He drew himself up as straight as a king and pointed his sword at the door to Morjin's chambers. And a single, terrible cry broke from his throat like thunder and shook the hall:
'KALKIN!'
'Do you hear that, Morjin! My name is Kalkin, and I've come to return you to the stars!'
It hurt my ears to hear him shout this name; it hurt my heart. As the hall fell silent again, we all looked at him in amazement And then Master Juwain, who had a better memory than any of us, turned to him and said, 'The Damitan Elu speaks of Kalkin.
He was one of the heroes of the first Lightstone quest.'
I suddenly remembered King Kiritan telling of this in his great hall-of how Morjin had led heroes on the first quest, only to fall mad upon beholding the Lightstone and slaying Kalkin and all the others – all except the immortal Kalkamesh.
As Master Juwain began recounting this ancient tale, Kane shook his sword at him and cut him off. He said, 'I've warned you that many of these ancient histories do not tell true. Morjin never led that quest. And he did not kill Kalkin, as you can see.'
'I don't know what I see,' Master Juwain said, looking at him strangely. 'If you're not Kalkamesh, then whatever happened to him?'
'I happened to him!' Kane said. 'Do you understand? After the first quest, Kalkin became Kalkamesh. And an age later, after the Sarburn, when Kalkamesh cast Alkaladur into the sea, he became Kane, do you understand?'
As I looked down at my sword, my amazement deepened. And then I squeezed the Lightstone more tightly in my hand as I asked him, 'But if you are really Kalkin, didn't the touch of this cup bestow upon you immortality?'
Kane, or the man that I had known by that name, began pacing about like a caged tiger as he cast quick, ferocious glances at the doors of the hall. He suddenly stopped and snarled out 'Listen, damn you, and listen well – we haven't much time.'
He stared down at the blackish blood pooled on the floor as if looking far into the past. Then he looked up and said, 'Once there was a band of brothers, a sacred band.'
He nodded at Master Juwain and went on, 'We were not of any of your Brotherhoods; ours was much older. So, much older, much more glorious, I, you – you can't understand…'
From beyond the hall's western gate came a pounding as of many boots against stone. We all pressed closer to Kane to hear what he had to tell us.
'I will say their names, for they should be heard at least once in every age,' Kane said. 'There were twelve of us: Sarojin, Averin, Manjin, Balakin and Durrikin. And Iojin, Mayin, Baladin, Nurijin and Garain.' 'That's only ten,' Maram pointed out.
'The eleventh was myself,' Kane said. He pointed at the door to Morjin's chambers.
'And you know the name of the twelfth.'
Now many voices shouted from beyond the hall's eastern doors. I knew that we should be searching for the secret passage that Liljana had spoken of. But the gleam of my sword, in whose silver I saw reflected the Lightstone, gave me to understand that it was somehow more important to listen to Kane.
'We came to Tria early in the Age of Swords,' Kane told us. 'So, it was a savage time, even worse than this. Manjin was killed in a Sarni raid. Mayin was murdered on the Gray Prairies looking for clues as to where Aryu had taken the Lightstone.
Nurijin, Dunikin, Baladin, and Sarojin, Balakin, too, and then even Iojin, sweet beloved Iojin – all killed. All except Garain and Averjin, who set out with Morjin and Kalkin on a ship captained by Bramu Rologar to seek the Lightstone.'
Kane paused to stare at the cup that I held, and then continued, 'And find it we did.
The Lightstone was made to be found. But on the voyage back to Tria, Morjin enlisted the aid of Captain Rologar and his men to kill Averin and Garain. So, and Kalkin, too. But Kalkin was harder to kill, eh? So, he killed Captain Rologar and four of his men and damned himself, do you understand? He killed, in violence to his soul, killed men, before Morjin stabbed him in the back and cast him into the sea.'
Now, beyond the hall's northern door, came a clamor as of shields banging together.
I knew that I, or all of us, should begin cutting arrows out of the dead in the event that Atara miraculously regained her second sight.
Instead, I nodded at Kane and asked him, 'But how did Kalkin live to tell such a tale?'
'The dolphins saved him. They were friends with men, once upon a time.'
'But that still doesn't explain Kalkin's immortality,' I pointed out.
Master Juwain, ever the student of history, caught Kane's eyes and said, 'You've recounted that Kalkin and his band of brothers came to Tria early in the Age of Swords. But the first quest took place late in that age, didn't it?'
'So,' Kane said, his eyes flashing, 'so.'
'Hundreds of years later,' Master Juwain said. 'But if Kaikin and Morjin, and the others as well, lived all that time, then they didn't gain their immortality by touching -'
'The Lightstone has no such power!' Kane suddenly shouted, cutting him off.
'Haven't I made that clear?'
'Then how,' Master Juwain asked, 'did Kalkin become immortal?'
'The way that men do,' Kane told htm. 'By becoming more than men.'
It was as if a cold wind had fallen down from the nighttime sky and found the flesh along the back of my neck. A shiver, like a lightning bolt made of ice, ran up and down my spine. I stood staring at Kane waiting for him to say more.
'It was the Galadin who sent us here to recover the Lightstone,' he told us. 'For them, who were immortal and could not be killed, Ea was deemed too perilous. For us, who were merely immortal, this world proved to be perilous enough, eh?'
How was it possible, I wondered? How was it possible that this man who stood before us grim, angry, pained and still dripping with the blood of those whom he had slain – could be one of the blessed Elijin?
'Five men Kalkin put to the sword, eh? But we were forbidden to kill men. And so in breaking with the Law of the One, Kalkin broke with the One, perhaps forever.'
Kane stared at the cup in my hand, and there was an immense and endless blackness inside him waiting to be filled with light. How long he had been waiting, I thought!
For he, who had once held the Lightstone and had beheld its perfect radiance even as I had, had been cast into a lightless void and had endured a dark night of the soul that had lasted nearly seven thousand years.
Maram, suddenly understanding this, gazed at Kane in awe. 'No wonder you fought so hard to bring us here to recover the Lightstone.'
'Ha!' Kane called out. 'I never thought we would find the Lightstone here. I never believed the account of Master Aluino's journal. I knew Sartan Odinan, and I never thought it possible that his greed would have permitted him simply to drop the Lightstone down on top of Morjin's damn throne.'
Maram looked at him nervously and said, 'If that's true, then you must have wanted
– '
'Revenge!' Kane cried out. He raised up his bloody sword and swept it about the hall. 'I came here to put this into Morjin's treacherous heart! Does anyone deserve death more? What's one more murder against all those I have slain?'
'Perhaps,' I said, remembering Atara's warning, 'one too many.'
'You say that?' growled at me, looking at my sword. 'How many have you slain with that today?'
'Too many,' I said as I looked about the hall. Then I held Alkaladur out toward him and said, 'If you are really Kalkamesh, then you forged this sword. And so it is yours.'
'No, it's yours now. You're better at killing with it than I ever was,'
'But if you were to take it back, the silver gelstei might -'
'It's not your damn bloody sword I want!' he thundered at me. There was a strange, faraway look in his eyes – and the faint fire of madness, too. 'It's not the silver gelstei that I want.'
Now the red flames in his eyes built hotter as he stared at the Lightstone. His voice filled with anger and a
