The blue glow in the center of the Lightcatcher vanished from view.
Rhapsody turned in Grunthor’s grip and buried her face in his massive chest as his arms came around her, keeping her from collapsing to the ground. The rest of the witnesses to the ritual looked at each other in the dark.
* * *
“Tomorrow, just after dawn, if anything came to me from the auspicy, I will leave you a written message here on the altar,” said the Diviner, cleansing his hands with oil. “Perhaps the flight patterns of whatever birds are left in Sepulvarta will give me a direction as to the whereabouts of the Child of Time.”
“Thank you again, Hjorst,” Talquist said. “A carriage is waiting to take you back to the guesthouse after your vigil.”
“No, thank you, I’d much rather walk,” said the Diviner. “It will be bad enough having to endure another week in one of your carriages taking me to port as it is.”
“Will it disturb your vigil if I send the guards in to remove the woman from the narthex?”
“No,” said the Diviner, “as long as they do not enter the sanctuary, and are silent.”
“Very good. It shall be ordered so.”
“When I arrive back in the Hintervold I will alert my generals and field commanders to be on the lookout for your messages when the time comes for us to wade into the fray. I wish you luck in finding the Child of Time. Perhaps you could ask the Scales when you get home.”
Talquist’s smile broadened.
What an outstanding idea, he mused. Not the Scales you are thinking of, Hjorst, but a scale was used nonetheless. If all has gone well, the assassins may even be in Canrif already.
“My thanks again,” he said as he made his way down the concentric rise. “I will be certain to make it worth your while, Hjorst, if I ever have the opportunity.”
The Diviner’s voice was distant from the altar as Talquist made his way to the basilica door.
“If you wish to make it worth my while, never speak to me of it again, and forget about ever requesting another augury, unless you want me to gut you as I did the sexton. Good night.”
The emperor turned and smiled at his friend, then left the basilica.
Then he tossed the ashes into the wind and then gave the guards instructions to have the woman sleeping in the narthex brought to his waiting carriage. He made his way down the front steps, past the defiled fountain, and climbed into the coach, where he waited impatiently.
By the time the carriage arrived at the guesthouse, a mere five streets away, the acolyte could no longer be successfully sacrificed for an augury.
* * *
“M’lady, please don’t panic,” Gyllian said sensibly. “I know that was terrifying to hear, but take courage—they both agree that Canrif is unassailable. As long as you and your son are here, they will not even attempt to find you.”
“That’s right, miss,” Grunthor said, squeezing her shoulders again. “You can just stay ’ere ’til the end of the war.”
“That’s not my understanding,” Rhapsody said nervously. “Ashe and I have always assumed that I would need to fight. There are but three elemental swords in the Known World, and I have the most powerful of them.”
“Your husband and grandson both have such weapons as well,” said Achmed quietly. “Their priority was your security; you don’t need to be adding to their worry by risking your life, and that of your brat. As long as you’re here, Talquist can’t touch you.”
ABOVE THE GROTTO OF ELYSIAN, YLORC
The five men had arrived at the rim of the canyon hidden in the depths of the forbidding mountains.
Quietly Dranth wiped the sweat from his forehead and surveyed the panorama of peaks rising even higher behind him than the ones they had summited had been. Born of the red sand desert in Yarim, the windy high peaks of Ylorc were a torment to him and the others.
But it mattered little.
A sight that had burned his eyes a year before filled his memory again, as it did during many of his waking moments, and all of his sleeping ones.
The head of the guildmistress, a woman he had loved and served since her childhood.
Slashed from her neck, her eyes still open.
Tossed unceremoniously into a box, wrapped carefully in paper and shipped back to him at the tile foundry of Yarim Paar.
It was an image that haunted him.
But not as much as it inspired him.
“Careful,” he said to Colhoe, one of his subordinates from the Raven’s Guild, as he lowered a coil of rope down the side of the wall that formed the underground canyon. “This is the greatest honor we will ever have—let us make it memorable.”
* * *
“Heed the advice of your friends, m’lady,” the Patriarch said, placing a hand on her arm, then turning to the Firbolg king. “I will take my leave of your mountain at week’s end after my last prayer ritual, Your Majesty. Thank you for allowing me to learn of your Lightcatcher, and to rebuild part of the Chain of Prayer from your kingdom. When it has been re-formed, I will make certain your safety, and that of your subjects, is foremost in my offerings. And, of course, anything I saw within your realm will never be spoken of.”
Achmed smiled slightly. “Thank you. Travel well.”
“I’d like to see your son before I leave, if you don’t mind,” Constantin said to Rhapsody. “I will offer my blessing to him again. You will both be in my prayers at all times.”
Rhapsody, still pale, nodded numbly.
“Thank you. We will need every entreaty we can obtain,” she said.
33
SEPULVARTA
The next morning, after he had finished with the weeping acolyte again, Talquist dressed and made his way to the basilica.
“Is the Diviner gone?” he asked the guards standing watch at the main door.
“Yes, Majesty. He left just after dawn. The carriage driver had his belongings, and said he was taking him to port in Ghant. A cohort accompanied them.”
