Morlock speeded up the process by putting the globe down on the dark ground and twisting his blade like a knife.

The globe of dark glass shattered and the thread of light lay bare. Morlock picked it up in his right hand. It cast strange shadows on his face; Deor didn’t like it. (But he remembered the alternatives. Brains!)

“Pull one of his eyes open,” Morlock croaked.

Deor wondered which one he should choose. He crouched down beside Kelat and held open both the stranger’s eyes. They were stark and staring in the strange light, their pupils gaping wide in the dark.

Morlock thrust the needle of light into Kelat’s left eye, spearing the dark pupil in its exact center.

Kelat’s eye like a thirsty mouth drank down the light. Darkness fell like a thunderbolt in the Perfect Occlusion.

Kelat began to scream and thrash.

“Out with him!” Morlock hissed.

Morlock must have had the stranger’s feet; Deor grabbed one of his arms and they dragged Kelat into the dim light of a cool spring evening.

Now Kelat was sobbing with his face in the dirt. He lifted himself onto all fours and then sat back heavily, staring around him with weeping eyes.

“What’s your name?” Deor said, curious whether the stranger remembered it.

“I’m Kelat,” said the stranger. “You . . . you were in the dream. So was the other. I saw the other one in hell. Is he a devil?”

“No.”

“He looks like a devil.”

“What does a devil look like?”

“Him.”

Morlock hawked and spat. He went over to his waterbottle and drank. Then he came back and offered the bottle to Kelat.

The stranger took the bottle suspiciously and sniffed at it. Then he looked relieved and took a sip. At last he drank deep and handed the bottle back to Morlock. “Thanks, friend.”

“Why a friend, now, and not a devil?” Deor asked. “Or is he both?”

“The devil doesn’t drink water,” Kelat said, as if everyone should know this. “But I still don’t understand why you were in hell, or how I got out.”

“It wasn’t hell,” Deor explained, “just a jail. Although there were resemblances, from the little I saw of the place. I’m Deor syr Theorn, by the way. This is my friend and harven-kin Morlock Ambrosius.”

“Yes,” Kelat said slowly. “Yes—I was afraid of that.”

“Why ‘afraid’?” Deor asked.

“I will not say at this time. I owe you both much, but some things I must keep to myself.”

“Can you say why you came into the Wardlands, and how?”

“Was that where I was?”

“I’ll take that as a no.”

“No. No. I think the dragon sent me. He put—he had someone put something in me. In my—in my face—or in my brain. I don’t feel it there anymore. Two of your order took it out of me.”

“You know our order then?”

“Of course. You are members of the Graith of Guardians.”

“You speak Wardic extremely well.”

“We call it ‘the secret speech’ in the unguarded lands. I had a Coranian tutor who helped me with it.”

“How many languages do you speak?” Morlock asked.

“The secret speech, and Vraidish, and what they call Ontilian. But I cannot read the old script.”

“And that is why you were sent on this mission?” Morlock asked. “Because of your skill with languages?”

“I sent myself!” Kelat insisted. “At least . . . I set out on my own. But it was not to the Hidden Land . . . the Wardlands, as you call it. There was a dragon in the empty places west of the Sea of Stones; the Gray Folk there worship him as a god. He is said to know many things. I thought he might know how to heal the sun.”

“Rulgân Silverfoot,” said Deor.

“His right foreclaw is metal, it is true,” Kelat said. “But there is a gem there that keeps it alive. I found him. I . . . I was trapped by him. It was he who sent me to you. I don’t know why. Most of that time is a dream to me. I remember talking, or him talking through me, but I don’t remember the words.”

“Could you find him again?” Deor asked.

Kelat bowed his head and thought. “I will not be taken prisoner again,” he said. “I will not let that thing in my mind again. But I do want to face him again, yes. And kill him if I can, before the sun goes dark. But why do you want to find him?”

“We want what you wanted,” Deor assured him, “to heal the sun. Rulgân may know who is killing it. If we can find that out, we can stop it. But that will be our errand, not killing dragons—as enjoyable an occupation as that may be.”

Kelat looked at Morlock. “He talks,” Kelat said. “Does he talk for you?”

“About this we are of one mind,” Morlock said.

“Well, I will take you to find Rulgân Silverfoot. I owe you much. I was standing in the gate of Death’s city when you called me back.”

“Eh.”

“That means,” Deor said, “‘Maybe you can return the favor sometime.’ Morlock doesn’t say much. I say we eat and sleep and start out sometime after midnight.”

Morlock nodded and turned toward his backpack, no doubt to break out the flatbread and dried meat.

“Morlock syr Theorn,” Deor said sternly, “I beg you to leave that stuff alone until we have to choose between it and death by starvation. I have food enough for all three of us tonight, and we can seek more tomorrow. Now—I’m thinking sandwiches of toasted cheese, sausages, and a few pieces of fruit. I have a bottle of Old Vunthorn we can share as well. Really, Kelat, you must take my word on this. Morlock may have dragged you out of jail and out of the jaws of death, but I’m the one who just saved you from hell.”

CHAPTER EIGHT

Vengeancer

About the time that Deor was serving out toasted cheese sandwiches, Aloê Oaij was peering into the eyes of a corpse.

After Morlock and Deor left Tower Ambrose for the lockhouse and points unknown, she returned to her bed and lay there for a while on Morlock’s side, thinking about one thing or another, but not really trying to get to sleep.

A gravedigger and a healer—that was what she needed. And time. Time that was passing as she lay there.

Eventually she got back up, took a run through the rain room, and dressed for the road: clean but well-worn clothes of black and brown, and a weather-faded red cloak she rarely used anymore. She left, telling the lock not to expect her back for a day or two.

The stable opened politely at her approach, and she went in to saddle her red palfrey, Raudhfax. She seemed glad to get some exercise, and no more inclined to sleep than Aloê was.

Aloê rode her first to the Chamber of the Graith. There were only two thains on guard at the front; she recognized neither, but they evidently knew her, standing aside to let her enter without a word being spoken.

Inside the dome she saw Bleys and a few others—Guardians cloaked red and gray, and a couple of black-robed savants—huddling around the wreckage of the Witness Stone. Well, if anyone could heal the Stone, it would be Bleys.

But Aloê wasn’t here to deal with the stone. She proceeded to the Arch of Tidings, one of several little rooms running around the base of the dome that formed the great central chamber. It held a number of message socks in identity with various fixed points in the Wardlands.

The thain on duty there gave her pen, ink, and a palimpsest to write on. She also seemed inclined to chat. Aloê dismissed her with a single lifted eyebrow and sat down to dash off a message to the Lokh of Necrophors at New Moorhope. Then she slipped it in the sock for New Moorhope and hoped someone was on night watch in the message room there.

The Lokh of Necrophors was a voluntary order of gravediggers and morticians. Aloê knew she would need help in studying the body of the murdered Summoner Earno, and she hoped the Lokharch could send her a necrophor experienced in handling murder victims.

She was prepared to wait hours for an answer, and perhaps leave in the morning without one, but to her surprise, as soon as she withdrew her palimpsest from the message sock she saw that the reverse had been inscribed with a response.