Saint Camber

by Katherine Kurtz

  Camber, after the expected feeble protests, accepted the invitation gracefully, secretly delighted at the ease with which his son had turned a much-desired meeting of father and children into an ecclesiastically expedient dinner engagement, and before decidedly partial witnesses. Days had passed since he had last been able to talk with any of these three who loved him most; and there were many details yet to be decided, before he left for the relative isolation of his new see in Grecotha. He allowed a resigned smile to shape his mouth as he and Crevan headed for the archbishop’s private chapel to begin their night’s vigil.

  The investiture of Crevan Allyn went off without incident the next morning, and it was with some relief that Camber finally put away the last of the vestments he had worn and started back to his own quarters with Joram. Again, he had managed not to be the principal celebrant at the accompanying Mass, thereby avoiding—at least technically—the exercise of priestly functions to which he was not entitled.

  But the moral issue he had been putting off for several weeks now would soon have to be faced—tomorrow, in fact, when Bishop Cullen would be required to celebrate his first Mass. Camber was glad that he and Joram would have some time this afternoon to discuss the matter in depth. And dinner tonight would bring the added comfort and insight of Evaine and Rhys.

  But an afternoon of such soul-searching was not to be his. No sooner had he and Joram stepped from the cathedral doorway than he was met by one of the king’s pages, conveying Cinhil’s invitation to ride out from the city for the afternoon. Apparently, Cinhil had decided that the former vicar general needed physical activity to occupy his mind and body; for no excuse of fatigue or pressing duties or prior commitment elsewhere could persuade the page to let him decline the invitation.

  Half an hour later found Camber riding out of Valoret at the king’s side, hard pressing the tall bay courser he rode in order to keep up with Cinhil’s fleet Moonwind. Eight mounted knights accompanied them, for it was not seemly that the King of Gwynedd should ride out unattended. But the riders hung back a score of lengths to the rear, giving their royal master the illusion of privacy he wished. The effect was as if the two men rode alone, only a cloud of dust and the muffled sound of following hooves reminding them that they were guarded at reasonable call.

  After an initial gallop, the two rode at a gentle canter for some minutes, each man alone with his thoughts in the breeze which their passage stirred in the warm summer air. When at last they pulled up in the shade of an oak grove to let the horses blow, the knights stood by just out of earshot. For all practical purposes, they were alone. Camber wondered what was on Cinhil’s mind, for him to insist so strongly on this meeting, but he knew better than to speak first and break the mood.

  Cinhil let the reins slide through his gloved fingers and lie slack on Moonwind’s neck as the stallion stretched to steal a mouthful of grass. Oddly, the king had begun to acquire a taste for riding since the war, and appeared far more at ease astride a horse than Camber had ever seen him.

  For several minutes, the only sounds were the rustlings of breeze-stirred leaves and the soft, horse noises of snuffling breath and muted harness jangle. Leather creaked, a rich, comforting comment on the laziness of the summer’s day, as Cinhil gave a contented sigh.

  “So, we have a new master of the Michaelines,” Cinhil finally said. “How does it feel to be just plain Father Cullen, if only for a few hours?”

  The king’s smile was open and friendly, genuinely curious, and Camber allowed himself to relax just a little.

  “I feel a little naked, if the truth be known, Sire. And sad, too, in a way,” he admitted. He leaned his elbows on the high pommel and echoed Cinhil’s sigh. “I shall miss my Michaelines. The Order has occupied some of the best years of my life.”

  “Aye, that’s probably true—though you have many more good years ahead, I’ll warrant.”

  “God willing,” Camber agreed idly.

  “And your successor—he is a competent man,” Cinhil replied, after only a slight hesitation. “I’ve had numerous occasions to speak with him since we returned from Iomaire, and I confess I am impressed. I was a little surprised you chose a human, though.”

  Camber gave Cinhil one of Alister’s sidelong glances of appraisal. “Are you disappointed, Sire?”

