Canticle

Disturbing Answers

  Mullivy was not a swift walker, and Druzil used this time away from Barjin to reestablish contact with his master. He sent his thoughts out across the miles to Castle Trinity and found an eager recipient awaiting them. Greetings, my master, the imp communicated. You have found Barjin?

  In the catacombs, as you believed, Druzil replied. The fool.

  Druzil wasn't certain that he shared Aballister's appraisal, but the wizard didn't need to know that. He has other allies, the imp imparted. Undead allies, including a mummy.

  Druzil smiled widely as he sensed Aballister's reaction to that bit of news. The wizard didn't mean to communicate his next thoughts, but Druzil was deeply enough into his mind to hear them anyway.

  I never would have believed that Barjin could achieve that. Many emotions accompanied those words, Druzil knew, and fear was not the least among them.

  The mighty Edificant Library is in peril, Druzil added, just to prod the wizard. If Barjin succeeds, then the Most Fatal Horror will have put us on the path toward a great victory. All the region will fall without the guidance of the library's clerics.

  Aballister was wondering if the price was too high, Druzil realized, and the imp derided that he had told the wizard enough for this day. Besides, he could see the daylight up ahead as his zombie chauffeur neared the tunnel exit. He broke off direct communication, though he let the wizard remain in his mind and view through the imp's eyes. Druzil wanted Aballister to get a good look at the glory of the chaos curse.

  * * * * *

  The white squirrel kept high in the branches, unsure of what its keen senses were telling it. Mullivy came to the edge of the earthen tunnel, then immediately turned around and disappeared back into it. Another scent, an unfamiliar scent, lingered. Percival saw nothing, but like other foraging animals, low on the food chain, the squirrel had learned quickly to trust more than just its eyes.

  Percival followed the scent―it was moving―to the tree-lined lane. The road was quiet, as it had been for the last two days, though the sun shone bright and warm in a clear blue sky.

  The squirrel's ears perked up and twitched nervously as the library's door opened, seemingly of its own accord, and the strange scent moved inside.

  The unusualness of it all kept the squirrel sitting nervously still for many moments, but the sun was warm and the nuts and berries in the trees and shrubs were abundant, just waiting to be plucked. Percival rarely kept any thought for any length of time, and when he spotted a pile of acorns lying unattended on the ground, he was too relieved that the groundskeeper had stayed in the tunnel to worry about anything else.

  * * * * *

  Druzil's perceptions of the state of the Edificant Library were far different from Cadderly's. Unlike the young scholar, the imp thought the rising, paralyzing chaos a marvelous thing. He found just a few priests in the study halls, sitting unmoving in front of open books, so riveted by their studies that they barely remembered to draw breath. Druzil understood the hold of the chaos curse better than any; if Barjin entered the hall with a host of skeletons at his back, these priests would offer no resistance, would probably not even notice.

  Druzil enjoyed the spectacle in the dining hall most of all, where gluttonous priests sat on chairs set back from the table to accommodate their swelling bellies, and other priests lay semiconscious on the floor. At one end of the table, three priests were engaged in mortal combat over a single remaining turkey leg.

  Arguments, particularly between priests of differing faiths, were general throughout the building, often becoming more serious encounters. The least faithful or studious simply wandered away from the library altogether, and few had a care to stop them. Those most faithful were so absorbed in their rituals that they seemed to notice nothing else. In another of the second-floor study chambers, Druzil found a pile of Oghman priests heaped together in a great ball, having wrestled until they were too exhausted even to move.

  When Druzil left an hour later to report to Barjin, he was quite satisfied that the chaos curse had done its work to unpredictable perfection.

  He felt the first insistent demands of his master when he rounded the northern side of the building, approaching the tunnel.

  You have seen? his thoughts asked Aballister. He knew that if Aballister had been paying attention, the wizard would know the state of the library as well as Druzil did.

  The Most Fatal Horror, Aballister remarked somewhat sourly.

  Barjin has brought us a great victory, Druzil promptly reminded the ever-skeptical wizard.

