The Initiate

by Louise Cooper

"I -- had to." She bowed her head. "I think I was afraid of you."

  "And now?"

  "No. Not now."

  His hands closed on her arms, drawing her towards him. She gasped, involuntarily but softly, as his lips touched her neck, then leaned into the embrace as he held her more tightly. For a moment they stood motionless, then, unexpectedly, he released her and stepped back.

  Sashka understood, and the realization that he was unsure of himself gave her a heady sense of power. She smiled, suddenly confident and wanting to reassure him, and he saw the answer to his hopes reflected in her face. He took her hand, and as he began to move towards the inner room she followed him compliantly, knowing she had won.

  The bedchamber was almost dark, lit only by the warm crimson glow from a dying fire in the grate. Tarod seemed no more than a shadow in the dimness, but the body that pressed close against hers was real enough... Sashka closed her eyes, and the soft sound of the door closing had a finality that thrilled her in a way she had never known before...

  "Wed her?" Keridil stared across the room at Tarod, and though surprise was foremost in his expression there were also other, less easily decipherable feelings lurking beneath the surface.

  Tarod gazed back, his eyes slightly narrowed. "Is the idea so very disconcerting?"

  "No -- no, of course not. Just... surprising." Keridil hunched his shoulders. "You, of all people... I find it hard to imagine you willing to compromise your independence."

  It wasn't the reaction that Tarod had hoped for, and resentment flared along with the disappointment. He had decided to follow the Circle tradition of formally asking the High Initiate's blessing for his marriage -- but Keridil's response had soured what should have been an occasion for congratulation.

  Very softly, but with an edge of venom, he said, "And harder still, perhaps, to imagine my inveigling my way into a liaison with a Veyyil Saravin?"

  Keridil's cheeks went scarlet. "I implied no such thing!" He half turned away, then stopped and made a sharp, angry gesture. "I'm sorry, Tarod -- maybe I was ungracious; I didn't intend to be." A faint smile caught his mouth. "Even you must surely admit that the news was unexpected."

  Mollified to a degree Tarod nodded, and Keridil added, "Nor would I have anticipated your being such a stickler for protocol. I'd have thought a precipitous flight with the girl one dark night would be more your line!"

  The atmosphere eased as Tarod laughed, and the High Initiate crossed to a small, locked cabinet. They were in what he ironically referred to as his headache room -- Jehrek's old study -- where he conducted most of the formal business that now made up the major part of each day, and he opened the cabinet and drew out a black glass bottle and two small silver cups.

  "For special occasions and desperate measures only," Keridil said. He pulled the cork, and splashed a finger's measure of a brilliantly sapphire-colored liquid into each cup before holding one out to Tarod. "It's distilled in Empty Province from the flowers of a bush that blooms once in fifteen years, and its name's unpronounceable. But I'll vouch that a whole clan of drovers could be drunk insensible on a quarter of a bottle!"

  Tarod smiled thinly. "Special occasions and desperate measures -- which is this?''

  "The former, I assure you! Now that I've had a minute or two to adjust to the notion... But no; seriously, Tarod, I offer my solemn congratulations." Keridil raised his cup and made the sign of Aeoris's blessing. "You've chosen well -- and so has she. I drink to you, and to your bride."

  Formally they sipped the spirit, then Keridil slumped into a chair and swung his feet up on the table, the too-casual movements an attempt to mask his sudden embarrassment. "So... how does Fyran Veyyil Saravin react to you as a prospective son-elect?"

  "Ah... that I've yet to learn."

  "You haven't bespoken him?"

  "No." Only this morning -- the last day of the High Initiate's inaugural festivities -- Tarod had suggested to Sashka that he should request an interview with Frayn without further delay. She had smiled up into his face, her eyes mischievous as her arms twined around his neck.

  "There's no urgency, my love. And besides, Father will present no obstacle."

  He kissed her. "You seem very confident..."

  "I am very confident! My father is an ambitious man, Tarod -- when he knows I'm to wed a seventh-rank Adept of the Circle, he'll be beside himself with delight! Oh, don't look at me that way -- I know how you feel about rank and privilege, and I share your contempt. But what harm is there in making the most of his fond illusions?"

