“No apologies are necessary,” said the figure. The voice was low and muted. There was something peculiar about the sound, as if it were coming through water from a long way off. An obscuring charm, thought the Silentman to himself. A powerful one, too. Well, I won’t grudge him that. After all, I use them myself.
“This is the appointed day,” continued the figure. It paused and its head turned from the Silentman to Dreccan and then back. “Where’s the box?”
“Right here,” said the Silentman. “And our gold?”
“First the box. Was it found where I said it was?”
“Precisely,” said Dreccan. “Right where you said.”
The Silentman nodded. “A child could’ve waltzed in and lifted it.”
“It took a great deal of skill,” said Dreccan hastily, “our best men. And not without danger. Sadly, we lost one on the job.”
The hooded face turned to him.
“Was the box opened?”
“Of course not,” said the Silentman. “We followed your instructions to the letter. The Guild’s about business, sir. When we accept a contract, we keep our word. We’re known through all of Tormay for—”
“Put it on the steps.”
Feeling somewhat disgruntled, the Silentman placed the box on the dais steps and then retreated back to his chair. The little fellow obviously did not trust them. The figure crouched over the box but did not touch it. The hood lowered until it was almost touching the carved hawk’s head on the lid. And then, the figure sniffed sharply. It straightened up.
“What have you done?!” said the figure.
“What do you mean?” said the Silentman. “We’ve got you your box, haven’t we? Where’s our gold now?”
“Your gold?” said the figure. “Curse your gold! You’ve opened the box!”
“You must be mistaken,” said the Silentman. “No one’s opened the blasted thing.”
“The box has been opened, and what was once within is now gone. You’ll not get your gold!”
“Here now,” said the Silentman. “How do I know you’re telling the truth and not just trying to swindle us out of our gold, hey? What about that? I wasn’t born yesterday!”
“Fool! I would happily give you the wealth of the entire world for what was once in this box. I would have filled this court with gold. But you have brought your doom upon you. You and this accursed city!”
“Doom?” said the Silentman, alarmed at these words. “What do you mean by that?”
“Death,” said the figure. “Death, and something worse. Unless you can do one thing.”
“What’s that?”
“Bring the person who opened the box. Bring them alive and you yourself shall live.”
The Silentman gulped and mopped his forehead. The person who opened the box?
“Certainly,” he said. “Anything you want. Anything at all.”
“It isn’t what I want. My wants are nothing. It’s what my master wants. And he is coming.”
“Oh, he is? And when do you think—”
“Find the person who opened the box. Quickly, for you do not know what you have done. The power that was inside the box is beyond your imagining, the power to destroy, the power to bring to life in a single breath. The power to preserve. Do you not know that all of Tormay is as dross in comparison to what that box held? Find the person who opened it. My master is coming soon!”
The Silentman opened his mouth to say something—he was not sure what—but the figure was gone. The lamplight flared and the shadows in the court retreated.
“Ronan,” said Dreccan, after what seemed like a long silence.
“Find him!” The Silentman pounded his fist on his chair. “Find him now!”
“And what of the boy?” said Dreccan.
“What do you mean?” said the Silentman. “The boy’s dead. Ronan killed him.”
“But you heard what he said.”
“What are you babbling about? I want that gold!”
“The power to destroy.” Dreccan’s face was pale in the lamplight. “The power to destroy, the power to bring to life in a single breath. The power to preserve.”
When the Silentman spoke. His voice was slow and tired.
“Then maybe it isn’t just Ronan we need to find.”
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE: THE VIEW TO THE EAST
The hawk angled through the night sky on his outstretched wings. The city of Hearne lay far beneath him, pricked with light here and there, but mostly sleeping in darkness on the edge of the sea. The night sky above the hawk had more light to offer than the city, blazing and sparkling with stars in a perfectly clear expanse. The stars seemed impossibly close, and they bent their gaze down to the world and to the hawk flying alone in the night.
There were, perhaps, only four people in all of Tormay, save the hawk, who would have had the wisdom to hear the speech of stars, but they all were asleep. Only the hawk heard.
The stars hastened lower, growing in brilliance and deepening in the colors of their fire. Ruby, emerald, diamond and amethyst, the night grew darker and blacker around them as they burned ever brighter with their gem-like fire.
Hast thou seen? whispered one star.
Hast thou seen and hast thou not heard?
There is one who dreams in the darkness.
But he sleeps still, said another star.
Thankfully, he sleeps.
And thou, little wing, thou must watch and wait.
Watch and wait.
Look ye to the east.
Fly well, little wing, murmured another star.
Aye, fly well, for the house of dreams sleeps not.
Never sleeps but doth watch over all.
Even the stars, added another stars.
Even the stars!
Rejoice!
And with this word echoing in the sky, the voices of the stars grew and rose in liquid song, thrilling through the dark and the bitter cold and the unfathomable distances of space. The sky trembled with the sound. The beauty of it was so sharp and sudden that the hawk faltered in his flight. But then the chorus died away and the stars withdrew to their appointed courses, shining in comfort and sorrow. The two will ever go hand-in-hand, for that is the balance of wisdom. The hawk knew it well, knew it to his own comfort and sorrow.
As he flew, the hawk considered carefully what he had heard. His gaze until this moment had ever been on the city of Hearne, particularly on the dark ruins of the university where the boy Jute slept. Now, however, he turned his beak to the east and looked there. There was no one in all of Tormay, no person, animal, or bird, who had as keen eyesight as the hawk. But even he could not pierce the night with his vision. All he could make out, far across the miles and distance, was the vague, jagged outlines of the Morn Mountains in the east, their snowy peaks touched here and there with starlight and moonlight.
With a shrug of his wings, the hawk turned and spiraled down toward the city. Hearne slept in an uneasy quiet below him. He could hear the surge and crash of the waves on the beach beneath the wharves. He could smell bread baking as a baker went about his lonely morning duties. His sharp eyes caught a hint of movement in an alley as three cats strolled along, careless and casual in their pursuit of rodents. Despite these tiny signs of life, the city lay in darkness. A deep darkness.
The hawk alighted on top of the tallest tower in the university ruins. He furled his wings. He could feel the whispering of the wards guarding the university. Down and away to his right, in one of the larger and better preserved wings of the complex, he sensed Jute. Sleeping, safe and sound. The hawk nodded in satisfaction at this. The wind blowing past the tower seemed to sigh in agreement.
The hawk turned and gazed to the east. There was nothing to see there except for the night, of course. But that did not matter to the hawk. He waited and watched and he did not sleep. He spent the remainder of the night there, perched in silence on the tower roof. And even when the first faint blush of sunrise crept up into the eastern sky, he was st
ill watching.
About Christopher Bunn
Christopher Bunn has worked on all the continents except for Antarctica, holding jobs in television production, construction, refugee work, and cobbling. Currently, he lives with his family in California and works on a farm.
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Steve Windsor and Lise Carter
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