Desperate and convinced that he must, Keth shot him the third time. Blue erupted in the copse. The divine fire blasted from Herfod’s eyes, his mouth, his fingers. It vaporized the ominous shadows. The monks threw themselves on the earth and lay there fearfully with arms over heads. Keth pulled the slower elderly abbot down and crouched overtop. Seconds later, he and the abbot heard a foot thud next to them. They looked up to see Herfod standing above. There wasn’t a sign of the unnatural darkness behind him, nor were any shreds clinging to his limbs.
“I did warn you,” the young man said and then fell over in a dead faint.
“Oh!” Samel cried. “Oh! The poor boy!” He scrabbled over to him. “We should have listened.”
“I know,” the abbot said, slowly creeping to a seated position. One of the guardians arrived to help Keth assist him to a stand. “When will I learn to take his word for something this grave? Why I thought I would know better, I have no idea.”
“It’s not your fault,” Samel said. “We were too hopeful, that is all.” He removed his fingers from Herfod’s neck. “His pulse is strong.”
“He’s bleeding!” Keth said. “He’s stabbed himself!”
“Oh! He’s gotten himself in the chest!” Henrel cried. “He’s going to die!”
“No, he won’t,” Samel barked. “Don’t spout nonsense.” He began the healing chant before they noticed the wound had stopped bleeding. Likely it had already shut.
The answering divine power swelled over both Samel and Herfod’s figures near the end of the prayer. Within the blue glare, Herfod gasped and opened his eyes. His right hand shot out and grabbed Samel’s throat. Samel croaked and raised his palms from Herfod’s chest, arresting the flow of heavenly energy.
“Herfod!” the abbot shouted. The clawed hand released Samel. Samel coughed and wheezed inward.
“Sorry!” Herfod said. “Sorry. I was … I was dreaming. Thought you were someone else.”
Neither of his seniors needed to ask whom. “Go and find his blades,” the abbot directed the worried young protectors. They went off reluctantly. To Herfod he apologized in Winfellan. “I’m sorry. I should have believed you.”
“Oh, never mind about it. It wasn’t your fault.” Herfod sat up carefully, but winced nevertheless. “I think I hit a rock in the stream. My back is a bit tender.”
“You forced me off before the healing energy passed into you properly.” Samel said huskily. That boy had a grip. His throat still hurt.
“I’m sorry,” Herfod repeated.
“I know. I’m fine. What happened, Herfod? What happened here?”
“I don’t know. One moment I was looking at a small wisp of shadow. The next moment I was ….”
“You were?” Anselm prodded.
“I was dancing where I shouldn’t be,” Herfod said, his face stark with the dark memory. “I don’t want to talk about it.”
He stood abruptly and walked away. He’d been dancing for the Ancient Power, and she had been enjoying it. Farther off from his observers, he paused and shuddered beneath the moonlight. It had been perilous. It had been ecstasy. But somehow the Turamen monks had brought him back before he’d finished the dance.
He heard Samel approach, knew him from the sound of his tread, but would not look at him. “Herfod?” Samel said.
“How did you save me?” he asked.
“We shot you with aura bolts. Three of them. The power reflected out of you and destroyed the shadows.”
“Oh,” he whispered. That was how. Such a desperate measure by which to drag him from the bosom of the Ancient Power. And he had fought the return all the way. He had fought until the final blast had burned the obsessive desire out of him.
Yet just the memory made him want to dance again. She was close, so close beneath his feet. He had to get out of here.
“I’m going for a walk,” he said to his confessor. He took off running and disappeared before Samel had a chance to say another word. Keth hurried to follow. The darkness undid his attempt when he tripped on a large rock and tumbled onto his front. Henrel, just behind, fell on top of him.
“Ow! Oaf! Get off!” Keth bleated.
“Who’s the oaf? You fell first!”
“It’s dark out!” Keth excused himself.
“Good thing, because I don’t like looking at your face this close. Or is that your butt?”
“Get off!” Keth said again.
