Andawyr glanced at Yatsu who answered his question before it was asked.
‘Ivaroth’s body was found, but there was no sign of the blind man. But he existed all right. Many people saw him. And it seems he knew how to use the Power and use it well.’
‘He’d been taught.’
It was Antyr. Andawyr turned to him sharply.
‘What I learned from him faded almost immediately. It always does. But some impressions lingered, for what they’re worth. Someone, at some time, loomed large in his life – literally – a tall, powerful figure – someone who held him in thrall with the knowledge and the promise of power he offered. And whatever took his sight was… a great light, or…’ He searched for a word. ‘… something that was torn from him, something that was bound to him in the deepest way.’ He nodded. ‘Yes. It was a loss. A terrible, wrenching loss.’
‘You sound almost sorry for him,’ Yatsu said.
‘How could I not be?’ Antyr replied without hesitation. ‘Who am I to say that I might not have travelled his way in his circumstances? You’re a soldier, you understand that. But sorrow for how he came to be as he was gave me no qualms then about what I did to him, nor does it now. I’d have had it otherwise but I’d no choice. He was evil beyond imagining. Removal from this world was all that was left for him, for all our sakes.’
There was a long silence. Attention turned to Andawyr who was looking out at the sunlit valley. ‘Twice now you’ve referred to him as being gone from this world.’ He turned and smiled slightly. ‘Have you picked up our Goraidin’s unexpected flair for euphemism?’
There was enough humour in his tone to lighten the dark atmosphere that had crept over the group. Antyr returned it.
‘No. I’ve picked up their painful insistence on accuracy. I don’t know whether the man’s dead or not. He was just gone from where we were. And gone from this world. He was no longer a threat. And he was hurt – badly hurt. That I do know.’
Andawyr’s eyes narrowed. ‘So many, many questions,’ he said. ‘I can see why you’d feel the need to seek help.’ He gave a rueful laugh. ‘It would be much easier for us all if we could just declare that you’re rambling due to a sickness of the mind, but I fear you’re all too sane. And, in any case, I’d have you stay here if only to find out more about your splendid Companions.’ He clapped his hands and just managed to restrain himself from reaching down to stroke the two wolves. ‘You’re welcome to stay here as long as you wish, though I’d feel obliged to warn you that while you’re sane now, you might well not be after dealing with our incessant questioning.’
‘That’s true,’ Yatsu muttered.
Before Andawyr could respond to the taunt, Antyr said, ‘I doubt you can ask as many questions as I’ve asked myself, but I appreciate your kindness and thank you for it. I’d welcome the opportunity to learn more about who I am and what’s happened. Not only because of my ignorance about my own abilities, but because there were others as evil as he bound in that place…’ He stopped.
‘And?’ Andawyr prompted.
‘As I said, something’s wrong. While I was there I “saw” something which has been returning to me constantly, and which disturbs me in a way I can’t explain. It’s as though I’ve seen a hurt deep in the heart of the way the world itself is made.’
Chapter 4
Andawyr had been about to rise but he froze as Antyr spoke. The coincidence of Antyr’s words with his own recent concerns suddenly made him feel afraid.
‘Finish your tale, Antyr,’ he said quietly. ‘I shouldn’t have interrupted you. Tell us about this… hurt… you found, and the others you saw there.’
Both Grayle and Tarrian opened their eyes and looked at him.
‘I saw no one. Only the blind man. The others I heard. Voices ringing around and through me.’ Instinctively Antyr wrapped his arms about himself as the memory of their cold presence returned to him. ‘They were captive there, they said. Chained by others, long ago. Others like me. For using – misusing – what they called the true power. They called me an Adept – cried the word out in a frenzy. They were waiting for the blind man to bring me to them. They needed me so that they could be free again – free to move amongst the Threshold worlds – to wreak vengeance. Their ambition was the same as the blind man’s – to destroy everything and to remake it in a fashion of their own.’
He chuckled humourlessly. ‘Somehow, I defied them, or rather I spoke defiantly to them. Threatened them with the name they’d given me and added my own personal menace as best I could. “I am an Adept of the White Way. Heir to those who bound you here.”’ He shrugged, then curled his lip in a self-deprecating sneer. ‘Whistling in the dark, I suppose. It had as much effect as it would on you. I was less than an apprentice, they told me. As if I didn’t realize that for myself. A thing of clay and dross with the merest spark of past greatness in me.’ Antyr paused, mulling over the cold dismissal, still vividly with him. Then a flicker of triumph displaced his bitter sneer. ‘Still, I defeated them. When the blind man fell, they fell with him. Bound again by their own malevolence.’
He looked at Andawyr. ‘But they’re still there. Still festering, waiting, until some other innocent stumbles upon them. Someone less fortunate than I was. And they told me there were others, too; that their punishment was but part of a greater ill and that they were only the vanguard for the reshaping that was to come.’
Andawyr waited for a moment, unsettled by this eerie tale, then asked again, as casually as he could. ‘And the hurt you thought you saw. The hurt deep within the world.’
‘I’ve no words for that,’ Antyr went on. ‘I didn’t see as we see here. Nothing there was as it is here. This place is a vague shadow by comparison. As am I. I was both part of and separate from everything. All I can tell you is that there are countless worlds, somehow both here and not here, and that they are being disturbed by a wrongness which emanates from here. I’m sorry I can’t explain it better, but those are the only words I can find. Though the memory keeps returning to me – disturbing me.’
‘Your words are fine,’ Andawyr said. ‘And your pain needs no explanation.’
He massaged the remains of his nose.
‘Ar-Billan, what do you make of all this?’ he asked abruptly.
The young man started violently and made several peculiar noises before managing to speak properly. ‘It’s a strange tale,’ he stammered. ‘But it seems honest enough.’ He flicked a rueful glance towards Antyr as if trying to retrieve the awkward words, and added hastily, ‘And, as you said yourself, the trust of the Goraidin in the teller adds much to it. It demands serious study.’ Then he was floundering. ‘But I don’t think I can make anything of it. I know that you and the Senior Brothers have conjectured about the possibility of other worlds, here but not here, as Antyr put it, but I’m still struggling with what you find to be much less demanding concepts. I’m afraid all I have at the moment are questions.’ Then he became youthfully earnest. ‘But whatever else it might mean, if someone has trained another in the use of the Power – and it seems they have – and there’s been so little discipline in that training that they’ve run amok with it, then we’ll have to make something of it. If this… tall… man’s trained one, he might have trained others and there’s no saying what the consequences might be.’
Andawyr nodded appreciatively. ‘A good down-to-earth point which, I’ll confess, I’d missed, Ar-Billan. What do you think we should do, then?’