Читать книгу Black Jade - David Zindell, David Zindell - Страница 13

For a long while, however, we stood on a mantle of ground near the tunnel’s mouth looking in vain for this fabled school. Kane set out along the heights to our left to see what he could see, while Master Juwain picked his way along the rocks to our right. They returned to report that they could descry no sign of the school, or indeed, of any human habitation.

‘Perhaps,’ Master Juwain said, pointing at the folded, forested terrain below us, ‘the school is hidden. The lay of the land might conceal it.’

‘Then let us find a better vantage to look for it,’ Kane said.

‘As long as that vantage lies lower and not higher,’ Maram said. ‘It’s damn cold on these heights.’

We began making our way down the rugged slope into the valley. We found a line of clear patches through the trees that might or might not have been part of an ancient path. After an hour, we came out around the curve of a great swell of ground, and we gathered on a long, clear ridge that afforded an excellent view of almost the entire valley. All we could see were trees and empty meadows and the river’s bright blue gleam.

‘Perhaps your Rhymes misled us after all,’ Maram complained to Master Juwain.

Master Juwain’s jaws tightened as he readied a response to Maram’s incessant faithlessness. And then, from below us, through the trees, there came the faint sound of someone singing. I could make out a pleasant melody but none of the words. Although it seemed unlikely that an enemy would cheerfully alert us, Kane and I drew our swords even so.

A few moments later, a small, old man worked his way up the path into view. He wore plain, undyed woolens and leaned upon a shepherd’s crook as if it were a walking staff. I saw that he had the wheat-colored skin and almond eyes of the Sung. Long, thick white hair framed his wrinkled face. Despite his obvious age, he moved with the liveliness of a much younger man.

‘Greetings, strangers!’ he called to us in a rich, melodious voice. ‘You look as if you’ve come a long way.’

His words caused Master Juwain to rub the back of his head as he scrutinized this old man. He said to him, ‘A stranger’s way is always long.’

‘Unless, of course,’ the old man said, smiling, ‘he is no stranger to the Way.’

Now Master Juwain smiled, too, and he bowed to the old man. Having completed the ancient formula by which those of the Brotherhood recognize and greet others of their order in chance encounters in out of the way places, the two of them strode forward to embrace each other. Master Juwain gave his name and those of the rest of us. And the old man presented himself as Master Virang.

‘You did well,’ he told Master Juwain, bowing back to him, ‘to find your way here. My brethren will be eager to learn why you have brought outsiders to our valley.’

He cast a deep, penetrating look at Kane and me, as we faced him with our swords still drawn. I had a sense that he could peel back the layers of my being and nearly read my mind. And Maram said to him, ‘Then this is the Valley of the Sun? We weren’t sure, for we saw nothing that looked like a school. You don’t dwell underground, do you?’

He shuddered as he said this. Since the Ymanir, who might have carved the mysterious tunnel above us, had also built the underground city of Argattha in these same mountains, it seemed a likely surmise.

His question, though, made Master Virang smile. ‘No, we are men, not moles, and so we dwell as most men do.’

‘Dwell where, then?’ Maram asked. ‘I could swear that there isn’t a hut or even an outhouse in all this valley.’

‘Could you?’

Master Virang kept one of his hands inside his pocket as he looked at Maram strangely. Then he looked at me. The space behind my eyes tingled in a way that seemed both pleasant and disturbing. I found myself, of a sudden, able to make out the trees in the distance with a greater clarity. It was as if I had emerged from a pool of blurry water into cold, crisp air.

‘Ah, I could swear it,’ Maram muttered. ‘We’ve looked everywhere.’

‘Indeed?’ Master Virang asked. ‘But did you look down there?’

So saying, he pointed the tip of his staff straight down the slope below us toward the most open part of the valley, where the river ran through its heart. The air overlaying this green, sunny land began to shimmer. And then I gripped my sword in astonishment, for out of the wavering brilliance a few miles away, along the banks of the river, many white, stone buildings appeared. So distinctly did they stand out that it seemed impossible we had failed to perceive them.

‘Sorcery!’ Maram cried out, even more astonished than I. He shook his head at Master Virang, and took a step back from him. ‘You hide your school beneath the veil of illusion!’

Liljana, too, seemed disquieted by the sudden sight of the school – and even more so by Master Virang. In her most acid of voices, she said to him, ‘We had not heard that the masters of the Great White Brotherhood had learned the arts of the Lord of Illusions.’

But Master Virang only matched her scowl with a smile. He said to her, ‘To compel others to see what is not is indeed illusion, and that is forbidden to us, as it is to all men. But to help them apprehend what is – this is true vision and the grace of the One.’

He bowed his head to Liljana and added, ‘Our school is real enough, after all. You are tired and travel-worn – will you accept our hospitality?’