  “Disappointed? Nay, of course not. But I thought—I thought that you would surely choose another Deryni,” he finally blurted, at last betraying his anxiety. “You weren’t jesting, were you, about wanting to help me?”

  “I would never jest about that, Sire. Crevan Allyn is the best man for the job in these troubled times, were he Deryni or human. He will be a uniting factor, not a divisive one. That will be increasingly important as potential enemies begin to test you in the months and years ahead.”

  “You begin to sound like Camber,” Cinhil snorted. “Perhaps he did touch you that night.”

  Camber coughed and then sneezed to cover his alarm.

  What was Cinhil talking about? He could not know that Camber was now Cullen—at least his tone did not indicate that he was in any way suspicious.

  But what night was Cinhil talking about? It almost had to be the night of the memory integration. What had happened? He had always assumed that everything had gone well, that no suspicions had been aroused—else Joram or Rhys or Evaine would surely have found a way to warn him.

  On the other hand, he knew he did not remember all of that night. He had a vague recollection that Cinhil and someone else had at least come to the door, but he had lost consciousness shortly after that. Could it be that something had happened—something minor, but disturbing to Cinhil, nonetheless—and his children had merely assumed that he knew?

  He turned in his saddle to look at Cinhil squarely, letting a little of his puzzlement show on his face. Honest dismay should not arouse suspicion. He knew that Alister would have been similarly curious in such a situation.

  “Perhaps who touched me that night, Sire?” he asked in a low voice. “And what night? What are you talking about?”

  “Why, the night you were so ill—Sunday, it must have been. The night before Camber’s funeral.” Cinhil looked back at him in surprise. “You don’t remember?”

  Camber shook his head slightly, his gaze not leaving Cinhil.

  Cinhil drew a deep, shuddering breath and glanced away, trying to hide a haunted look in his eyes, then looked back at Camber quickly.

  “You really don’t remember?”

  “What happened, Sire?”

  Almost without thinking, Camber had let his voice take on a harder, more demanding edge—still Cullen’s, but far more harsh than Camber had intended. Fortunately, Cinhil seemed wrapped in his own reluctant remembrance, gray gaze fixed unseeing on the reins slack in his gloved hands.

  “I—I guess I just supposed you were aware of what was going on,” the king finally whispered. “But I realize now that you were like one possessed. Alister … what demon were you fighting that night?”

  Camber closed his eyes briefly, as if to shut out a painful memory, chilling at the image of possession Cinhil had touched. In a way, he had fought a demon, had been possessed—but in no way that he dared explain to Cinhil.

  Still, what connection had Cinhil made between Camber and Cullen, if any? Camber had to know.

  He shook his head. “It—is nothing I may speak of here, Sire,” he said softly. “But I sense now that my memory of that night is even less complete than I dreamed. Pray, tell me what happened. I—seemed to sense that you were there at some point, but beyond that, I remember very little. When I awoke the next morning, Rhys was asleep beside my bed and I had not the heart to wake him; and there was no time to ask him after that.”

  Cinhil drew breath again and tried to regain a more objective tone.

  “You—had stopped breathing. Rhys was trying to keep you alive. He said you were fighting some vestige of Ariella. We thought you were dying.”

  “Go on.”

  “Well, your young L
ord Dualta was with me, watching as all of us got more and more afraid for you. Even I could feel a little of what you were fighting—the fear and terror of it, anyway. And then, suddenly, Dualta—fell to his knees and invoked Camber to fight for you, to make you live.”

  “He—invoked Camber,” Camber repeated.

  Cinhil gave a reluctant nod, not meeting Camber’s gaze. Each word seemed to be dragged from deep inside him, almost against his will.

  “He said—he said something like ‘Oh, if the Lord Camber were only here, he could save Father Cullen!’ And then—” Cinhil swallowed, and enunciated each word carefully. “Then a shadow seemed to come across your face, and I—seemed to see—the face of Camber on top of yours, shifting in that shadow.”

  “Camber’s face!” Camber breathed.

