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that he, for godsakes, had built. He left a trail going out of here, and he
knew it. Why sail a few hundred miles and tie up to a dock when somebody is
going to come looking? Why leave Shed alive behind you, to tell about you
being in on the raid on the Catacombs? And there's no way in hell he'd leave
Darling twisting in the wind. Not for a minute. He would have had arrangements
made for her. You know that." My arguments were beginning to sound a little
strained to me, too. I was in the position of a priest trying to sell
religion. "But Asa says they just left her hanging around some inn. I tell
you, Raven had a plan. I bet, if you went down there now, you'd find Darling
gone without a trace. And if the ship is still there, that crate wouldn't be
aboard." "What is this with the crate?" One-Eye demanded. I ignored him. "I
think you have too much imagination, Croaker," the Captain said. "But, on the
other hand, Raven is crafty enough to pull something like that. Soon as I can
spring you, figure on going down to check." "If Raven's crafty enough, how
about the Taken being villainous enough to try something against us?" "We'll
cross that bridge when we come to it." He faced One-Eye. "I want you and
Goblin to save the games. Understand? Too much clowning around and the Taken
will get curious. Croaker. Hang on to this Asa character. You'll want him to
show you where Raven died. I'm heading back to the outfit. Elmo. Come ride
with me part way." So. A little private business. Bet it had to do with my
suspicions about the Taken. After a while you get so used to some people you
can almost read their minds.
Chapter Thirty-Three: JUNIPER: THE ENCOUNTER
Things changed after the Captain's visit. The men became more alert. Elmo's
influence waxed while mine waned. A less wishy-washy, more inflexible tone
characterized the Company deputation. Every man became ready to move at an
instant's notice. Communications improved dramatically while time available
for sleep declined painfully. None of us were ever out of touch more than two
hours. And Elmo found excuses to get everyone but himself out of Duretile,
into places where the Taken would have trouble finding them. Asa became my
ward out on the black castle slope. Tension mounted. I felt like one of a
flock of chickens poised to scatter the moment a fox landed among us. I tried
to bleed off my shakiness by updating the Annals. I had let them slide sadly,
seldom having done more than keep notes. When the tension became too much for
me, I walked uphill to stare at the black castle. It was an intentional
risk-taking, like that of a child who crawls out a tree branch overhanging a
deadly fall. The closer I approached the castle, the more narrow my
concentration. At two hundred yards all other cares vanished. I felt the dread
of that place down to my ankle bones and the shallows of my soul. At two
hundred yards I felt what it meant to have the shadow of the Dominator
overhanging the world. I felt what the Lady felt when she considered her
husband's potential resurrection. Every emotion be- came edged with a hint of
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despair. In a way, the black castle was more than a gateway "through which the
world's great old evil might reappear. It was a concretization of metaphorical
concepts, and a living symbol. It did things a great cathedral does. Like a
cathedral,it was far more than an edifice. I could stare at its obsidian walls
and grotesque decoration, recall Shed's stories, and never avoid dipping into
the cesspool of my own soul, never avoid searching myself for the essential
decency shelved through most of my adult life. That castle was, if you like, a
moral landmark. If you had a brain. If you had any sensitivity at all. There
were times when One-Eye, Goblin, Elmo or another of the men accompanied me.
Not one of them went away untouched. They could stand there with me, talking
trivialities about its construction or, weightily, about its significance in
the Company's future, and all the while something would be happening inside. I
do not believe in evil absolute. I have recounted that philosophy in specific
elsewhere in the Annals, and it affects my every observation throughout my
tenure as Annalist. I believe in our side and theirs, with the good and evil
decided after the fact, by those who survive. Among men you seldom find the
good with one standard and the shadow with another. In our war with the Rebel,
eight and nine years ago, we served the side perceived as the shadow. Yet we
saw far more wickedness practiced by the adherents of the White Rose than by
those of the Lady. The villains of the piece were at least straightforward.
The world knows where it stands with the Lady. It is the Rebel whose ideals
and morals conflict with fact, becoming as changeable as the weather and as
flexible as a snake. But I digress. The black castle has that effect. Makes
you amble off into all the byways and cul-de-sacs and false trails you have
laid down during your life. It makes you reassess. Makes you want to take a
stand somewhere, even if on the black side. Leaves you impatient with your own
malleable morality. I suspect that is why Juniper decided to pretend the place
did not exist. It is an absolute demanding absolutes in a world with a
preference for relatives. Darling was in my thoughts often while I stood below
those black, glossy walls, for she was the castle's antipode when I was up
there. The white pole, and absolute in opposition to what the black castle
symbolized. I had not been much in her presence since realizing what she was,
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