“You spoke to the imperor, telling him of the preflecting pool.”
She sighed again.”It was a misjudgment and it did no good.”
“I think mayhap it did, Lady.” Shandie had found Sagorn, and Rap. According to Kadie, Gath had recognized the imperor in time for Inos to save him from the goblins. Ylo had remained loyal to Shandie in the hope of seducing his wife and had thereby made possible his escape from Hub—all these things because of the visions in the pool.
“Mayhap it slowed the fall,” the Keeper conceded in her leathery whisper, “but it will not change the outcome for the better. I may have incurred the enmity of the Gods by overstepping the limits They set for Keef.”
“Keef?” he queried. Then he turned his face to look at the dark miasma of anguish rising from the floor in that other corner.
“The first Keeper lies there. Your presence here awakens ancient malice, Rap of Krasnegar.”
“I mean no harm.”
“Indeed you do!” The Keeper straightened; fury flamed around her. “You hope to enlist our help in your vain struggle against the one who calls himself the Almighty. You would have us discard a thousand years of sacrifice and renunciation. You would tear down walls that generations have lived to defend.”
Rap was shaken by the vehemence of her rejection. “Is not the battle against the Evil a duty for all mortals?”
“Do not presume to lecture me on what is evil!” Her voice rang louder, and bitter. Echoes stirred. “The sufferings that the world inflicted upon Thume cleared any debt—that was the concession Keef wrung from the Gods. We may keep the world away, but never meddle.”
“Then you do not know what is happening out there.”
“I know very well. The Keeper is allowed to watch—even, in some cases, to send others to appraise. But knowledge must not stray into action.”
She was as open to argument as a granite pillar. His cause was hopeless.
“Then tell me how things stand.”
At once he wondered if he had been wise to ask that. Her gruesome, wizened face writhed into a cryptic smile. Before he could summon courage to withdraw the question, she answered it.
“They do not stand. They crumble even as you breathe. Every day his power waxes. Even I, with all my powers, dare not venture now beyond the boundaries of my domain lest I be discerned.”
“If we can gather all the free sorcerers of the world together—”
“You will not come close to matching the Covin.”
There was a dread finality about that judgment. If it was true, then the war was lost. If it was true. Rap felt the cold despair of the Chapel chilling his heart. He struggled against the ancient negation he sensed in this strange place, the stark hopelessness, a thousand years of denial.
“With respect—can you know this?”
“I can. I do. I have watched this evil grow since long before the wardens knew of it, and I have its measure.”
“Add to those few sorcerers, then, the many I suspect you have here in Thume. Add also yourself, the paramount power of a demigod. How then does the balance seem, Lady?”
“Closer,” she admitted, “but still not a fair fight. And you shall not draw on our powers. All we have is needed to preserve our security. We will not throw it away in a hopeless cause.”
His quest was doomed! Angrily Rap rose to his feet. He was handily the taller, yet so great was her might that he still felt prostrate before her.
“How can you hope to keep your presence secret? You know the dwarf’s mind. As his powers grow, so do his fears. If he rules all the world but Thume, then he will feel required to rule Thume, also. He will find you and he will crush you in your turn!”
“The land is hidden from him and will remain so,” the Keeper said with icy finality.
“Then may I take my child and depart in peace?”
The Keeper’s hollow eyes glittered. “No. I told you I may not meddle. I have answered your questions. To release you with what you know would be to influence events.”
He had suspected that. “You lay subtle traps!” he said bitterly.
“But unequivocal. You and the girl will remain. You will find life here tedious, perhaps, but it will be better than the torment Zinixo would impose upon you. And when you die, Sorcerer, you will deed us your words of power in payment for your board.”
“But—”
“Such is my decree.” The Keeper and her chair faded like smoke into the dark, leaving the Chapel empty. The grave in the corner continued to pour forth its thousand-year lamentation.
Hope never comes:
A dungeon horrible, on all sides round
As one great furnace flam’d; yet from those flames
No light, but rather darkness visible
Serv’d only to discover signs of woe,
Regions of sorrow, doleful shades, where peace
And rest can never dwell, hope never comes
That comes to all.
— Milton, Paradise Lost, I, 60
EIGHT
Minstrel boy
1
Stroke! Stroke! Stroke! . . .
Blood Wave II
rushed over the gray sea with a bone in her teeth, lifting her head in time to the strokes, riding the long swell. Banked oars moved as one, brawny rowers moved as one, breathed as one: blades up, heads down; heads up, blades down; stroke, stroke! The pace was merciless. Gath had never seen Drakkor drive his crew like this. It seemed impossible that those gasping, sweating men could stand the strain a moment longer. Veins bulged in scarlet faces. Almost every oar handle was smeared with fresh blood, yet not a man aboard would even want to quit, because there was a race in progress. They would sooner die than lose, all of them.
It seemed rather silly to Gath. He was only half jotunn—two quarters, to be exact—so perhaps his mixed blood didn’t have the right ingredients to let him understand how plowing a beach ten minutes ahead of another crew could be worth all this torture. More important, his prescience made him quite certain that Blood Wave was going to win. That did take the thrill out of things.
The cliff ahead rose sheer from the ocean, its toes standing in a welter of white surf like fleece. Blood Wave would pass that reef to starboard, and very close. To larboard, and even closer, Seadragon matched her pace. He could hear the hoarse intake of breath from their crew over the cold wind, the cold salt wind that must feel so kind to all the overheated, halfnaked rowers.
He was on water duty with Vork, moving down the lines with a water skin, squirting into open mouths as the heads went back at the end of the stroke. Three or four mouthfuls per man, a quick cooling drench on the head, then on to the next. It was infinitely easier work than the actual rowing, but it required every bit as much care. If he stumbled into an oar or even shot the jet into a man’s face and threw him off his timing, then all the Gods would not save him from the thane’s fury—or the crew’s, for that matter. He would be torn apart.
His prescience showed it happening—very faintly, but clear enough to keep him mindful of the danger. The chances that Vork would do it were clearer, quite scarily possible. Still, Gath would not say anything. To mention prescience or sorcery on board this ship brought an automatic whipping, as he’d learned the first day.
The cape was Killer’s Head and on the other side of it lay Gark, Blood Wave’s home port, Thane Drakkor’s thanedom. The island itself was Narp; part of it was Gark and part was Spithfrith, but the division varied from time to time, depending on the respective thanes’ skill at denting and perforating neighbors. At the moment almost the whole island was Spithfrith, and Blood Wave’s crew had given young Vork a very rough voyage because of that. Gark was the little town that would be coming into view shortly. For the last hour Gath had known what it would look like, and he was not much impressed. He would not say so.
He washed down Grablor and moved to Red, the biggest man aboard, who amply deserved his nickname now. His hair was even redder than Vork’s, and today his face matched it. His eyes bulged like onions. Gath wanted to ask why Blood Wave’s crew would be so utterly and eternally disgraced if Thane Trakrog’s Seadragon reached Drakkor’s home port first. It made no sense, because they’d sighted Trakrog hull-down two hours ago and made up all that distance already, but apparently it did matter. It mattered greatly.
He gave Red his third squirt, doused his head as it went forward, and then moved to the next man, Gismak, sneaking a glance at the opposition.