“And the women?”
Atrus looked to Catherine and smiled. “I know of only two women who ever learned to write.”
§
The next few weeks were hectic. In the absence of his father’s charts, Atrus drew up detailed maps of the harbor-side districts, then divided his young helpers into teams of six. Two of those teams, led by Marrim and Irras, went out into the streets and alleyways of lower D’ni to search for Books; another, under Carrad, began the task of raising the sunken boats from the floor of the harbor and repairing them; and a fourth, headed by Catherine, went back and forth between the harbor and K’veer, bringing back food and supplies from Chroma’Agana and Averone. The fifth team, supervised by Atrus himself, began the job of clearing a storehouse for whatever Books were found, while he, in whatever spare moments remained, worked on maps of D’ni.
At first progress was slow. There were few big houses in the lower levels, and thus few private Book Rooms, and they quickly discovered that the public Book Rooms had already been plundered by Gehn and most of the Guild Books destroyed, just as Atrus had feared. Even so, by the end of the second week they had a total of thirty-four Books. Finished with the maps, Atrus began the task of reading and cataloging them.
Marrim, returning from a long and fruitless search of the Ne’weril district, went in to see Atrus, who was sitting at his makeshift desk in the storehouse.
“Forgive me, Master Atrus,” she began, “but why are we waiting?”
“Waiting?”
“To begin the search of the Ages.”
He smiled tolerantly. “I understand your enthusiasm, Marrim, but this is not something to be rushed. We need to have some idea of the scale of the venture before embarking upon it. Meanwhile there is much to do here. We have to build up a stock of blank Linking Books, and ink and writing materials. Unless you know a way of returning from an Age without a Linking Book?”
A Faint color came to Marrim’s cheeks. She bowed her head.
“Let us gather in every Book we can find,” Atrus went on. “Then we can decide which to visit. You see, some of the Books are damaged, Marrim. Pages are missing or have been torn or burned. Others are clearly old and I’d guess were little used by their owners, even though they bear the Maintainer’s inspection stamp. What we need to find are newer, more healthy Ages, for it is in those that we are most likely to find our survivors.”
“And have we found any such Ages yet?”
“Two. But it might well turn out that the Books we find in these lower districts were all visited—and corrupted—by Veovis and his ally. It may be that only those from more distant, higher districts remained untouched. That is why I am taking great care to mark on the maps where each Book was found and the circumstances of its discovery. Such details might prove crucial when we come to organize the next stage of our search.”
“Then ought we not to be searching the higher districts first?”
Atrus laughed. “Is that what you wish to do, young Marrim?”
She nodded.
“Then that is what you shall do.” He turned and searched among the papers on his desk until he located one of the maps he had finished only the day before. “Here,” he said, handing it to her, “this is where my grandfather and his family once lived. Jaren was a Guild district. If there are Books anywhere, they will be there. But take supplies enough for several days, Marrim, unless you fancy trekking back down to the harbor every night.”
“And you, Master Atrus? Won’t you come with us this once?”
He stared at her, surprised by her request, then nodded. “Perhaps I will come along. This once.”
§
Though he had been on many Booksearches with his father, Atrus had never stood within these walls, never walked among these strangely familiar rooms, and now that he did he wondered just why Gehn had not brought him here.
Anna. That was why. It reminded Gehn too much of Anna.
He walked on, aware for the first time in his life just how strong the connection was between himself and this ancient place. A connection of blood. And though he was only one part in four D’ni, that did not dilute what he felt.
No wonder Gehn became obsessed.
“Atrus?”
He turned to find Marrim watching him.
“This was my grandfather’s room,” he said quietly, indicating the desk, the walls of books. “And his father’s before him.”
She nodded, then: “We’ve found the Book Room.”
“Ah…” He steeled himself against bad news. “And?”
“There’s a Book.”
“Just one?”
Marrim nodded.
Atrus was silent a moment. His grandfather, Aitrus, had been the owner of two Ages. One, Ko’ah, had been handed down over eight generations, and was the family retreat. The other, Gemedet, named after the complex three-dimensional game played by the D’ni, had been written by him and the ahrotahntee, or “outworlder,” who in time had become his grandmother, Anna.
The Book Room was downstairs. The door of the room was smashed, the shelves on the walls ransacked long ago. The faint yellow-brown residue that was everywhere in D’ni, and that he had always assumed was natural to the place, here lay thick upon everything.
On a podium in the center of the room a Book lay open, the faint ghost of a palm print over the dulled descriptive panel. He went across and stood, his hands gripping the edge of the podium as he stared down at the page.
Ko’ah. This was the Book of Ko’ah.
Of course. He remembered now. His grandfather, Aitrus, had taken the other Book with him when he’d returned here after the fall of D’ni, so that Veovis could not get to Anna and the child.
Atrus looked up, feeling giddy. The long years seemed to wash over him, as if, in that instant, he was his grandfather.
“Are you all right?” Marrim asked, concerned for him.
“Yes.”