“Herfod!” Samel called into the darkness, but he wasn’t answered. “Oh, no!” He hadn’t had time to tell him about the woman. “Please don’t take a week to come back!” he called anxiously. “I have something important to tell you!”
Even then, Herfod would not return. Samel hesitated and then went back to Abbot Anselm. “He’s gone for a walk,” he said to the old man.
Anselm heaved a great sigh. “Oh, the poor boy,” he repeated Samel’s earlier words. “I hope he tells you what he saw in that darkness, Samel. Whatever it was, he needs to share his experience. He won’t find any strength bearing this alone. It was a fell thing, whatever it was.”
Samel nodded in agreement. He was afraid for Herfod, very afraid. The rapture he had witnessed on Herfod’s face: it hadn’t been holy. It had been perilous.
***
Vik awoke with a start and discovered Samel hovering above him, one hand prodding his shoulder. “Oh!” Vik cried. “You’ve brought him?”
Samel shook his head. “No. He’s gone. He’s upset.”
“What? Why?” Vik attempted to stand, but Samel pressed him back down.
“Listen, Vik. I will tell you all of it. I only hope you understand what happened, for I certainly do not and neither does the abbot.”
Vik perforce stayed in the armchair and listened, and his expression grew bleaker by the second. “Damn,” he said at the end of the dire report. “It still wants him.”
“It?” Brother Samel said. “What is this you speak of?”
“The Ancient Power, the force lurking deep in the earth, the power that all witches borrow from. Samel, he must not work with the white witches further. It will warp them to its purposes. It will use them to get him. Keep them away from him. Let another monk take over the training exercises.”
“I will do it,” Samel vowed. “But, Vik? Why does it want him?”
“I don’t know. Neither does he. But it drags him down, Samel! It drags him! He mustn’t dance for his freedom again. Marun has done something to prevent it.”
Samel nodded. “He said as much, but we insisted he must try. We regret not listening to him.”
“What about Nicky? What about the vision? What if she tries to look again?”
“I have thought on it. I will bind the memory. It is the best I can do for now. If Herfod thinks to unbind it after we tell him, then so be it.”
Vik inclined his head in agreement. “Do it, then. She loves Ugoth enough to keep trying.”
“Does she? Yet she took Herfod.”
“She loves Herfod more,” Vik said. “Samel, Kehfrey never tried to bind her. He’s the one man who would never enslave her. He’s the one man who would let her walk away if that was best for her. He already has done. Her heart is his because of these things. Do you understand? He’s her most perfect mate. She can be herself, do almost anything, take lovers and enjoy them, and he would never revile her for any of it.”
Samel stared in shock and surprise. “I find this hard to fathom,” he admitted after a few seconds. “He’s a man like all of us. How can he not be jealous?”
“I didn’t say he can’t be jealous. He can! I’ve seen him jealous! But I swear you’ve never met anyone less selfish than him. All he cares about is that the people he loves are happy. If he thought being possessive would get in the way, he’d just stop being possessive. He’s done it before.”
Samel realized it was true. Herfod was one of the least possessive people he’d ever met. Virtually every gift he had ever been given, whether from the king or a grateful supplicant, Herfod had in turn
given away. Why, he’d almost driven Brother Launderer mad for the many times he’d cast off his mantle and boots and passed them to poor folk, up until Abbot Anselm had made an injunction against Herfod doing so. Technically the outerwear and boots hadn’t been Herfod’s to give, but though he’d ceased imparting these items to the needy, Brother Launderer still scowled whenever he saw the young culprit. No, Herfod wasn’t altogether possessive, Samel thought.
“Except about pie,” he amended.
Vik smiled widely, understanding the reference, for if Brother Launderer disliked Herfod, then Brother Baker hated him with a passion. Not even a locked pie closet could keep Herfod out of the pies and often not even a wary guard. Herfod was positively rapacious about pies.
“Except about pie,” Vik agreed.
