'I thought we should surely lose him toapoplexy.'
Eyes followed them as they crossed the dim reaches of the Aisle, idle or curious, hostile or sympathetic, noting, perhaps, the number of Guards that walked with them, or who were the civilians in the crowd. They moved inashifting blur of witchlight, the glow of it stirring around them like a luminous fog.
Ingold stopped, startled at the chaos that prevailed in the wizards' complex. 'We haven't had time to get things straightened out yet,' Gil apologized.
'It comforts me to hear that,' the old man said, surveying the long, narrow room. Fleeces, skins, and crates seemed to make up most of the furnishings; staffs leaned in corners like rifles in an armoury; makeshift shelves had been set up, stacked with dilapidated books. The bluish witchlight slid like silk over the round body of a pearwood lute and winked on the angles of white and grey glass polyhedrons that were scattered across the table, the floor, and everywhere else. Parchments, wax tablets, dusty chronicles, and scrolls of yellowed paper littered every horizontal surface in sight, and over one of the room's fewchairs lay a great pile of homespun brown cloth, and with it a tiny satin pincushion sparkling like a miniature hedgehog.
The wizards had evidently made themselves very much at home.
'And we have to show you -' Aide began.
But Thoth broke in. 'Let them rest, child, and eat.' His voice was as harsh as a vulture's, slow and heavy. He glanced once at the crescent-tipped staff that Rudy leaned in a corner and looked
back down at Ingold. 'You found Quo, then?
Ingold shut his eyes and nodded tiredly. 'Yes,' he said.
'And Lohiro?'
'Dead.'
Thoth's eyes flickered to the staff, to the bundles of books that Rudy and several volunteer helpers were placing on a small cleared corner of the table, and back to the ravaged face of his friend. 'So,' he said.
Ingold's eyes opened. He studied the other man's narrow face. 'What happened, Thoth? Lohiro said you had been killed.'
'No.' The Recorder of Quo laid a long, bony hand on Ingold's shoulder. 'The others... yes. Your girls have been telling me,' he went on slowly, 'of their - findings - regarding the fortunate places of ancient times. These were similar to your own discoveries, I am sure.'
Ingold nodded wretchedly.
'But deeper, since they had access to things to which you did not.'
Only those who stood nearest heard Ingold whisper, 'I should have guessed.'
'Perhaps,' the tall wizard said evenly. 'But you are wrong if you suppose that Lohiro did not have such knowledge.'
Ingold looked up quickly; though all reason for fear was past now, the reflection of it suddenly aged his sunken eyes.
'From the outset, as you know, I sought the oldest of the records for reference to the Dark - largely without result,' Thoth continued. 'The records there did not go much farther back than Forn's time, but your mention of Nests at Gae, Penambra, and Dele - all the great centres of the wizardry of old - seemed to fit into a disquieting pattern. Shortly after Lohiro and the Council closed Quo to all, I went to him with my suppositions, and he,
Anamara, and I searched the town and the Seaward Mountains for miles. We suspected that a Nest lay under the tower itself, under the subfloors of the old vaults, though we could find no sign of it. Still we three spelled and respelled the foundations of the tower. Believe me, Ingold, not even the winds of the Dark could have risen through the cracks in the floor, had we not been betrayed.'
Those strange eyes rested for a moment on the old man's haggard face. 'It was when we were spelling the mountains, I think, that Lohiro first spoke of the Dark as being of asingle essence. We found little concerning them in the books, though my students turned the libraries inside out, breaking spells of opening on volumes whose very languages had been long forgotten and combing for something, anything - to little avail. But Lohiro watched in Anamara's mirror and saw the Dark Ones fight at Penambra and Gae. He said that their strength lay in their numbers and in their movements. He said that what one of them learned, they all then knew. He said this was clear when they left their northern Nests in the plains to join the assault on Gae.
'At first, he spoke of it only in terms of the maze - that we could not afford to let so much