by Jean Lorrah
“He is at Norgu’s castle,” Wulfston explained.
“Norgu!” exclaimed Telek. “That bastard. He’s the one who sold us to the slavers!”
One of the other sailors added, “My lord, we were there, and did not see Lord Lenardo.”
“Norgu didn’t want you to. But Lenardo is there, all right. I’ve been in contact with him. Do you know of anyone else who survived? We don’t want to leave anyone stranded in Africa.”
“No, my lord, ” said Telek. “It seemed all the others with Adept or Reading powers were killed in the storm.”
“As if we were their special targets,” Zanos confirmed bitterly.
Nevertheless, it felt so good to speak his native language, to be among people from home, that Wulfston wished they could take the time to share the stories of their adventures. But Lenardo was waiting.
Within the hour they were on the road, the Night Queen crew eager to act against the man who had sold them into the slave pens.
They rode until an hour past sunset, then made camp. If they started early the next day, they could get close enough to Norgu’s castle that only a short ride the next day would take them there, fresh and ready to fight if necessary. It would probably be necessary; it was unlikely that Norgu did not know there was an army approaching his castle.
Tadisha and Kamas contacted Ashuru, who was on the road now, moving toward them. Her army should join theirs the next day.
They had not yet crossed the border into Norgu’s lands, but that border was visible from the hill where they had posted sentries. After the evening meal, Wulfston climbed the hill, trying to Read to Norgu’s castle. It was a foolish gesture; he could not Read even as far as he could see from the top of the hill in the moonlight. Was Lenardo Reading their progress? Why didn’t he make contact?
Wulfston exchanged passwords with the sentries, then walked down the hill a short way to where someone had felled a tree to form a bench. The view in the moonlight was exquisite, but he was in a little hollow where he could not be seen from above or below; he suspected that this must be a favorite courting spot for young people from the village whose fires twinkled below.
He felt Tadisha’s mind touch his, and gave her a wordless welcome. In moments she came to sit beside him.
“Can you See to Norgu’s castle from here?” he asked.
“Not without going out of body,” she said in a soft voice that would not carry beyond their sheltered hollow. “You should not be attempting to See it, either. We want Norgu to think our movement is simply positioning our troops against the Savishnon assault. And who knows what Savishnon Seers might make of your thoughts?”
“From what Barak showed us, they simply take anything foreign as something to be destroyed.”
“Let’s not talk about the Savishnon,” said Tadisha, “or Norgu, either. Is your land so beautiful in the moonlight, Lord Wulfston?”
“The moon shines on the whole world,” he replied. “Its light reveals beauty everywhere.” He turned to look at her face, silvered, with golden glints in those eyes that glowed like a cat’s.
She turned her face to his, but before he dared follow his own desire, she leaned toward him, murmuring,
“Then you could learn to love this land as much…” Her voice trailed off as her lips brushed his, producing almost a spark as he started back.
Tadisha straightened, peering at him. “Wulfston, are you afraid of me?”
“Of you? No. Of another woman trying to control me? I will always be wary of that.”
“I’m not trying to control you!” she said indignantly. “I like you!”
“And you would like me to stay in Africa,” he observed.
“This is your homeland.”
He shook his head. “No, Tadisha. This is the home of my ancestors, but it is not my home. I understand now why my parents never wanted to return to Africa; they would not have wanted me here, where Chulaika and Z’Nelia use me as a pawn in their games of power, and you and your mother- I’m tired of women pushing me around!”
Tadisha smiled. “You sound just like Kamas!”
“I understand just what he’s going through,” he told her seriously. “My parents often left me in the care of my sister until they were killed, and then Nerius took me home and handed me over to Aradia. It’s difficult to explain. I don’t want you to think I don’t love her. I do. And she loves me, but she is only now beginning to accept me as her equal. And I don’t know if she’ll ever stop trying to manipulate me.”
“And you think I am trying to manipulate you?” Tadisha asked. Wulfston heard what sounded like honest amazement in her voice. Then she said thoughtfully, “I must be very careful how I treat Kamas. I would not want his having an older sister with stronger powers to confuse his thinking. I certainly don’t want my younger brother to have trouble understanding the difference between manipulation and caring.”
