The Scar (43 page)

Bending over her, he repeated the same questions several times; concentrating, she finally understood. “How can I help you? What do you need me to do?”

Even after they returned from the dank, raw night, she could not stop crying for a long time. She had radiated tears; she had drowned in their salty water like a dying sailor in the bosom of the sea. Egert, who had experienced a far greater shock that evening, held up better. He carried the shivering Toria for the last block before the university: her legs failed her and no longer desired to work. In her whole life only her father had ever carried her, and only in her remote childhood. She quieted and went limp, not helping Egert support her weight, but he stepped lightly as if he really were carrying a child or a small animal, as light as a feather, that had come to grief.

As he carried her, he felt each strained nerve, each quivering muscle, the beating of her heart, her fatigue and her distress. Then he pressed her more firmly to himself; he wanted to enfold her, to swath her in his own tenderness, to shelter, to warm, to protect.

The encounter with the dean, of which he was so afraid, passed without a single word. Submitting to Luayan, Egert helped Toria get into bed; a wailing old serving woman already waited nearby. The dean intently examined the guilt-ridden, tense Egert, but he never opened his mouth.

An ember prowled about the coals in the fireplace. Toria smiled faintly. The worst was far, far behind her; her present health, feverish and weakened, did not oppress her. On the contrary, she wished to dwell forever in this burning cloud, relishing her own frailty, serenity, and security.

“Tor. What can I do to help?”

Egert’s concern and anxiety pleased her. But her father … her father was always aware of everything.

The potion prepared by the dean steamed on the bedside table.

“It’s not all that serious,” whispered Toria, softly squeezing Egert’s hand. “There’s nothing to worry about. The medicine will help.”

He withdrew for a second to stoke the fireplace. The light flared up more brightly, and it seemed to Toria that Egert was now surrounded by copper tongues.

Laboriously, she sat up in her bed, holding the coverlet to her chest. “Give me the flask.”

Scooping the potion from his hands, she kneaded it into her temples for quite a long time. Soon she no longer had the strength to continue, but she did not think to summon the elderly nurse. Seeing that she was wearied, Egert offered yet again to help. Cautiously, overcoming his clumsiness, he proceeded to rub the ointment into the skin of her face and neck. The medicine smelled even more strong and bitter than wormwood warmed by the sun.

Her fever fell almost instantaneously, but instead of relief she again felt grief, and covered in sweat, she at first gave a short sob, then losing control over herself, she commenced to shake violently as tears streamed down her face.

Egert was at a loss. He considered running for the dean, but he could not release her quaking, moist hands. Egert leaned over the invalid, and his dry lips found first one tear-filled eye and then the other. Savoring the bitter taste in his mouth, he smoothed her disheveled, dark hair and drew his cheek against her cheek, scraping his scar along her skin. “Tor, look at me. Don’t cry.”

The fireplace burned evenly, and the warm potion smoked, having not yet cooled off completely. Murmuring something vague, tender, and soothing, Egert fondly stroked her neck, tracing the pattern of beauty marks with his finger, that memorable constellation that decorated the heavens of his disastrous dreams. Then he began to rub the ointment into her shoulders and slender arms, freed one after the other from beneath the coverlet. The room was warm, even sultry. Toria’s shaking gradually subsided, and she sobbed less frequently. Her breast, damp from sweat, still heaved under her thin chemise, forcing air in her lungs.

“Thank Heaven,” he whispered, feeling the sickly trembling leave her. “Thank Heaven. Everything will be all right. You really are better, aren’t you?”

Toria’s eyes seemed impenetrably black; her pupils were wide, like an animal’s at night. She stared at Egert, and her hands convulsively clenched the ends of the pulled-down coverlet. The fire burned down. It needed to be stoked again, but Egert did not have the will to leave her, not even for a second. It became dusky in the little room. Shadows danced, scattering ruddy light along the walls. Toria let out a lengthy sob and drew Egert to herself.

They curled into each other. Egert inhaled the bitter, unexpectedly pleasant odor of the medicine and held her lightly, fearing to squeeze her shoulders too intensely and thus inflict pain. Toria, blithely closing her eyes, nestled her nose into his shoulder. The fireplace died out and the darkness deepened.