  And so he had capitulated -- as, during these last, half-crazed six days, he had indulged her in everything. Frayn Veyyil Saravin could wait -- to Tarod, nothing mattered beyond the barely believable fact that, after only five wild days and nights, Sashka had agreed to become his wife....

  His attention returned to the present as Keridil said, "Well, I wouldn't delay overlong, if I were you. There'll be plenty of rivals for a girl such as Sashka Veyyil... safer to take the marriage oath as soon as you can!"

  Was there still a rankling element in Keridil's easy words? Tarod recalled the sharp exchange between them on the first night of the celebrations, when Keridil had cast -- or seemed to cast -- aspersions on his motives; then he dismissed the thought as unworthy. They had, surely, been friends for too long to allow jealousy to cloud the issue.

  "That's what I'd wish myself," he said. "In fact I thought that possibly when you return from the Summer Isle -- "

  "Gods, don't remind me!" Keridil grimaced. "I'm due to leave as soon as the sun rises tomorrow, and I don't relish the prospect of a fifteen-day ride, panoply or no."

  "There are a great many more people anxious to see their new High Initiate with their own eyes. And besides, once you reach the High Margrave's court you'll be able to think of us poor Initiates shivering in the grip of winter whilst you enjoy the southern sun!"

  "And enjoy waking nightmares about what those old fools on the Council will do without me to restrain them," Keridil countered sourly. "Most of the senior members should have been retired into graceful oblivion long ago. It was only Father's sense of obligation that prevented him from making overdue changes."

  "Nonetheless, when you return -- "

  "Oh, yes, when I return... I want to reform this community of ours, Tarod, and I blame you for the feeling. Do you recall what you said to me on the first night of the celebrations, when we'd listened to the Margraves' grievances? You were right -- we are stagnating, and in danger of becoming little more than a worthless anachronism. The Warps, the brigand activity -- it all adds up to a condition that threatens to get out of control, while we sit idly by and do nothing." Keridil got to his feet again, fired by his own thoughts and pacing the room restlessly. "You did me a service that night, and I won't forget it. And I'll need Adepts such as you -- further-seeing, less hidebound -- to help me."

  "You only need ask. I've no intention of leaving the Castle; I mean to bring Sashka here to live with me."

  "Yes... yes, of course." Keridil frowned, as though he'd forgotten the matter of Tarod's impending marriage. "Then on my return, there'll be a great deal to set in motion." He looked at the other man. "I know I can rely on you." Suddenly he seemed to shrug off the chain of thought, and picked up his cup again. "In the meantime -- good health to you again, my friend. You're a luckier man than I think you know!"

  When Tarod had gone, Keridil sank back into the ornately carved chair that tradition obliged him to occupy during meetings in this room. He knew he should go to bed if he was to be fit to travel in the morning; but knew too that he wouldn't sleep.

  He had behaved less than honorably tonight. He should have been glad for his old friend's happiness, willing to rejoice wholeheartedly with him; but instead the worm of discontented envy had poisoned the interview.

  He had no right to be jealous. Sashka Veyyil had chosen of her own free will, and -- as he had said -- chosen well. But while Tarod's future now seemed to follow a path of assured happiness, Keridil
felt that his own was clouded by uncertainty, and by obligations that he would have given anything not to have to fulfill. It wasn't the matter of the freedoms that had been so acutely curtailed when Jehrek died; from childhood Keridil had been schooled for that eventuality, and was resilient enough to cope. Part of him -- albeit a small part -- even quite enjoyed the pomp and circumstance attached to his new role. No; it was the other obligations, the more personal ones, that hurt.

  His father, so he believed, had intended that he should marry soon, and at their last meeting -- which had ended in such tragedy -- he had intimated clearly that he wished his son to wed Inista Jair. An eminently suitable match. Inista would make a perfect complement to the High Initiate's station; her breeding was impeccable, her qualifications couldn't be faulted. Jehrek had wanted to do the very best by his only heir. And Keridil, like any loving and dutiful son, could not bring himself to go against what had been, in effect, his father's dying wish.

