Heartlight

by Marion Zimmer Bradley

  He was not precisely what Colin had expected. Buckland was somewhere in his early thirties, sleek and model-handsome, with dark brown hair cut fashionably short and hazel eyes. He was dressed in the Washington uniform: a dark blue blazer, maroon rep tie, and grey flannel slacks. Despite such scrupulous conservativism, he wore a heavy gold hoop in his left ear and a massive gold signet ring on his right hand.

  “Dr. MacLaren? I’m Caradoc Buckland.” He held out his hand and Colin shook it.

  The next thing—the reasonable thing—would have been for Buckland to ask Colin’s business here, but he did not. He gestured for Colin to accompany him, and led Colin toward the back of the house, where the elevator Colin had heard before was waiting.

  “Did you have any trouble finding us?” Buckland asked politely, sliding the bronze gates of the elevator shut.

  They know. The intuition brought with it an almost overwhelming urge for flight. But Colin had known they would know who he was—if not at the moment he entered the building, then very soon thereafter. The Thule Group never closed its books on an opponent until it had buried him itself.

  “Oh, no particular trouble,” Colin answered easily, the first rush of dread fading into the prickle of anticipation along his nerves. The urge to play the Great Game never died, even after half a century.

  The elevator stopped on the third floor. “If you’ll come this way, Dr. MacLaren,” Buckland said. His voice gave no hint that anything out of the ordinary was occurring.

  The hallway was carpeted in vivid scarlet, with padding so deep that Colin was conscious of his feet sinking into the surface. The rug seemed to swallow sound, giving the hall the same dense hush as a cathedral. With a small part of his consciousness, Colin wondered how the confrontation was to be staged, and who the players were to be.

  The door at the end of the hall was a single slab of carved rosewood, the grain brought out through generations of hand-polishing. Buckland swung it open and gestured for Colin to precede him. The office walls were paneled in oak, and in its way this room was as much of a stage-set as the reception area downstairs had been.

  The desk stood isolated in the middle of the room, an immense ornate carven antique.

  “Hello, Colin,” the man behind the desk said.

  It was Toller Hasloch.

  His bright hair had softened with time to the color of old ivory, and his body had thickened with age, but he was unquestionably the same man Colin had last seen a quarter of a century ago. Colin felt the shock of that surprise like a hammer blow to the chest, making him want to gasp for breath.

  “Do sit down, Colin,” Hasloch said, rising to his feet like any good host. “Doc, please get our visitor a drink.”

  Colin sank into the offered chair, unable to take his eyes from Hasloch’s face. He barely noticed when Buckland set a glass on the table at his elbow. Age was an anchor, slowing his reflexes, sapping his resiliency, and Colin set himself against it as if were a living enemy. Hasloch had meant to stagger him with the revelation that he was alive, and Colin could not afford to let him have his way. After a moment the first paralyzing surprise faded, and he could think again.

  “What are you doing here?” Colin asked bluntly, although it was the question Hasloch himself should have asked.

  How had Hasloch survived? Though in the final analysis the question was irrelevant to the problem at hand, it still deviled Colin’s thoughts. If only he’d stayed in New York—if Simon hadn’t been injured almost at that same moment, drawing Colin’s attention away to the West Coast. By the time he’d returned to the East to helm the Bidney Institute, checking to see that Hasloch was actually dead had been the furthest thing from his mind.

  They always say that it’s the details that will get you in the end … .

  “I’m living my life,” Hasloch said, with too much innocence. Buckland had taken up a sentry position by the door, and Colin felt a momentary pang of smugness—all this fuss over one old man!

  “While it’s true that I prefer to keep a lower profile these days,” Hasloch said, still smirking, “I’m hardly a hermit. I have wealth, power, influence, material possessions, pleasant company … .”

  Hasloch had always been high-strung, and even now, his nerves betrayed him. He could not keep his hands still; they roved across the littered surface of his desk like independent entities, plucking up first one item then another to toy with. Colin watched his hands moving over the objects. Most of them were perfectly mundane, but in the middle of them, gaudy and out of place, were five transparent clear candy-colored pieces of plastic. A cube, a triangle, a diamond, and two that had so many facets they might as well be round. Gaming dice, such as Colin had seen in Rowan’s living room.

