“Atrus?”

Atrus looked up from his desk to where Gehn stood on the far side of the library.

“Yes, father?” he said, setting his pen aside, careful not to drip any ink across the copy paper.

“Come with me.”

Atrus stood uncertainly, then, skirting the dais at the center of the room, joined his father at the foot of the steps.

Two weeks had passed since the expedition into the city, and Atrus had begun to think that his father had forgotten his promise, but Gehn was smiling now.

“Are you ready, Atrus?”

“Ready, father?”

“To begin your work. It is time you learned how to Write.”

He followed Gehn up into a large, yet strangely claustrophobic room. At first he didn’t understand why, then he realized that it had been cut directly from the surrounding rock, which was why, perhaps, the ceiling was so low—a cave within a cave.

Books crowded the undecorated stone walls and were heaped up on the floor on all sides, while in the center of the room was a large desk, lit by a curiously shaped lamp—the only source of illumination in that dim and musty place. Facing that massive desk was another smaller one that had been cleared.

Gehn led him across, standing Atrus to one side while he sat in his chair and, reaching into one of the drawers, drew out a shallow metal tray on which was a large quill pen and a number of the amber-colored ink pots they had found on their first book hunt.

Setting the tray to one side, Gehn leaned across and pulled one of the big, leather-bound books toward him—its brown cover flecked with white—opening it to the first page.

It was blank.

He looked up at Atrus, his pale eyes fixing his son. “You have spent six weeks now, learning how to copy a number of basic D’ni words and have discovered just how complex and beautiful a script it is. But those characters also mean something, Atrus. Something much more than you’ve previously understood. And not just in this world. They were developed over tens of thousands of years for a specific task—that of describing Ages…of creating other worlds. They are not like the words you and I speak casually, nor can they be used so in the books. Writing—D’ni Writing—is not merely an Art, it is a science. The science of precise description.”

He turned, looking to the blank page. “When we begin, there is nothing. It is… uncreated . But as soon as the first word is written—just as soon as that first character is completed, the last stroke set down upon the page—then a link is set up to that newly created world, a bridge established.”

Atrus frowned. “But where does it lead, this bridge?”

“Anywhere,” Gehn answered, glancing at him as he removed the lid of the amber-colored crystal ink pot. “The D’ni called it Terokh Jeruth, the great tree of possibility.”

Atrus laughed. “It sounds like magic!”

“And so it is. But you and I are D’ni, and so I shall share a secret with you. We are not ordinary men, Atrus, we are gods! ”

“Gods?” Atrus stared back at his father, bewildered.

“Yes,” Gehn went on fervently, his eyes lit with a passion Atrus had never seen in him before. “Common men but dream and wake. We, however, can live our dreams. Within limit—limits that the finest D’ni minds took great care to define over the millennia—we can create whatever we can visualize. We use words to conjure worlds.”

Atrus’s mouth had fallen open.

“Why, I could show you worlds so rich, so vivid in their detail, that they would make you want to burst with admiration for their makers. Worlds of such splendor and magnificence that they make this marvelous world of ours seem ordinary!”

Gehn laughed, then held the ink pot up for Atrus to see. Within the thick, yellow, glasslike walls of the container, was a fine black liquid.

“What do you see, Atrus?”

Atrus looked up, meeting his father’s eyes, momentarily startled by that echo of Anna’s customary words.

“Ink?”

“Yes…but not just any ink. It has special powers that ordinary ink does not possess. So, too, with the pages of the book. They are made of a special paper, the formula for which was kept secret by the Guild.”

“And the pen?” Atrus asked, pointing to it. “Is that special, too?”

Gehn smiled. “No. The pen is but a pen. However, if anyone else tried to do what we are about to do—anyone, that is, without D’ni blood—then they would fail. It would be impossible.”

Turning to face the page, Gehn set the ink pot down, then, dipping the metallic tip of the quill into it, lifted the pen above the page and began to write.

Slowly a D’ni character—the word “island,” Atrus noted—began to form, its intense blackness burned almost into the pure white surface by the pen.

Gehn wrote another dozen characters onto the page, then lifted the pen and looked to Atrus.

“Is it done?” Atrus asked, surprised that there had not been more. He had expected fireworks or the heavens to open. “Have you made a new Age?”

