Poggwydd looked around doubtfully. “Why should I do that? Why can’t I just go home? I can find my way once I’m outside again.”
Questor gave him a sympathetic look. “Not from here, you can’t. You will have to trust me on this.” He paused, thinking. “If you try, Poggwydd, Nightshade might get her hands on you a second time. Do you understand me?”
The Gnome nodded quickly. He understood, all right. “I’ll do as you say,” he agreed reluctantly. “How long do I have to wait?”
“I don’t know. Maybe quite a while. You must be patient.”
Poggwydd sniffled. “I don’t have anything to eat. I’m hungry.”
Abernathy rolled his eyes. Questor squeezed the Gnome’s shoulders and released him. “I know. Be brave. We’ll try to find you something to eat and bring it down. But you have to stay where you are, no matter what. This is important, Poggwydd. You must not leave this room for anything. All right?”
The Gnome rubbed at his nose and shrugged. “All right. I’ll wait. But try to hurry.”
“We’ll be as quick as we can.” Questor backed away, looking once again at Abernathy and Elizabeth. “We’ll have to start over, tourists or no tourists. The common rooms first, then back into storage. But I’m willing to bet the book we need is right out there where we can see it.”
“You know,” Elizabeth said thoughtfully, “I think there were some books that were kept separate from the others, ones printed in a language that no one here could read. My father mentioned them once.”
“Now we’re getting somewhere!” Questor exclaimed in undisguised glee. “Books written in Landover’s language, carried over by Michel or my brother! They would have to be the ones, wouldn’t they?”
And with that, following Questor’s final reassuring smile and wave of the hand to Poggwydd, they were out the door and on their way back through the castle.
The search took them longer than they expected, however, extending well into the late afternoon, when the last of the tourists were straggling back to their buses and cars and heading home. They hunted through the rooms of the castle twice before they found what they were looking for. There were books in every room, and most of them were under lock and key. That meant keeping watch and distracting both tourists and guides while the locks were released and a quick survey made to determine if any of the books were what they were looking for. Questor used magic on the locks, which hastened the process, but checking through the books took an inordinate amount of time and for most of the day yielded absolutely nothing.
Until finally, with time running out and the castle closing down, Elizabeth remembered a massive old glass-front cabinet in an upstairs drawing room tucked away in a dormer that was not visible from the roped-off doorway. There were some books there, she thought. Just a few, but she remembered them because her father had remarked once on their covers. Following her suggestion, they hurried to the drawing room as a bell sounded closing time in the downstairs hall. While the girl and Abernathy kept watch, Questor stepped over the ropes and wormed his way through an obstacle course of furniture to the cabinet. He peered inside. Sure enough, there were the books, a dozen of them, all wrapped in dark cloth covers that concealed the titles. The cabinet latch was locked, but a whisper of magic and he was inside.
Excited now, Questor reached past a collection of amethyst glassware that fronted the books and pulled the first out. To his extreme disappointment it was written in English and had nothing at all to do with Landover. He checked another two. It was the same. Another dead end, it seemed. Hope dwindling, he continued on more quickly. Books on gardening, travel, and history.
“Questor Thews, hurry!” Abernathy hissed from the doorway as voices from down the hall rapidly approached.
Questor opened the eighth book in the collection and his eyebrows shot up. It was written in Ancient Landoverian script, in a language the old wizards had commonly used. He paged through it hurriedly to make sure, hearing the voices more clearly: laughter, a quick greeting to Elizabeth, her response. Feverishly, he wedged himself between the wall and the cabinet, where he was out of sight of anyone standing in the doorway.
“Still poking about, Elizabeth?” someone asked, coming to a stop beyond the ropes. “Aren’t you getting hungry?”
“Oh, we’re almost done,” she replied with a nervous laugh. “Is it all right to stay a bit longer?”
“One hour,” a second voice advised. “Then we leave. Call if you need anything.”
