Ironcrown Moon (35 page)

It came to him. The dank lower chamber of Mallmouth Bridge’s bascule machinery. The treacherous armiger Mero Elwick in a rage of frustration, knowing he could never use Concealer himself and vowing that Snudge wouldn’t have it, either. A tremendous blow with a broadsword that left the sigil unharmed, while Mero himself was incinerated in a flash of defensive sorcery.

Something like that had happened to the missing thief.

“Yes,” said a low-pitched voice from the hut’s doorway.

“Who’s there?” Snudge cried. Drawing his sword, he crouched back against the opposite wall. A small cloaked person was standing there, visible only in silhouette.

“Come out, sir knight,” he said, “and bring the sigils and the book with you.”

“Aroint thee, whoreson!” Snudge cried, reaching with his left hand to touch Concealer and turn himself invisible—

He froze stock-still, paralyzed in every muscle save those of his face. He spat out a curse.

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“Be silent, Deveron Austrey. Or may I call you Snudge?” The figure stepped back and became discernible in the dawnlight, a little man whose head would have come barely to Snudge’s shoulder, dressed in a suit of well-cured skin and wearing a cloak of mingled dark colors in a pattern that mimicked tree bark. His skin was sun-browned and his large eyes were a startling green. “Be calm. I mean no harm

—not to you, especially, since you’re of the blood. I command you to put away your sword and come out. Bring the Trove of Darasilo.”

Compelled to obey, Snudge emerged in furious silence, placed the bags and the book on the ground, and glared at the stranger.

“My name is Odall,” he said, “and I’ve been sent by the Source. Do you remember Red Ansel’s Source? The one he spoke of when you and he sat in a small boat on Gala Bay, and you summoned the Light and quickened the Concealer sigil you wear next to your heart?”

Snudge felt his scalp tingle and his throat grow tight.

“Do you remember?”

“Yes,” Snudge whispered. He began to inch towards Odall.

“The Source has decided that you’re needed in the New Conflict. Ansel himself doesn’t know, and we Green Men aren’t allowed to tell him about you for a while yet. Don’t you mention this meeting of ours to him or anyone else, either.”

“You’re… a Green Man?”

“Yes. There’s more of us about than you’d think, but mostly we stick to the wild places where humans seldom go. If we’re taken unawares by one of you giants, we haven’t much of a chance.”

Snudge tried to keep his voice steady. “What do you want with me?”

“I came to stop you from smashing the sigils in the trove.”

“The things are evil! They destroy people’s souls and bodies. I know that for a fact.” He continued to edge almost imperceptibly toward the little man.

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Odall grinned. “Nevertheless, you’re willing to use your Concealer sigil in what you think is a good cause. You’d use it to help your master, Conrig Win-cantor—and oddly enough, that’s as it should be. Conrig will never know it, but he’s been enlisted to help in the New Conflict, too.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Snudge said sullenly.

“It’s not necessary that you should.” The cheerful demeanor of the Green Man vanished like a snuffed candleflame, and Snudge realized that he was once again quite incapable of movement.

“Do you recall the words you used to bring Concealer to life?”

“Yes,” Snudge said through his teeth. “Why do you ask?”

Odall didn’t answer. He went into the croft, and after a few minutes came out with the saddle and harness that had belonged to the missing thief. The things should have been too heavy for one of his slight build to carry, but he flung pad and saddle onto the back of the mule as though they were weightless, expertly tightened the cinch, and shortened the stirrup leathers. “How splendid that I can go home in style! I’ve had a long foot-slog.”

When the mount was ready he picked up the ancient book, and as Snudge watched in fascinated horror, he tore off the cover with its moonstone disk and set it carefully on the rock Snudge had selected earlier as an anvil for his hammer. Then he opened one of the sigil sacks and took out a small oblong moonstone.

“See this? It’s name is Subtle Gateway, and it’s one of the Great Stones. Hold it tight, close your eyes, and say EMCHAY MO. Then tell it where you want to go. It will carry you anywhere in the world. If you should desire to take up to ten other persons with you, or three horses, or a boat
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up to four ells long, or a heap of goods equivalent to the weight of three horses, say EMCHAY

ASINN. Clear enough?”

