For a long while he passed through the cool places of dancing shadows before he reached the entranceway where the great slab Pol had toppled lay in shattered ruin all about.
Picking his way among the rubble, he continued into a place where the echoes died in the distance and the walls and roof were no longer visible, a place where the odor of the beasts hung heavy and the torch flickered in vagrant drafts. Here, too, he knew his way, and he proceeded along it with much less trepidation than he would have experienced some months earlier.
The vast, still mounds of scaled and furred bodies were sprawled casually about, many of them sleeping in the depths of magical charges as they had, he had, before. Some few others slept out their natural daily, weekly or monthly spans.
He wondered, as he made his way to the familiar niche, whether the one he sought would indeed be resting there. He might be anywhere in the world, his absence necessitating Mouseglove's rousing another--a thought he did not relish. Having been trapped for twenty years in the same version of the sleep spell as Moonbird, he had developed a peculiar link--a thing even verging on friendliness--with the giant dragon. With any of the others, he would have to attempt a complicated explanation, possibly beginning with his own identity. No, he did not like that thought at all.
As he came near to the place where Moonbird normally rested he grazed his shoulder against an unremembered rocky prominence.
Mouseglove! It has been long!
He stumbled back. It was a shoulder of dragon rather than a shoulder of stone against which he had brushed. He recovered almost immediately and moved to lay his hands upon the beast.
"Yes, I am back," he replied. "There is trouble. We need your help."
The great bulk shifted beneath his hands, causing them to slide along the hard, smooth scales. Moonbird began to rise.
What is it? he asked.
"We must go to Anvil Mountain, find Pol's scepter, take it to him."
He cast it into the fiery hole. He told me this.
"He told me, also--"
But I have been back, and the fires have died. All is gray rock now. I do not know how far I could dig in it. Get tools.
Mouseglove thought for a moment.
"There is a room off the main courtyard," he said, sending along the image. "I will return and look over the tools there. Meet me in the yard."
It will be faster for me to take you there.
"Well ..."
Mount!
Mouseglove scrambled onto his back. Minutes later, they were gliding through the darkness.
XI
Pol was awakened by the light shining upon his face. He tossed his head several times to avoid it, then sat suddenly upright, eyes opened.
The door of his cell stood wide.
Had someone come for him, then met with some momentary distraction? He listened. There were no sounds from the corridor.
Cautiously, he rose to his feet. He crossed the cell to the place where he had stood earlier, conjuring ineffectively, eyes throbbing.
Some illusion? To torment him?
He extended his hand beyond the door frame, touched the door. It moved slightly. At that moment, he felt the essence of mocking laughter, soundless. It was as if something vaguely sinister were amused at his puzzlement, his trepidation--something inhabiting a level of reality which did not coincide with his own. He stood frozen, waiting, but it did not occur again.
Finally, he moved forward, passing out into the corridor. It was deserted.
What now? he thought. Should he set out upon the route along which he had followed Larick? Should he strike out and explore elsewhere within the castle? Or should he head back to the courtyard, take one of the flying beasts and flee?
The latter course struck him as the most sensible: Flee, hide and wait for the return of his powers. Then he could go back to Rondoval, rouse his bestial minions and come back here as he had come to Anvil Mountain--to tear the place apart. It made better sense than remaining, powerless and outnumbered, in the citadel of an enemy.
He turned in the direction of the courtyard with the cages. Then he stood still.
His way was barred by a sheet of pale flame.
"And so my choice is not really a choice," he said softly.
Is it ever? came the familiar, ironic notes in his head.
"I guess that remains to be seen."
Like most things, came the reply, accompanied by slightly conciliatory sensations.
"I've never been able to figure out whether you're an enemy or an ally."
We are agents. We aided you once.
"And the next time...?"
Why should you have any reason to doubt those who have helped you in the past?
"Because I came away with the feeling that I'd been pushed into something."
I would say, rather, that we pulled you out.
"That is a debatable point. But you say that you are agents. Agents of what?"
Change.
"Much is encompassed by that word. Could you be more specific?"
Two of the forces at work upon this world are science and magic. At times they are opposed to one another. We are on the side of the magic.
"This place hardly seems a stronghold of technology."
It is not. There is no direct confrontation involved here.
"God damn you! Getting a straight answer out of you is like milking a wildcat! Why can't you just tell me what is involved?"
The truth is such a sacred thing that we guard it well.
"I believe that you want my cooperation."
That is why we are assisting you again.
Pol tried shifting to the second seeing. This time it seemed to work smoothly. With it, he detected the outline of a human form within the flame--small, masculine, head bowed, hands hidden within the long sleeves which overlapped near its dark center. An orange strand drifted near Pol's right hand, the far end of it vanishing within the flame. He caught it with his fingertips and twirled it. The dragonmark throbbed upon his forearm.
"Now you will tell me what I wish to know--" he began.
His hand felt as if it were on fire. He stifled a scream and dropped to one knee in his agony. His second vision departed. His entire arm ached.
We will not be coerced in such a fashion, came the reply.
"I'll find the right way," he said through clenched teeth.
It would be so much easier and would save so much time if you would let us show you rather than spend the night telling you what is involved.
Pol rose to his feet, holding his aching right hand in the other.
"I suppose that's the best deal I'll get from you tonight."
It is. Turn and follow the other.
Pol turned and beheld another tongue of flame. This one was only the size of his hand, and it hung in the air in the middle of the corridor about eight paces before him. A moment after his gaze fell upon it, it began to drift away from him. He followed.
It led him through a hall filled with grotesque statues, both human and non-human, a low, red brilliance, a soft, almost vibrant glow lying upon the whole setting, cast perhaps by the flame itself, giving the impression that all of the stone forms were beginning to stir. The air there was stale in his lungs, and he found himself holding his breath until he had departed the place. The luster was present in some of the other chambers and hallways, yet somehow it lacked the sinister character it had given to that room and those representations. The dragonmark had begun throbbing when they had entered the place and did not grow still until they were well away.
He moved down a series of stone stairways, each rougher than the preceding one, passing through damp chambers and long passageways, which, judging from the descent he had made, must be well beneath the castle itself and hacked from the living stone of the mountainside. At some point, Pol ventured a look behind him and saw that the other flame was nowhere in sight. He also saw, however, that the shadows seemed to slide in a liquid, almost sentient fashion at his back, in a manner he found more than a little unsettling. He hurried to keep pace with his guide.