  Instantly he knew what must have happened, though he still could not remember it; the temporary relaxation of physical controls as his beleaguered mind fought to resolve the inner chaos of another’s memories—a few seconds only, but long enough to leave an indelible impression on those who saw.

  With a blink, he was back with Cinhil again, seaice eyes searching the king’s with dismay appropriate to Alister. He opened his mouth, but no sound came out. He swallowed and, with a hand sign, bade Cinhil continue.

  “I—gather—that you, too, find it hard to believe,” the king murmured. “Nonetheless, I assure you that we saw what we saw. For a few seconds, the image wavered—and then you began to breathe, and the face disappeared, and you were yourself again. Dualta said it was a miracle.”

  Camber felt Alister’s memories tugging at his own, and this time he let the cold shudder pass through his body as he crossed himself in the gesture he had seen Alister use a dozen times.

  A miracle. Was that what Cinhil thought, too? How that supposition must gall the poor, guilt-ridden king, who could not seem to escape Camber’s influence, even with the man’s death. No wonder he was troubled. Camber had not foreseen this complication.

  “I wish someone had told me sooner,” he said, after a few seconds’ pause. “I had no idea.”

  “And Rhys or Joram didn’t tell you?”

  Camber shook his head. “They must have assumed I would remember. Besides, I told you that I found Rhys asleep by my bed the next morning, and I left for the cathedral before he awoke. And what with the funeral and the chapter meeting, I didn’t really have a chance to speak with either of them in private before they left for Caerrorie. It’s not the sort of thing one discusses in front of just anyone, you know.”

  “Certainly not,” Cinhil agreed. “Besides, I forbade them all to discuss it further, except among themselves. That reminds me, I should find that young monk who was kneeling in your oratory and question him further. Is he attached to your household?”

  “The monk?” Camber realized with a start that Cinhil must be referring to Evaine. “No, I think he was from one of the outlying houses, quartered with another order until our facilities can be rebuilt. I suspect he’s been sent back by now. I don’t even remember why he was brought to me. It all seems so long ago.”

  “No matter. I’ll find him.”

  Oh no you won’t, Camber thought. At least that was one thing he need not worry about—though now he wondered how Evaine had managed to keep her identity a secret, especially if Cinhil had spoken to her at all.

  But for now, he must worry about the king himself, and Dualta—and Guaire, he also realized. After all, Guaire’s little “dream” had deliberately been staged to look like a supernatural visitation. At the time, there had seemed no reason to play it otherwise. Now, if Guaire should get together with Cinhil or Dualta and compare notes …

  He suddenly realized that Cinhil had fallen silent and was looking at him strangely. He stole a glance at Cinhil’s face, then turned his attention to his saddlebow, wondering where he and the king stood now. He dared not speak.

  After a moment, Cinhil sighed.

  “You believe it, too, don’t you?”

  “Believe it, Sire?”

  “That he came back. That it was a miracle.”

  Camber exhaled slowly. “I—don’t know, Cinhil. Do you want me to say I do or I don’t? It’s—beyond all reason, all rational explanation—and I still don’t remember any of it. I haven’t even the delusion of memory to go on.”

  “It’s called ‘faith,’ Father,” Cinhil said grimly. “Once, I thought I had it. Very recently, I thought I had it. Now—God, will I never be free of him?”

  A fist came down on the pommel of the saddle, its force checked only as gloved flesh made contact with tooled leather. The royal head bowed in a soundless, choking sob, and the red-clad shoulders shook.

  Camber dared not answer that response, beyond a lowering of his own gaze and sympathetic silence. Cullen would not be expected to share Cinhil’s hostility toward Camber, for Cullen and Camber had been friends, and Cinhil knew that. But until Camber could find out from Rhys or Joram or Evaine just what happened that night, he must not let the discussion go back to Camber MacRorie. To do so could only risk inviting even more dangerous speculation than what had already passed between him and the king. Better to feign quiet sympathy, which was not altogether manufactured, and try to turn their conversation to more neutral subjects.