  And Tarod was to marry Sashka Veyyil...

  It was ridiculous; he had exchanged barely a dozen words with the auburn-haired Novice-Sister. But even that had been enough to tell Keridil that, compared with her, the Inista Jairs of the world were as dull granite to a jewel. Oh, he might do what was expected of him, wed Inista, father a son to succeed him when he went to Aeons in his turn. But while Tarod and his bride lived among them, could he ever be content?

  Recklessly, Keridil reached for the black glass bottle and filled his cup to the brim. Better to wake tomorrow with hammers in his head than stay wakeful all night with the envy eating at him like a disease.

  Was she lying with Tarod tonight? Rumor spread like a forest fire in the castle, and enough people had heard about Tarod's locked door and the girl missing from the suite of rooms allocated to the Novices for the tale to be likely true. And a mere few minutes ago Keridil had given his blessing to their union, forcing himself to keep the painful jealousy out of his mind. When he returned from the Summer Isle, the formalities would be completed and Sashka Veyyil would be tied to another man.

  It wasn't that he was in love with her, Keridil told himself bleakly. He couldn't even claim a proper acquaintance, and there was far more to love than the pangs of infatuation from a distance. But that situation could change with such dangerous ease, and if his only consolation lay in the charms of Inista Jair, then it was cold consolation indeed....

  He drained his cup, and the floor under his feet seemed to sway as he got up to lock the bottle away again. The spirit had worked with a vengeance, but it still wasn't potent enough to blot out the frustration. Perhaps, he told himself, his sojourn in the south would help to set matters in a healthier perspective; by the time he returned the whole issue might seem like a storm over nothing. But deep in his heart, he doubted it.

  Someone knocked softly, hesitantly on the door, and old Gyneth Linto, Jehrek's steward who had now transferred his allegiance to Jehrek's son, looked in.

  "Oh -- pardon me, sir; I thought you'd retired. I was about to extinguish the lights." He made to withdraw, but Keridil beckoned him back.

  "It's all right, Gyneth -- I'm just away to bed. You shouldn't have waited up."

  "No trouble, sir." Gyneth smiled his vague, gentle smile and shuffled across the room. Methodically, he began to snuff out the candles one by one. "The torches in the courtyard have been doused, sir, now the celebrations are over. Most of the folk out on the Peninsula have gone, too; though a few are waiting to wish you good speed tomorrow."

  "Yes. Yes, thank you."

  "And I've completed the packing and the loading myself, sir, so all's ready for an early start." The old man paused, looking up at Keridil from his stooped position over a smoking candle. "Is anything amiss, sir? You're not feeling unwell?"

  Old Gyneth was far too shrewd for comfort... Keridil forced himself to smile, and shook his head. "No, Gyneth, I'm fine. Simply tired, that's all. I'll bid you good night."

  "Thank you, sir. Good night."

  He was snuffing the last of the lights as Keridil opened the door. The High Inititate glanced back once, his spirits feeling as dark and as cold as the room now looked. Then he walked quietly out into the passage and away towards his private rooms.

  Chapter 11

  "I don't want you to leave. You know that, don't you?"

  Sashka closed her eyes and let her head droop forward on Tarod's chest. "I know. But it's for such a short while ... and I don't want to risk putting myself in the Lady's bad favor; not now of all times."

  He sighed and, though he couldn't argue with her reasoning, released her only with great reluctance. An irrational part of his mind feared that out of sight could become out of mind -- once reinstalled at the Sisterhood Cot, might Sashka find that as time went by it became easier and easier not to return to the Castle?

  She gleaned something of his thoughts, and added cajolingly, "It will also give me time to visit my parents, and tell them the news. They'll want to begin preparations immediately -- and they'll be so happy for us."

  Tarod looked gravely at her, his eyes unquiet. "Will they?" he asked. "You've seemed almost reluctant to tell them... as though they might not approve. Or -- do you have doubts, Sashka?"

  "No, my love!" The denial was so vehement that he wished he'd held his tongue. Her fingers traced a line lightly from his throat across to his left shoulder and arm. "Tarod, trust me. I'd give anything not to be parted from you, but I must go. It will be only a short while, and then we'll be together again... forever."

