FIFTEEN

Discovery

 

Bernarr lay dreaming.

Sweat beaded on his forehead and he moaned as he clawed at the sheets. The dream was vivid: he could hear the breeze rustling in the trees, the sound of the surf against the cliffs. The colours were vibrant and even the scent of the woods, the horse’s sweat, and the oiled leathers filled his nostrils.

‘How dare you take my kill from me?’ the Baron demanded furiously. ‘Have you no manners at all?’ The boar lay twitching at the feet of the Baron’s mount, while Bernarr resisted the urge to draw steel and attack the youth.

The younger man bowed in his saddle. ‘I am sorry, my lord. I feared that you would miss and endanger yourself.’ Zakry’s tone was dripping with sincerity, but the slight lift of his lip offered mockery.

Bernarr stared at him coldly. ‘I have been hunting boar in these woods of mine since you were soiling your swaddling-clout,’ he said. ‘And I am hardly in my dotage now. I assure you, I am capable of taking down one of my own boars.’

Zakry inclined his head. ‘Sorry, my lord. I will have the huntsmen gather it up,’ he said, sounding apologetic.

‘You will leave it where it lies,’ Bernarr said abruptly. ‘I will not have it on my table.’ He touched the rein to the neck of his mount and turned back toward the hunt.

‘My lord,’ Zakry called out behind him. ‘I would speak with you in private.’

Bernarr stopped his horse, clenching his teeth. Such impudence! Even so, he turned and rode back to where the young lord sat fiddling nervously with the reins. ‘Follow me then,’ he said. ‘Let us get out of these woods and go somewhere no one can listen to this “private conversation”.’

He broke from the woods into meadowland starred with yellow flowers, drying slightly to a golden shade as the summer grew late, and rode up a hill. Birds broke out of the tall grass before them as the horses’ hooves threw up clods of earth. Bernarr kept the pace to a hard gallop until he came to the top of the rise. They stopped just short of the cliffs, the sea below a glorious vista. Gulls wheeled overhead.

Zakry pulled up past him, patting his horse’s neck. ‘Magnificent,’ he proclaimed, taking a deep breath.

‘What do you want?’ Bernarr asked impatiently.

‘My lord,’ Zakry said, ‘the Lady Elaine should never have left Rillanon: she pines for it, and even you can see that she is thin and pale. She should return to the capital. This is not the life for her! She needs excitement and the glamour of the court. I would ask you, for her sake, my lord, to put her aside.’

Bernarr stared at him in disbelief. ‘I beg your pardon?’ he said. ‘Would you repeat yourself, sir?’

Zakry looked surprised. ‘My lord, I assumed you to be a man of the world. You must have known that Elaine and I were lovers.’ He laughed nervously. ‘Certainly you knew she wasn’t a virgin.’

‘Stop!’ Bernarr shouted. His knuckles were white on the reins and his eyes were wide, his breath whistling through his teeth as he tried to contain his fury.

‘I love her,’ Zakry said, as if the older man hadn’t spoken. ‘I never should have let her go. But it isn’t too late, you could have the marriage annulled. She would thank you for it.’

‘Put her aside? Are you mad? Elaine would die of shame if I were to do such a thing!’

‘It is what she wants, sir! She loves me, my lord. And I know she wishes to be with me. Please, have pity on us and let us be together.’

Bernarr made no attempt to hide his rage. ‘You will return to the castle now! Pack and leave my house and take the first ship from Land’s End you find, or I will not answer for your life beyond sunset.’ Turning to ride away, he wrenched at the rein with a strength that brought a squeal of protest from the horse.

‘Sir!’ Zakry shouted. ‘You will listen to me!’ He dug his spurs into his horse’s flanks and nearly collided with the Baron’s bay.

Will he lay hands on me, on my own land? Bernarr wondered. But he said nothing. With a whistle of effort, he turned and struck the other man hard with the back of his fisted gauntlet, iron studs ripping into flesh. Zakry fell back with a cry of pain. His cheek was laid open to the bone within a fraction of an inch of one eye. He dropped his reins and raised both hands in a protective gesture.

