Camber the Heretic

by Katherine Kurtz

  “The regents are waiting outside to take you all prisoner,” he whispered. “I got here as soon as I could.”

  Camber, now with physical contact to work with, could not control a gasp of shock and consternation as he reached out with his mind and encountered Rhys’s still-addled state.

  My God, Rhys, what’s happened to you? he sent, glancing at the doorway from which Rhys had appeared and seeing Tavis still waiting there, though in shadow. Did Tavis do this to you?

  Yes, but there isn’t time to explain now, Rhys managed to reply, without verbalizing this time. How are we going to get out of this?

  The procession was forming in earnest now, and Archbishop Oriss and Bishops Dermot and Niallan were approaching to escort Camber to his place. In desperation, Camber reached out into Rhys’s mind with force, probing deeply as the Healer let fall all his shields to give as much information as possible in the shortest time.

  Under the circumstances, Camber’s touch could hardly be gentle. As he withdrew, his own mind reeling with the implications of what he had just read, Rhys teetered dangerously on his knees. Quickly Camber slipped his right hand under the Healer’s elbow and raised him as he himself stood. He was so appalled at Rhys’s mental condition that he could hardly think; and Joram, who had been catching the overflow from his exchange with Rhys, had no ideas either.

  He must somehow defuse the situation. If the regents dared to enter the cathedral to try to take him, the people must know what was happening. As yet, he could detect no sign of intrusion at the far end of the cathedral.

  The people were standing shoulder to shoulder, waiting for his blessing when his procession should move out of the cathedral. But as he eased into place behind Joram and his processional cross, flanked by the unsteady Rhys on one side and Archbishop Oriss on the other, he saw Jebediah finally making his way up the steps from the nave to the choir and heading toward him. The procession began moving, to the low chant of a psalm whose words eluded Camber in the confusion of trying to assess what was happening, and he met Jebediah just in the center of the choir. The head of the procession was already down the steps which Jebediah had just ascended, and beginning to move slowly up the center aisle. Jebediah looked surprised to see Rhys dressed as a priest.

  “Alister, the outer courtyard is filled with armed men,” he reported, loud enough that the other bishops near Camber could also hear. “Murdoch, Tammaron, and Ewan are there on horseback, with several of their captains, and I think I saw Hubert and the king. We couldn’t stop that many. I’m sorry.”

  “Then, it is a confrontation,” Camber said in a low voice, taking a closer grip on the crozier in his left hand, “Rhys says they plan to take all the bishops prisoner and force a new election.”

  “More likely kill you all,” Jebediah breathed. “At least it wouldn’t surprise me if those men had orders not to be too careful with some of the bishops. Bishop Niallan, Dermot, I would think you’re prime targets, along with Alister.”

  As those within earshot reacted, Camber nodded grimly.

  “I fear you’re right, Jeb. Well, I suppose this calls for drastic action. My Lord Bishops,” he called, raising his voice and his crozier, “stop the procession and attend me. Quickly.”

  At his words, those nearest him gasped, jostling those ahead of them and passing the word until the entire procession had halted and the choir monks had ceased their singing. A murmur of surprise and curiosity rippled through the congregation, quickly subsiding as the procession melted back to either side of the choir screen to frame the new archbishop coming forward to stand there on the steps. Quickly the other bishops clustered to either side of him, those who had not been close enough to hear Jebediah’s warning staring in amazement at their new leader, gaping as those who had heard spread the essence of the news until their archbishop raised his hand for silence. At his right, Joram moved into place with the jewelled processional cross of the primatial office, underlining Camber’s authority as he began to speak.

  “Good people of Valoret, I pray your attention for yet a little while longer.”

  His words brought an almost immediate cessation of sound in the rest of the cathedral.

  “This day you have seen me enthroned as your archbishop and primate. As you are doubtless aware, choosing a worthy successor to Jaffray of Carbury was not an easy task. After many weeks of deadlocked voting in which I was not even a candidate, two of the men who were candidates came to me and begged me to be their leader. They said that both, with their supporters, could endorse me; and combining both factions would give us the majority vote we needed to elect a new archbishop.

