Part 4 (1/2)

Pain, born in her swelling heart, was spreading like molten metal through the entire body of the Archimage of the Land. It was a jubilant hurting, mingled with stark fear. She spoke in a voice made unsteady by emotion.

”Since the Blue Lady's imprisonment, have the Lercomi Folk visited underwater ruins of the Vanished Ones at the Star Men's behest?”

”Nay,” said Ansebado, ”but we have heard that other Mere tribes have been compelled to do so. They have gathered certain ancient artifacts coveted by the Star Men, but none of them knows what these things might be, nor do we.”

But Haramis knew. ”I will come to you again, Ansebado. Command your Folk to watch by the imprisoned Blue Lady until then. Should any person emerge from her magical portal, bespeak me at once, even if you must lay down your lives to do so. Now farewell.”

She clasped her talisman and commanded her magic to take her to Kadiya.

Chapter Five.

QUEEN Anigel stared at the plate of food before her, a simple grilled fillet of garsu fish and a helping of glazed dorun tuber, and put down her knife and fork. ”I confess that Hara's dreadful account of the poor Blue Lady has robbed me of my appet.i.te. It pierces my very soul to know that there is nothing we can do to free her from that h.e.l.lish enchantment.”

”If Iriane is frozen stiff,” Kadiya said reasonably, ”she cannot be suffering. What good can it do her if you pine and starve yourself?”

”You are ever practical,” Anigel said with a sigh. ”But hardhearted.”

”Nonsense,” said the Lady of the Eyes, taking a goodly helping of bittercress salad and pouring rich cheese dressing over it. ”One must sympathize with the troubles of others, but not to the point of impairing one's own good health- especially if one has duties of state to perform. Don't you agree, Hara?”

The Archimage inclined her head. ”My talisman refuses to confirm my suspicions, but I believe that Iriane's- imprisonment may be only the beginning of a new time of peril for all of us. The return of the Star Guild, and the possibility that Orogastus may be gathering weapons of the Vanished Ones, poses a grave danger to the peace and good balance of the world. It may be that we three will once again be called upon, and if this be so, then we will need all of the physical and mental strength we can muster.

And you, dearest little Sister, have important personal obligations as well.”

Queen Anigel received this admonition in chilly silence. But she began with obvious reluctance to eat.

The triplets were at dinner in Ruwenda Citadel, seated at the high table with the Queen presiding, while others of the court feasted at lower boards in the torch-lit great hall. There were many persons missing-including King Antar and his military advisers-and the usual cheerful conviviality attending the evening meal was absent. Less than an hour earlier, the magic of Haramis had transported Kadiya and herself to the Citadel, where they had reported to the Laboruwendian court not only the misfortune of the Archimage of the Sea but also the apparent resurgence of the Star Guild under the leaders.h.i.+p of Orogastus.

The latter piece of news had caused a furor, since only a single day now remained before the departure of the royal entourage on the long journey to Labornok. King Antar, Lord Marshal Lakanilo, and General Gorkain had sequestered themselves in order to make hasty plans for increasing the security of the train, leaving the Queen and her two sisters to speculate upon what the dire events might portend.

”At the present time,” the Archimage said, ”only the Lords of the Air know what Orogastus's long-range plans might be. But we can be a.s.sured that they involve the conquest of the world- both by physical means and by dark sorcery.”

Anigel added more crystallized honey to her cup of darci tea and stirred it morosely. ”I find it hard to believe that once again that evil man has cheated death. Who would ever have thought such a thing possible? Hara, how could your talisman have deceived you about his fate?”

It was Kadiya who made the unpalatable reply. ”The talisman spoke true-only the Archimage misinterpreted its words.”

Haramis admitted the accusation with a doleful nod. She brought forth the portrait of Orogastus and put it on the table before them. ”When I requested a view of his dead face, the talisman could not comply. Only when I worded the command differently, avoiding the mention of death, did it show me his likeness so that I could fas.h.i.+on this picture.”

Now the Lady of the Eyes cried fiercely, ”d.a.m.n that wizard! For all we know, he has already found the star-box and bonded Ani's Three-Headed Monster to himself!”

”No,” Haramis stated positively. ”My talisman indicates that he has not. Some other person has the coronet and the box-but the Circle will not tell me who.”

Kadiya took up her tableknife and with precision sliced a drumstick from the succulent roasted togar on the platter before her. ”You may wager platinum to plarr-pits that Orogastus will seek out this coy new magician and attempt an alliance.”

”You are probably right, Kadi,” Anigel said. ”And this is all the more reason why you should heed Hara's counsel, and give up your own impotent talisman into her safekeeping so that neither villain gets hold of it.”

”Never!” Kadiya said through her mouthful of meat. ”Even though the Three Moons tumble from the firmament!”

”Oh, Kadi,” cried the exasperated Queen. ”It is the only safe course and you know it.”

