Lord of the Libraries

by Mel Odom

  “Good,” Craugh said. “At least we won’t have that to argue about.”

  “If I had known the Grandmagister had something like this planned—”

  “Would you have stayed?” Craugh looked at Juhg reproachfully. “It seems to me that you were only too happy to leave the island even after the Dread Riders, Blazebulls, and Grymmlings had leveled the library.”

  “That’s not fair.”

  Craugh studied Juhg. “Would you have let Aldhran Khempus—or anyone like him, for that matter—abscond with Wick?”

  “No.” And that’s only one of the differences between us, Craugh. I don’t trust villains. And I suspect you convinced the Grandmagister to risk his life with your clever words. Still, Juhg felt a stab of guilt over his belief, though at this juncture it was unavoidable.

  “That’s exactly my point.”

  “Why did the Grandmagister have to allow himself to be captured? To suit some purpose of yours?”

  “Not mine alone,” Craugh said, looking irritated. “It was Wick’s idea and I went along with it. So that we could learn what Aldhran and the others know.”

  Perhaps it was the Grandmagister’s idea, Juhg thought sourly. But I’ll believe that when I see cows fly. “You mean, to find out what they knew about The Book of Time?”

  “Yes.”

  “You said, ‘Aldhran and others.’ What others?”

  “We’re not sure yet. That was one of the key reasons we concocted this plan. I agreed to the plan—with great reluctance, I might add—because we needed to do something. I had hoped the Grandmagister might come to his senses, or that we might establish another lead as to who our foes were.”

  Juhg scowled. “Getting the Grandmagister kidnapped isn’t much of a plan.”

  “On the contrary. It was all that we were left with. That’s how desperate we had become. Aldhran and his cohorts … well, they’re very cunning, very dangerous.” Craugh set his bowl and plate aside. “And letting Wick get kidnapped wasn’t our first plan.”

  “That makes me so relieved.”

  “We are far more clever than you think. You forget, we knew we had the eye of the monster aboard One-Eyed Peggie. We knew we could use the eye to track Aldhran and his gang of cutthroats.”

  “You could have used your powers.”

  Craugh shook his head. “If I’d used my powers, Aldhran would have known. He would have sensed magic like the kind that I use. The monster’s mystic powers are more elemental than mine, more a part of the earth, of the air that we breathe. Aldhran has no way of detecting the link the monster’s eye has to Wick as a member of this pirate crew.”

  “Then the fact that the Grandmagister arrives at Imarish tomorrow morning doesn’t surprise you? Because you and the Grandmagister planned this?”

  Craugh blew out a disgusted breath. “Twaddle.”

  “Twaddle?” Juhg couldn’t believe it. “Twaddle? You know that the Grandmagister told me to come to Imarish to pick up the package he left for me. Don’t you think there’s every possibility that he told Aldhran Khempus as well? Because he was being tortured? I mean, surely with all this planning going on, you and the Grandmagister had to have considered that he would be tortured.”

  “Your cynicism ill becomes you, apprentice,” Craugh remarked pointedly.

  Refusing to be dissuaded, Juhg said, “If I had known what was going on, maybe I could have handled things differently.”

  “What things?” Craugh raised an arched, accusing eyebrow.

  Juhg didn’t answer.

  “Do you really think you handled the matter of your abandonment of the Grandmagister after the Library and so many of the books were destroyed so well?”

  Juhg started to get up.

  “Oh, do sit down,” Craugh said, exasperated. “You tiptoe around everything but what you want to ask. I only brought it up to show you that I do understand.”

  “I wasn’t there when the Grandmagister needed me,” Juhg said in a small, quiet voice. He was afraid of the wizard’s wrath, but he also wanted some of the blame placed squarely where it belonged. “But I also wasn’t the one chasing after The Book of Time years ago. I wasn’t one of the people responsible for setting The Book of Time free in this world.”

  Craugh sighed. “Ah, I miss the certainty of youth. Truly I do. Those were the times when you could simply look at any question and know that the answer you have for it is the correct one. Never a doubt. Never a fear.”

