Deryni Checkmate Page 5

  "Duncan! You old reprobate!" Morgan exclaimed, striding across the damp cobblestones of the courtyard. "What the Devil are you doing in Coroth?"

  "Visiting you," Duncan replied, blue eyes twinkling with pleasure as he and Morgan came together in a quick embrace. "Things weren't exciting enough in Rhemuth, so I thought I'd come pester my favorite

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  cousin. Frankly, my archbishop was overjoyed to be rid of me."

  "Well, it's good he can't see you now," Morgan said, grinning widely as Duncan pulled a pair of saddlebags from the grey's back and slung them casually over his arm. "Just look at you—covered with mud and smelling like horses. Come on and let's get you cleaned up. Deny, see that Duncan's escort is taken care of, will you? And then see if you can get my squires to draw him a bath."

  "Right away, m'lord," Deny said, smiling and bowing slightly as he backed a few steps in the direction of the riders. "And welcome back to Coroth, Father Duncan."

  "Thank you, Deny."

  As Deny moved among the guards and began issuing orders, Morgan and Duncan bounded up the steps and into the great hall. The hall was a flurry of activity in preparation for the coming banquet, and scores of servants and workmen were setting up heavy trestle tables and benches, rehanging the costly tapestries which had been removed and cleaned for the occasion. Kitchen varlets swarmed through the hall, sweeping hearths and readying spits for the roasting of meats. And a group of pages was industriously polishing the ornate wooden chairs at the High table.

  Lord Robert stood by to oversee the entire operation. As the workmen finished setting up each table, Robert directed kitchen wenches in the wiping down with oil to bring out the rich patina of age and supervised the placing of the great pewter candelabras and service from the ducal treasury. To his right, Lord Hamilton, the balding seneschal of Castle Coroth, had been arranging the placement of musicians for the evening's entertainment. At the moment, he was en* gaged in a heated argument with Morgan's chief talent for the evening, the much acclaimed and celebrated troubadour Gwydion.

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  Deryni Checkmate

  As Morgan and Duncan approached, the little performer was almost dancing in his anger, resplendent as a peacock in his full-sleeved orange doublet and hose. His black eyes snapped in outrage as he stamped his foot and half-turned away from Hamilton in disgust. Morgan caught his eye and crooked his finger for Gwydion to approach, and the troubadour threw Hamilton one final haughty look of contempt before gliding to Morgan's side to bow curtly.

  "Your Grace, I cannot work with that man any longer! He is arrogant, boorish, and has no artistic rapport whatsoever!"

  Morgan tried to conceal a smile. "Duncan, I have the somewhat dubious honor to present Master Gwydion ap Plenneth, the latest and most illustrious addition to my court. I might also add that he sings the finest ballads in the Eleven Kingdoms—when he's not quarreling with my staff, that is. Gwydion, my paternal cousin, Monsignor Duncan McLain."

  "Welcome to Coroth, Monsignor," Gwydion murmured formally, ignoring Morgan's implied reprimand. "His Grace has spoken of you often and well. I trust your stay will be a pleasant one."

  "I thank you," Duncan replied, returning the bow. "Back in Rhemuth, you're reputed to be the finest troubadour since the Lord Llewelyn. I trust you will see fit to prove that reputation before I must leave."

  "Gwydion shall play tonight if he is permitted to arrange the musicians as he wishes, Monsignor," the troubadour bowed. He glanced at Morgan. "But if Lord Hamilton persists in his malicious persecution, I fear I shall develop a splitting headache. That, of course, would make it quite impossible for me to perform."

  He drew himself up haughtily and folded his arms across his chest in a theatrical gesture of finality, then contemplated the ceiling with studied nonchalance. It was all Morgan could do to keep from laughing.

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  "Very well," the duke said, clearing Kis throat to cover his smile. "Tell Hamilton I said you can arrange things any way you like. I want no more quarreling, though. Do you understand?"

  "Of course, Your Grace."