The voices continued on down the hall and faded away.
“Questor!” Abernathy warned a second time, his patience obviously at an end.
Questor freed himself from his hiding place and looked down at his discovery. Carefully he pulled back the cloth covering. There were symbols etched in gold leaf on the leather binding that read Gateway Mythologies.
“Drat!” he muttered, shoved the book back into place, and pulled out the next one. Greensward Histories. He reached for the third.
Theories of Magic and Its Uses.
“Yes, yes, yes!” the wizard whispered in relief.
He could not take time to read it here, he knew. He checked the last of the volumes and found nothing. He would have to hope that the one in his hands held what he was looking for. He moved quickly back across the room toward the door.
“I’ve got it!” he announced triumphantly as he reached Elizabeth and Abernathy.
Abruptly an alarm went off. They all jumped, and Elizabeth gave a short cry. Questor hurriedly tucked the book into the carry bag he had brought. “What’s happened?” he gasped, white hair and beard flying out in every direction. “What did I do?”
“I don’t think you did anything at all!” Elizabeth grasped his arm as he whirled this way and that, casting about for imagined attackers. “It’s a fire alarm! But I can’t imagine what set it off!”
Questor Thews and Abernathy immediately looked at each other. “Poggwydd!” they exclaimed.
They hurried along the corridor to the stairs and started down, jostling and bumping against each other, all talking at once.
“We shouldn’t have left him alone!” Questor moaned, clutching the carry bag and its precious contents close against his chest.
“We should have tied and gagged him!” Abernathy snapped. From below came the sound of shouts.
“Maybe it isn’t him at all!” Elizabeth encouraged.
But it was, of course. Two security guards were hauling Poggwydd into view just as they arrived at the bottom of the stairs. The Gnome was disheveled and covered from head to foot in a coating of ash. He was struggling and moaning pathetically while the guards held him at arm’s length between them, not at all certain what it was they had.
“Boy, I’ve seen it all!” one of them was muttering.
“Shut up and hold on to him!” the other growled irritably.
Poggwydd caught sight of Questor Thews and started to call for help, but the wizard made a quick motion with one hand and the startled G’home Gnome was rendered instantly voiceless. His mouth worked in futile desperation, but nothing came out.
“Stand back, folks,” one of the guards advised as they carried the struggling Gnome past.
“What do you have there?” Questor asked, feigning ignorance.
“Don’t know.” The guard’s attention was diverted momentarily as Poggwydd tried to bite him. “Some sort of monkey, I guess. Filthy as a pig and twice as ugly. Found him in the kitchen, trying to start a fire. It almost looked like he was trying to cook some food he’d stolen, but c’mon, he’s a monkey, right? Anyway, the fire alarm went off or he might have burned the place down. Look at him fight! Mean little devil. Must have escaped from a zoo or something. How he found his way here, I’ll never know.”
“Well, be careful with him,” Questor offered, trying to avoid Poggwydd’s furious look.
“Careful as can be.” The guard laughed.
“There, there, little fellow,” Questor called after the struggling Gnome. “Someone
will come to claim you soon!”
“Can’t be soon enough for me!” the other guard called back, and the unfortunate Poggwydd was dragged kicking and writhing through the front door and out of sight.
Questor, Abernathy, and Elizabeth stood staring after the Gnome in silence for a moment. Then Questor said, “This is my fault. I completely forgot about him.”
“You told him to wait where he was,” Abernathy reminded him, evidencing a noticeable lack of sympathy. “He should have listened.”
“Questor, what did you do to stop him from talking?” Elizabeth asked.
The wizard sighed. “Cast a small spell. I couldn’t very well let him tell them who we are, and that is exactly what he was about to do. Besides, things would be much worse for Poggwydd if they found out he can talk. He is better off if they think him an animal, believe me.”
“He is an animal,” Abernathy muttered. “Stupid Gnome.”
“Stupid or not, we have to help him,” Elizabeth said at once.
