“They must have discovered some better use for Wayfinder than tracking us.”
“Better than hunting down another Sword?—it sounds strange, but the truth must be that they don’t realize that we have Woundhealer. Possibly they don’t even know that it was in our camp.”
The day passed in hiking, scanning the skies, which fortunately remained clouded, and foraging for berries. When dusk came on, Ben changed course, now leading the way generally north and east, in the direction from which they could expect the approach of Prince Mark and his people.
* * *
Half an hour after the Blue Temple attack, morning was brightening slowly and sullenly as Chairman Hyrcanus was establishing himself in an organized field office.
In intervals between his other tasks, Hyrcanus kept coming back to look at the supine figure of the captive woman. Each time he looked, and shook his head, and went away again. He said: “If this is indeed the Silver Queen, it would seem that she has somehow grown young again.”
“Magic,” offered the Director succinctly.
Another Blue Temple wizard, evidently some kind of specialist brought in for a consultation, sighed uncertainly. “No mere ordinary youth-spell, I can vouch for that.” He glanced toward Valdemar, still lying under magical paralysis. “What does her companion say?”
“He says that she might be anyone, for all he knows. We’ll conduct some serious questioning presently.”
But Hyrcanus and his aides were giving the Silver Queen and Valdemar only a small part of their attention. Much more of their time was spent in gloating over their captured Sword, and getting the field office organized.
A swarm of hustling soldiers heaving poles and fabric, aided by some minor magic, had needed only a few minutes to complete the task of erecting the Chairman’s pavilion.
This large tent was put up very near the place where Valdemar still lay, with a light rain falling on his face. From the moment when the pavilion started to take form, he had a good view in through its open doorway. New lights, even stranger than the magically augmented torch, were somehow kindled inside it, to augment the morning’s feeble daylight.
Valdemar kept looking toward Yambu. He could see her face rather more clearly now, still unconscious, or submerged in some kind of self-inflicted trance.
A bustle of blue and gold activity continued around the pavilion and inside it. Gradually the movements became more orderly. As soon as the work was finished, the Director ordered that the two captives be brought into the big tent, with a view to beginning their formal questioning.
Valdemar was hauled roughly to his feet, and words muttered over him, giving him movement in his legs, and some degree of control. Then he was marched in through the fabric doorway. Chairman Hyrcanus himself, red-faced and puffing as if the labor of erecting the tent had fallen to him personally, still garbed in heavy winter garments despite the relative warmth of spring, was seated behind a folding table near the center of the pavilion, still grumbling in an almost despairing tone about the sacrifices he had had to make to venture personally into the field on this operation so vital for the Blue Temple’s future.
The Director, seated at the Chairman’s side, tried to soothe him with expressions of sympathy.
Standing before the central table, Valdemar heard once more, somewhere behind him, the voice of Sergeant Brod. Turning his head, he saw that the Sarge had reappeared, evidently still trying to make himself useful to the Chairman and his people. But Brod had been forced to remain outside the tent.
Hyrcanus himself was wasting no time, but not hurrying particularly either, shuffling papers about in front of him, methodically getting ready to undertake, in his own good time, whatever business might be required.
Behind the Chairman, piled inconspicuously in the shadows toward the rear of the tent, Valdemar could see what appeared to be certain metal tools, looking too complicated to be simple weapons. Vaguely he wondered what they were.
The Chairman cleared his throat. He made an announcement, something to the effect that this session was going to be only preliminary.
Looking sternly at his clerks, seated at another table along one wall, he added: “The fact that we must conduct, in the field, operations more properly performed at headquarters, is no excuse for inefficiency. Everything must be done in a businesslike fashion.”
Yambu, having somehow been restored to at least partial consciousness, was now being brought into the pavilion too, and made to stand beside Valdemar. They exchanged looks; neither said anything. Valdemar thought that probably there were no useful words to be said at the moment.
* * * * * *
Rain and wind surged against the blue and gold tent, as if in a fruitless endeavor to get at the papers inside.
Several folding chairs, enough—as Valdemar thought he heard someone remark—for the absolute necessary minimum of meetings, were disposed about within the tent. Two or three of the strange Old World lights had been placed on the tables, and another mounted on a folding metal stand. Valdemar got the impression that there was some kind of heating device as well, Old World or magical, giving off a gentle invisible glow of warmth around the Chairman’s feet.
Hyrcanus, mumbling almost inaudibly to himself, was busily extracting more sheaves of paperwork from a dispatch case of dull leather, and laying the stuff out upon his table under the bright, efficient light. Valdemar, watching, assumed that this array of written records must be intended to serve some magical purpose. He could not picture any mundane necessity for it.
At a nod from the Chairman, one of his subordinates gave the order for the prisoners to be moved, one at a time, somewhat closer to the central table.
Before getting down to serious questioning, the Chairman, acting in the tradition of his organization, saw to it that his captives’ names and descriptions were noted down, and that they were methodically robbed. Hands went dipping into Valdemar’s pockets, and his clothing was patted and probed, by means both physical and magical.
