Jack Of Shadows (12 page)

"I don't know what to tell you," she said. "I thought it was the right thing to do-when I went looking for it and found it-to bring it to you and give it to you."

"Why?"

"I told you long ago that the Baron was always kind to old Rosie. You hung him upside down and opened his belly when you took his realm. I cried, Jack. He was the only one who'd been kind to me for a long while.- I'd heard much of your doings, and none of what I heard was good. With the power you have, it is so easy to hurt so many; and you have been doing it. I thought that if I went and found you a soul it might soften your disposition."

"Rosalie, Rosalie." He sighed. "You're a fool. You meant well, but you're a fool."

"Perhaps," she answered, squeezing her hands together tightly and looking back at the soul, which stood staring.

"Soul," said Jack, turning toward it again, "you've been listening. Do you have any suggestions?"

"I have only one desire."

"What is that?"

"To be united with you. To go through life with you, comforting and cautioning, and-"

"Wait a moment," said Jack, raising his hand. "What does it require for you to be united wit me?"

"Your consent."

Jack smiled. He lit a cigarette, his hands ? trembling slightly.

"What if I were to withhold my consent?" he asked.

"Then I would become a wanderer. I would follow you at a distance, unable to comfort you and caution you, unable-"

"Great," said Jack. "I withhold my consent. Get out of here."

"Are you joking? That's a hell of a way to treat a soul. Here I am, waiting to comfort and caution you, and you kick me out. What will people say? There goes Jack's soul,' they'll say, 'poor thing. Consorting with elementals and lower astrals and-' "

"Clear out," Jack said. "I can do without you. I know all about you sneaky bastards. You make people change. Well, I don't want to change. I'm happy the way I am. You're a mistake. Go back to the Dung Pits. Go wherever you want. Do whatever you want. Just go away. Leave me alone."

"You really mean it."

"That's right. I'll even get you a pretty new crystal, if you would prefer curling up inside one of those."

"It is too late for that."

"Well, that is the best I can offer."

"If you do not wish to be united with me, please do not throw me out like a vagabond. Let me stay here with you. Perhaps I can comfort and caution and counsel this way, and then you might see my value and change your mind."

"Get out!"

"What if I refuse to go? What if I simply force my attentions upon you?"

"Then," said Jack, "I would expose you to the most destructive powers of the Key, sections I've never essayed before."

"You would destroy your own soul?"

"You're damned right! Go away!"

It turned then toward the wall and vanished.

"So much for souls," said Jack. "Now we'll find you a chamber and some servants, and we'll see a feast prepared."

"No," she said. "I wanted to see you. Very well, I've seen you. I wanted to bring you a thing, and I've delivered it. That is all."

She began to rise.

"Wait," said Jack. "Where will you go?"

"My time as the Wise Woman of the Eastern Marches having passed, I am returning to the Sign of the Burning Pestle on the coach road by the sea. Mayhap I will find some young tavern wench to nurse me when I grow feeble. I'll teach her of the Art in return for this. "

"Stay awhile, at least," he said. "Rest, eat..."

"No. I do not like this place."

"If you are determined to go, allow me to send you by an easier means than walking."

"No. Thank you."

"May I give you money? "

"I would be robbed of it."

"I will send an escort."

"I wish to travel alone. "

"Very well, Rosalie."

He watched her depart and then moved to the hearth, where he kindled a small fire.

Jack worked on his Assessment, becoming an increasingly prominent figure in it, and he consolidated his rule of the night. During this time, he saw countless statues of himself raised in the land. He heard his name on the lips of ballad singers and poets-not in the old rhymes and songs of his roguery, but in tellings of his wisdom and his might. On four occasions did he allow the Lord of Bats, Smage, Quazer, the Baron and Blite to return partway from Glyve, before he sent them back again, each time in a different fashion. He had decided to exhaust their allotted lives and so be rid of them forever.

Evene danced and laughted at the feast Jack gave in honor of her father's return. Wrists still a-tingle, he raised in toast a wine from the cellar that had once been his.

"To the Lord and Lady of Shadow Guard," he said. "May their happiness and their reign endure as long as there is night to cover us! "

Then the Colonel Who Had Never Been Slain By Another quaffed it, and there was merriment.

High on Panicus, a part of Panicus, Morningstar regarded the east.

A soul wandered the night, cursing.

A fat dragon wheezed as he bore a sheep toward his distant den.

A beast in a twilit swamp dreamed of blood.

