Kestrel fingered the three talismans hanging about his neck. 'This one looks something like a match stick.' He held it out to Milligan. 'Where we come from, it is a mark of great honor, since only a few we call wizards have the capability to build a flame. I suppose that here such skill is also a great rarity. No one such as yourself could hope to accomplish such a feat.'
Milligan cocked his head to one side. 'If it were not for the aura you possessed, I would agree with Jelilac and judge you most insane,' he said. 'Of course I can light a fire. Why, so could any child. It is not a question of ease, but one of law. On all corners of the great sea, a flame is prohibited under penalty of death.'
Kestrel frowned, but Milligan continued. 'The second tenet states that the entropy of luck always increases. There is no way it can be avoided. Each transfer from one to another, even each use that dilutes it back to the ether- all such transferals reduce its potency. The last thing that anyone would want is a flame that completely disorders its fine crystalline structure and renders it useless.
'Why, even an archon could become a pauper, if he approached too close to a fire. Without his luck to guard him, all of his great displays of state on the islands would be washed away by the next giant wave that sweeps across our sea. Even if he possessed the strange book of figures that Myra is reputed to have found, his ships would start to wander aimlessly, missing all of their ports. In the time of a single sigh, he would find that he had come to possess nothing, neither food for his next meal nor even clothing to ward off the chill. And each and every one who but an instant before stooped in the deepest of bows would shun his misfortune, casting him aside and letting him wander to his death, unheralded and alone.
'No, the object of us all is to find ways to increase our luck, to concentrate it into tighter and tighter confines that enhance its potency. It is the only way to survive, to move ahead, and to strive for the mantle of the archon. The fatalists cannot be right. Things should not be left to the will of the cosmos. Outcomes are determined by men with luck; he who has the greatest will certainly emerge the winner.'
'I would think that skill or wit would somehow be important as well,' Kestrel said. Cautiously, he placed one hand on the ladder and looked at the rungs. Perhaps, if the sidebeams were ripped apart they would serve well enough. He smiled inwardly and looked at Astron. It was something the demon probably would have thought of, and yet it came to him first.
'In the dim past, skill and wit did determine the outcome of many events,' Milligan answered. 'We contested by might of arms and clever strategies of state. But then, as our legends record it, wise archon Williard with overwhelming odds was defeated by a force a tenth his size when his horse stepped into the only squirrel hole on the field of battle. An errant arrow hit his second in command in the throat, and, without a leader, the army stumbled into a mire.
'Luck triumphed over all else; and from that day to this, everyone who strives for power concentrates on increasing his own luck and dissipating that of others. Skill and talent mean little to one who can select a marked token from a bowl of thousands with but a single thrust of his hand.'
'Then what need do you have of this experimentation?' Kestrel asked. He placed his hand firmly on each of the ladder's sidebeams and strained outward while smiling in Milligan's direction. 'If starting a fire is of no use, then whatever else of value can we be to you?'
'The means for accumulating and dissipating luck are not written in stone monuments for all to see,' Milligan said. 'It is only by centuries of trial and error that the methods that we use have come to light. Doubtless many more efficient techniques yet remain to be discovered.' He waved his hand in a wide circle. 'Luck is all about us, albeit at very low pressure. Certain actions seem to compress it into smaller volumes and increase its potency to alter events.
'As I have said, when one walks under a ladder, a portion of whatever one possesses leaks out into the ether. Immediately reversing direction prevents the loss before it can transpire.' Milligan paused and ran his tongue over his lips. 'But what if one circled back and walked under the ladder again in the second direction, the one that prevented the loss. Perhaps then the vector of transaction would remained fixed in a positive direction, each circuit under the ladder increasing one's luck, rather than dissipating it away.
'That then is the test. The first of you, I care not which, will walk once under the ladder and then spin the top through the maze. He will be what we call the control. The second will walk once and then immediately reverse before taking the test. The third, after reversing direction, will continue around the mast and back under the overhang a dozen times more. The last will not reverse directions at all but rotate the dozen times in the same sense as the first.'
