Orbelon's World (Book 3) (7 page)

   'You did well, captain. Does the Lord High Invigilate know of this woman?'

   'I have not informed him. Her hubbub was loud and protracted, though. Someone may have thought it significant enough to bring to Lord Fectur's attention; I cannot say.'

   'I prefer that he knows nothing of this. Should he turn up here refer him to
me. He is not to be permitted to see or speak to this woman without my express permission.'

  
'Very good, my lady.'

   'Now, show me to her.'

   The old woman did not rise when Issul entered. She was seated on a rough pallet beside one wall, her legs stretched before her. 'Forgive me. I mean no disrespect, but I am old and my limbs ache, my joints are stiff. I’ve walked a long way to find you, and now my old body is admonishing me in no uncertain terms.'

   Issul stared at her. She was the same woman she had come upon in the woods. The deep scratches on her cheek had darkened into unsightly scabs. Issul felt herself growing angry. 'What is it you want? Do you have a name? Who are you?'

    The old woman did not rush to reply. 'I wondered,' she said at length, 'when we met in the forest, but I did not know it was you. Not that it would have made a difference. The Karai warriors took you. I did not think we would ever meet again.'

   'But they did not take you?'

   'What good was a hag like me? No, they pushed me to the ground and made off with a younger, more comely prize.'

   'But they let you live.'

   'I fully believe I am alive, yes. Had there not been fighting all around perhaps they would have killed me. But the element of surprise, which had been theirs, had now been taken from them. They were more interested in getting away.'

   'My soldiers scoured the woods. There was no report of you.'

   'Why would there be? The forest is dense, and I did not wish to be found. And who, in such a fray, would take notice of an old peasant woman in the woods?'

   Issul weighed this. 'I say again, have you a name? And why have you come here?'

   The old woman gave a gummy smile. 'Aye, I've a name, though it'll mean nothing to you. I am called Arene. As for what I want,' she sighed, and stared ruefully at an uncertain point low upon the opposite wall. 'I have come from afar. Initially, Queen Issul, I came to save you.'

   A chill slid the length of Issul's spine. 'Save me?
From what?'

   Arene's eyes moved back to her. 'There is a destiny upon you, and your world. I could have prevented it. That is why I was sent. I could have done it so easily, but it is too late now. I have been foiled.
Twice. Twice the Vileborn has been in my grasp, and twice he has escaped. Fate played a hand, I’m sure of it. Now all I can hope to do is instruct you.'

  
'Vileborn?' Issul shuddered.

  
'The Child who came from Death.'

  
She knows!
'How-- what do you know about him?'

   Arene raised her arm and lightly touched her wounded cheek with the back of her hand. 'He is strong, that little boy. I had him in my hands. He tore half my cheek away. I’d not expected such furious zest.'

   'What did you want with him?'

  
'To kill him.' A harsh edge of emotion tinged Arene's voice. 'To end his brief life before . . .' she waved her heavy hands, '. . . all this and everything that will now ensue.'

   'It was you beside the pond, was it not?'

   'You know of that? Of course, you would. Aye, that was I.'

   'Were you planning to kill him then?'

   'His guardian slept. It could have been an accident. An infant left alone beside a pool. . . . Who would have thought anything?'

   'Then what stopped you?'

   'The presence of another person. A young man who came unexpectedly out of the forest - ' she paused, her eyes narrowing. 'Almost as if he were sent.'

   She laid a peculiar inflection upon these last words. Issul reflected uneasily for a moment,
then said, 'Did you not know the young man?'

   'I had never sen him before,
nor since.'

   Issul nodded to herself. It was as Moscul had told her. The assumption, from Ohirbe's and Julion's accounts, had
been  that Arene and the mysterious stranger were together. Issul reached into the sash at her waist and drew forth a small pouch of blue leather, gathered at the neck with a slim thong. She untied it and emptied the contents into the palm of her hand. 'Have you seen this before?'

   After a moment Arene nodded. 'I think it is the gift given to the Vileborn by that young man beside the pool. May I examine it?'

   Issul hesitated, then nodded. Arene took the small ivory carving which Julion had illicitly taken from Moscul, and which Fectur's man, Gordallith, had subsequently brought back to Orbia. She inspected it closely, holding it circumspectly between finger and thumb. 'Often I have wondered about this thing.' She closed her hands around it and shut her eyes in concentration. When she opened them she said, 'There is magic here. This thing - what is it, a tooth, a tusk? - it has come out of Enchantment or its environs, almost certainly.'

   The hairs prickled at the nape of Issul's neck. Pader Luminis had said as much.
What can it contain?
  She took the carving back. 'Can you tell me anything more?

  
'Of that? No. How did you come by it?'

   Issul ignored the question. 'The young man - he prevented you committing murder? Did he see what you were doing?'

   'If so, he gave no indication. And I would use the word 'murder' with caution, lady. I hesitated, for I had no heart to kill an innocent babe. But that babe is no innocent, as you surely know. Now he is free, with who can say what consequences?'

   'Do you think the young man knew the Child?'

   'He seemed not to, but it was a strange meeting. I don’t know.'

   'Did he speak his name?'

   'He did. But understand, the moment was filled with tension. I was discomposed, caught almost in the act of infanticide, as it would have been viewed. He spoke with the Child's guardian at the same time. His name. . . it was not a common name. At the time that marked it, so I thought. Ah, but I am old. I curse my failing powers. So much was on my mind. By the following day, in my confusion, the name had escaped my recall. He was coming here, though. I know that.'

   'Here?'

   'To enlist in the King's army and vanquish the Karai, so he said.'

