by Tad Williams
The fever did return sometime during the night. When Tiamak escaped its clutches once more, it was to find himself floating in lazy circles, his flatboat becalmed in a marshy backwater. His leg, although swollen and tremendously painful, did not seem markedly worse. With luck, if he could get to Kwanitupul soon he would not lose it.
Shaking loose the cobwebs of sleep, he offered yet another prayer to He Who Always Steps on Sand—whose existence, despite Tiamak’s generally skeptical nature, had come to seem a great deal more conceivable since the misadventure with the crocodile. Whether this weakening of his disbelief was due to the mind-dizzying fever, or to a resurgence of true faith brought on by the nearness of death, Tiamak did not much care. Neither did he scrutinize his feelings about the matter very deeply. The fact was, he did not want to be a one-legged scholar—or worse, a dead scholar. If the gods did not help him, then there was no resource available to him in this treacherous marsh other than his own fast-failing resolve. Faced with those simple alternatives, Tiamak prayed.
He poled himself out of this latest backwater, at last reaching a place where several waterways came together. It was hard to tell exactly how he had wandered to this point, but using the newly-kindled stars as a reference—especially the Loon and the shining-pawed Otter—he was able to orient himself toward Kwanitupul and the sea. He kept his bargepole moving until dawn, when he could no longer ignore his weary mind and wounded body crying out for rest. Fighting to keep his eyes open, he floated down the watercourse a little farther, poking in the muddy bank until at last he located a large stone which he levered free This he secured to his fishing line and dumped it over the side to act as an anchor so he could remain moored in an uncovered section of the waterway as he took his desperately-needed sleep, safely away from tree-clinging ghants and other unwanted company.
Now able to preserve the gains made by his poling, Tiamak made better time. He lost half of the next afternoon (his eighth or ninth since leaving home, he guessed) to another resurgence of fever, but was able to push on a bit during the evening, and even continue after dark in order to make up some of his lost time. He discovered that there were far fewer biting and stinging insects once the sun had vanished into the western swamp, this and the oddly pleasant blue glow of twilight made such a nice change from his sun-battered afternoons that he celebrated by finally eating the rather forlorn-looking river-apple he had found on a branch overhanging the watercourse. River-apples were usually gone by this late in the year, those which had escaped the birds falling free at last to drift on the eddying water, bobbing like fisherman’s floats until their seeds wound up at last in some mud-dam or root-tangled clump of soil. Tiamak had considered the find a good omen. He had put it aside after many expressions of thanks to beneficent deities, knowing he would enjoy it more if he savored the thought of it for a while.
The first bite through the rind of the river-apple was sour, but the pale flesh nearer the middle was wonderfully sweet. Tiamak, who had been surviving for days on waterbugs and edible grasses and leaves, was so overcome by the taste of the fruit that he nearly fell into a swoon. He had to put most of it aside for later.
Kwanitupul could have been said to occupy the northern shore of the upper prong of the Bay of Firannos, except that there was no real shore in that location: Kwanitupul lay on the Wran’s northernmost fringe, but it was still very much a part of the greater marsh.
What had once been a minor trading village made up of a few score tree-houses and stilted huts had grown vast when the merchants of Nabban and Perdruin and the Southern Islands discovered the array of valuable things that came from the Wran’s unreachable interior—unreachable by any except the Wrannamen, of course. Exotic feathers for ladies’ gowns, dried mud for dyes, apothecarical powders and minerals of unequaled rarity and potency, all these things and many more kept the bazaars of Kwanitupul thriving with merchants and traders from up and down the coast Since there was no land worthy of the name, pilings were driven deep into the mud instead, and shallow-drafted boats were laden with powdered stone and mortar and allowed to sink along the banks of the swampy waterways Across these foundations countless huts and walk-ways had sprung up.
