Into the Labyrinth

3

The old man huddled in his cell. He looked pathetic and rather pale. Once, when a bubbling cry of excruciating torment was wrenched from Samah, the old man shuddered and put the tip of his yellowed white beard to his eyes. Xar watched from the shadows, deciding that this wretched relic would probably collapse into a trembling heap if the lord stamped his foot at him. Xar approached the cell, signed Marit to use her rune-magic to remove the bars.

The old man’s wet robes clung to his pitifully thin body. His hair trailed in a sodden mass down his back. Water dripped from the straggly beard. On the stone bed beside him was a battered pointed hat. The old man had from all appearances been attempting to wring the water from the hat, which had a twisted and maltreated look about it. Xar stared hard and suspiciously at the hat, thinking it might be a hidden source of power. He received the odd impression that it was sulking.

“That is your friend you hear screaming,” said Xar conversationally, sitting down beside the old man, taking care to keep himself from getting wet.

“Poor Samah,” the old man said, trembling. “There are those who would say he deserves this, but”—his voice softened—“he was only doing what he believed to be right. Much as you have done, Lord of the Nexus.”

The old man lifted his head, looked intently at Xar with a disconcertingly shrewd expression. “Much as you have done,” he repeated. “If only you’d left it there. If only he’d left it there.” He inclined his head in the direction of the screams and gave a gentle sigh.

Xar frowned. This wasn’t precisely what he’d had in mind. “The same thing will be happening to you shortly, Zifnab—”

“Where?” The old man peered around curiously.

“Where what?” Xar was growing irritated.

“Zifnab! I thought”—the old man looked deeply offended—“I thought this was a private cell.”

“Don’t try any of your tricks on me, old fool. I won’t fall for them... as did Haplo,” Xar said.

Samah’s cries ceased for a moment, then began again.

The old man was regarding Xar with a blank expression, waiting for the lord to proceed. “Who?” he asked politely.

Xar was strongly tempted to commence torturing him right then and there. He contained himself by a great effort of will. “Haplo. You met him in the Nexus, beside the Final Gate, the gate that leads to the Labyrinth. You were seen and overheard, so don’t play stupid.”

“I never play stupid!” The old man drew himself up haughtily. “Who saw me?”

“A child. His name is Bane. What do you know about Haplo?” Xar asked patiently.

“Haplo. Yes, I do seem to remember.” The old man was growing anxious. He stretched out a wet and shaking hand. “Youngish chap. Blue tattoos. Keeps a dog?”

“Yes,” Xar growled, “that is Haplo.”

The old man grabbed Xar’s hand, shook it heartily. “You will give him my regards—”

Xar yanked his hand away. The lord stared at his skin, displeased to note the weakening of the sigla wherever the water touched them.

“So I arrive to give Haplo—a Patryn—the regards of a Sartan.” Xar wiped his hand on his robes. “Then he is a traitor, as I have long suspected.”

“No, Lord of the Nexus, you are mistaken,” said the old man earnestly and rather sadly. “Of all the Patryns, Haplo is the most loyal. He will save you. He will save your people, if you will let him.”

“Save me?” Xar was lost in astonishment. Then the lord smiled grimly. “He had better look to saving himself. As you should do, Sartan. What do you know about the Seventh Gate?”

“The citadel,” the old man said.

“What?” Xar asked with feigned carelessness. “What did you say about the citadel?”

The old man opened his mouth, was about to reply, when he suddenly let out a shriek, as though he’d been kicked. “What did you do that for?” he demanded, whirling around and confronting empty air. “I didn’t say anything. Well, of course, but I thought that you... Oh, very well.”

Looking sullen, he turned back around, jumped when he saw Xar. “Oh, hullo. Have we met?”

“What about the citadel?” Xar recalled hearing something about a citadel, but he couldn’t remember what.

“Citadel?” The old man looked vague. “What citadel?” Xar heaved a sigh. “I asked about the Seventh Gate and you mentioned the citadel.”

“It’s not there. Definitely not there,” the old man said, nodding emphatically. Twiddling his thumbs, he looked nervously around his cell, then said loudly, “Pity about Bane.”

“What about Bane?” Xar questioned, eyes narrowing.

“Dead, you know. Poor child.”

Xar couldn’t speak, he was so amazed. The old man kept rambling on.

