This brought a roar of laughter and shouts of excitement.
Mideon headed off, and the whole room was alive with movement.
“We’re going to be okay, right?” Moya asked Beatrice.
The princess hesitated.
Moya stared at her. “What aren’t you telling us?”
“Look . . . ah . . .” Beatrice sighed.
“What do you mean, look? You can see the future. You know what’s going to happen. Or was that all a lie?” Moya glared at the white-haired dwarf, who, at that moment, appeared more like a guilty child.
“I told you the truth—just not all of it. Listen, I can guarantee that Rain will survive, and he’ll go on to be great, but this isn’t going to be easy for any of you.”
The Belgriclungreian seer’s eyes dimmed just then. Her mouth turned down and tears gathered and glistened. She refused to look back at any of them. Instead, she looked at her own feet and bit her lower lip as if in pain.
“Sure hasn’t been a skip through a field of flowers so far,” Tressa said. Her voice was strained and tired.
Beatrice raised her head. She wiped her eyes and sniffled. “In a moment, once we go up those steps and return to the valley floor, things are going to become . . . bad . . . very bad. Then . . . they’ll get worse, and finally . . . well . . .” She let out a little laugh that sounded a bit insane. “You’ll find out.”
“Yes, please don’t spoil it, whatever you do.” Tressa scoffed.
“The point is,” Beatrice said, “there will come a time when you’ll believe that everything I told you was wrong. That I’m insane. When that happens, just remember this: It’s not important to have faith in me, because I have faith in you.”
Beatrice gave Rain a hug, which he suffered awkwardly, but the princess didn’t seem to mind. “The Great Rain,” she said with an amazed shake of her head. “I’ve finally been able to meet you.”
“Come on, Great,” Moya said, “the king is calling us.”
They followed the rush of men who flowed like a river up a set of stairs that took many branches and spilled out onto the flinty plain through numerous holes at once. Coming up, Brin saw the sky had turned red, and all around them was a forest of spears.
“We have unfinished business, you and I,” Sebek told Tesh. His face was only an outline against the light from above, but his voice was unmistakable.
A moment later, a rope snaked down, dangling the length of the hole and coiling around three times at the bottom. Tesh thought Sebek might climb down, but the onetime Galantian’s face disappeared from the edge. The rope remained.
Tesh looked at Andvari, who looked back, surprised.
“Turning out to be an exciting day for me,” the dwarf said.
“Me, too.” Tesh looked at the dangling rope, then shouted up, “Why should I bother to give you the satisfaction?”
“Beat me, and you can escape,” Sebek replied from somewhere beyond the lip.
Tesh coughed out a bitter laugh. “From Ferrol’s castle? You really give me no credit at all, do you?”
“Almost everyone has gone to the battle at the bridge. Place is nearly empty. Even if it weren’t, if you can best me, you can best anyone.”
Tesh continued to look at the rope, unconvinced. Even if Sebek was telling the truth, Tesh couldn’t beat him. After years in the Harwood, even if he were fresh, even if they were in Elan, Tesh didn’t have the skill to take Sebek. He never had. And in Nifrel, Tesh wasn’t confident he could beat Tressa in an arm-wrestling match. Tesh wasn’t at all certain he could summon the strength to climb the rope. His arms were deadweights. His legs dragged. And he was tired, so very tired. If he were breathing, he’d say the air was bad, because he felt sick.
“You just going to sit down there?” Sebek called out, his tone rich with that same jeering scorn Tesh remembered hating from his youth. “Even if I’m lying, there’s still a chance you could get away. Slim, but possible. You really want to stay down there forever?”
“What would you do?” Tesh asked Andvari.
The dwarf looked down at himself. “I’ve been here so long that I don’t think I can remember how to walk. But if someone lowered a rope for me, I wouldn’t be asking anyone for advice.”
Tesh took hold of the line, then looked back. “If I beat him, I’ll throw the rope back for you.”
Andvari’s face brightened. “Can you beat him?”
“No.”
The light in the dwarf’s face faded. “Way to get an old Belgriclungreian’s hopes up. What did you do in life? Pull the wings off flies?”
“No, I was a warrior. I killed the guy that’s waiting up there for me. He was my teacher, and I only managed to best him because he was wounded and helpless.”
“So. What yer saying is, I shouldn’t expect to see a rope anytime soon.”
“Not really.”
Concern about being able to climb was removed when Sebek pulled him up. Tesh expected that Sebek would be right at the top, ready to cut his head off, but he wasn’t. The Fhrey was at the far end of the chamber, limbering up, stretching nonexistent muscles.
This was the first time Tesh had the chance to take in his surroundings: large round room, white bone floor with a fancy floral design, circular colonnade, and a ring of fluted pillars. Everything was made of bone. In some places, it was polished so smooth and perfect, it could have been pools of cream. No torches or lanterns lent their glow; the light came from the bone itself. It, too, was white, with the indifferent luster you’d expect to leak from cold stone.
Sebek wasn’t alone. He couldn’t be, according to Andvari, as it would have taken at least two people to move the twin sheets of mica. Tekchin stood beside Sebek, holding Tesh’s swords. He looked the same as the last time they’d met, and for an instant, Tesh let himself hope.
“Here!” Tekchin shouted and tossed his swords. The pair of Roan-made steel blades clattered on the polished bone. When they hit, the noise was hollow.
“Couldn’t get Eres or Vorath to come?” Sebek asked Tekchin.
“All of them went with the queen. They’d rather fight than watch, I guess.”
Sebek nodded. “The old lady is planning a grand party. Hate to miss it myself.”
“Do you really think this will take that long?” Tekchin asked. He looked across the open floor at Tesh. On his face was a smirk of contempt.
In that look, Tesh understood that Tekchin knew the truth.
Of course he does. They’re all here. The Galantians—his best friends—have told him everything—told him how they died. How I killed them.
“Better not. Need to get done before the queen bitch returns. I don’t envy your girlfriend, boy,” Sebek shouted at Tesh. “The queen aims to bring the hammer down hard.”
Sebek drew Lightning and Thunder. “Remember these? Go on, boy. Pick up your toys. It’s time we settled this debate.”
“What debate?” Tesh asked, stepping forward. He knew he was about to endure an incredible beating. He refused to even glance toward Tekchin. The swords he picked up were, indeed, his, or at least his memory of them. The real things were at the bottom of some miserable muddy pond along with his hands.