Into the Labyrinth (novel)
Into the Labyrinth (1993) is a fantasy novel by American writers Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman, the sixth book by in their The Death Gate Cycle.
 Cover | |
| Authors | Margaret Weis Tracy Hickman |
|---|---|
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Series | The Death Gate Cycle |
| Genre | Fantasy |
| Publisher | Bantam Spectra |
Publication date | 1993 |
| Media type | Print (Paperback |
| Pages | 496 (paperback) |
| ISBN | 0-553-56771-3 |
| OCLC | 30564137 |
| Preceded by | The Hand of Chaos |
| Followed by | The Seventh Gate |
Plot summary
On Abarrach, Xar is attempting to learn the secret of necromancy, but he needs a fresh corpse to test it on. He interrogates the lazar Kleitus about the location of any living Sartan, and Kleitus reveals that Haplo lied to Xar about all the Sartan dying at the hands of the dead; Balthazar and his group remain living. Kleitus also reveals to Xar that there is a "Seventh Gate", as well as the ones that lead to the four worlds and the ones that lead to the Vortex and the Nexus, and that the Seventh Gate was the room where the Sartan performed the Sundering Spell. Xar immediately becomes obsessed with it, realising that it must be very powerful and would allow him to recombine the four worlds and unite them under his rule.
Marit, the woman Haplo fell in love with in the Labyrinth, is one of the Patryns working with Xar on Abarrach. Sang-drax, the leader of the dragon snakes, is also supposedly working for Xar, though Marit does not trust him. Marit and Sang-drax bring Samah and Zifnab to Xar, having captured them near Death's Gate. Xar is exhilarated to finally be able to face Samah and unleash his hatred of the Sartan. Samah has been changed by his recent experiences and is now repentant, understanding how wrong he was and how much damage he did to all the races, including his own. Samah also tries to tell Xar not to trust the dragon-snakes, but Xar thinks he is being tricked by Samah and refuses to listen to him. Xar tries to interrogate Samah about the Seventh Gate, but Samah just says they "sent it away", which makes no sense to Xar. He leaves Sang-drax to torture Samah and goes to talk to Zifnab.
He discovers that Zifnab is actually one of the dissenting Sartan who refused to go along with Samah's plan; he was among the mensch on Earth during the Sundering, and was the first of either race to escape the Labyrinth. It was he who penned many of the books Xar educated himself with in the Nexus. (With all that Zifnab has seen, his total dementia seems a bit more understandable.)
Zifnab, amongst his ramblings, tells him that Haplo is his most loyal servant, that Bane is dead, and that the mensch in Arianus are about to start up the Kicksey-Winsey. Xar is afraid that he will no longer be able to control Arianus, so he tells Marit to prepare for a trip to Arianus to see what's happening. He returns to Samah's cell, lets him die, and starts the spell to try to revive him. Jonathon, the lazar, comes to Samah's cell but Xar just thinks he's a random lazar he called for to help with reviving Samah. Sang-drax calls Xar to the other cell, where Zifnab has disappeared, and when Xar comes back to Samah's cell Jonathon has released Samah's repentant soul before departing himself.
Xar talks to Sang-drax about what happened on Arianus, and Sang-drax twists what actually happened so it looks like Haplo was disloyal to Xar. Xar uses rune-joining to bind Marit to him as his "Wife" so that they can communicate via his rune and hers, drawn entwined on her forehead. Then he sends her to Arianus and goes himself to Pryan with Sang-drax.
In Arianus, Hugh the Hand risks his life by returning to the Brotherhood's stronghold to talk to Ciang. Out of curiosity, she lets him live and he tells her of his contract for Bane to kill Haplo. He doesn't know how to kill a "god". She gives him the Accursed Blade, an ancient artefact held by the Brotherhood that looks like a crude knife but is imbued with Sartan magic and can turn it into whatever is needed to fight its owner's enemy. Hugh takes it and leaves for Drevlin.
