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Chapter 45

Justin had recognized the two of them the moment he'd seen them together. The high priest of the lady of the forest's grove had showed them all the picture the day before.

Justin, scribe, petty thief, professional informer and would-be gigolo had joined the Lyr worshipers as a potential source of income, either from informing or from blackmail. It had been a good source of income and protection—his fellow devotees were, some of them, influential men. But this—this looked like the big pay-off. He'd originally had hopes of getting Keri pregnant and getting his way into the inn that way, but her father had made it clear that he'd rather see her dead in a ditch than married to Justin. The girl had the intellect and morals of a rabbit, and had been keeping herself occupied and miraculously un-pregnant with passing travelers for some years. Justin did consider that she was worth keeping as the first of his stable, because she'd sleep with whoever he told her to and bring him the money. Although he'd have to watch her. She stole! Now, he'd have the funds to set up in style. He'd caught up with two of the three that the Lady of the Forests wanted. There was no way off Lapithidia except via Port Lapith. And the sprites had a small grove on the island, just outside the port. Their sacred island of Arcady was close by.

The chaos generated by Finn and the girl's leaving made it a simple matter to hop off the ship without any centaur being the wiser. To his irritation Keri followed him.

"Go back," he ordered.

"No. You're up to something. Probably with that tramp in trousers."

It was a case of beat her there on the quayside, or put up with her. And there were any number of stevedores and other people about who would probably interfere in his business. So he merely shrugged. Let her tag along.

She complained about it being too cold to strip off once they got to the trees. Well, that was up to her. He'd seen what got done to those who broke the rules. He walked on, naked as the day he was born, while she carped at him. "Shut up or I'll beat you black and blue, bitch. Do as you're told."

"I only do as I wish," said the tree-woman suddenly. "Have you come to die?"

Keri screamed. Justin bowed. "I have found your quarry, Lady of the Forest. I have brought you the ones you seek."

This sprite looked identical to the one back on Starsey. "Explain," she said, as cool as ever.

For the first time doubt that he might get a reward crept into Justin's mind. But he could play hard to get.

A little later he knew that he could not. And that his life would be a great reward. But the Lady of the Forest was not finished with him.

 

Belet arrived on Arcady at the same time as the ship with the hasty message from Lapithidia did. The sprites did not keep the message from him. And he in turn shared what he had with them.

"He has to be a dragon. A shape-shifted dragon, protecting her."

"A shape-shifted dragon," said Lyr. "It fits. Well, we can deal with that together."

Belet concurred. They had. Compulsion had now been set on no less than fourteen dragons, together. But that was a complex working, and shaped their inclinations.

"I think we should settle for merely stunning it. We can do that too, you know."

"Of course I know. The first Lyr knew. We all know. We have some gold for us to bespell."

"I will move in some troops from Cark. We can keep watch . . . it will take them as long to come down from the plateaux as for us to land in force. We can move over by night and wait in the lee of the cliff west of Port Lapith. One vessel at sea with a mirror can relay the message by day, and a phosphorus flare by night."

The Lyr nodded, a habit she had learned from her human devotees.

 

On the high plateaux, with a phalanx of centaurs acting as outriders and guides, Meb found that she was pleasantly alone with Finn. She hadn't realized how Justin and the innkeeper's daughter had irritated her just by being in their space so often. And, for once, Finn seemed quite disposed to talk. He pointed to a rocky tor. "I put those there. I do occasionally have to do some hard work."

Meb looked at the strange shaped spike of weathered stone. "Why, Finn?"

He shrugged. "Energy flow problem. Think of everything as flowing rivers of forces. Patterns of it. Sometimes something disrupts that pattern. Mostly things correct themselves. I mean, think of a stream. It can only do just what it is meant to do if it flows exactly down a certain path. A child puts some stones in the stream and it deviates . . . it either comes back to the path or, next time there is a storm the stones wash away. Occasionally someone will come along and jam the stones together so that they cannot wash away. Then I may have to adjust things—either to compensate with other forces or to undo the blockage or put another rock in higher up or lower down. That's what that tor is."

It was said so matter-of-factly that Meb had no doubt that he'd done it. And that he knew exactly what he was talking about. "What would happen if you didn't do it?"

"It gets very complicated. It can actually just destroy things. Or it can distort other areas. It can affect anything from how much rain a place gets to how prosperous a local farmer is. Mostly it is fairly stable. But the world is not entirely self-correcting. Eventually the errors and problems and pressures build up and then you get the energy-equivalent of a storm, which tries to wash away blockages. It is my job to see that it doesn't get to that point."

"You . . . fix Tasmarin?"

"Good gracious, no! Only the energy flows. But not only for this world. I had a ring of eighty or so I was responsible for. Planes."

"Planes?"

"Places like this. When you are a little more experienced I'll try to explain the maths to you. Think of them as many, many different worlds. I traveled around them keeping them stable, keeping them linked."

"You mean . . . there are many worlds?"

"Possibly an infinity of them. There are also some that are joined. It all comes down to the First."

"The first?"

