Legacy of the Darksword - Margaret Weis [28]
Smythe was witty and effervescent and brought light and air into our house, which seemed gloomy and suffocating by contrast. He undoubtedly knew what terrible things the King and the General had been saying about him and he didn’t care. Smythe spoke no word in his own defense, he said nothing against either of them. In fact, he greeted them both with deference and pleasure. In their cold and stilted greeting of him, they seemed, by contrast, ungracious, bitter, twisted.
“Father Saryon.” Kevon Smythe took my master’s hand and a radiance shone from him that engulfed Saryon, who actually blinked, as if looking into a blinding light. “I am honored to meet you at long last. I have heard much of you, all good, and of Joram. It is a subject that fascinates me. Tell me, Father,” he said as he accepted a proffered seat in a chair, not on the couch where sat the other two, stiff and upright. “Tell me the story of Joram and of the Darksword. I know bits of it, but I would like to hear it from your own lips.
“I am sorry to say, Reuven,” he added, looking at me, “that I have not read your account, of which I’ve had the most favorable reports. My time is such that it does not give me leisure to read as much as I would like. Your books are in a prominent place in my library, and someday, when the pressures of leadership are removed, I look forward to reading them.”
It was very odd, but I felt a glow of pleasure suffuse me, as if he had paid my books the best of compliments, when—in bald truth—part of me knew perfectly well that he had undoubtedly received distilled accounts of what was in the books from his subordinates and that, though he might indeed own them, he had no intention of ever looking at them.
What was even stranger was that he was aware of the dichotomy of feelings he produced in others and that he did so on purpose. I was fascinated and repulsed at the same time. In his presence, all other men, including the King and the General, appeared petty and ordinary. And although I liked and trusted them and I did not like and did not trust him, I had the uneasy impression that if he called me, I would follow.
Saryon felt the same. I knew because he was talking about Joram, something he was always very reluctant to do with any stranger.
“. . . Thimhallan was founded by the wizard Merlyn as a land where those blessed with the art of magic could live in peace, using that art to create beautiful things. There were Nine Mysteries of Life present in the world, then. Each person born into that world was gifted with one of these mysteries.”
Kevon Smythe’s lips parted, he whispered beneath his breath the number “thirteen” and a chill went over me. The Four Dark Cults, who had remained behind, would have made the number thirteen.
Saryon, unconscious of the interruption, continued on. “There are Nine Mysteries, eight of them deal with Life or Magic, for, in the world of Thimhallan, Life is Magic. Everything that exists in this land exists either by the will of the Almin, who placed it here before even the ancients arrived, or has since been either ‘shaped, formed, summoned, or conjured,’ these being the four Laws of Nature. These Laws are controlled through at least one of the eight of the Mysteries: Time, Spirit, Air, Fire, Earth, Water, Shadow, and Life. Of these Mysteries, only the first five currently survived at the time of the Darksword’s creation. The Mysteries of Time and Spirit were lost during the Iron Wars. With them vanished the knowledge possessed by the ancients— the ability to divine the future and the ability to communicate with those who had passed from this life into Beyond.
“As for the last Mystery, it is practiced, but only by those who walk in darkness. Known as Death, its other name is Technology.”
“Quaint.” Kevon Smythe was amused.