"Because I love you. " The angel spoke with sweet simplicity that held neither obligation or reproach. " The angel spoke with sweet simplicity that held neither obligation or reproach. "You saved me "You saved me-or you tried. And there are others I love who need you. There is only a small chance that the storm can be turned away-but it is the only chance that remains. "

Saved her? Saved the angel who stood on the tower top? Simon felt exhausting confusion tug at him again. He could not afford to wonder.

"Then show me, if you must."

This time the translation from gray nothing to living vision seemed more difficult, as though this place was somehow harder to Teach, or as though her powers were flagging. The first thing Simon saw was a great circular shadow, and for a long time he saw nothing else. The shadow grew ragged at one edge. Tracings of light appeared there, then became a figure.

Even in the dislocated netherworld of the vision, Simon felt a stab of fear. The figure that sat at the edge of the shadowy circle wore a crown of antlers. Before it, point down, double-guarded hilt clutched in its hands, was a long gray sword.

The enemy! His mind was empty of names, but the thought was clear and cold. The black-hearted one, the frozen yet burning thing that caused the world's misery. Simon felt fear and hatred burning inside him so strongly that for a moment the vision flickered and threatened to vanish. His mind was empty of names, but the thought was clear and cold. The black-hearted one, the frozen yet burning thing that caused the world's misery. Simon felt fear and hatred burning inside him so strongly that for a moment the vision flickered and threatened to vanish.

"See!" The angel's voice was very faint. The angel's voice was very faint. "You must see!" "You must see!"

Simon did not want to see. His entire life had been destroyed by this monstrosity, this demon of ultimate evil. Why should he look?

To learn the way to destroy it, he told himself, struggling. he told himself, struggling. To keep my anger strong. To find a reason to go back to the pain. To keep my anger strong. To find a reason to go back to the pain.

"Show me. I will watch. "

The image strengthened. It took Simon a moment to realize that the darkness which surrounded the enemy was the Pool of Three Depths. It gleamed beneath the cloak of shadows, the stone carvings uncorrupted, the pool itself alight and scintillant, shifting as though the very water were alive. Washed by the liquidly shifting glow, the figure sat on a pedestal on a peninsula of stone with the Pool all around.

Simon dared to look closer. Whatever else it might be, this version of the enemy was a living creature, skin and bone and blood. His long-fingered hands moved fretfully on the pommel of the gray sword. His face was covered by shadow, but his bowed neck and shoulders were those of one horribly burdened.

His attention captured, Simon saw with surprise that the antlers upon the enemy's head were not horns at all, but slender branches: his crown was carved from a single circlet of some silvery-dark wood. The branches still bore a few leaves.

The enemy lifted his head. His face was strange, as were the faces of all the immortals Simon had seen-high-cheeked and narrow-chinned, pale in the shifting light, and surrounded by straight black hair, much of which hung in twisted plaits. His eyes were wide open, and he stared across the water as though in desperate search. If something was there, Simon could not see it. But it was the expression upon the enemy's face that Simon found most disconcerting. There was anger, which did not surprise him, and an implacable determination in the set of the long jaw, but the eyes were haunted. Simon had never seen such unhappiness. Behind the stern mask lurked devastation, an inner landscape that had been scoured to bare rock, a misery that had hardened into something like the stuff of the earth itself. If this being ever wept again, it would be tears of fire and dust.

Sorrow Simon remembered the name of the gray sword. Simon remembered the name of the gray sword. Jingizu. So much sorrow Jingizu. So much sorrow He felt a kind of convulsion of despair and anger. He had never seen anything as terrible, as frightening, as the enemy's suffering face. He felt a kind of convulsion of despair and anger. He had never seen anything as terrible, as frightening, as the enemy's suffering face.

The vision wavered.

"... Simon . . ." Simon . . ." The angel's voice was as quiet as a leaf tumbling across the gra.s.s. "... The angel's voice was as quiet as a leaf tumbling across the gra.s.s. "... must send you back...." must send you back...."

He was alone in misty gray nothingness. "Why did you show me that? What is it supposed to mean?" "Why did you show me that? What is it supposed to mean?"

"... Go back, Simon. I am losing you, and you are far away from where you should be.... "

"But I need to know! I have so many questions!"

