The Pearl of the Soul of the World

by Pierce, Meredith Ann

  The Ancient halted, half turned away. Aeriel gazed at her.

  "How can I help you, Lady?" she asked finally.

  The Ancient turned on her. "Crush the Witch's army," she answered, with such fierceness that Aeriel flinched. "Destroy her darkangels. And lay the pearl of the world in her hand."

  Aeriel stared, amazed at what Ravenna seemed to be asking. Was she, Aeriel, to convert the lorelei as once she had rescued a darkangel? But the Witch was infinitely more powerful—and more wicked—than her unfinished darkangel "son" had been. What if Oriencor did not wish to be saved?

  What if she used the sorcery of the pearl to further her own evil ends?

  Yet Ravenna seemed so certain that Aeriel dared not question her. She was an Ancient, after all, with knowledge far superior to Aeriel's own. I am but the bearer, the pale girl told herself. Perhaps it is not necessary that I understand. The Ancient lady paced, moving restlessly.

  "What does the future hold, Aeriel—do you know?"

  Aeriel shook her head. Ravenna sighed.

  "Nor do I. Many possibilities exist. An infinity: destiny isn't fixed, you know."

  Aeriel nodded, trying desperately to comprehend. So Talb the Mage had told her once, many daymonths past. She thought of the Lady Syllva's army, poised on the desert's edge ready to march—or was it already marching by now? How long had she been wandering with the Witch's pin in her head and how long healing here under Ravenna's care? The other returned to her, reaching once more to touch the pearl, and again Aeriel felt the strange, glancing thrill of the Ancientlady's power.

  "This jewel on which I have shown you the past," she said, "can also scan ahead in time. I have other such jewels here in the City. And I have sat with them countless hours on end, searching, hoping for a means to undo my daughter's madness."

  "What have you seen?" Aeriel asked.

  "Many things."

  Images stirred once more in the pale girl's mind.

  "I have seen your army overthrown and Oriencor triumphant. I have seen Irrylath putting the Blade Adamantine into my daughter's heart. I have seen him killed——"

  "No!" Aeriel cried involuntarily, as the scene loomed before her—even though these images of possible futures had a shifting, half-finished look. They were not fixed and vivid as the actual past. Still she recoiled. Ravenna nodded.

  "Your husband, yes," she said, "that served my daughter once."

  Pain and rage and jealousy swept through Aeriel at the thought of Irrylath. Desperately, she tried to clear her mind, to banish the frightening image that the pearl now wove there: Irrylath falling from the back of the Avarclon, hurtling headfirst through empty air toward a great turbulence below. The vision refused to fade. She shuddered. A tear, hot and salty, spilled down her cheek.

  "Say it will not happen," she whispered. "Say that Irrylath will not be killed."

  The Ancient, her great, dusky hand so much larger than Aeriel's, brushed the tear from the pale girl's lips.

  "I cannot promise you that," she said sadly. "Would that I could. But I have also seen him alive at the end of the war. You killed. You all killed. The possibilities are numberless, and no one is any more likely than another."

  She touched the girl's cheek lightly, and Aeriel smelled myrrh. The pearl's horrific speculations vanished now. She sighed in relief.

  "That is why I made the rime," Ravenna told her, "to try to guide you and the Ions—all of history—toward that one best future I have glimpsed among the rest."

  The Ancientlady eyed her very sadly now.

  "Have you ever treasured something, child," she asked, "a thing so dear you thought you could never give it up—then learned you must?"

  Cold terror returned to Aeriel. No. Never— not Irrylath! She shook her head.

  Ravenna sighed. "Soon I must do so—give up what I love best for the good of the world. Come, child. Gird on your sword. The time has come for me to spell you the end of the rime and put my gift into the pearl."

  8

  Rime and Shadow

  Aeriel's heart leapt at the Ancient lady's words. Now at last she was to learn the riddle's end. Almost eagerly, she reached for the sword that the other had given her. Its strange, sorcerous feel alarmed her still, but she did as Ravenna bade, belting the long blade's girdle about her waist. She trusted the dark lady completely. Ravenna nodded.

  "Now say me the rime."