  Only the fact that he had steeled himself not to betray anything kept Colin from showing his surprise now. This could be coincidence, but Colin thought it was proof, instead.

  And the approach he’d planned to take with a stranger named Caradoc Buckland would not work, Colin realized, now that he knew Toller Hasloch was—against all expectation—involved.

  “Forgive me,” Colin said politely. “I’m just wondering why you’re telling me all this?” He’d learn more by being irritating than through conciliation—Hasloch had always had a tendency to make speeches.

  “Because,” Hasloch growled, placing his hands flat on the desk and leaning up out of his chair across it, “I want you to know how thoroughly you failed, you son-of-a-bitch.”

  He’d hoped to irritate Hasloch, and it seemed he had. Behind him, Colin felt Buckland straighten to even greater attention.

  “So I did,” Colin agreed, still calmly. “I suppose I should say I’m happy to see you’re looking well?”

  “Because it gets you off the guilt-ridden White Light hook?” Hasloch snapped. “Does it, Colin? Does it really?”

  He got to his feet and began to pace, but Colin’s answer seemed to restore his good spirits. “You tried to kill me—I suppose your Masters gave you hell for that. Did they throw you out? Or did you remain upon sufferance, atoning through good works? Tell me all about it, Colin. Tell me about all the ‘good’ you’ve done in the world—is it any match for what I have done?

  “Remember our first conversation, all those years ago? I told you then what I intended to do, and I’ve done it: my patrons ripped America’s heart out with the Kennedy assassination, destroyed its soul with Vietnam, and shattered its mind with Nixon’s betrayal of trust.”

  Hasloch must be both secure and confident to speak so freely in front of Buckland … or else have an unimaginably strong hold over the younger man. At the moment, it didn’t matter which.

  “And we haven’t been idle since: read the newspapers, Cold Warrior—this is the eve of our triumph! Your American Eagle is dead and the White Eagle of Thule will triumph in my lifetime. What can you possibly set against that?” Hasloch demanded.

  “Walls,” Colin MacLaren answered. Hasloch’s rhetoric was only the expression of his own bleakest fears, and he’d had decades to come to terms with them, and find what comfort he could. “The Berlin Wall is down—and as for Vietnam, you should visit more of your hometown landmarks. The Memorial is supreme proof that hearts can heal and minds can mend—and souls can be redeemed. Even yours, Toller.”

  Hasloch stopped his pacing and laughed harshly. “Not by a tired old man who refuses to face the darkness in his own soul!” He returned to his desk and lowered himself into his chair, regaining his composure with a visible effort. “But I’ve been indulging myself at your expense. You had some business with my aide, and I haven’t allowed you to conduct it. Please, feel free.” He gestured toward Caradoc.

  This conversation was not going as it would have if Hasloch had really known the business that brought him here. Was it possible that Hasloch did not connect him with Rowan Moorcock? There was no reason he should. Even if she had been questioned, they were as unlikely to have questioned her about him as she would be to volunteer the information that she knew him. Ha
sloch knew him in another connection entirely.

  Colin said nothing, playing for time.

  Hasloch raised his brows inquiringly at Buckland. Colin saw the young man frown, thinking hard.

  “I suppose it’s about Julian—ah, Pilgrim, I suppose I should say. But I’m not sure why Jourdemayne didn’t come herself,” Buckland said. “I was looking forward to seeing her again, actually.”

  Pilgrim? What business did the Thule Group have with Truth’s half-brother? He’d been institutionalized since shortly before Truth had come to see Colin for the first time, and Colin was pretty sure he still was. From what little she’d told him, it was for the best. The child Colin had known had grown into a monster—the faint shadow of malice that had marred Thorne’s essentially sunny nature reaching full unchecked flower in his son. What business could the Cincinnatus Group have with Pilgrim?

