The Wizard (32 page)

me enough, anyway. I saidI'm a friend of Toug's, and I think Etela thought Toug must have told me about Org. I saw him once or twice when we were in Utgard." Svon added, "I suppose most of us did." I nodded, feeling Gylf press my leg. "So I thought it might help Toug if Org were to saynot to everyone, just to the ones that matterthat he'd killed the king." This was an entirely new idea. I said, "You think Toug did it, and he's feeling guilty? I assure you, he didn't." "No. Not at all." Svon cleared his throat. "He was with Wistan the first time King Gilling was stabbed. Isn't that correct, Wistan?" Wistan nodded. "And he was fighting beside me when the king was killed, so it's quite impossible. But Wistan thinks others believe him guilty." "Her Majesty." Wistan added, "His Lordship, too. Her father. He won't say it, but he does, and thinks he can't believe Sir Svon and me because we're his friends. I'mI am his friend. So it's true. If I thought he'd done it, I'd lie to save him." Svon said, "I wouldn't. Why are you looking around?" "The air stirred. It hasn't since this fog came. Gylf wanted to tell me something a minute ago, and I imagine that was what it was." My hand was on his head; I felt his nod. "It wasn't a breeze, but on a ship, sometimes, when you're becalmed, a sail stirs and everyone looks and smiles. Soon it stirs again, if you're lucky. The thing that stirs it isn't really a wind, only air that's been moved by a wind far away. But you're desperate for wind, and when the sail stirs you know one's on the way." "May your words reach the ears of Overcyns," Svon said. I had not thought him religious, and I said so. "I felt they'd betrayed Sir Ravd and me. You're going to ask if I expected them to fight beside me. Yes, I suppose I did. I've outgrown that, or hope I have." He turned to Wistan. "Becoming a knight does it. That and wounds." Wistan said, "He's trying to protect me, Sir Able, so I'd better tell you. Squires have honor to uphold too." "Of course they do." "I thought his ogrecould you send him away now?" "He bothers you." "Yes, sir. He does. Will you, Sir Able?" I shook my head. "I'd sooner send you, Wistan. Say what you have to say, and go." "I thought Org had killed the king. He says he didn't." Weary with standing and weary with waiting, I leaned upon Eterne. "Go on." "Anyway I thought he had, and Etela told me he belonged to Sir Svon. So went to Sir Svon and said if Org confessed to Queen Idnn and her father, and of course to His Grace, I didn't think they'd punish him, and Toug wouldn't think they thought he had done it anymore." "You should say 'Her Majesty' not Queen Idnn." "I will, Sir Able. For a minute I forgot. Well, Sir Svon said he didn't think his ogre had done it, but we'd find him and ask him. So we went, you know, out here in the wood, and he called him, andand . . ." "He came." "Yes, sir." Wistan gulped. "I mean Sir Able. I never had seen him up close. But he wouldn't say he did it, even after Sir Svon explained. So I wanted him just to say it, to tell them he did even if he didn't. That's when you came." "I understand, but I wish you were half as concerned for Toug's safety as you are for the state of his feelings. He's lost in this with Lady Lynnet, Etela, and Vil, it seems, and the four of them may meet with something worse than Orga nice steep drop, for example." "I hope not, Sir Able." "Or a bear, or any of a thousand other things. Would you like to meet Org when you were wandering in this?" Wistan shook his head and backed away. "Then return to the camp, directly and quickly. Sir Svon and I are about to send him away, as you asked." Wistan turned and ran. Svon gave me a tight-lipped smile. "He requires a bit of seasoning." "He does, but he's getting it. Toug requires rescuing, apparently, and he's not getting