  “I was reluctant to accept their proposal, for I knew that there were certain other of our brethren who would never support my candidacy, but finally I told them that, if the next day’s vote proved their earnest, I would accept the yoke which they and the Holy Spirit chose to lay upon me.”

  Outside in the yard, he could hear voices shouting, and the sound of steel-shod hooves echoing against the paving stones, and he realized he had not much time.

  “I do not shrink from that duty or that yoke, for I believe that I have something to offer the people of Gwynedd. But now I have learned, even as I was preparing to leave this cathedral and give you my blessing, that there are those who would dispute the right of your bishops to elect their primate from among themselves.”

  A murmur of consternation began to grow in the congregation, but Camber held up his hand and raised his voice to keep above them.

  “Not only would they dispute that right, but they would force the bishops of Gwynedd to elect an archbishop of their choosing, whether or not the bishops agree.”

  “Who would do that?”—“Who?”—“Who?”—“Give us their names!” the shouts began to ring out.

  At that moment, the doors at the rear of the cathedral were thrown back and a mass of horsemen appeared, silhouetted against the snow. The lead riders wore the livery of the House of Haldane, but as those parted, Camber could just make out the device of Murdoch of Carthane.

  “Alister Cullen, come out into the yard!” Murdoch cried, spurring his horse right into the doorway, to fidget and slip on the inlaid tiles of the floor.

  “There is your answer, good people!” Camber cried, gesturing toward Murdoch.

  Furious, Murdoch wheeled his horse around in a tight little circle.

  “Bishops of Gwynedd, I command you, in the name of the king, to cease this folly. Your king will be lenient, but only if you abide by his will!”

  “Since when is the synod of bishops bound by the will of the king in such a thing as this?” Dermot shouted back. “Or rather, by the will of the regents! Alister Cullen is our legally elected, properly enthroned archbishop. The regents have no right—”

  “The regents have every right to protect the kingdom for its king!” Murdoch retorted. “Alister Cullen is an agitator, with his Deryni powers and his Deryni insinuations into the affairs of this kingdom. He is not acceptable to the Crown!”

  Eustace, usually so jovial and light-hearted, took a step forward. “Has the king said that? I think not!”

  “Then, he shall say it!” Murdoch retorted, before Eustace could continue. He sidled his horse closer to the doorway again. “Make way for the King’s Grace! Stand aside, you! Make way!”

  And as Camber and the others watched incredulously, the soldiers parted behind Murdoch and King Alroy came riding through on a white horse bedecked in scarlet bardings. He wore his scaled-down crown of crosses and leaves, a scarlet surcoat worked with the Lion of Gwynedd on his chest, and mail gleaming at neck and wrists and knees. The sheathed state sword of Gwynedd hung from his saddle, and a mounted knight followed at his stirrup, bearing the banner of the kingdom.

  An awed murmur sighed through the cathedral, and Camber knew that they had lost. He had not expected Alroy to be with the regents on such a mission. The king’s presence lent a legitimacy to which the people were already responding—the old Haldane mystique. The fine
distinction between Crown and advisors was already blurring. Camber could feel it in the air.

  “People of Gwynedd,” Alroy said, in a clear, loud voice, “our regent has spoken truly. It is against our wish that Alister Cullen has been elected to this highest of ecclesiastical offices. We do therefore declare his election to be null and void. We command our bishops to meet again and reconsider our wishes. And if anyone defies us at this time, we order our regents and military forces to take them into custody to await our further pleasure.”

  A stunned silence met the end of Alroy’s speech, but only for a few seconds. Then Dermot O’Beirne was stepping out from the others, his dark eyes flashing with anger.

  “Sire, this is not meet!” he cried, pounding the iron-shod foot of his crozier once against the marble step in emphasis. “Further, it is against law and custom. Archbishop Cullen was elected by due process. Not even the king may—”

  “The king,” Murdoch interrupted in an imperious tone, “may do what he wills! Your resistance is very dangerous, Bishop O’Beirne!”

