Enchanted Pilgrimage (7 page)

“Humans, however, have traveled in the Wasteland,” said Gib. “There was that old traveler who wrote the tale that Mark read.”

“He would have to have had a powerful talisman,” said Sniveley. “Has this friend of yours a talisman?”

“I do not think he has. He never spoke of it.”

“Then he truly is insane. He has not even the excuse of treasure, of finding some great treasure. All he seeks are the Old Ones. And tell me, what will he do if he finds the Old Ones?”

“The ancient traveler did not seek treasure, either,” said Gib. “He simply went to see what he could find.”

“Then he was insane as well. Are you certain there is no way to dissuade this human friend of yours?”

“I think not. There is no way, I am sure, that one could stop him.”

“Then,” said Sniveley, “he does have need of a sword.”

“You mean you'll sell it to me?”

“Sell it to you? Do you know the price of it?”

“I have some credit with you,” said Gib. “Drood has credit. There are others in the marsh who would be willing …”

“Take three marshes like the one down there,” said Sniveley, “and there would not be credit enough in all of them to buy the sword. Do you know what went into it? Do you know the care and craftsmanship and the magic that was used?”

“Magic?”

“Yes, magic. Do you think that a weapon such as it could be shaped by hands and fire alone, by hammer or by anvil?”

“But my ax—”

“Your ax was made with good workmanship alone. There was no magic in it.”

“I am sorry,” Gib said, “to have bothered you.”

Sniveley snorted and flapped his ears. “You do not bother me. You are an old friend, and I will not sell the sword to you. I will give it to you. Do you understand what I am saying? I will give it to you. I will throw in a belt and scabbard, for I suppose this down-at-heels human has neither one of them. And a shield as well. He will need a shield. I suppose he has no shield.”

“He has no shield,” said Gib. “I told you he has nothing. But I don't understand.…”

“You underestimate my friendship for the People of the Marshes. You underestimate my pride in matching a sword of my fabrication against the howling horrors of the Wasteland, and you underestimate, as well, my admiration for a puny little human who, from his studies, must know what the Wasteland is and yet is willing to face it and its denizens for some farfetched dream.”

“I still don't understand you fully,” said Gib, “but I thank you just the same.”

“I'll get the sword,” said Sniveley, rising from his chair. He was scarcely on his feet when another gnome, wearing a heavy leather apron and who, from the soot on his hands and face, had been working at a forge, came bursting unceremoniously into the room.

“We have visitors,” he screamed.

“Why must you,” asked Sniveley, a little wrathfully, “make so great a hullabaloo about visitors? Visitors are nothing new.…”

“But one of them is a goblin,” screamed the other gnome.

“So one of them is a goblin.”

“There are no goblins nearer than Cat Den Point, and that is more than twenty miles away.”

“Hello, everyone,” said Hal of the Hollow Tree. “What is all the ruckus?”

“Hello, Hal,” said Gib. “I was about to come to see you.”

“You can walk back with me,” said Hal. “How are you, Sniveley? I brought a traveler—Oliver. He's a rafter goblin.”

“Hello, Oliver,” said Sniveley. “And would you please tell me just what in hell is a rafter goblin? I've heard of all sorts of goblins …”

“My domicile,” said Oliver, “is the rafters in the roof atop the library at the University of Wyalusing. I have come here on a quest.”

Coon, who had been hidden from view, walking sedately behind Hal, made a beeline for Gib and leaped into his lap. He nuzzled Gib's neck and nibbled carefully at his ears. Gib batted at him. “Cut it out,” he said. “Your whiskers tickle and your teeth are sharp.” Coon went on nibbling.

“He likes you,” said Hal. “He has always liked you.”

“We have heard of a pack-train killing,” said the goblin, Oliver. “Word of it put much fear in me. We came to inquire if you might have the details.”

Sniveley made a thumb at Gib. “He can tell you all about it. He found one human still alive.”

Oliver swung on Gib. “There was one still alive? Is he still alive? What might be his name?”

“He is still alive,” said Gib. “His name is Mark Cornwall.”

