Patternmaster

by Octavia E. Butler

  Teray hit him.

  The blow, not one of Teray’s hardest, bounced off Coransee’s shield. Teray struck again, testing the strength of the shield. It was like pounding with his fists against a stone wall. He remembered with longing the muteherd Jackman’s eggshell shield.

  Coransee hit back, rammed Teray’s shield, not testing but trying at once to demolish. Teray’s shield withstood the blow.

  Teray realized already that neither he nor Coransee would be pounded into defeat in the usual way. Something more was needed.

  Teray swept his perception through Coransee’s brain as though through the brain of a Clayark.

  For an instant, Coransee frowned, seemed disoriented. But he was recovering himself even as Teray swept again. Somehow he deflected Teray’s second sweep. Then abruptly he struck back.

  As quick as Teray’s sweep had been, the Housemaster almost caught him unshielded. And that deflection …

  Safely shielded, Teray tried to understand what had happened. It was as though he had tried to land a physical blow and had had the blow blocked by his opponent’s arm. It was not like running against the solid wall of a shield. No Patternist could lay a mind shield around his physical body. But apparently a strong Patternist could strike out with part of his strength to deflect attacks against his body. An attack that could be sensed could at the same time be deflected. Teray thought he understood. A second later Coransee tested his understanding.

  Coransee struck at Teray’s head. For a confused instant, Teray thought he perceived a physical object flying at him. A fraction later, he knew what it was, and used his new knowledge with fear-inspired accuracy.

  Without understanding quite how he knew, Teray realized that he had just avoided—or at least postponed—a cerebral hemorrhage. Coransee was unwittingly teaching him to defend himself. If only he could learn fast enough.

  Teray contracted the muscles of Coransee’s legs savagely.

  Before Coransee could stop himself, he fell screaming to the ground. He had been too busy guarding the vital parts of his body. He had not realized what agony his legs could give him.

  And before he could shut that agony out, Teray hit him again—hit at what had to be a weakened, unattended shield.

  And smashed through! He had a foothold.

  Instantly Coransee forgot his legs and slashed at Teray.

  Teray hit back hard, hit again and again. He was a man in armor battering a naked man. He had won. Surely he had …

  Coransee slammed him back, hammered at him as no shieldless Patternist should have been able to. Teray fought with savage desperation, unable to believe what was happening. The naked man was beating him into semiconsciousness.

  Finally, Coransee tore Teray loose from his hard-won foothold. Tore him loose, held him, and continued to batter him. There was no longer any question. Coransee was stronger.

  The Housemaster broke through what was left of Teray’s shield and began beating Teray in earnest. Now Teray was the naked man.

  Pain.

  Teray could not think. He was ablaze with agony. He lashed out blindly. The old way of killing Clayarks—Coransee’s way: the large artery just where it emerged from the heart.

  Coransee had been foolish enough to relax his defenses. After all, he was winning.

  For all his speed, he could not reestablish them in time. Teray ruptured the great blood vessel.

  Coransee’s attack collapsed. But even as he lay on the ground clutching his chest, trying to prevent himself from bleeding to death, he took his revenge.

  Teray found himself suddenly disoriented. His head hurt. His head was exploding. He tried to reach up, clutching it between his hands. One of his arms would not work. He was going to be sick. He managed to turn his head so that he did not vomit over his own inert body. His mind was still working, still aware. In spite of the broken blood vessel in his brain, he was still conscious. He could still fight.

  With his last strength, Teray swept through the struggling Housemaster’s brain. Coransee had no defense now. He was completely occupied with his injury. Teray swept over him again and again, leaving himself no strength to keep his own body alive. He was killing both Coransee and himself, but his awareness had deteriorated to such a degree that he did not realize it. He realized only that he could not hold on to consciousness much longer. That he must do as much damage as he could while he could.

  He did not know when Coransee’s body went into violent convulsions. He did not know when Coransee’s muscles contracted so violently that they snapped one of the Housemaster’s legs. He did not know when Coransee bit off a large piece of his own tongue. He knew nothing until just before he lost consciousness completely. Only then did he realize that he had won. Coransee was dead.

  Teray opened his eyes to a vast expanse of clear blue sky. It took him a moment to see the ragged walls of the ruin and realize where he was. He was weak and tired and ravenously hungry. He tried to remember what had happened.

  Then it came back to him and he sat up abruptly. Too abruptly. He would have fallen back had Amber not been there to help him. She had come from nowhere, kneeling beside him, steadying him.

  “It’s over. You’re all right. Eat.”

  There was food. Roast meat from somewhere. He stared at it. “What …?”

  “Rabbit, remember? We are as encircled by wild rabbits as we are by Clayarks.”

  He had been out for a while, then. They had had time to cook. That was to be expected. Coransee had all but killed him. He flexed his right arm—the one that hadn’t worked the last time he had tried to use it—and moved his right leg. Both moved easily. Satisfied, he settled down to eating roast rabbit and fresh biscuits and drinking a great deal of water. He ate in silence for several minutes, concentrating only on the food. Finally, he spoke. “He is dead, isn’t he?”

  “Of course.”

