The Initiate

by Louise Cooper

  "Father, I must go and see what's to do!" Keridil was already halfway to the door, foreboding eclipsing all other considerations. But Jehrek protested.

  "There's nothing you can do, boy! Leave it to Grevard, at least until we've -- "

  Keridil rarely interrupted his father, but he did so now. "No -- I should go. Forgive me." He pulled the door open, and would have gone out into the corridor -- but a sudden cry from Jehrek halted him in his tracks.

  "Keridil!"

  The old man was on his feet, but suddenly doubled over as if in terrible pain. One hand clawed blindly in Keridil's direction, a plea for help which Jehrek couldn't put into words.

  "Father... ?" Keridil's eyes widened in horror. "Father, what is it, what's the matter?"

  His only answer was a strangled gasp, and Jehrek swayed dangerously. Keridil ran forward -- and was just in time to catch the High Initiate as he fell.

  Slowly, Tarod became aware of an almost intolerable aching that throbbed throughout his body, and fancied he saw a dim room with a single shaft of cold light filtering through half-drawn curtains. Gradually his senses began to stir and he thought he felt another presence at his side -- but this time it wasn't a return to the world of nightmare. Cautiously, not sure of his own physical and mental state, Tarod opened filmy eyes.

  He had been right; there was a room and the light was the light of the twin moons beyond the Castle walls. And there was someone else present...

  A hand, small and cool and firm, touched his forehead. He tried to reach up to take hold of the fingers, but the strength wasn't in him. Then the indistinct figure leaned closer, and he recognized Themila Gan Lin.

  "Tarod? Can you hear me?"

  Her words awoke a memory that took him back over the years to the moment when he had awoken from the delirium of injury and exposure, to find himself in the Castle for the first time. But this was no delusion; he was back in the world of reality.

  He tried to answer Themila, but his throat was too dry. She held a cup to his lips; he tasted cold water and it was like the sweetest wine, easing the constriction until he could speak.

  "Themila..." He was too weak to touch her, but at least he could smile.

  Her voice shook as she whispered, "Don't try to move. Grevard will be here as soon as he can."

  "Grev -- ? Oh. Yes." He was alive. The realization was almost impossible to believe. But he was alive.

  "Is it night?" he asked, when he had voice enough.

  "Deep night," Themila told him, and there was a peculiar catch in her voice that he didn't understand. "Oh, Tarod... we've feared so for your life! Grevard despaired of you time and again, and now..." Abruptly she stood up and went to the window, gazing out into the moon-tinged darkness. "Perhaps it's a good omen despite everything..."

  Tarod was nonplussed. As yet his mind was still cloudy, and he could remember little of events that had led up to his delirium, still less of his experiences during the coma. But something was tugging at the recesses of his memory...

  Themila opened the curtains a little wider, and for the first time he saw her clearly. She wore a long night-shift with a wrap over it -- and over the wrap was a purple sash fastened at her left shoulder and right hip. Purple was the color of death... Themila was in mourning.

  He tried to sit up, and cursed the weakness which put the effort beyond him. "Themila -- the sash -- "

  She turned back towards the bed, but before she could answer the bedchamber door opened and Keridil entered. He was carrying a lantern which threw harsh light onto his face, and Tarod saw immediately the strain etched into his features. Keridil approached and stood looking down at him, but seemed incapable of speaking. And Tarod saw that his eyes were reddened and that he, too, wore a purple sash, identical to Themila's but for a single, simple design embroidered in gold thread just below the shoulder-knot.

  A double circle, bisected by a lightning-flash. Only one such sash existed, and only one man in the world was ever privileged to wear it. It was the sash of a High Initiate in mourning for his predecessor.

  And then the memory came back. Yandros... a life for a life...

  With a strength that he shouldn't have possessed Tarod took hold of the nearest bedpost and pulled himself painfully upright. His eyes met Keridil's in a torment that the other man didn't comprehend, and he said, "When?"

