have been this faint robe-rustle sound of rising.
Mark held his breath as the blind face turned once
more toward him, and this time stayed turned in his
direction. Behind those eyelashes, white and
grotesquely long, the pale collapsed lids were as
magnetic as any stare. Something about them was
perversely beautiful.
There was a tiny almost inaudible humming, a
miniature disturbance in the air near the Dark King’s
head. Some demonic or familiar power was
communicating with him-so Mark perceived, watching
with Sightblinder’s handle in the grip of his hand.
The Dark King seemed about to speak, but
hesitated, as if he were magically aware that
something was wrong, that matters here in this
innermost seat of his power were not as they should
be. Still the blind face confronted Mark, and Vilkata
whispered a soft question into the air. A humming
answer came. Mark could feel the power of the
sheathed Sword at his own side suddenly thrum more
strongly.
When Vilkata did speak aloud, Mark was surprised
at the sound of his voice, smooth, deep, and pleasant.
“Burslem, I am surprised to see you here. I take it
that the task I sent you on has been completed?”
Burslem. To Mark the name meant nothing. “It is
indeed, my lord. My head on it.”
“Indeed, as you say . . . now all of you, finish
quickly what you are about in here. I want you all
at the conference table as quickly as possible. The
generals are waiting.” And Vilkata and his halfvisible
familiar vanished, behind a sable swirl of draperies.
One wizard, a junior member of the group perhaps,
stayed behind briefly to settle whatever still remained
to be settled upon their ghastly altar. The others,
Mark among them, filed through the doorway where
Vilkata had disappeared. They passed through the
next chamber, which was filled with what looked like
draped furniture, and entered the next beyond that.
The room was larger, and somewhat better lighted.
It contained a conference table large enough to
accommodate in its surrounding chairs all of the
magicians and an approximately equal number of
military-looking men and women, who as Vilkata had
said were already seated and waiting. The military
people wore symbolic scraps of armor, though as
Mark noted none of them were visibly armed there in
the presence of their King. Vilkata himself,
predictably, was seated in a larger chair than the
others, at one end of the table. Behind him a map on a
large scale, supported on wooden poles, bore many
symbols, indicating among other things what appeared
to be the positions of several armies. There was
Tashigang, near the center of the map, there the
winding Corgo making its way northward to the sea.
There was the Great Swamp ….
Mark was making a hasty effort to memorize the
types and positions of the symbols on the map, but the
distractions at the moment were overpowering. The
magicians were taking their places at the table, and
fortunately there seemed to be little ceremony
about it. But again Mark had to delay marginally, to
be able to make a guess as to what place Burslem
ought to take. He was not sure whether to be relieved
or not, when he found himself pulling out the last
vacant chair, some distance down the table from the
King.
As the faint noise of people seated themselves died
out, a silence hold upon the room, and stretched. As
Vilkata sat on his raised chair, the hilt of the
Mindsword at his side was plainly visible to the rest of
the assembly. And the humming presence above the
King’s head came and went, all but imperceptibly to
the others in the room.
“I see,” the Dark King said at last-and if there was
irony in those two words, Mark thought that it was
subtly measured-“that none of you are able to tear
your eyes away from my new toy here at my side.
Doubtless you are wondering where I got it, and how
I managed to so without your help. Well, I’ll give you
all a close look at it presently. But first there’s a
report or two I want to hear.”
Again the blind face turned back and forth, as if
Vilkata were seeking to make sure of something. A
faint frown creased the white brow, otherwise
youthfully unlined. “Burslem,” the Dark King added in
his pleasant voice, “I want to hear your report in
private, a little later. After you have seen my Sword.”
“As you will, Lord,” Mark said clearly. In his own
ears, his voice still sounded like his own. The others
all heard it without noticing anything amiss. But
whatever Vilkata heard did not erase his faint
suspicious frown.
Now some of the magicians and generals, following
an order of precedence that Mark could not
identify, began to make reports to the King and his
council, each speaker in turn standing up at his or her
own place at the table. The unsuspected spy was able
to listen, half-comprehending, to lists of military units,
to descriptions of problems in levying troops and
gathering supplies, to unexpected difficulties with the
constructions of a road that would be needed later to
facilitate the unexplained movement of some army. It
seemed to Mark that invaluable facts, information vital
for Sir Andrew and his allies, were marching at a fast
pace into his ears and out again. Listen! he demanded
of himself in silent anguish. Absorb this, retain it! Yet
it seemed that he could not. Then there came a
relieving thought. When he saw Dame Yoldi again,
she would be able to help him recapture anything that,
he heard now; he had seen her do as much for others
in the past.
If he ever got to see Dame Yoldi’s beautiful face
again. If he ever managed to leave this camp alive.
There was the monstrous Sword at Vilkata’s side,
and here was Vilkata himself, seated within what
looked like easy striking distance of Mark’s own
Sword, or of -his bow-Mark still had his two arrows
left. More important by far, thought Mark, than any
mere information that could be collected, would be to
deprive the Dark King of the Mindsword, and, if
possible, of his own evil life as well.
Mark knew of no way by which the Mindsword, or
any of its eleven peers, could be destroyed. The only
way he could deprive the enemy of its use would be
by capturing it himself, and getting away with it.
There was a chance, he told himself, maybe even a
good chance, that Sightblinder could disguise and
preserve him against demonic and
human fury while he did so. Against demons he had a
new hope now, hope in the inexplicable power of a
few simple words.
It seemed likely that he would have to kill Vilkata to
get the Mindsword from him. And that would be a
good deed in itself. Yes, he would kill Vilkata . . . if he
could. If the evil magicians in the outer chamber had
had magical defenses, how much stronger, if less
obvious, would be those of the Dark King himself?
To strike at Vilkata successfully, he would have to
choose his moment with great care. Bound into his
own thoughts by calculation and fear, Mark lost touch
with the discussion that was going on around the
table. Presently, with a small shock, he realized that
the Dark King was now addressing his assembled
aides, and had been speaking for some time. All of
them-including Mark himself, half consciously-were
answering from time to time with nods and murmurs
of agreement. Probably Mark had been roused to full
attention by the fact that the voice of the Dark King
was now rising to an oratorical conclusion:
“-our plan is war, and our plan goes forward
rapidly!”
There was general applause, immediate and loud.
The first to respond in a more particular way was a
bluff, hearty-looking military man, who wore a scrap
or two of armor to indicate his status. This man
leaped to his feet with apparently spontaneous
enthusiasm, and with a kind of innocence in his face.
There was a tone of hearty virtue in his voice as
well. “Who are we going to hit first, sir?”
Vilkata paused before he turned his blind face
toward the questioner, as if perhaps the Dark King
had found, the question none too intelligent. “We are
going to hit Yambu. She is the strongest-next to me-
and therefore the most dangerous. Besides, I have
just received disturbing news about her . . . but of that
I will speak a little later.”
Here Vilkata paused again. The almost inaudible
humming, almost invisible vibration, continued to
perturb the air above his head. “I see that most of you
are still unable to keep from staring at my plaything
here,” he said, and put his pale right hand on his
Sword’s hilt. “Very well. Because I want you, later, to