Swift-spoken runes and a graceful weaving of the hands, all done without conscious thought on Alfred’s part, reduced the iron bars of the cell to small piles of rust lined up in a neat row.
Alfred touched the Haplo’s neck. He could not find the heartbeat, the life’s pulse had sunk low, and he feared he was too late. Reaching out a gentle, trembling hand, he turned the man’s head to the light. He saw the eyelids flutter. He could feel a soft stirring of warm breath on the skin of the hand that he held near the Patryn’s cracked and parched lips. He was alive, but just barely.
“Haplo!” Alfred leaned near, whispering urgently. “Haplo! Can you hear me!” Watching anxiously, he saw the man’s head nod with a feeble motion. Relief flooded through him. “Haplo! Tell me what happened to you? Is it sickness? A wound? Tell me! I”—Alfred drew a deep breath, but there had really never been any doubt over his decision—”I can heal you—”
“No!” The crusted lips could barely move, but Haplo managed to form the word, managed to summon enough breath to speak it aloud. “I won’t… owe my life … Sartan.” He ceased talking, shut his eyes. A spasm convulsed his body and he cried out in agony.
Alfred hadn’t foreseen this, couldn’t think how to handle it. “You wouldn’t owe your life to me! I owe you!” He was babbling, but it was the only thing he could think to do under the circumstance. “You saved my life from the dragon. On Arian—”
Haplo sucked in a breath. He opened his eyes, reached out and gripped Alfred’s robes. “Shut up and … listen. You can do … one thing for me … Sartan. Promise! Swear!”
“I—I swear,” Alfred said, not knowing what else to say. The Patryn was very near death.
Haplo was forced to pause, summon his waning strength. He ran his swollen tongue over lips coated with a strange, black substance. “Don’t let them. . . resurrect me. Burn… my body. Destroy it. Understand.” The eyes opened, gazed intently into Alfred’s. “Understand?”
Slowly, Alfred shook his head. “I can’t let you die.”
“Damn you!” Haplo gasped, his weak hand losing its grasp.;
Alfred traced the runes in the air, began his chant. His only question now, the only dread left in his heart was: would his magic work on a Patryn?
Behind him, he heard, like an echo of his own words, the soft phrase, “I won’t let you die!” And he heard the chanting of runes. Alfred, concentrating on his work, paid no attention.
“Damn you!” Haplo cursed him.
CHAPTER * 33
THE CATACOMBS, ABARRACH
FOLLOWING ALFRED’S FIRST ENCOUNTER WITH HAPLO ON ARIANUS, the Sartan took pains to study the Patryns, the ancient enemy. The early Sartan were meticulous record keepers, and Alfred delved into the mass of histories and treatises kept in the record vaults in the mausoleum beneath Drevlin. He searched particularly for information on the Patryns themselves and their concepts of magic. He found little, the Patryns having been wary of revealing their secrets to their enemies. But one text struck him particularly, and it came now to his mind.
It had been written, not by a Sartan, but by an elven wizardess, who had formed a romantic liaison (brief and volatile) with a Patryn.
The concept of the circle is the key to the understanding of Patryn magic. The circle rules not only the runes they tattoo upon their bodies and how those runes are structured, but it also extends into every facet of their lives—the relationship between the mind and body, relationships between two people, relationships with the community. The rupture of the circle, whether it be injury to the body, the destruction of a relationship, or rupture in the community, is to be avoided at all costs.
The Sartan and others who have encountered the Patryns and are familiar with their harsh, cruel, and dictatorial personalities are continually amazed at the strong loyalty these people feel for their own kind. (And only their own kind!) To those who understand the concept of the circle, however, such loyalty is not surprising. The circle preserves the strength of their community by cutting the community off from those the