Exile's Return (15 page)

“Where is she?” Flynn asked, getting to his feet.

“Gone,” said Kaspar

As he watched the color again drained from Flynn’s face. Whatever good the woman had done had departed with her.

“Come on,” said Kaspar. “We’ve got a trip to take. At least now I know where we’re going.” He studied his companion’s face and knew Flynn was again in the grip of despair. Trying to force him to a better frame of mind, he said, “It’s not far.” He was lying, but he was concerned over Hildy’s warning. “And we can put this bloody thing down and get some hot food!”

Flynn said nothing as he picked up the rope harness again and put it around his shoulders, then took up his backpack. Kaspar did likewise and when the armor was once more slung between the two men they set off.

It seemed only a short walk to the entrance to the cavern, but it took a few minutes to reach it. If the hall was bathed in a soft amber glow, the cavern ahead defined gloom. There was a faint hint of light in the distance, so Kaspar felt no need to find material for torches. He doubted there would be any to find close by. He paused for an instant at the threshold, then entered.

It seemed the faint light ahead kept retreating as they walked through the gloom of the cavern. At one point Flynn said, “Where are we?”

Kaspar replied, “I never asked.” He judged it would be unwise to tell Flynn they were approaching the banks of the River of Death.

The light started growing brighter, and at last they arrived at an opening into a much larger cavern. The rocks rose up beyond the eye’s ability to follow them, and the surface looked odd and slippery. Kaspar walked over and touched it. It felt like soapstone. A broad river barred their way ahead, and in the distance something could be seen coming toward them. Kaspar sensed that whatever it had come from the opposite bank of the river. As it grew nearer, it resolved itself into the shape of a man in heavy robes sculling a wherry.

“Kaspar,” said Flynn. “Do we cross?” He put down his burden and quickly dropped the rope harness. “I think we’re supposed to cross.”

The hairs on the back of Kaspar’s neck rose as he realized where they were. “Flynn, come back!” he shouted as his companion walked toward the ferry. “We’re in the Halls of the Dead! If you cross the river you enter Lims-Kragma’s domain! We need to look for the path on this side.”

He hurried after Flynn and grabbed him by the arm.

Flynn turned and Kaspar saw an expression of utter relief on his face. “No, it’s over for me. I know that now. I’m crossing.”

Kaspar released Flynn’s arm as the ferry touched the shore. The ferryman held out his hand, as if beckoning.

“He’s waiting,” Flynn said. “I must go.” He removed the pouch at his belt and handed it to Kaspar. “The ring, and some other rare items.” Kaspar took the pouch and stood holding it as Flynn moved to the bank and climbed aboard the wherry. By the time Kaspar could react, the ferry was already away. Flynn looked over his shoulder. “If you make it, find my family in Krondor, won’t you? See they are all right?”

Kaspar could say nothing. He watched his companion vanish into the mist on the river.

Then he was alone.

For the first time since beginning this strange odyssey Kaspar felt helpless. He looked down at the alien armor and almost gave in to despair. He stood motionless for a full five minutes, his mind reeling with the improbability of everything that had happened to him since he had lost his throne, then he started to laugh.

He couldn’t stop himself. If there had ever been a more colossal joke played upon a mortal by fate, he couldn’t imagine what it was. He laughed until his sides ached, and realized he was verging on the same hysteria that had gripped Flynn.

Throwing back his head he roared a primal challenge, giving voice to his defiance. “Is this where it ends?” he screamed. With a single shout, he answered himself: “No!” At last he regained control and softly added, “It is not!”

He gathered his wits and looked down at the armor. After lugging it halfway across this continent, he felt resigned to having to haul it the other half by himself.

He gathered up the rope and fashioned a harness, which he worked around the armor, under the thing’s armpits, and then he stood it on its feet. He got behind it and slipped his arms though the ropes and then leaned forward, hoisting the armor on his back.

As fit as he had ever been in his life, Kaspar knew that he would be in agony when he reached wherever he was bound. But, as his father used to say to him, sooner begun, sooner finished.

