I started to rush down the corridor, then heard a gasp from the wizard that sounded like genuine pain. I paused, unsure if this was a trap, and turned on the moon and stars on my belt buckle. They cast a pale glow, no brighter than a candle, but I could see his eyes squeezed shut and a strange, almost melting quality to one cheek.
“Why did you shine that light?” he said in a low, nearly indistinct voice.
“To see to get out of here and to scare back your ghouls!”
“You will not escape from here. You think those doors are safety, but outside it’s midnight, and my wolves will meet you. Let me go, and I shall let you live.”
My heart was pounding too hard to make any sort of rational decision possible. “I don’t know how long I’ve been in your castle, but it must still be sometime in the afternoon. Come with me, and I’ll let you live!”
In the glow of my belt buckle, I hurried on, still dragging him with me. He was putting up very little resistance now.
But as we reached the door I heard him chuckle. Just outside the door, wolves were howling.
“It is not midnight,” I said between clenched teeth. A flash of lightning hit just below us on the hill, and for a second I could see the wolf pack, enormous furry beasts, nearly as tall at the shoulder as I, their eyes and teeth glowing phosphorescent.
The natural world, I told myself, was much more powerful than any wizardry. Prince Vlad could make it appear night, but it would not actually be night until the earth had turned. Even his storm clouds, brought with the magic he called the magic of blood and bone, could be blown away by the wind.
Especially if that wind was aided by weather spells. Standing just inside the door, still holding onto him, I shouted the spells that should drive a storm higher, further away, that will bring the sunshine back out over a threatened crop.
And the sky split open. If I saw the Last Judgment with living eyes, I thought irrelevantly, I would know what to expect.
Black, tattered clouds pulled back, letting the late afternoon sun pour its light onto the wizard’s hill. The wolves, even bigger and closer than I had thought, gave me a startled look, then turned and trotted away.
But everything else lay revealed with the sickening, partially decayed look of something rediscovered after long burial. Only the obsidian castle, with its window eyes and gaping mouth, stayed solid and untorn.
The wizard shrieked. I released his arm involuntarily, then stared at him in horror. He had his face in his hands, but two round stones dropped from between his fingers and rolled away.
I went down on my knees beside him. “My God! Have I killed you?”
“Don’t — mention — God — to — a — wizard,” he said very slowly, as though having to force out each word. Several other parts of his body now seemed loose, only held in place by his clothes. He dropped his hands and turned his eyeless face toward me. One cheek was nearly gone. “I told you I never left my castle,” he said, slightly more strongly. “You haven’t killed me, you’ll be disappointed to discover. But it will take me years to rebuild this body. Curse you, Daimbert!”
He tried to make it a resounding shout, but it came out as a half-stifled rattle. I didn’t wait to see what particular curses he might call down on me. I fled down the hill, pausing just once to look back and see him crawling in through the door of his obsidian castle.
“He’s not dead,” I said, lying stretched out on the ground with my face on my arms, trembling all over. “But I don’t think he’ll be able to come after us.”
Joachim put a hand on my shoulder, but no one said anything for a moment. “I think you should have killed him,” said Hugo. “After all, he wanted to kill you.”
“That was a threat,” I said. “He didn’t want me dead so much as he wanted information-information which in fact does not exist.”
“He betrayed my father by withholding information,” said Dominic darkly. “Even after fifty years, that betrayal must be avenged.”
“I avenged your father without meaning to,” I said. “I never even imagined that the wizard’s physical body was only held together by spells that would dissolve in daylight. At least I know why he’s never come to Yurt after the ruby ring.”
“I should have avenged my father myself,” Dominic muttered. “The one useful thing we’ve learned is that whatever he wanted us to find in the Wadi is probably still there-and involves my ring. All the business with Arnulf and Warin and the bandits must be something entirely separate.”
“Unless King Solomon’s Pearl is real,” I said in a low voice, “and that’s what’s in the Wadi. If it really will give someone his heart’s desire, that wizard is hoping it will give him the ability to rebuild his body properly.”
There was another long pause. “You realize,” said Hugo to me at last, “that we never saw anything-not the hill, not the castle, not even the wolves.”
“It’s all real,” I said, making myself roll around and sit up. “It’s concealed by magic, but it’s still there. That’s why I know he’s still alive-the spells are much too complicated to be maintained without an active mind behind them. Keeping those spells going will take all his energy for a long, long time.”
“Then let’s go,” said Ascelin. “The further we are from real wolves the better.” He offered me a hand to pull me up. “So he admired my ability to leave no tracks, you say?” he added with a grin.
We sat on the terrace outside an inn, eating grilled fish and salad with dark-cured olives and drinking white wine. A trellis covered with climbing flowers shaded us from the afternoon sun. Off in one direction we could see sage-covered hills, scattered with gray-green olive trees, and in the other sunlight flashing on the Central Sea. Red sails leaned in the wind as ships large and small headed in or out of harbor. We didn’t recognize the kind of fish we were eating or most of the herbs in the salad, and none of us cared.
Joachim came back to the table and sat down. I lifted my eyebrows interrogatively. “I was finally able to talk to Claudia on the telephone,” he said. “It was hard to hear her; I don’t think the telephone’s spells were working very well. She never did say what had been in the package. She just said she was sorry it had been stolen, but that it didn’t really matter.”
