Childe Morgan (31 page)

Breaking free, he pounded down the nave after his quarry, shoving aside flustered clergy and lingering townsfolk, jumping over fallen ones or dodging to avoid tripping over them, caroming off pillars as he tried to keep his quarry in sight.

Far at the west end, a group of monks saw him coming, alarmed by the shouts echoing from that end of the cathedral, and pointed urgently toward the baptistry chapel in the northwest corner, very near the door to the sacristy, where two black-clad figures were circling and feinting in a deadly dance that suddenly exploded into a knife-fight, quick and violent and bloody. Nearby lay the crumpled forms of several more black-clad bodies. Kenneth had nearly reached the struggling pair when another black-robed man burst from the sacristy doorway, sword in hand, and launched himself at Kenneth.

They met in a clash of ringing steel and grunted exclamations that sent frightened onlookers scurrying for cover in archways and behind pillars. After an initial flurry of heated attacks and parries, Kenneth's attacker disengaged, backing off briefly in more calculating assessment.

Again they engaged, feinting, testing, neither doing any damage—until Kenneth's attacker suddenly launched another flurry of furious attack. After half a dozen ringing exchanges, blade slithered along blade until the two swords locked at the cross-guards, the two men eye-to-eye, each straining to shift the balance. Kenneth attempted to disengage, but his opponent would not be budged, his cold gaze catching Kenneth's in what immediately became an attempt to seize his will. He was Deryni, Kenneth realized, and moreover, almost certainly the man of whom Jamyl had warned him.

Wrenching away his glance, Kenneth finally managed to disengage, worried now, sword sweeping before him in guard as he circled a few steps, looking for an opening. He probably had the edge in experience and even skill, but his opponent was at least a decade younger. From far at the other end of the nave, he could hear urgent shouting, and the sound of running footsteps, and prayed that more of his opponent's associates had not launched a separate attack on the king.

They closed again, with Kenneth well aware that this time the stakes were even higher than his own possible loss of life. After another flurry of exchanges, they locked blades again, but Kenneth kept his gaze averted and spun out from under the other's blade, ending crouched in a guard position a dozen paces away, breathing hard. The running footsteps were closer now—whether friend or foe, Kenneth knew not.

But there would be no renewal of
this
battle—at least not with swords. Though Kenneth's opponent again raised his blade, a look of calculated loathing in the dark eyes, this time he stretched forth his sword-arm to sight along his blade, a sneering smile twitching at the corners of his mouth. Then, though the sword tip sank slowly toward the floor, the man's other hand lifted in a fist that, as the fingers opened, brought forth a spitting ball of orange fire.

As the man's arm cocked back to throw, all Kenneth could think to do—and it was his body that reacted instinctively, not his brain—was to flatten himself to the floor, at the same time rolling as far aside as he could, even as lightning arced from the man's hand. The lightning seared past where Kenneth's torso had been, narrowly missing a ribbed column and taking a smoking gouge of masonry out of the wall beyond.

He recoiled from the sight, and saw, to his horror, that Duke Richard and the king had very nearly reached what was about to become a deadly killing zone, and that his Deryni attacker now was turning his blade toward the king, fire again in his other hand, a look of triumph in his eyes as he again cocked his arm to launch another magical strike.

“Nooooooo!”
Kenneth screamed.

In that same instant, his eye caught motion high in the clerestory above him: a black-clad and hooded archer looking down, drawing a little recurve bow to full-nock, the barbed arrowhead lowering to bear directly at him.

Except that, when the gloved hand let fly, the arrow thudded into the throat of Kenneth's attacker, who clawed at his throat with a strangled gurgle—and enveloped his own head in flames, slain by his own magic. Kenneth's gasp was lost in the shouts of nearby witnesses and the sound of footsteps approaching, as he twisted to look back up to the clerestory.

For an instant Kenneth did not move; nor did the man above, who paused with hand to ear and bow-arm still extended, face obscured by his hood.

