By now she’d come across enough wards to be able to tell from the very density of its blankness how powerful this one was, and so guess the immense power of the magic it was warding, here in the very heart of unmagical Larg. And what she had felt, what had drawn her attention, was the first faint beginnings of a change, a weakening of the ward, a faint seeping through of the power beyond it. It was unlike anything she had felt before. She started to shudder.
“Hold me,” she gasped.
Ribek put his arm round her and hugged her firmly to his side, but the shuddering wouldn’t stop. Through it she heard snatches of what was going on. The tinkle of the bell, “…motion is that…as either a product of the witness’s lunacy, or not truly magical activity of the sort referred to…and those against…carried with Proctors Benter and Gald dissenting—”
“Hold it! Hold it!”
The Gate Sergeant’s bellow overwhelmed the shuddering. He was standing by her side with pike gripped in both hands as if he intended to use it.
“Orders is orders!” he yelled above the growing hubbub. “Twelve years, morning after morning, I’ve been reading out that clause Three-a there. Made no sense to me, but when it happened I did what it said, ’cause I know an order when I hear one. Same with what the gentleman there read out of his black book. That’s an order, and you don’t argue it to and fro, you do what it says. So now where’s this Sleeper, and how…?”
Maja raised a juddering arm and pointed at the far corner.
“Right,” cried the Gate Sergeant. “Out of the way there…”
Clamor filled the room, only to be stilled in an instant. A thin whisper came out of the air, faint and dry as the scuttle of a mouse in a hayloft.
“I have woken. Bring the strangers to me.”
“Maja—she can’t stand strong magic. It will kill her,” said Ribek in a low, strained voice. He’d spoken to empty air, but the whisper answered.
“I will protect her.”
The shuddering died away. Ribek lifted her into his arms.
“This way then,” said the Gate Sergeant. “It’s where the lassie was pointing, over in this corner. Stand aside, please.”
Maja could have walked, but she needed to cling to Ribek, to his beautiful ordinariness, although something else, something invisible, was now also holding and protecting her. A door had appeared now in the corner, its carving and gilding matching the other doors in the council chamber. It hadn’t been there when she had looked before, but she sensed nothing from it as the Gate Sergeant tried its handle, found it unlocked, opened it and held it for Ribek to carry her through.
“Do I come too, ma’am?” the Gate Sergeant croaked.
“No need,” said the whisper. “You have done well, Sergeant. My blessing is on you and yours, and on this whole, loved city. Farewell.”
The Gate Sergeant hesitated, turned, stopped, turned back, and forced his voice to function.
“You’re going then, ma’am?”
“Yes. The covenant is broken, and when all is settled I may go.”
The Gate Sergeant saluted and closed the door.
“Phew!” said Ribek.
“You can put me down now,” said Maja. “I’m all right. Someone’s shielding me. Like Jex. Only…” Only so much more powerfully than Jex could have done. He would have been utterly overwhelmed by what now surrounded them.
She looked around. They were in a plain, stone corridor dimly lit by ordinary-looking lanterns with unmagical flames in them. No doors opened off it. They went along it, Ribek moving with short, effortful steps as if he were walking through something much denser than air, and then down a flight of stone steps.
“We’ll be well underground now,” Ribek muttered. “Land slopes up from the river. Ah, this looks like it.”
In front of them the passage ended, with an open door on the right. Maja had never heard him sound so nervous. Like a shy schoolboy, she thought. She herself felt utterly unafraid. There was a kindliness in the shield around her, like the mother’s love she had never really known. Hoping to share some of that with him, she took his hand as they reached the doorway.
“Come in.”
This time the whisper came through human lips, a voice full of human weariness. They crept into the room.
It was a very ordinary space, stone-walled, windowless, unadorned. But for the vaulted roof it might have been a storeroom in a well-built farmhouse. At the same time, Maja recognized that it was extremely old, far older than the Council Chamber they had just left, older even than the ancient walls of Larg, almost as old as the hills. And despite the shielding that wrapped her round, she knew it for a place of power.
There was no furniture in it apart from an iron bedstead. On it a dark green bedspread stitched with what Maja guessed were magical symbols, though she was unable to sense them through her shield. White sheets and pillowcase, looking as if they had been laundered yesterday. On the pillow a skull.
No, not quite. A head next thing to a skull, hairless, the almost transparent skin drawn tight over the fleshless bone, the mouth a slit, invisible lips drawn in between toothless jaws, the eyes clouded over with a gray, bloodshot film.
The slit of a mouth opened, revealing the two thin lines of the lips, so dark a purple they were almost black. They barely moved to release their whisper.
“Welcome. I am the Sleeper, Guardian of Larg. Two hundred years and more I have waited here for you, though under the covenant between myself and the Watchers I could not stir to help you. And now, though they have broken the covenant, there is little I can do. All but the last shreds of my power are gone.
“You, child. What is your name?”
“I’m Maja Urlasdaughter,” whispering too, as if in the presence of the dead. “My friend is Ribek Ortahlson. We come from the Valley.”
“Of course. I knew your ancestors, Meena and Tilja, Alnor and Tahl. With Lananeth I was the earliest of the Ropemaker’s helpers.”
