Crystal Fire (18 page)

"I am sorry you must see your father like this after all these cycles," the old man began. "Until five sols ago he was quite healthy in body, if not in mind." He shook his head, puzzlement furrowing his brow. "But ever since that last visitor, his condition has deteriorated rapidly. I made a serious mistake in allowing the man in. I realize that now."

Brace gripped the abbot's arm in a clasp of iron. "What man? Who was he?"

"He said he was your brother, Lord Teran Ardane. At the time it seemed quite plausible, since he evidently knew your father, as well as said he was sent by the King. So I let him in."

"What did this man look like?" Brace demanded hoarsely.

"He was tall, blond, and very striking in appearance. He was dressed in black and wore a govern collar. I knew the tale of your brother's sentencing to Carcer, and that he wore a govern collar because of it, so that fit in as well." The abbot paused. "He
was
your brother, wasn't he?"

"No," Marissa interjected. "Your visitor was the master criminal, Ferox. Your description fits that of the one given of my sister's abductor."

Her eyes met Brace's and an anguished look passed between them. Then Brace's gaze swung back to the abbot.

"What was the purpose of Ferox's visit with my father?"

"II don't know. He said he wished to be alone with Lord Ardane. I thought he was his son . . ."

Brace inhaled a shuddering breath. "I wish to see my father." He moved toward the door.

"Brace."

He halted and turned to Marissa.

"Let me go in with you."

Bleak eyes stared down at her and she saw the inner battle raging within. Then he sighed. "As you wish, femina." Brace motioned to the abbot. "I am ready."

The holy man nodded and unlocked the door. Brace squared his shoulders and strode through, Marissa following. Behind them, the door closed softly.

A man writhed on a low cot in the far corner, moaning piteously. A tremor wracked Brace's big frame, and Marissa gripped his arm in a gesture of support. He glanced down at her, his smile wan.

Gently freeing her hand, Brace turned, then made his way across the room.

"Father?" he rasped as he sank to his knees beside the cot. He touched his father's shoulder.

Ware Ardane stiffened, then flung himself around to face his newest visitor. Bloodshot eyes stared out of a ravaged, bloated face. He squinted, struggling to focus.

"Ferox!" he croaked. "So, you've come back to finish off what little is left of me."

"No, Father," the younger man whispered. "I'm Brace. Your son Brace."

Dark eyes, the same shade as Brace's, slowly scanned his face. For an instant Brace thought he saw recognition flare, then his father's eyes clouded.

"N-no," the older man groaned. "It's not possible. It's just another trick to get me to reveal the secret. But I won't. I won't."

Lord Ardane cried out, arching upward in the throes of an excruciating pain. His fists clenched in the sheets as if to hold him to the bed. Sweat poured from his body.

With an anguished sound Brace pulled his father to him, cradling him in his arms. "Father," he whispered. "Father . . ."

How was it possible, he wondered, to have been separated all these cycles and still feel such strong emotions for the man he now held? He'd thought they'd died long ago, buried be- neath a thick layer of pain and longing for the father he'd hardly known.

Brace glanced down at him. The powerful frame was thin and wastedthe once handsome features haggard and aged beyond his cyclesbut still belovedly recognizable. Brace blinked back a hot rush of tears.

The madness of the Ardanes had driven his father to this. For a fleeting moment, Brace couldn't help but see himself lying on that bed, his father's fate his own. The thought made him sicksick to the marrow of his bones. He inhaled great gulps of air to tamp down the nausea.

Gradually the old man's pain passed. He slumped against his son. For long secundae Brace clung to him, as Lord Ardane's breathing slowly evened. Finally his father pushed back.

"Your brother. Teran." The light of lucidity returned to his eyes. "How is he?"

"H-he is fine, Father," Brace replied, his voice still ragged. "He co-rules now with the Queen of Aranea. And in several monates you'll be a grandfather."

Lord Ardane's mouth lifted in a tremulous smile. "A grandfather. And you, Son. Have you no children of your own to tell me about?"

Brace shook his head. "I've yet to life-mate."

"A pity," the older man sighed. "And your precious motherhow is she?"

