Raymond E. Feist - The Complete Darkwar Trilogy - Flight of the Night Hawks, Into a Dark Realm, Wrath of a Mad God

‘But those are devices,’ said Nakor.

‘Miranda doesn’t need a sphere,’ said Pug softly. ‘She can will herself from place to place if she knows where she’s going.’

‘But no one else can.’

Pug smiled. ‘So I thought, but you forgot to use one when you left the cave on the island the last time we met.’

Nakor shrugged. ‘It’s a trick.’

Pug nodded. ‘She’s been trying to teach Magnus and me the trick, then; we still haven’t got it, but then we’ve only been working on it twenty years or so.’

‘If that end attaches to the sphere,’ said Nakor, ‘where does the other end attach?’

Pug squinted at it, as if he might see where it led. After a few minutes of almost motionless study, his eyes grew round. ‘Nakor,’ he whispered, as if afraid to raise his voice.

‘What?’

‘It’s a rift!’

‘Where?’ said Nakor.

‘At the end of that energy thread. It’s tiny beyond imagining, but it’s there. Varen made his rift work. At first I thought he was storing vast energy to create a rift of normal size, but I was wrong. He just wanted a tiny rift, but one left open … for years.’

Nakor took a deep breath. ‘You know more about rifts than any man living, Pug, so I’ll not doubt you, but how can one exist that’s so tiny?’

‘The level of control to fashion one like this, and to keep it stable, in place, for the year or more we’ve been seeking this … it’s unbelievable.’ Pug stood upright and said, ‘Someone out there knows more about rifts than I do, Nakor. I could never fashion something this delicate, this precise.’

‘We better get back to Bek,’ said Nakor, ‘before he sets fire to the grass just to have something to watch. What do you want to do about this?’

‘I’m going to send a few of our better scholars and ask Magnus to see if we can entice a pair of Tsurani Great Ones to come and examine this thing. We will not have unravelled the mystery of what Leso Varen was doing in Kaspar’s citadel until we find the other end of this energy thread, and that means the other side of the rift.’

Nakor put his hand on Pug’s shoulder and squeezed slightly, as if reassuring him. ‘The other side of the rift could be a very bad place.’

‘It almost certainly is,’ said Pug.

Nakor said, ‘And we still need to talk about those messages you’ve shown me.’

‘I don’t know what more to say, Nakor.’ Pug’s expression grew thoughtful. ‘I may have erred in showing them to you. I haven’t even told Miranda.’

Nakor lost his smile. Pug rarely saw the little man look this thoughtful, so he knew whatever was said next would be something serious. Suddenly the grin was back, and Nakor said, ‘Then you are in very serious trouble when she finds out.’

Pug laughed. ‘I know, but she’s got the worst temper of anyone in the family, and if she read those messages … we both know that time travel is possible. I journeyed to the dawn of time with Macros and Tomas, but I don’t know how to do it.’

‘Apparently, in the future, you do.’

‘But you know what the big question is, don’t you?’

Nakor nodded as they turned away from the tiny glowing thread of magic. ‘Are you sending messages to yourself to ensure a thing happens, or are you sending a message to prevent a thing that has happened to you from coming to be?’

‘I thought about the very first message that appeared to me, the morning before Earl James and the boy Princes left for Kesh.’

‘Tell James if he meets a strange man to say, “There is no magic.”’ Nakor nodded. ‘How do you think you knew that would be me?’

‘My theory is that we met much later in life, perhaps sometime yet in the future, and when things were much more dire than they are now. Perhaps it was my way of ensuring we had years to work together.’

‘I wondered much the same thing,’ said Nakor. ‘But we’ll never know, will we?’

‘If the future is fluid, then whatever I did changed things …’ He laughed. ‘Macros.’

‘What about him?’

‘His hand is in this, I know,’ said Pug. ‘Like everything else in my life …’ He shrugged. ‘If you get the chance, next time you see Tomas, ask him about the armour he wears and his dreams from the past, and … well, let him tell you. But that was Macros, and it also involved time travel.’

‘I will.’

They walked out of the woods, and neither man spoke a word until they reached Bek. The young man grinned. ‘Find it?’

‘Yes,’ said Pug. ‘How did you know it was there?’

Bek shrugged. ‘I don’t know. I just felt it was there.’

Pug and Nakor exchanged a look, then Nakor said, ‘Let’s go.’

‘Can we get something to eat?’ asked Bek. ‘I’m starving.’

‘Yes,’ said Pug. ‘We’ll feed you.’ Silently, he added to himself, And we’ll care for you as long as you don’t become a threat. Then we’ll kill you .

Pug took out a Tsurani orb and the three of them vanished from the grassy plain.

KASPAR STRODE INTO THE ROOM.

Talwin Hawkins and Caleb both nodded greeting.

‘It’s done,’ said Kaspar.

‘Political asylum?’ asked Caleb.

‘Of a sort. But it will do for our purposes.’

‘It’s good to have friends in high places,’ said Tal.

They were in a small room in the back of an inn, located in a different district of the city from where Caleb and the boys were staying, one frequented by foreigners and those from distant corners of the Empire. The coming and going of three obviously non-Keshians would not draw attention here. It was late and the city was quieting down, though this area was replete with revellers, as the plaza outside was frequented by the youth of this district. Against his better judgment, Caleb had left the boys outside near a fountain where a dozen or so young boys and girls had gathered. Still, he suspected they would find less trouble out in the open than if he left them in their room next to the two Trueblood girls, their excitable mother, and their personal bodyguard.

When he had finally seen the man, he wondered, like Tal had said, if he was really human.

‘Turgan Bey has told me what his agents have discovered, so far,’ said Kaspar. A pewter pitcher rested on the table and he poured himself a cup of wine. Drinking it, he made a face. ‘We should chuck this business and set up a wine importer from Ravensburg and some of the districts in the Eastern Kingdoms. We’d make a fortune if this is the best they have.’

‘This is not the River House,’ said Tal with a smile, referring to the restaurant he had established in Roldem. ‘And this is not the best wine that can be had in Kesh, as you know.’

Caleb took a sip. ‘It is, however, the best that can be had here.’

Kaspar leaned forward. ‘There is no pattern in the deaths, save one. Every murdered noble, Trueblood or not, is part of a loose alliance of Lords and Masters who are favourable to the ascension of Prince Sezioti to the throne when Diigai finally dies.’

Caleb said, ‘And is that supposed to happen any time soon?’

‘You tell me,’ said Kaspar. ‘Your father and brother are more likely to understand the information on the Emperor’s use of magic to extend his life than anyone.

‘But it’s clear from what Bey told me that many of the Lords and Masters are unhappy with him being the first Emperor to do so. His predecessor, Empress Leikesha, made it to over ninety on sheer spite – according to what I’ve been told she may have been the toughest old boot to ever sit on that throne – so the extra ten years or so for Diigai isn’t a problem yet, but it’s his use of magic that is. Seems the opinion of a majority of the rules of Great Kesh is the old boy is losing his political edge. He spends most of his time with his courtesans – which at his age, I think is heroic – and many of his edicts seem capricious. But none of them alter significant policy, so the level of distress over his current rule hasn’t reached a critical juncture, but the Gallery of Lords and Masters’ collective patience is wearing thin, and eventually the Emperor will be pressured to name an heir.’