Although he posed this invitation as a question, politely and formally, there could be no doubting what our answer would be. All of us, I thought, bore misgivings as to how the Brotherhood’s school had been hidden from us. Even more, though, we were curious to learn its secrets and ways.

And so Master Virang twirled his staff in his hand as he led us back along the path. He fairly jumped from rock to rock like a mountain goat. The rest of us, trailing our horses, moved more slowly. It took us most of the rest of the morning to hike down into the valley and to come out of the forest onto the school’s grounds, laid out above the river. We walked through apple orchards, ash groves and rose gardens, and fields of rye, oats and barley. The Valley of the Sun was as warm and bright as its name promised, especially near the ides of Ashte with the full bloom of spring greening the land. A ring of great, white mountains entirely surrounded it and guarded it from the worst winds and snow.

This refuge deep within the Nagarshath range was nothing so splendid and magnificent as the Ymanir’s crystal city, Alundil, beneath the Mountain of the Morning Star. But it shone with a quiet beauty and was pervaded by a deep peace. It seemed to exist out of time and to take no part in the ways and wars of the world. We all sensed that it concealed ancient secrets. The two hundred or so Brothers who dwelled here worked hard but happily in getting their sustenance from the land. We passed these simple men dressed in simple woolen tunics, laying to in the fields with hoes or dipping candles or working hot iron in the blacksmith’s shop. Others tended sheep in pastures on the hillsides or attended to the dozen other occupations necessary for the thriving of what amounted to a small town. But the Brothers’ main occupations, as we would learn, remained the ancient disciplines, or callings, of the Great White Brotherhood. And each of these seven callings was exemplified by a revered master, and indeed, by the Grandmaster of the Brotherhood himself.

Master Virang, who proved to be the Meditation Master, helped us to settle into two of the school’s guest houses just above the river. Liljana, Atara and Estrella took up residence in the smaller of them, while the rest of us set up in the other. There, in these steeply-roofed stone hostels that reminded me of the chalets of my home, we spent hours soaking our cold, bruised bodies in hot water and washing away the grime of our journey. It was good to put on fresh tunics, and even better to sit down to a hot meal. Master Virang saw to it that we were served chicken soup and fresh bread for lunch, and cheese and berries, too. He left us alone to eat these heartening foods, but then returned an hour later to spirit away Master Juwain to a private meeting with the Grandmaster.

What they discussed all during that long afternoon we could only wonder. Master Juwain rejoined us only at the end of the day, when we gathered with the entire community of Brothers for a feast in the Great Hall. We were so busy, however, exchanging pleasantries with the curious Brothers that Master Juwain could not find a moment to confer with the rest of us. His face seemed tight and troubled, and I wondered if the Grandmaster had given him ill tidings or perhaps had chastened him for leading our company here.

I did not have to wait long to find out the answers to these questions – and to others that vexed me even more sorely. After the feast, we were summoned to take tea with The Seven, as the Brotherhood’s masters were called. On a clear, lovely night we adjourned to one of the nearby buildings. Here, from time to time, in a little stone conservatory, the Grandmaster came to dwell in solitude or sit with the Music or Meditation Masters, or others with whom he wished to speak. Indeed, the circular space where we met with them had much the air of a meditation chamber. White wool carpets and many cushions covered the floor across its length and breadth. Vases of fresh flowers had been set into recesses built into the walls. These curves of white granite were carved with various symbols: pentagram, gammadion and caduceus; sun and eagle, swan and star. In various places, some ancient artisan had chiselled the Great Serpent in the form of a lightning bolt – and of a dragon swallowing its tail. The twelve pillars supporting the dome above us also showed cut glyphs. The light from the room’s many candles illumined the shapes of the Archer, Ram, Dolphin, and nine other signs of the zodiac. The dome itself was smooth and featureless save for twelve round windows letting in the light of the stars.

This radiance seemed to gather within the hollows of a goldish bowl, set upon a marble pedestal beneath the northernmost window. In size and shape, if not shimmer, the bowl seemed like unto the Lightstone itself. I sensed immediately that it must be a work of silver gelstei, for I felt the silustria of my sword fairly singing to it. It must be, I thought, one of the False Lightstones forged in the Age of Law. Once, in the Library of Khaisham, my friends and I had come across a similar vessel of silver gelstei, shaped and tinted as the Lightstone in a vain attempt to capture its powers. Like all the silver gelstei, though, this cup would resonate with the true gold, and so was still a very great treasure.

The conservatory’s only items of furniture were three low tea tables, inlaid with tiny triangles of lapis, shell and jet, and set with little round tea cups. As my companions and I entered the room, the Grandmaster and his Brothers stood up from behind them to greet us. In Tria I had sat at table with kings, but these seven masters of the Great White Brotherhood seemed possessed of no less presence and authority.

