by Tom Holt
Multiverse theory.
The Eye couldn’t grin, but it could shine. Told you so, it told itself, I told you but you wouldn’t listen, well, that’s one in the Eye for you. Yes, all right, the logical aspect of its persona agreed grumpily, but so what? Don’t you see, demanded the speculative part, and the logical part asked if that was supposed to be funny.
Multiverse theory. There are other worlds, like this one but different, other Realms, filled with other mountains, other oceans, other cities, other millions and millions of people, none of whom have ever encountered the Eye or what it stands for, or been given the opportunity to listen to its message and doctrine. Millions and millions and millions of people who, to put it bluntly, didn’t know any better.
Fresh meat and pastures new. Yum.
It took the Eye a long time—several milliseconds—to recover from the shock. Then it set about absorbing as much data as it possibly could. It downloaded the human’s brain; large parts of it were apparently encrypted, but that shouldn’t be a problem. It swarmed through the human’s book, which it was able to do even though it lacked fingers to turn pages, hitherto an insuperable problem in the quest for knowledge—I like this book, the Eye decided, I wonder if there are more where this one came from—and found a tantalising portal that appeared to lead somewhere completely unimaginable, except that it was for the time being closed, or offline, to use the human’s word for it; sorry for any inconvenience, please try again later. The Eye resolved to do just that, and moved on. In a neglected cupboard at the back of human’s mind, it came across the sentiment if thine Eye offend thee, pluck it out. It did the metaphysical equivalent of cordoning off that area with yellow tape, but decided it wasn’t a serious threat at the moment.
Exhaustion; it had done too much. It was horribly frustrating to be so weak, even here, in the greatest of its strongholds. But the Tower could only draw in and retain so much power, and the wretched humans and their strange devices tapped off an infuriatingly high percentage of that, so the Eye had had to come to terms with certain limitations, which it wisely accepted. It closed itself and withdrew from the human’s mind, and he woke up.
Bloody bureaucrats, he thought.
He yawned and stretched, found he’d woken up with a headache. Aspirin; had they got any? Probably not. Molly had ordered some, but that was the trouble with having to get every damn thing mail order via the Net, you ran out of something and then God only knew when the replacement supply was going to get there.
This is a horrible place, he thought. We ought to go home.
Now where did that come from, all of a sudden? Never once, in spite of all the buggerations and tribulations, had he considered admitting defeat, giving it best, crawling back to Putney with his tail between his legs. Nor, he resolved, was he going to consider it now; not after he’d posted all that stuff on the blog about being so happy, and having spent so much money. The latter point especially; God only knew what they could expect to get for this place if they sold it again, even with all the improvements—which, he knew only too well, had barely scratched the surface. Not enough to buy anything decent back home, that was for sure. They’d end up in a grotty little rat hole somewhere, with no money. No; he’d made this apple-pie bed for himself and now he had to lie on it. No alternative. Sorry, but there it is.
He looked at the screen of his laptop and swore under his breath. Somehow, in spite of the fortune he’d spent on anti-virus software, it had contrived to pick up something nasty. He flipped through to see what the damage was, but it appeared to be limited to the screensaver. Gone was the view from the top of the Tower on a clear day (amend that slightly; the clear day, there’d only been one so far), and in its place a horrible glaring cartoon red eye. He couldn’t decide whether it was a still or an animation; he couldn’t see it moving, but he was sure it did, when he looked away for a split second. Someone’s sense of humour. He did everything he could to get rid of it, but nothing seemed to work. Still; it looked horrible but it didn’t seem to be doing any harm. He added get rid of horrible thing to his list of things to do, and dismissed it from his mind.
“I read the prophecies,” Mordak said.
Tinituviel stopped dead, one hand wrist deep in a filing cabinet drawer. “Well done. Bet your finger’s sore.”
Mordak sat down on a footstool. The Iron Throne was all very well, but the front of the seat chafed the insides of his knees. “They’re drivel,” he said.
That got him a look, which he ignored. “You can’t have read them properly. You did make sure the book was the right way up?”