  “I’m sure you can think of a number of reasons she wouldn’t want to see you,” Colin said, getting to his feet. He blessed the assumption that he was here on Truth’s business, as it concealed so neatly his own purposes. All that remained was for him to get out of here before they realized they’d been hooked by a red herring.

  “She can hardly have thought it would be more impressive,” Hasloch said mockingly. “Sending you, I mean. Not that you’re not impressive in your way, of course,” he added. “A triumph of superannuation, if nothing else.”

  Both he and Buckland seemed to know what Hasloch was talking about, but that wouldn’t last long. “Spare me the trite insults,” Colin said. “I’d worry more about my own plans than Truth’s if I were you, Toller—at least based on past performance. I suppose you don’t need me to spell out the message? And now, I’ll bid both of you fascinating gentlemen adieu. Don’t trouble yourselves to escort me. I can find my own way out.”

  Colin was a little surprised to reach the street unmolested, and a few blocks’ walk brought him to the attention of a cruising cab. He took it downtown and picked another cab at random from a queue before heading for his final destination. Even his exhaustion could not tempt him to forgo such elementary precautions, though he doubted that Hasloch would bother to have him followed. Both of them knew there was a second act to come—and if Hasloch were very clever, he would realize what it was. Rowan was a student at Taghkanic, after all.

  And Hasloch was clever.

  The Airport Holiday Inn was a soulless cracker box, set along a roadway named for a famous American traitor. Its accommodations were duplicated in a thousand locations in half a dozen countries, as anonymous as a phone booth. Colin threw his coat over a chair and sat down on the bed, kicking off his shoes. He slipped the pendant between the mattress and the box spring; the concealment would delay a cursory search, though not a professional one.

  What came now? If Toller were interested in Pilgrim, Colin owed Truth a warning—but Colin had gained Dylan’s promise to stay out of things through the simple threat of involving Truth, who, though in England, was only a phone call away. He knew that wouldn’t hold Dylan back for long, but if Colin called Truth now, Colin knew Dylan would consider himself absolved of his promise immediately. And with Toller Hasloch involved, that was far too dangerous.

  Colin frowned, pondering. Pilgrim had been transferred to Fall River last year, after Truth had met Nathaniel. He picked up the telephone and dialed.

  “Etheling.”

  “Nathaniel, it’s Colin.” He thought of telling Nathaniel that Hasloch was alive, then realized that Nathaniel must already know—that he would have kept track of matters involving Hasloch when Colin had not. Nathaniel had certainly known Hasloch was alive down all the long years when the belief in his own guilt had tormented Colin.

  But such was my penance, and in the turning of the Wheel all things are understood. So mote it be.

  Colin bowed his head, schooling his rebellious spirit to acceptance. It was a moment before he could go on.

  “I have some information for you, Nathaniel. You’ll remember Toller Hasloch?”

  There was a moment of electric silence before Nathaniel answered. “Yes, Colin,” he said gently.

  “When I spoke to him today—” Colin found himself pausing, and forced himself to go on. “When I spoke to him, he made the assumption that I was acting on Truth Palmer’s behalf. He mentioned Pilgrim—in the vaguest possible way, of course. I don’t want to sound a false alarm, but—”

  “Better a thousand false alarms than no true warning,” Nathaniel said somberly. “Pilgrim is here, safe in my care. He has no visitors and would not know them if he did. What is Hasloch’s interest?”

  “Unfortunately, he didn’t tell me. I’ll have to ask him the next time I see him,” Colin said. There was a silence.

  “Is there anything else I need to know?” Nathaniel asked.

  Colin debated. But if he did not want to involve Truth, someone must know. “Claire’s cousin, Rowan Moorcock, disappeared while investigating the Thulists, and the trail leads right to Toller Hasloch and something called the Cincinnatus Group.”

  “Ah.” There was no inflection in Nathaniel’s voice. “Good hunting, then, Colin. And take care.”

  “As much as I can, old friend,” Colin answered. “Walk in the Light, Nathaniel.”

  “And you, Colin. Always.”

