The Years of Longdirk- The Complete Series

by Dave Duncan

  "Always?"

  Keeper and acolyte exchanged glances.

  "Perhaps not always." Father Lachlan adjusted his spectacles. "I have heard of cases where the demon was exorcised but the husk remained inanimate and soon died—as if the mortal soul had gone. When that might happen, I don't know. Would it be displaced at the moment of possession, or expelled by the exorcism? I can't venture to guess. I can't even guess how one could find out. Why? What are you implying?"

  "Bear with me!" Rory stretched and made himself more comfortable, raising his knees to lean his arms on them. "I shall have to tell you a story. Could 'Susie' be the name of a demon?"

  The acolyte displayed signs of annoyance. "Anything could be the name of a demon—who ever speaks with them? In the lore, they are identified by the names of the places they are thought to have been collected, but I'm sure that is mostly guesswork. In common parlance, to say that you know a demon's name means that you know how to conjure it, but that is not a name in the usual sense, just the formula by which that particular demon is controlled, the words of command."

  "Quite," Rory said, evidently satisfied. "Well . . . the story. It's quite long—perhaps it should wait until another day? No? As you please. Well, when I was a mere cub, even cuter than I am now, I was carted off south as a hostage. I know I talk like a Sassenach. I can't help it—I spent my childhood in England. That's why I hate the bast—scum ... so much. Part of the time I even lived at court. I knew Lady Valda."

  5

  No one said a word. The fire crackled, the trees thrashed in the storm, but no one spoke.

  Rory yawned, enjoying the reaction. "Not intimately, of course, much as I... I never spoke with her, and I'm sure she didn't know I existed. I knew her only as one of the ranking courtiers and the most beautiful woman in the land. Men drooled as she went by. The palace floors were permanently soaked. The rugs rotted. Unfortunately, I was at a very impressionable age. I swear my whiskers grew in two years early because of her. You can't begin to imagine how I suffered."

  "Get to the point!" old Murray growled, looming over the guests clustered around his hearth.

  Rory looked up at him with bland stupidity, an effect spoiled by the golden flames dancing in his silver eyes. "Why? We have all night to talk."

  The hermit stretched out his large and horny feet to toast at the fire. "Then I shall narrate the circumstances of your last visit to the spirit."

  "Demons, no! Not in front of these innocent young gentlemen!" Rory did not seem very worried, though. He rose. Yawning, he stepped over to the bed and turned the free end of the blanket to cover Meg. He came back to the fire and settled again on the floor with the other three, closer to the fire than before. He grinned, admitting that he was playing tricks with them.

  "All right, I'll get to the point. The point is that I was at court when Valda was banished. Now that was a very curious affair! It has never been properly explained.

  "I'd spent years taking dancing lessons on an estate near Guildford, in Surrey. A group of us were brought to court at Greenwich in March 1509, to learn some civilized manners. Edwin was still king then. Edwin was a big man. Not big like our bareknuckle friend here, although he was beefy enough—big in the sense of domineering. He could be cruel and ruthless, but he was never mean. Edwin might stamp you into the ground, but he wouldn't knife you first. He was a bugle of a man—loud, resolute, overbearing. Early in his rule, he'd been suzerain for a while, and I think he did a fair job of satisfying the Tartars without grinding the peasants of Europe too badly. He fell afoul of some political infighting. The Khan deposed him and appointed the king of Burgundy in his place, but I don't think that had anything to do with Edwin's performance.

  "His son Bryton was much the same sort of hard-riding, hard-wenching, crude-but-rather-likable ruffian. Another bugle, but not quite as strident. The middle son, Idris, was quieter, devious, persuasive. A violin, maybe.

  "Then there was Nevil. Nevil's mother was Queen Jocelin, Edwin's second wife. There's no question she dabbled in gramarye, and it was generally assumed that she'd snared the old boy by putting a hex on him. Potentates usually keep mistresses, you see, and he didn't. When a top dog does nothing in the nighttime, that's always regarded as curious behavior. No matter ... Jocelin still had a sexual glow to her, and the old rascal certainly seemed content."