Tallest of the Seven, and the most striking, was the Grandmaster himself. His name was Abrasax, but because the Brothers found it too much of a mouthful to address him as Grandmaster Abrasax, most of them called him, simply, Grandfather.

His age, I thought, was hard to tell. A corona of curly white hair covered his head and flowed in waves down his cheeks and chin to form a rather magnificent beard. His seamed and weathered skin made for rather a stark contrast with it, for it was as brown as a tanned bull’s hide. According to Master Juwain, Abrasax’s father had been a chieftain of the Tukulak tribe and his mother a Karabuk maiden taken captive as concubine. In Abrasax, I thought, gathered the comeliest features of both the Sarni and Karabuk peoples. He had the long, well-shaped head of the Sarni and a solid and symmetrical face. His muscular hands fairly radiated strength; I could easily imagine them working one of the Sarni’s stiff war bows, if not the great bow of Sajagax himself. But his nose flared like a delicate and perfect triangle, and so, I guessed, it must have been with his mother and her kin. His eyes were large and liquid like a horse’s eyes, full of gentleness and grace. And full of wisdom, too. And something else. In the way he looked at me, with sweetness and fire, I had a deep, disturbing sense that he could perceive things in me that others had never seen – not Atara or Kane, or even my mother, father or my own grandfather.

He motioned for me to sit opposite from him at the centermost table. I lowered myself onto a plump cushion, with Master Juwain to my right and Liljana to my left. Master Virang sat to the right of Abrasax, and Master Matai, the Master Diviner, joined us as well. The two other tables were pulled up close to ours, end to end, making for what seemed one long table. Maram and Kane took places at the one to my right, and so, across from them, did Master Okuth and Master Storr. To my left, Atara, Estrella and Daj sat facing Master Yasul and Master Nolashar, the Music Master. I couldn’t help staring at this middling-old man. His hair was cropped short like that of most of the Brothers, but was as straight and black as my own. Too, he had the long nose and black eyes of many of my people. His name and quiet, alert bearing proclaimed him as a Valari warrior, at least by lineage and upbringing. But now, it seemed, he trained with the flute or mandolet instead of the sword, and made music instead of war.

As soon as we all had settled into our places, the doors opened behind us, and six young Brothers entered bearing big, blue pots of tea. They set them down before us, along with smaller pots of cream and bowls full of honey. I took my tea plain, in the Valari way, and so did Master Nolashar. But most of the others set to pouring in cream and stirring their tea with little silver spoons that tinkled against the sides of their cups. The Brotherhood makes use of scores of teas, blended from hundreds of herbs, and the one I first sipped that night was as sweet as cherries, as fiery as brandy, and as cool and bracing as fresh peppermint.

Abrasax waited for the young Brothers to finish their work and leave. He smiled at Daj and Estrella in a kindly way. Then his face fell stern, and he looked at the rest of us, one by one, and most keenly at Master Juwain as he said, ‘I would like, first and foremost, to welcome you all to our school. It has been nearly a hundred years since anyone outside our order has taken refuge here, for our rules are necessarily strict and we do not usually break them. Master Juwain, however, has explained the need that drove him to lead outsiders here, and I am in agreement with his decision, as are the rest of us. As long as you abide by our rules, you may remain as long as you would like.’

His voice was deep and strong and sure of itself. But there was no pride or veiled threat in it, as with a king’s voice, only curiosity and an insistence on the truth. And so, with all the candor that I could summon, I bowed my head to him and said, ‘Thank you, Grandfather. If we could, we would remain in this beautiful place for a year. But as Master Juwain will have told you, we have urgent business elsewhere, and we would ask of you not only your hospitality but your help.’

Abrasax exchanged a quick look with Master Virang, and then Master Storr, a rather stout man with fair, freckled skin and eyes as blue and clear as topaz gems. And then Abrasax said, ‘You shall certainly have our hospitality; as for our help in your quest, we are met here tonight to decide if we can help you, and more, if such help would be wise.’

His obvious doubt concerning us seemed to pierce Maram like a spearpoint, and my prickly friend took a sip of tea, and then muttered, ‘The whole world is about to burn up in dragon fire, and the Masters of the Brotherhood must sit and debate whether they will help us?’

Abrasax just gazed at him. ‘You must understand, Brother Maram, that a great deal is at stake. Indeed, as you say, the whole world.’

‘Please, Grandfather,’ Maram said, ‘I’m a Brother no longer, and you should call me Sar Maram.’

‘All men are brothers,’ Abrasax reminded him, ‘but it will be as you’ve asked. Sar Maram, then.’

Maram nodded his head as if this name pleased him very well – even if Master Storr and a couple of the other masters present clearly disapproved of it. Maram looked around the table at the pots of tea, and I could almost feel his fierce desire that they should contain brandy or other spirits instead.

