The Robin And The Kestrel bv-2

by Mercedes Lackey

  And as for the citizens themselves_nothing had really happened yet to show them that this was anything other than talk. Oh, the nonhumans were gone, but they'd gone off on their own, surely_and they were taking jobs and custom that could have gone to humans instead, so where was the harm?

  Nothing to alarm anyone in that.

  The Prime Service wound to its dignified end. And if only Padrik's words had not left such a bad taste in Jonny's mouth, he could have enjoyed it. The music was glorious, and Padrik quite the most impressive clergyman Kestrel had ever seen. As a show alone, it was fabulous.

  The trouble was, this "show" was like a tasty candy with poison at the center, a slow-acting poison, one whose effects were so subtle that the poor fool who'd eaten it had no notion of what was happening until it was too late.

  Padrik vanished into the Cathedral, and a secondary Priest stepped forward onto the platform. This was not a usual part of Prime Services_

  "Let the sick be gathered, and the poor be brought," the Priest cried out, for all the world like a Sire's Herald announcing the start of a feast. "Let all those in need come forward into God's own House, for the High Bishop's prayers and God's blessing!"

  The entire crowd surged towards the door. Kestrel and Robin exchanged a single look, and in a heartbeat had packed up all their remaining God-Stars, locked up the wagon, and were joining the tail of the crowd as it squeezed in through the wide-open doors of the Cathedral.

  The building was as impressive on the inside as on the outside, with the same sinuous, sensuous carvings everywhere, and sunlight shining through the brilliant colored glass of the windows, staining the pristine marble with splashes of crimson and gold, azure and emerald. They were not there to sightsee, however, or to gawk at the statues and glass. What they wanted lay at the front of the Cathedral, where the altar stood_

  Their experience in Faire crowds stood them in good stead here; they were able to wiggle and squirm their way up the side along the wall, until they were near enough the altar to hear every word and to see Padrik clearly.

  And it seemed that no one was too terribly concerned either about damage to the carvings or to their dignity; people in the rear climbed up onto the pedestals of the carved saints and clung there, hanging onto their alabaster robes like so many children clinging to their mothers' skirts. Robin found footholds for two in the carving of Saint Hypatia the Librarian, and Kestrel joined her there, both of them clinging to the saint's arms, while the alabaster lips smiled down at them as if Hypatia was enjoying their company on her tiny pedestal.

  They tried to compose their faces into the appropriate expressions of piety, but only Saint Hypatia was paying any attention. All eyes were riveted to the altar, Padrik, and the young man who had been brought to him on a sedan-chair.

  The man seeking Padrik's blessing was in his twenties or thereabouts, dressed in an expensive silk and velvet tunic and shirt of a dark blue that seemed too big for his thin body. Unlike virtually everyone else they'd seen so far in the city, he wore heavy gold chains about his neck, massive gold rings, and matching gold wrist-cuffs. There was a velvet and fur robe covering his legs.

  Padrik was young for one with such a high position in the Church; Kestrel judged him to be in his middle thirties, at most. There was no gray in his golden hair, no wrinkle marred the perfection of his face. In fact, he was just as handsome as any of the alabaster carvings in here, a face that matched the glorious voice. In his pristine white robes he was the very ideal Priest, the image of a modern Saint. The white surcoat over his white robes gleamed with gold embroidery, and Kestrel was willing to bet every copper penny they'd made that day that the embroidery had been done with real gold bullion.

  "What brings you to me for the Church's blessing, my son?" he asked the young man, who was not that much younger than he.

  The young man's voice quavered when he spoke. "It is my leg, My Lord Bishop. All of my life my left leg has been shorter than my right, and twisted_I cannot walk on it. No one has been able to heal it, and many have tried _"

  Padrik's voice grew stern. "Are you saying you have sought the services of the Deceivers, the Unbelievers, those who dare to work that blasphemy they call magic?"

  The young man did not answer; instead, he broke into tears, sobbing his plea for forgiveness. Padrik's voice softened immediately, and he laid a comforting hand on the young man's shoulder. "God is not mocked, but neither is he unforgiving," he said, his voice taking on the same tones of his sermon. "You have come to God for His blessing and forgiveness, and He shall be generous to you."

  He raised his voice. "Let all who see, believe, and let all who believe, rejoice!"

  As the crowd held its collective breath, he pulled the lap robe off and laid his hands on the young mans legs. It was very clear that one was shorter than the other, although if it was twisted, Kestrel couldn't tell, for the young man wore loose velvet trews with open bottoms instead of breeches or hose, and expensive leather boots. Still, every Healer would be the first to sigh and admit that those born with defective limbs were doomed to live with them; there was nothing any Healer could do to Heal those born with an ailment.

  Nothing any Healer could do. Except, it seemed, this one_

  As silence held sway over the crowd, Padrik slowly stretched the young man's bad leg, straightening it and pulling on it until it was exactly even with the good one!

