Crane asked, "You don't think that stuff really helps, do you?"
A singing bird to you, Moipe, if you will but set us free.
Tenebrous Tartaros, be not angry with me, who have always honored you. Theft is yours, murder, and foul deeds done in darkness. Am I never again to walk freely the dark streets of my native city? Recall how I walked there with Auk, like me a thief. When I surmounted Blood's wall, you favored me, and I gladly paid the black lamb and the cock I swore. Recall that it was I who brought the Pardon of Pas to Kalan, and allow me to steal away now, Tartaros, and Doctor Crane with me. I will never forget, Tartaros, that thieves are yours and I am one. I have searched my conscience, Tartaros, to discover that in which I have displeased you. I find this: that I detested your darksome tunnels with all my heart, never thinking in my pride that you had sent me there, nor that they were a most proper place for such as I. I renounce my pride; if ever you send me there again, I will strive to be grateful, recalling your favors. This I swear. A score of black rats to you, Tartaros, if you will but set us free.
Highest Hierax, be not angry with me, who have always honored you. Death is yours. Am I never to comfort the dying again? Recall my kindnesses to Pricklythrift, Shrub, Flax, Orpine, Bharal, Kalan, and Exmoor, Hierax. Recall how Exmoor blessed me with his dying breath, and forget not that it was I who slew the bird to whom blasphemers had given your name. If only you will free us, I will bring pardon to the dying all my life, and burial to the dead. I have searched my conscience, Hierax, to discover that in which I have displeased you. I find this: that-
"I thought you fellows used beads."
"Potto took them, as I told you," Silk said dispiritedly. "He took everything, even my glasses."
"I didn't know you wore glasses."
That when I beheld those who had died in the sleep into which Pas had cast them,, I did not propose their burial, or so much as offer a prayer for them; and when Mamelta and I found the bones of she who had carried a lantern, I in my pride took her lantern without interring her bones. I renounce my pride and will be ever mindful of the dead. This I swear. A black he-goat to you, Hierax, if you will but set us free.
Enchanting Thelxiepeia, be not angry with me, who have always honored you. Prophesy and magic are yours. Am I never to cast the Thelxday lots again, nor to descry in the entrails of sacrifice the records of days to come? Recall that of the many sacrifices I offered for Orpine, for Auk, and for myself on Scylsday past, I read all save the bird's. I have searched my conscience, Thelxiepeia, to discover that in which I have displeased-
Abruptly the room was plunged in such darkness as Silk had never known, not even in the ash-choked tunnel, a darkness palpable and suffocating, without the smallest spark or hint of light.
Crane whispered urgently, "It's Lemur! Cover your head."
Despondent, not knowing why he should cover it or what he might cover it with, Silk did not.
I find this: that I sought no charm-
The door opened; Silk turned at the sound in time to see someone who nearly filled the doorway enter. The door closed again with a solid thud, but no snick from the bolt.
"Stand up, Patera." Councillor Lemur's voice was deep and rich, a resonant baritone. "I want both of you. Doctor, take this."
A thump.
"Pick it up."
Crane's voice: "This is my medical bag. How did you get it?"
Lemur laughed. (Silk, rising, felt an irrational longing to join in that laughter, so compellingly agreeable and good-natured was it.) "You think we're in the middle of the lake? We're still in the cave, but we'll be putting out shortly. I spoke to Blood and one of his drivers brought it, that's all. "Patera, I have some little presents for you, too. Take them, they're yours."
Silk held out both hands and received his prayer beads and the gammadion and silver chain his mother had given him, the beads and chain in a single, tangled mass. "Thank you," he said.
"You're a bold man, Patera. An extremely bold man, for an augur. Do you consider that you and the doctor, acting in concert, might overpower me?"
"I don't know."
"But not so bold now that you've lost your god. Doctor, what about you? You and the augur, together?"
Crane's voice, from the direction of the cot, "No." As he spoke, Silk heard the soft snap of a catch.
"I have your needler in my waistband. And yours, Patera. It's in my sleeve. In a moment I'm going to give them back to you. With your needlers back in your possession, do you think you and your friend the doctor could kill me in the dark?"
Silk said, "May all the gods forbid that I should ever kill you, or anyone, or even wish to."
Lemur laughed again, softly. "You wanted to kill Potto, didn't you, Patera? He questioned you for hours, according to what he told me. I've known Potto all my life, and there is no more objectionable man in the whorl, even when he's trying to ingratiate himself."
"It is true that I could not like him." Silk chose his words. "Yet I respected him as a member of the Ayuntamiento, and thus one of the legitimate rulers of our city. Certainly I did not wish to harm him."
"He hit you repeatedly, and eventually so hard that you were in a coma for hours. The whorl would be well rid of my cousin Potto. Don't you want your needler back?"
"Yes. Very much." Silk extended his hand blindly.
"And you'll try to kill me?"
"Hammerstone challenged me in the same way," Silk said. "I told Councillor Potto about it, and he must have told you; but you're not a soldier."
"I'm not even a chem."
Crane's voice: "He's never seen you."
"In that case, look at me now, Patera."
A faint glow, a nebulous splotch of white phosphorescence near the ceiling, appeared to relieve the utter darkness. As Silk stared in fascination, the closely shaven face of a man of sixty or thereabouts appeared. It was a noble face, with a lofty brow surmounted by a mane of silver hair, an aquiline nose, and a wide mobile-looking mouth; staring up at it, Silk realized that Councillor Lemur had to be taller even than Gib.
The face spoke: "Aren't you going to ask how I do this? My skin is self-luminescent. Even my eyes. Watch."
Two more faintly glowing splotches appeared and became Lemur's hands. One held a needler as large as Auk's by the barrel. "Take it, Doctor. It's your own."
Crane's voice, from the darkness beyond Lemur's hands: "Silk's not impressed."
Leaving Lemur, the needler vanished.
"He's a man of the spirit." Crane chuckled.
"As am I, Patera. Very much so. You've lost your god. May I propose another?"
"Tartaros? I was praying to him before you came in."
"Because of the dark, you mean." Lemur's face and hands faded, replaced by a blackness that now seemed blacker still.
"And because it's his day," Silk said. "At least, I'd assume that it's Tarsday by now."
"Tartaros and the rest are only ghosts, Patera. They've never been anything more, and ghosts fade. With the passing of three hundred years, Pas, Echidna, Tartaros, Scylla, and the rest have faded almost to invisibility. The Prolocutor knows it, and since you're going to succeed him, you should know it, too."