  Juhg’s anger finally slipped loose its chains. He stared harshly at the wizard. “I don’t wish to talk to you.”

  “Well, you have to,” Craugh snapped. “We’re in this together, you and I. And the Grandmagister could well die because you and I can’t get along at the moment.”

  “There’s a reason for that.”

  “For Wick to die?” Craugh’s voice was harsh.

  Taking a deep breath, Juhg shook his head. The possibility banked his anger, though it could not extinguish the righteous heat of conviction. “Not that. Never that.”

  Craugh took out his pipe and lit it. He puffed for a moment or two. Juhg didn’t move because he knew he hadn’t been excused. He also hadn’t gotten answers to the questions he had.

  “We need to find a way to work together,” Craugh stated. “What will that take?”

  Juhg answered honestly. “I don’t know.”

  “What do you want to ask me?” Craugh asked finally. “Do you want to know why I went after The Book of Time all those years ago?”

  Juhg studied Craugh, striving to see through the wizard’s seeming willingness to try to find a common ground. Craugh, even if he hadn’t been a wizard, would have been a cunning master of artifice. But because he was a wizard, Craugh had even more reason to develop duplicitous skills.

  “To begin with,” Juhg said, “yes, I would like to know how you came by The Book of Time.”

  Craugh hesitated, then he turned his green eyes to Juhg. “Let me see your journal.” He held out a hand.

  Hesitating, Juhg searched the wizard’s face. Does he just want to make sure he gets rid of all the evidence of what I’ve learned? He knew that Craugh was aware he wrote in his journal every day, just as the Grandmagister had trained him to do.

  “Please,” Craugh added. His hand shook a little.

  Surprised that there was no surliness and no threats, and also—ultimately—no choice if he wanted cooperation, Juhg reached into his rucksack and took out the handmade book. He hesitated only a little before handing it over.

  Flipping through the book almost casually, Craugh found the recent pages Juhg had filled. Mostly there were the images. Juhg hadn’t known what to say about the turn of events. He hadn’t yet found words to interpret everything he’d seen and felt.

  The wizard smoked calmly. “Well, you’ve definitely stated your case in these. And you’ve gone on to your own style of drawing. Wick has every right to be as proud of you as he is.”

  Surprised, Juhg thought he detected a hurt tone in Craugh’s voice. Without another comment, the wizard passed the book back, then sat and smoked for a bit.

  “Perhaps,” Craugh said in a thick voice after a few minutes, “this talk is just going to be a waste of time. I think you’re already predisposed in the matter.”

  Relief flooded through Juhg. Had Craugh just released him? He started to get up and the wizard made no move or suggestion to stop him. Instead, surprisingly, he stopped himself and sat back down.

  Craugh’s eyebrows lifted in surprise. “Well then.”

  “Don’t get me wrong,” Juhg said, “I still don’t trust you. I won’t lie to you about that, and even if I did lie I think you would know. But I do want to hear your side of things.”

  “Why?”

  Juhg thought for a moment. “To be fair?”

  Craugh scowled and pulled irritably at his beard. “You’re as bad as Wick. Both of you think the world is a fair place.”

  “No,” Juhg said in a cold voice. “I don’t think the world is a fa
ir place. I grew up in a goblinkin gem mine, Craugh. I have learned to think the world will eat you the first day you take your eye off of it.”

  “Then we share that view.”

  “But I want to be fair,” Juhg went on. He held the wizard’s gaze with difficulty, feeling fear razor up his spine. Instead of swapping hard looks with Craugh, Juhg wanted to run for his life. “The world may not be a fair place, but I want to be a fair person.” His voice caught with the sadness he’d been feeling and he made himself go on. “I’ve always respected you, Craugh. Maybe I haven’t always liked you or liked the things that you did or liked what you said or how you said your piece, but I always respected you.

  “Until today?”

  Juhg made no answer.