"The First. Intelligent beings, rather like dvergar. And centaurs. And merrows and creatures of smokeless flame. The whole boiling lot of you except us dragons. You are all in some way aspects of the First. I always have to laugh when one of the species—usually the alvar, tells me they are descended from the First. You all are."

"Except dragons," said Meb grinning at him. "They're entirely different."

He nodded. "Yes. The First made us, the way the dvergar make things of metal. We were to them something like what dogs are to people. I was one of the early ones, from just after they'd discovered how to make worlds link. Díleas was bred to herd sheep. I was made to fix energy imbalances in the great rings of worlds. See, there have always been multiple discrete planes of existence. Worlds . . . but really more than just worlds. Certain conditions cause them to form. That is intrinsic to existence. The First discovered this. They also discovered that, given certain stringent conditions, it was possible to cause planes to divide, but not to become discrete. To remain linked. Of course such a thing was not stable. In the beginning they could barely keep them mutually linked for the briefest of moments. But they found stable forms, shapes in multidimensional mathematics which could remain in that formation state—in which separate universes are linked—as long as they feed back into themselves. In other words: they created a ring of universes. Many strange and cataclysmic energies are required to remain in balance. That is my task. Energy is not destroyed or created, it merely changes states and places. It needs to move to prevent too much building or being lost from any one place. I was built in the beginning, to do this. There were . . . quite a few of us back then."

Meb thought she understood at least one word in ten of what he'd said. But it seemed important to keep him talking. "And now?" she asked.

Fionn shrugged. "I may be the last. We never had much to do with each other. Saw each other in passing, occasionally. Anyway I have been stuck here on Tasmarin for a number of centuries. I've never been too sure whether the dragons were right, and that this was their escape . . . or whether it was merely human mages getting rid of more trouble than they were worth. Either way, both sides have been the loser. They may not have understood that."

"Now I am the one that really doesn't understand."

"Tasmarin—this world—is a made-up thing. Pulled together from the places that linked the ring of worlds. Think of that as a whole lot of ships anchored to each other, by their strongest and most magical of places—and that someone went and chopped out those pieces and made a new ship out of those pieces."

"That probably wouldn't be too good for the other ships."

"You grasp the problem. And they're not very well joined together any more either. That causes difficulties too. Makes them likely to sink each other. Of course the only way to fix it all up again is to give the pieces back. The people on the new ship need to be able to get back to the old ships in one piece. And that, you might say, is what I am trying to do now. Return the part that attached them to their place of origin. I have dealt with the Angmarad of the merrows, the hammer of the dvergar, and windsack of the centaurs. I'm on my way to do the next as soon as we get the staff of the sprites."

"They—the sprites—tried to catch us before."

Finn patted Díleas, who nuzzled up against him in response, and tried to eat the corner of his cloak. "It's a bit like being a sheepdog. There are some sheep who would prefer it if you left them alone. Others—the occasional ram—who will turn on you. Try to trample or to kill you. That doesn't mean that you don't still have to herd them along, without killing the awkward ones. Ah, we get closer to their puddle." He pointed.

There on the plain stood the remains of a marble column. In the distance stood another. And further over, a piece of what was left of a frieze still balanced on top of a column. "Needs work," said Finn with a grin. "Now unless I am mistaken they will expect us to walk. Try to stop Díleas from lifting his leg on the columns. They're quite touchy about them."

They walked between the columns, across manicured turf to the edge of . . . a hole. A big hole, but nothing more, surrounded by clipped grasses. Díleas sniffed at it.

"We need a divining rod," said Finn to their escort. "And only one will work."

"We have brought the staff of the sprites," said the elderly centaur, heavily. One of the others rode forward with an object in a long case. He opened it. Inside on the velvet lining lay . . . a stick. A dried out, ordinary stick, with the bark cracking away from the fork at the top and a few dead roots at the end.

Finn took it and handed it to Meb.

It was odd that a piece of wood could hold such despair.

"You can leave us to it now," said Finn commandingly.

The centaurs seemed totally taken aback at this, but did retreat back to among the columns.

"I have no experience of this," said Finn, which was just exactly what Meb did not want to hear. "You'll have to do it. I believe human workers of the earth-magics hold the two ends of the fork, and the shaft twitches down at the presence of water. Then they dig a well."

"What happened to the water that was here?" asked Meb.

"I knew I'd need a reason to come and collect the staff. When the first tower went down, I realized that to survive the destruction, the species needed their treasures returned—otherwise they'd be trapped, in part, with whoever held their people's treasure. So I set things in motion to stop the spring that seeps to this place. I was sure they'd give up the staff in exchange for that being fixed. The water came to it via the peat bog around this place. The water is still there. It's an artesian flow. I can feel it below us."

"Oh." Meb took hold of the fork. "And now?"

"Walk. Chant something for the audience. Then we'll tell them to get digging."

Meb began walking around the edges of the hole. It was possibly a hundred paces across and perfectly circular, except for one spike of rock sticking into it. She couldn't think of anything useful to chant so she hummed the last tune that 'Brys had played. The one about the love between the sea and the mountains. And when she reached the spike of rock the stick began pulling. Dragging at her hands.

