Destiny

by Paul B. Thompson

  When Favaronas showed a tendency to dwell on the scroll’s long-winded recitation of the disagreement between Stabo and Mexas, Faeterus commanded, “Spare me these mediocrities,” and Favaronas skipped ahead.

  Anyone who entered Inath-Wakenti eventually was taken by the lights, according to the scroll; the inhabitants were immune to them unless they tried to leave. Then it was noticed the animals were disappearing. The beasts were not trying to leave, yet their number steadily diminished. Facing starvation, the prisoners (as Favaronas had begun to think of them) tried tunneling out. They dug miles of passages beneath the blue-green soil, but the lights found them there too.

  The scroll ended there. Still curious, Favaronas asked, “Is that how they died?”

  “Eventually. They could not live off each other’s flesh forever.”

  Favaronas turned away, aghast at the horror Faeterus revealed so casually. The archivist silently bemoaned his foolishness in returning to this place. He had been safely in the company of Glanthon and his warriors, outside the valley’s dreadful influence, and he’d thrown that safety away for the hope of power. If he managed to survive, he would confess his crimes to the Speaker and beg forgiveness. Whatever punishment was meted out, Favaronas would embrace it with joy.

  The final scroll had the shortest text of the three—a stanza of verse. When Favaronas began a halting translation, the sorcerer surprised him by quoting the lines in full. Hooded head tilted up toward the starry sky, Faeterus recited.

  The sun’s eye grows dark. No moon loves him.

  The stars sleep and answer not the night. Until

  The father holds the key in his hand,

  standing before the Door

  And reads the Holy Key.

  From the Stair of Distant Vision,

  under the sun’s black eye

  The Door is opened. The Light revealed

  Burns all, consumes all, kills all

  Unwraps the flower, cracks the egg

  Pulls the seed from the ground.

  If the Holy Key is broken.

  In Elvish, each line had the same number of syllables, which made it doggerel by the standards of Silvanesti poesy. Favaronas commented on its poor quality.

  Faeterus chuckled deep in his throat. “Not good poetry perhaps, but excellent prophecy, elf spawn.”

  With that, he rose and ordered Favaronas to do likewise. The archivist intended to roll the still-softened scrolls carefully for transport, but as soon as his fingers touched one, it disintegrated. Cracking and popping like sheets of softening ice, each scroll fell into shards that crumbled further and further until only a fine white dust remained. The archivist turned a stricken face to his captor, but Faeterus only shrugged.

  “I shouldn’t have spoken the words aloud. It matters little now. The play is nearly done.”

  The illumination spell ended, and Faeterus reached toward Favaronas.

  Shying from his touch, Favaronas hurried up the mountainside as quickly as he was able.

  The pebbly soil crumbled under their feet, hampering their progress. In firmer patches of ground, Favaronas caught sight of Faeterus’s unbroken footprints—broad but short, with only three thick toes. Wedge-shaped impressions at the front of each toe print were made by his clawlike nails. When he’d glimpsed the sorcerer’s foot during the trek across the valley, it had sported four toes. Now it had only three. The sorcerer seemed to be losing his elf appearance, perhaps reverting to his natural form, a notion that only fueled his captive’s terror. There was no saying what sort of creature Faeterus might truly be.

  They reached a level place and Faeterus halted. Favaronas immediately collapsed, determined to rest for however long he was allowed. Looking around, he realized this was no narrow ledge, but a large open space. Other features were difficult to discern. His eyes were so tired, he had trouble focusing in the dark. His silent speculations came to an end when Faeterus spoke.

  “The Stair of Distant Vision,” the sorcerer declared. “Here begins the end of your race.”

  * * * * *

  Breetan and Jeralund had picked up a promising trail. Two people—elves, from the size and shape of their footprints—were heading east into the high mountains. Wondering why two elves would be out, alone and on foot, so far from their camp, Breetan decided to track them. After a day’s stalk, she and the sergeant glimpsed their quarry along an open ridge. One was a middle-aged elf so exhausted he staggered like a drunkard. The other was completely covered by the heavy layers of a hooded, ragged robe.