Zakry’s horse backed, confused and frightened, and flung up its head. Bernarr’s horse, sensing its rider’s anger and knowing the reins had gone slack, became excited. It laid back its ears, spun and kicked. Zakry’s horse, struck hard in the chest, reared. Making a single protesting whinny - almost like the cry of a giant child - it stepped backwards and to the side: one, two, then a third step.

And suddenly they were both gone.

Bernarr pulled hard on the reins, forcing his fractious mount into a tight circle. When he had finally re-established command, he slowly guided the horse to the edge of the cliff and stood up in his stirrups to look over the edge.

Both man and horse had disappeared. Below him, the wild waves crashed around fanged rocks, the spray tossing up forty or fifty feet at each great surge and making the solid granite of the cliffs tremble. Then, briefly, he saw the barrel of the dead horse amidst the breakers, the retreating tide pulling the animal out to sea. Of Zakry there was no sign.

Zakry’s disappearance was explained away by a contrived excuse: a message from the east, the need for him to return home by the first ship; and the willingness of those who listened not to offend their host by showing disbelief. Zakry’s luggage was sent to town the next day, to follow him to Rillanon, and Elaine’s friends continued to enjoy her husband’s hospitality. Elaine seemed distant and withdrawn.

Days later Bernarr had to send for a chirurgeon to examine Elaine, for she had taken to bed and complained of being ill.

‘I have the most happy news for you, my lord,’ the man gushed.

‘My lady is not ill,’ Bernarr said, his lips lifting in a smile.

‘Even better, my lord!’ The man preened as though he’d worked a marvel. ‘The Baroness is with child! Quick work, my lord, eh?’

The Baron stared at him, his face an unreadable mask. He remained motionless, until the chirurgeon bowed again. ‘My steward will see to your fee,’ Bernarr said coldly and. went into the house. Yet even the chirurgeon’s vulgarity could not destroy his delight at the news, or his relief that Elaine was not truly ill. He went directly to her rooms.

She looked up, startled at his entrance, her green eyes wide. Bernarr knelt at her side, taking her hand in his and kissing it.

In his dream he could still feel the fragile fingers, the soft skin, still see the pulse beating in her neck as she lay pale against the white pillows and cushions.

Tears gathered in her eyes, yet her expression was not joyous. They spoke in broken sentences, and he remembered nothing of what they said, save that when he left her chamber, she was quietly weeping.

The guests observed the obligatory feigned joy at the news of her condition, used it as an excuse to organize a feast, and drank a large portion of the baronial wine cellar.

But soon they were forced to leave. By ship to Krondor, then overland to Salador and on to Rillanon was a trip of more than a month. Once the Straits of Darkness were in the grip of winter storms, the only passage was around the southern tip of Great Kesh, a travel of three months beset with storms, pirates and Keshian raiders. When it became clear the Baron would not invite them to spend the winter in Land’s End, they bid their host and hostess a polite farewell, and departed.

The Baron twisted in the damp sheets, his eyes fluttering as he moaned. The storm . ..

On the night on which the Baroness Elaine went into labour a storm sprang up out of the sea; hills and walls of purple-black cloud piled along the western horizon, flickering with lightning but touched gold by the sun as it set behind them. The surge came before the storm: mountain-high waves that set fishermen dragging their craft higher and lashing them to trees and boulders; then to praying as the thrust of air came shrieking about their thatch. When the rain followed it came in nearly horizontal, blown before the monster winds.

Whips of rain lashed the manor, too. Lightning forked the sky and thunder rattled the windows. Bernarr had bribed the midwife to stay at the manse for the last two weeks and now he was very glad he’d done so.

As he got ready to dine, a servant announced a traveller and his servants at the gate, begging shelter. This Bernarr granted gladly - hospitality brought luck, and at this moment he wanted his full share. The house was so still these days he would also welcome the company and he was delighted to discover that his guest was a scholar who cared far more for the books in his coach than for either his horses, his servants or himself.

He was a tall, imposing man, with large eyes and a penetrating gaze, a few years older than Bernarr. His name was Lyman Malachy.

