The Legends of Camber of Culdi Trilogy

by Katherine Kurtz

  “In nomine Patris, et Filii, et Spiritus Sancti. Amen,” he whispered, as his hand moved in the sign of their faith, the familiar words beginning to give him an anchor to sanity. “Introibo ad altare Dei.”

  “Ad Deum qui laetificat juventutem meam,” the others responded, Joram leading them coolly in the response.

  I will go up to the altar of God, to God Who gives joy to my youth.…

  “Judica me, Deus …” Camber continued. Judge me, O God, and distinguish my cause from the nation that is not holy: deliver me from the unjust and deceitful man.

  “Quia tu es, Deus.…” For Thou, O God, art my strength; why hast Thou cast me off? the others replied. And why do I go sorrowing whilst the enemy afflicteth me?

  They offered up the Mass for Davin and his memory. They willed the meaning of every word to penetrate beyond their grief, lifting them into a renewal of their purpose. They had no book of scripture for their use that night, so each of them contributed from memory a verse which meant something to him or her in this troubled time—something to give comfort, or hope, or courage to go on.

  Camber celebrated the Mass in the Michaeline manner, giving both Host and Cup to all who shared the rite. Now he moved among these loved ones of his, laying a piece of consecrated Host in each reverently outstretched palm, while Joram followed with the Cup. When he had finished, he had gained a measure of peace which almost transcended the tragedy of Davin’s death. Somehow, he resolved, Davin’s death would not have been in vain.

  Ansel returned to Grecotha with Camber and Joram that night, for there was virtually no place in Gwynedd where the last Earl of Culdi might show his face and live, once the regents’ writ was circulated. But another monk would not be noticed, especially in the household of a bishop; and so, with his bright locks shorn in a clerical tonsure and dyed a light brown, Ansel was introduced to the Grecotha community as Brother Lorcan, a Michaeline lay scribe sent to augment Bishop Alister’s clerical staff. The difference of garb and hair, surrounding a face which had not been that well known anyway, was sufficient to hide Ansel without benefit of magic.

  Father Willowen and the rest of the Grecotha congregation welcomed the new brother warmly, and thought nothing amiss the next day when, after the commemorative Mass which the bishop celebrated for the chapter, the newcomer was invited to share the bishop’s private Michaelmas observances with his secretary. Everyone knew that Michaelines stayed together, especially for this important feast day. Camber and Joram used the time to good advantage to instruct Ansel further regarding ecclesiastical deportment and the Order to which he pretended. Within a few days, he was sufficiently informed to be able to move among the priests and monks of Grecotha without suspicion.

  The others, too, returned to their various abodes, though all of them strove to keep as low a profile as possible in the days and weeks ahead. With no further need to monitor poor Davin, Gregory retired to Ebor and began making quiet arrangements for his family to leave Gwynedd, though he himself would return as often as the Council needed him. Jebediah went back to Argoed and bade farewell to his Michaeline brethren. Rhys and Evaine kept the feast of Michaelmas at Sheele with their children, but their celebration was much subdued by having to tell the children that their cousin Davin was dead. Little Tieg was too young to understand fully, but the eight-year-old Rhysel cried and cried.

  Jaffray returned to Rhemuth to conduct the appropriate religious observances at Saint George Cathedral the next morning with Archbishop Oriss; but that night he slipped out of his apartments in Oriss’s episcopal residence and made his way to a little-known Portal in the cathedral’s sacristy, whence he whisked off to Saint Neot’s and his old Order.

  He spent that night and most of the next day closeted with Dom Emrys and the Elders of the Order, telling them of all that had happened in King Alroy’s hall the day before and seeking counsel. His visit sparked a flurry of speculations and consultations among his brethren at Chapter; and when Jaffray met with the Camberian Council the following week, he told them of the Gabrilites’ growing concern. If the Michaelmas Plot, as it had come to be called, pushed human reaction to the breaking point, the Gabrilites felt that the Deryni religious houses would be among the first to feel the regents’ wrath. Nowhere else could one find so high a concentration of Deryni in close proximity. And the Gabrilites, as teachers of the most sophisticated Deryni practitioners in the known world, would be prime targets.

