to burgeon upward, swallowing us in its depths. Forest. Come again.

  And not only that. It would have been enough, those four. Quite enough. But I had called others as well, the named and unnamed. Those, too, came to the final couplet.

  A thing of great bones. A thing of rock. A thing of gems. A thing of wind. A thing of cloud.

  A quintessence of deserts, hot as molten brass and glowing with sun. A distillation of great groles, monstrous and hungry.

  A songster, multivoiced, crying in the language of the Shadowpeople with a silver flute in its hands.

  These—all these.

  I looked at them, mouth open, forgetting why they had been summoned. Murzy jostled me with her elbow, bringing my attention back to the rough altar before us.

  “Those surrounding us are your enemies,” I said. “The shadow. The Oracles. They come to harm us, but they will also kill you all. I beg help from all the old gods. By the Eye of the Star.”

  “By the Eye of the Star,” they whispered at me, a torrent of sound, like a river in spate. There was one of them—oh, I don’t remember which one. An immensity. Something so huge my senses could not encompass it. It was simply there, before me, around me, asking a simple question in a voice that could no more have been ignored than a lightning stroke could be ignored.

  “Look at me, Star-eye! What do you see?”

  “Bao,” I said, holding on to Murzy’s hand for all I was worth.

  It was replaced by another thing, asking the same question. I made the same reply out of a dry throat, wondering if this was right, if I had guessed aright, or if we would all be swept away. The threatening shadows, the Oracles, they were out there somewhere. I wondered if they saw, if they knew what was happening, then could not wonder any longer, for a third being was around us.

  “What do you see, Star-eye?”

  “Bao.” Bao, yes, to them all. I felt Cat at my shoulder, trembling, proud Cat, trembling like a sapling in storm.

  Then something new. A being there, before us, and with it a smaller version of itself.

  “Look at my child, Star-eye. What do you see?”

  Oh, what could I say? What should I say? I knew, knew the answer I had was right, but to say it. To say it . . .

  “I see love, Great One. I see a following of perfection.”

  “And do you see bao?”

  “No, Great One, neither bao nor its lack. Until time shall show. Watch and learn.”

  Storm then, a wildness of cloud. Dodie crept close to us. We were all seven gathered tight. Somewhere behind us, I could feel Peter’s presence, firm as stone, holding to the earth and waiting. Before us the sky broke and roiled, a being half-seen vanished in its depths to reappear beside us.

  Something green, then. Forest, I think. Chimmerdong. That great being, that old god we had so long invoked under the name of Eutras. It held out its hand—hand. It held out a great promontory of branch and twig and leafy swag, within which rested a flock of silly birds, twittering and hopping about. They did not see me or know me. “What do you see, Star-eye?” it asked.

  “I see bao,” I croaked from a dry throat. “Part of your own, Great One.”

  “In all, or each?” it asked in a great, windy whisper. “In all or each?”

  “In all, Great One.”

  “Will you take one for your supper?” it asked me gently.

  Murzy’s hand tightened on mine. Oh, Murzy. “I will, perhaps, if there are plenty, if you will allow, sometime, though not now.”

  “And if there were not plenty?”

  “I would not, Chimmerdong,” I cried. “I would not. None of us would.”

  And Eutras was gone and all the others, and there was only the mighty Flitchhawk there before us. “Well, Jinian,” it said. “Well, Star-eye.”

  “Well, Flitchhawk,” I said, trying to get enough spit in my mouth to make a sound. “We meet again.”

  “What is your wish, Star-eye? Shall we punish these shadows for you? These Oracles?”

  Oh, tricky Flitchhawk. I heard Peter moving behind me, held up a hand quickly to keep him from speaking, to keep any of them from speaking.

  “The star-eye knows you may not, great Favian. For they have not bao of their own, and punishment would be vicious. We do not punish what cannot learn.”

  “Shall I kill them for you then, Star-eye?”

  “The star-eye knows you may not, Flitchhawk. For the shadows are of the bao of Lom, and the Oracles are of the bao of the Eesties.”

