Ursula Le Guin: The Farthest Shore

“I do not know. There is a weakening of power. There is a want of resolution. There is a dimming of the sun. I feel, my lords– I feel as if we who sit here talking, were all wounded mortally, and while we talk and talk our blood runs softly from our veins…”

“And you would be up and doing.”

“I would,” said the Archmage.

“Well,” said the Doorkeeper, “can the owls keep the hawk from flying?”

“But where would you go?” the Changer asked, and the Chanter answered him: “To seek our king and bring him to his throne!”

The Archmage looked keenly at the Chanter, but answered only, “I would go where the trouble is.”

“South or west,” said the Master Windkey.

“And north and east if need be,” said the Doorkeeper.

“But you are needed here, my lord,” said the Changer. “Rather than to go seeking blindly among unfriendly peoples on strange seas, would it not be wiser to stay here, where all magic is strong, and find out by your arts what this evil or disorder is?”

“My arts do not avail me,” the Archmage said.

There was that in his voice which made them all look at him, sober and with uneasy eyes. “I am the Warder of Roke. I do not leave Roke lightly. I wish that your counsel and my own were the same; but that is not to be hoped for now. The judgment must be mine: and I must go.”

“To that judgment we yield,” said the Summoner.

“And I go alone. You are the Council of Roke, and the Council must not be broken. Yet one I will take with me, if he will come.” He looked at Arren. “You offered me your service, yesterday. Last night the Master Patterner said, `Not by chance does any man come to the shores of Roke. Not by chance is a son of Morred the bearer of this news' And no other word had he for us all the night. Therefore I ask you, Arren, will you come with me?”

“Yes, my lord,” said Arren, with a dry throat.

“The prince, your father, surely would not let you go into this peril,” said the Changer somewhat sharply, and to the Archmage, “The lad is young and not trained in wizardry.”

“I have years and spells enough for both of us,” Sparrowhawk said in a dry voice. “Arren, what of your father?”

“He would let me go.”

“How can you know?” asked the Summoner.

Arren did not know where he was being required to go, nor when, nor why. He was bewildered and abashed by these grave, honest, terrible men. If he had had time to think he could not have said anything at all. But he had no time to think; and the Archmage had asked him, “Will you come with me?”

“When my father sent me here he said to me, `I fear a dark time is coming on the world, a time of danger. So I send you rather than any other messenger, for you can judge whether we should ask the help of the Isle of the Wise in this matter, or offer the help of Enlad to them.' So if I am needed, therefore I am here.”

At that he saw the Archmage smile. There was great sweetness in the smile, though it was brief. “Do you see?” he said to the seven mages. “Could age or wizardry add anything to this?”

Arren felt that they looked on him approvingly then, but with a kind of pondering or wondering look, still. The Summoner spoke, his arched brows straightened to a frown: “I do not understand it, my lord. That you are bent on going, yes. You have been caged here five years. But always before you were alone; you have always gone alone. Why, now, companioned?”

“I never needed help before,” said Sparrowhawk, with an edge of threat or irony in his voice. “And I have found a fit companion.” There was a dangerousness about him, and the tall Summoner asked him no more questions, though he still frowned.

But the Master Herbal, calm-eyed and dark like a wise and patient ox, rose from his seat and stood monumental. “Go, my lord,” he said, “and take the lad. And all our trust goes with you.”

One by one the others gave assent quietly, and by ones and twos withdrew, until only the Summoner was left of the seven. “Sparrowhawk,” he said, “I do not seek to question your judgment. Only I say: If you are right, if there is imbalance and the peril of great evil, then a voyage to Wathort, or into the West Reach, or to world's end, will not be far enough. Where you may have to go, can you take this companion, and is it fair to him?”

They stood apart from Arren, and the Summoner's voice was lowered, but the Archmage spoke openly: “It is fair.”

“You are not telling me all you know,” the Summoner said.

“If I knew, I would speak. I know nothing. I guess much.”

"Let me come with you:

“One must guard the gates.”

“The Doorkeeper does that-”

“Not only the gates of Roke. Stay here. Stay here, and watch the sunrise to see if it be bright, and watch at the wall of stones to see who crosses it and where their faces are turned. There is a breach, Thorion, there is a break, a wound, and it is this I go to seek. If I am lost, then maybe you will find it. But wait. I bid you wait for me.” He was speaking now in the Old Speech, the language of the Making, in which all true spells are cast and on which all the great acts of magic depend; but very seldom is it spoken in conversation, except among the dragons. The Summoner made no further argument or protest, but bowed his tall head quietly both to the Archmage and to Arren and departed.

The fire crackled in the hearth. There was no other sound. Outside the windows the fog pressed formless and dim.

The Archmage stared into the flames, seeming to have forgotten Arren's presence. The boy stood at some distance from the hearth, not knowing if he should take his leave or wait to be dismissed, irresolute and somewhat desolate, feeling again like a small figure in a dark, illimitable, confusing space.

“We'll go first to Hort Town,” said Sparrowhawk, turning his back to the fire. “News gathers there from all the South Reach, and we may find a lead. Your ship still waits in the bay. Speak to the master; let him carry word to your father. I think we should leave as soon as may be. At daybreak tomorrow. Come to the steps by the boathouse.”

“My lord, what-” His voice stuck a moment. “What is it you seek?”

“I don't know, Arren.”

“Then-”

“Then how shall I seek it? Neither do I know that. Maybe it will seek me.” He grinned a little at Arren, but his face was like iron in the grey light of the windows.

"My lord," Arren said, and his voice was steady now, "it is true I come of the lineage of Morred, if any tracing of lineage so old be true. And if I can serve you I will account it the greatest chance and honor of my life, and there is nothing I would rather do. But I fear that you mistake me for something more than I am. "

“Maybe,” said the Archmage.

“I have no great gifts or skills. I can fence with the short sword and the noble sword. I can sail a boat. I know the court dances and the country dances. I can mend a quarrel between courtiers. I can wrestle. I am a poor archer, and I am skillful at the game of net-ball. I can sing, and play the harp and lute. And that is all. There is no more. What use will I be to you? The Master Summoner is right-”

“Ah, you saw that, did you? He's jealous. He claims the privilege of older loyalty.”

“And greater skill, my lord.”

“Then you'd rather he went with me, and you stayed behind?”

“No! But I fear-”

“Fear what?”

Tears sprang to the boy's eyes. “To fail you,” he said.

The Archmage turned around again to the fire. “Sit down, Arren,” he said, and the boy came to the stone corner-seat of the hearth. “I did not mistake you for a wizard or a warrior or any finished thing. What you are I do not know, though I'm glad to know that you can sail a boat… What you will be, no one knows. But this much I do know: you are the son of Morred and of Serriadh.”