Bradley, Marion Zimmer - Shadowgate 04 (99 page)

 
         
"He's
getting away," Rowan said, in a dull, disbelieving voice. "Shouldn't we
…”

 
          
"No,"
Colin said. He squeezed her shoulder reassuringly. "Let him go. He'll be
back. But maybe, in time, he'll begin to learn. Remember that when you see him
again."

 
          
And
reverberating through the chamber, Colin heard the soft sound of a Book
closing.

 
          
But
not forever.

 
          
"Isn't
it time for you two to get moving?" Farrar said. He held out his key ring
toward Colin. "I called the sheriff's department before I came down here
—
I had to leave the car in
the driveway, but it ought to be okay there for a few minutes at least. Just
leave the keys in it when you're done with it. Park it anywhere."

 
          
"Who
the hell are you?" Rowan demanded with dazed bemusement. She pushed
herself away from Colin and glared at Farrar, holding herself upright now by
sheer force of will.

 
          
"Nobody
in particular," Farrar said, smiling faintly. "Just somebody who was
in the right place at the right time
—
finally."

 
          
"What
will you do?" Colin asked him.

 
          
"Oh,
I imagine I'm probably going to jail," Farrar said. "I just killed a
man. Hasloch certainly needed killing, but you don't evade the consequences
afterward. You take the hit
—
you don't make things worse. That's the rule."

 
          
And
then, someday, your atonement is complete. . . .

 
          
"You
weren't sent by the department," Colin said.

 
          
"No,"
Farrar said simply. He stepped out of the doorway and carefully broke the
shotgun open. "Go ahead. I've got a few things to do here before I
go." He gestured. "Right down that hall."

 
          
"And
straight on till morning," Rowan muttered, taking a hesitant step toward
the door.

 
          
The
return down that endless passageway was worse than the first journey had been.
The secret door still stood open, and the two of them passed through it hand in
hand.

 
          
Rowan
was staggering blindly, exhausted by her ordeal and the psychic agony of the
Temple, and Colin felt the full weight of every moment of his years. But both
of them were moved by the same driving motivation: the desire not to spend a
moment more than they had to in this unspeakable place.

 
          
For
one horrible moment Colin thought that the Temple doors would not open without
their key, but on this side all that was needed was the simple push of a button.
The doors swung inward, and across the antechamber they could see the lights of
the elevator, standing with its doors open.

 
          
"We
should wait here for him," Rowan said, collapsing against the inside wall
of the elevator. "Right?"

 
          
"I
don't think so," Colin said. "We have to get you out of here and
safe. You're the best witness if this mess ever goes to court. Toller wasn't
working alone. We'll only have leverage if we have something to expose."

 
          
"Like
an underground Satanist Temple in Virginia?" Rowan said with weary humor.
She pushed herself away from the wall and pushed the button. "Geraldo
Rivera, here I come."

 
          
The
elevator doors opened into darkness. The door at the end of the short hallway
was closed.

 
          
"Come
on," Colin said to Rowan. His voice sounded hoarse and strange to him
—
like a parody of age. But
the old man had won one for the home team. "Just a flight of stairs and
we're home free."

 
          
Rowan
was reaching for the knob when the door was jerked open from the outside. She
yelped, jumping backward into Colin and nearly knocking them both over.

 
          
A
Fauquier County sheriff's deputy stared back at her, gun drawn.

GLASTONBURY
,
NEW YORK
,
FRIDAY,
DECEMBER 31,  1999

Ring in the thousand years of peace. Ring in the valiant
man and free, The larger heart, the kindlier hand; Ring out the darkness of the
land; Ring in the Christ that is to be.

—
ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON

 
          
TOLLER
HASLOCH HAD BOASTED OF THE FRIENDS HE'D HAD IN HIGH places, but apparently he'd
had nearly as many enemies there. The deputies who had arrested Rowan and Colin
took them to the nearest hospital, and while they waited for treatment
—
Rowan for dehydration and
shock, Colin for the supposed frailty of his advanced age
—
the uniformed deputies had been
replaced by sleek civilians who discouraged questions of any sort.

 
          
For
a while Colin wondered if he had defeated Hasloch only to fall prey to the rest
of Hasloch's monstrous network, but after the hospital released them, their
keepers simply drove them to a Washington hotel just off the Mall, where the
two of them spent three days locked incommunicado in a suite on the eighteenth
floor before they were driven to the airport and released.

 
          
No
one ever asked either of them any questions, and Colin was content to have it
so. He had done what he had come to do. And more
—
he had found the last work
of his life.

