(Shadowmarch #1) Shadowmarch

by Tad Williams

  “But, Master, that doesn’t make sense,” Toby said, yawning but a little more awake now. “If the gods made all the spheres, couldn’t the gods just make a new star?”

  Chaven had to smile. “You are doing better. That is a proper question, but a more important question is, why haven’t they done it before now?”

  For a moment, just a moment, he saw something ignite in the young man’s eyes. Then caution or weariness or simply the habit of a lifetime dulled the expression again. “It seems like a lot of thinking about a star.”

  “Yes, it is. And one day that thinking may teach us exactly how the gods have made our world. And on that day, will we not be nearly gods ourselves?”

  Toby made the pass-evil. “What a thing to say! Sometimes you frighten me, Master Chaven.”

  He shook his head. “Just help me get the perspective glass fixed on Kossope again, then you can take yourself to bed.”

  It was just as well he was now alone, Chaven thought as he wrote down the last of the notations. Even Toby might have noticed the way his hands had begun shaking as the hour he was waiting for came nearer. It was powerfully strange, this feeling. He had always coveted knowledge, but this was more like a hunger, and it did not seem to be a healthful one. Each time he used the Great Mirror, he felt more reluctant to cover it up again. Was it simply lust for the wisdom that he gained or some glamor of the spirit which gave that wisdom to him? Or was it something else entirely? Whatever might have caused the craving, he could barely force himself to take the time to drape his long box full of rare and costly lenses with its heavy covering, and only the sharp chill of the night air persuaded him to add even more delay so that he could crank shut the door in the observatory roof, shutting out those intrusive, maddening stars.

  His need was especially sharp because it had been so long—days and days!—since the mirror had gifted him with anything but shadows and silence. How frustrating it had been all of tonight, trying to concentrate on Kossope when it was the three red stars called the Horns of Zmeos, also called the Old Serpent, that had his deepest attention: when they appeared behind the shoulder of Perin’s great planet, as they would do tonight, he could consult the mirror again.

  When the observatory room and the perspective glass were both secured, he went in search of Kloe. Tonight, if the gods smiled, her work and his offering would not lie ignored again.

  Chaven’s need had grown so strong that he didn’t notice how roughly he was handling Kloe until she gave him a swift but meaningful bite on the web of his thumb and forefinger as he put her out. He dropped her, cursing and sucking at the wound as she scampered away down the passage, but although his anger was swiftly replaced by shame for his carelessness toward his faithful mistress, even that shame was devoured by the need that was roaring up inside him.

  He sat before the mirror in a dark room that already seemed to be growing darker still, and began to sing. It was an old song in a language so dead that no one living could be certain they were pronouncing it correctly, but Chaven sang the words as his onetime master, Kaspar Dyelos, had taught them to him. Dyelos, sometimes called the Warlock of Krace, had never owned a Great Mirror, although he had possessed broken shards of more than one and had been able to do wonderful things with those shards. But mirror-lore as a discipline was as much about remembering and passing that memory along for the generations to come as it was about the practical manipulation of the cosmos—Chaven often wondered how many wonderful, astounding things had been lost in the plague years—and so Dyelos had taught all that he had learned to his apprentice, Chaven. Thus, on that day when Chaven had found this particular mirror, this astounding artifact, he had already known how to use it, even if he had not precisely understood every single step of the process.

  Now Chaven rubbed his head, troubled by an errant thought. His brow was starting to ache from staring into the mirror-shadows and wondering if something else was looking at the shadow-mouse that lay on the shadow-floor, and whether that something would finally come. Was he doomed to failure again tonight? He was distracted, that was the problem . . . but he could not help being puzzled by the fact that he suddenly couldn’t remember where he had acquired the mirror that was before him now, leaning against the wall of his secret storeroom. At least it seemed sudden, this emptiness in his memory. He could recall without trouble where and when he had obtained each of the other draped glasses on the shelves, and their particular provenances as well, but for some reason he could not just at this moment remember how he had obtained the jewel in his collection, this Great Mirror.

