He paused.
—The Black Elfstone is mine—
Quickening did not respond this time, but simply continued to stare into the Stone King’s scarred eyes. Uhl Belk’s massive body shifted again, moving as if mired in quicksand, the stone grinding resolutely, a wheel of time and certainty given the skin of substance.
—You—
He pointed to Walker, a finger straightening.
—The Asphinx claimed a part of you; I can sense its stink upon your body; yet somehow you still live; are you a Druid—
“No,” Quickening answered instantly. “He is a messenger of the Druids, sent by them to recover the Black Elfstone. His Elven magic saved him from the poison of the Asphinx. His claim to the Black Elfstone is the rightful one, granted him by the Druids.”
—The Druids are all dead—
Quickening said nothing, waiting for the Stone King, standing fearlessly beneath him. A sudden movement of one massive arm and she would be crushed. She seemed unconcerned. Walker glanced quickly at Morgan, but the Highlander’s eyes were on the face of Uhl Belk, transfixed by the ugliness of it, hypnotized by the power he saw there. He wondered what he was expected to do. Anything? He wondered suddenly what he was doing there at all.
Then the Stone King spoke again, a slow rasping in the silence.
—I have been alive forever and I will live on long after you are dust; I was created by the Word and I have survived all that were given life with me save one and that one will soon be gone as well; I care nothing for the world in which I exist save for the preservation of that over which I was given dominion—eternal stone; it is stone that weathers all things, that is unchanging and fixed and therefore as close to perfection as life can achieve; I am the giver of stone to the world and the architect of what is to become; I use all necessary means to see that my purpose is fulfilled; therefore I took the Black Elfstone and made it mine—
The dome echoed with his words, and then the echoes died away into silence. The shadows were lengthening already as Walker’s light began slowly to fail, the magic fading. Walker felt the futility of what they were about. Morgan’s sword arm had lowered uselessly to his side; what purpose was there in trying to employ a weapon of iron against something as ancient and immutable as this? Only Quickening seemed to believe there was any hope.
—The Druids were as nothing compared to me; their precautions to hide and protect their magic were futile; I left the Asphinx to show my disdain for what they had attempted to do; they were believers in the laws of nature and evolution, foolish purveyors of the creed of change; they died and left nothing; stone is the only element of the earth’s body that endures, and I shall live in that stone forever—
“Constant,” Quickening whispered.
—Yes—
“Eternal.”
—Yes—
“But what of your trust, Uhl Belk? What of that? You have disdained to be that which you were created—a balancing force, a preservationist of the world as it was created to be.” Her voice was low and compelling, a web weaving images that seemed to take form and shimmer in the dead air before her. “I was told your story. You were given life to preserve life; that was the trust given you by the Word. Stone preserves nothing of life. You were not instructed to transform, yet you have taken it upon yourself to subvert everything, to alter forever the composition of life upon the land, to change living matter to stone—all this to create an extension of who and what you are. And look what it has done to you.”
She braced herself against the anger already forming on the Stone King’s brow. “Give back the Black Elfstone, Uhl Belk. Let us help you become free again.”
The massive stone creature shifted on his bed of rock, joints grating, the sounds cracking through the arena as if some invisible audience sought to respond. Uhl Belk spoke, and his voice had a new and frightening edge to it.
—You are more than you pretend to be; I am not deceived; yet it does not matter; I care nothing for who you are or what you want; I admitted you to me so that I might examine you; the magic with which you touched me caught my attention and made me curious as to who you might be; but I need nothing from you; I need nothing from any living thing; I am complete; think of me as the land on which you walk and you as the tiniest of fleas that live upon me; if you should become a bother I will eliminate you in an instant; if you should survive this day you will probably not survive another—
The great brow knitted, and the gnarled face re-formed its ridges and lines.
