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unable to see Ivory as perilous. She didn t understand him, but the idea of fearing him, him personally,
was not one she could keep in mind. She tried to be respectful, but it was impossible. She thought he
was clever and quite handsome, but she didn t think much about him, except for what he could tell her.
He knew what she wanted to know and little by little he told it to her, and then it was not really what she
had wanted to know, but she wanted to know more. He was patient with her, and she was grateful to
him for his patience, knowing he was much quicker than she. Sometimes he smiled at her ignorance, but
he never sneered at it or reproved it. Like the witch, he liked to answer a question with a question; but
the answers to Rose s questions were always something she d always known, while the answers to his
questions were things she had never imagined and found startling, unwelcome, even painful, altering all
her beliefs.
Day by day, as they talked in the old stableyard of Iria, where they had fallen into the habit of meeting,
she asked him and he told her more, though reluctantly, always partially; he shielded his Masters, she
thought, trying to defend the bright image of Roke, until one day he gave in to her insistence and spoke
freely at last.
 There are good men there, he said.  Great and wise the Archmage certainly was. But he s gone. And
the Masters . . . Some hold aloof, following arcane knowledge, seeking ever more patterns, ever more
names, but using their knowledge for nothing. Others hide their ambition under the grey cloak of wisdom.
Roke is no longer where power is in Earthsea. That s the Court in Havnor, now. Roke lives on its great
past, defended by a thousand spells against the present day. And inside those spell-walls, what is there?
Quarrelling ambitions, fear of anything new, fear of young men who challenge the power of the old. And
at the centre, nothing. An empty courtyard. The Archmage will never return.
 How do you know? she whispered.
He looked stern. The dragon bore him away.
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 You saw it? You saw that? She clenched her hands, imagining that flight.
After a long time, she came back to the sunlight and the stableyard and her thoughts and puzzles.  But
even if he s gone, she said,  surely some of the Masters are truly wise?
When he looked up and spoke it was with a hint of a melancholy smile.  All the mystery and wisdom of
the Masters, when it s out in the daylight, doesn t amount to so much, you know. Tricks of the trade -
wonderful illusions. But people don t want to believe that. They want the mysteries, the illusions. Who
can blame them? There s so little in most lives that s beautiful or worthy.
As if to illustrate what he was saying, he had picked up a bit of brick from the broken pavement, and
tossed it up in the air, and as he spoke it fluttered about their heads on delicate blue wings, a butterfly. He
put out his finger and the butterfly lighted on it. He shook his finger and the butterfly fell to the ground, a
fragment of brick.
 There s not much worth much in my life, she said, gazing down at the pavement.  All I know how to
do is run the farm, and try to stand up and speak truth. But if I thought it was all tricks and lies even on
Roke, I d hate those men for fooling me, fooling us all. It can t be lies. Not all of it. The Archmage did go
into the labyrinth among the Hoary Men and come back with the Ring of Peace. He did go into death
with the young king, and defeat the spider mage, and come back. We know that on the word of the king
himself. Even here, the harpers came to sing that song, and a teller came to tell it.
Ivory nodded gravely.  But the Archmage lost all his power in the land of death. Maybe all magery was
weakened then.
 Rose s spells work as well as ever, she said stoutly.
Ivory smiled. He said nothing, but she knew how petty the doings of a village witch appeared to him,
who had seen great deeds and powers. She sighed and spoke from her heart -  Oh, if only I wasn t a
woman!
He smiled again.  You re a beautiful woman, he said, but plainly, not in the flattering way he had used
with her at first, before she showed him she hated it.  Why would you be a man?
 So I could go to Roke! And see, and learn! Why, why is it only men can go there?
 So it was ordained by the first Archmage, centuries ago, said Ivory.  But ... I too have wondered.
 You have?
 Often. Seeing only boys and men, day after day, in the Great House and all the precincts of the School.
Knowing that the townswomen are spell-bound from so much as setting foot on the fields about Roke
Knoll. Once in years, perhaps, some great lady is allowed to come briefly into the outer courts. .. Why is
it so? Are all women incapable of understanding? Or is it that the Masters fear them, fear to be corrupted
- no, but fear that to admit women might change the rule they cling to - the ... purity of that rule.
 Women can live chaste as well as men can, Dragonfly said bluntly. She knew she was blunt and
coarse where he was delicate and subtle, but she did not know any other way to be.
 Of course, he said, his smile growing brilliant.  But witches aren t always chaste, are they? Maybe
that s what the Masters are afraid of. Maybe celibacy isn t as necessary as the Rule of Roke teaches.
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Maybe it s not a way of keeping the power pure, but of keeping the power to themselves. Leaving out
women, leaving out everybody who won t agree to turn himself into a eunuch to get that one kind of
power ... Who knows? A she-mage! Now that would change everything, all the rules!
She could see his mind dance ahead of hers, taking up and playing with ideas, transforming them as he
had transformed brick into butterfly. She could not dance with him, she could not play with him, but she
watched him in wonder.
 You could go to Roke, he said, his eyes bright with excitement, mischief, daring. Meeting her almost
pleading, incredulous silence, he insisted:  You could. A woman you are, but there are ways to change
your seeming. You have the heart, the courage, the will of a man. You could enter the Great House. I
know it.
 And what would I do there?
 What all the students do. Live alone in a stone cell and learn to be wise! It might not be what you
dream it to be, but that, too, you d learn.
 I couldn t. They d know. I couldn t even get in. There s the Doorkeeper, you said. I don t know the
word to say to him.
The password, yes. But I can teach it to you.
 You can? Is it allowed?
 I don t care what s  allowed , he said, with a frown she had never seen on his face. The Archmage [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]