Split Infinity (43 page)

Dawn was breaking in its unmitigated splendor as they approached the castle. Stile, asleep on Neysa, had missed the pretty moonrisings and settings of the night.
 
He squinted at the castle blearily. He had barely four hours left before his match for Rung Five in Proton—and he hadn’t even settled the situation in Phaze yet. If only Blue hadn’t been so far from Yellow—

Stile had slept, but it seemed the tensions of his mission had prevented him from unwinding properly. If the Blue Adept had really been murdered, who had done the deed? If Blue’s magic had not saved him, how could Stile survive without the aid of magic? Yet this was the way it had to be. Even if magic had been permitted him, he would not be prepared with suitable verses.

Yet he still had to check this castle out. To know, finally, exactly what his situation was. Whatever it might be, whatever it might cost him. The Oracle had told him to know himself, and he believed it was good advice.

The environs of the Blue Demesnes were surprisingly pleasant. There was no black fog or yellow fog—not even any blue fog. Just the pure blue sky, and a lovely blue lake, and fields of bluebells and blue gentians and bluegrass. To Stile’s eye this was the most pleasant of places—not at all like the lair of an Adept.

Still, he could not afford to be deceived by superficialities. “I think it would be best to enter in disguise, as before,” Stile said. The animals agreed.

This time Stile donned Neysa’s socks, while Kurrelgyre assumed man-form. Then the seeming man led the two seeming unicorns up to the castle gate.

The drawbridge was down across the small moat, and the gate stood open. An armed human guard strode forward, but his hand was not near his sword. He was, of course, garbed in blue. “What can we do for thee, man?” he inquired of Kurrelgyre.

 
“We come to see the Blue Adept,” the werewolf said.

“Thine animals are ill?”

Surprised, Kurrelgyre improvised. “One has bad knees.”

“We see not many unicorns here,” the guard observed. “But surely the Lady Blue can handle it. Come into the courtyard.”

Stile was startled. This was the first he had heard of a Lady Blue. How could she be the Adept, if the original had been a man, and was now dead? Unless she had been his wife. This complicated the picture consider-ably!

“But we wish to see the Adept himself,” the were-wolf protested.

“If thou’rt dying, thou seest the Adept,” the guard said firmly. “If thine animal hath bad knees, thou seest the Lady.”

Kurrelgyre yielded. He led his animals through the gate, along the broad front passage, and into the central court. This was similar to one of the courts of the palace of the Oracle, but smaller; it was dominated by a beautiful blue-blossomed jacaranda tree in the center.
 
Beneath the tree was a deep blue pond fed by a rivulet from a fountain in the shape of a small blue whale that overhung one side. The Blue Adept evidently liked nature in all its forms, especially its blue forms. Stile found his taste similar.

There were several other animals in the yard: a lame jackrabbit, a snake with its tail squished, and a partly melted snow monster. Neysa eyed the last nervously, but the monster was not seeking any trouble with any other creature.

A maidservant entered the yard, wearing a blue print summer dress. “The Lady will be with thee soon,” she said to Kurrelgyre. “Unless thou art in immediate pain?”

“No pressing pain,” the werewolf said. He was evidently as perplexed by all this as Stile was. Where was the foul nature an Adept was supposed to have? If the Blue Adept were dead, where was the grief and ravage?

They might have had to fight their way into the castle; instead it was completely open and serene.

The girl picked up the snake carefully and carried it into the castle proper.

What was this. Stile wondered—an infirmary? Certainly it was a far cry from the Black or Yellow De-esnes, in more than physical distance. Where was the catch?

The girl came for the rabbit. The snake had not reappeared; was it healed—or dead? Why did the animals trust themselves to this castle? Considering the reputation of Adepts, these creatures should have stayed well clear.

Now another woman emerged. She wore a simple gown of blue, with blue slippers and a blue kerchief tying back her fair hair. She was well proportioned but not spectacular in face or figure. She went directly to the snow-monster. “For thee, a freeze-potion,” she said. “A simple matter.” She opened a vial and sprinkled its contents on the monster. Immediately the melt disappeared. “But get thee safely back to thy mountain fastness; the lowlands are not safe for the likes of thee,” she admonished it with a smile that illuminated her face momentarily as if a cloud had passed from the face of the sun. “And seek thee no further quarrels with fire-breathing dragons!” The creature nodded and shuffled out.

