The man put the coat aside and came over. ‘Take your time. There’s water here.’ He brought a jug and cup, and poured. As he held it out Jared saw that the right forefinger of his hand was missing; a smooth scar seamed the knuckle.
‘Only a little, Master. It’s very cold.’ Jared barely felt the shock to his throat. As he drank he watched the dark-haired man and the man stared back, a rueful, sad smile.
‘Thank you.’
‘There’s a well just near here. The best water in the Realm.’
‘How long have I been here?’
‘There’s no time here, remember. Time seems to be forbidden in the Realm.’ He sat back, and there were feathers stuck to him, and his eyes were steady and obsessive as a hawk’s.
‘You are Sapphique,’ Jared said quietly.
‘I took that name in the Prison.’
‘Is that where we are?’ Sapphique pulled plumage from his hair. ‘This is a prison, Master. Whether it’s Inside or Out, I’ve learnt, is not really important. I fear they both may be the same.’ Jared struggled to think. He had been riding in the Forest.
There were many outlaws in the Forest, many woodwoses and madmen. Those who couldn’t bear the stagnation of Era, who wandered as beggars. Was this one of them?
Sapphique sat back, his legs stretched out. In the firelight he was young and pale, his hair lank with the forest—damp.
‘But you Escaped,’ Jared said. ‘Finn has told me some of the tales they tell about you in there, in Incarceron.’ He rubbed at his face and found it rough, faintly stubbled. How long had he been here?
‘There are always stories.’
‘They’re not true?’ Sapphique smiled. ‘You’re a scholar, Jared. You know that the word truth is a crystal, like the Key. It seems transparent, but it has many facets. Different lights, red and gold and blue, flicker in its depths. Yet it unlocks the door.’
‘The door. . . You found a secret door, they say.’ Sapphique poured more water. ‘How I searched for it. I spent whole lifetimes searching. I forgot my family, my home; I gave blood, tears, a finger. I made myself wings and I flew so high the sky struck me down. I fell so far into the dark that there seemed no ending to the -abyss. And yet in the end, there it was, a tiny plain door in the Prison’s heart.
The emergency exit. Right there all the time.’ Jared sipped the cold water. This must be a vision, like Finn had in his seizures. He himself was probably lying delirious now in the dark rainy woodland. And yet could it be so real?
‘Sapphique .. . I must ask you...’
‘Ask, my friend.’
‘The door. Can all the Prisoners leave by it? Is that possible?’ But Sapphique had gathered the feathered coat and was examining its holes. ‘Each man has to find it himself, as I did.’ Jared lay back. He tugged the blanket around him, shivering and tired. In the Sapient tongue he said softly, ‘Tell me, Master, did you know Incarceron was tiny?’
‘Is it?’ Sapphique replied in the same language, his green eyes as he looked up lit by deep points of flame. ‘To you, perhaps. Not to its Prisoners. Every prison is a universe for its inmates. And think, Jared Sapiens. Might not the Realm also be tiny, swinging from the watchchain of some being in a world even vaster? Escape is not enough; it does not answer the questions. It is not Freedom. And so I will repair my wings and fly away to the stars. Do you see them?’ He pointed, and Jared drew in a breath of awe, because there they were, all around him, the galaxies and nebulae, the thousands of constellations he had so often watched through the powerful telescope in his tower, the glittering brilliance of the universe.
‘Do you hear their song?’ Sapphique murmured.
But only the silence of the Forest came to them, and Sapphique sighed. ‘Too far away. But they do sing, and I will hear that music.’ Jared shook his head. Weariness was creeping over him, and the old fear. ‘Perhaps Death is our escape
‘Death is a door, certainly.’ Sapphique stopped threading a blue feather and looked at him. ‘You fear death, Jared?’
‘I fear the way to it.’ The narrow face seemed all angles in the firelight. It said, ‘Don’t let the Prison wear my Glove, use my hands, speak with my face. Whatever you have to do, do not allow that.’ There were so many questions Jared wanted to ask. But they scuttled away from him like rats into holes and he closed his eyes and lay back. Like his own shadow, Sapphique leant beside him.
‘Incarceron never sleeps. It dreams, and its dreams are terrible. But it never sleeps.’ He barely heard. He was falling down the telescope, through its convex lenses, into a universe of galaxies.
Rix blinked.
He paused, barely for a second.
Then he slashed the sword down. Attia flinched arid screamed but it whistled behind her and sliced the ropes that held her to Keiro, nicking her wrist so that it bled. ‘What the hell are you doing?’ she gasped, scrambling away.
The magician didn’t even look at her. He pointed the trembling blade at Keiro. ‘What did you say?’ If Keiro was amazed he didn’t show it. He stared straight back, and his voice was cool and careful. ‘I said, what’s the Key that unlocks the heart. What’s the matter, Rix? Can’t answer your own riddle?’ Rix was white. He turned and walked in a rapid circle and came back. ‘That’s it. It’s you. It’s you!’
‘What’s me?’
‘How can it be you? I don’t want it to be you! For a while I thought it might be her: He jabbed the blade at Attia. ‘But she never said it, never came near saying it!’ He paced another frantic circle.
Keiro had drawn his knife. Hacking at the ropes on his ankles he muttered, ‘He’s barking.’ No. Wait.’ Attia watched Rix, her eyes wide. ‘You mean the Question, don’t you? The Question you once told me only your Apprentice would ever ask you. That was it? Keiro asked it?’
‘He did.’ Rix couldn’t seem to keep still. He was shivering, his long fingers gripping and loosening on the swordhilt. ‘It’s him. It’s you.’ He tossed the sword down and hugged himself. ‘A Scum thief is my Apprentice:
‘We’re all scum,’ Keiro said. ‘if you think...’ Attia silenced him with a glare. They had to be so t careful here.
He undid the ropes and stretched his feet out with a grimace. Then he leant back and she saw he understood. lie smiled his most charming smile. ‘Rix. Please sit down.’ The lanky magician collapsed and huddled up like a spider. His utter dismay almost made Attia want to laugh aloud, and yet she felt sorry for him. Some dream that had kept him going for years had come true, and he was devastated in his disappointment.
‘This changes everything.’
‘I should think so.’ Keiro tossed the knife to Attia. ‘So I’m the sorcerer’s apprentice, am I? Well, it might come in useful.’ She scowled at him. Joking was stupid. They had to use this.
‘What does it mean?’ Keiro leant forward, his shadow huge on the cave wall.
‘It means revenge is forgotten.’ Rix stared blankly into the flames. ‘The Art Magicke has rules. It means I have to teach you all my tricks. All the substitutions, the replications, the illusions. How to read minds and palms and leaves. How to disappear and reappear.’
‘How to saw people in half?’
‘That too.’
‘Nice.’
‘And the secret writings, the hidden craft, the alchemies, the names of the Great Powers. How to raise the dead, how to live for ever. How to make gold pour from a donkey’s ear.’ They stared at his rapt, gloomy face. Keiro raised an eyebrow at Attia. They both knew how precarious this was.
Rix was unstable enough to kill; their lives depended on his whims. And he had the Glove.
Gently she said, ‘So we’re all friends again now?’
‘You!’ He glared at her. ‘Not you!’
‘Now now, Rix.’ Keiro faced him. ‘Attia’s my slave. She does what I say.’ She swallowed her fury and glanced away. He was enjoying this. He would tease Rix within inches of Insanity; then grin and charm the danger away. She was trapped here between them, and she had to stay, because of the Glove.