Queen Ashuru caught up with them on the road the next day, bringing good news. “The combined army of the Assembly has driven off the first assault of the Savishnon. They have turned eastward, traveling across the plain rather than rampaging through our lands. But such an army needs supplies. When they grow hungry, they will turn southward again. Can there be any hope of gaining Norgu’s cooperation?”
“Perhaps,” suggested Wulfston, “now that we know why he hates his mother we may persuade him to join us against Z’Nelia.”
The next day they reached Terza, the small city grown up around Norgu’s castle. No one paid them much attention as they rode up the main street toward the castle walls. Obviously Norgu frequently had distinguished visitors.
But while the streets bustled with morning activity, the castle was strangely quiet. The gates were still closed, and no guards stood watch atop the walls. Drifting high above the castle’s turrets Wulfston saw-
No, it can’t be! Surely not the eagle he had seen at the lake. Yet curiosity prompted him to try to see through this bird’s eyes, for it commanded a view of the entire castle.
At his mental touch, the eagle broadcast such a rupulsion that he was rocked in his saddle. Obviously not the same bird!
Yet the memory of seeing through the eyes of that eagle prompted another memory: the view Norgu had given the Assembly of the Savishnon armies. Strange… it had been much like the eagle’s view, from above. Had Norgu also used an eagle, perhaps this one-?
Tadisha, who had been watching and Reading him, now turned her Seer’s powers toward the castle.
Wulfston opened his own powers to the full-
Where was Lenardo? Why didn’t he greet them?
Tadisha, Ashuru, and Kamas all were Seeing now, for they met no minds guarding against intrusion.
Wulfston Read with them the empty courtyard, the gates closed but unbarred, the empty stables-
And inside, empty rooms. No servants, no retainers… and no guests.
But in Norgu’s main hall, devastation.
The place had been firestormed.
Charred and blistered remains of furnishings surrounded a blasted corpse. And Norgu, seated in the midst of the ruin, physically unharmed but mentally blank, his eyes fixed in a glassy stare, seeing nothing.
Chapter Seven
Wulfston moved toward Norgu, who was obviously in shock. Ashuru brushed past him. “Ill care for the boy. It’s his mind that needs healing.”
She was right; people injured physically needed Wulfston’s skills. He spared a glance at the corpse to confirm his expectations; it was Sukuru.
Then where were Chulaika and Chaiku? And where was Lenardo? Why had the Master Reader not given a mental call for help?
Traylo and Arlus ran out of the main hall, then back to Wulfston, coaxing him to follow. Unable to Read anything to guide him, he accepted the dogs’ direction through the corridors and down a stair that narrowed as it wound into darkness. For the first time, he experienced the Readers gift of movement without hesitation when there was no glimmer of light to see by.
Norgu’s
dungeons stank of agony and death. By the time he came to the bottom of the stairs, Wulfston was holding his breath. Why had Traylo and Arlus brought him to this empty place?
He could Read no one there… alive.
The dogs, though, whimpered and fussed. Wulfston concentrated on a rushlight on the wall, until it burst into smoky flame. In the dim light he saw two bodies on the floor.
Chulaika and Chaiku, mother and son wrapped in one another’s anus.
No spark of life-?
They were breathing! He could see no injury; they appeared merely to be unconscious. Then why couldn’t he Read-?
Wulfston grasped Chulaika’s shoulder, intending to turn her over.
At the touch, — something grabbed at his mind! The more he fought, the more he was dragged into seething chaos. His mental shout to Tadisha and Kamas for help was swallowed up in the maelstrom, along with every thought, every memory, that made him a separate being!
Chulaika, Chaiku, and Sukuru stood before Norgu. Sukuru was defeated, Chuklaika controlling Chaiku’s powers to hide her thoughts. Norgu must not find out how much power his half-brother had, or he would either kill the boy or take him from her to use as his own weapon.
For Chaiku was Chulaika’s weapon, carefully crafted to use against Z’Nelia. No one was going to take her son from her before the time was ripe!
