“The painting itself no more than five days,” said Soreas, “but of course I sketched for it and thought about it for weeks.”
“And you have the time to paint like this often?”
“Always. When we are in Ellerinonn our only duty is to our art.”
“Is everyone here an artist?”
“Of some kind, yes.” Soreas smiled. “I suppose that must seem strange to you.”
“Not entirely,' answered Kerish, tilting back his head to look at the ceiling again. “In Galkis, all the nobles are taught to write and play and sing and dance. Craftsmen are held in the greatest honour because the Book of the Emperors says that "to create is to mirror the action of God".'
“We have no gods here,” said Soreas lightly. “Elmandis has freed us from them.”
He led Kerish into the colonnade and they sat down among the scattered cushions. A blonde child ran through the garden carrying garlands of fresh blue flowers. She put one round Kerish's neck, gave the other to Soreas and then climbed on his lap to hug him.
“This is my daughter, Reahno.”
A plump young man and a curly-haired woman came towards them carrying baskets of fruit. They also received garlands from Reahno.
“And here is my sister, Ideao, and her husband Gannius. They live in the Valley of Shining Streams, some distance from Tir-Rinnon but they are staying with me while my wife is Beyond.”
“Otherwise he would waste away,” explained Ideao. “Soreas is so absorbed in his painting he never remembers to gather fruit for himself.”
Kerish was presented with a bowl of fresh fruit and a fine porcelain cup of fragrant wine.
“The fruit on the trees is for everyone to pick?”
“Of course,” answered Gannius, “by the grace of Elmandis there is always enough.”
“More than enough,” said Soreas with mock gravity. “If we did not stop you brother, you would eat sweet jellahns till you burst.”
“Don't believe him,” protested Gannius, with his mouth full, “I pick them to copy in the patterns on my plates and jars. I'm a potter, Kerish. Naturally they'd rot if I didn't eat them, which would be wasteful...”
The rest of the explanation was lost in the others' laughter. Not at all abashed, Gannius offered Kerish a jellahn. It was curiously shaped, with a skin mottled in lurid shades of red and purple, but it tasted delicious.
“Did I understand that your wife is abroad?” asked Kerish.
Soreas frowned. “Yes. From time to time we must all leave Ellerinonn to work in the dark places of the world as teachers or healers. It is not our custom to talk about it or about those who are Beyond.”
Kerish began to apologise but the little girl had followed the conversation.
“Father, you said mother would be back for my birthday. Why didn't she come?”
“She was needed, Reahno.”
“I don't want to go away to the cruel places!”
“Reahno, that is enough.” Soreas pushed her from his lap. “Now go and bring a finger bowl for our guest.”
When the brief meal was over, they sat around a lily pond in the centre of the garden finishing their wine. Ideao asked Kerish if he would like to hear a song and she had soon fetched and tuned her lyre. She sang of her home in the Valley of Shining Streams to a tune that leaped and sparkled like the waterfalls. Then Kerish was teased into admitting his own talents. Ideao found an instrument for him that was very like a zildar. He tuned it cautiously, played a few chords and then, without knowing why, launched into the last song that the Poet Emperor ever wrote, "Come gentle death and lead me from the dark". It was in High Galkian so the Ellerinionns could not understand the words but they all seemed moved by the sweet melancholy of its music. Soreas stared into the pool and hardly spoke again, while Kerish and the others discussed music until it was time to take the Prince back to the palace.
* * *
In the Chamber of Healing, Forollkin slept and Elmandis still held the golden chalice.
“You have been longer than I said,” he murmured as Kerish came in. “You must have been happy.”
“My Lord, how is Forollkin?”
Elmandis smiled. “In a moment, you shall ask him yourself. Help me now.”
Kerish lifted Forollkin's head while Elmandis held the chalice to the young Galkian's lips and forced a few drops down his throat. Forollkin stirred, coughed and opened his eyes.
“I saw them growing,” he muttered, “flowers, huge and black.”
Elmandis set down the chalice and shook him by the shoulders. “Return.”
Forollkin blinked and sat up, fully awake. “Kerish. Majesty. I don't remember how...”
Elmandis stepped back. “Look at your leg now.”
Forollkin did and gasped. Where the wound had been was smooth brown skin without a mark. He prodded the place as if he could not believe the evidence of his eyes.
“Do you believe in the power of the Seven Sorcerers now?” asked Elmandis.
Forollkin stretched and bent his leg. “I suppose I must. I thank your Majesty.”
“You must try out your leg, of course, before believing,” said Elmandis. “In the cool of the evening young people gather outside my palace to run and throw and wrestle. Join them and tonight I shall hold a banquet in your honour.”
“Your Majesty, the captain of the Zeloka...” began Forollkin.
“Worthy Engis has already been told that you will not return till morning,” said Elmandis. “Some of my people have gone of their own accord to feast the crew.”