But then the bow-arm slowly lowered, the other hand pushing back the hood from bright blue eyes and chestnut hair sleeked back in a braided warrior's knot. Looking grimly satisfied, Kenneth's savior inclined his head in a graceful bow, then jutted his chin beyond Kenneth, where Jamyl's desperate knife-fight had shifted onto the floor. The hand that the man raised in salute and leave-taking, just before he stepped back from the gallery's parapet, was marked at the wrist with a tattooed cross.

E
VEN
as his unexpected rescuer's identity registered, Kenneth was squirming upright, sword somehow still miraculously in his hand, searching wildly for the king and Duke Richard. He spotted them farther back in the nave, where they had followed Kenneth's example by throwing themselves to the floor at the threat of magic, and were picking themselves up. Bishop Faxon and several monks helping them to their feet, all solicitous. Relief washed over him in a wave, but it was not complete. The direct and immediate threat to the king might be neutralized, but Jamyl—

Fearing the worst, he staggered in the direction he had last seen the squire, but Jamyl's fight was over, his body all but hidden beneath that of his much larger opponent. There was blood on the floor around the pair: a great deal of it.

Heartsick, Kenneth started to reach for the body on top, to drag it clear, then jerked back as the man moved. To his relief, the vague movement proved to come not from the larger man, but from Jamyl himself, trying to squirm out from under.

“
Jesu
, he's heavy!” Jamyl's head emerged from under the dead-weight of the other man, profound relief in his eyes as he saw Kenneth cautiously stretching out his sword to prod the body on top.

“He's also quite dead, m'lord. Can you help me get him off?”

At once Kenneth laid aside his sword and scrambled closer to grab a handful of the dead man's clothing and heave him clear of Jamyl, who was breathing raggedly and covered with blood.

“Christ, he
is
heavy!”

“He felt like a horse on my chest,” Jamyl gasped, struggling to sit up. “He's wearing a breast and back, and steel vambraces—which didn't leave me much in the way of targets.”

Together they heaved the dead man onto his back, where the cause of his death became immediately evident. The hilt of a Haldane squire's dagger was protruding from under the man's chin, its blade driven up through the jaw and into the brain. The man appeared to be the one Kenneth had chased down the nave and lost.

“Well, at least
you
got him,” Kenneth muttered. “He got away from
me
.”

Behind him, the sound of running footsteps told of further company about to arrive, and monks were beginning to creep from their hiding places and venture closer, now that the danger appeared to be past. Meanwhile, Kenneth was making his own assessment of Jamyl's condition, prodding tentatively at a great bloody rent in the younger man's sleeve.

“Is any of that blood his, or is it mostly yours?” As he said it, he glanced up at the gallery behind them, but he could see no sign of Sé Trelawney. If others had seen him, it was likely they had taken him for one of the lancer archers.

Jamyl winced as he made his own inspection of his wounded arm, grimacing as his hand came away red.

“Mmm, mostly mine, I'm afraid, though some of it probably comes from that fellow.”

He nodded toward the nearest of the other men sprawled in the vicinity, who wore a cowled monk's robe like the others. The man appeared to be breathing, but his face was covered with blood from a deep cut that sliced from the bridge of his nose downward past the right-hand corner of his mouth.

“Another nasty friend, eh?” Kenneth retorted, tight-jawed, as he reached for his sword.

But Jamyl grabbed urgently at Kenneth's hand with his bloodied one and shook his head, the blue-violet eyes engaging Kenneth's as they had up in the gallery—though this time, no compulsion accompanied the intensity of his gaze.

“He is not one of them, my lord,” Jamyl said very deliberately. “He is…an associate.”

“An associate?” Kenneth repeated. “What kind of—”

“Not now, my lord!” Jamyl whispered, casting an anxious glance beyond Kenneth, for Richard and the king were nearly upon them, both with swords in their fists, and Bishop Faxon Howard not far behind.

