“She has the Stiehl!”
Drisker shouted it with such fury that it became not a question but a cry of despair. The extent of his anger was almost beyond measure. The Stiehl was a creation of dark magic with a history that went far back in time—so far back there was no clear record of how the weapon had been forged or who had fashioned it. What was known was that there was nothing it could not cut through and no one it could not kill. It had surfaced first in the days of Walker Boh and the assassin Pe Ell, while they were on their journey to the ancient stronghold of the Stone King, accompanied by the highlander Morgan Leah and Quickening, the daughter of the King of the Silver River. Pe Ell had killed the girl using the Stiehl, but had been killed himself later. Afterward, the Stiehl had been locked away in Paranor. Grianne Ohmsford and then Aphenglow Elessedil, both while serving as Ard Rhys, had determined it must never emerge again. Since then, it had remained locked away in the vaults of the Druid archives.
Until now. Until this.
Cogline, to his credit, said nothing, letting Drisker think it through. For a shade dead more than a thousand years, he possessed excellent instincts.
“I have to get out of here,” Drisker said finally, staring down at the Black Elfstone, his gaze fixing on what he believed might still be the answer to his problems. “I have to use the Stone to free myself and go after her.”
“Well, perhaps,” the other replied.
“Perhaps? You don’t think it might be dangerous to let Clizia Porse run around with the most dangerous weapon in the world while she implements her plans for…well, for whatever she’s planning?”
“Yes, but what are her plans, exactly? I don’t know. Do you, Drisker? How will she use the Stiehl to advance them? It might behoove you to think this through. And there is yet another matter to consider.”
He went silent, his expression enigmatic as he waited for a response.
“Another matter,” the Druid repeated. He shook his head. “Of course there would be another matter, and you wouldn’t be happy if you didn’t make me guess what it is, would you?”
“It should be obvious.”
“Let’s suppose that what is obvious to you—a shade with some insights that the living lack—isn’t necessarily obvious to me. Please enlighten me.”
Cogline shrugged. “You have to figure out how to use the Black Elfstone.”
“What? You think it won’t respond to me? That I am not a true member of the Druid order with the power to summon its magic?”
And suddenly it occurred to him that perhaps the Stone might not be his to use. He was no longer Ard Rhys. He was not even the last of the Druids. That alone might prevent him from employing its magic. What if he had disqualified himself by leaving the order and abandoning the post of Ard Rhys? Yet he could not imagine that Clizia Porse, complicit in the fall of the Keep, would be the only one who could wield it.
Cogline was watching him. “It isn’t as simple as it seems,” he said quietly, his body shimmering as if with a sudden chill. “It requires something to command such magic. It demands a price.”
“What are you talking about? What sort of price?”
“It is not for me to say. It is for you to find out.”
“Very profound. Well, then, I will do as you say. I will find out for myself. Care to come watch?”
He started off without waiting to see if the other would follow, stepping from the chamber and closing the doors behind him. Let the shade pass through the walls if he wishes to follow. Using magic, he reset the locks and resealed the chamber. The Black Elfstone was in his pocket once more as he strode back down Paranor’s hallways, heading for the doors leading out to the Keep’s west gates. His mind was spinning. Had Clizia discovered she did not have the Elfstone? And what were her plans for the Stiehl?
He stopped abruptly. He could find all that out easily enough. Both he and Clizia still had their scrye orbs. It would be a simple matter for him to contact her. They could speak to each other, and he could ask her what she knew.
But to what end? What would this accomplish? And what could he say to her that would matter? At best, she would be outraged both that she did not have what she needed and that he was still among the living. What sort of bargain could he hope to make with her that would help him but not her? It was likely to be a short conversation.
The complexity of the situation was daunting. Neither of them was about to give in to the other. Thinking on it further, he realized that the only advantage he had was that she couldn’t be certain whether he still had the Elfstone. She might believe he was ignorant of the fact that it was still there somewhere in Paranor. She couldn’t know that Cogline still lived on as a shade within the Keep and had purloined the Elfstone from her and given it back to him. She might even think he still believed the Elfstone was in her possession—that she really had stolen it from him.
He watched Cogline materialize beside him, bleeding through the passageway stone. He turned away from the shade. There must be a way he could take advantage of this knowledge that he had and she didn’t. But he couldn’t think just what it might be.
He continued down the hallway, reaching the west doors of the building and stepping out into the open courtyard beyond. The air was gray and misty, the skies a screen of impenetrable gloom through which neither moon nor sun was revealed. The outer walls of the Keep were blank screens ahead of him, barely visible through the haze. He already knew that from the top of those walls he could see nothing in any direction; the world of the Four Lands had disappeared, and what had replaced it was a vast emptiness.
He walked swiftly toward the gates, noting as he went that nothing seemed to have changed beyond the walls—no sign of life, no birdsong, no wind rattling the tree branches. Nothing. Only an immense void that threatened to crush his spirit.
But he would change all that. Standing before the west gates, he brought out the Black Elfstone and held it forth, summoning its magic to dispel the gloom and bring Paranor back into the world of the Four Lands.
Nothing happened.
He hesitated, not wanting to try again too quickly, afraid he was making a mistake. He walked through the steps he had taken to summon the magic—focusing on the Stone, binding to its power, speaking the words of summoning, the congealment of elements surrounding him that would ease the magic’s passage. He had done them all, and if he was entitled to use the magic, as he had insisted to Cogline he was, it should have responded.
He tried again, taking his time, making sure he did everything correctly, and giving his words and gestures exactly the right amount of time and space.
Surface, he commanded the magic silently.
Once again, nothing happened.
“Surface!” he hissed aloud.