Stargate (12 page)

“Ghakazian! What brings you to Danar? Come in.”

Ghakazian stepped inside, and Janthis closed the door behind them. Ghakazian glanced swiftly around. The room was small and seemingly bare. Opposite him three stone-rimmed windows gave out onto darkening sky, and Ghakazian knew that if he stepped to them and looked down, he would see the tips of the haeli forest and beyond that the torchlit city, lying on the slope of the hill that lazily became the vast high cliff where the corions wintered, deep within the stone. One of the walls was gray and blank, but that was an illusion. At a word from Janthis the gray would fade to the dark brilliance of black glass, and the universe would glow back at him, each system clear and true. At another word Janthis could call to him one sun, one group of worlds, and their images would rush to fill the wall.

The wall opposite the mirror wall was also gray and blank. Ghakazian had never seen it change, nor Janthis approach it. He had often wondered if it showed the leader of the council the Unmaker himself, or perhaps the realms of the Messengers, or even the place beyond everything that was, where the Lawmaker lived outside time and space. Now Janthis spoke, and twilight became the full benison of noon. He turned to Ghakazian.

“No council will be called for a long time yet, and the yearly rush of mortals from Danar's other planets to see the budding haelis has not yet begun. What is on your mind?”

Ghakazian found unaccountably that he could not meet the steady, dark eyes of the other. Janthis was smiling at him, and Ghakazian crushed the urge to challenge, to foment argument over something, anything. He fixed his eyes on the dead sun-ball which lay on the sill of one of the windows, seeing himself and Janthis reflected in it but curiously distorted, their shapes elongated and curved, his own wings black around him.

“I am seeking an answer to an important question, Janthis,” he answered evenly. “I want to study the Books of Lore.”

“Of course. Usually only Traders passing through Danar request a day in their dust. Perhaps I can help you?”

Ghakazian tore his gaze away from the ball and looked at Janthis. You cannot help, he thought, the words almost a sneer. You are pale, Janthis, you are polite, you are incapable of dealing with our common fear and giving real aid.

“No, I need no help,” he said, already turning away. “I ask only light from Danar's sun. I will read, and then I will leave all as I find it.”

Ghakazian alighted at the foot of the narrow, winding stair and walked along the dim passage. Presently he came to a plain wooden door, and pushing it open, he stepped inside, blinking at the sudden glow that met him. Janthis had filled the room with Danar's obliging sun, and for a moment Ghakazian stood still, looking about. He had been here only once before, long ago, but everything was as it had been then, and as he had seen it in his vision. The row upon row of books, the low ceiling, the pale blue pedestal with the corion's claws curling up over the edge of the reading surface. The room was very quiet, with a self-contained, ageless silence that he was all at once unwilling to disturb. Somehow the atmosphere was filled with the mute wisdom of the ages and did not invite intrusion. He held his wings tightly against his back and walked forward, his heart sinking. So many books, hundreds of them of every size and shape, each asking a mind of great capability to unravel their mysteries. Well, he thought. I have the time. I have all the time there is, and if the Book spoke true, then I am bound to find what I seek.

He approached the shelf nearest to him and saw to his relief that the books had not been piled haphazardly. On a small gold plaque set into the shelf he read,
The Law Pertaining to the Firstborn.
In an orderly succession the books marched away, rounded the corner, and were lost on the other side of the room. Ghakazian raised his eyes. The plaque on the next shelf read,
The Law Pertaining to the Messengers.
His fingers itched. He doubted that he would learn anything about the Messengers that he did not know already, but he had the curiosity of the rest of his kin when it came to the denizens of deep space. He passed on, each plaque giving him only a fast-growing sense of the weight of power of the Lawmaker, and the complexity of the All. There were Laws pertaining to the inanimate suns, to the suns without worlds, to the living and insentient, to the Traders. He exhausted one wall and stepped over to the far side of the room. Here were the Laws pertaining to the sun-lords and their suns. Here, too, was the Book of What Was in the All, volumes garnered from each world and growing all the time, the collected histories of the immortals and their charges. At the top, lying on its side, was a single slim book, bound in white leather and lettered in silver. Ghakazian took it down, turned it over and read,
The Law Pertaining to the Book of What Will Be.
He almost opened it but then shook his head and put it back. He would not be diverted. Perhaps he might return one day and turn its pages, but not now. He went on searching until finally he found the books of Laws pertaining to mortal men. One by one he wrenched them from the shelf and skimmed them eagerly, but they did not hold what he wanted. The volumes dealt with the laws governing birth and dying, memory, limited powers, and even mortals in the realms of the Messengers, but nothing revealed a command that would send them unharmed through a Gate onto another world. He tossed each book back onto the shelf, disappointment becoming an irritated anxiety. I am on a foolish errand, he told himself. What am I doing here? I shall go back to Ghaka and get the Book, and bring it and its nonsense to Janthis.