Do not betray me!
came Jamyl's further plea, as he collapsed back, moaning, though his double-squeeze of Kenneth's hand told Kenneth that the moan was more for effect than an indication of real discomfort.

“Jamyl!” Brion cried, sheathing his sword as he pressed between the gathering monks to approach. Richard was heading on to check the other body, its features charred beyond recognition and an arrow through its throat. “Is he all right? And who the devil is that?” he added, pointing at the dead man with a Haldane squire's dagger protruding from underneath his chin.

“I don't know, Sire,” Jamyl said baldly before Kenneth could answer. “He was attacking one of the monks as I came down from the galleries,” he added, jutting his chin in the direction of his wounded “associate.” “When I tried to intervene, he attacked
me
.”

“See to both of them,” Bishop Faxon ordered, beckoning toward some of the other clergy personnel hovering nearby. “And see whether any of the others are alive.”

“It looks like one of our archers got this one,” Richard said, prodding the other dead man with a toe. “Sweet
Jesu
, how did he get so burned? Look at his hand and face!”

“He was Deryni, my lord!” said one of the monks, who came scurrying from behind a nearby column. “Look!” He pointed toward the damaged wall, with its singed and pocked mortar. “Praise God, that your man was able to stop him!”

Later inquiry among the remaining Haldane lancers never revealed just who had shot the arrow that stopped the man, and none of the archbishop's guards ever admitted to it. Nor did Kenneth enlighten them. But he knew beyond any doubt that he, and quite possibly the king, owed their lives to the timely intervention of Sir Sé Trelawney.

Later that evening, with Jamyl patched up and mobile, if looking a bit peaked, Kenneth Morgan was obliged to give a fuller reckoning to the king and his uncle regarding what had happened that day in the cathedral. Sitting after supper with Brion and Duke Richard—but not the new archbishop or any of his associates—Kenneth chose his words carefully, very aware of the need to protect the secret identity of his erstwhile ally, who was excused from serving table on account of his injury, but installed nonetheless in a chair by the fire, his injured arm supported in a sling to ease his wound. He had long before decided that he would not mention Sé. He did not know what connection there might be between the Anviller knight and the squire sitting across the table from them, but he knew he must protect both of them, if at all possible.

“There is really very little to tell, beyond what you already know,” Kenneth said, topping up Duke Richard's cup and then his own when Brion passed a hand over his own cup and shook his head. Jamyl was still nursing his initial cup, along with his wounded arm, and likewise declined.

“I met up with Jamyl after you sent me to stand-down the archers, up in the clerestory galleries, and we found Milo Guthrie dead.” That much was true. “I sent Jamyl across to the other side while I took Milo's bow and continued forward—and saw the two men drawing down on the two of you. So I shot the first one and rushed the second; I'd only the one arrow, but I'd known I'd only have time for one shot, if there was more treachery.”

He paused to take a swallow of wine, carefully choosing the next part of his story. Knowing that Alyce had at least begun awakening Brion's ability to Truth-Read, he knew he dared not lie outright, but he could be economical with his details. Everything had happened very quickly.

“After that, it was a matter of getting downstairs to you as quickly as I could. As I threaded my way down that ridiculous internal turnpike stair at the transept, afraid that I was going to get stuck, it occurred to me that only a Deryni could have subverted any of our men in the space of only a few hours—and that maybe he'd gotten to more than just the two I'd killed. That's why I ordered the ones on the ground to drop their weapons. When the one in the back broke and ran, I figured he had to be our infiltrator.”

“And Jamyl had gotten down by then,” Brion said eagerly, still smiling at the image Kenneth had conjured of getting stuck in the turnpike stair, “so he was able to corner him there by the baptistery chapel.” He flashed his squire a pleased grin, eliciting a raised cup and a wan, answering smile.

“He very nearly crushed me to death, Sire,” Jamyl allowed, seizing on the opportunity to embroider on the humor Brion was finding in the story. The king
was
only fourteen and a bit, after all. “He was wearing mail and a breast and back under those monk's robes. The only place I could get at him was above the neck—though that certainly sufficed.”

