The Complete Morgaine (99 page)

“Lellin Erirrhen has said,” the elder
arrha
declared, “that he is
hers,
lord Merir. And therefore he insists on coming and going at her bidding, refusing ours.”

“Else,” Morgaine said in a loud voice, “the council would keep me blind and deaf. And Lellin and Sezar in their service to me have kept me from taking other action, my lords. They know what you do not. By serving me . . . they have served you.”

Merir's lips made a taut line, and Lellin looked at the old lord, bowed to him very slowly, and to Morgaine . . . faced his grandfather again. “Of our own choice,” Lellin said. “Grandfather—the
arrhendim
are needed. Please. Come and look. They cover the riverside like a new forest. Come and look on this thing.” He cast an anguished glance about at all the
arrha.
“Come out of your grove and see this horde. You talk of taking it into Shathan. Of peace with it . . . as we found with the remnant of the
sirrindim.
Come and look on this thing.”

“One more dangerous to us,” said the elder, “is already here.” And Gate-force flared, making the air taut as a drawn string. It shimmered about the elder.

And it grew. One and another of the
arrha
began to bring forth that power, until the
arrhendim
flinched back against the wall, and the whole dome sang with it.

“Liyo,”
Vanye murmured, and whipped his sword from its sheath, for two of the
arrha
barred the doorway, and the air between shimmered with the barrier they formed.

“Cease!” Morgaine shouted.

The elder stamped the heel of his staff on the floor, a sound almost drowned in the taut air; his half-blind eyes were set rigidly. “Six of us have invoked the power. There are thirty-two. Surrender that which you bear.”

“Liyo.”

Morgaine slipped
Changeling
's ring and dropped the sword to her hip. Vanye looked about him, at the elders, at the frightened
arrhendim
 . . . and Roh, whose face was pale, but whose hands stayed from his weapons.

“Two more,” said the elder. The singing in the air grew louder, numbing hearing, and Morgaine lifted her hand.

“You know what the result will be,” she cried.

“We are willing to die, all of us. The passage we open here may be wide enough to work ruin on the enemies of Shathan as well. But you who do not love this land . . . may not be willing to become part of that. One by one we shall add to the force. We do not know how many of us will be needed before the passage is complete, but we shall discover it. You cannot leave. You can try your other weapons. If you do, we will answer you with all we have. Or you can draw that sword and complete the passage beyond any doubt: its force with ours is sufficient beyond any argument. It will drink us all up, and more besides. But surrender that weapon and we shall deal well with you. Our word is good. You have nothing to fear from us.”

Gate-force keened in the air. Another joined it.

“Liyo,”
Vanye said. Very small his voice sounded in that power. “Your other weapon—”

She said nothing. He dared not look at what was happening before her, but kept his eyes to the
arrhendim,
who were at her back and armed; and Roh, Lellin and Sezar were apart from the others, fear in their faces, but they stood with arms folded and had never moved.

“My lords!” Morgaine exclaimed suddenly. “My lord
arrha!
We are gaining nothing by this. Only your enemies gain.”

“We have made our choice,” said Merir.

“You sat here—sat here until I should become desperate enough to try to come stir you out of it. A trap of your working, lord Merir? It is a well-devised one.”

“We are utterly willing,” said Merir, “to perish. We are old. There are others. But there is no need of it, unless you value power more than your own life. If we add many more jewels to the web, lady Morgaine, it will be accomplished. You sense that. So do I.” He held up his hand, with the jewel-case upon it.
“Here is another mote of that power you hold. Perhaps this will complete it. It is that near. Shall I add it to the others?”

“Enough! Enough. I see that you are capable of doing it. No more.”

“Surrender the sword.”

She unhooked it and grounded it point-down before her. “My lords of the
arrha!
Lord Merir is right . . . that is an evil thing. And there is only one of it, and that itself is a great evil, and subtle. You hold your power divided into many hands; whoever takes this, that one will be more powerful than all the others. Which? Who of you seeks it?”