“Some would say it wasn’t his fault. Considering the way he was raised and all that. Loveless childhood. Father an evil wizard. Boy didn’t stand a chance. I don’t buy that!” The old man looked extremely fierce. “That’s the problem with the world. No one wants to take responsibility for his actions anymore. Adam blames the apple-eating incident on Eve. Eve says the serpent made her do it. The serpent claims that it’s God’s fault for putting the tree there in the first place. See there? No one wants to take responsibility.” Somehow Xar had lost control of the situation. He was no longer even enjoying Samah’s tormented screams. “What about Bane?” he demanded.

“And you!” the old man shouted. “You’ve smoked forty packs of cigarettes a day since you were twelve and now you’re blaming a billboard for giving you lung cancer!”

“You are a raving lunatic!” Xar started to turn away. “Kill him,” he ordered Marit. “We’ll learn nothing from this fool while he’s alive...”

“What were we talking about? Ah, Bane.” The old man sighed, shook his head. He looked at Marit. “Would you care to hear about him, my dear?” Marit silently asked Xar, who nodded.

“Yes,” she said, seating herself gingerly beside the old man.

“Poor Bane.” He sighed. “But it was all for the best. Now there will be peace on Arianus. And soon the dwarves will be starting up the Kicksey-winsey...” Xar had heard enough. He stormed out of the cell. He was very nearly irrational with fury—a drunken sensation he didn’t like. He forced himself to think logically. The flame of his anger was quenched, as if someone had shut off one of the gas jets that gave light to this palace of tomb-like darkness. He beckoned to Marit.

She left the old man, who in her absence continued talking to his hat.

“I don’t like what I am hearing about Arianus,” Xar said in a low voice. “I don’t believe the doddering old fool, but I have long sensed that something was wrong. I should have heard from Bane before now. Travel to Arianus, Daughter. Find out what is going on. But be careful to take no action! Do not reveal yourself—to anyone!”

Marit gave a brief nod.

“Prepare for the journey,” Xar continued, “then come to my chambers for your final instructions. You will use my ship. You know how to navigate Death’s Gate?”

“Yes, Lord,” Marit answered. “Shall I send someone down here to take my place?”

Xar considered. “Send one of the lazar. Not Kleitus,” he added hastily. “One of the others. I may have some questions for them when it comes time to raise Samah’s body.”

“Yes, Lord.” Marit bowed respectfully and left.

Xar remained, glaring into Zifnab’s cell. The old man had apparently forgotten the Patryn’s existence. Rocking from side to side, Zifnab was snapping his fingers and singing to himself. “‘I’m a soul man. Ba-dop, da-ba-dop, da-ba-dop, da-ba-dop. Yes, I’m a soul man...’”

Xar hurled the cell bars back into place with grim delight.

“I’ll find out from your corpse who you really are, old fool. And you’ll tell me the truth about Haplo.”

Xar strode back down the corridor toward Samah’s cell. The screams had ceased for the moment. The dragon-snake was peering in through the bars. Xar came up behind him.

Samah lay on the floor. He appeared near death; his skin was clay-colored and glistened with sweat. He was breathing spasmodically. His body twitched and jerked.

“You’re killing him,” Xar observed.

“He proved weaker than I thought, Lord,” Sang-drax said apologetically.

“However, I could dry him off, permit him to heal himself. He would still be weak, probably too weak to attempt to escape. However, there would be a danger—”

“No.” Xar was growing bored. “I need information. Rouse him enough that I may speak to him.”

The bars of the cell dissolved. Sang-drax walked inside, prodded Samah with the toe of his boot. The Sartan groaned and flinched. Xar stepped in. Kneeling beside Samah’s body, the Lord of the Nexus put his hands on either side of the Sartan’s head and raised it from the ground. The lord’s touch was not gentle; long nails dug into Samah’s gray flesh, leaving glistening trails of blood. Samah’s eyes wrenched open. He stared at the lord and shivered in terror, but there was no recognition in the Sartan’s eyes. Xar shook the man’s head, dug his fingers to the bone.

“Know me! Know who I am!”

Samah’s only reaction was to gasp for breath. There was a rattling in his throat. Xar knew the signs.

“The Seventh Gate! Where is the Seventh Gate?”

Samah’s eyes widened. “Never meant... Death... Chaos! What... went wrong...”

“The Seventh Gate!” Xar persisted.

“Gone.” Samah shut his eyes, spoke feverishly. “Gone. Sent it... away. No one knows... Rebels... Might try... undo... Sent it...”

A bubble of blood broke on Samah’s lips. His eyes fixed in his head, staring in horror at something only he could see.

