High Deryni (29 page)

“If I force him back to consciousness, it could kill him.”

“Then we'll have to take that risk.”

Morgan's eyes flicked to the boy's face, then back to Kelson's. “Let me try another way, my prince. It is not without its own risks, but…”

He gazed into Kelson's unblinking eyes for several seconds, and finally Kelson gave a slow nod.

“Can you do it here with reasonable safety?” he asked, inquiring as much after Morgan's safety as that of the boy.

Morgan lowered his eyes. “You must have your information, my prince. And your barons will have to see me in action sooner or later. I think we have little choice.”

“Then do it,” Kelson breathed, straightening on his knees and glancing around him at his watching lords. “Gentlemen, I beseech you to stand away and give His Grace space to work. The boy's message must be heard, and only my Lord Alaric's gifts can make that possible without endangering an innocent life. There is no danger to any of you.”

There was a murmur of consternation among nobles and clergy as Kelson spoke, and several made furtive movements toward the doors until Kelson's sharp gaze swept the room and held each man in his place. Those closest to the tableau moved away a little, as the king had asked, until only Duncan and Kelson himself were still kneeling beside Morgan and the unconscious page. As Morgan shifted to a sitting position, supporting the boy in his lap, the murmuring ceased and the room grew hushed. For all but a few, this would be the first time they had ever seen a Deryni use his powers.

Morgan looked up at them and studied the fearful, sometimes hostile faces. Never had he looked so human, so vulnerable, as he sat in the middle of the floor with the child cradled in his arms. Never had the gray eyes been so guileless in the presence of potential enemies.

But there must be confidence. Now was not the time for old enmities, for fears to crowd beside the trust that must be engendered. Here must be a time of openness, of stark truth. These men must be convinced, once and for all, that the fearsome powers of the Deryni could be used for good. So much depended upon what happened here in the next minutes. There must be no mistakes.

Morgan permitted himself the tiniest of smiles as he carefully chose his words.

“My lords, I fully understand your apprehension,” he said in a low voice. “You will have heard many rumors about my powers and the powers of my people, and it is natural that you should at first fear what you do not understand.

“What you are about to see and hear will, undoubtedly, seem very strange to you,” he went on. “But so the unknown always seems until it becomes the known.” He paused. “Even I cannot predict with certainty just what will happen in the next minutes, for I have no idea what this lad has been through. I ask only that you do not interfere, no matter what happens—that you watch and listen silently. The process is not without its danger for
me
.”

As he looked down at the boy again, a faint sigh whispered among the watchers, quickly fading into total silence. Morgan smoothed the unconscious boy's fair hair gently across his forehead, then positioned his left hand so that he could see the gryphon signet close by the boy's chin. With a last glance at Duncan and Kelson, who still knelt silently across from him, he gazed at the gryphon and made a conscious effort to relax, breathing deeply to trigger the Thuryn trance as he had learned long ago.

Then his head bowed and his eyes closed, and his breath came deep and easy. The boy stirred once beneath his hands, then was still.

“Blood.”

Morgan whispered the word, but there was an alien quality to the sound that sent a ripple of chill through the watching lords.

“So much blood,” Morgan murmured, louder this time. “Blood everywhere.” His head slowly raised, though the eyes remained tightly closed.

Duncan glanced sharply at Kelson, then edged closer to his kinsman, his pale eyes fixed on the familiar face now gone strange. He had more than a suspicion now what his kinsman was attempting, and the thought chilled him for all his understanding of the act. He wet his lips nervously, his eyes never leaving the strained face of Morgan.

“Who are you?”
he said in a low voice.

“Oh, my God, who's that coming?” Morgan's voice replied, as though he had not heard, a boyish quality evident even as Duncan had suspected.

“Ah, 'tis only my Lord Jared, with his good allies, the Earl of Marley and his friends…. ‘Boy, bring wine for my Lord of Marley. Bran Coris has come to reinforce us. Bring wine, lad. Show your respect for the Earl of Marley!'”

Morgan's voice paused, then continued in a lower, darker tone, so that his listeners had to move closer to catch all of his words.

“The armies of Bran Coris join with ours. The royal blue banners of Marley mix and meld with the sleeping lions of Cassan, and all is well.

“But, wait! The soldiers of Bran Coris draw their swords!”

Morgan's eyes popped open, but he continued to speak in the boy's voice, his voice rising in pitch, almost cracking with the strain.

“No! Not treachery! It cannot be! Bran Coris's men ride with the Furstán hart beneath their shield covers! They slay the duke's men! They cut a swatch of carnage through the ranks of Cassan!

“My lord! My Lord Jared! Flee for your life! The Marley's men are upon us in treachery! Fly, oh, fly away, Your Grace! We are undone! Oh, my lord, we are undone!”

With an anguished moan, Morgan's head dropped against his chest, bitter sobs wracking his body. Kelson started to reach out and touch him, but Duncan frowned and shook his head. They watched tensely as Morgan's sobbing finally stopped and he raised his head once more. The gray eyes were blank and strained, the cheeks strangely damp, the expression that of a man who has just looked on Hell. He stared unseeing for several seconds, and then:

“I see my Lord Jared go down beneath a sword,” he whispered dully. Duncan controlled a gasp of anguish. “I do not know if he is dead. I fall from my horse and am nearly trampled, but I escape, I play dead.”

He shuddered and continued, choking back another sob. “I roll beneath the body of a slain knight, am drenched by his dying blood, but I am not found out. Soon the battle ends and night falls, but even then there is no safety. The Marley's men take prisoners, and Torenthi death squads dispatch the badly wounded. No living man escapes that field of death except in chains.

