Deryni Checkmate (17 page)

“That was a dedicated man standing there just now,” Duncan observed. “This Warin fellow must have a great deal of charisma. I wonder what he told that sailor to make him take his own life for the cause?”

Morgan snorted. “It isn’t difficult to imagine. ‘By killing the Deryni monster, you aid all of humankind. There will be rewards for you in the Hereafter. Only through death can you escape the wrath of the Deryni, and prevent him from defiling your immortal soul!’ ”

“Powerful persuasion for the common man, where superstition already runs rampant,” Duncan allowed. “And I’m afraid we’re going to see a lot more of it, if and when the Interdict falls. It will bring all of this out in the open. This is only a taste.”

“Well, I can’t say I like the flavor,” Morgan said. “We’ll not stay long at the Orsal’s court today, Duncan. I may not be able to do any more at home than I can there, but I at least want to be present when things start falling apart.”

“Then you’re finally convinced the Interdict
is
a serious threat.”

“I never thought any different,” Morgan replied.

 

THE sun had sunk into the sea and
Rhafallia
was churning her way back toward the Corwyn coast before Morgan at last had time to relax and ponder the day’s events.

It had not been a good day. Aside from the obvious horror of attempted assassination and the death of Richard, even the meeting with the Hort of Orsal had been less than satisfying. His Hortic Highness had been in a terrible disposition, for he had just received word that five of his prized R’Kassan stallions had been stolen from a breeding farm in one of his northern provinces. Torenthi border raiders had been responsible for the theft, and when Morgan and Duncan arrived, the Orsal had been much more interested in recovering the animals and wreaking vengeance than in discussing mutual defense in a war that was still three months hence.

So the meeting had not been fruitful in that respect. Morgan visited with his old friend and his family and was coerced into allowing the Orsal’s second heir, the eleven-year-old Rogan, to return with him to the ducal court for knightly training. But the defense plans so vital in the coming months were never settled to Morgan’s satisfaction. When the duke boarded
Rhafallia
to go home, two of his castle lieutenants had stayed behind to wrangle with the Orsal’s advisors and sea captains and work out final details of the protective alliance. Morgan did not like delegating such crucial responsibilities to others, but he could see no real choice in this particular case. He could not personally afford to spend at the Orsal’s court the days necessary to come to a final agreement.

The weather, too, had deteriorated during the day. When Morgan sailed at sunset, it was in name only. The air was so still that the ship could not even leave the quay without the aid of oars. The crew, with the good-natured resignation that was characteristic of the men on Morgan’s ships, unshipped their oars and settled down to row. As stars began to appear in the east, the crew’s rough voices sang and hummed sea chanties as old as man’s first ventures on the sea.

The ship was dark except for green steering lanterns fore and aft. On the afterdeck, Captain Kirby stood watchful guard beside the helmsman. Beneath him, under the shelter of the afterdeck, Master Randolph and the others of Morgan’s party reclined on hard pallets and tried to sleep. The duke and Duncan were bedded down on the forward platform, sheltered against a light drizzle by a canvas canopy Kirby had rigged before they set sail.

But Morgan could not sleep. Gathering his cloak around him more closely, he leaned out from under the canopy to scan the stars. The Hunter had risen from the sea in the east, and his bright belt winked frostily in the chill March air. Morgan studied the other constellations distractedly, not thinking about what he saw, before settling back on his pallet to sigh, hands clasped behind his head.

“Duncan?”

“Hmmm.”

“Are you asleep?”

“Not now.” Duncan sat up and rubbed a knuckled hand across his eyes. “What’s the matter?”

“Nothing.”

Morgan sighed again and clasped his knees against his chest, chin resting on folded arms. “Tell me, Duncan. Did we accomplish anything today besides the loss of a good man?”

Duncan grimaced, tight-lipped in the darkness, then tried to force a light tone. “Well, we saw the Orsal’s latest offspring—number seven, I make it. And a ‘lusty bairn,’ as we say in Kierney.”

“Hurrah for the lusty bairn.” Morgan smiled halfheartedly. “We also saw little Orsals one through six, number three of whom is now part of my entourage. Why didn’t you stop me?”

