The Armies of Daylight - By Barbara Hambly Page 0,77

weeks on end this winter," Gil continued, "and, according to the chronicles of both Gae and Renweth, there has never been any record of the Pass being blocked for more than a day or so, and that in dead winter. But of the times that it has been blocked, two of them were within the first hundred years of the chronicle, and four have been within the last twenty years. The first time was twenty years ago-the same year Ingold saw the Dark hunting aboveground in the deserts of Gettlesand."

"It snowed in Penambra that year," Blid the Soothsayer said suddenly. "It had never snowed there before, though it has twice since. I remember standing in the courtyard of our house, while everyone was running about and whispering and catching snowflakes in their hands. The dooic slaves were terrified. They had no idea what it was."

"Perhaps they did," Ingold murmured, "and that was what terrified them."

There was silence, as each tried to remember back to those lost years: a boy standing in the muddy court of his home in that city of palms and flowers, catching snowflakes in wondering hands; and a fugitive spell weaver lying in the darkness of a desert cave, seeing the Dark drop on an old dooic who had shuffled in for shelter from an unnaturally icy night. Rudy thought, That was the winter before I turned five, when I began to have visions of magic .

Kara spoke up suddenly. "There was an epidemic in Ippit then. I was only a little girl, but mother always said it was because of the cold."

"We marked the increasing number of famines and sicknesses," Ungolard said, his earrings flashing as he raised his head. "I was in the College of Astrologers in Khirsrit. These things were noted there, but not, as you have said, my fair lady, their meaning."

"Me granddad disappeared that winter," Ilae whispered, looking up from stroking the cat. "Uncle says he went out to look for't' pigs of an eve, nor never came back."

"I think what we're dealing with," Gil said slowly, "is a weather cycle, a-an alternation of hot periods and cold, governed by the growth and retreat of the ice in the north. The ice doesn't have to move very far south to change the climate. When it does, for whatever reason, when the temperature stays too low for too long, the moss in the Nests of the Dark starts to die. The herds start to die. And then the Dark Ones begin to hunt on the surface of the earth."

She rolled her notes together and rested them endwise on the table, her hands folded upon them.

"There was a short cold spell twenty years ago. I think, that the climate has been gradually cooling for at least the last hundred years. The short spell affected only the most exposed Nests-those of Gettlesand, the plains, and the far North. The one we're in now-a far deeper one-has affected all the northern Nests-at Gae, Quo, Dele, and Penambra. It will be only a matter of time before the herds in the southern Nests begin to die as well.

"And that's the answer." Gil shrugged and scanned the faces of the mages ranged around the table. "The answer is that there is no answer. We've never found anything that indicates that Dare of Renweth ever fought the Dark at all. The cold spell then lasted six to eight hundred years. This one could easily do the same. The Dark Ones will go away when the weather warms and their herds build back to strength-not before."

"That's a lie!" Alwir's voice cracked across hers like the stroke of a leaded whip. He surged to his feet, a storm of rage darkening his face. "The whole idea of the world getting colder or warmer is utter nonsense! Foolish drivel and treason against the allies of the Realm! The world is the world, the earth is the earth. It is fixed, stable. The sun is set in its orbit and the earth in its shape. Your talk of- of the sun getting colder or swamps covering the West of the World-it is impossible!"

"But it isn't," Gil protested unwisely. "Just because a thing is created doesn't mean that it's immutable. Look at a man's body. It changes and grows old, grows a beard in its proper time or loses hair, and gains or loses flesh-"

"Don't quibble with me, girl!" the Chancellor roared, towering over her like an enraged bear. "This idiocy about women's fashions