The Sword Of Bheleu tlod-3

by Lawrence Watt-Evans

  Out on the open plain, the north wind drove through him; his right flank became so cold that his left seemed warm by contrast. The sword's hilt in his right hand burned like a live coal, but it was a good, soothing heat and did not cause him any pain.

  He strode on across the wasteland. Skelleth was not considered part of the Northern Waste, but it was still harsh, barren country, little better than his homeland. The few farms that he passed or crossed were empty and silent; the hay had been cut and gathered a month before, and the farmers had taken their crops and their goats and gone to the village to take shelter for the winter when first the north wind blew down from the hills. Only the ice-cutters ventured out on the plains once the snows came, and then only in large groups.

  At the end of an hour he had traveled something over four miles, a distance he thought should be sufficient. He stopped and looked around.

  The plain lay, bleak and empty, in all directions. To the north, it ended in low hills; to the east, Skelleth was still visible as a line on the horizon; to the south and west, there was nothing else for as far as he could see. He had left the old Yprian Road a hundred yards from the gate, and it was now lost in the distance.

  He took the sword in two hands and stood for a moment feeling the warmth that now bathed them both; the left seemed to be thawing, though it had not actually frozen. He concentrated on the heat and let it flow up his arms.

  He was not sure at first how to go about what he wanted to do. He recalled that, when he was possessed, he often lifted the sword above his head just prior to performing his magical feats; feeling slightly foolish, he raised the blade up.

  Without any conscious volition, his hesitant gesture changed; he thrust the sword powerfully upward, pointing at the sky, until the red gem was directly before his red eyes, its glow as bright and warm as fresh blood. Overhead, the steely gray sky was darkened by wisps of black cloud.

  The glowing jewel held his gaze. He stared at it in fascination for a long moment, and the clouds gathered above him. Thunder rumbled in the northern hills.

  The sound broke his trance, and he looked upward.

  The sky had not been clear when he left the town, but it had shown no threat. Now it was filled with blossoming thunderclouds. There would be a storm long before he could reach the shelter of the village walls.

  He still held the sword before him, its point toward the sky; now, involuntarily, he thrust it up above his head, crying out, "Melith!"

  The name was unfamiliar to him; it was answered by a flash of lightning and a low rumble of thunder.

  He remembered suddenly that, when he had entered the temple of Bheleu in Dыsarra and first taken the sword, the sky had been full of thunder, and lightning had blasted the broken roof of the temple. Lightning had struck the altar and scattered the bonfire that surrounded it.

  Lightning had struck the sword while he held it.

  He realized suddenly that he was standing on a deadfiat plain in a thunderstorm, holding up six feet of bare steel. Lightning had an affinity for metal, as everyone knew, and was drawn as well to the highest objects in reach. Standing thus would ordinarily have verged on suicide.

  This was no ordinary sword, however, and he began to wonder if it was an ordinary storm. Was it natural or had the sword summoned it? Had the storm that shattered the temple of Bheleu been natural?

  He did not think he cared to try so dangerous a test of the sword's nature as to invite being struck by lightning. Merely because he had survived it once did not mean he could do so again. He yanked the sword down.

  It resisted, but obeyed.

  Immediately the seething clouds overhead stilled; where it had seemed that the storm would break in seconds and pour a torrent upon him, now the clouds were calm, and it seemed as if there were no storm at all. No lightning flashed. No thunder roared. Even the north wind died away to a breeze.

  He recalled Saram's proposed test; would the sword burn the earth? He thrust it out before him, pointing at the ground a dozen feet away.

  The gem flared up brightly, and a rumble sounded. At first he thought that it was fresh thunder, but then the ground heaved up beneath him, rolling under his feet. Staggering to keep his balance, his left hand fell from the hilt, while his right, holding the sword, swung out to his side.

  The tremor stopped, and the earth was again as still and solid as ever.