As Kwanitupul grew, Nabbanai and Perdruinese drifted in to share its dilapidated precincts with the native Wrannamen, until the trading city had spread its way over many miles of canals and swaying bridges, growing across and clogging the outer byways of the swamp like water-hyacinth Its ramshackle eminence now dominated the Bay of Firannos as its older and larger sister Ansis Pelippe did the Bay of Emettin and Osten Ard’s north-central coast.
Still dizzy with fever, Tiamak found himself at last drifting up out of the swamp’s wild interior into the increasingly crowded arterial water-ways of Kwanitupul. At first, only a few other flatboats shared the green water with him, and these were almost entirely poled by other Wrannamen, many wearing feathery tribal finery in honor of their first visit to the grandest marsh-village of all. Farther into Kwanitupul the canals were choked with a host of other crafts—not only small boats like Tiamak’s, but ships of all size and design, from the beautifully carved and canopied barks of rich merchants to huge grain ships and barges carrying cut stone that slid along the waterways like imperious whales, forcing smaller boats to scatter or risk being swamped in their rolling wake.
Tiamak normally enjoyed the sights of Kwanitupul enormously—although, unlike his tribesmen, he had seen Ansis Pelippe and the other port cities of Perdruin, beside which Kwanitupul was only a slightly shabby copy. Now, however, his fever was upon him once more. The lapping of water and the shouts of Kwanitupul seemed curiously distant; the waterways he had traveled many times before were forbiddingly unfamiliar
He wracked his wandering mind for the name of the inn to which he had been directed to go In his letter, the one whose delivery had martyred Tiamak’s gallant pigeon Ink-daub, Father Dinivan had told him…told him…
…You are sorely needed. Yes, he remembered that part. The fever made it so hard to think…
Go to Kwanitupul, Dinivan had written, stay at the inn we have spoken of, and wait there until I can tell you more. And what else had the priest said? More than lives may depend on you.
But what inn had they spoken of? Tiamak, startled by a smear of color before his unfocused gaze, looked up in time to prevent his boat sliding in front of a larger vessel with two flaring eyes painted on its hull. This boat’s owner jumped up and down in the bow, waving a fist at Tiamak as he drifted past. The man’s mouth was moving, but Tiamak heard only a dull roaring in his ears as he poled out of the wake. What inn?
“Pelippa’s Bowl!” The name struck him like lightning out of the sky. He did not realize he had shouted it aloud, but such was the din of the waterway that his indiscretion mattered little.
Pelippa’s Bowl: an inn Dinivan had mentioned in a letter, because it was run by a woman who had once been a nun of Saint Pelippa’s order—Tiamak could not summon the woman’s name—and who still liked to talk theology and philosophy. Morgenes had stayed there whenever he traveled in the Wran, because the old man liked the proprietress and her irreverent but thoughtful mind.
As these memories came back to him, Tiamak felt his weary spirits lifted. Perhaps Dinivan would join him at the inn! Or, even better, perhaps Morgenes himself was staying there, which would explain why Tiamak’s latest messages to the old man’s home at the Hayholt in Erkynland had gone unanswered. Whatever the case, with the names of his Scrollbearer friends to offer as currency, he was certain that he would find a bed and a sympathetic ear at Pelippa’s Bowl.
Still fever-addled, but with a more hopeful heart, Tiamak bent his aching back to the pole once more. His frail boat skimmed along Kwanitupul’s greasy green waterways.
The strange presence in Simon’s head spoke on. The spell of the woman’s voice held him gently prisoned, enwrapped in a charm that seemed to have no seam or flaw. He was in perfect darkness, as in the moment just before the final tumble into sleep, but his thoug
hts were as janglingly active as those of a man who only pretends to slumber while his enemies scheme across the room. He did not awaken, but neither did he pass into forgetfulness. Instead, the voice spoke on, and the words summoned images of beauty and horror:
“…And although you have gone away, Hakatri—to death or the Ultimate West, I know not which—I shall say these things to you, for in truth, no one knows the way time flows on the Road of Dreams, or where it is that thoughts may wander that have been cast out on the scales of the Greater Worm or on the other Witnesses. It could be that somewhere…or somewhen…you will hear these words and know of your family and your people.