Then his hand, tormented by its own audacity, reached under her chemise to her feverish breast, quaking from the beating of her heart.

It seemed to Toria that she was lying at the bottom of a reddish black, incandescent sea, and that tongues of flame were dancing over her head. She lost herself in the flames, refusing to think about anything else, and she ceased struggling against her mounting dizziness. Egert’s hand was transformed into a distinct living creature, which roamed along her body, and Toria experienced an ardent gratitude toward this affectionate creature, completely her own.

They dissolved into each other in a dreamy delirium. As they lay in the darkness, Egert realized suddenly that, even though he was a highly experienced lover, not once in his riotous youth had he experienced any feelings that even vaguely resembled this urgent desire to touch, to give warmth, to envelop.

The coverlet slipped off toward the wall. The gossamer fabric of her chemise became superfluous; Egert sheltered Toria from the outside world with his own body.

She abruptly awoke from her fantastic euphoria. Her physical relations with Dinar had gone no further than a few prudent kisses. Recognizing what was happening, she became frightened and froze under Egert’s caresses.

Instantly perceiving this, Egert pressed his lips to her ear. “What?”

She did not know how to explain. Distressed at her awkwardness, she artlessly ran her hand over his face. “I…”

He waited, gently placing her head on his shoulder. Fearing to insult him or surprise him, she could not find the words. She felt bashful and out of place.

Then, guessing what troubled her, he embraced her as firmly and as tenderly as he had never before embraced her or anyone else. Still full of fear and apprehension, she sobbed, grateful that there was no need to explain.

“Tor,” he whispered soothingly. “You’re afraid, aren’t you?”

She was indeed afraid. The night floated through the room, warmth radiated from the just-extinguished fireplace, and from Toria’s soul radiated a fondness and an almost childlike gratitude toward the man who understood everything without words.

He drew her to himself tenderly. “Don’t worry. Everything will be just as you wish, just as you say. Tor, what is it, why are you crying again?”

She suddenly recalled a dragonfly that had flown into her room when she was a child. Heavy and green, with dark eyes like round teardrops, it had rustled in the corner, chafing against the wall with its lacy wings. It flew up to the ceiling and fell almost to the very floor. “Beyond stupid,” her mother said with a laugh. “Catch it and let it loose outside.”

Where does this memory come from, and why?

Toria caught the dragonfly. Carefully, afraid to clench her hand too tight, she carried the poor thing out into the yard and let it go, following its flight with her gaze. For a long time afterwards she still felt the light tickling of the dragonfly’s wings and tiny feet on her palm.

She breathed nervously. This is happening today; this is happening right now. So many fears and hopes, so many dreams … This stood before her, waiting, and she would change; she would become a different person; she was afraid, but how could she be otherwise: this was inevitable, like the rising of the sun.

Egert again understood her without words. His joy communicated itself to her, drowning out her fear. From out of the darkness she heard her own happy laughter, which was immediately followed by a confused thought: Was it appropriate to laugh? Images of the dragonfly’s wings, lights beyond the river, snow sparkling in the sun all flashed before her eyes, and just as she lost herself in a new delirium, she had time to think, Now.

8

On a black, winter evening, Dean Luayan interrupted his usual work.

Ink was drying on an unfinished page, and a quill was poised in the dean’s motionless hand, but he sat, frozen behind his desk, unable to tear his gaze from a candle that was guttering in a candelabrum.

Beyond the window, the wet wind of a protracted thaw raged; in the fireplace, the fire burned in an even, hospitable manner. The dean sat, widening his eyes that were watery from strain. An impenetrable, nocturnal horror watched him from the flame, and the same horror rose to meet the dean from the depths of his soul.

The presentiment of a mage, even one who has not achieved the level of archmage, does not occur without reason. Now disaster was approaching so near that the dean’s hair stirred from its breath. Right now, already now perhaps, it was too late to salvage anything.

The Amulet!

