Wraiths of Time

  Even the Talent had not kept the line free from the taint of ambition and greed. Perhaps that was why it ran so thin in this generation. Misused, or forced, that kind of power was lost. Perverted, it could turn upon the very one who tried to make it weapon or tool. Perhaps Idieze had chosen that shrine of infamy now with good reason. In such places, where emotion to a high degree had been released in some desperate and bloody action, there was wont to cling, even for generations, a residue of evil that could obstruct the clear sight of the Talented, leave them open to an invasion that was to be feared above all things. Only she was not Ashake, so such an invasion need not be feared.

  Her bearers turned a corner, then another. Finally the stretcher was set down, not on the floor, but apparently on a couch, for the surface gave a little under Tallahassee’s weight. She heard them retreat, yet she was certain that she was not alone. And she strained her ears to catch the faintest sound.

  “Ashake?” No “Great Lady” now. Idieze might have been addressing one in house bondage.

  Close upon that call of name came a vicious, openhanded slap which Tallahassee had not been expecting. Without thinking she opened her eyes. Idieze leaned over her, smiling, her own eyes very wide and alive.

  “I thought so,” she observed. “Khasti said that the sleep-spray would not hold you too long. You have been trying to play a game, but the time is past for games, Sister.” She stressed the last word. “You would never grant me that name, would you, Ashake? Nor stretch out your hand in any welcome. You ‘saw me’ when I came to you. Now I see you!”

  Her lips parted in what was nearer a snarl than smile, showing small pointed teeth, very white against the red of her lips.

  “I see you,” she repeated, lingering over those words, as if from the saying of them she achieved some manner of contentment. “But will anyone continue to see you for long? Think on that, Sister!”

  Tallahassee made her face as impassive as she could and gave no answer. Idieze’s spite might be a weakness. And any weakness she must note and ready herself to use.

  Idieze had turned and now approached a table as Tallahassee moved her head so she could watch. She had been right. The Rod had been brought with her. There lay the case in which she had placed it at Jayta’s bidding. Idieze’s fingers rested for a moment on the lid, but she made no effort to open it. She only looked back over her shoulder at her captive.

  “You see—this too we have, in spite of all your struggles to keep it to hand. And very easy it was to take both you—and it. I have heard so much prating of the Power, the Talent. All my life people have been in awe of this thing, the force of which could not be proven. See how easy it was for us to defeat you?” She laughed. “I spoke of other roads, Sister—now we walk them. And there is nothing you can do to retrace time and change that, nothing!”

  She ran her hand in a greedy gesture down the length of the case. Tallahassee thought that for all Idieze’s spoken disdain for the Talent, she was still wary enough to let the Rod remain hidden; she was not so sure inwardly of the freedom of her other path as she would have the world believe. Tallahassee could sense the other’s aching desire, the wish that it might be her own hand which could lift that symbol from its bed, that she need not work through Userkof.

  Even as Tallahassee’s mind pictured Ashake’s cousin, so did he suddenly come into view. He lacked the height of Herihor and, though those two might have matched year-to-year in age, Userkof’s flabby body and petulant expression seemed to add a toll of extra time. He did not wear a uniform, but rather loose trousers, fastened at the ankle, and a sleeveless over-jacket of white, much covered with elaborate embroidery. Also, his head was bare of the wig preferred by the court. Instead, he had a twist of flaming red scarf about his skull, which was a mistake, for it accented somehow the loose gaping of his thick lips, those jowls that softened and weakened his jawline.

  “Maskaq said …”

  Then his eyes went beyond Idieze and he saw Tallahassee. First they widened in what she could only believe was real surprise, then he laughed, a low chuckle.

  “So you did it!”

  Idieze was watching him closely, and Tallahassee did not miss the shadow of contempt in her face as she answered:

  “My Lord, did you then so doubt the success of our plan?”

  “There were many obstacles. She was in her own palace—guarded,” he answered. Now he advanced to where Tallahassee lay and stared down at her before he laughed again.