  The incongruity was beginning to feel like an itch that would not be scratched and it was growing worse. Even the powerful hunger he felt began to weaken a little as the puzzle took hold of him. Where did it come from, this powerful thing? I have had it . . . how long?

  Just then something flared in the center of the looking glass, a great outwash of white light as though a hole had been torn through the night sky to release the radiance of the gods that lay behind everything. Chaven threw his hands up, dazzled; the light faded a little as the owl settled, folded its bright wings, and looked back at him with orange eyes, Kloe’s sacrificial mouse in its great talons.

  All his other thoughts flew away, then, as though the wings had enfolded him as well, or perhaps as though he had become the tiny thing clutched in that snowy claw, in the grip of a power so much greater than his own that it could seem a kind of honor to give up his life to it.

  He came up out of the long emptiness at last and into the greater light. Music beyond explaining—a kind of endless drone that was nevertheless full of complicated voices and melodies—still filled his ears but was beginning to grow less. His nostrils also seemed still to breathe that ineffable scent, as powerful and heady-sweet as attar of roses (although such roses never grew on bushes rooted in ordinary earth, in soil steeped in death and corruption), but it was no longer the only thing he could think about.

  It might have only been with him a moment, that deepest bliss, or he might have been basking in those sensations for centuries, when the voice-that-was-no-voice spoke to him at last, a single thought that might have been “I am here,” or simply, “I am.” Male, female, it was neither, it was both—the distinction was of no importance. He expressed his gratefulness that his offering had been received again, at last. What came back to him was a kind of knowing, the powerful calm of something that expected nothing less than to be adored and feared.

  But even in the midst of his joy at being allowed within the circle of this great light again, something tugged again at his thoughts, a small but troubling something, just as shadows in his room of mirrors sometimes seemed to take odd shapes at the corner of his eye but never at the center of his vision.

  Questions, he remembered, and for an instant he was almost himself. I have questions to ask. The Rooftoppers, he announced, those small, old ones who live in hiding. They speak of someone they call the Lord of the Peaks who comes to them and gives them wisdom. Is that you?

  What came back to him was something almost like amusement. There was also a sensation of dismissal, of negation.

  So they do not speak of you? he persisted. It is not you who visits them with dire warnings?

  The shining thing—it looked nothing like an owl now, and although at this moment its shape was perfectly plain to him, he knew he would not afterward be able to explain it in words, nor even quite remember it—took a long time to answer. He felt the absence in that silence almost as a death, so that when it did speak again, he was so grateful that he missed part of what it told him.

  Things had been awakened that would otherwise be sleeping, was all the sense that he could make of its wordless, fragmented thought. The shining thing told him that its works were subtle, and not meant for him to understand.

  He sensed he was being chided now; there was more than a hint of discord in the all-surrounding music. He was devastated and begged forgiveness, reminded the shining thing that he only wanted to serv
e it faithfully, but in the one piece of his secret self which remained to him, the small sour note had allowed him to think a little more clearly. Was that truly his only wish—to serve this thing, this being, this force? When he had first touched it, or it had touched him, had they not almost seemed to have been equals, exchanging information?

  But what did it want to learn from me? What could I possibly have given to this . . . power? He couldn’t remember now, any more than he could remember how the mirror, the portal to this painful bliss, had first come into his hands.

  The radiant presence made it clear that it would forgive him for his unseemly questioning, but in return he must perform a task. It was an important task, it seemed to say, perhaps even a sacred one.

  For a moment, but only a moment, he hesitated. A little of himself still hung back, as though the mirror were a fine sieve and not all that had been Chaven could pass through it into this singing fire. That tiny remainder stood and watched, helpless as though in a nightmare, but it was not strong enough to change anything yet.

  What must I do? he asked.

  It told him, or rather it put the knowledge into him, and just as it had chided, now it praised; that kindness was like honey and silvery music and the endless, awesome light of the heavens.

  You are my good and faithful servant, it told him. And in the end, you will have your reward—the thing you truly seek.