  Toby smothered a yawn. Everyone else appeared to be far more engrossed in this irrelevant rigmarole than he was. Hamish's eyes were big as mushrooms. He wouldn't find this in any book.

  "Nevil had been absent from court for a year or so— officially studying law at Oxford, although everyone assumed that he was studying gramarye. I'm sure he was, because Oxford is notorious for it. He reappeared in the palace just a month or two after I arrived there. The value of a good school is not what you learn but the friends you make there, yes? Nevil turned up with Lady Valda on his arm. He already had a wife and child, but they were not in evidence and were never mentioned. This was the summer of 1509."

  Ten years ago—Rory must be in his middle twenties now. Fair men often looked younger than they really were.

  "Nevil was just nineteen, slim, dark. Valda seemed ... ageless. If Bryton was another bugle and Idris a violin, then Nevil was a harp. He spoke very softly, and there always seemed to be overtones of meaning shimmering behind the main refrain. ... I'm getting fanciful. He was sweet and he was sinister. He was boyishly young and yet gave the impression of being well seasoned in evil. He was moonlight to Lady Valda's noonday sun.

  "Valda hit the court like a charge of gunpowder. No one doubted for an instant that she was a hexer, and everyone waited to see what would happen between her and Queen Jocelin. Well, they had one thing in common—they both wanted to see Nevil on the throne. Within three months, Bryton died of a fever and Idris in a hunting accident. In January, in a fit of total sobriety, Daddy Edwin jumped from a high window and Prince Nevil was King Nevil. It really wasn't difficult at all, now was it?"

  Rory glanced around. Father Lachlan nodded, everyone else looked blank. Meg mumbled and rolled over on her side, pulling her legs up. Straw crackled. Father Murray's craggy jaw clenched, but he did not turn his head. Rory caught Toby's eye and grinned faintly.

  "Of course, he wasn't officially king until he had made the required visit to Sarai to do homage to the Khan and have his accession confirmed. He never did. Queen Jocelin left court within a week—probably the wisest move possible under the circumstances. The court gossiped, as courts always do. The courtiers wondered if Valda would be content to remain royal harlot or if she craved royal honors, and what would happen to Nevil's existing queen if she did. They wondered if her powers would extend to making him suzerain. They wondered what France and Burgundy would do—whenever a monarch dies, it's regarded as good manners for his neighbors to invade as soon as possible and grab off whatever they can before his successor gets settled in. Nevil was smart enough and subtle, he just didn't seem strong enough to be an effective ruler. The question was whether Valda could rule through him, or so the gossip went. Then came the infamous Night of the Masked Ball."

  Rory glanced around as if to see who already knew about the Night of the Masked Ball. Everyone except Toby was nodding understanding.

  "No one knows exactly what happened that night. The king did not attend the ball, and neither did Valda. In fact, Valda was never seen again. He put a price on her head the next day."

  "Ten thousand marks," Father Lachlan muttered.

  "That came later. It was less to begin with. Nevil himself was changed after that night, dramatically changed. Everyone noticed. Oh, he looked just the same, and he had the same gentle manners and soft voice, but something fundamental was different. He was nothing like a harp anymore, more of a bass drum. He began raising taxes, raising men, planning for war. One of the first things he did was to call us all in—the Scottish hostages his father had collected—and send us home."

  Rory's face darkened and he stared at the fire for a moment. "Bef
ore we left, he made us swear allegiance at a grand public ceremony in Westminster Hall. I've told you how old I was, and I was not the only madcap youngster in the group. We agreed we were utterly determined to die rather than betray our beloved Scotland. We were going to smuggle knives into the hall, we were going leap out windows in a mass suicide . . . and so on. Of course none of us did anything of the sort. Nevil demanded the full Tartar obeisance, and we kowtowed and touched our faces to the floor and laid the king's foot on our heads and all that, just as we were supposed to. Well-trained dogs!"

  He fell silent and continued to scowl at the embers for so long that Hamish plucked up the courage to whisper, "He used gramarye on you?"

  Rory turned an eagle glare on him. "Would I admit this if he hadn't? I mean, would I ever admit he hadn't hexed me, when I confess to treason?"

  The kid shriveled about three years younger, shaking his head vigorously.