  “Then what may I do for you, Star-eye?”

  “Drive them away for a time, Flitchhawk. If you will. We need time.” Wings then. A thunder of wings, beating down, raising a cloud of choking dust and a heart of storm.

  As usual, we all ended up flattened. Whenever the Flitchhawk flew, everything around it ended up flattened. There was wind, a monstrous, howling wind that moved out from us and away. I saw it thrust the shadows before it like a mighty broom, saw the banks of darkness fade into distance. Most of the Oracle’s followers, as well, tumbled away. Behind them the Oracle stood, untouched, ribbons slapping wildly on the gale. Alone, it could not really harm us all.

  It became very quiet. I heard the Oracle calling, almost laughing at me.

  “Oh, very good, very good. Didn’t we say she is the heroine type? One time, Jinian Footseer. Two times, Jinian Dervish Daughter. Three times, Jinian Star-eve. And the third shall be the last! The old gods will not come to your aid again.”

  I sagged, feeling Peter’s arms around me. Murzy and the others were whispering among themselves.

  “They’ll be back?” Murzy said. It was only half a question. “Oh, yes,” I sobbed. “They’ll be back.”

  15

  THE DAGGER OF DAGGERHAWK

  We went down into the windswept morning to find the city swarming with workers. There were sevens scattered among the Gamesmen; there were Gamesmen I had not seen before. Even as we watched, a new troop of them came down the hill into the city, the very last, so they said, from the caverns. So, stones screamed their way into walls; high above the street a crew was lifting rafters into place. For a moment, just a fraction of a breath, I could believe the city was as it had appeared in memory.

  “An Elator came to tell me what happened,” said Dodir. “You’ve driven them away, is that it?”

  “Temporarily,” I said. “Until tonight, perhaps. Not for long.”

  We went on toward the Tower. I noticed the lamp was burning more brightly than it had before. Himaggery was there, sitting by Mavin, stroking her arm. Any honest feeling, it seemed, made it glow the brighter. Though Peter and I had started it glowing, it went on gathering light from everywhere it could. That is the way of the light, to gather, as it is the way of shadow.

  Himaggery rose when we came in. “So, we have yet a little time?” He didn’t sound hopeful, but he wasn’t depressed about it, either. A kind of fatalistic cheer, that was it. A sense that pervaded the city and all of us who were in it.

  “We have yet a little time,” I said. Privately I believed it was our last day to live, but I didn’t say so. It might just have been weariness. There had been little-enough sleep for any of us lately, and there was no point in dispiriting the others.

  We went through the broken walls to the foundry. The foundryman was moving around the mold, looking at it doubtfully. “I thought perhaps it would have cooled,” he said. “An ord
inary bell that size would have cooled by now. It’s still hot. Too hot to take out of the mold. I don’t understand it.”

  I shared a glance with Murzy. The Bell had melted into it my star-eye and all our pool fragments dipped in the milky stuff with which crystals came. I mentioned this to the metalworker, seeing his face crease with concentration as Peter’s often did.

  “I don’t know,” he said, shaking his head. “I don’t know. The quantity was very small, but strange alloys can be made with very small quantities of additives. . . .”

  I put out a hand toward the mold. It was too hot to touch. Far too hot to break open yet. “Perhaps by night,” I said, not believing it. “Undoubtedly by the time the Oracle returns.”

  Peter and I went into the woods together. There was a glade above the camp that was untouched by the sickness of the world, a place where flowers bloomed and trees were still green. We went to have the privacy to say and do what all lovers say and do. I learned again what it is like to be loved by a Shifter. He learned again, so he said, that he loved me. I had had all the best of it and told him so. We argued about that. The day wore on. We ate meat and bread and drank wine. We laughed, even, at some silliness or other. Sun sparkled through the leaves, dappling our bare skins with coins of gold, and we spent them prodigiously on our pleasure. And night came, as we had known it would.

  “I have to go,” I said.

  “Where are you going, Jinian love?”

  “Up there.” I pointed. “The Oracle will come up there.”