THEN CAME THE time of the true breaking of the Compact.

It grew cold, and he consulted the Book. He found the names of those whose turn had come. He waited and watched, but nothing occurred.

Finally, he summoned those dark Lords before him.

"Friends," he said, "it is yor turn for Shield duty. Why have you not done it?"

"Sir," said the Lord Eldridge, "we agreed refuse it."

"Why?"

"You broke it yourself," he said. "If cannot have the world the way that it was, would like it to remain the way that it is. That is to say, on the pathway to destruction. Slay us if you wish, but we will not lift a hand. If you are such a mighty magician, repair the Shield yourself. Slay us, and watch the dying."

"You heard his request," Jack said to a servant. "See that they are slain."

"But sir-"

"Do as I say."

"Yes."

"I will attend to the Shield myself."

So they were taken and slain.

And Jack went forth.

On the top of a nearby mountain, he considered the problem. He felt the cold; he opened his being; he found the flaws in the Shield.

Then he began sketching the diagrams. With the point of his blade, he scratched them on a rock. They smoldered as he did so and then began to glow. He recited words from the Key.

"Uh-hello."

He whirled, raising the blade.

"It's just me."

He lowered it, and gusts of icy wind went by.

"What do you want, soul?"

"I was curious as to what you were doing. I sometimes follow you around, you know."

"I know. I don't like it."

He returned his attention to the diagram.

"Will you tell me?"

"All right," he said, "if it will keep you from whining around-"

"I'm a lost soul. We do whine."

"Then do it all you want. I don't care."

"But the thing you are doing ..."

"I am about to repair the Shield. I think I have the spells worked out."

"I do not believe that you can."

"What do you mean?"

"I do not think it can be done by a single individual."

"Well, let's find out."

"May I help?"

"No!"

He returned to the pattern, elaborated upon it with his sword blade and continued his incantations. The winds went by and the fires flowed.

"Now I have to go," he said. "Stay out of my way, soul."

"All right. I just want to be united with you."

"Maybe sometime when life gets boring-but not now."

"You mean that there is hope?"

"Perhaps. Not at the present time, however."

Then Jack stood upright and regarded what he had done.

"Didn't work, did it?"

"Shut up."

"You failed."

"Shut up."

"Do you want to be united with me?"

"No!"

"Maybe I could have helped you."

"Try it in hell."

"Just asking."

"Leave me alone."

"What will you do now?"

"Go away!"

He raised his hands and buried the power. It failed.

"I can't do it," he said.

"I knew that. Do you know what to do now?"

"I'm thinking."

"I know what to do."

"What?"

"Go check with your friend Morningstar. He knows lots of things. I believe he could advise you."

Jack lowered his head and stared at the smoldering pattern. The wind was chill.

"Perhaps you are right," he said.

"I feel certain that I am."

Jack swirled his cloak about him.

"I go now to walk in shadows," he said.

And Jack walked among shadows until he came to the place. Then he climbed.

When he reached the summit, he moved toward Morningstar and said, "I am here."

"I know."

"You also know what I desire?"

"Yes."

"Can it be accomplished?"

"It is not impossible."

"What must I do?"

"It will not be easy."

"I did not feel it would be. Tell me."

Morningstar shifted his great bulk slightly.

And then he told him.

"I don't know that I can do it," Jack said.

"Someone must."

"Do you know of anyone else? Someone I might appoint?"

"No."

"Are you able to foretell my success or failure?"

"No. One other time I spoke of your shadows."

"Yes, I recall."

There was silence on the mountain. "Goodbye, Morningstar," Jack said. "Thank you."

"Farewell, Jack."

Turning, Jack moved into the shadows.

He entered the great hole that led to the heart of the world. In places, there were patches of light on the walls of the tunnel. Then he would enter into shadow and advance great distances in a brief time. In other places, the darkness was absolute and he went as others go.

Occasionally, there were strangely furnished side galleries and dark doorways. He did not pause to explore these. Infrequently, he heard the scurrying of clawed feet and the clatter of

hooves. Once he passed an open hearth in which bones were burning. Twice he heard screams like those of a woman in pain. He did not pause, but loosened his blade in his scabbard.

He passed a gallery wherein a gigantic spider clung to the center of a rope-like web. It began to stir. He ran.

It did not pursue, but after a time he heard laughter far to his rear.

When he paused to refresh himself, he saw that the walls of that place were damp and mold-encrusted. He heard a sound like the flow of a distant river. Tiny crab-like creatures fled from him and clung to the walls.

