The Key to Creation (35 page)

“Who built that?” Mia said. “And how? Where could they have gotten the materials? Why would anyone put it out here?”

“It’s the Lighthouse at the End of the World,” Criston said, barely whispering.

Prester Hannes, though, had no questions. “Ondun did this, and His reasons are His own.” His gaze ran up and down the gigantic tower. “One does not ask God how He does things.”

Though it was daylight, a dazzling beacon shone from the apex of the lighthouse tower. Lines of foamy water around the rocky mound indicated barrier reefs. Criston wondered whether it was a signal, or a warning.…

He ordered the sails furled, the anchor dropped. “We’ll take one of the ship’s boats over.”

“I will go with you, Captain.” Hannes seemed to consider it a foregone conclusion.

“I intended to take you along, Prester. You too, Sen Aldo—and Javian. If there is a man living in the lighthouse, the man in the legend, maybe he can tell us how close we are to Terravitae.”

Criston felt both excited and wary as they rowed the ship’s boat over to the rock outcropping and the tower; he noted that the prester did not offer to take a turn at the oars. Javian and Aldo found a place among the rocks to secure the small boat, and the four men climbed out onto the mossy water-washed stones and ascended the stone platforms.

A wooden door opened at the base of the huge tower and a man waved, as if he had been expecting them all along. “You arrive at last, Captain Criston Vora!” The tall, majestic stranger had carefully combed silver hair and a neat silver-gray beard. His clothes were of a style that Criston had never seen, and his expression held a weight of impossible age, although he seemed healthy and energetic. “I have watched your
Dyscovera
for months.”

Criston blinked. “Who are you? How do you know my name?”

The man smiled from the doorway. “I know all of you, quite well in fact. Prester Hannes”—he nodded—“the well-traveled Saedran chartsman Sen Aldo na-Curic…and young Javian. I could list every person aboard your ship, if you like. I watch. I make note of what I see.” He shrugged. “I have nothing else to do, and it eases the boredom of the centuries. I am Mailes.”

“And this is the Lighthouse at the End of the World.” Prester Hannes was visibly shaken. “I have read the Book of Aiden.”

The man seemed charmed by the idea. “Ah, young Aiden! I wonder what he has to say about me.”

Hannes looked awed and perhaps a bit disgusted by this man, and his voice had a biting, judgmental undertone. “We already know your story, sir—how you offended Ondun and were exiled here.”

The lighthouse keeper was amused. “Do not be convinced of what you know, Prester. Stories have a tendency to change as they are told and retold.” He stepped back through the doorway and gestured them inside. “Come, I have plenty of bread, wine, and fish.” He sighed and mumbled, “Always plenty of bread, wine, and fish…I am happy to share it with you.”

As they climbed an endlessly spiraling series of flagstone steps, Hannes raised his voice, a bit out of breath. “If you did know Ondun in the flesh, then I can’t help but show you respect. But you also angered Ondun so much that He sent you away from Terravitae and imprisoned you in this lighthouse forever.”

“Oh, not forever—just until Ondun returns. And I wish he’d stop dallying. He can be very stubborn.” Mailes sounded flippant.

On their way up the dizzying staircase, they passed shelves of books on the walls, packed with volume after volume after volume. Aldo looked longingly at the unread tomes, but even with his perfect memory it would take him decades to absorb and memorize such a vast library.

Noticing the Saedran’s intense interest, the old man commented, “I have all the time in the world to write down my thoughts. Some good work in there, if I might be so immodest, though I have no expectation anyone will ever read them.”

Halfway up the stone tower Mailes stopped at a main chamber, which contained even more impressive bookshelves. Without addressing the prester’s accusations, the lighthouse keeper invited them to a table that was set with loaves of bread, roasted fish, and a jug of wine, as promised. He took a seat in a sturdy driftwood chair and gestured for them all to eat.

Javian tasted the food. “Not much flavor,” he observed.

“Ondun promised that I would be nourished and cared for in my exile,” Mailes explained. “But he didn’t want me to enjoy it.”

Criston asked in spite of himself, “And what did you do to offend Him so greatly?”