"... I waited for you so long. I am called to go on, Simon. . . ."

And now he did feel her slipping away. A very different kind of fear caught at him. "Angel! Where are you?!" "Angel! Where are you?!"

"... I am free now ... I am free now ... Faint as feather brushing feather. Faint as feather brushing feather. "I have waited so long. . . ." "I have waited so long. . . ."

And suddenly, as the last touch of her voice slid away, he knew her.

"Leleth!" he cried. he cried. "Leleth! Don't leave me!" "Leleth! Don't leave me!"

A sense of her smiling, of Leleth free and flying at last, brushed him, then was gone. Nothing came in its place.

Simon was suspended in emptiness, without direction or understanding. He tried to move as he and Leleth had moved, but nothing happened. He was lost in the void, more lost than he had ever been. He was a rag blowing through the darkness. He was utterly alone.

"Help me!" he screamed. he screamed.

Nothing changed.

"Help me, " he murmured. " he murmured. "Someone. "Someone."

Nothing changed. Nothing would ever change.

23.

The Rose Unmade

The ship plunged again. As the cabin timbers creaked, Isgrimnur's empty cup bounced from his hand and clanked to the floor. plunged again. As the cabin timbers creaked, Isgrimnur's empty cup bounced from his hand and clanked to the floor.

"Aedon preserve us! This is horrible!"

Josua's smile was thin. "True. Only madmen are at sea in this storm."

"Don't joke," Isgrimnur growled, alarmed. "Don't joke about boats. Or storms."

"I was not jesting." The prince gripped his chair with his hand as the cabin lurched again. "Are we not mad to let the fear of a star in the sky hurry us into this attack?"

The duke glowered. "We are here. Heaven knows, I don't want to be, but we are here."

"We are here," Josua agreed. "Let us only give thanks that for now Vorzheva and the children and your Gutrun are safe in Nabban."

"Safe until the ghants get there." Isgrimnur winced, thinking of the horrid nest. "Safe until the kilpa decide to try dry land."

"Now who is the worrier?" Josua asked gently. "Varellan, as we saw, has become an able young man, and a good portion of Nabban's army stayed there with him. Our ladies are much safer than we are."

The ship shuddered and pitched. Isgrimnur felt the need to talk, to do anything besides listen to what sounded like the timbers of the hull being wrenched apart. "I have been wondering something. If the Niskies are cousins to the immortals, as Miriamele told us, then how are we to trust them? Why should they favor our fairy-folk over the Norns?" As if summoned by his words, a Niskie's song, alien and powerful, rose once more above the shouting winds.

"But they do." Josua spoke loudly. "One of the sea-watchers gave her life so Miriamele could escape. What stronger answer do you need?"

"They haven't kept the kilpa as far away as I'd I'd like." He made the sign of the Tree. "Josua, we have been attacked three times already!" like." He made the sign of the Tree. "Josua, we have been attacked three times already!"

"And would have been attacked more often were it not for Nin Reisu and her brother and sister Niskies, I have no doubt," said Josua. "You have been on deck. You've seen the cursed things swimming all around. The seas are choked with them."

Isgrimnur nodded somberly. He had indeed seen the kilpa-far too many of them-swarming about the fleet, active as eels in a barrel. They had boarded the flagship several times, once in daylight. Despite the agony of his ribs, the duke had killed two of the hooting things himself, then spent hours trying to wash the oily, foul-smelling blood from his hands and face. "I know," he said at last. "It is as if they have been sent by our enemy to hold us back."

"Perhaps they have." Josua poured a bit of wine into his cup. "I find it strange that the kilpa should rise and the ghants should come pouring out of the swamps at just the same moment. Our enemy's reach is long, Isgrimnur."

"Little Tiamak believes that was happening in the ghant nest when we found him-that somehow Stormspike was using him and the other Wrannamen to talk to those bugs." The thought of Tiamak's countrymen used by the ghants, burned up like candles and then discarded, and of the hundreds of Nabbanai mariners dragged away to a hideous death by the kilpa, made Isgrimnur curl his fist and wish for something to hit. "What kind of a demon could do such things, Josua? What kind of an enemy is this, that we cannot see and cannot strike?"

"The greatest enemy we have." The prince sipped his wine, swaying as the ship pitched again. "An enemy we must defeat, no matter the cost."