'What will the spinning top prove?' Kestrel asked while he slid his arms up the ladder to feel another rung.
'It is a test of luck, to be sure,' Milligan said. 'The spinning top caroms through the compartments in a manner that no one can predict, scattering pins at random. The count of how many are felled is the measure we wish to monitor. If all the pins are toppled before the one attached to the blade, then the game is stopped and you are lucky indeed.'
'And if the blade topples,' Kestrel said. 'What does that prove?'
'The finger you place in the hole will be severed, a most unlucky outcome,' Milligan said. He looked quickly back at the maze on the table and then smiled at Kestrel. 'The beauty of it is that you all have ten. We will be able to run some forty trials before we are done.'
Kestrel decided he had heard enough. It did not matter if the others were fully alert or not. With or without oars, they must be away. 'Astron,' he yelled, 'unlash the dory. Get it back over the side.' With a grunt he twisted the ladder from its resting place and crashed it downward on the middle of the table, hoping that the force of the blow would break it apart.
The ladder bounced harmlessly off of the horizontal surface, however, the bottom end kicking up painfully into Kestrel's thigh. He staggered a single step and then sagged to one knee, his leg refusing to give him support. As he fell, he pushed at Phoebe, propelling her forward toward the gunwale where the dory was lashed. He rolled over on his back, expecting to see Milligan spring at him with some weapon, but he saw instead the little man feverishly fingering the brightest talisman which hung from his neck.
'Jelilac, Jelilac,' Milligan screamed. 'They are followers of Byron. Despite the great auras they once possessed, they follow Byron, to be sure.'
Kestrel rose to kneeling and grabbed Nimbia about the shoulder. Crawling with one hand on the deck, he urged her in the direction he had pushed Phoebe. Looking forward, he saw Astron fumbling with the mooring knots, apparently not making any progress in getting them untied. Two seamen cautiously came forward, their fingers outflexed and reaching for the thongs of leather about Nimbia's neck. Kestrel staggered erect and pointed wildly into the sky. 'Look,' he shouted. 'Not one shooting star, but two. Not to witness it is a great misfortune.'
He held his breath for an instant, but the two sailors were totally unaccustomed to such a blatant deception. As one, they turned and began searching the clouds. Kestrel limped forward a single step. As he felt his Ieg again give way, he staggered against the nearest of the seamen. A ring on the sailor's hand scratched his cheek as he fell. Concentrating as hard as he could, he managed to grab hold of the loops and chains about his neck and pull the man to the ground.
Kestrel gathered up as many talismans in his hands as he could manage. With a back-wrenching yank, he snapped them from the seaman's neck. The sailor screamed. With an almost animal fury, he began clawing at Kestrel's arms to get them back.
Kestrel flung them in the direction of the dory; although several went over the gunwale, two landed at Astron's feet. Almost immediately the knot on the last fetter unraveled. The demon quickly reached down and grasped the bow in the cradle of his arms and hoisted it up over the low railing. Phoebe and Nimbia reached the stern and lifted it up as well. In an instant, the small boat splashed down onto the waves.
Kestrel crawled forward to the gunwale, blocking out the seaman who scrambled on the deck with him to retrieve the two talismans that remained. Kestrel reached to scoop them up a second time but grimaced as sharp splinters from the deck dug into his palm.
Astron bent down, grasped the talismans tightly in one hand, and then grabbed Kestrel by the arm with the other. Kestrel reached out for Phoebe and Nimbia. Without thinking further, they jumped together over the side.
The salt water stung Kestrel's cheek when he hit, but he paid it no heed. Lashing out blindly, he felt the side of the dory and grasped for a hold. Through sea-spattered hair, he saw Milligan leaning over the rail, cupping his hands to his mouth.
