King's Blood Four

by Sheri S. Tepper

  Then it happened. The doors to the castle burst wide, and the followers of Mandor fled forth, white and trembling, falling, crawling, vomiting on the stones, clutching their way across those slimed stones like crippled creatures, crabwise slithering away, away from what came behind. I saw Dazzle, and Huld, and a hundred faces I had seen in Mandor's halls, the High King, and followers of his. They came forth in a flood and saw me, and seeing me they knelt down or fell down before me and cried to me for help. "King, " "Prince, " they cried, bending their knees to me, leaning upon their hands and beating their foreheads upon the stone.

  And I told them to be still and wait. Be still, I said, for

  Mandor comes.

  As at last he did. No less white than they, no less horrified, and yet with some dignity yet and a pathetic attempt at beguilement. Even now, even now he tried to use Talent upon me and still he wound it about himself.

  I motioned him to kneel. I said, "I have shown you your dead, Mandor. I have brought you your dead. The ancient ones you have dishonored. The newly dead you have robbed of life. Some among them have Game to call against you, so they tell me... "

  If it were possible for him to grow more pale, he did so. I looked from him to Dazzle. "And there are other dead, Dazzle. Your mother, I think, and others perhaps. Would you have them brought here to join those we have brought from the Caves of Bannerwell?"

  She did not answer me. I had not thought she would.

  She was too busy clutching the power to herself, weaving, weaving as Mandor was. Well, Let them weave. The Ghost army crowded out of the castle door, moving toward these pitiful mortals, moving to trample them, take them up, inhabit them, clothe themselves in life again... Dorn within me cautioned me.. Before they grew stronger, it was time to send them back... back...

  And then, of a sudden, if was as though someone lifted a great heaviness from me. Before me the Ghosts began to waver. They cried softly, once, twice, and were gone. A sound swept through my head like wind in pines and the smell of rain. Dazzle looked up at me, horrid that face. Mandor saw her, screamed, and screamed again as his people looked upon him and scrawled away from him, away and away, clutching at one another like survivors of some great flood, and casting glances backwards at him in horror. Then it was that Mandor and

  Dazzle flew at one another, clawing, striking with their hands, locked in a battle of ultimate despair.

  Behind me someone spoke my name. "Peter.

  Enough. We have come to Bannerwell as you have asked. "

  I turned. It was that lean man, Riddle, the

  Immutable, the leader of the Immutables, Tossa's father.

  "I have been told what you tried to do, " he said. "For

  Tossa. I thank you. "

  "It was useless, " I wept. "Useless, as this has been.

  But I tried to.... "

  "I know, " he touched my arm. Then I saw others behind him, Chance, Yarrel.

  "You got there, " I said stupidly. "You got back. "

  Yarrel's eyes were on Mandor and Dazzle, not upon me. His expression was one I dreaded, full of horror and contempt. I knew what he was thinking and did not want him to say it, but he did. "See there, " he whispered.

  "This is what Talents do. This is all that they do, and I have had enough of it... "

  "Shhh, " said Riddle. "We have agreed; Part of the blame is ours. We have allowed it. to go on. And we are agreed that it must end... "

  "While you are here, they cannot use their Talents, " he spit the word at me. "But when you are gone, Riddle, they will use them once more. And again. And again. "

  He turned away and went through the shattered wall, his shoulders heaving. Once he turned to look back and saw my face, saw something there, perhaps, which moved him for a moment. His hand moved as though he would have gestured to me in friendship, but his face hardened in that moment and he turned away.

  I knew what I could do. I could follow him. Soon we would be away from Riddle's force or power or Talent and my own would be usable once more. Then I could evoke Trandilar, and Yarrel would love me as once he had done-more, more. He would adore me. As

  Mandor's people had done.. Oh, for the moment I

  -wanted that. Yes. For that moment I wanted that.

  And then I did not want that at all, never, not Yarrel.

  I miss him. I have not seen him, but I know he is well.

  Some days I need him greatly, greatly, more than I can say. Perhaps, Someday... well. All time is full of somedays.

  After a long time full of many confusions, we came away from Bannerwell. Dazzle and Mandor stayed behind, together with Huld and a few others-and the

  Immutables. Neither of them can hide what they are any longer. They are what they are.

  I imagine them there, inhabiting the corridors and stairways of Bannerwell, drifting like shadows down long, silent staircases, vanishing behind hangings, seen at a distance upon a crenellated battlement, dark shadows, moving blots, heard in the long nights as the wind is heard, a ceaseless moan, never encountering one another except to see a shade vanish from a lighted room, to hear a cry down a chimney stack from some long unused

  . place within that mountain of stone which is

  Bannerwell.

  I imagine them awake in the dark hours, veiled by night, hidden in gloom, plodding endless aisles of opulent dust in the Caves of Bannerwell to look upon the tombs, to dream of such a silence, such a healing as that, for on the tombs the marble dead sleep whole and unblemished, softly gleaming in torchlight, forever safe except to one such as I-such as I.

  I think of Huld, hopeless and without honor, committed to his endless servitude, his mordacious kinship with horror, and I imagine that he follows them there, down those endless halls, watering the sterile dust with his tears.

  Will we meet again, Mandor and I? I do not think he will five long. I would not if I were he.

  But-I am not he.

  And I-I returned with Himaggery to the Bright

  Demesne. We found Silkhands upon the mountain and brought her with us. She was changed by it all. She does not talk as much now as she used to. But then, neither tol.

  Windlow is here with us. Riddle conies to meet with

  Himaggery now and again. Our part of the world is only a small part of the world. Elsewhere there are

  Guardians and Councils and Wizardly doings and much persecution of Heresy. There are plans afoot. When a little time has passed, I may have heart to take part in them.

  Just now I do not take part in much. Himaggery says he is sure there is a way Talents such as mine can be fitted into a world which Yarrel would approve, a way in which a Peter and a Yarrel may continue to be friends.

  Just now, however, that world seems far away and long into the. future.

  So, I think on that and 'imagine' what such a world might be like. What might my place in it be? I am such an animal as they have not known before, a Shifter-

  King-Necromancer who may, if he chooses, become

  Sorcerer, Seer, Sentinel-and every other thing as well.

  I must leave here to decide about that, I think. I must find Mavin. I think she knows something which all these solemn men have not yet thought of.

  The fruit trees bloom in the mists of the Bright

  Demesne. Soon will be Festival time. I shall no longer sew ribbons upon my tunic to run the streets as a boy. King's blood one. King's blood ten. King's blood, and the world waits. The End