“Half of them,” Mordak said, “are later interpolations, which is obvious, because they’re written in New Low Elvish, you can tell by the increased use of the pluperfect subjunctive and the decrease in reliance on enclitic demonstratives. Any fool could see that,” he added.
Tinituviel pursed her lips. “Arguably,” she said. “Though Uviel and Picalillilion, in their landmark paper in the Elvish Journal of Superior Thought—”
“And half of the remaining half are about stuff that had already happened when they were written, which to my mind isn’t entirely honest. Still, what would I know? I’m only a goblin.”
“Yes, you are. Talking of which, are you sure you looked up all the long words? You didn’t just skip them?”
“Which leaves,” Mordak said, “the other half of a half, which I’m guessing came from a different source. There, I’m prepared to concede, we might be onto something.”
“Aha.”
“Actually,” Mordak said, and no doubt those needle ears picked up the slight change in his tone of voice; you didn’t have to explain every damn thing, like you do when you’re talking to goblins, which was nice. “Actually, I’m a bit concerned.”
“A bit.”
“A bit, yes. Which is pretty hot stuff, bearing in mind that I’m a High Vat goblin, possibly the most dangerous life form you’ll ever meet, and traditionally we don’t even know the meaning of concern.”
“Along with lots of other words.”
“Traditionally,” Mordak said. “But on this occasion I’m concerned bordering on mildly apprehensive.” He paused. “If you feel you need to run away screaming and hide behind something, please do so now. No? Right, here we go. This Nameless One. Bit of a piece of work, isn’t he?”
“Mphm.”
Mordak refreshed his memory from the notes he’d jotted down on the back of a desiccated troll’s ear. “It says in the Prophecies that he is the destroyer of worlds.” He paused. “That’s not good.”
“Quite. It’s evil. Presumably you don’t have issues with that.”
“Yes and no.” Mordak scratched his chin with his foreclaw. “On the face of it, yes, destroying worlds is a perfectly legitimate Evil activity, and one which, as Dark Lord, I might feel obligated to go along with.”
She was grinning. “I can feel a spurt of New Evil coming along,” she said. “Do go on.”
“Yes, all right, there’s no need to get all letters-to-the-editor at me. I’m just saying. Destroying worlds; is it really in the best interests of evil, in the sense that we’ve come to understand the word, or is it in fact misguided and downright counterproductive? I feel we need to ask these questions.”
“I bet you do.”
“For example,” Mordak went on, “let’s start with a basic and widely accepted definition of evil; the greatest harm to the greatest number. You’re all right with that, presumably.”
“It’ll do, I suppose.”
“Fine. So, you’ve got this world, on which a large number of people are living, let’s say for the sake of argument peacefully and in a state of moderate contentment. With me so far?”
“I think I can just about get my head around that, yes.”
“And then someone comes along and destroys this world. Blows it up, hits it with a falling star, whatever. All the people die. Evil?”
“Definitively so, I’d have thought.”
“Ah,” M
ordak said eagerly, “but is it? Let’s go back to our definition. The greatest harm to the greatest number. A planet is destroyed, millions are snuffed out in the blink of an eye. Do you see where I’m headed?”
She frowned. “Frankly, no.”
“In the blink of an eye,” he repeated. “No lingering in pain and dread. Most of them won’t even know what hit them. No suffering, no agony, it’s practically merciful. Probably they’re better off in the long run.”
“You know, maybe you’re reaching just a teeny bit there.”
“I don’t think so,” Mordak said robustly. “Phut and you’re gone, never even knew you were in trouble. Where’s the evil content in that? Also, once that world’s been snuffed out, it means that there’ll be no more people. No more people, no more misery, unhappiness and grief. If we look at it in terms of productivity quotients, taking the malon as our standard unit, a world of six billion people produces, what, eighty billion malons of evil per annum for fifty thousand years, OK? That’s twenty-four million billion malons. All right. Destroy that world in one fell swoop. Agreed, that’s pretty bad, but twenty-four million billion malons’ worth of bad? I don’t think so. Ten million billion malons, tops. That’s a net loss to the cause of the Great Darkness of fourteen million billion malons. Call that evil? Because I don’t.”