He was about to turn away when his eye caught the last plaque, low down, almost at his feet. Sighing, he bent and read,
The Law Pertaining to the Gates.
With a quick intake of breath he squatted, his wings scouring the dust from the floor behind and beside him. “Immortals and Gates, Messengers and Gates, Traders and Gates,” he murmured, his forefinger trailing along the volumes. Then he had it. He drew forth the book with a short laugh and placed it carefully on the reading desk.
The Law Pertaining to Mortals and the Gates,
it said. Eagerly he turned to the first page.

At first, as he perused slowly, he was convinced that the book could tell him only those things he knew already, but in a more orderly way. On the day when the Worldmaker had come to Ghaka to complete his Making, he had talked long with Ghakazian, explaining to him the position the yet uncreated mortals would hold, and the mortals on Ghaka and its satellites had been Ghakazian's study and his love for many centuries. He knew it all. But he read on, committing
every
word to memory so that he could bring them out for further thought when he was home. The sunlight illumined the pages steadily. The silence remained whole and dumb. He passed from chapter to chapter, his concentration complete, only his eyes and his long, feather-light hands moving.

When he had gone through three quarters of the book, he stiffened and exclaimed softly. It was not that he had read something he was not aware of, but the piece of information he had just consigned to memory came back and reformed, was changed, and sparked with new meaning. A
mortal cannot use a Gate to travel the invisible corridors from world to world,
he had read,
for its body is incapable of the rapid transformation from blood and bone to pure essence and back again. Permanent division of body from essence would be the result. Only at death can a mortal travel beyond time and space, because it is then that body and essence assume a new form together.
Ghakazian read it again, with close attention.
Only at death can a mortal travel
… And death released new powers in a mortal essence, powers for the metamorphosis of the body. But without that body a mortal could go through a Gate unencumbered, a pure essence, deathless, and no mortal on any other world would be able to withstand its strength for possession or command.

“Ah,” Ghakazian hissed through his teeth as he slammed the book shut and ran to replace it on the shelf. “I knew! All the time I knew, and yet I did not know. I will tell them, I will explain to them what they must do, and they will do it for love of me.”

He hurried out of the room, banging the door shut behind him and running up the curving stair. Once he had gained the upper chambers, he took to the air, racing for the pillared terrace and the Gate beyond.

He sped through his own Gate, burst out of the mouth of the cave, and plummeted like a stone, dropping until he had reached the level of Mirak's home. “Mirak!” he shouted. “Come out! Hurry! I have something urgent to discuss with you!” Mirak emerged almost at once, and with a jerk of his head Ghakazian darted away. Together they skirted the peaks and came at last to Ghakazian's crag. Ghakazian did not pause but swooped up and over the top, disappearing into the rock funnel, and Mirak rushed after him. Only when they both perched on the ledge, warmed by sunshine, and Ghakazian had made certain that his hall was empty of wingless ones, did he speak. It was necessary to choose words that Mirak would understand, that fitted his experience, and Ghakazian tried to shrink his own weight of knowledge to match.

“Mirak,” he said, leaning back against the rough wall of the mountain, his arms folded, “when are you to die?”

Mirak frowned in confusion over the odd question. “Not for another four hundred and twelve Ghaka-years,” he answered.

“If I asked you to die tomorrow, would you do it?”

