Iome had a dozen fish cooking on rocks around a small campfire. She glanced up at him, saw the gleaming amber javelin.
“What have you found?” she asked, a smile broadening across her face.
“The fortress of Abyss Gate,” Gaborn said. “Erden Geboren’s old bedchamber was there, untouched through the ages. I found his own reaver dart!”
“What else?” Iome pressed him.
Gaborn said, “An old book, a manuscript I think.”
“In Erden Geboren’s own hand?” Iome asked. She looked as if she would get up and dance.
Gaborn nodded at her evident delight, but looked around in rising concern.
“Where’s Averan?” Gaborn asked.
“She walked up the trail a way,” Iome said. “She said that she wanted to pee in private, but I think she’s very upset about Binnesman. She just wants to be alone.”
Gaborn reached out with his Earth Sight. Yes, Averan had gone down the trail a way. He could sense no danger around her.
Gaborn pulled out the volume, and Iome unwrapped the leather that bound it. She opened to the title page, and read slowly, “ ‘The Tales’...no, I think that is ‘Lore of the Netherworld, as Told by One Who Walked Among the Bright Ones.’ ”
“You can read this old tongue?” Gaborn asked in astonishment. “I’ve never heard it spoken outside the House of Understanding, in the Room of Tongues. Where ever did you hear it?”
“I learned it from Chancellor Rodham,” Iome said. “He was quite the scholar and thought it infinitely more worthwhile for me to learn Alnycian than needlepoint.”
Gaborn studied her in frank amazement. “History has been silent as to what Erden Geboren learned from the Bright Ones and glories,” Gaborn mused. “Now we know why: he never finished his book. This is fabulous. Only the most powerful wizards have ever walked the path between our world and the netherworld, the One True World.”
Iome flipped to the second page. “This is old,” she said. “It’s hard to decipher.” She struggled to read.
“ ‘Mine voice is coarse...a crude tool, I fear. Mine tongue is of brass, untrustworthy. How may I recount the words of Bright Ones and glories who thunder, who...’—I don’t know that word—‘men with words of light, who whisper to...’ or is it ‘in?...the ears of our spirits? Listen to the words of glories, if thou canst. Unless my poor voice fails, as I fear. Yet still I hope that thou shalt hear.’ ”
Gaborn was immediately riveted. Iome glanced up to see his expression. She flipped open a page at random, halfway through the book, and began to read. “ ‘Then the Fael saith unto me—’ ”
“What’s a Fael?” Gaborn asked.
Iome said flippantly. “Something that saideth things unto Erden Geboren.” She began to read again. “ ‘Learn to love all men...’ He can’t decide whether to use the word ‘equally’ or ‘perfectly.’ ”
“If you loved all men perfectly,” Gaborn suggested, “wouldn’t you love them equally?”
Iome nodded and continued. “ ‘Do not esteem one man above another. Do not love the rich more than the humble, the strong more than the faint, the kind man more than the cruel. But learn to love all men equally.’ ”
“Hmmm,” Iome said with a thoughtful look on her face, as if the words disturbed her. She began to close the book.
Gaborn had never heard words like that, had never heard anyone other than a king who dared utter a commandment about how men were to treat each other.
A Fael must be a king among the Bright Ones or glories, he decided. “Keep reading.”
Iome forged ahead with great deliberation. “ ‘Then asketh I: “How can I love all men with equal perfection?” And the Fael answereth...’” Iome grunted in consternation. “Erden Geboren has got a lot of this blacked out. In part, he seems to say that we learn to love those that we serve, and he writes that ‘Thou must learn to serve each man perfectly.’ But he’s scribbled a note in the margin, asking, ‘How mayest I fixeth’...I think he means ‘fix in people’s minds,’ ‘that serving a man perfectly meaneth to serve his best...’—I don’t know that word—‘in defiance of his own wants? For truly some men wanteth that which is evil, and still we are bound to provide them with only that which is good. Those men under sway of the...lo...loci fighteth goodness by rote, never guessing that the minions of the One True Master command them.’ ”
Gaborn’s head spun as if he had been slapped. “Are you sure it says that?” he asked. “The One True Master?”
“It does!” Iome said.
“Is he talking about the reaver queen?” Gaborn asked. Binnesman had suggested that Erden Geboren had been hunting for a particular reaver, one that he called the locus, but neither the wizard nor Gaborn could guess what it might be that he sought.
“It sounds to me,” Iome said, “as if he is talking about something more powerful than a mere reaver.”
Gaborn grunted, wondering. The Days taught that there was only one eviclass="underline" selfishness, a trait that all men have in common. That seemed a sufficient explanation for evil. After all, who among men does not desire endless wealth, or unfailing health, boundless wisdom, or unending life? Who does not crave the love and admiration of others?
Certainly, such longings are only too human, Gaborn thought, and in themselves, they are not evil. For, as Gaborn’s father had once pointed out, a man who craves wealth and is thus driven to greater labors blesses both himself and those around him. The woman who wants wisdom and studies long into the night enriches all that she meets. And often Gaborn wished that he could become the kind of lord who could win the undying affection of his people, because to him it seemed an accurate measure of how well he governed.
It is only when we crave such things so much that we are willing to destroy others to get them, Gaborn told himself, that we engage in evil.
“The One True Master...is what Erden Geboren was hunting when he died,” Gaborn mused. “He prosecuted his war with the reavers for more than a decade. Could it possibly be the same creature we are hunting for now, after so long, or is the name merely a title used by the reavers’ lord?”
Gaborn suddenly had some questions for Averan. Could this One True Master have lived for seventeen hundred years? What more could she tell him about it? He looked up the tunnel. She hadn’t returned.
“Averan?” Gaborn called. His words echoed through the cave.
There was no answer.
“Averan?” Iome called.
But it was pointless. Gaborn used his Earth Sight, feeling for danger. He sensed her presence, a mile up the tunnel.
“Where is she going?” Gaborn wondered, and panic swept through him, for he sensed where she was going: into danger.
10
The Consort of Shadows
A child must lean on faith to guide him because he lacks both the wisdom that comes from experience and the foresight that comes from a mature mind. While some promote faith as a virtue, I prefer wisdom and foresight.
Averan had left the camp with her mind in a muddle. She felt a keen sense of worry, and it grew with every minute. The Consort of Shadows was on their trail, and she knew that he would never leave them alone.
Right now, Averan suspected that he would be waiting for them to return back up the cave. Most likely he would dig a hole somewhere along the tunnel, bury himself and hide with nothing but one or two philia above the ground.
Given its reputation as a hunter, Averan doubted that even Gaborn could evade the Consort of Shadows forever.
Their only hope was to find another reaver tunnel, one that led deep into the warrens. And the prospect seemed slim. The Waymaker had never been in this shaft, and Averan felt lost.
For a while she walked alone with her worries. They were getting deeper into the Underworld. The air felt warm and heavy. With the warmth, king’s crown began to adorn the walls; it was a bright yellow fungus that slowly grew from a central infestation, then died out in the middle, leaving a golden halo that slowly spread. In the distance Averan heard a strange sound.