The Wizard (23 page)

will grant it myself, Squire, if I can." "You can't, Your Lordship. Or anyhow I don't think so." Thiazi leaned forward, both huge hands on the polished black wood of the huge table. "This is becoming interesting. Tell me why you deserve this boon, and I may grant it." Toug filled his lungs. "When you gave me my sister, My Lordand I'll never forget itit was for going outside alone at night and finding Logi's forge, and killing him. Now I'm going out again, only in daylight. We'll probably be killed. Everybody here knows that." Svon nodded and said, "I must speak to you privately." "So I'd like the reward first, and because it may make it easier for me to do what you want us to do. I mean, get Logi's slaves, and bring them here." "Go on," Thiazi told him. "What I want is for you to promise that if we do, you'll set them free. All of them who come here and help the king. If you promise, we can tell them that you did and they'll do everything they can to help, and that may do it." "Bravo," Beel muttered; and then, more loudly, "Bravo!" "It's not a bad thought, Squire." Thiazi relaxed, with an amused smile at Beel. "I'd be disposed to grant it, if I could. Unfortunately, our law forbids the freeing of slaves for any reason." "You tried," Svon whispered to Toug. "However, I can offer another. One you may like as well or better. The slaves you bring here will be divided between Sir Svon and yourself. Sir Svon will have first choice, you second, Sir Svon third, and so on. Thus you shall each receive the same if the total is even, and Sir Svon one more if the total is odd." "That won't make them help us," Toug muttered. "They don't want to belong to us." "Oh, but it will. In time you and Sir Svon will return to Celidon, and they'll be free." Thiazi paused, and the cruel smile returned, "Unless, of course, you choose to sell them before you go. But you need not tell them that." I sat up; and seeing Uns crouched by the fire to spread my shirt to the warmth of the flames, I said, "I've had the strangest dream." "I got sumpin' I gotta tell ya, sar." "In a moment, Uns. I want to tell somebody about this before I forget. We never dreamed in Skai. Did I tell you?" Uns shook his head. "We never did,and it never seemed odd to us that we didn't. At least, it never seemed odd to me." I found Parka's bowstring among my blankets and showed it to Uns. "I was listening to this before I slept. That might have had something to do with it." "Wid not dreamin' in Skai, sar?" "With my dream. I don't know why I didn't dream there. Perhaps the others did, though I never heard anybody mention it. The Valkyrie's kiss brings forgetfulness so deep that I never thought of Disiri. It seems impossible, but I didn't." "Yessar." "I was conscious of something wrong, you understand." I fell silent, lost in thought. "Exactly as I was conscious of something wrong in my dream. Years passed before I could put a name to itbefore I remembered her face. That was when I went to the Valfather." "Jist like me comin' ter ya, sar." "My Valkyrie was Alvit, Uns. She'd been a princess and died a virgin, facing death with dauntless courage. I should have held her dearer than Disiri. I wanted to but couldn't." "Yessar. Like ter see 'un someday, sar." "Maybe you will. It isn't at all likely, but it's not impossible. What was I talking about?" " 'Bout ya bowstring, sar, 'n ya dream." "You're right." I lay down again and laid the bowstring on my chest. "My bowstring is spun of severed lives, Uns." "Fer real, sar?" "Yes. Of lives that are ended, and I think lives cut short. It may be only because most lives are." "Guess so, sar." "So do I, Uns. It's all either of us can do. Of lives cut short, whether for that reason or another. Maybe only because a woman cut them with her teeth for me. She may have ended the lives by that act. I can't remember her name." "Don't matter, sar." "She will remind me of it eventually, I feel sure. What I was going to say, Uns, was that whenever I let an arrow fly from this string, I hear them in its singing hear their voices as they spoke in life. When I draw Eterne, all the knights who have held her unworthily appear." "Yessar. I seen 'em, sar." "Whether to affright my foes or encourage me, I can't say. Sometimes they fight at my side. Sometimesjudging, I suppose, that I have no need of their aidthey don't. Disiri saw to it that I gained Eterne. That I would have a chance to gain her, at least." "Yessar." Uns had returned to his laundry, turning my drawers where they hung upon a bush, and feeding sticks and winter grass to the fire that dried them. "She wanted me to win Eterne because she loves me." "Yessar." I sat up again, running my fingers along Parka's string. "Have you heard this, Uns? Have you, Gylf?" Both nodded, Gylf more circumspectly. "You have?" Uns nodded again. "Kin I tell my news now, sar? Won't take mor'n a minute." "And you'll bust unless you do. I understand. Okay, I'll listen. But you must answer a question afterward, or try to. Is the king dead? King Gilling?" "Nosar. Gettin' better's wot he sez." "King Gilling said that he was getting better?" "Nosar. I mean, most like he done, sar, on'y 'twarn't him I heered. 