  “The Scarecrow!”

  Jeralund agreed with Breetan’s whispered evaluation. Who else in this lifeless place would need to burden themselves with such a supremely uncomfortable disguise?

  Knight and sergeant stalked their prey with utmost care. The range was too great for her special crossbow, so Breetan forced herself to be patient. Her target would not get away. The Scarecrow must have a good reason for being up there, perhaps heading for a secret rendezvous with other elf rebels.

  After nightfall, a pale greenish light brightened their quarry’s campsite. Breetan, climbing some ten yards from the sergeant, wondered if it was meant to be a signal, but she could discern no answering gleam from the surrounding peaks, so she resumed the climb.

  Less than a minute later, she did notice light, a faint, diffuse glow on the rocks around her. She turned to look behind. A swarm of small, glowing globes was sweeping upslope at considerable speed. Since arriving in the valley, she and Jeralund had seen similar lights in the distance. Breetan thought them lamps carried by patrolling elves, but the lights closing on them belied that theory. Each was a floating fireball, colored green, red, blue, or yellow.

  They whizzed overhead, emitting a sizzling sound as they passed. Breetan loaded her crossbow with a hardwood quarrel and raised the sight to her eye. The lights were small but so bright that they were easy to see. She loosed. The black-painted quarrel flew true. A golden light dropped to the ground. She went to retrieve her prize.

  The light was much dimmer, and Breetan was certain she’d injured it, whatever it was. When she got close, she realized it wasn’t actually lying on the ground, but hovering a few inches above it. Even as she noticed that, the dim light suddenly brightened and leaped off the ground straight at her face. Flinging herself backward, she tumbled down the slope, losing her crossbow and finally fetching up against a gnarled juniper tree. The little globe of golden fire, shining brightly, sailed well overhead.

  Jeralund had made no headway against the lights either. He’d drawn his sword when they approached and slashed at them as they dodged and dashed around him. The only result was exhaustion. Sweating despite the coolness of the night air, he lowered his blade and stood panting. Surprisingly, the lights stopped as well. He decided they were reacting to his movements. When he fought, they swarmed. When he stood still, they quieted.

  Moving slowly and carefully, he sheathed his sword. A single orange light left the swarm above him and plummeted directly at his face. Jeralund’s reaction was immediate and unfortunate. He flung up a hand to ward off the light. When he touched the ball of fire, both it and he vanished in a flash of white. A heartbeat later, a dull boom echoed over the mountainside. The remaining lights winked out.

  Breetan disentangled herself from the juniper tree. She found her crossbow, undamaged by the fall, but wasn’t so fortunate herself. It felt as though she’d broken a rib. Wincing, she looked up in time to see Jeralund engulfed in light. She stumbled to the place where he’d been, but he had vanished.

  The echoes of the boom faded away. Unnatural silence reclaimed the night. Casting a final, fruitless look around, Breetan shouldered her crossbow and resumed the chase.

  * * * * *

  “Pull! Heave away! Smartly now, smartly!”

  Hands cupped around his mouth, Hamaramis shouted encouragement as a hundred elves strained on ropes and levers, trying to upend a giant block of stone. Hamaramis had chosen one of the smaller stones within the elves’ camp
, but smaller did not mean small. The block was twenty feet high, ten wide, and as much as six feet thick. Affixing hooks to its top had been easy. Shifting the massive block was not.

  The Speaker had returned from a long sojourn at the center of the mysterious platform and had ordered Hamaramis to bring down a monolith immediately. The general had wanted to topple a block all along, to strengthen the defensive wall When the Speaker explained why he wanted to move the stone, Hamaramis feared the disease attacking the Speaker’s body had begun to affect his mind as well.

  “While on the platform I spoke with Hytanthas Ambrodel!”

  With the care of one humoring a disordered mind, Hamaramis replied, “With his ghost, sire?”

  Gilthas made a dismissive gesture. “He lives, General, but is lost in the maze of tunnels under the valley. I mean to break into them and find him.”