"Aha," said Finn. The stick touched the rock. Meb noticed in the periphery of her vision that the centaurs had come galloping in. But she was focussed on the single drop of water that had formed on the end of the rock.

"Stop!" shouted the centaur, as Finn heaved at the rock. "It is a holy pool."

"It's a holy hole right now," grunted Finn, not stopping. "Give me a hand here. Your water is under that rock. Look. There are droplets forming already."

The centaur lowered his javelin and stared. A few more drops of water dripped down. Then a tiny trickle. "We need to move this rock," said Finn. "That is: If restoring this pool of yours is something that you want to do?"

Some thirty of the half-horses were now milling about. Peering down. Exclaiming. Someone produced a rope, and they hitched it to the end of the rock. The centaurs hauled. And hauled. The rope broke. The rock had moved a fraction more, and by now a cupful of water splashed down every few moments from the bottom edge of the rock. The hole was very deep and wasn't going to fill in a hurry from that.

"Let's have another couple of ropes," called Finn. "Come, Scrap. Tuck the stick in your bag, and let's give them a hand."

So they did. The rock cracked and popped out of the ground. And Finn and Meb got thoroughly soaked by the fountain.

"It'll take a day or two," said Finn, "but your pool will fill now. You may have to lead the excess water away, somehow. This area is mostly limestone except for that bit of granite we pulled away. This was the bottom of the sea once, you know. You're on the edge of the granite and limestone. That's why you suddenly got the hole. Sorry. The sacred pool."

"We owe you a great debt," said the old centaur.

"To my assistant," said Finn graciously. "But this is what we were sent to do. So if it is all the same to you, we'd like to be off your high plateau by dark. Because it is freezing up here."

"But will it still work, Asclepius?" asked one of the centaurs looking at the water pouring down. "It is . . . clear."

"Oh, it will still reflect," said Finn. "I believe that's what you find important? And it's the same water. It just hasn't flowed through a peat bog first."

"How do you know it is the same water?" asked the elderly centaur.

Finn waved his arms at the grassland. "What else can it be? If you want it dark you can throw some ink in it. Now can we go? I have to get along to Arcady. And you really don't want smelly humans peering into your magic pool."

The centaurs were, it seemed, not very sensitive to sarcasm. "A habitation will be provided, and viands will be brought for you."

They were. A tent. Straw pallets. Rugs. And a gamey stew that was long on boiled wheat kernels and garlic, but was still good eating. Díleas thought it very adequate, worth putting up with not being allowed to exercise his herding instinct on centaurs.

"Why are they keeping us here, Finn?"

He chuckled. "Because they want to see if their pool works. You see, the water used to seep along through the bog. It was acidic and the color of ale from the peat. The water now is as clear as centuries of rock-filtration can make it. It's also not acidic, so the pool won't grow bigger . . . But they used it for their scrying of futures. It's a fairly futile pastime, but they like it. So they want to see if it is going to work."

The next morning, at dawn, they walked back through the ruined columns and across the green turf. Dileas ran ahead and stopped at the edge of where the hole used to be. And drank.

"I think Díleas is giving our friend Asclepias the pool-watcher fits. No, Scrap. Let him drink. Fits are good for centaurs. They will make the Children of Chiron send us away. Because their pool is working."

Asclepias yelled, and other centaurs came running to peer into the water. "Acteaon on a ship!" "And a war-band . . ."

A breeze riffled the water.

For a moment Meb saw a black dragon.

Asclepias looked at the riffled water. Shook his head in amazement. "It . . . it works now without even the focus of will! It works better!" he said incredulously. He bowed to them. "Thank you. You have worked a great wonder for us."

"I think," said Finn, "that I ought to warn you, you will probably find it both clearer and . . . less clear. You'll see deeper and that can be confusing."

"You speak sooth for a water-diviner," said one of the centaurs.

"I've been around. Been told a thing or two. And now, seeing as your pond is full, and works and time and tide press on us, can we leave?"

Asclepias nodded. "Indeed. We will see you back to a ship with such rewards as we can provide."

"Breakfast?" asked Meb, hopefully.

Even the solemn centaurs laughed. And provided breakfast. It was oat porridge, and Díleas was less impressed than with the stew of the night before.

The centaurs escorted Finn, Meb and Díleas back to the cart, and back towards the only way down off the high plateaux. As they moved other centaurs came to hear the news. Their escort on the steep downhill pass to Port Lapith was a substantial one, and they all seemed happier now.

Which was more than Meb could say about the strange piece of stick. Just touching it felt . . . tragic. "Why is it so sad?" she asked Finn.

He sighed. "Because it is a sad thing, I suppose. When Tasmarin was cut off, there was only one sprite, and the sapling she was going to plant. When a token of trust was needed . . . well, it was all that Lyr had. And it was only going to be temporary, and the sapling wasn't due to be planted until spring . . . It's just a dead stick now. But that is why all the sprites are just one sprite. They are all grown from cuttings from the first one. She was a cold woman—not all tree-spirits are, in the wider planes. But it was still a bleak thing to have happen."

 

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