Dark Foundations (28 page)

On cue, the enormous screen came alive with two lines of text:

We praise you, O God: we acknowledge you to be the Lord.

All the worlds worship you, the Father everlasting.

Luke turned to it. “. . . the
Te Deum
. And may we sing and play with all that we have.”

With a great clatter of sound, everyone rose, mist eddying around their feet. The silence returned. Then the music director raised her baton and brought it down sharply.

There was a vast crescendo of music as above the organ's thunder and the awesome rumble of drums, trumpets blazed, horns clamored, and strings and woodwind sang together. And then, just as it seemed the deafening roar of sound could get no louder, every voice sang, “We praise you, O God! We acknowledge you to be the Lord!”

And Merral sang with them, giving all he had to the ancient words, aware of a defiant and exuberant joy cascading into every space in that vast hall. His thoughts were with the words and their meaning, but beyond that he sensed that what he was participating in was more than music—it was a united act of defiance against evil.

Perhaps too, it was more than that. The accounts of those who were there were never in total agreement, but there were many who claimed that at the words “
To you, all angels cry aloud: the heavens and all the powers therein; to you, cherubim and seraphim continually do cry, Holy, Holy, Holy: Lord God of the armies of heaven,
” other voices—not of flesh and blood—could be heard singing too. Indeed, there were those who claimed to have seen flames of fire dancing with high-spirited joy among the vast vaulted expanse of the roof.

But what was undeniable—for the whole of Farholme saw it—was that as the congregation sang the words “
You are the King of Glory, O Christ
” an extraordinary thing happened, so extraordinary that even in the midst of singing with all they had, men and women gasped with joy
.

The mist parted and through the great south windows, bathing all in a glorious dazzling golden light, shone the sun.

As soon as he could after the end of the service, Merral broke away from the animated crowds and found the access doorway at the side of the hall. He left Lloyd sitting in a seat nearby and climbed up the long spiral stairway to the service balcony. He felt lighthearted, as if a heavy burden had been lifted off him and he could hardly now remember the gloom he had experienced minutes earlier.

He expected to find no one in the balcony and was not surprised to find that it was empty. He stood there, gazing down at the floor of the hall far below.

Suddenly he knew he was not alone and turned to see, on the very edge of his vision, a tall dark form. He didn't even bother to try to focus on the figure; he knew it was the envoy and that the effort would be worthless.

“Thank you,” he said.

“Thank him who sent me,” came the reply. Here in this vast echoing chamber the absence of any resonance in the envoy's voice seemed even more striking.

“You altered the order of service.”

“I make no apology. The enemy loathes praise and joy.”

“What happened?”

“For long centuries, the Lord's Assembly has been spared the worst attentions of the enemy. But now, in his wisdom, the Highest has lifted his hand of protection and for an allotted time, the enemy is unchained. From now on the power of the enemy will be felt both here and across the Assembly. Today, the great serpent chose to move against you. He saw an opportunity to crush your spirits, but in his haste and hate, he overstepped the bounds set for him by the Most High. And, as he breached such limits, I was allowed to intervene. I can only do what is permitted.”

“The enemy is affecting the rest of the Assembly?”

“From now on, yes. Those who have so far only known the summer of God's grace must now stand and face the bitter winds of winter. They will feel the enemy's hatred and power in many ways.”

“But why?”

“Why?”
There was a sting of rebuke in the word. “All must be tested. That is why. And your duty, Man, lies not in guessing your Lord's purposes but in doing his will. Now listen.” Here his voice seemed gentler. “For the appointed time, the enemy is moving against the Assembly. He finds much that will serve him: wind and mist, sea and air, bird and beast, and increasingly, men and women. Yet even now, his authority is limited.”

“I see. What would have happened if you had not intervened?”

“You would have been defeated before war came. Remember, the enemy doesn't seek to destroy you utterly.”

“I thought he did.”

“No, he prefers your corruption. He seeks to win men and women to himself, to have them yield to his power and will. His goal is the entire Assembly turned to his ends and the creation of a dark empire whose emblem would not be the Slain Lamb among the Stars but the serpent triumphant over them. Now, return to your work. I have already been sent to counsel you to watch, stand firm, and hope. I now add to it a new command: fight.”

“Thank you.” Seeing that the envoy was about to leave, he asked on impulse, “Do you like music?” As the words came out, he marveled at his folly.

“Do
I
like music?” For the first time, Merral sensed bemusement in the envoy's tone. There was a pause. “Yes.”

Merral turned to the figure, seeing the vague, out-of-focus image of a long black coat and a head half hidden under a strange black broad-brimmed hat. Yet somehow in the face Merral sensed delight. “Where I come from,” the envoy said in his bloodless voice, “there is always music and joy, as you know.”