  Rory relented with a bitter smile. "Nine years ago and it still rankles! It didn't last, of course. Away from the source demon, hexes soon fade. Or go to any sanctuary and the spirit will take it off you. And in compensation, we were going home! We were all ecstatic at the prospect of seeing the Highlands again—at least we all said we were, but some of us had been prisoners for years and could barely remember our homeland.

  "What we couldn't understand was what had come over Nevil. All those hostages his father had used to keep Scotland quiet for a decade—why was he letting us go? The court thought he'd gone crazy. As soon as we were safely home, the Highlands exploded, with every ex-hostage right out in front, screaming to enlist and prove his patriotism. The Lowlands followed. We knew what was going to happen. Everyone knew what was going to happen. It was inevitable. But Nevil knew what he was doing." He grinned. "Well, lad? Have you any suggestions?"

  Again Hamish shook his head. "I don't know, sir." He was as intent on the story as a toddler hearing a favorite bedtime fairy tale.

  Toby was bored. He stretched his long arms and yawned luxuriously. "Practice! Nevil's father wanted peace. Nevil wanted war. He used the Scottish campaign to temper the army he was raising. The Battle of Norford Bridge, June, 1511... it was an English training bout."

  Hamish gaped at him as if he'd grown wings.

  Rory laughed. "Muscles," he said, "you are acting out of character! Who told you that?"

  "Don't remember." In fact he'd worked it out for himself, at the time, while the Fillan survivors were still limping home. He must have been a horribly cynical little boy to have seen that. He'd even been cynical enough not to speak such blasphemy in the glen, for he'd never told anyone.

  "Well, you're absolutely right, although of course it wasn't apparent at the time. It's obvious enough in hindsight." Rory shot a reproving glance at Hamish, who shrugged bashfully. "Nevil was a different man after Valda's disappearance, and a military genius in particular. The French invaded the English enclaves in Brittany and Aquitaine. He invaded France. He didn't merely beat them back and rough them up as he was supposed to under the usual rules. He conquered France, annexed it, and had himself crowned at Reims. Then he went on to grander things. He has never lost a battle, never failed to hold a field or take a city."

  "He hasn't conquered the Highlands!" Hamish protested.

  "Hasn't he?" growled the keeper from his lofty perch.

  Rory scowled at the fire and did not answer.

  "Admit it!" said the keeper. "He has! He strangled you. Scotland has never been able to throw out the English without the backing of France or Flanders. Now Nevil rules both of them, and half of Europe besides. You have no money, my lord, no guns, no prospects."

  Still watching the dancing flames, Rory said, "That's true. At the moment at least, that's true."

  Hamish had subsided into horror-stricken silence.

  "But?" said Father Lachlan. "If I were King Fergan, which I am not, then I might be thinking of other allies— such as the Tartars themselves." He smirked mischievously, firelight flashing on his eyeglasses.

  "Dangerous talk!" Rory snapped.

  "Oh, nonsense! If a peaceable old man like me can work it out for himself, then don't you think the English can? I've never heard of the Khan taking any interest in Scotland at all, I admit, but he must be getting seriously worried about Nevil."

  The rebel did not want to talk about that.

  "What has all this got to do with me?" Toby demanded. "Who was Susie?"

  Rory turned thoughtful silver eyes on him. "Do you understand how the Golden Horde runs Europe, how government works?"

  "The kings are vassals of the Khan."

  "In theory. But in practice? You know the English have to reconquer Scotland all over again every few years. The Tartars haven't brought an army across the Vistula in two hundred years, and yet all of Europe still pays tribute to the Khan. Do you think the Golden Horde's hexers are so much better than ours that they do it with demons?"

  "I never really thought about it," Toby admitted, shifting position. He hated being lectured at any time, and it had been a long day.

  Hamish chuckled. "It's no use asking Toby about history, sir. My pa could never beat any history into him."

  "Couldn't he?" Rory studied Toby again for a minute. "Or couldn't he beat it out of him?"

  The boy frowned. "How do you mean?"