“I?” Duncan chuckled. “I thought you were dying for a new Hortic squire at Castle Coroth, my Lord General. Just think—you can take the Orsal’s son into battle with you.”

Morgan snorted. “The Devil I can! If I take the second heir to the Hortic throne into battle and something happens to him—God forbid—I’ll end up dying for my new squire, all right. But what could I say? I owed the Orsal a favor. He’s fostered enough of
my
retainers. And it would have been very difficult to bow out gracefully with the boy standing right there.”

“You don’t have to explain,” Duncan replied. “If there’s trouble, you can always put the lad on the first ship for home. I get the impression that young Rogan would like that anyway,” he continued wistfully. “I don’t think he’s the warrior type.”

“Yes, hardly the sort of son I’d pictured for the Hort of Orsal. He’s second in line, and I have the feeling he isn’t even happy about being that close.”

Duncan nodded. “A potential scholar or physician or monk, if I ever saw one. It’s a pity he’ll probably never have the chance to pursue his true calling. Instead, when the time comes, he’ll become some sort of minor functionary in his older brother’s court—never really happy, never knowing why. Or perhaps knowing why, yet unable to do anything about it. That’s the saddest part of all, I think. I grieve for him, Alaric.”

“So do I,” Morgan agreed, knowing that Duncan, too, must be feeling the futility of being trapped in a role he did not wish to play, forced by circumstances to veil his true potential and masquerade in a world he had not asked for or made.

With a sigh, Morgan leaned out of his pallet to study the stars once more, then edged closer to the bow where light was streaming from the forward steering lantern. Sitting back against the railing, he stripped off his right glove, smiled at the gryphon signet gleaming coldly in the green-tinged lantern light.

Duncan scooted across the deck on hands and knees to crouch beside his cousin. “What are you doing?”

“It’s time for Derry’s report, if he’s going to make one,” Morgan replied, polishing the ring against a corner of his cloak. “Do you want to listen with me? I’m only going to first-level trance unless he calls.”

“Go,” Duncan said, sitting cross-legged beside Morgan and nodding his readiness. “I’ll be one step behind you.”

As both men fixed their attention on the ring, Morgan inhaled deeply to trigger the earliest stage of the Deryni Mind-Touch, then exhaled slowly as he entered trance. His eyes closed; his breathing became slow and controlled. Then Duncan was reaching across to cover the gryphon seal with his cupped hand, to join in the rapport.

They cast around for perhaps a quarter hour, at first touching only the consciousness of crewmen and members of the ducal party aboard. As they extended their awareness, they caught the ghostly flickers of other minds, contacts so fleeting as to be almost undetectable, and certainly unreadable. But nowhere was there any sign of Derry. With a sigh, Morgan withdrew from his trance, Duncan following.

“Well, I suppose he’s all right,” Morgan said, shaking his head lightly to dispel the last vestiges of fogginess that such a search usually left behind. “Unless he’s in serious trouble, I know he would have called if he’d had anything to report.” He smiled. “I’m afraid our young friend Derry liked his first taste of magic far too much to pass up the opportunity for a repeat performance, if there was the slightest excuse he could use. I think he’s probably safe.”

Duncan chuckled as he crawled back to his pallet. “It’s a little surprising how easily he took to magic, don’t you agree? He acted as though he’d been doing it all his life, hardly batted an eye when he found out about me.”

“Product of long indoctrination.” Morgan smiled. “Derry has been my aide for nearly six years. And up until two nights ago, I never let him see me use my powers directly. He saw the fruits of those powers on occasion, though, if not the methods. So when the time finally came to get involved himself, there was no question in his mind as to whether being Deryni was a bad thing. He knew better. He shows remarkable potential, too.”

“Could he be part Deryni?”

Morgan shook his head and lay down. “I’m afraid not. Which raises another interesting question. It makes one wonder what other humans could do, given the chance, if they weren’t so damned convinced that magic is evil. Derry, for example, shows remarkable adaptability. There are a number of simple spells I could teach him right now, if he were here, and he’d have no difficulty whatever in mastering them. And he doesn’t even have ancestry through one of the original human families that carries the potential for receiving power—like Brion did, or like the Orsal’s line.”

