Camber the Heretic (39 page)

Jebediah, who had been out at the Michaeline commanderie at Argoed for the past week, traced one of the golden inlays of the table with a scarred forefinger.

“It sounds to me like we need someone to keep an eye on Tavis better. It's too bad all my men have been cashiered from the guards. The royal household is going to be moving to Rhemuth this summer, unless I miss my bet, and a well-placed guard could really keep us posted.”

“A human?” Evaine asked. “That's the only one who would be acceptable, for Tavis would be able to detect another Deryni. But a human sworn to our service would also be detectable, if Tavis became the least bit suspicious.”

Jebediah nodded thoughtfully. “That's true. And if we used a human, and gave him sufficient protection to escape detection, he'd be little use for reporting back.” He sighed and thought a moment, then raised his head again. “Rhys, how about your little trick? What if we were to send in a Deryni with his powers blocked?”

Joram raised one cynical eyebrow. “Same problem. If his powers are blocked, how would he be any better than a human? We could set up a link and monitor him from here, I suppose, and that could be useful if he could remember what he was supposed to be watching for—but if he could remember that, then it could also be read by Tavis.”

Davin raised his hand tentatively. “Maybe we just need to take a bit of a chance, then. Surely Tavis O'Neill has better things to do with his time than to read every paltry guard who comes into the royal service. For that matter, you could send your man in with his powers blocked initially, then remove the block after he's established as a trustworthy member of the household.”

Camber nodded. “Now, that I like. Good thinking, Davin.” He glanced at the others. “Of course, the next question is, where do we find someone suitable? He's almost got to be someone unknown, but he also has to be someone who can be trusted with the knowledge of this Council. That narrows our choices considerably.”

“Aye, it does, that,” Jaffray agreed. “Queron, Emrys, any ideas from your connections? Queron, is there someone within the Servants of Saint Camber who might do?”

Queron shook his head. “There are few Deryni within our ranks, Your Grace. And the few who are have not the martial training to carry off such a deception. The idea of recruiting such a man from cloistered ranks is a good one, though.” He turned toward Emrys. “Perhaps one of your Gabrilite novices, Emrys? Or you, Jebediah? Even better. How about some young Michaeline trainee?”

It was Jebediah's turn to shake his head. “Those of sufficient training were in public positions too recently. No, what we need is a highly trained Deryni from outside those ranks.”

“How about me?”

It was Davin who had spoken, and all eyes turned toward him in astonishment. Evaine started to shake her head, a horrified look on her face, but Davin held up a hand and swept them all with his gaze.

“No, listen. It's perfectly logical. I have the martial training, I'm associated with this Council, and I—”

“And you're instantly recognizable wherever you go, Earl of Culdi,” Camber interrupted, shaking his head vehemently. “No, I won't hear of it.”

“Pardon me, Bishop Alister,” Davin said softly, “but it isn't entirely up to you. Uncle Joram, didn't you once tell me how, after my father was killed, my grandfather placed your shape and Rhys's on two of the servants, so that you could escape to rescue Prince Cinhil?”

There was a low whistle of amazement from Gregory, and several sighs around the table, as Joram slowly nodded. Camber, controlling his apprehension only with great effort, could see the pulse beating wildly in his son's temple.

“Didn't you tell me that, Uncle?” Davin repeated softly.

Slowly Joram forced himself back into control, willing his hands to relax from their white-knuckled grip on the edge of the table, swallowing once, taking a deep, calming breath.

“Yes, I told you that.”

“And you, Uncle Rhys,” Davin continued. “You were there. You experienced it, too. And I'm sure that Aunt Evaine must know how to do it.” He glanced from one to the other of them, trying to read their reactions.

“Don't you see? It's the perfect solution. One of you puts a shape-change on me, and Rhys temporarily blocks my powers. You give me a false identity as a human soldier, newly recruited to the guards. No, even better, you actually snatch a guard who's just been assigned to the royal household, and I take his place. Then, after I've established myself, Rhys removes the block and I report regularly through a prearranged contact—Jaffray, perhaps. Or maybe a psychic link. It's the perfect solution, I tell you.”

