The Spell-Bound Scholar (24 page)

Still the idiot boy refused her, refused to grasp what was his for the taking! Could he suspect how she wished to strike at him once she had him mesmerized by desire? No, surely not! But she would never have him transfixed more thoroughly than she did now, and if he would not reach out to consummate his desire, she would! Reaching up, she clasped his face in both hands and pulled it down to her own, kissing him lightly at first, lips nibbling, then with tongue teasing, and as his mouth opened to embrace hers and his arms finally rose about her, she reached out with her mind, pulling his into an erotic dreamland strong enough to make him lose contact with the world.

Gregory knew well what she was doing and why but allowed hope to spiral and carry him away, letting his heart believe what his mind denied—that she was truly in love with him. He remembered everything Geoffrey had taught him about kissing and put it to practice, letting the kiss deepen almost of its own accord as he touched her back, her shoulders, her hips in the places Geoffrey had told him of, and was elated to feel an answering increase in her desire. Overcome with affection and wanting to give her even more pleasure than she gave him, he fed her own eroticism back to her, amplifying it strongly. He felt his own desire feed hers, then felt her tremble as her emotions became rapacious, feeding back into him until he felt he would burst even though he

threw his whole heart into the kiss and fed the desire back into her, swollen with love.

Finister's whole body convulsed; dazed, she melted in his arms, and Gregory let himself be lost in her kiss and in the ecstasy she wove about him as the emotions of her desire and his fed upon one another, swelling and spinning them both into a whirlpool of rapture that paralyzed them, so intense as to prevent the very deeds it inspired, until the power of the spell overwhelmed Finister and she broke the kiss, slumping in his arms, unconscious.

Gregory teetered, scarcely able to hold on to consciousness himself, but the power of his site slowly steadied him, and he reached down into her mind with overwhelming love but found there only a sort of rosy haze. With great tenderness his mind groped through that mist, trying to achieve mentally what his body had been denied.

He froze, and his heart turned to ice. Beneath the haze of a very real desire still burned the white, actinic spark of hatred and lust for revenge, the hunger to slay him as soon as he dropped his guard. It was still there, the determination to fulfill her assignment, to enslave or slay him, and the hormonal intoxication of erotic feedback only obscured it, delayed it, but never for a moment cancelled it.

Reaction hit him and he plunged into a despair as great as his intoxication had been only minutes before. He slumped to the ground mourning, holding the unconscious woman in his arms and gazing down at her with yearning and agony, overcome with the realization of his failure. All his efforts had been insufficient. His magic had amplified her desire, yes, but he himself had proved inadequate. His enchantment might have taken the desire she had kindled within him and caught her up in a gyre of emotion—but his body, his face, his personality had all failed to win her love.

Cordelia found him there weeping over the unconscious woman. So deeply immersed in his grief was he that he did not even notice her panicked call for her mother and brother.

Something flickered across the face of the moon; looking up, Cordelia saw her mother's broomstick spiralling down to

land—holding not only Gwendylon, but Geoffrey, too! So that was why he had not teleported to her immediately, only sent a thought that he would join her "presently." Her alarm doubled—what had happened to him, how had he damaged himself, that he must fly on a broomstick rather than teleport?

Her concern diminished only a little when Geoffrey said as he dismounted, ' 'Mother, you are not sufficiently recovered to do this!"

He sounded quite anxious. Cordelia cried in alarm, "Recovered? Recovered from what?"

"I have slept well and long, Geoffrey," Gwen assured him. "Be not anxious, my son. For the patient's sake as well as my own, I shall not attempt this healing if I so much as suspect I have not the strength." She turned to her daughter. "Your brother is kind to be so concerned, Cordelia, but I have not suffered anywhere nearly so much as he seems to think."

"No, only exhausted herself, first in a game of riddles with a computer, then with drinking it dry of all its knowledge of the human mind!" Geoffrey protested.

Cordelia stared. "What computer? Where?" And nothing would satisfy her until she heard the whole story or at least a summary of it, at the end of which she regarded her mother with admiration. "You must tell me how you outguessed a mainframe, Mother, when we have leave—but Geoffrey is right, you must be careful not to strain yourself."

"I shall be cautious, never fear, and if you doubt me, remember my concern for the patient." Gwen touched her hand with a warm smile. "Now, my dear, what is so horribly amiss? . . . Oh!" She stared at her youngest, sitting on the ground before a wall glowing with twilight, head bowed over the beautiful young woman in his arms. Even from ten yards' distance she could see how his shoulders shook. She stepped closer to Cordelia and murmured, "What has happened here?"

"I know not," her daughter answered in the same tone. "I know only what I see; I have feared to inquire without you."

Gwen touched her son's mind and found it in turmoil. "Wisely refrained, Cordelia, when he is so distraught." She

stepped forward to kneel by Gregory and asked softly, "Why do you weep, my son?"

"For a love that shall never live, Mother," he answered in a hollow voice.

Gwen studied him for a moment, frowning, then said, "Say that you weep for unrequited love, rather—and if the poor child you hold in your arms has been so wounded in her heart as I think, it is small wonder that she cannot love, neither you nor any man."

Gregory looked up at her with deadened eyes. "There is no hope of healing her heart, then?"

"I have not said that," Gwen answered. "There may be hope indeed. Let me study her mind awhile."

Gregory straightened, his eyes coming alive. He sat very still, cradling Finister in his arms, waiting while his mother probed and sifted through the woman's memories, even the ones she had forgotten, and especially the ones of which she had never been aware. Finally Gwen nodded and said, "I think she can be healed."

Gregory heaved a sigh of relief, going limp, then remembered that he held Finister in his arms and straightened again.

"Before we do, though," Gwen said, her voice suddenly grim, "we must ask whether we should."