He jumped up. The incantation that secured the safe released immediately, but the lock resisted for a long time, disobeying his shaking hands. Finally opening the jasper casket, Luayan, who had never been shortsighted, squinted his eyes.

The medallion was uncorrupted. Not a single spot of rust disfigured the gold disk. The medallion was clean, but the dean still gasped from the stench of impending doom.

Not trusting himself, he once again examined the medallion. Then he hid it, and lurching, he rushed to the door.

“Toria! Tor!”

He knew that she was nearby in her room because he had called upon her earlier for help, but now she appeared almost instantly, and she was almost as pale as he was himself: evidently, something in his voice had terrified her. “Father?”

Behind her he could distinguish the silhouette of Egert Soll. In the last few days the two of them had become inseparable. Heaven help them.

“Toria, and you, Egert, get me water from five sources. I will tell you which, and where they are. Take my lantern; it will not go out even under the strongest wind. You, Toria, put on your cloak. Quickly.”

If they wanted to ask him what was going on, they either could not or decided not to. The dean did not seem himself; Toria flinched upon meeting his gaze. Without saying a word, she took the five vials, which were attached to a belt. Egert swept her cloak over her shoulders, and as he did so she felt the affectionate, encouraging touch of his palm. A rotten winter without frost howled beyond the walls. Egert raised the burning lantern up high, Toria took hold of his arm, and they set out into the winter night.

As in a ritual, they crept from source to source: in all there were five. Thrice they had to gather the water from a pipe walled in stone, once from a small well in a courtyard, and once from the iron muzzle of a snake in an abandoned fountain. The five vials were full, the belt they were in weighed down Egert’s shoulder, and Toria’s cloak was soaked through when, staggering from exhaustion, they stepped back over the threshold of the dean’s study. Usually gloomy, on this night it was full of light. Rows of candles crowded on the desk, on the floor, were molded to the walls; the tongues of flame jumped and waved when the door opened, as if greeting the two who entered.

In the middle of the room stood a strangely shaped object with birdlike claws at the bottom; on top, three more claws supported a round, silver basin.

Obeying the impatient gesture of the dean, Egert retreated into the farthest corner and sat there, right on the floor. Toria arranged herself nearby on a low taboret.

The tongues of flame elongated more and more; their length was unnatural, strange to the eyes. The dean stood over the silver basin and poured each of the vials into it. His hands moved slowly upward; his lips, firmly set, did not move, but to Egert it seemed—though perhaps it was his fear that made it so—that in the stillness of the study, in the howling of the wind beyond the windows he heard sharp words that clawed at his hearing. The ceiling, on which patterns of shadows fused and then decayed, seemed choked with swarms of insects.

Something knocked against the window from outside. Egert, taut as a bowstring, shook convulsively. Toria rested her hand on his shoulder without looking at him.

The dean’s lips twisted, as if from strain. The flames of the candles stretched painfully and then diminished, regaining their usual shape. Standing motionless for a second longer, the dean whispered under his breath, “Draw near.”

It was as if the waters in the basin had never existed. There, where their surface should have been, rested a mirror, as silver and vivid as mercury. The Mirror of Waters, thought Egert as he stood transfixed.

“Why can’t we see anything?” Toria asked in a whisper.

Egert was almost resentful. For him, the mirror itself seemed miracle enough. However, at that very moment the silver haze shimmered, darkened, and then it was no longer a haze, but night, and a wind, the same wind that blew beyond the windows, whipped the branches of naked trees, and drew sparks torches, first one, then two, then three. Without trying to decipher the image, Egert marveled only that here in this small circular mirror something strange and secret was being reflected, something that was taking place who knows where. Entranced by the magic and by his own participation in the secret, he came to his senses only when he heard Toria cry out in a resonant voice, “Lash!”

That single, short word sobered Egert like a slap in the face. Obscure figures prowled in the mirror, and even in the meager light of the few torches, it was possible to distinguish hoods, some pulled low over the eyes and some flung down onto the shoulders. An entire troop of soldiers of Lash was for some reason swarming about in the night, permitting the wind to torment and harass the hems of their long robes.