“Did you say that bandits had nearly killed you in order to steal it?” asked Hugo.
“Of course not,” said the chaplain in surprise. “I’ve already told you, I’m sure they wounded me by accident. And at any rate I wouldn’t want to worry Claudia.”
“I’ll try to telephone the queen after dinner,” said the king.
“And I’ll try Diana,” said Ascelin.
“I hate to tell you this, Ascelin,” said Hugo, his mouth full and motioning to the waiter, “but this is a lot better than your cooking.”
“Are you ready for the roast lamb?” asked the waiter. “It will be out in a just a moment. Let me refill your wine glasses.”
We hadn’t had any wine since we left King Warin’s castle. The local vintage had a flinty undertone and tasted wonderful.
“Success,” said Ascelin, lifting his glass as though in salute. “All the way down through the eastern kingdoms to the sea, without being killed, without being captured, without even being in battle. Next time, Haimeric, I will stick with the main routes, but even with all the delays we’re as far along as we would have been if we’d stayed west of the mountains.”
“But isn’t our slow progress due in part to the rest of you having to wait for me?” asked the king.
“No, having to wait for me on foot,” said Ascelin with a smile. “If you all had stallions like Dominic’s, you’d have been in the Holy Land weeks ago.”
“So how you think we should go from here?” asked Dominic. “Along the coast, or out to sea?” He finished the last of his salad and poked Ascelin with his elbow. “I ask, of course, knowing that whatever you suggest, we should do just the opposite.”
The waiter came out at this point with a steaming platter, lamb scented with garlic and rosemary. I felt my capacity to keep eating was unlimited.
“Pilgrims normally follow the coast road,” said Ascelin. “It’s a safe route, and it goes by a number of pilgrimage churches, including all those dedicated to the martyrs killed back in the days of the wars between Christians and the People of the Prophet. Those were the wars which drove most Christians, except those of Xantium, into the west. Even pilgrims with no intention of going as far as the Holy Land often follow part of that route.”
“That’s the way my bishop went,” put in Joachim.
“But traders stick to the sea,” Ascelin continued. “It’s certainly faster and a lot easier for anyone with heavy goods. The most dangerous part of the sea voyage is west of here, through the shoals and islands, and we’ve already skipped that part.”
“Even if we are on pilgrimage ourselves,” said Hugo, “our principal goal is still to find my father and his party. I think we should try to get to the Holy Land as quickly as possible and start searching for them from there.”
“We’ll be able to book sea passage to Xantium from here,” said Ascelin. “All routes in and around the Central Sea pass through Xantium. That’s where your brother’s agents will have their offices,” with a glance at Joachim, “and that’s where the last overland route to the Holy Land begins.”
The king nodded. “You’ve taken us safely so far, Ascelin. I’ll trust you to continue to guide us. Tomorrow we’ll book our passage.”
There were three couples at the next table, talking and eating and apparently enjoying themselves nearly as much as we were. The women wore yellow or blue cotton dresses, printed all over with flowers. “We never get fabric like that at home,” commented the king. “Maybe I should buy some to take home for the queen.”
“I’ve already told you, sire,” said Hugo with a grin, “don’t load up the luggage now. Wait until we’re on our way home.”
I had been too busy eating to join in the conversation, although to my surprise I found myself slowing down on my third helping of lamb. I dipped a piece of bread in the juices on my plate and wondered where the palm trees I had expected might be.
The terrace where we were sitting was high above the harbor, and off in the distance I could see marshy land bordering the sea, but no palm trees swayed anywhere in sight. I swallowed my bread and asked about them.
“Don’t worry,” said Ascelin. “You’ll see plenty of palms when we get to the East.” I wondered if we would also see the dancing girls that Hugo had imagined with his father. “There are even some in the marshy areas near here. It will probably be a few days before we sail, so we can look for them if you like.”
The waiter, carrying a tray filled with strawberry tarts, interrupted us at this point. But palm trees became our goal for the next two days. Ascelin was able to find a ship going to Xantium that was willing to take us, and while it was loading its cargo we followed steep, rocky paths down to the harbor, and from the harbor along sandy beaches that led for miles in either direction. Here at last were the palms I had imagined during the winter in Yurt, their old fronds lying dry and close to the trunk, their new fronds branching out from the top, reminding me oddly of the way that young Prince Paul drew pictures of trees.
“So is this it, Wizard?” Hugo asked me with a chuckle. “Everyone is searching for something on this trip. The chaplain wants pilgrimage churches; the king wants a blue rose; I want to find my father; Dominic, having found his father, is now looking for whatever’s in the Wadi; and Ascelin wants the chance to boss everyone around that I’m sure the duchess doesn’t give him at home. And you’re on a quest for trees?”
I laughed, but his comment started me thinking. I myself had thought that I was on this quest to find Evrard, as well as to assist my king however I could, but I might well be searching for some thing else as well. There was an old saying I had first heard as a boy in the City, “What ye seek, and what ye find, will oft-times be of different kind.”
As we and our highly dubious horses boarded the ship at last, and the sails creaked up the mast to catch the dawn wind and take us out of the sage-scented harbor, I wondered again what I was seeking. Once out of harbor, the sails filled and the lines tightened, and the bright waves began slapping against our ship’s hull as we started east along the coast. Whatever it was, or whatever I would find, we seemed to be heading toward it.