As the young man eagerly searched all their faces, Gregory glanced at Joram.

“Well, can you do it?”

“No.”

“Joram!” Evaine chided. “Of course you can.”

“But I won't. It's too dangerous,” Joram replied stubbornly. “I know it was necessary then.”
And other times, too
, his further thought echoed in her mind. “But it's too dangerous now. What if he's found out? He's your nephew, too, Evaine.”

“I know that.”

Quietly Evaine glanced across the table at her husband. In the back of her mind, she could feel the shocked rapport of her father, helpless, once again, to do anything to prevent what now seemed to be inevitable.

“Rhys, what do you think? Could Davin carry it off, given your block and a shape-change? I can handle the latter, if you don't feel competent.”

Rhys sighed, knowing the reluctance both Evaine and her father were feeling, yet unable to find a good reason to object.

“I can block him. I'd feel safer if someone else also knew how to undo it, in case anything should happen to me, but I'm afraid I must agree that Davin seems to be the only man for the job—if, indeed, this is a job we need to have done. Unfortunately, I've been racking my brain ever since he mentioned it, and I can't think of any other way to keep tabs on Tavis and our wayward princes and their even more wayward regents. I say we let him try it, if he's willing.”

“And if he fails, will you take his blood on your hands, too?” Joram asked harshly. “Can we afford to risk one of our own number on something this chancy?”

“There is blood already on our hands,” Evaine murmured, remembering the many, many who had already died. “But if there is to be more, then better there be the chance of our best blood succeeding rather than the greater chance of failure by those less qualified.”

“Amen to that,” Jaffray breathed.

“Then, are we agreed?” Evaine asked. “I say aye, and Rhys, and Jaffray, and Davin, of course. And Joram says nay. Gregory, how say you?”

“Aye.”

“And Father Alister?”

He felt her sorrow and her resignation across the bond of her love, and knew that she was right. Slowly he nodded, not daring to meet his son's eyes. He felt his daughter's swell of support, deep and bolstering, as she turned her attention to Jebediah.

“And you?”

“He is right. There is no one else. I say aye.”

“Then so be it,” she murmured. “I'm sorry, Brother,” she added, as Joram hung his head and gnawed his lip.

After a long silence, it was Davin who dared to speak. “Well, then, it's all settled. When can I start?”

“It will be a week or so,” Jebediah quickly replied. “We must find guard officers who know our replacement guard, but not too well, and then you must review the guard protocols, so you'll know what you're doing. It's a little different from being an earl. I'd say at least a week. Evaine, Rhys, do you agree?”

Both nodded simultaneously.

“I'll need to work with him on the blockage and memories we must instill,” Rhys said. “Then there must be a compulsion for him to appear, after things are safe, where I can join him to remove the blockage and restore his real memories. Somewhere the guards can go when off duty. And I'm sure that Evaine will want to work on the physical shape-changing more than once.”

Two weeks later, they were ready. A week it took to drill Davin in his military manners, for he would be playing a far lower rank than ever he would have held in his own right as earl; and another week he worked with Rhys and Evaine, practicing the total relaxation which would be necessary for optimum effect. The while, Jebediah sought out the officers who would be able to vouch for Davin in his new role. The soldier he was to replace was also found: one Eidiard of Clure, a slender young highland man of Davin's approximate coloring and build who had only lately been assigned but had not yet reported to court. On the appointed evening, the full Council, less Jebediah, gathered in the
keeill
, below the Council chamber.

Keeill:
the term meant chapel or sanctuary, and this one had been ancient when the first Haldanes pacified what later became Gwynedd, nearly three centuries before. It, and most of the Council chamber above, lay hidden beneath a high, rock-girt plateau of the rugged Rhendall mountains, almost within sight of the sea. An ancient Deryni brotherhood known only as the Airsid claimed credit for the
keeill
itself, and apparently had at least started work on the chamber which now housed the Council, but they had disappeared before it could be finished—no one knew why.