  The Speaker insisted no one else be told of this. Hamaramis understood the need for secrecy. From what Hytanthas had reported, the other missing elves were most likely dead, but if the news of Hytanthas’s survival spread, bereaved family members would mob the scene and impede their efforts. The old general’s notion of shoring up their defenses would be a good cover.

  Hamaramis called for more hands on the ropes. Onlookers crowded in to take hold wherever there was space. The general sent a volunteer up the stone to make certain all ropes were pulling equally. Behind the block, elves wielded levers made of the valley’s twisted trees. They piled dirt under the levers to improve their lifting ability.

  “Once more then. Heave!”

  The ropes went taut. Elves strained and groaned and sweated. The block leaned forward a few inches, buckling the turf before it, but no amount of pulling could budge it further. Hamaramis finally called a halt. The elves dropped the ropes and nursed their aching limbs. The old general went to consult with his Speaker.

  The unnatural cold atop the circular platform had worsened Gilthas’s condition, and the palanquin’s original design had been modified. Rather than sitting upright, the Speaker reclined fully, with pillows to prop head and shoulders and a number of mantles and cloaks tucked around him for warmth.

  “It’s no good, sire,” Hamaramis declared. “Eight or ten feet of its length must be buried. We’ll never move it this way.”

  Gilthas shook his head in wonder. The original inhabitants, slight in size and few in number, must have employed magic to erect the thousands of ponderous stone blocks. Unfortunately, magic was in short supply among the new occupants of Inath-Wakenti.

  Sunset had come and gone. Hamaramis suggested they call a halt for the night. Gilthas agreed. He dismissed the volunteers and gave permission for the levers to be taken for firewood. Closing his eyes, he lay quiet for a long minute.

  “Amazing, isn’t it?” he finally murmured.

  “What, sire?” Hamaramis asked.

  “How empty the valley feels without Lady Kerianseray.”

  Quieter too, the old general thought, but merely agreed with his king.

  As the volunteers streamed away, a few youths removed the ropes still atop the stone. Gilthas, watching their nimble ascent of the stone, sighed with envy and tried to sit up. Hamaramis objected, telling the Speaker he was overtaxing himself. Gilthas held up a silencing hand. Only a very few were allowed to chide him, however well-meaning: his wife was one, Planchet had been another.

  Gilthas’s attention turned to the turf buckled in front of the stone. He leaned over the side of the palanquin, the better to see, and steadied himself by resting a hand on the block.

  The monolith shifted.

  The elves atop the block protested, thinking Hamaramis was trying to overthrow it.

  “It’s not us!” he yelled back, assuming they had somehow upset the stone’s equilibrium. “Clear off now!”

  With a noise like a great waterfall, the stone continued to lean forward even as the elves scrambled down. Alarmed, the bearers took up the palanquin’s poles and carried the Speaker out of harm’s way. As soon as his hand left the stone, the movement stopped. The monolith remained where it was, canted halfway to the ground.

  Hamaramis stared at his king. “I have an idea, Great Speaker,” he said and asked Gilthas to approach and touch the stone again.

  Understanding dawned on Gilthas’s face. “You think I did that?”

  “Please, sire.”

  It was ludicrous. Gilthas was no iron-arm, endowed with preternatural strength. Of late his lungs were so congested, he could walk barely ten paces without gasping for breath. Feeling foolish, Gilthas had the bearers carry him back to the leaning block, and he pressed a palm against the stone. It shifted immediately. Startled, he snatched his hand away and the movement stopped. He looked from his hand to the stone, unable to believe the evidence of his own eyes. Moving the great monolith had required no more effort than opening one of the well-balanced doors in the palace of Qualinost.

  “Get everyone clear,” he said hoarsely. Hamaramis and the bearers moved back. He put a hand on the stone and gave a modest shove.

  The monolith moved as if weightless.

  The twenty-foot-tall block fell heavily onto its face. The base, pulling free of the ground, flung dirt skyward. Shouts of joy erupted all around. Still seated in his palanquin, Gilthas was leaning on the fallen slab, his shoulders and head liberally sprinkled with dirt, his face wearing a very bemused expression.