Xar dropped the head. It fell limp and unresisting, struck the stone floor with a crack. The lord laid his hand on Samah’s inert chest, put his fingers on the Sartan’s wrist. Nothing.

“He is dead,” Xar said, cool with controlled excitement. “And his last thoughts are of the Seventh Gate. Sent the Gate away, he claims! What nonsense. He proved stronger than you thought, Sang-drax. He had the strength to continue this deceit to the end. Now, quickly!”

Xar ripped apart Samah’s wet robes, laying bare the still chest. Producing a dagger—its blade was marked with runes—the lord set the sharp tip over Samah’s heart and pierced the skin. Blood, warm and crimson, flowed from beneath the knife’s sharp edge. Working swiftly and surely, repeating the sigla beneath his breath as he drew them on the skin, Xar used the knife to carve the runes of necromancy into Samah’s dead flesh.

The skin grew cool beneath the lord’s hand; the blood flowed more sluggishly. The dragon-snake stood nearby, watching, a smile lighting the one good eye. Xar did not look up from his work. At the sound of footsteps approaching, the Lord of the Nexus said merely, “Lazar? Are you here?”

“I am here,” intoned a voice.

“...am here,” came the sighing echo.

“Excellent.”

Xar sat back. His hands were covered with blood; the dagger was dark with it. Lifting his hand above Samah’s heart, Xar spoke a word. The heart-rune flashed blue. Fast as lightning, the magic spread from the heart-sigil to the sigil touching it, from that sigil to the one touching it, and soon blue light was flickering and dancing all over the body.

An eerie, glowing form wavered into being near the body, as if the dead man’s shadow were made of light instead of darkness. Xar drew in a shivering breath of awe. This pallid image was the phantasm—the ethereal, immortal part of every living being, what the mensch called the “soul.” The phantasm tried to pull away from the body, tried to free itself, but it was caught in the husk of chill and bloody flesh and could only writhe in an agony comparable to that experienced by the body when it had lived in torment. Suddenly the phantasm disappeared. Xar frowned, but then saw the dead eyes pathetically lit from within: a mockery of life, the spirit joining momentarily with the body.

“I have done it!” Xar cried in exaltation. “I have done it! I have brought life back to the dead!”

But now what to do with it? The lord had never seen one of the dead raised; he had only heard descriptions from Haplo. Appalled and sickened by what he had seen, Haplo had kept his descriptions brief.

Samah’s dead body sat bolt upright. He had become a lazar.

Startled, Xar fell back a step. He caused the runes on his skin to glow bright red and blue. The lazar are powerful beings who come back to life with a terrible hatred of all things living. A lazar has the strength of one who is past feeling pain and fatigue.

Naked, his body covered with bloody tracings of Patryn sigla, Samah stared around in confusion, the dead eyes occasionally flickering with pitiable life when the phantasm flitted inside.

Shaken by his triumph, overawed, the lord needed time to think, to calm himself. “Lazar, say something to it.” Xar motioned, his hands trembling with excitement. “Speak to it.” He drew back against a far wall to watch and to exult in his achievement.

The lazar, a man, obediently stepped forward. Before death—which had obviously come by violence, to judge by the cruel marks still visible on the corpse’s throat—the man had been young and comely. Xar paid scant attention to the lazar beyond a brief glance to assure himself that it wasn’t Kleitus.

“You are one of my people,” said the lazar to Samah. “You are Sartan.”

“I am... I was,” said the voice of the corpse.

“I am... I was,” came the dismal echo from the trapped phantasm.

“Why did you come to Abarrach?”

“To learn necromancy.”

“You traveled here to Abarrach,” repeated the lazar, its voice a lifeless monotone, “to learn the art of necromancy. To use the dead as slaves to the living.”

“I did... I did.”

“And you know now the hatred the dead bear for the living, who keep them in bondage. For you see, do you not? You see... freedom...” The phantasm coiled and wrenched in a futile attempt to escape. The hatred on the face of the corpse as it turned its sightless—yet all too clear-seeing—eyes to Xar caused even the Patryn to blanch.

“You, lazar,” the Lord of the Nexus interrupted harshly, “what are you called?”

“Jonathon.”

“Jonathon, then.” The name meant something to Xar, but he couldn’t think what.

“Enough talk of hatred. You lazar are free now, free from the weaknesses of the flesh that you knew when you were alive. And you are immortal. It is a great gift we living have given you...”

