Seven Swords

Chapter 41

You are quiet for a talking beast," he told the cat finally "Like you, I have much to mull."

What do you know of what I must consider?"

1, too, carry out another's mission - only in my cas it is a quest for another semblance of my self.'

You will **tell Tell them what?" ...them, then."

To say it is to arm you."

The cat stretched, flaring its claws into the sand. 'I am already armed. It is you that are weaponless, shadow bay Eeryon started. "I see you come and go. One day you will wink out forever.

'One day

I know things without knowing their pedigree, the cat mused. 'Bits and pieces of previous lives shuffle like cards through my mind. I seem to know you for a thing of misbegotten shadow. I doubt you will endure long. But It does not take long to do evil. I will not do evil!

No one does evil until it is done. All act for good their own or another's. All evil is done in the name of someone's good."

Names again! I wish I had never heard anything's true name.' Eeryon's fists pounded the sand. The cat batted at the motion, at one fist. Its velvet touch burned him like fire. He jerked away, staring into the ambiguous feline eyes. "Tell me the truth. We seek the same sword for different reasons, different masters. What shall I do?"

The anguish in Eeryon's voice was enough to wring pity from a stone. From a cat it received a contemplative blink. 'Learn more of parents, and less of masters. As a crystal caster of my acquaintance likes to say, the future chases its tail to the past.' Eeryon sighed in exasperation and pushed himself

upright to meet the returning Thane.

You were right, Thane admitted. The island is mostly

sand and rock. Its underwater sojourn must have drowned all the foliage. We're lucky it's been afloat again long enough for rainwater to collect in the rocks."

'So close,' Javelle chaffed. And yet too far.' 'You know where we are?' Eeryon asked sharply.

'Clymerind was a nomad isle, Thane explained. 'It sailed the Outer Abyssal Sea. When it sank, it lay south east of the Six Realms, off Tolech-Nal."

"The sword was lost in Rindell Pond on the verge of the Shrinking Forest,' Javelle took up the tale. But much of the Realms altered in the gate's great collapse. Our parents saw Rindell Pond become a lake. It might be all dry ground by now.'

'Besides, Thane put in, cheerfully toting obstacles, 'we don't know how long Clymerind has been asail. It could have floated south to the Furzenlands, or north off

the City of Rule-If there still is a City of Rule. Father was pretty clear about the upheaval as he and Mother left. Then we search for a raindrop within a deluger

Eeryon's frustration came so sharp and sudden it sur

prised them all. "You join us in our quest?" Javelle asked, her eyes shining spontaneously with a joy she could not explain.

Its innocence struck Eeryon silent. 'He has his own business here. Thane reminded

her.

'Our business is the same now- to leave the island for realmland," Javelle said. 'And, I've told him of our

need "You didn't!" 'You were the one who mentioned Geronfrey. I think Eeryon wants to join us in our quest to save our father.

Javelle turned to him. 'Don't you?"

Eeryon looked from their waiting dark eyes to the cat's ever-observant emerald gaze. The creature said nothing.

'Yes,' Eeryon answered slowly - so slowly he to be answering another question entirely. 'I want to join you."

seemed

'You see?' Javelle crowed to her brother. 'You must be an eloquent storyteller, Thane conceded

grudgingly. "There has to be something I'm good at," she said lightly.

'Besides, with Eeryon along, we double our magic. "Triple, the cat put in from the sand. "Triple, Javelle repeated. She looked from one boy to the other, beaming hope and begging peace. Neither could

resist her enthusiasm.

"Triple, they agreed, speaking together and then laughing 'You had better begin your new alliance, Felabba put in tartly, by concocting a way off this island. I've no desire to spend another night getting sand between my toes."

This time Javelle joined them when they laughed. The cat did not laugh. Nor did Briarwhip, who came padding over the sand to crouch by Eeryon, tilt his disheveled head, and remain unusually still.

In the creature's three small fiery eyes, only unasked - and unanswered - questions gleamed. By late afternoon, the threesome, accompanied by the two animals, had located the island's narrowest end long spit of snoutlike land with waves sneezing on either

a

side.

'We have found the head," Thane analyzed. Now we must bridle it.'

How? Javelle wondered. With what?" Magic, Thane grinned. He was in his element. 'Mother

says that no matter how native magic is, you must find its specific paths within yourself. Sometimes it takes a lifetime." Father hasn't got that long,' Javelle put in tightly. Besides, I'm not interested in hearing how mystical magic is. I want to see results."

A hard critic, Eeryon.' Thane winked broadly. 'But

mark my reasoning. Rengarth is a world brewed of water

and air and land, of birds and fish. I have an affinity

for water, so it is to the things of water I will look for

aid.'

'Stop bragging and start doing."

'Peace, Javelle, I have, in case you haven't

an idea." 'Say it!'

guessed yet,

'Don't screech. It's so unbecoming a lady.'

I'm not a lady, I'm your sister and your elder and heir of Rengarth and I'll have you cast into a Bubblemere if you don't produce more than overheated air.'

