The Nonborn King (24 page)

The Craftsmaster said somberly, "The kid's not that far wrong about your deep motivation, Celo "

"Adversary' Fight me fairly," begged Celadeyr, his face grimacing in torment Aiken lowered himself to the pavement. "I fight with the weapons I have. It's the only sensible way " And he waved one hand.

In the air out over the gorge now hovered an armed and mounted host of some four hundred knights, with the brilliantly glowing forms ofCulluket, Alberonn, and Bleyn poised in the van. Behind them were Tanu and hybrid wamors representing all five of the Guilds Mental, the strength of their auras confirming the power of their minds.

Respectfully, the rainbow army lifted their weapons- A resounding salute rolled over the battlement. "Slonshal, Celadeyr! Slonshal, Lord of Afaliah!"

"We're not here to fight," Aiken insisted, and the warm cajolery seeped into Celadeyr's brain willy-mlly. "We're here to demonstrate that there's hope for us all if we unite against the Foe. I had to leave most of the fighters at home in Goriah, but I did bring this bunch for you to review, and there's also my new elite guard of human golds down on the ground just outside your city's north gate, if you'd care to give 'em a fareyed once-over."

Celadeyr extended his mental vision. There seemed to be at least a thousand troops out there -.. and the gale of Afaliah was opening to them. The ranks of mounted men and women were led by officers with metapsychic auras Some of the rank and file glowed and some did not, but all were collared in gold and bearing most peculiar armament.

"Go ahead," urged Aiken. "Take a really close look at their weapons Our late great Battlemaster might have talked a good game about abolishing Lowlife technology, but he wasn't stupid enough to follow his own principles. Like you were. Creative Brother' The cellars at my Castle of Glass in Goriah were stuffed with seventy years' worth of contraband, including the things you see. Zappers. Stun-guns. Solar-powered blasters. Double-barreled Rigby .4?0 elephant rifles. Air guns with steelpellet ammo. Some disruptors Just about every kind of portable proscribed weapon you can imagine smuggled past the unsuspecting officials at Madame Guderian's estabbshment by sneaky time-travelers who wanted a small advantage over their fellow Pliocene exiles. And there may be other caches besides the one I found. Do you have one, Celo? No? Then perhaps we'd better put the same question to your son Unet and daughter Fethneya "

Celadeyr's eyes came back into focus A sad smile played over his lips "No, I didn't know about [he contraband caches But it would help explain something that puzzled me, rumors that the Foe had developed fearsome new weapons after they destroyed Burask. The late Lord Osgeyr was notoriously covetous, and it would have been just like him lo have stored away the forbidden arms instead of destroying them."

Aiken said, "Thanks for the tip I'll check into that "

The army of sky-nders was on the move, their chalikos trotting smartly on air over the city rampart, and then beginning a slow spiral down into the great courtyard The knights of Afaliah formed into an involuntary honor guard

"I had another reason for coming," Aiken said

Celadeyr discovered that he was free at last He made no move to threaten the gold-clad youth. "I think I know "

Aiken wagged a finger "Now, don't jump to false conclusions' We're all in this together, I told you. United against the Foe' No, I came because the wedding invitation we sent you seems to have gone astray "

Ceiadeyr could not help an incredulous obscenity

The golliwog was all sincerity "We never heard a word from you Mercy was desolated So was I How could I celebrate my nuptials without my old friends from Afaliah'' My comrades of the Delbaeth Quest? So I'm here to reextend the invitation Personally "

"Come on, Celo," said Aluteyn Craftsmaster gently. "I had to choose life Now it's your turn."

Celadeyr stood there, hands at his sides, feet wide apartHis fingers clenched once and relaxed His eyes closed, cutting off the physical image, at least, of the Adversary. The reluctant affirmation came.