None answered.

“You have never seen a Gate opened,” Morgaine said. “You have never summoned that power entire, counting that passage dangerous. You are right. Shall I show you? Damp that which you hold: I shall show you my meaning. Let me show you
why
Nehmin must cease to exist. You value reason, my lords; then listen to me. I have no terms. I come not to possess Nehmin by the threat of destroying it. I come to destroy it, whether or not the enemy is stopped. I do not want any power over you.”

“You are mad,” said the elder.

“Let me show you. Damp the jewels. If I do not convince you, the unveiling of only a few of them while
Changeling
is unsheathed will be sufficient for your purposes . . . and mine. You do not well reckon . . . that I also am willing to die for what I do.”

The elder stepped back, bewilderment in his look. Merir made a helpless gesture. “She says well,” Merir said, “We can always die.”

The force ebbed, more suddenly than it had grown, jewel after jewel winking into cover. And when it was utterly gone, Morgaine eased
Changeling
forth, crystal as the jewels, which were only motes that human flesh itself could obscure unharmed. Opal fire flowed along
Changeling
's runes, and suffused the blade, and darkness flared at the tip of it, where the wind began. Someone cried out. Its light bathed all their faces. She moved it, and the wind grew stronger, whipping at the torches, tugging at hair and robes and howling within the dome. Vanye stepped back from her side, not even aware that he moved until he found himself near Lellin.

“Here is the passage you would form!” Morgaine shouted over the roar of the wind. “Here it is open before you. Look into it. Have you courage now to add your jewels to that? A few of them would suffice, and this whole dome will be elsewhere, with us in it. The shock of air will level all the trees hereabouts, and perhaps, as you say, take a good part of the enemy with us. Or more than that, if the force leaks through to this side of here and now. This is the power that your fathers' fathers' fathers trifled with. You do well to avoid it. But what will your children do? What, when someday someone less wise than yourselves
takes it up again? What, if I surrender the sword to you, and someday one of your folk draws it? On it is written the knowledge of the Gates . . . and it cannot be destroyed, save by one who will carry it unsheathed within a Gate, into the Fires. Who of you wants to go in my place? For any man who loves this world, for any man who holds this weapon and has anything of virtue left in him—there is only one choice in the end—and that is to take it out of this world, forever. Is not a calamity written in your legends? The same calamity fell everywhere that such power has been . . . and it will come again, and again. That power must have an end. Does one of you want the sword? Does one of you want to carry it under those conditions?”

She held it aloft, and the void gaped and howled. Roh was at her back; Vanye saw him, never took his eyes entirely from him. Roh's face was rigid, his eyes reflecting that opal light.

And suddenly Roh moved, fled, thrusting aside Sezar and Lellin, rushed past the
arrha
guards . . . the two of them too dazed to react. Vanye realized his sword was still in his hand. He looked on the others, on faces pale and drawn . . . turned and saw Morgaine. Her arm trembled from that force which numbed body and soul. Sweat stood on her face.

“You must seal it off,” she said. “Let me take this out of your world and seal the passage forever after me. Your other choice is not one that Shathan can survive.
This—this
—does not love living things.”

“Put it away,” Merir said hoarsely. “Put it away, now.”

“Have you seen enough? I always questioned the wisdom that made this thing. I know the evil of it. Its maker knew. And perhaps that is its only virtue: that it is shaped as what it is . . . it is something that you can see and know exactly as it is. There is no ambiguity here, no yes and no. This thing ought not to exist. Those delicate jewels of yours . . . are nothing other than this. Their beauty deludes you. Their usefulness deludes you. Someday someone will gather them together and you will know that they were all aspects of
this.
Look. Look at it!”

She swung it in a great arc, faster and faster, and the wind grew until it pulled at them, until the light blazed white, until the void widened and there seemed little air in the room. Cold numbed the skin, and the
arrha
held to their chairs, those standing staggered to the walls as if their own weight could not anchor them.