Pain flooded Brace at the memory of how his mother had died, brokenhearted at the life- sentencing of her two sons. Now, knowing the horrible fate of her husband, Brace understood his mother's secret anguish and what their sentencing, on top of that, had done to her. He damned the cruel destiny that might yet destroy them all.

''I hurt her in so many ways," his father rambled on, recalling Brace from his bitter thoughts. "With my unfaithfulness when I was first betrothed to her and the problems that followed, and then when the madness finally overtook me." He sighed. "She deserved better than I ever gave her."

"She loved you, Father. Always."

Ware Ardane smiled, and Brace caught a heartrending glimpse of the man he used to be.

"I know, Son. I know."

As if beckoned by a newer, more harsher memory, the older man's expression darkened. "Ferox came to visit me. He carried the Crystal in a strangely shaped box and opened it when I refused his offer. Ah, the pain then, the blinding light and shrieking noise!"

"What did Ferox want from you, Father?"

"He wanted me to key the stone, to use my powers in his service." Lord Ardane gave an unsteady laugh. "As if the Knowing Crystal would ever permit that!"

"What do you mean?" Uneasiness slid through Brace. "Wouldn't the Crystal allow you to commune with it?"

Ware Ardane laughed, grimly this time. "Not after I learned of its true essence all those cycles ago, and the insidious evil it had wrought upon us all. And, ever since Ferox left, it's as if the Crystal's turned on me with an even greater v-vengeance."

He turned to gaze up at Brace. "It's
his
revenge, I'd wager, after all these cycles. For the wrong he thinks I did him. Because I never . . .

"There's something you and Teran should know about Ferox," his father gasped, his fingers gouging into Brace's arm. "Something kept s-secret for far too long

"
Ah
!" His face twisted in pain, and once more Lord Ardane arched back in agony.

Brace struggled to hold onto him, but his father's strength was suddenly too much to contain.

"Marissa!" he cried. "Help me!"

Instantly she was at his side, flinging herself across the lower half of Lord Ardane's body while Brace held down his chest and arms. The old man jerked beneath them, flailing and writhing, his cries shrill. Bloody tears poured from his eyes onto the bedsheets. Finally the struggles ceased. He lay there, unmoving.

His father's breathing was barely discernible. For a frantic moment Brace thought him dead. Then Lord Ardane's eyelids lifted.

"S-son?" he whispered, so softly Brace wondered if he'd only imagined the word.

"Yes, Father?"

"Beware the stone."

"Why? What is its true essence, its insidious evil?" "Ah, Brace," Lord Ardane moaned. "If I tell you, the stone will turn on you as well, drive you to madness. It's the only way it has to protect itself against a Crystal Master."

Brace's eyes lifted to Marissa's. Their gazes locked and a moment of piercing insight arced between them.

"Brace," Marissa whispered, seeing his features harden with a fierce resolve. "Don't."

He smiled, but it never quite reached his eyes. "There's no other choice. There has never been. I must know."

"Tell me, Father," he urged. "Tell me the truth about the Knowing Crystal. I must know it all if I'm to prevail against it."

Eyes filled with an encroaching madness gazed up at him. "In the past," his father gasped, "the stone could only function under the direct control of a Crystal Master. But no more. To maintain itself, it now seeks to dominate us . . . body and mind. It seeks . . . total power! Beware, Brace. Beware!"

"Is that the secret then, Father?" Brace demanded. "Is that all?"

"Th-the secret?"

Confusion clouded Lord Ardane's eyes. For a panic-stricken moment, Brace thought he'd once more lapse into madness.

Then his father shook his head. "Part of it, perhaps. But the true secret is the Crystal's vulnerability. There are pools on the planet Moraca
Ah Gods
!"

Once again the agony shuddered through his father, increasing in intensity with each passing secundae. Lord Ardane jerked spasmodically, his cries of anguish rising to fitful, piercing screams. He choked, he gagged, then blood gurgled up from his throat. A glazed look spread across his face.

"Father!" Brace cried. "No!"

Beneath her grasp Marissa felt the old man go slack and knew the end had come. She released him and leaned back to gaze at Brace.

He gathered the limp form of his father to his chest, rocking him back and forth. And, though his face was turned away, Marissa knew that Brace wept, his broad shoulders shaking with the depth of his grief. She stepped away from the bed, not knowing what else to do or how to comfort him. Stepped back to watch silently, feeling helpless, confused, and very sad.

