"Leaving? rrCan't get out," Jordam growled.

"Krawg has the king's keys," said Auralia. "He ... he borrowed 'em to get me out."

"We've sealed the vent," came a girl's voice from deeper in the dungeon. "Nothing's gonna crawl through here now."

"rrNo!" said Jordam, his large hand fastening around Auralia's arm. "No leaving, O-raya. Take me too."

"You can't leave us!" Krawg gasped. "You just got here!"

"Krawg, a long time ago King Cal-raven gave me his Ring of Trust," said Auralia. "He promised me he'd keep me safe. But he's forgotten. And now he's got all kinds of trouble to worry about. I can't fix it for him. Best thing I can do is get out of here. Before I get angry and cause any more trouble." Her voice was sharp with bitterness. "And I could cause a lot of trouble."

"Just show them who you are," Krawg said. "Show 'em tricks and inventions and things! Play like you used to!"

"Krawg, I can't play on command," she laughed sadly. "When I remembered who I was before, I wanted to be that girl again. But now I'm older. I've changed. I feel different. The world's heavier. I can't ... I can't make the colors work together. And it wouldn't make a difference if I did. Nobody's paying attention."

"rrGo back to caves," said Jordam. "Where O-raya belongs."

"Don't tell me what to be." Anger flared in her voice. "Don't tell me where I belong."

"No ... no leaving. The boy ... the boy ..." Jordam slumped forward.

"Hairy!" she said, squeezing his thumb in her small hand. "Krawg, we've got to help him down to the river. We'll take him there. That's a way out ... isn't it?"

Krawg nodded, picking up the glass trumpet that Jes-hawk had left in the corridor. "I'm takin' this horn," he muttered, "in case we need an alarm."

"Take me with you," said an unfamiliar voice.

Ryllion stepped out of the stairwell shadows.

Seeking to conceal himself in a cloud of swirling fireflies, Pretor Xa drifted north toward Inius Throan.

The blue, bell-like membrane of his mind cast itself open, then contracted, pulsing its progress, trailing those long, serrated strands of memory, thousands of years old, along behind. Memories. Of bodies he'd put on for disguises. Of beauty he'd distorted, then dismantled, to demonstrate his power. Of rivers he'd poisoned. Conspiracies. Flattery he'd flung into the endless appetites of human hearts. Potions he'd mixed. The exhilaration of watching Deathweed take root in the world.

Happening upon a crow's dead carcass, the Seer's blue ghost dove into the open beak. The bird suddenly coughed, fluttered, and leapt awkwardly into the sky, flinging itself toward the mountains' stony feet. No calls answered its raucous cry. Nothing remained alive in the smoking ruins of the Fearblind North below.

It soared over the Forbidding Wall's foothills, reptiles and rockspiders scuttling away before it. The dead crow's talons tensed and struck, snatching a coiled blood-snake from beneath a boulder. Landing on a rain-wet ledge that knifed the night air, it pecked the neck of the snake until its body stopped thrashing.

The bird collapsed, its wings splayed across the rock. Pretor Xa, disembodied, wriggled from the bird's form into the snake's lifeless cord.

The snake's body shuddered, slithering secretively between the mountainside's jutting bones. Urgently, the miserable Seer strove for miles until he rode the reptile into view of Inius Throan.

The yellow moonlight comforted him. That sphere of mawrn, the Seers' watchtower, remained suspended even though all other endeavors were on the verge of failing.

The moon was all that remained of the Seers' original bodies-the shapes they had cast off. He could only vaguely remember what it had felt like to be fully embodied, flying through vast fields of stars like a whale in the ocean, to war against the others. They had hated the mystery, because it was greater than they were. That hatred fueled their flight from its presence, and their bodies had begun to break down. Rather than endure such humiliation, they'd scraped off their flesh. It was better than begging for healing, for restoration. They would go on and inhabit the shells of their choosing and rip apart those unions of heart, mind, and body that had come from the mystery.

Dwelling within the cloud of their own self-destruction, Pretor Xa and his allies had sought to ruin the mystery's children. But the mystery's fortress was shielded, and they could not enter through aggression.

We meant to erase all the beauty. But by the mystery's designs, torn threads weave themselves together again. It's maddening. Every act of destruction revealing, in time, our ignorance. We've made nothing that stands on its own. We've only the pleasures of making suffer all that mystery loves.