Advancing farther, he encountered pits and crevasses from which noxious fumes arose; occasionally, flames leaped from one of these.

It was long before he came to the bridge of metal just a handspan in width. He looked into the abyss it crossed and saw only blackness. He poised himself, balanced carefully and passed slowly onward. He sighed when he set foot on the far side, and he did not turn and look back.

The walls of the tunnel widened and vanished now, and the ceiling rose into invisibility. Dark masses of varying density moved about him, and while he could at any time have created a small light to guide him, he feared to do so, because it could attract whatever was passing. A large light could be managed as well, but its existence would be brief; the moment he entered

the world of the shadows it created it would cease to be, and he would stand in darkness once more.

For a time he feared he had entered a gigantic cavern and had gone astray there; but a ribbon of white appeared before him, and he held it with his eyes and continued to advance. When, after a long while, he came upon it, he saw that it was a large black pond with lights like fish scales glimmering upon it, cast from the faintly glowing fungus that covered the walls and roof of the cavern.

As he circled the pool, heading for a patch of great darkness beyond its opposite shore, there came a thrashing within the water. His blade was in his hand as he turned.

Having now been discovered, he spoke the words which caused an illumination to appear above the pool. A large ripple arrowed in his direction, as though a great bulk moved beneath it. From either of its sides now, a clawed tentacle rose, black and dripping, and extended itself ii his direction.

He squinted against the light he had created and raised up his blade for a double-handed blow.

He spoke the quickest charm he knew to grant him strength and accuracy. Then, as soon as the nearest tentacle came within striking range, he swung and cut through it. It fell near his left

boot, still writhing, struck against him and caused him to fall.

At this, he counted himself fortunate. For as he fell, the second tentacle slashed through the space his head and shoulders had occupied a moment before.

Then a round face, perhaps three feet in diameter, blank-eyed and crowned with a mass of writhing strands as thick as his thumb, exploded above the water, opened a large hole in its lower portion and moved toward Jack.

Not rising from where he lay, Jack swung the blade and pointed it directly at the thing, holding it with both hands, and he repeated words from the Key as rapidly as his mouth could form them.

His blade began to glow, there came a sputtering sound, then a stream of fire began to flow from the point of the weapon.

Jack moved the blade in a slow circle and the stench of burning flesh soon reached his nostrils.

Still, the creature continued to advance, until Jack saw the whiteness of its many teeth. Its good tentacle and the stub of its severed one flailed wildly, striking dangerously near. The beast gave a hissing, spitting sound. At that moment, Jack raised the blade, so that the fire fell upon the things that writhed on top of it.

With a sound that was almost like a sob, it threw itself backward into the pool.

Its bulk raised a wave that washed over Jack. But before it struck him and the beast vanished into the depths, he saw the creature's backside; and it was not the coldness of the water that caused him to shudder.

Rising then, he dipped his blade into the pool and repeated a spell to intensify a thousandfold the power he had called into the weapon. With this, the blade began to vibrate in his hands so that he could scarcely hold it. Yet he braced himself and stood there, the light blazing above and the stilled tentacle beside him.

The more he feared the power he had summoned, the longer it seemed that he stood there, and perspiration covered him like a sudden extra warm garment.

Then, with a hissing that was near to a shriek, half the creature's bulk rose with a rush of waters above the pool's center. As it vanished below once more. Jack did not move, but maintained his stance until the pool began to boil.

The creature did not rise again.

Jack did not eat until he had circled the pool and entered the far tunnel; and he knew that he dare not sleep. He strengthened himself with drugs and continued on.

Coming to a region of fires, he was attacked by a hairy man-beast and its mate. But he stepped into shadow, mocking them as they strove to reach him. Not wishing to waste time with torment and death, however, he renounced this pleasure and caused the shadows to transport him to their farthest limit.

The region of fires was vast, and a moment later when Jack stood at its far edge, he knew he was nearing his goal. There, he prepared himself for the next place of danger he must pass.

After a long walk, he began to detect the odors, reminding him of the Dung Pits of Glyve and something even more foul. He knew that soon he would be able to see again, though there would be no light and, consequently, no shadows into which he might escape. He rehearsed the necessary things.

The odors increased in intensity, until he fought with his stomach to retain what it held.

Then a gradual vision came into his eyes, unlike normal sight.