Aiken fairly sparkled with pleasure. "Kaleidoscopic' You won't regret it. Creative Brother There are tots of ways we can help each other in these lough times For instance, " Alken snapped his fingers

Another astral bubble materialized and wafted down to the parapet Inside was a samurai wamor in full Muromachi panoply, wearing a golden torc The sphere evaporated and the wamor bowed

"Lord Celadeyr, Craftsmaster, I want you to meet d new friend of mine named Yosh Watanabe A technician of great ingenuity' that armor of his used to be made of hundreds of little iron plates, but he replaced them with tabs of mastodon hide and melted the iron and made himself a blood-metal sword He's lived free almost from the first day he came through the time-gate, and yet he couldn't wait to join up with Me' Celo, you and Yosh want to gel together for some serious consultation Back in the Milieu, he was a pretty heavy robotics engineer And he also flies a mean kite "

Yosh winked at the Lord of Afaliah, who stared back at the samurai with a wild surmise

Alken said, "Now, the rest of my gang and me have to be moving right along We'll spend the night, but then we're off for Tarasiah and a few other places on an inspection tour and to deliver a few more messed-up wedding invitations' But Yosh will be glad to stay on here for a few weeks to help you with your problems You can bring him back to Goriah when you come up for the wedding And the other fun and games "

"I see," said Ceiadeyr faintly

'That okay with you, Yosh''" Alken inquired

"Whatever you say, Chief," said the samurai affably He turned to the Lord of Afaliah "What say we take a little survey of the balls-up right now?"

Celadeyr didn't move But the Craftsmaster put an arm around his old friend's shoulder and began drawing him toward the stairway

"That's a good idea," Aluteyn said "And I think I know where we can find some of the special tools and components needed for me repair job Celo, is Treonet's iab still intact?"

The Lord of Afaliah nodded

Aluteyn explained to Yosh "'One of my late guild-brothers was a keen fosterer of Elder Earth microprocessing and other electronic doodads His mansion has an attached lab and one of the biggest technical libraries in the Many Colored Land We'll go there, set you up in style, son You can shuck your fancy ng-out, too. and get into some more practical clothes I don't suppose you'd mind if I watched while you worked^"

'My pleasure," said Yosh

"See you all at supper," said Alken, and vanished like a blown-out flame

Celadeyr shook his head "And that would be our king "

"The idea," Aluteyn Craftsmaster observed, "might grow on you "

SHE CAME OUT INTO THE EVENING CALM FOR A LAST BREATH

of air before summoning the women. The moon, pregnant as she was. hung new over the Strait of Redon. It would not mature until May Day, which was an excellent portent for the Loving; but Mercy's time had come.

The balcony of her tower suite was broad, with shrubs and flowers planted in golden ums. She rarely went out there now, for ihe amethyst faene lighting installed by Alken-Lugonn seemed chilling and melancholy to her. How different it had been in Nodonn's time' Then the jewel-lamps strung along the crystal balustrade and in the angles of the opaque glass walls had gleamed warmly rose, and she had only to will it and the daemon lover himself would appear beside her to share the setting of the sun behind Breton Island, flame tones sinking at last to star-studded violet. On a night such as this one, they would make a joint wish upon the shy crescent moon.

And now the bones of the glorious Apollo rested in the New Sea's mud "But mine will lie here." she told die babe inside her, "in this land of Bnttany where I was born six million years from now- And one day, Georges Lamballe and Siobhan O'Connell will wander along the beaches and headlands of Belle He and find a stone with a thin film of carbon and phosphor streaking it. And it will be me " The ferns leaped, sharing the pain, and she was overcome with remorse.

Peace darling Agraynel peace Grania veinofmyheart Tonight you will be freed.

The unborn relaxed Mercy tried again to fathom her child's mind; but under the easily perceptible surface emotions the personality was ungraspable, a fearsome bright otherness, hungering The preconscious of the Thagdal's hybnd daughter was a humming vortex impatiently waiting to suck a new world of physical sensation, no longer comforted by the limited stimuli available to the womb-bound. The infant yearned without knowing for richer inputs than waterborne sounds of maternal heart and lungs and digestive tract, or the dim redness seen through filmed eyes, or vague tactilities dulled by her fetal coating of vemix caseosa unguent, or the omnipresent taste and smell of ammotic fluid More' the inarticulate teiepathic voice seemed to cry. And the mother replied: Soon

Agraynel's ultrafaculties (as those of all term fetuses, whether potentially operant or latent) were totally onented toward loveneed. She beat with her weak psychokinesis against the uterine prison, plucked at Mercy's consciousness with feeble redaction;

strove to create an unbreakable bond between the two of them. even as she tried to gain freedom; coerced most strongly of all And thereby was forged mat commonplace miracle, the metapsychic link between every normal mother and child.