Shouldn’t that be mala?”
“The greatest harm,” Mordak went on, “to the greatest number. Again, the figures just don’t add up. Let’s go back to our planet of six billion people. That’s six billion at any one time. But they have kids, they die; over the course of, say, three Ages we’re looking at ten thousand billion people. Trash the world at a point, say, halfway through the second Age, that’s five thousand billion people who’ll never have the opportunity to encounter or experience evil. Five thousand billion potential customers, thrown away. Hardly,” he added, beaming, “the greatest possible number. So, as far as both halves of the definition are concerned, this joker isn’t evil at all. He’s a bloody philanthropist.”
Tinituviel looked at him for a moment with what could almost have been admiration. “And you thought up all that by yourself? That’s so sweet.”
“Counter-productive,” Mordak said firmly, “counter-revolutionary and downright heretical. This Nameless One isn’t on our side at all. Therefore, he’s the enemy.”
“And therefore isn’t entitled to your job, agreed.” She tucked a stray wisp of hair behind her ear. “I really like this New Evil. It can be anything you want it to be. Which is good,” she added, as Mordak glowered at her. “Flexible, adaptable, therefore instantly relevant to the needs of modern society. Or not having your head chopped off, as the case may be.”
Mordak shrugged ruefully. “Well, there’s that consideration, too. But I genuinely believe I happen to be the right orc for the job. I mean, look at the progress we’ve made. Giant leaps forward in free healthcare, housing, education, employment—”
She nodded. “Evil jobs for evil workers.”
“There wasn’t much of that sort of thing going on under my distinguished predecessor,” Mordak pointed out with a certain degree of feeling. “And by the sound of it, he and this Nameless twit are practically interchangeable. I mean, take that other bit in the Prophecies. He will plunge all the Realms into darkness impenetrable.” He shook his head sadly. “Oh dear.”
“Not keen?”
“I should say not. Look, I’ve just spent a hell of a lot of time, effort and money trying to improve our image, so that when people hear goblin and Dark Lord there isn’t that instant knee-jerk reaction. Oh, them. The bad guys. The nasty party. I’ve bust a gut trying to make the dwarves and the humans and, heaven help me, your lot, realise that just because we have our ideological differences, that doesn’t mean we can’t work together constructively in those areas we can agree on, such as trade, communications, the environment, all that stuff. Then along comes some frothing-at-the-mouth born-again reactionary and turns all the lights out. Result: years of painstaking diplomacy down the toilet in a matter of seconds. That’s what some people just don’t seem to realise. Evil can no longer afford to regard itself as some sort of monolithic isolationist bloc, it’s got to get out there and start a meaningful dialogue with the greater community of species and ideologies. Evil right or wrong just won’t cut it any more. I do wish people could see that, it’s so blindingly obvious.”
“Quite,” Tinituviel said, and if she was smirking she had the grace to turn her head away a little. “So that’s decided. We don’t like the Nameless One and we don’t want him in our backyard. Fine. What are you going to do about it?”
“Ah.” Mordak frowned. “There I think we have a problem. These Prophecies.”
“Hm?”
“Well.” He made a vague, resigned gesture. “They’re prophecies, aren’t they? Not warnings, not this is what’ll happen if you don’t pull your claw out and deal with it. More like, well, statements of fact, really. The Nameless One will arise, and so on and so forth.”
Tinituviel smiled. “That’s not how it works.”
Mordak looked up hopefully. “Isn’t it?”