  Emotion flickered in the wizard’s eyes but he quickly walled it away by staring at his next breath of smoke. He held his silence till it grew uncomfortable for them both.

  “I am unwilling to simply throw that respect away,” Juhg stated, knowing that the wizard could never bring himself to break the strain between them. “The Grandmagister is the wisest person I know. He believes in you. So, honoring his wisdom, I am forced to believe in you as well.”

  “Even after the monster knew my name and so many secrets came spilling out?”

  “And the way that you killed the woman, Ladamae? Yes, even after that.”

  “She had to be killed. She would never have let you go.”

  “You freed me.”

  “She would have taken you again, and then she would have killed you. Or she would have run amuck among the dwarves here on this ship. I couldn’t very well have that, now could I?”

  “If that was going to be the case, no.”

  Craugh hitched himself up and resettled. “Despite your … honorable intentions, apprentice, once you hear me out you may distrust me even more than you wish to honor your mentor’s belief in me.”

  “I can bear it,” Juhg said, “if you can.”

  “All right then. But I’m going to have to ask you some questions as well.”

  Juhg waited.

  “Do you remember what you told me about the disagreement you never bothered to have with Wick that led you to leave the Vault of All Known Knowledge?”

  The memory stung Juhg and made him feel guilty. Is that the tack the wizard is going to take? That we have both let the Grandmagister down? He centered himself and denied the guilt. “Yes, of course I do.”

  “You left, twice, and you never once told Wick why.”

  “It was no use. He would never have understood. I thought the time had come for the books to be handed back into the world. The Library was supposed to keep them until the threat posed by the goblinkin was over. That threat is over. As over as it’s going to be until the humans, dwarves, elves—and even dwellers—learn to unite again. And the only way they’re going to do that is to communicate again. Through books. Crossing the distance involved in a quick fashion and talking face-to-face is out of the question. It’s going to take common knowledge and a lot of years. They will all have to see that we have dreams in common. The Grandmagister wouldn’t have seen it that wary.” Juhg had told Craugh that shortly after the Library had been destroyed.

  Craugh nodded. “Wick wouldn’t have. I told you that you were right about that. He loved the Library too much. He persists in loving the Library despite its destruction. But you still could have told him the truth. He could have known why you were leaving. Again.”

  “Like you told him the truth about The Book of Time?” Juhg asked.

  Craugh leaned back against the railing and stared up at the sky. “When I was very young, an impossibly long time ago as I sit here and think of that period now, I wanted power.” He stopped and shook his head. “No, that’s not right. I craved power. I lived for it, and I killed for it.” He flicked his green eyes to Juhg for just a moment and gave him a sad smile. “I was not overly concerned about others. Or what their dreams were. If I could scare them or beat them, or, failing either of those, kill them, they didn’t matter. I guess you could say I was not a very good person. Perhaps even evil, if you want. But I was young and I was powerful. That is a very heady mix.” He tamped his pipe bowl down and his voice softened. “And there was a girl. A very, very beautiful girl.”

  “Ladamae,” Juhg said before he could stop himself. Still, he wanted all the facts and he wanted them right.

  “Yes,” Craugh agreed. “Ladamae. But she wasn’t mine. In those days, she belonged to Methoss. I only wished she were mine.” He sucked on the pipe, bringing it back to life. “She and I met by seeking some of the same things, again and again. Till finally we got past the distrust and forged a friendship. Methoss came to be my friend as part of that. Not a very good one, mind you, but a friend all the same. As the very young count their friends. Based on similar interests, ambitions, and strength.”

  “And two days ago, you killed them both.”

  “True, but in those days it was a friendship. There were others that we found interests in common with, and eventually there got to be a great lot of us.” Craugh shook his head. “I think then we could have been called evil. There were too many of us, you see, to stop. We were too many and we were too powerful.”

  “All of you were wizards?”

