Something beside
the road caught my attention just before I reached the crest and
got my first close look at the glittering plain. It was a small
frog, mostly black but with stripes and whorls of dark green upon
its back. It had eyes the color of fresh blood. It clung to a
slightly tilted slab of grey-black rock. It wanted to go somewhere,
anywhere, but its right hind leg was injured and when it tried to
jump, it just sort of spun around in place. “Where the heck
did that come from? There isn’t supposed to be anything alive
up here.” I had been looking forward to having the clouds of
flies that followed the animals get thinned out when they buzzed
out beyond the safe zones and encountered killer shadows.
Swan said, “It won’t be alive for long. The white
crow dropped it. I think it was bringing it along for a
snack.” He pointed.
At the white crow. Bolder than ever, the bird had made itself at
home on the back of my friend the mystic stallion. The horse seemed
content with the situation. Perhaps even a little smug when it
looked at me.
“I just remembered,” Swan said. “For what
it’s worth. Last time we came up here Croaker made everybody
who belonged to the Company touch their badges and amulets to the
black stripe that runs down the middle of the road. Right after he
touched the stripe with the lancehead on the standard. Maybe none
of that amounts to anything. But I’m a superstitious kind of
guy and I’d be more comfortable—”
“You’re right. So be quiet. I recently reread
everything Murgen had to say about his trip and he thought it might
be a good idea, too. Tobo! Hold up!” I did not believe the
boy would actually hear me over the clatter generated by the column
but did expect that people would pass the word. I looked at the
hapless frog once more and marveled that the crow was smart enough
to let it go. Then I hastened to overtake our fledgling wizard.
The column stopped. Tobo had gotten my message. He had chosen
not to ignore it. Maybe he had caught something from the white
crow.
His mother and grandmother both were right there with him where
he waited, making sure he did sensible things. He was exasperated
by the delay. He was already far ahead of everyone but Sahra and
Gota . . .
Ah! As I recalled, Murgen had had the same trouble with the
Lance of Passion.
My first glimpse of the plain awed me. Its immensity was
indescribable. It was as flat as a table forever. It was grey on
grey on grey, with the road just barely darker. There was no doubt
whatsoever that this was all one vast artifact.
“Hang on, Tobo. Don’t go any farther,” I
called. “We almost forgot something. You need to take the Key
and touch it to the black stripe that runs down the middle of the
road.”
“What black stripe?”
Swan said, “It doesn’t show up nearly as well this
time. But it’s there if you look.”
It was. I found it. “Come back this way. You can see it
back here.”
Tobo backtracked reluctantly. Maybe I should have Gota carry the
Key. She could not move fast enough to outrun the rest of us.
I stared on, beyond Tobo, feeling a faint touch of that passion
to hurry myself. I was getting close to my brothers
now . . . Dark-grey clouds were beginning to
gather down there. Murgen had mentioned a nearly permanent overcast
that, nevertheless, did not always seem to have been around during
his nights. I could make out no hint of the ruined fortress that
was supposed to be a few days ahead of us. I did see plenty of the
standing stones that were one of the outstanding features of the
plain.
“I see it!” Tobo shouted, pointing downward. The
little idiot swung the pickax, burying the point in the road
surface.
The earth shuddered.
This was no devastating quake like those some of us recalled
from years ago, when half the Shadowlands had been laid waste. It
was just strong enough to be sensed and set tongues wagging and
animals protesting.
The morning sun must have touched the plain oddly, somehow,
because all the standing stones began to sparkle. People oohed and
aahed. I said, “I guess this is why they call it glittering
stone.”
Swan demurred. “I don’t think so. But I could be
wrong. Don’t forget what I said about the Company
badges.”
“I haven’t forgotten.”
Tobo pried the pick out of the road’s surface. The earth
shifted again, as gently as before. When I joined him he was
staring downward, baffled. “It healed itself,
Sleepy.”
“What?”
“When I hit it the pick went in sort of like the road was
soft. And when I yanked it back out, the hole healed
itself.”
Swan remarked, “The center stripe is getting easier to
see.”
He was right. Maybe that was because of the brightening
sunlight.
The ground trembled again. Behind me, voices changed tone,
becoming frightened as well as awed. I glanced back.