  And as the Cathedral rang with cheers, the young man leapt up from his sedan-chair and ran to the altar, to strip off his gold jewelry and place it there in thanksgiving.

  There was more of the same, much more. Padrik healed several more people; one blind, one deaf, and one palsied, plus at least three cripples and a leper. Then as the secondary Priests brought forward a group of raggedly clothed folk, Padrik produced a shower of silver and copper coins out of the air as alms for the poor. Finally he singled out one young Priest for a "blessing of the Hand of God." A beam of golden light came from Padrik's upraised hands and bathed the Priest in momentary glory. The young man fell to the ground, chanting in some foreign tongue, while another Priest translated what sounded like prophecies, and messages from "the blessed Spirits and Angels" about members of the congregation. Those were all suitably vague enough they could have come from the head of any common fortune-teller at the Faire, but the rest of it impressed and even frightened Jonny.

  But Padrik was saving the best for the last.

  A shout came from the back of the Cathedral_a cry of "demon!" and "possession!" and shortly several Cathedral guards came forward, dragging a filthy, disheveled, struggling man with them. The man's eyes rolled wildly, and he shouted a string of blasphemies and insults that had Jonny flushing red within a few moments. As they threw the man down in front of Padrik, knocking over one of the many-branched candelabra at the front of the altar, he howled like a beast and spat fire at the Priest, setting fire to his robe.

  Someone in the crowd screamed; the crowd surged back a pace. The guards seized him again at that, as one of the secondary Priests beat the flames out with his bare hands. Through it all, Padrik remained where he was, his face serene, his hands spread wide in blessing.

  The High Bishop looked down upon the writhing man, whose face was contorted into an inhuman mask, and began to pray, alternately exhorting God to help the sinner, and ordering the demon to release its victim.

  The man spat fire again, this time touching nothing, then vomited a rain of pins all over the carpet in front of the altar. Then he howled one final time and lay still.

  Padrik directed one of the Priests to sprinkle the man with holy water; presumably as a test to see if he was still demon-haunted.

  Evidently he was, for the holy water sizzled when it touched him, and left behind red, blistered places. There were gasps from the crowd, and a few moans.

  Finally the High Bishop himself knelt down beside the man and laid his hands upon the man's forehead.

  There was a tremendous puff of smoke from the man's chest, and an agonizin
g screech rang through the Cathedral, a terrible sound that could never have come from a human throat, unless it was a human being disemboweled alive. The man went limp, and Padrik sprinkled him with holy water again. This time it did not burn him, and Padrik declared him free of the demon that had possessed him, gently directing the other Priests to take him to the Cathedral complex to recover.

  That, it seemed was the end of the show, for as Padrik stood, he suddenly swayed with exhaustion, and one of the Priests hurried forward to support him. He leaned heavily against the man, and immediately all of the others but one gathered around both of them, taking the High Bishop off through a door behind the altar. That one Priest announced_unnecessarily_that the High Bishop was exhausted by his ordeal, and there would be no more healing until the morrow.

  He did not use the word "miracle," but everyone else in the Cathedral was already shouting the word aloud, praising God and the High Bishop in the same breath. Spontaneous hymn-singing broke out, three different songs at once. Most of the crowd headed for the door, but some flung themselves full-length in front of the altar to pray at the tops of their lungs.

  Jonny clung to the arm of Saint Hypatia, feeling dazed and dazzled. In the face of all of that_

  Surely Padrik was a Saint! And if he was a Saint, how could what he had been preaching be wrong?

  All of his earlier convictions went flying off like scattered birds; and if Robin had not pulled him down off his perch and dragged him out, he probably would have remained there, clinging to the alabaster Saint, and wondering if he should prostrate himself as so many others were doing, and pray for forgiveness for his doubts.

  He did not really take in Robin's expression until they got outside. Then he got one of the great shocks of his life, for her eyes burned with anger, fiery and certain, and her face was a cold mask donned to hide her true feelings.

  She pulled him along until they reached their wagon, then shoved him roughly at the rear door as a hint to unlock it. He did so, hands shaking, and they both climbed in. Once they were inside, and not before, she finally spoke.

  "Convinced, were you?" she said, her words hot with rage, although she whispered to keep her voice from carrying outside the wooden walls, "Just like all those other fools out there. You saw Padrik perform real miracles, didn't you? With your own eyes! Damn the man! May real demons come and snatch his soul and carry it down to the worst of his nightmare hells!"

  "B-b-b-b-but _" Jonny couldn't get any more than that out.

  "Produces alms from thin air, does he? Well so can I!" And before he could say or do anything, she showered him with coins that came from out of nowhere. "I can heal the blind and the deaf, too, if they were never blind nor deaf in the first place!"

  "B-but the l-leper _" he managed.

  She snorted. "Flour and water paste make the open sores, paint makes the skin pale, and you can wash it all right off. It's an old beggar's trick. Remember how he passed his hands over the 'leper's' limbs? He was wiping them with a damp sponge hidden in the big sleeves of that robe."

