“No,” he replied. “They sent for me after Mandor died.”
“Dead? Mandor?” I could not imagine it, even though I had foretold it myself. I had known he could not long withstand the pain of a disfigurement visible to everyone, of loss of power, of the absence of adoration, not he who had lived for power and adoration and had adored himself not least among them. And yet … it was strange to think of him dead. “How did he die?”
“From the tower.” Riddle indicated the finger of stone which gestured rudely from the western edge of the keep. “He stood there often. We saw him in the dusk, or at dawn, a black blot against the sky. Then one morning he was not there, and his body was found among the stones at the river’s side. They sent for me then, and I arrived in time to learn that Huld had gone as well.”
“Dead?”
“I fear not.” He looked angry, biting off the words as though they tasted bad. “Himaggery had left Demons here, around the edges of the place, to Read if any tried to escape. They did not Read Huld. I theorize that he drugged himself into unconsciousness after hiding in a wood wagon or some such. Certainly he went past us all without betraying his presence.”
I said nothing. I did not like the idea of Huld loose in the world. I shivered, and Riddle reached out to me again.
“So, my boy. What brings you to the Dike? Was it to meet with Mandor again?”
I shivered once more. “Never. I have an errand away north of here, and the Dike is a convenient place to begin the northern journey.”
“Ah. Well, you will not begin that road tonight, will you? There is time for hot food, and for a bath? Some talk, perhaps. I have not had news of the south for some time.”
So I went with him to his camp, a sturdy stone house near the mill, once almost in ruins but reroofed and made solid by the Immutables and those pawns released from Bannerwell. We were waited on by quiet people with faces I thought I recognized from the time of my captivity. At my unspoken question, Riddle explained.
“These were Mandor’s people, yes. Once his powers were nullified by our being here, he could not beguile them any longer. None would stay. They saw him, feared him, gradually learned what he had done to them and so began to hate him, I think. He could not bear it.”
“What had he done to them?” I asked cynically. “More than any Gamesman does?”
“More,” he said. “Though perhaps it was not he who conceived it…No. I will say no more about it.”
I wanted to hear no more about it, though later I was to wish I had insisted. I told him of the disappearance of Windlow and of Himaggery. He withdrew into startled silence, but then told me of other vanishments he knew of. He speculated, almost in a whisper. I drank wine and tried not to fall asleep. Others of the Immutables came in and greeted me kindly enough. They murmured among themselves while I yawned. Then we were alone and Riddle was leaning across the table to put his face close to mine.
“I have no right to ask it, Peter, but I beg a service of you. One you may be loath to give.”
“I will do what I can,” I murmured, half asleep.
“We need to speak with Mandor’s spirit.”
The sickness rose in me so that I choked on it, retching, tears pouring from my eyes as I tried not to vomit upon the table. In a moment he was putting cool water on my face, giving me a cup to drink. “How can you ask it,” I gargled at him. “And why? What would you know that his ghost can tell you?”
“We have found certain … things in Bannerwell. After Huld had gone, our people found them and summoned me. They are … things which some of these pawns have reason to remember with great pain. We have studied them as best we may. We need to know what they are, how used, but more important, from whence they came. Mandor would have known. We believe they belonged to him.”