  He no longer felt the cold; the warmth of the sword's touch had spread through his body. As he looked at the blade and realized what had just happened, sweat broke out on his forehead.

  He could not believe that the sword had caused an earthquake. He took it in both hands, in a reversed grip, and placed the tip on the soil at his feet.

  Nothing happened.

  He held it in that position, waiting and thinking. He realized that he did not want anything to happen. Perhaps that was affecting his experiment. He forced himself to stop denying the sword's power, and instead recited to himself, "Move, earth, I command it!"

  The ground shook, roaring; he saw dust swirl up on all sides.

  "Stop!" he cried.

  It stopped.

  Earthquakes frightened him. The uneasy movement of that most immovable of things upset his view of the way the world should be. Such displays undoubtedly consumed vast amounts of the sword's energy, but he could not bear to continue.

  Storms, however, were something he was accustomed to.

  He looked at the gem. It was glowing brightly, vividly red.

  It could not be limitless, he told himself. It must exhaust itself eventually.

  With that thought in his mind, he raised the sword above his head and summoned the storm to him.

  The light of the jewel bathed him in crimson, and the blade glowed brilliantly white as the storm broke about him with preternatural fury. A bolt of lightning burned through the air over his head and shattered against the sword, bathing him in a shower of immense blue-white sparks, but he felt nothing but a slight warmth and a mounting joy in the power he wielded.

  Another bolt followed the first, though Garth knew that was not natural; and then a third came. He was washed in white fire, and the ground at his feet was burned black.

  Lightning continued to pour down upon him while cold rain beat against the plain around him. He stayed dry in the heart of the storm, for the lightning and the heat of the sword boiled away the rain before it could touch him, encircling him in steam and mist.

  He discovered that he could steer the lightning away from him and direct it where he chose by pointing with the sword, as he had spread flame in Skelleth. He drew the sword's heat into him and thrust it upward, and the rain turned warm around him; then he sucked it back down and away, and the rain became first sleet, and then hail-though the frozen drops were smaller than natural hailstones.

  He called aloud another strange name, "Kewerro!" The wind howled down out of the north, and the storm became a snowstorm, then a raging blizzard.

  He was drunk and staggering with the power of the sword, and still the gem glowed as brightly as ever, the blade as gleaming white as the moon.

  He sent the snow away again, turning the north wind back, and allowed the south wind to bring rain in its place. The sky was black, the sun buried in thunderheads; only lightning and the light of the sword lessened the gloom.

  He drew the storm around him, whipped it into a howling maelstrom, and forced its winds to whirl faster, until his cloak was flapping with a sound like the breaking of stone; still the gem remained undimmed. Maintaining the roaring hurricane, he moved the earth as well, rippling it around him like a lake in a breeze. He pulled the rain from the sky in sheets, in streams, and pounded lightning on the shifting ground, surrounding himself in a halo of crawling electric fire.

  Finally, he could stand no more; he fell to his knees. The earth stilled. One hand fell from the sword's hilt; the lightning stopped, and the wind dropped. In the sudden silence after the final thunderclap, he closed his eyes and heard the beating of the rain soften
to a gentle patter.

  He opened his eyes and looked hopelessly at the sword. His fingers adhered to the hilt as firmly as ever.

  The gem glowed fiery red, and he thought he heard mocking laughter, his own voice laughing at his despair.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  The twenty-first councilor and Derelind's report from Mormoreth arrived almost simultaneously.

  It was the Seer of Weideth, uncomfortable on a borrowed horse, who completed the Council's quorum; he arrived late in the evening while a light, chilling drizzle blew down out of the north, and his calls to the castle's gatekeeper went unheeded for fully fifteen minutes, unheard over the hiss of the rain and the mutter of the wind. There was only a single guard posted at the gate after dark and he was huddled well away from the window, drawing what warmth he could from his shuttered lantern and a skin of cheap red wine; finally, though, he heard something worth checking on and peered down to discover the Seer, shivering at the gate, wrapped in an immense gray cloak.