Love' called the insatiable wee mind. More love'

Mother loves you. You love Mother Sleep

The child-mind drifted away, content.

Poor Alken. Mercy thought, comparing

And then. Nodonn My Nodonn

"But it is not our way" protested Lady Morna-la "A mother of our battle-company should travail courageously until victorious' And especially you. who may well be the founding matnarch of a new Host'"

"We will conduct the birth in the way I've decided." Mercy said 'The Lord Healer has come to assist me with the Skm 164 THE NONBORN KINO

and ail of the noble ladies now awdit us in the audience chamber "

"All of them?" Morna was as awed as she was dismayed "For this most private, sacred moment?"

"The female knights who accompanied Lord Alken-Lugonn will have to receive their instruction later But the others are ready I willingly forego my privacy I am Lady Creator, and it's my duty to instruct all of you in this For the future "

Morna could not mistake her intention "Surely you don't think, "

"When the others see it, and the way it affects the baby, they won't have it any other way

Morna bowed her head "As you have said, you are Lady Creator But so many things have changed "

Mercy smiled encouragement at the towering woman in the lavender robes Her eyes were a brilliant blue tonight and her aubum hair hung free She wore a long gauze shift, white with a golden hem, and her arms were bare, the skin very pale with a dusting of tiny freckles The yoke of the gown, where the golden torc shone, was slashed straight between her full breasts to a point just above the swell of the child

"Dear Farseeing Sister Morna. you're Kingmaker Aspirant now, and second ranked among the Most Exalted Ladies But you've also been kind to a bereaved human woman, and once, eight hundred iong years agone, you midwifed Queen Non tusvel when she bore her first son The office wilt be only slightly different this time And, of course, Agraynel is a girl But as you'll see once her aura is separated from mine, she's going to be an exceptional person, worthy to be your godchild "

Mercy took one of Morna's coo! dry hands and pressed it to her belly "Feel her Meet her' She's ready " The fetus gave a great bound and Mercy laughed The minds of the two women embraced "Now then Take me to the dais of the audience chamber, where all of them are waiting "

The great room was very dim, and of course the stainedglass windows that glonfied il in daylight were night-masked There were no faerie lights, only sconces of candles casting d wavering orange glow about the stage No couch waited, no chair, no birthing-stool There was only a golden table with two large basins, one beaten gold, the other transparent crystal, half-filled with warm water Beside the table waited Dionket Lord Healer, summoned from his voluntary retirement in the Pyrenees, holding a golden pouch in one hand and a glittering ruby blade in the other Ranged behind him, looking self-important and radiating not a little apprehension, were three Tanu maidens a redactor wearing scarlet and white, a psychokmetic dressed in rose and gold, and a blue-garbed coercer, this last none other than Olone, the bethrothed of Sut hvan-Tonn

Very slowly, Mercy came to the front of the dais and stood alone The several hundred spectators were cloaked and hooded in white, unmovmg, their minds as carefully enshrouded as their bodies.

I greet you Sisters, Mercy bespoke them.

We respond to your summoning, the minds whispered Lady of Goriah.

I am here to demonstrate a new way of bringing forth life You know that my powers are great, and that they are also different from those of most creative persons among the Tanu My powers are gentle, not aggressive They are not for battle, but for nurture I will teach them to you For you may all, if you desire it, follow this way that I am going to show to you now.

She stepped back to the table, to Dionket Morna and the three girls hovered in the background Mercy stood facing the audience of breathless women and closed her eyes The tail Lord Healer made a gesture From his golden pouch flowed an enveloping sheet of material thinner than the finest plass It settled over Mercy, perfectly transparent, like a veil covering a statue Her body began to radiate, the light concentrated most strongly in the swollen abdomen The white gown seemed to become as clear as the Skin, and in the midst of the light was a small form.

Something almost ectopiasnuc came from Mercy s body, shimmering through the abdominal wall, to float between her hands that were now outstretched A mind-gasp, instantly suppressed, arose from ihe crowd- Dionket's auslere face softened in a smile. The closest spectators were aware of a great web of redaclive and psychokinetic power from his mind blending with creative forces of the mother for her almost instantaneous. healing.