‘Yes,’ said Malachy, ‘when I heard of the sudden death of your father, I began my journey from a great distance. With many distractions and delays behind me, I arrive tonight.’ He shook his sleeve as if to dispatch the remaining drops of rainwater on the cuff. ‘I had exchanged missives with your father, but I had no knowledge of his heirs. I feared you wouldn’t know what you had in his books and might sell them to someone else before I could possibly make an offer.’

The Baron smiled and shook his head. He was about to speak when he noticed that Lyman’s eyes had gone distant, which surprised him. Up until this moment the little fellow had been an excellent and most attentive guest. But almost immediately Lyman’s eyes cleared and he looked gravely at the Baron.

‘A child will be born in this house tonight,’ he said. ‘A boy.’

‘How could you know that?’ Bernarr asked in wonder. ‘The Baroness is with child, but she isn’t due so soon.’

Lyman smiled tersely. ‘I would not trust everyone with this knowledge,’ he said. ‘But, as you are an educated man, beyond crude peasant superstition, and so generous a host, I will confess. I am a magician.’

‘Ah,’ was all Bernarr said. But he wondered what to do. He’d taken an instant liking to his mysterious guest, and like most citizens of the Kingdom he had his doubts about those who dabbled in magic; yet he felt a curious kinship with Malachy. He chose to be delicate; after all, the man would be gone in the morning. ‘That must cause you some . . . difficulty.’

‘It has at times,’ Lyman admitted. ‘There is prejudice against those of us who follow the art, who have the gift.. . But fortunately for me my family was well off and I was sent far from home to study. As a result, no one who knew me as a child knows of my talents, and as my parents left me with a handsome legacy, I am able to support myself quite comfortably. Which means I can afford to buy books!’

They both grinned at that. Then came a sharp rap on the door.

‘Come,’ Bernarr called.

A servant appeared, his face drawn and his eyes wide. ‘My lord! The Lady Elaine’s time has come!’

Bernarr rose to his feet, his heart leaping to his throat. As he passed his guest, he saw a small smile raise the corner of the magician’s mouth.

Images sped by.

The midwife standing by the door, a worried expression on her face. ‘The baby is coming . ..’ and then her words faded.

Then the face of Elaine, pale and drenched in perspiration as the midwife commanded her to push. The screaming and the blood.

The crying baby, held out proudly by the midwife, who said, ‘You have a son, my lady’ to the fading Baroness, who was in too much pain even to recognize the baby for what it was.

Blood was everywhere.

Blood.

Bernarr turned in bed, moaning and crying, No! he tried to say, but only another low groan escaped his lips.

Then Lyman was at his shoulder. His manner was calm and commanding. ‘Everyone leave the room,’ he said simply.

Then the screaming stopped.

Bernarr sat up in bed. He was panting as if he had run for hours, and his still-fit body was taut and drenched with perspiration as if he had fought a battle. He rolled out of bed, pulled off his soaked night shirt, and threw it across the floor. Through the window he could see the morning sun had just crested the mountains, and another day had started. Only hours, he thought, as he sat naked on the bed, reaching for a mug and the pitcher of water left on the night table. He drank and refilled the mug to drink again.

But the other thirst - the thirst to end this nightmare that had plagued him for seventeen years, to see his Elaine restored and free of the endless pain - still lingered.

Standing up, he moved to the tub of water awaiting his morning wash. He didn’t mind the cold water: he had grown used to it. He needed to cleanse himself of the foul feeling on his skin, and would not don clothing until he did. He stepped into the small copper tub, squatted and grabbed the sponge upon the table next to it, ignoring the chilly bite of the water. If only I could clean away my pain, he thought, as he had every morning for seventeen years.

But soon . . .

Aunt Cleora went pale. ‘Oh, Ruthia!’ she gasped, a hand pressed to her throat.

The horse-dealer prodded the saddle where it lay on the flagstones of the kitchen floor. A black-and-white kitten came up to it, sniffing at the fascinating scents of horse-sweat, leather and blood.

‘Aye, it’s blood, right enough,’ Kerson said. ‘And this -’ his toe touched the stub of an arrow that jutted up from the rear of the saddle,’- isn’t no hunting shaft, either.’