Now the woman turned to Kurrelgyre. Stile was glad he was in disguise; that daylight smile had shaken him.
 
The woman had seemed comely but ordinary until that smile. If there were evil in this creature, it was extraordinarily well hidden.

“We see not many unicorns here, sir,” she said, echoing the sentiment of the guard at the gate. Stile was startled by the appellation, normally applied only to a Citizen of Proton. But this was not Proton. “Which one has the injured knees?”

The werewolf hesitated. Stile knew his problem, and stepped in. The unicorn costume was for sight only; any touch would betray the humanness of the actual body.

 
“I am the one with the knees,” he said. “I am a man in unicorn disguise.”

The Lady turned her gaze on him. Her eyes were blue, of course, and very fine, but her mouth turned grim. “We serve not men here, now. Why dost thou practice this deceit?”

“I must see the Blue Adept,” Stile said. “Adepts have not been hospitable to me, ere now. I prefer to be anonymous.”

“Thou soundest strangely familiar—“ She halted.
 
“Nay, that can not be. Come, I will examine thy knees, but I can promise nothing.”

“I want only to see the Adept,” Stile protested. But she was already kneeling before him, finding his legs through the unicorn illusion. He stood there helplessly, letting her slide her fingers over his boots and socks and up under his trouser legs, finding his calves and then at last his knees. Her touch was delicate and highly pleasant. The warmth of it infused his knees like the field of a microwave therapy machine. But this was no machine; it was wonderfully alive. He had never before experienced such a healing touch.

Stile looked down—and met the Lady’s gaze. And something in him ignited, a flame kindled in dry tinder.
 
This was the woman his alternate self had married.

“I feel the latent pain therein,” the Lady Blue said.
 
“But it is beyond my means to heal.”

“The Adept can use magic,” Stile said. Except that the Blue Adept was dead—wasn’t he?

“The Adept is indisposed,” she said firmly. She released his knees and stood with an easy motion. She was marvelously lithe, though there were worry-lines about her mouth and eyes. She was a lovely and talented woman, under great strain—how lovely and how talented and under how much strain he was now coming to appreciate by great jackrabbit bounds. Stile believed he knew what the nature of that strain might be.

Kurrelgyre and Neysa were standing by, awaiting Stile’s decision. He made it: he bent carefully to draw off the unicorn socks, revealing himself undisguised.

“Woman, look at me,” he said.

The Lady Blue looked. She paled, stepping back.
 
“Why comest thou like this in costume, foul spirit?” she demanded. “Have I not covered assiduously for thee, who deservest it least?”

Stile was taken aback. He had anticipated gladness, disbelief or fear, depending on whether she took him for her husband, an illusion, or a ghost. But this—

“Though it be strange,” the Lady murmured in an aside to herself. “Thy knees seemed flesh, not wood, and there was pain in them. Am I now being deluded by semblance spells?”

Stile looked at the werewolf. “Does this make sense to thee? Why should my knees not be flesh? Who would have wooden knees?”

“A golem!” Kurrelgyre exclaimed, catching on. “A wooden golem masquerading as the Adept! But why does she cover for the soulless one?”

The Lady whirled on the werewolf. “Why cover for thy henchman!” she exclaimed, her pale cheeks flushing now in anger. “Should I let the world know my love is dead, most foully murdered, and a monster put in his place—and let all the good works my lord achieved fall into ruin? Nay, I needs must salvage what I can, holding the vultures somewhat at bay, lest there be no longer any reprieve or hope for those in need. I needs must sustain at least the image of my beloved for these creatures, that they suffer not the horror I know.”

She returned to bear on Stile, regal in her wrath.
 
“But thou, thou fiend, thou creature of spite, thou damned thing! Play not these gruesome games with me, lest in mine agony I forget my nature and ideals and turn at last on thee and rend thee limb from limb and cut out from thy charred bosom the dead toad that is thy heart!” And she whirled and stalked into the building.