Marit arrives on Drevlin and discovers the three mensch races peacefully preparing to restart the Kicksey-Winsey, helped by Haplo. She reports to Xar and he orders her to kill Haplo and bring his body back to Xar. Hugh also arrives and prepares to kill Haplo. Trian, Limbeck, Jarre and Haplo use the automaton to restart the Kicksey-Winsey, bringing water to the higher realms and starting to move them all into position.
The dog leads Hugh to Haplo's ship, and Haplo finds them there, then Hugh tries to kill Haplo. The Accursed Blade turns into an axe, Haplo tells the dog to attack Hugh and Hugh accidentally falls onto Haplo's knife, severing a major artery, and dies. Then he comes back to life, cursing his fate. As instructed, he has told Haplo that "Xar wants you dead" so Haplo prepares to leave, then Marit comes aboard. Hugh tries to use the Accursed Blade to defend Haplo from Marit, but the blade, being Sartan-made, tries to attack both the Patryns. Whilst trying to fight off the Accursed Blade, Haplo also tries to convince Marit that he is loyal to Xar and that the dragon-snakes cannot be trusted. She tells Haplo that she did bear him a child, whom she called Rue before giving her up to a group of Squatters. They fly the ship through Death's Gate to Pryan to find Xar, but then Haplo thinks of tytans and the Accursed Blade becomes a tytan. Haplo realises the blade loses its powers while in Death's Gate, so takes them back through Death's Gate and to Chelestra.
The ship starts to break apart, losing its Patryn magic in the Chelestra water. Hugh is terrified by being surrounded by water, even though the Chelestran sea is breathable. A dragon-snake appears outside the ship and seems to have some control over the Cursed Blade. The ship breaks apart, Haplo and the others are rescued by Alfred.
On Pryan, Paithan, Aleatha, Roland, Rega and Drugar are living in the citadel they reached with Haplo. Paithan is obsessed with a room in the center of the citadel that he calls the Star Chamber, a room with seven huge seats and an apparatus that generates blinding light. Roland and Aleatha are mostly not on speaking terms; the elf maiden finds herself spending more time with Drugar, who may be the last of his race. But Drugar has discovered a delightful illusion: at a certain clearing in the garden maze, at certain times of the day, he can see ghostly shadows of people from all the mensch races, walking around and talking to each other.
Xar arrives on Pryan, accompanied by Sang-drax, and finds that he cannot land his ship in the citadel because it's protected by the Sartan runes. He lands outside the citadel, and is attacked by tytans.
Fizban and his good dragon turn up to talk to the mensch in the citadel. Xar is let in and tries to befriend the mensch. Sang-drax and Fizban's dragon fight each other, then disappear. Xar asks Zifnab about the Seventh Gate. Zifnab tells him that Sang-drax has just stolen his ship and left Pryan, so Xar is stuck there.
Marit, Haplo and Hugh are in a peaceful white stone room, though they don't know where. She talks to Xar, and he tells her to stay with Haplo. Haplo thinks that she saved him from the wound he got while in the ship, but she says it was Alfred. Alfred comes to visit them, bringing Haplo's dog. Hugh is furious with Alfred for bringing him back to life, and wants Alfred to take away his life again. Alfred tells Haplo that the Chamber of the Damned that they visited on Abarrach was the Seventh Gate, and that Samah didn't, or couldn't, destroy it after the Sundering but instead sent it away, then everyone forgot it was on Abarrach.
Alfred reveals that Orla is dead. Alfred also reveals that the four of them are in the Vortex, the peaceful place in the centre of the Labyrinth, and that the Vortex is the unidentified beautiful place Haplo saw when going through Death's Gate. Marit is terrified, because it took many generations for the Patryns to get through the Labyrinth, and now she's back at the heart of it, unlikely to ever get to the final gate again.
Xar decides to leave Pryan in a ship he spotted outside the citadel, covered in Sartan runes, but to do that he needs to get past the tytans. He decides to kill off the mensch and revive them with necromancy to serve as distractions.