Samel agreed with a smirk. Becoming serious again, he turned toward the woman Herfod loved. Heaving out a soft sigh and then pulling in a steadying breath, he began the chant to bind her memories of the last twenty-four hours. Once his task had been accomplished, he bade Vik return home.
“I will stay here for when she awakens,” he assured the young man. “I will tell her she was ill and that I healed her. If Ugoth comes, I will say the same.”
Vik rose from the armchair, but he did not intend to return to the monastery. “I will ride out into the country,” he informed Samel. “Kehfrey may not have gone far.”
“He wears the assassin gear,” Samel said. “He will not come out into the open, I think. Find Keth. He carries a habit for him.” As the young man strode to the door, Samel added a caution. “And Vik! She won’t remember the news you have given her. Do you understand? She doesn’t know that Herfod has broken it off with her. You must warn him.”
Vik nodded gravely and bade farewell, and Samel settled into the armchair for the vigil. He hoped Ugoth would visit. He wanted a word with him about seeing after this woman’s future. If what Vik had said was true, Brother Herfod would not press this issue, knowing the woman prized her freedom more than her child’s security, but Samel needed to think of the child. If the vision were to pass into reality, the child would be the last offspring Ugoth had remaining. The child’s future must be secured. Ugoth would just have to see reason over it.
***
“I will not!” the king said angrily.
He sweated profusely, not only flustered that his former confessor, Brother Samel, was there in his mistress’s house, but completely off guard over the revelation that she was with child.
And now? Now Samel wanted him to marry her off!
They were in the sitting room, Samel standing near the doorway, Ugoth pacing in the centre because he could not hold still. “I will not,” he repeated. “I will see after her needs myself.” He stomped away and wiped his brow with a velvet sleeve. He turned back to confront Samel. “What are you doing here? I mean, how did you happen to be called to see after her illness?”
“Vik was visiting when she became ill,” the monk said, no intention of telling him the real reason, that he’d followed Vik to learn the identity of Herfod’s lover or that this lover had suffered a terrible cerebral injury scrying the death of Ugoth’s children. Samel felt it better to leave the latter revelation to Herfod. Herfod always knew the best way to approach the king concerning difficult matters. “He saw me on the street and asked me to help,” Samel ended.
“Vik?” Ugoth said angrily. “Vik was visiting?”
“They are old friends. Do you not remember? They knew each other in Wistal, just as Herfod knew her. How can you be jealous of Vik? You know she’s not to his tastes.”
“Oh, yes. I had forgotten a moment. That they knew each other before, I mean.” Ugoth began to pace again.
“Ugoth,” Samel began.
“No!” Ugoth cried and then shouted his upset “No! Get out of here! I won’t listen to you! I’m not like you! I won’t abandon her!”
Samel whitened at the reminder of his own sin. After a moment, he turned slowly and walked out of the sitting room. Ugoth flinched at the cruelty he had inflicted on the man. Samel had been a teenaged boy when the tragedy had happened; his lack of fortitude against his parents’ harsh morals had scarred him for life. Ugoth rushed to the doorway.
“Brother Samel! I’m sorry! I didn’t mean—!”
“Yes, you did,” Samel interrupted. “Yes, you did.” He departed the house without another word.
Ugoth thudded his head with his own palm. “Stupid! Stupid! Stupid!” he hissed.
“Ugoth?” Nicky called. He hastened into the hall and looked up the stairwell. She stood at the top step, still in her rumpled dress from yesterday.
“Nicky! Get back in bed!”
“In bed? But it’s the day! It’s the afternoon!”
“You’ve been ill.” He rushed up the stairs to her.
“I have not. I feel fine.”
“But you collapsed yesterday afternoon.” He grasped her gently and forced her back into the room. “A monk came to heal you.”
“What? There was no monk here!”
“Don’t you remember? Vik visited you? You became ill.”
“Vik visited me?” she stared in confusion. “No, he didn’t.”
Ugoth frowned. Was this more of what had happened earlier when he’d informed her of Eshaia’s ultimatum? She had believed he’d called on her in the night when he had not. “Nicky? Don’t you remember my visit yesterday morning?”
