Deryni Checkmate Page 6

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  watched and listened attentively as the duke began to speak.

  "Now, here's Coroth. Here's the estuary arising from the two rivers. Up the Western River which forms our northeastern border with Torenth is Fa-thane, the Torenthi trading town. It's also a staging area for all of Wencit's raiding expeditions along this segment of the border.

  "What I want you to do is to ride upriver toward Fathane, on the Torenthi side, then loop west along our northern border and back here. Your mission is to gather information, and there are three areas I'd like you to concentrate on: Wencit of Torenth's plans for the war in this area; anything you can find out about this Warin rascal in the north; and any leak of the threatened Interdict. Duncan told you about that, didn't he?"

  "Yes, sir."

  "Very well. You can choose your own disguise, but I think a fur trader or trapper would be good cover. I'd rather you weren't recognized as a fighting man."

  "I understand, sir."

  "Good. Now, here's where the magic comes in."

  He reached along the side of his neck until he found a slender silvery chain, which he then proceeded to pull outside his emerald tunic. As the last of the chain emerged and Morgan slipped it off over his head, Derry could see that there was a silver medallion of some sort attached to the chain. He bent bis head slightly so Morgan could loop the long chain over his head, then looked down curiously at the medallion which now dangled at mid-chest level. It seemed to be a holy medal of some kind, though Deny couldn't identify either the figure depicted or the legend inscribed around the edge. Morgan turned the medallion to face forward, then leaned back against the bookcase beneath the tapestry map.

  "All right, now I'm going to ask you to help me

  54 Deryni Checkmate establish a special kind of Deryni rapport. It's akin to Mind-Seeing, which you've seen me do a number of times, but not nearly as tiring because you remain in control. Just relax and try to let your mind go blank. It's not unpleasant, I assure you," he added, seeing Deny's momentary discomfiture. Derry nodded and swallowed. "Good. Now watch my finger and relax." As Morgan held up his right index finger, he began moving it slowly toward Derry's face. The young man's eyes tracked the finger almost until it touched the bridge of his nose, then fluttered shut. He exhaled softly and relaxed as Morgan's hand rested on his

  forehead.

  Morgan held that position for perhaps half a minute, nothing outwardly happening, then reached out and enclosed the medal in his other hand, closed his eyes. After another minute he released the medallion and looked up, dropped his hand from Derry's forehead. Derry's eyes popped open with a start.

  "You—talked to me!" he whispered incredulously, his voice tinged with awe. "You—" He looked down at the medallion in amazement. "I can really use this to communicate with you all the way from Fathane?"

  "Or farther, if necessary," Morgan agreed. "Just remember that it's a difficult operation. Being Deryni, I could call you any time it became necessary— though it would take a great deal of energy. But you have to confine your calls to the times we agree upon. If I'm not trying to reach you, you haven't the strength to summon me yourself. That's why it's important that you keep track of the time. I'll expect your first contact about three hours after dark tomorrow night. You should be in Fathane by then,"

  "Aye, m'lord. And all I have to do is use the spell you taught me, and that will put me into rapport?" His blue eyes were wide, but trusting. "Correct."

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  Deny nodded and started to tuck the talisman into his tunic, then stopped and pulled it out to look at it again. "What kind of medal is this anyway, M'Lord? I don't recognize the inscription or the figure "

  "I was afraid you'd ask," Morgan grinned. "Ifs a very old Saint Camber medallion dating from just after the Restoration. It was left to me in my mother's will."

  "A Camber medal!" Deny breathed. "What if someone recognizes it?"

  "If you keep your clothes on, no one will even see the medal, much less recognize it, my irreverent friend!" Morgan retorted, slapping Deny's shoulder and chuckling. "No wenching for you on this trip, I'm afraid. This is strictly business."

  "You always have to take the fun out of everything, don't you?" Derry muttered, tucking the medallion inside his tunic with a grin as he turned to leave.