He produced a pair of pliers from a loop at his waist and bent, putting one foot on the saddle and pinching the tool closed on the glint of metal where arrow shaft joined leather.

‘Come up there!’ he grunted, heaving backward, the muscles in his arms and shoulders bunching.

It came free, and he stuck it under their noses. ‘See? Bodkin point, not a broad head. None use that, except for hunting men - it’s meant to pierce armour or jerkin.’

Lorrie stared at the saddle with a sick dread in her heart, worse even than the cold feeling that had held her since her family died. She knew they were dead; she knew Rip was still alive for the feeling was there in distant flashes. But she didn’t know whether Bram was alive or dead.

‘The horse come in at first light,’ Kerson said. It was an hour after sunrise, and the family had just been finishing the morning meal when the horse-trader had arrived at the door of the house. ‘Poor beast had its ribs beat raw by the stirrups, and dried foam caked halfway to its tail. Looks like it was trotting all night. Took a bad fright, and I thought seeing’s it was that tall blond lad, your young niece’s friend, that bought it, and he was on his way chasing after your niece’s other friend, the lad I sold . . .’ he pointed to Lorrie,’. . . your old horse to, well, anyway, seeing as it sort of all fit together, I thought you should know.’

Aunt Cleora looked around. ‘The Constable?’ she said.

Kerson snorted. ‘For an affray in the town bounds, certainly,’ he said. ‘Although he uses those two-a-penny thief-takers, more than his own men. No, out on the road it would be the Baron’s men-at-arms who’d be the ones to see, except he doesn’t pay no mind to common folks’ problems these fifteen year and more.

The soldiers might turn out if Kesh attacked the city, but for a lost lad, taken by bandits or slavers, no. They’ll not stir.’

He looked at Lorrie and Flora, where they sat side by side on the bench. ‘It’s all that I can do, Miss Flora. I’ve my own family and kin and business to look after. I just thought you should know, like.’

When the man had gone, silence lay heavy for a moment. Cleora came over to put an arm around Lorrie’s shoulders.

‘He went to look for Rip, and he may be dead,’ Lorrie whispered. ‘And all because of me.’

Surprisingly, Flora shook her head. ‘No,’ she said. ‘He would have looked for your brother anyway. He was that sort of man - I could tell.’

Lorrie nodded dumbly, fighting back tears and wiping at her eyes with the back of her hand.

‘And Jimmy’s my . . . foster-brother, and he went looking for Rip, too, and he may be dead,’ Flora said decisively. ‘Or they may both be hurt. I have to go and look.’

‘That’s impossible!’ Aunt Cleora squeaked. ‘A young girl, on her own in the country?’

Even then, Lorrie had to smile; Aunt Cleora seemed to think goblins and bandits lurked behind every bush. Or maybe they do, she thought, looking at the saddle again, her eyes drawn to it with unwilling fascination.

‘She won’t be going alone. I’m going too!’ Lorrie said.

It’s my baby brother and my intended. And I can’t let Flora go alone, after all she’s done for me!

Both the other women looked at her. ‘But you .can barely walk!’ Flora said.

‘I can use a stick,’ Lorrie said stoutly. True, it’s healing fast, but how far will I get? she thought, more honestly. ‘I can ride, maybe. Or crawl, if needs must.’

Aunt Cleora looked from one to the other. ‘I wish Karl were here with his men,’ she said unhappily. ‘It’ll only be a couple of weeks until his ship’s back from Krondor.’ She looked at them again; Lorrie could tell Flora wore the same mutinous expression as herself. ‘I don’t like it. I don’t like it at all,’ Cleora said again. ‘But if you must go, you’ll take my dog-cart.’

Flora sprang up and hugged her aunt. The dog-cart was a vehicle with two tall spoked wheels and a body slung on leather rests, with a folding cover, drawn by a single horse. It would hold two easily, and on a good road wouldn’t be too hard on a healing leg.

‘Thank you, Aunt Flora!’ she said, and Lorrie nodded enthusiastically.

The pretty, middle-aged features of the older woman creased in worry, but Flora was already up and about, stuffing things in bags.