  Not entirely contented, but knowing her answer must suffice, he nodded. "So be it, love. Though how I'll occupy myself enough to stay sane while you're gone I daren't speculate."

  Sashka returned his smile warmly. Strange, she thought, how such a vulnerable and emotional soul had proved to lie beneath this man's cool exterior. When their courtship began she had been a little afraid of him -- though never outwardly admitting it. Now, knowing him better, she believed she understood the powerful inner feelings that moved him, and she was no longer afraid.

  She reached up again, standing on tiptoe to kiss him. "If I don't go down to the courtyard, the party will leave without me..."

  "You should have allowed me to take you to West High Land, instead of insisting on riding out with a regular party."

  "The two of us, alone?" She laughed, but gently and with an underlying sensuous pleasure. "Would we ever have reached the Cot, love? Or would you have spirited me away to some secret place where no one would ever hear of us again?"

  "Would you have minded if I did?"

  "You know I would not... but we must be patient just for a little longer. And then..." Sashka left the sentence unfinished, qualifying it only with another smile that expressed more than words.

  On a sudden impulse Tarod reached to his own shoulder, where the gold Initiate's badge glinted dully in the light from the window. Unpinning it, he pressed it into Sashka's hands.

  "Hold fast to it." His voice wasn't entirely steady. "It will bring you back to me."

  "Oh, Tarod..." Sashka clutched the brooch so tightly that the bright metal dug .into her palm. A talisman -- and a token, to prove Tarod's intentions in the face of any scepticism. When her father saw a seventh-rank Adept's badge in her possession, he wouldn't dare to chastise her for pledging herself without his permission! And as for her fellow Novices...

  She slipped the brooch carefully into the pouch at her waist, and her heart was light as they walked down the main Castle stairs and out into the courtyard. The rest of the party -- a few Initiates attending an assize in West High Land, and three stewards sent to buy horses at Chaun -- were waiting, already soaked by the fine drizzle that had been falling since dawn, and Sashka was gratified to see that her own horse had been blanketed to keep the saddle dry. She pulled up the hood of her expensive hide coat so that it covered her hair, and turned to Tarod.

  "I'll return as soon as I can, my love. And I'll send you a message by the first courier from the Cot, to tell you what my father and th
e Lady have said."

  Not caring that the impatient riders -- and probably a good many others besides -- were watching, Tarod pulled Sashka towards him and kissed her. "I'll be waiting."

  From a vantage point at the massive Castle gates he watched until the party was dwarfed in the distance, Sashka's face no more than a faint blur as she looked back. Then he walked slowly back across the courtyard, oblivious to the increasing activity around him, and returned to his rooms.

  He felt as if a vital part of his own being had left the Castle with Sashka. During the early part of their courtship he had fought against the emotional pull that threatened to make him dependent on her and therefore vulnerable; now he could no longer sustain the mental battle, and had capitulated. And the experience was more exquisite, more inspiring, more painful than he had imagined possible. The time without her stretched ahead dismally -- in the eight days since the inaugural celebrations ended and Keridil had left for the South Tarod had lived only for Sashka. Now, he must try to take up his old place in the Circle, which he had utterly neglected since the night the girl had walked into his life.

  His bedchamber, lit only by the thin grey daylight, looked shadowed and dreary. On the window-ledge a pile of books was gathering dust, and one pillow in the disordered bed still bore the imprint of where Sashka's head had lain. Tarod sighed. He would have to shake himself out of this mood, or his life until she returned would be intolerable. If he could --

  A sound, like a sharp, derisive laugh, came from behind him. He whirled -- but the room was empty. Tarod's pulse quickened, and an instinct he had all but forgotten in the last heady days surfaced. The timbre of that laugh had betrayed the truth -- a faintly unreal echo that told him it had not originated in any human dimension -- and with the realization came a memory that, since meeting Sashka, had lost its meaning and potency. The dreams, the fever, the bizarre meeting with Yandros on another plane... and the promise he had made. All set aside since more earthly considerations had taken precedence....