Thane bowed and pointed to the waves. 'I will call on the powers of the deep, the great creatures of the Outer Abyssal Sea, of some of whom not even our parents may have been aware. Eeryon, being adept with the frippery on his sleeves, is a natural fisherman. He will cast the lines and nets to snare them, bridle them, harness them. Together, we will drive this nomad island like a chariot

to wherever we wish.' The simplicity and sense of this plan struck them all

dumb with admiration - at least no one spoke for several moments. Javelle was the first to find a flaw in it. You have no

role for Felabba." 'She will... instruct... these creatures to follow our commands."

'What makes you think, young dreamer, that the crea

tures of the sea are mine to command?" Felabba asked

tartly.

'You're a beast, like them.' Silence greeted this two edged answer. 'You're... commanding by nature." Silence. 'You'll probably be able to strand a tasty dinner on our shores as reward for your efforts.'

'Now I see the logic,' the cat said. 'Magic always goes

better with the promise of a full stomach." 'And I?' Javelle said. "What role have I in this joint

enterprise?" 'You can fix the stranded fish once we get where we are going.'

'Oh,' she said, speechless for once.

Eeryon touched her arm. You can watch us and guide us. Magic is highly self-absorbing. Don't let us spell awry. Don't let' his voice lowered 'me slip away."

'No.' Javelle didn't understand the task she had under taken, but she knew from looking into Eeryon's oddly translucent eyes that it was a grave one. 'All right. Their paths were set; matters had become serious. 'You'd best begin sunfall. If I'm to I must see.'

Both young men nodded. Felabba bestirred herself. moving to stand beside them. Javelle pulled back, drawing Briarwhip with her. The moment was serious enough that she felt a certain comfort in having the rough-coated creature at her side, a fellow witness.

Sunlight was already slanting through the clouds. Seabirds skirled along the headland, their wings beating heartbeat-slow in the salt-soaked, wind-laden air.

To Javelle, watching, it all evolved with the odd slowed motion of the birds. Nothing visibly changed. The trio stood looking to the sea, each silent, each lost in its own

self, be it from Rengarth, or Without, or who-knows For the longest time, nothing happened. Javelle grew where. impatient, then remembered her father's words: magic is a great long Nothing with a Spectacular Period to it. She also remembered why she was here and Thane - on this windswept spit of sand watching waves crash and hoping for something she didn't really believe

it had never believed in her. in, because Magic. Yes, Javelle thought. For Kendric, apostate of magic, let magic come. For Javelle, outcast of magic, let magic come. For Irissa, mistress of magic, let magic come. For Thane, born of magic, let magic come. For Felabba, reborn of magic, let magic come. For Eeryon, fading from magic, let magic come. For... Briarwhip, mismade of magic, let magic come. For... Geronfrey, mis user of magic, let magic come. Now!

If Javelle had really believed in the magic of her mind, she might have thought her inner litany had taken outer shape.

For waves crested on the sand in faster rhythm. Clouds seemed to sally overhead at greater speed, as if racing the sun to its dying fall in the water. Wind hushed by with rapid caressing fingers. Sand rose in circling pillars and danced down the beach. The salt-tang on the air grew heavy, like incense. A mist

of whipped water and sand and air and cloud foamed at

the sea's mouth, and ate at the island.

The land itself heaved, as if giving a great sigh, like a winded mount being asked for greater speed and longer service.

Something sang in the surf - many things. Shells rever berated to the notes of wind and water. Forms washed up. rising from the curling waves - finned, furled, tentacled, winged forms.

Among them the lancing silver whips of Eeryon's lines - spun from the endless reels of his sleeves - lashed like sprays of water. Captured leviathans reared above the water beyond the surf - great shining bodies sleek with

scales. Human heads surfaced on fish-supple bodies, and fishheads with staring eyes and sucking mouths topped human forms - as if the dead of both kinds had found new commingled life in the water.

Life teamed upward at the island's fringes, every variety of water-breathing life summoned from the sea's soft sand

underbelly. Silver lines secured it all in a gentle custody. Then Felabba licked her chops.

The creatures ebbed from the sand and the surf, pulled out for the deeper water where the sinking sun blazed a b****y trail. Silver lines tautened, a thousand or more tied to as many submerged sea-steeds.

Clymerind the Wonderful shuddered from sand dune to shoreline. Its great, sunken body lurched forward. Waves sprayed at its rear as the island sliced shiplike through the sea.

On its quarterdeck - the sandy rise the three had commandeered - wind whipped their hair into their eyes. Sand, flying in multitudinous grains, sealed Felabba's green gaze shut. But it was too late. The island was moving. The island was under way, at sail. The sun moved into their lee, burning crimson.

Javelle looked to Felabba, an intent figure of wind whipped fur, staring blindly into the future. Thane was braced, jaw set, looking more like Kendric than he ever had, making Javelle feel twice bereft for some reason, and twice blessed.

Eeryon was the last she looked at, and him twice. He seemed tauter than one of his silver lines. When she searched his eyes, she found their color had leeched into the flat silver sea. All that was left to Eeryon was the expanded pitch-black centers, holes in the mask of his face.

She stepped nearer, touched his plain black velvet sleeve. Her hand sank into the fabric as into night, vanishing. Her breath caught. She felt she was sinking interminably, drowning on dry land. Then she touched bottom. Herself. Her sense. That will that Kendric had tried to tell her