—What am I if not the whole of your existence; look about you and I am everything you see; look where you stand within Eldwist and I am everything you touch; I have made myself so; I have made myself one with the land I create; I am free of all else and shall ever be—
Suddenly Walker Boh understood. Uhl Belk wasn’t a living thing in the conventional sense of the words. He was a spirit in the same way as the King of the Silver River. He was more than the statue that crouched before them. He was everything they walked upon; he was the entire Kingdom of Eldwist. The stone was his skin, he had said—a part of his living self. He had found a way to infuse himself into everything he created, ensuring his permanency in a way that nothing else could.
But that meant he was a prisoner as well. That was why he didn’t rise to greet them or come hunting for them or involve himself directly in any way in what they were about. That was why his legs were sunk down into the stone. Mobility was beyond him, an indulgence meant for lesser creatures. He had evolved into something greater, he had evolved into his own world. And it held him trapped.
“But you are not free, are you?” Quickening questioned boldly, as if reading Walker’s thoughts. “If you were, you would give us the Black Elfstone, for you would have no real need of it.” Her voice was hard and insistent. “But you cannot do that, can you, Uhl Belk? You need the Black Elfstone to stay alive. Without it, the Maw Grint would have you.”
—No—
“Without it, the Maw Grint would destroy you.”
—No—
“Without it…
—No—
A stone fist crashed downward, barely missing the girl, shattering a portion of the ground next to her, sending jagged cracks along its surface for a hundred yards in every direction. The Stone King shuddered as if stricken.
“The Maw Grint is your child, Uhl Belk,” Quickening continued, ramrod straight before him, as if it were she who had the size and the power and not the Stone King. “But your child does not obey you.”
—You know nothing; the Maw Grint is an extension of me, as is everything in Eldwist an extension of me; it has no life except what I would give; it serves my purpose and no other, turning the lands adjoining and all that live within them to stone, the permanency of myself—
The girl’s black eyes were bright and quick. “And the Black Elfstone?”
The Stone King’s voice was resonant with some strange mix of emotions that refused to be identified.
—The Black Elfstone allows—
The jagged mouth ground closed and the Stone King hunched down into himself, limbs and body knotting together as though they might disappear into a single massive rock.
“Allows?” Quickening breathed softly.
The flat, empty eyes lifted.
—Watch—
The word reverberated like a splitting of the Stone King’s soul. Rock grated and ground once more, and the wall of the dome behind them parted. Gray, hazy daylight spilled through as if to flee the steady curtain of rain that fell without. Clouds and mist drifted past, bending and twisting about the buildings that loomed beyond, cloaking them as if they were a gathering of frozen giants set patiently at watch. An eerie wail burst from the Stone King’s mouth and it filled the emptiness of the city with a sound like a thin sheet of metal vibrating in the wind. It rose and died quickly, but its echo lingered as if it would last forever.
—Watch—
They heard the Maw Grint before they saw it, its approach s
ignaled by a rumble deep beneath the city’s streets that rose steadily as the creature neared, a low growl building to a roar that jolted everything and brought the three from Rampling Steep to their knees. The Maw Grint burst into view, shattering apart the stone that was Uhl Belk’s skin, splitting it wide just beyond the wall of the dome, just without the opening through which they stared wide-eyed and helpless. They could see the Stone King flinch with pain. The Maw Grint rose and seemed to keep rising, a leviathan of impossible size that dwarfed even the buildings themselves, swaying like a snake, a loathsome cross between burrowing worm and serpent, as black as pitch with foul liquid oozing from a rock-encrusted body, eyeless, headless, its mouth a sucking hole that seemed intent on drinking first the rain and then the air itself. It shot into view with a suddenness that was terrifying and filled the void of the dome’s opening like a wave of darkness that would collapse it completely.
Walker Boh went cold with disbelief and horror. The Maw Grint wasn’t real; it was impossible even to imagine such a thing. For the first time in his life he wanted to run. He watched Morgan Leah stagger back and drop to his knees. He watched Quickening freeze in place. He felt himself lose strength and only barely managed to keep from falling. The Maw Grint writhed against the skyline, a great spineless mass of black ooze that nothing could withstand.