‘Few men,’ he told Abrasax as he nodded at me, ‘whether they are Brothers or not, have seen what we’ve seen or fought so hard to free Ea from the Red Dragon’s claws.’

‘You have fought hard, it’s true,’ Abrasax agreed. ‘But ferocity at arms, even of will, can never be enough to defeat the Dragon. Even as we speak, he moves to seize his moment. Has Master Juwain told you the tidings?’

‘No,’ Maram grumbled, shaking his head, ‘he hasn’t had the chance.’

‘Evil tidings we’ve had out of Alonia,’ Abrasax told us. ‘Count Dario Narmada is dead, murdered by one of Morjin’s Kallimun. Baron Maruth has proclaimed the Aquantir’s independence, and so with Baron Monteer in Iviendenhall and Duke Parran in Jerolin. In Tria, Breyonan Eriades has allied with the Hastars to hunt down all Narmadas of King Kiritan’s sept.’

Abrasax looked at Atara and said, ‘I’m sorry, Princess.’

Atara turned her grave, beautiful face toward him. ‘I’m sorry, too. My father’s father reconquered the dukedoms and baronies you speak of and made Alonia great again. Count Dario might have held the realm together. No one else is strong enough.’

‘Not even King Kiritan’s only legitimate child?’

Atara touched the white cloth binding her face and said, ‘A woman, and a blind one at that? No, I am Atara Manslayer, now – no one else.’

‘Then it must be said that Alonia is no more.’

Atara laughed bitterly. ‘Morjin will hardly even need to send an army marching north to reduce her to ashes.’

Abrasax massaged the deep creases around his eyes, then said, ‘Galda has fallen, Yarkona and Surrapam, too. In all lands, our schools are being found out and burned down one by one. Our Brothers, put to the sword. And yet the evilest tidings of all have come out of Argattha.’

His words piqued Liljana’s intense interest, and her plump, round face turned toward him as she asked, ‘And how have these tidings come to you, then?’

Abrasax looked deep into her eyes and told her, ‘We will be as forthcoming with you as we hope you will be with us. You see, for a very long time now, we have kept a secret school within Argattha. But not five months ago, it was discovered, and the last of our order there, Brother Songya, was captured and crucified. We will try to re-establish the school, but …’

A silence fell over the tea tables and spread out into the room. I gazed up at the flowers in the stands and the ancient glyphs cut beneath the stone ceiling. The round windows there glistened with starlight.

‘Before Brother Songya died,’ Abrasax went on, ‘he sent word of the excavations beneath the city. There is, as you know, a great earth chakra there – the greatest on Ea. Morjin’s slaves have nearly driven tunnels straight down into the heart of it. The digging has been stopped only by a great seam of quartz that breaks picks and shovels. If Morjin had a firestone, all would be lost. All is nearly lost, as it is.’

‘Do not speak so, Grandfather,’ Master Yasul said to him. The Master Remembrancer was an old man with skin as dark as mahogany and tight little curls of white hair capping his bald head. He might have hailed from Karabuk or Uskudar, but seemed so at home in this quiet room as to have been born here. ‘We still have hope.’

Abrasax picked up his cup to take a long sip of tea. Then he looked around the tables. ‘We must at least act as if there is hope. But I have said that this is a night for openness, and we cannot turn away from the truth. The Red Dragon needs only to gain a little more mastery of the Lightstone to open the great chakra. When its fires break free …’

His voice choked off as he looked at Master Yasul and Master Juwain. Then he said, ‘The first faint flames have already broken free. It cannot be long before he unleashes the Baaloch upon the world.’

At the mention of Morjin’s master, Angra Mainyu, the Great Beast, we all fell into a deep silence as we sipped our tea. Then Master Juwain said to Abrasax: ‘But what of the Maitreya, Grandfather? Isn’t it clear that he must be found and aided so that he can keep the Red Dragon from using the Lightstone?’

Abrasax pulled at his long beard. ‘No, that is not so clear as you might wish. With your help, Valashu Elahad gained the Lightstone only to lose it to the Red Dragon. If we lost the Maitreya as well, then there truly would be no hope.’

At this, I drew in a quick breath and said, ‘If fate leads us to find the Shining One, we will not lose him.’

I stared at Abrasax as he and the other six masters stared back at me.

Abrasax motioned toward Master Matai. He had the soft curls and golden complexion of many Galdans, and his sharp brown eyes seemed to perceive a great deal. And Abrasax said, ‘Our Master Diviner believes that these are the last days of the age, and that the Valkariad is surely near.’

With reverence and longing he spoke the name of that great moment at the end of history when all men and women would ascend to becoming greater beings: Ardun into Star People, and Star People into Elijin, who would take their rightful places as newly crowned Galadin. And the Galadin themselves would become as gods in the glory of a new creation.