Pushing the image of Flynn vanishing into the gloom from his mind, Kaspar turned left, away from the river, and walked until he found a path.

He couldn’t tell how long he walked. His back ached and so did his feet, but he kept on. At some point he felt as if he were climbing, and then a short while later, he saw light ahead.

He trudged upward, and found himself in another cave. This cave felt less eerie than the large cavern. He thought he must have crossed some sort of boundary and now was back in what he had come to think of as the ordinary world.

At the far end of the cave, he saw light and he hurried toward it. He had no sense of time passing. He might have been in the cavern by the River of Death for days for all he knew. He wondered if people in there ever grew tired or hungry.

He came out of a cave in the side of the mountain, emptying into a narrow trail that led up to the left and down to the right. He looked down, hoping that the bastion might be below, for a downhill walk seemed very appealing at the moment. From the angle of the sun he judged it to be nearly midday, so he must have been inside the mountain for at least one full day.

He started upward.

Kaspar had no measure of distance on this mountain, which irritated him. As a hunter he had prided himself on a keen sense of always knowing where he was. But he knew that time had passed. He had slept on the trail, lashed to the armor, after night fell, and it was again approaching midday when he saw the bastion in the distance. It seemed to sprout out of the face of the mountain itself, facing east toward the sun. By Kaspar’s calculations, they had approached the City of the Dead Gods from the east, so he must have wended his way completely around the mountain to get here.

He trudged up the trail and found that it ended before a large oak door which was wide enough to admit a small cart. He saw no handle, lever, or knocker, so he balled his fist and pounded on the gate.

Nothing happened for several minutes, then the door swung open. A man of advancing years, gray-haired and-bearded, in a simple brown homespun robe, opened the door. “Yes?”

“I seek the Keepers.”

“They see no one,” the man said, about to close the door.

“Kaspar, Duke of Olasko, is hardly ‘no one,’” Kaspar replied, leaning on the gate. “Here, show this to whoever you need to show it to.” He handed over the copper disc.

The man looked at it and nodded. “Wait here.”

A few minutes later he returned with another even older man who asked, “Who gave this to you?”

“The woman whose likeness is engraved on it. She called herself Hildy, though I suspect that’s not her real name.”

“Indeed,” said the older man. “You may enter.”

Kaspar stepped inside and saw that he was in a small courtyard, most of which was occupied by a vegetable garden. When the gate was closed behind him, Kaspar unburdened himself of the armor.

The two men looked at it, and the older one said, “What is that?”

“I was hoping you could tell me,” said Kaspar. “The Father Elect of the Temple of Kalkin bid me bring this to you.”

“What are we to do with it?” asked the younger of the men.

“I have no idea,” said Kaspar, “but nearly fifty men have died to bring it here.”

“Oh, my,” said the younger man. “That was hardly necessary. I mean, it’s very nice, I’m sure, but as you can see, we have little need for armor here.”

Kaspar said, “I think you miss the point. I’m here to see the Keepers. Where may I find them?”

The two men looked at one another. “Why,” said the elder, “we are the Keepers. You have found us. I am Jelemi, and this is Samas.” He pointed to the armor. “Leave that there. No one will steal it.”

Samas chuckled at the joke. “We’re the only ones here.”

“Come inside,” said Jelemi. “That disc you brought has earned you a meal, a warm bed, and some conversation before you leave tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow?”

“Yes,” said Samas, motioning Kaspar toward the entrance of the bastion. “We are not permitted to entertain. It’s part of our job. We must be vigilant and alert. Guests would distract us.”

“Distract you from what?”

“Why, protecting the gods, of course.”

Kaspar faltered for a step, then got his feet back under him. He decided it would be best to sit down and get something to eat before he attempted to unravel this strange mystery.

Kaspar ate slowly.

It wasn’t until food was put before him that he realized he was famished. He also knew that if he ate quickly, he might earn himself stomach cramps. The meal was simple—boiled vegetables, bread baked a few days before, but still edible, a slice of very pungent but flavorful cheese, and a cup of water. Yet it was very satisfying.