  “I’ll come with you.”

  “No.” I pushed him down, fixing him with my fiercest glance. “No, Peter. I have the Dagger of Daggerhawk Demesne. Though I may not call on the old gods again, there are other beings I may call. If necessary, I will use the Dagger on myself. No. Don’t say anything. It will be easier for me this way.

  “I’ve told Murzy and the others to stay at the Tower. I’m going to call Shadowpeople and send them there. I want you to go to the foundry. The Bell must be cooled by now. It must be! Remember the words of the Seer, Peter? Sorah, so long ago? Upon the Wastes of Bleer. She told us the Wizard had the Bell, the book, the light. There are Wize-ards here in plenty, and we must have all three. The Bell. The light. The singing.”

  “There is no book,” he said stupidly, staring at me as though to memorize me. “No book to sing from.”

  “They have Mavin,” I retorted. “Ask them to sing Mavin’s song. She will be their book.”

  I think he knew it would hurt me if he argued, so he didn’t. I saw him holding on to his self-control as though with both hands. He left me there. Halfway down the hill he turned and stared, remembering to wave, trying not to weep, remembering at last to Shift some clothing for himself, and then he was gone.

  My own clothes lay on the grasses. For this occasion I had decked myself. My gown was blue, girdled and cloaked in green and violet. They were colors Peter liked. I had worn them for him, and for myself. If I must meet death, then it would be well clad, not as some scruffy wanderer. So, these silken, lovely things. I put them on, drawing my hair high and pinning it there with jeweled combs. They had been among Mavin’s things, and Himaggery had wept when he saw them. He had given them to her long ago, before Peter was born. He had told me to take them and wear them in her memory. So I did, saying her name as I slipped them into my hair.

  Then, only then, I laid out the materials for a summons. It was a simple thing. I had barely finished when I heard a trill from among the trees.

  Jinian, “ it said. “Here is Proom and Proom’s people for the singing. “ So much for the art. Why had I assumed Proom would not be perfectly aware of what was going on? He had always turned up fortuitously in the past. Why not this time?

  “Will you sing Mavin’s song in the ruined Tower, Proom?”

  “That one. Yes. And another we have, also of Mavin, and of Jinian and Peter, and of Ganver, too. “

  “There is no book in the tower. “

  “I have brought the book, “ he said, stepping forward into the glade where I stood with my shoes in the grass beside me and all the Wize-ardly stuff spread around. He held it, a book almost too big for him, clutched to his chest. “We took it when the Tower fell. We have had it always.“

  He started away down the hillside, others emerging from the trees to follow him. He turned. “Where are you going in your ceremonial dress, Jinian Star-eye?”

  I gestured behind me. He shook his head sadly. “We will sing your song, too, Jinian. We will sing your song. “

  Then they were gone, light as leafy shade on the grass, and I was alone with my shoes lying in the grass and my Wize-ard’s pouch and the Dagger on my thigh and Murzemire’s words in my heart.

  “I have Seen,” she had said brokenly. “The Oracle and all his followers. They will come there!” And she had pointed to a low saddle of the mountain where the rocks lay bare and the soil ashen as though burned by an acid flame.

  I put on my shoes and went to that place.

  It was dusk when I arrived there. The place was littered with stones, great skull-shaped boulders on which the lichen had died, leaving gray scrofulous patches, like dead skin. Soon after I arrived, I saw the Oracle emerge far down the opposite slope. It stood quietly as I mounted one of the great stones. This time there was no mockery. Their ribbons were black and indigo, death colors. The shadows lay behind them in drifts, unmoving. There would be no play tonight. Nor would I have time to prepare or worry, or grieve. It saw me standing on the boulder and moved upward, toward me, its many followers behind it in a fluttering tide. Tonight they led the shadow.

  I had the Dagger in my hand, the Daggerhawk blade, the wings of it curving beneath my fingers, the jewels of it glittering. Cold, so cold that blade, and coming toward me the great, gross bulk of the Oracle. Its original Eesty shape had long been overlaid with pretense and guile. The ribbons it had worn as mimicry were a part of it now. The hands it had imaged were now real; the face it had painted had become its own face. It had begun out of mockery at us pathetic human shapes; it had gone on out of stubborn, relentless anger; it had ended by losing everything it could ever have cared about, and even now it would not make an end.