‘The Age of Light must be at hand,’ Abrasax said. ‘Either that or the Skardarak, when all the stars shall be put out and it will grow cold and dark forever.’

He drew in a deep breath, held it and then let it out slowly in a whoof of wind. Then he said, ‘And even as we see two possibilities, and only two, for the world, so we have only two choices open to us now: to entrust Master Juwain and his companions with the quest to find the Maitreya, or not. Let us now speak truthfully with one another so that we might make this choice. Master Yasul?’

The Master Remembrancer pulled at the dark folds of skin beneath his narrow jaw as he regarded me. He said, ‘Valashu Elahad speaks of his desire, and that of his friends, to make a quest to find the Maitreya, but is this their true calling? They are a strange company, and we must be sure of whom Master Juwain has brought to us.’

‘And who is it, then, whom Master Juwain has brought to us?’ Master Storr asked. His blue eyes sparkled in the strong candlelight. I wondered what land had given him birth: Nedu? Thalu? Eanna? The Master Galastei ran his blunt hand through his wispy white hair and coughed out, ‘A claimant to the throne of Delu, an heir to Kiritan’s branch of the House Narmada, and the sole surviving son of the Valari’s greatest king. Beware the pride of princes, I say. Beware their true purpose. And this lordless knight, Kane. All of them, of the sword.’

I rested my hand on the hilt of my sword, which I had set by my side. I looked at Kane who had taught me to wield this terrible weapon with a single-minded will to destroy any and all who stood against me.

‘And then there is Liljana Ashvaran,’ Master Storr said. His cool blue eyes fixed on the woman who was as my mother. ‘Master Juwain has told us little more than that she is a noble of Alonia who joined Valashu and the others on the great Quest. An unusual calling, isn’t it, for one of her age, rank and gender?’

In truth, I knew of no other matron, noble or not, who had set out into the wilds of Ea in pursuit of the Lightstone.

Liljana’s pretty round face grew as intense and reflective as a full moon. To Master Storr, she said, ‘Why should you think that noble impulses are so unusual? Your order, I’ve been told, exists to quicken that which is noblest in everyone.’

Master Storr blinked at Liljana’s riposte. He exchanged pained looks with Master Yasul and the others. I gathered that he wasn’t used to being addressed by women – or anyone – so sharply.

Then he pointed his teaspoon at Liljana. ‘Surely what is noblest is not the keeping of secrets from those who would help you.’

‘And what secrets do you think I keep?’

Master Storr did not respond. His eyes grew even colder, like glacier ice, as he gazed at her with a greater and greater vehemence. Liljana thrust her hand inside the pocket of her tunic, and her jaw tightened in defiance. Finally, she removed her fist from her tunic and shook it at him. ‘You will not,’ she told him. ‘You will not.’

‘Will I not?’ Master Storr said to her.

In answer, her soft brown eyes summoned up such an intense heat that he finally blinked and looked away.

Liljana turned toward Abrasax and said, ‘Your Master Galastei tries to use this to read my mind!’

So saying, she opened her hand to reveal her blue crystal.

‘He tries to seize control of it – and me!’ she said. ‘Like the Red Dragon himself!’

‘No – I only wanted to know what you conceal from us,’ Master Storr called out. ‘As Master Matai has said, we must be sure of you.’

‘Not this way! You have no right.’

‘I am the Master of the Gelstei.’

‘Not my gelstei. Would you steal my journal as well, and force the lock to read its pages?’

‘I will make no apologies,’ Master Storr said. ‘Too much is at stake, and we must do what we must do.’

‘Is that the way of the Masters of the Brotherhood, then? Is that noble?’

They might have contended thus all night if Abrasax hadn’t finally held up his hand and said to Liljana, ‘Master Storr has fought too many battles with the Red Dragon, and is sometimes overzealous in protecting the Brotherhood. You are right, forcing another’s mind is not our way. I do apologize, for all of us. But Master Storr also is right that too much is at stake, and so there can be no secrets within this room.’

Liljana sat facing Abrasax. She must have perceived that of all the Seven, he studied her the most intently. She gazed back at him with all the force of her will, as if commanding him to fix his attention elsewhere. But not even Liljana, it seemed, could stare down the Grandmaster.

‘Your Sisters,’ he said to her, ‘have always kept too much hidden.’

‘My … Sisters?’ Liljana coughed out. It was one of the few times I had ever seen her at a loss for words.

‘Do you deny,’ Abrasax asked her, ‘that you are of the Sisterhood?’

‘But why would you think that?’

‘I am a Master Reader, am I not? Your chakras, each of them, give off flames – how should I not be able to read their colors? And to perceive that your aura shimmers like that of one who has been trained in the ways of the Maitriche Telu?’

