The Way Between the Worlds

by Ian Irvine

  “What a duffer he is! I’d better get someone to look after him, I suppose,” said Karan with studied casualness.

  “Haven’t you forgotten something?” said “him” coldly from the bed. “How are you going to get admittance to Saludith? How are you going to find what you’re looking for there? It won’t be in common speech. You won’t even get in without a master chronicler.”

  “I suppose we’d better take him along, just in case,” said Karan grudgingly, then laughed and gave Llian a hug.

  They sat down on the bed to plan. They would go before dawn, and there was much to be done before then. Saludith was a long way south and would be frigid at this time of year. And they must prepare for the gate going astray.

  “I’d like a few hours’ sleep before we go,” said Karan, when all that was done. Llian was asleep already.

  “Meet me on the roof of the citadel an hour before sunrise,” Maigraith said, picking up her pack.

  Sometime during the night it had begun to rain, and it grew heavier with the dawning, so that when Karan and Llian reached the rooftop there were pools everywhere. A glimmer of light led them to Maigraith. Water was already dribbling down the back of Llian’s neck. He wished he had never heard of Saludith. He wished he was back in his warm bed, with or without Karan. His head hurt.

  Maigraith had something small and dark in her hand, like a lightglass that was not lit. She tucked its twin into a crevice on the roof. She concentrated hard, and suddenly pale-blue fire made a tracery of lines all around them, like a birdcage. The lines faded.

  Maigraith swore and adjusted her hood. “There is a difficulty I hadn’t thought of last night. I can’t make a gate to a place I’ve never been to.”

  “I’ve been to Saludith,” said Karan. She made a link and gave Maigraith her memories of the city.

  Maigraith tried again; again she failed. “Gates can only be opened in certain places, such as here, and they can only go to certain places. But it seems Saludith is not such a place.”

  “Maybe Nassi chose the site for that reason,” said Llian.

  “This college of hers, Llian, is it actually in Saludith?”

  “No, not in. Near, I think. I haven’t been there.”

  “Can you remember any places near Saludith, Karan?”

  Karan thought for a moment. “It was years ago. Nowhere else near there has left so clear an image in my mind that I’d risk our lives on it. Hang on! There was a place a day or two east of Saludith.” She closed her eyes to conjure up the image. “A narrow, deep valley where all the rock was white—chalk! I remember it distinctly. I’d never seen chalk before. The roads were white, and the grass a funny yellowy-green, and on my left a track wound up to a high hill shaped like a cone. On the side facing the road, near the top, there had been a landslide, leaving white rock peering out of the side of the hill like a window. There was a cap of grass over the crown of the hill, and on that an abandoned watch-tower.”

  It was just starting to get light. Karan renewed the link and Maigraith concentrated on the image. It was a good one—clean and strong.

  “I have it,” said Maigraith. “Take my hands!”

  The blue tracery glowed around them, Llian’s head spun and they vanished from the rooftop.

  They reappeared in pitch darkness, in freezing cold and howling wind, right in the middle of a blizzard. Karan gripped Llian’s hand tightly to stop herself being blown off her feet.

  “Where’s Maigraith?”

  “I don’t know,” Llian shouted.

  “Hang on, I’ll try to find my globe.”

  “Don’t let go!” he yelled.

  Snow swirled between them and his groping fingers found only air.

  “Where have you gone?” he screamed above the wind. He walked two steps and fell down an embankment. At the bottom he kept rolling, finally coming to a stop in a mound of snow.

  “Karan!” he shouted, but there was no reply.

  Llian stood up. The wind blew him off his feet again, so he crouched down in the snowdrift, which provided meager shelter from the howling wind. He tried to work out what had happened. They had landed on the side of a steep hill. Presumably Karan and Maigraith had also fallen down here somewhere. It had been just on dawn in Thurkad but that might be an hour later, this far south. He enveloped himself in his cloak and waited stoically for it to get light.