  There were other Deryni establishments—the Varnarite School, and Llenteith, near the Connait, and the newly established schola near Nyford—which had already been burned out once and partially rebuilt—and the Council saw to it that all of these were warned, Camber and Jaffray making especial use of their episcopal rank to help the religious houses formulate escape plans. They could only hope that there would be time to use those plans, if the worst came to pass.

  For nearly a month, their luck held. But then, in late October, during a last wave of near-summer weather, the balance swung once more against the Deryni and their cause.

  The unseasonable heat, then in its second week, had brought a resurgence of the so-called Deryni plague which had swept through Gwynedd in high summer; in Valoret, a mob of irate townsfolk and farmers had whipped themselves up to stone a merchant family which had been spared the plague and was, therefore, suspected of being Deryni. A riot ensued when the town guards tried to rescue the intended victims, and they had been forced to summon a troop of the archbishop’s household guards to assist them.

  The archbishop himself led the sortie, since he was then in Valoret on one of his now-rare pastoral visits, a snow-white surcoat over his hauberk and a closed-face helm covering his head. A burnished bronze crucifix laid along the nasal and overshadowing the eyes proclaimed his identity, but he carried no weapon himself, save his crozier of office, for his Gabrilite Order was sworn to nonviolence. Jebediah, visiting Jaffray on his way back to Grecotha from a trip to Argoed, rode at the archbishop’s side in full Michaeline array.

  They had ridden out well-armed and twenty-strong in the noonday sun, alert, but not as vigilant as they might have been—for who would have thought that scarcely-armed townsmen and farmers could seriously threaten mounted knights on the city streets? The knights pressed their destriers into the fray, the weight of the great horses seemingly insurmountable by men on foot, laying about them with weighted riding crops and the flats of swords.

  Only Jebediah at once recognized the danger from hoes, bills, and pitchforks, or the stones which whizzed past their ears and occasionally rang against steel helm or thudded hollowly against a shield. Too late he tried to call them in to regroup and guard one another more closely—too late, as one of Jaffray’s men was suddenly yanked from his horse and buried under shouting, poking, pounding men. All at once, the milling, muttering gathering of disgruntled but basically law-abiding subjects had become a ravening animal, intent on destroying any who stood in its way.

  Even Jebediah’s swift blade was not fast enough to block the chance thrust of a bill-hook before it buried itself to the haft in the eye-slit of Jaffray’s helmet. The archbishop was dead before his body even hit the cobblestone pavement.

  The act took an instant only to register. Stunned by the sacrilegious murder of their archbishop and primate, both sides shrank from the still, white-garbed form as if expecting lightning to arc down from the heavens and slay them all where they stood.

  But lightning did not strike them; and when the immensity of what had happened reached other levels, it was Jaffray’s Deryniness which did strike them—and the fact that a Deryni had fallen at their hands—that so high a Deryni as the Primate of All Gwynedd could be killed like any other man!

  Even the swords and horses of the soldiers could not stop them then! Not only did the original family of suspected Deryni perish in the violence which followed, but many townsfolk, as well, and fully a third of the archbishop’s household guard. Jebediah’s Michaeline garb made him a ready target—fortunately only rarely reac
hed, and then by no blow which did him any real harm. It was sheerest luck which brought him through unscathed, for his Deryni faculties were so shocked by the proximity of Jaffray’s violent and unexpected death that he could not think for a time—could only let his soldier’s reflexes take over as he tried to stay alive. He was later to speculate that the only thing which saved him was his fortunate presence with the tiny group of knights who took Jaffray’s body to safety; even in their fury, the mob fell away from the white burden which one of the knights carried over his saddlebow, as if it were some awful apparition.