The other Seers were away, searching for new bodies to wear back to the Cent Regus Core before their favorite secret was discovered. Their most enduring work of distortion. A boast greater than the Cent Regus chieftain's grandest prize.

Pretor Xa hated the other Seers. They hated him. But their collaboration had been necessary in order to conspire against the one who claimed authority. Who dared suggest they could not stand alone as masters of themselves.

But Pretor Xa was less concerned about their collective secret than his own. His best work. Ryllion, whom he had shaped from boyhood. Seeking Ryllion's body on the shores of Deep Lake, he had found signs that the man was alive. Following those signs, he'd come here. To the threshold of Inius Throan.

Ryllion drew him like a magnet. He could not say why. Perhaps it was the strength that he had cultivated in the man. Perhaps it was the way Ryllion listened with such trust, the way he took risks to achieve great things. His dutiful secrecy. His ambition.

I need mawrn, thought the snake-bodied Seer, gazing at the moon through the milky beads of the snake's eyes. I have so little power, so little comfort, no strength.

The Seer found a nest in the rocks. It slithered in, surprised a cliff monkey, and sank venomous teeth into its neck. The monkey flailed, shrieking, and went limp.

I used to enjoy this.

Pretor Xa swam through the venom, filling the monkey's body. He raised it to its feet. It stumbled as he learned its bends and balance, but he forced it to the base of the towering wall.

The Seers had watched from their sky-bound fortress as the one rebel among mystery's inventions became frightened of all he'd abandoned. Tammos Raak's fear had led to division, and division to violence. He fled his house, climbed the tallest starcrown, and called for aid from the mystery. The Seers had flown down into the Expanse to smash the starcrowns, dragging Tammos Raak from the stage.

Had mystery come to make puppets of its inventions and drag them back over the wall? No, it would never force its workmanship to comply. That would betray weakness. Fear. And it would make mystery tyrannical.

Controlling the monkey's body as if it were a spindly puppet, Pretor Xa staggered wearily along the base of the city's sky-reaching wall.

Ahead, in the rocks, he saw a crowd of shimmering figures gathered around a body on the ground. Swelling with hatred, he drove himself at the huddled company and they scattered, fading. What remained was a crooked carcass, an open crater smoking where its chest had been. The dead man's face was contorted in anguish, and it was familiar.

This isn't my beloved Ryllion. He's unstitched and gone.

Pretor Xa lost control of his animal shell. He flung himself against the hard ground beside Ryllion's body. Then he raised himself and dashed the monkey's skull against a boulder. He bled into the air, illuminating Ryllion's shell in a soft blue glow.

He'll live beyond my reach and sight, while I must start again. The very best I can accomplish out here ... the mystery suffers and absorbs it. Transforms it.

He looked at the broken shell at his feet.

He looked at the wall of Inius Throan.

29.

THE RING OF TRUST.

ith silent steps King Cal-raven kept to the shadows and followed Scharr ben Fray through the alleys. The old man had said nothing more during the feast, barely touching the bounty offered to him. He moved now like a man who wakes to the smell of smoke and who hastens to fill a bucket with water to save his house, fearing it may be too late.

I've disappointed you, Cal-raven thought. You want me to prepare a place where you can chase your questions, declare your discoveries, and be the revealer of wonders. You'll remain unbound and solitary. I'll be your student and carry the weight of commitment.

But I've seen something you haven't. And my vision for this house no longer corresponds with your plans.

Scharr ben Fray ascended a stair set against the side of a bulky stone structure crowned with spikes. As the mage disappeared through the door at the top, the king paused. For a moment he remembered following Old Soro into the Mawrnash hut, knowing that what he found inside could change everything.

When Cal-raven stepped through into the lantern-lit room, he did not see his teacher. Beneath a suspended lantern, a scroll, glimmering with runes, was spread across a long, leaning table with only three legs standing strong. Beside it waited a large blackstone casket gilded with gold.

The scroll provided a map, and its ancient lines seemed to waver like vines on a breeze as he approached. Inius Throan. And here, he's marked the path down to the enchanted river. He's looking for a way north, through the Forbidding Wall.