“Well, I hope he’s careful,” Duncan murmured, rolling over and pulling his cloak around himself with a grunt. “A little knowledge can be dangerous, especially if it happens to be Deryni knowledge. And right now, the world can be a very dangerous place for Deryni sympathizers.”

“Derry can take care of himself,” Morgan said. “He thrives on danger. Besides, I’m sure he’s safe.”

But Derry was not safe.

CHAPTER EIGHT

ISAIAH 14:31

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

BUT Derry was not safe.

That morning, after leaving Fathane, he had decided to head north toward Medras to see what he could learn. He did not plan to go all the way to that city, for there was not sufficient time if he was to be back in Coroth by the following night as Morgan had ordered. But Medras was where Torenthi troops were reputed to be gathering. If he were prudent, he might be able to gain valuable information to relay back to Morgan.

Of course he had reminded himself, as he rode out the gates of Fathane, that he would need to exercise a great deal more caution if he intended to do his work in another establishment like the Jack Dog Tavern of the night before. The altercation in the alley had been far more brutal than he cared to repeat.

That was yet another reason for quitting Fathane as soon as possible. He had no wish to be connected with those two bodies in the alley. He doubted that any of his drinking companions of the previous night would even be able to remember him, much less connect him with the deaths, but witnesses had a bad habit of remembering things at the most inopportune times. And if, by some quirk of fate, those did—well, life would be neither easy nor long for one who had dared to kill two of Wencit’s hand-picked spies.

So he had ridden north and inland toward the city of Medras, stopping occasionally at inns and wells to chat with the local folk and to peddle a few furs from the pack behind his saddle. By noon he had reached the turn-off road to Medras, only minutes behind a large company of foot soldiers bound for that city—and very nearly had been stopped and questioned by a pair of men from the rear guard of that troop.

If he had entertained any uncertainty before, that incipient threat convinced Derry that, indeed, he had best not go on to Medras after all. It was time to head west, back into Corwyn. Dusk found him crossing the rolling northern reaches of Morgan’s territory, the fertile buffer region separating Corwyn from Eastmarch. The roads near the border were notoriously poor, and the one Derry had chosen was no exception, but he had made good time since crossing the Torenth-Corwyn border.

Now, however, as the shadows lengthened and dusk began to settle, his horse stumbled and slowed on the rough footing. Reluctantly Derry forced himself to pay more attention to his riding.

Darkness would soon be upon him, but he had a definite destination in mind before he stopped for the night. For while this was Morgan country, it was also Warin country, if rumor was correct. Ahead lay a town with a passable inn. Besides a hot meal, of which Derry was sorely in need, he might also gain valuable information.

The thought cheered him. Whistling a cheery tune under his breath as he rode, Derry let his gaze continue to scan the terrain ahead, then focused abruptly on the horizon slightly to his left.

That was strange. Unless he was seriously mistaken, the sunset glow behind the next hill was not only in the wrong place—indeed, he had seen the sun set thirty degrees farther to the right—but it was growing brighter instead of darker.

Fire?

Drawing rein to listen and sniff the air, Derry frowned, then struck out across the open fields toward the hill. The bitter, acrid bite of smoke grew stronger in his nostrils as he rode. As he neared the crest of the hill, he could see black clouds of smoke billowing into the still-pale sky ahead. Now, too, he became aware of shouts echoing on the chill night air.

Suspecting the worst, and hoping that he was wrong, Derry slipped from the saddle and covered the remaining few yards on foot. His jaw tightened as he dropped to his stomach to scan the scene below.

Fields were burning. Perhaps thirty or forty acres of winter wheat stubble were smoldering to the south, and actual flames threatened a modest manor house just off the road Derry had left.

But it was not only fire that threatened the inhabitants of the house. He could see armed horsemen plunging about in the manor courtyard, flailing about them with swords and lances, cutting down the green-liveried men on foot who tried futilely to ward off their attack.