that." My mind touched Cloud's, but she had neither saddle nor bridle. "Will you send Org to look for him? And Lynnet and the rest?" Svon nodded and told Org to stand. He rose, and seemed larger than I had ever seen him. Uns had said he caught him young, but he had been so fearsome when I fought him that it had never occurred to me that he might not be full grown. "Org," Svon said, "I know you were listening. I don't want you to harm any of our party. Nod if you understand." Org nodded. "I want you to search this wood for Toug, and for Etela, Lynnet, and Vil. If you find them, bring them back unharmed. Do you understand?" Org nodded again. He had been dark, doubtless because Svon had told him to make himself visible; he grew fog-pale as Svon spoke. "Go now." Org vanished much more swiftly than Wistan had. "He won't harm them," Svon said, "or I don't think he will. It may depend on how hungry he is." I remarked that he had rescued Toug and Etela in the town beyond the walls of Utgard. "He fed well there," Svon told me. "There was always killing, and he killed half a dozen Angrborn when Sir Garvaon and I fought their champions. Their friends buried them, but he robbed the graves. He saysdo you want to hear this?" I told him to go ahead. "He says there's no better eating than a corpse that's been dead a week in a cold climate. Do you want him back?" I shook my head. "He's a useful follower, but . . ." I said I understood, and calling Gylf to me asked him to cast about for Toug's scent. "I should look for them myself," Svon said. "That's an amazing dog you have. He used to irritate me almost as much as Pouk, but I'd love to have him, or one like him." I said, "I hope that someday you will." "I doubt it, but it's pleasant to think about." The handsome, tight-lipped smile came and went. "Before I fetch my horse, will you answer one question? For old times' sake?" I said that ignorance would prevent my answering many questions and honor many others, but I would not lie to him. "Do you think I killed His Majesty?" "Certainly not." "I was fighting. Both times. Both times when he was stabbed, I was fighting. Had you thought of that?" I shook my head. "Well, I have." Svon looked troubled. "I've thought about it often, and even talked about it with Her Majesty. I could have done it so easily." "Yes," I said. "I suppose you could." "The first time, particularly, the night we fought his champions. My sword was in my hand. It was dark, and there was a great deal of noise and confusion. Pandemonium. Idnn has described it to you, I know." I nodded and added that Toug and others had as well. As I spoke we heard Gylf give tongue; he had struck the scent. I listened for a moment (as did Svon), and said that if the fog had not deceived me, he was already some distance away. "I'll get my horse," Svon said, and was soon lost to sight. Privately I hoped he would not become lost too. For an hour I did my best to follow Gylf's voice, a deep-throated bay when the trail was plain, small sounds when some vagary of terrain made it difficult. Just before I caught up with him, I heard the silver notes of a trumpet, faint and far through fog that swirled and thinned as the wind rose, telling Marder's folk to put out their fires and saddle up. Overtaking Gylf, I warned him that we might have trouble catching up even if we found Toug. More distinctly than usual he said, "Not alone." "Toug? No, of course not. Lynnet, Etela, and Vil are with him, or at least I hope they're still with him." "More." Gylf sniffed the ground again, and growled. I cannot say there was fear in that growl; but he grew larger and darker as I watched, and when he spoke again, turning to repeat that Toug and the others were not alone, his head was as big as my war saddle and his fangs longer than my hand. "Nor are you," a voice behind me said.

