Riddle-Master Trilogy

by Patricia A. Mckillip

  The crows flew eastward. They passed other long convoys of supply-carts and strings of horses; they rested in the eaves of great houses, whose yards were choked with smoke and the din of forges. The brilliant colors of battle livery and the dark, sweating flanks of plow horses flickered through the smoke, as men gathered to march to Caerweddin. There were young boys among them, and the rough, weathered faces of shepherds, farmers, smiths, even traders, receiving a crude, desperate introduction to arms before they joined the forces at Caerweddin. The sight spurred the crows onward. They followed the Thul as it ran toward the sea, cutting a dark path through the dying fields.

  They reached Caerweddin at sunset; the sky was shredded like a brilliant banner by the harsh winds. The whole of the city was ringed by a thousand fires, as if it were besieged by its own forces. But the harbor was clear; trade-ships from Isig and Anuin were homing toward it on the evening tide. The beautiful house of the Ymris kings, built of the shards of an Earth-Masters’ city, burned like a jewel in the last light. The crows dropped down into the shadows just outside its closed gates. They changed shape in the empty street.

  They did not speak as they looked at one another. Morgon drew Raederle against him, wondering if his own eyes were as stunned with weariness. He touched her mind; then, searching into the heart of the king’s house, he found Astrin’s mind.

  He appeared in front of the Ymris land-heir as he sat alone in a small council chamber. He had been working; maps, messages, supply lists were strewn all over his desk. But the room was nearly in darkness, and he had not bothered to light candles. He was staring ahead of him into the fire, his face harrowed, colorless. Morgon and Raederle, stepping out of the street into the blur of light and shadow, did not even startle him. He gazed at them a moment as if they had no more substance than his hope. Then his expression changed; he stood up, his chair falling behind him with a crash. “Where have you been?”

  There was a realm of relief, compassion, and exasperation in the question. Morgon, casting a glance at his past with an eye as probing as the single, wintry eye of the Ymris prince, said simply, “Answering riddles.”

  Astrin rounded his desk and eased Raederle into a chair. He gave her wine and the numbness began to wear out of her face. Astrin, half-kneeling beside her, looked up at Morgon incredulously.

  “Where did you come from? I have been thinking about you and Heureu—you and Heureu. You’re thin as an awl, but in one piece. You look—if ever I’ve seen a man who looks like a weapon, you do. There is a quiet thunder of power all over this room. Where did you get it?”

  “All over the realm.” He poured himself wine and sat.

  “Can you save Ymris?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe. I don’t know. I need to find Yrth.”

  “Yrth. I thought he was with you.”

  He shook his head. “He left me. I need to find him. I need him…” His voice had sunk to a whisper; he stared into the fire, the cup a hollow of gold in his hands. Astrin’s voice startled through him, and he realized he was nearly asleep.

  “I haven’t seen him, Morgon.”

  “Is Aloil here? His mind is linked to Yrth’s.”

  “No; he is with Mathom’s army. It’s massed in the forests near Trader’s Road. Morgon.” He leaned forward to grip Morgon, bringing him out of the sudden despair overwhelming him.

  “He was there beside me, if only I had had enough sense to turn and face him, instead of pursuing his shadow all over the realm. I harped with him, I fought with him, I tried to kill him, and I loved him, and the moment I name him he vanishes, leaving me still pursuing…” Astrin’s grip was suddenly painful.

  “What are you saying?”

  Morgon, realizing his own words, gazed back at him mutely. He saw once again the strange, colorless face that had been over him when he had wakened, voiceless, nameless, in a strange land. The warrior before him, with a dark, tight tunic buttoned haphazardly over a shift of mail, became the half-wizard once more in his hut by the sea, riddling over the bones of the city on Wind Plain.

  “Wind Plain…” he whispered. “No. He can’t have gone there without me. And I’m not ready.”

  Astrin’s hand slackened. His face was expressionless, skull-white. “Exactly who is it you’re looking for?” He spoke very carefully, fitting the words together like shards. The harpist’s name shocked through Morgon then: the first dark riddle the harpist had given him long ago on a sunlit autumn day at the docks at Tol. He swallowed dryly, wondering suddenly what he was pursuing.

