The Book of Silence

by Lawrence Watt-Evans

  The Forgotten King was there as well, seated at his usual table. His presence there, at almost any time the tavern was open for business, was so reliable that he was thought of by the villagers not so much as a regular patron, but as a permanent fixture, like the dark wooden paneling of the walls or the heavy oaken tables. Day after day the old man sat alone, unmoving and silent, in the back corner beneath the stairs, wrapped in his ragged yellow mantle, his face hidden by his tattered cowl.

  As he had a hundred times before, Garth turned away from the window and its view of the square and stared instead at the ancient human.

  The King gave no sign that he was aware of the overman’s scrutiny, but Garth had no doubt that he knew he was being watched.

  Half a dozen more ordinary humans were in the tavern and they had all certainly noticed the overman’s presence. Most had seen him turn away from the window as well. Overmen were unmistakable, and highly distinctive in Skelleth. Garth’s size, quite aside from any other details, marked him as something different from the common run of humanity; he stood almost seven feet in height, but was so heavily muscled as to look almost squat. He dwarfed the chair he sat upon and seemed out of proportion with the entire taproom, though in truth he was of only average size among his own species. His eyes were large and red, the oversized irises bright blood-red, though his pupils were as round and black as any human’s. Unlike human eyes, no white showed, only black pupil and red iris.

  His hair was dead straight, dead black, coarse, and thick; it reached his shoulders and no farther, though he had never cut it. Sparse black fur covered his entire body, save his hands and feet and face. Where no hair or fur hid it, his skin was leathery brown hide, like that of no other species that ever existed and certainly unlike anything human.

  His face was as beardless as a woman’s; overmen grew no facial hair, and his body fur stopped well short of his chin. His cheeks were sunken by human standards, normal to his own kind. He had no nose, but two close-set slit nostrils. To human eyes, a healthy overman bore an unsettling resemblance to a human skull; the hollow cheeks, missing nose, great red eyes, high forehead, and hairless jaw all contributed.

  Garth’s hands, too, were unlike a human’s. Rather than having a single thumb at one side, his hands had both the first and fifth fingers opposable, making possible acts of manipulation that humans had trouble even imagining.

  It was hardly surprising that men and women feared overmen, as they feared anything that seemed monstrous and strange. Nor was it startling, therefore, that the other patrons of the King’s Inn should glance occasionally in Garth’s direction, wary of what he might do. Garth in particular, of all overmen, they feared; the possibility of a new berserk rage such as those brought on by the Sword of Bheleu was always at the back of the villagers’ minds.

  When he turned away from the window, therefore, to look across the taproom at the yellow-clad figure at the back table, what little conversation there had been faded and died. The townspeople watched, to be sure that the overman was not looking at any of them.

  Garth rose, and even the rustling of clothes and the bumping of chairs ceased.

  His gaze wandered for a moment from the old man to the great barrels of beer and ale along the western wall. His mug was empty; he picked it up, made his way through the tables and chairs, and drew himself afresh pint. The innkeeper, a plump, middle-aged man, stood nearby and silently accepted a coin with a polite nod.

  Garth sipped off the top layer of foam, then let his gaze wander back toward the Forgotten King’s table, where it settled once more on the silent old man. Without quite knowing why, he moved in that direction.

  When he reached the table, he thumped his mug of ale down and seated himself across from the King, as he had done so very many times in the past three years.

  “Greetings, O King,” he said.

  The old man said nothing.

  Garth looked him over, as he also often had done. He noted again that the old man’s eyes were invisible, lost in the shadows of his ragged yellow hood. No one, as far as Garth knew, had ever seen the Forgotten King’s eyes. A thin wisp of white beard trickled from his bony chin well down his yellow-wrapped breast. His hands lay motionless on the tabletop, things of bone and wrinkled skin more like those of a mummy than the hands of a living man. The scalloped tatters of his robe hid the rest of him from sight, so that little else could be said of his appearance with any assurance, save that he was thin and seemed tall for so aged a human, though still shorter than any grown overman.