“What we have to do,” Questor announced quickly, “is to go back to the house, where I can study this book and find out if it is what we are looking for.”
“It better be,” Abernathy grumbled. “I have seen all I care to see of Graum Wythe!”
“Where do you think they will take him?” Elizabeth asked, her brow creased with worry.
“Wherever they think he came from, I suppose,” Questor replied absently. He was peering down into the carry bag at the book.
“I just don’t want us to forget about him a second time,” Elizabeth insisted. They started for the entry. “He looks so helpless.”
“Believe me, he is anything but,” Abernathy sniffed. He was thinking about the G’home Gnomes’ penchant for eating stray pets. “He does not deserve an ounce of your sympathy. He is a nuisance, plain and simple.”
Elizabeth took his hand and squeezed it. “You are being difficult, Abernathy. It’s not his fault he’s here.”
“It is not our fault, either. Nor our responsibility.”
“She’s right, you know,” Questor Thews offered.
Abernathy gave his friend a scathing look. “I know she’s right. You don’t have to tell me that.”
“I was just trying to point out—”
“Confound it, Questor Thews, why do you insist on belaboring—”
Still arguing between themselves while Elizabeth tried in vain to reestablish some semblance of peace, the wizard and the scribe passed down the corridor to the front door of the castle and out into the fading light.
In front of them, a King County police car was just pulling away.
After their return to Elizabeth’s house, Questor Thews stayed up all night reading the purloined book. He sat curled up in an easy chair in the far corner of his bedroom with a single light illuminating the pages as he turned them one by one. He was certain early on that this book was what they had been looking for and that hidden within its text lay the answer to the riddle behind their improbable escape from Nightshade. Theories of Magic and Its Uses. They were right there, all the discoveries of all the wizards since the dawn of Landover, set out as postulates and axioms, theories proved and suspected, absent only the recipe and ingredients for each specific stew. They were theories, not formulas, but were quite enough to get at the essence of things. Questor even knew what to look for. He hated himself for this, but the obviousness of the truth facing him was inescapable once he accepted its possibility. He worked his way through the book tirelessly, ignoring his exhaustion, suppressing his growing fear, reading on determinedly.
Across the room from him Abernathy slept with his face turned away from the light. It was just as well. His friend didn’t want to have to look at him just now.
Sometime during the long, slow hours after midnight Questor Thews discovered what he was looking for. Even so, he kept reading, not wanting to take anything for granted, not wanting to give up his search for a better answer, although he knew already that there wasn’t going to be one. He read all the way through the book and back again. He studied individual passages and considered alternative possibilities until his head hurt. Then he went back to the passage he had discovered earlier and read it again slowly, carefully. There was no mistake. It was what he was looking for. It was the answer he had been seeking.
He sighed and put the book down in his lap. He looked over at Abernathy again, and tears came to his eyes. His face crumpled, and his chest ached with need. Life was just so unfair sometimes. He wished things could be different. He wished this could be happening to someone else. His sticklike frame twisted into a clutter of old bones and wrinkled skin, and his heart knotted in his chest.
Finally, exhausted of feeling, he reached up, turned out the light, and sat motionless in the dark, waiting for morning.
SPECTER
“The title of the book is Monsters of Man & Myth,” Ben told Willow, speaking directly into her ear.
They rode double atop a still-skittish Jurisdiction, Willow in front, Ben behind. Bunion had retrieved the horse after a lengthy chase, and now they were traveling west again toward the Greensward. Ahead rose the black wall of an approaching thunderstorm. Behind lay the remains of the wurm and the sulfurous stench of ash and gases from the Fire Springs. Overhead, the sun beat down mercilessly, a blinding white-hot flame that turned the arid emptiness of the Eastern Wastelands into a furnace.
Rain will come as a welcome relief, Ben thought wearily, trying to distance himself from his growing thirst.
