“Young Master?”
Atrus turned onto his side, wondering for an instant where he was. Herbs. The smell of herbs. Ah, yes. The old woman’s hut. He was on the Thirty-seventh Age of Gehn, and it was morning.
He sat up, rubbing his eyes, then looked to the old woman, who stood with her back half bent in the opening to the stall.
“Forgive me, young Master,” she said breathlessly, “but the Lord Gehn wants to see you at once.”
Nodding his thanks, he stood and stretched. What time was it? And how long had he slept? He seemed to sleep longer, deeper, while he was here. Maybe it had something to do with the air.
He yawned, then, knowing how his father hated to be kept waiting, went outside.
Pulling on his glasses, he studied the scene that met his eyes.
Beneath him the slope was a tawny brown, furred like an animal’s back. Beyond it the folds of land that surrounded the lake were revealed in browns and greens—so many different shades that he caught his breath to think of such subtle variation. And the textures! He walked out slowly, onto the ridge. Tall, dark trees, their crowns explosions of jet black leaves, covered the left flank of the nearest hill, ending abruptly in a smooth covering of bright green grass. Atrus laughed.
“Why do you laugh, Master?”
Atrus turned, facing the acolyte, the smile gone from his face. He had sot seen him when he’d stepped out.
“I laughed because of that hill there. It reminded me…well, of a half-shaven head. The way those trees end in a straight line…”
The priest stepped up and looked, then nodded; but there was not the slightest trace of amusement in his expression. He looked back at Atrus, then, with a bow, said, “Your father awaits you, Master.”
Atrus sighed inwardly. It was his fourth day on the island and still the man retained his distance.
He walked slowly down the slope, silent now and thoughtful, looking about him at the swell and fold of hills surrounding the lake. As the village came into sight, he stared at it a while, then looked to the acolyte.
“What is your name?”
“My name? ” The man seemed strangely intimidated by the query.
“Yes, your name. What is it?”
“My name is…One.”
“One?” Atrus gave a small laugh. “You mean, the number one?”
The man nodded, unable to meet Atrus’s eyes.
“And was that always your name?”
He hesitated, then shook his head. “My birth name was Koena.”
“Koena,” Atrus said, walking on, his eyes taking in the pleasant shapes of the thatched roofs just below him now, the covered walkways, the delightful contrast of the lake’s vivid blue against the bright greens and russets of the land sloping down to it. “But One is the name my father gave you?”
Koena nodded.
A faint smile appeared at the corners of Atrus’s mouth. Of course. He should have known. He turned his head, studying the man a moment, not disliking his long, rather severe features, noting in the unforgiving daylight just how coarse the cloth of his cloak actually was, how crudely fashioned the symbols on it.
“Have you been my father’s helper long?”
“A thousand days.”
Then this Age was indeed “recent.” Gehn had created it only a matter of three years ago at most. But what about before that? Had it existed in any form at all? Did these people have any memories of a time before the Lord Gehn had come among them? And if they did, were those memories true memories, or were they also written in?
He knew from his studies that you could not actually write such things: not directly, anyway. Yet when you created an Age, with all of its complexities, then a great shadow of cause and effect was thrown back, such that the Age, though new created, still had a “history” of a kind. Not a real history, of course. How could it have a real history, after all? But in the minds and memories of its inhabitants it would seem as if it had. To them, the past would seem as real as it did to him or Gehn.
Or so Gehn argued. For himself he was no longer quite so sure.
A strange, high-pitched cry from somewhere to his left made Atrus start, then turn to look for its source. There was a strange flapping noise in the air, then a shadow whisked past his feet. He looked up in time to see a strange, plump-bodied animal shoot past, swimming, it seemed, through he air.
Koena was staring at him, astonished. “Master?” he asked. “Are you all right?”
“That!” Atrus said, pointing after it. “That… animal …what is it?”
“ That? That is a bird, Master.”
Atrus stared openmouthed, watching the “bird” circle over the lake, the flapping noise coming from the long arms it used to pull itself through the air. He watched it swoop, then dive.