  One hand on the swordhilt, the other going to touch the pearl upon her brow, Aeriel closed her eyes and began:

  " On Avaric's white plain…" She recited until she came to the final lines: The Witch of Westernesse's hag overthrown."

  There she halted. That was all she knew. Without opening her eyes, she sensed the Ancientlady's smile.

  "You know most of it, then. Good. Here is the rest:

  "Whereafter shall commence

  such a cruel, sorcerous war,

  To wrest recompense

  for a land leaguered sore.

  With a broadsword bright burning,

  a shadow— "

  Abruptly, she broke off. Aeriel blinked in surprise. An image composed of beads of fire had jumped into place upon the near wall of deep blue glass. She recognized the dark features of Ravenna's liege man.

  "Lady, a word," he began.

  "Melkior," exclaimed the Ancientlady softly. Aeriel sensed her dismay. "I bade that we not be disturbed."

  "Forgive me, my liege. The duaroughs insist…" He halted short, his gaze glancing beyond her to Aeriel. "She's awakened," he murmured in surprise. "You said you would send for me when she revived."

  Ravenna's lips compressed, but not with anger. "Time presses," she began.

  The dark man's eyes widened suddenly. "And you've given her the sword? You swore that you would not, not until—"

  She shook her head. "I thought to spare you."

  "No!" Melkior cried. "Lady, hold off. Hold off until I come!"

  His image vanished. Ravenna whirled. "Haste, child," she said urgently. "I had hoped to accomplish this while Melkior was yet occupied with your companions, but he will be here in another moment.

  Quickly—draw the sword."

  Aeriel stared at the Ancientlady. "Am I to defend you against your liege man?" she stammered.

  The dusky lady hurriedly shook her head. "No. I would not ask that of you. Nor would I wish any harm to come to Melkior. But we must lose no time. Unsheathe the glaive."

  Aeriel did so. The blade leapt from the scabbard almost without her will. The misty fire along it burned and whispered.

  "Hold it up before you," Ravenna bade.

  Aeriel held the glaive point-upward, clasping its long hilt in both hands. It seemed to have no weight, stood humming upon the air. Lighdy, deliberately, the Anciendady brought her palm down upon the point. Aeriel started, feeling a jolt of energy course through the blade. The pearl upon her brow blazed, and for a moment, the white fire running along the sword flared in a wreath of burning colors.

  "Sheathe it," Ravenna said.

  Aeriel slid the blade, whitelit again, into its case. The light of the pearl on her brow had diminished now. Holding her hand, the Ancienlady seemed suddenly short of breath.

  "Don't fear," she said.

  Carefully, she cupped her palm to the pale girl's forehead. Aeriel felt a sudden rushing, as of hurding headlong, or as of some unbreakable diread spinning out of Ravenna and into the pearl. Its force held Aeriel transfixed. She could not have moved if she had wished. Only snatches reached her mind—of strange magics, indescribable sorceries, the woven patterns for all living things— all winding themselves away, unreadable, in the jewel's depths. Already the diread had begun to dwindle and slacken. Aeriel felt a change of air as, all at once, the wall behind Ravenna parted, and her liege man dashed through.

  "Stop!" he cried. "Lady, stop—"

  Gently, the Ancient took her palm from the pale girl's brow. "Peace, Melkior," she whispered, turning.

  "It's done."

  Her voice was hollo
w, her face gone ashen beneath the dusky color of her skin. The dark man started forward with a cry, and the Ancientlady sagged into his arms. Aeriel bit back a gasp as she watched Ravenna's liege man support her to the black glass floor. The Ancientlady was dying; Aeriel realized it in horror. The pearl, blazing now, enabled her to feel some echo, as beneath her own breastbone, of the other's heart, now guttering like a spent lamp's flame.

  "Lady—Lady, what have you done?" she cried, falling to her knees beside her and Melkior.

  Ravenna lay supine in the dark man's arms. She gazed at Aeriel. Sofdy, with great effort, she spoke.

  "Child, have you not understood… a word I have said? All myself—all that I have gathered— I have placed into that jewel. You must bear it to the world's heir…to my daughter. Destroy Oriencor's army,"

  Ravenna breathed, "and put the pearl into her hand."