CHAPTER TWENTYSIX SEA DRAGONS

The slope descended for whole leaguesso it seemed to me. And if it did not, if I am somehow mistaken, it is because I have made the distance less than it was. How far to Aelfrice? No one asks, for all who know Aelfrice, even by repute, know that no man has found the league that will measure the way. How far to summer, sir? How many steps? How far to the dream my mother had? The trees grew great and greater, until those of the wood we had left behind us in Mythgarthr seemed shrubs. The fog, which had been thinning, darkened from white to yellow. Gylf sniffed the air, and I did the same and said, "The sea." "Does it please you, Lord?" Uri grinned at me, and I recalled all the fires we had fed together, the flying horror she had been, and the moaning Aelfmaid who had trembled in the lush grass beside the durian tree, red as sunset and too weak to rise. I found I was smiling. "It would if I weren't needed in Mythgarthr. How much time has passed while I idled here in Aelfrice? A year?" "Not an hour, Lord. You have only walked a few steps." "But I'll walk many more before I find my friends." "Not at all. Would you see them? Come with me." She led us through trees where no path ran, and out upon a point of naked rock, with swirling fog to either side. I protested that I could see nothing, and Gylf backed away to shelter among the trees again. "You will in a moment, Lord, when the fog lifts." Uri linked her arm with mine, perhaps to assure me that I need not fear the height, and I found her no Aelfmaid but a human woman, slender and naked, with a floating mass of hair like a smoky fire. A shower pelted us with rainand was gone. The fog parted; through the rent, I glimpsed the stone-strewn beach below, the white-maned waves that pounded it with every beat of my heart, and beyond them (where the water was no longer clear or green, but deepest blue) the head and shoulders, claws and wings, of a snow-white dragon greater than Grengarm. There are no words for the way I felt; if I were to say here that my heart sunk, or that I felt I had been gutted like a deer, what would that mean to you? Nor would it be true, since I felt far worse. Cold sweat ran down my face, and I leaned on my sword, fearful my knees would not support me. Uri spoke, but I did not reply Nor can I recall what she saidher voice was lovely, but the singing of a bird would have conveyed as much or more. The fog closed, and the white dragon was lost to view. "Bad! Bad! Bad!" That was Gylf, barking from the shelter of the trees. "Your master will not think so," Uri told him. "He has built his fame on the slaying of these creatures. Think of the joy in the Golden Hall!" Her arm held mine more tightly. "I had not meant you to see Kulili so, Lord. And yet" "You're glad I did, so you can bear witness to my fear and shame." I tried to turn to go, but she grappled my arm, and upon that narrow outcrop I did not wish to oppose her. "Not glad. Amused. Kulili has defied armies." "You would frighten me more, if you could." "You are my lord." She turned to look me in the face; and her own held beauty beyond that of mortal women, though her eyes were yellow fire. "If you fear her you will not fight her, and if you do not fight her you will live. I have bantered with you often, Lord." "Too often." I watched the swirling fog, fearful that it would part again. If I had seen the white dragon when it did, I might have thrown Uri from the precipice and fled. "As you say. I am not bantering now. A second death for you, here, may mean oblivion. Do you think to ascend beyond your Valfather?" I shook my head. "Nor will you, Lord, if you die againhere or in Mythgarthryou may perish utterly. This I hold is that part of the Able who was which survived." "Sir Able," I told her. "You demean yourself!" I watched the fog in silence. "Garvaon and Svon are knights. 'Sir Garvaon,' they say, and 'Sir Svon,' and bask in your reflected glory." "As those who come after us will bask in ours." "You're going to fight Kulili anyway, aren't you? You're going to fight her alone and perish from the world." I did not speak; but in my mind Gawain knelt again, baring his neck. "Did you see Garsecg and the rest?" "No," I said. "The Isle of Glas?" That surprised me. I confessed that I had not, but only the white dragon. Nothing more. "Then we must stay. Garsecg and some Sea Aelf wait on the beach, but we must remain until you see the isle, so you will know that Garsecg's words are true." "He is a demon out of Muspel," I said. "He was your friend, and would be your friend again if you would permit it." "Baki wanted me to come here and kill him." "I have seen, Lord, that you will not." I did not believe then, and do not believe now, that Uri had power over the fog, which had been thinning as we spoke. Whether or not she possessed such power, the fog cleared a little. The white dragon had vanished beneath the waves. Far off I beheld the Tower of Glas, and its top (which had been lost