“Amazing!” Atrus said. “I’ve never seen its like!”
Koena was staring at him now.
Atrus shook his head. In the other Ages there had been many birds, but never anything like this. This was simply bizarre. It was more like a small rodent than a bird and seemed far too heavy to fly, and those strange, furred wings.
What did he write? He wondered. Why would Gehn create such a creature? Or had he? What if this wasn’t deliberate? What if it was an accident?
Atrus turned, looking to Koena.
“Come,” he said, intrigued by the thought that his father might purposefully have created such a creature. “Let’s go down. My father will be angry if he is kept waiting.”
§
Gehn, who was finishing his breakfast, sat at a table covered in a thick red cloth edged with golden tassels. He was eating from a golden bowl, a golden goblet at his side. Behind him, on a stand, was a silk pennant, the D’ni symbol of the book emblazoned in black on its pure white background. Atrus stepped into the tent, looking about him, noting the luxuries that were on display on every side. In the far corner of the tent was a massive wooden bed, the headboard clearly of local design. Beside it was a D’ni dressing screen, painted gold and blue and carmine.
He stepped forward. “You sent for me, father?”
“Ah, Atrus…” Gehn said, wiping his mouth with a silken cloth, then threw it aside. “I thought we should continue with your lessons, Atrus.”
“Father?”
Gehn nodded, then took his arm and led him across to a low table in the corner on which a large-scale map of the island had been spread out.
Atrus stretched out a hand and touched the bottom left-hand corner with his index finger. “Where’s that?”
“Gone,” Gehn said, looking at him strangely.
“And that?” he said, noting another, smaller island just beyond the sea passage.
“Gone.”
Atrus looked to his father and frowned. “How?”
Gehn shrugged.
“I…” Atrus shook his head. “Is this what you want me to look for? Things disappearing?”
“No, Atrus. I want you simply to observe.”
Atrus stared at his father a moment, then looked back at the map. As far as he could see everything else was precisely as he recalled it from his preliminary journeys around the island, down to the smallest detail.
Gehn went across to his desk and, opening the leather case he had brought with him from D’ni this time, took a slender notebook from inside and handed it to Atrus. “Here.”
Atrus opened it and scanned a few lines, then looked back at his father. “What are these?”
“What you have there are a number of random phrases from the Age Thirty-seven book. What I want you to do, Atrus, is to try to ascertain what aspects of this Age they relate to, and how and why they create the effects they do.”
“You want me to analyze them?”
“No, Atrus. But I do want you to begin to grip the relationship between the words that are written on the page and the complex entity—the physical, living Age—that results. You see, while our Art is a precise one, its effects are often quite surprising, owing to the complexity of the web of relationships that are created between things. The meaning of an individual phrase can be altered by the addition of other phrases, often to the extent that the original description bears no relation whatsoever to the resultant reality. That is why the D’ni were so adamant about contradictions. Contradictions can destroy an Age. Too often they simply make it break apart under the strain of trying to resolve the conflicting instructions.”
Atrus nodded. “Yet if what you say is true, how can I tell if what I am observing relates directly to the phrases in this book? What if other phrases have distorted the end result?”
“That is for you to discover.”
“But if I have only these few phrases…”
Gehn stared at him, then raised an eyebrow, as if to indicate that he ought to be able to work that one out for himself.
“You mean, you want me to guess?”
“No guess, Atrus. Speculate. I want you to try to unravel the puzzle of this world. To look back from the world to the words and attempt to understand exactly why certain things resulted. It is, you will come to see, every bit as important as learning the D’ni words and phrases that purport to describe these things. Indeed, much of my experimenting over the years has been along these very lines. I have learned a great deal from my observations, Atrus, and so will you.”
“Father.”
“Then go now. And take the map, if you wish. I have no further need of it.”
§
Atrus sat in the long meadow above the lake, the folded map in his lap, his father’s notebook open at his side. Surrounded by the thigh-high grass he could not be seen, unless by someone working on the slopes on the far side of the lake, but right now it was midday and the villagers were in their huts, eating.