  Eventually the sun rose to illuminate a white world. Snow whirled all about. Llian stood up, shaking it off his hood. “Karan!” he shouted.

  A sheep-shaped mound not far up the hill heaved. “Oh, it’s so cold.”

  “Why did you let go of my hand?” he said crossly.

  “I didn’t, you let go of mine. Have you seen her?”

  “No!”

  They eventually found Maigraith huddled in the snow beside a rock, with a twisted knee and a lump on her head.

  “What happened?” they said together.

  “I don’t know. You weren’t with me. The first I remember is waking with a sore head, so I crawled here and waited.”

  “Is this the right place?”

  “We’ll have to wait until it stops snowing,” said Karan.

  “Obviously it wasn’t winter when you were last here,” Llian said sourly. “Take us out of here. Anywhere!”

  “I can’t,” Maigraith said.

  “Why not?”

  “I can’t make another gate without resting from the first. The after-effects are bad enough as it is.”

  They put up their tent, with considerable difficulty, and huddled inside it all day.

  That night the snow eased but in the morning Maigraith’s knee was, if anything, more swollen and painful than previously. “We’ll have to go back,” said Karan.

  Maigraith tried to visualize the rooftop. Nothing happened.

  “I can’t do it,” she said. “I know the destination but I can’t see it in my mind.”

  “Let me help you,” said Karan. Making another link, she gave Maigraith her own image of the place.

  Maigraith went rigid. “Stop!” she screamed.

  “What’s the matter?”

  “You… see it differently from me. No, I’ve lost it. It’s hopeless, and every try makes it worse.”

  Karan and Llian looked at one another. “It’s going to be a long cold walk back to Thurkad,” said Llian. “Two hundred leagues, the way the birds fly—I calculate we’ll get there about mid-summer. Has anyone got any money?”

  “Shush, Llian.” Without the gate their plight was desperate. Karan had not a grint on her, of course.

  “My knee isn’t so bad now,” said Maigraith.

  The weather began to clear and shortly they saw, from their vantage point, the town of Saludith only a league or two to the west and, about as far south, a stronghold that might have been their destination. It seemed to fit the rather vague description of the college that Llian remembered. Further along the road, a track wandered in that general direction.

  By the time they reached the place it was nearly dark. Haakhaast Academy, it said in iron letters over the gate. An ancient, tottering guard asked their business. From inside his coat Llian produced a badge that proclaimed him to be a master chronicler.

  “I am Llian, of Chanthed. I must consult the library on a matter of some urgency.”

  The guard stared at the badge, inspected Llian, then rang a bell and waved them through to the next gate. This time the inspection was more rigorous, but eventually they graduated into a courtyard and a third gate. It was open, beyond which they saw a wide hall. Once more Llian showed his badge and told his story. This time he was questioned searchingly about things that a master chronicler might be expected to know, or so Karan gathered, since she knew none of the answers.

  Evidently the test was passed, for a servant ushered them into a sitting room: stone walls and floor, high timbered ceiling. The room was frigid, even near the fire. A slender woman dressed in a toga of gray silk hobbled in. She had a long pallid face and eyelids that sa
gged down over her eyes so she could hardly see. She wore sandals whose leather straps were as fine as string, exposing blue feet twisted with rheumatism.

  “My name is Ralah. I am the Autand of this academy.” She examined Llian’s badge, and asked one or two other questions, which he answered, apparently to her satisfaction.

  “We have to be sure,” she apologized, blinking constantly. “What we have here is very precious. Precious to us anyway, though fewer and fewer come to look, or to study. Llian the Zain! I’ve heard of you, of course, though I’ve not had the privilege of hearing you tell. It’s many years since I made the long journey to Chanthed, and I shall not go again. Perhaps while you are here…” She squinted at him and Llian saw that under the drooping lids her eyes were cloudy—she was nearly blind.

  “I would be most happy to tell for you,” he said. “If it’s not too presumptuous, I could tell the Tale of Nassi and Shuthdar.”

