Hell's Foundations Quiver (44 page)

Clearly, however, this was not the moment to make that argument to the Grand Inquisitor. Nor was it the moment to suggest that an official authorization to … ease the rigor in the camps might be in order. Clyntahn's expression and flat, hard voice made that abundantly clear.

On the other hand,
he thought,
the camp Inquisitors are
already
‘easing the rigor' with which they're administered. None of them want to admit it's out of terror that they might be the next to find themselves in Mab's sights, but there's no use pretending that's not the reason
.

This wasn't the moment to mention
that
, either, but behind the customary tranquility of his own expression, Wyllym Rayno found himself deeply and unaccustomedly concerned. For the first time in his memory—for the first time since the War Against the Fallen—the Inquisition's aura of invincibility as Schueler's Rod in the world had begun to erode. It was still a small thing, and it was happening only slowly, yet it was happening not simply among the Inquisition's own ranks but in the eyes of Mother Church's children in general.

And, he thought, even the greatest avalanche began with the slippage of a few small stones.

 

.II.

Nimue's Cave, Mountains of Light, The Temple Lands

“It's hard t' believe.” Greyghor Mahlard's expression was troubled, but there was a hard light in his eyes. “Even after wakin' up here and all, it's hard t' believe.”

“I don't doubt it,” Merlin replied.

He wasn't physically present at the moment—another of those things Mahlard probably found hard to believe—but Owl had placed his hologram in one of the chairs around the conference table. Now he leaned back in the chair his PICA actually occupied in far distant Siddar City.

“In fact,” he continued, “it may be even harder
because
of everything that's happened, especially to you and your family, Greyghor.”

Mahlard snorted harshly.

“After what happened t' my family?” His voice was even harsher than his snort had been. “Trust me, I've a lot less reason t' put one damned bit o' trust in those bastards in Zion. I'd figured
that
much out even before you rescued us,
Seijin
Merlin!”

“I don't think that's exactly what the
seijin
means, Greyghor,” Sandaria Ghatfryd said from her own place at the table. Mahlard looked at her, and she shrugged. “Of course you realized Clyntahn and the rest of them had betrayed everything they'd ever been taught about God! There are millions of people on Safehold who've realized that just by watching them in action; you and your family
experienced
the way they've twisted and broken every good thing in the
Holy Writ
. But there's a difference between that and rejecting the
Writ
itself, and the more we've seen people—
mortal
people, like Clyntahn and the other three—pervert the
Writ
, the more tightly we've clung to what it really says. Our anger and our hatred for them and what they've done is … framed in our outrage for the way in which their actions defy what we
know
is the will of God and the teachings of the Archangels. And that makes it even harder for us to accept anything that challenges the rock we've been hanging onto for dear life, far less something that breaks the rock up into tiny pieces of gravel and then throws it out the window!”

Mahlard looked at her for several long moments, then nodded slowly.

“Sandaria has a point,” Nimue said from the chamber's doorway. Her hologram walked across to the table and took a seat between Sandaria and Aivah. “Sorry I'm late.” She made a face. “Irys and Phylyp had a late session with Anvil Rock and Tartarian. And Koryn, of course. They're hammering out the final details for incorporating the Corisandian Army into the Imperial Army, and Tartarian's especially eager to get that out of the way.” She chuckled. “Getting Corisandian officers into the Navy's the next step, and guess who wants his admiral's streamer back?”

“I don't blame him.” Merlin shook his head, expression sour. “He's been stuck in council chambers ever since he ended up on the Regency Council, and I've had more experience of being stuck in an ‘office job' of my own than I ever wanted!”

“I don't think you'd get a lot of sympathy from Cayleb,” Aivah pointed out. “You do get out and about a lot more than you've allowed him to. Well, you and Sharleyan, anyway.”

