King's Test (45 page)

"Our
prisoners?" Abdiel asked, taking up a red pill, holding it to
his nose, then putting it down in favor of a black.

"They did
not sleep. A guard is posted in the room with them and they attempted
to remain awake, hoping the guard would fall asleep and they could
steal her key."

Abdiel chuckled,
placed the black pill on his tongue, and bit it through. The
mind-dead do not require sleep and can remain awake, alert, and
functioning until the body itself keels over.

"It is a
waste of personnel, master, to keep a guard on them day and night. It
would be far more resourceful to kill them now." Mikael made the
statement but the thought was Abdiel's. He considered it, then shook
his head.

"No. The
boy is Blood Royal and has, even for us, an unusually high empathy.
Tusca is also Blood Royal, though diluted. The two have formed a
bond, unknown to either of them as yet. If the mercenary died, the
boy would immediately be aware of his loss. We will kill the
mercenary and the woman shortly, but all in good time, my dear
Mikael. All in good time."

Abdiel grimaced
slightly. The black pills were bitter; he didn't like them. He washed
it down with a glass of water and grabbed hastily for an orange
capsule, whose flavor he enjoyed.

"I have
finalized my plans, Mikael," Abdiel continued, savoring the
capsule’s faint aroma. "I am now ready to proceed with
them. I will rid myself of an ambitious Warlord, a troublesome king,
and a perverted Adonian genius. That leaves me with the bomb, the
Lady Maigrey, and the star-jewel. And
that,
my dear Mikael,
leaves me with the universe. "

"The Lady
Maigrey will not give up the bomb," Mikael observed.

Abdiel crunched
the orange capsule, sucked out the center. He took Mikael's hand, and
stroked his palm caressingly. "She will not have a choice. She
will be only too happy to give it to me, just as she will be only too
happy to die afterward." The mind-seizer considered bonding with
his disciple, but decided against it. There was breakfast to finish
and work to be done with the boy. He let Mikael's hand drop and
turned his attention back to the pills. Abdiel sighed. Still one
black one left.

"Do you
truly believe the boy is destined to be king?" Mikael asked.

"Destiny!"
Abdiel scoffed. "You sound like Derek Sagan, or worse, that
priest father of his, who maintained that we are controlled by some
omnipotent, omniscient Being who counts the hairs upon our heads and
grieves over the fall of a sparrow. Here is your Being." The
mind-seizer reached up his hand, needles flashing in the light, and
tapped his own skull. "Here is the power that controls and
manipulates and determines and decides.

"Faith in
this God of his has always been Sagan's weakness and it will be his
downfall. You see, my dear, no matter what he may protest to the
contrary, Derek Sagan believes in his heart that this boy is his
anointed king. He was always a reluctant rebel, was Sagan. He tried
to save with one hand what he was destroying with the other.

"If he had
devoted himself to conquering the galaxy," Abdiel continued,
putting off as long as possible the taking of the black pill, "he
could have done so. The part of him that burns with ambition has the
skill and intelligence, the wealth, the power to rule. He designed
and had that bomb built for just such a purpose. And what does he do?
Throws it away in an obsessive search for his lost king! Oh, he has
his excuses, made mostly to justify himself to himself. But you will
see, Mikael, when it comes to the test, when he is forced to make a
choice, he will go with God. And it will be my privilege to hasten
him on his way."

"I
understand, master," Mikael said, rising, filling the water
glass, and returning to his seat.

"This
initiation business." Abdiel popped the pill into his mouth,
chewed furiously. "A perfect example. I looked into the boy's
mind, saw the whole affair. It was as good a performance as any of
the old spiritualists used to put on for the benefit of gullible
clients. The boy nearly suffocates for no apparent reason. Real
spikes, not fake as is supposed to happen, pierce the boy's flesh.
Cleansing fire—from heaven, no doubt—heals the terrible
wounds."