Also, I have need just to speak with you, my beloved son, though you have been long absent.
“You know that your brother blamed himself for your terrible wounding. When you went away at last into the West in search of heart’s-ease, he became cold and discontented.
I will not tell you all the story of the maraudings of the ship-men, those fierce mortals from across the sea. Some hint of their coming you had before you went away, and some would say that it was these Rimmersmen who struck the greatest blow against us, for they threw down Asu’a, our great house, and those of us who survived were driven into exile. Some would say that the Rimmersmen were our greatest foes, yet others might say that our most terrible wound came when your brother Ineluki raised his hand against your father, Iyu'unigato—your father, my husband—and slew him there in the great hall of Asu’a.
Still others would say our shadow first grew in the deeps of time, in Venyha Do’sae, the Lost Garden, and that we brought it with us in our hearts. They would say that even those born here in our new land—like you, my son—came into the world with that shadow already staining your innermost selves, so that there has been no innocence anywhere since the world was young.
And that is the problem with shadows, Hakatri. At first consideration they seem to be quite simple—a matter only of something that stands before the light. But that which is shadowed from one side may from another angle show as a brilliant reflection. What is covered by shadow one day may die in harsh sunlight another day, and the world will be lessened by its passing. Not everything that thrives in shadow is bad, my son…”
Pelippa’s Bowl…Pelippa’s Bowl…
Tiamak was finding it difficult to think. He repeated the name distractedly a few more times, having momentarily forgotten what it meant, then realized he was looking at a swinging signboard that bore the painted image of a golden bowl. He squinted at it woozily for a few moments, unable to remember exactly how he had wound up in this spot, then began looking around for a place to tie his boat.
The sign of the Bowl hung over the door of a large but rather undistinguished-looking inn in a backwater section of the warehouse district. The rickety structure seemed to sag between two larger buildings, like a drunk with a crony at each elbow. An armada of small and medium-sized flatboats bobbed in the waterway below, tied at the building’s crude wharf or lashed directly to the pilings that held the building and its slovenly fellows above water. The inn was surprisingly quiet, as if both the guests and ostlers were sleeping.
Tiamak’s fever had returned strongly and his exertions had left him very little strength. He balefully regarded the rope ladder that depended from the landing. It was badly tangled; even reaching up with the steering pole he came short of the lowest rung by a good cubit. He considered jumping to make up the last bit of distance, but even in his diminished state Tiamak realized that when one was too weak to swim, there would be few things more foolish than jumping up and down in a small boat. At last, stymied, he called hoarsely for assistance.
If this was one of Morgenes’ favorite hostelries, he thought muzzily some time later, then the doctor had a high tolerance for slackness. He renewed his braying cry, marveling at the pained quality of his own voice as it echoed through this unfrequented area of Kwanitupul. At last, a white-haired head appeared in the doorway above and remained there for long moments, regarding Tiamak as though he were some interesting but unsolvable puzzle. At last the head’s owner left the safety of the doorway and came forward. It was an old Perdruinese or Nabbanai man, tall and well-built, whose handsome pink face wore the simple expression of a young child. He stopped and squatted at the edge of the landing, looking down at Tiamak with a pleasant smile.
“The ladder.” Tiamak waved his steering pole. “I can’t reach the ladder.”
The old man looked kindly from Tiamak to the ladder, then seemed for some time to reflect gravely on the whole question. At last he nodded, his smile widening. Tiamak, despite extreme weariness and the pain of his throbbing leg, found himself smiling back at this strange old bird. After this exchange of unspoken good cheer had gone on for some little while, the man abruptly turned and disappeared back into the doorway.
Tiamak howled despairingly, but the old man reappeared a few moments later with a boat-hook clutched in his long-fingered hand which he used to jiggle the ladder free, it uncoiled the rest of the way and the bottom splashed into the green water. Tiamak, after a moment of muddied deliberation, took a few things from the boat and began to climb. The Wrannaman found he had to stop twice during the short three-fathom trip to rest. His crocodile-bitten leg was burning with a pain like fire.
