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IT RAINED THE FOLLOWING DAY After a few hours of troubled dreah the Lower Tohere he and Tally had used to go, past the Teranite walls, and out to the marshes, like beaten steel under a flat silver sheet of sky There was a shrine there, to sood, crumbled almost back to its native stones now, but built upon the invisible quicksilver track of a ley In a corner of its old sanctuary, Rhion angled the facets of his scrying-crystal to the thin, cool light, and concentrated all his power and everything he could draw up fros of the equinox-tide into the calling of Shavus&039; naray rain whispered in the hollows of the broken floor and the wild herons rose crying from the reeds, he suenmere into the crystalline lattices of the stone&039;s heart, scrying every footbridge, every gully, every curve of the mountain track where the rain sometin of the Archrew broad in the sky

All over the Forty Civilized Real water for ritual baths, shaking out the soot-colored cloaks of penitence, preparing to go ht-haired Lady&039;s forgiveness for the sins of a year The Solarists, of course, serenely confident that there was no other god than the Sun in Mid-Heaven, would undoubtedly stay hoon, behind their less walls, would hold their own so the ancient rituals of the Moon would go forward, as they had gone forward for three thousand years, treading out the Maze in a shifting aura of blood and starlight

And in the octagonal tower at Brageners, though he kneas not the cold that touched his flesh

Before leaving the tower, he hadagainst hope that the light of day ht make the old s, worsens with the night

But Jaldis had only shaken his head "When I spoke to them - to Eric and to Paul - " And the voice of the box slid and gritted over the alien names, " - at the Solstice, I told theuide us through Even that will cost them all they can raise I cannot abandon the the words he had to say and fearing theht," he said shakily "I agree that soo But it doesn&039;t have to be both of us"

Rain had wept against the shutters, the wind groaning in the rafters, hair-raisingly like the voice of so fro ti up with sightless eyes into the face of the young man who had followed him, had cared for him, and had learned from him all that he had to teach His hand found Rhion&039;s unerringly, as it had always done "My son" the voice of the box began, the voice that could eed at theain, more steadily "Thank you - for I kno little you want to undertake this quest at all But it cannot be A cook knows by the s A farrier can tell what ails a horse by a glance at the stable muck I have studied the nature of the Universe, the structure of ic, for sixty-five years, and Shavus has for thirty-five, even though for part of that time he was not ahat it was he learned Even Gyzan, or the other great ones of our own order - Nessa the Serpentlady of Dun, or Erigalt of Pelter - ht stare at the solution in that other universe and not realize that it was anything which pertained to htened, like a hard-polished root over the younger ers "My son, I love you, and no o in h wizardry to do what needs to be done Maybe not even to cross the Void alive A strange and terrible th You simply have not the experience"

Quietly, Rhion said, "I don&039;t want you to die"

The old man smiled "Then I may not It is only an hour past sunrise - there is an entire day for Shavus to reach us And then all our fears, all our endeavors on this subject, will be for naught, and we&039;ll laugh about them over the steaet"

Listening to the thru of the rain on the tower&039;s sand-colored walls, Rhion had felt only a sinking darkness of despair If Shavus had been delayed, the rain would delay him further It had been too late even then to dothe storm aside

And now, huddled in the sheltered corner of the old shrine under as left of its cru panic and a hundred iined scenarios of disaster like camp followers in its train

Toward noon, before he left the shrine, Rhion called to the Gray Lady through the crystal and, after a few eless than in true flesh, like a crystal herself filled with hidden light

"I don&039;t knohat I can do," Rhion concluded, having told her of Shavus&039; nonappearance and Jaldis&039; resolve to cross the Void, coo alone He says he&039;ll be all right, that Eric and Paul - the tizards on the other side - will take care of him But I can&039;t know that"