  Aballister was quick to reply. The library is not yet won. Do not count our victory until Barjin is actually in control of the structure.

  Druzil replied by shutting the wizard completely out of his thoughts in midconversation. "Tellemara," the imp muttered to himself. The curse was working. Already the few score priests remaining at the library probably would not be able to fend off Barjin's undead forces, and their potential for resistance lessened with each passing moment. Soon, many of them likely would kill each other and many others simply would wander away. How much more control did the wizard require before claiming victory?

  Druzil paid no heed to Aballister's final warning. Barjin would win here, the imp decided, and he was thinking, too, that maybe he could find extra gains in his mission from Aballister, in spying on the powerful priest. Ever since the magical elixir had been dubbed an agent of Talona, the priests of Castle Trinity had enjoyed a more prominent role in the evil triumvirate. With the Edificant Library in Barjin's hands, and with Barjin controlling a strong undead army, that domination would only increase.

  Aballister was an acceptable "master," as masters went, but Druzil was an imp from the domain of chaos, and imps owed no loyalty to anyone except themselves.

  It was too early to make a definitive judgment, of course, but already Druzil was beginning to suspect that he would find more pleasure and more chaos at Barjin's side than at Aballister's.

  * * * * *

  "Do something for him!" Cadderly pleaded, but Newander only shook his head helplessly. "Ilmater!" gasped the dying priest. "The ... pain," he stammered. "It is so won―" He shuddered one final time and fell dead in Cadderly's arms.

  "Who could have done this?" Cadderly asked, though he feared he knew the answer.

  "Is not Ilmater the Crying God, a deity dedicated to suffering?" the druid asked, leading Cadderly to a clear conclusion.

  Cadderly nodded gravely. "Priests of Ilmater often engage in self-flagellation, but it is usually a minor ritual of no serious consequence."

  "Until now," Newander remarked dryly.

  "Come on," Cadderly said, laying the dead priest onto the floor. The blood trail was easily followed, and both Cadderly and Newander could have guessed where it led anyway.

  Cadderly didn't even bother knocking on the partly opened door. He pushed it in, then turned away, too horrified to enter. In the middle of the floor lay the remaining five priests of the Ilmater delegation, torn and bloodied.

  Newander rushed in to check on them but returned in only a few moments, shaking ins head grimly.

  "Priests of Ilmater never carry it this far," Cadderly said, as much to himself as to the druid, "and druids never go so far as to become, heart and body, their favored animals." He looked up at the druid, his gray eyes revealing that he thought his words important. "Danica was never so obsessed as to slam her face into a stone block repeatedly."

  Newander was beginning to catch on.

  "Why were we not affected?" Cadderly asked.

  "I fear that I have been," replied the sullen druid.

  When Cadderly looked more closely at Newander, he understood. The druid continued to fear not for his animal-transformed friends, but for himself.

  "I have not the true heart for my chosen calling," explained the druid.

  "You make too many judgments," Cadderly scolded. "We know that something is wrong―" he waved toward the room of carnage "―terribly wrong. You have heard the priestess
of Sune. You have seen these priests, and your own druid brothers. For some reason, we two have been spared―and perhaps I know of two others who have not been so badly affected―and that is not cause to lament. Whatever has happened threatens the whole library."

  "You are wise for one so young," admitted Newander, "but what are we to do? Surely my druid brothers and the girl will be of no help."

  "We will go to Dean Thobicus," Cadderly said hopefully. "He has overseen the library for many years. Perhaps he will know what to do." Cadderly didn't have to speak his hopes that Dean Thobicus, aged and wise, had not fallen under the curse also.

  The journey down to the second floor only increased the companions' apprehension. The halls were quiet and empty, until a group of drunken rowdies appeared down at the other end of a long hallway. As soon as the mob spotted Cadderly and Newander, they set out after them. Cadderly and the druid did not know if the men meant to attack them or coerce them into joining the party, but neither of them had any intentions of finding out.

