The Dark-Eyed Girl
When the gods had fought for one hundred years, Pale Daughter was so dismayed that she resolved to go out and surrender to her father to end the war, but her husband Silvergleam, his brother, and sister would not let her
go, fearing her death. But her cousin Trickster came to her in secret and
piped her a sweet tune, telling he would help her to slip away from her husband's house. Trickster intended to keep her for himself, and would
have, but a great storm came and he lost her in its howling discord. She lost herself as well, wandering a long time without knowing who she was.
In the battle Whitefire killed Thunder's son, Bull, and Thunder in his
rage beat down and killed Silvergleam, husband of Pale Daughter,
father of Crooked. Many died that day, and the music of all things
was thereafter more somber, even unto this hour.
— from One Hundred Considerations out of the Qar's Book of Regret
H;
E HAD BEEN FALLING for so long he could not remember what it was like not to fall, could not remember which direction.was up, or even what having an up and down meant. The last thing he remembered was seeing the gates, the sign of the owl and pine tree, and then-as if those monstrous gates had swung open and a black wind had lifted him and carried him through-he had been tumbling in darkness like this, helpless as a sparrow in a thunderstorm.
Sister, he called, or tried to, I'm falling. I'm lost…! But she did not come, not even as a ghost of memory; they were separated by some gulf that even their blood tie could not bridge.
Sister. I'm dying… He could never have guessed that it would happen this way-that they would have no last farewell. But she must know how he loved her. She was the only thing in this corrupted world that mattered to him. He could take solace in that, anyway…
Who… are… you…?
It came to him as a whisper-no, less than a whisper, it came like the sound of a flower unfolding on the far side of a meadow. Still, in the midst of such utter emptiness, it was a glorious sound, glad as trumpets.
Who's there? Is that you, Storm Lantern? But he knew that the fairy's words could never feel like that in his mind, each one as cool, gentle and precise as water dripping from a leaf after the rains had stopped. It was a woman speaking, he could feel it, but that still didn't seem quite right: the touch seemed even too light for that. And then he knew. It was the dark-haired girl, the one who had watched over his other dreams.
Who are you? he asked the emptiness. He was still falling, but the move¬ment seemed different now, no longer plunging toward something but sail¬ing outward. Do I know you?
Who am I? She was silent for a time, as if the question surprised her. I… I don't know. Who are you?
A silly question, he thought at first, but found he had no easy answer. / have a name, he insisted, I just can't think of it right now.
So do I, she told him, still no more than a ghostly voice. And I can't think of mine, either. How strange…!
Do you know where we are?
He could feel the negation even before he caught the word-thoughts. No. Lost, I think. We're lost. For the first time he recognized the sadness in her voice and knew he was not the only one who was afraid. He wanted to help her, although he could not help himself or even say what it was that troubled him. All he knew was that he was falling endlessly outward through nothing, and that it was a blessing beyond price to have someone to share it with.
/ want to see you, he said suddenly. Like before.
Before?
You were watching me. That was you, wasn't it? Those things were chasing me, and the halls were on fire…
That was yon. It was not a question, but almost a sweet note of satisfac¬tion. I was afraid for you.
I want to see you.
But who are you? she demanded.
/ don't know! When he grew angry her presence became fainter and that frightened him. Still, it was interesting to know he could still feel anger. When he had been falling alone, he had felt almost nothing. I just know that I was by myself, and then you were here. I haven't felt… It would have been almost impossible to explain in his waking life-in this wordless, direction¬less place it was far beyond impossible. / haven't felt anyone in my heart since I lost her. He could not summon the name, but he knew her, his sister, his twin soul, his other half.
The other was silent for a long moment. You love her.
I do. But there was a misunderstanding between them, a sort of cloud of confusion, and again the girl's presence became remote. Don't go! I need to see you. I want to… There was no word for what he wanted-there weren't even thoughts that could be strung together-but he wanted a reason to exist. He wanted a place to be, and to feel someone waiting for the thoughts in his head, so that he knew there was more to the uni¬verse the gods had made than simply a few whispers in endless darkness. / want to…
There is a place around us, she said suddenly. / can almost see it.
What do you mean?
Look! It's big, but it has walls. And there's… a road?
He could see it now, at least its faint lineaments. It was a space only slightly smaller than the endless dark through which they had been falling, and only a little more bright, but it had shape, it had boundaries. At the center of it he saw what she had called a road, an arching span of safety over an astonishing, terrifying dark nothing-a nothing even more profound than the void through which he had been falling. But this pit of blackness beneath the span was not simply nothing, it was a darkness that wanted to make everything else into a nothing, too. It existed, but its existence was a threat to all else. It was the raw stuff of unbeing.
