Camber the Heretic (20 page)

Their number had decreased the previous spring, when the beloved Dom Turstane died in a fall—but while they began evaluating several potential candidates to replace him, they found that somehow the balance of seven plus the vacant seat worked, even better than when they had been eight.

Whatever the cause, they gradually stopped even talking about filling the empty place. Sometime during that period, Jebediah made a joking remark about the seat being reserved for Saint Camber, perhaps sensing unconsciously what Camber had been feeling all along, and the name was seized upon by Gregory and Jaffray, who both were ardent supporters of the Camberian movement. They called it Saint Camber's Siege. The Camberian Council remained at seven.

Now one of those seven hurried toward his appointed meeting with his fellows, clasping cloak to throat and slipping along a shadow-girt corridor toward Jaffray's apartment and the Portal it contained. The archbishop would not be there by now, but its Portal would. With its use, Camber would be at the council chambers in the blink of an eye.

He passed no one in the corridors at this hour, and for that he was grateful. When he reached Jaffray's door, he scanned beyond it briefly, cast up and down the corridor in either direction, then bent to the door latch and reached out with his mind, found the pins, nudged them gently with that particular Deryni skill which not all of his race could wield with this degree of accuracy.

He kept a little tension on the latch while he worked, finally feeling the handle drop beneath his hand. With a smile—he had not lost his touch—he eased the door open and entered, closing and locking it behind him. But a few muffled steps, felt-soled indoor boots quiet on carpet, and he was slipping into Jaffray's sleeping chamber and across to the far wall, drawing aside the curtain to step into Jaffray's oratory.

He stilled his mind and visualized his destination, let his awareness of the place's power flow through him. A moment he took to center in, to set his destination firmly in mind. Then he reached out with his mind and bent the energies, and was no longer in the oratory at Valoret.

As his eyes came into focus, he saw Jaffray himself standing just outside the Portal with a candle in his hand. The archbishop was muffled from chin to toes in the same deep violet of cassock and mantle as Camber, his dark, grey-streaked Gabrilite braid and jewelled pectoral cross gleaming in the candlelight. He nodded nervously as Camber's eyes met his.

“I'm sorry about the regency, Alister. I wish there were something I could have done.”

Camber shrugged, stepping out of the Portal with a resigned expression on his face.

“We underestimated Murdoch. What can I say?”

“It wasn't your fault,” Jaffray murmured, shaking his head. “None of us thought he would be that brazen. By the way, did you hear they'd named Tammaron chancellor?”

“I rather suspected that they would,” Camber said dryly, glancing toward the entrance to the council chamber.

Jebediah was waiting there with Jesse, Gregory's eldest son, and Camber's grandsons, Davin and Ansel, now-teenaged sons of the martyred Cathan MacRorie. The three were regular visitors to meetings of the Council, for they had all spent many months over the past several years riding the roads of their respective lands with their retainers in an effort to keep down the activities of bands such as that which had accosted Camber and Joram a few days before. More than a few young Deryni firebrands had found themselves hauled before the local courts in Culdi and Ebor and fined or temporarily incarcerated for the deeds of themselves and their men. Based on such experience, the opinions of men like Jesse and Davin and Ansel were often invited. On the shoulders of such as these would rest the eventual future of all Deryni in Gwynedd.

As the three made respectful bows to the two bishops, Camber smiled his greeting and wondered why they were waiting outside with Jebediah—then reasoned that Joram and Evaine were probably awaiting his decision on whether the matter of Rhys's newfound talent should be discussed before those not of the Council. There was no question in
his
mind about that, however. He nodded to Jebediah and pressed his shoulder in reassurance and affection, as he and Jaffray passed.

Torches blazed in golden cressets to either side of the great hammered doors, reddening the already ruddy bronze and throwing the carved scenes into bold relief, making the figures seem to come alive as the doors opened and the shadows flitted across the incised panels. Evaine and Joram were already there, standing restlessly by their places at west and south, respectively, of the eight-sided table. Gregory, the only other member yet present, was strolling back and forth before a panel of wood-limned ivory set into the northeastern wall, pretending avid interest. Three more of the eight walls under the faceted amethyst dome held similar panels, depicting scenes from Deryni legend. The north wall was taken up by the huge, ceiling-high doors, and the other three were still blank stone—for the chamber was still not finished inside, after seven years of work.