“One we would be happy to share,” said the lazar of Samah in a low, dire voice.

“...to share,” came the fearful echo.

Xar was displeased; the rune-glow that came from his body flared. “You waste my time. There are many questions I will ask you, Samah. Many questions you will answer for me. But the first, the most important, is the one I asked you before you died. Where is the Seventh Gate?”

The countenance of the corpse twisted; the body shook. The phantasm peered out through the lifeless eyes with a sort of terror. “I will not...” The blue lips of the corpse moved, but no sound came out. “I will not...”

“You will!” Xar said sternly, though he was somewhat at a loss. How do you threaten one who feels no pain, one who knows no fear? Frustrated, the lord turned to Jonathon. “What is the meaning of this defiance? You Sartan forced the dead to reveal all their secrets. I know, because Kleitus himself told me this, as did my minion, who was here previously.”

“This man’s will was strong in his life,” the lazar answered. “You raised him too quickly, perhaps. If the body had been allowed to remain quiet for the requisite three days, the phantasm would have left the body and then the soul—the will—could no longer have any effect on what the body did. But now the defiance that died with him lives still.”

“But will he answer my questions?” Xar persisted, frustration growing.

“He will. In time,” Jonathon answered, and there was sorrow in the echoing voice. “In time he will forget all that meant anything to him in life. He will know only the bitter hatred of those who still live.”

“Time!” Xar ground his teeth. “How much time? A day? A fortnight?”

“I cannot say.”

“Bah!” Xar strode forward, came to stand directly before Samah. “Answer my question! Where is the Seventh Gate? What do you care now?” he added in wheedling tones. “It means nothing to you. You defy me only because that’s all you remember how to do.”

The light in the dead eyes flickered. “We sent it... away...”

“You did not!” Xar was losing patience. This wasn’t turning out as he had foreseen. He’d been too eager. He should have waited. He would wait the next time. When he killed the old man. “Sending the gate away makes no sense. You would keep it where you could use it again if need be. Perhaps you did use it—to open Death’s Gate! Tell me the truth. Does it have something to do with a citadel—”

“Master!”

The urgent cry came bounding down the corridor. Xar jerked his head toward the sound.

“Master!” It was Sang-drax, calling and gesturing wildly from the end of the corridor. “Come swiftly! The old man is gone!”

“Dead, then?” Xar grunted. “All for the best. Now let me be—”

“Not dead! Gone! He is gone!”

“What trick is this?” Xar demanded. “He couldn’t be gone! How could he escape?”

“I do not know, Lord of the Nexus.” Sang-drax’s sibilant whisper shook with a fury that startled even Xar. “But he is gone! Come and see for yourself.” There was no help for it. Xar cast a final baleful look at Samah, who appeared completely oblivious to what was going on. Then the lord hastened down the corridor. When the Lord of the Nexus had left, when his voice could be heard rising strident and angry from the far end of the cellblock, Jonathon spoke, quietly, softly.

“You see now. You understand.”

“Yes!” The phantasm peered out of the lifeless eyes in despair, as the living man had once peered out of his prison cell. “I see now. I understand.”

“You always knew the truth, didn’t you?”

“How could I admit it? We had to seem to be gods. What would the truth have made us?”

“Mortal. As you were.”

“Too late. All is lost. All is lost.”

“No, the Wave corrects itself. Rest upon it. Relax. Float with it, let it carry you.”

The phantasm of Samah appeared irresolute. It darted into the body, fled out of it, but could not yet escape. “I cannot. I must stay. I have to hang on...”

“Hang on to what? To hatred? To fear? To revenge? Lie back. Rest upon the Wave. Feel it lift you up.”

The corpse of Samah remained seated on the hard stone. The eyes stared up at Jonathon. “Can they forgive me... ?”

“Can you forgive yourself?” the lazar asked gently. Samah’s body—an ashen and blood-covered shell—laid slowly down on the stone bed. It shuddered, then was still. The eyes grew dark and now truly lifeless. Jonathon reached out his hand, closed them.

Xar, suspecting some trick, stared hard into Zifnab’s cell. Nothing. No sight of the wet and bedraggled old Sartan.

“Hand me that torch!” Xar commanded, peering about in baffled outrage. The Lord of the Nexus banished the cell bars with an impatient wave of his hand and strode into the cell, flashing the light into every part of it.