Jelemi and Samas ate in silence, with the occasional grunt or gesture that one associates with people who have been living together for a very long time and feel little need for spoken communication. Kaspar used the time to gather his thoughts and reflect on what he had been told in the Hall of the Dead.

At the end of the meal, Samas cleared away the platters and cups, and Jelemi looked at Kaspar. The old man had piercing blue eyes and despite his feeble appearance and somewhat distracted speech, Kaspar was sure that his mind was neither feeble nor distracted, but a pose to put people off guard.

“I promised you some conversation before you depart tomorrow. So, what would you like to talk about?”

Kaspar said, “I think it would serve us both if I told you a story.” Kaspar began with his exile, not embellishing his part or diminishing his faults, just telling the two men how he had come to fall to such low estate. He then recounted his encounter with Flynn, Kenner, and McGoin, and their travels.

While he spoke the candle burned down. When he had finished, Jelemi asked some questions, drawing out details Kaspar had missed or glossed over.

Kaspar knew it was past midnight by the end, yet he felt no need to sleep, so anxious he was to make some sense out of the insanity in which he was trapped. After a long silence, he asked, “Can you tell me what that armor is?”

“No,” said Jelemi. “I can only tell you it is ancient, and evil, and cursed.”

“Can you do something about the curse?”

“No. That would take the power of the gods.”

“Well, then,” said Kaspar, “can you intercede with the gods on my behalf?”

Samas said, “You need to go to a temple to ask for intercession.”

Kaspar let his frustration show. “It was a temple that sent me here!”

Jelemi stood up. “The hour is late and you’re tired. We can talk more over the morning meal.”

“I will show you to your room.” Samas said.

Kaspar followed the short monk through the main hall, which seemed devoid of furnishings, to a flight of stone steps at the rear. “Once,” said Samas, “there were more than a thousand Keepers in the bastion. Now there are only three of us.”

“Three? I’ve only seen two.”

“Keeper Andani is down is down at Ispar-by-the-Sea, shopping for some things we need.”

“That’s…what? Three, four hundred miles from here?”

Samas nodded. “We go every five or so years, whether we need anything vital or not; we grow most of what we need here. We take turns. If we don’t get away from the Bastion every once in a while, it can get tedious. I will go next.”

“How long have you served here?”

Samas stopped to a door and said, “You may sleep here.” He paused as if calculating. “I’ve been in the Bastion for four hundred and thirty-two years next Midsummer’s Day.”

Stunned, Kaspar said, “You don’t look your age.”

Samas laughed. “There are benefits to serving the gods.” Then his tone grew somber. “But I think we need to recruit some new members. We asked the gods about this and are waiting for an answer.”

“How long have you been waiting?”

“Not very long,” said Samas. “Only twenty-seven years.”

Kaspar said good night and entered the room, or rather, a monk’s cell. There was a sleeping mat, an oil-lamp, flint and steel to light it, a coarse blanket, and a bowl and pitcher full of fresh water. A metal cup sat in the bowl.

Kaspar didn’t know if he could sleep, so anxious he was to get his questions answered before he was asked to depart in the morning, but as soon as his head was on the mat, he fell asleep.

At dawn, Kaspar awoke. He found a tub at the end of the hall with enough water in which to bathe. He wished he had the means to wash his clothing, but decided that he’d rather be quickly dirty again than trudging down the mountain with the armor strapped to his back in wet garments.

In the kitchen, he found the two Keepers waiting for him. Jelemi beckoned him to sit down. He found a generous portion of hot oatmeal in a bowl, freshly baked bread, honey, cheese, and tea. He fell to with a nod of approval.

As Kaspar ate, Jelemi said, “We have considered your story and are at a loss as to why the good Father Elect of the Temple of Kalkin sent you to us. We have little knowledge that is not available to him.”

“I have considered that there may be no reason more profound than that he wished his problem to become someone else’s problem,” observed Kaspar.

Jelemi and Samas exchanged startled looks, then started to laugh. “You know,” said Samas, “we never considered that. It’s a little too obvious, I think.”