Mahlard looked back and forth between speakers, following the conversation, and his expression had changed from its tight anger into one touched with wonder. He'd been a woodworker in a moderately prosperous but small Border State town far from any thronerooms or palaces. Now he found himself sitting at a conference table, face-to-face with potentially demonic beings out to steal his soul, yet it was evident that he found such casual references to the two most powerful monarchs in the world almost more surreal.

“That may be true,” Merlin said, “but it's getting a little afield from Greyghor's point. And, frankly, how he winds up dealing with it is going to be significant for his future in more ways than one.”

“I know.” Mahlard leaned back in his own chair, rubbing his forehead with the fingers of his right hand. “Don't think for a minute I'm not grateful t' you—to
all
of you.” He lowered his hand to wave at the individuals, flesh-and-blood and electronic, around the table. “Fact is, I'd be dead by now, and so'd Stefyny and Sebahstean, and that's the truth.” His mouth tightened with remembered pain as the faces of the wife and son he'd never see again flowed through his mind. “Whatever happens from here'll be a lot better'n where we'd've been 'thout you. And I understand why you need t' be sure I'll keep my mouth shut 'bout just how you managed it.”

Merlin nodded, watching the Sardahnian's expression thoughtfully. He'd been impressed by Mahlard's intelligence and resilience. It was impossible to miss the dark places experience had left behind the gray eyes he shared with his daughter, but Nimue Alban had seen those dark places behind many another set of eyes, even before her resurrection here on Safehold, and Merlin had seen a lot more since. Mahlard handled his better than a lot of those other eyes' owners had handled theirs, perhaps because his surviving children needed him to. And whatever else, they hadn't slowed his mental quickness. He wasn't a well-educated man, even by Safeholdian standards, but he possessed an abundance of common sense, and his horrific experiences hadn't dulled it.

That was good … probably. Merlin had seen no option but to transport him and the two children directly to Nimue's Cave after their rescue. The three of them couldn't reappear in Sarkyn—or anywhere else they might conceivably be recognized, for that matter—after they'd “died” in Camp Chihiro. Nothing in the Church of God Awaiting's theology supported the concept of physical resurrection, and even if it had, the Temple Loyalists would instantly have proclaimed the three Mahlards had to be demons. Nor could he have allowed them to simply awaken somewhere else—in Tellesberg, for example—with no memory or explanation for how they'd escaped the camp. Their confusion and disbelief would have driven Greyghor to ask the very questions no one could afford for him to ask.

In theory, he could leave the small family here indefinitely, just as he'd explained to Sandaria that he could leave her. At the moment, he rather suspected Stefyny and Sebahstean would have voted in favor of exactly that. He'd managed to visit the Cave physically three times since they'd awakened, and if the two of them had initially been a bit shy around him, they'd quickly gotten over it. At first, he'd been irked to discover that Sandaria and Aivah had explained to them—and to their father—that
Seijin
Merlin had personally rescued them. Telling them they'd been rescued by Merlin when Dialydd Mab had taken credit for the attack on Camp Chihiro's inquisitors as far as all the rest of the world knew had seemed an unnecessary complication. But he'd quickly realized how silly it was to worry about
that
“complication” when there were so many others to worry about where their rescue was concerned, and the kids were a joy.

Sebahstean was a solemn, sober little boy, and Merlin doubted that was going to change, given the appalling things he'd endured. But he was also bright and full of energy, and those experiences of his hadn't killed his ability to love. Stefyny seemed less outwardly marked by what had happened to them, yet she had a grave, thoughtful streak which was far older than her years. She didn't begin to understand the full truth about how she, her father, and her baby brother had been not only rescued but completely healed. Even her broken nose had been repaired and her missing teeth regenerated. That was quite enough for her, and Aivah had been wise enough not to even attempt the explanation which had been given to her father. As far as Stefyny was concerned,
Seijin
Merlin and his friends were simply magic. They didn't call themselves angels, and she was willing to let them pretend they weren't, but none of that affected the proof that miracles
did
happen and that one of them had happened to her, and her smile could have melted a Glacierheart canal in winter.

