Hederick, The Theocrat (d-4)

by Ellen Dodge Severson

  "We will present our news in person," Phytos said. "We wish to see him now. Call High Theocrat Hederick from this court of his."

  Dahos refused.

  Phytos, Feelding, and Salomar released their arrows at the same time. They'd gauged their aim to miss the three guards-but just barely. Each man leaped aside, swore and clapped a hand to an ear, an arm, or the side of his neck. They started toward the centaurs.

  Dahos held them back. He gazed blandly at the cen shy;taurs as though he was unimpressed by their little stunt. Then, to the guards' disgust, he bowed slightly, said, "Come with me," and strode back through the gate. He drew an incense-holder from his pocket; incense would cleanse the air, lessen the sacrilege of allowing nonhu-mans into Erolydon. He stopped once to speak to a yel shy;low-robed novitiate, who rushed ahead of him to spread the word.

  Kifflewit saw his chance at that moment. He darted through the confused crowd and leaped into the leather pouch on Phytos's back. None too soon, either; the cen shy;taur had already launched into movement.

  The kender squatted among three thick carafes of wine, as many rounds of milk-white cheese, and a handful of smooth stones. He searched along the seam of the pack until he found a loose stitch and used his fingers to widen the seam until he had a passable view of his surround shy;ings.

  The hole also admitted some much-needed fresh air; the cheese was of the fragrant sort. "Smells like old boots," the kender muttered. He wondered if Phytos would notice if he jettisoned a couple of cheese rounds, and decided the centaur probably would.

  Kifflewit had heard about Erolydon's splendors, of course, but seeing the temple up close and in person was a different experience. Although he'd viewed all this in his mind's eye countless times, now he actually saw the black shy;ened vallenwood trunk, which they passed in the court shy;yard, and the double wall that allowed spectators to observe the daily executions. He saw, too, the scratched portal through which the materbill entered.

  And then they were inside Erolydon itself. Kifflewit blinked. The tapestries! The jeweled statues! Precious gems were inlaid into the marble floor. Crystals sus shy;pended at the doors caught the light and fractured it into a dozen colors, and the visitors' movements sent the prisms whirling. Rainbows darted into every corner. And the colors! The kender's jaw dropped in amazement, and he gasped-taking in a lungful of cheesy air.

  Kifflewit stifled a cough, then put his eye back to the hole.

  More tapestries. They stretched from floor to ceiling, about the height of four tall men, and each depicted high points in Seeker history. A muscular-looking god leered at a seductive-looking goddess. A fearsome goddess beamed fire from her eyes as she pointed an accusing finger at a quivering soul. An emaciated god stood in a mountain of coins and jewels, valuables dropping from his outspread fingers. An innocent-looking goddess, deer and wildlife surrounding her, stared adoringly at the emaciated god and stretched her hand toward the man's steel coins.

  "How terrific!" Kifflewit whispered. If Tarscenian was right, the Diamond Dragon would be even greater a sight than all this. Perhaps he'd take a closer look at these things on his way out, though.

  Thick incense from Dahos's holder found its way into the pack and mingled unpleasantly with the odor of the cheese. That, combined with the centaur's swaying stride, gave rise to a distinct feeling of queasiness on the part of the kender. He swallowed and gulped to sip fresh air through the inadequate hole in the pouch. All he took in was a belt of smoke redolent with gardenias and valley lily. He cautiously lifted the top of the pack to see if there was any opportunity for escape.

  They had passed through double doors and entered a long, tilted hallway, illuminated by torches set in sconces on the walls, and were picking their way downward.

  Dahos pointed. "The Great Chamber is down here. I will send a messenger into the room to request His Wor shy;ship's presence."

  Kifflewit frowned. He thought about the layout of the temple that he'd worked out in his head, piecing together stories and scraps of overheard conversation.

  "Meet in a hallway?" Phytos snorted. "High Priest, we will be received in ceremonial fashion, just as human emissaries."

  "I'm afraid that won't be possible," Dahos said, smil shy;ing.

  Phytos, Feelding, and Salomar pushed past the high priest. Salomar and Feelding reached for the heavy oak doors at the same time. Dahos was retreating up the ramp toward the temple's main entrance even as Kifflewit sprang from Phytos's pack.