in cloud when I had seen it in Garsecg's company) was just visible where it rose into Mythgarthr. At the sight I understood as never before that the land we walk on there, and the sea we sail on there, are in sober fact the heaven of Aelfrice. I saw the Isle, the tops of a few trees, and its beach. Five tiny figures waited there; and though they were so small, I knew that they were Vil, Toug, Etela, Lynnet, and another. One waved to me. Perhaps I should write here of our descent of the cliffs to the beach below. I will not, because I recall so little. Disiri, Gawain, and Berthold swam through my mind, with the Valfather and many another, one of them a boy who had lain in the grass of the Downs and seen a hundred strange things in clouds, a flying castle among them. Garsecg greeted us, in form a venerable man of the Sea Aelf, as I had first seen him and seen him most often. He embraced me as a father,and I him. "They have slandered me to you," he said, "and I dared not come to you. You would have slain me." I swore that I would not. "Uri and Baki told you I was Setr, and you believed it." "They are your slaves," I said, "though they pretend to be mine. How could I not believe it?" Another man of the Aelf (as it appeared) came near. "If he denied it, would you credit him?" His eyes were endless night, his tongue a flame. "If he is Setr," I said, "Setr is not as I was told." Garsecg nodded. "I am Setr. Let us leave these others, and sit alone for a moment. I will explain everything." We left them, walking a hundred paces or so along the beach. When we had seated ourselves upon stones, I whistled Gylf to me. "It would be better," Garsecg said, "if we were two." "Setr cannot fear a dog." He shrugged. "Setr fears interruption, as all do who must unravel complexities. It was I who taught you of the strength of the sea. Do you acknowledge that?" "I do. I have never denied it." "Not even to the Valfather?" "Least of all to him." I wished then, and mightily, that he stood at my side. Not because I longed for his spear, but because I longed for his wisdom, which surpasses that of all other men. "You have said you are my friend, Sir Able, and those words I will treasure always." Garsecg fell silent, staring out to sea, where mist mingled with white spume. "Let me unravel what has occurred here. There is much that is wrong, and I am to blame for much of it. I had plans. They went awry. Such things, I hope, do not befall you." "Only too often they do." My eyes had followed his, and I was looking at the Tower of Glas; it seemed far indeed, and I could no longer see the isle at its summit. "I am of Muspel. So was Grengarm, whom you slew." I waited. "You are a man of Mythgarthr, and a good man. Are all the men of Mythgarthr good? I do not ask whether they are all as good as youI know they cannot be. Only whether they are good at all." "I would like to think there is some good in the worst of them." "But on balance?" I thought then of Master Thope. He had sought to save me when the duke's knights would have killed me. For that effort to protect the duke's honor, he had been stabbed in the back. "On balance," I said, "many who think themselves good are not." "Just so. You have been to Skai. I have not. Let us leave aside the Giants of Winter and Old Night. They are for the most part evil as I understand it, and some say they are entirely so. We will not speak of them. Among the Overcyns, are there some in whom the worse part outweighs the better?" I explained that there was said to be one at least, and that the restthough they punished himdid not take his life for his brothers' sake. "Here in Aelfrice?" "The Aelf are worse than we, if anything." "So in Muspel. There are many who are strong and very wise, though not good. Grengarm was neither the strongest nor the worst. They plotted to seize this fair world and despoil it. I tried to dissuade them, for the Aelf should be the objects of our reverence, as the Overcyns are yours. I tried, as I say. I failed." He sighed so that my heart went out to him. "When I saw at last that it was no use, I determined to frustrate them. I came here." He spread his hands, mocking himself with a wry smile. "Humbly, I warned the Aelf of their danger. Some believed me, but most did not. They are divided into many clans, as you must know. I warned them that if they did not unite against us they must fall to us one by one. Those who had refused to credit me refused to credit that as well. Among those who believed, some would not merge clans with the rest. Your Queen Disiri was one of those. You see I am being completely honest with you." "You were my friend," I told him, "when I was wounded and needed one badly. Now I must ask about other friends, those upon the Isle of Glas. How did they get there?" Garsecg shrugged. "They wandered into Aelfrice. So you did as a boy, not so long ago." I nodded. "My friends and I would have sent them home, but the white dragonperhaps you saw itsnatched them from us and