  Darkness was approaching as Duncan guided his tired mount back toward the city of Coroth, and the night chill of the mountain country was already beginning to settle in the glens.

  The meeting with Tolliver had been at least partially successful. The bishop had agreed to delay his answer to the couriers from Rhemuth until he could evaluate the situation, and had promised to keep Morgan advised of any further action regarding his eventual decision. But the Deryni aspect of the case had bothered Tolliver, as Duncan had known it would. And the bishop had warned Duncan to dabble no more in magic if he valued his priesthood and, indeed, his immortal soul.

  Duncan pulled his cloak around himself more closely and urged his horse to a faster pace, remembering that Alaric would be impatient for word of the outcome. Also, he mused, there would be a state dinner awaiting him. And unlike his ducal cousin, Duncan

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  loved ceremony. If he hurried, he should be able to make it in time for the main course. It was not yet dark. As he rounded the next bend, not really thinking about anything in particular, he was suddenly aware of a tall dark form standing in the road not ten yards ahead of him. It was difficult to make out any details in the failing light, but as Duncan drew rein to avoid riding the man down, he noted that the pedestrian was clad in the garb of a monk, a peaked cowl pulled over his head and a staff in his hand.

  Something was not as it should have been, however. Almost unconsciously the warrior in Duncan guided his right hand to the hilt of the sword strapped beneath his left knee. The figure turned his head toward Duncan—he could not have been more than ten feet away—and Duncan jerked his mount to a halt, his heart in his throat.

  For the face which gazed serenely up at him from beneath the grey cowl was one he had come to know quite well in the last months, though never in the flesh. He and Alaric had studied it a hundred times as they searched the musty volumes for information on an ancient Deryni saint. It was the face of Camber of Culdi.

  Before Duncan could speak, or even react beyond a mindless shock, the man nodded courteously and extended an empty right hand in a token of peace.

  "Hail, Duncan of Corwyn," the stranger mur-njured.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  And the Angel that spoe in me, said to me ... 9

  Zechariah 1:9

  DUNCAN'S THROAT went dry and he had difficulty swallowing. For the man had called him by a name he had thought known to only three living men: himself, Alaric, and the young King Kelson. There was no way that this person could know that Duncan was half Deryni, that his mother and Alaric's had been twin sisters, of the high Deryni born. It was a secret Duncan had guarded zealously all his life.

  And yet the man before him had called him by his secret name. How could he know?

  "What do you mean?" he managed to whisper, his voice a quarter octave higher than normal. He cleared his throat "I'm a McLain, of the lords of Kierney and Cassan."

  "And you are also a Corwyn, of your sainted mother's right," the stranger contradicted gently. "There is no shame to being half Deryni, Duncan."

  Duncan shut his mouth and managed to regain most of his composure, then wet his lips nervously. "Who are you?" he asked, holding his ground, but unconsciously letting his hand drop from the sword hilt he had clutched until now. "What do you want?"

  The man chuckled amiably and shook his head. "No, of course you don't understand, do you?" he

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  murmured almost to himself, still smiling easily. "You needn't be afraid. Your secret is sealed within me. But, come. Dismount and walk with me awhile. There is something I would have you know."


  Duncan hesitated for an instant, a trifle uncomfortable under the man's serene gaze, then complied. The man nodded gravely.

  "You may consider this a warning, Duncan—not a threat from me, for it is not that, but for your own good. In the weeks to come, your powers will be sorely tested. More and more you will be called upon to use your magic in the open, to either accept your birthright and take up the fight as is your duty, or else to forever renounce it. Do I make myself clear?"

  "You do not," Duncan whispered, his eyes narrowing. "To begin with, I am a priest. I am forbidden to practice the occult arts."

  "Are you?" the man asked quietly.

  "Of course I'm forbidden to practice magic."

  "No. I mean, are you a priest?"

  Duncan felt his cheeks begin to burn, and he had to avert his eyes. "According to the rite by which I was ordained, I am a priest forever, 'unto—"

  " 'Unto the order of Melchizedek,'" the man quoted. "I know what the scripture says. But are you really a priest? What happened two days ago?"