A huge mushroom of dark rouge dust with black filigree
highlights running through it boiled up from whence we had come.
Its topmost surface seemed almost solid but as it rose and moved,
the pieces of junk riding on it fell off.
Goblin burst into laughter so wicked it must have carried for
miles. “Somebody got into my treasure trove. I hope she
learned a really painful lesson.” I was close enough for him
to add a whispered, “I wish it could be fatal but
there’s not much chance of that.”
“Probably not.”
“I’ll settle for crippling her other leg.”
I said, “Sahra, there’s something I need you to do.
You remember Murgen telling us how he kept getting ahead of
everyone when he came up here? Tobo has been doing the same thing.
Try to slow him down.”
Sahra sighed wearily. She nodded. “I’ll stop
him.” She seemed apathetic, though.
“I don’t want him stopped, I just want him slowed
down enough so everyone else can keep up. This could be important
later.” I decided the two of us needed to have a long talk in
private, the way we used to do before everything got so busy. It
was obvious that she needed to get some things out where they could
be lined up and swatted down and pushed away from her long enough
for her heart to heal.
She did need healing. And for that she had no one to blame but
herself. She did not want to accept the world as it was. She seemed
worn out from fighting it. And in those ways she had begun to look
very much like her mother.
I told her, “Put a leash on him if that’s what it
takes.”
Tobo glowered at me. I ignored him. I made a brief speech
suggesting anyone who carried a Black Company badge should press it
to the road’s surface right where Tobo had wounded it. The
public readings aloud I had been doing had included Murgen’s
adventures on the plain. Nobody questioned my suggestion or refused
to accept it. The column began moving again, slowly, as we found
ways to bless, if only secondarily, the animals and those who did
not have Company badges. I stayed in place and said something
positive to everyone who passed by. I was amazed at the number of
women and children and noncombatants in general who had managed to
attach themselves to the band without me really noticing. The
Captain would be appalled.
Uncle Doj was last to go by. That troubled me vaguely. A Nyueng
Bao to the rear, more Nyueng Bao to the front, with the foremost a
half-breed . . . But the whole Company was a miscegenation. There
were only two men in this whole crowd who had belonged to the
Company when it had arrived from the north. Goblin and One-Eye.
One-Eye was almost spent and Goblin was doing his determined best,
quietly, to pass on as many skills as he could to Tobo before the
inevitable began to overhaul him as well.
I walked past the slow-moving file, intent on getting back up
near the point so I could be among the first to see anything new. I
did not see or feel any particular mission in anyone I passed. It
seemed that a quiet despair informed everyone. These were not good
signs. This meant the euphoria of our minor successes had
collapsed. Most of these people realized that they had become
refugees.
Swan told me, “We have an expression up north,
‘going from the frying pan into the fire.’ Seems like
about what we’ve done here.”
“Really?”
“We got away from Soulcatcher. But now what?”
“Now we march on until we find our buried brothers. Then
we break them out.”
“You’re not really as simple as you pretend, are
you?”
“No, I’m not. But I do like to let people know that
things aren’t always as difficult as they want to make
them.” I glanced around to see who might overhear. “I
have the same doubts everyone else has, Swan. My feet are on this
path as much because I don’t know what else to do as they are
out of high ideals. Sometimes I look at my life and it seems pretty
pathetic. I’ve spent more than a decade conspiring and
committing crimes so I can go dig up some old bones in order to
find somebody who can tell me what to do.”
“Surrender to the Will of the Night.”
“What?”
“Sounds like something Narayan Singh would say,
doesn’t it? In my great grandfather’s time it was the
slogan of the Lady’s supporters. They believed that peace,
prosperity and security would result inevitably if all power could
be concentrated in the hands of the right strong-willed person. And
it did turn out that way, more or less. In principalities that did
‘Surrender to the Will of the Night,’ particularly near
the core of the empire, there were generations of peace and
prosperity. Plague, pestilence and famine were uncommon. Warfare
was a curiosity going on far, far away. Criminals were hunted down
with a ferocity that overawed all but the completely crazy ones.