  Raederle shifted in her chair, pillowing her face against a fur cloak draped over it. Her eyes were closed. “You’ve answered so many riddles,” she murmured. “Where is there one last, unanswered riddle but on Wind Plain?”

  She burrowed deeper into the fur as Morgon eyed her doubtfully. She did not move again; Astrin took her cup before it dropped from her fingers. Morgon rose abruptly, crossed the room. He leaned over Astrin’s desk; the map of Ymris lay between his hands.

  “Wind Plain…” The shaded areas of the map focussed under his gaze. He touched an island of darkness in west Ruhn. “What is this?”

  Astrin, still hunched beside the fire, got to his feet. “An ancient city,” he said. “They have taken nearly all the Earth-Masters’ cities in Meremont and Tor, parts of Ruhn.”

  “Can you get through the Wind Plain?”

  “Morgon, I would march there with no other army but my shadow if you want it. But can you give me a reason I can give to my war-lords for taking the entire army away from Caerweddin and leaving the city unguarded to fight over a few broken stones?”

  Morgon looked at him. “Can you get through?”

  “Here.” He drew a line down from Caerweddin, between Tor and the dark area in east Umber. “With some risk.” He traced the southern border of Meremont. “Mathom’s army will be here. If it were only men we were fighting, I would call them doomed, caught between two great armies. But Morgon, I can’t calculate their strength, none of us can. They take what they want in their own time. They aren’t pretending to fight us anymore; they simply overrun us whenever we happen to get in their way. The realm is their chessboard, and we are their pawns… and the game they are playing seems incomprehensible. Give me a reason to move the men south, to pick a fight in the bitter cold over land that no one has lived on for centuries.”

  Morgon touched a point on Wind Plain where a lonely tower might have stood. “Danan is coming south with his miners. And Har with the vesta. And the Morgol with her guard. Yrth wanted them there at Wind Plain. Astrin, is that enough reason? To protect the land-rulers of the realm?”

  “Why?” His fist slammed down on the plain, but Raederle did not even stir. “Why?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “I’ll stop them in Marcher.”

  “You won’t stop them. They are drawn to Wind Plain, as I am, and if you want to see any of us alive next spring, then take your army south. I didn’t choose the season. Or the army that is following me across the realm. Or the war itself. I am—” He stopped, as Astrin’s hands closed on his shoulders. “Astrin. I have no time left to give you. I have seen too much. I have no choices left. No other seasons.”

  The single eye would have searched into his thoughts, if he had let it. “Then who is making your choices?”

  “Come to Wind Plain.”

  The prince loosed him. “I’ll be there,” he whispered.

  Morgon turned away from him after a moment, sat down again. “I have to leave,” he said tiredly.

  “Tonight?”

  “Yes. I’ll sleep a little and then leave. I need answers…” He gazed across at Raederle’s face, hidden in the fur; only the line of her cheek and chin, brushed by light, showed beneath her hair. He said very softly, “I’ll let her sleep. She might follow me when she wakes; tell her to be careful flying across Wind Plain.”

  “Where are you going?”

  Raederle’s hair blurred into fire; his eyes closed. “To find Aloil… To fi
nd a wind.”

  He slept without dreaming and woke a few hours later. Astrin had covered Raederle; she was barely visible, huddled under fur-lined blankets. Astrin, lying between them on skins beside the fire, was guarding them. His sword was unsheathed; one hand rested on the bare blade. Morgon thought he had fallen asleep, but his good eye opened as Morgon stood. He said nothing. Morgon leaned down to touch his shoulder in a silent farewell. Then he caught at the night beyond the stones.

  The night winds snarled in furious contention around him as he flew. He did not dare use power in the stretch between Caerweddin and Wind Plain. Dawn broke in sheets of cold, grey rain over hunched trees and lifeless fields. He flew through the day, fighting the winds. By twilight, he reached Wind Plain.