  Duncan looked up defiantly. "I'm merely suspended. I've not been degraded from the priesthood, nor excommunicated."

  "And yet, you yourself said that the suspension didn't really worry you, that the more you use your powers, the less important your vows become."

  Duncan gasped, instinctively drawing closer to the man, and his horse tossed its head in alarm.

  "How do you know that?"

  The man smiled gently and reached his hand to the horse's bridle to keep it from stepping on his sandaled feet. "I know many things."

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  "We were alone," Duncan murmured, almost to himself. "I would have staked my life on it. Who are you?"

  "The power of the Deryni is by no means evil, my son," the man said in a conversational tone. He dropped his hand and began walking slowly down the road. Duncan shook his head in dismay and moved his horse along with him, straining to hear what he was saying.

  "... necessarily good, either. The good or evil is in the soul and mind of him who uses the powers. Only an evil mind can corrupt the power for evil." He turned to glance at Duncan as they walked—and continued.

  "I have observed your use of the power so far, Duncan, and I find it most judicious. You need have no qualms as to whether your motivation is righteous. I understand the struggle you have undergone to be able to use it at all."

  "But-"

  "No more," the man said, holding up his hand for silence. "I must leave you now. I ask only that you continue to examine your motives in that other matter I mentioned. It may well be that you are called in other ways than you had thought. Think you on it; and the Light go with you."

  With that, the man was gone; and Duncan stopped in confusion.

  Gonel

  Without a trace!

  He looked down at the ground beside him where the man had been walking, but there were no footprints. Even with the lowering darkness, he could see his own tracks extending back the way he had come, the horse's hoofmarks firmly imprinted in the damp clay of the road.

  But of the other's passage there was no trace.

  Had he only imagined it?

  No!

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  It had been too real, too chillingly threatening to have been in his mind alone. Now he knew what Alaric must have felt like when he'd had his visions. That sense of unreality, yet the certainty that he had been touched by someone or something. Why, this had been as real as—as that shining apparition that he and others of Deryni blood had seen at Kelson's coronation, supporting the crown of Gwynedd. Now that he thought about it, it could even have been the same being! And if so—

  Duncan shuddered and pulled his cloak around Himself again, then mounted and touched spurs to his beast. He wasn't going to find any more answers on this deserted road. And he had to tell Alaric what had happened. His cousin's visions had come at times of cusp, when grave crises were brewing. He hoped this wasn't a portent.

  It was three miles back to the courtyard of Castle Coroth. It would seem like thirty.

  At Castle Coroth, the night's festivities Had begun with the setting of the sun. As darkness descended, richly clad lords and their resplendent ladies had begun to fill the ducal hall with color and sound as they awaited the arrival of their duke. Lord Robert, true to his word, had managed to transform the usually gloomy government chamber into an oasis of light and cheer, a welcome respite from the damp and darkness of the moonless evening.

  Beaten bronze chandeliers suspended from the ceiling blazed with the light of a hundred tall candles. Light gleamed from the facets of fine crystal and silver goblets, reflected on the mellow wink of polished pewter and silver service on the dark tables. A dozen pages and squires in emerald green livery scurried around the long trencher tables putting out bread and decanters of mellow Fianna wine. And Lord Robert, stationed near the head of the table, kept a watchful

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  eye out for his lord's appearance as he chatted with two beautiful ladies. Lute and recorder warbled as a festive undertone to the chatter of the guests.

  As the guests mingled, Morgan's trusted surgeon, Master Randolph, circulated casually among the assembled nobility and gentry, nodding greeting and pausing occasionally to chat with those he knew. His task tonight, as it usually was on such occasions, was to feel out the mood of his master's subjects and to later report items of interest. As he made his way across the room, he picked up snatches of conversation.

  "Well, I wouldn't give ye a copper fer a Bremagni mercenary," one portly lord was saving to another as his eyes followed a stately brunette across the room. They can nae be trusted!"