Valdemar realized to his surprise that these people were more concerned with him than with the Silver Queen. The only reason he could imagine for this was that he had happened to be holding the Sword when they arrived.
An exact inventory was taken of all valuables confiscated from the two prisoners. Actually these were very few, and of disappointingly little value.
Valdemar noted that the high officials of the Temple took very seriously this business of accounting for items of trivial financial value.
“Money?”
“Practically none, sir.” But the clerk, under the Chairman’s cold stare, went on to itemize the few small coins which had been taken from Valdemar and Yambu. This painstaking listing, accomplished in the meticulous Blue Temple fashion, occupied what seemed to Valdemar an inordinate amount of time.
Though Valdemar had never before had any direct dealings with the Blue Temple, he like everyone else had heard a thousand stories exemplifying its legendary greed and stinginess. While the young man had no liking for the picture painted by those stories, the tales inspired in him not terror so much as contempt and wariness. He was now waiting impatiently for a chance to argue that he should be considered a non-combatant here and allowed to go on about his business.
But the Chairman was in no hurry, nor were his clerks, who evidently understood exactly the attitude toward work that was required of them. While Hyrcanus sat shuffling and rearranging his papers at one folding table they were busy writing and calculating at another. Among their other tasks, Valdemar gathered as he listened to their clerkly murmurs, was that of keeping a precise expense account—how much was this mission costing the corporation?
In the background, two or three meters behind and above the droning clerks, a small window high in the rear wall of the pavilion afforded Valdemar an occasional sight of one of the griffins, or perhaps two—he could not be sure whether it was really the same huge, nightmarish head and neck that now and then loomed up in the morning’s gloom, as if the bea
st were curious about what was happening inside the tent. The griffin, or griffins, had evidently been tethered close behind the pavilion.
The griffin or griffins, Valdemar realized at a second look, were eating something out there. Lion-jaws dripped with a dark liquid in the uncertain, cloudy light. Suddenly he had the horrible feeling that the creatures were tearing some animal—or human—body to pieces for a snack.
The Chairman coughed drily. But then, just when Valdemar thought Hyrcanus might at last be ready to get down to business, the Chairman delayed again, turning to his Director of Security to lament the cost to the Temple in time and money of this journey. He had spent some days in getting here, traveling from the unnamed city of his headquarters, and he considered the expense of shipping his necessary equipment to have been almost ruinous.
Talking to his Director of Headquarters Security, upon whose bald head the Old World light gleamed brightly—and who, here in the bright light, looked even older than he had outside—now and then looking up to glare at his new prisoner or prisoners as if he considered them to blame—the Chairman deigned to give them all several reasons why he had felt it necessary to take charge personally of this expedition:
“One, because I feared that Master Wood, on once getting the Sword of Wisdom into his hands, would never relinquish it.” Hyrcanus paused thoughtfully. “Of course I suppose Woundhealer is one Sword Wood might be induced to give up—for a price.”
The Director, to no one’s surprise, expressed agreement.
Now a long strongbox was carried into the tent by a couple of soldiers in blue and gold, who handled the prize warily. After depositing the strongbox at the Chairman’s feet, they opened it, lifted out the Sword of Wisdom, and placed it carefully in front of Hyrcanus upon the table, after a blue satin cloth had been meticulously folded and positioned for a cushion.
One of the clerks, moving fussily and nervously, slightly adjusted the Old World lights to provide Hyrcanus with the best illumination.
Only at this point was Valdemar struck by the conspicuous absence of the Sword of Mercy. Since he had been taken prisoner, no one in his hearing had even mentioned Woundhealer—that could only mean, he thought, that either Ben or Zoltan had managed to get away with the Sword of Healing.
At this thought, Valdemar shot the Lady Yambu a sharp glance. And she, as if she somehow knew just what idea had just occurred to him, responded with a glance urging caution.
Yes, Valdemar thought, it must be true. Hyrcanus and his people gave no indication of realizing how close they had come to capturing the Sword of Healing. Had they been aware of how narrowly that prize had just escaped them, they would already have launched an intensive search for it, and not be dawdling through this leisurely preparation for an interrogation.
Of course Wayfinder by itself was treasure indeed. Treasure enough, as Valdemar was beginning to realize, to dazzle at least slightly even the Chairman of the Blue Temple himself. When the soldiers put the Sword of Wisdom down in front of Hyrcanus, his eyes came alight. He touched the black hilt with a tentative forefinger, then stroked it greedily.
Confronted with the reality of Wayfinder, Chairman and Director both appeared to speedily lose interest in their prisoners. Evidently any serious questioning would be allowed to wait.
The Director of Security rubbed his bald head nervously as he stared at the Sword. He said: “Sir, we must get this property to a place of safety as soon as possible.”
“Of course.” Hyrcanus leaned forward on the table. “But surely we would be at fault, derelict in our duty to the Temple Stockholders, if we did not find one other duty even more pressing, and perform that one first?”
“Sir?”
“We must delay carrying this treasure away to safety, just long enough to make our first use of it.”
The Director hesitated. “May I ask what use Your Opulence has in mind?”
