'But my Lord!' Jaiddon stared with fresh horror. 'I barely passed my apprenticeship a fortnight ago!'
A nightmarish parody of a smile touched the Master's withered lips. Jaiddon felt his heart twist in response.
'Years and experience have proven useless against these Renders.' The Master Shaper spoke with difficulty. 'Varna, Loremistress of the Pattern, lies dead. Myself, they have broken. I can no longer Shape even a child's toy. Circadie is dying. I place her last hope in your hands.'
Tears spilled sudden and hot down Jaiddon's cheeks. He was glad they could not be seen by the man in the bed. 'What can I do that you could not?'
The Master was silent for a long while. 'I do not know,' he said at last. 'You are young. Your training is incomplete. But you are talented beyond all that have gone before, so is it inscribed in the Pattern of your hands. It is my hope, all of Circadie's hope, that you, with your untried, unchannelled power, might find means your forebears missed by the wayside. I realize I am probably asking your death. Yet, I ask. Will you face the Renders, and challenge their Reality with Shape?'
Jaiddon stood like a statue. Sunlight spilled through the window and branded a square of warmth in the sweat that chilled his back. He was afraid. Once as a child he'd had a cut that would not stop bleeding. It had been Shaped to health, but the man, the Master whose hands had wrought against the Void, lay dying of a Render's touch. Jaiddon swallowed again, and spoke.
'My Lord, the Renders will have me anyway. I may as well meet the Void in their path.'
But the blue tunic and white shirt of Mastery given him after his audience did nothing to ease his self-doubt. For all his alleged talent, Jaiddon could not even read his own lifepath. His peers had laughed often over that.
Black as oblivion, the Renders' path ran northward. Jaiddon could sense its presence without sight by the utter lack of resonance beneath his feet. Here and there, his step struck solidity, and he recognized the harmonics that answered. They were Megallie's. Newly appointed Loremistress in Varna's stead, she had been mending, perhaps after seeing the Master Shaper comfortable.
Her work had been cursory, her touch, unerring. Gazing downward through the darkness beneath his soles, Jaiddon saw where a Grand Axis of the Pattern was laid bare. Megallie had fused it, perfectly. He could not repeat her work. Years of training lay ahead before he dared attune to a major ring, far less forge one complete.
Jaiddon cursed. His earlier plan was no better than a foolish dream. Having seen the original Pattern of Solidity after which all others were formed, he knew himself incapable of breaking even its simplest curve.
Jaiddon moved on. Anger drained away and left a rocky bed of despair.
* * *
The Renders lay in a hollow beneath a tangle of scrub thorn, asleep. Jaiddon came upon them so suddenly he nearly fell into the ditch their unbelief had torn through the fabric of the ground. There were three, as the Master had said, opaque bodies dark as blight against the Patterned perfection of grasses fired like crystal by starlight. Even passive, the Renders' Reality radiated threat like a breath of cold.
Jaiddon shivered and fought revulsion. His ancestors had once been formed of substance, as these Renders were, but generations of Shaping had transformed them gradually away from Reality. Cast upon the sea as exiles, they had delved among the mysteries of the mind and the illusory laws of sorcery, and in their fusion, developed the art of Shaping. Circadie was raised above the waves through generations of effort. Ring upon ring of power, joined and interlaced, held its soil dry above the tide. From that framework, the Shapers of Circadie forced tiny allotments of wood, metal, and stone to serve the needs of many.
The Pattern and the Shape that was Jaiddon would not be visible to the Renders when they wakened, just as the grass, the trees, and the soil did not exist through their senses.
Jaiddon groped through despair for an action, any action, that might halt the Renders' terrible course. He knew from memory each passage from the ballads that described past encounters with their kind. But such facts were useless. The Master Shaper had charged him to abandon precedents. Jaiddon pressed damp palms to his temples. If Circadie and the people who inhabited it could be made visible to the Renders, their disbelief might weaken, diminishing their ruinous effect upon the Pattern.
The simple act of enforcing the shape that surrounded them would not suffice. That had been attempted already without success. Jaiddon decided instead to inscribe the Pattern directly upon the minds of the Renders. Surely even Reality's logic could acknowledge and accept the laws of solidity and allow Circadie existence.
