Rob Scott - Lessek_s Key

‘Or perhaps he’s busy taking care of other business while Steven and Gilmour are locked in here.’

‘Could be,’ Mark agreed. ‘What was his daughter’s name? Malagon’s daughter?’

‘Belle- No, Bella something,’ Garec said. ‘I don’t remember. Do you think he’s gone back to Welstar Palace to take her?’

‘Judging from Eldarn’s history, that’ll certainly be high on his to-do list. People have got to be wondering what’s happened to their dictator, regardless of how nasty the old bastard was. If he’s dead, they’ll want a fresh start; it doesn’t matter how long they’ve toiled under the thumb of a grade-A prick, they’ll all be praying for a new beginning under Whatshername’s rule. If Nerak has any doubts about sorting us out, or working the spell table – wherever that is – he wouldn’t leave Eldarn to flop around like a fish on dry land, will he? He’ll get back there and start running things as Bellawhatshername.’

‘That makes sense,’ Garec said, ‘especially if Malagon’s body came floating up on shore in Orindale. Those generals won’t know what to do, but I’m sure most of them would rather cut off a hand than take orders from a girl.’

Mark laughed. Some things didn’t change, no matter what world you were in. ‘He’ll take her – the poor kid never had a chance – and do something ugly right from the start. They’ll all get the message that Daddy’s little girl is just as cruel as the old man.’

Garec laughed. ‘Imagine being a doll in her dollhouse!’ He looked around. ‘Where are the others now?’

‘Steven is upstairs staring at the wall again, and I don’t know what happened to Gilmour this morning. He’s been in quite a funk,’ Mark said. ‘The fight was good for him; he was almost back to normal, but now he’s reverted to being all wet and beaten up. I suppose he’s spending these days working spells to make up for lost opportunity; I guess he figures Nerak knows where he is so he can make as much mystical noise as he wants.’

‘I’m worried about him,’ Garec agreed. ‘He just about came apart when he saw that empty spell chamber.’

‘Who can blame him?’ Mark sighed. ‘If I were him, I’d be downstairs locked in the wine cellar. It’s probably good that he’s back there blasting away. Gives him a chance to bone up on his skills while we wait.’

‘That is what we’re doing, isn’t it?’ Garec asked, ‘waiting?’

‘I don’t know what else you’d call it. Waiting for someone to figure out where we’re going or what we’re doing, waiting for the snow to melt so we can get past the almor, waiting for Gita and the Falkan Resistance to get to Traver’s Notch, waiting for Gilmour to discover something in that Windscroll he brought down with him? I don’t know, Garec. I wish someone would tell me.’

‘Steven’s not had any luck either?’

Mark shook his head. ‘If he had, he wouldn’t be in there staring at it.’

‘I’m not sure he’s going to get anything out of it.’

‘He hasn’t had a glimmer.’

‘What does it say? I can’t remember it exactly.’

Mark laughed, hollowly. ‘I have it memorised. It says: It’s been gone for a long, long time, Fantus, and you’ll never find it. Eldarn itself wards the spell table for me, Eldarn and Eldarn’s most ruthless gatekeepers. Forget the spell table, Fantus. It’s mine. It always has been mine. Steven wrote it using ashes from the fireplace. That was a bit odd, actually, with all the sealed canisters of ink in the library, but the ashes worked.’

‘He’s still convinced there’s a hidden meaning, even though he’s stared at those words every single day…’ Garec’s voice trailed off as he gazed into the flames.

‘Not so much a hidden meaning. I’m with him on this: Nerak’s a brash sonofabitch, too confident and too certain of victory, and it’s quite possible he said something that will lead us to the spell table. But it’s been what – twenty days? – since Nerak was here and none of us have come up with a damned thing.’ He dipped a ladle into one of the buckets they had drawn from the cistern the evening before, filled a goblet and handed it to Garec, then filled another for himself.

‘Thanks,’ Garec said, then asked, ‘sunonabitch?’

Mark shrugged. ‘Close enough. I add it for colour; it’s one of my favourites.’

‘What does it mean?’

He thought about it, then said, ‘In a literal sense it’s an insult to one’s mother.’

‘Those are always effective.’ Garec drank.

‘But the way I use it is more to say that Nerak is a great pile of cat-shit.’

‘All right, thanks.’ Garec grimaced. ‘You know, there really is nothing worse than cat-shit.’

Mark laughed. ‘How did we get here?’

‘We’re here to save Eldarn and send you back to Colorado. Have you forgotten?’

‘Oh, yes, right, save Eldarn. Of course, I had better write that down. I’ll see if Steven has any ash left. I’ll scrawl it here on my water goblet so I don’t forget.’ He refilled his cup.

Garec reached back for a piece of chair, tossed it on the flames and said, ‘But first we have to figure out how Eldarn itself might ward the Larion spell table.’

‘And then we have to get through Eldarn’s greatest gatekeepers.’

‘Most ruthless gatekeepers,’ Garec corrected.

‘Sorry, most ruthless gatekeepers,’ Mark said.

‘I wonder what aven it is.’

Mark looked surprised. ‘Does it matter?’

‘We’re sitting here drinking water. Whose idea was that?’

‘You think it’s late enough for wine?’

‘We’d have to go back down into the cellar. I don’t like it, but I’ll risk it.’

‘Yeah, I’d hate to get caught down there. Too dark, too many damp places. That miserable almor could be down there anywhere waiting for us. Maybe we’ll stick with water for a while and send Steven down there when he takes a break. At least he’ll have the staff with him.’

‘Right,’ Garec said. ‘We wouldn’t want to get trapped down there.’

Mark had leaned over the water bucket when he heard Garec’s goblet clatter to the floor. The Ronan was already running towards the stairwell at the far end of the great hall. ‘Hey,’ Mark shouted, his echo coming back at him from fifteen stone hallways at once, ‘where are you going?’

‘Sunonabitch!’ Garec called without looking back.

Garec burst into Steven’s chamber without knocking and was surprised to find Gilmour there, considering the crooked ash letters Steven had scrawled on the grey stone wall. ‘I know where this is,’ he panted, heaving in great swallows of air. Gilmour and Steven offered him twin blank stares as he waved a hand at the writing and gasped out again, ‘I know where this is. The spell table, I know where we can find it.’

‘Sit down, boy, relax.’ Gilmour was obviously unconvinced. ‘Get your breath back and tell us how – or rather, where.’ He looked at Mark questioningly as he too ran into the room, but Mark just shrugged and raised his eyebrows.

‘I just figured it out downstairs with Mark. We were-’ He stopped and laughed nervously; he didn’t want to be wrong after bursting into the room like a bad actor in a second-rate melodrama. ‘Well, we were downstairs, drinking water we collected yesterday from the cistern – it isn’t bad, but it tastes like lake water, all full of minerals and fishy things. And we were talking about going downstairs to get some wine, which is a good deal more pleasant, anyway, we decided to wait and send Steven down there, because to tell the truth the almor scares the dog piss out of both of us, and neither of us wanted to go down to fill the flagons.’

‘Gosh, thanks Garec,’ Steven said dryly.