  "Stop them!" the kender shouted into the centaur leader's ear. "That's the door to the materbill's dungeon! See?" A slamming of the door confirmed that Dahos had run away. Kifflewit heard a bolt being drawn, then another.

  The doors were cracked open. A huge golden paw snaked around the portal and raked Salomar across the torso. As Phytos backpedaled frantically, fire spewed through the doorway. The flames caught Feelding full in the face. Both centaurs dropped their clubs and their bows. Phytos, the kender clinging to his back, lunged toward his wounded friends, his bow ready.

  "No! Run, Phytos!" Salomar gasped. "We two are lost. Go back to Fyr-Kenti glade. Tell the others. Prepare for war."

  Phytos hesitated. Another gout of fire belched through the door, downing Feelding and Salomar. The materbill roared and leaped through. He tore into the two centaurs with claws and fangs.

  Phytos whirled and pounded back up the hallway. A short distance from the double doors, he reared and struck the portal with both forelegs. The centaur pounded at the door with his club, then whirled and loosed a volley of blows with both hind legs.

  Kifflewit fell from Phytos's back.

  Then the centaur crashed through. He shook off shards of wood and splinters, then clattered through the opulent entryway past the tapestries, crashing out through the main entrance into the sunshine.

  Kifflewit, hiding behind the broken door, saw the cen shy;taur bound to the top of the inner wall, teeter for a mo shy;ment on top, then vault over the outer wall to freedom.

  A snarl brought the kender's attention back to his own precarious circumstances. The materbill, gorging on cen shy;taur, lifted its head and gazed up the hallway. As it chewed, it surveyed the kender and the route to freedom. It took a step toward the door.

  Then a phalanx of temple guards, armed with spears and shields, entered the hallway. The materbill seemed to gauge this new enemy. The guards edged down the hall shy;way, holding up huge shields. The materbill retreated to the opposite side, behind the carcasses of the centaurs. The guards came closer. The leonine creature crouched. Then the first row of guards, shields before them, reached with their spears, nudging the dead centaurs toward the materbill. The materbill backed up slowly until it had moved back beyond the doorway. Then the guards slammed the doors to the materbill's quarters and barri shy;caded them.

  Kifflewit Burrthistle dove out of sight behind the wreckage of the doors just as the High Theocrat appeared at the top of the hallway, flanked by Dahos. A dozen lesser priests crowded behind them. "What is this?" Hed-erick bellowed. "Unholy creatures in my Erolydon? By my own high priest's orders? Dahos, have you lost your mind?"

  "I thought to rid us of the centaurs, Your Worship," Dahos replied. "I know that you…"

  "By committing sacrilege?" Hederick screeched. "We'll have to reconsecrate the entire building! By the New Gods, Dahos, I should…"

  Dahos waited, his face ashen. "But I used incense--"

  he ventured, then swallowed hard. The guards grew silent and watchful.

  Hederick drew in a shuddering breath. "No," he whis shy;pered. "I have need of you, High Priest. You are valuable to me-at the present, at least." He chewed his lower lip and raised his voice. "We will see if you can atone." "I will try, Your Worship," Dahos murmured. "You will oversee the reconsecration. Get to work immediately."

  Dahos bowed and, at a trot, left the High Theocrat. Hederick surveyed his priests. Kifflewit peeked, unno shy;ticed, from the pile of boards. "The temple is defiled," the High Theocrat announced. "We will not ret
urn to the Great Chamber. We will reconvene on the shores of the lake immediately. Priests, move the spectators onto the back grounds. Guards, bring the prisoner to me there."

  The guards marched past. The priests' robes swirled busily as the priests hurried to do Hederick's bidding.

  In the confusion of robes and uniforms, one small kender went unnoticed. Soon Kifflewit Burrthistle was standing in the sunshine outside on the grass. Marble walls extended westward from the building to the lake, Beyond the walls to the north and south, vallenwoods and pines stood like sentinels. The gentle wind buffeted leaves and needles, creating a sound like a thousand people whispering.

  Hundreds of people milled around Kifflewit. Although some spied him and clapped their hands over their coin pouches, no one cried out at the presence of a kender. They were outside the temple proper, after all, and Seeker rules forbidding kender and other unclean creatures applied only to the building itself.