But that wasn’t entirely true. For a moment he had glimpsed his grandmother, Anna, in her final illness, Catherine by her bedside, the old lady’s pale, flecked hands caged within Catherine’s younger, stronger fingers, and recalled what she had told him then about those final days. And as he recalled that moment he felt a strong, almost violent urge to see Ko’ah, to link to it and see with his own eyes where his father, Gehn, was born; where Anna had nursed him through that first, almost fatal illness.
He raised his hand over the page, shadowing the ghostly imprint.
“Master Atrus?”
Atrus looked up, startled from his reverie. If he had moved his hand the tiniest bit it would have brushed the surface of the page. Reaching across, he closed the Book, then turned, looking at Marrim. “You’d best look after this.”
Atrus stepped back as Marrim came across and, taking the long-handled cutters from her belt, snipped the chain that connected the Book to the podium. He watched her carefully lift the Book and slip it into her knapsack with that same reverence he had seen her exhibit with all the Books.
Marrim turned to face him again, smiling, ever enthusiastic, her pale, oval face framed by the vivid blackness of her long, thick braided hair. “Where now?”
“Let’s leave here,” he answered her, looking about him one last time. “Let’s go and find the others.”
§
Irras paused in the shadowed hallway, frowning. Something was different. And then he understood. The colors. The colors here were brighter, more vivid.
He realized with a start what it meant.
Reaching out, he touched he wall, then drew his fingers back, sniffing at them. Clean. The wall was clean.
Irras spun around, holding his lamp out. “Gavas! Meer! Come quickly! I think we’ve found something!”
They rushed up, then looked about them, puzzled.
“What?” Meer asked. “What have you found?”
“Look about you,” Irras answered, amused now. “What do you notice that’s different?”
It was Gavas who saw it first. �
�The walls…the floor…they’re clean!”
Irras nodded. “And if they’re clean, what does that mean?”
“That someone’s…cleaned it?” Meer offered. And then his mouth fell open.
“Exactly!” Irras said, beaming now. “Someone’s been here before us. Someone must have come here and cleaned the walls and floors.” He half-turned, lifting the lamp high once more. Everywhere they looked it was clean.
“Go back,” he said, gesturing to Gavas. “Find Master Atrus and bring him here at once. He’ll want to see this for himself!”
§
That night Atrus called a special meeting. When all were gathered, he came out into their midst, the Book they had found in the great house in Jaren—the Book of Bilaris, as it was called—under his arm. He looked about him and smiled.
“So?” Catherine asked, preempting him. “Are we going to visit this Age?”
Atrus smiled. “Yes. But not yet. First I need to study the Book more carefully.”
“But what about the signs?” Catherine said. “The cleanliness of the house, the book of commentaries we found…there are D’ni in that Age.”
“That may be so,” Atrus conceded, “but for the sake of three or four days, I’d rather be certain all is well. Remember, caution is everything. For the lack of caution, D’ni fell. We must not make the same mistake. In all likelihood, the people on this Age—on Bilaris—are survivors from the fall. And from the cleanliness of the house, it would seem that they share our aspirations; they, too, would like to see D’ni rebuilt to its former glory. But…just as D’ni fell, so might many of these Ages have fallen. We do not know. Seventy years is a long time, even for a D’ni. Much can change in that time.”
He paused, looking about him again. “Then so it shall be. I shall prepare a Linking Book. Four days from now, we will link through. Myself, Marrim, Irras, and Meer. Catherine will stay here with Carrad, in case anything goes wrong.”
“And in the meantime, Master Atrus?” Carrad asked.
“The work goes on,” Atrus answered him. “There are Books to be found, boats to be repaired, quarters to be built.”
“And food to be eaten,” Carrad said, reminding Atrus that they had not yet had supper.
Atrus laughed, for the first time that day relaxing. “Trust young Carrad to think of his stomach at such a time!”
Carrad feigned a hurt expression, but like all there, he knew they had taken a huge step forward, and as Atrus looked about the circle, he saw how each face mirrored that same realization.
Survivors! Cautious as he was, Atrus, too, believed they would find them in Bilaris. There were D’ni in the Ages. They had only to be patient now and they would find them!
§
That night Catherine and Atrus decided to return to Chroma’Agana. Catherine had been back several times, but for Atrus it would be the first time since they had set up camp in D’ni, six weeks before.
Rowing across the dark and silent lake, he watched the city slowly recede, its details blurring into the great wall of rock, and felt himself relax.
K’veer was silent, empty. Lighting a lamp, they made their way up the great twist of ancient steps and into his father’s study where the Linking Book awaited them. There, Atrus hesitated.
“What?” Catherine asked, amused. She knew that look.
In answer he went across to the shelves beside the desk and took down his father’s notebook, slipping it into his knapsack, which already held the Book of Bilaris, the book of commentary, two blank Linking Books, a pot of special D’ni ink, and a pen.
“You need to rest…” Catherine began.
“And I shall rest,” he said, tightening the cord, then throwing the bag over his shoulder again. “But I also have to work. We’re close now, Catherine.”
“I know. But you must ease off. You’ll be ill.”