Jaiddon took a last breath, unmindful of the thornbranch that hooked his sleeve. Substance never yielded its Reality easily, and a Render was a living entity, self-aware, and defended against intrusion. Prepared for struggle, Jaiddon closed his eyes and reached out for the thoughts of the Render who lay nearest. Had his training been complete, he would have known the Pattern of Solidity represented the framework of madness to the mind he sought to Shape, but he had barely won his novitiate, and in ignorance, he touched.
Contact opened a blind abyss of unreason. Jaiddon broke into sweat, strove to hold firm against a Reality whose nature commanded Shape to go molten and flow formless into the Void. It seemed as though his Pattern of existence would be crushed to powder beneath the weight of the Render's mind. As the first tremor of dissolution crept through the fibers of his body, Jaiddon cried out. So this was what happened to the Master! Panic thundered through the gaps in his being, twisting reason into a hard knot of terror. Jaiddon tore free.
He was drenched, shaking, and the echo of his scream seemed reflected in the quivering stars. Shocked by the enormity of failure, Jaiddon did not pause to review the nature of what he opposed. Instead, he flung himself recklessly into a second attempt. This time, he shaped fear into a bastion of support.
The Render flinched beneath his touch. He stirred and moaned softly as Jaiddon began to inscribe the primary axis of the Pattern behind his thoughts. As the secondary axis was begun, his protest became louder. Jaiddon tasted sweat on his lips. If he slipped, he would die. With remorseless determination, he bent the will that opposed him and fused the first of the seven rings of power.
The Render shot bolt upright and yelled. His companions roused at once, and the force of their waking thoughts threw Jaiddon from his feet.
'Sweet Jesus, Alaric, what ails you?' said one of the Renders sharply.
Alaric shook his head and shivered. 'I dreamed. Mary Mother, I dreamed I saw grass and trees, land.'
'Ye're mad, man,' his companion said. 'There's nothin' here but ocean, and this silly boat afloat on it.' He thumped his hand. Circadie shuddered in recoil. Bushes, soil, and a nearby boulder frayed like overstressed fabric, and vanished.
Jaiddon dragged himself to his knees, numbed beyond thought by the heaving dark that bloomed at the Renders' touch. He had failed. Though the effort left him weakened, he had to move clear of the Render's blundering presence and think of something else. Slowly, he rose.
The motion caused Alaric to whirl, eyes widened in panic. The incomplete Pattern within his mind allowed him partial sight of the Shape surrounding him, and he yelled hoarsely. 'Almighty God, there's a ghost!'
'Alaric, ye fool! Ye'll have yerself overboard!' A companion jerked him back by the shoulder, then fixed a flat gaze upon the spot where Jaiddon stood. 'No ghost there, man. Nothin' but sharks 'n' salt water.'
Unbelief struck Circadie like a stormwave. Shape shattered to fragments before it, land and the life it harbored flung piecemeal into the yawning dark of the Void. Jaiddon cried out as the ground under his feet came unbound. Every skill he possessed fought to hold his being complete against a rushing tide of ruin. Loose pebbles and soil slipped like lost hopes through his fingers as he tumbled between debris toward the restless ocean beneath.
His fall was broken by unyielding blue light; , a bar of the Pattern itself laid bare. Deformed like wax touched by flame, it had n
ot yet parted beneath the stress of the Renders' unbelief. Jaiddon groped for handholds in the riven earth, dragged himself upright. Dizzied and confused, he forgot caution, and the moment his head appeared above ground level, Alaric screamed again.
The other Renders restrained him with difficulty. ''Tis the devil's work, surely,' said one. 'A clear case of possession.'
Jaiddon dragged himself clear of the ruinous gap. The word devil meant nothing to him, and with uncomprehending eyes, he watched the Render who had spoken kneel over Alaric.
'Christ deliver us,' he said. 'I never thought I'd perform an exorcism for a soul in an open boat.'
More strange words, and the chant that followed was in an unfamiliar language, as well. But its effect upon the Pattern was instant annihilation.
Half a hill exploded soundlessly into oblivion. Jaiddon screamed. The Void rose to engulf him. He felt light, insubstantial as ash. The breeze off the sea blew through the rifts as the Render's strange ritual unbound the force that held him complete. Trapped in a rushing vortex of wind and dark, Jaiddon suddenly longed to see the disbelief that was destroying him take Shape. Shape could be opposed, and on the heels of thought came insight.