The cabin door swung open. Camaris steadied himself, then entered, his scabbard sc.r.a.ping the doorframe. The old knight's cloak drizzled water on the floor.

"What did Nin Reisu say?" Josua asked as he poured wine for Camaris. "Will Emettin's Jewel Emettin's Jewel hold together for one more night?" hold together for one more night?"

The old man drained his cup and stared at the lees.

"Camaris?" Josua moved toward him. "What did Nin Reisu say?"

After a moment, the knight looked up. "I cannot sleep."

The prince shared a worried look with Isgrimnur. "I do not understand."

"I have been up on deck."

Isgrimnur thought that was obvious from the water puddling on the floor. The old knight seemed even more fearfully distracted than was usual. "What's wrong, Camaris?"

"I cannot sleep. This sword is in my dreams." He pawed fitfully at Thorn's hilt. "I hear it ... singing to me." Camaris tugged it a short way out of the scabbard, a length of pure darkness. "I carried this sword for years." He struggled for words. "I ... felt it sometimes, especially in battle. But never this way. I think ... I think it is alive."

Josua looked at the blade with more than a little distrust. "Perhaps you should not carry it, Camaris. You will be forced to take it up soon enough. Put it somewhere safe."

"No." The old man shook his head. His voice was heavy. "No, I dare not. There are things to learn. We do not know how to use these Great Swords against our enemy. As you said, the time is fast coming. Perhaps I can understand the song it sings. Perhaps ..."

The prince lifted his hand as if to dispute him, then let it fall. "You must do as you think best., You are Thorn's master."

Camaris looked up solemnly. "Am I? I thought so, once."

"Come, have some more wine," Isgrimnur urged him. He tried to rise from his stool but decided against it. The battles with the kilpa had set back his recovery. Wincing, he signaled to Josua to refill the old man's cup. "It is hard not to feel haunted when the wind howls and the sea flings us about like dice in a cup."

"Isgrimnur is right." Josua smiled., "Here, drink up." The room lurched once more, and wine splashed onto his wrist. "Come, while there is more in the cup than on the floor."

Camaris was silent for long moments. "I must speak to you, Josua," he said abruptly. "Something weighs upon my soul."

Puzzled, the prince waited.

The knight's face seemed almost gray as he turned to the duke. "Please, Isgrimnur, I must talk with Josua alone."

"I am your friend, Camaris," said the duke. "If anyone is to blame for bringing you here, it's me. If something is plaguing you, I want to help."

"This is a shame that burns. I would not tell Josua, but that he needs to hear it. Even as I lie sleepless for fear of what the sword will do, G.o.d punishes me for my secret sin. I pray that if I make this right, He will give me the strength to understand Thorn and its brother swords. But please do not force me to bare this shame to you as well." Camaris looked truly old, his features slack, his eyes wandering. "Please. I beg you."

Confused and more than a little frightened, Isgrimnur nodded. "As you wish, Camaris. Of course."

Isgrimnur was debating whether he should wait in the narrow pa.s.sageway any longer when the cabin door opened and Camaris emerged. The old knight brushed past, hunched beneath the low ceiling. Before Isgrimnur could get more than half his question out, Camaris was gone down the pa.s.sageway, thumping from wall to wall as Emettin's Jewel Emettin's Jewel heaved in the storm's grip. heaved in the storm's grip.

Isgrimnur knocked at the cabin door. When the prince did not answer, he carefully pushed it open. The prince was staring at the lamp, his blasted expression that of a man who has seen his own death.

"Josua?"

The prince's hand rose as though tugged by a string. He seemed entirely leeched of spirit. His voice was flat, terrible. "Go away, Isgrimnur. Let me be alone."

The duke hesitated, but Josua's face decided him. Whatever had happened in the cabin, there was nothing he could give the prince at this moment but solitude.

"Send for me when you want me." Isgrimnur backed out of the room. Josua did not look up or speak, but continued to watch the lamp as though it were the only thing that might lead him out of ultimate darkness.

"I am trying to understand." Miriamele's head ached. "Tell me again about the swords."