  A grimace swept over the Ancient's face. Melkior's grip upon her tightened. "No, Lady," he implored her. "Don't leave me."

  Wearily, she turned to him, touching his cheek. "Had I another choice… but we both know I must."

  Her eyes drifted closed. Her hand upon the other's cheek slid to the floor. No breath now stirred the Ancientlady's breast: no pulse moved in her veins. Ravenna is dead, thought Aeriel, stunned. How can that be? She shook her head, her thoughts disjointed. Soon she will be turning into ash. Then, No, the Ancients' bodies do not crumble at death. They remain perfectly preserved, forever, unless they are burned. For a long moment, Melkior simply stared at his lady's still form; then he buried his face in her hair.

  Behind him, standing in the open doorway, Aeriel caught sight of the three duaroughs: Maruha, Collum, and Brandl. The duarough woman looked as fit as the other two now, well recovered from her wound. The three of them hung back, as if in reverence turned to dismay. Maruha's face was wide-eyed, Collum's ashen and grim. Brandl looked as though he, too, might weep.

  Shaking, Aeriel rose. The pearl upon her brow burned heatless white. In its depths, the Ancient's sorceries moved, unreachable: incomprehensible to her even if she could have found and read them. How am I to complete my task? she thought numbly. How am I to defeat the Witch and convert her to her mother's cause? The sword at her side murmured softly, sang. The only other sound in the room was the dark man's sobbing. A hand slipped into Aeriel's. Someone was tugging at her. Looking down, she saw Maruha.

  "Come," the duarough woman said softly. "Come, Sorceress—Lady Aeriel. We must be off. We should not stay."

  Aeriel stood upon the red desert sands. The smoked glass of the Dome rose at her back, curving inward over the City, now left behind. The airlock had proved a series of hatched doorways, which the duaroughs opened readily by complicated and unfathomable means. Yet, watching by pearllight, Aeriel felt a whisper of comprehension steal eerily over her: some aftereffect of Ravenna's sorcery, perhaps.

  She almost believed that if she had put her mind to it, she could have opened the Ancient doors herself.

  Instead, she turned heavily away. Thoughts of the dying Ravenna chilled her still. Memory of the Ancient interrupted by her liege man filled Aeriel with bitterness—only a few more moments, and she might have known the whole of the rime! Her back to the Dome, Aeriel stood gazing out at the desert dunes. It was nightshade, and by the tilt of the stars, not many hours after Solstarset.

  "But it was nightshade when we came," she murmured and shook her head, amazed. Almost a daymonth spent in NuRavenna—and how many more wandering the desert and the caves? Irrylath's army must be halfway to the Waste by now! So much time lost…Maruha beside her nodded.

  "We've been within for hours upon hours, Lady—handfuls of dozens of them—while you and the holy Ancient conferred."

  Aeriel glanced at the duaroughs. They think I have the rime, she thought. They think the Ancient-lady gave me all of it— that I am prepared to meet the Witch.

  "We spent the time going about under the Dome, Sorceress," Brandl added as he and Collum wrestled with the airlock's final closure, "surveying the City's machines—for Lord Melkior said we must be gone in haste as soon as his lady had given you all you needed if we were to join this war in time."

  His young face was shining with expectancy, his words eager and bold. Already he seemed to have forgotten Ravenna fallen, Ravenna dying. But I don't have all I need, Aeriel wanted to scream. She only gave me half the rime's end— not enough! Not nearly enough. I don't even know what the pearl is, or the sword. To calm herself, she took a deep breath. The outside air felt deliciously thin and cool.

  "You must not call me 'lady' or 'sorceress,"" she answered distantly instead. "I'm neither."

  Collum snorted. "Indeed! And I suppose you have no pearl upon your brow, Lady, nor a sword that sings ever so softly in gift from the Ravenna herself."

  "Who is gone now," whispered Aeriel, touching the swordhilt, then the pearl. She felt lost. "Ravenna is dead."

  "You're her heir," Maruha insisted.

  Aeriel shook her head. Not I, she thought. The Ancient boons are not for me. Yet a desperate resolve had begun to fill her. No matter that she had not the last of the rime. No matter that she now bore two strange sorcerous gifts the purpose of which she did not even know. Somehow, by means she did not yet understand, she must persuade Ravenna's daughter to renounce her treachery and become the world's heir.