Yet the Stone King did not waver. A thick, gnarled hand lifted, the one that had cradled his chin when they had thought him a statue, and the fingers slowly began to open. Light burst forth—yet it was light the like of which none of them had ever seen. It sprayed in all directions at first and did not illuminate in the manner of ordinary light but instead turned everything it touched dark.
This is not light, Walker Boh realized as he fought to hold back a flood of sensations that threatened to overwhelm him. This is the absence of light!
Then the fingers of the Stone King spread wide, and they could see what he held. It was a perfectly formed gemstone, its center as black and impenetrable as night. The stone glittered as it reflected the thin streamers of gray daylight and let not even the smallest trace pass within. It looked tiny cradled in Uhl Belk’s massive stone palm, but the darkness it cast stretched away into the farthest corners of the dome, into the deepest recesses, seeking out and enveloping the whole of Walker’s scattered luminescence so that in a matter of seconds the only light remaining came from the rent in the dome’s stone skin.
Walker Boh felt his own magic stir within him in recognition.
They had found the Black Elfstone.
Uhl Belk cried out then, a thundering howl that rose above even the sounds of the Maw Grint’s coming, of the wind and the rain and the sea far beyond, and he thrust the Black Elfstone before him. The blackness gathered and tightened into a single band that shot forward to strike the Maw Grint. The Maw Grint did not resist. Instead, it simply hung there, transfixed. It shuddered—pained and pleasured both somehow, wracked with feelings that the humans crouched before it could only imagine. It twisted, and the blackness twisted in response. The blackness spread, widening, flowing out, then back again, until the Stone King was enveloped as well. They could hear him groan, then sob, again with feelings that were mixed in some veiled way, not clearly defined and not meant to be. The Elfstone’s magic joined them, father and son, monsters each, a substanceless lock that bound them as surely as iron chains.
What is happening? Walker Boh wondered. What is the magic doing to them?
Then the nonlight disappeared, a line of shadow fading, steadily dissipating like ink soaking into and through white netting, the air brightening until the daylight returned and the link between the Stone King and the Maw Grint had vanished. The Maw Grint sank from sight, oozing back into the earth. The hole that it had made closed after it, the stone knitting into place, as smooth and hard as before, leaving the street whole again, creating the illusion that nothing at all had happened. The rain washed away all traces of the creature’s coming, streams of water loosening the greenish film of poison secreted from its body and carrying it from sight.
Uhl Belk’s fingers closed once more about the Black Elfstone, his eyes lidded, his face transformed in a way that Walker could not describe, as if he had been made over somehow, created anew. Yet he was more frightening looking than ever, his features harsher, less human, and more a part of the rock that encased him. He withdrew the Elfstone, his hand clasping it tightly to his body. His voice rumbled.
—Do you see—
They did not, not even Quickening. The puzzlement in her dark eyes was evident. They stood mute before the Stone King, all three, feeling tiny and uncertain.
“What has happened to you, Uhl Belk?” the girl asked finally.
Rain hammered down, and the wind ripped through the dome’s rent.
The massive pitted head began to turn away, the stone grating ominously.
“You must give us the Black Elfstone!” Quickening shouted.
—The Black Elfstone is mine—
“The Shadowen will take it from you—just as you took it from the Druids!”
Uhl Belk’s voice was weary, disinterested.
—The Shadowen are children; you are all children; you do not concern me; nothing that you do can harm or affect me; look at me; lam as old as the world and I shall last as long; you shall be gone in the blink of an eye; take yourselves out of my city; if you remain, if you come to me again, if I am disturbed by you in any way, I shall summon the Rake to dispose of you and you shall be swept away at once—
The floor rippled beneath them, a shudder that sent them tumbling backward toward the opening in the wall. The Stone King had flinched the way an animal would in an effort to shed itself of some bothersome insect. Walker Boh rose, pulling Quickening back with him, beckoning to Morgan. There was nothing to be gained by staying. They would not have the Black Elfstone this day—if indeed ever. Uhl Belk was a creature evolved far beyond any other. He was right; what could they do that would harm or affect him?
