Other images flowed past. He saw the dark shape that grew at the base of the massive stairwell in Asu‘a, the tree-thing he had almost touched, whose alien thoughts he had felt. The stairway itself was a spiraling pipe that led from the roots of the breathing tree up to Green Angel Tower itself.
As he thought of the tower, he abruptly found himself staring at its pinnacle, which reared like a vast white tooth. Snow was falling and the sky was thick with clouds, but somehow Simon could see through them to the night sky beyond. Hovering low in the northern darkness was a fiery ember with a tiny smear of tail—the Conqueror Star.
“Why have you brought me here, to all these places?” Simon asked. The spot of light hovered before him as though listening. “What does this mean?”
There was no answer. Instead, something cold splashed against his face.
Simon opened his eyes, suddenly very much an inhabitant of his painful flesh once more. A distorted shape hung upside down from the ceiling, piping like a bat.
No. It was one of Inch’s henchmen, and Simon himself was hanging head-down at the lowest point of the wheel’s revolution, listening to the axle squeak. The henchman turned another dipper full of water over Simon’s face, pouring only a little of it into his mouth. He gasped and choked, trying to swallow, then licked his chin and lips. As Simon began his upward turn, the man walked away without a word. Little drops ran down from Simon’s head and hair, and for a while he was too busy trying to catch and swallow them before they dripped away to wonder at his strange vision. It was only when the wheel brought him down the other side again that he could think.
What did that mean? It was hard to hold a coherent thought against the fire in his joints. What was that glowing thing, what was it trying to show me? Or was it just more madness?
Simon had experienced many strange dreams since Inch had left him—visions of despair and exaltation, scenes of impossible victory over his enemies and of his friends suffering dreadful fates, but he had also dreamed of far less meaningful things. The voices he had heard in the tunnels had returned, sometimes as a faint babble barely audible above the splashing and groaning of the wheel, other times clear as someone whispering in his ear, snatches of speech that always seemed just tantalizingly beyond his comprehension. He was beset by fantasies, dizzy as a storm-battered bird. So why should this vision be any more real?
But it felt different. Like the difference between wind on your skin and someone touching you.
Simon clung to the memory. After all, it was something to think about, something beside the horrible gnawing in his stomach and fire in his limbs.
What did I see? That the pool down below the castle is alive again, filled up by the water that’s splashing right under this wheel? The pool! Why didn’t I think of it before? Jiriki—no, Aditu—said that there was something in Asu‘a called the Pool of Three Depths, a Master Witness. That must be what I saw down there. Saw? I drank from it! But what does that matter, even if it’s true? He struggled with his thoughts. Green Angel Tower, that tree, the pool-are they all linked somehow?
He remembered his dreams of the White Tree, dreams that had plagued him for a long time. At first he had thought it was the Uduntree on frozen Yijarjuk, the great ice waterfall that had stunned him with its magnificence and improbability, but he had come to think it had another meaning as well.
A white tree with no leaves. Green Angel Tower Is something going to happen there? But what? He laughed harshly, surprising himself by the rasping noise—he had been silent for many, many hours. And what can I do about it anyway? Tell Inch?
Still, something was happening. The Pool was alive, and Green Angel Tower was waiting for something ... and the water wheel kept turning, turning, turning.
I used to dream about a wheel, too—a great wheel that spun through Time, that pulled the past up into the light and pushed everything alive down into the ground ... not a huge piece of wood paddling dirty water, like this.
Now the wheel was carrying him down once more, tipping him so that the blood again rushed to his head and made his temples pound.
What did the angel tell me in that other dream? He grimaced and choked back a cry. The pain as it moved to his legs felt like someone jabbing him with long needles. “Go deeper, ”she said. “Go deeper ”
Time’s walls began to crumble around Simon, as though the wheel that carried him, like the wheel that had haunted his dreams, plunged directly through the fabric of the living moment, pushing it down into the past and dredging up old history to spill across the present: The castle below him, Asu‘a the Great, dead for five centuries, had become as real as the Hayholt above. The deeds of those who were gone—or those like Ineluki who had died but still would not go—were as vital as those of living men and women. And Simon himself was spun between them, a bit of tattered skin and bone caught on the wheel-rim of Eternity, dragged without his consent through the haunted present and the undying past.
Something was touching his face. Simon surfaced from delirium to feel fingers trailing across his cheek; they caught in his hair for a moment, then slid free as the wheel pulled him away. He opened his eyes, but either he could not see or the torches in the chamber had all been extinguished.
“What are you?” asked a quavering voice. It was just to one side, but he was moving away from it. “I hear you cry out. Your voice is not like the others. And I can feel you. What are you?”
The inside of Simon’s mouth was swollen so that he could barely breathe. He tried to speak, but nothing came out except a soft gargle of noise.
“What are you?”
Simon struggled to answer, wondering even as he did so if this was another dream. But none of those, for all their rustlingly intrusive presence, had touched him with solid flesh.
An eternity of time seemed to pass as he made his way to the top of the wheel where the great chains sawed noisily upward, then began his downward turn again. By the time he reached the bottom he had worked up enough spit for something close to speech, although the effort tore at his aching throat.