He had begun with the simplest of the twenty phrases his father had copied out for him—one which related to the composition of the soil here. From his own studies he knew how important the underlying rock and soil was to the kind of Age that resulted, especially the soil. A good rich soil, full of nutrients and minerals, would produce good harvests, which in turn would allow the people of that Age to spend less time carrying out the backbreaking task of cultivation. That was crucially important, for a people who did not have to spend every daylight hour providing food for their tables was a people that would quickly develop a culture. For culture, Atrus understood, was a product of excess.
Yes, he thought, recalling his days in the cleft. He understood it now. Had Anna been born and raised in the cleft, they would not have survived. Had she been simply a cultivator and no more, they would never have had enough, for there had never been enough growing space, enough seeds, enough water—enough of anything —to allow them to survive. What there had been was Anna’s talent as a painter and a sculptor. It was that, ironically, which had kept them alive: that had provided them with the salt they needed, the seeds and flour and fuel, yes, and all of those tiny luxuries that had made life there bearable. Without them they would have died.
As it was, he had grown beyond the expectations of such a dry, uninhabitable place. The rich soil of Anna’s mind had nurtured him, bringing him to ripeness.
Only now did he understand that. After years of blaming her, he saw it clearly once again.
The soil. It was all down to the soil. Growth began not in the sunlight but in the darkness, in tiny cracks, deep down in the earth.
Atrus smiled, then looked to the side, reading the D’ni phrase again. By rights, the soil here ought to have been rich and fertile, yet from his own observations he saw that other factors had affected it somehow. There was a slight acidity to it that was unhealthy.
He frowned, wishing that his father had given him the whole book to read and not just random phrases. Yet he knew how protective his father was of his books.
He was about to lay back and think the problem through, when he heard a tiny cry from somewhere just behind him. Setting the map aside, Atrus stood, looking about him at the meadow.
Nothing. At least nothing he could see. He took a few paces, then frowned. He couldn’t have imagined it, surely?
It came again, this time a clear cry for help.
He ran toward the sound, then stopped, astonished. Just ahead of him the thick grass ended in a narrow chasm about six feet across and twelve or fifteen long—a chasm that had not been there the last time he had looked.
He stepped up to its edge, careful not to fall, and peered down into its darkness. It was the girl—the one he’d seen that first morning. She had fallen in and now seemed stuck up to her knees in the dark earth at the bottom of the crack some eight or ten feet down.
“It’s okay,” he said. “Don’t worry. I’ll get you out.”
He turned, looking about him. He needed a rope or a branch or something. Anything he could throw down to her, then haul her up. Yet even as he stood there, thinking about it, he heard the soft fall of earth and, looking back, saw how it had fallen over her, making her position worse.
The edge of the nearest copse was fifty yards away. By the time he got there, broke off a branch and came back, she might quite easily he buried under it.
There was only one way.
He sat down on the edge, then, testing that it would take his weight, turned, and began to lower himself down into the crack, searching the face of it for footholds as he went.
“Reach up!” he called to her. “Reach up and take hold of my right foot.”
He felt something brush the tip of his boot. Too high. He was still too high. The earth he was clinging to didn’t feel all that secure, but he could not abandon her. He moved down a fraction more and felt, as he did, her hand close about his ankle.
“Good!” he said, thankful that she was only a waif of a girl. “Now get a grip with your other hand.”
Two second passed, and then he felt her other hand grip his ankle.
“Okay. Now hold on tight. And don’t struggle. If you struggle, we’ll both fall in again!”
Slowly, painfully slowly, he hauled himself up and over the edge, turning at the end, to reach down and grab her wrists, pulling her up the last few feet.
She sat there, beside him on the grass, trembling, her chest rising and falling as she tried to get her breath, her frightened eyes staring at the black wound in the earth that had almost claimed her.
“Are you okay?” he asked, after a moment.
She went to nod, then shook her head.