  “Greetings, Cousin.”

  Idieze came to his side. “She does not answer. But she will learn, will she not, my Lord?”

  His tongue crept out, swept over his loose lower lip. He might have been reaching into a dish that held some sweetmeat he savored.

  “Oh, yes, she will answer!” he agreed.

  He reached out a thick-fingered hand and flicked Tallahassee’s chin. There was something about him of a small boy who had been dared to some act and must carry through. Idieze must be full of triumph at this moment, but Userkof, for all his seething malice and spite, was still uncertain of success.

  “My Lord.” Idieze’s hand on his arm drew him away from their prisoner, back toward the table. “See what lies here, ready for your hand!”

  Her fingers went to the box and she loosened the catches, throwing back the lid to display the Rod. The pleased malice faded from her husband’s face as he looked down. Instead he drew a breath so deep even Tallahassee could hear the faint hiss of it.

  “It is yours, take it!” Idieze’s expression held more than a shadow of contempt now, which Userkof did not see. He was too intent upon the Rod.

  “I have—have not the Talent …” he said, not as if he spoke to the eager woman, but rather as if he drew some warning from his own thoughts.

  “Talent!” spat Idieze. “What need have you for that, my Lord! Has not Khasti given us and will give us yet again, much more force than these superstitious, meddling priests can conceive of controlling? You are of the Blood, you have only to pick up this, and you can command the Empire. Are you such a nothing”—her voice grew shriller, shrewish—“that you cannot do even this one small thing to gain a throne? You say you are a man, at least prove that in this much.”

  He had sucked in his bulbous lips, now he wiped his hands down the front of his jerkin as if they were wet and he might not be able to grip anything in them tightly enough.

  “Khasti is coming.” Idieze moved the Rod box a fraction closer to Userkof. “Meet him with the Rod. Do you now see what that will mean? He thinks too well of himself, even though his plan for getting this was a failure. You must make him understand that you are of the Blood.”

  Once more Userkof wiped his hands down his sides. He glanced uncertainly at Idieze, then back to the box and what it held.

  “Show him,” she hissed. “This you must do—or he will not be the tool we need. Rather will he think and plan for himself! He failed, but we have succeeded. Prove that to him, husband—and then you shall hold him in the hollow of your hand. For there must not be two minds and two wills when you come to power—only one!”

  Yes, yours, Tallahasse thought. However much Idieze urged, it would seem that Userkof was haunted by fear. As well he might be, Ashake’s memory prompted. No one, not even of the Blood, could master the Rod unless there was that within them which answered to the undefinable thing that kept the ancient belief strong through all these centuries of study and testing.

  Userkof put out one hand, and Tallahassee noted that it shook. How strong Idieze’s will must be to bring him to such an action. She was not sure what the result might be, but that it would benefit Userkof—no.

  Perhaps he had screwed up his small store of courage to its greatest point for he made a sudden grab with his right hand, wrapping his fingers about the staff a hands-breadth below the lion mask, snatching the Rod from the padded box.

  For a single moment he held it before him, even as Tallahassee had done when the soldiers had broken into the ruin. Then—he
screamed, high and shrill, more like a woman than a man. The Rod fell from his hold, struck against the floor and rolled.

  But Userkof’s hand—still held stiffly before him … The skin on his fingers was as red as if blood had been drawn. Slowly the flesh faded to an ashy grey. He screamed again as his fingers thinned into claws, fused so that he could not flex them.

  Idieze shrank back, her face open for the first time to terror, staring at that horror of a hand, while Userkof’s screams became peals of mindless agony. His wife nearly stumbled over the Rod, started to kick out at it, and then stopped, as if she feared now with a deathly terror any contact with the thing. Userkof sank to his knees, his body shaking. He still screamed even as he slid completely to the floor.

  People burst into the room—guards first, their hand weapons drawn and ready. But when they saw what lay beside their master on the floor, looked at the ruin of his hand, they backed away. Their withdrawal cleared a path for another man.

