“I can’t blame them for wanting to leave,” Alfred said quietly. “I want to leave very badly myself at this moment. But I know perfectly well what will happen when these Sartan arrive on the other worlds. It will only be a matter of time before they begin to try to take over, disrupting the lives of the mensch.”
“They’re a sad-looking lot,” Haplo said.
Alfred, not realizing he’d spoken aloud, jumped to hear Haplo’s voice. Or maybe he hadn’t spoken aloud. Haplo had always been able to read his thoughts.
“You’re right,” Haplo went on. “These Sartan are weak now, but once they are able to quit using their magic for survival, their magic will strengthen. They’ll discover its power.”
“And then there are your people.” Alfred glanced at the sleeping Marit. The dog lay protectively at her side, growling warningly at anyone who ventured near her. “If they escape from the Labyrinth and enter the worlds, who can say what will happen? Patryns have sucked in hatred with their mothers’ milk, and who can blame them?”
Alfred began to tremble. He dropped the food, pressed his hands to his burning eyes. “I see it all happening again! The rivalries, the wars, the deadly confrontations. The innocent victims caught up in it, dying for something they don’t understand ... All ... all ending in disaster!”
The last burst from Alfred in a hollow cry. Looking up, he encountered the necromancer’s glittering black-eyed gaze. Balthazar had returned. Alfred had the sudden, uncanny impression that the necromancer had followed every twist and turn of his thoughts. Balthazar had seen what Alfred had seen, shared the vision that had led to his horrified cry.
“I will leave Abarrach,” Balthazar said to Alfred, softly. “You cannot stop me.”
Alfred, shaken and disturbed, was forced to quit using his magic. He didn’t feel strong enough to turn ice to water on a hot summer’s day.
“It was a mistake to come here,” he muttered.
“But if we hadn’t, they would have all died,” Haplo observed.
“Perhaps it would have been best.” Alfred stared at his hands—large, with large-boned wrists; slender, tapering fingers; graceful, elegant . . . and capable of causing so much harm. He could use them for good, too, but at the moment he was not disposed to see that. “It would be best for the mensch if we all died.”
“If their ‘gods’ left them, you mean?”
“ ‘Gods’!” Alfred repeated, with contempt. “ ‘Enslavers’ is nearer the mark. I would rid the universe of us and our corrupt ‘power’!”
“You know, my friend”—Haplo sounded thoughtful—“there may be something in what you say . . .”
“There may be?” Alfred was startled. He’d been babbling, flailing about mentally, not expecting to hit anything. “What exactly did I say?”
“Don’t worry about it. Go make yourself useful.”
“Do you have any suggestions?” Alfred asked meekly.
“You might want to find out what Balthazar’s scouts are reporting to him,” Haplo suggested dryly. “Or hadn’t you noticed that they’d returned?”
Alfred hadn’t noticed, as a matter of fact. His head jerked up, his body twitched. The Sartan he’d seen posted near the cavern’s entrance—the one Balthazar had sent on some sort of errand—was back. Balthazar brought the young woman food. She was eating ravenously, but between mouthfuls, she was talking to him, their discussion low-voiced and intense.
Alfred started to stand up, slipped on a smattering of kairn-grass seeds, and sat back down again.
“Stay here,” Haplo said. He gave the dog a silent command.
The animal rose to its feet. Padding silently over to Balthazar, the dog flopped down at his feet.
“He sent her to inspect the ship. He’s going to try to seize it,” Haplo reported, hearing through the dog’s ears.
“But they can’t, can they?” Alfred protested. “Marit surrounded it with Patryn runes . . .”
“Under ordinary circumstances, no,” Haplo said. “But apparently someone else on Abarrach has had the same idea. Someone else is also trying to steal the ship.”
Alfred was astonished. “Surely not Xar . . .”
“No, my lord has no need for that ship. But someone else on this world does.”
Suddenly, Alfred knew the answer.
“Kleitus!”
18
“I wish we were stronger!” Balthazar was saying, as Alfred hesitantly approached the necromancer and the guard. The dog, tail wagging, pattered over to greet Alfred.
“Our numbers greater! But ... it will have to suffice.” The necromancer glanced around. “How many of us are physically capable . . .”
“Um . . . what’s going on?” Alfred remembered just in time to pretend that he didn’t know.
“The lazar, Kleitus, is attempting to steal your ship,” Balthazar reported, with a calm that astonished Alfred. “Of course, the fiend must be stopped.”
So that you can take it yourself, Alfred added, but he added it silently. “The ... um ... that is ... Patryn rune-magic guards the ship. I don’t think it can be broken . . .”
Balthazar smiled, thin-lipped, grim. “As you recall, I once saw a demonstration of ‘Patryn’ magic. The rune-structures are visible, they glow with light when they are activated. Isn’t that true?”
Alfred, wary, nodded.
“Half the sigla on your ship are now dark,” Balthazar reported. “Kleitus is unraveling it.”
“That’s impossible!” Alfred protested in disbelief. “How could the lazar have learned such a skill—”
“From Xar,” Haplo said. “Kleitus has been watching my lord and the rest of my people. The lazar has discovered the secret of the rune-magic.”
“The lazar are capable of learning,” Balthazar was saying at the same time, “because of the soul’s proximity to the body. And they have long wanted to leave Abarrach. They can find no living flesh here on which to feed. I do not need to tell you what terrible tragedies will befall in the other worlds if the lazar succeed in entering Death’s Gate.”
He was right. He had no need to tell Alfred, who could envision such horror all too clearly. Kleitus had to be stopped, but—once the lazar was stopped, it was—who was going to stop Balthazar?
Alfred sank down on a rock ledge, stared unseeing into the darkness. “Will it never end? Will we go on forever perpetuating the misery and the sorrow?”
The dog flopped down, whined a little in sympathy. Balthazar stood near, black eyes probing, plodding. Alfred flinched, as if the sharp gaze had drawn blood. He had the distinct feeling he knew what Balthazar was going to say next.
Balthazar placed his gaunt, wasted hand on Alfred’s shoulder.
Leaning over him, the necromancer spoke in low tones. “Once I might have been able to cast such spells as are required. But not now. You, on the other hand . . .”
Alfred blenched, shrank away from the man’s touch. “I ... couldn’t! I wouldn’t know how . . .”
“I do,” Balthazar said smoothly. “I have been thinking long on the matter, as you might guess. The lazar are dangerous because—unlike the ordinary dead—the living soul remains attached to the dead. If that attachment were to be severed, the soul wrenched from the body, I believe the lazar would be destroyed.”
“You ‘believe’?” Alfred retorted. “You don’t know for certain.”
“As I said, I have not been strong enough to conduct such an experiment myself.”
“I couldn’t,” Alfred said flatly. “I couldn’t possibly.”
“Yet he’s right,” said Haplo. “Kleitus must be stopped. Balthazar’s too weak to do it.”
Alfred groaned again. What do I do about Balthazar? he asked silently, conscious of the necromancer hovering at his elbow. How do I stop him?
“Worry about one thing at a time,” Haplo returned.
Alfred shook his head dismally.
“Look at these Sartan,” Haplo told him. “They can barely walk. The ship is a Patryn ship, covered with Patryn runes—inside and out. Even if Kleitus destroys all the runes, new ones will have to be crafted to enable the ship to fly. Balthazar won’t be leaving anytime soon. Plus I don’t think Lord Xar will be too pleased with the idea of letting these Sartan escape him.”