“I don’t care what you do, Sukuru,” Norgu was saying. “You’re worthless to me. Shall I kill you? You have been of service to me, even though you did not intend it. You might have brought Lord Wulfston, but you also brought me the hostage who will deliver him right into my hands. Wulfston’s coming here, thinking to take Lenardo from me as easily as I took him from you.”
The young Mover turned his attention to Chulaika. “What do you think, dear aunt, betrayer of my mother? You chose this stranger from a distant land to be your champion. A fine champion! The only way you could get him here was to kidnap his brother. Are your charms fading, Chulaika? Couldn’t you seduce the Beast Lord as you did my father?”
Chulaika stood impassively. Let Norgu reveal just how much he knew of her plan. “You’d never help me,” she said.
“Why should I share the throne of the Zionae with you and your bastard?” Norgu demanded. “You pinned your hopes on that poor little baby-you thought he’d have my father’s powers. But he’s just like you, without power, a weakling. He can’t even talk! That’s the kind of offspring you produce, Chulaika.”
Norgu lounged back on his throne in an attitude of disrespect, waiting for Chulaika’s response. She refused to give him one. Finally he prodded, “Should I let you go with Sukuru? You’d make a good family. Bunch of weaklings. Maybe I should make you marry him. “
Suddenly Norgu sat up straight. “What-?”
His servants were running in the corridor outside the main hall, men dashing up the great staircase toward the room where Lenardo was kept.
Chulaika Saw with Norgu, Lenardo on his feet, braced for the onslaught. The white man had some minor Mover’s powers, certainly enough to handle those servants.
But not Norgu! From the young Mover’s mind, the command to sleep struck the stranger lord. The man fought it easily until Norgu backed it with his Mover’s powers, physically overpowering the Seer. The white man slumped into unconsciousness. The servants entered the room, and began to carry Lenardo out-
Where? Why?
Norgu had seemed surprised when the servants appeared. Yet it must have been on his order.
Chulaika stared at Norgu, and suddenly he turned, fixing his eyes on her.
It wasn’t Norgu!
Chulaika’s Seer’s powers were very dim; she had recognized only the overlay of Norgu up to that moment, but in those eyes she recognized the look, the madness.
Norgu’s hand rose clumsily, still fighting the force within his body.
Chulaika screamed and flung herself behind Sukuru, shielding Chaiku with her body.
The thunderbolt struck Sukuru, killing him instantly.
“No!” Norgu howled, fighting the demon in possession of his body.
Chulaika slithered out from beneath Sukuru’s charred body and ran, dragging Chaiku by the hand. The boy began to wail in fear. “Quiet!” she hissed, and his sounds stopped, although tears still rolled down his face.
Where could she hide?
Thunderbolts were striking randomly throughout the castle as the witch possessing Norgu improved her control.
Hangings burst into fire, and servants dropped in their tracks.
Chulaika scurried into the kitchen, where a number of Norgu’s staff cowered, waiting for orders. “Under the table!” Chulaika told them, diving beneath it herself, clutching Chaiku close. The servants crowded in around them, their terror providing a psychic shield. Chulaika took Chaiku in her arms, calmed him, and entered the mother/son bond in which she could brace her son’s Movers powers. It made them nearly invisible to Seers.
But their attacker had firm control of Norgu’s powers now, and was methodically destroying his castle.
The kitchen fireplace was large enough to roast a buffalo. When the fire leaped from it to the table, the servants scattered, Chulaika and Chaiku with them.
Carrying her son, Chulaika ran with the servant who spilled out into the hall, until they came to the stairway leading down to the dungeon.
Praying desperately to Shangonu that the intruder had not been able to follow her, she fled down the winding stairs, stumbling in the darkness, catching the rhythm until the stairs ended abruptly and she hurtled into darkness, falling onto a damp stone floor.
Breathless, she clung to Chaiku, making him enforce the Mover’s shield with all his strength, a strength amazing for a child so young, but still a child’s strength. In moments, the effort dragged them both into unconsciousness.
“Lord Wulfston! Wulfston, come out of it!”
The voice came from a great distance, calling somebody she vaguely knew.