“Good, good. And has anyone else entered the basilica?”
“Just the workmen, sire.”
“Workmen?” Talquist’s eyes narrowed.
“Yes, Majesty. Your orders to cover and remove some of the frescoes and stained-glass images are being attended to.”
“Ah, good. Carry on.” Talquist waited as the door was opened for him, and then strolled into the basilica.
Where the night before there had been darkness, twisting shadows, and gleaming ethereal radiance, this morning there was dusty sunlight raining through the glass windows atop the dome. Talquist made his way hurriedly through the narthex to the sanctuary, nodding perfunctorily at the artisans who stopped in their work, carrying ladders and hanging cloth, to bow before him.
Atop the altar, a scroll was waiting.
The emperor climbed the stairs made of concentric circles until he stood before the altar. It was all he could do to keep from snatching the rolled parchment and tearing the seal open, but he controlled himself and picked up the scroll with dignity, trying not to call attention to himself.
As he broke the seal, he cast a glance around and noted that the artisans had returned to their work, almost as if he wasn’t there.
Good, he thought.
He unrolled the paper and looked down at it.
Northeast, the coarsely written script said. It looks to be an early winter as well. I expect the next of your ships to dock at Verne Hys to be delivering berries and several cases of a fine single malt.
Northeast, the Diviner noted.
Canrif.
He looked up from the scroll and glanced around the basilica again.
A dozen or so laborers were setting about removing tiles from mosaics and stripping paint from frescoes that had been indentified as celebrating Cyrmian history, rather than elemental lore. All seemed engaged except for one, who looked perplexed, studying a fresco on one of the walls of the nave.
Talquist tucked the scroll into his robes and trotted down the concentric rise.
He came quietly up behind the man and looked to see what he was confused about.
“Can I help you with something, my son?” he asked pleasantly.
The artisan turned around. His eyes widened at the sight of the emperor, crowned and wearing the golden symbol of the ascendant sun on a chain around his neck. He bowed deeply and nervously.
“Majesty. Pardon and apologies.”
“None are necessary. I am grateful for your talents and labor in restoring Lianta’ar to the glory that it should have held all along. Is something causing you confusion?”
“I—I was merely uncertain as to whether this fresco is Cymrian, and therefore needing to be stripped, or an appropriate depiction of elemental lore, Majesty. I do not know what it represents.”
“Well, move aside and let me have a look.”
The worker obeyed quickly.
Talquist eyed the fresco. He had spent a good deal of his lifetime in research and study of every type of lore—pure, legend or folk—in the pursuit of the answer to the question of the identity of the purple scale he had found in the sand of the Skeleton Coast. He was therefore surprisingly familiar, for a godless man, with sacred paintings and depictions of folktales and religious legends.
It was the image of a woman, ordinary in nature, her coloring favoring the dark eyes and skin of a native Sorbold, rather than the blue-eyed, fair-skinned Cymrian lineage. She was clothed in common garments except for a veil or wimple of some sort that covered most of her hair, and was surrounded by smiling children of all sizes and colorings, as well as women, some of whom were holding infants.
At her feet was a pond or a well of some kind, modest of size and filled with dark water, in which an image of the gibbous moon was reflected.
The woman held in her hands what appeared to be a small round tray of some kind, on which a single object rested. It was familiarly shaped, hand-sized and oblong, with a slightly tattered edge, and was yellow in color. It seemed to be scored with lines of no recognizable pattern.
Talquist froze.
He blinked and looked at the fresco again, staring most closely at the object on the tray in the woman’s hands.
Then, after a moment, he was aware of the breath of the workman standing behind him. He turned around slowly and forced as pleasant a smile as he was capable of to come over his face.
“What is your name?”
“Devein, Majesty.”
“Devein, I am thirsty. Could I prevail upon you to request a cup of water from the guards at the basilica door?”
“Of—of course, sire.” The workman took off like a jackrabbit.
Talquist turned quickly back to the fresco.
He reached inside the inner pocket of his robe and pulled out his greatest possession, the one he carried over his heart.
The gray scale, purple when it caught the light, scored with the image of a throne on the convex side.
The New Beginning.
And held it up before him.
It was almost the exact size and shape as the yellow image on the tray in the fresco, its edge finely tattered like a fish scale.
Talquist’s hands began to tremble violently.
Yellow—one of the scales that Faron and he were missing between them in the spectrum.
He could hear the sound of heavy footsteps approaching; he quickly slid the scale back into his robes and forced another smile to his face.
“Thank you,” he said, accepting the flagon that the workman offered him. He drank deeply, willing himself to be calm.
“So, have you decided what you would like done with this fresco, Majesty?” Devein asked nervously.
Talquist nodded and took another sip.
“Leave it for now. I will ask you to have it removed shortly.”
* * *
Talquist had almost finished the repast that had been brought to the basilica for his refreshment when he heard the unmistakable sounds of military footfalls echoing through the narthex on their way to the sanctuary.
He rose, wiped his mouth with the linen napkin and laid it on the makeshift table before him, and waited.