He stared at her a moment, then, standing, went back across to where he’d left the map and notebook, and, picking up his cloak, took it back and wrapped it about her shoulders.
She looked to him, grateful, then stared back at the crack. “What is it?” she asked, her voice a whisper.
“I don’t know,” he answered, troubled suddenly, remembering the missing islands on the map. But perhaps my father does.
§
Gehn reached across the desk and drew the case toward him, then, taking the tiny key from the chain about his neck, unlocked the clasps.
“I shall be gone only a few hours,” he said, glancing up at Atrus, who stood on the other side of the desk, the girl beside him. “She will remain here with the acolyte until I return. And you shall say nothing. You understand, Atrus? I do not want the islanders panicked by this. There is a simple explanation and I shall find it.”
Atrus bowed his head.
“Good.” Gehn nodded decisively, then began to pack away all of his books and papers.
“Father?”
“Yes, Atrus?”
“I had planned to go out to the fishing grounds this afternoon. I’d made arrangements with one of the fishermen. Should I cancel that now?”
Gehn paused, considering, then, “No. You had best carry on as though nothing has happened. But try not to be out too long. I shall have need of you when I return.”
“Of course, father.”
“Good. Now go and fetch the acolyte.” He looked to the girl. “You…take a seat in the corner there. And take that cloak off. Only those of D’ni blood should wear such a cloak!”
§
Once his father had gone, Atrus went directly to the harbor. The boat he was to go out on was owned by an old fisherman named Tarkuk, a wizened little man with strangely long fingers. His son, Birili, was a short, heavily muscled young man of few words. He gave Atrus a single glance as he stepped on board; thereafter he barely acknowledged him.
They sailed out through the sea channel into the open sea.
Out there, unprotected by the bowl of hills, a breeze blew across the water’s surface, making the boat rise and fall on the choppy surface. As Tarkuk watched from the stern, one long, sun-browned hand on the tiller, a small clay pipe clenched between his small yellow teeth, Birili raised the mast and unfurled the sail.
Atrus watched, fascinated as the square of cloth caught the wind and seemed to swell, tugging against the restraining rope in Birili’s hand. As the boat swung around it slowly gathered speed, gently rising and falling as they made their way around the curve of the island.
He leaned out, looking down through the clear, almost translucent water. The seabed was still visible this close to the island, flat and cluttered, the odd tangle of weeds giving it the appearance of scrubland.
Somewhere around here there had been a second tiny island. Nothing large, but significant enough to have been marked on Gehn’s original map. Now there was nothing.
So what did that mean? What was happening here on the Thirty-seventh Age?
He sniffed the air, conscious of its strong salinity. The lake, too, he’d been told, was salty. The villagers got their water from springs in the surrounding hills and from a single well just behind Gehn’s tent.
Or did, when he wasn’t in residence.
Behind him the island, which still dominated the skyline, was slowly receding. He turned, looking out past Birili and the billowing sail. The sea stretched out into the distance. There, where the horizon ought to be, it seemed hazed.
“What’s that?” he asked, pointing toward it.
“What’s what?” Tarkuk asked, leaning forward, trying to see past the sail, as if something was actually on the water itself.
“That mist…”
The old man stared a moment, then turned his head and spat over the edge of the boat.
“It is the mist. It is where the sea ends.”
Atrus frowned. “But surely there’s something out there, beyond the mist?”
But Tarkuk merely looked away.
Atrus looked back. Now that they were closer, he could see that the mist was like a solid barrier, forming a curving wall about the island.
Strange, he thought. It’s as if it all really does end there.
As they came farther around the curve of the island, other boats came into sight, anchored a mile or so out from the land—seven of them in all, forming a huge elliptic on the open water, gently rocking in the warm, pleasant breeze.
They joined the others, lowering the sail, anchoring at what was clearly Tarkuk’s position in that flattened circle.
Each in his place , Atrus thought, conscious of how docile, how amenable these people were.
The old man turned back, a coil of fine-meshed net between his hands. “Would you like to fish, Master?”