  "My father died two hours ago, at First Moonrise." Keridil sank onto the bed, head hanging, pushing his hands through his tawny hair as though desperately tired.

  Tarod shut his eyes against the thoughts that tried to fill his mind. "Aeoris keep his soul..." he whispered.

  Chapter 8

  The words on the page were dancing before Tarod's eyes, turning into spiderlike images that made no sense. He took a deep breath, pinching the bridge of his nose between thumb and forefinger, then shook his mane of dark hair and looked again.

  It was no use. He had simply been trying for too long, and his brain was rebelling against the endless hours of reading. With a sigh he shut the book and crossed the library vault to return it to its place among the shelves. As he gave the spine one final, resentful flick to line it up with its fellows a footfall sounded beside him, and he looked down to see Themila, hands on hips, staring at him accusingly.

  "Tarod. Will you never learn? You know what Grevard said -- no mental exertion until he pronounces you fully recovered! And here I find you, barely seven days out of bed -- "

  Tarod silenced her by laying a finger lightly on her lips, then bent to kiss her forehead while she fumed. "I'd just finished." He could have added, and failed, but did not. Neither Themila nor Keridil knew just how much time he spent searching through these ancient files, nor the reason why he did so -- and as yet Tarod wanted to keep his secret intact.

  "You shouldn't have started!" Themila admonished him, "After all you've suffered -- "

  "Themila, please..." He took hold of her shoulders and shook her with gentle affection. "I appreciate your concern, believe me. But between you, you and Keridil would make me into an invalid if I let you! I'm well, Themila. Now, will you stop trying to mother me every hour of the day?"

  She bit her lip in confusion, then her posture relaxed. "If I'd had a son half as troublesome as you, I'd have been grey before my time! Very well, then; you're as fit as can be; I accept it. In which case, why are you not catching up on some sleep, in readiness for tomorrow?"

  He had forgotten tomorrow...

  "Firstly," Themila continued, "you've promised to escort me at the procession. And I'm sensible of the honor -- it isn't often that a mere third-ranker has the chance to appear at important ceremonies with a high Adept. Secondly, your name is down on the list for the arena."

  "What?"

  "It is. Look at the list posted in the dining hall, if you don't believe me. "You volunteered three nights ago, at Keridil's urging."

  "I must have been drunk."

  "You were -- both of you; and a disgraceful exhibition you made of yourselves!" Themila laughed at the memory, knowing the while that both Tarod and Keridil had been trying to expunge some emotion in the wake of Jehrek's death that could not be exorcised by normal means. "But that doesn't change the fact that you're listed to meet Rhiman Han in the first horsemanship trials, and to show our honored guests that Initiates are more than pale, withered ascetics!"

  "Gods..." Tarod sounded disgusted, but in reality Themila's small magic was beginning to work. No one, high or low, could escape the demands of the seven-daylong celebration that would begin with the next sunrise -- and maybe such a diversion was what he needed now, far more than either Grevard's pills and potions or the dark machinations of his own mind...

  He held up both hands in a gesture of defeat. "Very well, Themila, I give you best! I'll retire to my bed, and think no more of reading or study until the festivities are over!"

  He kissed her again, on the cheek this time, only just avoiding her lips, and with a mingling of love and concern she watched him leave the library.


  There was still something desperately wrong with Tarod. Themila knew it as certainly as if he were her own flesh and blood, but was no nearer than she had ever been to understanding the truth. Tarod skillfully diverted all her attempts to probe, and -- especially since Grevard had pronounced him fit enough to leave his rooms -- he had been outwardly so much more content than she could ever remember him that she often wondered whether her misgivings were imaginary. But intuition was an old friend to Themila, and intuition told her that the outward appearance was a mask. Beneath the surface something moved Tarod that she couldn't even begin to comprehend, and in her weaker moments she had to admit that it frightened her. She would gladly have striven to overcome that fear to help him, but until he was ready to speak more openly her hands were tied.