A moment later Fhremus, his supreme commander of the land forces of Sorbold, came into view, a young soldier following at a respectful distance behind him.
“You sent for me, Majesty?” Fhremus asked, as he came to a halt, bowing.
“Indeed.” Talquist signaled for the soldiers to follow him to the wall where the fresco was displayed.
“Is this the soldier who will be in my retinue on the way back to Jierna’sid?”
“Yes, sire. His name is Kymel.”
“Well met, Kymel,” Talquist said as the young soldier bowed. “And you have arranged to double the number of soldiers in my retinue, as I asked, Fhremus?”
“Yes, sire. They will be under the command of Titactyk.”
“Thank you, Fhremus; I just wanted to review some of the plans for my return tomorrow morning with Kymel. I assume he can be trusted to accurately relay my orders to Titactyk?”
“Yes, sire.”
“Excellent. And this is important—send word to the naval command, under highest security and seal. Tell them to launch the offensive on the harbor of Avonderre immediately.”
“Yes, sire.”
“You may go.”
The supreme commander bowed and took his leave. Talquist turned back to Kymel.
“Kymel, on the way back to Jierna’sid, I will be sending half the retinue off on a side mission to the seacoast between the border at Jakar and the port of Windswere in the Nonaligned States. I will discuss the specifics of this mission with Titactyk, but I want you to make careful note of this image. I asked Fhremus to bring me someone who was intelligent and had a good memory, so I know you will not fail me in this, am I correct?”
Kymel’s face went hot.
“Absolutely, Majesty.”
“Good, good. Make special note of this part of the image.” He pointed to the tray and the yellow object on it. Kymel looked carefully, then nodded.
“Thank you, Kymel. I expect I will be seeing you on the morrow, then. Good day.” The young soldier bowed, turned on his heel and left the basilica as his commander had.
Talquist went through the door of the basilica, stopping long enough to confer with the guards.
“Locate the artisan named Devein, and tell him he can strip the fresco now.”
“Yes, Majesty.”
The Merchant Emperor walked briskly to the carriage and embarked.
“Take me back to the guesthouse,” he said cheerfully. “It’s been a stimulating morning; I feel the need for an afternoon nap.”
He thought of the young acolyte back at the guesthouse and smiled, congratulating himself for telling Gregory to select the prettiest one, as the coachman’s voice clicked to the horses and the carriage began to roll away from the basilica.
34
Children who were blessed to grow up in plenty, or at least enough, more often than not had access in their youth to fables and fairy tales, stories told to them by loving parents and family members, nannies or teachers, tales of magic and adventure to amuse them, to teach them lessons and morals, to give them practice in learning how to dream.
But motherless and fatherless children, orphans, and even those with one parent to cling to in the darkness of poverty, the nightmare of the slave mines, the cold and the biting wind of a life under the docks or in the faceless streets and alleyways of every city on the continent, those children were by far more in need of such stories. Even the smallest amount of encouragement to such children might have made the torment that they lived in daily a little less terrible, may have offered an inspiration to endure for the prospect of better days in the future. Sadly, the bedtimes of these children were not opportunities for the warm and loving impartment of the fairy tales, legends, and stories of good children being elevated to high praise, wealth, social stature, and happy endings that their luckier counterparts benefited from. The nightmares of the dark hours that bedev
iled such children were scarcely more frightening than the reality of their waking lives.
But even without the same opportunities to learn of legends with happy endings and stories extolling bravery, selflessness, and pluck, there was one legend that seemed to make its way into every dark alleyway, every windswept dock, every brutal salt mine, every stinking stable, every orphanage where less fortunate children spent their days, working, slaving, or just trying to survive.
The legend of the Well of the Moon.
On first blush it was possible to write off the legend as wish-fulfillment, a story that was both impossible and tempting to believe, especially for children to whom a simple crust of bread, a day without beatings and a night without fear would be the fulfillment of their greatest wish. But there was something compelling about the tale, the story of a haven for children, particularly children in want and need, between the land and the sea, within both and neither places, where children who had run away from their abusive homes and their rotten lives could find solace, or peace, or even happiness.
The legend told of a guardian who, while having no loyalty to adults, was sympathetic to the plight of lonely, damaged children, and, if that guardian could be found, would lead such children to a place of peace and safety, where adults were kind, soldiers did not beat them for being in the wrong place, food and water were plentiful, there were real toys to be played with and they could eat cookies and sweetmeats all day, and pain could not find them.
There were many versions of the tale, of course, because it was common to such a wide variety of climes and cultures across an expansive continent, but one phrase, or its variant, heard in every telling was this:
The Guardian of the Well of the Moon will guide you to that peaceful place, when the moon is full, when the tide is high, when all other paths are exhausted, when all the sandbars are covered, when all other roads are blocked.
But only if you are a child.
It was a tale that went back many generations, and was conveyed in many languages. When other tales were passed around and vanished into the wind, when other legends were proven false or disbelieved, the legend of the Well of the Moon continued to cling to the collective vault of oral tradition, continued to be heard and often believed by the poorest of the poor, the most forgotten of the lost.