'Twar that cat, sar. Ya cat, on'y if'n he's yorn, why ain't he here ter tell ya hisself ?" "He is," Mani announced with a fine flare for the dramatic. With head and tail high, he emerged from the shadows and bowed. "Your servant, most noble of knights." "My friend, rather." Ignoring a low growl from Gylf, I opened my arms. Mani sprang into my lap. "Your yokel spied upon me, Sir Able, and I have no doubt you would cut his throat for it if I asked. Certainly my royal master would hang him in chains, did I so much as raise my paw." Mani raised it, claws out, by way of illustration. "Would you prefer I forgive him?" "Greatly," I told him. "In that case I do." Mani's claws vanished. "You are forgiven, fellow." "Tanks, sar!" Uns pulled his forelock. I said, "A talking cat does not astound you, Uns?" "Hit's a magic cat, I reckon." "And you've seen a magic sword. Perhaps other things." "That's so, sar, 'n hit come ter tell da queen lady I been workin' fer 'bout how her pa's tryin' ter git Toug kilt, sar. 'N I likes Toug 'n hope ya kin make him stop." "I addressed Her Majesty before yourself because you had given me to her," Mani explained. "I felt you'd approve for that reason. She has influence with her father, and it would better for him to spare Toug voluntarily. If he's prevented by forcewell, dear owner, he's King Arnthor's ambassador. There's no getting around that." I rubbed my jaw. "Is he trying to kill Toug? Or have him killed?" Mani, who had decided his paw needed smoothing, smoothed it. "He is not. Your opinion of my judgment must be high, I know. We have known each other for some while." "It is." "In which case you will give weight to my opinion, which is that Lord Beel won't sully his honor with murder, whether by his own hand or another's. He thrusts Toug into positions of danger. The stratagem is not unknown." "Why?" I lay down once more. "He wishes you in his son-in-law's service because he believes he will keep the crown with you to guard it." Mani waited for me to speak, but I did not. "He believes this because my mistress, by which I mean by first mistress, has told him so. To be precise, because she told that long fellow Thiazi. You recall him, I'm sure." "Yes, I do. Why did she say it?" "She no longer confides in me as she used to," Mani said pensively. "Not that we are estranged. When one is dead . . ." "I understand." Mani condescended to address Uns. "I myself have been dead on several occasions. We are permitted nine demises, of which the ninth is permanent. Doubtless you know." "Nosar, I dint. On'y I do now, Master Cat." "You may refer to me as Master Mani, fellow. Though I am a cat, cat is not my name." Master Mani redirected his attention to me. "You asked why she prophesied as she did. May I hazard a conjecture?" "Because it's true?" "Certainly not. I would guess she feared that my masterby which term I designate His Royal Majesty King Gilling of Jotunland, to whom my royal mistress Queen Idnn, his wife, has given memight do you violence otherwise. Thanks to her foresight, he is instead solicitous of your life." "More so than I." I shut my eyes. "You can hear my bowstring, can't you, Mani? Even now?" For once Mani was silent. "I can, there's one voice that cries out to me again and again. After I got this bowstring, I tried not to hear it. To tell the truth, I tried not to hear any of them. Now I have been listening, for that one especially. I hear it now, and I can make out a few words, and sobbing." "Mebbe that queen ya like, sar? Could she be, like, passed across?" "Disiri? No. Disiri is not dead." For a half minute or more there was silence save for the crackling of the fire Uns fed and stirred; at last Mani said, "There is a room in Utgard, the Room of Lost Love." I opened my eyes and sat up. "Have you been in there?" Mani shook his head. "I've merely seen the door." "You know where it is?" "Lord Thiazi has a study. Very capacious, and nicely situated, in which he pursues the art. Other rooms open off it. I have been through all the doors but one, and that one is kept locked. I have climbed the ivy outside, but that room has no window." "You'd like to get in." "Perhaps." Mani's emerald eyes, which had been half shut, opened wide. "Certainly I'd like to look inside." "Have you lost love, Mani?" He sprang from my lap and vanished in the night. "What about you, Uns?" "Don' know a' none, sar, on'y I likes Squire Toug." "So do I." I stretched. "I don't want him killed or maimed any more than you do." "Then you'll stop it, sar? Tomorrer, like?" "No. Mani told Her Majesty of Jotunland, while you eavesdropped. Is that right?" "I never calt it right, sar." "Naturally not. But you did. She may stop it. Or not. Surely she'll try. As for me ..." I yawned. "Toug wants to be a knight." The song of the string had begun, and although Gylf laid a gentle paw upon my hand, I said no more. Svon motioned to Toug, who shut Thiazi's door behind them. The vast hallway, always dark, seemed darker than ever; bats chittered high overhead. "That's a bad man," Toug said under his breath. "That isn't a real man at all," Svon told him. "If you haven't learned it yet, learn