While the Highwardens were absent the others milled about the Council Chamber and talked. Some, anticipating a long deliberation, even stepped out to the tavern around the corner for a cup or two. Chert, who had the distinct feeling he was the subject of almost every conversation, and not in a way he’d like, went and joined Chaven, who was sitting on a bench along the outer wall with a morose expression on his round face.
“I fear I’ve brought you nothing but trouble, Chert.”
“Nonsense.” He did his best to smile. “You’ve brought a bit, there’s no question, but if I’d come to you the same way, you’d have done the same for me.”
“Would I?” Chaven shook his head, then lowered his chin to his hands. “I don’t know, sometimes. Everything seems to be different since that mirror came to me. I don’t even feel like precisely the same person. It’s hard to explain.” He sighed. “But I pray that you’re right. I hope that no matter how it’s got its claws into me, I’m still the same man underneath.”
“Of course you are,” said Chert heartily, patting the physician’s arm, but in truth such talk made him a bit nervous. What could a mere looking glass do to unsettle a learned man like Chaven so thoroughly? “Perhaps you are worrying too much. Perhaps we should not even mention your own mirror, the one Brother Okros has stolen.”
“Not mention it?” For a moment Chaven looked like someone quite different, someone colder and angrier than Chert would ever have expected. “It may be a weapon—a terrible weapon—and it is in the hands of Hendon Tolly, a man without kindness or mercy. He must not have it! Your people...we must...” He looked around as though surprised to find that the person speaking so loudly was himself. “I’m sorry, Chert. Perhaps you are right. This has all been...difficult.”
Chert patted his arm again. The other Funderlings in the wide chamber were all watching him and the physician now, although some had the courtesy to pretend they weren’t.
“We have decided,” said Highwarden Sard, “not to decide. At least not about the most dangerous issue, that of the legitimacy of the castle’s regent, Lord Tolly, and what if anything we should do about it.”
“We know we must come to a decision,” amplified Highwarden Travertine. “But it cannot be rushed.”
“However, in the meantime, we have decided about the other matters,” continued Sard, then paused to catch his breath. “Chert Blue Quartz, stand and hear our words.”
Chert stood up, his heart pounding. He tried to catch Cinnabar’s eye, to glean something of what was to come, but his view of the Quicksilver Magister was blocked by the dark, robed bulk of Highwarden Caprock.
“We rule that the boy Flint shall be punished for his mischief, as Cinnabar so quaintly put it, by being confined to his house unless he is accompanied by Chert or Opal Blue Quartz.”
Chert let out his breath. They were not going to exile the boy from Funderling Town. He was so relieved he could barely pay attention to what else the Highwardens were saying.
“Chert Blue Quartz himself has done no wrong,” proclaimed Sard.
“Although his judgment could have been better,” suggested Highwarden Quicklime Pewter.
“Yes, it could have been,” said old Sard with a sour look at his colleague, “but he did his best to remedy a bad situation, and then realized that he could not go on without the advice of the Guild. To him, no penalty, but he must no longer act without the Guild’s approval in any of these matters. Do you understand, Chert Blue Quartz?”
“I do.”
“And do you so swear on the Mysteries that bind us all?”
“I do.” But though he was reassured by what had been said so far, Chert found he was not as confident about what would be done in the long run. Also, he had grown used to doing things that others—especially the Magisters and Highwardens—might think were beyond his rights or responsibilities. He and his family were dug very deep into a strange, strange vein.
“Last we come to the matter of the physician Chaven,” said Sard. “We have much still to discuss about his claims and will not make a decision recklessly, but some choices must be made now.” He stopped to cough, and for a moment as his chest heaved it seemed he might not go on. At last he caught his breath. “He will remain with us until we have determined what to do.”
“But he cannot remain in your house, Chert,” said Cinnabar. “It is already nearly impossible to keep our people from whispering, and it’s likely that only the fact these Tollys have banned us from working in the castle has kept his presence secret from them this long.”
“Where will he go...?”
“We will find a place for him here at the guild hall.” Cinnabar turned to the Highwardens. Sard and Quicklime nodded, but Travertine and Gneiss looked more than a little disgruntled. Chert guessed that Cinnabar had cast the deciding vote.
“I am sure Opal will want to keep feeding him,” Chert said. “Now that she’s learned what he eats.” He smiled at Chaven, who seemed not entirely to understand what was happening. “Upgrounders don’t like mole very much, and you can’t get them to eat cave crickets at knifepoint.”
A few of the other Magisters laughed. For the moment, things in the Council Chamber were as friendly as they were likely to be—still tense, but no one in open rebellion.
“So, then.” Sard raised his hand and all the Magisters stood. “We will meet again in one tennight to make final decisions. Until then, may the Earth Elders see you through all darknesses and in any depths.”
“In the name of He who listens in the Great Dark,” the others said in ragged chorus.
Chert watched the Magisters file out before turning to Chaven, who was still staring down at the floor of the Council Chamber like a schoolboy caught with his exercises unlearned. “Come, friend. Cinnabar will show us where you’ll stay, then I’ll go back to my house and pack up some things for you. We’ve been very lucky—I’m surprised, to tell you the truth. I suspect that having Cinnabar on our side is what saved us, because old Quicklime trusts him. Cinnabar will probably replace him one day.”
“And I hope that day is far away,” said the Quicksilver Magister, striding up. “Quicklime Pewter has forgotten more about this town and the stone it’s built with than I’ll ever know.”
As they began to walk toward the chamber door, Chaven at last looked up, as if wakening from a dream. “I’m sorry, I...” He blinked. “That veiled figure,” he said, pointing at the fabled ceiling. “Who is that? Is it...?”
“That is the Lord of...that is Kernios, of course, god of the earth,” Chert told him. “He is our special patron, as you must know.”
“And on his shoulder, an owl.” The physician was staring down again.
“It is his sacred bird, after all.”
“Kernios...” Chaven shook his head. “Of course.”
He said no more, but seemed far more troubled than a man should who had just been granted his life and safety by the venerable Stone-Cutter’s Guild.
23. The Dreams of Gods
The war raged for years before the walls of the Moonlord’s keep. Countless gods died, Onyenai and Surazemai alike.
Urekh the Wolf King perished howling in a storm of arrows. Azinor of the Oneyenai defeated the Windlord Strivos in combat, but before he could slay him, Azinor was himself butchered by Immon, the squire of great Kernios. Birin of the Evening Mists was shot by the hundred arrows of the brothers Kulin and Hiliolin, though brave Birin destroyed those murderous twins before he died.