The Knight

“I have no means of knowing. Or say, rather, that I know that any direction will prove right if we cleave to it long enough. This may be the shortest way. It may be the longest. In any event, it will take us to the sea in the end.”

“I still don’t hear any waves.”

“Nor do I. But if we continue as we have begun, we will hear them if there are any.”

I thought about that, and the weather. There was hardly any wind, and so I said, “That’s right, it’s pretty calm.”

“It is, and it is in just such weather as this that this isle is most often sighted by seamen. It is a thing of heat and calm, most often seen at twilight.”

“If it’s too calm to sail, couldn’t they row here?”

“They could, and some do.”

I had been pretty mad at Garsecg because he had gone away and left Uri and Baki to take care of themselves. But I got to thinking about all the things he had done for me, and how I had left them just as much as he had. So I stopped and motioned for him to catch up to me, and we walked together a little. We were in the shade of the trees all that time.

Before long we came to where the shade was only spotty, sunshine coming through the leaves in bright patches, sort of dappled. Then it seemed like something a whole lot bigger than Garsecg was walking beside me. Only it was not.

It was not really like a snake, and it was not really like a bird either. But I have to write those because they are as close as I can get. It was beautiful, and terribly scary. I do not remember all the colors and they changed anyway, but the thing was that whatever colors there were, were the darkest those colors could ever be. The blue was darker than black usually is, and so was the gold, a sort of brown gold with a deep, deep luster you felt like you could fall into. And dark, like you had seen something gold in the middle of a storm, but nowhere near as real as smoke.

I could hardly see Garsecg at all right then, but he looked like he was about to laugh. I told him I liked him better when he was Garsecg.

“I know.”

“That’s what you really are, isn’t it? You’re Setr. Are you really from the world under Aelfrice?”

“I am. Will you turn aside for a step or two now, Sir Able? There is something to be seen here more important than any view of the sea, and if you will consent I will show it to you.”

I felt like I had already seen something important, but I said I would.

Chapter 27. Kulili

There was not any path, just soft grass and ferns underneath the big trees, down, around , and down again until it brought us to a little toy valley that could not have been more than a hundred yards long and wide. It was so pretty down there it took your breath away. There were tiny little waterfalls coming out of the rocks, and a pool in the middle with white lilies growing all around it, and some other kind of white flower that was prettier than the lilies. More ferns, too. The ones I had seen before had been little, but there they were huge, like the ferns were in Aelfrice. They arched up over my head so high I could have ridden a horse under them and never taken my helm off. It was dark shade there and Garsecg looked completely real, so real I knew if I touched him I would not feel the thing he really was at all.

Where the shade was thickest there was a white statue. It was a naked woman, but where it was in that dark shade it sort of loomed out at me like a ghost. One hand looked like she wanted to cover up her breasts, and the other hand looked like she was begging for something.

I was naked myself, as I guess I have already said, and when I saw that statue something happened that had happened at school when I watched the girls play volleyball. I did not want Garsecg to see it, so what I did was to jump right into the pool. It worked, too, because the water was good and cold. When I came up I tossed my hair out of my eyes the way you do and tried to grin.

Garsecg bent over to look at me. “Why did you do that?”

“To cool off and wash away my sweat. Aren’t you hot after all that walking? I was.”

He gave me his hand, and I swam over and climbed out.

“Look. Wait until the ripples die, and look carefully.”

“You said you wanted to show me my reflection,” I said, “so I’d know why the Osterlings were scared of me. Only I don’t think they were. Is that all this is?”

“No. Look deeply into the pool, Sir Able.”

I did. It looked like that pool went down forever but kind of crooked and off to the side, and I said so.

“Like many such waters, it is a gate to Aelfrice,” Garsecg told me. “I am showing it to you so that you will know how such gates look. Could you not tell, when the Kelpies carried you to me, that you were entering Aelfrice?”

I shook my head.

“Does it not seem to you that you should be peering down into the topmost story of the Tower of Glas?”

It had not hit me before, but he was right. The dirt on the island could not have been more than ten or twelve feet deep. I really stared after that; and I remembered that even though I had sunk down quite a way when I jumped in, I had never touched bottom.

“Here one may stand in Mythgarthr and scrutinize the gate,” Garsecg said. “Remember what you are seeing. Fix it in your mind. In times to come, what you learn may be of value to you.”

I could not believe that pool went down to Aelfrice, and I said so. It did look fu

“You will never drown,” Garsecg told me. “You are one with the sea—more than you know.”

The way he said it, I knew he meant it. And all’I could think about then was that Disiri was in Aelfrice. I want her more than I have ever wanted anything in my life, and I dove right in. I would do it again.

It did not even feel very cold the second time, and as soon as I started to slow down I began swimming hard. I had been a pretty good swimmer even back in America, and while I had been with Garsecg I had gotten so good you would think I was putting you on if I told you how good I was. I went down and down.

It should have gotten darken and darker, only it did not. There was beautiful blue light, like I had seen under the sea before, and seeing it before did not make it any less beautiful now. After a while I decided I could use a little rest, and I just let myself float in it while I tried to figure out which way was up. It probably seems to you like that ought to be pretty easy, and the fish always know, but when there are no fish in sight and you ca

I floated there a long time, or anyhow it seemed long to me. There was a little current that turned me slowly, around and around, and carried me along, and that felt great. I was thinking about Disiri and the statue, and they got mixed up in my mind, and I started wondering if I was really real at all. It seemed to me this might be what it was like when you were just a memory, and maybe Disiri was remembering me, and would always remember me, would always love me like I would always love her, and this was me in her mind.

I am Kulili. It was not really a sound in my ear at all. It was more like a sound in the bones of my skull.

Down. Come down.

I did, and I knew which way down was because that was where her voice was coming from. The blue light went purple, then everything went black. Fingers touched my face, only I knew they were not really fingers at all. It seemed sort of not fair, and I said, “I can’t see you.”