“Help ... me ... ”
But if someone was there, they did not speak or touch him again. His circle continued, uninterrupted. In darkness, alone, he wept without tears.
The wheel turned. Simon turned with it. Occasionally water splashed on his face and trickled into his mouth. Like the Pool of Three Depths, he thirstily absorbed it to keep the spark inside him alive. Shadows flitted through his mind. Voices hissed in the porch of his ear. His thoughts seemed to know no boundary, but at the same time he was trapped in the shell of his tormented, dying body. He began to yearn for release.
The wheel turned. Simon turned with it.
He stared into a grayness without form, an infinite distance that seemed somehow near enough to touch. A figure hovered there, faintly glimmering, gray-green as dying leaves—the angel from the tower-top.
“Simon, ” the angel said. “I have things to show you.
Even in his thoughts, Simon could not form the words to question her.
“Come. There is not much time. ”
Together they passed through things, moving crossways to another place. Like a fog evaporated by strong sun, the grayness wavered and melted away, and Simon found himself watching something-he had seen before, although he could not say where. A young man with golden hair moved carefully down a tunnel. In one hand was a torch, in the other a spear.
Simon looked for the angel, but there was only the man with the spear and his stance of fearfully poised expectation. Who was he? Why was Simon being shown this vision? Was it the past? The present? Was it someone coming to rescue him?
The stealthy figure moved forward. The tunnel widened, and the torchlight picked out the carvings of vines and flowers that twined on the walls. Whenever this might be, the past, future, or present, Simon now felt sure that he knew where it was happening—in Asu‘a, in the depths below the Hayholt.
The man stopped abruptly, then took a step backward, raising his spear.
His light fell upon a shape that bulked huge in the chamber before him, the torch-glare glittering on a thousand red scales. An immense clawed foot lay only a few paces from the archway in which the spearman stood, the talons knives of yellow bone.
“Now look. Here is a part of your own story....”
But even as the angel spoke, the scene faded abruptly.
Simon awoke to feel a hand on his face and water running between his lips. He choked and spluttered,-but at the same time did his best to swallow every life-preserving drop.
“You are a man,” a voice said. “You are real.”
Another draught of water was poured over his face and into his mouth. It was hard to swallow while dangling downside-up, but Simon had learned in his hours on the wheel.
“Who... ?” he whispered, forcing the word out through cracked lips. The hand traced across his features, delicate as an inquisitive spider.
“Who am I?” the voice asked. “I am the one who is here. In this place, I mean.”
Simon’s eyes widened. Somewhere in another chamber a torch still burned, and he could see the silhouette before him—the silhouette of a real person, a man, not a murmuring shadow. But even as he stared, the wheel drew him up again. He felt sure that when he came back around this living creature would be gone, leaving him alone once more.
“Who am I?” the man pondered. “I had a name, once—but that was in another place. When I was alive.”
Simon could not stand such talk. All he wanted was a person, a real person to speak with. He let out a strangled sob.
“I had a name,” the man said, his voice becoming quieter as Simon rotated away. “In that other place, before everything happened. They called me Guthwulf.”
PART TWO
The Blazing Tower
21
The Frightened Ones
Miriamele awakened slowly into darkness. She was moving, but not of her own power, carried by somebody or something as though she were a bundle of clothing. The cloying sweetness was still in her nose. Her thoughts were muddy and slow.
What happened? Binabik was fighting that terrible grinning man....
She dimly remembered being grasped and pulled back into darkness. She was a prisoner ... but of whom? Her father? Or worse ... far worse ... Pryrates?
Miriamele kicked experimentally, but her legs were firmly held, restrained by something less painful than ropes or chains, but no more yielding; her arms were also pinioned. She was helpless as a child.
“Let me go!” she cried, knowing it was useless, but unable to restrain her frustration. Her voice was muffled: the sack, or whatever it was, still covered her face.
Whoever held her did not reply; the bumpy progress did not slow. Miriamele struggled a bit longer, then gave up.
She had been drifting in a half-sleep when whoever carried her stopped. She was set down with surprising gentleness, then the sack was carefully lifted from her head.
At first the light, though dim, hurt her eyes. Dark figures stood before her, one leaning so close that at first she did not recognize the silhouetted shape as a head. As her eyes adjusted, she gasped and scrambled backward until hard stone halted her. She was surrounded by monsters.
The nearest creature flinched, startled by her sudden movement. Like its fellows, it was more or less manlike, but it had huge dark eyes with no whites, and its gaunt, lantern-jawed head bobbed on the end of a slender neck. It reached out a long-fingered hand toward her, then drew it back as though it feared she would bite. It said a few words in a tongue that sounded something like Hernystiri. Miriamele stared back in horrified incompre hension. The creature tried again, this time in halting, oddly-accented Westerling.
“Have we brought harm to you?” The spidery creature seemed genuinely worried. “Please, are you well? Is there aught we can give to you?”
Miriamele gaped and tried to slide out of the thing’s reach. It did not seem inclined to hurt her—at least not yet. “Some water,” she said at last. “Who are you?”
