All metal belongs to the Ila. When it is broken its reshaping must be written down and its weight accounted, whether it be iron or silver or gold or copper. All metal the Ila gives for the good of villages. The earth will not grow it. It will not spring up like water. If a village or a tribe finds any metal, they must make it known to a priest. If it is traded, an au’it must write it. If it is sold, an au’it must write it. If it is lost in a well, that well must be drained. So also if it is lost in sand or carried off by a beast, an au’it must write it, and it must be hunted out.

—The Book of Oburan

Fever burned in marak’s skin, ran in veins of fire through his body. His bones ached. Strange smells assaulted his nostrils. The place reeked like the lye pits, or a tanner’s vat at noonday.

He lay in a bed of sorts, unable to move his arms. “Hati,” he said, and then, scrupulously, dutifully, to be fair: “Norit?”

He had no sense of living presence near him. He wondered where they were.

He wondered where he was.

Very faintly and remote from his immediate concern, too, he thought of the au’it, and the rest of the madmen the Ila had sent with him, at his word.

He thought of Tofi, who had lost everything on this journey. Of Malin and Kassan and Foragi, the fools who had walked into the desert.

A man in sand-colored robes had lured him from the safety of a camp where he at least had allies. He had been a fool to leave, and a greater fool to walk into the tower. He had thought so much of following the vision at the last he had forgotten good sense.

Mad, Tain had said. Not my son. Not my blood. Living in my house, taking my food.

When he failed Tain’s expectations Tain had had no love for him. But when he exceeded them he had Tain’s bitter jealousy. The army had cheered for him, and Tain had sulked in his tent, full of resentment.

Was there nowhere any right course?

He saw his sister sitting in the dust, his mother falling behind, left sonless.

He saw the faces of his father’s men, all staring, all grim and betraying nothing while Tain accused him. Not my son.

After an interval he heard footsteps moving around him. He smelled strange, pungent things. The roaring in his ears built and built to a sickening headache.

Perhaps he was dying. The possibility failed to alarm him. There was no particular pain, except the headache, and he had had no few of those in his life.

But if he was dying, it was without answers, and that was not fair.