  He flew low over it, a huge black carrion crow casting a bitter eye over the remains of the unburied warriors of Heureu’s army. Nothing else moved on the plain; not even birds or small animals had come to scavenge in the fierce rain. A treasure of arms gleamed in the twilight all over the plain. The rain was hammering jewelled sword hilts, pieces of armor, horse’s skulls and the bones of men alike down into the wet earth. The crow’s eye saw nothing else as it winged slowly toward the ruined city; but beyond the shield of its instincts, Morgon sensed the silent, deadly warning ringing the entire plain.

  The great tower rose above the city, spiralling into night as he winged past it. He kept his mind empty of all thought, aware only of the smells of the wet earth, and the slow, weary rhythm of his flight. He did not stop until he had crossed the plain and the south border of Ymris and finally saw the midnight fires of Mathom’s army sprawled along the river near Trader’s Road. He descended then and found shelter among the thick, leafless oak. He did not move until morning.

  Dawn crusted the earth with frost and a chill like the bite of a blade. He felt it as he changed shape; his breath froze in a quick, startled flash in front of him. Shivering, he followed the smell of wood smoke and hot wine to the fires beside the river. Dead warriors of An were posted as sentries. They seemed to recognize something of An in him, for they gave him white, eyeless grins and let him pass among them unchallenged.

  He found Aloil talking to Talies beside the fire outside the king’s pavilion. He joined the wizards quietly, stood warming himself. Through the bare trees, he saw other fires, men rousing out of tents, stamping the blood awake in their bodies. Horses snorted the chill out of their lungs, pulling restively at their ropes. Tents, horse trappings, men’s arms, and tunics all bore the battle colors of Anuin: blue and purple edged with the black of sorrow. The wraiths bore their own ancient colors when they bothered to clothe themselves with the memories of their bodies. They moved vividly and at will among the living, but the living, inured to many things at that point, took more interest in their breakfast than in the dead.

  Morgon, finally warm, caught Aloil’s attention as he began listening to their conversation. The big wizard broke off mid-sentence and turned his blue, burning gaze across the fire. The preoccupied frown in his eyes turned to amazement.

  “Morgon…”

  “I’m looking for Yrth,” Morgon said. “Astrin told me he was with you.” Talies, both thin brows raised, started to comment. Then he stepped to the king’s pavilion and flung the flap open. He said something; Mathom followed him back out.

  “He was here a moment ago,” Talies said, and Morgon sighed. “He can’t be far. How in Hel’s name did you cross Wind Plain?”

  “At night. I was a carrion crow.” He met the black, searching eyes of the King of An. Mathom, pulling his cloak off, said crustily, “It’s cold enough to freeze the bare bones of the dead.” He threw it around Morgon’s shoulders. “Where did you leave my daughter?”

  “Asleep at Caerweddin. She’ll follow me when she wakes.”

  “Across Wind Plain? Alone? You aren’t easy on one another.” He prodded the fire until it groped for the low boughs of the oak.

  Morgon asked, pulling the cloak tight, “Was Yrth with you? Where did he go?”

  “I don’t know. I thought he came out for a cup of hot wine. This is no season for old men. Why? There are two great wizards here, both at your service.” He did not wait for an answer; he cast a quizzical eye at Aloil. “You are linked to him. Where is he?”

  Aloil, staring down at the fuming oak logs, shook his head. “Napping, perhaps. His mind is silent. He made a swift journey across Ymris.”

  “So did Morgon, by the look of it,” Talies commented. “Why didn’t Yrth travel with you?”

  Morgon, caught without an answer, ran one hand through his hair vaguely. He saw a sudden glitter in the crow’s eyes. “No doubt,” Mathom said, “Yrth had his reasons. A man with no eyes sees marvels. You stopped at Caerweddin? Are Astrin and his war-lords still at odds?”

  “Possibly. But Astrin is bringing the entire army to Wind Plain.”

  “When?” Aloil demanded. “He said nothing of that to me, and I was with him three nights ago.”

  “Now.” He added, “I asked him to.”

  There was a silence, during which one of the sentries, wearing nothing more than his bones under gold armor, rode soundlessly past the fire. Mathom’s eyes followed the wraith’s passage. “So. What does a man with one eye see?” He answered himself, with a blank shock of recognition in his voice, “Death.”