“No, it’s not, damn your eyes!” Snudge strove without success to overcome the paralysis. His feet seemed rooted to the ground. “I don’t want to use a Great Stone that’ll put me in deep thrall to the Lights!”

“Well, that’s as may be, and you do have a point. But the Source thinks you’ll need Subtle Gateway in order to carry out your bounden duty, so you’re obliged to take it. With luck, you may only have to use it a few times and the pain-debt will be not too onerous. When your duty’s fulfilled, we’ll show you how to drain the stone’s life, then get rid of it for you.”

“It should be destroyed now, and so should the rest of Darasilo’s Trove!

For God’s sake, Odall, why are you preventing me from ridding the world of these terrible things?“

“Easy, lad. Have no fear. These bags of sigils and the coverless book I’m taking will be destroyed, all right. But not just smashed to bits, as you planned to do. They’ll be disposed of in a manner that serves the Source and hastens the downfall of the evil Lights.”

Odall placed the sigil named Subtle Gateway on the book cover and vaulted onto the back of the mule. “Don’t forget now: EMCHAY

MO and EMCHAY ASINN are the words that conjure its power. The words of activation are the same as those you used for Concealer.

And be very sure to name yourself Snudge to the Light, rather than Deveron Austrey, just as you did before. As Ansel told you, Snudge is your name, and yet it’s not. And so you’re not as beholden to the Lights when using their sigils as are certain other persons I could mention.”

“But you haven’t explained—”

The Green Man nicked the reins and turned the mule in the direction that Mattis and the warrior troop had taken. Speaking over his shoulder, he said, “See that you move along to Tarn as soon as possible. Your duty lies there.” Odall and the mule vanished into thin air, and Snudge’s body came back under his control.

“Wait! Who is this Source? What’s he up to? How did he know how to find the sigils? They can’t be scried!”

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May, Julian - Boreal Moon 2 - Ironcrown Moon them safe from the Conjure-Queen as well.

The soft voice seemed to emanate from no particular direction, and was weighted with a profound sadness.

Snudge eyed Subtle Gateway and the torn book cover with loathing. “Curse you, Odall!” he shouted at the unseen speaker. “I’ll be no one’s cat’s-paw!”

Someone laughed, a melancholy sound.

If you believe that, then see that you fulfil your duty to King Conrig not blindly and without

—

question, but only as best you can

.

“I wasn’t talking about the king.” Snudge looked about in bewilderment.

When you’ve finished activating the Gateway, crush the moonstone medallion and the book cover. Tell Lord Stergos no one else

—

—

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what happened here today. He, not you, is the proper one to pass on news of the trove’s destruction to his brother Conrig

.

Snudge felt his anger fade, leaving a mounting fear. “You’re not the Green Man. Who are you?”

I am the One Denied the Sky, the lowliest of the Likeminded, but despite that, designated to lead the New Conflict. Someday I hope I may tell you my tale. But that cannot happen until there is an ending.

“An… ending?”

Bespeak your young friend, Vra-Mattis. Have him inform the warriors that he has lost the trail of Scarth Saltbeck. They must all return to

Elktor with you now.

“Do you intend to let Scarth escape? What happened to the other thief, Felmar, and the second book?”

Both wretched men had roles in the New Conflict. Felmar is dead and Scarth will not live much longer. You may also tell this to Lord

Stergos. The second book need not concern you. Eventually, it will also be destroyed.

“What about Kilian Blackhorse? Is he also a participant in your Conflict?”

Yes. And so is Beynor ash Linndal of Moss, who has returned to this island to commit heinous sins. But ask me no more questions. Do the things I’ve requested of you, Snudge. You must, if it’s all to come right in the end. Otherwise the Pain-Eaters will triumph. Farewell.

==========

He took off his gauntlet and pressed the carving of the tiny door to the disk with his bare hand.

As before, the irascible inhuman voice boomed on the wind, asking what he wanted.