“No. I’ll watch, thanks.”
With a nod to his son, Tarkuk turned and, with a strange, looping motion, cast his net out onto the surface of the sea, keeping only the knotted end of a guide string in his hand. Slowly the net drifted to the right, forming a great figure eight in the water. As the string grew taut, he began to haul it in. As he did, Birili cast his own net from the other side of the boat, his stance, his movements so like his father’s that Atrus gave a little laugh of recognition.
The old man had hauled the net over to the side of the boat. Now he leaned over and, with a quick little movement of the wrist, began to loop the net up out of the water and onto the deck.
Atrus sat forward, his eyes wide. The dull brown mesh of the net glistened now with shimmering, wriggling silver. Hundreds and hundreds of tiny silver fish, none longer than his hand, now filled the net. As Tarkuk threw the last coil of the net onto the deck, so Birili, on the other side of the boat, began to draw his in.
So simple, Atrus thought, watching Tarkuk take one of the big rectangular woven baskets from near the bow and, crouching, begin to pluck fish from the net and throw them into it.
Careful not to get in his way and mindful of the gentle sway of the boat, Atrus stepped across and, kneeling, looked into the basket. It was like looking into a chest of silver—only this silver was alive.
Reaching out, he closed his hand about one of the wriggling shapes and tried to pick it up, and found he was holding nothing. The fish had slipped from his grasp.
Atrus raised his fingers to his nose and sniffed, frowning at the unfamiliar smell, then rubbed his thumb across his fingertips. He had not known they would be so slippery, so slick with oil.
Tarkuk had stopped and was watching him, a deep curiosity in his eyes. Atrus met those eyes and smiled, but the old man was not to be reached so easily. He made a small motion at the corner of his mouth, then looked down, getting on with his work again.
He looked to Tarkuk. “It looks like there are enough fish here in this boat to feed the whole village!”
“You think so?” The old man shrugged. “Once you’ve lopped off the head and taken the bones and skin into consideration, there’s not much meat on a single fish. It would take several dozen of them to make a half-decent meal. Besides, we use them for other things, too. For their fat, mainly. We make oil from it, for our lamps.”
Atrus nodded. “And your clothes?”
“Those are made of linen.”
“Linen?”
“There is a plant. It grows on the island. We harvest it and dry it and then weave it into cloth.”
He had seen it but not known what it was. And in his head, Atrus put another piece of the puzzle into place. Fish that had an oily fat for fuel. A plant that could be woven into clothes. Such things, when written in, would allow human life to thrive in a place like this.
He felt a tinge of admiration for Gehn. It was simple, certainly, but clever. Very clever.
“Can we go out farther?”
“Farther?” The old man seemed puzzled by the question.
“Yes…out there, where the mist is.”
Tarkuk stared at him, his face hard, his whole manner suddenly very different. “Why?”
“Because I’d like to see it,” Atrus said, for the first time slightly irritated by the old man’s response.
Birili, he noted, had stopped hauling in his net and had turned to stare at him.
“The currents are too strong out there,” Tarkuk said, as if that settled the matter.
“Nonsense,” Atrus said, knowing suddenly what it was. They were afraid of the mist. They had a superstitious fear of it.
He watched as Tarkuk and his son tersely finished gathering in their nets. Then, when the baskets were fastened and the nets furled beneath the bow seat, a stony-faced Birili hauled up the anchor, then, hoisting the sail again, held the rope taut as the canvas filled.
As they moved out between the boats, Atrus noted the startled looks on the faces of the other fishermen.
Ignoring Tarkuk’s piercing look, he went to the side and trailed his hand briefly in the water, noting how warm it was. The breeze had dropped, but the water was still choppy. Indeed, it seemed to get choppier the farther they sailed from the island.
Ahead, the wall of mist came closer and closer.
Again he let his hand trail lightly in the water, then jerked it back, surprised.
Cold…the water was freezing cold!
Atrus stared down into the water. Out here the water was dark. One could not see where it ended— if it ended—beneath them. He had the sudden, gut-wrenching feeling that they had sailed out over some kind of shelf and that beneath them was a mile or more of water.