Stile stared after her, bathed in the heat of her fury.

“There is a woman,” he breathed raptly.

Neysa turned her head to look at him, but Stile was hardly aware of the import of her thought. The Lady Blue—protecting her enemy from exposure, for the sake of the good work done by the former Blue Adept.
 
Oh, what a wrong to be righted!

“I must slay that golem,” Stile said.

Kurrelgyre nodded. “What must be, roust be.” He shifted to wolf-form and sniffed the air. Then he led the way into the castle.

Stile followed, but Neysa remained in the courtyard.
 
She had run almost without surcease for a day and night, carrying him, and her body was so tired and hot she could scarce restrain the flames of her breath.
 
Kurrelgyre, unfettered, had fared better; but Neysa needed time by herself to recover.

No one sought to stop them from entering the castle proper. The guard at the gate had been the only armed man they encountered, and he was back at his station.
 
There were a few household servants, going innocently about their businesses. There was none of the grimness associated with the demesnes of the other Adepts he had encountered. This was an open castle.

The wolf followed his nose through clean halls and apertures until they arrived at a closed door. Kurrelgyre growled: the golem was here.

“Very well, werewolf,” Stile said. “This needs must be my battle; go thou elsewhere.” Kurrelgyre, under-standing, disappeared.

Stile considered momentarily, then decided on the forthright approach. He knocked.

There was, as he expected, no answer. Stile did not know much about golems, but did not expect much from a construct of inanimate materials. Yet, he re-minded himself, that was what the robot Sheen was. So he had to be careful not to underestimate this thing. He did not know the limits of magical animation.
 
“Golem,” he called. “Answer, or I come in regardless.
 
Thine impersonation is at an end.”

Then the door opened. A man stood there, garbed in a blue robe and blue boots. He was. Stile realized, the exact image of Stile himself. His clothing differed in detail, but a third party would not know the two of them apart.

 
“Begone, intruder, lest I enchant thee into a worm and crush thee underheel,” the golem said.

So golems could talk. Good enough.

Stile drew his rapier. For this had werewolf and unicorn labored so diligently to return his weapon to him!
 
“Perform thy magic quickly, then, impostor,” he said, striding forward.

The golem was unarmed. Realizing this, Stile halted without attacking. “Take a weapon,” he said. “I know thou canst not enchant me. Dost thou not recognize me, thou lifeless stick?”

The golem studied Stile. The creature was evidently not too bright—unsurprising if its brains were cellulose—but slowly Stile’s aspect penetrated. ‘Thou’rt dead!” the golem exclaimed.

Stile menaced him with the sword. “Thou art dead, not I.”

The golem kicked at him suddenly. Its move was almost untelegraphed, but Stile was not to be caught oft guard in a situation like this. He swayed aside and clubbed the creature on the ear with his left fist.

Pain lanced through his hand. It was like striking a block of wood—as he should have known. This was a literal blockhead!
 
While he paused, shaking his hand, the golem turned and butted him in the chest. Stile braced himself just in time, but he felt dull pain, as of a rib being bent or cartilage torn. The golem bulled on, shoving Stile against the wall, trying to grab him with hideously strong arms. Stile knew already that he could not match the thing’s power.

Unarmed? The golem needed no overt weapon! Its body was wood. Stile got his sword oriented and stabbed the torso. Sure enough, the point lodged, not penetrating. This thing was not vulnerable to steel!

Now he knew what he was up against. Stile hauled up one of his feet and got his knee into the golem’s body as it tried to butt again. His knee hurt as he bent it, but he shoved the creature away. The golem crashed against the far wall, its head striking with a sharp crack —but it was the wall that fractured, not the head. Stile took a shallow breath, feeling his chest injury, and looked around. Kurrelgyre was back, standing in the doorway, growling off other intruders. This would remain Stile’s own personal fight, like a Game in the Proton-frame. All he had to do was destroy this undead wooden dummy. Before it battered him into the very state of demise he was supposedly already in.