  With a curt nod, he turned on his heel and strode back across the hall to where he had been working, arms still folded across his chest. As he approached, Lord Hamilton saw him and glanced at Morgan as though asking for support, but Morgan merely shook his head and gestured toward Gwydion with his chin. With a sigh that was almost audible even across the room, Hamilton nodded acquiescence and disappeared through another door. Gwydion took over where Hamilton had left off, directing the complete rearrangement of the musicians' area and strutting like a bantam rooster.

  "Is he always that temperamental?" Duncan asked, somewhat taken aback, as he and Morgan continued on through the hall and up a flight of narrow stairs.

  "Not at all. He's usually worse."

  They came to the top of the staircase and Morgan opened a heavy door. A few feet beyond that was another door, heavy walnut inlaid with an enameled Corwyn gryphon. Morgan touched the eye of the beast with his signet, and the door opened silently. Inside was Morgan's private study, his chamber of magic, his sanctum sanctorum.

  It was a round room perhaps thirty feet in diameter, perched atop the highest tower in the ducal castle. The walls were of heavy stone, pierced only by seven narrow green glass windows which extended from eye level to ceiling. At night, when the candles burned late in the round tower room, the tower could be seen for miles around, its seven green windows glowing like beacons in the night sky.

  There was a wide fireplace in the wall ninety degrees to the right of the doorway, with a raised hearth

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  Deryni Checkmate

  which extended six to eight feet to either side. Above the mantel hung a silk banner of the same Gryphon design which graced the door, and various other objects rested along the top of the mantel. A tapestry map of the Eleven Kingdoms covered the wall directly opposite the door, with a wide, heavily laden bookcase beneath it. There was an immense desk with a carved wooden chair to the left of the bookcase, and a wide couch covered with a black fur throw to the left of that. Immediately to the. left of the door was the tiny portable altar Duncan had known he would find, with a plain, dark wood prie-dieu before it.

  All these things took but an instant to assess, however. For Duncan's attention was drawn almost immediately to the center of the room, which was bathed in a misty emerald glow from a high, round skylight. Beneath the skylight was a small table perhaps an arm's length across, flanked by two comfortable-looking chairs with green leather cushions. In the center of that table, a small, translucent amber sphere about four inches in diameter rested in the upraised claws of a golden Corwyn gryphon.

  Duncan whistled lightly under his breath and crossed to the table, never taking his eyes from the amber sphere. He started to reach out to touch it, then changed his mind and merely stood there admiring. Morgan smiled as he joined his cousin and leaned against the back of one chair.

  "How do you like it?" he asked. The question was strictly rhetorical, for Duncan was obviously enthralled with the thing.

  "It's magnificent," Duncan whispered, with the awe in his voice of any artisan looking at a particularly fine tool of his trade. "Where did you ever find such an enormous—it is a shiral crystal, isn't it?"

  Morgan nodded. "The very same. The Hort of Orsal found it for me a few months ago—at an outrageous price, I might add. Go ahead. Touch it if you like."

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  47

  As Duncan slipped into the nearer of the two chairs, the forgotten saddlebags slung across his arm bumped against the table. He looked down with a start, as though just remembering he had them, and his handsome face went tense, guarded. He lifted the bags to the table and started to speak, but Morgan shook his head.

  "Go on with the crystal," he urged, seeing Duncan's discomfiture. "I don't know what you've got in there that you think is so important, but whatever it is it can wait."
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  Duncan bit his lip and looked across at Morgan for a long moment, then nodded acquiescence and eased the bags to the floor. He took a deep breath and pressed his palms together for an instant, then exhaled and reached out to surround the crystal with his two hands. As he relaxed, the crystal began to glow.

  "Beautiful," Duncan breathed, the tension draining away as he moved his hands lower on the crystal to better expose it. "With a crystal this size, I ought to be able to form images without half trying."

  Concentrating anew, he gazed deeply into the crystal and watched the glow intensify. The sphere lost its opacity and became a transparent amber, clouded briefly as though breathed upon from within. Then a shape began to form in the mist, which gradually solidified and took on human aspects. It was a tall man with silvery hair, wearing an archbishop's robes and miter and wielding a heavy jeweled crozier. He was very angry.

  Loris/ Morgan thought to himself as he leaned forward to inspect the image. What the Devil is he up to now? He certainly has Duncan riled, whatever it is....