“You’re Zara! You’re in the story we tell in the Valley! You were Lord Kzuva’s magician!”
The corpse-face woke with the ghost of a smile.
“I used that name. When our first tasks were done, and the major demons bound beneath the earth, Lananeth chose to return to natural life and die in human time. I stayed by the Ropemaker’s side.
“By then he had other helpers. His is a restless soul. He fretted to be away from his task, back in the life he knew, exploring and learning. With our agreement he bound us into a covenant that during his absences we should cooperate for the general good of the Empire. Time passed, and all seemed well. Before he last left he told me, and no one else, that he had discovered the gateway into another universe, and there was one extremely difficult task that he could at last accomplish there, and there alone. He could not tell when he would return. I was already old and weary, and asked to be released from my binding and my tasks, and he agreed.
“I chose another course from Lananeth. To preserve what was left of my inward self I came to Larg. Over three years I built a barrier of wards around the city almost as strong as those around the walls of Talagh. That done, I laid my powers aside and surrounded myself with ordinariness, as devoid of magic as I could make it. I healed, and taught others to heal, by ordinary natural means. My old colleagues remained in Talagh, increasing their powers. We waited for the Ropemaker’s return.”
The whisper had slowed, become syllable after dragging syllable. It paused, gathered strength and went on.
“He did not return. The Watchers’ power grew. Before they could complete the change and become the Watchers, as they are now, they had a need that only I could fulfill, so we bound ourselves under the covenant, in terms that neither they nor I could afford to break, that I should fulfill that need and that they should have no power or jurisdiction over my city of Larg.
“Again we waited. I grew older. I could have renewed my powers and prolonged my life, but at great cost to my true self. In the end I could do no more than cast myself int
o sleep and await the next event. It has now come, twice over. You have appeared at the gates of Larg, and in the very day and hour of your coming to Larg the covenant was broken with a force that battered against my wards around the city, and woke me from my sleep. The Watchers will say that what they have done is still within the terms of the covenant, and for that reason I dare not break the pact between us. I know who you are, and what you are trying to do. But still for the sake of this city I dare not help your search. I can give you my blessing, and that is all.”
She paused again. At length, Ribek broke the silence, whispering too in that presence.
“You…you can’t tell us where this gateway is, the one to the other universe?”
“I dare not meddle. I must recall what is left of my powers, and I do not know if they are enough, and I am old and tired. What the Watchers have done is to wake a great sea demon to use him against the fleets of their enemies. In so doing they have woken others, including the storm demon Azarod, whom long ago I bound and cast into the pit. Before anything else he will come to Larg to take vengeance on me and mine. My barrier is weaker over the sea and it will not hold him of its own. Now you must go, while I prepare to do what I can to protect my city. The Proctors will decide whether to give you passage. My blessing is on you. You may tell them that.”
“Thank you, ma’am,” said Ribek, low-voiced, and moved toward the door. Maja tugged at his sleeve.
“Perhaps Benayu could help her,” she whispered. “Tell her about the dragon. And there’s a demon-binder on Zald.”
He hesitated, then turned back to the bed.
“I…I don’t know if it’s any use, ma’am,” he said. “One of our friends outside the barrier—she isn’t a magician, but she’s got a demon-binder on a jewel called Zald-im-Zald, if that’s any use. And we’ve got someone with us. He had to stay up on the hill outside your wards, because he’s a magician. He knows about storms. We were at Tarshu, on a hill above the town, when the Watchers summoned a tremendous tempest from out at sea to attack an enemy airboat.”
“I saw that tempest in my dream. Someone had spoken the Ropemaker’s true name, and the shock of it almost woke me. I saw the airboat’s fall. I saw a hunting dragon tossed aside like a leaf on the lashing tail of the wind.”
“Benayu did that. The dragon was hunting us, and it was just going to get us when he used a bit of the storm to blow it clean away and kill it. It took a lot out of him, but he did it. If it’s storms you’re planning to deal with…”
“Perhaps. Zald-im-Zald will work only for its owner, and I cannot work with her if she is not a magician. But your other friend…Hold your left hand over my face so that I can breathe into your palm…. Now close it, and keep it closed till you see your friend. Tell him what has happened, and if he agrees let him breathe the breath that I have given you. He will then know my need and purpose and be free to refuse.
“Now go. Tell the Proctors to prepare for a mighty storm. Say that with your friend’s help I will try to protect the city. In that way, if all goes well, they will have cause to assist you as I cannot myself do. Farewell.”
“Thank you, ma’am,” said Ribek, and turned to the door once more. Before they reached it, the whisper came again.
“The man you are looking for…he was born in Barda.”
CHAPTER
9
As they crossed the threshold into the Council Chamber the cocoon around Maja vanished. Instantly a jolt of pure magic from Zara’s chamber overwhelmed her. Utter darkness. No sight, sound, smell, touch, only that blast of power. And beyond it, something else, something that was there and wasn’t. Was there and wasn’t in a way she knew…
And then she was standing, dazed, in the Council Chamber, with Ribek’s steadying arm around her. There was blank wall where the door had been.
