David Farland - Beyond the Gate

Thomas licked his lips. “Then they’re gone now, to whatever world they hail from?”

Thomas looked into Gallen’s eyes quizzically, and Gallen wondered how much he knew-or had guessed. “Yes, they’re gone, and I don’t think they’ll be back.”

Thomas leaned forward conspiratorially, and whispered, “You’ve talked to an angel? Wha-what did the creature say, man?”

Gallen found his heart hammering. He was tom between the desire to speak the truth, and the desire to keep his secrets. “There are many worlds beyond Geata na Chruinne,” Gallen said, “and people there are not so different than they are here. Some of them are far more beautiful than anything you dream. Some of them are wise. Some of them live forever. In many ways, life is easier there than it is here, but there are also greater perils.”

Thomas sat back, stunned, his face a mask of hope and confusion. “Well, I’ll be … I wonder … I wish I could see … I wish I could have talked to an angel.”

Gallen could see Thomas’s secret desire written plain on his face. The man wanted to see what lay beyond Geata na Chruinne, and Gallen had promised Maggie that he’d talk to Thomas about a quick date for the wedding. He wondered if he told Thomas the truth, if Thomas could understand how important it was for Maggie to marry soon.

“Maggie and I have both been beyond the gate with the folk that you call angels,” Gallen said. “And now that Maggie’s been there, she won’t rest easy until she washes the dust of this world from off her feet once and for all.”

Orick had quit licking his wounds, and now he looked up. “Well, if you’re going to say that much, you might as well tell him the whole truth, Gallen.” Orick turned to Thomas. “Gallen and Maggie are people of some import out there now. They have to return. The fate of ten thousand worlds rests on their shoulders.”

Thomas sat back, as if expecting Gallen to sprout horns from his head or wings from his back. It was an utterly fantastic tale that Gallen was telling, yet the dead “demon” and “angel” in Thomas’s shed gave some proof of it. Thomas must have believed him, for the old minstrel began to weep. “People there can live forever?” Thomas asked. “And all you have to do is walk through Geata na Chruinne?”

“You need a key to the gate,” Orick said.

“And have you got one?”

Gallen nodded.

“Can I see it?” Thomas begged, making little grasping motions with one hand.

Gallen checked to make certain that his mother wasn’t watching, then he went to his room, came back with the key-a glowing crystal globe with golden wiring inside.

Thomas stared in awe, held it in both hands. “This is not of this world, that’s sure,” Thomas said. “But I don’t know if it’s a thing of God, or of the devil.”

“Neither,” Gallen said. “It was made by the Tharrin, a race of good people who rule the heavens.”

Thomas licked his lips, handed the key back to Gallen, who scooted it into his pocket. Thomas said, “So why haven’t you gone already? Is it those green-skinned devils?”

“Something like that,” Gallen said. “Maggie and I have enemies who will begin hunting us soon, and this is a good place to hide. Maggie wants to get married here, before we leave. And to tell the truth, I wanted to say goodbye to my friends.”

“So that’s why Maggie is so hot to marry you now,” Thomas said. “She doesn’t care about your political future, because your future lies elsewhere.”

Gallen nodded.

Thomas folded his hands, stared at them thoughtfully for a long time. “And if you don’t like it out there, you can always come back here, I suppose?”

“Aye,” Gallen said. “We could.”

Thomas leaned back in his chair, studied Gallen a moment, his gray eyes measuring the boy. His beard and moustache were impeccably trimmed. His body was leathery, but he had a gut growing on him. He was at that stage of life where he was still tough, but somewhat worn. And in his bright purple pants and a peach-colored shirt, he looked as if he should be out juggling or singing in the streets. “I want to go with you,” Thomas admitted at last.

“Are you sure?” Gallen asked. “It’s a big place, stranger than I have time to tell.”

“Hmmm …” Thomas eyed the boy thoughtfully, almost grudgingly. “I’ve never put much faith in God and heaven, or any rewards in the afterlife. But dammit, boy, I want to live forever!”

“And if I were to take you with me,” Gallen mused, “what could you pay?” He said it as a joke, but Thomas didn’t see it as one.

“How much do you want?” Thomas asked, licking his lips.

And Gallen realized that there was only one answer. Nothing that Thomas took with him would be of any value out there. “Everything you own,” Gallen said. He watched the old man smile weakly, thinking he would balk at the price. “All of it. You’ll give it all to my mother, and go into the next world as broke as a babe.”

Thomas watched him calculatingly. “I’ll need my lute and my mandolin and flutes.”

“You can keep those,” Gallen said.

“A fitting price,” Thomas agreed. “I’ll make out the papers this morning.”

“And one more thing: I want consent to marry your niece.”

“No, no,” Orick said. “You can’t barter for her like that, Gallen. It’s not proper.”

Thomas smiled greedily, and he scratched his beard, thinking.

“Maggie won’t care. We’ll all get what we want,” Gallen said. “What does it matter what price Thomas and I agree on?”

“It’s a deal,” Thomas said, and he reached out his hand. The two men shook. “I’ll go tell her. She’s got her dress made, so you can marry as soon as the priest gets back.”

Thomas got up, swaggered to the door, opened it and looked out at the sheriffs all gathered around out there. “Oh, it’s going to be the damnedest long day you ever saw,” Thomas bellowed, and he was out the door.

After Thomas left, Gallen’s mother fixed a huge breakfast of ham and eggs with sweet rolls, and in the early morning dawn, Gallen, his mother, and Orick sat down to eat, watching the sheriffs outside through the windows, who all stared in at the banquet with envy.

All through the morning, there was nothing to do but sit, and Gallen waited with a heavy heart, considered routes of escape. But escape was out of the question. Orick tried to go outside, for the sheriffs had one of his bear friends, a female named Grits, in custody, but the sheriffs would not let him past.

And so they sat. In a couple of hours, Thomas came back and sang to the sheriffs a bit, sat with them and drank, laughing, as if they were all as thick as thieves. He came in for a minute, warned Gallen to lock all the doors and windows, and keep his weapons handy. “There’s some sentiment for a lynching out there among those boys. They’ve come a long way to get you, and they don’t want to go back empty-handed. But I think I can cool their heads,” Thomas whispered, then he was back out the door.

In the early afternoon, the scar-faced sheriff came back to Gallen’s door, offering him a bargain. “If you come with us now,” the sheriff said, droplets of nervous perspiration on his brow, “I’m prepared to set your fiancée free. No harm will come to her.”

“And if I don’t come with you?” Gallen asked, wondering why the sheriff wanted a bargain, what had spooked him.

“‘Who knows?” the sheriff said. “We’ll take her north for questioning. It’s a dangerous road. Prisoners have been known to get killed while trying to escape. And the interrogations can get brutal. Even if your girl does make it through all of this, she’ll have a long walk home, over lonely roads, where robbers sometimes would rather take a woman’s virtue than her purse.”