Ridiculous , he thought, then turned, looking to where Birili stood, the rope slack in his hand.
He looked to the sail, then frowned. The wind had dropped completely. By rights they ought to be slowing, but the boat was traveling faster than ever.
The currents , he thought, beginning to understand. He turned, looking to the old man. Both he and his son had their eyes closed now, and were kneeling in the bottom of the boat, as if in prayer. As for the boat, that was sailing itself now, in the grip of something that was drawing it along at a clipping pace.
Slowly the wall of mist approached, filling the sky in front of them. It was cold now, bitterly cold, and as they raced along, the water beneath them seemed to boil and bubble. Then, suddenly, they were alongside that great wall of whiteness, flying along on the surface parallel to it.
Atrus reached across and took the old man’s arm. “Tarkuk! Listen to me! We have to do something!”
Tarkuk opened his eyes and stared at Atrus as if he didn’t recognize him. “ Do something?”
“Yes!” Atrus yelled. He looked around, then spied the oars that lay in the bottom of the boat. “Come on! If we all row then we might pull free!”
Tarkuk shook his head slowly, but Atrus would not let him lapse back into his fear. Gripping his shoulders now, he shook him hard.
“Come on! I command you! Now row!”
Coming to himself, Tarkuk met Atrus’s eyes and bowed his head. “As my Master commands.”
Tarkuk stood unsteadily, then, raising his voice, barked orders at his son. At first Birili seemed reluctant, as if he had already consigned himself, body and soul, to the deep. Then, like a sleepwalker waking, he took up his oar and sat.
“Here,” Atrus said, sitting beside him. “Let me help.”
He had sculled his father’s boat often enough in the past to know how to row, and he knew they would get nowhere unless they all pulled together.
“Come on!” he called, encouraging them now. “Row if you want to live!”
They heaved and heaved, fighting the current, struggling to turn the boat back toward the island. For a while it seemed that the current was too strong and that all their efforts were about to end in vain, but then, suddenly, they began to pull away.
Sinews straining, they hauled their way, inch by inch across the dark surface of the water, that massive wall of whiteness receding slowly at their back, until, breathless from the effort, they relaxed, staring back the way they had come.
Atrus stretched his neck and looked up, straight into the sky. He ached. Every muscle in his body ached, yet he felt a great surge of triumph.
“Well done!” he said, looking about him and laughing. But Tarkuk and his son were looking down, silent—strangely, eerily silent.
“What is it?” he asked after a moment, touching the old man’s arm. At the touch, Tarkuk jerked away.
Atrus blinked. What was going on here? What had he missed? He had made a mistake, true, but they had survived, hadn’t they? Why, he had forced them to survive! He had made them row when they had given up.
He reached out, shaking the old man by the arm. “What is it? Answer me! I have to know!”
Tarkuk glanced at him, then dropped his eyes again. “We have cheated the Whiteness.”
“Cheated…?” Atrus laughed, astonished. “What do you mean?”
But the old man would say no more. Slowly Birili got to his feet and, adjusting the sail, turned the boat back toward the island.
In silence they sailed back.
As they climbed from the boat and mounted the steps, Atrus made to speak to Tarkuk again, but the old man seemed reluctant even to acknowledge him now.
Atrus shook his head, perplexed. What had happened out there? Just what exactly had he missed?
He didn’t know. But he would. He would make it his business to find out, before his father returned.
§
Atrus hurried across the bridge, conscious of the gathering clouds overhead, then ran up the slope toward his father’s tent.
Surprised by his sudden entrance, Koena got up hurriedly, making a little bowing motion, still uncertain quite how to behave toward Gehn’s son. “Young Master? Is everything all right?”
The girl was sitting on the ground nearby, staring up at Atrus.
“No,” Atrus answered, walking past Koena and sitting in his father’s chair.
“Master?” Koena came across and stood before him. “Are there more cracks?”
“No. But there is something I want an explanation for.”
