Black Jade

Black Jade will destroy you.'

He went to say that we couldn't just go strolling into the heart of the Skadarak and pick up the Black Jade from the ground, then smash it with an axe into pieces.

'It was brought here long ago,' he told us. 'It would be buried deep under layers of earth.'

'Unless perhaps it was left in some sort of cavern,' Maram said.

'That is one cavern I wouldn't walk into, and neither would you.' Kane smiled at Maram, but the coldness in his eyes only made Maram shudder. And Kane continued, 'No, I'm certain that the earth has swallowed up the Black Jade. We would have to dig for it.'

Berkuar considered this as he chewed at one of his barbark nuts, then spat into the fire. 'The Crucifier's men mine for gold not far from the Skadarak. What if they've gone into it to mine for something else?'

'No, they would not dare,' Kane said to him. 'And they would not succeed if they did. Morjin would know this. So, it would be as if the Black Jade and the earth have become as one.'

He told us that the black gelstei had surely poisoned the very earth, even as the earth fed the crystal with its own dark fires.

'If you knew all this,' Master Juwain said to him, 'why did you wait until now to tell of it?'

'Because I didn't know,' Kane stared up at the trees beyond the remade fence surrounding us. 'There are many dark places on Ea, eh? I haven't visited them all, and until the droghul spoke of the Skadarak, I knew no more of it than you.'

'But from what we discussed with Master Storr in the library, you must have suspected.'

'So — so what if I did? I think you suspected it, too.'

Master Juwain considered this as he rubbed at his bald head. Then he said to Kane, 'If Morjin's men would not go after the Black Jade, then what about Morjin himself — or one of his droghuls?'

'No, he wouldn't dare, either,' Kane said. 'One must be careful in employing a dragon as an ally, eh? So with the Black Jade. The Lightstone might give him a measure of power over it, but not over the very earth of which it has become a part — not yet. It would be the earth that would devour him.'

He sighed as he looked at Master Juwain, and then added, 'But Angra Mainyu, if he were freed — he would dare. So, and he would claim the Black Jade for himself.'

I took a sip of tea and watched the fire's light playing in the black mirrors of Kane's eyes; I said to him, 'The droghul spoke of a Great Lie and of Angra Mainyu's struggle to become the Marudin. That word is strange to me — do you know what he meant?'

'I do,' Kane told us. His sigh was almost indistinguishable from a growl. 'I've spoken of this before — part of it. Of how Asangal fell into evil out of his love for the world and so became Angra Mainyu. So, and fell even more out of fear and hate. He hated most of all his inevitable end in becoming one of the Ieldra, and cursed the One who had made things so. He cursed creation itself. But death is only part of life, eh? — just as suffering carves hollows in the soul to leave room for joy. You said this once yourself. Angra Mainyu denied this. He called this truth the Great Lie. He vowed to make anew the whole universe in a new creation. He would, himself, although he was only of the Galadik order and had no such power.'

Kane paused to take a drink of his tea. Then his eyes fell upon me as he continued, 'But power he seeks as a bat does blood. All the power of the Ieldra, and more. And he said the greatest part of the Great Lie was that the Galadin should die in becoming the Ieldra. For he believed that there could be another order, beyond that of the Galadin; he called this order the Marudin: they who would not have to die into light, but who would touch all things in lighdt, even as the rays of the sun fall upon the earth. One, and only one, was destined to rule this order as the Marudin. And so rule creation itself.'

He reached into his pocket and brought forth the oval-shaped baalstei that he always kept close to him. 'I've said that the Black Jade is no greater, in size, than this little trinket that I took from that damned Gray. You've seen the seven gelstei that Abrasax and his brethren keep — they are no larger. But the first of the great gelstei that crystallized out of the angel fire at the beginning of time were immense beyond imagining. Immense in power, too. The Ieldra used them to create Eluru. Somewhere, in the stars around Ninsun, the first gelstei still dwell. So, Angra Mainyu would try to use the Black Jade to wrest the power of these crystals from the Ieldra, even as he once tried during the War of the Stone.'