Mirak's eyebrows shot up in astonishment. “I do not understand, Ghakazian. How could I die tomorrow, even if I wanted to? I must live until it is my time to leave Ghaka forever.”

The brown eyes of his master suddenly swiveled to him and fixed him with a penetrating stare. “Tell me,” Ghakazian went on evenly, “how would you kill a man, Mirak?”

Mirak's puzzled smile faded. It seemed to him that the draught from the depths below had ceased to blow around him and had been replaced by a brooding cloud. He lifted his shoulders to dispel it, but his wings felt heavy and difficult to control, as though he had been flying through a rainstorm.

“I do not know,” he answered, and his voice sounded weak and thin to his ears. “And even if I did know such a terrible thing, I would not do it.”

“Even for me, your life, your soul?”

Mirak swallowed. “Sun-lord,” he blurted, “I have never asked a reason from you for the things you bid me do, for all things in your mind are pure and good, and it is our duty and our pleasure to obey you. But for this, I would ask why. And after asking why I would consider well.”

Ghakazian unfolded his arms and, jumping the abyss, came up to Mirak. His hands stroked the brown skin, ruffled the long feathers, played about the high forehead.

“Mirak,” he whispered, “I must tell you a story, but this story is not like the stories you tell to Hira, it is not about the ancestors in the dawning of the world. I would ask nothing of you that would mean your harm. A blackness is eating up the worlds one by one, slowly but surely. If it comes to Ghaka, the people will change. They will learn how to hate and kill. But I, Ghakazian, know how to defeat this blackness, if only you and all my mortals will help me. Together we can keep it from Ghaka's Gate, but that can only be accomplished if the people do exactly as I say, without question.”

Mirak had listened, his face impassive. Now he asked, “What is the nature of this blackness?” The query was sharp, and Ghakazian removed his hands and clasped them behind his back, under his wings. If I tell him, if I say the words, then innocence will flee from Ghaka forever, he thought. Yet they must be said. The people must know. His eye caught sight of the Book lying just where he had laid it, and he stepped away from Mirak. I could bend you to my will by the raising of my smallest finger, he thought. I have the power. Yet I will not do so unless there is no other way. You are my treasure. You will understand.

“The blackness spreads,” he said deliberately, “and at the heart of this blackness is the Worldmaker. He is not as he once was, Mirak. He fought with the Lawmaker, and he has become the Unmaker. The sun-lords have done what they can, but it is not enough. Now I propose to give battle to the Unmaker, for I know that he will go to Shol and be admitted, and Shol will fall. But he shall not come to Ghaka!” The brown eyes had become hard as the granite that entombed the pair of them, and Mirak was swept with an urge to cower down onto the ledge. His sun-lord had always been laughing and kindly, and this being with the first glimmerings of a real and awesome power that Mirak had not been aware of before filled him with terror. Light flaring from his outflung arms and crackling in his streaming dark hair, Ghakazian shouted, “I will go to Shol, and there I will force him back, and Shol will belong to the people of Ghaka, in peace and plenty!”

“Can it be true?” Mirak whispered, and all at once the fire left Ghakazian, and he slumped, giving Mirak a tired smile.

“I am forbidden to lie,” he said gently. “In the ages before the darkness came, I did not lie to your ancestors because I knew only truth, and now, even when it has become possible for me to deceive you, I do not. If I lied, I would cease to be what and who I am. You have never heard an untruth, Mirak, and if you trust in me, you never will.”

“I have always trusted you,” Mirak said haltingly, still trembling at what he had seen. “Give me time to ponder what you have told me, sun-lord, and then I wish to hear more.”

Ghakazian bent and, reaching behind him, lifted the Book from the rock and handed it to Mirak.

“Read this,” he ordered. “Stay here and learn. This is the Book of What Will Be. It will tell you all you need to know. I will go and speak with Tagar.”

Mirak took it gingerly and almost dropped it. He had never held such a heavy thing, nor one so cold. Yet its beauty drew his eyes, and a longing stole over him to hug it, kiss it, cradle it. Reverently he turned to the first page. For a moment Ghakazian watched him, a slight, smug smile coming and going on his mouth, and then he swooped through the arch, across the hall, and out over Ghaka.