  Khasti!

  He was as tall as Jason and spare of figure. His features were finer than Userkof’s—he might well be a son of the Blood, though who he was remained an unsolved mystery. He could be traced no farther back than ten years when he had been discovered by a desert patrol beside a dead camel, himself barely alive. But he was of Empire stock and not a northern barbarian, and on his recovery he had managed to so impress the Commander of the fortress to which he had been taken that that officer sent him to New Napata with a recommendation to General Nemos.

  From his first coming fortune seemed to have favored him. In spite of the fact that he made no close friends, nor confided in anyone, when he wished he could bind men to him. And no one denied the quick dexterity of his mind. Not even Zyhlarz could probe the extent of his intelligence. From the beginning of his life in New Napata, he shunned all that was of the Temple. Also, he allowed others in time to see that he disdained and held of small account what he deemed unprovable superstition, an attitude that attracted and soothed the egos of those who could not hope to ever enter the ruling center of the Empire.

  Now he knelt beside Userkof, putting out his hand to clasp the wrist of that shriveled horror. Having given the claw fingers what seemed a single searching glance, he turned his attention to the man whose screams had died into a whimpering. Stooping, he stared straight into Userkof’s distended eyes and murmured something so low-voiced that only the injured man might have heard. The rest of that company, including Idieze, kept well distant, as if the Prince was truly cursed, and that curse in turn might well envelope them all.

  Userkof’s eyelids slowly closed. Then his head rolled limply to one side, his mouth slack, a thread of drool dripping from his open lips. Khasti took quick command.

  “Take him to his chamber!” He snapped fingers at the guards who were very plainly loath to approach at all, but could not disobey. It was only when they bore the Prince from the room that Khasti looked about—at Idieze, at the Rod, and finally and most piercingly at Tallahassee.

  There was nothing to be read in that stare he turned on her. And that very fact began to arouse within her the fear she thought she controlled. He showed no emotion, she could not guess at his thoughts. It was as if she were an object, not a living being. That quality in him was what Ashake had feared most in Khasti—now Tallahassee found it gripped her also.

  So, Princess …” Though he still looked to Tallahassee it was Idieze he addressed. “You have been busy, it would seem.”

  Perhaps that cool note of superiority that was plain in his voice snapped Idieze out of her state of shock. Her lips tightened as she drew herself up, once more self-controlled.

  “We have succeeded,” she returned. “There lies what your aide was sent to fetch and did not.” With her foot rather than her hand she indicated the Rod.

  “With what seems an unhappy result. My lord Prince has not managed to control it.”

  Khasti knelt on one knee again to inspect the Rod, bringing from the breast of his long grey robe something so small that he could conceal it in the palm of his hand. This he passed down the length of the staff, being careful, Tallahassee noted, not to come within touching distance. Twice he made that passage, up and down, and then opened his fist for an intent examination of a metal object no larger than the matchbox of her own time.

  A single frown line deepened between his brows as he continued to study what he held.

  “Radiation.” The word he uttered was more for himself than his hearers. “But what?…”

  Khasti gained his feet in a single lithe movement, came to Tallahassee’s side with one stride. Now his hands loosed the bonds that had kept her captive.

  “What would you do?” Idieze was beside him. “She—”

  “It would seem, if all accounts are the truth,” and this time his arrogant disdain of Idieze was very plain, “that the Princess Ashake can handle this symbol of might and show no harm therefrom. I would have proof of that here and now. Or would you, Princess, care to raise it from the floor?”

  The last of her wrappings gone, Tallahassee sat up, only the thin night garment flimsy about her. She was stiff, and her back ached from her long imprisonment in one position. But she swung her feet to the floor, keeping her face as carefully blank as she could.

  “Can you pick that up?” Khasti came directly to the point.