Atrus laughed. “For a moment you sounded just like Anna…”
He fell silent, realizing just how true that was. Why, if he closed his eyes, he could see in memory the two of them standing together under the trees on Myst island, more like mother and daughter than two strangers from separate worlds.
Long ago that memory, for Anna had been dead for nearly thirty years.
Shadows, he thought, surprised by how fresh her loss still seemed. How strange that the past could cast such deep shadows on the future.
Shaking off the mood, he stepped across and, with a smiling glance at Catherine, placed his palm upon the open page.
§
Atrus lit the fire, then straightened. Through the open door of the cabin he could see the moonlit lawn, edged by tall Oreadoran oaks, and, through the trees, the sea like a sheet of shimmering, beaten metal, stretching away into infinity.
It was a beautiful night. The kind of night that made Atrus feel young again; as young as when he’d first met Catherine. So it was whenever he returned here after a long absence.
Catherine was in the library at the far end of the island. She had gone there almost as soon as they’d arrived, the Book of Bilaris under her arm, while Atrus, who had given his solemn word that he would rest, had sat upon the shore, barefoot, staring out into the distance as the sun went down and the tide slowly ebbed.
He stepped outside, into the freshness of the night, then turned to look along the rocky spine of the island, his vision traveling along the narrow path toward the long, low shape of the library and the workshops and laboratories beyond, the connected buildings climbing the gentle slope of the hillside like steps, the textured stone a silvered gray beneath the moon.
He was tempted to call out to Catherine and ask her to come and walk with him, but he knew that she did not like to be disturbed when she was working. In that she was like him. Even so, he began to walk in that direction, hoping that perhaps she would look up and see him and, setting aside her work, come out and join him under the open sky.
Looking about him he realized just how much he loved this place. Its peacefulness spoke to the depths of him. Its sounds were like the sounds of his own body. Here he felt complete.
Yes, and it was strange how he needed to go away before he realized that. It was like Catherine. All those months of separation had, he knew now, been necessary. To teach him her worth.
Atrus looked up at the night sky, wondering, not for the first time, just when he was. From his studies of the star charts in the observatory, he had worked out that he was in a very different part of the galaxy from the planet he knew as Earth—or its equivalent—if one even existed in this Age. But it was more difficult to tell just how far he was from it in time, for when one linked there were no limits. The mind-staggering vastnesses of Time and Space were irrelevant. Congruity—the matching of word and place—was all that mattered.
Or, as his grandfather, Aitrus, had explained it to his grandmother, Anna: “These Ages are worlds that do exist, or have existed, or shall. Providing the description fits, there is no limitation of time and space. The link is made regardless.”
Atrus stopped, a smile lighting his features as he remembered how young Marrim’s face had filled with wonder when he had first explained it to her. And still, when he thought of it—when he really thought about it—he would feel that same wonder fill him. It was an astonishing ability to possess. Little wonder that his father, freed from the restraints of D’ni society and lacking the true humility of his D’ni peers, had thought himself some kind of god. It was clear now why Anna had taught him as she had—avoiding the same mistake she had made with Gehn.
Careful not to make the same mistake, his first lesson to his own students—to Marrim and Irras and Carrad and all their fellows—was this: One did not make the Ages to which the words linked. A far greater force than the D’ni had made those, yet it was easy to be deluded into thinking so, for the universe was so vast, so all-encompassing, so infinite in its variety of worlds, that almost anything one wrote had its counterpart in reality.
Unstables worlds. Worlds that were living hells. Or the
beautiful, “impossible” worlds that Catherine once wrote.
Moving past the Eye Pool, Atrus swiftly climbed the grassy slope until he stopped, not ten yards from the door to the library. The door was open, and from where he stood in the darkness, he could see Catherine, seated behind the great oak desk, the Book open before her, one finger tracing the lines of D’ni symbols as she read.
Atrus smiled and walked on, taking the path that led round to the right, past the side of the library and out onto the cliff path. Ahead of him the great Anchor Rock was a shadow against the greater darkness of the sky. Beyond it lay a thousand miles of emptiness.
He walked out onto the pale stone, the sea fifty feet below him, the great muscular shape of the Anchor Rock above him and to his left. Standing there, he thought of his father and of the notebook they had found in the study on K’veer. It had told him little that he did not already know or suspect, yet, reading Gehn’s words at this distance from events, he had, against all expectation, been impressed by his father’s intellect, and had found himself wondering what Gehn might have become had D’ni not fallen. And that thought had spawned others. Was it really Gehn’s fault that he had become what he’d become? The destruction of his hopes at such an impressionable age had clearly traumatized the boy, yet could everything be accounted for by that? What of the cruelty in his father, that twisted aspect of Gehn? Was that a product of events, or was it something natural in the child that, through circumstance, had been encouraged rather than controlled?
It was impossible to say. All he knew was that he himself had been lucky. Lucky to have had Anna during those formative years of his upbringing—to have been taught by so good and wise a teacher.
And then there were his own sons…
The Myst Reader Page 65