“Yesterday morning? You didn’t come to me until the afternoon.”
Ugoth swallowed uncomfortably. She didn’t remember. An entire day had vanished from her mind. She didn’t know he couldn’t be with her so often. “Come back upstairs, my love,” he said gently. “I’ll see you to bed.”
“But I’m not ill!” she protested again.
“Oh, Nicky,” he said. “Yes, you are.”
Firmly, gently, he stripped the dress from her and put her to bed in her under things. After, he told her everything that had happened, leaving out the upsetting information about his wife. He wasn’t certain if informing her of Eshaia’s ultimatum had worsened her illness or not, but he didn’t dare take the risk of repeating it.
Nicky didn’t believe the things he related until Ugoth had the butler verify all that he had said. She lay in the bed after and gazed up in shock. “I don’t understand,” she said after the butler had exited. “I don’t remember any of it.”
“I know, love,” he said, kissing her nose lightly. “Rest. I’ll have a message sent to Herfod and have him come and see after you.”
She brightened. “Will you? He’ll know what’s wrong. He always knows what to do.”
“Does he?” he said, frowning faintly. “You have a lot of faith in him.”
“Of course I do. He’s Kehfrey!” she cried, as if this made it obvious.
“Yes,” he muttered. He rose to a stand. “I’ll just see about something for you to eat.” He left the room quietly, his face a calm mask, but on the landing, his eyes darkened with suspicion. She had glowed at the mention of Herfod’s name. She had just glowed! He wanted to crush her! He wanted to crush Herfod!
He stomped down the steps. “I must be crazed,” he said at the bottom. What he considered couldn’t possibly be true. It was Herfod he was thinking of. His best friend. His most trusted advisor.
Ugoth laughed at his stupidity. Herfod never had an interest in sex. He had been teased and enticed by innumerable temptresses, only to tease them back and turn them all down. Ugoth shook his head derisively. He was being an idiot. Herfod was immune to desire. The gods had made him immune.
Ugoth walked into the kitchen and calmly ordered the staff to prepare a tray for Nicky, then returned upstairs to keep her company. He had a few more minutes remaining to be with her, after which he was required at the castle to see after his duties. But he promised himself he would visit her the next available opportunity, even if he had to create the opportunity by cancelling a rendezvous. Her welfare, and that of their child’s, was more important just
now.
***
When Herfod returned to the dell late that day, he discovered Vik waiting for him where the disastrous attempt at freedom had taken place. He had expected to find someone, his own gang in particular, but he found Vik and Vik’s gang instead. A little concerned by this, Herfod hailed his brother from within a bush. The guardians attempted to restrain Vik from going forward, but Vik ordered them back.
“It’s just Herfod. I told you! I was expecting him.”
“Why is he hiding in a bush?” one of the warrior monks asked.
“Because he is!” Vik snapped. “Stay here.”
He shoved out from between them. They stared after him, ready to rush forward if necessary, and watched with befuddled expressions as Vik reached beneath his cloak and handed a folded habit into the bush. A black-garbed arm snaked out and caught it, withdrawing quickly after.
“Did you just see a dagger on that arm?” one of the guards asked the others.
“That’s what I saw,” another affirmed. “More than one actually.”
“What’s Brother Herfod doing with edged weapons?” a third wondered.
“Mysterious Brother Herfod,” a fourth said, which sort of answered all their questions.
They nodded in unison. Yes, mysterious Brother Herfod. He could be expected to do almost anything at all. “It really must be some sort of special training he’s giving Keth’s gang,” one said, repeating the excuse Keth had used earlier.
“They looked damned tired,” another commented. “Think he plans to have us staggering out in the dark too?”
“I hope not.”
Mysterious Brother Herfod appeared shortly, shaking the habit down until it settled properly. For a moment, they clearly viewed tight black trousers on his legs and more weapons. They stared in fascination. They knew he often practiced knife play with the king, but they’d had no idea he possessed an arsenal of blades or the outfit that hinted beneath the habit.
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