“When all is quiet, I crawl from beneath my dead knight and stagger to my feet. I start to whisper a prayer for the dead knight's soul, for he has unwittingly saved me from the enemy.” Morgan's face contorted and his right hand crumpled the silken banner still across the boy's chest. “But then I see the black hart banner in the dead knight's hands, the blue eagles of Marley sprinkling the leather of his surcoat.” He stifled a sob.

“I take the banner as proof of what I have seen, and then I stumble into the night. Two—no,
three
horses die beneath me before I reach the gates of Dhassa with the news.”

His eyes glazed slightly, and Duncan thought he was about to come out of it, but then the strange voice spoke again, Morgan's lips curving in a strained smile.

“But, I have accomplished my mission. The king knows of Bran Coris's treachery. Even if my Lord Jared lies dead, our liege lord the king will avenge him. God save…the king!”

With that, Morgan's head slumped once more against his chest, and this time Duncan did not stop Kelson as he reached across to lay a trembling hand on Morgan's arm.

After a few seconds, the tense shoulders relaxed and Morgan breathed a great sigh. Then his right hand flexed against the tattered silk he still clutched, and he opened his eyes. He stared at the still form of the boy in his arms for a long moment, remembering the horror he had shared, then disengaged his hand from the silk and laid his hand across the boy's forehead.

The gray eyes closed momentarily and opened again, and then Morgan straightened and raised his eyes to meet Kelson's. His cheeks still glistened with the tears he had shared with the boy, but he made no move to wipe them away.

“He has borne a heavy burden for you, my prince,” Morgan said quietly. “Nor do I welcome the news he has brought us.”

“One is not expected to welcome the news of treachery,” Kelson murmured, his eyes distant and hooded. “Are you all right?”

“Only a little tired, Sire. Duncan, I am sorry about your father. I wish the boy could have seen what became of him.”

“I am his only remaining son,” Duncan whispered dully. “I should have been out there, at his side. He was getting too old to lead armies.”

Morgan nodded, knowing the guilt his kinsman must be feeling, then looked up at the assembled lords and bishops. Two squires came to take the boy away to rest, but they would not meet his eyes as they took the boy from his arms. Morgan got to his feet, steadying himself against Kelson's shoulder, then swept the torchlit room with his cool gaze. The eyes were dark, mostly pupil in the flickering torchlight—inky pools of power and mystery, even though the body behind them was exhausted.

But to his surprise, as his gaze touched the men, they did not shrink from the contact. The bishops shuffled feet, twisted nervous fingers in the folds of purple cassocks, but they did not retreat. The generals and captains, too, stared at Morgan with a new look of grudging respect, fearful but now willing to trust. In all, there was not a man in the room who would not have gone on his knee to Morgan in an instant, had he requested it—notwithstanding Kelson's presence in the room.

Only Kelson, brushing dust from the knees of his hose in a carefully casual gesture, seemed unaffected by the feat of magic they had just witnessed. Anger, not awe, and a little resignation were in his manner as he stepped slightly away from Morgan and surveyed his waiting court.

“As you have surmised, gentlemen, the news of Bran Coris's defection has shocked and angered me greatly. And the loss of Duke Jared will be felt by all of us for many years to come.” He flicked a sympathetic glance at Duncan, and the priest bowed his head.

“But I think there is no question what must be done now,” the king continued. “The Earl of Marley has allied himself with our bitter enemy and turned against his own kind. For this he will be punished.”

“But, what
are
his own kind, Sire?” Bishop Tolliver whispered. “What are
we
, hodge-podge of human and Deryni and half of each? Where is the dividing line? Who is on the side of right?”

“He who serves the right is on the side of right,” Cardiel said softly, turning to face his colleagues. “He who is human and Deryni and half of each. It is not a man's blood that makes him choose good or evil. It is what lies within his soul.”

“But we are so different…” Tolliver glanced at Morgan in awe.

“It does not matter,” Cardiel said. “Human or Deryni, we share at least one common bond—and it is thicker than blood or oath or any spell that one might bind from the outer darkness. It is the sure and certain knowledge that we side with the Light. And he who would side with Darkness can only be our enemy, no matter what his blood or oath or spell.”

The other bishops, with the exception of Arilan, glanced among themselves and then were silent. Cardiel, after a slow scan across their faces, turned back to Kelson and bowed.

“I and my brethren will assist you in whatever way we can, Sire. Will the news of Bran Coris change your plans to leave at dawn?”

Kelson shook his head, grateful for the bishop's intercession. “I think not, Excellency. I suggest that all of you get some sleep and make whatever arrangements are necessary for your provisioning now. I shall need the help of every one of you in the days ahead.”

“But we are not fighting men, Sire,” old Bishop Carsten protested weakly. “What possible use can we—”

“Then pray for me, Excellency. Pray for us all.”

Carsten opened his mouth and then shut it again, rather like a fish gulping air. Then he bowed and edged back with the rest of his colleagues. After a pause, those in the rear of the group turned and began making their way from the room. As they filed out, Nigel and the generals returned to their maps and resumed their interrupted discussion, though much subdued.

Kelson watched as Morgan led Duncan back to a window seat and talked with him for several minutes, then joined the fringes of the war council. Markers clicked and voices were raised and lowered with the tension of revising their plans, but after a while Kelson turned away from the council and walked slowly to one of the fireplaces. He was joined shortly by Morgan, who had noticed his withdrawal, even if no one else had.

“I hope that you're not going to try to insist that Bran's defection was all your fault,” Morgan said in a low voice. “I've just listened to Duncan tell me how this could all have been avoided, if only he had been at Rengarth with his father's army.”

Kelson lowered his eyes, studying a scuff mark on the leather of his wide belt. “No.” He paused. “Bran's wife and his heir are here in Dhassa, did you know?”