Her children stared at her, appalled.

Then Gregory found his voice. "Do you ask if it is right to slay her, Mother? We have threshed out that question already!"

"You have threshed it," Gwen agreed, "but have you found wheat, or chaff?"

Cordelia frowned, looking into her mother's eyes. "What have you found, Mother, that makes you now doubt her right to live?"

"Chiefly that, though her will may have been formed by those who punished her for independence and rewarded her for subservience," Gwen said, "it was nevertheless her own choice to slay and maim. Perhaps I can cure her, perhaps not; perhaps I can bring her true self out clear of the fears and yearnings that shroud it—but she may still choose to murder and steal. Have we the right to cure her and free her if she

will become no more human for our efforts?"

The young people were silent, two of them staring at Fin-ister as though they were seeing her as a monster for the first time—but the third still with love. "Surely we have the right to decide it, Mother," Gregory said, "for it is our family that has suffered from her actions more than any other."

"There is some truth in that," Gwen said slowly. "Must we summon your father for a family council, then?"

"Father? No!" Cordelia said instantly, then explained, "There is no need, for we know what he will say—that if she has injured even one of his children, the only mercy she deserves is a quick death."

Geoffrey nodded. "If he votes for mercy. I think he might prefer that her death be slow."

"Yes, if he did not have to wreak it," Cordelia returned.

"There is truth in that," Gwen sighed. "He loses reason at thought of hurt to you and myself."

' 'More pertinent, I think, is the question of what Magnus would say if he were here," Geoffrey offered. "After all, it is he who has suffered most at her hands."

Gwen cast a dubious look at the tormented face of her youngest but agreed, "There is merit in that. Do you truly think Magnus would say we should slay her?"

"Probably not," Geoffrey said in disgust. "You have reared us all to be too merciful."

Thank Heaven for that, Gwen breathed in silent prayer.

"We need not wonder," Gregory said, his voice listless. "I have spoken with my brother every other month or so since he left home."

Gwen turned to gaze at him. "Indeed you have, and have told me of his exploits."

Geoffrey and Cordelia eyed their brother with some envy; his telepathic range far exceeded their own—though, Cordelia had to admit, it might only have been that his desire for contact with Magnus was greater than theirs. He had been very young when his idolized elder brother had left home.

"Well enough, then," Gwen said. "Reach halfway across the galaxy if you must, my son. Let us hear what your brother says."

Gregory's eyes lost focus; his body stilled.

Cordelia stared, then whispered to Geoffrey, "So that is the secret of it! He sends himself into his trance of meditation to reach our brother!"

"No doubt aided by the likeness of genes," Geoffrey agreed, then shook his head decisively. "I should never have the patience for it."

"Nor I," Cordelia agreed. "I have never been able to understand how Gregory can waste so much time in contemplation when he might be out and about doing wonders and celebrating life with others his age."

Geoffrey sighed. "It is his choice, and who are we to criticize?"

"After all," Cordelia said, "he does not criticize us."

"Magnus speaks," Gregory said, his voice remote. "He delights in my thoughts; he greets you all with love."

"Oh, and ours to him!" Cordelia had never been present during one of these conversations.

Neither had Geoffrey. "What foes does he vanquish now?'

"None." Gregory gazed off into space, his voice like the sighing of the wind. "He is aboard his ship, journeying between planets."

"How does he?" Gwen asked anxiously.

Gregory was silent a minute, then said, "Better than at any time except in the heat of battle, Mother. He has a new companion now and she has calmed his inner turmoil considerably."

"She?" Cordelia pounced on the word with delight and jealousy. "What manner of she?"

Gregory paused for an exchange of thoughts again, then

said, "She is a peasant woman named Alea, one who has been as badly hurt as he in her way."

"Is she indeed!" Gwen said, fascinated.

"She is, and Magnus is now intent on healing her."

"Magnus?" Cordelia frowned. "What does he know of healing a woman's heart?"

"Only what his computer Herkimer can tell him, but that seems to be a great deal."

"Does she think of healing him?" Cordelia demanded.

"He cannot say, for he will not, of course, read her thoughts unless there is danger," Gregory said, "but he thinks she may be a telepath, though untrained and so of unknown strength."

"That is hopeful," Gwen said, "and might incline him toward mercy toward this woman whose emotions were exploited and twisted in childhood. Tell him our dilemma, my son, but not of your own feelings toward this Finister."

"I shall try," Gregory said, "though he is skilled, and will no doubt read some of it from my mental overtones." Then he was silent.

His family waited as he told the whole of the tale to his brother, hundreds of light-years away. Gwen wondered how thoughts could bridge a gap that nothing material could. That led her to thinking of the breakdown of simultaneity at near-light speeds and wondered what time, what year it was where Magnus sailed, how old he was now, and if by some magic of H-space he might be no older relative to herself than he would have been if he had stayed on Gramarye.

Then Gregory spoke. "He is horrified at the thought of executing Finister for her injuries to him, but thinks she should suffer in her own turn so that she will not injure others again."

Gwen expelled a sigh of relief and Cordelia clasped her hands. "His heart is still generous!" Then her face darkened. "But I am loathe to hear that he wishes her to suffer."

"Be sure that she has," Gwen told her, "and it has not inclined her toward mercy—but if I cure her, she shall relive those sufferings in such a way as to triumph over them." She

turned back to Gregory. "Does Magnus understand that she is a proven murderer?"

"I spoke to him only of his own grievances," Gregory said, his voice still distant. "Shall I make him judge of her other crimes, then?"

Gwen took her time answering and phrased it carefully. "Say rather an advocate, either for or against. Will her murders change his mind? I cannot, after all, be sure of my healing; the mind is ferociously complex. She may yet murder again."