  After a moment, Camber gathered up his reins and urged his bay into a slow, ambling walk, leading a withdrawn and silent Cinhil quietly along a grassy path which skirted the oak grove. He commented on the warm weather, on the high water level of the streamlet through which they guided their mounts; and soon they were discussing politics, and arguing the fairness of the ransom Cinhil was considering for the Torenthi prisoners, as if nothing had happened.

  They did not return to the subject of Camber, much to Camber’s relief; but he was secretly pleased to note that many of Cinhil’s ideas for the future of his kingdom seemed to come almost directly from the reading which he and Joram had forced on Cinhil in the early months of his rehabilitation from priest to prince. Gone were the tantrums and sulks of a few weeks ago. It was as if the war and the events of the past fortnight had burned out that streak of emergent obstinacy which had so worried Camber before.

  The rest of the afternoon gave him much insight into how Cinhil was assimilating into his duties, and seemed to open the way for an increasing intimacy between king and future bishop. Almost, the price of his own transformation from Camber to Cullen began to appear justified. If only there were not that nagging question, constantly worrying at the back of his mind.

  What had happened that night? What had Cinhil actually seen?—no matter what he thought had occurred. And would that event come back to haunt him?

  He had to wait several hours for even a partial answer to that question—until he and Cinhil and their escort had returned to Valoret, hot and dusty, and he had escaped to his own quarters to wash and change for dinner.

  He greeted Joram, then Evaine and Rhys, as Alister Cullen should—the perfect host in front of Guaire and the two servants who brought their meal and laid the table. The four of them made suitably inconsequential small talk while the food was served, the goblets filled with wine, the meal begun. In no word or nuance of manner or movement was there anything to suggest that he was anything but the gruff former master of the Michaelines, soon to be a bishop and prince of the Church.

  But as soon as Guaire and the servants had left the room, all pretense fell away as Camber asked his question. The faces of sons and daughter confirmed what he had suspected: they had not known that he did not remember. All of them had assumed too much.

  When, after hurried preparation, Camber entered Evaine’s mind and relived that night from her point of view, seeing the facade his daughter had felt constrained to put on the incident, he could understand why Cinhil had been so unnerved. So far as Cinhil and the trusting Dualta were concerned, a miracle had occurred.

  And since Cinhil had forbidden all to talk about it, the incident should go no further. Unfortunate that Evaine should have to use a
deception involving this particular explanation, but better that than to betray the greater good for which so many had already given so much. Even Joram was reluctantly forced to admit that her solution had been brilliant, under the circumstances.

  Still, what Camber next told them did not help to alleviate the general unease which their discussion had already raised. The matter of Guaire was related in terse, half-apologetic phrases, Camber hardly daring to meet their eyes as they listened with growing disbelief. Certainly, his well-meaning intervention was understandable, especially in the light of what he had not known; but it did complicate matters further.

  Nor could the mistake be easily remedied. It was too late for Camber or anyone else to reenter Guaire’s mind and try to erase his memory of the “dream” he thought he’d had. Guaire’s experience, even blurred by the drugs Camber had given him, was by now far too fully integrated into his memory of Camber as a whole. To tamper at this point would alert even the fully human Guaire to the reality of psychic intervention, and might drive him to inquire further as to what had happened, and who had done the meddling.

  But it was Joram who finally stumbled on a real cause for alarm, almost as an afterthought, as he speculated gloomily on all the possible things that could still go wrong. Like his father, he quickly drew the deduction of disaster if Guaire and Cinhil and Dualta should get together and compare notes. But from there, he went one step further.

  Suppose any two of them did compare experiences? Even if they did not see through the sham of both events and uncover the deceptions, suppose they accepted what they had seen as fact, corroborated each by the other? Suppose the word spread? Camber MacRorie had always been popular among the common folk, and never so much as since the Restoration. “Kingmaker,” they called him. And “Defender of Humankind,” since he had helped to throw down the evil excesses of the Deryni Imre. Two miracles attributed to the man already called hero could start a cult of Camber.