  “I am of the Blood and the Upper Way,” she returned obliquely. Tallahassee was not sure what method of control they might exert on her. But suppose she got the Rod in her hands, she might then be able to exert pressure on them in implied threat, though Ashake memory gave her only a very hazy and incomplete hint of how that symbol of authority was put into use.

  “Do not! She will curse us and we shall die!” Idieze caught at his arm, dragged him back a little. “You have freed her—with the Rod in her hand you do not know what she can do!”

  “She will do very little,” Khasti returned calmly. “I will see to that. Now!”

  In one hand he still held the object he had used to examine the Rod, but in the other he had, with the speed of a conjuror, produced something else, a glittering disk he spun out through the air, twirling it on the end of a chain. Against her will Tallahassee’s eyes were drawn to that. Over her dropped the same compulsion that had held her to another’s will back in the museum.

  So compelled, she arose jerkily, not even mistress of her own body, and then stooped to close her hand on the Rod. The shaft felt warm, almost alive in her grasp. There was something she could do—should do—but Ashake memory was not strong enough to tell her. No, as Khasti’s prisoner she must take up the Rod and carry it, three—four tottering steps forward, to place it once more within the guarding case.

  “Well done, Great Lady.” He made a sneer of her title as he leaned forward to push down the lid, seal the Rod from sight. “So it is true, you have some control over that thing.” Now he swung the box up before her, holding it steady at her heart level and watching its surface. Once more the frown line appeared and he shook his head, perhaps denying the path of his own thoughts.

  “You see, Princess,” he said to Idieze, “how the new knowledge confronts and vanquishes the old? She is now as obedient to my control as might be a hunting leopard in leash.”

  “She is dangerous, too. She can be our deaths,” Idieze retorted.

  “Quite so. Yet it was you who brought her here, Princess.”

  “Because we must have a hostage until our plans are full ripe. They deem her the Heir, they will not want to lose her.”

  “So you have thought it all out?” Khasti smiled—coldly. “There is no need for the old methods of hostages and bargains. Did we not agree, Princess, that the time has come to sweep away the past and strike out anew, unburdened by age-old superstition and custom?”

  “We have not yet the strength—”

  “We have all we need—for the present. If more must be sought, we know well where to discover it.”

  Idieze gazed at him in open bitterness. Maybe she was begin
ning to realize now, Tallahassee suspected, that the power behind the Emperor Userkof would not be his wife after all, but this other.

  “Then what do we do with her?” She stabbed a finger at their prisoner as if she wished it were steel aimed to take the other’s life.

  “She will be very safe, Princess—with me.” As he uttered those words Khasti let the whirling disk grow still, thrust it back into the folds of his robe. But before Tallahassee, released from that compulsion, could move to save herself, his hand came into the open again holding a cylinder. Once more there was discharged into her face the same narcotic spray that had brought her prisoner here. She remembered crumpling forward and that was all.

  She roused slowly, but now she played no game of trying to confuse her captors concerning her state, for she had an idea that she could achieve nothing by that a second time. Around her shone light, bright enough to make her blink, and she heard queer sounds she found hard to identify.

  The surface under her was level and hard as she levered herself up on her arms to look about. She was—caged! There was indeed a mesh of netting secured to four stout posts which kept her in one section of a very large chamber. But there was far more than her own cage here.

  Tallahassee had no difficulty in identifying objects that would have been totally strange to Ashake. This was a laboratory of sorts, hardly differing from those in which she had once been a student. To her left stood a clicking box which reached nearly to the ceiling, but elsewhere there were two long tables crowded with retorts, bottles, instruments. And the air was slightly acrid with the fumes of chemicals.

  On the nearest table there stood a much smaller cage, fashioned exactly like hers but of slightly different shape, and in that lay the Rod, out of its box again. Even in this strong light Tallahassee believed she saw a shimmer of radiance about the gem that was its head. Beside it lay something else—the Key—or at least an ankh which was enough like the one she had seen in Jayta’s hand to be its twin. Yet it had not been displayed earlier as part of Idieze’s loot.