Gehn laughed. “It exists, yes…but as yet it is very crude. It takes a great deal of work to create an Age. There are special formulas you have to follow, precise laws to obey. As I said, it is not simply an Art, it is a science—the science of precise description.”

He gestured toward the open book. “As yet, I have merely sketched out the most basic elements of my new world. Ahead lies an immense amount of hard work. Every aspect of the Age must be described, each new element fitted in. But that is not all.”

Reaching across, Gehn took another, much smaller book from a pile at the side and held it out to Atrus. “Once the Age is complete, one must always— always —make a Linking Book.”

Atrus took the small book and opened it, noting at once how few pages were in it. All of them were blank.

“Yes,” Gehn continued. “Whenever you travel to a newly written Age you must always carry a Linking Book with you. If you did not, you would be trapped there, without any way of traveling back.”

Atrus looked back at his father, wide-eyed. “But what’s actually in one of these Linking Books?”

Gehn took the book back. “Each Linking Book refers to one of the larger descriptive books—to one specific book. You might say that it contains the essence of the larger book—certain phrases and words that fuses it to that book and no other. But that is not all. For a Linking Book to work, it must also include an accurate description of the place one wishes to link to on that particular Age, which is recorded by writing a special D’ni symbol, a Garo-hertee. Yes, and a Linking Book must be written in the Age and location it is meant to link to. And so a Linking Book is, in a sense, a working substitute for a descriptive book.”

Atrus thought a moment, then. “And can there be only one Linking Book for each descriptive book?”

“Not at all,” Gehn answered, delighted by his son’s understanding. Then, setting the slender book back on the pile, he added, “You can make as many Linking Books as you want. But you must always make at least one. That is the first rule. One you must not forget.”

Atrus nodded, then, “But what if you change the Age? What if you decide to write more in the descriptive book? Would the Linking Book cease to work?”

“No. If the descriptive book is changed, then all Linking Books associated with it will link to the changed world.”

Atrus’s eyes lit, imagining it, only now realizing just how complex and powerful this Writing was. “It sounds… astonishing! ”

“Yes,” Gehn said, his eyes looking back at Atrus, godlike and wise beyond all human years. “Oh, it is , Atrus. It is.”

 

§

 

That night, Atrus decided he would speak to his father, to remind him that it was almost time for them to go back and visit Anna.

Encouraged by Gehn’s high spirits over supper, Atrus waited until he had lit his pipe and settled back in his chair in the corner of the kitchen before he broached the subject.

“Father?”

Gehn stretched his legs and stared at his boots, the gently-glowing pipe cradled in his lap. “Yes?”

“When are we going back?”

Gehn looked to him languidly. “Back? Back where?”

“To the cleft.”

Surprisingly, Gehn laughed. “ There? You want to go back there?”

“Yes,” Atrus said quietly. “You said…”

“I said I would try. I said…”

Gehn sat up and, setting the pipe aside, leaned toward Atrus. “I said that to keep your grandmother quiet. I never meant…” He shrugged, then started again. “Look, Atrus, it would take us the best part of four or five days to get there and another three or four to return here. And for what?”

“Well, couldn’t you write a book to the cleft and bring her here?”

And how would you set about writing such a book? This world has already been created.”

“Then can’t you write a Linking Book?”

Atrus stopped, realizing that, of course, he couldn’t. He would have to be at the cleft in order to write that Linking Book.

Gehn watched him, seeing that he understood, then spoke softly. “I should, perhaps, have said you cannot link to another location in the Age you are in. It is impossible.”

Atrus was silent a moment, then. “But you told me you would take me back.”

“Oh, Atrus, grow up! There’s nothing there.”

Atrus looked down. “But you promised . You said…”

Gehn stood. “I simply do not have the time, and even if I did, I would scarcely waste it going there. The place is a pit, Atrus. Literally so. Besides, that woman is poisonous. Don’t you understand that yet? I had to take you away from there.”

“You’re wrong,” Atrus said quietly.

But Gehn simply shook his head and pointed at the chair. “Sit down. I shall tell you a story. Then you can tell me if I am wrong or not.”

Atrus sat, angry still and resentful, refusing to meet his father’s eyes.