“I’m all right,” she muttered, but he kept hold of her arm as he led her toward the center of the table where the Proctors were seated.
Everyone in the room seemed to be staring at them, as before, but the whole atmosphere had changed. There were doubt, anxiety, interest still, but instead of irritation with these two troublesome intruders, there was now something like awe in their faces. Ribek and she had spoken with the Sleeper of Larg, which no one before had done for who knew how long.
Ribek halted confidently in front of the long table and the President nodded to him to speak.
“Well, we’ve seen the Sleeper,” he said quietly. “I can’t tell you about most of what she said, except that you’ve got to make up your own minds what to do about us. But she gave us a message for you to prepare for a storm. It’s not going to be an ordinary bad storm, but a real monster. The Watchers at Tarshu have raised a great sea demon to destroy the Pirates’ fleet, and that’s woken other demons. One of them’s about to attack Larg. She’ll do her best to protect the city, and we’ve got a friend up on the hill outside the barrier who’ll try to help her, but she’s very old and tired and she thinks that it may be too much for her, even with the help of our friend. So if you’ll let us go back and tell him…”
The President glanced right and left. Everyone nodded. All stood. The Clerk rifled urgently through his folders and passed him a large card, from which he started to read in a carrying voice.
“The Court is adjourned. A State of Emergency is declared. Preparations for a major storm, Category Five, to begin immediately. All shipping to be double-moored. All citizens not engaged in official storm preparations to go to their homes. Curfew imposed. Volunteer Watch and fire crews to report immediately for duty. Watch authorized to arrest persons breaking the curfew on suspicion of looting. Automatic triple penalties imposed on those detected in actual looting…”
Everyone seemed to know the drill. Junior officials were already scampering out of the room, others hurrying in for orders. The President finished reading and put the card down.
“Gate Sergeant,” he called. “Ah, there you are. We’ll forget about your little outburst just now. Will you take our visitors back to the gate, provide them with a pass-box, free of charge in the circumstances, and give them every help you can to get them back to their friends the other side of the barrier before the storm breaks.”
“Horses, sir?”
“If we can find them in time. See to it, Guard Captain. Two steady horses to the South Gate, an experienced horseman to ride with the girl and bring the horses back, expense to be defrayed from the City Purse…”
As soon as Maja stepped out into the open she was aware of the coming storm. There was a sudden chill in the air and fine spray in the freshening wind, which came and went in sudden violent gusts. The bells of twenty towers were jangling at random. A line of uniformed men carrying staves were chivvying the last few loiterers off the square. And out to sea—the great ward was weaker there, Zara had said—something vaguely felt but huge and malevolent was moving toward the city.
They hurried back through almost empty streets the way they had come. It was late evening by the time they reached the gate. The Gate Sergeant left them under the arch while he went into the guardroom for the pass-box. By now Maja felt deathly tired from the magical batterings in the Council Chamber on top of the long day on the road. She hoped the horses would come. She doubted if she could make it up the hill on her own feet.
They waited. The howl of the wind strengthened, for Azarod himself now rode in it. She could feel Zara’s great ward vibrate to his violence. The Gate Sergeant seemed to be taking a long time. A thought struck her.
“Can you ride with only one hand, Ribek?” she said.
“Walk if I have to. Where’ve they all got to?”
Almost as he spoke the horses arrived, a wizened old groom riding one and leading the other. He was wearing a heavy oiled cloak and a wide-brimmed hat tied under the chin. His vast white moustache was pretty well all she could see of his face.
“Right you are, sir,” he said. “Wild weather already, and it’ll be worse up the hill. Hoist the little lady up behi
nd me and we’ll be off.”
“There’s a problem,” said Ribek, holding his arm across his body as if he’d hurt it. “I’m not much of a horseman, and I’ve only got one hand I can use.”
“That’s all right, sir. I’ll take the reins and you can hang on to her mane. There’s a mounting block over there.”
Before they could move the Gate Sergeant returned with the pass-box and a couple more oiled cloaks like the groom’s. Maja’s was hugely too large for her, of course.
“Smallest I could find in the store,” he said, as he parceled her up in it and belted it round her. “It’s going to be wet up there on that hill.”
He lifted her up and she put her arms round the old groom. He smelled of stables. It was strange not to be riding with Ribek, but it wouldn’t have made sense. They moved to the block to let Ribek mount, and then on toward the outer archway.
“Good luck,” said the Gate Sergeant. “See you in the morning, supposing any of us are alive still.”
“Good luck to you, and thank you,” said Ribek.
The gale seemed to be blowing from the north, so for a little while they were still in the lee of the city wall, but the moment they were off the bridge it slammed into their backs, hissing and shrieking. Even a winter storm at Woodbourne had been nothing like this. If it had been from any other direction it would have blasted them off the road or forced them back. As it was, it seemed to be driving them on up the hill.
Despite that, the horses at once half shied. The groom cursed them and wrenched at the reins and drove them on. The riders bent themselves low over their necks to lessen the pressure on both themselves and the horses. Maja laid her right cheek against the groom’s greasy cloak and peered out to sea.
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