“Let go! Come out of the woman’s mind, Wulfston!”
He gasped with the mental anguish of releasing memories that for long moments had been his, but Tadisha’s mind was there to support him.
He was kneeling, frozen, with his hand on Chulaika’s shoulder. Tadisha’s warm hand touched his cold one, lifting it from the contact.
The weakness of relief flooded him as he forced himself up on legs gone numb. “Thank you. I’ll be all right now.”
“What happened?” Tadisha asked. “We couldn’t find you! Finally the dogs led me down here.”
“The woman is Chulaika,” Wulfston replied, staring down at her. She was not veiled now. He had seen that face before, in Barak’s vision. “Z’Nelia’s twin sister.”
Tadisha used her Seeing power to examine the woman and her child. “They’re just unconscious. We’ll take them upstairs and put them to bed. Which is where you belong, too.”
“No.” he insisted, “I’m all right now. But Z’Nelia has Lenardo.”
“Z’Nelia!”
“She took over Norgu’s body, used his powers to destroy his own castle, and put Lenardo into Adept sleep. Apparently she used Norgu’s servants to carry Lenardo away-I don’t know where, because Chulaika doesn’t. But Norgu had the power to do Z’Nelia’s will, as your body didn’t, Tadisha.”
“But what was he doing out of body? Norgu has never shown much interest in expanding his Seer’s powers.”
“He was not out of body,” Wulfston replied. “Z’Nelia has learned to take over a Mover who is awake.
That’s why
Norgu was in shock when we got here. He couldn’t fight her off. It was a harsh lesson, Tadisha, to have his own powers wrested from his control.”
“Mother finally brought him out of shock,” said Tadisha, “and he is sleeping.”
By this time they were up the stairs. Wulfston drew deep breaths of clean air, then asked, “Where is my help needed?”
“We’ve put the worst injured in the main hall.”
There wer
e the usual casualties of Adept attack: burns, broken bones, shock. Within hours, all were in healing sleep, and those uninjured had already buried the dead, as was the custom here. Wulfston, Tadisha, Kamas, Barak, and Ashuru met around the dining table.
When Ashuru heard what Wulfston had learned from Chulaika’s memories, she said, “We are in grave danger indeed. Z’Nelia’s powers grow daily. Perhaps she is now stronger than all of us together. Yet if we do nothing to stop her, she may learn more and yet more, becoming ever more powerful.”
“She seeks a confrontation with me,” said Wulfston, “or she would not have taken Lenardo. She must think I’m here to take her throne. If only she understood that I don’t want it! If we had found Lenardo here today, he and I would have helped you against the Savishnon, and then gone home. Now I must fight Z’Nelia for Lenardo. I ask your aid.”
“You have it,” said Ashuru. “Z’Nelia made herself my enemy when she attacked my daughter.”
But Chulaika and Norgu were another matter. Z’Nelia’s sister and her son were awake the next morning, and Wulfston confronted them with all he had learned from the unexpected mental contact. “You were the real force in the plan to bring me to Africa,” he told her, “not Sukuru. You merely used him to keep my attention from you, so I would not find out that you are Z’Nelia’s sister.”
“Since I have no powers of my own,” Chulaika replied, “why would I try to oppose Z’Nelia?”
“Ah, but you have a power,” Wulfston told her, “a unique power in my experience, and, I suspect, that of the Movers and Seers here as well. That is why you have been able to hide… your ability to direct the powers of others!”
Pure fury burned in Chulaika’s eyes. Wulfston saw her glance at Barak. Now her secret was a part of history.
He, too, looked to the Grioka, asking a silent question. “Go on,” the old man said. “I think, Lord Wulfston, that you have something of the Grioka’s talent yourself.”
“If so,” said Wulfston, “I haven’t known how to use it. I should have known you were lying, Chulaika, that day on Freedom Island. You made us all think the man with the knife was attacking Chaiku. But no matter how drunk he was, why would he publicly attack a little boy? He was just drunk enough to See and yet not think. Yes, a minor Seer, who suddenly Saw through your veil the face of his enemy, Z’Nelia!”