Kaspar nodded. “Often people overlook the obvious, I have found.”

“Well, we hate to send you away with no help whatsoever,” said Jelemi. “Why don’t you stay an additional day and we’ll think if there’s anything we may have missed.”

“That’s welcome news. I thank you,” said Kaspar. “I was just wishing earlier for the opportunity to wash my garments.”

“We can accommodate you in that,” said Samas. “When you’ve finished eating, find me in the garden and I’ll show you were you can do your laundry.”

The two Keepers rose from the table, leaving Kaspar alone. He helped himself to a second helping of oatmeal and cheese, and sat quietly, contented to have a day to rest after so many days of struggle.

Kaspar appeared at the table in the kitchen in time for supper. He felt rejuvenated. He had washed his clothing, though he felt awkward standing around naked waiting for the clothing to dry next to the fire. And then he had eaten a midday meal and taken a long nap. He knew tonight would be his last opportunity to get any information from the two Keepers, so he had spent the afternoon framing questions for them.

Striking up a conversational tone, Kaspar asked, “Would you tell me how your order came to be?”

Jelemi motioned to Samas and said, “He’s a bit more of an historian than I am.”

Samas said, “Little is known of the time before the Chaos Wars. It is said that man came from another world, through great rends in the sky. What is known is that an ancient race lived here before us.”

“The Dragon Lords?” asked Kaspar.

“That is what men call them. They are known as the Ancient Ones by other races.”

“We thought that perhaps the armor had something to do with them.”

“It does, but not in the way you think,” answered Samas.

Jelemi threw Samas a look that suggested to Kaspar that he had stumbled onto something they didn’t want him to know about. “If it’s not of the Dragon Lords, is it…booty or a trophy of some kind?”

Jelemi sat back with a sigh. “More of a reminder, I’ll wager.”

“You’ve discovered something about it since we last spoke?”

Samas nodded. “We have searched the archives and I must confess that I found the entire thing intriguing. It was not of this world, and the claim by the monk that it was somehow ‘wrong’ awoke a vague recollection. I read on and I think I know what he was talking about.”

Jelemi again shot him a warning look, and Samas said, “Why don’t we just tell him? He’s probably going to be dead before he can say anything to anyone who may cause us trouble.”

Jelemi stood up and in a scolding tone said, “Very well, but if someone has to explain to the gods why this man learned their secrets, it won’t be me!” He nodded to Kaspar. “You two have a nice chat. I’m going to tend the chickens.”

“What is it that Jelemi doesn’t want you to say?” Kaspar asked.

“You said you were a noble, so how grounded are you in theology?”

Kaspar shrugged. “As much as the next layman, I suppose. I do my duty at the temples.”

“But you don’t believe?”

“I’ve seen and heard and read too much not to believe in the gods, Samas. But it is difficult at times to believe they are overly concerned with my choices in life.”

“In the main, you are correct. The only issue of your life that matters is how you live it, and that is between you and Lims-Kragma. She will judge you and decide where upon the Wheel you return.” He chuckled. “She’s the only god that all men meet, eventually.” He stood up. “Help me clear away these dishes.”

Kaspar took the plates while Samas took the cutlery and cups. They moved to a wooden sink in which rested a bucket of soapy water. Samas said, “Scrape off the scraps into that bucket at your feet, please. We feed them to the chickens and pigs.”

“You have pigs?”

“Oh, we have quite a nice little farm on the other side of the garden,” said Samas as he started cleaning cups, first washing them in the soapy water, the dunking them in a bucket of clear water. “It’s a little bit of a walk down the hillside, on a nice plateau. We could feed many more Keepers if we needed to. In any event, what you should know is that what is taught in the temples to the laity is but a small part of the truth about the gods. What the temples know, in turn, is also only a part of that truth, though a larger part than what they teach. And what we, the Keepers know, is more than the temples, though they would chafe to hear such.

“But what we know is only a small part again. Some theologians argue that even the gods’ knowledge is limited, and there is only one being who knows all, a Great Mind, or godhead, a being so vast and all-knowing that our attempts even to understand its nature are pathetic attempts at abstraction.