  The white light began to fade, retreating like a wave that had crested and now ran backward down the sand to rejoin the sea. Within moments he was alone in a deep, secret room lit only by the guttering flame of a black candle.

  Pounding on the kitchen door brought Mistress Jennikin out in her nightdress and nightcap. She held the candle before her as though it were a magic talisman. Her gray hair, unbound for the night and thinning with age, hung in an untidy fringe over her shoulders.

  “It is only me. I am sorry to rouse you at such an hour, but my need is great.”

  “Doctor . . . ? What is wrong? Is someone ill?” Her eyes widened. “Oh, Zoria watch over us, there hasn’t been another murder . . . !”

  “No, no. Rest easy. I must go on a journey, that is all, and I must leave immediately—before dawn.”

  She held the candle a little closer to his face—scanning for signs of madness or fever, perhaps. “But Doctor, it’s . . .”

  “Yes, the middle of the night. To be more precise, it is two hours before dawn by my chain-clock. I know that as well as anyone and better than most. And I know at least as well as anyone else what I must do, don’t you think?”

  “Of course, sir! But what do you want . . . I mean . . .”

  “Get me bread and a little meat so that I can eat without stopping. But before you do that, rouse Harry and tell him I need my horse readied for a journey. No one else, though. I do not want everyone in the household watching me leave.”

  “But . . . but where are you going, sir?”

  “That is nothing you need to know, my good woman. I am going now to pack up what I need. I will also write a letter for you to take to Lord Nynor, the castellan. I hope to be gone only a day or two, but it might be more. If any of the royal family needs the services of a physician, I will tell Nynor how to find Brother Okros at the Academy—you may send anyone else who comes in search of me and cannot wait to Okros as well.” He rubbed his head, thinking. “I will also need my heavy travel cloak—the weather will be wet and there may even be snow.”

  “But . . . but, Doctor, what about the queen and her baby?”

  “Curses, woman,” he shouted, “do you think I do not know my own calling?” She cowered back against the doorframe and Chaven was immediately sorry. “I apologize, good Mistress Jennikin, but I have given thought to all these things already and will put what is needed in the letter to Nynor. Do not worry for the queen. She is fit, and there is a midwife with her day and night.” He took a deep breath. “Oh, please, take that candle back a little—you look like you intend setting me on fire.”

  “Sorry, sir.”

  “Now go and rouse Harry—he’s slow as treacle in winter and I must have that horse.” She clearly wanted to ask him something else but didn’t dare. Chaven sighed. “What is it?”

  “Will you be back for Orphan’s Day? The butcher has promised me a fine pig.”

  For a moment he almost shouted again, but this was the matter of her world, after all. This was what was important to her—and in ordinary times would have been to Chaven as well, who dearly loved roast pork. So what if these were not ordinary times? Perhaps there would be no more Orphan’s Day feasts after this one—a shame to ruin it. “I am as certain I will be back before Orphan’s Day—and in fact, before Wildsong Night—as anyone can be who knows the gods sometimes have ideas of their own. Do not fear for your pig, Mistress Jennikin. I am sure he will be splendid and I will enjoy him greatly.”

  She looked a little less frightened as he turned—as though despite the hour, life no longer seemed quite so dangerously topsy-turvy. He was glad that was true for one of them, anyway.

  The physician’s manservant did his best to turn Chert away. The old man seemed distracted, guilty, as though he had been called away from the commission of some small but important crime and was in a hurry to get back to it.

  Taking a nap, Chert guessed, although it seemed early in the morning for such things. A late lie-in, then. He would not be chased off so easily. “I don’t care if he isn’t seeing anyone. I have important business with him. Will you tell him that Chert of Funderling Town is here.” If the physician was just busy and not at home to visitors, Chert thought, perhaps he could go around through the secret underground passage—surely Chaven would not dare to ignore a summons to that door—but it would take him a very long time to manage going and then making his way back, and he bitterly resented the idea of losing so much of the day. Each hour last night spent in fruitless search for the boy had been more galling than the last and was even more infuriating now, as though Flint were on some kind of wagon or ship that sped further away with each passing moment.

