He picked up the half-sphere and put it in his pack. Sephris watched it vanish into the pack the way a man might watch his lover's back fade into the distance.
Cale looked at Sephris, then looked at the halfling and said, 'Jak, let me have a moment.'
Surprised, Jak looked a question at him but nodded. Without a backward glance, he exited the library.
Before Cale could say anything, Sephris said, 'You are a priest, aren't you, Erevis? I could calculate the answer but I'm very tired and it would be easier if you would simply tell me.'
Cale nodded and asked, 'How did you know?'
Sephris chuckled, 'I can see the abhorrence on your face.'
Cale started to protest but Sephris held up his hand and shook his head.
'I'm all too familiar with it,' Sephris said. 'You see in me what you fear you may become. Only another priest has that fear. Only priests are wise enough to fear, rather than covet, the gifts the gods may give.'
'The little man-Jak-is also a priest,' said Cale. 'You didn't see the same fear in him?'
Sephris waved his hand dismissively. 'He is a seventeen. A seventeen is prime, evenly divisible by only itself and one, at least among whole numbers. Do you see? A seventeen is not divided in his soul. He is at peace because he already knows what he is. He is not becoming. He is what he is supposed to be. Do you want to know what number you are?'
Cale knew that whatever he was, he was not a prime number, but some number divisible by two. Cale's soul and his loyalties were divided, and he knew it. Light and darkness warred in him, man and god, faith and independence.
'No,' he said, a bit more harshly than he had intended.
Sephris accepted that without a word.
Cale had planned to ask Sephris what he meant when he had called him the 'First of Five,' but he decided then and there that he didn't want to know. He didn't want to plumb any deeper into Sephris's thought processes. He did not want to plumb any deeper into his own nature. Except….
'Was it worth it?' Cale asked. 'Oghma's gift?'
Had Mask granted Cale a 'gift' of the sort that Oghma had bestowed on Sephris, Cale would have hated him for it.
Sephris nodded. He took Cale's meaning.
'That is a fundamentally flawed question, Erevis. Do you know why?'
Cale shook his head.
'Because it implies a choice.'
Mentally, Cale rejected Sephris's statement. He insisted on believing that at some point choice entered into the equation.
Cale said, 'I'm not a determinist, Sephris.'
Sephris smiled softly. 'Then let me answer you this way. Serving a god brings many rewards, but it also demands a price, always a price. The price I paid-' he sighed, a sound both contented and fatigued-'is simply more apparent to you than the price you have paid … and will pay.'
To that, Cale could think of nothing to say. He found that his hand was in his pocket, clutching his mask. He released it as if it was white hot.
Sephris leaned back in his chair, closed his eyes, and said nothing further. Cale took that as an invitation to leave.
'Thank you for your help, loremaster. If we get the other half of the sphere …'
Sephris smiled, though he still kept his eyes closed, and said, 'Then we will speak again.'
Cale turned to go. The library didn't appear as disorganized before.
When he laid his hand on the door handle, Sephris called to him, 'One last piece of advice, Erevis. Listen carefully, for here is the key to understanding Fate.' He paused before he said, 'Two and two are four.'
Cale gave a smile. If only it was that simple.
'I don't believe in Fate, loremaster.'
Sephris opened his eyes then and said, 'That is only because you cannot yet do the math.'
Outside, Jak didn't ask Cale what transpired between he and Sephris. Instead, the halfling and Cale filled Riven in on events. The assassin took it in without a word.
Afterward, he said, 'So the sphere tells the time that something will occur. But we don't know what the something is and we don't know where it will happen.'
Cale nodded. Almost involuntarily, all three glanced skyward, though no stars were visible in the daytime sky.
Jak took out his pipe and tamped it.
'But we can be sure it's not good,' the halfling said.
At that, Riven scoffed. Cale suspected that the assassin didn't care if what Vraggen sought from the sphere was good or otherwise. He only wanted to kill the wizard whose spell had made him afraid. Cale would just have to use that.
Jak struck a tindertwig and puffed on his pipe. The pipeweed's aroma filled the overgrown yard.
'Cale,' Jak said, 'we can't give them the sphere.'
'Still thinking like a Harper, Fleet?' Riven asked with a sneer. 'What do we care what this sphere signals? Worried about the innocent?'
Jak blew smoke in Riven's direction. He started to frame a reply, but Cale's hand on his shoulder cut him off.
'Little man, he's just goading you,' Cale said. 'It's his way. Just leave it alone.'
Cale shot Riven a contemptuous glance.
'We can't turn over the sphere,' Jak repeated. 'They aren't human, at least some of them aren't, and we don't know what they plan to do.' He shot a heated glare at Riven and added, 'And burn him if he won't think about innocents. Wearing a pin didn't make me what I was, Drasek Riven, and resigning from the Network doesn't change what you are.'
Riven only sneered.
Cale found that he too was concerned about innocent lives, and that realization pleased him. But there were more selfish reasons at work. He wanted to stop Azriim and Vraggen-kill them-for personal reasons. They had invaded Stormweather Towers, murdered guards, kidnapped Ren, and tried to incinerate he and Riven at the Stag. They had earned his wrath. For that, they would all die.
Cale patted Jak's shoulder and said, 'We're not giving them the sphere, little man, or at least we're not letting them keep it. We get Ren back safely and kill them all, under the leaves of the Elm. That solve your problem?'
'Solves mine,' Riven said, and he winked at Fleet.
Jak blew smoke rings at him and said, 'You couldn't solve two and two with an abacus, Zhent.'
Jak's choice of words gave Cale gooseflesh.
'We've got a day,' Cale said. 'Let's get ready.'
CHAPTER 10
Cale sat in the chair in their room at the Lizard, preparing for communion with his god. Jak and Riven were already asleep in their cots. Cale was to wake Riven before dawn, but doubted he would. He knew he would not be able to sleep that night.
No candle lit the room but Selune's light through the shutter slats cast silver lines on the floor. Cale waited. Though Selgaunt's churches stopped tolling after the tenth hour, Cale knew intuitively when the midnight hour began. A benefit of serving the Lord of Shadows, he supposed.
He calmed himself, and cleared his mind. Time passed. When midnight arrived, a cloud passed before Selune