  “Not all of us. Most of us, though. Others were shape-changers, were-beings, and mercenaries. We took over empires, scattered troops with our magic, and killed with impunity any who dared stand against us. I was determined to learn all I could of magic. The others, well, most of them only wanted to take over empires, destroy armies, and kill people they decided they didn’t like or people who unwisely made known that they didn’t care for them.” He paused and made a fist, like he was grasping something. Magical sparks flickered between his fingers. “But I wanted the very heart of magic.”

  Listening to the raptness in Craugh’s voice, Juhg knew that ambition was not far from the wizard’s mind even now. “This was before the Cataclysm.”

  “This,” Craugh whispered, “was before Lord Kharrion. And we’ll talk about him and his part in this as we go along. After years of roaming the world together, we found out about The Book of Time. You see, we had been gathering magic items the whole time. Some we stole and others we destroyed. But The Book of Time was special. Even the name was enough to spark our interest. It sounded like a name that could conjure great magic.” He drew on the pipe and released a slow cloud of rolling smoke. “Do you even know what The Book of Time can do, apprentice?”

  Watching the wizard’s face in the shadows, Juhg could see the excitement, and he could hear it in Craugh’s voice. Part of the wizard had not come far from those days. Sometimes—in fact, maybe most of the time—when Craugh had accompanied the Grandmagister on his quests for lost books and knowledge, the wizard had his own agenda.

  “No,” Juhg whispered. “I don’t know what it can do.”

  “Once you gain possession of The Book of Time and learn its secrets,” Craugh said, “you can alter the very fabric of time. You can go backward and forward in time. You can pick out a moment in time and save or take a life. You can change one incident and affect a future. You could affect a single man, or control the destiny of a nation. The man who controlled The Book of Time, why, he’d be the most powerful man in the world.” He smiled.

  “You wanted to be that man,” Juhg said.

  The wizard’s smile faded. “Yes. More than anything in the world.” He held out a bony hand. “Can you imagine what it must be like? To hold so much in the palm of your hand?”

  “No. I would never want that kind of responsibility.”

  “Ah, but you’re looking at it wrong, apprentice. I didn’t see possession of The Book of Time as responsibility. I saw it only as opportunity.” Craugh took his pipe from his mouth and aimed the stern at Juhg. “Just as you saw the chance to give back to the masses the books in the Library as opportunity.”

  “How do you think I meant them to benefit me?” Juhg was incensed.

 
; “Perhaps to assuage your guilt over the fact that you lived through the goblinkin slave mines and your family did not,” Craugh suggested.

  “You lie!”

  “A guess, apprentice, that is all that I offer. And possibly you wanted to be the one to give the books back to the world so that you could be an important person.”

  “You’re wrong.”

  Craugh nodded. “I know that I am. I know you, apprentice. And I heard your impassioned speech by the ruins of the Vault of All Known Knowledge. You wanted only to free the books once more so that all of the world could benefit from them.”

  Juhg’s cheeks burned. Saying it out loud like that, or maybe it was just because it came from Craugh, made him sound foolish.

  “Don’t be embarrassed,” Craugh said quietly. “That’s a noble dream. Wick hasn’t yet experienced that one. He’s been protecting the books far, far too long. Until the Library was destroyed, he could conceive of the books being in no one else’s hands. They were his responsibility.”

  “They still are.” Juhg didn’t like the way Craugh’s interpretation made it sound like the Grandmagister was no longer going to be able to care for the surviving books.

  Waves lapped at the ship sitting idle in the ocean. The wind had changed direction again and the cold spray carried now and again across the ship’s bow. The darkness surrounding them made the chill seem colder.

  “Where did you learn about The Book of Time?” Juhg asked.

  “From the Gatekeeper,” Craugh said.

  5

  Blood of Bad Blood

  “The Gatekeeper?” Juhg echoed. “The Gatekeeper of the In-Betweenness? But surely that is a myth.”

  “After everything you’ve seen, apprentice, do you yet believe there are myths that don’t at least have a root or two in truth?” Craugh shook his head. His gray hair blew. Far off, lightning flared out over the coast hidden by the night and the fog, and the sudden light flickered in his green eyes. “The Gatekeeper is real. To an extent.”