The Quest for Saint Camber (59 page)

For that, at least, he thought he need not worry. If his captors had wanted him dead, there had been ample opportunity for that. Danger there might be in his present situation, but he really did not think his captors would allow the fumes to reach lethal levels.

The fumes
could
be the trigger for an inner testing, though, he realized, as he got another whiff and felt the vertigo again, stronger than before, so that he had to shake his head several times to clear it. It was said that in ancient times, such caves often were used as places of initiation, where the candidate must lie down before the god's image and breathe narcotic gas, in hopes of receiving a prophetic dream. If the method had been sufficient for the ancients to gain communication with their gods, perhaps it also followed that the method would suffice for communication with a saint—though he had to wonder how the Christian folk of Saint Kyriell's had happened upon such an archaic practice.

But, no matter. Further speculation or resistance likely was pointless. Kelson had said he wished further knowledge of Saint Camber; this was his testing, to see if he was in earnest. On one level, it was the archetypal descent into the underworld, a symbolic death and rebirth in the power and knowledge of the god-force—in this case, cloaked in the mythology of Saint Camber. And since he could not escape the ordeal, it behooved him to make the most of it and learn as much as he could. If this was the method that Camber's Servants embraced—and they seemed to hold it in great reverence and esteem—then it must have some merit.

Breathing as shallowly as possible, lest he succumb to the fumes before he had time to prepare, Kelson staggered to the pile of sleeping furs and sank down cross-legged, almost falling, pulling one of the furs across his lower body against the chill. To protect his physical body if he lost all consciousness—which was almost certain, judging by his increasing lightheadedness—he conjured a protective circle around himself, warding it conscientiously as Morgan and Duncan had taught him. It would not keep out the fumes, but it certainly would be a deterrent to any physical entity attempting to take advantage of his helplessness—for he recalled accounts of human agents sometimes assisting the forces of the divine, priests and priestesses of the old gods often taking on the guise of heavenly messengers to guide initiates toward the desired conclusions. Kelson had no quarrel with sacred drama—for that was what it was—but if Saint Camber
did
vouchsafe a vision to him, Kelson wanted to be certain that the saint's will was untainted by that of his Servants, no matter how well meaning they might be.

And so Kelson set his hands on his thighs, cupped palms upturned in receptivity, and gazed up at the statue of the saint, breathing more deeply of the fumes now—which were also becoming more concentrated, as the minutes slipped by and no vent was opened to let them dissipate—and feeling his internal guards gently slipping away as he sank into a profound meditative state, akin to that needed for deep Deryni rapport. In an attempt to nudge any resultant vision in the desired direction, he recalled the one time he personally thought he might have had contact with Saint Camber—at his coronation, when a grey-cowled apparition, seen only by himself, Morgan, and Duncan, had appeared from nowhere to place his hands on Kelson's crown, acclaiming him a king for Deryni as well as humans.

He could feel his body relaxing more with every breath, increasingly in thrall of the vapors rising from the pool, but he kept trying to focus his increasingly muzzy concentration toward that earlier vision, seeking the saint, drifting lethargically on a tide of dreamlike expectation.

No thread of Kelson's concentration or his present circumstance penetrated the many feet of rock separating him from Dhugal, however. Brother Michael and the girl Rhidian had returned to kneel together on the altar step, and Bened and Jilyan sat on either side of Dhugal, but they no longer even bothered to interfere by shielding around him. Dhugal feared it was because the two knew he could not penetrate with his powers beyond the door where the king had disappeared.

Still, he could not abandon his brother and liege lord to the mercies of these unknown folk, simply because they claimed to reverence the same saint—and a Deryni one, at that—that Dhugal and Kelson had come seeking. Kelson might be in mortal danger even now, depending upon Dhugal to make the difference in whether or not he survived—as he had depended upon Dhugal for his physical survival earlier, when he lay so badly injured.

