Merlyn's Arc

Chapter 11 of 19

Merlyn stood at the edge of the broken shelf. Water rushed in the dark below. His legs held him now, and the conduit rune spared his blood. But his eyes ached. A gray film crept across the gold thread of live rock he had read so clearly moments ago. He blinked. The thread dimmed, then returned. His sight was failing. Slowly. The greater cost of the rune had not finished with him. "Something's wrong," Merlyn said. He pressed a knuckle to his eye. "My sight comes and goes. The rune took ten years. I think it means to take more." Kjell crouched beside him. The troll teeth in his beard clicked. For years this hunter had trusted Merlyn to read what he could not. Now he watched his old teacher rub his eyes like a man going blind again. "Then read the book," Kjell said. "Find the fault. You always could." Merlyn opened the stone-bound tome across his knees. He turned the carved pages himself. His finger traced the border his master had cut. Near the sight-rune he found a mark he had missed before, small and half-buried in the pillar design. He leaned close. The gray film thickened. He could not tell the rune from the shadow. "I can't see it," Merlyn said. "That's the fault itself. The rune bleeds sight to feed its own hunger. If I don't seal it, I go blind for good." Gunnar knelt by the split rock. He set his ear to the wet stone, then struck it once with his hammer. "Live rock's close now," he said. "Strong. Stronger than the shelf above." He looked at Merlyn. "Use it." Thorin stood at the wall, his father's axe across his arms. Iron rings shook in his gray beard. "Carve, then," he said. "We didn't drag you this deep to bury you here." Merlyn pressed his palm to the broken edge. The deep water's warmth answered through the fresh stone. He read the buried mark not with his eyes but with his tattoos, letting the earth magic trace its shape. A sealing-sign, meant to close the wound the sight-rune had left open. He raised his hammer. Gunnar gripped his wrist and steadied the swing. Merlyn drove the first half of the sign into the wet rock. Then the second. The brands on his forearms burned gold. Power ran down into the deep water and rose again. It did not spend his years. The stone paid the reach. The gray film pulled back. The gold thread sharpened. Merlyn saw the tome's carved letters, then the split rock, then Kjell's scarred face, each one clear and steady. He held his hand before his eyes and counted the calluses. "It holds," Merlyn said. "The bleeding's stopped. My sight is mine now, and it stays." Thorgar hauled a slab aside. Cold air rushed up from the split, and below, the water ran fast toward some deeper dark.