He sensed a rush of stonemastery behind him. Scharr ben Fray was sealing the door.

"You needn't have been secretive," said the mage. "I meant for you to come. I've much to show you."

"So I'm a captive audience." Cal-raven shook his head. "You mean to reveal your plans for my house. You're accustomed to having that power over me, knowing I live in a world shaped by your self-serving revelations."

The mage laughed quietly. "Well, if there was any question about who holds power here, you settled that at the feast. House Auralia, eh? I should have known."

Cal-raven turned his back and pointed to the map. "This river ... it's a vulnerability. Viscorclaws are prowling outside the walls, and the river is unguarded."

"It is a problem," sighed Scharr ben Fray. "It should be guarded. But not sealed off."

Cal-raven closed his eyes. "Tell me what you found in Raak's Casket."

"I will show you those things. But let me study them first. They may be a trick of my brother's devising. And you have better things to-"

"You're worried, aren't you? Worried your brother solved a big mystery before you did. You want to be the voice of revelation." He opened his eyes. "Show me what you found in the casket."

Scharr ben Fray narrowed his eyes to golden splinters in the lamplight. "Scroll upon scroll. And they contradict one another. You're asking for confusion at a time when House Auralia needs a decisive, confident king."

"I am confident in this-that all I counted certain might have been a lie, and I am truly skeptical of all I've ever said." He pointed to the casket. "The scrolls. They say Tammos Raak was a liar. Don't they?"

Ah, he thought, watching the struggle in the mage's face. I've surprised you at last.

"I haven't had time to study them closely."

"Now you're a liar too."

Scharr ben Fray looked down at the casket, ran his hand slowly across its golden lid. "Reveler retrieved Raak's casket for me. It has been protected by the Jentan furnace since Tammos Raak sent it to the School for safekeeping. They're his treasures. Why would he keep testimonies that call him a liar?"

"Because they were written by his brothers and sisters," said Cal-raven. "He couldn't bring himself to burn their histories after he slaughtered them."

Cal-raven's words struck the mage hard. He slumped forward, spreading his arms across the casket, huffing like a wolf guarding its den. "You read these scrolls. When I wasn't looking."

"No. But I did find something else your brother meant to hide."

"What?"

"A secret dungeon. Beneath my ... beneath Tammos Raak's chamber. It was sealed for centuries, I think. Until your brother found it. He tried to hide the keyhole by crafting a stone mural over it. But I recognized the recent work. I opened that small dungeon, and when I explored those few cells, I found pictures. Pictures drawn by prisoners that Tammos Raak couldn't bring himself to kill right away. They probably starved in their cells after he fled. But the walls tell their story."

Scharr ben Fray's eyes widened. "You ... saw this?"

"It's a different story than I've ever heard. Tammos Raak led brothers and sisters-not children-from beyond the mountains, down into the Expanse. He lured them from the safety of their homes with promises of wealth and power. They expected pursuit. They expected a fight. Thus, the design of Inius Throan. But only the Keepers followed them. Peaceful guardians, sent to invite them back home with reminders of all they'd left behind. Raak's brothers and sisters were haunted. The Keepers drifted into their dreams and the dreams of their children."

He pointed to the map, tracing the walls of Inius Throan. "These towers, they're for archers. Fourteen of them. Tammos Raak's defiant message that he would shoot down the fourteen Keepers sent to bring him back."

Scharr ben Fray sat still, eyes pressed shut, brow furrowed as if he were trying to wake from a nightmare.

"But life beyond the Wall was hard. The runaways' senses suffered. They saw fewer colors. It was hard to make things grow. They were miserable. Tammos Raak's plan was failing. He was afraid. He was angry. So to preserve his kingdom, he slaughtered those brothers and sisters who opposed him and locked up those he could not bear to lose. Those prisoners would write this story on their walls."

Scharr ben Fray sighed. The strength went out of him. He rose and limped weakly to the solitary window.

"Their children were too young to know what Tammos Raak had done. They were too young to speak or read. Too young to think of opposing him. So he invented a story to tell them about how he had saved them. They grew up ignorant of his crimes."

"There is a letter of appeal in this casket," sighed the mage. "From one of Raak's sisters who followed him to this city. She begged him to let her go home. She said that she was afraid. She had nightmares. The moon was full of faces-leering, jeering phantoms. She said that deceivers had lured them down into the Expanse to destroy them in order to hurt the one who had made them."