  The manservant, despite Chert’s protests, was about to shut the door in his face when an old woman stuck her head under the tall old man’s arm and peered out at the Funderling. He had seen her before, just as he had seen the old man, although mostly from a distance as Chaven led him through the Observatory. He couldn’t remember either of their names.

  “What do you want?” she asked, eyes narrowed.

  “I want to see your master. I know it is inconvenient—he may even have given orders not to be disturbed. But he knows me, and I’m . . . I’m in great need.” She was still looking at him with distrust. Like the old man, she had faint blue shadows under her eyes and a fidgety, distracted air. No one has had much sleep in this house either, Chert thought. After his own night stumping up and down Funderling Town and even through Southmarch aboveground, he felt like an itching skin stretched over a stale emptiness. Only fear for the lost boy was keeping him upright.

  “It can’t be done,” she said. “If you need physick, you must go to Brother Okros at the academy, or perhaps one of the barbers down in the town.”

  “But . . .” He took a breath, pushed down the urge to shout at this obstinate pair. “My . . . my son is missing. Chaven knows him—gave me some advice about him. He is a . . . a special boy. I thought Chaven might have some idea . . .”

  The woman’s face softened. “Oh, the poor wee thing! Missing, is he? And you, you poor man, you must be heart-sick.”

  “I am, Mistress.”

  The manservant rolled his eyes and vanished back down the hallway. The woman stepped out into the courtyard, drying her hands on her apron, then looked around as though to make sure they were safe from prying eyes. “I shouldn’t tell you, but my master’s not here. He’s had to go on a sudden journey. He left this morning, before dawn.”

  A sudden suspicion, fueled only by coincidence, made him ask, “Alone? Did he go alone?”

  She gave him a puzzled look, but
it began to shade into resentment as she answered. “Yes, of course alone. We saw him off. You surely don’t think . . .”

  “No, Mistress, or at least nothing ill. It’s just that the lad knows your master and likes him, I think. He might have tagged along with him, as boys sometimes do.”

  She shook her head. “There was no one about. He left an hour before the sun was up, but I had a lamp and I would have seen. He was in a terrible hurry, too, the doctor, although I shouldn’t speak of his business to anyone. No offense to you.”

  “None taken.” But his heart was even heavier now. He had hoped at the very least that Chaven’s keen wit might strike on some new idea. “I’m sure you have a great deal to do, Mistress. I’ll leave you. When he comes back, could you tell him that Chert of Funderling Town wanted urgently to speak with him?”

  “I will.” Now she seemed to wish there was more she could do. “The gods send you good luck—I hope you find your little lad. I’m sure you will.”

  “Thank you. You’re very kind.”

  In his weariness he almost slipped twice going up the wall. When he reached the top, he had to sit and gasp for some time until he had air enough to speak. “Halloo! It is Chert of Funderling Town!” He dared not shout too loud for fear of attracting attention below—it was the middle of the morning and even this less-traveled section of the castle near the graveyard was not entirely empty. “Her Majesty Queen Upsteeplebat very kindly came to meet me and my boy, Flint,” he called. “Do you remember me? Halloo!”

  There was no reply, no stir of movement, although he called again and again. At last, so tired he was beginning to be concerned about the climb down, he rose to a crouch. Out of his pocket he took the small bundle wrapped in moleskin. He opened it and lifted the crystal up until it caught a flick of morning light and sparkled like a tiny star. “This is a present for the queen. It is an Edri’s Egg—very fine, the best I have. I am looking for the boy Flint and I would like your help. If you can hear me and will meet with me, I’ll be back here tomorrow at the same time.” He tried to think of some suitable closing salutation but could summon nothing. He made a nest of the moleskin and set the crystal in it. What a beautiful, shining monster might hatch out of such a thing, he thought absently, but couldn’t take even the smallest pleasure in the fancy.