Liljana looked at Kane and Master Juwain briefly before glancing at me. She seemed, somewhere inside herself, to cast off a heavy cloak. Then she held her head high as she told Abrasax: ‘I am the Materix of the Maitriche Telu.’

The Seven, all except Abrasax, seemed to draw in a single, hissing breath. Master Yasul leaned over to confer in low tones with Master Nolashar, while Master Matai exchanged resentful looks with Master Virang. And then Master Storr called out: ‘So this is her secret! And a dark one it is, too!’

In silence he stared at Liljana, and so did Master Matai and the others – even the gentle-faced Master Okuth.

But if they thought to intimidate or even shame Liljana, then they did not know her. The more they beamed their disapproval and dread at her, the brighter and stronger she seemed to grow. And then she told them, ‘Others have called my Sisters and me “witch” before.’

‘No one has called you that,’ Master Storr said.

‘Not with your lips, perhaps, but you say it with your eyes.’

Master Storr rubbed at his temples a moment before asking Liljana: ‘Do you deny that in times past you nearly succeeded in inserting one of your Sisters into Morjin’s chambers as a concubine? With the intention of poisoning him, as the Maitriche Telu once poisoned King Daimon and many others?’

‘King Daimon Hastar,’ Liljana said to Master Storr, ‘was nearly as evil as Morjin. After his untimely death, Alonia enjoyed nearly fifty years of prosperity and good rule.’

‘Poisoners,’ Master Storr muttered. And then more softly: ‘Witch.’

‘We did what we had to do! When your ways failed to educate and uplift, we were left to deal with one bloodthirsty tyrant after another!’

I looked to my right to see Kane smiling savagely as his lips pulled back from his long, white teeth.

Master Storr tried to ignore him, and he snapped at Liljana: ‘And your way has been poison, seduction, even the violation of men’s minds!’

‘No, that has not been our way – you know nothing about us!’ Liljana turned toward Abrasax, and for what seemed an hour she gazed at him, and he at her. His understanding seemed to pour out from him and embrace her. Tears filled her eyes. She was the hardest woman I had ever known, but sometimes the softest, too.

Finally Abrasax rose from his cushion and circled the tables until he stood above her. He reached down to grasp her hand and pull her up facing him. With his fingertips, he wiped the tears from her cheek. And then, as we all looked on in astonishment, he bent down to kiss her moist eyelids. To Master Storr and the rest of the Seven, and to all of us, he said, ‘War will come soon enough, but let us not allow it into this room. Once, we of the Brotherhood and the Sisters of the Maitriche Telu were as brothers and sisters. I would have it so again.’

He squeezed Liljana’s hand and bowed his head to her. Then, fixing Master Storr with a stern look, he returned to his place.

The room fell quiet, and for a while, the seven Masters of the Brotherhood sat drinking their tea. Strong sentiments like invisible currents passed between them. At last, Master Storr looked at me and said, ‘War, of the spirit, at the very least, Valashu Elahad and his companions must wage, if they make this new quest. Theirs will be a dangerous journey. And one danger we should speak of now, since Liljana Ashvaran has already hinted of it. I would ask to see the rest of their gelstei.’

I nodded my head at his request, and drew Alkaladur from its sheath. My sword’s silvery silustria gleamed in the starlight. Then Master Juwain brought forth his emerald varistei. Liljana set her little blue whale upon her table while Atara sat cupping her scryer’s sphere inside her hands. Kane scowled as he reached into his pocket and showed Master Storr his baalstei, cut into the shape of a flat, black eye. And then Maram gently laid his firestone, red as a ruby and as long as his forearm, on his table.

‘Ah, my poor, poor crystal,’ he said, gazing at the webwork of fine cracks running through it. ‘Ruined in battle with that damn dragon.’

Abrasax just stared at him. ‘That battle, I think, will prove to be as nothing against the battle you still must fight against the Red Dragon.’

‘Ah, I don’t want to fight at all,’ Maram muttered. Something in Abarasax’s manner seemed to encourage Maram to open himself to him. ‘It’s nearly ruined me, you see. The madness of the world: her stupidities and cruelties. If only I had time enough for love! If only I could heal this beautiful crystal, I might find the way to heal my heart.’

‘I’m not sure,’ Abrasax said to him, looking around the room, ‘that we all see the connection.’

Maram gazed longingly at his crystal. ‘To use the red gelstei is to summon and concentrate fire. Ah, to direct it toward a single target, you see. So with love, and therefore the heart. If my heart were made whole again, I might find the great love I was born for.’

Abrasax smiled as he again stood up from the table. He stretched back his shoulders and drew in a deep breath. Then he walked around Master Okuth and Master Storr sitting at their table with Maram, who turned toward him. Abrasax held his hands above Maram’s head for a moment before bringing them down over his shoulders and then his sides. And he said, ‘You have a great heart, Sar Maram Marshayk. Flames fill it with a bright green radiance. But they would burn brighter – much brighter – if they weren’t so concentrated here, lower down in your svadhisthan chakra.’