  
'If he spoke the truth.'

   'Aye, if he spoke the truth.'

   Issul rolled the ivory carving pensively between her fingers, her brow knitted in perplexity. 'You were sent, you say, to kill this child you call Vileborn? Who by? And how do you know of him?'

  'Be seated, young Queen,' Arene replied, and nodded towards a chair in the corner of the cell. 'I will tell you what I know. And when I’ve done, well, you will perhaps be a little better informed, even a little more prepared for what you must face, maybe even a touch wiser. But the world, alas, will not have changed.'

   She waited while Issul lowered herself onto the chair, then resumed, 'I am of the
Hir'n Esh
, a term which you will not have heard before. An approximate translation into your tongue renders it as 'Witnesses of the Unfolding'. We are a community, few in number, united by a common experience, a common activity. Our home is a secret location hard upon the border of Enchantment, but at a great distance from here, upon the other side. In that location there manifests an unusual concentration of energy, a magical coalescence, known to us as the Well of Immaculate Vision. Ages past our forebears constructed a protective fortress about the Well, and we have

devoted
our existence to its study. We are able to attune with its extraordinary energy, and in so doing the events that have befallen this world are revealed to us, as, in many cases, are events which have still to occur.'

   'You see the future?' asked Issul.

   'Futures among possible futures would be a more accurate summation. We see what has been, what is, what is predicted or intended to be, and then some of the many possible futures that such events may engender. Hence we foresaw the coming of the Vileborn and all that its birth might entail. We didn’t know exactly where or even when its coming would fall. That’s why I was sent here, to search him out and end his existence before he could bring catastrophe upon the world. But I failed. Perhaps Fate - one possible, unforeseen future - intervened to prevent me carrying out my task. I know only that I did not accomplish it, hence another train of events has been set in motion, and you, beautiful Queen Issul, are at its centre.'

   'I?'

   The old woman nodded. 'You allowed the Vileborn to live, secreted him where he might not be found, told no one the terrible secret of his birth. Is that not so?'

   Issul held her gaze but said nothing.

   'And later you realized the awful truth, and sought him out - to do what? Would you have killed him? No matter, you lost him, as did I once again. He’s free now, dwelling in the wild, preparing his way. He knows something of what he is, and that he is sought by those who would end his life and others who will follow him and do his bidding. He knows he can command great powers. And he’s of Enchantment, at least in part, and so he must war. And others must war with him. So it unfolds.'

   'And I have a part in this?'

   'If you will save your kingdom, and your husband and children.'

   Issul drew in a sharp breath. Arene nodded, half-smiling to
herself. 'Yes, I see that it is true. They’re gone, are they not?'

   'How do you know of this?'

   'Its potential was manifest in the Well, as were others. Now that you have confirmed this particular strand, I can instruct you if you so wish. Of course, I can guarantee you nothing. We are limited when it comes to accurately predicting events which have yet to come to be. We see only possibilities within the uncertain flux. We see myriad paths, yet myriad more exist. So I can’t say that my guidance will bring you what you desire, only that your failure to heed it will certainly bring you what you do not. Now tell me, have you yet found the way to Enchantment?'

   Issul stared at her, speechless for some moments.

   'Speak, child!' demanded Arene.

   'There-- there is an opening, yes.'

   'Good. That is one less task, then. So, what else? Another world, yes? A world that was a prison, is still a prison; a world that is a god? Tell me, for these things are vague.'

   'Yes, what you are saying makes sense to me.'

   'Then heed the god. You have no choice.'

   'And leave Enchantment's Reach to my enemies?'

   'You have many perils ahead of you, that is the one absolute certainty. All of this could have been avoided had I slain the Vileborn, or indeed had you slain him at birth - for that was one other potential that was revealed by the Well. Such a path lies ahead of you, Issul, and I would not be you for anything. But if you do not take it you face the certain knowledge of defeat, total and irreversible. That much the Unfolding revealed without ambiguity.'

   Issul's heart had swollen, preventing words. In her mind's eye an image of her children formed. Alone in an alien world, they cried out for her. She heard their frightened voices. A sob escaped her lips; she turned her head away.

   'Oh, child, I know your anguish and I do not wish you harm,' said Arene softly. 'If there were a means of avoiding this, I would choose it. But there is none. I am sorry.'

   Issul rose, holding herself stiffly. 'We will speak again later,' she said, her voice betraying her. 'In the meantime I will have you moved to somewhere less oppressive.'

   She departed quickly, and outside took a moment to recover her thoughts. From the end of the passage Shenwolf strode towards her. In the fingers of her right hand she still clasped the little ivory carving. Again she looked at it, wondering, then dropped it back into its pouch and slipped it inside her sash.

   'I’m sorry, I was delayed,' said Shenwolf, arriving at her side. He was garbed in the crimson-and-blue livery of the elite Palace Guard, the bar of rank at his throat.
'Moving from my former barracks. The messenger took time to find me. What’s happened? Are you distraught?'

   She shook her head, her voice still faltering.
'Nothing.' She turned back to regard the door of Arene's cell. 'I had . . . there is a woman in there. I thought perhaps to have you join me when I interviewed her. It is no matter. I’ll see her again.

   She passed instructions to the captain of the guard for Arene's removal to a more comfortable chamber, and moved on, absorbed in a thousand agonies.

IV

   'Orbelon.' Issul stood alone in her chamber, staring at the blue casket, her face a mask.

  
'Orbelon.'

   She turned at a penumbral movement to her side, and saw him at the edge of the room, half-shadow,
the wall behind him visible through his form.