No, that's not a road, he said as the one stripe of something slowly hard¬ened into visibility. It's a bridge.
And then they were facing each other on the curving span, the boy and the girl, shifting and vague as objects seen through murky water. Neither of them were really children, but neither were they grown or anywhere
close to it. They were raw, frightened, excited, and still new enough to the world that a thing like this made as much sense as anything else.
Her eyes were what held him, although he could not keep his stare fixed on them for more than a moment-everything here was inconstant, shift ing and blurring as though he had exhausted his sight with hours of read-ing instead of just regaining it.
It wasn't the eyes themselves that fascinated him, although they were large and kind, brown like the eyes of some creature watching with caution from the forest depths. Rather it was the way her eyes looked at him and saw him. Even in this fit of madness (or whatever had swallowed him) the brown-eyed girl saw him, not what he said or what he seemed or what oth¬ers imagined him to be. Perhaps it was only because they were in this place without names-perhaps she could have seen him here in no other way- but the way she looked at him felt like a welcoming campfire summoning a freezing, exhausted traveler. It felt like something that could save him.
Who are you? he asked again.
I told you, I don't know. Then she smiled, a surprising flash of amusement that transformed her solemn little face into something astounding. I'm a dreamer, I suppose, or maybe I'm a dream. One of us is dreaming this, aren't we? But that was a jest, he knew. She was no idle wisp of either his fancy or her own-she was strong and practical. He could feel it. And who are you?
A prisoner, he told her, and knew it was true. An exile. A victim.
Now for the first time he felt something other than kindness from her, a sour taste in her reply. A victim? Who isn't? That isn't who you are, that's just what's happening to you.
He was torn between his desire to feel her sweetness again and the need to explain just how badly life and the gods had treated him. The gods? They were trying to kill him!
You don't understand, he said. It's different with me. But he found that here on this bridge over Unbeing, this span that led away in either direction to unseen and unknowable ends, he couldn't explain why that was. I'm… wrong. Crippled. Mad in the head.
If you expect me to feel sorry for you because you dream of impossible places and people without names, she said, some of her sly humor creeping back, then you'll have to try something else instead.
He wanted to let himself enjoy her, but he could not. If he did-if he belittled his own miseries-how could he even exist? The only thing that made his suffering bearable was the knowledge that it also made him difFERENT that he had been elected somehow for this pain, But I didn't ask to be like this! His despair rose up in a howl of fury. / didn't want things to be this way! I don't have the strength for any more!
What do you mean? Her amusement was gone-she was looking at him again, really looking. He would not recognize this blurry, occulted phantom even if he stood face-to-face with her, at least not by her features, but he would know the quality of attention she gave him anywhere, in any disguise.
/ mean it's too much. One horror after another. The gods themselves… The monstrousness of it all could not be explained. I'm cursed, that's all. I'm not strong enough to live with it any longer. I thought I could-I've tried-but I can't.
You don't mean that. It's a kind of… showing off.
I do mean it! I'd rather be dead. Dead, he might not see his beloved twin soul ever again-or this one either, this new friend in darkness-but at this moment he didn't care. He was tired of the burden.
You can't ever say that. Her thoughts were not plaintive but angry again. We all die. What if we only get one chance to be alive?
What if it's all pain?
Push against it. Escape it. Change it.
Easy to say. He was disgusted and furious, but suddenly terrified she would leave him alone on this bone-white span over nothing-no, worse than nothing.
No, it's not. And it's even harder to do, I know. But it's all you have.
What is?
This is. All of it. You have to fight.
Will you… will you come back to me if I do?
I don't know. A flash of sweetness in the nothing, a smile like a fluting of birdsong in the dark before sunrise. / don't know how I found you, so I can't say if I'll ever find you again, dear friend. Who are you?
I can't say-I'm not sure. But come back to me-please!
I'll try… but live!
And then the bridge, the pit, the girl, everything was gone, and Barrick Eddon was swimming slowly back up through the ordinary soundings of dream and sleep.
– ^
Ferras Vansen was relieved to see that the prince's miseries seemed to have eased a bit. Barrick was no longer making that terrible wheezing
noise, and although he still lay stretched on the stone floor of their cell he seemed to be resting now instead of suffering. Vansen, who had tried to› comfort the prince once and had been hit in the face by a Hailing hand for his trouble, let out a breath. Apparently he would live, although Vansen was still not entirely certain what had sickened him so badly. It seemed to he something to do with…
So what was that thing? he demanded of Gyir. That… door. You haven V told me anything since we came back into our own heads except "Grab the boy's legs" when he was thrashing on the floor. Why do you keep silent?