But there was always bad trouble along the frontiers. The
Lady’s minions, the Ten Who Were Taken, all wanted to build
sub-empires of their own, which never lacked for external enemies.
And they all had their own ancient feuds with one another. Hell,
even peace and prosperity create enemies. If you’re doing all
right, there’s always somebody who wants to take it away from
you.”
“I never pictured you as a philosopher, Swan.”
“Oh, I’m a wonder after you get to know
me.”
“I’m sure you are. What are you trying to tell
me?”
“I don’t know. Killing time jacking my jaw. Making
the trip go faster. Or maybe just reminding you that you
shouldn’t get too distressed about the vagaries of human
nature. I’ve been getting my roots ripped out and my life
overturned and a boot in my butt propelling me into an unknown
future, blindfolded, for so long now that I am getting
philosophical about it. I enjoy the moment. In a different context
I do Surrender to the Will of the Night.”
Despite my religious upbringing, I have never cherished a
fatalistic approach to life. Surrender to the Will of the Night?
Put my life in the hands of God? God is Great, God is Good, God is
Merciful, there is no God but God. This we are taught. But the
Bhodi philosophers may be right when they tell us that homage to
the gods is best served when seconded by human endeavor.
“Going to get dark after a while,” Swan reminded
me.
“That’s one of those things I’ve been trying
to avoid thinking about,” I confessed. “But Narayan
Singh was right. Darkness always comes.”
And when it did, we would find out just how wonderful a talisman
our Key was.
“Have you noticed how the pillars keep on glittering even
though the sky has started to look like it’s going to
rain?”
“I have.” Murgen never mentioned this one
phenomenon. I wondered if we had not done something never done
before. “Did this happen last time you were up
here?”
“No. There was a lot of glitter when we had direct
sunlight but none that seemed like it was
self-generated.”
“Uhm. And was it this cold?” It had been getting
chillier all day.
“I recall a sort of highland chill. Nothing intolerable.
Whoa. Sounds like party time.”
A whoop and holler had broken out at the head of the column. I
could not determine a cause visually, being of the short
persuasion. “What is it?”
“The kid’s stopped. Looks like he’s found
something.”
Something beside
the road caught my attention just before I reached the crest and
got my first close look at the glittering plain. It was a small
frog, mostly black but with stripes and whorls of dark green upon
its back. It had eyes the color of fresh blood. It clung to a
slightly tilted slab of grey-black rock. It wanted to go somewhere,
anywhere, but its right hind leg was injured and when it tried to
jump, it just sort of spun around in place. “Where the heck
did that come from? There isn’t supposed to be anything alive
up here.” I had been looking forward to having the clouds of
flies that followed the animals get thinned out when they buzzed
out beyond the safe zones and encountered killer shadows.
Swan said, “It won’t be alive for long. The white
crow dropped it. I think it was bringing it along for a
snack.” He pointed.
At the white crow. Bolder than ever, the bird had made itself at
home on the back of my friend the mystic stallion. The horse seemed
content with the situation. Perhaps even a little smug when it
looked at me.
“I just remembered,” Swan said. “For what
it’s worth. Last time we came up here Croaker made everybody
who belonged to the Company touch their badges and amulets to the
black stripe that runs down the middle of the road. Right after he
touched the stripe with the lancehead on the standard. Maybe none
of that amounts to anything. But I’m a superstitious kind of
guy and I’d be more comfortable—”
“You’re right. So be quiet. I recently reread
everything Murgen had to say about his trip and he thought it might
be a good idea, too. Tobo! Hold up!” I did not believe the
boy would actually hear me over the clatter generated by the column
but did expect that people would pass the word. I looked at the
hapless frog once more and marveled that the crow was smart enough
to let it go. Then I hastened to overtake our fledgling wizard.
The column stopped. Tobo had gotten my message. He had chosen
not to ignore it. Maybe he had caught something from the white
crow.
His mother and grandmother both were right there with him where
he waited, making sure he did sensible things. He was exasperated
by the delay. He was already far ahead of everyone but Sahra and
Gota . . .
Ah! As I recalled, Murgen had had the same trouble with the
Lance of Passion.