‘What is it?’ Jimmy asked, prodding with his finger at the locket-sized device that lay on the table.

The old couple whose cottage it was huddled back by the hearth, unconsciously gripping hands as they stared at the thing. They had just finished supper, happy to provide porridge, eggs, a pair of apples and a very bitter brew that almost passed for ale for another of Jarvis’s silver pieces.

Jimmy thought that on another occasion, his entire focus would be upon Jarvis Coe’s purse, for it seemed to possess an endless supply of silver. But that was then, and this was now, and there were mysteries to unravel and boys to save.

Jarvis Coe sat on a stool, hands on his knees as he leaned forward. His craggy face was set, and the low flames from the hearth cast restless red lights across the lines and planes of it. ‘It’s magic,’ he said softly. Jimmy felt the small hairs bristle down his spine at the word. ‘Forbidden magic. It’s a man-finder, bound by blood and bone and seed.’ His finger traced the needle. ‘See, here? The needle is bone from a dead baby harvested in the dark of the moons -’

The old woman moaned and shivered, huddling closer into her husband’s protective arm.

‘- and the hair is of the man you wish to seek, or from his close kin. Mother or father, or both, if you wish to find their child. I’d say that was the case this time: you said the boy was fair-haired, and this tress is brown. Not necromancy; not quite, but related to it. Dark enough magic to be troubling, in any event.’

‘Who are you, that you know this?’ Jimmy asked.

Jarvis looked up quickly, his eyes hooded. After a long moment he nodded. ‘Well, you’ve a right to know, I suppose, if you’re to be involved in this affair. I’m an agent for the High Priestess of Lims-Kragma in Krondor.’

The young thief bounded backward, hand going to his knife. The old midwife made signs with her hands, and her husband rose too and sidled towards the door, where his billhook was propped.

Astonishingly, Jarvis Coe laughed. ‘No, no, my friends, you needn’t worry. She is the Mistress of Death, not murder. We’re all coming home to Her, eventually, so she doesn’t need anyone hurried along.’ His lips quirked, and he quoted in an archaic dialect:

‘Under her sway gois all estatis;

Princes, prelatis, poetasis;

She sparis na prince, for his presence

Na clerk, for his intelligence;

Her awful straik may no man flee . . .’

Jimmy who had no time for such fripperies, nodded stiffly, still alert and poised. ‘And what are you doing on the trail of men who kidnap children?’ he asked.

‘The Temple particularly doesn’t like people who make death-magic,’ Coe said.

‘Why not?’ Jimmy said, thinking of rumours he’d heard of those priestesses.

‘Because it gives the Goddess a bad reputation,’ Coe said. ‘And that endangers the temples. In ages past, before the temples reached accord with the Crown and agreed to allow the Temple of Ishap to settle disputes, there was more than one riot in which an angry mob sacked a temple and killed all the worshippers. Even with a hundred years and more of peace between the temples, there’s still a strong potential for mayhem if word of something like this gets out, and if people think the Temple of Lims-Kragma had a hand in it.

‘Moreover, it’s stealing from Lims-Kragma: the life energies which should be returned to Her hall for judging are denied their proper placement on the next turn of the Wheel of Life. Those souls are tortured, tormented and eventually vanish as if they had never existed. It’s an abomination and heresy of the worst stripe.

‘No good ever comes from these practices, and only those who are truly evil or truly fools undertake such.’ He showed his teeth. ‘I am the particular “no good” that will come to the necromancer who’s working in the vicinity. I’m no magician myself,’ he went on. ‘But I do have some .. . talent in these areas . . . and I have resources from my employers, which will help me deal with him.’

‘But not necessarily mercenaries, stone walls and iron bars?’ Jimmy said sardonically.

I’m really not happy, he thought. I’d almost rather he was one of Jocko’s spies. On the other hand, he’s likely to be much more useful than one of the secret police, and if I’m to undertake hero-of-legend deeds against an evil enchanter, no less, I could do with some help.

