Someone did enter the tower, but not through the wall, rather emerging from beneath the archway to the east. The figure was clad in oilskins and wore a squall hat like sailors used in foul weather. The figure, a woman, Dale thought, was drenched and left puddles with each step she took, her oilskin boots clomping on the stone floor.

She paused before Itharos and looked up at him, water runneling off the rear brim of her hat. She stared, and he floated for what seemed like forever, then they both broke out laughing.

Itharos drifted to the floor and threw his cowl back, and stretched his arms wide. “Boreemadhe, my dear! I am so happy to see you.”

The two hugged. “It has been a while, hasn’t it?” the newcomer said. Even with Itharos standing on the floor, she was very short, almost squat.

Itharos put his arm around her shoulders and brought her to Dale. “This is Boreemadhe,” he said, “and Boreemadhe, meet Rider Littlepage.”

“Pleased,” the woman said. “I am the guardian of—”

“Don’t tell me,” Dale said. “Tower of the Rains.”

Boreemadhe clapped, spraying illusory drops. “Yes! Tower of the Rains. So nice to be here, where it is dry.” She proceeded to peel off her oilskins, which vanished as she dropped them to the floor. Last off was the squall hat, revealing a round elfin face and eyes that creased to crescents when she smiled. Underneath her oilskins she wore a fisherman’s sweater, the cuffs rolled up, and a long woolen skirt. “I feel I must have moss growing behind my ears.”

Itharos checked. “No, my dear, you do not.”

“Are we the only ones who’ve arrived?” Boreemadhe asked.

“So far.”

“Then perhaps you can catch me up on what this is all about.”

A full tea service appeared on the table, as well as another chair exactly like Itharos’, and the two sat to tea. Dale wished it wasn’t just illusion as she wouldn’t mind a cup herself. She was enlisted to once again fill in the missing gaps of history, with occasional comments from Itharos. She wished Alton could be here to do the telling, and she hoped her long absence wasn’t driving him mad.

When she finished, Boreemadhe said, “I did notice the guardians were most, erm, grumpy, during my passage. Off-key, as you will.”

Itharos nodded solemnly. “A most apt description. There is anger, resentment, and fear among them. I should hate their song to unravel altogether.”

Boreemadhe nodded emphatically. “That would be the end, wouldn’t it?”

“The end?” Dale asked.

“The song,” Boreemadhe said, “keeps the wall whole, strengthens it, gives it life, so to speak. As it stands, the song’s harmony is fragmented, the rhythm chaotic from some quarters. Think of the guardians as a chorus. As the disharmony spreads, as it inevitably will, the wall will weaken.”

“The song,” Itharos added, “is becoming a lament of sadness, and presently the guardians are on a path of despair and self-destruction.” He closed his eyes, his hand outstretched, wavering, as if there was something he felt on the air. “Darkness and despair.” He shuddered and opened his eyes.

Dale excused herself and told the two she’d return the next day. As she sank into the tower wall, she heard them carrying on like old friends after a long separation. As if, she thought, the imminent danger to the wall, and to them all, were a passing thing.

SHIP IN A BOTTLE

The seeker ghosted through the woods, weaving between spruce and pine, wafting toward the canopy on updrafts only to spiral downward and continue its journey through the shadows, a tail of crimson and gold light streaming behind it. Thursgad, riding his weary horse, followed it; had followed it for days upon days through impossible and wild terrain as the glowing red ball illuminated the most direct path to its destination.

“Direct” did not mean “easy,” and the hungry, exhausted man on his stumbling steed bemoaned the fact that the seeker rarely led him along roads. Down ravines, up ledges and hillsides, through tangle of wood, yes, but not along any civilized path. Not that there were many roads or maintained pathways in the thick of the Green Cloak.

Hunger and exhaustion were meaningless to the seeker. It existed for the sole purpose of leading Thursgad to the book of magic Grandmother desired. Her other spell, tucked in its purse, hung from his belt. Maybe his imagination got wild now and then, but sometimes he swore he felt the thing hungering, hungering for his blood, pulsating against his hip. It made him shudder. He followed Grandmother’s explicit orders not to handle it or look at it. Not until he had to.

The seeker flared. It had brought Thursgad to the edge of a clearing. He half dismounted, half fell from his horse, and tied the reins to a branch, then dropped to the ground and crawled to the very edge of the woods, staying in the shadows.

A cry of surprise almost passed his lips and he put his hand to his forehead thinking he must be fevered and seeing things. A grand manor house of stone and timbers rose up before him, occupying well-ordered grounds of lawn and garden. He blinked his eyes to make sure he wasn’t dreaming, but the place did not vanish. What was it doing here in the middle of the wilderness? He scratched his head. There’d been no roads, no paths, and this was no simple woodsman’s cabin.

The seeker circled his head like a biter looking for blood, impatient for him to move on. He swatted it away and continued to survey the scene before he stepped from his concealment. He did not want to be caught by the estate’s inhabitants.