My first glimpse of the plain awed me. Its immensity was
indescribable. It was as flat as a table forever. It was grey on
grey on grey, with the road just barely darker. There was no doubt
whatsoever that this was all one vast artifact.
“Hang on, Tobo. Don’t go any farther,” I
called. “We almost forgot something. You need to take the Key
and touch it to the black stripe that runs down the middle of the
road.”
“What black stripe?”
Swan said, “It doesn’t show up nearly as well this
time. But it’s there if you look.”
It was. I found it. “Come back this way. You can see it
back here.”
Tobo backtracked reluctantly. Maybe I should have Gota carry the
Key. She could not move fast enough to outrun the rest of us.
I stared on, beyond Tobo, feeling a faint touch of that passion
to hurry myself. I was getting close to my brothers
now . . . Dark-grey clouds were beginning to
gather down there. Murgen had mentioned a nearly permanent overcast
that, nevertheless, did not always seem to have been around during
his nights. I could make out no hint of the ruined fortress that
was supposed to be a few days ahead of us. I did see plenty of the
standing stones that were one of the outstanding features of the
plain.
“I see it!” Tobo shouted, pointing downward. The
little idiot swung the pickax, burying the point in the road
surface.
The earth shuddered.
This was no devastating quake like those some of us recalled
from years ago, when half the Shadowlands had been laid waste. It
was just strong enough to be sensed and set tongues wagging and
animals protesting.
The morning sun must have touched the plain oddly, somehow,
because all the standing stones began to sparkle. People oohed and
aahed. I said, “I guess this is why they call it glittering
stone.”
Swan demurred. “I don’t think so. But I could be
wrong. Don’t forget what I said about the Company
badges.”
“I haven’t forgotten.”
Tobo pried the pick out of the road’s surface. The earth
shifted again, as gently as before. When I joined him he was
staring downward, baffled. “It healed itself,
Sleepy.”
“What?”
“When I hit it the pick went in sort of like the road was
soft. And when I yanked it back out, the hole healed
itself.”
Swan remarked, “The center stripe is getting easier to
see.”
He was right. Maybe that was because of the brightening
sunlight.
The ground trembled again. Behind me, voices changed tone,
becoming frightened as well as awed. I glanced back.
A huge mushroom of dark rouge dust with black filigree
highlights running through it boiled up from whence we had come.
Its topmost surface seemed almost solid but as it rose and moved,
the pieces of junk riding on it fell off.
Goblin burst into laughter so wicked it must have carried for
miles. “Somebody got into my treasure trove. I hope she
learned a really painful lesson.” I was close enough for him
to add a whispered, “I wish it could be fatal but
there’s not much chance of that.”
“Probably not.”
“I’ll settle for crippling her other leg.”
I said, “Sahra, there’s something I need you to do.
You remember Murgen telling us how he kept getting ahead of
everyone when he came up here? Tobo has been doing the same thing.
Try to slow him down.”
Sahra sighed wearily. She nodded. “I’ll stop
him.” She seemed apathetic, though.
“I don’t want him stopped, I just want him slowed
down enough so everyone else can keep up. This could be important
later.” I decided the two of us needed to have a long talk in
private, the way we used to do before everything got so busy. It
was obvious that she needed to get some things out where they could
be lined up and swatted down and pushed away from her long enough
for her heart to heal.
She did need healing. And for that she had no one to blame but
herself. She did not want to accept the world as it was. She seemed
worn out from fighting it. And in those ways she had begun to look
very much like her mother.
I told her, “Put a leash on him if that’s what it
takes.”
Tobo glowered at me. I ignored him. I made a brief speech
suggesting anyone who carried a Black Company badge should press it
to the road’s surface right where Tobo had wounded it. The
public readings aloud I had been doing had included Murgen’s
adventures on the plain. Nobody questioned my suggestion or refused
to accept it. The column began moving again, slowly, as we found
ways to bless, if only secondarily, the animals and those who did
not have Company badges. I stayed in place and said something
positive to everyone who passed by. I was amazed at the number of
women and children and noncombatants in general who had managed to
attach themselves to the band without me really noticing. The
Captain would be appalled.