“It is said that men created the gods, too. That the gods fulfil our expectations of them, which is why we need so many. It’s difficult to conceive of a single being who can take responsibility for everything in this universe and the other universes we know of. So, man created gods for every conceivable function. I do not know if this is true, but I do know that each god does have a role.

“Above the lesser gods existed seven greater gods.”

“I thought there were only five greater gods,” said Kaspar.

“There are, now. But before the Chaos Wars there were seven. One died during the Chaos Wars—Arch-Indar, the Goddess of Good. This caused a tremendous imbalance, for there was no agent to counteract the God of Evil. His name is never mentioned, for even to think it is to draw his attention to you and make you his minion.”

“I can see that would pose a problem,” said Kaspar, in a tone that suggested he didn’t entirely believe what he was hearing. The Chaos Wars, to most scholars, was a creation legend, a mere story to explain how the world came to be the way it was.

Samas smiled. “I can see you don’t believe me, but that doesn’t matter. I’m not about to tell you his name.” He winked. “Because I don’t know it. Most theologians call him ‘the Nameless One.’”

Kaspar grinned. “There was a time in my life when I would have openly scoffed at all this, but what I have gone through these last few years…” He shook his head. “I will try to be open-minded.”

“To understand what a catastrophe this was, you have to understand something about the way the universe works. Nothing is destroyed. Can you understand that?”

Kaspar said, “But I’ve
seen
things destroyed.”

“You’ve seen things transformed.” Samas pointed to the wood bin. “If I take a piece of wood and put it in the hearth, what happens?”

“It burns.”

“Would you say it was destroyed?”

“Yes,” said Kaspar.

“But it’s not, you see. It becomes heat, and light, and smoke, and ash. When a man dies, the body becomes corrupt, and like everything else in nature, it is part of a cycle. We bury bodies or we burn them, but it doesn’t matter if the body feeds worms or turns to ash, it is transformed, not destroyed.

“But the mind and spirit, they live on. The spirit we know goes to be weighed, and if worthy returns to a better place on the Wheel of Life. If less worthy, a lesser place. But what of the mind?”

Kaspar admitted to himself that he was now intrigued. “What of the mind?”

“That goes to the gods, you see. What you’ve experienced, what you’ve learned, is the entirety of universal understanding—every living being returns consciousness to the gods. And they in turn evolve.”

“I think I understand.”

“Good. Some time between the creation of the universe and the Chaos Wars something went terribly wrong. The Nameless One is the most likely culprit, but we do not know for certain. Even the living gods do not know. But at a critical time, when the universe was changing, a war erupted in heaven.

“The lesser gods rose against the greater gods, and with them rose the Dragon Lords to challenge both lesser and greater gods. The Dragon Lords were cast out of this universe, and left to wander in an alien dimension until the Riftwar.”

“Really?”

“That was what that was all about. You didn’t think it was something as petty as the Tsurani wanting to conquer a metal-rich world, did you?”

“I thought it had to do with Tsurani politics back on Kelewan.”

Samas smiled as he dried off his hands. He motioned for Kaspar to return to the kitchen table. “You are an educated man, I see. No, whatever the invaders thought, it was the Nameless One behind the attack. You see, evil profits from extreme chaos or extreme order. Good profits from a balance between the two. With total order, there is no growth. With total chaos, everyone and everything is constantly at risk. In the end, you will discover that by its nature, evil is insanity.”

“I’m not sure what you mean.”

Samas looked at Kaspar as a tutor would a truculent child. “Surely, I don’t need to explain this to you?”

Kaspar said, “I am truly not sure.”

“Have you ever wronged a man…just to do him harm? Or have you always had a reason?”

Kaspar answered quickly. “There was always a reason.”

“There you have it,” said Samas as he sat down. He motioned for Kaspar to fetch over a cup of water for him. “You would never look at yourself as ‘evil’ no matter what the other fellow thought of what you did. It’s in our nature. And that’s the great secret of evil. It is never viewed as evil by those who perpetrate the evil.”