“Master?”
Atrus hesitated, then. “Something happened.”
“Something?”
“Yes, when I was out on the boat. The old man said something about cheating the Whiteness.”
Loena gasped. “You have been out there?”
“Out where? ” Atrus said, knowing where he meant, but wanting to hear it from his lips.
“To the Mist Wall.”
Atrus nodded. “We sailed the dark current. And then we rowed back.”
Koena’s mouth had fallen open. “No,” he said quietly.
“What is it?” Atrus asked. “What am I missing? What don’t I understand?”
Koena hesitated, his eyes pleading with Atrus now.
“Tell me,” Atrus insisted, “or I shall have my father wring it from you!”
The man sighed, then answered him, speaking reluctantly. “The Whiteness…it was our Master. Before your father came.”
He fell silent. There was a rumble of distant thunder.
Atrus, too, was silent for a time, taking in this new piece of information, then he looked to Koena again. “And my father knows nothing of this?”
“Nothing.”
“The old man and his son…what will happen to them?”
Koena looked down. It was clear he did not want to say another word, but Atrus needed to know.
“Please. You have to tell me. It’s very important.”
The man shrugged, then: “They will die. Just as surely as if you had left them out there.”
Atrus shook his head. Now that he understood it he felt a kind of dull anger at the superstitious nonsense that could dream up such a thing. He stood, his anger giving him strength, making him see clearly what he had to do.
“Listen,” he said, assuming the manner of his father. “Go and fetch the villagers. Tell them to gather outside my father’s hut. It is time I talked to them.”
§
The sky was darkening as Atrus mounted the steps of the meeting hut and turned to face the waiting crowd. A light rain fell. Everyone was there; every last man, woman, and child on the island, Tarkuk and Birili excepted. Atrus swallowed nervously, then, raising his hands the way he’d seen his father do, began to speak, trying to make his voice—not so powerful or deep as his father’s—boom in the same sonorous way.
“This afternoon we went out to the Mist Wall. We sailed the dark current and came back…”
There was a strong murmur of discontent at that. People looked to each other, deeply troubled.
“I have heard talk that we have somehow cheated the Whiteness, and it is for that reason that I have summoned you here.”
He paused, looking about him, hoping that what he was about to say next would not prove too difficult for his father.
“I understand your fears,” he went on, “but I am proof that the Power of the Whiteness is waning. For did I not sail to the Mist Wall and return? Did the Whiteness take me? No. Nor shall it. In fact, when my father, the Lord Gehn, returns, he and I shall go out beyond the Mist Wall.”
There was a gasp at that—a great gasp of disbelief and shock.
“It cannot be done,” Loena said, speaking for all gathered there.
“You disbelieve?” Atrus asked, stepping down and confronting his father’s man.
Koena fell silent, his head bowed. Overhead there was the faintest rumble of thunder. Great clouds had gathered, throwing the bowl of hills into an intense shadow.
Atrus glanced up at the ominous sky, then spoke again. “All will be well,” he said.
There was a great thunderclap. Lightning leapt between the clouds overhead, discharging itself in a vivid blue-white bolt on the crest of the hill facing them. Atrus stared at its afterimage in wonder, then looked about him, seeing how everyone else had fallen to the ground in terror.
“It’s nothing,” Atrus said, lifting his voice above the now-persistent grumble. “Only a thunderstorm!!”
There was a second, blinding flash and one of the trees on the far side of the lake was struck, blossoming in a great sheet of sudden flame.
“The Whiteness is angry,” someone cried from just below him. “See how it searches for you!”
Atrus turned, angry now, knowing he must squash this at once. “Nonsense!” he cried. “It’s only the storm!”
But no one was listening. The islanders were pulling at their hair and wailing, as if something horrible was about to descend among them.
Then, as a third lightning bolt ionized the air, sending its tendrils of static hissing through the rainfilled darkness as it sought the earth, Atrus saw, in the brilliant flash, the figure of his father, striding down the path between the huts, heading for the bridge.
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