With that he rested his hand on Maram’s belly and smiled at him.

‘Ah,’ Maram said, nodding at me, ‘I suppose this isn’t a good time for a recitation of “A Second Chakra Man”?’

‘No,’ I said to him, ‘I suppose it is not.’

Abrasax’s eyebrows pulled together in concern as he pushed against Maram’s belly and told him: ‘Between here and your heart chakra is where your sun makes its orbit. And a great whirl of fire it is, blazing orange with streaks of viridian and crimson.’

As Abrasax’s hand continued pressing against Maram, I could almost see this fiery orb that he spoke of.

‘There is nothing wrong with your heart,’ Abrasax told Maram. ‘And you do have time for love – all the time in the world. But what is it that you love, above all else?’

Maram glanced at me nervously, and then turned back to Abrasax as he said, ‘There is a woman. Somewhere in the world, a woman who can take in my heart and, ah, all of me. The one whose hips and breasts swell like the mountains and seas, like the very curves of the earth: she, whose desire is as boundless as my own. Some men seek the most beautiful of women, others the kindest or the most pure. But I dream of the most passionate.’

At this Abrasax cleared his throat and said to him, ‘You must be careful what you wish for. Careful even of what you whisper inside your mind. The earth listens. There are powers there that no one fully understands. Her fires feed ours, and what we create inside ourselves, we can bring into being.’

He pressed his hand against Maram’s chest, then walked around the tables again to return to his cushions. He sat gazing at Maram, who wrapped his huge hand around his red crystal and lowered his eyes to study the fine cracks marring it.

‘All of them,’ Master Storr said, looking from Maram to Liljana, ‘must be careful with their gelstei. Each time they use the sacred crystals, Morjin will use the Lightstone to find his way farther into them and twist their power toward his will.’

I gazed into the silustria of my sword, and so did my friends study their gelstei.

‘Indeed,’ Master Storr continued, eyeing our crystals, too, ‘I counsel that they surrender their gelstei to us for safekeeping.’

At this, Maram’s hand closed around the cut planes of his firestone while I gripped the hilt of my sword more tightly.

‘Surrender this to you?’ Maram said, holding his long, red crystal pointing at Master Storr. ‘You might as well ask me to cut off, ah, more personal parts of myself so that they don’t lead me into troubles.’

‘I know,’ Atara said, turning her sphere between her hands, ‘that this came to me for a purpose.’

Kane’s response was the simplest and most direct of all of us. He held up his black stone for all to see and then closed his fist around it as he called out, ‘Ha!’

Abrasax sighed as he looked at Master Storr and said, ‘I told you this would be the way of things, as you of all of us should understand.’

Master Storr bowed his head, but said nothing as he turned his attention back to the gleam of our crystals.

And Abrasax said to us, ‘So it goes. Everywhere on Ea, Morjin finds his way into men’s minds, and so gains control of their arms, voices and eyes. And no one is willing to give them up either just to thwart him. But I counsel you: if you use your gelstei, Morjin will slowly seize control of them.’

‘Even my sword?’ I said, holding up its blade so as to catch the room’s candlelight.

‘The silver gelstei,’ Master Storr said to me, ‘would be last of your crystals to be perverted, if indeed it truly can be perverted. It is possible that only the Maitreya, having gained full mastery of the Lightstone, could touch upon the silustria of your sword – and then only for the highest of purposes. But I don’t really know. Therefore I, too, counsel not using it.’

Kane smiled at this as he gripped his large hands together and said, ‘And have you followed your own counsel, then?’

‘What do you mean?’ Master Storr said.

Kane pointed toward the waist of Master Storr, and then at Master Okuth and Abrasax. ‘What is it you keep inside your pockets?’

At this, Abrasax smiled at Master Storr in a knowing way, and then looked at Kane. ‘You have keen perceptions – from where do they come? What is that you keep inside yourself?’

Abrasax’s smile deepened as he studied Kane. I knew that my mysterious friend hated being singled out for scrutiny in this way. His glare fell hot with a barely-contained fury. And then he stood up to face the Grandmaster of the Brotherhood.

It took a brave man to hold Kane’s gaze, as Abrasax did. I didn’t need to be a reader to see the fire that seemed to leap straight out of Kane’s black eyes. As the candles flickered in their stands and the other Masters drew in deep breaths or held them inside, Abrasax continued staring at Kane. The Grandmaster’s eyes grew brighter, like moonlit oceans, and I fancied that I saw this radiance touch his hair and beard and spill down over his tunic in flows of scarlet, orange and other colors. And yet it was nothing against the splendor that enveloped Kane. He stood as beneath a rainbow. Its hues clung to his body like a robe of fire and slowly deepened and brightened into a shimmering brilliance. White light crowned his savage head, and so did flashes of glorre. I stared at him, awestruck. I couldn’t believe what my eyes or some other sensing organ told me must be true. It lasted only a moment, this piercing vision into the heart of Kane’s being. And then I blinked my eyes, and it was gone. I saw my old friend standing before me as he usually did: fiercely, willfully, joyfully – with challenge toward Abrasax or anything in the world that might try to thwart or even contain him.