Since their rescue, the two kids had explored many of the safer sections of Nimue's Cave under Sandaria's and Owl's supervision, and Nahrmahn had introduced them to Owl's library of holodramas and electronic books. They'd taken the holograms and books in stride as just so much more “magic,” and no one had tried to explain to them that Nahrmahn—or, for that matter, Merlin—was dead. Still, whether they realized it or not, they were as much prisoners here as they'd been in Camp Chihiro. It was a very different sort of imprisonment, but no less real, and they deserved better than that.

Besides, my cave's getting a little crowded
, he thought.
I'll have to see about having Owl extend it a bit farther if I'm going to go on taking in boarders
.

“You're right that we couldn't afford to have the true story get back to the Temple, Greyghor,” he said. “For that matter, having word of a
genuine
‘miracle' get back to Clyntahn would be … less than ideal from my perspective, if not for exactly the same reasons. Although,” he smiled faintly, “I would love to watch our dear friend the Grand Inquisitor try to explain
that
one away!”

“That's because you have such a deep nasty streak,” Nimue told him. Aivah smothered a laugh, and Nimue smiled. But then her expression sobered as she turned to Mahlard. “You do realize what Clyntahn would have to do if the three of you ever turned up alive anywhere the Inquisition could get its hands on you?”

“He'd shut our mouths one way or t'other,” Mahlard said grimly. “Prob'ly torture us t' make us deny who we really were first, o' course. Doubt he'd lose much sleep over it, neither.”

“No, he wouldn't,” Merlin agreed. “But I don't think it's good for the kids to be locked away here forever, either, Greyghor. They need to be around other kids their own age, and to be honest, we need to get them there before their experiences here differentiate them too much from those other kids.”

“Not too sure what ‘differentiate' means,
Seijin
,” Mahlard replied, “but I think I've a fair notion of what you're tryin' t' say, and you're right. Lord love you, Sister Sandaria, but those two were a big enough handful even afore they fell into your clutches!”

“They're lovely children, Greyghor Mahlard!” Sandaria scolded.

“Never said different. But if they're t' keep their mouths shut 'bout all this, best t' get 'em away from the ‘magic' 'fore it soaks too deep into the bone, as you might say.”

Merlin nodded again. Mahlard was right about that, too. In fact, Merlin would almost have preferred for Nahrmahn never to have crossed the children's paths. Unfortunately, that would have solved nothing in the long run, unless they'd been prepared to slap Stefyny and Sebahstean into cryo and leave them there until the time came for their hopefully reasonable father to take them elsewhere, and cryo wasn't good for children. A
brief
stint wasn't likely to do them serious physical harm, but cryo—especially prolonged cryo—could have a significant effect on the development of cognitive function in children as a side effect of two of the preparatory drugs. In fact, some kids had an immediate and severe reaction to them, and in those cases the damage could be massive. That was why there'd been no children among the original colonists, which had played into Langhorne's “creation” myth quite nicely. Merlin had used one of those drugs to simulate death in all three of the Mahlards, but he'd been unwilling to risk using
both
on the children, however small the possibility of inflicting harm. Even if he had been, he knew Sandaria and Aivah—not to mention Sharleyan!—would have fought him every inch of the way.

“It's not something we have to decide tonight, right this minute,” he said. “I think we've got a little longer. Have you considered my suggestion, though?”

“Aye, I have, and seems t' me it makes sense. Never been t' Tellesberg—never wanted t' be, if you'll pardon my sayin' so—but it'd be good t' have some other folks around as know who we are an' how we came t' be there in the first place. These ‘Brethren' of yours sound like decent folk, and I've never heard aught but good 'bout Archbishop Maikel from anybody—'cept those bastards in the Inquisition, o' course. And Tellesberg's far 'nough from home there's not much chance o' meetin' anyone's might know us. And I've no doubt you'd all feel easier in your minds knowin' you'd someone you trusted keepin' an eye on us.”