  Garth wondered, once again, why the old man wore rags and why they were always yellow. Garth had heard him referred to as the King in Yellow, so it was scarcely a temporary or recent habit, yet there seemed no reason for it. The old man had money, the overman knew, and power, yet he spent his days in this ancient inn and wore only tatters. When Garth had first sought eternal fame, the Wise Women of Ordunin had described the yellow rags to identify the Forgotten King.

  Garth had long ago lost interest in the pursuit of undying glory that had originally brought him to the King; the price had been too high and the rewards, upon consideration, too intangible. He no longer had a single goal he was consciously pursuing. In fact, he did not know any more what he wanted from his life, though he was sure of certain elements. He wanted to go home. He wanted the respect of his fellows, and to be rid of the stigma he now bore of being known as subject to fits of madness. Beyond that, he was unsure.

  He did know, however, that he wanted nothing from the old man, unless it was the spontaneous renunciation of his oath. The King’s gifts and bargains always seemed to have unwanted strings attached; Garth’s dealings with him had been full of unspoken words and hidden meanings.

  Still, Garth found himself at this back-corner table more and more often.

  It was, he told himself, a natural curiosity in the face of the old man’s enigma that drew him, that and the lack of anything better to do. He was without family or friends and had no job to occupy his time; why should he not take an interest in such a mystery? He could speak to the old man without making bargains, without being sucked into his plotting and planning.

  If the thought had ever occurred to Garth that he sought out the King because the old man, alone in all of Skelleth, had absolutely no fear of Garth or the Sword of Bheleu, he had dismissed the idea as absurd and irrelevant.

  He gulped ale, then said, “Greetings, I said.”

  The King moved a hand, as if to wave the overman away.

  Garth was not willing to be turned aside that easily. He knew something of the King’s background and had some idea of his immense power, but he was not frightened. Very little could frighten Garth; he would not allow himself such weaknesses as unnecessary fears. He shrugged at the old man’s gesture and drank ale.

  The King sat unmoving, watching with hidden eyes.

  Garth finished the contents of his mug, motioned to the tavernkeeper for more, and stared back.

  The King was old, Garth knew, older than anything else that lived in the world. He had survived for more than a thousand years at the very least, perhaps for several thousand. He had been in Skelleth since its founding three centuries earlier. He could not die in the natural way of things. It was hardly surprising that his behavior should be strange.

  As Garth had pieced together the story, the King, in the dim and ancient past, had made a bargain with The God Whose Name Is Not Spoken, Death himself. The King had then been a monarch in more than name, the wizard-king of the long-lost and forgotten empire of Carcosa. He had sought immortality and agreed to serve as the Final God’s high priest in exchange for eternal life. In time he had come to regret his bargain and had forsaken the god’s service, only to find that he was unable to die. Blades could not cut him, blows could not harm him; the petrifying gaze of a basilisk had left him untouched. He still possessed knowledge and magical power far beyond anything known since the fal
l of Carcosa, but he had no call to use it, for it could not get him the one thing he wanted.

  One great magic could attain his death, a mighty spell requiring both the Sword of Bheleu and the Book of Silence. He had the sword, but lacked the book. Garth had sworn to fetch the book in order to be free of the sword, but he did not intend to fulfill his vow.

  As far as Garth was concerned, that put an end to the matter, save for one detail. He had not been called upon to carry out his promise; he was not yet truly forsworn. He was able to maintain a pretense of honor—a pretense he knew to be false—as long as the King did not demand that he fetch the book.

  The King had not made that demand yet only because he had not recalled where, several centuries earlier, he had left the book. Garth hoped that the memory was lost forever; then he might never be forced to break his sworn word.

  At the same time, though, he found himself wishing that the affair were over with, that the oath were broken and done, rather than still hanging over him.