“Close to thirty years ago, when I was but a child of four, there was a war. A young man named Veovis started it. He was the son of a nobleman, and the sole heir to a powerful estate. In time he would have become one of the ruling Council, a lawmaker. But he was not content with what he had, nor with the promise of what would be. Veovis broke D’ni law. He abused his privileged position.”

“In what way?”

“His crimes were heinous, unmentionable. He was a cancer that needed to be cut from the D’ni culture. Eventually he was caught and, despite his father’s intercession, he was tried before the Five Lords. For more than twenty days witnesses gave evidence. Finally, the Five gave their decision. Veovis was to be imprisoned. To be kept in a place from which he would never escape. But before the decision of the Five could be implemented, several of Veovis’s young friends helped him to flee D’ni.

“For six months, nothing was heard of Veovis, and it was assumed that the problem had taken care of itself. But then rumors began to circulate. Rumors that Veovis had taken a new name and was to be found in the drinking houses of the lower city, stirring up discontent against the ruling faction.

“At first, nothing was done. Rumors were only rumors, it was argued. But then a number of incidents occurred. A stabbing of a senior official in one of the guilds. A bomb in one of the main ink works. The desecration of a book.”

Atrus frowned, not understanding, but his father was staring off into the distance, caught up in his recollections.

“After this last incident, a Council meeting was called. At last, they decided to take action. But already it was too late. Veovis had indeed been staying in the lower city. Furthermore, he had been fermenting trouble among the lower classes. What none of the ruling Council could have known, however, was just how deep that discontent ran, nor how raw a nerve Veovis had touched. Only two days after the Council met, serious rioting broke out in one of the lower city districts. Before curfew that evening, the whole of the lower city was in chaos as the mob roamed the streets, maiming or killing whoever dared to stand against them.”

Gehn stopped, turning to face Atrus.

“As I said, I was but a child at the time. I was staying in one of the great Guild houses in the upper precincts. My home was several miles away, on a great bluff of rock that I could see from one of the windows in the refectory. I remember standing there all that afternoon, as the roar of the mob and the awful cries of the dying came up to us from below, and wondering if it was the end. It was a terrible time, made worse by my fears for my own family. We were safe in the Guild houses, of course. At the first sign of trouble, the Council had barred the gates to the upper city and trebled the guard. But many on the outlying estates died that day, victims of their own servants—men and women they had trusted all their lives.

“It was fully six weeks before the last of the rebels was subdued and Veovis himself captured, trying to make his escape through the lower tunnels.”

“This time, when the Five met, their decision was unanimous. Veovis was to die. He was to be executed, there on the steps of the Great Library.”

Gehn looked away, clearly pained by what came next, then spoke again. “It was a wise decision. Yet before it could be sealed and passed as law, one final witness stepped forward, begging their leave to speak out on the young man’s behalf.”

Ti’ana, Atrus thought, recalling what Anna had told him.

Gehn slowed once more, staring out past Atrus. “That witness was a woman, Ti’ana.”

Atrus opened his mouth, aching to finish the tale—to show his father what he knew—but Gehn seemed not to be aware of him. He spoke on, in the grip of the tale; a sudden bitterness in his voice.

“Ti’ana was much respected by the Five and so they let her speak. In her view, the danger had passed. Veovis had done his worst and D’ni had survived. Furthermore, she argued, if it had not been Veovis, some other rabble-rouser would have stirred the mob to action, for the discontent had not been that of a single man, but of the whole class. In the circumstances, she said, her eloquence swaying those venerable lords, should not the Council’s original decision be carried out?”

Coming to the bottom of the steps, Gehn stepped out onto the second ledge and, looking to his son, sighed deeply. “And so it was done, Atrus. Veovis was placed inside his prison. The prison from which he could not escape.”

Gehn paused, his eyes on Atrus. “It was three days later when it happened. They had checked on him, of course, morning and evening, but on the evening of that third day, the guard who was sent did not return. Two more were sent, and when they returned, it was with the news that the prison was empty. There was no sign of either Veovis or the guard.

“They should have known that something was seriously wrong, but they had not learned their lessons. And when Veovis did not reappear, they assumed that all was well, that he had fled—who knew where?—and would not be seen again. But Veovis was a vengeful young man who had seen his hopes dashed twice in the space of a year. Only a fool would think he’d simply go away and lick his wounds. Only a fool…”

Atrus blinked, surprised by the sudden anger in his father’s voice.