“Yis-fidri am I,” the creature replied. “These others are my fellows, and that is my mate Yis-hadra.”
“But what are you?” Miriamele wondered if the seeming kindness of these creatures could be a trick of some sort. She tried to look unobtrusively for her knife, which was no longer sheathed at her waist; as she did so, she took in her surroundings for the first time. She was in a cavern, featureless but for the rough surface of the rock. It was dimly illuminated, all glowing pink, but she could see no source for the light. A few paces away, the packs she and Binabik had carried lay beside the cavern wall. There were things inside them she could use as a weapon if she had to....
“What are we?” The one called Yis-fidri nodded solemnly. “We are the last of our people, or at least the last who have chosen this way, the Way of Stone and Earth.” The other creatures made a musical sound of regret, as though this meaningless remark had great significance. “Your people have known us as dwarrows.”
“Dwarrows!” Miriamele could not have been more surprised had Yis-fidri announced they were angels. Dwarrows were creatures of folktale, goblins who lived in the earth. Still, as unbelievable as it seemed, they stood here before her. And more, there was something almost familiar in Yis-fidri’s manner, as though she had known him or someone like him before. “Dwarrows,” she repeated. She felt a terrified laugh bubbling inside her. “Yet another story springs to life.” She sat up straighter, trying to hide her fright. “If you mean me no harm, then take me back to my friend. He is in danger.”
The saucer-eyed creature looked mournful. He made a melodious sound and one of the other dwarrows stepped forward with a stone bowl. “Take of this and drink. It is water, as you asked.”
Miriamele sniffed at it suspiciously for a moment, then realized that if they could bring her here so easily the dwarrows had little need to poison her. She drank, savoring the feel of the chill, clean water on her dry throat. “Will you take me back to him?” she asked again when she had finished.
The dwarrows looked nervously at each other, heads wavering like poppies in a windy field. “Please, mortal woman, ask not for that,” Yis-fidri said at last. “You were in a perilous place—more perilous than you can know—and you carried something there which you should not have. The balance is exceeding delicate.” The words sounded stilted and almost comical, but his reluctance was very clear.
“Perilous!?” A spark of indignation kindled. “What right do you have to snatch me away from my friend? I will decide what is perilous for me!”
He shook his head. “Not for you—or not for you only. Dreadful things are in the balance, and that place ... it is not good.” He seemed very uncomfortable, and the other dwarrows swayed a little behind him, humming nervously to themselves. Despite her unhappiness, Miriamele almost laughed at the odd spectacle. “We cannot let you go there. We are deeply sorry. Some of our number will return and look for your friend.”
“Why didn’t you help him? Why couldn’t you bring him with us if it was so important that we not be there?”
“We were sorely afraid. He did fight with an Unliving One, or so it seemed. And the balance is very delicate there.”
“What does that mean?!” Miriamele stood up, for a moment more angry than fearful. “You cannot do this!” She began to edge toward a shadowy place on the cavern wall that she thought might be a tunnel mouth. Yis-fidri reached out and caught at her wrist. His thin fingers were callused and hard as stone. There was deceptive strength, great strength, in this slender dwarrow.
“Please, mortal woman. We will tell you all that we are able. Content yourself for now to stay with us. We will seek for your friend.”
She struggled, but it was hopeless. She might have been pulling against the weight of the earth.
“So,” she said at last. Fright was turning to hopelessness. “I have no choice. Tell me what you know, then. But if Binabik is hurt because of what you’ve done, I’ll ... I’ll find a way to punish you, whoever you are. I will.??
?
Yis-fidri hung his great head like a dog being scolded. “It is not our wont to force others against their will. We have ourselves suffered too much at the hands of bad masters.”
“If I must be your prisoner, at least call me by my name. I’m Miriamele.”
“Miriamele, then.” Yis-fidri let go of her arm. “Forgive us, Miriamele, or at least judge us not until all we have to say is heard.”
She lifted the bowl and took another drink. “Tell me, then.”
The dwarrow looked around at his fellows, at the circle of huge dark eyes, then began to talk.
“And how is Maegwin?” Isorn asked. His bandage gave him a strange, swollen-headed appearance. Icy air crept past the tent flap to ripple the flames of the small fire.
“I had thought she might be coming back to us,” Eolair sighed. “Last night she began to move a little and take deeper breaths. She even spoke a few words, but they were whispered. I could make no sense of them.”
“But that is good news! Why are you so long-faced?”
“The Sitha woman came to see her. She said it was like a fever—that sometimes the sufferer comes near to the surface, like a drowning man coming up for air one last time, but that does not mean ...” Eolair’s voice shook. He made an effort to control himself. “The healer said that she was still just as close to death, if not closer.”
“And you believe the Sitha?”
“It is not an illness of the flesh, Isorn,” the count said quietly. “It is a wound to her soul, which was already damaged. You saw her in the last weeks.” He twined his fingers, then untwined them. “And the Sithi know more of these things than we do. Whatever happened to Maegwin left no marks, no broken bones or bleeding cuts. Give thanks that your own injury is something that can be mended.”