"It might prove instructive for you to do so. Or, better yet, open your being to the emanations from the Shield."
"I shall-in private.-But there is always some leakage. The seven whose presences are required to dam it will learn of it and act. There is no cause for concern or foreboding."
"There is if one of the seven is confined and unable to respond."
The other's eyes widened.
"I don't believe you," he said.
Jack shrugged.
"I was seeking a safe place from which I might disembark when you offered me your- uh, hospitality. It is certainly easy enough to verify."
"Then why did you not speak of it sooner?"
"Why?" asked Jack. "If my sanity is to be destroyed, what is it to me whether the rest of the world goes on existing or is destroyed?"
''That is a very selfish attitude," said the Lord of Bats.
"It is my attitude," said Jack, and he jingled his bells.
"I suppose I must go check your story." The other sighed, rising.
"I'll wait here." said Jack.
The Lord of Bats led him into the high hall that lay beyond the iron door, and there he cut his bonds.
Jack looked about him. There were familiar designs worked in mosaics on the floor, heaps of rushes in the corners, dark hangings upon the walls, a small central altar with a table of instruments beside it, an odor of incense in the air.
Jack took a step forward.
"Your name was strangely entered in the book of Ells," said the Lord of Bats, "for that of another was blotted out above it."
"Perhaps the tutelary deity had second thoughts on the matter."
"To my knowledge, this has never occurred before. But if you are one of the seven chosen, so be it. Hear me, though, before you move to essay your part of the Shield duty."
He clapped his hands and a hanging stirred. Evene entered the room. She went and stood at her Lord's side.
"While your powers may be necessary for this thing," he said to Jack, "do not think that they approach my own here in High Dudgeon. Soon we must strike lights, and there will be shadows. Even if I have underestimated you, know that my Lady has had years in which to study the Art and that she is uniquely gifted in its employment. She will add her skills to my own, should you attempt anything save that for which I brought you here. No matter what you believe, she is not a simulacrum."
"I know that," said Jack, "for simulacra do not weep."
"When did you see Evene weep?"
"You must ask her about it sometime."
She dropped her eyes as he turned his toward the altar and moved forward.
"I'd best begin. Please stand in the lesser circle," he said.
One by one, he ignited the charcoal within ten braziers, which stood in three rows of three, four and three each. He added aromatic powders, causing each to flame and cast smokes of different colors. Then he moved to the far side of the altar and traced a pattern upon the floor with the blade of an iron knife. He spoke softly and his shadow multiplied, recombined into one, swayed, grew still, darkened, and then stretched across the hall like an endless roadway to the
east. It did not move thereafter, despite the flickering light, and grew so dark that it seemed to possess the quality of depth.
Jack heard the Lord of Bats' whispered, "I like this not!" to Evene, and he glanced in their direction.
Through the rolling smoke, by the flickering lights, within the circle, he seemed to take on a darker, more sinister appearance and to move with greater and greater assurance and efficiency. When he raised the small bell from the altar and rang it, the Lord of Bats cried, "Stop!" but he did not break the lesser circle as the sense of another presence, tense, watching, filled the hall.
"You are correct with respect to one thing," Jack said. "You are my master when it comes to the Art. I am not so addled as to cross swords with you, yet. Especially not in your place of power. Rather, I seek merely to occupy you for a time, to assure my safety. It will take even the two of you some minutes to banish the force I have summoned here-and then you will have other things to think about. Here's one!"
He seized a leg of the nearest brazier and buried it across the hall. Its charcoal was scattered among rushes. They began to burn, and flames touched the fringes of a tapestry as Jack continued:
"I have not been summoned for Shield duty. With splinters from the table, charred in the
flame of our dinner candle, I altered the entry in the Book of Ells. Its opening unto me was the spell you detected."
"You dared break the Great Compact and tamper with the fate of the world?"
"Just so," said Jack. "The world is of little use to a madman, which is what you would have had me; and I spit on the Compact."
"You are henceforth and forever an outcast, Jack. Count no darksider as friend."
"I never have."
"The Compact and its agent, the Book of Ells, is the one thing we all respect-always have respected-despite all other differences. Jack. You will be bounded now to your ultimate destruction."
"I almost was, here, by you. This way, I am able to bid you good-bye."
"I will banish the presence you have summoned and extinguish the fire you have caused. Then I will raise half a world against you. Never again will you know a moment's rest. Your ending will not be a happy one."
"You slew me once, you took my woman and warped her will, you made me your prisoner, wore me around your neck, set your Borshin upon me. Know that when we meet again, I will not be the one who is tortured and bounded into madness. I have a long list, and you head it."
"We will meet again, Shadowjack-perhaps even in a matter of moments. Then you can forget about your list."
"Oh, your mention of lists reminded me of something. Are you not curious as to whose name I effaced when I entered my own into the Book of Ells?"
"What name was it?"
"Strangely enough, it was your name. You should really get out more often, you know. If you had, you would have noticed the chill, inspected the Shield and read in the Book. Then you would have been on Shield duty and I would not have become your prisoner. All of this unpleasantness could have been avoided. There is a moral there somewhere. Get more exercise and fresh air-that may be it."
"In that case, you would have been the Baron's, or back in Glyve."
"A moot point," said Jack, glancing over his shoulder. "That tapestry is going pretty well now, so I can be moving along. In, say-perhaps a season, perhaps less-who knows?-whenever you finish your Shield duty-you will doubtless seek me. Do not be discouraged if you do not succeed at once. Persist. When I am ready, we will meet. I will take Evene back from you. I will take High Dudgeon away from you. I will destroy your bats. I will see you wander from offal to the grave and back again, many times. Goodbye, for now."
He turned away and stared along the length of his shadow.
"I will not be yours, Jack," he heard her say. ''Everything I said before was true. I would kill myself before I would be yours."
He breathed deeply of the incensed air, then said, "We'll see," and stepped forward into shadow.
6
THE SKY LIGHTENED AS, sack over shoulder, he trudged steadily eastward. The air was chill and snakes of mist coiled among gray grasses; valleys and gulches were filled with fog; the stars pierced a ghostly film of cloud; breezes from a nearby tarn lapped moistly at the rocky land.
Pausing for a moment, Jack shifted his burden to his right shoulder. He turned and considered the dark land he was leaving. He had come far and he had come quickly. Yet, farther must he go. With every step he took toward the light, his enemies' powers to afflict him were lessened. Soon, he would be lost to them. They would continue to seek him, however; they would not forget. Therefore, he did what must be done-he fled. He would miss the dark land, with its witcheries, cruelties, wonders and delights. It held his life, containing as it did the objects of his hatred and his love. He knew that he would have to return, bringing with him that which would serve to satisfy both.