with the situation before she could be of any value. The Master has kept track of her travels but has never called her back."
"What about the kid, then? You mean Joe just hauled the poor kid over, left him here, and bugged out?" She was appalled. "No wonder he's got no self-discipline! Who's been raising him, anyway?"
"We all have, to a degree. In a sense, he's the young prince of Terindell."
"But—what about him and his father? I mean, Irving at least knows what happened, doesn't he?'
Poquah shrugged. "I don't know. Sometimes I think he does; sometimes I think he does not. All the time I believe he thinks of it as irrelevant to him. It is not easy for anyone to fully understand another, but for an elf to understand humans to that degree—I fear not."
Marge shook her head sadly in wonder. "So what was I called here for, then? The old boy just wants to talk over old times or what?"
"I'm not certain, but I rather think it is more serious than that. You have certainly felt it."
"The dark chill, you mean. I think everybody canfeel it, even the most nonmagical of humans. It's ugly and pervasive."
"And it is growing stronger," Poquah added.
"Yeah. But I hardly think it's anything I can do much about. Lord knows it's driving me to exhaustion, though. Everybody's so down, so depressed, I often have to cleanse myself every third or fourth person. There are times even now when I've felt fat, bloated, and too dense even to fly right. But hey, I did my bit. More than my bit. Besides, what could I do now against even the old enemies? Our company's long disbanded, and things aren't like they were. None of us are like we were."
"Less who we were than even we think," Poquah responded a bit cryptically. "Still, we are no more self-piloting than before, either. Our destinies run a strange race through the Law, the Rules, instinct, intellect, and destiny. Something is unfinished. I cannot explain it anybetter than that, but it has been constantly there. A sense that there is something among our own threads that remains undone. Until we do it, we cannot pass the burden to the next generation. That's the Rules."
"I never did like the Rules all that much," she muttered.
"They are excessive," Poquah agreed, "but they are also necessary. Without the Rules, it is unlikely that any of us would be alive today or a stone of this castle standing. The Rules, like any good body of law, are good not because they are all necessary—indeed, most are quite silly—but because they are so mathematically evenhanded. Neither good nor evil can ever gain absolute victory so long as the Rules exist, and so long as they provide opportunity, the cleverest will come out on top. So long as the Rules exist, we tend to be guaranteed a tie, given an equal force on each side. With no Rules, with no margins built in, I, as a mathematician, wouldn't give a gold bar for good's chances."
They were now inside the inner castle and up the winding stairway to the Great Hall on the second floor above the arch. This one great room had changed the least; various suits of armor from countless periods—including some built for nothing remotely human—stood all around, great portraits of dour-looking nobles and sorcerers and the like stared down, and great fireplaces and wonderful great tables and chairs with arms and legs carved into fantastic shapes of gargoyles, wild animals, fairy folk, you name it, graced the hall.
Against the far wall was a massive bookcase running floor to ceiling and along the entire expanse without break, filled with huge heavy-looking tomes all bound in red buckram with gold-embossed spines. Hundreds of volumes, going off to both sides and up and down in asea of blood red, the Books of Rules Existent under which the whole of this world, this universe, was governed.
"I will go and tell the Master you are here," Poquah said, bowing slightly. "He's been quite tired of late, what with
"What about the kid, then? You mean Joe just hauled the poor kid over, left him here, and bugged out?" She was appalled. "No wonder he's got no self-discipline! Who's been raising him, anyway?"
"We all have, to a degree. In a sense, he's the young prince of Terindell."
"But—what about him and his father? I mean, Irving at least knows what happened, doesn't he?'
Poquah shrugged. "I don't know. Sometimes I think he does; sometimes I think he does not. All the time I believe he thinks of it as irrelevant to him. It is not easy for anyone to fully understand another, but for an elf to understand humans to that degree—I fear not."
Marge shook her head sadly in wonder. "So what was I called here for, then? The old boy just wants to talk over old times or what?"
"I'm not certain, but I rather think it is more serious than that. You have certainly felt it."
"The dark chill, you mean. I think everybody canfeel it, even the most nonmagical of humans. It's ugly and pervasive."
"And it is growing stronger," Poquah added.
"Yeah. But I hardly think it's anything I can do much about. Lord knows it's driving me to exhaustion, though. Everybody's so down, so depressed, I often have to cleanse myself every third or fourth person. There are times even now when I've felt fat, bloated, and too dense even to fly right. But hey, I did my bit. More than my bit. Besides, what could I do now against even the old enemies? Our company's long disbanded, and things aren't like they were. None of us are like we were."
"Less who we were than even we think," Poquah responded a bit cryptically. "Still, we are no more self-piloting than before, either. Our destinies run a strange race through the Law, the Rules, instinct, intellect, and destiny. Something is unfinished. I cannot explain it anybetter than that, but it has been constantly there. A sense that there is something among our own threads that remains undone. Until we do it, we cannot pass the burden to the next generation. That's the Rules."
"I never did like the Rules all that much," she muttered.
"They are excessive," Poquah agreed, "but they are also necessary. Without the Rules, it is unlikely that any of us would be alive today or a stone of this castle standing. The Rules, like any good body of law, are good not because they are all necessary—indeed, most are quite silly—but because they are so mathematically evenhanded. Neither good nor evil can ever gain absolute victory so long as the Rules exist, and so long as they provide opportunity, the cleverest will come out on top. So long as the Rules exist, we tend to be guaranteed a tie, given an equal force on each side. With no Rules, with no margins built in, I, as a mathematician, wouldn't give a gold bar for good's chances."
They were now inside the inner castle and up the winding stairway to the Great Hall on the second floor above the arch. This one great room had changed the least; various suits of armor from countless periods—including some built for nothing remotely human—stood all around, great portraits of dour-looking nobles and sorcerers and the like stared down, and great fireplaces and wonderful great tables and chairs with arms and legs carved into fantastic shapes of gargoyles, wild animals, fairy folk, you name it, graced the hall.
Against the far wall was a massive bookcase running floor to ceiling and along the entire expanse without break, filled with huge heavy-looking tomes all bound in red buckram with gold-embossed spines. Hundreds of volumes, going off to both sides and up and down in asea of blood red, the Books of Rules Existent under which the whole of this world, this universe, was governed.
"I will go and tell the Master you are here," Poquah said, bowing slightly. "He's been quite tired of late, what with
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