  Newander turned back after rounding one corner and cast a simple spell. The group came in fast pursuit, but the druid had laid a magical trip-wire and the intoxicated mob had no defense against such a subtle attack. They tumbled in a twisting and squirming heap and came up too busily wrestling with each other to remember that they had been chasing somebody.

  Cadderly considered the headmasters' area his best hope―until he and Newander crossed through the large double doors at the southern end of the second level. The area was eerily quiet, with no one to be seen. Dean Thobicus's office door was among the few that were not open. Cadderly moved up slowly and knocked.

  He knew in his heart that he would get no response.

  Dean Thobicus was never an excitable man. His love was introspection, spending hours on end staring at the night sky, or at nothing at all. Thobicus's loves were in his own mind, and when Cadderly and Newander entered his office, that was exactly where they found him. He sat very still behind his large oaken desk and apparently hadn't moved for quite a while. He had soiled himself, and his lips were dry and parched, though a beaker full of water sat only inches away on his desk.

  Cadderly called to him several times and shook him roughly, but the dean showed no sign of having heard him. Cadderly gave him one last shake, and Thobicus fell right over and remained where he dropped, as if he hadn't noticed.

  Newander bent to examine the man. "We'll get no answers from this one," he announced.

  "We are running out of places to look," Cadderly replied.

  "Let us get back to the girl," said the druid. "No good in staying here, and I am afraid for Danica with the drunken mob roaming the halls."

  They were relieved to find no sign of the drunken men as they exited the headmasters' area, and their return trip through the quiet and empty hallways was uneventful.

  Their sighs of relief upon entering Danica's room would have been lessened considerably if either of them had noticed the dark figure lurking in the shadows, eyeing Cadderly with utter hatred.

  * * * * *

  Danica was awake but unblinking when the two men returned to her. Newander started toward her, concerned and thinking that she had fallen into the same catatonic state as the dean, but Cadderly recognized the difference.

  "She is meditating," Cadderly explained, and even as he spoke the words, he realized what Danica had in mind. "She is fighting whatever it is that compels her."

  "You cannot know that," reasoned Newander.

  Cadderly refused to yield his assumptions. "Look at her closely," he observed, "at her concentration. She is fighting, I say."

  The claim was beyond Newander's experience, either to agree or refute, so he accepted Cadderly's logic without further argument.

  "You said you know of others who might have escaped?" he said, wanting to get back to the business at hand.

  "The dwarven cooks," replied Cadderly, "Ivan and Pikel Bouldershoulder. They have been acting strangely, I admit, but each time I have been able to bring them to reason."

  Newander thought for a few minutes, chuckling quietly when he remembered Pikel, the green-bearded dwarf that so badly wanted to join the druidical order. The notion was absurd, of course, but Pikel was an appealing chap―for a dwarf. Newander snapped his fingers and allowed himself a smile of hope as he found a clue in Cadderly's report. "Magical," he said, looking back to Cadderly. "It is said by all who know that dwarves are a tough lot against magical enchantments. Might it be that the cooks can resist where men cannot?"

  Cadderly nodded and looked to the vine-covered bed. "And Danica will resist in time, I know," he said and turned back to Newander immediately. "But what about us? Why have we been spared?"

  "As I told you," replied Newander, "it might well be that I have not been spared. I was gone all of yesterday, out walking in the sunshine and feeling the mountain breezes. I found Arcite and Cleo, bear and tortoise, upon my return, but since I came back, I must admit that I, too, have felt compulsions."

  "But you have resisted them," said Cadderly.

  "Perhaps," Newander corrected. "I cannot be sure. My heart of late has not been for the animals, as seemingly were the hearts of my druid kin."

  "And so you doubt your calling," Cadderly remarked.

  Newander nodded. "It is a difficult thing. I so badly wish to join Arcite and Cleo, to join the search they have begun for the natural order, but I want, too ..."

  "Go on," Cadderly prompted as though he believed the revelations were vital.