Kane sat staring at the little black gelstei resting in his palm. Estrella and Daj edged up close to him, waiting to hear if he might say anything more. Maram took a swallow of tea, while Berkuar spat yet again into the fire. I listened as the wood there popped and hissed.

'Perhaps,' I said, 'we should find the Black Jade and destroy it.'

'No, Val,' Kane murmured to me, 'that is not possible.'

I went to bed that night telling myself that fighting through Morjin's forces to the north or wading through the Cold Marshes to the south would be much riskier than facing whatever darkness we might find in the Skadarak. But in truth, I didn't really know. And a deeper truth whispered like fire in some far corner of my mind: that I desired to look upon the darkest part of the world and know that the light I held inside would be bright enough to guide me through it.

We set out the next morning toward the west. Although it was late in Ashte, no hint of summer's warmth worked its way into this southern wood. It grew even colder, and the drizzle thickened into a sort of semptiternal gray cloud that enveloped us like a wet blanket. I blinked my eyes against the moistness there, while Maram licked beads of water from his mustache. We plodded along, yard by yard, through the dripping bracken.

Berkuar took the lead, with me close behind, followed by Atara, Master Juwain, Liljana and the children. Maram accompanied Kane, who, despite his wound, insisted on guarding our rear. Berkuar deployed Pittock and Gorman far out in the woods, to our right and left, to cover our flanks. Gorman, on our left, was also to look for sign of the Cold Marshes and give warning if we were about to wander into boggy ground or even quicksands. I led Altaru, the better to keep pace with Berkuar — and to feel solid ground beneath my boots. Then, too, the pain that sliced through my back with every step was slightly less in walking than in having to sit up straight in a jolting saddle.

According to Berkuar's reckoning, we should reach the Cold Marshes after only ten or fifteen more miles, and so it proved to be. We smelled this vast expanse of stagnant water and rotting vegetation long before we saw it. Through the trees wafted a stench that recalled the fetor of the Black Bog. The cloying air seemed to make it worse. Particles of drizzle caught up the reek and deposited it in our nostrils, in our hair and upon our garments. It made breathing itself a nasty trial.

'Whew!' Maiam said as he fanned his hand before his face. 'If it smells this bad here, in the woods, I don't want to know what it would be like to cross these damned Cold Marshes.'

Berkuar called out to him: 'No one crosses the Cold Marshes. Now be quiet, lest you call down a demon upon us!'

Berkuar believed, as did his fellow Greens, that the souls of sorcerers and other evil beings were doomed to linger in the cursed places of the world such as the Cold Marshes. These demons could even take form as werewolves and other beasts that might devour a man or suck out his blood.

'Demons!' I heard Maram mutter from behind me. There came a slap of a hand against flesh. 'That's the fourth mosquito I've sent on in the last half mile, and I've hardly seen one in all of Acadu. Ah, I'm getting a bad feeling about all this. Does no one else remember the Vardaloon? The mosquitoes there were worse than any demons.'

The closer we drew to the pungent reek of the Marshes, the more numerous Maram's least favorite insect grew. They did not descend upon us in clouds and choke our nostrils, as in the Vardaloon, but it seemed that every bush we brushed past disturbed dozens of the little black beasts. They winged through the air as they found their way unerringly to us and settled soft as snowflakes on our hands, brows and hair. Their whine was a torment in our ears.

'You didn't warn us of this,' Maram grumbled to Berkuar as he slapped at his neck. 'Now I know why no one crosses the Marshes!'

Berkuar only smiled at Maram, and then he spat into his hand. He rubbed this juice of the barbark nut over his cheeks and forehead. This vile, red substance seemed to drive away the mosquitoes.

A sudden trill from our left alerted Berkuar that Gorman had found something. We veered off toward Gorman, whose green cloak rendered him almost invisible against the green leaves of a bearberry bush. We walked as