  With an effort she recalled her original purpose in coming to the library; a scroll -- one of the older historical records that she needed to reread in order to prepare a children's tutorial. Locating it, she tucked it under her arm and walked to the door of the now quiet vault. On the threshold she looked over her shoulder, and memory came back of the night she and Keridil had found Tarod in the grip of insanity in this room. That image -- it had been so fleeting as to be almost unreal; but it had happened. And its ramifications were yet, she believed, to be fully faced or understood by anyone....

  Shivering, and telling herself it was no more than the chill of approaching autumn, Themila hastened away up the stairs.

  Tarod was no longer afraid of sleep, but nonetheless tonight the rest that he knew he needed eluded him. Summer was having a final, defiant fling as it faded, and the air was unusually oppressive. One moon had risen and its light, green and sickly, filtered through the window as he lay in bed -- yet he knew that neither the closeness nor the moonlight was responsible for his restlessness.

  Tomorrow, the inaugural celebrations for the new High Initiate of the Circle would begin. Seven days that combined complex formal ceremony with an abandoned rejoicing, drawing vast crowds from every part of the land; aristocratic Margraves, religiouses from every Sisterhood Cot, nobles, merchants, traders, peasants... every man, woman or child capable of climbing onto a cart or riding a horse would be made welcome, their numbers spilling across the Star Peninsula when the Castle precincts proved insufficient to accommodate them all. The official period of mourning for Jehrek Banamen Toln was over; his son Keridil had faced the final tests and passed them to take his father's place, and everyone now looked to the future.

  But Tarod alone knew the truth of how and why Jehrek had died. Grevard had pronounced that the High Initiate's heart had proved unequal to the demands of his calling: Tarod knew better. And while he lay all but helpless in his rooms for nearly two months, chafing against the weakness that hampered him as he slowly recovered, he had had a good deal of time to think back to the vision that had come to him while he was still in the grip of delirium.

  Yandros. Still the origins of that name eluded him. He knew it, and yet it came from no known source. But the figure which had confronted him in the dreamlike dimensions of the Marble Hall had been real, tangible; no figment of a twisted imagination but an entity whose existence was in no more doubt than his own.

  But what manner of entity? Tarod shifted uneasily, staring towards the square of his window as though looking for inspiration in the cold moonlight. One thing he knew with unshakeable conviction; Yandros was not, and had never been, human.

  Yet he had spoken as though a kinship bound them...

  Tarod forcibly crushed the small inner voice, unwilling to follow such a dangerous speculation. All he could be certain of was that Yandros -- whoever, whatever he might be -- had kept his word, and with a vengeance. A life for a life... and the golden-haired being had wielded a power that took the life of the High Initiate in exchange for Tarod's own.

  He hadn't confided his experience to Keridil, and nothing would induce him to do so; the guilt and confusion were still far too strong. He felt that he alone was responsible for Jehrek's death; the conviction tormented him ceaselessly -- and yet Yandros had insisted that there was a vital reason why Tarod should live in another man's stead. A destiny, he had called it.

  But what manner of destiny? Tarod shuddered with an unnameable trepidation. Yandros wielded a power far beyond the experience of the Circle's highest Adepts -- but did that power come from the gods, or from another, darker source?

  It was an unanswerable question, and didn't make for pleasant speculation. Tarod thought of the Old Ones, who had ruled the world for countless centuries before their own degeneration had led to their final fall, and of the black gods whom they had worshipped... but no. Chaos was gone, banished from existence along with its human marionettes, and no power in the universe could bring them back to this world.