Yet Quickening seemed unconvinced. “It is you who shall be swept away!” she shouted as they backed through the opening into the street. She was shaking. “Listen to me, Uhl Belk!”
The craggy face was turned again into shadow, the massive shoulders hunched down, the thinker’s pose resumed. There was no response.
Standing outside in the rain they watched the wall seal over, the skin knit, the rent fade away as if it had never been. In moments the dome was an impenetrable shell once more.
Morgan moved to place his hands on Quickening’s shoulders. The girl seemed unaware of him, a thing of stone herself. The Highlander leaned close and began whispering.
Walker Boh moved away from them. When he was alone, he turned once again to face Uhl Belk’s haven. A fire consumed him and at the same time he felt detached. He was there and he was not. He realized that he no longer knew himself. He had become an enigma he could not solve. His thoughts tightened like a cinched cord. The Stone King was an enemy that none of them could defeat. He was not simply ruler of a city; he was the city itself. Uhl Belk had become Eldwist. He was a whole world, and no one could change an entire world. Not Allanon or Cogline or all of the Druids put together.
Rain streamed down his face. No one.
Yet he already knew that he was going to try.
XXVI
Pe Ell had changed his mind twice before finally settling the matter. Now he slipped down the darkening street and ducked into the doorway of the building in which the others had concealed themselves with his misgivings comfortably stowed. Rain dripped from his cloak, staining the stone of the stairs he followed, tracking his progress in a steady, meandering trail. He paused at the landing to listen, heard nothing, and went on. The others were probably out searching. There or not, it made no difference to him. Sooner or later, they would return. He could wait.
He passed down the hallway without bothering to conceal his approach and stalked through the doorway of their hiding place. At first glance the room appeared empty, but his
instincts warned him instantly that he was being watched and he stopped a dozen feet through. Shadows dappled the room in strange patterns, clustered about haphazardly as if stray children chased inside by the weather. The patter of the rain sounded steadily in the silence as Pe Ell stood waiting.
Then Horner Dees appeared, slipping noiselessly from the shadows of a doorway to one side, moving with a grace and ease that belied his bulky frame. He was scratched and bruised and his clothing was torn. He looked as if some animal had gotten hold of him. He fixed Pe Ell with his grizzled look, as rough and suspicious as ever, an ageing bear come face-to-face with a familiar enemy.
“You constantly amaze me,” Pe Ell said, meaning it, still curious about this troublesome old man.
Dees stopped, keeping his distance. “Thought we’d seen the last of you,” he growled.
“Did you, now?” Pe Ell smiled disarmingly, then moved across the room to where a collection of withered fruits sat drying in a makeshift bowl. He picked up and took a bite. It was bitter tasting, but edible. “Where are the others?”
“Out and about,” Dees answered. “What difference does it make to you?”
Pe Ell shed his damp cloak and seated himself. “None. What happened to you?”
“I fell down a hole. Now what do you want?”
Pe Ell’s smile stayed in place. “A little help.”
It was difficult to tell if Horner Dees was surprised or not; he managed to keep his face from showing anything tart seemed at a momentary loss for a response. He hunched down a few inches, as if settling himself against an attack; studied Pe Ell wordlessly, then Shook his head.
“I know you, Pe Ell,” he declared softly. “I remember you from the old days, from the time you were just beginning. I was with the Federation then, a Tracker, and I knew you. Rimmer Dall had plans for me as well; but I decided not to go along with them. I saw you once or twice, saw you come and go, heard the rumors about you.” He paused. “I just want you to know.”
Pe Ell finished the fruit and tossed the pit aside. He wasn’t sure how he felt about this unexpected revelation. He guessed it really didn’t matter. At least now he hart an inkling of what it was that bothered him so about Dees.