Mailes looked wistful rather than guilty. “I had an affair with his wife. I loved her, Ondun didn’t…but he refused to admit it. As I said, he can be very stubborn.” The stranger’s gaze grew distant. “Iyomelka…a fine woman, lovely and strong, opinionated, passionate, and absolutely fascinating. Ondun grew bored with her over the centuries, and she didn’t deserve that. I loved her, truly I did.”

Aldo raised his eyebrows in surprise, while Hannes sputtered in the middle of a draught of wine. He lurched up from his chair and shoved aside the plates of fish and bread. “You are a liar! That is not what the scripture says!”

Mailes was surprised by the rude outburst, but his voice remained mild. “I believe I know what I did and did not do, Prester.”

Hannes turned his gaze toward Criston and Javian, ignoring the Saedran chartsman as irrelevant. “He is a deceiver! Ondun exiled him. We can’t trust anything he says.”

Mailes gave a bittersweet chuckle. “Oh, Ondun exiled me, all right. He demanded that I stay here and watch for him to return. What an arrogant, petulant person! After he managed to rid himself of me, Ondun tried to patch up his relationship with Iyomelka, even got her pregnant, but she fled Terravitae. That was when Ondun sent his sons after her…but they couldn’t find the girl either, so he left.”

Hannes was filled with disgust. “That is not why Ondun departed from Terravitae!”

Mailes gave him a curious frown. “Why are you so frightened of the truth, Prester? I knew Ondun. I have been here in this tower for all the centuries your civilization has existed. I might be the only true witness left alive in the whole world—there were very few of our people remaining, even that long ago. Do you not welcome a chance to correct your misunderstandings?”

“I have no misunderstandings,” Hannes said.

“That is your greatest misunderstanding!” With a chuckle, Mailes began to eat his fish, chewing mechanically, and tore a chunk of bread from the nearest loaf.

Hannes was so angry he was rendered speechless. Criston was also at a loss. Aldo asked, “How do you know so much about us?”

Instead of looking at the Saedran, Mailes fixed the prester with his gaze. “I have watched all of you, all your lives. I
know
you, Prester Hannes. I know where you have been, and what you have done. I watched you burn Urecari churches in Uraba. I watched you poison kegs of wine at the feast of the soldan of Inner Wahilir. I saw you strangle Asha, the wife of Soldan-Shah Imir—a woman who had only tried to help you.”

“They were Urecari!”

“They were still people.”

“I was improving the world, in the name of Ondun.” He crossed his arms over his chest, and Mailes simply raised his eyebrows at the defense.

Javian and Sen Aldo looked stunned by the revelations, though Criston already knew about the mayhem the prester had caused in his years of wandering Uraba. Hannes had been rather proud of what he had accomplished. After learning what the Urecari raiders did to Windcatch, to Adrea, to his unborn child, Criston felt little sympathy for them. He couldn’t blame the prester for his hatred.

Mailes continued, drawing satisfaction from his recitation. “I saw you in the church of Urec during the Ishalem fire, I saw you escape from the Gremurr mines and struggle over the mountains. I saw Criston Vora save you. I saw you stir up violence against King Sonhir and his people, leading a mutiny aboard the
Dyscovera
. I saw what you did to the obelisk on the island. Need I go on?”

Despite his anger, the prester refuted none of Mailes’s statements. “How can you know these things?”

“As I said, I am here in my lighthouse. I observe the world.” The old man turned his smile to Criston. “And you, Captain Criston Vora—I watched you kiss your Adrea goodbye when you sailed away on the
Luminara
. I saw you floating on your raft of wreckage and cheered when you hooked a sea serpent that towed you to rescue. I saw you become a hermit in the mountains. I cried along with you when your beloved dog died.”

Criston swallowed hard. All the memories of his life pressed down upon him like a heavy snowfall.

“And Sen Aldo na-Curic—let me tell you that your wife and children are doing well. Your sister remains unmarried, finding fault with every suitor who comes. Your brother still does not know what profession to choose. I must say that the Mappa Mundi your father has been painting is most impressive.”

Tears sparkled in the chartsman’s dark eyes.

Javian blanched in superstitious terror. “Captain, who is this man? Does he mean us harm? How does he know all these secrets? A man’s life is his own, not a puppet show to share with everyone else.”

Mailes just chuckled. “It is the only diversion I have, and not all secrets are bad, young man.” He rose from his chair and went to the curving staircase again. “Let me show you, if you will have a look. Come to the top of my tower.” Leaving their flavorless banquet, he led the four men up another winding staircase to the top of the dizzying tower.

