“Did you get what you needed, mage?” I demanded hoarsely, not daring to try to remember for myself in case I fell into that smothering turmoil of sorcery again.
“Oh yes, Ryshad, most certainly.” My wits were still woolly, I realized; the exultation in the Archmage’s voice didn’t fill me with nearly the dread that my reason told me it should.
“Thank you, thank you very much indeed,” continued the wizard, pulling a plain black robe over his shirt sleeves as he spoke. “You have been more help than you can possibly imagine. Now, if you will excuse me, I have a great deal to do and you will need time to recover. Otrick, Usara—with me, if you please.”
The three mages swept out of the room without further courtesy and I found myself alone with Tonin and Livak. I managed to get myself onto my side, propped on one elbow, trembling with an exhaustion that for the life of me I couldn’t understand. Livak was sitting on a stool by the bed where I lay, rubbing her hands, which I could see had been crushed white and numb in a fierce grip. An angry red line betrayed the bite of a broad ring band into her finger.
“Did I do that?” I asked, aghast.
“You or that D’Alsennin, I’m not sure,” she replied, a faint smile doing nothing to lighten the shock in her eyes, green as deep water and about as revealing.
“Was it very bad?” I managed to keep my voice level, which was some achievement, given the circumstances.
Livak shuddered involuntarily. “It was so strange,” she said slowly after a long moment’s silence. “It simply wasn’t you. There was nothing of you, of Ryshad, in what you said, how you acted, how you moved even. It was all that lad, the D’Alsennin boy, wearing your skin and looking out of your eyes.” She clasped her hands to her face in remembered shock. “Your eyes, Rysh, they went completely blue, pale as ice and less alive. Arimelin save me, but it was foul!”
I reached for her hand and after a hesitation, a breath only but unmistakably reluctant, she gave it to me. I clung to her like a drowning man as we shared a look and remembered Aiten’s death together.
“I’m so very sorry we had to put you through that,” Tonin began hesitantly, plucking absently at the slashed sleeves of his purple jerkin, the latest Ensaimin style from the north, which he wore with none of the required bravado. “I’ll admit I was hoping for a rather more revealing contact than we have had with other subjects, given the extraordinary sympathy you’ve established with the D’Alsennin sword, but that turned out to be dramatic beyond anything I expected. I certainly had no idea it would be quite so dangerous. I cannot explain it, though I’ll address myself to the question at once, obviously.”
The shock in his voice made me realize I had been through something even more traumatic than I had realized, still dazed as I was. I looked at Livak again. “At least it’s all over now. No more dreams, no more voices in my head.”
She looked over at Tonin and I followed her gaze to see him looking first startled then guilty. “It is over, isn’t it?” she demanded in a dangerous tone.
“Well…” Tonin clasped his notes nervously to his barrel of a chest and I remembered thinking before that he was somewhat overtimid, both for a man of his size and of such standing in his learned community. His hands were soft too, never toughened by anything more demanding than paper or pen.
“Has Planir lied to me?” I managed to sit up and looked around instinctively for my sword. Still reasoning too slowly, I was thinking I might be using it on the Archmage, before remembering the cursed blade was what had run me into his snares in the first place.
“No one has told you untruths, not deliberately anyway.” Tonin moved closer, his voice more confident. “It’s just that we didn’t realize what we were dealing with. We have all been misled by only having such partial information. We all thought these dreams were echoes of the past, carried by the artifacts. Now we know better, it’s clear the actual consciousness of the original owner is held in the item and communicating with the unconscious mind of whoever possesses it in the present. That can never have been foreseen, or intended, for that matter.”
“Temar’s been doing a cursed sight more than communicate with my unconscious mind,” I just managed not to snarl. “Are you telling me I still have him lurking in the back of my head?”
“For the moment, I’m afraid so,” sighed Tonin with unfeigned regret. “I’ll set to work at once, go through all the references and that Arimelin archive, see what I can do for you.”
I was tempted to let my mounting fury find its target in him for an instant, but simple justice held me back. It wasn’t Tonin’s fault and, if he could be believed, it wasn’t even Planir’s, not really. Besides, I was starting to think that the uncharacteristic rages I had been feeling were not my own, but Temar’s. A wave of black depression swept over me as I managed to swing my feet to the floor, my legs feeling as weak as if I’d been lying abed with a four-day fever. “So I risked my life and my sanity for no purpose?”
“Not at all!” Tonin looked most concerned. “Now we know what happened to the colonists in Kel Ar’Ayen—”
As he spoke the image of the great cavern full of silent figures came sweeping over me. I gasped and clutched at the bed, hearing the linen rip beneath my fingers as my heart raced, blood pulsing in my head until I managed to slam a door shut on the vision.
“Ryshad?” I hated to hear the uncertainty in Livak’s tone.
“Yes.” I managed to open my eyes and squint at her, attempting a reassuring smile and evidently failing miserably.
“Saedrin save us, I hate this!” she burst out, the fury in her voice a dim echo on my own wrath. I clung to that bright anger in a vain attempt to ward off the dark surges of despair that threatened me on all sides.
The door opened. “Is he all right?”
“Come in, Shiv,” I said wearily. “I’m upright and conscious, which is about as good as it’s going to get for the moment.”
Whatever Shiv saw in my face evidently shook him, which perversely cheered me up a little. He looked guiltily at Livak, who glared at him, expression fierce.
“I came to see if you wanted to come home with me, if you feel ready,” Shiv glanced at Tonin, “but if you need to stay here—”
“I’ll come.” I got unsteadily to my feet and Livak tucked herself under my arm to give me what support she could.
“It might be better if you waited a while…” protested Tonin weakly as we made our way toward the door.
“No, thank you.” I drew a deep breath and gripped the door handle as much for support as to open it. “Just find a way to throw Temar D’Alsennin out of my head once and for all.”
Outside I was startled to realize the noonday sun was riding high in the cloud-strewn sky. Hadn’t we started this nonsense just after breakfast? I’d sent Shiv with a message, telling Planir to be ready at the second chime of the day and duly I arrived to sit and concentrate obediently on Tonin’s incomprehensible, archaic chants. I had certainly been expecting an unpleasant experience, but never to lose myself so completely as I evidently had. If young D’Alsennin had had the run of my head for that amount of time, no wonder I was feeling so peculiar.
“Come on.” Shiv took my other arm. Leaning heavily on the pair of them, I stumbled along toward the dubious sanctuary of Shiv’s little house. Given the dramatic events still echoing around in my memory, it was rather incongruous to see women with their market baskets, men delivering faggots of firewood, children skipping through a rope tied to a horse-rail, normal life going on all around me. We certainly attracted some curious glances; people must have thought I was a drunk making an early start, but that was the least of my concerns as I struggled with Temar’s increasingly intrusive recollections. I kept seeing Avila trying to hold up Guinalle when she fainted on the boat, Den Fellaemion leaning on Guinalle at a meeting in the settlement, Vahil supporting a wounded man in the frantic flight from the Elietimm invasion. The summer sun was warm on my back but the chill of that distant and long forgotten cavern seemed to have bitten deep into my bones, gnawing at me despite the heat of Hadrumal. By the time Pered opened the door to us, I was shaking again, and not just from fatigue.