 
          
"I
hope Claire and Daddy are having fun," Rowan said, looking into the fire.

 
          
"Probably
they're having as much fun as it is possible to have in Rhine-beck," Colin
assured her gravely.

 
          
Last
spring, Claire had finally succumbed to Justin's persuasions and moved
permanently to the old farm in Madison Corners. The countryside was much
changed from the days when the Church of the Antique Rite had held sway there:
though still suffering from the same economic depression that gripped other
agriculturally-dependent parts of the
U.S.
, it was a more wholesome
sort of stagnation than before, if such a thing were possible. Claire had found
a great deal of use for all the skills she'd acquired in the course of a long
life, from nursing to crisis intervention, and from what Colin had seen when
they came for Christmas, she and Justin were very happy.

 
          
It
was his second winter in the old farmhouse on Greyangels Road. The house had
welcomed him back last fall as if he had never left; Winter Greyson (nee
Musgrave) was its current owner, and the Greysons had been pleased to find so
congenial a tenant. Grey had taken a particular delight in shipping Colin's
pack-rat collection of books and papers to him; though Rowan was not as capable
a secretary as Grey had been, she had learned quickly. Much of Colin's
collection would pass directly to her use in the years to come.

 
          
"They'll
be staying until Monday," Colin reminded her. "But they do have a
home of their own to go to. And an old house needs looking after, especially
during a New England winter."

 
          
"Yes,
but . . ." Rowan said, and let the sentence drop.

 
          
Colin
knew what she was thinking. While Claire and Justin were here, Rowan was able
to maintain the pretence of a normal life. The furnishings of the Sanctuary
—
which normally occupied the
second upstairs bedroom
—
were tucked away, and the regime of meditation and
spiritual exercises that occupied Rowan's time
—
outside of her mundane
studies
—
was
suspended.

 
          
"It's
New Year's Eve," Colin said. "I've seen too many of them to care, but
you ought to be out celebrating, not staying here keeping me company."

 
          
Rowan
made a rude graphic noise. "And who am I supposed to go out
with?
Ninian?
And do what? People
—
ordinary people
—
just seem so ... oblivious.
I know it's wrong, but I don't have anything to say to them, and what could they
say to me? I feel like we're on different planets."

 
          
The
path of the disciple had not been
—
and still was not
—
an easy path for either of
them. The passage to membership in Colin's Order was long and arduous, and
many of its time-worn practices seemed meaninglessly archaic to Rowan, who
rebelled strenuously against them. For all her manifest dedication to the
Light, Colin still sometimes felt that Rowan took the Great Secrets of
Initiation far too lightly.

 
          
But
the past year had taught them much about each other. In the spring Rowan would
be finished here at Taghkanic, and Colin would take Dr. Rowan Moorcock to visit
Nathaniel, and then
—
with his permission
—
would take her on to London,
for formal initiation into the Order.

 
          
"Well,
just as you like," Colin said. "Next year is the real turning of the
Millennium, anyway
—
not that it's anything but an arbitrary benchmark. Just as
long as you don't feel you're missing anything."

 
          
Rowan
shook her head, not looking at him. In some ways her path was harder than his
own had been: it was far easier to endure secrecy and isolation than the
knowledge that what you were doing would be a source of incredulous mockery if
it was ever revealed. Colin was not sure he could have faced what Rowan faced
every day with mindfulness and a still heart.

 
          
But
she has been born for her own age, as I was born for mine. In each lifetime we
are given the Tools we need to perform the Great Work, though in every
century they are different.

 
          
At
Midsummer the newest Daughter of the Sun would be received into the Temple of
Light as it existed on the Outer Plane, and she would become heir to all of
Colin's power and the wisdom of more lives than this. His heritage would pass
safely into the hands of his disciple for safekeeping into the third
millennium.

 
          
"Oh,
that reminds me," Colin said. "I have a present for you." He'd
meant to give it to her next June, but it seemed right that she should have it
now.

 
          
"A
New Year's present?" Rowan said, getting to her feet as Colin levered
himself out of the chair in front of the fire.

 
          
"Of
a sort. Wait here."

 
          
Colin
went through the kitchen to his bedroom and took an object off his desk.
Carrying it carefully in both hands, he came back into the living room and held
it out to Rowan.

 
          
"Many
years ago, a friend gave this to me. It's served me well all these years
—
as a sort of reminder, you
might say. Now I'm passing it on to you. Call it a legacy."

 
          
"It's
beautiful," Rowan said.

 
          
She
held the paperweight up so that it caught the firelight: a sterling sword, its
surface soft with the patina of age, pierced an anvil set into a block of white
stone.