  The c-c-c-cripples _"

  Her eyes narrowed. "Think a minute. The only one you actually saw 'healed' of anything was the first one. The rest simply showed up on crutches and danced off without them. Here _"

  She sat down on the bed and did something with her boots, spreading her skirts over her legs to hide them as the first cripple's trews had hid his. And as soon as she sat down, sure enough, one of her legs was longer than the other. The right was longer by far than the left, by a good two inches.

  Kestrel felt his eyes goggling. "H-h-how _"

  "You'll see in a second. Take my feet in your hands the way Padrik did." He followed her instructions, taking her feet, one in each hand. "Now, pretend to pull on the left one, but push slowly on the right one."

  He did so; as soon as he began he realized what she had done. She had pulled her right boot down, and as he pushed on the right foot, he pushed her foot back into place within the boot.

  The skirts hid most of what was going on; distance would take care of the rest. And because attention had been focused on the short leg, it would appear that the shorter leg was being straightened, not the other being shortened. "You see?" she said, jumping down onto the floor of the wagon again, and stamping to get her feet back into the boots properly. "You see what he's doing? Tricks and chicanery, and probably every one of the people his miracles cure is someone from the Abbey here! The light that struck the Priest came from a mirror he had hidden in his palm; I saw him get into position to catch a gold-colored sunbeam coming through the stained-glass windows. Remember how he held his hands over his head when he prayed? He must have the location of every sunbeam in the Cathedral charted and timed!"

  "Th-the p-prophecies w-were p-pretty vague," Kestrel said, feeling his confidence and conviction returning with a rush of relief.

  "And if you get a big enough crowd of people in a place, someone is going to match the 'widow who has lost a sum of money' and the 'tradesman searching for the son that ran away.' Gypsy fortune-tellers work that way all the time, when they don't have the true gift of sighting the future." Her expression was still angry, however. Whatever had put her in a rage, it was not that he had temporarily been convinced of Padrik's genuineness.

  "B-but the d-d-d-demon _" he ventured, wondering at the truly grim set to her mouth,

  "That is what got me so mad!" she said, gritting her teeth in anger. "Someone has been teaching Padrik Gypsy magic! Everything else is the brand of chicanery that professional beggars and false preachers have been doing for hundreds of years, but he could not have simulated that possession without the help of Gypsy magic! Spitting fire_that's done with a mouth full of a special liquid in a bladder you keep in your cheek_remember how close the man was to the candles? He even knocked one over, and that was the one that he used to light the liquid as he spit it out. Vomiting pins is something only we know how to do. The first batch of holy water had a secret dye in it that only turns red after it touches another dye, which you paint on the skin; the water droplets left behind looked like blisters because you expected blisters to be there. The 'sizzle' came from someone dropping real holy water into one of the incense burners while everyone was watching the show; I watched him and I saw the steam. And the smoke when the 'demon' left the body is another one of our tricks! The howl came from someone frightening a peafowl up in one of the towers_either that, or they've trained it to cry on command." She spread her hands wide, some of the hot rage gone from her expression, replaced by determination and a colder fury. "Some of that Padrik could learn to do on his own, but most of it was done with accomplices. That means that not only is someone teaching him, someone is helping him! And I am going to find out who it is!"

  Kestrel nodded, remembering she had told him that the Gypsies swore never to reveal their tricks to outsiders. This was an even greater betrayal of that oath than teaching Gypsy magic to him would be, by an order of magnitude. He was, after all, a Gypsy by marriage, and he suspected that if he really needed to learn the tricks, Gwyna could get permission from the head of her Clan to teach him. But to teach them to a complete outsider_worse, to one who was using those tricks to promote an agenda that would ultimately be very bad for other Gypsies_that was the worst of betrayals.

  "N-not only wh-who," he told her, "but why. P-Padrik is already hurting n-nonhumans and F-Free B-Bards; h-how long b-before he s-starts on G-Gypsies?"

  "Good point." She straightened her skirts. "We've done enough business already that no one will question our packing up early_in fact, if I drop the right remarks as I pay our tithe as we leave, we might even be considered very pious for not making too much of a profit from the faithful."

  "S-so wh-what are we d-doing?" he asked, opening the back of the wagon again, to let them both out modestly, through the door, rather than crawling out the window over the bed.

  "We're hunting information," she told him, as he took the reins of the mares, and she counted out the tithe from the bag
of coins she'd hidden under her skirt. "Who and what and why."

  When they paid the reckoning for the next week in advance, the innkeeper was positively faint with gratitude. Kestrel felt very sorry for him; apparently he'd lost two more patrons who had simply not been able to conduct the business they needed. The nonhuman gem-carvers these men wished to patronize had left in the summer, and the quality of the gems that the humans who had bought their business produced was apparently inferior to the original work.