  “Jinian,” it called to me. “Jinian Footseer. Dervish Daughter. Does it still wear the star-eye on its little bosom? My sign, human. Mine. The sign of me.”

  “No,” I said, so softly it might not have heard. “No, Oracle. It is my sign. I’ve earned it.”

  “You?” It laughed. I had heard a laugh like that once before in the fortress of Zale, a high chirp of mirthless sound, like a dreaming bird. Birds, who have no bao, may dream of souls? Why not. So the Oracle might dream now of what it had lost—or never had.

  “I, Oracle.”

  “You pity me, girl?”

  “I pity you, Oracle.” I didn’t know what I said. It was too late for anything but truth, and truth is what I told.

  Then came light in those painted eyes. Oh, Gamelords and all the old gods. Light in those eyes. An evil joy. A monstrous peace. And I knew why, for the Dagger seemed to tremble in my hands. The Daggerhawk blade, which would kill by a touch only when used in anger. And I had no anger left against this thing. Only Pity. Impotent pity. Which could do nothing with the Dagger, nothing at all.

  It came toward me. Behind it the others, a shuffling multitude of them. Behind me, below me in the city, softened by distance, I heard the cries of the workmen struggling to hang the Bell. Hang it and ring it in order that all might be restored. I could hold these pathetic monsters off perhaps a minute or two, pretending an anger I did not feel, but my heart was lost in me. The light we had spun into the lamp of the Tower would be the world’s light, but not our own. Not Peter’s and mine. The effort we had put into the Bell would be the world’s cure, perhaps, but not ours.

  “Have you thought,” I called to the Oracle, “that even now it is not too late?”

  “Too late? Why, human girl, Dervish Daughter, it is not early enough. I should have ki
lled you there in the Forest of Chimmerdong, long and long ago. I should have taken you myself and fed you to the monstrous Pig.”

  “Why didn’t you?”

  “Because we foresaw this end, Footseer. Foresaw the Dagger in your hand and you unable to use it. Because we thought it unnecessary. All your kind are so useless! We knew in the end it would come to this. More fun to play the Game out, you see. More fun to let it go on. . . .”

  “But didn’t you also see the world’s death? And the death of all? Of every one of you? Of all your Brotherhood?”

  Silence. As though I had uttered a curse upon them. Silence, with the Oracle dancing from side to side, laughing at me, the laugh a hollow one which the others did not echo, falling into silence as it became aware of their silence.

  “We will not die!” The cry came from behind the Oracle, from that close pack that shuffled toward me. “You lie, Footseer. We will not die.”

  I wanted to laugh, to laugh and cry all at the same time. “Oh, foolish children,” I called, forgetting they were not my children. “You will die. All the Brotherhood will die. I, too, perhaps, but you certainly. This, too, has been Seen!”

  A wailing, then, like an angered ghost. Among those who shuffled along after the Oracle an eddy moved, a circling, as though some within that throng chose to move another way. Looking down on them, I was reminded of water as it breaks over a submerged stone, whirling darkly and without visible purpose. The Oracle had been at the front of this mob, but now it seemed to be behind the foremost rank, pulled sideways as though caught by that strange undertow.

  “The Riddler told us the world died but that we would live, masters of all!” It was the same voice, complaining bitterly. “Our bao would conquer everything!”

  Pity again. So foolish, so childish, so damned. “What did you think you would do to live when the world died? When the world was only a sphere of cold stone? When there were no seas, no plants? How did you think you would live?” I called out to them, receiving no answer. “And since you have no bao, how would it conquer?” The mob was pushing against the stone I stood upon, and it rocked. I turned to leap to the safety of the hill behind me, only to find a tentacle of the throng had moved between me and that place. They pushed, and I rocked once more, staggering to keep my balance.