  Kifflewit Burrthistle slipped through a crowd to get a better view. Along the way, he picked up three coins, a copper bracelet, and a hand-mirror-putting them in his pockets for safekeeping. In the process, he realized he also carried several of the stones that Phytos had secreted in his pouch.

  "They can't have been very important, for him to have gone off and left them like that," he said to himself. "Good thing I found them. If I ever run into him again …"

  Hederick mounted a small stile. He had changed into a new ceremonial robe; the brown one had been sullied by the presence of the centaurs. He now wore deep blue vel shy;vet, with carmine and silver edging at the neck.

  "What a pretty robe," Kifflewit whispered. "But it seems a bit hot for summer." Other topics were of greater consequence. For example, where was the Diamond Dragon? Tarscenian had said Hederick wore it around his neck, but no pendant swung against the blue velvet. "Must be inside," Kifflewit mumbled, leaning forward near a portly man in black. Yes, the kender decided, there might just be the faintest V of a thong beneath the mater shy;ial, with a swelling at the point of the V.

  "Blessed Seekers," Hederick intoned, "I encourage you to enjoy the goddess Ferae's sunshine while I make sev shy;eral announcements and pass judgment on an unrepen shy;tant sinner."

  The crowd waited expectantly.

  "First," Hederick said, "you may know that the ground you are standing on will soon be the site of Erolydon's Ceremonial Pavilion, a splendid new structure created for worshipping the New Gods outdoors."

  The crowd murmured. Hederick raised one hand and waited until the noise had diminished. "With that holy object in mind, my followers, I know you will rejoice at the opportunity to help provide the steel coins to raise the structure."

  "What does that mean?" a woman whispered to her husband.

  "He's raising our taxes again," the man whispered back.

  Murmuring rose again from the crowd and this time did not die out when Hederick raised his hands. "The wood for the blessed pavilion will be the finest vallen-wood, of course."

  "More of the sacred trees?" a man exploded from the center of the crowd. Two guards immediately pinioned him and hustled him back into the temple. Several marked his passage with haunted eyes.

  The High Theocrat smiled. "I rejoice that you are now unanimous in your love for the New Gods. Surely the pantheons will bless you doubly for your latest gifts."

  "All the pantheons have blessed my family with so far is great poverty," came a woman's voice. This time, when the guards pushed to the vicinity, they could not identify the detractor, and the unhelpful crowd gave no hint.

  "Who spoke?" demanded the captain of the guards. He swept his glance over a group of four huddled women. They glared at him from beneath gaily colored kerchiefs but said nothing. "Who spoke?" the captain repeated.

  After a few moments had passed, Hederick snapped, "That's enough, Captain. Take them all into custody."

  "It was me!" cried an exhausted-looking woman in an embroidered skirt and plain black blouse. "Leave the oth shy;ers alone!"

  The captain and his guards looked irresolutely from the women to the High Theocrat. "I said take them all," Hed shy;erick ordered. "Now do it, unless you want to find your shy;selves included with them."

  The women were dragged, screaming, into Erolydon.

  Hederick leveled an angry stare at the crowd. Kifflewit retreated behind the portly man. "Does anyone else yearn to blaspheme the New Gods?" the High Theocrat demanded.

  Briefly the people parted, and Kifflewit glimpsed two figures who looked strangely familiar. The blond woman was clothed as a warrior. The man, a seeming beggar, was festooned with clumps of hair atop his head, and his cheeks and chin were bright with new cuts. The crowd closed again, and Kifflewit couldn't see what happened next.

  At that moment, a new disturbance broke out from the direction of Erolydon. The guards hauled a man, gagged and bound, through the crowd and threw him down at the base of Hederick's stile.

  "A mage of evil!" the portly man above Kifflewit breathed. Entranced, the kender made his way past a few people to get a better look. A black-robed mage! You didn't see too many avowed mages these days, with feel shy;ings running high against them and all. And an evil mage was even rarer.

  Hederick gazed serenely down at the black-robed mage. "Your hands are bound, your mouth stopped, to prevent you from unleashing a heinous spell amid these believers. I prefer to allow my prisoners last words before I pronounce a sentence of death, but I'm sure you would agree that that would be a mistake in your case." He chuckled.

  The man, whose severe features and gimlet stare hinted at his alignment with Evil, managed to look disdainful.