“The art of prophecy, lesson one. Feel free to take notes, by the way, because this is proper Elf stuff, and you may find it hard to follow. Prophecy,” she went on, “is, as you say, a statement of fact. The following things will happen—”
“See? That’s what I—”
“Provided,” she went on firmly, “a certain precisely defined set of circumstances arise. Note the word precisely. The prophecy can only come about if all the requirements are exactly fulfilled. If there’s just one thing that isn’t exactly right, then the whole deal’s off. The prophecy goes into a sort of holding pattern and stays up there hovering until the great wheel of Destiny comes full circle and the circumstances are sort of attracted to it, like iron filings to a magnet. That,” she added impressively, “is the wisdom of the Elves, handed down from generation to generation.”
“To explain why so many of your prophecies don’t actually work?”
“Precisely. Which means,” she continued, “if the prophecy says the Great Dawn will come about when an iron frog sits on a blue lily pad in the dead centre of the Lost Lake of Dimmithduin, it’s no earthly good if the frog’s copper, or the lily pad’s mauve, or if an iron frog sits on a blue lily pad eighteen inches to the right of the dead centre of the lake. The prophecy takes one look at it, says does not compute, and wanders off and amuses itself for another ten thousand years. Which means,” she went on, “that if for some reason a person has a vested interest in a prophecy not coming true, it’s usually no big deal to make sure it doesn’t.”
Mordak gazed at her with big, round eyes. “Straight up?”
“Elf’s honour. All that stuff,” she added, “is not widely known, for obvious reasons. There’s a lot of money and kudos in the making-sure-bad-things-don’t-happen sector, so it wouldn’t do if people realised just how easy it is. But—”
“It can’t be terribly difficult, or Elves couldn’t do it,” Mordak said happily. “Or humans, even. Probably explains why your lot keep winning, come to that. Something must,” he added bitterly. “But anyway, what you’re saying is, if we can snafu just one condition of the prophecy, this Nameless One can go take a running jump.”
“Very good.” She clapped her hands together twice. “Now then, I take it you’ve made a detailed analysis of the conditions set out in the Prophecy. You have, haven’t you?”
“Yes, actually.” Mordak pulled another shrivelled troll’s ear from the top of his boot. “One, a great portal shall open. Two, she who should never have been born will rise up among the chosen people. Three, the Children of Fluor will leave the Golden Land, lit by another sun, and pass through the Gate of Flour and Eggs and occupy the high places and the low places and the Seat of Seeing, and they shall speak to those who are here and yet not here through the Stone of Snordor that rests in Shanad-Dûm. Four, those who dwell in the low places will forsake the ol
d ways and be turned around and will answer the call.” He paused. “Have you got any idea what that’s all about?”
“Not a clue. Go on.”
“And, finally, five, he who made all things will rattle the small stones together in the place of great tidiness and fall the wrong side of a dot, and the hour of some-word-nobody’s-ever-managed-to-translate will be at hand. That’s it,” Mordak added, turning the dried ear over to make sure there was nothing on the other side. “That’s all we have to go on. Well?”
“What’s the word you can’t translate?”
He pointed. She craned her neck and peered. “Looks like R’xit,” she said.
“What does that mean?”
“No idea.” She grinned at him. “Tell you what,” she said. “If you can’t banjax just one thing out of that lot, I’m a cave-troll.”
He relaxed a little. “So you’re not too worried, then?”
“Oh, I’m worried all right. I’m worried because the fate of the Realms depends on a goblin doing something right, no matter how easy or trivial. But I reassure myself with the thought that the goblin in question has a wise Elf to advise him, and by and large he’s been trained to do as he’s told.”
“Four thousand eggs,” said the grocer’s wife, “one ton of flour, four hundredweight of butter, thirty gallons of milk, six hundredweight of lard.” She looked up, then down. “What’s all this, then?” she asked. “Throwing a party?”
The dwarf shrugged. “Don’t ask me,” he said. “I just run the errands.”
“Not sure we’ve got four thousand eggs,” the grocer’s wife said. “Hang on, I’ll ask him.” She stuck her head round the side of the door to the storeroom. “Customer wants four thousand eggs. We got that many?” A muffled voice spoke. “Sorry,” she told the dwarf. “I can do you nine dozen, and that’s your lot.” She peered at him. “What do you want with that many eggs, anyhow?”