“Lord King, I must speak to you alone,” murmured Kerish.
“After the banquet, Prince.”
* * *
Kerish and Forollkin joined a group of bronzed Ellerinionns on a wide green lawn. Forollkin wrestled and Kerish was caught up in a game of toss ball. In Galkis, he had often enviously watched young soldiers play this very game. Now there was no one to forbid a Royal Prince to join undignified pursuits and he leaped and tossed joyfully.
After the sports they bathed with the Ellerinionns in an indoor pool fed by a warm spring and were then led to a pleasant room overlooking a walled garden. They dried themselves and, with some difficulty, dressed in the clothes that had been laid out for them. These were lengths of fine white linen bordered with spirals and rosettes, woven in red and blue. Forollkin felt most uneasy and insisted on pinning his at the waist, but the simple folds suited his lean body and sun-darkened skin.
Footsteps sounded on marble and Soreas stood smiling in the doorway. Kerish greeted him with pleasure and introduced Forollkin. The Ellerinionn grasped Forollkin's hand.
“We are glad to see you healed. Elmandis wishes me to take you both to the Place of Feasting. My daughter sends you these.”
He gave them bracelets skilfully made from red and blue flowers stitched on to bands of cloth.
“Tonight they are beautiful; tomorrow they will be faded,” said Soreas. “These are the jewels of Ellerinonn.”
“So you do not care for cold, eternal gems?” asked Kerish, fingering the Jewel of Zeldin.
Soreas answered him gravely, “We care only for things that remind us of our humanity. The flowers come again each year. New flowers and new men to receive our heritage.”
“Don't you believe in a life after death?” demanded Forollkin.
“No,” said Soreas. “Elmandis has taught us to live without such a hope and we are the stronger for it. Will you come?”
The Place of Feasting was a courtyard paved in creamy marble and surrounded by pillared terraces. The feasting area was lit by torches held in the pale stone hands of statues of generations of young Ellerinionns. The terraces were scattered with brightly woven cushions and low couches had been placed round the edge of a dancing floor. Already the place was full of people, deep in earnest conversations or tuning instruments.
Soreas led the Galkians to where Elmandis reclined, a crown of flowers overshadowing his face. The King asked them to share his couch, Kerish on his r
ight and Forollkin on his left. Soreas then joined his family on the other side of the dancing floor.
As soon as they were seated, children ran up with baskets of flowers. Elmandis plucked out a crimson wreath and placed it on Kerish's head. The flowers brought back too vividly the soft voice of the Emperor, a crimson cup and a dead woman. Kerish sat very still trying to shut out the memory.
Elmandis clapped his hands for the feasting to begin. Rare fruits, sugared flowers, bread, honey and bowls of soft cheese and yoghurt were brought. The feasters sat in small groups sharing woven baskets of fruit and painted chalices of wine or nectar. As they ate, Ellerinionns strolled on to the dancing floor to entertain the company. Some danced lightly and gracefully, their white robes rippling like the sea; some played lutes and lyres; some sang and some recited poetry.
In compliment to their guests, a group chanted a Galkian song known through all Zindar, "Oh Golden Galkis, matchless star of cities, beneath the snow-clad mountains ever shining." When it was over Kerish was asked to sing or play.
Kerish took a draught of wine, nervously tuned a borrowed instrument, and sang the Lay of Prince Tor-Koldin and the White Trieldiss. In his pure flawless voice, he told how five hundred years before, the Trieldiss, the rarest of beasts, had appeared in the mountains above Galkis. Whoever ate its heart would become a great poet and that was what Tor-Koldin desired. His thoughts sparkled like fire jewels but when he tried to catch them on paper their beauty faded. The young Prince took the bow and arrows forbidden to the Godborn and went up into the mountains. For seven days he followed the Trieldiss as it leapt from crag to crag. At last, he brought it to bay against a wall of rock. For the first time he saw the beast clearly and it was beautiful beyond his imagining. He could not destroy such perfection even for his heart's desire. He threw down his bow and sadly turned away but to his wonder the Trieldiss spoke, “Prince Tor-Koldin, you have spared my beauty. You have a poet's soul and with it my heart.” The Prince returned to the Golden City and set down in words the beauty of the Trieldiss. He became the Poet Emperor, famous in Zindar as the greatest whoever expressed the thoughts and feelings of men.
Kerish had chosen well. His song delighted the Ellerinionns. Even Elmandis smiled at the Prince and shared with him his own cup of wine. A lively circle dance began. A laughing, fair-haired girl caught Forollkin by the hand and made him join them.
They would have taken Kerish too but Elmandis shook his head.
“If you would speak with me alone, Prince, come with me now.”
Kerish nodded and followed Elmandis as he strode away from music and light and laughter into the darkness.