it now." "I know." "Then act like it and speak like it. Their whole race is evil, though some are better than others. The worst are monsters far worse than beasts." "Logi had three arms," Toug said pensively. "I haven't told anybody about it, but he did." "There was once a knight named Sir Ravd," Svon said. He had begun to walk so fast that Toug had to trot to keep up. "Sir Ravd was sent to suppress outlaws in the northern forest from which you hail, the forest south of the mountains." "I remember," Toug said. "He was killed. I think Duke Marder thought the outlawsthe free companies, as they called themselveswould not attack a great and famous knight, though he had no comrade save his squire. If that's what Duke Marder thought, Duke Marder was wrong." "I won't tell anybody you said that," Toug declared. "I would say it to his face. I already have." Svon took a dozen strides before he spoke again. "Sir Ravd died. His squire lived, though he had been left for dead. He returned to Sheerwall, eager to tell everyone how his master had charged foes so numerous they could not be counted, how resolutely and how skillfully his master had fought, sending scores to the wolves. How he, Sir Ravd's squire, alone and wounded, had buried Sir Ravd by moonlight, digging the grave with a broken ax, and heaping it with the weapons of the slain." Not knowing what else to say, Toug said, "Yes, sir." He glanced behind him, for he felt unseen eyes on his back. "They heard him in Sheerwall," Svon continued, "and they slandered him. Not to his facethey were not as brave as the outlaws, who had faced Sir Ravd and his squire too, and never flinched. But he found, this squire, that he had an enemy no sword could touch, rumors that dogged his steps." Abruptly, Svon stopped and turned to face Toug. "I have tried to teach you in the short time we have been together." "Yes, Sir Svon. I know you have, and I've learned a lot. From you and from Sir Able, too." "This is my most important lesson. It took me years to learn it, but I throw it to you like a crust." "Yes, Sir Svon," Toug repeated. "We go into danger. You fought a Frost Giant and won. We may be fighting a score before noon. When we do, you may live and I may die." "I hope not, Sir Svon." "I've no wish to die. None at all. If we fight, I hope for victory. I'll do all I can to see that we're victorious. You have that mace." "Yes, Sir Svon. Sword Breaker." Toug held her up. "Where is the dagger you took from the Angrborn smith? You showed it to mea dagger as big as a war sword. Have you still got it?" "It's back in my room unless somebody took it." "Bring that too. Bring them both." "I will, Sir Svon." "If I die and you live, Toug, you'll have to face a foe more terrible than the Angrborn, and more subtle. Whispers, sly smiles, sidelong looks. Do you understand me?" "I think so, Sir Svon." "You'll have to fight them, and you fight them by finding a battle to die in, and not dying. By doing that over and over, Toug." "Yes, Sir Svon." "You're a peasant boy? As Sir Able was?" "We're not as bad as you think, Sir Svon." "I don't think it." Svon sighed, and it came to Toug that Svon's sigh was the loneliest sound he had ever heard, a sigh like a ghost's, a sound that would haunt the cavernous halls of Utgard longer than the bats. "I was brought up by my father's servants, Toug. Mostly Nolaa and her husband. They were proud of me, and taught me to be proud of myself. It helped, and for years it was the only help I had. Has anyone been proud of you? Besides me?" Toug gulped. "I wouldn't have been able to kill Logi if it hadn't been for Org, Sir Svon. He was fighting him first to protect us, and he did more than I did. Only you said I wasn't supposed to tell about him." Svon smiled; it was not a warm smile, but it made him handsome. "I'm proud of you just the same. More proud, because you told the truth when the temptation to lie must have been great. I've lied often and know that temptation. Who besides me?" "My sister, Sir Svon. Ulfa, when she found out I was a squire, and might be a knight someday." "That's good, and Ulfa and I may be enough. Sir Ravd was never proud of me, and I was never as proud of him as I should have been. Here I feel I should order you to remember him, but you never knew him." "I saw him, Sir Svon, when he came to our village and talked to people." "Then remember that, and remember what I've told you about him." They separated; but Toug, instead of going to the turret he shared with Mani and Etela, stood and watched Svon's back as Svon strode away down that lofty hall, a hall empty of all beauty and comfort,
ill-lit by such daylight as found its way through the high windows on one side. And it seemed to Toug that at its termination he saw a knight with a golden lion rampant on his helm and a golden lion on his shieldand that Svon did not see him, though Svon was so much nearer. Toug turned away muttering, "This whole keep's haunted." Later, as he was starting up one of the endless flights of stairs, he said, "Well, I hope we don't have to fight at all. That we just get the slaves, and that's all there is." Still later he added, "I wish Mani was here."