  “He earned it.”

  She said nothing.

  “I should be dead too. You saved me.”

  “Healed you.”

  “Did the others give you any trouble?”

  “Not after they saw that he was dead. Two or three of them wanted to stop me from helping you but I convinced them not to.”

  He raised an eyebrow questioningly

  “They’re still alive. They’re probably going to give you trouble.”

  “I can handle them now that Coransee is dead.” He looked around for Coransee’s body. She read his glance and pointed past the dusters of waiting outsiders and women. Just beyond a ragged edge of wall, he could see two outsiders working at something, digging a hole, a grave.

  “No,” he said quietly.

  Amber looked at him.

  “The Clayarks will be at the grave the moment we leave. He’s freshly killed. They’ll gut him and eat him the way we did those rabbits. I’m not going to give any Patternist to them.”

  “What, then?”

  “Burn him. Burn him to ashes.” He looked at her. “Can you see that it’s done thoroughly? Are you strong enough after your hand?”

  She nodded.

  The Patternists had gotten wood for their cooking fire from a pair of ancient dead trees behind the ruin. Now they took more of the wood, and made a funeral pyre for the fallen Housemaster.

  The woman, Rain, had washed smeared blood from Coransee’s face and closed his eyes. She had straightened his body on its pyre and wept over him. Now, as he burned, as Amber saw to it that he was completely incinerated, others wept too. Teray watched them impassively for a few moments, then walked away. There was something missing. He had hated Coransee. He had never been more pleased at another person’s death. Yet …

  The mutes would have made a ceremony, a funeral. Mutes were ceremony-making creatures. Patternists had left such things to them for so long that there were almost no Patternist ceremonies left. For a funeral, ancient words would have been said, and the body consigned to the earth with quiet dignity. Even Patternists who thought no more of mutes than they did of draft animals
attended such ceremonies with respect. They had become the due of any Patternist or mute who died—a time for friends, husbands, and wives to pay last respects. The ten who had belonged to Coransee, who now belonged to Teray, would have appreciated it.

  Amber came to stand beside Teray. “It’s done.”

  “All right.”

  “What are you going to do?”

  “Get us out of here as soon as they’ve buried the ashes.”

  “While you were unconscious, they asked me which of us would lead them—you or me.”

  Teray turned to look at her, his expression cautious, questioning.

  She smiled. “Would I have saved you if I wanted them that badly? You know they’re yours. His whole House is yours.”

  “Did you … did you want it at all?”

  “A House like that? If you had been anyone else, Teray, you and Coransee would have burned together.”

  He shuddered, knowing she meant it, knowing that he was alive only because she loved him. Not for the first time, he realized what a really dangerous woman she could be. If he could not make her his wife, he would be wise to make her at least an ally.

  “I’d give you that House if it weren’t so far from Forsyth,” he said.

  She raised an eyebrow.

  “I don’t want you that far away from me if I succeed Rayal.”

  “I think you will succeed him, but …”

  “If I do, it will probably be in spite of whatever Rayal can do to stop me. But look, if it happens, I’ll try to find a Housemaster in Forsyth who’s willing to make a trade—move to Redhill. If I can’t, I’ll give you any help you need to establish a new House in Forsyth.”

  “You’ve decided I’m going to settle in Forsyth.”

  “At the very least, you’re going to stay in Forsyth. After all, I’m offering you a bribe.”

  She laughed, as he had intended her to, but did not give him an answer, exactly. “Do you realize we’re linked again?” she asked.

  That startled him. He could see at once that it was true, but he had not been aware of linking with her. He could not recall when it had happened.

  “I was healing you,” she said. “I wasn’t shielded, of course, and you just caught hold.”

  “I don’t remember.”

  “You didn’t know what you were doing. You were just returning to a familiar position. I didn’t mind. Frankly, I was glad to have you back. If you wind up in Forsyth, one way or another, I’ll get a House there.”

  He kissed her. She had put him in just the right frame of mind for the other thing he had to do. He went over to the cluster of outsiders and women who stood watching as Coransee’s ashes were covered with earth. When that was done, he spoke to them.

  “Come back into the building and sit down,” he told them. “We have one more thing to do before we go on.”

  They obeyed silently. Some of them, Rain in particular, clearly resented him, but they had seen him kill their Housemaster in a fair fight. Custom said they should lower their heads and accept him as their new Housemaster, unless one of them wanted to challenge.

  “We’re surrounded by Clayarks,” he said. “If we go on through them the way we have, someone will be killed. Instead, I intend to kill the Clayarks. All of them. Now.” The ten Patternists understood him. They began to look apprehensive. “I need your strength as well as my own for this,” he continued. “I want all of you to open and link with me.”

  Immediately there was protest.

  “You don’t have any right to ask that of us,” said a man named Isaac. “Even if we could be sure you knew what you were doing that would be too much.”

  Teray said nothing, just looked at the man.

  “We hardly know you, and you’re asking us to trust you with our lives.”

  “Your lives will be safe with me.”

  “You say. Even Coransee never asked this of us.”

  “I’m not asking it either.”

