Chapter 14

For ten days he stood at the border between worlds, as the shamans despaired for his life. Larken sang healing songs over him, and the music and words trickled into his long, dry sleep like a dream of water.

Fordus would rise toward the surface then, toward light and waking, but there was another voice inhabiting his sleep-a voice deep and tranquil and alluring.

Lie down, be at peace now, you have fought long and hard and done your best, let someone else do the hard work henceforth and come to me, come to me in the sweet darkness.

I will teach you everything of prophecy.

On the third day after his wounding, he gave in to the voice, to its soothing and promises and to his own curiosity, and his dreams revealed wonderful things.

It was always the desert he traveled, a featureless desert with neither rock nor salt flat nor arroyo to mark it, to distinguish one path from innumerable others. And always in this dream, he came upon the kanaji pit by surprise-an old wide well swallowed by sand, rising from the heart of nowhere.

He entered the pit, the darkness, and his hands began to glow with unexpected light-a light that seemed to rise from his own veins, filling the high circle of limestone wall.

But instead of the expected glyphs, the accus shy;tomed marks in the sand, the woman Tanila sat before him, her dark eyes glittering and wild.

The words came to her readily, easily, like the words of Larken's songs. You have opened the rift of the world, she began, as he extended his glowing hands toward her. Let the new world arise from rift and confu shy;sion. Let it change in the flame of your hand.

Then the light in his veins would extinguish, the blackness would surround him, and he would sleep heavily, darkly, until the voices returned, Larken's first, then the deep soft voice in pursuit. The dream would happen again and again. And each time, before complete and oblivious darkness, he would hear the other voice, melodious and solitary, blend shy;ing with his memories of Tanila's voice. And it would tell him the last thing, the thing his heart remembered as he slept.

Your studies are over, Prophet. Now the world will shake. You no longer need glyphs to prophesy, nor the cus shy;tomary second tongue. You will speak to the multitudes on your own, needing neither interpreter nor bard.

In the depths of his sleep Fordus tried to argue, tried to say no, I have not done this before, have not prophesied and interpreted as well. It is not permit shy;ted. The ancient way of prophecy is twofold.

But the voice was insistent.

You are a city unto yourself, a wondrous city, Fordus Firesoul. Istar will pay you tribute, will be subject to your command. The rival you have longed for awaits you in Istar: the Kingpriest, your match in valor and worthiness. But you will triumph.

And this I promise: In the heart of Istar you will find out who you are.

Who I am? he asked, with the same insistent yearning he had felt upon first learning of his strange adoption.

Hurry. You must hurry to know. You must storm Istar now.

Do not delay.

But we are too few.

Do not delay.

On the plateau the rebels held hopeless vigil over their wounded leader. Northstar knelt at his feet and Stormlight at his head, praying the deep prayers to Mishakal. Larken stood above the three of them, beating the drum slowly and singing the Three Songs of Healing, over and over. They stopped only for an hour's fitful sleep.

On the second night, Gormion took her followers back to the red tents of the bandits. It was enough, she concluded. The man was dead, and all that remained was to name Stormlight as his successor.

The Que-Nara were more faithful. Many of them stayed through four, five nights, but on the sixth day the number of watchers began to dwindle. Women led the children to their tents, and some of the older warriors and the shamans returned to camp on the seventh day.

The grumbling began. Stormlight heard it first from Gormion, when he returned after the seventh night's vigil, headed for his tent and three hours' sleep before sunrise.

All responsibility had fallen on Stormlight. In the seven days that Fordus had lain silent atop the Red Plateau, he had come to see how unwieldy the sole command of this irregular army could be.

It was sleep, however, that he thought of now, and when he heard the rattle and ring of jewelry approaching from behind, for a moment Stormlight envied Fordus his coma. He turned to face the dark-haired bandit, his expression level and impassive.

"It is time to decide, Stormlight," the bandit cap shy;tain declared, her eyes flashing with impatience and anger.

"What would you have me decide, Gormion?" His voice remained calm, he believed-no hint of the rising irritation he felt as the woman drew near him and raised a solitary, thin finger, pointing and jabbing at him like she wielded a dagger.

"The fate of the rebellion, Stormlight. I would have you decide what is next. Instead of waiting for the … visionary to die."

Stormlight remained impassive.

"While we crouch on our haunches," the bandit continued, "and await the passing, Istar is moving troops to the north."

"You know this for a fact, Gormion?"

He knew that she didn't.

"What would you do if you were Kingpriest, Stormlight?"

"I am not Kingpriest, Gormion."

"You could be. You are resourceful and brave."

Stormlight laughed wearily. Seven days had worn thin his patience, but this was the most ridiculous of Gormion's proddings. Was she foolish enough to believe that an elf whose greatest enemy sat on the Istarian throne .. .

"And you command these armies."

Tanila had spoken the same words a week ago when he first met her at the fireside.

Astonished, Stormlight stared at the bandit leader. Gormion's face, once beautiful, had wrinkled and lined over the years with scheming and anger. Not yet thirty, she looked twice her age.

"What did you say, Gormion?"

With a sniff of disgust, the woman backed away from Stormlight, who continued to stare at her, his dark eyes intent and wide. "I said what I said, elf," she decreed, the menace in her voice brittle and thin.

She wheeled about in a chiming of bracelets and a rattle of beads. "I said what I said," she repeated, calling the words over her shoulder as she fled to the darkness of her tent, to safety and concealment.

"And you, Stormlight of the Lucanesti, had better listen. Or be lost like the rest of your people!"

Back in the Abyss, her female crystalline body abandoned in the fires and eruptions, Takhisis banked in the windless air and laughed exultantly.

Gormion would be easy, when the time came. Hers was a spirit primed for hatred and strife.

Takhisis beat her wings, her laughter settling to a low, contented rumble.

For wherever strife and hatred abounded … there was confusion . . . and confusion was an inroad for her every evil work.

Her defeat was only a temporary one, and not without some satisfaction. For Sargonnas's glowing condor also had crumbled in the air, the bard's song changing the vaunting god into a harmless shower of sparks.

It had been rather beautiful. A bright show of fire shy;works in the desert sun. It had given Takhisis an image as well… an idea how to punish her insolent consort.

When they returned to the abyss, she had set upon him like a hawk on a sparrow, swooping through the bottomless darkness, folding her wings in a sear shy;ing dive through the nothingness, sensing him somewhere below her.

Her thoughts called out to Sargonnas in the black shy;ness, and he answered. Penitently. Fearfully.

He told her of Fordus's weakness-of the man's great desire to discover his origins, his parentage.