  Where the monolith had stood, there was a deep hole. Hamaramis went to the edge and looked in. The pit was dark, deep, and cool. Fingers of mist coiled around the old general’s boots. He wondered aloud whether every standing stone concealed a tunnel opening. One of the Speaker’s bearers asked a different question: Why had the inhabitants of Inath-Wakenti used such weighty doors?

  Hamaramis’s first concern was the defense of the camp. If all the stones could be moved easily with the Speaker’s help, they could be used to create a stronger perimeter. On the other hand, it wasn’t prudent to open so many holes into the tunnels. There could be dangers below as unfriendly as the ghosts and will-o’-the-wisps above.

  “Don’t worry, General,” Gilthas said quite casually. “When we’ve finished exploring the tunnel, I’ll just put the stone back where it was.” The bearers and the general stared at him and he laughed.

  Hamaramis summoned warriors to guard the opening. Gilthas told the general he wanted the tunnel explored immediately.

  “At night, sire?”

  “It’s always night down there.”

  His logic was impeccable. Hamaramis quickly put elves to work erecting a frame so the explorers could be lowered into the hole. Workers skilled in woodworking and rope craft were summoned. Additional torches were lit.

  While the work was underway, the Speaker sent for a scribe to map the tunnels. The warrior sent to fetch a volunteer returned alone. The scribes were notably lacking in enthusiasm for the quest.

  Hamaramis berated the warrior for failing to carry out the Speaker’s command. “I’ll bring a scribe, sire—at the end of my sword, if necessary,” the old general growled.

  Gilthas stopped him. He would not force anyone to face danger. He wished he could enter the tunnel himself. He once had been quite skilled with an ink brush. Of course, such adventures were beyond him at the moment.

  He had decided to send only warriors down when a young elf emerged from the camp, running full out. Catching sight of them, the newcomer slowed abruptly. Despite ink-stained fingers and the short haircut of a scribe, the newcomer was very young and female. She bowed quickly to the Speaker, to Hamaramis, and even to Truthanar, just arriving with his helpers.

  “Great Speaker, I am Vixona Delambro, apprentice scribe. I come in answer to your summons,” she panted.

  “You’re a child!” Hamaramis exclaimed.

  “I’ve taken the scribes’ oath.” That meant she was at least eighty, though she looked much younger.

  Gilthas asked, “Why do you want to go?”

  “To serve you, sire.” He regarded her stea
dily, and she blurted, “And to show those old cranks I’m as good as they!”

  He understood. His senior scribes were from a generation that hadn’t allowed females into their profession. In Qualinesti the prohibition against females had been rescinded long ago, but few women were motivated to buck the formidable oldsters who guarded the scribal tradition so jealously. Scribes’ oaths of discretion, probity, and accuracy were not empty mouthings. The penalties for violating any part of the code were severe and the damage to one’s honor even more so. In all his life, Gilthas had known fewer than a dozen female scribes.

  Something about Vixona touched Gilthas. Perhaps it was her faint resemblance to Kerian—she was blonde, but had the same heart-shaped face as his wife. More likely it was Kerian’s stubbornness Vixona brought to his mind.

  “You’ve got fine mettle, young lady. Don’t fail me.”

  “I won’t, Great Speaker. I won’t!”

  Rather sourly, Hamaramis asked her if she could handle a weapon.

  “I fought in the desert against the humans.”

  So had every elf in the valley. “Do you have any proficiency with weapons?”

  She was forced to admit she did not, but the general’s obvious disapproval could not quench her enthusiasm.

  The exploration party would be led by Hamaramis, and he chose three warriors to accompany him. Each would take two torches, one burning and one in reserve. Lamps would have been better in a tunnel, but all the oil had been requisitioned as food. They would be armed with swords only, no bows. The general tried to press a borrowed blade on Vixona, but she demurred, being already burdened with parchment, inkpot, and brushes. He looked to the Speaker for guidance. Gilthas waved the borrowed blade away. Let her take what she wanted, he said.