Abdiel gulped
water. Replacing the empty glass on the table, noting with relief
that there were only orange, green, and purple capsules left, he
wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and selected a green. "What
a waste. Sagan has no idea of his own mental power. Not only does he
convince the Lady Maigrey and almost convinces the boy that these
'miracles' have occurred, Sagan manages to convince himself! An
illusionist who believes devoutly in his own illusions."

"You say
'almost convinces," master. Then the boy does not believe?"

"Dion
believes because he wants to believe, not because he truly does. He
was, after all, raised by an atheist and there is doubt and confusion
deep within the boy. But instead of accepting and dealing with his
internal conflicts, Dion fears them. He seeks desperately to prove
himself."

"You have
control of his mind, master?"

"No,"
Abdiel admitted. "He is Blood Royal and of good stock. People
denigrated the Starfires, but none of our Order could gain ascendancy
over any of them. They were a conceited lot; they thought well of
themselves, too well to easily let another take hold. Dion has enough
self-love to make him safe from my control, but he has enough
self-doubt to leave him vulnerable—not to what I command but to
what I suggest. In other words, Mikael, I won't have to force him to
do what he will do. He will be glad to do it himself."

Mikael bowed his
head in acknowledgment of his master's genius. Abdiel took the last
capsule. His repast concluded, he sank back comfortably in the sofa
cushions, content to bask in the radiant warmth of the solar heater.

"Bring me
the boy," Abdiel commanded.

"Is he
awake?"

"He will
be, by the time you reach him."

The storm broke,
its fury preceded by a ball of blazing lightning that burst over
Laskar with the crack of doom. Lightning flashed constantly, thunder
rattled and boomed, rain hurtled from the heavens, hail pounded like
fists on the outside of the Warlord's shuttlecraft. The noise did not
wake Sagan. He hadn't been asleep. He'd spent the night fighting a
revolution, spent the night sharing Maigrey's dream.

He felt this
morning as he had felt that morning long ago—drained,
exhausted, empty. He could imagine how Maigrey must be feeling and he
refrained from touching her mind, as one refrains from touching an
open wound that is raw and bleeding. Let it have a chance to heal,
the scar tissue to grow over. . . .

"My lord.
You sent for me."

"Yes,
Marcus. Enter."

The door slid
aside. The centurion stood in the doorway.

The Warlord,
facing the window, watching the majesty of God's wrath, did not look
around.

Marcus remained
standing at attention, silent, waiting to be commanded.

"Is my lady
awake?" Sagan asked finally.

"Yes, my
lord."

"I want to
hear directly from you what happened this morning."

"Yes, my
lord. I knocked several times on her ladyship's door and received no
answer and so, according to your orders, I entered the Starlady's
room—"

"Whose
room?" Sagan glanced around, missing a particularly spectacular
lightning strike. "What did you call her?"

Marcus flushed
deeply. Thunder shook the shuttlecraft. "The Starlady. Pardon,
my lord. It's just a ... a name we men gave her on board
Phoenix.
We meant no disrespect."

No, that's true
enough, Sagan thought. Quite the opposite, in fact. You would die for
her in a moment.

Perhaps you will
have the chance.

"Continue,
centurion," was all the Warlord said aloud.

Marcus cleared
his throat. "I entered the Lady Maigrey's room and found her
lying on the floor unconscious. I informed my captain—"

"—and
he informed me. Go on."

"It
appeared, on examination"—Marcus's flush deepened—

"that she
was not injured, but had fainted. The captain sent for the base
doctor. By the time he arrived, the Lady Maigrey had regained
consciousness and refused to see him. She sent us all out of the room
and sealed the door shut. The security cameras are on—"

"She's
disrupted the signal." The Warlord motioned to his own blank
monitor screens.

"I see, my
lord." Marcus seemed somewhat at a loss, not quite certain what
was wanted from him.

Sagan gave him
no help but remained standing motionless, staring out at the storm.

"She's all
right, I think, my lord," Marcus continued, feeling called upon
to say something. "We can hear her pacing—"

"Thank you,
centurion. That will be all. Your watch is nearly ended, is it not?"

"Yes, my
lord."

"I relieve
you of your duties early. Go get some sleep."