Because I am trying to understand. Gyir's thoughts traveled slowly as sum¬mer clouds. What we saw seemed to have only one explanation and I do not trust such seemings. But the more I think, the more I come back again and again to the same conclusion.
What conclusion? Vansen looked to the prince, who had sat up, but was hunched over like a small child with a bellyache. I am only a soldier-I know nothing of gods, fairies, magic. What is happening here?
You saw the pine tree and the owl, Gyir said. They are Black Earth's symbols. What else could we have seen except the fearful gate of lmmon, as you would name him-the way into the palace oflmmon's master, bleak Kernios himself?
It was not the familiar Trigonate god Vansen saw in his mind's eye now, not a statue or a painting on a church wall, but a memory from his early life in the dales-whispers of the dark man with his mask and his heavy gloves, who would grab wicked children (or maybe even good ones if he caught them alone) and drag them down beneath the ground.
Kernios… the god of the dead? Are you telling me that we are standing on top of the entrance to his palace? It was one thing to meet even a terrifying giant like Jikuyin and be told he was a demigod, another thing to be told that one of the all-powerful Trigon made his home just beneath their feet in this very spot, the dark brother whose frowning eyes had been on Fer-ras Vansen since he had drawn breath, the shadow that had haunted his dreams as long as he could remember. But how could that be? Why would it be here?
It could be anywhere. It simply happens to be here. Or a doorway does, at least. Where other doorways are, who can say…?
But what does that mean? If the gate's here, the whole palace has to be here, too, doesn't it? Buried down there in the stone?
Gyir shook his head. There was a small furrow between his eyes that showed his worry, the only sign of recognizable feelings on that bleak expause. The ways of the gods, theirr dwellings and habits, are not like ours. 'I'hey ivalk different roads. They live in different fields, some of which we cannot even tread. One side of a doorway is not always in the same place or even time as what is on the other side. The fairy lifted both hands, made a sign with them that spoke first of connection, then separation. It is confusing, he admitted.
Vansen thought about his own experiences trying to find his way around behind the Shadowline, then tried to imagine something that would con¬fuse even creatures like Gyir who had been born and raised in these shift¬ing, unfixed lands. But why are they digging it out? he asked. The giant and that gray man-why would they want to go near it? Ferras Vansen had a sudden, ter¬rifying thought. Is… Kernios on the other side of that? Waiting?
No, he is gone, Gyir said. All the gods are gone, Perin Shatterhand and Kernios and Immon the Black Pig-at least all those gods whose names I know. Banished to the lands of sleep.
"Then why are they digging?" In his agitation Vansen spoke aloud. After so much time, the croaking sound of his own voice irritated him. "For treasure?"
"Because they are mad," grunted Barrick, rolling over. "The Qar are mad, but the gods and demigods are even more so. This whole land is cracked and deathly." The prince couldn't yet sit up straight, but he was doing his best to hide his discomfort, and Vansen couldn't help admiring him for it.
Gyir must have said something to him then, because there was a pause before the prince said aloud, "Because I can't. It hurts my head too much. I'll just have to be careful what I say. Can you talk to both of us at the same time?"
J will try, Gyir said. You think us all mad, man-child? I wish it were only so, then our problems might not be so great.You speak from pain, because the essence of the gods hurts you, even when they are absent. In a way, you seem much like me. We have both felt the power of this place, only in different ways.
"What are you talking about?" Barrick asked.
You are sensitive, it seems, as I was and as all the Encauled would be-sensitive to the voice ofjikuyin, sensitive to the Pig's gate and to the throne room of Black Earth beyond. But it is a little strange, almost as if… as if… Gyir closed his eyes for a moment, thinking. No, he told them, opening his eyes again. It matters not. Listen, though, and I will tell you some things that do matter. The fairy settled himself on the stone floor of the cell and briefly closed his red eyes in thought.
When Kernios was driven out, he- Told them at last, he left behind everything that was material, all that was of flesh or the world…
Vansen was puzzled, uncertain if he had understood Gyir correctly. Dri¬ven out?
"Explain," Barrick said. "I'm tired of guessing."
Yes, driven out. He and the other gods were banished from these lands and cast into the realm of sleep and forgetting.
"Banished by who?"
I will try to explain all, but you two must not interrupt me with questions- especially you, Prince Impatience, since you are speaking aloud so anyone can hear. Gyir's anger flashed like lightning through his thoughts. We are fortunate-/ sense there is no one near who can hear what I say in your heads or who speaks your mortal tongue-but do not stretch your luck. We are in terrible, terrible danger- worse even than I had feared. The fairy raised his fingers to his temples as though his head pained him. Please, let me begin where I need to begin. Even to Vansen, still not entirely familiar with this way of conversing, it was im¬possible to mistake the desperation in Gyir's every thought.