  When Colin hung up the phone, his duty discharged, he felt a great wave of weariness sweep over him, taking his strength as the riptide takes the unwary swimmer. He’d lived a quarter of a century wishing his murder of Hasloch undone, and when, in one searing moment, he found that it had been, Colin’s guilt had been transformed as well. Hasloch was evil, a creature forged out of the dark heart of creation for only one task, just as Colin had been forged as a sword and shield to defy him. Colin could no more avoid his destiny than Hasloch could. They had been fated to be enemies before either of them had been born.

  What might the world have been like if Hasloch had not been born into it? If the men and women trusted by a nation had been trustworthy in truth, and had destroyed what they had been sent to destroy? Instead, blinded by petty fears, dazzled by the hope of money, of power, the defenders of the West had betrayed the Light for a thousand base and unworthy reasons, many of them without even knowing the true nature of the war they fought.

  Colin lay down on top of the bedspread, a part of him expecting to be able to feel the necklace even through the mattress, like the princess in the fairy tale. A part of his mind expected the phone to ring, though even Nathaniel did not know where he was.

  But it didn’t, and he slept.

  The Adept stood on a green hillside covered with tiny blue flowers whose scent was like homecoming and the morning. He had always come back here, in the interregnums between a thousand lives, seeking his absolution, the sign that he had been forgiven at last. In the distance, he could see the golden towers of the great Temple in which he had died, given the Cup of Nepenthe to expiate his crime. Life after life he had been bound to the Wheel—arrogance was always his besetting sin: pride, curiosity, and a belief that Power was above the Law.

  Power. What his soul craved. Power, always power, and mastery over the world that held him … .

  Colin awoke with a start, wisps of the dream still echoing through his consciousness. He had been taught that the gates of Time opened to the Adept in the shadows of Death, so that in one brief moment the pattern that stretched back through more lives than this could be glimpsed in its entirety. For the first time in his existence, Colin looked toward that moment with dread—what would he see, when he looked back across the gulf of Time that stretched back before his birth?

  He sat up, running his hand through his hair. It was dusk: the service-strip signs made a garish multicolored jumble in the road below his window. The memory that was almost a fantasy dispelled like smoke, leaving behind it only a terrible sense of responsibility.

  Sleeping in the middle of the day. They say that’s a sign of age. But the nap had not refreshed him. Colin sat on the edge of the hotel b
ed and gazed out the window at the airport sprawl, his mind as intractable as a rebellious beast of burden. He shook his head, half-dazed with lingering exhaustion. He didn’t have time for this. He had to make some kind of a plan to deal with Hasloch.

  He knew now that Rowan was a prisoner of what lurked behind the facade of the Cincinnatus Group. It was only a matter of time until Hasloch discovered that Colin had come to Washington looking for her. Hasloch would never believe in a deal that traded Rowan’s liberty for silence, and, more, he would not accept it. There was too much history between Hasloch and Colin, too much anger.

  A lifetime’s bitter dealing in the art of the possible made Colin consider the other thing he might trade: Claire for Rowan. Claire would consent to it, Colin was certain, and somewhere in the mechanics of the switch it should be possible to win both women’s freedom.

  But if he could plan a double cross, Hasloch could plan one too. Reluctantly, Colin rejected the idea. There was too little chance that it would succeed. He did not even know if Rowan was still alive to barter for.

  Wearily, Colin rubbed at his eyes. The wisps of his dream lingered, tormenting him with a faint bewildering guilt and a sense of corruption, liabilities he could not afford. He could not proceed in the task before him without a pure heart and very clean hands.

  But what was his task? To save Rowan Moorcock, or to destroy Toller Hasloch? Colin rubbed at his temples. So little to choose between the two goals in one sense—and in another, the whole gulf of damnation lay between them.

  Where was the utility in saving one life while the Shadow took thousands?

  Where was the triumph in letting the Shadow seize a thousand single lives while saying no single life was worth saving?

  Who saveth one life, it is as if he has saved the whole world. Out of the stillness of Colin’s heart the answer came, and with that answer, the perfection of his life’s work. The nagging sense of unkept promises faded, leaving clarity in its wake. This was the path that had been set out for him, a thousand lives ago.