CAD AY’ANRUDAY?

“GO TUGA LUVKRO AN AY COMASH DOM.” May the Cold Light grant me power.

The pain was tentative as the terrible being asked who he was.

KO AN SO

?

He told the truth that was not the truth, praying that Ansel and the Source were right.

“SNUDGE.”

An icy spear plunged into his breast, but stopped short of his heart. He endured, suffered, waited while the Great Light pondered his request to share power and pay the price. They were fickle beings, fond of deadly jests, as likely to slay a supplicant as to bestow their awful gifts. But once again, Snudge was one of the fortunate.

THASHINAH GAV

. We accept.

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“MO TENGALAH SHERUV.” Thank you.

He was struck down then, as before, only to come to his senses later with the memory of horror causing hot tears to pour from his eyes.

The agony had been much more severe than that he experienced during the activation of Concealer. Giving thanks for his survival, he lay there until his face dried and the sound of hoof beats vibrating in the ground under his ear warned him that the others were returning.

He sat up. It was bright dawn, with the dark clouds all fled to the east. The small oblong carving glowed faintly green when he opened his clenched fist. The sigil was perforated, like Concealer, and fit easily on the same golden neckchain. He tucked the two stones away, feeling them warm and alive against the flesh of his chest. Then he got to his feet, took up the sledgehammer, and
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smote the book cover and its moonstone disk again and again, until they were so pulverized that no man could ever tell what they had been.

==========

When Garon deemed the evening light too faint for safe travel, he called for the men behind him to halt. It was perhaps two hours until midnight. The clouds, tinctured faintly with crimson and violet, had lifted and the rain was over.

Kilian’s party had attained a flattish triangle of land covered with grass and alpine herbs, several acres in extent, that jutted out over the depths of the gorge like the prow of a rockbound ship.

On two sides the dropoff was almost sheer; the third abutted the shoulder of a hulking mountain. Shrubs and a few gnarled pine trees had taken root among the large rocks closest to the path, and a ring of fire-blackened stones revealed that someone had previously used the place as a campsite.

“We’ll stop here,” the young Brother told the alchymist, after he and his pillion rider, Niavar, had dismounted. “Later on, it may get windier than we’d like, but now that the rain has let up it shouldn’t be too uncomfortable. I grazed sheep in this little meadow betimes.

With my dog keeping guard, I never lost one over the precipice, but it won’t be safe for the horses to graze free. We’ll tie them up by the trees and cut grass for them.“

Raldo, who had suffered some bad bumps earlier when his mount wrong-footed and he tumbled off, was appointed cook so he would not have to move about too much. Cleaton took charge of the horses, and Niavar was sent to a nearby cascade with a canvas bucket and leathern bottles for water. Garon and Kilian prowled the flower-dotted open area, cutting grass with their keen-bladed hunting knives and gathering whatever dead plant material might be coaxed into burning.

“If you look beyond this south-facing cliff,” Garon remarked to the alchymist, “you can see part of the way we’ve come. The lake is at the horizon. Double Waterfall is visible if you follow the course of the river back to the great rock cleft. The eroded section of trail where Raldo fell lies beyond that ridge of very dark rock.”

Kilian approached the edge of the precipice and scanned the striking panorama. “We’ve climbed very high today, but not traveled as far from the lake as I hoped. What do you estimate—seven or eight leagues?”

Garon shrugged. “Closer to five as the raven flies, I fear. The two near disasters slowed us considerably. It’s a miracle that Raldo’s bay didn’t slide down into the ravine when he misstepped. We’ll have to poultice the beast’s right front fetlock, but he’ll be fine. I wish I could say the same about Brother Butterball. The man must be a mass of bruises. By tomorrow, he’ll hardly be able to move.”

“It could be a problem,” Kilian said.

“We won’t have an easy time of it crossing into Didion. In some spots, we’ll have to climb on hands and knees, hoping the horses can follow along after us. A disabled man will find the going hard. If the track turns truly foul, we may have to leave our mounts behind altogether.”