She had been with the dwarrows for several days, as far as she could tell: it was hard to know for certain here in the rocky fastness below the Hayholt. The shy earth-dwellers had continued to treat her well, but still refused to free her. Miriamele had argued, pleaded-even raged for a long hour, demanding to be released, threatening, cursing. As her anger spent itself, the dwarrows had murmured among themselves worriedly. They seemed so shocked and unsettled by her fury that she had almost felt ashamed of herself, but the embarra.s.sment pa.s.sed as quickly as the anger.

After all, she had decided, she had decided, I did not ask to be brought here. They say their reasons are good I did not ask to be brought here. They say their reasons are good-then let their reasons make them feel better. I shouldn't have to.

She was convinced of, if not reconciled to, the reasons for her captivity. The dwarrows seemed to sleep very little if at all, and only a few of them at a time ever left the wide cavern. Whether they were telling her the entire truth or not, she did not doubt that there was something out there that frightened the slender, wide-eyed creatures very badly.

"The swords," said Yis-fidri. "Very well, I will try better to explain. You saw that we knew the arrow, even though we did not make it?"

"Yes." They had certainly seemed to know something something significant was in the saddlebags, although it was possible they could have made up the story on the spot after finding it. significant was in the saddlebags, although it was possible they could have made up the story on the spot after finding it.

"We did not make the arrow, but it was crafted by one who learned from us. The three Great Swords are are of our making, and we are bound to them." of our making, and we are bound to them."

"You made the three swords?" This was what had confused her. It did not match what she had been told. "I knew that your people made Minneyar for King Elvrit of Rimmsersgard-but not that they forged the other two as well. Jarnauga said that the sword Sorrow was made by Ineluki himself."

"Speak not his name!" Several of the other dwarrows looked up and chimed a few unsettled words which Yis-fidri answered before turning back to Miriamele. "Speak not his name. He is closer than he has been in centuries. Do not call his attention!"

It's like being in a whole cave full of Strangyeards, thought Miriamele thought Miriamele. They seem afraid of everything. Still, Binabik had said much the same thing. "Very well. I won't say ... his name. But that story is not what I was told. A learned man said that ... he ... made it himself in the forges of Asu'a." Still, Binabik had said much the same thing. "Very well. I won't say ... his name. But that story is not what I was told. A learned man said that ... he ... made it himself in the forges of Asu'a."

The dwarrow sighed. "Indeed. We were the smiths of Asu'a-or at least some of our people were ... some who had not fled our Zida'ya masters, but who were still Navigator's Children for all that, still as like to us as two chunks of ore from the same vein. They all died when the castle fell." Yis-fidri chanted a brief lament in the dwarrow tongue; his wife Yis-hadra echoed him. "He used the Hammer that Shapes to forge it-our it-our Hammer-and the Words of Making that we taught to him. It might as well have been our own High Smith's hand that crafted it. In that terrible instant, wheresoever we were, scattered across the world's face ... we felt Sorrow's making. The pain of it is with us still." He fell silent for a long time. "That the Zida'ya allowed such a thing," he said at last, "is one of the reasons we have turned away from them. We were so sorely diminished by that one act that we have ever since been crippled." Hammer-and the Words of Making that we taught to him. It might as well have been our own High Smith's hand that crafted it. In that terrible instant, wheresoever we were, scattered across the world's face ... we felt Sorrow's making. The pain of it is with us still." He fell silent for a long time. "That the Zida'ya allowed such a thing," he said at last, "is one of the reasons we have turned away from them. We were so sorely diminished by that one act that we have ever since been crippled."

"And Thorn?"

Yis-fidri nodded his heavy head. "The mortal smiths of Nabban tried to work the star-stone. They could not. Certain of our people were sought out and brought secretly to the Imperator's palace. These kin of ours were thought by most mortals to be only strange folk who watched the oceans and kept the ships safe from harm, but a small number knew that the old lore of Making and Shaping ran deep in all the Tinukeda'ya, even those who had chosen to remain with the sea."

"Tinukeda'ya?" It took a moment to sink in. "But that's what Gan Itai ... those are Niskies!"

"We are all Ocean Children," said the dwarrow gravely. "Some decided to stay near the sea which forever separates us from the Garden of our birth. Others chose more hidden and secretive ways, like the earth's dark places and the task of shaping-stone. You see, unlike our cousins the Zida'ya and Hikeda'ya, we Children of the Navigator can shape ourselves just as we shape other things."