Brace wept on, his heart laid open, the anguish of all those wasted cycles slicing through him again and again. His father, condemned to a life of shameful exile, to madness made all the worse because a lucid mind broke through at times to taunt and torment him. His father. Found at lastand now lost to him forever.

"Father, Father," Brace whispered brokenly. "What am I to do?
What am I to do?
"

Blood pounded through his brain, filling it with a loud, rushing sound until he thought his head would explode. And within that surging wall of noise, a tiny voice cried plaintively, "Beware the stone.
Beware
 . . ."

«»«»«»«»«»«»«»«»«»«»«»«»

They buried Lord Ardane the next sol in a forest of shaggy sempervivus fir near the frozen alpine lake. As they stood beside the grave mumbling numb-lipped prayers in unison with the abbot and his monks, a frigid wind blew down from the mountains.

A winter storm was definitely brewing, Marissa thought grimly as the first large flakes began to fall. Better they remain another sol or two in the relative shelter of the monastery and determine the full severity of the impending weather than set out immediately as Brace had earlier decided. To be caught up in those snowy peaks when a blizzard hit . . .

The abbot drew alongside them as they departed the gravesite. "A moment more of your time, my son." He laid a firm but gentle hand on Brace's arm. "Alone."

Brace halted, then glanced at Marissa. "I'll meet you and Rodac back at the abbey."

She eyed him closely, then nodded and slogged on.

Brace turned to the abbot. "What is it, Father?" he forced the question through a painchoked voice. "What more could there possibly be?"

"The tale of how your father came to find the Knowing Crystal."

"H-he found the Crystal?" Brace fought his way up out of the misery that had enshrouded him since his father's death. "But how? It's been lost for over three hundred cycles, until my brother and Queen Alia discovered it on Carcer. When and how could my father have happened upon it?"

"You were but a small lad when the Lord Ardane was sent out on a secret military mission to Moraca. Though I wasn't privy to the details, in the course of the expedition your father somehow came upon the Knowing Crystal." The abbot shrugged. "Perhaps he was drawn to its hiding place by his inherent, if then unrealized, Crystal abilities. Your father was always a brilliant though unstable man. Even untutored he would have been sensitive to the Crystal's call.

"It doesn't really matter. What matters is that the Lord Ardane saw the stone for what it truly wasan evil, manipulative force bent on total control of the Imperium."

"And my father fought its powers, didn't he? Tried to destroy it?" Brace muttered. "Then the Crystal, to protect itself, turned on him, attempting to drive him mad."

Abbot Leone nodded. "Yes. Somehow the stone must have divined Lord Ardane's weakness, played upon it to push him over the edge. And, most tragically of all, no one would believe your father when he returned raving of the Knowing Crystal and its perils. As the madness progressed, he became dangerous. Finally your uncle was forced to banish him to our abbeyfor the protection of your family as well as to prevent your father's dire predictions from inciting a panic." "Did no one attempt to return to Moraca and find the Knowing Crystal? To try to discover if what my father had said was true?"

"No, my son," the abbot replied sadly. "No one really believed him. They thought him mad, after all."

"Curse King Falkan! He betrayed his own brother, condemning him to a life of exile and shame, without lifting a finger to vindicate him or validate his story." Brace's hands clenched at his sides. "If he had, perhaps the Knowing Crystal could have been stopped long ago and my father's madness halted. But instead he died, screaming in agony, an innocent victim of the cowardly indifference of others. Gods, how I hate them all!"

"There's little time left for hatred, my son," the abbot chided gently. "Though no one went back to validate your father's story when he first returned from Moraca, it's evident that Ferox eventually put it all together. I'd wager his search once more led to the Knowing Crystal. It has long been rumored that he was looking for something very special when he swept through the Moracan capital four cycles ago, massacring half the population."

Brace's mouth grew taut with rage. "The Knowing Crystal, perhaps?"

Abbot Leone nodded. "It seems the most probable set of circumstances for his acquisition of the stone." He sighed. "But that is no longer of consequence. There's a mission to be completed, an Imperium to save. And you are our only hope."