  And, whatever the truth about Yandros might be -- emissary of Aeoris or otherwise -- there was no escaping the fact that he owed the strange being his life. He had pledged himself on oath; and an oath was something that Tarod never broke. Time, Yandros had said, was the key, and in time he would understand. Those words had disturbed an old, old memory which had eluded Tarod even as he grasped for it and since then had obdurately refused to return. Now he felt that he had no choice but to wait until the task which he had been charged to accomplish was revealed to him -- but until then he knew that he was sentenced to exist in a kind of semi-limbo. Thoughts of what he might or might not be called upon to do obsessed him, yet every attempt he made to delve deeper into the mystery was thwarted. He had found no clue among the library's shelves, despite the fact that almost every historical and mythological treatise in existence could be found there. And his efforts to penetrate the veil by magical means had also failed -- in fact it seemed to him that, though his physical strength had recovered in full measure since his illness, his occult strength was another matter entirely. Doors that had previously been open were suddenly closed to him, and the power that once he had held easily -- and often literally -- at his fingertips could no longer be summoned in the old way. Night after night he had sat alone in his rooms, striving to invoke the forces which so recently had been child's play to him. Always he failed... and always his failure was echoed by a chillingly distant resurgence of that dark, pulsing heartbeat which had come to him in the Marble Hall, and which he associated irrevocably with the influence of Yandros. And if Yandros could hold sway over life or death, it would surely be a small matter for him to manipulate a mere mortal to his desires....

  Tarod had never allowed himself to be manipulated in his life -- except by Themila, but that was another matter altogether -- and his instincts reacted violently to the thought. But he was philosophical enough to realize that as yet he could do nothing to alter the situation; he must simply bide his time.

  And meanwhile he might be well advised to take Themila's advice and concentrate on the more mundane matter of the celebrations that lay ahead. He owed another and more personal debt to Keridil, although Keridil didn't know it, and had seen the degree of change which had taken place in his friend since succeeding Jehrek. Keridil felt his responsibilities very acutely whilst still grieving for his father, and the resultant strain was already telling on him. If he could support the new High Initiate in his task, Tarod felt that it was his duty to do so.

  He turned over, away from the window, suddenly tired and glad of it. The next seven days might provide the catalyst that the entire Circle needed, and when they were over there would be a period of calm while the Castle community settled into its new pattern. And with that calm might come some of the answers he had been seeking for so long....

  The first day of the inaugural celebrations dawned bright and promising, the Sun rising into a clean-washed sky and only a brisk breeze to mark the onset of Autumn. For two days a small army of men -- servants, some Initiates and as many of the Castle's children as could escape their lessons -- had been working to prepare for the great event, and the grim building was transformed by pennants and streamers that flew from every available w
indow and hung in swathes over the black walls. Official guests from every province had been arriving since dawn, anxious to reach the Castle early and ensure a good view of the proceedings. Following the suggestion of an elderly Council member who remembered his father's inauguration, Keridil had sent out a detachment of armed men to escort the visitors through the mountain pass, and the colorful caravan of wagons and closed carriages had come thundering through the gigantic gateway with seven mounted and caprisoned Initiates at its head.

  Every Provincial Margrave in the entire land was present today, each with a retinue of family and servants. Senior Province Councillors had braved the long journey northward, overawed by what was, for the majority, their first sight of the Star Peninsula, and wealthy landowners and merchants had come from as far afield as Prospect Province and the Great Eastern Flatlands. Even the Margrave of Empty Province, the barren north-eastern fastness whose only value was as a breeding ground for milk- and meat-providing herdbeasts and the tough little northern horses, had arrived with his small family, all dressed with the sobriety that befitted their lifestyle.

  Only two notables, in fact, were missing from the guest list -- the two individuals who, with the High Initiate, made up the ultimate ruling triumvirate of the land. The Lady Matriarch Ilyaya Kimi, absolute head of the Sisterhood of Aeoris, had written in a flowery but unsteady hand from her Cot in Southern Chaun, expressing her deep regrets that arthritis made it impossible for her to undertake the journey and heaping the blessings of the gods upon the new High Initiate. Keridil had never met the elderly Matriarch -- who must be at least eighty by now -- but knew her by repute as a warm-hearted if faintly eccentric woman who had held her post for some twenty years. And if the Lady Matriarch could not attend in person, she had nonetheless ensured that her Sisterhood would be well represented, to judge from the number of white-robed figures who were making their way towards the Castle.