I cannot put into words what rang then in my head. I know that I sank to the ground, as though a great hand were pressing me flat. Above Rogear’s head stood a column of black flame, not red like honest fire but – black! Its tip inclined toward Lord Amber. But he did not start away. He stood watching as if this did not concern him.
Though I cried a warning, I did not hear my own words. The flame leaned and leaned, out across the star, the circle which enclosed it, poised over Lord Amber’s head. Yet he did not even raise his eyes to see its threat, only watched Rogear.
About Rogear and the woman he held to him, the flame leaped and thickened as if it fed upon their bodies. It grew darker than ever, until they were hidden. And the tip of the flame moved as if trying to reach Lord Amber. Still it did not.
Slowly it began to die, fall back upon itself, growing less and less. And as it went it did not disclose Rogear or the woman. Finally it was but a glowering spark on the pavement – and nothing! They, too, were gone.
I put my hands to my eyes. To see that ending – it gave me such fear as I had never known, even though it did not threaten me. Then – there was silence!
I waited for my lord to speak – opening my eyes when he did not. And I cried out, forgetting all else. For no longer did he stand confidently upright to face his foes. He lay as crumpled beyond the circle as those who left within it – and as still.
About my feet the serpent no longer coiled. I staggered toward him, stopping only to pick up the gryphon. That was plain crystal again, its warmth and life gone.
As I had once held Toross against the coming of death, so did I now cradle my lord’s head against me. His eyes were closed. I could not see their strange yellow fires. At first I thought he was dead. But under my questing fingers his heart still beat, if slowly. In so much be had won, he was still alive. And if I could only keep him so –
“He will live.”
I turned my head, startled, fierce in my protection of the one I held. From whence had this one come? He stood with his back to the wall of the cliff, leaning a little on a staff carven with runes. His face seemed to shift queerly when I looked upon him, now appearing that of a man in late middle life, again that of a young warrior. But his clothing was gray as the stone behind him and could have been that of a trader.
“Who – ?” I began.
He shook his head, looking at me gently as one who soothes a child. “What is a name? Well, you may call me Neevor, which is as good a name as any and once of some service to me – and others.”
Now he stood away from the cliff and came into the circle. But as he came he used his staff to gesture right and left. The evil outer circle was gone; the star also. Then he pointed to the girl, the other man, to all other evidences of those who had striven to call the Power here. And they were also gone, as if they were part of a dream from which I had now awakened.
At last he neared me and my lord, and he was smiling. Putting out the staff again, he touched my forehead and, secondly, touched my lord on the breast. I was no longer afraid, but filled with a vast happiness and courage, so that in that moment I could have stood even against the full army of invaders. Yet this was better than battle courage, for it reached for life and not death.
Neevor nodded to me. “Just so,” he said, as if pleased. “Look to your key, Joisan, for it will turn only for you, as that one who dabbled in what was far beyond him knew.”
“Key?” I was bemused by his order.
“Ah, child, what wear you now upon your breast? Freely given to you it was with goodwill, by one who found the lost – and not by chance. Patterns are set in one time, to be followed to the end of all years to come. Woven in, woven out-”
The tip of his staff moved across the ground back and forth. I watched it, feeling that I could understand its meaning if I only made some effort, knew more.
I heard him laugh. “You shall, Joisan, you shall – all in good time.”
My lord opened his eyes, and there was life and recognition in his expression, but also puzzlement. He stirred as if to leave my hold, but I tightened that.
“I am – “ he said slowly.
Neevor stood beside us, regarding us with the warmth of a smile.
“In this time and place you are Kerovan. Perhaps a little less than you once were, but with the way before you to return if you wish. Did I not name you ‘kinsman’?”
“But I – I was – “
Neevor’s staff touched him once more on the forehead. “You were a part, not the whole. As you now are, you could not long contain what came to remind you of what you were and can be. Just as those poor fools could not contain the evil they called down, which consumed them in the end. Be content, Kerovan, yet seek – for those who seek find.” He turned a little and pointed with his staff to the blankness of the cliff. “There lies the gate; open it when you wish, there is much beyond to interest you.”
With that he was gone!
“My Lord!”
He struggled up, breaking my hold. Not to put me aside as I feared he now would, but rather to take me in his arms.
“Joisan!” He said only my name, but that was enough. This was the oneness I had ever sought, without knowing, and finding it was all the riches of the world spread before me for the taking.
Kerovan:
I held Joisan in my arms. I was Kerovan, surely I was Kerovan. Still –
Because that memory of the other one, the one who had worn my body for a space as I have worn mail, clung, so did I also cling to Joisan, who was human, who was living as I knew life and not –
Then the full sense of who and what I was as Kerovan returned. Gently I loosed my hold of her. Standing, I drew her to her feet. Then I was aware that the happiness of her face was fading and she watched me with troubled eyes.
“You – you are going away!” She clutched my forearms with her hands, would not let me turn from her. “I can feel it – you are going from me because you wish to!” Now her words had an angry ring.
I could remember our first meeting and how she had looked upon me then – I who was not wholly human, part something else that I did not yet know or understand.
“I am not an Old One,” I told her straightly. “I am indeed Kerovan, who was born thus!” I shook off her hold to step back and show her one of those hoofed feet, thrust stiffly out that she might see it plain. “I was born by sorcery, to become a tool for one who aspired to the Power. You watched her try to destroy what she had created, and instead she herself was destroyed.”
Joisan glanced to where the flame had eaten up those two.
‘Twice – cursed was I from the beginning: by my father’s line and by my mother’s desire. Do you understand? No fit mate for any human woman am I. I have said – Kerovan is dead. That is the truth, just as Ulmsdale is destroyed, and with it all the House of Ulm. . . .”
“You are my promised, wedded lord, call yourself what you desire.”
How could I break that tie she pulled so tight between us? Half of me, no, more than half, wanted to yield, to be as other men. But the fact that I had been a vessel into which something else had poured, even though that was gone again – How could I be sure it would not return, with force enough to reach out to Joisan? I could not – tainted, cursed, deformed – give me that name best-suited. I was no lord for her.
Once more I retreated, edging away, lest her hand meet mine once again and I could not control the desire of that part of me human-rooted. Yet I could not turn and go from her, leave her alone in the Waste. And if I went with her, back to her people, could I continue to hold to my resolve?