“And so it was that Veovis did return. And this time it was not in the company of an unwashed and uncontrollable rabble, but at the head of a small but well-trained force of fanatics who had but one thing in their minds: to destroy D’ni. Ti’ana was wrong, you see. The danger had not passed, nor had Veovis done his worst.”

“But she was not to know, surely?”

“No?” Gehn shook his head, a profound disappointment in his face. “The woman was a foolish meddler. And my father no less a fool for listening to her.”

“Your father?”

“Yes,” Gehn said, walking across to the edge and standing there, looking out across the ruined landscape. “Or is that something else she hasn’t told you?”

“She?”

“Anna. Your grandmother.”

“I…I don’t understand. What has she got to do with it?”

Gehn laughed bleakly. “You still do not know?”

“Know what?”

And now Gehn turned and looked at him again, his face hard. “That she was Ti’ana. Anna, I mean. That was her D’ni name, given to her by my father—your grandfather—when he married her.”

Atrus stared, shock in his face. “No. No . It isn’t possible. She would have said.”

“It’s true,” Gehn said bitterly. “Her words destroyed it…her meddling . It would all have been over, finished with. Veovis would have been dead, the threat dealt with, but no…she had to interfere. She could not help herself. As if she knew best all the while! She would never listen. Never! ”

Atrus shook his head, unable to believe it.

“Did she ever tell you about me , Atrus? Did she? No! Of course not! So ask yourself, what else did she fail to tell you?”

“But she couldn’t have!” he blurted, unable to help himself. “She couldn’t! ”

“No?” For a moment Gehn stared at him, as if studying an exhibit beneath a microscope. “You should not let sentiment blind you, Atrus. The world we inhabit is a harsh one, and sentiment can kill just as surely as a falling rock. It was a lesson your grandmother never learned. And that is why I cannot let you go back to her. For your own good.”

Atrus was silent a moment, staring down at his hands where they were clasped in his lap. Then he spoke again, his voice quiet now, lacking the defiant conviction it had had only minutes before.

“Anna was good to me. She looked after me, made sure I never starved. Yes, and she taught me, too.”

“ Taught you?” Gehn’s laughter was scathing. “Taught you what? How to survive in a crack? How to eat dust and dream of rain, I bet!”

“No!” Atrus yelled, hurt now and confused and angry—angrier than he’d ever been-though at who it was hard to tell. “She taught me more than you’ve ever taught me!”

Gehn’s laughter died. He stepped across and stood over Atrus, looking down at him coldly, threateningly. “What did you say?”

Atrus lowered his eyes, intimidated by his father’s physical presence. “I said she taught me more than you.”

Gehn reached down with his right hand, gripped Atrus’s chin, and forced him to look at him. “Tell me, boy. What did that woman ever teach you that was any use at all?”

He shrugged off Gehn’s hand and moved his head back. “She taught me D’ni, that’s what!”

Gehn laughed and shook his head. “Taught you to lie, more like!”

Atrus met his father’s eyes squarely, then spoke slowly, calmly, in fluent D’ni.”

“She taught me what is good and what is to be valued, those truths which cannot be shaken or changed.”

Slowly, like the sunlight bleeding from the horizon at the day’s end, the mocking smile faded from Gehn’s lips.

“You mean, you knew? ” Gehn said coldly. “All this while?” His face was hard now, his eyes cold. Once again there seemed something dangerous—something frightening—about him. “You sat there all that time, pretending not to know? Mocking me?”

“No,” Atrus began, wanting to explain, but Gehn was not listening. Grasping Atrus with both hands he pulled him up out of his chair and shook him.

“Why, you deceitful, ungrateful little boy! It would serve you right if I took you back and let you rot there in that pathetic little hole! Ah, but she would like that, wouldn’t she? And that is why we are not going back. Not now, not ever!”

“But you must!” Atrus cried out, appalled at the thought. “She’ll be worried! When she doesn’t hear…”

Taking Atrus by the scruff of the neck, Gehn half marched, half dragged him to his room and threw him inside, then slammed the door and locked it.

“Wait!” Atrus cried, picking himself up and throwing himself at the door. “Father! Please …you’ve got to listen!”