  "Oh, please, Sorceress," Brandl cried, coming forward. His hand had gone to his little harp. "Will you tell me the rest of the rime? I'll sing it wherever I go." He threw a glance—nervous and defiant by turns—in Maruha's direction. "I mean to be a bard, whatever my aunt may say."

  "Sooth—my whole family, worthless!" the duarough woman muttered. "You're as bad as your fool uncle, lad." But she made no move to interfere.

  Numbly, Aeriel knelt before him on the cool sand. "I cannot give you all," she said. "For Ravenna did not give me all. But I will give you what I can:

  "Whereafter shall commence

  such a cruel, sorcerous war,

  To wrest recompense

  or a land leaguered sore.

  With a broadsword bright burning,

  a shadow…"

  Aeriel bit her tongue and fell silent. She did not know the rest. She could not bear to look at Brandl's face, to see the disappointment she knew must be there when he realized how pitifully little she had gained for all her time in Ravenna's care. Dismay swept over Aeriel as she allowed herself to consider: so many futures possible. How could they hope to win this war without the rime's end as a guide… ?

  She had no time to think more—aware suddenly that even though her words had ceased, the recitation of the rime had not. Another voice now whispered it, a soft, strange voice that creaked like oiled wood. Aeriel's startled gaze went to the sword at her side—but it was not the sword that spoke. It was the scabbard.

  "With a broadsword bright burning,

  a shadow black as night

  From exile returning

  shall champion the fight…"

  The scrolls upon the inlaid surface of the wood swirled and shimmered, shifting their pattern, becoming a bird.

  "For love of one above who, flag unfurled,

  lone must stand,

  The pearl of the soul of the world

  in her hand…"

  The bird stretched, long narrow wings coming free of the sheath. Its white feathers shimmered.

  "When Winterock to water

  falls flooding, foes to drown,

  Ravenna's own daughter

  shall kindle the crown."

  Aeriel stared at the slim white bird upon the swordcase. Its bright, round eye stared back at her. She felt a rush of wild joy and disbelief.

  "Heron!" she cried.

  Maruha and Collum both stood gaping. Brandl hastily fell back. The heron blinked slowly, her metamorphosis only half complete.

  "By rights," she replied woodenly, "in my present form, you should be calling me Scabbird, but I suppose 'heron' will do if it must. Now let be. This is a difficult
transformation."

  The white bird's long, sharp bill snicked shut. She closed her eye and, flapping mightily, struggled free of the sheath. She gained size as she did so, her feathers losing their silvery gleam, till she stood on the desert sand at last, ruffling her snowy pinions and flexing her long, ungainly legs.

  "What magery is this?" Maruha whispered.

  "Ravenna's messenger-bird," Aeriel laughed, reaching to stroke the other's white breast feathers, "that I have not seen since Orm."

  The heron ruffled and danced away. "I have been about my lady's business," she snapped, "as you had all best be."

  Aeriel nodded. She felt buoyed up. She had the rime now! As well as the pearl, and the sword—none of them riddled out as yet, but all of them in her hand. Turning back to the duaroughs, she said, "Tell me, Brandl, have you got the verse?"

  The young bard goggled a moment, still gazing at the bird—but then he regained himself and said all three long stanzas of the rime back to her, even the last, almost perfectly on the first try. She nodded, smiling. Perhaps he would make a bard after all, despite Maruha. He had a bard's memory, at least.

  "Well, Lady Sorceress," Maruha said at last. "We had best be on our way. The Ancientlord Melkior told us of underpaths not far from here. We must return to our people and tell them all we have learned of our fellows forced to serve the Witch."

  "We must march belowground to rescue them!" Brandl added, face flushed with excitement, his eyes bright.

  "He's not an Ancient," Collum muttered beneath his breath. "Lord Melkior's a halfling, like the Witch."

  "No longer," answered Brandl sobering suddenly. "He's a golam now, all gears and wire— like the starhorse." His voice dropped softer still. "The Ravenna rebuilt him after Oriencor's treachery left him for dead, a thousand years ago. He has served the Ancientlady since."