"Now you're telling Krawg's story," said Cal-raven quietly. "Isn't it amazing? Krawg swears he made the six tricksters up. But I think it's true. I think that story's hiding here." He tapped the back of his head. "The Seers are tricksters, and they're trying to poison everything good so we don't remember our true home and go searching for it. Their aim is to rule us by making us think we rule ourselves. That way we'll never go home."

"It's a lie," spat the mage. "It has to be. How could Seers have kept us from the truth?"

"They didn't," said Cal-raven. "We've all dreamed of the Keepers. We've all sensed the call. But our pride has made us fearful. And we've resisted."

"Tammos Raak's master must have been a tyrant."

"Remember how we made statues together? You taught me the joy of collaboration. And what about the joy of being a good captain or a good father? Is that tyranny? To serve someone who serves you, for the joy of it?" As he stepped toward the mage, Cal-raven's eyes fell to a canvas contraption folded in the corner. "Is that a kite?"

"It's not a kite," the mage laughed, clearly happy to have kept a secret. "Do you see any strings? I've finished what my brother started. I'll be gliding from mountaintops soon. Escaping the pull of the earth and seeing what nobody has ever seen." He met Cal-raven's gaze. "It could be yours, Cal-raven. You could cast yourself from this tower and soar over the city. The first flying king."

"Don't change the subject," said the king. "Tammos Raak tricked a generation into thinking he had saved them from a curse. In fact, he kept them from their true home and covered up his murder of their parents. He made himself out as their savior when he was just a jealous runaway. A traitor. An interesting trick, don't you think? Seem familiar?"

"It's the strategy that the Seers whispered in Ryllion's ear," said the mage, "as they prepared to conquer Bel Amica. Kill the royals offstage, but onstage present yourself as the kingdom's savior."

"The oldest trick in their library." Cal-raven continued around the table. The mage flinched, but the king only placed a hand on his shoulder. "You've seen how this house is decorated with pictures of cozy places no one would ever need to leave. A world without trouble. Without decay. Without a shadow. Such a world does not inspire people to risk anything or seek out truth. Nor does it acknowledge what we see every day. Our own failures and lies."

Scharr ben Fray pulled away and rounded the table to keep them apart.

"But Auralia's colors ... they reconciled all of the world's broken things into beauty." Cal-raven looked at the folded glider in the corner. "Inius Throan isn't Abascar's true home, my old friend. It's the Seers' last, best trap to prevent us from finding it."

"A good story, Cal-raven," said the mage. "But you know you'll find the lie of it. You'll lose your faith in this just as you lost your faith in the Keeper."

"Oh, I still believe in the Keeper, Teacher," said Cal-raven. "I've just begun to see it-and those like it-as messengers sent to help us. They're works of art and nature, meant to remind us of home. They declare the glory of mysteries we've forgotten. They lure us to new places. Encountering them, we ask questions and venture beyond our self-made borders. They comfort us in the dark. But now I believe that my Keeper was sent, Teacher. Sent by one who waits for us to come home."

"You've the finest imagination I've ever seen," Scharr ben Fray roared. "All of us learn to see shapes among the stars, to connect the dots with lines and name them. It is how our minds work, to impose stories over the chaos so we can live with it. And we always will. Best to choose a good story. Otherwise you end up despairing." The mage suddenly looked older and lost. "Like Ryp," he said.

Cal-raven was silent.

"Ruffleskreigh's returned from Jenta with news. My brother saw Deathweed reach the School. He cast himself from his window. He took flight, for a few moments. Deathweed snatched him from the air." He opened his hands. "Your people may despair if you drive them on to some imagined destination. Tabor Jan's halfway to despair already. Wouldn't it be better to stay? To wrap your people around a new story? You just might save the world from the Deathweed if you do and rescue it from Ryp's surrender."

"It's too late. The master of the Keepers is leading me. I've come this far, and I'm not giving up now. Beauty is leading us home."

"You may find nothing at all. Or else a tyrant who takes away your freedom."

"And I may find the freedom to choose what is best and go on choosing it. All the time. Free of disappointment. Like kites that fly for their master for the joy of it. Without strings."