 

§

 

For three whole days, Gehn did not return. When he finally did, he announced himself by rapping loudly on the door to Atrus’s room.

“Atrus?”

Atrus was in his sleeping niche in the big wardrobe, a spot that felt more like his bed at home, reading a D’ni book, a half-eaten apple in one hand. The sudden knocking made him jump. Hiding the apple and the book, he quickly closed the wardrobe door and hurried across to the bed, slipping beneath the silken sheets.

“Atrus?” Gehn’s voice came again. Significantly, he spoke D’ni now. “Are you awake? I need to talk with you.”

He ought to have told him to go away, but the anger he’d first felt had now evaporated. Besides, he wanted to know just what his father had to say for himself.

“All right…” he called back, feigning indifference.

He heard the key turn in the lock. A moment later Gehn stepped into the room. He looked immensely weary, his pale eyes ringed from lack of sleep, his clothes unwashed—the same clothes he had been wearing the evening he had argued with Atrus.

Atrus sat up, his back against the massive, carved headboard, looking across at Gehn, who was outlined in the half-light by the door.

“I’ve been thinking,” Atrus began.

Gehn raised a hand. “We speak only D’ni henceforth.”

Atrus started again, this time in D’ni. “I’ve been thinking. Trying to see it from your point of view. And I think I understand.”

Gehn came closer, intrigued. “And what conclusion did you come to?”

Atrus hesitated, then. “I think I understand why you feel what you feel about Anna. Why you hate her so much.”

Gehn laughed, surprised, yet his face was strangely pained. “No, Atrus. I do not hate her. It would be easy if it were that simple. But I do blame her. I blame her for what she did to D’ni. And for leaving my father here, knowing he would die.”

“I don’t see the difference.”

“No?” Gehn came closer, standing over him. “It is hard to explain just what I feel sometimes. She is my mother and so she has to love me. It is her duty. Why, I even saw it in her eyes that last time. But she does not like me. To be honest, she never has.” He shook his head, then continued. “It was the same with Veovis. She never liked him . She thought him odious; ill-mannered and foul-tempered. Yet when it came down to it, she felt that her duty was to love him—to save him from himself.”

Gehn sighed heavily. “She was a hypocrite. She did not act on what she knew to be the truth. It was a weakness that destroyed a race of gods!”

“And yet you two survived,” Atrus said quietly. “She saved you. Brought you out of D’ni.”

“Yes,” Gehn said, staring away into the shadows on the far side of the room. “Some days I wonder why. Some days I ask myself whether that, too, was not weakness of a kind. Whether it would not have been better for us both to have died back there and end it all cleanly. As it is…”

Atrus stared at his father in the long silence that followed, seeing him clearly for the first time. There was something quite admirable about the spirit within him about the determination to try to restore and recreate the D’ni culture single-handedly. Admirable but futile.

“So can I go and see Anna?”

Gehn did not even look at him. “No, Atrus. My mind is made up. It would be too disruptive, and I cannot afford disruption.”

“But she’ll worry if I don’t go back…”

“Be quiet, boy! I said no, and I mean no! Now let that be the last word on the matter! I shall send Rijus with a note, informing your grandmother that you are well and explaining why she cannot see you again. But beyond that, I can permit no further contact between you.”

Atrus looked down. It was as if his father had physically struck him. Not see her again? The thought appalled him.

“As for the matter of your deception,” Gehn went on, unaware, it seemed, of the great shadow that had fallen on the young man’s spirit, “I have to tell you that I was gravely disappointed in you, Atrus. That said, I shall overlook it this once. Indeed, it may prove a great benefit in the long term. It will certainly save me a great deal of time and hard work, and it will also mean that I can press on more rapidly than I had anticipated. It is possible you might even start a book of your own.”

Atrus looked up. “A book? ”

“Yes, But you must promise me something.”

Gehn loomed over him, his manner fierce, uncompromising. “You must promise me never—and I mean never —to question my word again or to scheme behind my back. You must be absolutely clear on this, Atrus. I am Master here and my word is law.”

Atrus stared at his father, knowing him at that moment better than he had ever known him; then, realizing he had no other choice, he bowed his head.

“I promise.”

“Good. Then come and get something to eat. You must be starving.”

11