Brion shivered deliciously, though Richard looked thoughtful—and
he
was the one to be convinced, Kenneth realized, though the prince's next comment suggested that he was not questioning the story.

“I didn't teach you that,” Richard muttered, “though it's a good move. It would certainly stop a man quickly. Did you learn that in King Illann's service?”

Jamyl only shrugged and lifted his cup to the royal duke in salute, then drank again, hoping the assumption would suffice.

“Humph,” was all Richard said, though his tone was thoughtful and not at all suspicious. “I wonder if we'll ever know who he was—or the other one, who was tossing lightning at us. The armor is Torenthi; at least the breast and back are. Very fine workmanship—and the other man's sword is worth a small fortune.
Someone
is going to miss them….”

“Aye, and they'll have friends,” Kenneth said. “I'm sure the word will get out. Whoever they were, they were enemies of Gwynedd.”

“Aye,
that's
a certainty!” Richard retorted.

But Kenneth knew precisely who one of the dead men was, and by whom he had been sent, thanks to Jamyl—whose Deryni identity had been a
complete
surprise.

As for any connection between Jamyl and Sé Trelawney, other than their shared Deryni heritage…Kenneth took a long pull at his wine, well aware that Deryni were very good at keeping secrets.

 

T
HEY
had considered leaving Jamyl behind for a day to rest with the monks, but he woke the next morning declaring that he was fit enough to travel. During the night, while checking on his wounded “associate”—who would always bear the scar of the day's misadventure—he had also learned of another body found in the cathedral sacristy, armored like the man he had killed, and with not a mark upon him. Hearing that, he asked about the boy chorister who had taken ill before the ceremony; but the monks assured him that the boy had rejoined his choir immediately after Mass, long before trouble erupted. Jamyl suspected that the story's full telling might only be revealed when he had talked to his brother, but he kept his suspicions to himself as he retired at last to his bed and a restless night's sleep.

Thus reassured, he was, indeed, fit to travel the next day—and he was fit enough for other things as well. Before leaving for Rhemuth, Kenneth and Richard took the opportunity to interview all the remaining lancers, lest some remained under the influence of the mysterious attacker Jamyl had slain; but there were none. It was Jamyl who brought the men, one by one, into the room set aside for that purpose in the abbot's apartments; but even the brief transit down the corridor to get there was sufficient for him to satisfy himself that no one else had been tainted.

Kenneth quietly accepted Jamyl's subtle assistance, and managed to convey the impression to Brion and Richard that his confidence in the questioning was due entirely to the interrogation skills of Richard and himself.

Despite Jamyl's protestations that he was fit, they spent three days traveling back to Rhemuth instead of two, though that still would leave them with nearly a fortnight before the coronation. They had sent a pair of lancers on ahead to advise the queen and crown council of their imminent arrival.

All of the royal household were there on the great hall steps to greet them as they rode into the castle yard, the queen coming right down onto the muddy forecourt to grasp at her son's stirrup, clinging to him as he swung down to embrace her. Prince Nigel and the king's two sisters were also waiting to greet them, and Brion spared each of them a hug and a few words of cheer before mounting the great hall steps to receive the welcomes and good wishes of his ministers of state.

Seeing Seisyll Arilan there among them, nodding greeting to his nephew as they all dismounted, reminded Kenneth that Seisyll, too, must be Deryni like his nephew, though he found himself taking comfort in the realization that at least one more Deryni secretly served the House of Haldane. He did not know whether Jamyl would tell his uncle of confiding in Kenneth Morgan—he hoped not. The elder Arilan had always made Kenneth vaguely uneasy, though he had chalked it up to personality differences; now he knew the real reason. But he also knew that he would do his utmost to protect both these courageous Deryni who were pledged, like him, to protect the king and the royal house of Gwynedd.