The ladder was finished. The top level, contrived of ulnas and radii, stood only two feet under the opening of the shaft, and Aillas, with vast caution, practiced inserting himself into the shaft. There was nothing to delay his departure, except to await the next basket of bread and water, so that he might avoid meeting Zerling on his way to feed him. At the next feeding, when Zerling pulled up the untouched food, he would nod sagely and thereafter bring no more baskets.
The bread and water arrived at noon. Aillas took them from the basket, which was then drawn empty up the shaft.
The afternoon waned; never had time passed so slowly. The top of the shaft darkened; evening had come. Aillas mounted the ladder.
He placed his shoulders against one side of the shaft, his feet against the other, to wedge himself in place. Then six inches at a time he thrust himself up the shaft: at first awkwardly, with fear lest he slip, then with increasing ease. He paused once to rest, and again, when he had approached to three feet from the top, to listen.
Silence.
He continued, now gritting his teeth and grimacing in tension. He thrust his shoulders over the edge of the low wall and rolled to the side. He put his feet to solid ground, stood erect.
The night was quiet around him. To one side the mass of the Peinhador blotted out the sky. Aillas ran crouching to the old wall which enclosed the Urquial. Like a great black rat he skulked through the shadows and around to the old postern.
The door stood ajar, sagging on a broken hinge. Aillas looked uncertainly down the trail. He slipped through the aperture, crouching uneasily. No challenge came from the dark. Aillas sensed that the garden was untenanted.
He descended the path to the chapel. As he expected, no candle glimmered; the hearth was dead. He proceeded down the path. The moon, rising over the hills, shone on the wan marble of the ruins.
Aillas paused, to look and listen, then descended to the lime tree.
"Aillas."
He halted. Again he heard the voice, speaking in a dreary halfwhisper.
"Aillas."
He approached the lime tree. "Suldrun? I am here."
Beside the tree stood a shape of wisps and mist. . "Aillas, Aillas, you are too late; they have taken our son."
Aillas spoke in astonishment. "'Our son'?"
"He is named Dhrun, and now he is forever gone from me... Oh Aillas, it is not pleasant to be dead."
Tears started from Aillas' eyes. "Poor Suldrun. How could they treat you so?"
"Life was not kind to me. Now it is gone."
"Suldrun, come back to me!"
The pale shape moved and seemed to smile. "No. I am cold and dank.
Are you not afraid?"
"I will never be afraid again. Take my hands, I will give you warmth."
Again the shape shifted in the moonlight. "I am Suldrun, yet I am not Suldrun. I ache with a chill all your warmth could never melt... I am tired; I must go."
"Suldrun! Stay with me, I beg you!"
"Dear Aillas, you would find me bad company."
"Who betrayed us? The priest?"
"The priest indeed. Dhrun, our dear little boy: find him, give him care and love. Say that you will!"
"I will do so, as best I can."
"Dear Aillas, I must go."
Aillas stood alone, his heart too full even for the flowing of tears. The garden was empty except for himself. The moon rose into the sky. Aillas finally bestirred himself. He dug under the roots of the lime tree and brought out Persilian the mirror and the pouch with the coins and gems from Suldrun's chamber.
He spent the rest of the night in the grass under the olive trees.
At dawn he scaled the rocks and hid in the undergrowth beside the road.
A band of beggars and pilgrims came from the direction of Kercelot, east along the coast. Aillas joined them and so came down into Lyonesse Town. Recognition? He feared it not at all. Who could know this haggard gray-faced wretch for Prince Aillas of Troicinet?
Where the Sfer Arct met the Chale a cluster of inns displayed their boards. At the Four Mallows, Aillas took lodging, and, finally heeding the reproaches of his stomach, made a slow meal of cabbage soup, bread and wine, eating with great caution lest the unaccustomed food work mischief on his shrunken stomach. The food made him drowsy; he went to his cubicle and shaking out the straw pallet, slept into the afternoon.
Awakening, he stared around the walls in alarm close to consternation. He lay back, body trembling and at last eased his racing pulse... For a period he sat cross-legged on the pallet, sweltering in terror. How had he held his sanity so dark and deep below the ground? Urgencies now thronged upon him; truly he needed time to think, to plan, to recover his poise.
He rose to his feet and went down to the area at the front of the inn, where an arbor of vines and climbing roses shielded benches and tables from the hot afternoon sunlight.
Aillas seated himself at a bench beside the road, and a serving boy brought him beer and fried oat-cakes. Two urgencies pulled him in opposite directions: a near-unbearable homesickness for Watershade, and a longing, reinforced by the charge laid upon him, to find his son.
A dock-side barber shaved him and cut his hair. He bought garments at a booth, washed at a public bath, dressed in his new clothes, and felt immeasurably better. Now he might be taken for a seaman or a tradesman's apprentice.
He returned to the arbor in front of the Four Mallows, which had become busy with late afternoon trade. Aillas drank from a mug of beer and listened to such scraps of conversation as he could overhear, hoping for news. An old man with a flat florid face, silky-clean white hair and a mild blue gaze settled himself across the table. He gave Aillas an amiable greeting, ordered beer and fish-cakes and wasted no time engaging Aillas in conversation.
Aillas, wary of Casmir's notorious corps of informers, responded with simple-minded innocence. The old man's name, so Aillas gathered from the salute of a passerby, was Byssante. He needed no encouragement and provided Aillas information of all kinds. He touched upon the war and Aillas learned that conditions were generally as before. The Troice still immobilized the ports of Lyonesse. A fleet of Troice warships had won a notable victory over the Ska, effectively sealing the Lir from their depredations.
Aillas spoke only: "Exactly so!" and "So I understand!" and "Such things happen, alas!" But this was enough, especially when Aillas ordered more beer and so provided Byssante a second wind.
"What King Casmir plans for Lyonesse, I fear is not succeeding of its own weight, though if Casmir heard my opinion, he'd have me crotch to stock in a trice. Still, the conditions may go even worse, depending upon the Troice succession."
"How so?"
"Well, King Granice is old and fierce but he can't live forever.
Should Granice die today, the crown goes to Ospero, who lacks all ferocity. When Ospero dies, Prince Trewan takes the crown, since Ospero's son was lost at sea. If Ospero dies before Granice, Trewan takes the crown directly. Trewan is said to be a firebreathing warrior; Lyonesse can expect the worst. Were I King Casmir, I would sue for peace on the best terms to be had, and put my grand ambitions aside."
"That might well be the best of it," Aillas agreed. "But what of Prince Arbamet? Did he not hold first claim to the throne after Granice?"
"Arbamet died of injuries when he fell from a horse, something more than a year ago. Still, it's all the same. One is as savage as the next, so that now even the Ska won't come near. Ah my throat! So much talking is dry work. What of it, lad? Can you oblige an old pensioner a stoup of beer?"