A round-shaped object spun down, and Qeteb caught it in a hand.
"Tell me about this bowl," he said to Isfrael.
Isfrael's face brightened with excitement. "That is my mother's bowl!"
"And its significance is ..." Qeteb said patiently.
"It does many things, but one of its main purposes was to allow my mother to travel to and from the Sacred Groves."
"Do you know how to use it?"
Isfrael stared at the bowl, then raised his eyes to Qeteb's mask. "Yes. I can use it, but I will need your power added to the power of the bowl so that I can propel myself into the Groves. And
... one more thing."
I do hope your flesh is going to be sweet enough for all the trouble you are causing me, Qeteb thought, but he answered pleasantly enough. "Yes?"
"I take the bowl with me," Isfrael said. And then I shall be safe for all time! he thought.
"But of course," Qeteb said. "I would not dream of keeping it."
And even his visor seemed to smile reassuringly.
Isfrael relaxed with complete relief. "My people are in Sanctuary —" he began.
"No," said Qeteb. "No. They were not part of your original bargain."
"But—"
"No!"
Isfrael subsided. The Avar had abandoned him after all. And even then he had tried to save them.
He'd done his best. He had. He really had. Now he should concentrate on saving what was left.
"Very well," he said, and reached out for the bowl.
Isfrael may not have been told of the exact way in which Faraday had used the bowl to reach the Sacred Groves, but he was Mage-King of the Avar, instructed and expert in all of their secret arts. He knew the bowl for what it was: a conduit, a means of entering the Groves either when all other means were closed, or, as in Faraday's case, by a person who normally would not have the power or the knowledge to access the secret paths.
The Mother had forgotten the bowl when She'd closed the paths. She'd forgotten that She'd left the back door open.
And here it was, Isfrael thought, in the hands of the Demons. The silly Bitch, She needed him there to guide Her. Why, if he hadn't come along, the Demons would have accessed the Groves for themselves! The Mother was fortunate indeed that he was here to save Her and all who still dwelt within the Groves.
Isfrael placed the bowl on the ground. "I need water."
Instantly Sheol was at his side, solicitously offering him a pewter pitcher filled with clear, sweet water.
She poured it into the bowl, and as it swirled about, the water changed to a deep emerald colour.
Isfrael's chest constricted with excitement, and he had to fight to calm himself. He opened his right hand, and hesitated.
Qeteb, deep inside Isfrael's unwitting mind, instantly leaned out his own hand, one finger extended.
Isfrael stared at the mailed hand, then took a grasp of it —
It was deathly cold, as if it had been entombed for centuries within one of the great bergs thatdrifted in the Iskruel Ocean.
— and used one of the sharpened overlapping joints above a knuckle to slice a small way into his thumb.
Blood welled, and Isfrael let Qeteb's hand go.
He had not noticed the intensity of its cold, or the intensity of the coldness that now coiled deep inside his mind.
A trace, that the Demons could use later, at their leisure.
Isfrael stood over the bowl murmuring prayers and invocations to the Mother, then he let a single drop of blood fall into the bowl of water.
Blood swarmed over the entire surface of the emerald water.
Isfrael bent down, picked up the bowl, then straightened. He closed his eyes, tilted his head back slightly, and prepared to enter the groves.
"Do it now!" he whispered. "Use your power to propel me now\"
And the Demons did. They sniggered and they capered, they dribbled and they scampered, and they concentrated their entire power on the man and the bowl before them.
After all, they had promised.
Isfrael screamed, and then emerald light consumed him. He found himself caught up in a whirlpool of the light, and he almost panicked, until he realised that he was being propelled towards the Sacred Groves with such power that he was being forced through the barriers the Mother had erected.
