David Gemmell: Echoes of the Great Song

'A valiant attempt, my friend,' he said. 'Now I think you had best accept my offer.'

Touchstone had done so. But it had now been two years since his capture. Two long, lonely years.

'I will come home, Suryet,' he whispered. 'Wait for me.'

But as he was falling asleep he saw again the vision of the pillar of fire. Unlike most of his visions this was impossible to read, for surely ice and fire could not exist in the same place. Pushing it from his mind, the tribesman slept.

Questor Ro returned to the Serpent just before dawn. He was exhausted, though not entirely discouraged. Six times they had linked to the emanations, only for the power to drift away after a few heartbeats. It was not failure that exasperated him. Rather it was the tantalizing closeness to success. His cabin, as befitted a Questor, was large and fitted with wide windows, and a second door which led to a small, but private roofed deck on the port side of the ship. When the Serpent had been fully powered the cabin would have been considered luxurious, with its wide couches, deep chairs and thick carpets. Now, however, the tall windows allowed heat from the brazier to escape and the cabin was always cold. Questor Ro believed Talaban had this in mind when he had offered him these quarters back in the summer warmth of the port city of Egaru, the second city. Questor Ro would have been infinitely warmer in the smaller cabin, below decks, occupied by his Vagar assistant, Onquer.

Suppressing his irritation he added coal to the brazier. Then he practised the first of the Six Rituals, seeking to ease away the bone-numbing weariness that exhaustion and intense cold had brought to his system. Sitting cross-legged upon the floor, head bowed, index fingers held to his temples, the little man chanted the Prayer of One. Concentration was difficult, and random thoughts and fears intruded on the prayer. Even so, the ritual brought him inner warmth. This was pleasant, but did nothing to alleviate the weariness. It hung on him with the weight of failure.

How his enemies would love to see him return in shame. Caprishan would, of course, feign sympathy, while hiding his gap-toothed smile behind his fat hand. Niclin would be more openly hostile. He would be the one to point out the incredible waste of resources, highlighting the fact that he had predicted such an outcome, and had only sponsored it because of the once-infallible reputation of Questor Ro. The others would fall in behind them and Ro's power on the Council would diminish rapidly.

It will not happen, he told himself. I will not allow it. The seeds of doubt sprouted even as he made this promise. He had been right to believe that his newly designed pyramids could link to the Great Line. They had done so. And with ease. But they could not hold to it.

Think, he ordered himself. The line could not be moving. The emanations were radiating from the White Pyramid some sixty miles away, beneath a mountain of ice. It was a solid object, existing in one place. Therefore the lines of power should be straight and constant, and, once found, form Communion. Yet it was as if the source of power was constantly shifting and moving like a frightened deer.

You are missing something, he told himself.

Questor Ro pushed himself to his feet. From a small casket on his desk he took his crystals of white, blue and green, and a glove of white lace. Lifting the glove to his lips he kissed it, and thus began the second of the Six Rituals. He would rather have saved the energy of the crystals, but weariness was fogging his mind. Slowly he drew on their power, feeling the birth of new strength.

Then, holding the glove to his face he relaxed into a trance, his mind flowing back through the valleys of time. He pictured the park, and the grove of flowering trees by the fountain pond. He saw himself sitting there, Tanya beside him, the children playing nearby. The sun was high and bright, the park bathed in the gentle warmth of early autumn. He always summoned the same image. It occurred to him then that there are times when true beauty whispers past the conscious mind, invisible as a breeze. The day in the park had been pleasant.

No more than that. He had smiled as his three children played. He had kissed Tanya's hand. But his mind had been working on a mathematical problem, and he was anxious to return to his office and continue with it. If only there had been a moment of prescience. If only he could have guessed that for seventy years — lonely, isolated years — he would summon that ancient image like a man bringing forth his greatest treasure.

He had told Tanya of the mathematical problem. 'You will solve it,' she said with utter certainty. That certainty had invigorated him. It was one of the reasons he loved her so dearly.

Now he faced an even greater problem, and she was no longer here to feed him with her faith.

When at last he opened his tear-filled eyes he was calmer.

Wiping away the tears he returned to the problem. The White Pyramid, buried below the ice, could not be moving. This was a certain fact, beyond argument. What then could explain the phenomenon? Moving to the window he rubbed the frost from the glass then stared out over the white mountains. His men were returning now, and a second team waited, shivering on the decks above. Soon he would have to join them. Questor Ro was not a fool. He sensed they could spend endless days seeking Communion. And he had promised Talaban results.

He tugged at his forked beard. The answer was there — if only he could find it.

Wrapping his cloak around him he left the cabin, climbed the spiral stairs and emerged onto the central deck.

His second twelve-man team were huddled together, watching the return of the silver longboat. As he stood with them there came a sound like distant thunder and a huge section of ice toppled from a nearby glacier, striking the calm water of the bay and sending a large wave that lifted the longboat.

In that moment Questor Ro had his answer. Ordering the men to await his instruction he stood silently until the longboat was secured and his exhausted team were aboard, then summoned his assistant Onquer to his cabin.

The Vagar was hollow-eyed, his lips blue. Questor Ro allowed the man to stand for a while before the small brazier of hot coals.

'It is not the power source that is moving,' said Questor Ro. 'It is the ice covering the land.'

Onquer rubbed his thin hands together before the heat. 'Ice moving, lord?' he said dumbly.

'Pour yourself a drink,' ordered Questor Ro. With trembling hands Onquer lifted a blue glass decanter and poured spirit into a crystal goblet. Lifting it to his lips he sipped the fiery liquid. He shivered with pleasure.

'Yes, it is the ice,' said Questor Ro. 'It is brittle, and it moves. The pyramid is sixty miles away. Between there and here there are probably thousands of small shifts in the ice. We are like this ship, bobbing upon the bay. Constantly moving while staying in the same place. You understand?'

Onquer drained the drink. 'Yes, I see, lord. But what can we do?'

'We need one mobile receiver linked to the others. Thus we can adjust our movement to match the shifts in the ice.'

'This will take time, lord. More time than we have allowed.'