"Yes, my
lord. Thank you, my lord. Shall I detail a replacement?"

"No, I will
take care of that myself. You are dismissed, centurion."

Marcus did not
look overly pleased, but he could do nothing except salute and leave
the Warlord's presence. Sagan, watching him obliquely, saw the man
glance down the empty hallway toward the lady's room—the
Starlady's room— before making his reluctant way aft to where
the Honor Guard berthed aboard the shuttlecraft.

The Warlord left
instructions with the captain of the guard as to where he could be
found, walked down the empty hallway to Maigrey's door, opened it,
and stepped in. No door aboard his craft was sealed to him.

Maigrey halted
in her pacing, turned her head to look at him over her shoulder. She
wore a long, plain, white cotton gown, devoid of decoration. Her pale
hair hung down around her shoulders, unbrushed and disheveled. He
could see little of her face through the ragged hair, except two
eyes, dark as the smoke that swirled through his memories.

"Damn you
to hell, Derek Sagan." Her voice was calm, tight, controlled. So
might God Himself sound on the day of judgment.

"It had to
be done, Maigrey." Sagan was not apologetic, merely explanatory.
"Sparafucile told me how you froze when the mind-dead attacked
you. That's never happened to you in battle before. I wondered why,
and then I knew. You couldn't remember anything about that night,
could you? You had blotted out what happened, repressed it. And that
repression would hamper your ability to act and respond in any
situation where you might meet either the mind-dead or their master
again. And you will meet them again, my lady. And soon. For Dion's
sake, if for no other, you must be prepared to deal with them."

He had said the
right words, touched the right chords; their music was sad,
melancholy, but harmonious. That which had driven them apart
had—remembered, shared—brought them together. Maigrey
leaned her cheek against the steelglass, watched the rain pour down
the outside, watched the sky shed the tears that she couldn't cry.
Her grief ached and burned inside her, but somehow it was better than
that vague feeling of dread and terror, of not knowing, not
remembering.

"You're
right, my lord," she said softly, her eyes on the flaring
lightning, "and in my head I know she's been dead seventeen
years but in my heart it seems that she died ... in my arms . . .
just moments ago. ..." Maigrey lifted her hands, stared at them.

Sagan could
almost see the blood that had once covered them, the blood on her
blue robes, the pool of blood forming beneath the motionless head.

He walked across
the room to the window. Standing behind her, he rested gentle hands
upon her shoulders. His sympathy was silent and unexpected, even by
himself. Last night, for the first time, each lived through what the
other had experienced. Mind-linked, they had once been closer than
any two people could possibly come. Pride and mistrust were the
barriers that had risen between them; were the barriers that stood
between them still. Perhaps, if those barriers had been removed then,
things might have been different. Perhaps if they could be removed
now . . .

Sagan shook his
head, banished the speculation as being wasteful of time and energy.
Maigrey remained motionless, watching the retreating storm, relaxed
beneath his touch, resting against him for support. Her hand went to
her cheek, to the old scar that in her confused mind was an open
wound. Her thoughts were much the same as his, or maybe they were
his; he couldn't tell anymore. The longer they were together, the
more thin and transparent the barriers became. The idea of the
barriers falling was both attractive . . . and repellent.

"' Two
together must walk the paths of darkness . . .' "

It seemed his
father's voice that spoke the words now, as he had spoken them long
ago, the only words he had ever spoken since taking his vow of
silence. A shiver crept over Sagan, chilling his flesh, until he
realized it was Maigrey who had said them.

"I used to
think, my lord," she continued, "that we had fulfilled the
prophecy, that we had already walked the 'paths of darkness.' But I
begin to believe I was wrong. I have walked paths of darkness and you
have walked paths of darkness, but we have walked them apart, all
these years. And the prophecy says 'Two together.

Sagan,
understanding, clasped her more tightly, drew her closer to him. Both
kept their gaze fixed on the storm, on the lightning dancing between
cloud and ground, the hailstones battering the window, the rain that
streaked down in glittering rivulets, gathering up and blending their
reflections into one, as two streams converge to form a river.