“So we read,” Merral said, his heart seized with a wild longing.

“Indeed and it is so. And, remember this: in eternity, neither music, nor joy, nor anything else of worth can exist outside the presence of the Most High. That is the awesome choice that all of your race must make: whether to sing the music of the Lord that will never end or to scream in the clamor that can never be silenced.”

A gloved hand rose to the brim of the hat as if in a salute; then, in a silent moment, reality seemed to flicker and the figure was gone.

Merral descended the stairs in high spirits. He opened the door at the bottom and found Delastro waiting for him, with an irritated tilt to his head.

“Commander, what were you doing up there?”

Merral sighed. “I met with the envoy. I saw him there. He organized everything.”

Out of the corner of his eye, Merral saw Lloyd lean forward, his posture perhaps suggestive of a man in prayer, but his sharp blue eyes watched Delastro.

“I see. And you had nothing to do with what happened? Nothing?” There was barely suppressed exasperation in Delastro's voice.

“You credit me with too much power, Prebendant.”

“I saw you order Tenerelt over to the platform.”

“Someone had to take charge.”

Merral sensed a strange expression on the prebendant's face.
Of course.
He feels that task should have fallen to him
.

“And what did this envoy say about what happened?”

“That the enemy tried to crush us, but overstepped the limits set for him.”

“And did you try and bind this envoy of our Lord? bind him to your will?”

“
Bind
him?”

“Order him to aid us by the Lamb, by the shed blood, by the eternal covenant.”

“I'm not at all sure that would have been a good idea.” Merral paused, and vaguely aware that his euphoria made him reckless, smiled. “But I did ask him about music.”

The prebendant gave an impatient tap on the ground with his staff. “Commander, your attitude borders on folly.”

“I'm sorry. My question to the envoy was an innocent one.”

As the dry colorless face turned toward him, Merral read anger in the eyes. “If it was all so innocent, then why did you lock this door?”

Merral quickly swung the door open. “You must be mistaken. There is no lock.”

As the prebendant bent to peer at the door, Merral made a hasty apology and began to leave.

“Commander,” Delastro called after him, “beware that you are not out of your depth.”

We all are
out of our depth
. But he said nothing.

As he walked through the lofty doors to the sunlit plaza where the crowds mingled, he was aware of a large form striding beside him. “So, Lloyd, did the prebendant try the door?”

“Funny that, sir. He did, several times. But it wouldn't open.”

“And if he had opened it and gone up, what would you have done?”

“I'd have followed and taken any appropriate action. I have orders to protect you.”

“You are no respecter of persons, are you, Sergeant?”

There was a pause. “It's my job, sir. That takes priority.”

“But he's a leader of a congregation—a cleric.”

Lloyd shrugged. “Sir, as I've said before, this is getting to be one very strange world.”

12

O
n Ancient Earth shortly afterward, Chairman Ethan Malunal met once more with Eliza Majweske and Andreas Hmong, this time in the southern part of the land that had once been known as France not far from the ancient city of Avignon.

They sat around a plain table of time-darkened oak in a small, bare, and ancient stonewalled room. It was midafternoon on a blazing hot summer's day and rather than have the air conditioning on, Ethan had thrown open the shuttered windows and the door to the balcony.

Through the open doorway Ethan could see red-tiled roofs, the heavy silver coils of the Rhône, and beyond them both the dusty green roughness of the vineyards on the slopes beyond the river.

Despite the open shutters, the room was still warm. But there was a heaviness in the air that seemed to lower his spirits.

Over a long lunch and coffee they discussed the state of the Assembly's preparations for war. Nearly two months had passed since the Assembly had been put on a war footing, Although it had taken weeks for the vast manufacturing potential of the Assembly to switch to military demands, it had now done so. On a thousand worlds weapons were in production and ships of war were assembled in a dozen orbiting factories. Across the vast height and breadth of the Assembly the recruitment and training of armies were under way. Encouragement for the new military programs had been given by the preliminary—and still unofficial—results of the deep space observation satellite at Bannermene that had identified a cluster of apparently modified and industrialized worlds far beyond Farholme.

Finally, Ethan steered them to the matter that most troubled him. He tapped the thin red-covered booklet before him. “You've read this?”

Andreas and Eliza looked at each other, and then nodded. “Were you surprised, Eeth?” Eliza asked.

Ethan saw sympathy in her rich brown eyes. “Yes,” he said. “I am bemused and alarmed by this development. We have a common enemy and a common crisis. I had assumed that we would all pull together.” He gestured at the document. “But now, on world after world, we find some form of dissent.”