  “This is hardly a time,” Aloil said restlessly, “for riddles. If the way is clear between Umber and Thor, it will take him four days to reach the plain. If it is not… you had better be prepared to march north to aid him. He could lose the entire strength of Ymris. Do you know what you’re doing?” he asked Morgon. “You have gained awesome powers. But are you ready to use them alone?”

  Talies dropped a hand on his shoulder. “You have the brain of an Ymris warrior,” he said, “full of muscle and poetry. I’m no riddler, either, but living for centuries in the Three Portions taught me a little subtlety. Can you listen to what the Star-Bearer is saying? He is drawing the force of the realm to Wind Plain, and he is not intending to battle alone. Wind Plain. Astrin saw it. Yrth saw it. The final battleground…”

  Aloil gazed silently at him. Something like a frail, reluctant hope struggled into his face. “The High One.” He swung his gaze again to Morgon. “You think he is on Wind Plain?”

  “I think,” Morgon said softly, “that wherever he is, if I don’t find him very soon, we are all dead. I have answered one riddle too many.” He shook his head as both wizards began to speak. “Come to Wind Plain. I’ll give you whatever answers I have there. That’s where I should have gone in the first place, but I thought perhaps—” He broke off. Mathom finished his sentence.

  “You thought Yrth was here. The Harpist of Lungold.” He made a harsh, dry sound, like a crow’s laugh. But he was staring into the fire as if he were watching it weave a dream to its ending. He turned away from it abruptly, but not before Morgon saw his eyes, black and expressionless as the eyes of his dead, who had been eaten to the bone by truth.

  Morgon stood in the trees at the edge of Wind Plain at twilight, waiting as the night slowly drew the empty city and the long, whispering grasses into itself once again. He had been there for hours, motionless, waiting, so still he might have rooted himself to earth like a bare, twisted oak without realizing it. The sky spilled a starless black over the world, until even with his night-vision, the jewellike colors of the tower stones seemed permeated with the dark. He moved then, aware of his body again. As he took one final step toward the tower, clouds parted unexpectedly. A single star drifted through the unfathomable blackness above it.

  He stood at the foot of the stairs, looking up at them as he had when he first saw them one wet autumn day two years before. Then, he remembered, he had turned away, uncurious, uncompelled. The stairs were gold, and according to all legend they wound away from the earth forever.

  He bowed his head as if he were walking into a hard wind and began to climb. The walls around him were of the lustrous burning black between stars. The gol
d stairs ringed around the core of the tower, slanting gently upward. As he rounded it once and began the second spiral, the black gave way to a rich crimson. The winds, he realized, were no longer the thin, angry winds of the day; their voices were forceful, sinewy. The stairs beneath his feet seemed carved of ivory.

  He heard the voices of the winds change again at the third spiral. They held tones he had harped to in the northern wastes, and his hands yearned to match their singing. But harping would be deadly, so he kept his hands still. At the fourth level the walls seemed of solid gold and the stairs carved out of star fire. They wound endlessly upward; the plain, the broken city grew farther and farther away from him. The winds grew colder as he climbed. At the ninth level he wondered if he were climbing a mountain. The winds, the stairs, and the walls around him were clear as melted snow. The spirals were getting smaller, and he thought he must be near the top. But the next level plunged him into an eerie darkness, as if the stairs were carved out of night wind. It seemed interminable, but when he came out of it again, the moon was exactly where he had seen it last. He continued upward. The walls turned a beautiful dawn-grey; the stairs were pale rose. The winds had a cutting edge, merciless and deadly. They were prodding him out of his own shape. He kept walking, half-man, half-wind, and the colors around him changed again and again, until he realized, as others had realized before him, that he could spiral through their changing forever.

  He stopped. The city was so far beneath him he could no longer see it in the dark. Looking up, he could see the elusive top of the tower very near him. But it had been that near him, it seemed, for hours. He wondered if he were walking through a piece of a dream that had stood among the abandoned stones for thousands of years. Then he realized it was not a dream, but an illusion, an ancient riddle bound to someone’s mind, and he had carried the answer to it with him all the way.

  He said softly, “Death.”