He had always been ridiculed as a dreamer, unable to master his own imagery. What if he broke precedent, abandoned control and coupled the result with his lifelong training as Shaper? Jaiddon cursed and laughed. Poised on the edge of dissolution, he threw his wild imagination free rein. It seized upon the darkness that gnawed him and clothed it with pictures. Though they reflected unrelenting nightmare, Jaiddon patterned them and gave them Shape.
Circadie flowed and changed at his bidding. Plant, soil, and twig mirrored the fabric of his images. Fast as thought could unreel, Jaiddon found himself in an alien place of red haze. The ground turned to ash beneath his feet, littered with the Shaped symbols of the Renders' disbelief, among them every desire, hope, and motivation that founded it.
Jaiddon stepped carefully between the glancing sparkle of gem stones, jewelled goblets, and the dirt-gray bones which were his reshaping of the Renders' dead senses. He had no understanding for much of what he patterned, nor was he given time to seek it. Jaiddon waited to see which form would seek his death.
They came as demons, three of them, savage and thoughtless as the unbelieving minds they represented. Starved, naked, and crowned by bleached shocks of hair, they moved through the shadowed haze of imagery, eyes sultry as candleflame, and forked tongues tasting the air. Jaiddon knew immediate fear at the sight of them. But their Shape was comprehensible. It could be opposed.
Bending, Jaiddon scooped up a fistful of ash and placed his will upon it. Form broke and ran fluid at his touch as he repatterned Shape to match desire. Controlled, that which seconds ago had been ash assumed the outline of a longsword. Jaiddon tested the balance, then grimly inflected the pattern of tempered steel.
The weapon in his hand warmed. Its rough surface acquired the glassy bluish sheen of the forge. Jaiddon shivered with impatience. The change would take too long. The demons had sensed his presence, and with a hiss like a water kettle, two of them charged. The patterning was not yet complete, but Jaiddon had no choice. He raised his blade to meet them.
The demon that rushed at his throat was impaled. It screamed and wrenched. The half-finished sword snapped off near the hilt. Jaiddon fended the second one away with his forearm. Teeth and nails tore like knives through cloth, then flesh.
Jaiddon bashed himself clear with his knee and thrust the demon back with the jagged remnant of his blade. It sidestepped and spat. Jaiddon turned with it. The fallen one writhed underfoot, treacherously close. Nearby, the third crouched, watching with a baleful yellow eye.
'Render!' Jaiddon forced the word around the terror that gripped his tongue.
Nimbly avoiding the steel, the demon attacked, slashed, and twisted clear of Jaiddon's riposte. Thin furrows opened in Jaiddon's arm as it struck. Blood soaked through shredded silk shirt. Fear made the breath rattle in his throat. Circling, feinting, he survived two more rushes. Sweat stung his eyes. The demon was still unmarked. The third crouched, still, to one side. Jaiddon knew he was finished when it chose to fight.
Raising his free hand, Jaiddon shaped in glowing lines that portion of the Pattern that sealed its final Solidity. The demon hissed in fury and sprang for Jaiddon. Patterning broke with an aching flare of light. The creature bore him down. Hot breath scalded his skin. Fangs mashed his shoulder, and the demon's nails gashed at his side and back. Jaiddon battered unsuccessfully with his hands. Dizziness whirled his head. All would be lost in a matter of seconds. Aware of nothing but the final darkness that closed over thick as water to drown him, Jaiddon threw himself into a last, desperate attempt to Shape.
* * *
He wakened, choking. Water and blood had soaked his hair and clothing. Callused hands shook him.
'Death, 'e looks like the sharks been at 'im,' said a voice from above.
Jaiddon opened his eyes, blinked. He lay in a boat. Two strangers stood over him with faces bearded, gaunt, and peeling from overexposure to the sun. He struggled, craned his neck, and tried to see over the gunwale.
'Easy, lad,' said the man. His fingers tightened on Jaiddon's shoulders, making dizziness flood back. 'Ye come near to drownin'. Best stay still a bit an' catch yer breath.'
Jaiddon closed his eyes and wrestled despair. He had fallen into the hands of the Renders. Why was he not dead? Where was Circadie?
'Let me be,' he said softly as soon as he could speak. The hands fell away.