The others of the Seven, with my companions, sat gazing at Kane in wonderment. Master Storr shook his head as he called out, ‘No, it cannot be! Not this rogue knight!’

Then Abrasax bowed to Kane and said, ‘I never thought to live so long that my path would cross yours, Lord Elijin.’

Again, Master Storr said, ‘It cannot be!’

Abrasax drew in a deep breath. He looked from Master Storr to Master Matai, and then at Kane. ‘It surely is. This man is no rogue knight. It is, as the Master Diviner and I have deduced, now beyond argument that one of the Old Ones of the Elijik Order journeyed with this company into Argattha. And has found the way into our valley. His name, of old, was –’

‘I am,’ Kane growled out, interrupting him, ‘not the one you speak of. Once I was, perhaps, but now I am Kane.’

‘Kane, then,’ Abrasax said to him. ‘But you were, were you not, sent to Ea along with eleven others of your order to find and safeguard the Lightstone for the Maitreya?’

‘So,’ Kane said, glaring at him.

‘And of those eleven, only one other survives – Morjin.’

‘So,’ Kane said again.

Abrasax and the others of the Seven sat staring up at Kane. I noticed Master Storr’s hard blue eyes drilling into him as he regarded him with dread. He called out, ‘If this is that one, then he has fallen nearly as far as the Red Dragon. How can we be sure that if we help him to find the Maitreya, he won’t fall even farther?’

Kane, not deigning to respond to the Master Galastei’s terrible doubt, stood as still as a granite carving.

‘How can we be sure what any man or woman will do, in the end?’ Abrasax asked, looking at his fellows. ‘Master Juwain tells that in Argattha, Kane gave back the Lightstone to Valashu when he might have kept it for himself. Can all of us say that we would have surrendered it so faithfully? Surely Kane has passed the most vital test.’

His reasoning seemed to persuade even Master Storr, who inclined his head toward Kane. And Kane growled out to Abrasax, ‘And what of the Brotherhood’s Masters, then? You speak of keeping no secrets, and yet you keep some very powerful baubles hidden inside your pockets, eh?’

Abrasax smiled at Master Storr. ‘Did I not tell you that we could not conceal things from one of the Elijin?’

And with that he nodded at Master Matai, who reached into his pocket and brought out a small crystal sphere that shone like a ruby. The First, he named it. Master Virang likewise showed us a stone, which he called the Second, which gleamed golden-orange in hue. And so with Master Nolashar and his bright yellow sun stone and Master Okuth’s green heart stone, and then Master Yasul’s and Master Storr’s crystals – colored blue and purple – whose names were the Fifth and the Sixth. And then, finally, Abrasax drew forth a marble-like sphere as clear and brilliant as a diamond. It was, he told us, the Seventh: the last and highest of the crystals called the Great Gelstei.

‘Your crystals,’ he said to us, ‘are powerful and rare, but on all of Ea there are no other gelstei like these, for they were not made on earth.’

He went on to say that only the angels, and the Galadin at that, could possibly possess the art of forging the Great Gelstei. Then he held up his clear stone and showed it to Kane. ‘The Elijin who were sent here brought these with them, didn’t they?’

‘So,’ Kane growled out. ‘Nurijin, Mayin and Baladin were the stones’ keepers. And Manjin, Durrikin, Sarojin – Iojin, too. And all of them killed over the years on this cursed world. I had thought the stones lost.’

He drew in a long, pained breath and said to Abrasax, ‘It must have been a great work to seek these out and bring them here.’

‘The work of ages,’ Abrasax told him. ‘Many Brothers died in this quest.’

‘As you will die if you continue to use them.’

‘The Red Dragon, we believe,’ Abrasax said, ‘does not yet know that we keep them. And use them we must, at least tonight. There are tests still to be made.’

He sat cupping his clear stone in his hand. It shimmered a soft white, even as the crystals of the other Masters radiated colors of crimson and orange, up through a glowing violet.

‘We have questions for the girl,’ Abrasax said, looking at Estrella. Then he turned to me. ‘And for you, Valashu Elahad.’

The room fell quiet, and I nodded at Estrella and then Abrasax. I sat gripping the hilt of my sword as I waited for the seven Masters of the Brotherhood to test me somehow – if not in actual combat, then perhaps in a trial of the soul.