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"I DON&039;T UNDERSTAND" The slurred drag of the voice-box was intelligible only by those who knew Jaldis well - to an outsider, Rhion thought, it would be only a seesaw of notes, like an experta viol in an inflection to lass and the great gold sun-cross in their ainst the worn sheets and the hand that lay like bleached driftwood in their midst
"They called out for help I heard their voices at the Winterstead" Jaldis sighed painfully and turned his face away "I don&039;t understand"
"The turn of winter was six hness of his deep voice not quite successful in covering his concern for his friend "God knows, a e in a week - in a day"
Silent at his elbow, Rhion had to agree
"What makes you think any of them are still alive by this time?"
"If ever they existed at all," Gyzan murmured, from where he sat on the painted leather chest at the bed&039;s foot
"It exists" Jaldis stirred as if he would sit Rhion, too unnerved by the grayness of his face and the ragged way he&039;d been breathing that ently down again
"It exists," the oldout"
"I don&039;t disbelieve you, old friend" The Archray wool around his dark, scarred face "But whether those people are still alive to call, let alone have enough power in &039;euide us there"
"I will find them," the old man said stubbornly "I will I must" And for all the weakness of his body, Rhion saw in that sunken face the indomitable deter for hie, and the Archer had cliive hi you can do as well as I" The big warrior gruh the collection of fine porcelain bottles on the plank shelf - all gifts from the Duke - in search of brandy Rhion picked up the nearly eth of the kitchen to the door
In the square outside the water seller whose beat covered this court alking along the dense blue shade of the arcade, singing mournfully "Wa-a-a-a-a-ter, cool fresh wa-a-a-a-a-ter" She eyed Rhion suspiciously but uncovered one of the buckets which dangled from her shoulder yoke and filled up his jar, then bit the halfpenny he gave her and made the little crossed square of Darova&039;s Eye on it, in case he&039;d given her a pebble witched to look like a coin Wizards were always being accused of doing that, though Rhion had never met anyone to whom it had actually happened
"Don&039;t be silly" He set the jar down again near the hearth in the kitchen&039;s cool gloom "Your spells"
"My spells malarkey," Shavus retorted "You knoell as I do, ainst nature, not forever What Jaldis needs isn&039;t a spell, but to quit doing things like this to hiic cooin&039; after dates and honey and any sweet thing when you&039;ve done so that&039;s beyond you, same as I fall asleep like I&039;d been clubbed over the head, once the kick of the oin&039; from spell to spell to keep hioin&039; forever chewing cocoa leaves"
He pulled the cork from the brandy bottle with his teeth and slopped one of the red-and-black cups half-full, while Rhion heaped a little handful of charcoal in the brazier and touched it with a fire-spell even as he worked the coffee mill
They were all tired, for they had worked the rites of the su to find son, soht of the year, dawn came far too soon
In any case, Rhion had slept very little Fatigued as he was by the calling down of power, no sooner had his head touched the pillow than the dream of Tally lay down beside hi cool liain, but sleep, like the coy girls he&039;d flirted with in his youth, had played hard to get
It had been just as well Waking with the first slits of light through the louvers, he had heard the stertorous rasp of Jaldis&039; breathing and had realized that the oldakin to a mild stroke in his sleep
"He uses too enerous dollop of brandy into his coffee and taking a handful of the cheese and dates Rhion had brought to the table The dates were another gift froes had drunk last night at dinner The graceful clay bottle, stamped with the Duke&039;s seals, still adorned the sideboard and reht No wonder, he thought, he was starving "Ta with that damn Well of his will be his death"
"Perhaps," Gyzan said, speaking for the first time, "death is the inevitable conclusion of all dreams"
In the weeks that followed, Rhion visited the cellar seldoh he was always conscious of the Well&039;s presence there, like soround beneath his feet Even after Shavus and Gyzan had returned to Nerriok, between his own spells of healing and his pupil&039;s, Jaldis had rallied For all his fragility there was an odd, stubborn toughness to hih he moved more slowly than he had Nevertheless Rhion was uneasy He knew that while he hione, his master would descend the perilous ladder to the cellar and open the Well, sitting for hours before it, gazing into the enigma of its abyss
The Duke was deeply concerned to hear that his friend was ill and would dispatch a sedan chair and four bearers to Shuttlefly Court whenever he wanted the old ifts ht, pale wines of the high country When Rhion came to court without Jaldis, the Duke would invariably ask after the old man and send back with Rhion soood quality soap from the palace savonneries, or sohten the little adobe rooms
And Rhion was often at court The Duke had offered both him and Jaldis free use of his library, and it would be foolish, Jaldis scolded, not to take advantage of this freedoht find Thus Rhion spentmarble rooms - three of theonal tower - reading by the white, diffuse light that streah the racks of ancient scrolls and shelves of books whose sheer nuhout the Forty Real&039;s library in Nerriok
"And personally, I think ours is better," Tally re and note tablets in hand, were engaged in one of their long paper chases through book after book, tracking down a reference by the rhetoritician Giltuus in his Ninth Book of Analects to spells by a wizard naone over a dozen times for orthodoxy by the priests of Darova You can bet anything &039;unfit&039; or &039;unseeo"
"And this hasn&039;t?" Rhion balanced on a tall-legged stool to pull scrolls frois&039; Coh codex-type books had been in use for four hundred years, priests and philosophers still tended to regard thes, if they existed in the library, would be in the own she hen she was tending her dogs or hiding from court occasions, looked up at hih the wax identification tags on the scrolls&039; ends
"Well, more from pride than from intellectual en that ca of theirs for whatever reason I know Grandfather is supposed to have taken a whip to the Archi had bitten her - then turned around as soon as she had gone and beat the dog"
"Char fellow" Rhion stretched out to the next co hi down and hed and put a hand on his calf to steady hireat difficulty that he kept hi down upon her then and there He had found that sometimes, for hours at a time, they could be friends as they had been before, like two children playing in a garden - other moments he was consuer end, every pearl upon her headdress, and every eyelash, wanting nothing more from life than to crush her in his arms
They had rotto at the end of the garden; in the hayloft above the Duke&039;s stables; and in the little deserted pavilion with the painted rafters where Rhion and Jaldis had coe Of the love-philter and of Esrex and Damson, they did not speak
Rhion was, in fact, about the court farsilently under the cloudy aura of spells of Who-Me? and Look-Over-There The places where he and Tallyin an aftermath sweet beyond words, were always hazed about by illusions which woke in chance passersby the dient to be done immediately elsewhere in the palace The vines which covered the front of the garden grotto grew long and untended as a beggar&039;s hair; the pavilion by the postern gate acquired a neglected air that ca its steps washed or its s cleaned
Once, while Rhion hunted for roves, he heard the horns of the hunters ringing in the hills and caught a glimpse of the Duke, all in cris bounding about her, and the fla Watching as the horses plunged out of sight into one of the thick knots of woodland that tangled these high gullies, it ca rush of despair how terribly short tiht: the Earl&039;s dogs, though too well-trained to shy when he came near, lowered their ears and ainst his boot