  "An' what about a Bremagni lady?" the other murmured, nudging his companion in the ribs and raising an eyebrow. "Do you think they can be trusted?"

  "Ah-"

  The two exchanged knowing nods and continued to inspect the lady in question, not noticing Master Randolph's slight smile as he moved on.

  "And that's what the king just doesn't seem to understand," said a bright-faced young knight who looked barely old enough to have won his spurs. "It's all so very simple. Kelson knows how Wencit will move once the thaws begin. Why doesn't he just—"

  Yes, why doesn't he? Randolph thought with a wry smile. If s all so very simple. This young man has the answer to everything.

  "And not only that," a striking red-haired lady was saying to her companion, "it's rumored that he only stayed long enough to change, and then he was back on a horse and riding out for God knows where. I do hope he gets back in time for dinner. You've seen him, haven't you?"

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  "Ummm," the blond woman sighed approvingly. "I certainly have. What a pity he's a priest."

  Master Randolph rolled his eyes in dismay as he continued past the women. Poor Father Duncan was always being sought after by the ladies of the court— almost as much as the duke himself. It was positively disgraceful. It would be different if the priest encouraged them. But he didn't. If the good father was lucky, he wouldn't get back before dinner was over.

  Scanning the crowd casually, Randolph noticed three of Morgan's border lords in an earnest conversation over to his right. Morgan, he knew, would be vitally interested in what they had to say. But Randolph dared not go too close. The men knew him to be in Morgan's confidence and would surely change the subject if they thought they were being too candid for outside listeners. He edged as close as he dared and pretended to listen to two older men discussing falcons.

  "Aye, ye dasn't hae th' jesses too tight, or ye'll—"

  "... and so this Warin fellow rides right into my granary yard and says, 'Do ye like paying taxes to His Grace?' Well, I tells him that sure, nobody likes taxes, but by God, the duke's tenants gets their money's worth of protection and good government!"

  "Humph!" another growled. "Hurd de Blake was telling me just the other day how he'd had four acres of spring wheat bur
ned out by the scoundrel. It's been a dry winter up north by de Blake's place, and the wheat burned like Hades. Warin ordered him to make a contribution to the cause, and de Blake told him to go to the Devil!"

  ", . . nah, I like th' smaller tyrrits mysel', so ye can get yer hands around th' jesses rightlike . . ."

  The third man scratched at his beard and shrugged as Randolph strained to hear. "Still, this Warin fellow has a point. The duke is half Deryni, an' makes no secret o' the fact. Suppose he's plannin' to join with

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  Wencit in another Deryni coup, f put Corwyn under another Interregnum. I dinnae want my manors blasted with heathen Deryni magic when I deny their heretical teachings."

  "Ah, now, ye know our duke would never do a thing like that," the first lord objected. "Why only the other day .,."

  "My peregrine ..."

  Master Randolph nodded to himself and moved on at that, satisfied that the lords were no immediate threat; were, indeed, only talking about the things others were discussing tonight. Certainly, the people had every right to be curious about what their duke had planned, especially since he was getting ready to go off to war again, taking the flower of Corwyn's fighting men and leaving the others to more or less fend for themselves.

  This continued mention of Warin and Kis band was disturbing, though. In the past month, Randolph had heard far more about the rebel leader and his band than he cared to remember. And apparently the problem was getting worse rather than better. Hurd de Blake's lands, for example, were more than thirty miles inside the border, much deeper than Randolph had ever heard Warin to penetrate before. The situation was becoming more than just a border problem. Morgan would have to be briefed before court in the morning.

  Randolph glanced across the room to see slight movement behind the drapes from which Morgan would make his entrance—the duke's signal that he was about ready to come in. Randolph nodded and saw the curtain move again as he began to make his way slowly back in that direction.

  Morgan let the heavy velvet drapes fall back into place and straightened, satisfied that Randolph had seen his signal and was on his way. Behind him,