  "I'll bet it went like this: Teacher says: 'Strangerson, the Tartars overran England in 1244. When did the Tartars overrun England?' Horror Child says: 'Sir, I don't remember!' He does, but he won't admit it. So your pa reaches for his birch and tries to beat the answer out of him. I would guess that, in this case, he usually lost and Horror Child won. Am I right, Longshanks?"

  "No. I never called him 'Sir.'"

  Rory chuckled. "And you're still not admitting you know anything, are you? The khanate runs the continent on a simple divide-and-rule system. Whichever monarch is current suzerain grows rich, because he gets to collect and remit the tribute, and he can also call on the others to make war on his personal enemies in the Khan's name. They all want to be the next suzerain, and that keeps them licking the Khan's boots. They know that as soon as the present one begins to get out of line, the Khan will depose him and appoint another.

  "But now Nevil is turning the system upside down. He's deposed three suzerains and is about to start on a fourth."

  Father Lachlan pushed his glasses up his nose. "I cannot understand why the Tartars haven't marched against him already."

  Rory shrugged. "Because the khanate is old and decadent, probably. When they do come, they'll come like a tide. Or else they're waiting for Nevil to cross the Vistula, so they can take him on their home ground. That's when we ..." He yawned. "Never mind. It's getting late, and this is an odd place to be discussing world politics."

  "I thought you were going to tell us about Susie," said Toby.

  "So I was, Longsword, so I was. You don't know what a palace is like. It's like a school, with one teacher and hundreds of children. Courtiers are stupid, worthless people. They're idle, useless, and bored. They live in circles, grouped around the ruler, and all they ever worry about is which circle they're in and how they can move closer to the center. Their lives are an endless game."

  He shifted, leaning on his left arm and pulling his feet around. His eyes were suddenly very intent on Toby. "They have childish habits."

  Toby decided he did not like that stare. "Such as?"

  "Such as nicknames," Rory said softly. "Each circle, each little coterie, has its own codewords, its own signals. It's a great honor to be able to address someone of higher rank by his pet name, and of course everyone is always gossiping. The secret names are common knowledge, although just because you know that a senior minister is Wooky to his friends doesn't give you the right to get familiar. As Father Lachlan says, names can be words of power. Names are dangerous—I told you that."

  "You're not telling me much now. Who was Susie?"

  Hamish gulped.

  Rory did not look at him. He kept his eyes on Tob
y and his free hand hovered close to his dirk. "Got it?"

  "Suzerain?" Hamish whispered.

  "Right, lad. Susie for short. Susie was the innermost-secret codeword for King Nevil. That was probably what Valda called him in bed. Your oversized friend used to be Toby Strangerson. He says he still is, but Lady Valda calls him Susie."

  6

  Morning came, cold and dark, rainy and hungry. The Reverend Murray Campbell hammered on the cabin wall to rouse the men and must have then found the courage to go and waken the fearsome Meg, for they heard him beating on the other cabin also.

  Toby moved and groaned aloud. All his joints had frozen and all his muscles petrified. The fire had gone out. He had slept, though, slept like a boulder. The hexer had not haunted his dreams—he had been much too tired to dream.

  "Breakfast first, please," said a subdued whisper from Hamish's direction. "A hot breakfast and a blazing fire and dry clothes ..."

  "If we are to break our fast here," Father Lachlan remarked squeakily from Toby's other side, "which I doubt—then it will not be until after we have visited the shrine." His voice changed. "We are one short!"

  Toby sat up sharply. Rory was missing.

  More trouble? How could there possibly be more trouble than there was already?

  "I didn't hear him go. Perhaps he went to the market."

  "I just hope he didn't go up to the shrine by himself!" The acolyte found his eyeglasses and put them on, looking worried.

  "Is that dangerous?"

  "Er ... not usually. But it would be a grave affront to the keeper."

  Toby did not care eggshells for the keeper's feelings, and he thought Rory was more capable of looking after himself than any man he had ever met. He shivered out of his blanket and began pleating it into day wear.

  Ten minutes later, he was starting up the path to the shrine. Apparently it was correct procedure to attend to one's devotions on an empty stomach; it seemed disrespectful not to shave first, yet when he had suggested it, Father Lachlan had told him not to bother.