Jaiddon sat up, gripping the boat with bloody fingers. His body burned like fire, it was cut in so many places. When he stared outward, a triple image assaulted his eyes. If he looked with a Shaper's perception, the hills of Circadie appeared, churned and distorted where the Renders' thoughts had warped its form. The Pattern of Solidity glowed through, serene and blue where it remained whole, black and gapped where the Renders had broken through. On top, pale and insubstantial as a ghost's drawing, moved the heaving, restless shoulders of ocean swells that stretched in endless ranks to the far horizon.
Jaiddon fell back, suddenly weak. In his last moment of awareness, he had sought to Shape himself a form beyond the Void. He should have died. Instead, his dying act had transformed him close enough to Reality that the Renders could perceive him. When the sun rose, his flesh would cast shadow, as did all Substance.
Jaiddon dared a look at the Renders. Two stared at him with eyes that bore the haggard stamp of hardship.
The third lay grotesquely sprawled and still in the stern. Jaiddon recognized the Render he had inflected with a fragment of the Pattern. Remembering, also, the demon that had fallen beneath his sword, Jaiddon drew a painful breath and spoke.
'What happened to Alaric?'
The Renders started. One of them blanched with fright.
'Dead,' said the larger of the two. ' 'E woke up raving an' died. It was madness that done for him, but how did ye know his name?'
The other Render started forward and shouted. 'He knew because Satan sent him! Didn't he appear at the moment of Alaric's exorcism?' He pointed an accusing finger at Jaiddon. 'You come from Hell, your purpose to tempt us from faith. God will punish us for bringing you aboard.'
The large Render spat. 'The devil, Chaplain? Do ye smell brimstone?' Laughter followed, but it was forced.
Jaiddon raised himself onto the seat in the bow. Dizzy, sick, and weak as he was, it was evident the Renders distrusted his Reality. They might kill him, in their misunderstanding. Jaiddon thought quickly. Though he knew nothing of Hell, the devil, or exorcism, they were obviously powerful images to the Renders. Perhaps even these might be Shaped to advantage.
'I did not come from Hell.' His voice startled both men. 'I would help, but if you have no faith, I am powerless.'
'Christ have mercy,' said the Chaplain.
Jaiddon ignored him. 'You suffer greatly from hunger and thirst.' Both men stared, speechless. Jaiddon plunged ahead and h
oped their confusion would last long enough to weaken their disbelief. 'Fetch me a container. I will provide you with food and drink. Then give me your oarshaft, and I will Shape you a sail to carry wind, that you may return to the land you desire.'
The larger Render laughed. 'Would ye make miracles, lad?' He rummaged among the floorboards, and after a moment, extended a wineskin. 'Ye've got my faith, what there is of it.'
'Fill it with seawater.' Jaiddon's eye fell on the Chaplain. 'Do you have faith?'
The Chaplain swallowed and crossed himself uneasily. 'I pray four times daily.'
'Pray, then.' Jaiddon accepted the dripping wineskin. Its rough leather stung his torn flesh unpleasantly, but that did not deter him. Every kitchen drudge in Circadie knew how to pattern the salt from the water they drew to wash their pots. This was the simplest form of Shaping, and it took Jaiddon the space of seconds. He copied the Chaplain's motion over the wineskin for effect, and offered it to the Renders. 'Drink. If you have faith, you will be refreshed.'
The larger Render pulled the stopper, peeling features stiffly expressionless. He raised the wineskin to his lips, filled his mouth, then swallowed greedily. When his thirst was eased, he knelt before Jaiddon in awestruck silence while the Chaplain, also, drank his fill. ...
* * *
The tale is still told, in dockside taverns, of how a chaplain and a deckhand survived the wreck of the ship Saint Helena by saving a holy man from the teeth of a shark. In turn, he rewarded them, changing seawater into cheese, bread, and wine by miracle. There were witnesses who observed the two tacking into the harbor, their sail the bare shaft of an oar. The holy man was not with them. He was said to have left the boat by walking on the face of the sea.
Somewhere, over the horizon on the isle of Circadie, Jaiddon's ballad is still sung. It tells of a young novice who took a Master's Colors to defend the Pattern of Solidity from Renders, and how he accomplished his purpose and returned, bleeding and weary, the only Shaper since the Founders to cast a shadow.