Prince Barrick raised his hand in surrender or permission.
First you must understand something of my own history. I am not merely a war¬rior. In fact, it is the most unlikely thing I could have become. Those of my folk who are most like your people in shape-for it was a shape we all shared, once-are called "the High Folk," not because looking like a sunlander is comely, but because it is the old way of seeming. But even some of the High Ones are so different from your kind as to be almost unrecognizable, either born dissimilar or because they can change their outward appearance. Some of them have been figures of terror to your kind for thousands of years. Others, like the Guild ofElementals, take earthly shapes only when it suits them, like the gods themselves.
And then there are folk like me, who although we come from the great families of power that have kept the most of the old seeming, yet we ourselves are born different-freakish even among our varied folk. I am one such-one of the Encauled, as those of my malady are named. We are born with this tissue of flesh over our faces that we must wear all our lives, but we are granted other gifts-senses that are stronger than most, an understanding that allows us to find our way when even the powerful might become lost. Among the People, we Encauled often become the guides, the searchers, those who explore different ways. Some of us take service in the Deep Library in the House of the People, which is our great city and capital. The Library is where we speak with the spirits of those who have left their flesh, as well as with some who have never worn flesh. Serving the Library is an exacting and noble pursuit.
That would likely have been my calling, but my parents fell afoul of one of the court rivalries and my father was killed. My mother was driven out of the House of the People by a faction who held strong allegiance to KingYnnir-although, to be fair, they did not always act as the king would have wished, nor could he always con¬trol them. My mother and I wandered for years, taking service at last with Yasam¬mez-Lady Porcupine, the great iconoclast, the woman who belongs to no one but herself. In her house in the Wanderwind Mountains I grew, and when my mother at last became weary of the many defeats and disappointments of her life and surren¬dered to death, I was raised inYasammez's martial service, my gifts used not for con¬templation but for warfare on behalf of the woman who had taken me in and raised me almost as her own.
Because of her, fikuyin is not the first of the demigods I have met. When I was barely old enough to carry a sword I fought with my mistress at Dawnwood against Barumbanogatir, a fearsome bastard of old Twilight-the one you sunlanders call Sveros the Evening Sky. Giant Barumbanogatir killed three hundred of my lady's finest warriors before she brought him down at last with a spear through his great shield and into his throat. After that we fought other wars for the People, against the Dreamless and the treacherous mountain Drows, struggling and dying to keep our people safe even as the people themselves shunned us-even as all but Queen Saqri treated us like vicious animals to be tied at the edge of camp but never to be allowed any closer.
You see, only Saqri of the Ancient Song recognized us for what we were-the sharp sword in the People's sheath, which even when it is not drawn gives others pause, makes them think and weigh their lusts against their fears. Yasammez is of the queen's own family, and Saqri honored her as one of the oldest and purest of the High Ones still living. Queen Saqri knew that my mistress had been given in long life and in courage what the king and queen and their ancestors had surrendered in return for the gift of the Fireflower, the boon of the last god to our ruling family.
A boon that has now become a curse…
Ferras Vansen could feel thousands of years of confusing, dangerous his¬tory swirling like deep black waters just behind the fairy's words. He wanted to ask what the Fireflower was, but Gyir for once was speaking so openly that Vansen feared to distract him.
My lady Yasammez had been fighting for the People long centuries before ever I was born. At the dreadful, infamous battle of Shivering Plain, during one of the last of the wars of the gods, she destroyed the earthly form ofUrekh, no god's bastard but a true god himself, who wore the pelt of a magical wolf as his invulnerable armor. For that alone she would be remembered and celebrated until time's candle gutters out, but
it is not whyy I speak of that battle. Thai was the same day of which I told yon be fore, where Jikuyin delayed his coming, hoping to manipulate the results to his own advantage, and instead was struck down by Kernios himself, blinded and nearly killed.
Vansen remembered the story of Jukuyin riding late onto the field with his Widowmakers, then realizing he had bought more trouble than he could afford, since Perin, Kernios, and the gods called the Surazemai were winning and the rest of the gods and Qar were already in flight. Kernios hurt him, you said.
Indeed. Black Earth wounded Jikuyin so gravely that he would never heal. But now, for some reason, the demigod is digging his way into the very throne room of Black Earth-the one your kind call Kernios.
So what is Jikuyin going to do?