“What do you think you will find, Lord?” Sang-drax snarled. “That he is playing at peekaboo in a corner? I tell you, he is gone!” Xar didn’t like the dragon-snake’s tone. The lord turned, held the light so that it would flare into the dragon’s one good eye. “If he has escaped, it is your fault! You were supposed to be guarding him! Sea water of Chelestra!” Xar sneered, “takes away their power! Obviously it didn’t!”

“It did, I tell you,” Sang-drax muttered.

“But he can’t get far,” Xar reflected. “We have guards posted at the entrance to Death’s Gate. He—”

The dragon-snake hissed suddenly—a hiss of fury that seemed to wrap its coils around Xar and squeeze the breath from his body. Sang-drax pointed a rune-covered hand at the stone bed. “There! There!” He could say no more; the breath gurgled in his throat.

Xar held the torchlight to shine on the spot. The lord’s eyes caught a glint, a sparkle that came from something on the stone. He reached down, picked it up, held it to the light.

“It’s nothing but a scale—”

“A dragon’s scale!” Sang-drax glared at it with enmity, made no move to touch it.

“Perhaps.” Xar was noncommittal. “A lot of reptiles have scales, not all of them dragons. And what of it? It has nothing to do with the old man’s disappearance. It must have been here for ages—”

“Undoubtedly you are right, Lord of the Nexus.” Sang-drax was suddenly nonchalant, though his one good eye remained fixed on the scale. “What could a dragon—one of my cousins, for instance—possibly have to do with that daft old man? I will go and alert the guard.”

“I give the orders—” Xar began, but his words were wasted. Sang-drax had vanished.

The lord stared around at the empty cell, fuming, a disturbing and unfamiliar unease jabbing deep beneath his skin.

“What is going on?” he was forced to ask himself, and the simple fact that he had to ask that question indicated to the Lord of the Nexus that he had lost control.

Xar had known fear many times in his life. He knew fear every time he walked into the Labyrinth. But still he was able to walk in; he was able to grapple with his fear and put it to use, channel its energy into self-preservation, because he knew that he was in control. He might not know which enemy the Labyrinth was going to hurl at him, but he knew every enemy that existed, knew their strengths and their weaknesses.

But now. What was going on? How had that feebleminded old man escaped? Most important, what did Sang-drax fear? What did the dragon-snake know that he wasn’t telling?

“Haplo didn’t trust them,” the lord said to himself, glaring at the scale he held in his hand. “He warned me not to trust them. So did that fool who lies dead over there. Not”—Xar scowled—“that I believe any claim of either Haplo’s or Samah’s. But I am beginning to believe that these dragon-snakes have their own goals, which may or may not coincide with mine.”

“Yes, Haplo warned me against them. But what if he did so only to blind me to the fact that he is in league with them? They called him ‘Master’ once.[5] He admitted as much to me. And Kleitus talks to them. Perhaps they are all in league against me.”

Xar stared around the cell. The torchlight was failing; the shadows grew darker, began to close in around him. It was nothing to him whether or not he had light. The sigla on his body compensated, would make the darkness bright if he chose. He did choose. He tossed away the useless torch and drove away the shadows with his own magic. He didn’t like this world, this Abarrach. He felt constantly stifled, smothered. The air was foul, and though his magic nullified the poison, it could not sweeten the stench of the sulfurous fumes, remove the rank odor of death.

“I must make my move, and quickly,” he said.

He would start by determining the location of the Seventh Gate. Xar left Zifnab’s cell, strode rapidly back down the corridor. The lazar that called itself Jonathon (where had Xar heard that name? Haplo, undoubtedly, but in what connection?) stood in the corridor. Jonathon’s body itself was unmoving; the phantasm roved restlessly about it in a manner that Xar found extremely disconcerting.

“You have served your purpose,” Xar told it. “You may go—” The lazar made no response. It did not argue. It simply walked away. Xar waited until it had shambled back down the corridor. Then, putting the disquieting lazar out of his mind, along with the dragon scale and Sang-drax, Xar turned his attention to what was important. To Samah.

The corpse lay on the stone bed. It looked as if it slumbered peacefully. Xar found this more irritating than ever.

“Get up!” he snapped. “I want to speak with you.” The corpse did not move.

A feeling of panic invaded the lord’s body. He saw then that the eyes were closed. No lazar that he had ever seen went about with its eyes closed, any more than a living person. Xar bent over the corpse, lifted one of the flaccid eyelids.

Nothing looked back at him. No unholy light of life glimmered and winked. The eyes were empty. The phantasm was gone, fled.

Samah was free.