Huddled cross-legged and miserable on his straw mat, the hood of his grey cloak pulled far over his brow to block outside distractions, Dhugal clung to the two Camber medals like talismans against evil, one cupped in each hand, trying to use their proximity to amplify his now almost nonexistent contact beyond the closed door. Concentrating on the face on one of the medals, he tried to shape a form of the same vision that Kelson sought, drawing on everything that his father, Kelson, and even Morgan had ever shared with him about Saint Camber. And he, too, raised his heart in prayerful entreaty to the lost Deryni saint.

For Kelson, time slipped, disjointed, until eventually he had no idea how long he had been sitting at Saint Camber's feet—though he sensed a mild stiffness in his knees and back, a desire to move and stretch, after sitting cross-legged for so long. The vapor in the chamber was like thick fog now, making it far easier to envision features on the statue's face. He tried to imagine what it would be like if the statue came to life and spoke to him, visualizing the robed arms lowering—for surely they were tired after supporting the crown for all these years—picturing the head lifting just enough that Kelson could see features within the shadow of the hood.

And suddenly it was so! In Kelson's dreamlike state, now fully submerged in his own trancing as well as the effects of the narcotic mist still rising from the pool, he stared aghast as a ghost of the statute seemed to step outside itself, the stone figure still standing with arms eternally holding up the crown, but a more vital and powerful entity, spectrally transparent, freeing itself from its stone prison to float slowly toward him.

Kelson's heart was pounding as he watched the thing approach. He longed to back away from it, but he could not seem to force his limbs to move. He gasped as the apparition came up short against the barrier of his wards and spread its hands in a silent entreaty, its hood slipping back from its head to reveal a serene, beautiful face, clean-shaven and roundish in shape, crowned by a cap of silver-gilt hair. The firm, sensitive lips parted as if to speak, but Kelson could hear nothing.

The entity's desire was clear enough, however; it wanted in. And though Kelson found himself released from his immobility at last, it was only to raise his hand and open a gate in the wards—for he knew his spectral visitor could not pass without his invitation, nor did he desire any longer to withhold it.

His pulse was pounding as he traced the outline of the opening, using the edge of his hand like the blade of a sacred sword to cut the energies and seal them at the edges. And as the outline was complete, and Kelson's hand moved again to dissipate the energy bound within the outline and open the gate—an inadvertant beckoning gesture—the waiting figure crossed graceful, translucent hands briefly upon its breast in gratitude. Then suddenly it was inside the circle, the open gate clearly visible through its insubstantial body, seeming almost to swell in size rather than approach in any usual manner—though approach, it did, to Kelson's transfixed dread. The closer it came, the more Kelson had to tip his head backward to keep watching it, until it stood directly before him and he found himself falling backward, sinking into the softness of the sleeping furs on which he lay.

And even then, the dread did not cease, for the figure looming over him, terrifyingly insubstantial, leaned closer, toward his head, right hand outstretched to reach transparent fingertips toward Kelson's forehead.

He had no place to go, no way to escape it. And he fainted away as what should have been illusion proved to be a cool, solid physical touch, with a command whispered in his mind to sleep.

Dhugal, meanwhile, had no notion that the being associated with the medals in his hands had made so impressive an appearance. He had lost any thread of contact with the king some time ago. His further efforts to revive that contact seemed worse than useless, for nearly half an hour had passed since Dhugal had last been sure he was in contact.

Still, he could not give up. Dhugal had no idea what kind of ordeal Kelson might be undergoing, but if there was any chance that the king might be able to tap into the energy Dhugal was determined to make available to him, then Dhugal would keep it available until he himself passed out from exhaustion. In fact, the choice was not so drastic as that, for if the power was never tapped, then there was little drain on Dhugal. What Dhugal did not realize was that the focus of his call was broadening, with no receiver to tap it and give direction to the energy flow. And that listeners far away were beginning to scan in his direction.