  "I want to learn of Deneir and the other gods," Newander admitted. "I want to watch the progress of the world, the rise of cities. I want to ... I want," Newander shook his head suddenly. "I do not know what I want!"

  Cadderly's gray eyes lit up. "Even in your own heart you do not know what is in your own heart," he said. "That is a rare thing, and it has saved you, unless I miss my guess. That, and the fact that you have not been here for very long since this all began."

  "What do you know?" Newander asked, a sharp edge on his voice. He softened quickly, though, wondering how much truth was in the young scholar's words.

  Cadderly only shrugged in response. "It is only a theory."

  "What of you?" Newander asked. "Why are you not affected?"

  Cadderly nearly laughed for lack of a suitable answer. "I cannot say," he honestly admitted. He looked to Danica again. "But I know now how I might find out."

  Newander followed the young scholar's gaze to the meditating woman. "Are you going back to sleep?"

  Cadderly gave him a sly wink. "Sort of."

  Newander did not argue. He wanted the time alone anyway to consider his own predicament. He could not accept Cadderly's reasoning concerning his exclusion from whatever was cursing the library, though he hoped it was as simple as that. Newander suspected that something else was going on, something he could not begin to understand, something wonderful or terrible―he could not be sure. For all of his thinking, though, the druid could not rid himself of the image of Arcite and Cleo, contented and natural, and could not dismiss his fears that his ambivalence had caused him to fail Silvanus in a time of dire need.

  * * * * *

  Cadderly sat crosslegged with his eyes closed for a long time, relaxing each part of his body in turn, causing his mind to sink within his physical self. He had learned these techniques from Danica―one of the few things she had revealed about her religion―and had found them quite useful, restful, and enjoyable. Now, though, the meditation had taken on a more important role.

  Cadderly opened his eyes slowly and viewed the room, seeing it in surreal tones. He focused first on the block of stone, stained with his dear Danica's blood. It sat between the downed sawhorses, and then it was gone, removed to blackness. Behind it was Danica's cabinet and wardrobe, and then they, too, were gone.

  He glanced left, to the door and Newander keeping a watchful guard. The druid watched him curiously, but Cadderly hardly noticed. A moment later, both druid and door were holes of blacknes
s.

  His visual sweep eliminated the rest of the room: Danica's desk and her weapons, two crystalline daggers, in their boot sheaths against the wall; the window, bright with late morning light; and, lastly, Danica herself, still deep in her own meditation on the vine-wrapped bed.

  "Dear Danica," Cadderly muttered, though even he didn't hear the words. Then Danica, too, and everything else, was out of his thoughts.

  Again he returned to relaxation―toes, then feet, then legs, fingers, then hands, then arms―until he had achieved a sedated state. His breathing came slowly and easily. His eyes were open, but they saw nothing.

  There was only quiet blackness, calm.

  Cadderly could not summon thoughts in this state. He had to hope that answers would flow to him, that his subconscious would give him images and clues. He had no concept of time passing, but it seemed a long while of emptiness, of simple, uncluttered existence.

  The walking dead were alongside him then in the blackness. Unlike his dreams, he saw the skeletal figures as no threat now, as though he were an unattached observer instead of an active participant. They scuffled along on his mental journey, falling behind him, leaving him in a hallway. There was the familiar door, cracked and showing lines of light, always the ending image of his nightmare.

  The picture faded, as if some unseen force were trying to stop him from proceeding, a mental barrier that he now, for some reason unknown to him, believed to be a magical spell.

  The images became a gray blur for just a moment, then focused again, and he was at the door, then through the door.

  The altar room!

  Cadderly watched, hopeful and afraid, as the room darkened, leaving only a single, red-glowing object, a bottle, visible before him. He saw the bottle up close then, and he saw hands, his own hands, twisting off the stopper.

  Red smoke exploded all about him, stole every other image.

  Cadderly looked again on Danica's room, the image identical to the one he had blocked out―even Newander remained at his position near the door―except that now there hung in the air an almost imperceptible pink haze.