He didn’t want to go back to Lorrie and tell her he couldn’t find Rip: after all, he’d promised. On the other hand, he didn’t want to be chained to a red-hot metal plate in a dungeon for the next thousand years, either; or have his death-essence used to power a spell. Risk was one thing, doom another.

Besides, I suspect that ducking out on friend Coe would be unlucky. I do not want the hatred of a goddess dogging my steps. Her favour, on the other hand, and the favour of her priestesses ...

‘All right,’ he said at last. ‘What does this necromancer want with our blond-haired friend?’

‘In just four days the three moons will be dark,’ Jarvis said, his fingers toying idly with a crust of barley-bread. ‘And certain stars will be in conjunction. At that time .. . well, let’s say that the wayfarer they picked up and brought back to the manor would be useful for certain dark arts. Useful in a terminal sense. As would young Rip, your friend’s brother.’

Jimmy winced. He was used to beatings, stabbings and affrays: he’d taken part in them himself. But human sacrifice was another matter altogether. ‘This is getting beyond belief,’ he said. ‘Children, then wayfarers -’

‘One specific wayfarer,’ Jarvis said carefully as if reflecting on that fact.

The old woman made a noise and her husband tried to shush her, but she pushed him aside. ‘Four days, you say, priestess’s servant?’

Jarvis bowed. ‘Goodwife.’

‘That would be seventeen years to the day from the time Mistress Elaine died in childbed,’ she said. ‘Seventeen years to the very hour, at midnight.’

Jarvis’s face changed. A shadow of fear - and maybe disgust - passed over it. Uh-oh, Jimmy thought. This is bad news.

‘Did you .. . were you sure she died?’ Jarvis held up his hand. ‘Did you see the body laid out?’

The midwife shook her head. ‘He thrust us all out of the room, and later word was sent that things had been done,’ she said softly. ‘Thrust us all out, but kept with him a chance-met guest he’d been hosting that night, a scholar.’

‘Ah. I doubt that it was entirely chance, not on that night -certain happenings cast their own shadows, forward and backward in time.’ Jarvis looked down at the talisman. ‘Have you anything of the lady’s?’ he said. ‘Anything that touched her body?’

The old woman rose and went over to her pole-frame bed and dragged out a cedarwood chest that looked incongruously fine in the wattle cottage. Prodding around inside it, she brought out a small bundle wrapped in silk stained with old, dried blood. ‘She were fond of me, and a kind lady,’ the midwife said. ‘She knew she could trust old Meg; many a secret a midwife hears. This she gave me, for safekeeping. It would have been as much as her life were worth, did the Baron find it.’

Jimmy came close as Jarvis took the bundle from the old woman and swept the rough wooden surface of the table clean of crusts and crockery before he laid it down and began to unfold it.

‘Should the talisman be doing that?’ Jimmy asked.

The needle beneath the crystal lid was jerking; first it pointed southwest, toward Baron Bernarr’s manor; then it swung towards the bundle.

‘No, it should not,’ Jarvis said. Inside the silken handkerchief was a true locket, a delicate shell of electrum. ‘Even if this is the lady’s blood from the birthing -’

‘It is,’ the old woman said.

‘- or hair, or nail clippings,’ he went on. ‘The spell is linked to the similarity of essences. It should be pointing toward the son.’ Jarvis opened the locket, his fingers probing delicately for the catch. Within one half was a miniature portrait, a tiny thing no bigger than Jimmy’s thumb. The other held a love-knot, a twining of hair braided together, one strand blond, the other brown. ‘Could you bring me some light, Jimmy?’ he asked.

Jimmy went to the hearth. A tube of birch-bark stood on the bare earth beside it, containing long splints of lightwood from resinous pine, ready to kindle. He took one and held it to the low flames of the fire. It hissed and spat as it caught, giving off a resinous, medicinal scent. Jimmy brought it back to the table, holding it higher and to one side so that no driblets of hot sap would fall on the table, careful that none struck him, either.

The light was wavering and none too bright compared to a candle, but the old couple had none of those, or even tallow dips, but it was still bright enough for him to see the handsome blond young man in the portrait.

‘Ruthia!’ Jimmy blurted. ‘That’s the one they took!’