By the time he reached the top his head was reeling worse than it had all day. The old man had gone, but when Tiamak dragged the heavy door open and hobbled through he found him again, now sitting in the corner of an enclosed courtyard on a pile of blankets that looked as though they served as his bed, surrounded by skeins of rope and various other tools. Most of the space in the damp courtyard was taken by a pair of upturned boat-hulls. One had been badly slashed, as though by a sharp rock. The other was half-painted.
As Tiamak made his way around the jars of white paint that cluttered the path across the courtyard the old man smiled foolishly at him once more, then settled back into his blankets as though to fall asleep.
The door at the far side of the courtyard led into the inn itself. This bottom floor seemed to contain only a dowdy common room with a handful of stools and a few long tables. A sour-faced Perdruinese woman, heavy-armed and with gray-shot hair, stood pouring beer from one jug to another.
“What do you want?” she said.
Tiamak paused in the doorway “Are you…” he at last remembered the former nun’s name, “…Xorastra?”
The woman made a face. “Dead three years. She was my aunt. Mad as a mudlark. Who are you? You’re a swamp man, aren’t you? We don’t take beads or feathers here for payment.”
“I need a place to stay. My leg is injured. I am a friend of Father Dinivan and of Doctor Morgenes Ercestres.”
“Never heard of them. Blessed Elysia, but you do speak decent Perdruinese for a savage, don’t you? We have no rooms available. You can sleep with old Ceallio out there. He’s simple-minded but he does no harm. Six cintis a night, nine if you want food.” She turned away, gesturing absently at the courtyard beyond.
As she finished speaking a trio of children thundered down the stairs, smacking at each other with switches, laughing and shrieking. They almost knocked Tiamak down as they pushed past him and went through into the courtyard.
“I must have help with my leg.” Tiamak swayed as dizziness washed over him. “Here.” He reached into his belt-pouch and pulled out the two gold Imperators he had been saving for years. He had brought them with him for just such an emergency, and what good would money be to him if he died? “Please, I have gold.”
Xorastra’s niece turned. Her eyes bulged. “Rhiappa and her large Pirates!” she swore. “Look at that, now!”
“Please, good lady. I can bring you back many more of these.” He couldn’t, but there was a much better chance this woman would help keep him alive if she thought he could. “Just get a barber or a healer to see to my leg, and give me food and a place to sleep.”
Her mouth, still gaping in surprise at the appearance of the glittering golden coins,
widened even further as Tiamak pitched over at her feet, senseless as a stone.
“…But although not everything that thrives in shadow is bad, Hakatri, still much that hides in darkness does so to keep its evil hidden from all eyes.”
Simon was beginning to lose himself in this strange dream, to feel as though it were to him that the patient, pained voice spoke he felt bad for having been so long absent, for bringing further suffering to such a high yet afflicted soul.
“Your brother has long hidden his plans beneath a cloak of shadow. The year-end was danced countless times after Asu’a’s fall before we had even a hint that he still lived—if his spectral existence can be called life. Long he plotted in darkness, hundreds of years of black-minded deliberation before the first steps were taken. Now, with his plan marching forward, there is so much still hidden in shadow. I think and I watch, I wonder and I guess, but the subtlety of his design eludes my old eyes. I have seen many things since first I saw leaves fall in Osten Ard, but I cannot make sense of this. What does he plan? What does your brother Ineluki mean to do?”
The stars seemed very naked over Stormspike, gleaming white as polished bone, cold as knobs of ice. Ingen Jegger thought them very beautiful.
He stood beside his horse on the road before the mountain. The bitter wind whistled through the ivory muzzle of his snarling, dog-faced helm. Even his Norn-stallion, bred in the world’s blackest, coldest stables, was doing its best to duck the brutal sleet that the wind flung like arrows—but Ingen Jegger was exalted. The shrill of the wind was a lullabye, the sting of freezing sleet a caress. Ingen’s mistress had set him a great task.