“Stop it!” the elder cried.

She did so, and returned it to sheath. The winds stopped; the howling died; the dark void and the blazing light went together, leaving the dome darkened, the light of the torches sucked out, only a shaft of daylight reaching them from the door. She grounded the sword, sheathed, before her.

“That is the power you hold,
arrha.
You have but to combine your tiny
jewels into one. Did you not know that? We are armed . . . alike. And I make you free gift of that knowledge now—for someday one will discover it, and you will have to use them that way.”

“No.”

“Can you forget what I have told you?” she asked in a low voice. “Can you forget what you have seen? Can you take the sword and keep it forever sheathed, when the
sirrindim
rise up with cities and threaten you, when Men increase and you are few? Some evil,
qhal
or Man, someday . . . will draw it. And unlike your jewels, which will fade when the Gate is sealed, the sword is knowledge to build more such Gates.”

There was deathly silence. Some of the
arrha
wept, their heads bowed into their hands.

“Give it up,” Morgaine urged them. “Or leave Nehmin, and come my road, the passage that I must take. I have told you truth. I have shown you. And while Nehmin remains open, that truth will always gape at your feet to swallow you up. Seal up the passage; seal Nehmin and the stones lose their fire and Shathan stands . . . unbarriered, but living. Keep Nehmin open, and you will fall to it one day. But whatever you choose, I have no choice. I must take this sword out of the world. More than Shathan is at hazard. More than your lives. More than this world alone. The evil is as wide as all the passages that ever existed. And it is most dangerous when you think it tamed and secure. Those little stones are more evil than
Changeling
 . . . because you do not see them for what they are: fragments of a Gate. Joined, they will drink you in and ruin more than your own world: they will reach to others.”

The elder trembled, and looked on the others, and on Merir. Lellin wept, and Sezar, the both of them bowed to the floor; and two by two their brother
arrhendim
joined them.

“We have heard truth,” Merir said. “I think we have heard the truth my grandson was quicker to hear.”

The elder nodded, his hands trembling so that the staff rattled against the floor. He looked at all the
arrha
about him. There was none to say otherwise.

“Do as you will,” he said then to Morgaine. “Pass. We will seal Nehmin behind you.”

Morgaine let go a long slow breath, and bowed her head. After a moment she gathered
Changeling
to her side and hooked it there, drew it to her shoulder. “We have a number of Shiua to clear from our path to Azeroth. The enemy, my lords of the
arrha,
is still advancing from the river. What will you do about it?”

There was long silence. “We—must hold, this place and Nehmin. Nehmin is surrounded. The enemy has already taken all the area. We can speak to the
arrha
who hold Nehmin itself; and within the hold of Nehmin, they can work
what you ask. You may ride from here. We can give you seven days . . . to reach Azeroth and pass; and then we may kill the power.”

“You would fall. Shathan would be utterly open to the Shiua horde.”

“We fought the
sirrindim,
” said Merir. “The
arrhend
will drive these invaders back too.”

Morgaine stared at them, one after another, scanning all the company. And at last she folded her arms and looked at the floor, glanced up at Vanye. He tried to say nothing with his expression. She turned last to Merir. “Will you take my help? I would not leave you with such a gift as waits out there. Aye, Vanye and I could slip past, go another route . . . reach Azeroth in seven days. But what sits out there is—mine. I do not want to leave you to that.”

The elder approached her slowly, leaning on his staff. He bowed, deeply, and gazed at her when he straightened, like a man looking into the Gates themselves. “There have been—many passages for you.”

“Yes, elder. I am older than you.”

“Much so, I suspect.” The frail hand reached, touched Vanye's arm, and the dim gray eyes turned to his. “
Khemeis
to such an
arrhen
 . . . We sorrow for both of you. For both of you.” He looked at Lellin, and bowed, and to Sezar and the other
arrhendim;
and lastly at Merir and Morgaine once more. “You are experienced in wars. We are not. We need you. If you are willing, we need you.”