“The regions nearest the breach are weakening,” Itharos added, “to the point of death. Unstopped, the weakening will spread to each end of the wall.”

“I know,” Dale said. She would have shaken them if only they were corporeal.

“The wall bleeds,” Itharos continued, “because those guardians are no more. They have succumbed.”

“Isn’t that why you’re here?” Dale demanded. “To keep that sort of thing from happening?”

The mages looked uneasily from one to another.

“Not precisely,” Itharos said. “Our function is to inform the wallkeepers of trouble, and they in turn are supposed to inform the Deyers. It was up to the Deyers to fix any problems, for it is the Deyers who have an affinity for stone in their blood; the ability to work with the guardians.

“You must understand that we’ve little influence over the wall guardians. We can communicate with them enough to know when all is well, or not. We can even negotiate with them on a limited basis, as Merdigen did to rescue you from being imprisoned in the wall, but that’s about it. Before our powers faded with the departure of our corporeal forms, we might have been able to do more, but all our magic is gone from us, except for giving us the power to be.”

She looked hard at each one of them. “Then what’s the point of your being here?”

Itharos shrugged. “We don’t know the entirety of Merdigen’s intent in drawing us together.”

“So you’re just going to wait,” she said. “Wait and have a party when and if Merdigen returns, and in the meantime the wall will continue to die. Because that’s what’s happening, right? The wall is dying.”

“It is unfortunate,” Boreemadhe said, “but we cannot prevent it from happening.”

“Unfortunate?” Dale was incredulous. “Is there anything you can do?” Her question was met with silence and the shuffling of feet.

“Believe us, child,” Boreemadhe said, “if there was something we could do to repair the wall ourselves, it would have been done as soon as we were awakened.”

Dale practically quivered with anger, comprehending something of Alton’s frustration. “Nothing you can do,” she spat. “Do any of you even remember what it was like to be flesh and blood? Living under the open sky and breathing the fresh air?”

“Well, it’s been a while—” Itharos began, but Dale silenced him with a curt gesture.

“You may not have seen each other in a very long time, but you also haven’t seen your homeland in even longer. Each of you spoke to me about your shock over the devastation of the land, the people, following the Long War. Famine, child warriors with missing limbs, disease, a people and country moved back centuries to a more primitive age.” It was odd, when she thought about it, that she should find herself lecturing thousand-year-old great mages. Or, rather, projections of thousand-year-old great mages.

“It took centuries,” she continued, “for the people to make recovery. You’d probably not recognize Sacoridia today as the same place you left. Commerce is stronger than it’s ever been, with ships sailing to far off ports in search of trade, the land producing for the people, whether it’s the timber that builds the ships or the crops carried in their holds. Sacoridia’s arts and culture also flourish. The school at Selium spreads it across the land, and there are museums, theater, and music. Some painters and poets are almost as famous as the king! Why, you wouldn’t believe the number of bookshops in Sacor City alone.”

That caught their attention.

“Books,” Dorleon murmured.

“Books, bookshops, binders, printers—”

“Printers?” Winthorpe demanded. “What is this?”

They were in awe when she told them so many more books could be produced with a single printing press.

“You must bring us books,” Winthorpe said.

“Yes,” the others murmured. “Bring us books.”

Dale gazed at them in surprise. Their faces were hopeful, pleading, almost childlike with desire. Then she narrowed her eyebrows. She had them now.

“Sacoridia has arisen from the ruins through hardship and wars, and now it shines. You’d be proud of your people. But if we don’t solve the problem of the wall, there will be no more books. There will be nothing. Look, you’re all learned, scholarly people. It seems to me your ability to look at problems and solve them should not have been affected by the fading of your old powers. I’ve seen you working out those equations! And I assume you have no wish to see Sacoridia come to ruins after all your sacrifices. If you apply yourselves to the problem of the wall in this manner, who is to say you won’t find a solution to fixing it?”

“She’s right,” Fresk said, and the others nodded and murmured in agreement.

Dale decided to clinch her argument with an incentive. “If you get to work, I’ll see about finding you some books.”

She thought Alton would be proud of her little speech. It had the desired effect, for the group set aside their usual preoccupations and conjured chairs for themselves to sit around the table and work. Probably nothing would come of it, but at least she’d gotten them to try.

Alton appeared to relax when she sat down with him later in his tent to tell him of her visit with the tower guardians.

“I think they need Merdigen in order to focus,” she said. “He’s their leader, and they’ve just been waiting for him, not taking any initiative themselves.”