Alfred refuses to leave the Vortex, but Haplo gets his dog to bring Alfred, and just after they leave, a massive earthquake/landslide brings rocks down over the gateway so they can't get back to the Vortex. Whenever Alfred tries to use his magic the Labyrinth attacks them. They are attacked by tiger men, and rescued by local villagers. Alfred reveals to Haplo that his true, Sartan name is Coren, meaning "the chosen", a common Sartan name, but which Alfred hated when he woke up on Arianus and found that he was the only Sartan still alive there. But Haplo interprets the Sartan word as "to choose", and Alfred takes this as a sign, and becomes more determined to choose a path for himself.
Xar takes Roland, Rega and Paithan to a feast he has prepared, but discovers that Zifnab has drunk all the poisoned wine. Zifnab tells the mensch about the poison, and they try to escape from Xar, only to bump into Aleatha, who is distraught because Drugar has vanished into the mirror-world of the maze. She flees from Xar into the maze, which he can't enter because it's surrounded by Sartan runes, and she finds Drugar there, who used his amulet to travel to the other citadels, finding dwarves alive there. He tells her they should invite the tytans into the citadel.
Xar attacks them, Drugar dies, but Aleatha grabs the amulet and goes to the gate and invites the tytans in. Xar is attacked by Zifnab's dragon, furious that Zifnab has been killed.
Xar recovers from his battle with the dragon, and prepares to leave for the Labyrinth after Marit reports back to him— apparently corrupted by Haplo's influence into thinking Xar has made a mistake in allying with the dragon-snakes, as she says they are planning an attack.
He is surprised when the tytans don't kill the mensch, and actually act to protect the mensch from him, but he avoids a fight by snatching Drugar's amulet from Aleatha, killing Drugar, and running away. The amulet will gain him entry into the Sartan ship, which he can then use to return to the Labyrinth.
The book then reports that the mensch lived peacefully in the citadel with the tytans, that Paithan married Rega and Aleatha married Roland, and Paithan stayed in charged of the Star Chamber whilst Aleatha became High Priestess of the citadel.
The Patryn villagers take Alfred, Hugh, Haplo and Marit to a city. Haplo is astonished to see a city in the Labyrinth, and shocked that the headman of the tribe there is a soft-looking man with little physical strength, yet is respected by his tribesmen. They discover that Alfred is a Sartan. Alfred later talks to Vasu, the headman, and discovers that he is part Sartan, descended from those Sartan who were thrown into the Vortex/Labyrinth by Samah. Sang-drax appears, having been told by Xar where Marit is. Hordes of Labyrinth creatures gather to attack the city of Abri.
Marit overhears Sang-drax and other dragon-snakes talking about betraying them, and realises they are totally evil. She runs to find Haplo, who's in the city's humane prison with Alfred and Hugh, and she and Haplo are finally happily reunited. They discover that Hugh still has the Cursed Blade, which had disguised itself as Hugh's stregno pipe. Then the enemies attack.
At Abri, the battle between Patryns and Labyrinth creatures rages fiercely, but the real threat comes from the dragon-snakes. Haplo, Marit, and Hugh lead a sortie to deal with them, and the three battle Sang-drax in his serpent form. Sang-drax is apparently killed by Haplo, but Haplo has been badly injured and almost crushed beneath the massive body. Marit is attacked by a wolfen, then a green and golden dragon carries it away: Alfred, having made his choice to accept his power. He lifts the serpent's body off of Haplo, leaving Marit to hold Haplo's blood-soaked form, his heart-rune's wound having reopened. But while Alfred is distracted in battle with the dragon-snakes, Xar appears. He wants Haplo's knowledge of the Chamber of the Damned, and will stop at nothing to get it. The battle ends with the Labyrinth's armies driven off, but Marit dazed and wounded, Haplo abducted by Xar, and Alfred missing in action.
Reception
The book hit the bestseller lists for Waldenbooks and B. Dalton.[1]
References
- "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2005-09-01. Retrieved 2007-04-26.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)