Gregory glanced up eagerly as he heard them come in, striding eagerly to embrace the older of the two men.

“Alister!” He stood back to look at Camber from arm's length. “I'm told you came to visit me when I was injured, and I don't remember a thing. You must think me a terrible host!”

“As I recall, you were in no condition to host anyone—except, perhaps, the Angel of Death, if Rhys hadn't intervened,” Camber replied dryly. “Did Evaine tell you anything else about that day?”

“I haven't yet, Father Alister,” she replied, making a casual curtsey as he came closer to the table, “though I think it's something he should find out about tonight. Rhys was on his way to check on the princes when I left him, but as soon as he returns, I think all the Council should hear the whole story. I also invited Jesse and Davin and Ansel to join us. Do you mind? Their evaluations may give us some fresh insights, under the circumstances.”

“I have no objection,” Camber replied. “Jaffray?”

“None here,” came the archbishop's response.

“Then, it's settled,” Camber said, taking his seat between Evaine and Saint Camber's Siege, in the north, as Jaffray seated himself on the other side of the empty chair. “Gregory, would you ask them to come in, please?”

As Jebediah and the three young men entered, Joram waved his two nephews to stools on either side of him, and Jesse nervously took another stool between his father's chair and Evaine's. Camber gave Jesse a warm smile to put him at his ease, then glanced across to his right at his grandsons as Jebediah took his place directly opposite.

“Welcome, gentlemen,” he said, including them all in his greeting. “Jesse, I know what you've been up to lately. How about our younger MacRories? What news from your part of the kingdom, while we wait for Rhys?”

Davin, seated to Joram's right, flashed his famous grin, all shiny, even teeth in the fair, nearly beardless face. Though he did not know Camber as anyone other than Alister Cullen, both he and his brother had been close to the bishop for many years now.

“We were hoping you might be able to give
us
news, sir,” Davin replied. “There have been a lot of rumors, but precious few facts.”

“There are always many rumors in times such as these,” Camber said enigmatically. “I assume that you've heard about the king?”

Solemnly Ansel nodded, almost an identical image of his elder brother. “I received a private letter from Dafydd Leslie around noon today, sir. Dafydd said that Cinhil died sometime last night, and that the regency council would be meeting for the first time today. Did it?”

“Such as it is,” Jaffray said in disgust, as all eyes turned toward him. “Murdoch found a way to oust Alister from the regency.”

“No!”

That was clearly news to the three newcomers, and to Gregory, as well, who stopped pacing and then groped his way numbly to his seat.

“Aye. They chose Duke Sighere to succeed him, with his son Ewan sitting in for him, and then they dismissed all the Deryni from the council that they could. I'm the only one left.”

Joram snorted. “And they would have gotten rid of him, too, if they could have found a way.”

After a short, shocked silence, Davin found his tongue.

“How—how did they oust Bishop Alister?”

“A mysterious document, allegedly signed by the king,” Jaffray said, almost singing the words in his sarcasm. “Oh, it was Cinhil's signature,” he added, seeing the indignation growing on Davin's face, “and duly witnessed. Unfortunately, there's no doubt about that. We could have fought a forgery.”

“Who witnessed it?” Jesse broke in.

“Oriss and Udaut, neither of whom probably knew what was being signed, any more than the king did,” Jaffray replied promptly. “Oh, it's a bloody mess, all right. Alister is out and Sighere is in, for regent; Alister is out and Tammaron is in, for chancellor; and Jebediah is out and Ewan is in, for earl marshal. They also fired Torcuill and Bishop Kai. The only reason I'm still in is that they can't get rid of me. The Archbishop of Valoret stays, whether he's Deryni or no—at least for the moment.” He sighed. “And all of that is fact, not rumor. I was there.”