Neither
keeill
nor Council chamber were now accessible except by Transfer Portal, and no one could even guess how the first one might have been placed there. Even the existence of the complex had been discovered only by accident, from a chance reference in one of the ancient manuscripts which still occupied most of Evaine's leisure time. After that, many more months had passed before they were confident enough of their visualizations of the described Portal there to risk an actual Transfer.

Eventually they had done it, though; and discovery of the then only partially completed Council chamber and
keeill
had given them both a secure meeting place and a sanctuary for ritual workings. They had felt at home immediately.

The
keeill
was heavy and massive, the walls curved instead of faceted-in-eight. Roughly-dressed ashlar pillars, twelve of them, stood flush against the perimeter, with enough space between for a person to stand. The single bronze door in the northern quarter opened between two of them. Four bronze cressets held torches which gave smoky, wavering life to the four quarters, thrusting vague, dancing shadow-shapes in and among the recesses of the pillars. The ceiling was somewhat more finely finished, having geometric vaulting of a blue-grey stone that glittered slightly in the torchlight.

A dais of grey-black slate occupied most of the center of the room, the first of its seven shallow steps starting only an armspan from the heavy mass of the pillars. Precisely in the center of the dais was a square of stark white marble, an armspan on each edge and a hand's-breadth thick. Around that slab knelt Rhys, Evaine, and a taut-looking Davin, the three of them putting the final touches to a Ward Major construct which wanted only final activation, once its components were placed at the edge of the dais.

The others waited among the pillars, Jaffray and Gregory standing at the eastern and southern quarters and Camber and Joram by the door in the north—though Joram still was not resigned to what was about to take place. As those in the center began moving the ward components into position, the door opened to admit Jebediah and a sleepwalking young man who wore the harness of the Gwynedd Royal Guards. The grand master closed the door behind them, then turned slightly toward Camber and Joram, his gloved hand resting lightly on his companion's arm.

“It's necessary, Joram. You know that,” he said.

“So you tell me.”

“But you don't believe it, do you?”

Joram shrugged. “It simply seems that we're getting into more deception, all over again.”

“You reconciled yourself to the others,” Camber murmured.

“Those were different.”

“How, different?”

“They just—happened. There was no premeditation. This is—cold. And your victim, there, has nothing to say about it. Before, all the participants were willing ones.”

Camber nodded thoughtfully. “That's true. Crinan and Wulpher agreed to help us. Evaine chose to do what she did. And for Alister, it didn't matter.” He glanced at the silent Eidiard, at the blank, unseeing eyes, the slack expression, then back at Joram.

“But this young man has not been asked. And that bothers you?”

“It does.”

“He will not be harmed by what we do. He merely will be held incommunicado. It will be a very honorable confinement.”

“But his life is ruined, especially if this fails,” Joram pointed out. “Even if we change our minds and pull Davin out before anything happens to him, this man's military career is finished. You could never fill in the gaps so that he could step back into his place as it exists today.”

“No,” Jebediah agreed. “But we can make him another place. And even if we can't—well, sometimes soldiers in a war serve in many different ways. This will be his.”

“But he wasn't allowed to choose it,” Joram said.

“No, he wasn't, son. But that's the way it has to be.”

Joram made no answer to that, merely folded his arms across his chest and watched sourly as Jebediah took the compliant Eidiard up the seven shallow steps of the dais and transferred control to Evaine. Then, as Jebediah came back down to rejoin Camber and Joram, Rhys raised his arms and focused on the cubes, speaking the words which brought the Wards to life.

“
Primus, Secundus, Tertius, et Quartus, fiat lux!
”

Light flared in the perimeter of the dais, flickering blue-white starshine in a circle defined by the four ward components. Evaine touched her fingertips lightly to Eidiard's temples and deepened his trance. After a few seconds he swayed on his feet and would have overbalanced, had not Rhys moved in to support him. At that, Evaine drew her hands away and glanced at Davin, who had watched all in tense silence.