I replied slowly. “I think I do. You are not allowed to be the one who makes the changes. You were the White Prophet of your time, not the Changer.”
“Yes. Yes, that it is!” He smiled at me. “And this time is not mine. But it is yours, to be the Changer, and his to see the way and guide you. You did. And the new path found is. He pays the cost.” His voice sank, not in sorrow, but in acknowledgment. I bowed my head to his words.
He patted my shoulder and I looked up at him. He smiled the smile of age. “And on we go,” he assured me. “Into new times! New paths, beyond all visions. This is a time I never saw, nor she, she who me deceived. This, she never seen has. Only your Prophet has seen this way! The new path, beyond the dragons rising.” He gave a sudden deep sigh. “High the price was for you, but it has been paid. Go. Find what is left of him. To leave him there . . .” The ancient man shook his head. “That is not to be.” He gestured again. “Changer, go. Even now, I dare not the change-maker be. While you live, it is only for you. Now, go.” He gestured at my pack and at his door. He smiled.
Then, without any further talk, he eased himself down onto the Fool's bedding and stretched out before the fire.
I felt oddly torn. I was weary and the Black Man created just such an isle of rest as the Fool would have. And yet, in that comparison, I once more felt the urgency to put it all to a final end. I wished I had known I was leaving him; I would have warned Thick what to expect. Yet somehow, I did not think he would be alarmed to awaken here and find me gone.
Leaving him felt inevitable. I put on my still chilly outer garments, and shouldered my pack again. I looked once more around the Black Man's tiny home and could not help but contrast it to the splendor of the Pale Woman's glacial domain. Then, my heart smote me that my friend's body was still discarded in that icy place. I went out quietly into the deep gray of the night, shutting the door firmly behind me.
Chapter 28
CATALYST
In a backwater of the river there, not far from the Rain Wilders' city, lie huge logs of what is known as Wizard Wood. The sailor told me that it is a sort of husk that the serpents make in the process of becoming dragons. Much magical power is ascribed to this so-called wood. Artifacts made from it may eventually acquire a life of their own; it is said that the Liveships of the Bingtown Traders were originally made from such wood. Ground to a dust and exchanged by lovers, it is said to allow them to share dreams. Ingested in a larger quantity, it is said to be poisonous. When I asked why such valuable stuff would be left lying in a riverbed, the sailor told me that the dragon Tintaglia and her litter guard it as if it were gold. It would be worth a man's life, he told me, to steal so much as a sliver of the stuff. My effort to bribe him to get me some met with resounding failure.
— SPY'S REPORT TO CHADE FALLSTAR, UNSIGNED
The Black Man was right. No night could hide my path from me.
Nevertheless, it was a challenge to tread his narrow cliffside trail in the darkness. While I had lingered inside, slow rills of water had crept across it to become serpents of ice under my feet. Twice I nearly fell, and when I was at the bottom, I looked back up, marveling that I had descended without a mishap.
And I saw my way. Or, at least, the start of it. Higher in the cliff face and past the Black Man's door, a very pale blush of light emanated from the ice-draped stone. I shuddered at its dreadful familiarity. Then with a sigh, I turned back to the steep footpath.
Even by day, it would have been a nasty climb. My brief rest in the Black Man's cavern seemed to have more sapped my energy than restored it. I thought, more than once, of going back into the warmth and comfort of his home, to sleep until morning. I did not think of it as something I could do but rather as something that I wished I could do. Now that I was so close to my goal, I was oddly reluctant to confront it. I had put a little wall of time between my grief and me. I knew that tonight, I would look my loss in the face and embrace the full impact of it. In strange anticipation, I wanted it to be over.
When I finally reached the softly glimmering crack in the wall, I found that the opening was barely large enough for me to enter. The slow slide of water down the rock face was icing it gradually closed. I suspected that it must be a near daily task for the Black Man to keep this entrance clear enough to use.
I drew my belt knife and clashed away enough of the icy curtain that I could just squeeze through. My pack scraped. Once I was inside, I still had to turn my body sideways and edge forward toward the pale light, dragging my pack behind me. The crack widened very gradually, and when I looked back the way I had come, it did not look like a promising exit. If I had not known otherwise, I would have said that the crack came to an end with no outlet. The crack narrowed and then bent slightly before it intersected with a corridor of worked stone. One of the Pale Woman's globes gleamed there; it was the straying light from that orb which had beckoned me into this place.