Chapter 10
The Book of the Emperors: Warnings
Remember that God sees every action of your life and knows each thought. There is no abyss dark enough to hide from his light.
Elmandis led Kerish down a passage in which no torches burned. He unlocked a black door that opened on to a small, circular chamber. While the King lit an alabaster lamp, Kerish looked around him. The walls were hung with seven panels each bearing a life-sized image. No, not seven, only six. The last panel was cracked and darkened as if it had gone through fire.
The first was a portrait of Elmandis. The second of a fair boy very like him. The third was a silver-haired woman. The others were harder to make out. As Kerish stared at the portraits they seemed to sink below the shadowy surface of the panels and vanish. As he looked more closely at the ruined panel, the darkness appeared to swirl and shift. From its depths floated up a white face. White as stripped bone and riven, as if by a terrible blow, between the glittering eyes. Kerish shuddered and tried to look away. To his horror he could not. The eyes held him.
Kerish stumbled backwards and cried out, “No!”
Elmandis looked up, strode forward and struck his hand across the panel. It became nothing but dark, cracked glass again.
The image of the riven face was still imprinted on Kerish's eyes. Elmandis gently called his name and held the tips of his fingers against Kerish's eyelids. The Prince swayed a little and sat down in an ebony chair.
“What was it?” Kerish asked.
“One drowned in darkness far deeper than my power can reach. Yet you raised him...”
Elmandis looked curiously at Kerish, then pounced on the cirge chain about his neck and drew out the purple jewel.
“Prince, do you know what you wear over your heart?”
“It was the gift of the High Priest of Zeldin,”
“If he did not choose to tell you more, I will not. It was a gift powerful enough to draw Shubeyash to you.”
“Shubeyash?”
“The King of Roac, the Lord of the Unquiet Dead,” said Elmandis. “Once there were Seven Sorcerers. Now there are six.”
“He was a sorcerer? He held a key?” asked Kerish eagerly.
“He holds it still with all his might. Will you challenge the walking dead, Prince of Galkis?”
“I will challenge all the Seven Sorcerers,” answered Kerish, “for I must win their keys to free the Saviour. Lord Elmandis, only you can help me.”
“I do not wish to help you.”
“Why? Tell me why?”
Elmandis circled the room, never looking at the Prince.
“I will tell you as much as I may. My people believe that my power is the summit of what can be achieved by the human mind. That is a half truth. The labours of my mind brought me to a state of knowledge equalled only by five others in the history of Zindar. That knowledge brought each of us to make a bargain with the one you Galkians call Zeldin. I cannot tell you all the terms of that bargain but the centre of it was this: each of us was given a golden key to guard. So long as we hold those keys we are immortal. So long and not a moment longer. If I give up my key I will begin to age. In due time, I will die and the power that protects Ellerinonn will die with me. No, don't speak yet,” said Elmandis rapidly. “When the others received their keys, they were grateful. I railed against even so slight a limit to my power. Zeldin rewarded my ingratitude. He gave me a second key, a key of knowledge. Without that knowledge no one can win the keys to the Saviour's prison. So the fate of the Seven Sorcerers is locked within my mind.”
Kerish bowed. “Lord Elmandis, you have already begun to unlock that knowledge for me...”
“Perhaps I do so only to torment you?”
“Your people do not speak of you as a tyrant.”
“Is that not the final proof of my tyranny?”
Elmandis laughed and Kerish's hands clasped nervously on the Jewel of Zeldin. “I think you are wrong to teach your people to live without a god,” he began, “but I can see that you do it out of love for them. Surely, when the Saviour is freed he will reward you for making such good use of your key.”
“Did your High Priest promise that?” asked Elmandis.
“No,” began Kerish, “but if Zeldin always intended you to give up the key, then he will protect Ellerinonn...”
“Did he protect your crew from the Brigands?”
Kerish flinched and Elmandis stopped his pacing and stood for a moment facing the darkened panel.
“Forgive me, that was cruel. It would be fair to throw my words back at me. I called you proud because I saw in you a faint image of myself. Zeldin might act for the good of my people but I wish to control their destiny and mine.”
“So that your people live in a world where everything is accomplished for them by your power.”
It was Elmandis turn to flinch. “Have I not created the best place to live in all Zindar?”
“Yes, but are your subjects free to accept or reject your love, as you are free to accept or reject Zeldin's love?”
Elmandis looked so angry that for a moment Kerish thought he would be struck dead by the sorcerer's power. Then the Enchanter King sighed, sank down into a chair and studied the Prince's face.
“If I am to gamble everything on you, what will stand surety? Even if I give you my knowledge and my key, you and your brother h
ave a terrible journey still to make and keys to win from six unwilling sorcerers. How can I believe that you will ever achieve your goal?”
“Lord Elmandis, you recognized me when you saw me,” said the Prince. “Surely you knew from the beginning that it was I who would undertake this quest?”
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