”All very well for you to say,” muttered the Lady of the Eyes, pointing in accusation with the fowl's leg bone, ”having given up your own talisman to Orogastus in ransom-”

”Thus saving the life of the King my husband!” Anigel exclaimed in high dudgeon. ”Should I have let Antar die in captivity?”

”You did not give Hara and me time to rescue him,” Kadiya retorted, ”but capitulated to the kidnappers with unseemly haste, opening the way to the invasion of your kingdom.”

Very quietly, so that none of the other supping courtiers noticed, the Queen began to weep. ”You are right. I was at fault-but so are you. Your Three-Lobed Burning Eye is sure to be stolen by Orogastus or this unknown wizard sooner or later. My own foolishness and your stubborn vainglory may yet doom us all.”

”For shame, Kadi,” the Archimage said, taking her youngest sister in her arms. ”Have you forgotten that Ani is with child and should not be upset?”

”She is as rugged as a draft volumnial dropping its yearly calf, for all her fragile looks,” Kadiya remarked callously. ”And do not either of you think to convince me to give up my talisman through this soppy charade.”

Anigel ceased crying. She sat up, wiped her eyes with a napkin, and shrugged. ”It was worth the try,” she said sweetly.

”By the Flower!” the Archimage said, chagrined as much by the Queen's artful deception as by Kadiya's intransigence. ”You two will drive me to distraction.”

”No, dear Hara,” said Anigel, now in deadly earnest. ”We will rather do whatever must be done to help you conquer the Star Men and restore the balance of the world, no matter what the personal cost.” She turned to her other sister with a steely glance. ”Is it not so, Kadi?”

”Oh... lothok dung!” cried the Lady of the Eyes, flinging the drumstick down onto her plate. ”I suppose I will have to give in. You shall have the Burning Eye, Hara. What matter if my pride is in rags and my confidence undermined?”

”It is for the best,” the Archimage said, with evident relief.

”May I keep the talisman with me until we Three separate, at least?” Kadiya asked.

”Certainly. There can be no danger here within the Citadel. I know for a certainty that there are no viaducts here, through which Orogastus or his agents might enter and steal the Eye.”

”Those triply bed.a.m.ned magical bolt-holes!” Kadiya exclaimed.

Haramis pushed aside dishes and tableware, laid out a large clean napkin, and touched her talisman to it. There was a faint smell of scorched linen, and immediately the cloth became a wondrously detailed map of the world-continent. ”The viaducts are not truly magic, even though they seem so to us who know little of the science behind their making. Behold the viaduct portals.”

Anigel exclaimed in amazement, for the map became peppered with innumerable scarlet pinpoint dots. ”So many!”

”And now,” said the Archimage, ”since Orogastus stole a certain book belonging to Iriane that explained their operation, they are accessible to the sorcerer and his Star Guild.”

Kadiya said, ”The villains are capable of popping up out of any one of those points like ziklu from a warren, and they can also go to ground through them, escaping their pursuers. Hara is thus far unable to destroy the viaducts or close them with her magic.”

”It seems that the Vanished Ones used these pa.s.sageways for casual travel about their world,” the White Lady explained. ”To ordinary people, the viaduct openings are invisible and imperceptible. But if one knows more or less where the portal is, it is only necessary to utter the proper arcane command-'viaduct system activate'-whereupon it becomes visible and operative. Some of the viaducts were destroyed in the great conflict between the Vanished Ones and the Star Guild, but these on the map remain. Heretofore, they have been used only by the Archimages of yore and by the sindona, when they venture forth from the Place of Knowledge.”

Kadiya said, ”You'll be interested to know, Ani, that this viaduct”-she stabbed her ringer at one of the dots-”opens right into Zotopanion Keep in the Winter Palace of Labornok! It was the way by which both Iriane and the sindona gained access to the keep during the climax of the Battle of Derorguila.”

”Holy Flower!” cried the dismayed Queen. ”Is there no way of getting rid of these abominable tunnels?”

”My talisman says there is,” Haramis replied. ”However, its instructions are given in archaic scientific gibberish and so far I can make no sense of it. When I return to my Tower I will look further into the matter of obliterating the viaducts, but for the present we shall have to barricade them instead. All that are in critical locations must be enclosed within st.u.r.dy cages or earthen mounds, and be heavily guarded withal.”

Anigel studied the map intently. ”There are not so many portals in the Mazy Mire as elsewhere, but here is one not far from the Queen's Mireway. I wonder... The trip to the Winter Capital will be so lengthy and tedious in the early rains. If, as you say, there is a viaduct leading directly to Zotopanion Keep) -”

”Do not contemplate it for a moment!” Haramis said, aghast. ”Only one adept in the science of the Vanished Ones dare use the things. Sometimes their routing is fixed and one has no control over the ultimate destination. At other times, if a kind of complex magical spell is recited before entry, the viaduct carries the traveler to the location that is specified. But if this spell is not said properly, the person risks emerging within the Sempiternal Icecap or even deep beneath the sea.”