  He leaned back, his chair creaking a protest beneath his inhuman weight, and could not resist asking, “Have you remembered yet, O King?” His voice was expressionless, for overmen’s emotions were displayed differently from humans’. The mixture of bitterness over his false oath and anticipation of its final ruination that had prompted the question was so well hidden that Garth was not really aware of it himself.

  The King said nothing; his head moved very slightly, almost imperceptibly, to one side and then back.

  “You must tell me where it is, old man, if you want me to fetch it.”

  The King did not reply and moved not at all. Garth felt a surge of anger at this silence.

  “Speak, old man,” he said.

  No answer came. Garth’s annoyance increased.

  “Has your tongue shriveled in your head, then, O throneless King? Are you trying to imitate the corpses you resemble, since you cannot rightly join them? Have you now forsaken speech, the better to serve your foul black god?” He did not shout; his voice was flat and deadly, a dangerous sign among his kind.

  The Forgotten King moved slightly, as if emitting a faint sigh, but still said nothing. Garth drew breath for another question, but was distracted by the arrival of the innkeeper with a fresh mug of ale. The overman snatched it from him, swallowed half its contents at a gulp, and then ordered, “Be off, man!”

  The taverner risked a glance at Garth’s baleful red eyes and inhuman face, then hurried away, wondering if it would be safe to cut the overman’s next serving of ale with water. He knew the signs of Garth’s anger; rudeness to underlings like himself was one such indication. He did not want to worry about dealing with an overman in a drunken fury—but an overman enraged at being cheated might be equally bad. He looked at Garth’s mail-covered back and decided, at least for the moment, that his reputation for honest measure and good drink was worth preserving. He could only hope that the old man would calm the overman down.

  Garth was in no mood to be calmed down. When the innkeeper had moved away, he asked, “Why do you not speak? Is it perhaps that I am unfit to address you, O King of an empire long since dust, monarch of a dying memory, lord of a realm unknown? Is the Prince of Ordunin, a lord of the overmen of the Northern Waste, suited only to serve your whims, but not to speak with you? Does the master of ashes and woe, wearing rags and tatters and dwelling in a single dim room of an ancient inn, not deign to answer the exiled killer, the disgraced berserker? Will the servant of Death not choose to acknowledge the pawn of destruction?” His voice was calm, as still as water pooled on black ice, and laden with far more threat than any shout as he said, “Answer me, old man.”

  The old man answered. “Garth,” he said in a voice like ice breaking, “why do you disturb me? You know I prefer not to waste words in idle chatter.”

  The overman was wrenched momentarily from his anger by the sound of the old man’s voice, a sound unlike any other, dry and brittle and harsh, so unpleasant to hear that it could not fully be remembered. He regained his composure quickly, however, and replied, “Is everything I say idle chatter? Have I not the right to an answer when I ask a polite question?”

  “Hardly polite,” the old man demurred. “I will answer, however. No, I have not yet recalled where I left the Book of Silence in those ancient days when last I held it.”

  “So I must linger here, still waiting?”

  “Garth,” the old man replied, “you are bored, frustrated by inactivity. You are a warrior, given to violent action, not to sitting about a peaceful village. I have told you from the first that you are free to leave Skelleth and that your oath does not hold you here, as long as you return at intervals to learn whether or not I have recalled where the Book of Silence lies. Why, then, do you not find yourself some task to occupy your time, rather than remain here disturbing my contemplation?”

  So long a speech was unusual for the King, and Garth knew it well. He realized that he must have seriously annoyed the old man. His own anger, however, had not faded.

  “And what task shall I pursue, then? Where am I to go? I am forbidden the Northern Waste and therefore cannot aid my homeland against the human pirates who assail it. What other task awaits me? I have little taste for roaming aimlessly, particularly when the world is strewn about with wars and battles that do not concern me. I have no reason to side with any human faction and no desire to kill merely for my own amusement, so I will not join in these wars. I am welcome no place outside Skelleth. I have seen Mormoreth and left it in the hands of men who comrades I killed in self-defense; will they greet me as an old friend? I have visited Dûsarra and left it aflame and plague-ridden, its every citizen my enemy. The other lands and cities of the south are unknown to me, and overmen are unwanted strangers throughout. Where, then, shall I go?”