  Jebediah saw them safely to the gates of the episcopal palace, his wits returning as they gradually won through to open streets, but there he took his leave of them and made his way out of the city, not wishing to endanger them any further by the presence of a Deryni among them. With Jaffray’s death, the last highly-placed Deryni was gone from Valoret. And the mob’s reaction to Jaffray’s murder and to Jebediah had proven that Valoret was no longer a safe place for a Deryni to be, even as Torcuill de la Marche had predicted a full nine months before. As he made his way past the troops coming in to aid the failing episcopal guards, Jebediah wondered how long any place would be safe.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  For the chief-priest has his proper services, and to the priests their proper place is appointed.

  —I Clement 18:18

  The shock waves set into motion by the sacrilegious murder of Archbishop Jaffray reverberated through Valoret well into the night, and would eventually have repercussions throughout Gwynedd. Once Duke Ewan’s men had rescued the embattled episcopal guards, many of them apparently became convinced that Deryni were to blame for the disturbance. Jebediah’s presence at Jaffray’s side had now been magnified to the point that many believed that he was Jaffray’s murderer. And while, for the most part, the troops did not help the townsfolk to hunt down more Deryni, neither did they go out of their way to prevent it. In all, over fifty people were killed that day—not all of them, by any means, Deryni, though many were so accused; and several Deryni in “protective custody” in the town bailey were taken out and hanged, before Ewan could intervene and stop the murders.

  The only fortunate aspect of the entire day was that Baron Rhun had taken his hot temper and nearly half the Valoret garrison out on field maneuvers earlier in the week, to occupy the energies of the more restless and more anti-Deryni among them, or even Ewan might not have been able to control the reaction of his men. By rigid enforcement of curfew, he was able to restore order soon after dark, but several more days were to pass before affairs settled to a somewhat more steady truce.

  Word spread quickly. Camber and the others of the Council, of course, had known the mind-wrenching shock of Jaffray’s death at the instant it occurred, and had learned the details as soon as Jebediah could reach Rhys’s and Evaine’s Sheele Portal and come with them to the keeill. Numbly they pondered what to do next, how to proceed. Two of those closest to them had now fallen victim to blind violence not aimed at any individual—and if the situation had been a slow simmer before, it was now approaching a full boil.

  Word reached Rhemuth almost as quickly, for Duke Ewan, even in his moderation, was not above ordering one of his Deryni collaborators to take a messenger to Rhemuth through a Portal. The Court at Rhemuth received the news just at the end of supper, the messenger delivering his account in a brisk but stunned voice while regents, king, and princes listened avidly, but for different reasons. The boys were genuinely horrified and grieved, for all of them had grown somewhat fond of Archbishop Jaffray, Javan especially so. The regents pretended sorrow at the loss of a member of the regency council, Hubert even leading them in a prayer for the repose of Jaffray’s Deryni soul, but their pious mouthings were soon replaced by a lively and oath-punctuated discussion of who should succeed to Jaffray’s office.

  Javan and Rhys Michael were all but forgotten in the ensuing hour, as the regents began naming off and assessing all the bishops of Gwynedd; and Alroy, too, would have been ignored, had they not been mindful that his support must go behind whomever the regency council eventually recommend to the bishops’ synod which would now have to meet in Valoret to elect a new primate. When they had narrowed the field until Hubert seemed the only possible choice, only then did they turn their attention once more on the young king. With the weight of their positions and the boy’s fatigue on their side, they were very quickly able to persuade Alroy that Hubert’s election would be in the best interests of the kingdom and to elicit from him a promise to sign formal recommendation to that effect, as soon as the document should be drafted.

  It was further decided that the Court should return to Valoret as soon as possible, so that the regents might better oversee the elections. The accommodations at Valoret were far more satisfactory, Rhemuth not yet being finished to the degree of luxury which the regents preferred. Under the circumstances, Valoret would be a far more suitable location to winter and hold Christmas Court.

