V

The Book of the Castle

—1—

THE ASCENT FROM THE DEPTHS of the Labyrinth was far more swiftly accomplished than the descent had been; for on the interminable downward spiral Valentine had been an unknown adventurer, clawing his way past a stolidly uncaring bureaucracy, and on the upward journey he was a Power of the realm.

Not for him, now, the tortuous climb through level after level, ring after ring, back up through all the intricacies of the Pontifical lair, House of Records and Arena and Place of Masks and Hall of Winds and all the rest. Now he and his followers rose, quickly and without hindrance, using the passage reserved for Powers alone.

In just a few hours he attained the outer ring, that brightly lit and populous halfway house on the rim of the underground city. For all the speed of his climb, the news of his identity had traveled even faster. Word somehow had spread through the Labyrinth that the Coronal was here, a Coronal mysteriously transformed but Coronal nonetheless, and as he emerged from the imperial passageway a great crowd stood assembled, staring as if some creature with nine heads and thirty legs had come forth.

It was a silent crowd. Some made the sign of the starburst, a few called out his name. But most were content simply to gape. The Labyrinth was the domain of the Pontifex, after all, and Valentine knew that the adulation a Coronal would receive elsewhere in Majipoor was not likely here. Awe, yes. Respect, yes. Curiosity, above all. But none of the cheering and waving that Valentine had seen bestowed on the counterfeit Lord Valentine when he rode in grand processional through the streets of Pidruid. Just as well, thought Valentine. He was out of practice at being the object of adulation, and he had never cared much for it, anyway. It was enough — more than enough — that they accepted him, now, as the personage he claimed to be.

"Will it all be that easy?" he asked Deliamber. "Simply ride across Alhanroel proclaiming myself the real Lord Valentine, and have everything fall into my hands?"

"I doubt it mightily. Barjazid still wears the Coronal’s countenance. He still holds the seals of power. Down here, if the ministers of the Pontifex say you are the Coronal, the citizens will hail you as Coronal. If they had said you were Lady of the Isle, they probably would hail you as Lady of the Isle. I think it will be different outside."

"I want no bloodshed, Deliamber."

"No one does. But blood will flow before you mount the Confalume Throne once more. There’s no avoiding it. Valentine."

Gloomily Valentine said, "I would almost rather abandon power to the Barjazid than plunge this land into some convulsion of violence. Peace is what I love, Deliamber."

"And peace is what there will be," said the little wizard. "But the road to peace is not always peaceful. See, there — your army is gathering already, Valentine!"

Valentine saw, not far ahead, a knot of people, some familiar, some unknown to him. All those who had gone into the Labyrinth with him were there, the band he had accumulated in his journey across the world, Skandars, Lisamon Hultin, Vinorkis, Khun, Shanamir, Lorivade and the bodyguard of the Lady, and the rest. But also there were several hundred in the colors of the Pontifex, already assembled, the first detachment of — what? Not troops; the Pontifex had no troops. A civilian militia, then? Lord Valentine’s army, at any rate.

"My army," Valentine said. The word had a bitter taste. "Armies are something out of Lord Stiamot’s time, Deliamber. How many thousands of years has it been since there has been war on Majipoor?"

"Things have been quiet a long while," the Vroon said. "But nevertheless there are small armies in existence. The bodyguards of the Lady, the servitors of the Pontifex — and what about the knights of the Coronal, eh? What do you call them, if not an army? Carrying weapons, drilling on the fields of Castle Mount — what are they, Valentine? Lords and ladies amusing themselves in games?"

"So I thought, Deliamber, when I was one of them."

"Time to think otherwise, my lord. The knights of the Coronal form the nucleus of a military force, and only an innocent would believe anything else. As you will discover quite inescapably, Valentine, when you come closer to Castle Mount."

"Can Dominin Barjazid bring my own knights out in battle against me?" Valentine asked in horror.

The Vroon gave him a long cool stare. "The man you call Dominin Barjazid is, at the moment, Lord Valentine the Coronal, to whom the knights of Castle Mount are bound by oath. Or have you forgotten that? With luck and craft you may be able to convince them that their oath is to the soul and spirit of Lord Valentine, and not to his face and beard. But some will remain loyal to the man they think is you, and they will lift swords against you in his name."

The thought was sickening. Since the restoration of his memory Valentine had thought more than once of the companions of his earlier life, those noble men and women with whom he had grown up, with whom he had learned the princely arts in happier days, whose love and friendship had been central to his life until the day the usurper had shattered that life. That bold huntsman Elidath of Morvole, and the fair-haired and agile Stasilaine, and Tunigorn, who was so quick with the bow, and so many more — only names to him now, shadowy figures out of a distant past, and yet in a moment those shadows could be given life and color and vigor. Would they now come forth against him in war? His friends, his beloved companions of long ago — if he had to do battle with them for Majipoor’s sake, so be it, but the prospect was dismaying.

He shook his head. "Perhaps we can avoid that. Come," he said. "The time for leaving this place is at hand."

Near the gateway known as the Mouth of Waters Valentine held a jubilant reunion with his followers and met the officers that had been provided for him by the ministers of the Pontifex. They seemed a capable crew, perceptibly quickened in spirit by this chance to leave the dreary depths of the Labyrinth. Their leader was a short, tight-coiled man named Ermanar, with close-cropped reddish hair and a short sharp-pointed beard, who in his size and movements and straight-forwardness might well have been brother to Sleet. Valentine liked him at once. Ermanar made the starburst at Valentine in a quick, perfunctory way, smiled warmly, and said, "I will be at your side, my lord, until the Castle is yours again."

"May the journey north be an easy one," Valentine said.

"Have you chosen a route?"

"By riverboat up the Glayge would be swiftest, would it not?"

Ermanar nodded. "At any other time of year, yes. But the autumn rains have come, and they have been unusually heavy." He drew forth a small map of central Alhanroel, showing the districts from the Labyrinth to Castle Mount in glowing red on some bit of dark fabric. "See, my lord, the Glayge descending from the Mount, and pouring into Lake Roghoiz, and its remnant emerging here to continue on to the Mouth of Waters before us? Just now the river is swollen and dangerous from Pendiwane to the lake — that is, for hundreds of miles. I propose a land route at least as far as Pendiwane. There we can arrange shipping for ourselves nearly to the source of the Glayge."

"It sounds wise. Do you know the roads?"

"Fairly well, my lord." He poked his finger at the map. "Much depends on whether the plain of the Glayge is flooded as badly as reports have it. I would prefer to move through the Glayge Valley, in this fashion, simply skirting the northern side of Lake Roghoiz, never getting too far from the river as we proceed."

"And if the valley’s flooded?"

"Then there are roads farther north we can use. But the land there is dry, unpleasant, almost a desert. We would have trouble finding provisions. And we would swing much too close to this place for my comfort."