  "That's not fair, High Theocrat!" Kifflewit said. "He should get a chance to talk, like everyone else." In a twin shy;kling, the kender had drawn out a knife and skipped over to the captive mage. A moment later, and he had slit both gag and ropes. The mage sat up, rubbing his wrists.

  Hederick and his guards stood stunned for a moment. The crowd edged back as speedily as possible.

  "Repent, mage," the High Theocrat finally choked out.

  "Commend your soul to the grace of the New Gods."

  The wizard laughed. Suddenly he was standing.

  Hederick's guards leaped toward the mage.

  The black-robed wizard sprinkled powder retrieved from a packet hidden in his boot and swept one hand around him in a huge circle. "Anelor armida na refinej!" The guards doubled over as if they'd been poleaxed.

  The High Theocrat fumbled inside his robe and pulled out a leather-wrapped bundle. The Diamond Dragon! It had to be! Kifflewit rejoiced.

  "Hederick!" the mage shouted. "You call me evil, yet you cannot see the same in yourself! Centriep ystendalet trewykyl. See, then, what you have brought upon yourself. Gantendestin milsivantid!"

  Hederick untied the leather. The Diamond Dragon glit shy;tered on his palm.

  "There it is! The Diamond Dragon! Let me get a closer look!" Kifflewit cried and bounded up the stile.

  "Cariax povokiet zvrekanenet res," the mage shouted at that precise moment.

  The kender reached for the dragon and found it in his grasp. Suddenly, an explosion sent him crashing to the earth. He heard screams, smelled burning grass and something worse, and rolled sideways under the stile as people stampeded, seeking escape. The kender raised his head. The back gate was locked. There were only two get shy;aways: over the wall to the lake, for those few who could swim, and back through the temple Erolydon. The crowd ebbed and surged, unsure which way led to safety.

  There was no sign of the mage.

  Kifflewit crawled out from under the stile, clutching the Diamond Dragon. "Wasn't that exciting?" he said to no one in particular. "Where'd the mage go? Did he disap shy;pear? Turn into a bird? Fly away? What-"

  He turned and saw the body on the stile. The outflung hand still clasped the thong and empty leather cover that had masked the Diamond Dragon. The puffy face had relaxed. The blue robe was blackened and tattered.

  In the center of the High
Theocraf s chest was a scorched hole the size of a fist. Hederick's heart was gone.

  It was enough to silence even a kender. Kifflewit crawled up on the stile. "Gee, I'm sorry," he said to the corpse. "You were really fond of this." He held out the Diamond Dragon. "You probably would have wanted to have it with you when you died." The kender sighed. "Well, you can have it back now, if you like." He held his hand, the one with the Diamond Dragon in it, above the High Theocrat's lifeless palm.

  "No, Kifflewit!" came a shout.

  That voice. Tarscenian? The kender looked over his shoulder just as he dropped the artifact into Hederick's hand. But this wasn't Tarscenian; this was that beggar. And what a mess he was!

  At that moment, Hederick's hand grasped the kender's wrist.

  Kifflewit gave a squawk. Hederick held his wrist firmly. The kender could only stare in fascination as color returned to Hederick's flaccid cheeks. Then the pale blue eyes opened-and the wound closed in the High Theo shy;crat's chest.

  "But you can't live without a heart!" Kifflewit protested as he yanked his wrist away.

  Hederick sat up, his face devoid of expression. Kifflewit held out the thong and rewrapped leather. "I think you lost these," the kender said apologetically. Wordless, Hed shy;erick accepted the gift.

  And then Kifflewit was off through the crowd, scrambling over the rocks and up the wall, and diving into the lake. He swam underwater until a change in the light told him he'd passed beyond Erolydon's walls. Then he surfaced, turned south, and paddled in that direction until the Seeker temple had vanished behind the trees.

  At last Kifflewit Burrthistle climbed up on a boulder. The sun was warm, the sky cloudless. A warm breeze promised to dry his clothes in short order. A perfect day, really.

  Perfect for examining the Diamond Dragon at leisure, he thought, pulling the artifact from his pocket.

  Kifflewit hoped idly that Hederick didn't have the same goal in mind. If he did, the High Theocrat would find nothing in his precious leather packet but one of Phy-tos's stones.