Robert Silverberg - Lord Valentine's Castle

Elidath seemed like one who walked in dreams. He shook his head, as though to rid it of cobwebs.

"This is witchery," he said.

"Yes. And I am Valentine!"

"Valentine is in the Castle. I saw him but yesterday, and he wished me well, and spoke of the old times, the pleasures we shared—"

"Stolen memories, Elidath. He fishes in my brain, and finds the old scenes embedded there. Have you noticed nothing strange about him, this past year?" Valentine’s eyes looked deep into Elidath’s and the other man flinched, as if fearing sorcery. "Have you not thought your Valentine oddly withdrawn and brooding and mysterious lately, Elidath?"

"Yes, but I thought — it was the cares of the throne that made him so."

"You noticed a difference, then! A change!"

"A slight one, yes. A certain coldness — a distance, a chill about him—"

"And still you deny me?"

Elidath stared. "Valentine?" he murmured, not yet believing. "You, really you, in that strange guise?"

"None other. And he up there in the Castle has deceived you, you and all the world."

"This is so strange."

"Come, give me your embrace, and cease your mumbling, Elidath!" Smiling broadly, Valentine seized the other man and pulled him close, and held him as friend holds friend. Elidath stiffened. His body was as rigid as wood. After a moment he pushed Valentine away and stepped back a pace, shivering.

"You need not fear me, Elidath."

"You ask too much of me. To believe such—"

"Believe it."

"I do, at least by half. The warmth of your eyes — the smile — the things you remember—"

"Believe the other half," Valentine urged passionately. "The Lady my mother sends you her love, Elidath. You will see her again, at the Castle, the day we hold festival to mark my restoration. Turn your troops around, dear friend, and join us as we march up the Mount."

There was warfare on Elidath’s face. His lips moved, a muscle in his cheek twitched violently. In silence he confronted Valentine.

Then at last he said, "This may be madness, but I accept you as what you claim."

"Elidath!"

"And I will join you, and may the Divine help you if I am misled."

"I promise you there will be no regretting this."

Elidath nodded. "I’ll send messengers to Tunigom—"

"Where is he?"

"He holds Peritole Pass against the thrust we expected from you. Stasilaine is there too. I was bitter, being left in command here in the plain, for I thought I’d miss all the action. Oh, Valentine, is it really you? With golden hair, and that sweet innocent look to your face?"

"The true Valentine, yes. I who slipped off with you to High Morpin when we were ten, borrowing the chariot of Voriax, and rode the juggernaut all day and half the night, and afterward had the same punishment as you—"

"—crusts of old stajja-bread for three days, indeed—"

"—and Stasilaine brought us a platter of meat secretly, and was caught, and he ate crusts with us too the next day—"

"—I had forgotten that part. And do you remember Voriax making us polish every part of the chariot where we had muddied it—"

"Elidath!"

"Valentine!"

They laughed and pounded each other joyously with their fists.

Then Elidath grew somber and said, "But where have you been? What has befallen you all this year? Have you suffered, Valentine? Have you—"

"It is a very long story," Valentine said gravely, "and this is not the place to tell it. We must halt this battle, Elidath. Innocent citizens are dying for Dominin Barjazid’s sake, and we cannot allow that. Rally your troops, turn them around."

"In this madhouse it won’t be easy."

"Give the orders. Get the word to the other commanders. The killing has to stop. And then ride with us, Elidath, onward to Bombifale, and then past High Morpin to the Castle."

VALENTINE RETURNED TO HIS CAR, and Elidath vanished into the confused and ragged line of the defenders. During the parley, Valentine discovered now from Ermanar, his people had made strong advances, keeping their wedge tight and pushing deep into the plain, throwing the vast but formless army of the false Coronal into nearly complete disarray. Now that relentless wedge continued to roll on, through helpless troops that had neither the will nor the desire to hold them back. With Elidath’s leadership and formidable battlefield presence negated, the defenders were spiritless and disorganized.

But it was that very pandemonium and tumult among the defenders that made halting the wasteful battle almost impossible. With hundreds of thousands of warriors moving in patternless streams over Bombifale Plain, and thousands more rushing in from the pass as news spread of Valentine’s attack, there was no way of exercising command over the entire mass. Valentine saw Elidath’s starburst banner flying in the midst of the madness, halfway across the field, and knew that he was striving to make contact with his fellow officers and tell them of the switch in loyalties; but the army was out of control, and soldiers were dying needlessly. Every casualty brought a stab of pain to Valentine.

He could do nothing about that. He signaled Ermanar to keep pressing onward.

Over the next hour a bizarre transformation of the battle began. Valentine’s wedge sliced forward almost without opposition, and a second phalanx now moved parallel to his, off to the east, led by Elidath, advancing with equal ease. The rest of the gigantic army that had occupied the plain was divided and confounded, and in a muddled way was fighting against itself, breaking into small groups that clung vociferously to tiny sectors of the plain and beat off anyone who approached.

Soon these feckless hordes lay far to Valentine’s rear, and the double column of invaders was entering the upper half of the plain, where the land began to curve bowl-fashion toward the crest on which Bombifale, oldest and most beautiful of the Inner Cities, stood. It was early afternoon, and as they ascended the slope the sky grew ever more clear and bright and the air warmer, for they were beginning to leave the Mount-girdling cloud-belt behind and emerge into the lower flanks of the summit zone, that lay bathed forever in shimmering sunlight.

And now Bombifale came into view, rising above them like a vision of antique splendor: great scalloped walls of burnt-orange sandstone set with huge diamond-shaped slabs of blue seaspar fetched from the shores of the Great Sea in Lord Pinitor’s time, and lofty needle-sharp towers sprouting on the battlements at meticulously regular intervals, slender and graceful, casting long shadows into the plain.

Valentine’s spirit throbbed with gathering joy and delight. Hundreds of miles of Castle Mount lay behind him, ring after ring of grand bustling cities, Slope Cities and Free Cities and Guardian Cities far below. The Castle itself was less than a day’s journey above, and the army that would have thwarted his climb had crumbled into pathetic turmoil behind him. And though he still felt the distant threatening twinges of the King of Dreams’ sendings at night, they were becoming only the merest tickle at the edges of his soul, and his beloved friend Elidath was ascending the Mount by his side, with Stasilaine and Tunigorn riding now to join them.

How good it was to behold the spires of Bombifale, and know what lay beyond! These hills, that towered city ahead, the dark thick grass of the meadows, the red stones of the mountain road from Bombifale to High Morpin, the dazzling flower-strewn fields that linked the Grand Calintane Highway from High Morpin to the southern wing of the Castle — he knew these places better than the sturdy but still somewhat unfamiliar body he now wore. He was almost home.

And then?

Deal with the usurper, yes, and set things to order — but the task was so awesome he scarcely knew where he would begin. He had been absent from Castle Mount almost two years, and deprived of power most of that time. The laws promulgated by Dominin Barjazid would have to be examined, and very likely repealed by blanket ordinance. And there was also the problem, which he had barely considered before this moment, of integrating the companions of his long wanderings into the former imperial officialdom, for surely he must find posts of power for Deliamber and Sleet and Zalzan Kavol and the rest, but there was Elidath to think of, and the others who had been central in his court. He could hardly discard them merely because he was coming home from his exile with new favorites. That was perplexing, but he hoped he would find some way of handling it that would breed no resentments and would cause no—