“And Rydall’s creatures were in this book?” Willow asked in response, half turning to catch a glimpse of his face.
He nodded into her emerald hair, breathing the dusty scent of it. “A giant that gained strength from its contact with the earth, a demon that could mimic the look and abilities of whatever foe it faced, and a robotic machine man, armored and indestructible.” He looked off into the sweltering distance, trying to make out the geography of the land against the blackness of the storm. “I don’t remember the specific stories so much as the picture of the robot. It’s right on the cover, and it’s exactly the same as Rydall’s. But they’re all there. It’s as if Rydall read the book!”
“But that isn’t possible, is it?”
Ben sighed. “You wouldn’t think so.”
Willow looked forward again. The land shimmered with heat and dust. Bunion was out there somewhere, scouting for further dangers. If he found any, he would try to find a way around them. Another confrontation in their present condition was unthinkable.
“Where is this book?” Willow asked.
“In the library with the others,” Ben answered. “It’s one of several I brought over with me from my old life, books that I thought I might like to have. I remember why I picked that one in particular. I’ve had it since I was a boy, and it seemed to represent something of what I was hoping to find here in Landover—as if what wasn’t real in my old life might be real in this one.” He shook his head. “I got my wish, didn’t I?”
Willow was silent for a moment. “But how would Rydall know about it?”
Ben shrugged. “I can’t imagine. It doesn’t make sense. Why would he know about this book as opposed to any other book? Has he read through my whole library? Does his magic enable him to search out any book at random and read through it without even being there?” He swallowed against the dryness in his throat and kept his temper tightly in check. “What I keep coming back to, Willow, is how personal this all feels. Rydall using my own things against me; striking out at my family and friends; kidnapping Mistaya, Questor, and Abernathy; attacking you and me, chasing us all over the place with this business of pitting his monsters against the Paladin; coming after me over and over again—I just don’t get it. Supposedly it’s about surrendering the throne to Landover, but it doesn’t feel like Landover’s got all that much to do with it.”
Willow nodded without looking at him. “No,” she agreed, and was silent again.
They rode on through the afternoon unti
l the storm met them as they approached the edge of the Greensward. Black clouds swept past, blotting out the sun and blue sky, and a driving, blinding rain enveloped and soaked them to the skin in moments. The dust and grime of their travel were washed from their bodies, and the air about them was cooled. Jurisdiction plodded on, head lowered against the sheets of rain and swirling wind, and soon Bunion reappeared to lead them down into a grove of maple trees that provided good shelter from the damp. They dismounted, stripped off their clothing, wrung it out, and hung it to dry by a fire that Bunion had somehow managed to start. Sitting cross-legged in a soft patch of grass beneath the canopy of the trees, they watched the storm swirl around them and pass on. Darkness descended, and the world beyond their encampment disappeared. They dressed again, chewed halfheartedly on stalks of Bonnie Blue, rolled into their travel cloaks, and quickly fell asleep.
When they woke, it was raining again, a slow, persistent drizzle that fell out of low, empty leaden skies. The whole of the land about them had gone gray and misty in the early-morning light. They mounted Jurisdiction once more and rode out into the weather. Bunion went on ahead, a small, spidery figure skittering into the gloom until he was lost from view. The summer day was warm and filled with the smell of damp earth. Ahead, the Greensward stretched away in a patchwork of greens and browns, of tilled fields and grassy pastures, of mature forests and midseason plantings, all interspersed with rivers and lakes that in the rainy haze took on the look of molten metal, their surfaces stirred by the faint breezes that swept down across the flats.
By midday Bunion had returned with a second horse. He didn’t offer an explanation of where he had gotten the beast, and Ben and Willow didn’t ask. It was not a farm animal; it was a trained riding horse. Willow stood in front of the horse, a brown mare, and spoke to it encouragingly for a moment, then mounted smoothly and wheeled over beside Ben. She gave Bunion a smile and a wink, and the kobold was gone again.