His acerbic assessment of the situation brought a silence to the chamber which was not broken until the doors opened about a minute later to admit Rhys.

Jaffray's briefing had saved time, though, and they were immediately able to launch into a discussion of the situation at hand. They talked about young Alroy, now king, and his ill health, and the fact that he was thus far bearing up poorly under the stress; Rhys had had to put him to bed with a sedative before coming to join the others tonight. They talked about the regents, each adding his or her observations about each man so that a unified assessment of the potential dangers from each began to take shape.

That led them to a discussion of the roving bands of Deryni: the reason, in addition to the shakeup in the regency, that the meeting had been called. And Camber's recitation on their encounter with the band which had harassed Manfred MacInnis's party led to the reasons for his travel on that road in the first place, and what had happened at Ebor.

Ebor brought discussion to a crashing halt. It took two tellings, one from Rhys and one from Camber, and a demonstration on the disbelieving and almost hostile Gregory himself, before even Gregory would accept that it had happened.

“I just don't see how it's possible to take away a person's powers,” Gregory finally muttered, still unable to articulate his sense of violation. “And not to remember that you were even in my mind, Rhys—and you and Joram, too, Alister—nothing like that has happened since I was a very small child.”

“If it hadn't been a life and death situation, I would never—” Rhys began.

“Oh, I know that,” Gregory said impatiently, cutting him off. “I'm not angry that you intervened, God knows. Otherwise, I might not be here. It's just that—damn it all, Rhys! I've not had the benefit of your fancy Gabrilite training, or Joram's and Alister's Michaeline discipline, but I've studied with some good men—and women,” he added, with a nod toward Evaine. “I would have sworn by all I hold holy that I could have detected a memory lapse like that. It's—unnerving!”

“I'm sure it is,” Rhys returned quietly. “If it's any comfort, I think your head injury is responsible for at least part of the amnesia. Memory loss of an accident and the time surrounding it is quite common. Sometimes one eventually remembers—sometimes not. And when you add in the fact that you were sedated—” He shrugged. “What still amazes me, though, is the ease with which I was able to take away and restore your abilities, once I knew what was happening. Oh, it took energy, I grant you—no magical working is free—but no more than any other advanced Healing function. It's a shame Dom Turstane is no longer with us. I'd like another Healer to see this, so we could compare perceptions.”

Jaffray cocked his head thoughtfully as he ran a smooth finger along the gold set into the tabletop. “Fortunately, Turstane was not the only outside Healer to whom we have access,” the archbishop said. “Frankly, though, I doubt that even Turstane at his best could duplicate what you've apparently done.”

“No
apparently
about it,” Joram commented under his breath. “Ask Gregory whether he only
apparently
lost his powers.”

“All right.
Concedo
. I must confess to being more than a little mystified, though—and a bit frightened,” Jaffray admitted. “I thought I'd had access to every bit of esoterica that the Gabrilites had to offer—and their records are probably among the most detailed in existence in one place. Over the past seven years, Alister and Evaine have shared with me the additional wisdom of the Ancient Ones whose records Alister and Joram continue to uncover at Grecotha. None of that has prepared me for this. Being able to take away a Deryni's powers goes against everything we believe or were ever taught.”

“You say that with a note of almost ecclesiastical disapproval, my Lord Archbishop,” Rhys said with a tiny, wry smile. “How so? We've
given
Deryni powers, at least under carefully controlled circumstances. Why, then, should it seem so illogical that they could be taken away?”

“That's entirely different, and you know it,” Jaffray said reproachfully. “Giving power to a human and taking power away from a Deryni are two different things.”

“I tend to agree,” Evaine said, not noticing the effect their words were having on Davin and Ansel and Jesse. “Giving power to Cinhil was a magical operation, based partially on Cinhil's own unique potential. What Rhys did to Gregory was something else entirely.”

“Was it?” Joram pursued the point. “Rhys was involved in both operations. Maybe he was responsible for our success in giving Cinhil his powers. You have to admit, he
is
a common factor.”