  As they called in stewards and chamberlains to begin making travel arrangements, their air was almost festive. Javan’s quiet leavetaking with Tavis, ostensibly to go up to bed, went almost unnoticed. Rhys Michael was already asleep in his chair, so Tavis gathered up the slumbering prince and carried him after Javan as they made their way out of the hall. For Alroy, he could do nothing; the bleary-eyed king would not be allowed to sleep until his signature had been affixed to all the necessary documents.

  But Javan was only feigning fatigue, Tavis discovered, as he followed the limping prince up the winding turnpike stair in the wall of the keep and emerged on the top level but one, where the boys’ apartments lay. After putting Rhys Michael to bed, he went into Javan’s quarters to find the boy huddled over a single lighted candle set on the sill in the window seat, as far from the door as he could get.

  Javan did not protest as Tavis draped a fur-lined cloak around his shoulders against the cold which penetrated through the glass of the mullioned windows. The boy warmed chilled fingers a little over the candle flame, but he did not speak. His distress was almost palpable. Tavis drew another robe over his own shoulders, then eased down on the cushion opposite the prince. He started to touch the boy’s forehead, to try to ease the agitation which was radiating from him, but Javan would have none of it, shaking his head and withdrawing even further into himself.

  “Don’t, please,” he murmured, huddling deeper into his cloak. “It hurts, and I want it to, so I won’t be tempted to avoid telling you what I must.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  Javan swallowed audibly. “Tavis, I do not want Bishop Hubert to be elected archbishop.”

  “I certainly agree with that,” Tavis said amiably. “But, why do you not want him to be elected?”

  “Because he—lies,” Javan whispered, half-turning his face toward the candlelight reflected in the windowpanes. “And it isn’t just polite lies. You heard their discussion of the other archbishop candidates. I don’t even know most of them, but somehow I knew that Hubert was telling lies about them, to promote his own candidacy. A man of God should never do that, Tavis!”

  Tavis stared at the prince’s profile for a long moment, then lowered his eyes uneasily, almost afraid to voice his suspicion.

  “Javan, I have the impression that you’re not really as disturbed about Hubert’s lying as you are about the fact that you know.” Javan nodded. “And you’re trying to find a way to tell me that you—don’t know how you know.”

  Javan nodded miserably. “I’ve been noticing it a little for several weeks. It’s as if I can hear another voice, just like his real one, and it’s contradicting what he says out loud. It’s happened with a few others, too.”

  “Truth-Reading,” Tavis murmured under his breath.

  “What?”

  Tavis sighed and laid his hand on the boy’s shoulder. “It sounds like Truth-Reading, my prince. It’s—another Deryni talent.”

  “Oh, God!” Javan buried his face in his hands f
or a few seconds, then raised his head again. “Is it like shields?”

  “A little—only a kind of reverse effect. And more advanced. Much more advanced.”

  “But, it doesn’t always work!” Javan protested weakly.

  “No, but I’ll bet it gets more reliable every time you become aware of it.”

  Javan nodded reluctantly, and Tavis sighed and slapped his palm against the top of his thigh in renewed frustration.

  “God, what I’d give to know what happened the night your father died!” he whispered. “There has to be a connection!” He sighed again, then laid his hand on one of Javan’s.

  “They did something to you, Javan. I’m more and more convinced of that, even though we haven’t been able to get any deeper. It was something very strange, and secret and mystical, and—” He squeezed the boy’s hand and released it. “And I haven’t the faintest notion what it was. You keep growing psychically, and you shouldn’t. It’s almost as if you were Deryni.”

  Javan gave a little shiver, then clasped his hands and brushed his thumbs together, studying them carefully before looking up at Tavis again in the candlelight.

  “Do you remember how we talked about Rhys, after Davin was killed, and you said that you and he were two of a kind, and that maybe you could use some of his own tricks on him to get him to talk?”

  “I remember.”

  “Well, I was just wondering whether he might not come to Valoret in the next few months, since Bishop Alister will be there for the synod. He and Lady Evaine live at Sheele, you know. It isn’t far. And Bishop Alister is getting on in years. He might need a Healer. And if Rhys were to be visiting in Valoret, maybe we could invite him to come and see us.”