The festive atmosphere at the arrival of Merdigen and his companions all but evaporated—except for Mad Leaf who grinned, well, madly, and played with a twig in her hair. It seemed one of Boreemadhe’s gray clouds settled over the table.

“We must not let this deter us,” Merdigen continued. “In fact it should spur us to find answers, and that’s why I have called you all together: to find answers, for the wall is constantly weakening. We cannot fix the breach, but there may be other things we can do. We were always more powerful as a collective than as individuals.”

“We have been looking at the problem of the wall,” Itharos said, with a wink at Dale. He conjured out of the air copious diagrams and equations scrawled across scrolls.

However, as if this was some sort of cue, the tower began to rumble, the floor shuddering beneath Dale’s chair. She stood in alarm and the guardians cried out in consternation. The shaking grew, encompassing the whole of the chamber, raising dust. Crockery fell out of cupboards and crashed to the floor. A crack jagged up one wall and the floor pitched so much, Dale staggered from side to side as though she were on a ship at sea.

Blocks of rock tumbled from the unseen ceiling above and smashed to the floor. Dale dove under the table, knowing it would not be enough to protect her if the whole tower decided to collapse.

She was aware of Merdigen shouting orders and the mages running to and fro in the dust haze until they disappeared beneath the arches on either side of the chamber.

Another block crashed to the floor just inches from Dale and she gritted her teeth, wondering if this was the end of all things.

Alton paced alongside the wall. His night’s sleep had been worse than usual, filled with murmurings in his head. Uneasy, ghostly murmurings full of fear and despair eating at his mind. He awoke full of trepidation.

And yet everything about the morning was as usual. The encampment went about its day-to-day business and the wall and tower remained, as far as he could tell, unchanged. He’d hurried Dale through breakfast wondering if the mages in the tower would note any difference and provide an answer to his disquiet. He hadn’t told Dale how he felt, but he had practically pushed her through the wall.

Now he apprehensively awaited her return. Waited, waited, and waited. He was sick of waiting when he should be able to get answers for himself.

On impulse, he halted in front of the tower and pressed his palm against the stone facade. Shining strokes of lettering hurled away from his hand. He had not seen this in so long. He knew it was the wall guardians sending out messages of alarm. What was going on?

He was joyous that the guardians allowed him this much communication, but he feared what it meant.

Just then the ground pitched beneath him and he almost lost his footing. He did not jump away from the wall or seek cover, but pressed both hands against it, leaned into it, and tried to remain standing as the ground rolled under his feet.

“Dale!” he screamed in anguish.

SEEKING HARMONY

As the lettering continued to scroll out from beneath Alton’s hands, he became aware of the encampment behind him breaking into chaos; heard the shouting and running feet, the screams of horses. He glanced up, and to his horror, saw Tower of the Heavens swaying back and forth, as if it were made of some more pliant material than granite.

He pressed his palms hard against stone and willed the guardians to allow him entry, but a jolt from within the wall, a surge of anger, threw his hands off it. He knew that anger, felt familiarity. Pendric.

Still he did not retreat, but planted his feet wide and offered a silent prayer to the gods, then plowed his will into the wall past Pendric, past all resistance. Suddenly, after the long silence, his mind filled with voices in chaotic song.

We are lost. We are broken. We are breached.

If the song fell apart, so would the wall. But how could he fix the song from here, and alone?

There was no way.

Then without warning, the stone yielded beneath his hands and he sank forward into the wall till it swallowed him entirely. The passage was not fluid. He was buffeted from side to side, thrown against hard angles, his flesh bruised and abraded by rough stone, and an underlying thread of song tried to repel him. Pendric again.

Alton pushed forward like a swimmer in battering seas and emerged in the tower chamber, but rock solidified around his ankle. He pulled his foot out of his boot just before the wall crushed it.

He was elated he’d made it through the wall after being denied passage for so long. Maybe the guardians were so weakened, so caught up in chaos, that their barrier against him failed. Or maybe they were ready to embrace him again and accept his help. He hoped it was the latter.

His elation turned to apprehension as he peered through the haze of dust. Rubble littered the floor, and another tremor nearly knocked him off his feet. The columns in the center of the chamber weaved precariously. He could not see Dale and he feared the worst.

Merdigen poked his head out from beneath the western arch. “This way, my boy!” He waved at Alton to join him.

Alton dashed for the arch, and across grasslands where he had a brief impression of a raging storm of snow and lightning exploding around him till he emerged past the columns into the ordinary tower chamber again. One of the columns crashed to the floor beside him, breaking into sections. He ran beneath the arch. Merdigen shone with a faint glow, revealing little in the darkness. Straight ahead the corridor dead-ended where it intersected with the wall.

“The others are merged with the wall,” Merdigen said. “We must restore order, and we need your voice. Will you help?”