Challenges (55 page)

A stir in the crowds heralded the arrival of the peasants who, just like their betters, already wore their robe hoods up. It was difficult to pick out individuals like that, with faces shrouded in shadow. Delin had thought he might rattle Mardimil at least by
speaking
what the man hadn’t read, but he couldn’t pick out the fool from the other two men. Not to mention that the two groups were being kept separated from one another…

And then the outer doors were being slid open, letting in the bright sunlight and the muted roar of the crowd—less muted once they noticed the doors being opened. It was nearly time when they would find out who their next Seated Blending would be, and their level of excitement was so high that Delin could feel it in the air like something tangible. But most of that excitement was on behalf of the peasants he and the others would face. If Zolind had really expected the masses to become more and more fond of Delin’s group as the days and competitions went by, that was another part of the fool’s plan which hadn’t worked.

Delin joined the others in following their official guide out onto the sands, but he felt as though he were moving through a dream. The waves of screaming delight and applause washed over him, threatening to knock him down, making him believe that all the encouragement and support were for him. Sand began to enter his sandals the way it usually did, but this time he ignored it. All those people were waiting for
him
to fulfill their dreams, and he couldn’t bring himself to disappoint them.

The guide took them to the designated place in the sand and then left them, just as the other group was left thirty feet away. The sun beat down on them mercilessly, hating the fact that they were all protected by white robes and hoods. The others of his group moved into position in front of him, preserving the myth that it wasn’t possible to Blend otherwise. What the fools around them didn’t know couldn’t be used against
them
…

And then the giant torches set on two sides of the amphitheater burst into flame, and Delin was swept up and devoured by the entity the five of them Blended into. His last thought was what a relief it was to be devoured so, and then the entity looked about itself. Just as it had expected, another entity waited to challenge it the way the previous ones had.

But this latest enemy made no effort to rush to the attack, so the entity did it for its opponent. Fire flamed out as sand was hurled with strength and water was added as air was taken away—but somehow none of that worked. Everywhere the entity thrust was a shield-barrier, invisible and intangible, but still incredibly there. This had never happened before, not in any of the three battles which the entity had fought.

And then a counterattack came, one which was so strong that the entity was nearly overwhelmed completely. Only by the expenditure of total effort was the entity able to defend itself, and even so, some of the fleshly forms of its components staggered. The truth was clear and as unavoidable as the attack: the enemy was far stronger than the entity, and the next attack would finish the matter.

Despair wasn’t something the entity was truly able to feel, but echoes of the emotion came from one part of it. Defeat was merely something to be accepted if it came—but then the entity’s attention was taken by an oddity. Without the entity making an effort of any sort, the enemy entity suddenly disappeared as its five separate components collapsed to the sand. And the components lay there unmoving … how odd, how very odd…

And then it was Delin back again, aware of his individuality and completely stunned. Their opponents were down, apparently unconscious… How could that possibly have happened?

“I’m delighted to say that the major plan worked just fine,” Kambil told them all with a laugh. “Those letters were left in their apartment as a distraction, giving them something to think about even if they weren’t read. The thing we wanted them to miss was the fact that their undergarments were impregnated with hilsom powder. At the first sign that we weren’t able to defeat them, Zolind had the High Earth magic talents he sent here simply
shake
the undergarments. Their entity was so engrossed with ours that it never noticed, but it certainly noticed when they all breathed in the powder. They were immediately cut off from their individual abilities, and then the High talents were able to put them to sleep. They intended to use more than one High in order to reach the Earth magic member, I was told, and apparently whatever number they used was the right one.”

“Why weren’t the rest of us told about that?” Delin demanded as the others chuckled their appreciation. “I was nearly beside myself, and might even have refused to compete!”

“There was no real danger of that, and we had to make our act look good,” Kambil said soothingly despite the insanity now being produced by the crowds. “If we’d all strutted out here without a care in the world, the commoner officials would have known that something … extralegal was planned. But this isn’t the place to discuss it. Let’s accept everyone’s congratulations, and then go home.”