  The gatekeeper was an honest man and not inconsiderate; he hurried to his winch and called down an apology as he cranked open the portcullis. That done, he rushed down the tower steps, stumbling in the dark and very nearly sending himself falling headfirst, and opened the Lesser Portal. In daylight there would have been two other guards to share the task.

  "My lord, I am very sorry, truly I am! I had not thought any would be out in such dreary weather!"

  The Seer nodded, but did not manage to say anything. His home village was kept perpetually warm and dry by the heat of the neighboring volcanoes, and he was not accustomed to the damp chill of autumn rains.

  "I should have known better, though, with all of you folk arriving for these past several days; I don't suppose you're the last, either. I guess the rain caught you already on the road, and you didn't wish to waste money on an inn with the castle so close; I'd do the same myself. It's damnably strange weather for this early in the year, too, my lord-far colder than any year in my memory."

  The Seer looked at the gatekeeper and realized that he was a very lonely man, spending his nights sitting alone at the gate. He was unmarried, with no children, and his most recent woman had left him a few days earlier.

  That was not his business, the Seer told himself. His gift sometimes told him more than he wanted to know-and then other times it wouldn't tell him anything. He wished it were more reliable. He didn't particularly care if he were ever a great prophet, but it would be pleasant, he mused, at least to be a competent one, rather than having erratic flashes of insight and foreknowledge.

  It was the guard's loneliness, combined with his genuine contrition, that had brought on his little speech. He would go on talking until he got an answer.

  "Oh, I'm all right," the Seer managed. "You mustn't trouble yourself."

  "That's kind of you, my lord. Is there anything I can do for you?"

  "Where can I put my horse?"

  The gatekeeper replied with directions to the stable, instructions on whom to rouse and how, and warnings against trusting the worthless grooms.

  "Thank you," the Seer replied. He rode on as directed, before the man could begin another speech.

  At the stable, he obtained directions to a hall where he might find someone who would know where he was supposed to be; following them, he got lost briefly in the maze of stone corridors. Eventually, though, by asking whomever he chanced to meet, he found his way to the upper gallery where the Council was gathering.

  Chalkara noticed him as he reached the top of the stairs and recognized him immediately from his sending. "Greetings, O Seer," she said. "I hadn't known you were here. When did you arrive?"

  The Seer held out a flap of his cloak so that she could see that it was still wet and answered, "Just now. What's going on?"

  A stranger in a gaudy robe of purple velvet pushed past him and entered the gallery as Chalkara answered, "It's rather complicated to explain, and the meeting is about to start. Why don't you just come in, sit down, and warm up? If you have any questions, ask them as they come up."

  Confused, the Seer let Chalkara shove him through the door. There were chairs inside, arranged around a row of three long tables; he was tired, and sank into one gratefully.

  The room was lighted by several dozen candles in hanging chandeliers and standing candelabra, and a dozen or so men and women were already seated around the tables. Others were arriving as he took this in. Shandiph was seated at the head of the table he had chosen; none of the others were immediately recognizable. There was a tiny old woman seated at Shandiph's right.

  A stout man not quite into middle age seated himself at the Seer's right and remarked without preamble, "You're wet."

  "It's raining," he answered.

  "Have you just arrived, then?"

  "Yes."

  "Who are you?"

  "I am the Seer of Weideth."

  "Ah, then it's you who started all this!"

  "I suppose it is. Who are you, then?"

  "You don't know me? I am Deriam of Ur-Dormulk, and probably the only wizard here who knows what he's doing." He gestured to take in the entire assembly.

  The Seer decided that he didn't care for Deriam of Ur-Dormulk. He was trying to think of a polite way to break off the conversation when Shandiph rose and broke it off for him by calling the meeting to order.

