"How about the same thing we worked for four years to dig out of the Land of Unknown Shadows?" Murgen said. "The secrets of the shadowgates."
Heads nodded. I asked, "How would they know? And why would they want it? To stop this gate from leaking? Didn't Shivetya say they always repair themselves to that level? Tobo and Suvrin never found any that were open, did they?" I assumed Doj would be familiar with Tobo's adventures.
All eyes were on me. Murgen suggested, "This is Khatovar. Source of the Free Companies."
"More than four hundred years ago. Closer to five, now. They might not even remember."
"Probably not."
"And they must have some knowledge of shadowgates. They got Bowalk through this one, in and out of Hsien, then back through here again. Without destroying anything."
Lady said, "Another thing we can infer is that someone here knows something about controlling shadows."
"We can?"
"Implicit in the fact that Bowalk made it to Hsien and back again. As well as in the fact that we should've had more shadows to deal with here if a horde did break out and devastate the world when Bowalk came through the gate the first time. There's game, Doj says. If those were feral shadows we destroyed they would've killed all the game. Those things were here to watch us."
I growled. "Damn! Murgen. All that time at Khang Phi. You ever hear tell of any Shadowmasters that never were accounted for? We're not going to have to butt heads with Longshadow's long-lost mom, are we?"
"They're accounted for. Any that turn up here would have to be home grown." Which was possible. Two of the three we had destroyed in our world were exactly that. One had been one of the Lady's henchwomen believed dead but gone fugitive instead.
Continued talk led to the notion that we might have been lured to Khatovar specifically so we could be stripped of whatever knowledge we might possess.
Even now Lady remained a tremendous repository of arcane information.
I went off alone with my raven companions. One I told to take the Unknown Shadows out scouting, ranging as far as necessary to find the nearest natives. The other I sent to find Tobo. It carried a detailed and honest report, just as if Sleepy had sent us to Khatovar and expected regular communiques.
I hoped Tobo might have some useful suggestions. I hoped he knew more about Khatovar than he had pretended.
Neither Lady nor I could sleep. The white raven had not taken long to find people. An army was headed our way, though it was still on the far side of the mountains. The forvalaka was there, accompanying a family of wizards who, according to reports from Tobo, were the uncontested overlords of modern Khatovar.
Tobo's source was indirect. He had consulted the scholar Baladitya, who took our questions to the demon Shivetya. Shivetya then tacitly acknowledged his ability to monitor events in the worlds connected to the glittering plain.
The rulers of Khatovar were a sprawling, brawling, turbulent clan of wizards known as the Voroshk, which was simply their family name. The founding father's talented blood had bred true. And often. He had been a man of immense appetites. There were several hundred Voroshk today. Their regime was cruel. Its sole purpose was to further enrich and empower the Family. Following the disaster caused by the forvalaka's breakthrough into Khatovar, the Voroshk had learned to manage the shadows. It would be the Voroshk who had sent the shadows we had destroyed.
Kina, or Khadi, was no longer worshipped in the world bearing the name that meant Khadi's Gate. The Voroshk had exterminated the Children of Kina.
Nevertheless, once each year, sometime during the time when the Deceivers would have celebrated their Festival of Lights, somebody managed to strangle a member of the Family and get away.
Chances were good that the Voroshk knew their history well enough to recall that the Free Companies of Khatovar had gone out as missionaries on behalf of the Mother of Night. They might well dread the Queen of Darkness's return.
My own supernatural allies were under instruction to avoid notice except in instances where Khatovar's shadows could be picked off without risk of our secret strength being revealed.
Her face against my chest, Lady murmured, "These Voroshk sound like bad people, hon. As bad as any you've run into before."
"Including you?"
"Nobody's as bad as me. But you need to worry about this. There's a whole family of them. And they don't squabble amongst themselves. Much. Even when I had the Ten on their shortest rein they were always trying to stab each other in the back."
There was a message there, under her teasing. I held her and told her, "I'll retreat to the plain rather than risk the confrontation. We can always sneak back here some other time." But I would not be happy if I had to let Bowalk get away yet again.
I drifted off wondering about the minds of the Voroshk. Wondering about this mysterious world that had sent our forbrethren out so long ago, on a crusade that had gotten lost. Were the Voroshk unwitting pawns of Kina? Could they be yet another device by which the Dark Mother might try to bring on the Year of the Skulls?
"No," Lady said when I suggested it aloud. "We know whose role that is."
"Don't want to think about Booboo, hon. Just want to go to sleep."
25
Glittering Stone: The Revenant
Goblin denied nothing. "She kept me alive somehow. She intended to use me. But she never did anything to me. I spent most of the time sleeping. Dreaming ugly dreams. Probably her dreams."
The little wizard's voice was barely a whisper. It husked. He seemed permanently on the verge of tears. The irrepressible spirit that had made him the Goblin of old seemed to have fled.
His audience did nothing to make him welcome or feel wanted. He was not welcome or wanted. He had spent four years sleeping with the Queen of Night, the Mother of Deceivers.
"She lives in the bleakest place you can imagine. It's all death and corruption."
"And madness," Sahra added without looking up from the trousers she was mending.
Tobo asked, "Where's the Lance?" Goblin had been asked before. The Lance of Passion was the soul of the Company. As much as the Annals did, it tied past and present together. It went all the way back to the Company's departure from Khatovar. It had symbolic power and real power. It was a shadowgate key. And it was capable of causing a Goddess terrible pain.
Goblin sighed. "There's nothing but the head left. Inside her, from when I stabbed her. She made it migrate through her flesh. She's taken it into her womb."
The Captain, obviously uncomfortable with this heathen talk, snapped, "Would any of you infidels care to explain that? Tobo?"
"I don't know anything about religion, Captain. Not the practical stuff, anyway."
"Anybody?"
None of the infidels had a thought.
Sleepy had a few. One was that Kina was not a real Goddess. Kina was just an incredibly powerful monster. All the Gunni Gods and Goddesses were nothing but powerful monsters. There was only one God... She continued staring at Goblin, wondering if he was worth believing, wondering if the best course was just to kill him. The silence stretched. Goblin remained immensely uncomfortable. As he should be, considering the circumstances and his limited ability to explain what had happened to him.
There was no way anyone would ever trust him.
The Captain said, "I have a thought, Tobo."
Silence stretched again as the boy waited on her and she waited for him to ask what her thought was. Grown-up silliness.
Sahra said, "Why don't we have Goblin go help Croaker with Khatovar? He'll be more comfortable with his old friends, anyway."
Sleepy gave her a dirty look. Then Tobo did the same. Sahra smiled, bit the thread she was using, put her needle away. "That's done, then."