But he said, “What was it made you think the singer sang to you?”
“Only that he sang of the far north,” I said without thinking, “and in the Bright Desmesne a Seer told me my future lay there … with Silkhands.” I did not say the Seer was Windlow.
“Well then, that’s twice,” said Chance. “And Riddle’s grandpa is three times. Remember what I always said about that. Once is the thing itself, twice is a curiosity, but three times is Game.”
I did remember. It had always been one of Chance’s favorite sayings, particularly when I had committed some childish prank more than twice. “Whose Game? Who would be pulling me north?”
“Well, lad, there’s pulling and there’s pushing. The ghost was lamenting the loss of those things you carry. And maybe those things you carry are lamenting the loss of their bodies. I would if it was me. Maybe it’s them want to get back where they came from.”
So Chance was no help, no help at all. The knife of conscience twisted, and the serpent of guilt writhed under the knife. Was it possible? Could they be pushing me without my knowing? I tried to say no. “They have to use my brain to think with, Chance. They are only¾what did old Manacle call it¾patterns of personality. They are whatever they were when they were made. Didir comes into my head always the same Didir. She uses my mind, my memories to think with, but she does not carry those memories back into the blue. They stay in my mind, not hers. What I forget, she cannot remember. They couldn’t pull or push without my knowing!” I said this very confidently, but I was not sure. “And I’m not sure that Silkhands and I ought to go north for such a reason. It’s probably very dangerous.”
He looked at me in astonishment. “And what do I hear? Peter talking about dangerous? Well, and the daylight may turn pale purple and all the lakes be full of fish stew. I thought never to hear such stuff after Bannerwell. If we are not here to seek out mysteries and answer deep questions, why are we?”
“Why, Chance.” I laughed uncomfortably. “You’re a philosopher.”
“No.” He rubbed his nose and looked embarrassed. “Actually I was quoting Mertyn.”
I might have known. Oh, Gamelords, I could not turn my back on this thing without feeling cut in half. I could at least pretend to go wholeheartedly, even if I were torn. Why not follow the scent laid down for me as a fustigar follows a bunwit, “Head high and howling,” as Gamesmaster Gervaise was wont to say. These agonized thoughts were interrupted.
“Where did you and Silkhands arrange to meet?”
“She will be leaving Xammer soon, tomorrow or the next day. I thought it better not to travel together so close to the Bright Demesne. If someone is watching and plotting, let them work at it a little. I told her we would meet her below the Devil’s Fork of the River Reave, at the town there. Here, let us see.”
I burrowed out the chart we had been at such pains to buy, spreading it upon the ground with stones at the corner to keep it flat. It was well made, on fine leather, the lettering as tiny and distinct as care and skill could make it. I found where we were, between the ruins and the Great North Road, then traced that road north with my finger to the place it split below the fork in River Reave. The town was there. Reavebridge.
“Well,” I said, “we can go in disguise, on the road or off it; or in our own guise, on the road or off it. You are the wary one. I leave it to you.”
“Then let us continue as Smitheries, father and son,” he said. I agreed to that, and we packed up our things to ride away northeast where stretched the Great North Road.
The river which the Immutables call the Boundary came out of the northeast, and we followed it through the pleasant forests and farmlands north of Xammer. Ahead of us we could see the frowning brows of Two Headed Mountain, two days’ ride away, which cupped the Phoenix Demesne at its foot. Farther north were the bald stone tops of Three Knob, hazed with smoke from the foundries there. These were both landmarks I remembered from my years at Schooltown, though I had never yet seen either of them much closer than we saw them on our way. Behind Three Knob, between it and the rising range of eastern mountains, was said to be what Himaggery called a Thandbarian Demesne made up of Empaths, Mirrormen, Revenants … I couldn’t remember the other four Thandbarian Talents by Himaggery’s scheme of Indexing. His scheme depended upon listing all the Talents which shared porting as a Talent, first, then all those left which shared Moving, then Reading, and so on. I wasn’t sure it was any easier to remember than the old Indexes which listed each Talent as a separate thing, unique of its kind. One didn’t seem to make any more sense than the other. There were still thousands of different Gamesmen. If the Talents were evenly distributed, said Himaggery, then half of all Gamesmen would have any one of the Talents. Still, Himaggery was attached to his scheme, and according to him there were seven Thandbarian Talents and over a thousand Elatorian ones. And no Necromantic ones at all except for Necromancers themselves. Which was idiotic, because there were Necromantic ones, Ghouls and Bonedancers and even Rancelmen.