Oliver slowly sat down on the floor. “Thank all the powers that be,” he murmured. “He is still alive and well?”

“He took a blow on the head,” said Gib, “and a slash on his arm, but both head and arm are healing. Are you the goblin that he told me of?”

“Yes, I am. I advised him to seek out a company of traders and to flee with them. But that was before I knew to whom that cursed monk sold his information. Much good that it did him, for he got his throat slit in the bargain.”

“What is going on?” squeaked Sniveley. “What is all this talk of throat slitting and of fleeing. I dislike the sound of it.”

Quickly Oliver sketched the story for him. “I felt that I was responsible for the lad,” he said. “After all, I got myself involved …”

“You spoke,” said Gib, “of this human to whom the monk sold his information.”

“That's the crux of it,” said Oliver. “He calls himself Lawrence Beckett and pretends to be a trader. I don't know what his real name is, and I suppose it does not matter, but I know he's not a trader. He is an agent of the Inquisition and the most thoroughgoing ruffian in the border country.…”

“But the Inquisition,” said Sniveley. “It is …”

“Sure,” said Oliver. “You know what it is supposed to be. The militant arm of the Church, with its function to uproot heresy, although heresy, in many instances, is given a definition which far outstrips the meaning of the term. When its agents turn bad, and most of them turn bad, they become a law unto themselves. No one is safe from them, no perfidy too low.…”

“You think,” said Gib, “that this Beckett and his men massacred the pack train?”

“I would doubt very much they did the actual killing. But I am certain it was arranged by Beckett. He got word to someone.”

“In hopes of killing Mark?”

“With the certainty of killing Mark. That was the only, purpose of it. All were supposed to be killed. According to what you say, they stripped Mark, took everything he had. They thought that he was dead, although probably they did not know that the purpose of the attack was to kill one certain man.”

“They didn't find the page of manuscript. He had it in his boot.”

“They weren't looking for the manuscript. Beckett thought he had it. He stole it from Mark's room.”

“The fake,” said Hal. “The copy.”

“That is right,” said Oliver.

“And you came all this way,” said Gib, “to warn him against Beckett before it was too late.”

“I was responsible. And I was late. Small thanks to me that he still lives.”

“It seems to me,” said Sniveley gravely, “that the key to all of this may lie in what was written in that fake copy Beckett has. Can you enlighten us on that?”

“Willingly,” said Oliver. “We worked it out together and, as I remember it, were quite gleeful at the neatness of it. Some things we had to leave as they were, for the monk would tell whoever he sold the information to where the page of parchment had been found, in what book it had been hidden—the book that Taylor had written about his travels in the Wasteland. Most of which, I am convinced, was a tissue of lies. I even have my doubts he was ever in the Wasteland.

“But be that as it may, we had to leave the most of it, only taking out all mention of the Old Ones. In its place we inserted a story based on legend, a very obscure legend that Mark had come upon in his reading of some ancient tome. The legend of a hidden, legendary university, where was housed incredibly ancient, and equally legendary, books, and a great hoard of primeval treasure. Only a hint that it was in the Wasteland, only something that Taylor had heard about.…”

“Are you mad?” howled Sniveley. “Do you know what you have done? Of all the nincompoop ideas—”

“What is the matter?” asked Oliver. “What do you mean?”

“You moron!” shouted Sniveley. “You cretin! You should have known. There is such a university!”

He stopped in midsentence and fixed his gaze on Gib, shifted it onto Hal.

“You two,” he said, “you're not supposed to know. No one outside the Brotherhood is supposed to know. It is an old secret. It is sacred to us.”

He grabbed Oliver by the shoulder and jerked him to his feet. “How come you didn't know?”

Oliver cringed away. “So help me, I never knew. I never heard of it. I am just a lowly rafter goblin. Who was there to tell me? We thought it was a fable.”

Sniveley let Oliver loose. Coon crouched in Gib's lap, whimpering.

“Never in my life,” said Hal to Sniveley, “have I seen you so upset.”