  Ralah chuckled. “No, not that tale, we are steeped in it. One of the Great Tales, or even one of the lesser. Any would do! We hear so little here, and perhaps it would bring back something of the enthusiasm that we have lost. But, where are my manners?”

  She pulled a bell and refreshments were brought, a sweet mild brewed drink not unlike lasee, though they called it by a different name, mord, and honey cakes.

  “You had better tell me your business,” she continued, when they were seated by the fire munching their crisp cakes. “I hear the most urgent news, by skeet, though the details take months to get here. It must be critical to have brought you all this way in winter. How is the Great North Road south of Clews Top? Usually with the snow…” her voice was suddenly frosty.

  Llian glanced at Maigraith. “We did not come by any road, except the one outside your door,” she said. “Only two days ago we were in Thurkad, in the rain. I made a portal there and brought these two with me all the way to the chalk mountain.”

  Ralah stared at her, not even blinking. She made a little sigh and her shoulders sagged. “It’s never really lost, is it? A thousand years it might remain hidden, but sooner or later it will out again. The miracle of gates!”

  “We tried to go back when Maigraith twisted her knee, but the miracle didn’t work.”

  “You probably weren’t in quite the right place,” said Ralah. “I think I can see what you’ve come for, but tell me the story over dinner. The whole story.”

  After dinner, which featured turnip in a dozen combinations, all horrible, they took a glass of vinegary port and went to their rooms. Karan and Llian’s had a huge canopied bed, and the room was so cold that they were not long out of it.

  In the morning they were taken to the archives, where the most precious papers were kept, including the original writings of the famous Nassi. “Here we are,” said Ralah, indicating a shelf containing many rectangular boxes made of leather.

  Karan reached up and was instantly rebuked. “Only the chronicler may touch these boxes. The papers are old and very fragile.”

  Maigraith and Karan stood in the cold aisle, watching while Ralah took Llian down the row, explaining the system to him, taking down a box now and again to show what was inside.

  Llian had one of the boxes down. An odor of camphor came faintly along the aisle. “Come and look at this!” he cried. When they hurried up he said, in a voice suppressed to a whisper, “These are the very papers that Shuthdar made to trick Bandiar with.” He was awed. “Imagine! Nothing else he wrote remains.”

  Karan was less awed. “Is it any use to us?”

  “No, I don’t suppose so. But imagine…”

  Karan gave a loud sniff.

  “Yes,” said Llian sadly. “You’re right. Another time perhaps.” Closing the box, he blew a speck of dust off the spine and replaced it on the shelf with exquisite care. He took down another.

  That process was repeated for the whole of the day, and several times they had to remind Llian that they were not here for his amusement, though Karan suspected that he still indulged himself as much as he dared. She was sure that he went back to the box containing Shuthdar’s writings too, and spent a long time with it, but when she accused him he just smiled at her. Still, he got through many boxes, and late in the afternoon found the ones he was looking for, containing the records Nassi had made soon after fleeing with Shuthdar.

  It was evident that these documents had been looked at many times, for they were in worse condition than the others, yellow and cracking to pieces. They had to be handled with such care that it took almost a minute to turn each page. The task could take weeks.

  “There are copies of these papers, of course,” he said, turning to Ralah.

  “No copies,” she said.

  Llian was astounded. “But there could be a fire, or a storm might blow the roof off! Even a worm could destroy what you guard so carefully.”

  “It was not our founder’s wish that her private papers be duplicated. We respect that wish. When they are gone, they are gone. There are, of course, copies of all our other precious documents.”

  Llian made a rude noise. The Histories were more important than any single person, and when he returned to Thurkad he would write out everything he had read, from his perfect chronicler’s memory.

  He turned back to his work. Ralah sat on a stool watching him. Karan and Maigraith paced.

  The next day they started early. It was tediously slow for the watchers. The writing was crabbed, faint with age, and in an archaic dialect which was difficult even for Llian to make out. He worked through the boxes methodically, making sure that he had missed nothing, then went back to one.