“You may ask. Though I suppose it should be obvious.” The Chairman, his face displaying a look of satisfaction, paused as if for emphasis. “I intend to require this Sword to indicate to us the location of the greatest treasure in the world.”
For a moment there was silence in the pavilion.
Valdemar was suddenly struck by what he considered an ominous indication. Neither Chairman nor Director was displaying the least concern about the fact that their prisoners were listening to this discussion. It was, the young man thought, as if the Blue Temple officials considered their captives already dead.
At last Hyrcanus, standing up, moving carefully, drew Wayfinder from its sheath. The blade caught bright gleams from the Old World lights as the Chairman gripped the hilt in his two soft hands, making the Sword’s powers for the moment his own.
“Now, how shall I phrase this request exactly?” This preliminary question seemed to be addressed more to himself than to anyone else, or to the Sword itself.
The worried Director answered with a murmured suggestion that the first care be for safety.
But Hyrcanus stubbornly shook his head. “We have,” he said, “had direct assurances regarding our present security from our cavalry commander, and also from your powers, magician. True?”
“True, Your Opulence, but—”
“Tell me, do you believe that our encampment here is now secure, or is it not?”
“At the moment, sir, it is secure enough,” the other murmured unhappily.
“Then there you are. Would breaking camp right now make the Sword any safer? Besides, our men and beasts are tired. They are all in need of rest before we undertake another march.”
“True enough, Your Opulence.”
“While they rest, we at the executive level can best make use of our time by pursuing our further duties to the stockholders.”
Now for the first time Hyrcanus addressed the Sword directly. In his dry voice he phrased a simple demand: “Where is the greatest treasure in the world?”
Valdemar, watching with a dozen others, thought that the Sword did not react; or it reacted only slightly, and in an uncertain way.
“What in the world now?” the Chairman demanded, suddenly querulous. Obviously he had been expecting a more dramatic response of some kind. Letting the Blade rest on the table, he rubbed his left hand, the one free of the Sword’s hilt, over his bald head.
After a little silence, the Director cleared his throat. “Do you think, Chairman, there might possibly have been some ambiguity in your phrasing of the question?”
“Ambiguity? You mean, some uncertainty as to which of the world’s treasures is actually the greatest? Ah, the question of determining the best measure of determined value. Authorities do disagree on that, it’s true.” Hyrcanus cleared his throat again. “Perhaps I should rephrase my inquiry.”
Valdemar hoped that if Hyrcanus did receive from the Sword a plain unequivocal answer to any of his urgent questions regarding treasure, the Chairman would not feel it necessary to break camp at once, tired men and beasts or not, and follow the direction indicated.
Because what might he do with his prisoners then?
Hyrcanus was now interrupting himself to raise another point: “I wonder whether we ought not to approach Prince Mark—or any successful monarch might do, I suppose—with the idea of making some kind of trade for this lovely piece of magic, or offering it for sale—after, of course, we have used it to the best advantage for the Temple.”
“Prince Mark,” mused the Director, in a non-committal tone.
“I am assuming Mark can raise sufficient treasure to make such a purchase—indeed such a powerful Prince ought to be able to do so.”
A brief debate on this point followed, between Hyrcanus and his Director of Security. Finally the latter brought the discussion back to considerations of safety.
Valdemar, listening attentively, gathered that neither the Chairman nor the Director believed Mark had been able to retain any appreciable amount of booty from the fabulous, infamous Great Raid. Both officials seemed to be saying that comparatively little
Blue Temple wealth had actually been lost on that occasion.
But neither of the Blue Temple leaders seemed able to believe that Mark had not spent his years in power in Tasavalta amassing more wealth for himself.
Eventually they came back to the business at hand—getting the best possible quick advantage from Wayfinder.
“The more I think about it, Director, the more it seems to me that you are right. To assure that we obtain an unequivocal, useful answer, we must be clear in our own minds about the nature of the specific treasure we are seeking.” Hyrcanus toyed meditatively with the Sword.
The Director said: “I should think, Your Opulence, that the most likely site for a truly unsurpassable treasure might well be in one of the Blue Temple’s own vaults.”
“What do you say?”
“I wonder, sir, if we will know whether this Sword is pointing at our own gold. Do you, personally, know the locations, and certified values, of each and every one of our own hoards? Their bearings from this spot?”
Hyrcanus hesitated fractionally before insisting: “Of course I do! Don’t you?”
“Of course—sir.”
Valdemar, listening, marveled at the indications suggesting that neither of these men was really sure of the matter.
The young man could see the fires of cupidity beginning to burn out of control in the eyes of the new masters of the Sword of Wisdom, as they huddled close over their prize. It looked as if the Director was beginning to be won over from his concerns of safety by his master’s all-powerful greed. They were both staring at Wayfinder obsessively now. Perhaps, Valdemar thought, they were coming to terms with the condition all users of this weapon had to face—that the so-called Sword of Wisdom would never tell anyone Why, or What, or How, or When—or Whether—regarding any thing—but only, with seeming infallibility, exactly Where.
Hyrcanus murmured: “You are right. If our own treasure be not the greatest—then whose?”
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