Duncan, with the head of the deeply entranced Morgan in his lap and Ciard and Jass lying close beside, stirred slightly as his mind brushed just a tendril of a familiar mental touch—the touch of none of those apparently asleep around the fire. Uncertain, the Deryni bishop cast more intently in the direction he thought the touch had come from, forcing himself to extend farther than he thought he could, in hope of picking it up again. Jass moaned softly as Duncan's demand for energy became more intense, but he quieted at a touch, as Duncan shifted to a more evenly distributed draw.

For Duncan had touched something startling, unperceived even by Morgan—something he had feared never to find again. Only he was fully aware of what it had been—or what he thought it had been—and he was so surprised that he all but came out of rapport, dragging a groggy Morgan with him to half-consciousness.

Did you catch that?
he asked in Morgan's mind, laying a hand across the other's eyes when Morgan would have stirred and sat up.

Still in Duncan's partial control, Morgan subsided, only his silent query sounding in Duncan's mind.

Show me what you saw
, he asked.

Reverting to purely psychic activity, Duncan closed his eyes again and shared the image he had picked up—a silver medal of Saint Camber, blurred as if from double vision—or perhaps there were two medals. The design, however, was very familiar to both men.

Stirring lethargically, Morgan pulled one very like that of the shared image from inside his tunic. It had been his mother's and was the master for the ones he had cast for Kelson, Dhugal, and Duncan.

There are only the three others, that I know of
, Morgan observed, opening his hand so that Duncan could close it between their two palms.
And you weren't seeing yours or mine. We'll use this as a link
.

With that instruction, he edged into a dual and equal teaming with Duncan to take both of them much deeper, casting more powerfully now in the direction of the original contact. Both of them went dangerously deep, beginning to draw heavily on the energy resources of the humans linked with them; but just when they had about reached the end of their reserves and Ciard and Jass both began breathing unevenly, the contact came again. This time, Duncan was on it at once, dragging them all into the link and locking on it, Morgan retreating far enough to safeguard their backups while Duncan pushed the contact forward.

Dhugal! Praise God, son, is it really you?

The mixture of joy, fatigue, and fear that came through the link nearly shattered it, but it was, indeed, Dhugal.

Father!

Frantically—for the young border lord feared to lose the link at any instant, or to have his captors interfere—Dhugal sent a jumble of reassurance and basic information in telegraphic bursts of image rather than words: that both he and Kelson were alive; that the village where they lay was called Saint Kyriell's, apparently a lost stronghold of people calling themselves the Servants of Saint Camber, some of whom were Deryni; that Kelson even now was undergoing some kind of ordeal having to do with a vision-quest for Saint Camber—for the two of them had inadvertently violated local holy places when they broke through a series of tomb chambers to escape their weeks of wandering underground; how they had been swept along an underground river and beached, more drowned than not, with Kelson badly injured; and that Dhugal had discovered how to
Heal
him! Almost as an afterthought, Dhugal added that there had been
merasha
in Dhugal's flask.

The multiple information levels were staggering and bore far more investigation than was possible at this remove, but Duncan knew he dared not hold the link much longer. Morgan warned that their human energy sources were nearing the end of their endurance, and Dhugal himself was wavering, his concentration slipping.

But at least Duncan and Morgan now had a fix on the direction of the contact; and provided that nothing too untoward happened to Kelson in the next few hours, all should be well. If Duncan and Morgan had not made a physical rendezvous with the two by the following evening, they would attempt another contact then. Duncan was grinning broadly as he let the contact go and brought Morgan out of trance.

“God, do you believe it, they're alive!” Morgan blurted, struggling to a sitting position with Duncan's help. “We didn't just imagine it, did we? Reassure me that you read the same things I did, Duncan.”

Duncan only sighed and nodded happily, distractedly scanning their human allies and then deepening their trances to let them recover in sleep for a little while before all must rouse themselves and ride.

“Aye, they're alive, all right,” Duncan said. “For every question we've just had answered, though, several new ones arise.”

The first edge of Morgan's exuberance blunted immediately, and he grimaced as he shifted to a more comfortable position.