Uncle Doj was last to go by. That troubled me vaguely. A Nyueng
Bao to the rear, more Nyueng Bao to the front, with the foremost a
half-breed . . . But the whole Company was a miscegenation. There
were only two men in this whole crowd who had belonged to the
Company when it had arrived from the north. Goblin and One-Eye.
One-Eye was almost spent and Goblin was doing his determined best,
quietly, to pass on as many skills as he could to Tobo before the
inevitable began to overhaul him as well.
I walked past the slow-moving file, intent on getting back up
near the point so I could be among the first to see anything new. I
did not see or feel any particular mission in anyone I passed. It
seemed that a quiet despair informed everyone. These were not good
signs. This meant the euphoria of our minor successes had
collapsed. Most of these people realized that they had become
refugees.
Swan told me, “We have an expression up north,
‘going from the frying pan into the fire.’ Seems like
about what we’ve done here.”
“Really?”
“We got away from Soulcatcher. But now what?”
“Now we march on until we find our buried brothers. Then
we break them out.”
“You’re not really as simple as you pretend, are
you?”
“No, I’m not. But I do like to let people know that
things aren’t always as difficult as they want to make
them.” I glanced around to see who might overhear. “I
have the same doubts everyone else has, Swan. My feet are on this
path as much because I don’t know what else to do as they are
out of high ideals. Sometimes I look at my life and it seems pretty
pathetic. I’ve spent more than a decade conspiring and
committing crimes so I can go dig up some old bones in order to
find somebody who can tell me what to do.”
“Surrender to the Will of the Night.”
“What?”
“Sounds like something Narayan Singh would say,
doesn’t it? In my great grandfather’s time it was the
slogan of the Lady’s supporters. They believed that peace,
prosperity and security would result inevitably if all power could
be concentrated in the hands of the right strong-willed person. And
it did turn out that way, more or less. In principalities that did
‘Surrender to the Will of the Night,’ particularly near
the core of the empire, there were generations of peace and
prosperity. Plague, pestilence and famine were uncommon. Warfare
was a curiosity going on far, far away. Criminals were hunted down
with a ferocity that overawed all but the completely crazy ones.
But there was always bad trouble along the frontiers. The
Lady’s minions, the Ten Who Were Taken, all wanted to build
sub-empires of their own, which never lacked for external enemies.
And they all had their own ancient feuds with one another. Hell,
even peace and prosperity create enemies. If you’re doing all
right, there’s always somebody who wants to take it away from
you.”
“I never pictured you as a philosopher, Swan.”
“Oh, I’m a wonder after you get to know
me.”
“I’m sure you are. What are you trying to tell
me?”
“I don’t know. Killing time jacking my jaw. Making
the trip go faster. Or maybe just reminding you that you
shouldn’t get too distressed about the vagaries of human
nature. I’ve been getting my roots ripped out and my life
overturned and a boot in my butt propelling me into an unknown
future, blindfolded, for so long now that I am getting
philosophical about it. I enjoy the moment. In a different context
I do Surrender to the Will of the Night.”
Despite my religious upbringing, I have never cherished a
fatalistic approach to life. Surrender to the Will of the Night?
Put my life in the hands of God? God is Great, God is Good, God is
Merciful, there is no God but God. This we are taught. But the
Bhodi philosophers may be right when they tell us that homage to
the gods is best served when seconded by human endeavor.
“Going to get dark after a while,” Swan reminded
me.
“That’s one of those things I’ve been trying
to avoid thinking about,” I confessed. “But Narayan
Singh was right. Darkness always comes.”
And when it did, we would find out just how wonderful a talisman
our Key was.
“Have you noticed how the pillars keep on glittering even
though the sky has started to look like it’s going to
rain?”
“I have.” Murgen never mentioned this one
phenomenon. I wondered if we had not done something never done
before. “Did this happen last time you were up
here?”
“No. There was a lot of glitter when we had direct
sunlight but none that seemed like it was
self-generated.”
“Uhm. And was it this cold?” It had been getting
chillier all day.
“I recall a sort of highland chill. Nothing intolerable.
Whoa. Sounds like party time.”
A whoop and holler had broken out at the head of the column. I
could not determine a cause visually, being of the short
persuasion. “What is it?”
“The kid’s stopped. Looks like he’s found
something.”