  “What of the Yprian Coast?”

  “And what might I do there, but find another tavern wherein I might sit and be bored? I am no trader, I know that now; I have no desire to seek out new markets and new routes.”

  “Think you that is all that may be found there?”

  “What else might there be? Farms and villages, markets and men and overmen. The caravans have told us what may be found there, and it does not interest me. Others have gone before me as well; where might I explore that they could not have preceded me?”

  “Must you be first, then, as you were first in coming to Skelleth, first to think that overmen might trade here?”

  “For all the good that did me, yes. What point is there in doing what has been done before?”

  “I think, Garth, that you resent the ingratitude of those who have benefited from the trade you began.”

  “Perhaps I do, old man; what of it? Does it matter to either of us that I am scorned by those I have made wealthy? Or that my old companions allow me no responsibilities in the village I gave them? They are no concern of ours. I am sworn to aid you in your death-magic, O King; that is what concerns us. I am waiting for you to tell me how I may fulfill my oath.”

  “I have told you that I have not yet remembered.”

  “Then I must wait until you do.”

  “And plague me with angry questions?”

  “Should I so choose, yes.”

  The King did not reply immediately; during the pause, Garth drank the rest of his ale and decided against ordering another.

  “Garth, I would have you leave me in peace,” the old man said at last, “so that I might be able to think more clearly and recall more easily what I wish to recall.”

  The overman shrugged. “I care little what you would have, old man. I am not sworn to heed your every whim, only to fetch your book and aid you in your magics.”

  “You are bored. What if I gave you a task that could harm no one, but would result in great benefit for many innocent people?”

  Garth stared into the depths of his empty mug, then looked up, gazing acros
s the table into the shadows that hid the old man’s face.

  “What sort of a task?”

  “Slaying a dragon that has laid waste the valley of Orgûl.”

  Garth considered. His anger was fading, but his mind was slightly hazed with liquor. “A dragon?”

  The old man nodded, once.

  Garth thought it over. He was bored. He was irritable from inaction. It would be good to travel again, to see new places, to spend each night somewhere different from the night before. It would be good to get out of Skelleth, away from so many unpleasant memories. It would be good to accomplish something useful, and there could be little doubt that killing a dragon was useful. He had never seen a dragon, but he was familiar with the stories and legends about them. All agreed that the creatures were huge, dangerous, and phenomenally destructive. He himself had been a destroyer far too often in the past, he felt; here, then, he might find a chance to make up for some of that by destroying a menace worse than he had ever been.

  In a way, it might be a step toward avenging himself on Bheleu. The god of destruction had used Garth as a puppet, and the overman resented that. He felt that it might be a small sort of retaliation to kill a creature that could be considered one of Bheleu’s pets.

  He nodded. The more he thought about the proposed adventure, the more it appealed to him. “I think I’d like that,” he said.

  The Forgotten King’s mouth curved into a faint smile.

  Far to the west, in a windowless chamber draped in black and dark red, a man stared at the image in his scrying glass and smiled as well. The image had been exceptionally clear and detailed, and he had been able to read the overman’s lips. He had only the tail end of one side of the conversation, but it was obvious that Garth was being sent on an errand of some sort. That should provide an excellent opportunity for actions long delayed. Nearly three years had passed since the overman had defied the cult of Aghad, smashed the god’s altar, and slain his high priest; much had happened during that period, but the cult had not sought vengeance. Haggat, the present high priest of Aghad, was a patient man, and had taken his time in gathering power and planning his actions. He had wanted to be sure that nothing would interfere with the proposed revenge. Now, at last, everything was ready.