  Duncan snatched away his hands as though the crystal had suddenly become hot to the touch, and a look of disgust contorted his features for an instant. As his hands left the sphere, the form vanished and the sphere again became translucent. Duncan nibbed

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  his hands against his cassock as though wiping away something distasteful, then forced himself to relax, folded his hands neatly on the table. He looked at his hands as he spoke.

  "I suppose it's fairly obvious that this isn't just a social call," he murmured bitterly. "I couldn't even hide it from the shiral crystal."

  Morgan nodded understandingly. "I realized that when you got off your horse." He studied the gryphon signet on his right forefinger and rubbed it absently. "Do you want to tell me what has happened?"

  Duncan shrugged and sighed. "There isn't any easy way to say it, Alaric. I—I've been suspended."

  "Suspended?" Morgan's jaw dropped in amazement. "What for?"

  Duncan forced a wry smile. "Can't you guess? Apparently Archbishop Loris convinced Corrigan that my part in the coronation battle was more than just that of Kelson's confessor. Which, unfortunately, is trufc. They may even suspect that I'm half-Deryni. They were going to call me before an ecclesiastical court, only a friend found out and warned me in time. It's what we always feared might happen."

  Morgan exhaled and lowered his eyes. "I'm sorry, Duncan. I know how much the priesthood means to you. I—I don't know what to say."

  Duncan smiled wealcly. "It's worse than you suspect, my friend. Frankly, if it were only the suspension, I don't think I'd be so worried. I find that the more I function as a Deryni, the less important my vows seem to become." He reached to the saddlebags beside his chair and withdrew a folded piece of parchment which he placed on the table between them.

  "This is a copy of a letter now enroute to your bishop, Ralf Tolliver. A friend of mine who's a clerk in Corrigan's chancery risked a lot to get it for me. The point of the letter is that Loris and Corrigan want Tolliver to excommunicate you unless you

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  49

  recant your powers and 'take up a life of repentance.' Those are Archbishop Corrigan's words, I believe."

  "Me, recant?" Morgan snorted, an incredulous half grin on his face. "They must be jesting." He started to slide the letter across the table and pick it up, but Duncan held his wrist.

  "I still haven't finished, Alaric," he said quietly, holding Morgan's gaze with his own. "Unless you do recant and comply with their orders, they'll not only excommunicate you—they'll put all of Corwyn under Interdict."

  "Interdict!"

  Duncan nodded and released Morgan's wrist. "Which means that the Church will effectively cease to function in Corwyn. There will be no Mass, no marriages, baptisms, burials, no last rites for the dying—nothing. I'm not sure how your people will react."

  Morgan set his jaw firmly and picked up the letter. He unfolded it and began reading, and as he read his grey eyes went cold and steely: " To His Most Reverend Excellency Ralf Tofliver, Bishop of Coroth ... Reverend Brother, it has come to our attention ... Duke Alaric Morgan ... heinous crimes of magic and Sorcery contrary to the laws of God ... if said duke does not recant his Deryni powers . . . excommunicate . . . Corwyn under Interdict . . . hope that you will do this... sign of good faith ...' Damn!"

  Swearing explosively, Morgan half-crumpled the parchment in anger and threw it down on the table.

  "May nameless maledictions pursue them to the depths of Hell-slime! May lyfangs devour the last of their line, and thirteen devils forever haunt their sleep! Damn them, Duncan! What are they trying to do to rne?"

  He sat back in his chair and exhaled explosively, md Duncan grinned.

  "Do you feel better?"

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  Deiyni Checkmate

  "No. You realize, of course, that Loris and Cor-rigan have me exactly where they want me. They know that my influence in Corwyn is based not on pro-Deryni feeling, but on my people being pro-Morgan. If the Curia of Gwynedd declares me anathema because I'm Deryni, they know full well that my people will go along rather than see Corwyn put under Interdict. I can't ask my people to give up their faith for me, Duncan."

  Duncan slumped back in his chair and gazed expectantly across at his cousin. "So, what are we going to do about it?"

