Suddenly, he squeezed his eyes shut, pressing his middle finger and thumb against his temples. “And, oh, I hope to tell you, may I never have to live through something like that again! It was horrible, at first; another man’s mind inside my own, thought-tendrils reaching out, grappling. We fought on a figurative plain, beneath a symbolic sky, in the country of the mind; and we came close to killing each other. But at last we made peace and became friends of a sort; though there was always the tension, always the wariness—for we both wanted life, in the body. It was a constant threat—another fight for survival—there, in the midst of my own mind, my own flesh and body.”
“But it didn’t come,” Dirk murmured.
Gar shook his head. “No. We were allies; we worked together for a dream we both burned for. And now—he is gone, no vital power, no soul left, only a set of memories. He died of his own accord, almost; when he’d had his revenge, the power drained out, and he went back where he’d come from—but he couldn’t have lain easy if that staff had remained whole. Of course I laid him to rest—no man wishes to be a ghost.”
“No,” Dirk said slowly, “including me.”
“Ah.” Gar nodded; that seemed to explain a lot to him.
He lifted an arm, pointing to the top of the hill. “Come, let us climb. I cannot think of a better place to survey this world, than the top of DeCade’s tomb.”
They turned their faces up and began to climb. Gar turned to Dirk, his eyes probing keenly. “She had that deep a hold on you, then?”
“Yes,” Dirk said sourly, “and you had that deep a hold on her.”
“I? Or DeCade?”
Dirk shrugged. “Either. It didn’t really seem to matter. Any way you looked at it, I came in last.”
Gar strode upward in silence. Then he said, “That’s a pretty weak reason for leaving a planet.”
Dirk shrugged irritably. “Her, or the rest of them—it came out the same. Half-liking is a pretty poor sequel to loyalty.”
Gar shook his head. “That still rings hollow.”
Dirk stopped, scowling. “What are you getting at? The Wizard? The unseen hand that’s moved me, every step?”
“No, of course not.” But Gar was suddenly a little too casual about it.
Dirk frowned, puzzled; then he smiled, amused. “Oh, don’t worry, I figured that one out long ago. You were the source of the rumors, weren’t you? You started the discontent running through the land—the feeling that it was about to happen—and the word of the Wizard being seen, here and there.”
Gar nodded. “Just the usual whispering campaign—and a little projective telepathy, of course.”
Dirk raised his eyebrows. “Oh, you list that among your talents, too?”
“I am nothing if not versatile.”
“Yes, very.” Dirk frowned. “When Lord Core’s men found Madelon and me dead, and took you away—how’d you manage that, faking our deaths? I don’t know of any psi power than can swing that one.”
Gar flashed him a grin and turned away. Dirk waited for the answer.
He was still waiting when they came to the hilltop.
Gar planted his feet firmly and heaved a sigh, looking out over the countryside, slumbering in the false dawn. “Peaceful, isn’t it?”
“Yes,” Dirk agreed. “Now.”
“And yourself?” Gar raised an eyebrow.
Dirk looked back at him, his face carefully neutral. Then he nodded. “Not bad, now that you mention it. Surprisingly.”
Gar shrugged. “You’ve got it mostly threshed out now. She doesn’t really mean that much, does she?”
“No,” Dirk said after a few minutes, “she doesn’t. The people do—but not right now. Not yet.”
Gar nodded. “They’re done with their need for you—and you don’t need them yet. Not really.”
“No,” Dirk said slowly. “I’m young. I don’t need it. There’ll be time for a home.”
“Oh?” Gar cocked an eyebrow at him. “What were you planning to do in the meantime?”
“Clear out,” Dirk said, with a sour smile. “Epsilon Eridani, for starters—that’s the nearest main port. Trouble is, I’d rather not travel with my own crew, things being as they are; they don’t seem to be in any great rush to lift off. Can you stand a hitchhiker?”
Gar laughed and clapped him on the shoulder. “Glad to have you, Dulain. We can spend the trip trying to figure out what happened back here.”
Dirk found himself grinning, in spite of himself. “Hey … I thought we were supposed to be rivals.”
Gar shook his head. “Friends, Dulain—right from the start. But I couldn’t tell you that then, could I?” He rolled up his sleeve to the armband and put his finger on the stud to call his ship.
“No, I suppose not,” Dirk said, amused. “Tell me—when did you realize you’d become the Wizard?”
But Gar only gave him a grin as he pressed the stud.
The golden ship fell down from the sky.