  “This is all I can find. May I see the catalogue?”

  Ralah took him to the place. Llian went through the relevant cards, and again. “There seems to be one missing. There’s a missing number.”

  Ralah bent over the drawer, shuffling the cards back and forth. “Oh dear!” she said, blinking furiously. “You’re right.”

  “What was the item?” asked Maigraith.

  “I don’t know,” said Ralah, “but it would be—”

  “Something Nassi wrote about the flute,” Llian said bitterly. “But it’s gone, and the catalogue entry removed, and there’s no copy.”

  Ralah said nothing.

  “Do you have any idea what it said? How it was used, that is?” Llian tried to keep the frustration out of his voice.

  “I am the custodian, not a chronicler. It is not my task to know the details of her papers, only to keep them safe for posterity.”

  Oh for a Nadiril here! thought Llian. Posterity is now, and you are no use at all. “How can I find out if she wrote about it some place else?”

  “You can read everything in the library.”

  “That would take years,” he said to Maigraith. Then, turning back to Ralah, “There are no masters here, or even students, who know these particular papers?”

  “Alas,” she said. “No more.”

  “Go through it all again!” Maigraith looked impatient.

  Llian took the papers to a nearby table, sat down and began to read aloud. Finally he put everything back in the box. “She talks about Shuthdar playing the flute, but only in passing.”

  “She wrote at length about all his tricks and puzzles, but nothing at all about the most important thing of all?” said Maigraith. “Is there no mention about how he used the Secret Art to turn the music into a gate, and how he directed and controlled the gate afterwards?”

  “She may have written a treatise,” said Llian, “but it’s not here.”

  “Well, what do you think? Sniff it out with your chronicler’s nose.”

  “Such things have a way of disappearing, especially when no copies have been made.” He directed a reproachful glare at Ralah but she was oblivious.

  Ralah bent down until her nose was almost touching the page, moving her head up and down to read. Her eyes were watering. “I need my glass.” She fumbled inside her toga, found nothing and put her head down to the page again. Then sh
e turned the box over to see what was written there. Her lips moved. She looked up, her eyes focussing slowly on Llian’s face.

  “This is definitely the one. I went through all this some years ago, reading everything and checking the catalogue. It would astound you the number of errors I found.”

  Llian knew the workings of libraries all too well to be astounded at anything he found there, but he merely mumbled something that could be taken any way she pleased.

  Maigraith looked along the rows of shelves. “Days are precious now. We can’t waste any more time here.”

  Closing the box, Ralah put it back on the shelf and led them to the hall and the fire. “Lunch is ready,” she said.

  While they were drinking a welcome cup of tea Maigraith went through the visitors’ book.

  “Are you looking for anyone in particular?” asked Ralah, who had come up behind her silently.

  “Faelamor, Yggur, Tensor, Mendark, Tallia, Malien for starters,” Maigraith replied. “Oh, what’s the use? They might have come in disguise.”

  “It would have to be a very good disguise,” said Ralah. “Nassi made a kind of Sentinel to protect us from such intrusions, and most of them are still working. I can tell you that Faelamor has not been here, but Yggur has. Nadiril of course, and Mendark many times. He spent months here once, but that was before my time. I’ve not seen any of them in years.”

  Maigraith sighed. “Well, we need tarry here no longer.”

  “Someone’s been here,” she said once they were out of hearing, “and taken away what I came for. Someone’s waiting for the flute to be made so they can take it for themselves.”

  “Do you have any idea who?” Karan asked.

  “Faelamor, Yggur, Tensor, Mendark, for starters.”

  “We’ll have to be more careful,” said Llian. “Every villain on Santh will want the flute, once it’s made.”

  They trudged back through the snow, walked all around the hill in a spiral upward path, and every few steps Maigraith tried to open the portal again, but without the least glimmering of success. Finally, just as the sun was setting, she slumped down in the snow.

  “My head is exploding,” she said.