  Morgan smoothed the crumpled letter and looked at it again, then pushed it back across the table as though he had seen enough of it.

  "Has Tolliver seen the original of tliis letter yet?"

  "I don't see how. Monsignor Gorony sailed aboard the Rhafallia two days ago. If my calculations are correct, he should be arriving sometime tomorrow."

  "More likely about three hours from now, when the tide shifts," Morgan retorted. "Gorony must have bribed my captains to pile on more sail. I feope they made him pay!"

  "Is there any chance of intercepting th'e letter?"

  Morgan grimaced and shook his head. "I don't dare, Duncan. If I do, I'm violating the immunity of the very Church I'm trying to protect in Corwyn. I have to let Gorony get through to Tolliver."

  "Suppose I get there first, then. If I were to show Tolliver our copy of the letter and explain your concern for the situation, he might agree to delay for as much as several weeks before he takes action. Besides, I don't think he's going to like being dictated to by Loris and Corrigan. It's no secret that they consider him a backwater priest, country simpleton of sorts. We could play on his resentment—whatever it takes to keep the Interdict from falling. What do you think?"

  Morgan nodded. "It might work. Go make yourself

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  presentable and tell Deny to saddle a fresh horse for you. While you're doing that, I'll write a second letter to Tolliver asking for his support. It's not going to be easy." He rose and crossed to his desk, already drawing out parchment and ink.

  "Somehow I must strike just the proper balance between ducal authority, penitent son of the Church, and long-time friend—all without making the Deryni issue so strong he feels he can't in conscience go along."

  A quarter of an hour later, Morgan scrawled his signature at the bottom of the crucial letter and added his paraph, the highly personal flourish at the end of the stroke to guard against forgery. Then he applied sealing wax in a bright green blob below his name, pressed his gryphon seal into the hot wax.

  He could have done without the wax. With a little help, the Deryni signet was easily capable of imprinting without benefit of wax. But he didn't think it would be much to the bishop's liking. The Most Reverend Ralf Tolliver had nothing against the Deryni personally, but there were bounds beyond which even Morgan dared not go. A flagrant, or even minor, act of magic at this stage could entirely undo whatever good the letter, so painstakingly drafted, might accomplish. Morgan was folding the letter to seal it again when Duncan returned, a heavy wool riding cloak flung over one arm. Deny was with him.

  "Finished?" D
uncan asked, crossing to the desk and peering over Morgan's shoulder

  "Almost."

  He dripped sealing wax on the overlap to seal the letter closed and quickly stamped it with his seal. He looked up as he blew on the hot wax to cool it, then handed it to Duncan,

  "Do you have the other letter?"

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  "Umm." Duncan snapped his fingers. "Deny, bring me that, would you?"

  He pointed to the letter on the central table and Derry brought it, watching as the priest tucked it into the cincture of his clean cassock.

  "Do you want an escort, Father?" Derry asked.

  "Not unless Alaric does. Personally, I think that th~e fewer people who know about this, the better off we are. Alaric, do you agree?"

  Morgan nodded. "Good luck, Cousin."

  Duncan gave a quick grin, a nod, then was out the door and on his way. Derry stared after him for a moment, then turned back to Morgan. The duke had not moved from where he sat, but he seemed to be in a world of his own. It was with some hesitancy that Deny ventured to interrupt that world.

  "M'lord?"

  "Hmm?" Morgan looked up startled, almost as though he had forgotten the young man was there— though Derry was sure he hadn't.

  "May I ask a question, sir?"

  Morgan shook his head and grinned sheepishly. "Of course. You probably Have no idea of what's going on right now."

  Deny smiled. "It's not quite that bad, m'lord. Is there anything I can do to help?"

  Morgan studied the young lord, his chin resting on one hand, then nodded tentatively. "Perhaps there is," he said, sitting forward in his chair. "Deny, you've been with me for a long time now. Would you be willing to become involved in magic for me?"

  Deny broke into a broad grin. "You know I would, sirl"

  "Very well, then. Come over to the map with me."

  Morgan moved to the tapestried map covering the near wall, then ran his fingers along a broad finger of blue until he found what he was looking for. Deny