“Come off it. Who is he?” The man squinted at Jason, as if trying to penetrate the visor of the helmet.
Ferrin glanced around, never looking directly at Jason. “I see no one.”
“Have it your way. Travel well.”
Ferrin led Jason to the great gate and spoke briefly with a guard, who let them out through a narrow postern door. It began to sprinkle as they made their way down the slick switchback. By the time they reached the landing at the bottom and boarded a small ferry, the rainfall had become drenching.
Ferrin in his hooded robe stood silent beside Jason in his borrowed armor, the only passengers on the ferry, watching the raindrops disturb the lake by the light of a lantern as the craft advanced toward the shore. Jason shivered. The dampness magnified the chill.
The craft landed, and the two passengers disembarked. They walked along a quay to a low building with a slanted roof. Jason waited under the eaves while Ferrin went inside. A young man exited the building and jogged off into the rainy night.
When the young man returned leading a pair of horses, Ferrin came outside.
“Ready to ride?” Ferrin asked. Something in his intonation warned Jason to try to seem like an experienced horseman.
Jason put a foot in a stirrup and swung onto the saddle. His days riding with Jasher had left him feeling much more comfortable on horseback. Ferrin led the way.
As they approached, the gate in the wall protecting the ferry opened. Ferrin and Jason trotted out, Jason squeezing his mount with his knees, trying not to be jounced too much by the jerky gait. The gate closed behind them.
Jason glanced over at the gong. Four big guards flanked it, two under the roof on the platform, two on the steps with hoods up against the deluge.
Ferrin increased the pace, and Jason followed. Once they left the ferry town behind, the night became almost impenetrably black. Only the muted glow of an unseen moon provided luminance.
“Stay close,” Ferrin called back. “I know this country well. Even with the weather we’ll reach our destination in a couple of hours.”
Eventually the rain relented. They followed a narrow lane beneath the cover of trees. Water dripping from overhanging leaves made the rain seem to continue for some time.
A group of men stepped out into the path, barring the way, one of them lighting the scene by unhooding a lantern. Ferrin reined in his horse.
“Who goes there?” inquired the lantern bearer.
“Ferrin the displacer and an unnamed conscriptor, on urgent duty.” He held up a token.
The soldiers cleared out of the path.
At length Ferrin left the lane. The horses squelched across a sodden field as the rain began to fall again in large drops. They pressed through damp undergrowth to pass over the shoulder of a ridge, then followed a rain-swollen stream in the dale beyond.
Ferrin drew up his horse and dismounted near a group of mossy boulders beside a low bluff. Jason did likewise. They tethered the horses, and Ferrin grabbed a bundle from the back of his saddle, leading the way between the largest boulder and the steepest portion of the bluff to the hidden mouth of a cave.
Ferrin paused just inside the opening to ignite a small oil lamp. Holding the lamp aloft, he led Jason deeper into the cave. They climbed upward for a time and then had to wriggle into a horizontal cleft on their bellies and slither forward for about thirty feet. After that the way widened again, descending until they came to a roomy grotto where long stalactites hung over a placid pool of water.
“Come look,” Ferrin said, approaching the brink of the pool.
Jason came up to the edge. The water was remarkably clear. By the light of the lamp he could see a long way down, but the bottom was not in sight. “Deep,” he said.
Ferrin nodded. “This is a gateway. You need to hold a heavy stone so you sink fast. Once you reach a certain depth you will pass through into the Beyond. The portal only works in one direction. You won’t be coming back.”
Jason dipped a finger into the water, sending concentric ripples across the glassy surface. “It’s frigid.”
“Sorry, but this is the only way I know to send you home. And you have to go home. Maldor will not rest until you’re recaptured.”
“Will they link you to me?”
“Probably. I went into the dungeon using one of my false identities, but I expect to be discovered. When they find me out, I must be able to claim I rescued you to mercifully dispatch you and spare you the agony of the tormentors. I will claim to have dumped your corpse in the sludge pits. When I make that assertion, I need to be certain the lie will never be detected.”
Jason glanced at the deep water. “That isn’t what you’re doing, is it? Tricking me into killing myself?”
“No,” Ferrin said gravely. “I know it requires trust, because you will have to sink to a depth beyond the point of no return. But this truly is a portal to the Beyond. One of the last reliable passages from our world to yours. A closely guarded secret. If Maldor knew I was aware of it, I would probably be killed. Jump in holding a heavy stone. You will not return to the surface. But neither will you die.”
Jason clenched his fists. “I learned something very important from Maldor.”
“What?” Ferrin asked, clearly eager to uncover a new secret.
“The Word is a hoax.”
Ferrin stared. “What do you mean?”
“He invented the Key Word as a decoy for his enemies. The Word we learned was real, but it had power to kill a different wizard, not Maldor.”
Ferrin closed his eyes and tilted his head back. He rubbed his forehead. When he spoke, he seemed to be thinking aloud. “That makes perfect sense, but the possibility never entered my mind. The very existence of the Word is a zealously protected secret. Few who serve Maldor have even heard rumor of it. I always thought Maldor was flirting with disaster by not vigorously attempting to remove those who guard the syllables—at least one of them. I assumed they must be protected by some unnamed magic. Now it makes sense.”
Ferrin opened his eyes. “How did you uncover such a secret?” There was urgency in his manner.
“I got the whole Word. It didn’t work, and Maldor later explained it was a hoax, when he tried to convince me to join him.”
“You got the entire Word?” Ferrin exclaimed in flustered admiration. “Well done! I heard you called out something strange when you were brought before the emperor. I assumed it was a guess using whatever syllables you had accumulated. So you had the complete Word, and it failed; then you rejected an opportunity to join Maldor, even though the only alternative was endless torture?”