  "I see that we now have the necessary numbers," he said when the entire group was seated and silent, "counting Derelind. With this quorum, then, we are constituted an official gathering of the Council of the Most High, empowered to take action on behalf of the entire membership. I think that you will all agree shortly that some action must be taken, and quickly."

  He paused dramatically, and someone in his audience snorted derisively. Shandiph ignored it.

  "We have just received word, through the offices of the sorceress Zhinza, from Derelind the Hermit, who was earlier sent to the city of Mormoreth, in Orfin to ascertain the status of our comrade Shang and the basilisk which had been placed in his keeping. I now yield to Zhinza, so that she may give Derelind's message herself." He gestured toward the ancient woman and then sank into his chair.

  Zhinza rose and proclaimed, "Shang is dead. I was right."

  Deriam muttered something into his beard.

  "Tell them what Derelind said," Shandiph reminded her.

  "Derelind said," she went on, "that he arrived safely and found that Mormoreth is now inhabited by the bandit tribe that formerly roamed the Plain of Derbarok. Being a wizard, he was easily able to convince the bandits to talk to him and tell him how this came about. They claim the city was given to them as a gift by the person who killed Shang, as a blood-price for several tribesmen he killed as well."

  "All right, woman, who was it killed him?" Karag demanded.

  "Shang was killed by an overman named Garth."

  There was a moment of stunned silence as this news sank in.

  "What about the basilisk?" someone called.

  There was a hush as Zhinza looked about for the speaker and failed to locate her. Finally, addressing the group at large, she said, "Garth took it with him."

  The ensuing silence was brief and followed by a babble of many voices. Shandiph let it go on for several minutes before demanding order be restored.

  "You mean," Karag of Sland said, when he was reasonably sure he could be heard, "that our greatest weapon has fallen into the hands of the enemy even before we have begun to fight him?"

  "That would appear to be the case," Shandiph said. "Before we begin debate, however, I would like to have all the available information laid out. We are fortunate in that Kala of Mara thought to bring with her a good scrying glass. At my request, she has been studying this overman. At this time, I would like to ask her what she has learned."

  Kala was a young woman in a simple brown robe; she stood and said, "I haven't learned much, I'm afraid. It's very hard to use the glass on Garth of Ordunin; the sword resists the presence of all other magic, and he is never apart fr
om the sword."

  "Have you seen the basilisk?" asked Thetheru.

  "No, I haven't. I haven't seen any trace of it anywhere in Skelleth. I don't know what happened to it, but I don't think it's there."

  "That's good," Deriam said.

  "What I have seen, though, is enough to frighten me badly. I cannot look at Garth directly; the sword will not allow it. When I attempt to force it, it retaliates by filling my crystal with its own hideous light, so that I can see nothing. I haven't the strength of will to fight it. However, I have watched the village of Skelleth and places around the overman. There have of late been several great storms in that area, as well as earthquakes; they have had snow and hail, as well as the rain and sleet that might be expected in this season, and winds sufficient to tear apart thatched roofs. I have glimpsed lightning storms that lighted the night sky as if it were day. I think that Garth is somehow using the sword to create or summon these storms."

  "You say that you haven't been able to watch the overman himself?" Karag asked.

  "No, I haven't. I have also been unable to see inside the local tavern he frequents, whether he is there or not; I have no idea what this might mean."

  "These storms," Karag asked. "Are you sure he's causing them? I've never heard of any such magic."

  "I am not certain, but they are like no natural storms I have ever seen."

  There was a moment of silence; then Thetheru of Amag said quietly, "Do we have any chance of stopping such power?"

  "He has already taken our greatest weapon," Herina the Stargazer observed.

  "Well, no," Shandiph said, "he hasn't, really."

  There was another moment of silence; then Miloshir the Theurgist asked, "Are you referring to the Ring of P'hul?"

  "Among other things, yes."

  The Seer was confused. He had never heard of the Ring of P'hul. He looked about for Chalkara, but she was seated well down the table on the opposite side.