“I have a right to be upset,” said Sniveley. “A pack of fools. A set of various fools who have been snared up in something they should have kept their fingers out of. But, worse than that, an agent of the Inquisition has been given knowledge, faked knowledge that happens to be true, and what do you think he'll do with it? I know what he'll do—head straight into the Wasteland. Not for the treasure that was mentioned, but for the ancient books. Can't you see the power and glory that would descend upon a churchly human who found old heathen books and consigned them to the flames?”

“Maybe he won't get them,” Gib said hopefully. “He may try for them and fail.”

“Of course he'll fail,” said Sniveley. “He hasn't got a chance. All the hellhounds of the Wasteland will be snapping at his heels, and any human who gets out alive will do so through pure luck. But for centuries now there has been peace—at times unwilling peace—between humans and the Brotherhood. But this will light the fires. The Borderland will become unsafe. There'll be war again.”

“There is one thing that puzzles me,” said Gib. “You had no great objection to Cornwall going into the Wasteland—foolish certainly, but no great objection. I think you rather admired him for his courage. You were willing to give me a sword for him.…”

“Look, my friend,” said Sniveley, “there is a vast difference between a lowly scholar going out into the Wasteland on an academic and intellectual search and a minion of the Church charging into it with fire and steel. The scholar, being known as a scholar, might even have a chance of coming out alive. Not that he'd be entirely safe, for there are some ugly customers, with whom I have small sympathy, lurking in the Wasteland. But by and large he might be tolerated, for he would pose no danger to our people. He would not bring on a war. If he were killed, he'd be killed most quietly, and no one would ever know how or when it happened. Indeed, there would be few who would ever mark his going there. And he might even come back. Do you see the difference?”

“I think I do,” said Gib.

“So now what do we have?” asked Sniveley of Gib. “There is this journey that you are honor bound to make, carrying the book and ax the hermit gave you for delivery to the Bishop of the Tower. And on this journey your precious scholar will travel with you and then continue on into the Wasteland. Have I got the straight of it?”

“Yes, you have,” said Gib.

“You have no intention of going into the Wasteland with him?”

“I suppose I haven't.”

“But I have such intentions,” said the rafter goblin. “I was in at the start of it; I might as well be in at the end of it, whatever that may be. I have come this far and I have no intention whatsoever of turning back.”

“You told me,” said Hal, “that you had a great fear of open spaces. You had a word for it …”

“Agoraphobia,” said Oliver. “I still have it. I shiver at the breath of open air. The uncovered sky oppresses me. But I am going on. I started something back there in that Wyalusing garret, and I cannot turn back with it half done.”

“You'll be an outlander,” said Snively. “Half of the Brotherhood, half out of it. Your danger will be real. Almost as much danger to you as there is danger to a human.”

“I know that,” said Oliver, “but I am still going.”

“What about this matter of you carrying something to the Bishop of the Tower?” Hal asked Gib. “I had not heard of it.”

“I had meant to ask you if you'd show us the way,” said Gib. “We want to travel overland and I fear we might get lost. You must know the way.”

“I've never been there,” said Hal. “But I know these hills. We'd have to stay clear of paths and trails, especially with this Inquisition agent heading the same way. I suppose he will be coming through the Borderland. So far there has been no word of him.”

“If he had passed by,” said Sniveley, “I would have had some word of him.”

“If I am to go,” asked Hal, “when should I be ready?”

“Not for a few days,” said Gib. “Mark has to heal a bit, and I promised Drood I'd help him get some wood.”

Sniveley shook his head. “I do not like it,” he said. “I like no part of it. I smell trouble in the wind. But if the scholar lad's to go, he must have the sword. I promised it for him and it'll be a sorry day when a gnome starts going back on his promises.”

11

They had traveled for five days through sunny autumn weather, with the leaves of the forest slowly turning to burnished gold, to deep blood-red, to lustrous brown, to a pinkness of the sort that made one's breath catch in his throat at the beauty of it.

Tramping along, Mark Cornwall kept reminding himself time and time again that in the past six years he had lost something of his life. Immured in the cold, stone walls of the university, he had lost the color and the smell and the headiness of an autumn forest and, worst of all, had not known he had lost it.