  Isaac glared at him for a moment, then glanced out to where the ashes of Coransee were buried. Finally he lowered his head.

  “Lord.” It was Goran who spoke. There was no hostility in his voice. “Lord, we are all far apart in the Pattern. Are you certain that anyone other than Rayal can bring us all together?”

  “I can.” He was surprised to realize that he actually was as confident as he sounded. He had never gathered such a widespread group before, yet he had no doubt that he could do it, or that he should do it. “Open to me,” he said. “It will be easier on you if …”

  “You don’t know what you’re talking about!” Rain. Teray had expected to have trouble with her. “You think you can do what he could because you’re his brother? You think you’re as good as he was?” She was standing up now, and shouting. Teray spoke to her quietly.

  “Sit down, Rain, and be quiet.”

  “You’re nothing compared to him, and you never will …”

  She was much stronger than Jackman, but getting through her shield was not too difficult. Very carefully, he pushed her into unconsciousness—that to prevent her from wasting her strength fighting him. He formed a link with her. The unity was not pleasant even while she was unconscious, but he would get used to it.

  “I understand her problem,” he told the others. “I realize that some of the rest of you feel the same way. That’s why I’ve been patient. But now I’m through being patient. Those of you who refuse to open, I will force—not necessarily as gently as I forced Rain. Goran?” He had chosen Goran because he knew the young outsider would not refuse.

  Goran opened. Beside him, taking her cue from him, Lias also opened. That got things started. It was not necessary for Teray to force anyone else.

  Within seconds, he controlled the combined strength of ten Patternists. He had linked, then taken from all ten at once. The exhilaration he felt was something totally new to him. The canopy of his awareness first seemed almost as broad as the sky itself.

  Feeling like some huge bird, he projected his awareness over the territory. He could see, could sense, the lightly wooded land dotted with ruined buildings. He could see the distant ranges of hills, was aware of the even-more-distant mountains. The mountains were far beyond his striking range. In fact, they were near Forsyth, still over a day’s journey away, but he could see them. He swooped about, letting his extended awareness range free through the hills and valleys. Then, finally, he settled down, and focused his awareness on the Clayarks who formed a wide half-circle around his party. He swept down on them, killing.

  Before, with Amber, he had killed dozens of Clayarks. Now he killed hundreds, perhaps thousands. He killed until he could find no more Clayarks over all his wide range. He even checked the system of underground tunnels. When he was finished, he was certain that there were no more Clayarks anywhere near enough to affect him or his party.

  Then suddenly Rayal was with him.

  You’ve done well, young one. Very well. But be careful when you let your people go. Release only their strength. Keep your links with them.

  What am I being careful of? he asked coldly. You or my people? He would never forgive the old man for refusing him help when he needed it so desperately. Rayal picked up his thought.

  I don’t care whether or not you forgive me, young one. But keep in mind what you told Coransee’s people a few minutes ago. I suspect I’m even less patient than you are.

  Teray took the hint. What do you want of me?

  Let the woman know that you’ll be unconscious for a while once you let go of your people’s strength. Tell her not to try to help you—just to keep your people off you. She did it once. She’ll have to do it again. It’s a good thing you hadn’t taken from her too.

  He had not taken strength from Amber because she had obviously been tired. She had done her share for the day, he had thought. Now, obediently, he relayed Rayal’s thought to her. Rayal continued before she could reply.

  Now let them go. All at once, the way you took them. If you try it one at a time, you m
ight kill the last ones by giving back too much to the first one.

  Teray obeyed, let the strength of the ten Patternists snap away from him like a released spring.

  The breath seemed to go out of his body. There seemed to be nothing left of him. He sagged, the strength of his muscles gone. The strength of his mind kept him alive, but it did nothing more. He could still understand Rayal’s mental voice speaking inside him, but it would be a while before he could respond.

  It’s never easy, sent the old man. But the first time is always the worst. Ten or ten thousand, it doesn’t make any difference if they aren’t compatible with you. You pay for the power you take from them. You pay whether you take it through a few temporary links or through the Pattern itself.

  Can you tell whether the others are all right? Teray could not project the thought. He had no strength for that. But he hoped Rayal would pick it up.

  They’re fine. Even the one you had to knock out is still all right. They wonder what’s the matter with you.

  They aren’t the only ones.

  Rayal projected amusement. You’re fine. Recovering faster than I expected. You’d better be fine. I’ve stayed alive fifteen damnable years longer than I wanted to, waiting for you.

  In his surprise, Teray could not form a coherent thought.

  Surprised, young one? It doesn’t matter. As long as you’re good enough to succeed me, nothing else matters.

  But why would you wait for me? You had chosen Coransee.

  Coransee had chosen himself.

  But he said …

  That’s right. He said. Of course, he could have succeeded me. No doubt he would have if you hadn’t killed him.

  But you didn’t want him to?

  He wasn’t good enough, young one.

  He was stronger than I am.

  That’s not surprising. He was stronger than I would be alone—though I never let him know it. But the strength was all he had. That healing ability that your Amber found in you was all but missing in him. She’s not the only healer who’s tried to teach him.

  But why would healing ability be that important to a Patternmaster?