Delin’s anger wasn’t interested in waiting, but when the others threw their hoods off and headed back toward the gathering area, he had no choice but to do the same. That certainly wasn’t the place for discussions, but once they reached some quiet spot…

* * *

The promised discussion didn’t take place for hours. First they had to accept the congratulations of every human being they passed, and then they were put in individual carriages and paraded up the roads and through the streets. Not many people shouted and waved in the peasant areas, but once they reached the more important neighborhoods things definitely changed. People of position applauded politely as their carriages passed, and servants shouted words of delight and support. To a certain extent it was truly gratifying, but Delin was still too angry to really appreciate it. And that was another unanswered question: why were they being returned to their residence rather than taken to the palace?

When they finally did reach the residence, Delin had long since decided how it would be best to handle things. For that reason he made sure to stroll into the sitting room first while the others stood in the front hall sharing the excitement and delight they hadn’t been able to show earlier. While they made fools of themselves he took out the vial he’d hidden behind the cushions of a couch, poured himself a cup of tea from the service, then emptied the vial into the rest of the tea.

He had taken a chair and was sipping from his cup when the others stormed in, all of them acting like small children after successfully completing a prank. Delin added his own smile as he watched them all take tea, and when the last of them turned away from the service, he raised his cup high.

“To the newest Blending of the Empire, long may we reign!” he toasted, and the others added, “Here, here!” before joining him in drinking—just as he’d known they would. He then waited until they’d all taken seats, after which he looked directly at Kambil.

“For your information, you’ve all just swallowed a good dose of Puredan,” he announced amiably. “If the thought disturbs you, it shouldn’t. The leader of a group is entitled to know everything, and if he can’t get his answers one way, he has to get them another.”

“What answers are you after, Delin?” Kambil asked without the least sign of agitation. “I’ll be glad to tell you anything I can.”

“Of course you’re glad,” Delin countered, letting some of his fury show through. “You have no choice but to be glad. Now we can start with why I wasn’t told about what Zolind actually planned to do. He may not know I’m leader here, but you certainly do.”

“You weren’t told because you simply can’t be trusted, Delin,” Kambil replied pleasantly with a continuing lack of hesitation. “Even if you managed not to brag to someone, your arrogance would have been so thick that you would have given the game away. The commoners’ observers were watching us very closely, so we simply couldn’t afford that.”

“Are you insane?” Delin demanded in complete outrage. “I don’t brag about the things I do, and I’ve learned to be humble when humility is called for. You’re just making excuses, so I’ll give you a different question. Why are we here instead of at the palace? There are certain plans I mean to move ahead on at once, even before we’re Seated.”

“You’re talking about arranging to have your father and mother killed,” Kambil said with a nod, shocking Delin. “Yes, I know all about it, which is one of the reasons I agreed to Zolind’s demand that we come back here rather than go to the palace as we’re supposed to. Once we get there we’ll be expected to separate, and I needed to finish up with you before that’s done. We have much more important things to worry about than your vengeance against your parents.”

“But—what—What are you talking about?” Delin stuttered, suddenly noticing the way the others were calmly staring at him. “You can’t know—you can’t speak to me like—What’s going on here? You’re supposed to be drugged…!”

“Not many people can be drugged with plain water,” Kambil commented with a smile after taking another sip of his tea. “And that’s all you added to the service, plain water. The Puredan you paid quite a lot of gold for was never really Puredan, I made sure of that. Letting you have it would have been like putting a weapon into the hands of a small child.”

“A completely insane small child,” Bron added without inflection, still studying Delin. “I missed seeing it at first, of course, but certainly made up for that blindness later. Insane doesn’t necessarily also mean stupid, but you seem to be the exception to that rule.”