‘No,’ the old woman said. ‘That’s young lord Kethry, by the name of Zakry, who were Lady Elaine’s friend from Krondor. From before she met the Baron. Him who disappeared.’

‘Oh-ho,’ Jimmy said. ‘Well, from his looks -’

‘And from the behaviour of this needle -

‘I’d say that while the Lady Elaine may have had a son seventeen years ago, the Baron surely didn’t,’ Jimmy said.

Jarvis gave a lopsided grin. ‘You can see further than most, Jimmy,’ he said.

The cottager sighed. ‘You’ll have to tell them now,’ he said wearily. ‘No helping it.’

Meg the midwife nodded. ‘The Baron would have none of his son ... well, of the baby. For a moment he was overjoyed to have an heir, but when he saw his wife at the edge of death, he became a man possessed. He blamed the baby and told me to get rid of it, so that he would never see it again. Set it out for the wolves, he meant, but I couldn’t. So I took it to a farmer I knew - name of Ossrey - near Relling, whose wife had lost her babe but still had milk. They were glad to take it in and raise it as their own.’

‘Relling’s not far south of here, and somewhat east. Still on the Baron’s land, of course,’ her husband added. ‘He promised never to speak of it, and to give him credit, I’ve never heard the rumour come back. Like as not they’ve forgotten the babe wasn’t theirs; all they knew was the mother died birthing it, and likely they thought it some serving-girl’s by-blow.’

‘This makes a good deal of unpleasant sense,’ Jarvis Coe said. ‘The Baron obviously loved his wife very much.’

‘To madness,’ Meg said, sitting down on her bed and sighing as she looked at the cedarwood box. ‘And I never thought she wasn’t fond of him - even when she took sick after Kethry disappeared.’

‘Disappeared?’

‘In a hunt. Rode off to Krondor, the Baron said, leaving his servants and traps to be sent on, but nobody saw hide nor hair of him again. Young Lord Kethry never reached Rillanon.’

Jimmy snorted. I know that sort of sudden leave-taking, he thought. Bet if you asked, nobody saw him arrive anywhere else, either. The sea hides a good many sins.

‘Well .. .’ Jarvis said, looking at the three of them and obviously thinking how much to tell. Jimmy raised an ironic eyebrow: it was a bit late to be cautious about things.

Unless he plans to leave no witnesses, and I doubt he’s quite that ruthless.

Jarvis confirmed his guess by going on: ‘If a magician of the ... right sort... were at hand, as the lady lay dying, he could ... not keep her alive, exactly. Suspend her, between life and death, so that someone could attempt to heal her entirely later.’ He reached for a wooden mug of the old couple’s ale. ‘Let me wash out my mouth! She’d be suspended between life and death ... for ... by the Goddess! Seventeen years, dying every second!’

Jimmy felt the coarse bread and eternal bean soup turn into a heavy lump under his breastbone. ‘Lims-Kragma rest her!’ Another thought struck him. ‘And why do they want her son?’

Remind me never to get involved with wizards again., he thought. Looking back on it, he felt a touch of fear at how lightly he’d dealt with old Alban Asher, even.

‘Well, the force of life is released at death. They could try to revive her with anyone’s, but the more like to like, the easier. Children, because her life was lost birthing a child. The child himself, best of all - it’s the natural order that the lives of parents run on in their children, but it can be forced into reverse.’

The old man spat into the fire, which hissed.

Jarvis looked up. ‘We have four days,’ he said. ‘And so does young -’ He looked down at the locket.

‘Bram,’ Meg said.

‘- Bram,’ Jarvis echoed.

Jimmy sighed. ‘I suppose, if he loved her that much ... it’s evil and mad, but there’s a sort of grandeur to it.’

‘Less than he thinks,’ Jarvis said. ‘You can get someone back, in a way, but they’re often .. . changed. Unsealing the boundaries of life and death lets ... other things .. . in.’ He closed his eyes. ‘Things that once in our world are most difficult to cast out.’ Coe let out a long sigh, as he contemplated what that meant.

Jimmy felt the hair on the back of his neck and arms rise up, and wished more than ever he had just lain low in Krondor and not tried to be so heroic.