In the center of the turret chamber, a thick crucible held a ball of magical flame that blazed but consumed no fuel. The yellow-white fire danced against the dish of a large mirror that rotated slowly, directing the beacon along a circuit of the horizon.

More volume-filled shelves covered the walls of the room. On a small table, a tome lay open, its pages covered with line after line of tiny words. Sen Aldo hurried over to gaze down at the letters and drawings.

Mailes explained, “I write down what I see—and I see everything.” He walked to a brass stand that held a large circular lens on a swivel. He grasped the handles on either side and peered through. “I watch every land, all the people. I witness them going about their lives, since I no longer have a life of my own. Some parts of the world are forbidden to me, such as Terravitae and my own people—Ondun being petulant again. I am condemned only to observe, but I can see anyone, anywhere. Would you like to have a look?”

He turned the lens from side to side, pressing his eye closer. Then he glanced back at Criston. His lips quirked in a smile. “In fact, Captain, I know you will be most pleased to learn that your wife Adrea still lives.”

The
Al-Orizin

The
Al-Orizin
sailed through the sea of icebergs for two more days, barely managing to stay out of sight of Iyomelka’s ship.

Ystya followed Saan whenever he went out on deck. “If I can sense my mother, then she must know I am here as well. She will never give up.”

Saan looked into her eyes and gave her a reassuring smile. “And I promise
I
won’t give up either.”

He climbed up to sit with Yal Dolicar, who was taking his turn in the lookout nest. Both men wrapped themselves in blankets and stared out at the waters. Dolicar’s teeth chattered. “I’ve traveled throughout Uraba and Tierra, and once I went all the way to miserable Iboria Reach, but I have never been as cold as this.” When Saan reached out to take the spyglass with his cloth-wrapped hand, Dolicar warned, “Take care, Captain. It’s so cold the metal will freeze to your eyelid. I doubt you want a spyglass attached permanently to your face.”

Saan cautiously peered through the eyepiece, sweeping the sea around them. Large sections of ice calved off from the nearest berg and splashed into the water. Spray drenched the shivering crew on deck, who shouted in dismay.

Dolicar rubbed his hands together under the white steam of his exhalation. “I have a proposal for you, Captain—if you finish my shift for me, I’ll pay you one of the coins I took from the ice-locked ship.”

Saan’s lips quirked in a smile. “I never said you could keep those coins in the first place.”

Yal Dolicar shrugged. “Then I’ll split them with you. You’re the captain.”

Saan laughed. “Yes, I’m the captain. I have other duties besides chatting.” He took his leave and climbed down from the lookout nest.

By the time he got back to his cabin, his fingers were numb. When he closed the door behind him, relieved to feel the warmth, he was happy to find Sen Sherufa and Ystya huddled there, studying charts.

Over the past two days, the Saedran woman had carefully thawed the ice that covered the chart table salvaged from the ancient ship. Slowly and gently, she removed the frozen layer until she could peel away the chart underneath. After flattening and drying it, she spread the chart beside the ancient Map of Urec that Saan had brought along.

Ystya stood up, excited. “We’ve figured out something important—the maps match up.”

Sen Sherufa was not one to speculate, but she also seemed convinced. “I can’t decipher the frozen captain’s language after all, but his drawings are careful and detailed.” She pointed at the rough chart. “Look here, a sea of floating ice mountains. And they’re on Urec’s Map, too.”

Saan bent closer to look. On the fringe of Urec’s Map next to stylized drawings of curved waves, illustrations depicted white mountains floating in the sea. From studying this relic before, Saan had always thought those drawings were a chain of islands, assuming that either the ink color had faded or that they represented snowcapped peaks. Now that Sherufa compared them with the frozen captain’s charts, he realized that the white mountains were indeed the icebergs in this frozen sea. “That’s the connection we’ve been waiting for! Now we can mark
our
ship’s position on Urec’s Map and follow it all the way to Terravitae.”

“Oh, we are close,” Ystya said. “We will be in open water again soon, and then we can chart a straight course to Terravitae.”

He hugged Ystya, wrapped himself in a blanket, and wrapped his hands in warm cloths. “You two continue your work and keep my cabin warm. We have a course to set.”