carried them to the Isle of Glas." "You want me to fight that thing." "Certainly not! Did I say so? You would be killed." I looked at him sharply. "You asked me how they got there." Garsecg laid a hand on my shoulder, a firm touch and a friendly one. "You should have asked how you yourself came here. I sent Uri to fetch you, realizing you would want to know of their plight. I intend to recapture my tower if I can. And if I can, I will mount to its top and see to their welfare. But events here move slowly, while time flows swiftly in your Mythgarthr." "Which is where they are." "Exactly. For them, decades may pass while I collect an army. You have influence in Mythgarthr. You might collect a force there and sail to their rescue. Such was my thought. If you would prefer to join us here, we would be delighted to have you." I considered the matter for as long as it might take a man to pray, watching the farthest breakers so that I would not see Garsecg's eyes. My whole life, it seemed to me, was wrapped up in thismy knighthood, the Valfather and the Lady, even Disiri. At last I said, "You are a dragon of Muspel. Isn't that your true shape?" Garsecg nodded. "It is, though my sire was a king in Mythgarthr." "And your friends. Aren't they dragons of Muspel too?" "Some are. Some are of the Sea Aelf, as they appear." "Cannot several dragons defeat one?" "We will try, leading an army of the Aelf. You have seen me as a dragon. Was I as large as the white dragon?" "Not nearly. That was your true shape?" I took off my helmet as I spoke, and laid it on the shingle. "It was." I pulled my hauberk over my head; its links were so fine that I could store the whole of it in my helmet, and that was what I did, admiring it for what might well be the last time and wondering whether it was the wearing that brought its blessing or mere ownership. Grengarm had owned it, after all. "Are you going to swim out there?" Garsecg asked. "You know I am. I have sworn to fight Kulili." I undressed, and explained to Gylf that he would have to guard my armor and my clothing, and that he was to trust no one. He would not speak, but bared his teeth at Garsecg to show he understood. No more than Skai is Aelfrice like Mythgarthr. I have tried to show you how different it is; but I know that I have failed. At this point in my story, Ben, I have to confess that even I had not known just how different it was until I drew Eterne. The sound of her blade leaving the scabbard became a wind. (You cannot imagine this.) That wind snatched away such fog as remained. In Aelfrice, one never sees the sun. But there is light; and as the fog vanished, that light waxed until the whole sea flashed like a mirror. Over it flew ships of the olden time, long ships with many oars like wings, and embroidered sails red and black and green and gold, and high prows and high sterns of painted wood. At stern and prow stood the knights of Eterne, real as I myself was real. Their armor, the blades of the swords they held (those were Eterne too), and their smiles gleamed and glinted in that light. Still grasping Eterne, I dove into the sea. It is no easy thing to swim while holding a heavy sword. I did my best, swimming mostly underwater with my legs and my left arm for oars. The advantage I had (and it was a great one) was that the water did not drown me, but received me graciously. I cannot say that I breathed it as I breathed air ashoreI was never conscious of breathing at all. Perhaps I drew breath through my skin; or perhaps breath was not necessary to me as long as I remained there. Sharks came like shadows, swift and silent. One, then two, then three; the third was of monstrous size. I knew that though I might kill one, I could never kill all three if they attacked me together. Desperate, I slashed the nearest. Eterne's fabled blade severed head from tail, releasing a storm of dark blood and a dozen foulnesses. The remaining sharks fell upon it like hawks, and I swam for the surface as a dying man swims for Skai. The ships of the Knights of the Sword were there and all about me, one not half a bowshot off. I had not thought them real, and had never supposed I might climb aboard one. But climb on board I did, and it was a wondrous thing to stand dripping upon the deck of such a ship, a ship rowed not by convicts but by bearded warriors in leather byrnies studded with bronze, men of mighty arms whose eyes flashed like ice. "I am Sir Hunbalt," said the knight to me. "I welcome you to our company." We clasped hands and embraced. Soon the white dragon surfaced. We went for it with arrow and spear, though I could do nothing until we closed. There was a ram beyond the prow; I stood on it holding the carven figurehead with my free hand while the oars beat behind me like the white wings of the griffin, and churned the sea to foam. "Disiri!" I shouted. "For Disiri!" It was by this, I would guess, that the white dragon knew me. The ship on which her jaws had closed fell from her mouth. Our eyes