He saw a dank land of rocks and caverns, and all over it a certain mournful brooding lay. It was a still place, where mists twined slowly through the air and among the rocks, where faint vapors hung over large puddles of still water, where the odors and mists and vapors clotted together a brief distance overhead, to rain an occasional silent moment, redistributing the filth across the land. Beyond these things, there was nothing to be seen; and a bone-touching chill was everywhere.

He moved as quickly as he dared.

Before he had gone a great distance, he detected the slightest of movements to his left. He saw that in one of the normally still puddles a tiny, dark creature covered with warty protuberances had hopped forth and now sat staring at him, unblinking.

Drawing his blade, he touched it lightly with its tip and took a rapid step backward, expecting what might occur. The air exploded as the creature was transformed. It lowered above him on crooked, black legs; it had no face, no apparent depth of body, but existed as if it were drawn in outline with the darkest of inks. Those were not feet it stood upon. Its tail twitched as it spoke.

"Give me your name, that comes this way," said the voice that chimed like the silver bells of Krelle.

"None may have my name ere I have his," said Jack.

A soft laughter emerged from the outline of a horned head.

Then, "Come, come now! I wish to hear a name," it said. "I have no patience."

"Very well, then," said Jack; and he spoke one.

It fell to its knees before him.

"Master," it said.

"Yes," Jack replied. "That is my name. Now must you obey me in all things."

"Yes."

"Now I charge you by that which I spoke, to bear me upon your back to the ultimate bounds of your realm, leading downward, until you are able to pass no farther, nor any others of your kind. Nor will you betray me to any of your kin or comrades."

"I will do as you have said."

"Yes."

"Repeat it back to me as an oath."

This was done.

"Bend now lower that I may mount you and you be my steed."

He leaped onto the creature's back, reached forth, caught hold of either horn.

"Now!" he said; and it rose and began to move.

There was a clatter of hooves and a bellows-like exhalation. He noted that the texture of the thing beneath him was not unlike that of a very soft cloth.

The pace quickened and the landscape began to blur whenever he attempted to fix his eyes... . And then there was silence.

He became conscious of a black movement about him, and his face was fanned by breezes that came and went with the regularity of pulse-beats. He realized then that they were aloft, and that those were great black pinions that swept them above the noxious land.

They travelled for a long while, and Jack wrinkled his nose, for the reek of the beast exceeded that of the countryside. They moved at a great speed, but he saw that similar dark shapes occasionally passed in the region of the upper air.

Despite their speed, the journey seemed interminable. Jack began to feel that his strength would fail, for his hands began to ache now even more than they had when he had boiled the black pool. He feared sleep, for his grip might fail him. So he thought upon many things to keep him awake. Strange, he thought, how my greatest enemy did me my greatest favor. Had the Lord of Bats not driven me to it, I would never have sought the power I now contain, the power that made me ruler, that gave me full revenge and Evene ... Evene ... I still am not fully pleased with the terms by which I hold you. Yet ... What other way is there? You deserved what I did. Is not love itself a form of a spell, where one is loved and the other loves, and the one who loves is compelled to do the other's bidding? Of course. It is the same thing... . And he thought then of the Colonel her father, and of Smage, Quazer, Blite, Benoni, the Baron. All of them paid now, all of them paid. He thought of Rosalie, old Rosie, and wondered whether she still lived. He resolved to inquire after her one day at the Sign of the Burning Pestle on the coach road by the ocean. The Borshin. He wondered whether the deformed creature had somehow survived, and still sought his trail somewhere, with but one burning imperative within his twisted body. He was truly the Lord of Bats' last weapon, his last hope for revenge. Like the explosion of a geblinka pod, this made his mind return to things he had not thought upon for a long while: the computers and The Dugout, the classes and that girl-what was her name?-Clare! He smiled that he remembered her name, although her face was but a blur now. And there was Quilian. He knew he would never forget Quilian's face. How he had hated the man! He chuckled at having left him in the hands of the pain-crazed Borshin, who had doubtless mistaken Quilian for himself. He remembered that mad drive across the country, fleeing the light, heading darkside, not knowing whether the print-outs he carried did indeed contain The Key That Was Lost, Kolwynia. The thought of his exultation when he tested it. Although he had never revisited the light, he now felt a strange nostalgia for those days at the university. Perhaps it is because I am outside .now, he thought, and regarding this as an object; whereas then I was a part of the object itself... . And always his thoughts returned to the towering figure of Morningstar atop Mount Panicus...