Make right what was done to him, somehow. Perhaps the god's mighty spear Earthstar lies behind that gate, or perhaps Jikuyin seeks a more subtle prize. But if he does manage to open that doorway into Kernios' earthly realm, I can feel that Jikuyin will gain in power-gain immeasurably. His long-ago defeat cast him down into weakness-what you see before you is scarcely a shadow of what he was on the day he rode out onto Shivering Plain-but he is one of the last living bastards of the true gods. If he gains that strength back he will be the most powerful thing that walks on the green world.
But we can't do anything to stop him, Vansen said. Can we?
I fear we must, said Gyir.
Are you telling me it is up to us to defend all the world? Vansen turned to Barrick to see if the boy understood Gyir's riddling words, but the prince only stared back at him balefully, still struggling for breath.
Of course-but also to save our own lives. Great magicks-the oldest, most pow¬erful magicks-need blood and essences-what your kind call the souls of people or animals-to succeed. They need sacrifices. The word came like the tip of a dag¬ger, cold and sharp, almost painless at first. Especially the sacrifice of those who are themselves powerful in some way.
What are you talking about? But Vansen had already guessed.
I suspect now that we have not been worked to death like the other poor creatures poisoned by the gateway to the gods' realm because Jikuyin needs one of us-most likely me, since I am of the Encauled-or perhaps even all of us to unlock the way into Kernios' throne room. He needs our blood. He needs our souls.
ONE thing you had to say lor Ferras Vansen, Barrick decided. The guard captain never stopped… trying. If his stolid normality and his rude health hail not: already been sufficient reasons to hate him, then his relentless will¬ingness to keep pushing and fighting-as if life were a game and there would be some ultimate tally, some adding-up of accounts-would have more than sufficed. Barrick had always thought optimism was another name for stupidity.
But the dark-eyed girl would admire him, he realized with a pang.
"So what do we do?" Vansen asked Gyir quietly, speaking aloud so the prince could hear. The man was also thoughtful. Barrick wanted to hit him with something. "Surely we cannot simply wait for them to… to burn us on some barbarous altar."
"You might want to consider the small matter of a mad demigod and all the demons and beasts who serve him and who would happily tear us to shreds," Barrick pointed out with more pleasure than one would normally expect to accompany such a sentence. He was tempted to help Gyir and the soldier anyway, just so they could discover the futility of all such schem¬ing. He supposed it wasn't entirely their fault. They had not felt, as he had, the true strength of this place, the horrific, overwhelming power that re¬mained in Greatdeeps even if the god himself was gone-if he was truly gone. Whatever made Barrick sensitive also clearly made him wise: he alone seemed to understand the pointlessness of all this discussion.
But would she think it was pointless? Barrick knew she wouldn't, and that made him feel ashamed again. Shame or certain death, he thought — what splendid choices I am always given.
Of course, said Gyir. We would befools if we thought our chances anything but bad. However, we have no choice. As I told you, I have something here which must be carried to the House of the People at any cost, so we must resist Jikuyin and his plans.
"It's all very well to talk," Barrick said. "But what can actually be done? What hope do we have?"
There must be no more talking in spoken words, Gyir told him, even if it causes you pain. I will speak to both of you, and I will translate what each of you say to me, back and forth. It will be slow, but even though I do not feel anyone spying on us, if we are going to talk about what we might do, I can no longer risk being wrong.
Very well, Barrick said. But what point is there in talking about fighting Jikuyin, anyway? He's a giant-a kind of god!
Gyir slowly nodded. Pointless? Likely. It will take preparation and luck, and
even so we will probably gain nothing but a violent death-but at least the death will be of our own choosing, and that is worth more than a little. However, first I must find the serpentine, and think of a way to lay my hands on it.
The what? Barrick did not recognize the idea that went with the snaky word-picture-a trail of fire, a sudden expansion like a pig's bladder loo full of air. What do you mean?
Gyir paused for a moment as if listening. / spoke of it before. The burning black sand, the Fire of Kupilas.Ah, Ferras Vansen reminds me that your people call it "gun-flour."
Gun-flour? How would we get our hands on such stuff, locked in this cell? de¬manded Barrick. Might as well ask for a bombard or a troop of musketeers while we're at it-we won't get any of them.
They are using the swift-burning serpentine in the earth below us every day, Gyir told him. They pack it into the cracks and speed their digging that way, by smashing apart the stones. It is here in Greatdeeps, somewhere. We have only to find it, and steal some.
And then fly away like birds, said Barrick. How will we do any of those things? We are prisoners, don't you realize? Prisoners!
Gyir shook his head. No, child. You are only a prisoner when you surrender.