“He found the place by mistake,” the elf said. From his tone, this was a tale he did not want to tell and would tell only once. “We were never sure how he found the first pattern and came to the west. He brought his master Gird, and to our amazement, the High Lord, the Singer of Songs, the Maker of Worlds, and Namer of All, opened for him a way. So we guardians—we Sinyi, and the dasksinyi and kapristi as well—made treaty with Selamis, Luap of Gird, and gave him leave to make use of that place and bring others. We set limits on that right, which he swore to uphold, and warned him of dangers. But he opened his heart to evil and from the rock freed those imprisoned there, with great effort and danger…”

Freeing prisoners … Falkians laid great store by that, but Luap was not supposed to be Falkian. The Marshal-General’s head began to ache. “Who was imprisoned?” she asked.

“Those we do not name,” the elf said.

At a guess … “That would be iynisin,” Arianya said. “Unsingers, haters of trees and elves and men, is it not so?”

“It is so,” the elf said, through clenched teeth.

“And so more were loosed on the lands,” Arianya said. “A great wrong; I understand that. He broke faith with you, is that it?”

“Yes.”

“And so you prisoned his spirit in a wraith on the stone bridge?”

“No. That was not done by us. Nor were the men in the great chamber enchanted there by us. Had they been, we could have removed them. We cannot.”

She felt adrift again. “Then … who? Luap himself?”

“No. We do not know … we could not tell … but they must go.”

“How?” she asked. “If you cannot remove them, why do you think I could?”

“You must find a way. It is not … it is not safe. Not … stable … as it is. We must close the stone. There is evil—”

“There is always evil,” she said. “Evil has existed since the beginning—”

“No.”

The Marshal-General blinked. The elf must be wrong, but she realized arguing theology with an elf would not lead to anything useful. “When do you think evil began?” she asked.

“I do not know,” he said. “But I know the Singer sang no wrong notes, and the Maker’s hammer struck the anvil truly, and the Namer spoke true names. Some of us think it began with the coming of the lateborn—humans and others—and some think it came with the First Tree’s response—but we do not know. It was long and long—it would seem the beginning to you—but it was not.”

“And now you think more is coming.”

“Dragon flies,” he said, waving one arm sinuously. “The dasksinyi say Dragon removed his grace from them—”