“Which at least afforded us some amusement,” Homin said, the faint smile he wore causing Delin to feel chilled. “In the beginning you thought you were controlling Bron by calling him our leader, and never once stopped to wonder why the rest of us saw through the farce, but he didn’t. You simply grew tired of the pretense and made it clear that
you
were leader, and again never wondered why no one argued.”

“It was because we were all humoring you,” Selendi told him, the gentleness of her tone like a slap in the face. “It was amusing to a certain extent, but when we saw how easily you might ruin everything, it stopped being funny. We told Kambil we thought he should control you completely, but he said it wasn’t possible yet.”

“Which, unfortunately, it wasn’t,” Kambil said, taking up the narrative again. “There’s a definite … extra something … which comes from Earth magic in a Blending, but it doesn’t appear if the Earth magic user is being controlled. You might even call it a hidden reserve of emergency strength, but whatever it is it simply wasn’t there when I took full control of you. I had to leave you mostly uncontrolled, then, but we did without the extra anyway. Your terror was so thick that it affected the Blending entity, so you almost caused us to lose all by yourself.”

“I did no such thing!” Delin snarled, humiliation flushing his skin to the point of pain. “I don’t get terrified and I certainly don’t lose, but you people do make me sick! It isn’t me he’s controlling but the rest of
you
! I know you can’t see yourselves from the outside, but you’re not the same people you were!”

“And you’re only just noticing that,” Bron commented while Homin and Selendi showed those faint and horrible smiles again. “We remember exactly what we were like, but Kambil’s been working with us practically from the day we were first put into this group.”

“He just didn’t let us show these much more efficient selves until there was no one around to notice and wonder,” Selendi went on. “We love being efficient and capable, untouched by all those emotions which used to choke us and trip us. We’re the same as we used to be—except for the petty problems we were hampered by.”

“But I do actually regret something, even if the regret is faint,” Homin said, taking his turn again. “It would have been marvelous to be able to show the new me to that offensive Elfini, but your sickness made that impossible, Delin. If not for you, she wouldn’t have had to die.”

“You know I killed her?” Delin demanded, his voice much higher and more shrill than he’d wanted it to be. “But no one was supposed to—I mean, you’re completely mistaken. I did no such thing, so you’d better not say it again or I’ll—”

“Tell your father?” Kambil suggested with sickening amusement. “Or possibly kill us as well? Save yourself the effort of planning our deaths, Delin. You’re marvelous at making those sorts of plans, but you simply haven’t got what it takes to carry them out. You’re a bungler, and you’ve never killed anyone in your entire life.”

“That’s not true,” Delin choked out, his head whirling so wildly that his vision had started to blur. And he’d dropped his cup of tea… “I’ve killed more than once, Elfini and Ollon Kapmar, and those sluts at the pleasure parlors…”

“You did nothing at the pleasure parlors but faint,” Kambil’s voice came through the ringing in Delin’s ears. “After the first time, you mumbled something before you came out of it about how happy you were to have killed the girl. The manager of the establishment took that as his cue about how to behave, and therefore told you that he’d discreetly gotten rid of the body. Your tip to him was so generous that he shared the information about your preferences with the managers of the other parlors you patronized, and thereafter he shared their own tips as well. They lied to you, you fool, and simply kept the ‘dead’ girls out of your way for a while. You never really noticed their faces, so there were some you ‘killed’ two or three times.”

“No,” Delin moaned, fists to his temples in an effort to stop the throbbing pain in his head. “I did kill them, I did! Them and Elfini and Ollon Kapmar! You’re lying, you’re—”

“What I am is sick and tired of cleaning up after your messes,” Kambil said from somewhere, unbelievably sounding annoyed. “I didn’t trust you any farther than Selendi could throw you, so I followed you when you so generously agreed to help Homin. You were actually fool enough to go in and abuse that woman, after which you fainted as usual. If I hadn’t been there, she would have summoned the guard and had you locked up and the key thrown away.”