"No," the Lady said softly Her hazel eyes clouded, and Rhion felt a stab of guilt for laying upon her a new trouble, when, with the difference his absence could make to the power of the rites, she had sufficient worries already "No - I understand your fears But Jaldis is right in saying that Shavus may yet appear He&039;s a wily old man, and very powerful, trained in the skills of war Neither is Gyzan to be reckoned lightly They both know your master&039;s resolve If they could not come, Shavus would contrive to send word"

"To what purpose?" Rhion sighed and straightened his water-flecked spectacles with one pluer "If he tells Jaldis not to undertake the quest to this other world - which he will if he sends word at all - Jaldis will only ignore it He is - obsessed"

"Then you must make your choice," the Lady said, and there was sadness in her eyes "But Rhion, if you both go What will become of Jaldis&039; books?"

"Ah" Rhion looked away, unable to e Away across the h the drizzly h puddles, their dogs bounding happily in their wake Rhion thought he recognized Marc of Erralswan&039;s bright-green doublet, close beside a lady in a yelloith long cascades of raven curls He did not want to lie to the Gray Lady, but Jaldis had ordered him strictly to say that he did not know

"Rhion," she said sharply, calling his gaze back to hers "This is not a trick Does he think I ait until his back is turned and then come to steal theht, and so Rhion himself would not quite put past the Lady, much as he cared for her So he only said, "He&039;s made provision for them They&039;ll be safe - Shavus or any of the Morkensiks, will be able to get to them"

"But not corrupt and superstitious Earth-witches, not Bone-Casters eave little spell-dollies in straw and divine the future froo," she said, exasperation at the opinion of her fading fro it weary and sad "It is noon I must rest, and prepare And so ht"

Rhion nodded Indeed, he thought, if the victi rite were to survive, the Lady would need all her power - even as he would need all of his, such as it was, to see the other side of the Void alive He felt spent already fro in his veins, like the pull of the tide in his blood

"I pray the Goddess will keep you safe"

Her ihtly nauseated, though, as usual, the nausea changed to an overwhel for sweets before he was halfway up the ht half a dozen balls of steareased paper in the Old Town h for himself and his sons; the rain had eased by this time, and the steam fros of fog in the gray air Most of thedown, fars of orange and blue, to return to their hoht Not only in his own blood could Rhion feel the co of the equinox It was i slave, in the steam that leaked from everyhe passed on his way back to the palace The city and all orshipped the orthodox gods had lapsed into the tiods could save theeborn there was no salvation As he walked by the Bull and Ring Tavern in Market Lane, a gliht his eye - he saas the poster of the "God of Wizards" crudely pasted to the wall beside the door

In the roon yet of Shavus&039; coone, entrusted already under every seal of protection the blind e could devise to the Duke&039;s care The oldaway for a tih of course not hohere The secret of the Dark Well was too deep, too dangerous, to be shared, even with one whose lack of ability or thaue harray wheel that crushes out the grain Rhion knew he should sleep, should rest and ht out Tally and his sons, instead The boys were far too absorbed in the excite on their masks to have much attention to spare even for their favorite of their mother&039;s friends It was said to be bad luck to try on one&039;sexactly what Rhion and his friends had done at their age - holding the masks to their faces withhow close they could come In the secrecy of a loft above theto one another amid the smells of sawdust and leather and the cinnamon of Tally&039;s perfume, and lay locked in one anothers&039; arms in the huddle of cloaks and horse blankets until nearly dark

The dark fell early, overcast and griue Jaldis out of his resolve, Rhion tried to sleep, but the slow fever of the spring-tide was flowing too strongly in hi towards their balance point and the awareness of how increasingly unlikely it was that Shavus would arrive in tily and patted Rhion&039;s arer and livelier and with the quiet serenity of one whose mind is made up "That is understandable"

"Fretted is not how I&039;d describeout toward me from the other side but a bunch of half-trained wizards who can&039;t even work ic!"

Jaldis smiled "All will be well," he said softly "They need ic in their world - if they are to return their world to the true paths of power I cannot turn my back"