  “And if you have advised the king in this matter, then your counsel is dangerous, Earl Murdoch!” Dermot retorted. “The people will never stand—”

  “The people will never stand for these insults to their king!” Murdoch snapped. “And those who continue to oppose his royal will could be construed as traitors!”

  The word was a strong one. Murdoch had intended the shock value. As a murmur of outrage rippled through the assembled people, a few of the bishops exchanged uneasy glances, though Camber kept his head high and his eyes fixed unwaveringly on Murdoch—for it was Murdoch at whose word violence could erupt at any second. Behind the regent were mounted knights and men-at-arms for as far as he could see, almost blotting out the dingy, hoof-churned snow. These men, he knew, would have no qualms about riding into the cathedral itself, at the order of their leaders. And yet, for the sake of the Church which he now headed in Gwynedd, he could not accede to their wishes, even if it cost the lives of half the people in this place, as well as his own.

  “My Lord Earl,” Camber responded, raising his hand and trying to temper his words with just the right balance of strength and acquiescence, “there are no traitors beneath this holy roof, and certainly none among my brother bishops. Every one of us swore at His Highness’s coronation to uphold his lawful commands and to support his throne. None of us has forsworn his oath.”

  “Then, obey this command!” Tammaron retorted.

  “I cannot, for it is not lawful. Our oath pertained to temporal obedience. His Highness, in turn—and you, as his regents—swore to defend the spiritual well-being of his kingdom—which he does not do, if he tries to go against the lawful governance of the synod of bishops and their right freely to elect their primate.”

  He had hit the crux of the matter, and Murdoch knew it. For a moment, the regent’s jaw worked in silent rage, his face going almost purple in his anger. Nor were Tammaron and Hubert able to conceal their indignation, though Ewan, good soldier that he was, betrayed no sign of emotion.

  For a moment, Camber thought he might have won the point—that the regents would back down, at least for the nonce.

  But then Murdoch turned slightly in the saddle toward Alroy and mouthed something incomprehensible from where Camber stood. Alroy seemed to pale a little, but then he gave a tight little nod and raised his chin a trifle higher, his young face stiff and strained under the crosses and leaves he wore.

  “Take them!” he said, in a voice which carried the full length of the cathedral.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  As for the illusions of art magick, they were put down, and their vaunting in wisdom was reproved with disgrace.

  —Wisdom of Solomon 17:7

  An instant of shock immobilized everyone within reach of his words, but only until Murdoch and Alroy eased their steeds to either side and the knights and mounted men-at-arms began pressing their big warhorses down the center aisle. Carpet had been laid for the ceremony, and it gave the chargers footing. The riders and following foot soldiers had penetrated perhaps a quarter of the way down the nave before the fact of their actions truly began to register. Then people began to scream and scatter before the hooves of the great horses and their riders.

  “Sweet Jesu, I didn’t think they’d dare to do it!” Dermot gasped to Camber, as all of the bishops began surging back into the choir. “Alister, you must get away. Don’t let them take you!”

  “Niallan?” Camber called. “Can you give us sanctuary?”

  Niallan, pushing his way toward the sacristy door, gave a curt nod. “Aye, just let me go ahead. Dhassa’s set as a Trap Portal just now, you know.”

  “Let me come, too,” Dermot said. “Whatever happens, they’ve heard what I said today, and they count me as yours. They’ll have Cashien away from me, in any case. Better that I’m free, if in exile.”

  “Come, then,” Niallan nodded, pushing closer to the sacristy doorway.

  The soldiers were more than halfway down the nave now, and the screams of the frightened and the inevitably injured echoed among the columns and arches of the great cathedral. In the sacristy, an appalled Tavis O’Neill cowered behind a garment press and watched as Bishops Niallan and Dermot scurried into the sacristy and stopped on the Portal square. Dermot spotted him as Niallan slipped into place behind him, and the human bishop turned his head to murmur something to the Deryni; but Niallan only shot Tavis a stern, forbidding look and then pulled Dermot closer. Then both men disappeared.

  With a shudder, Tavis came out of his hiding place and scurried toward the Portal square himself. He had already stayed too long. He had to get out before someone else saw him.

  He glanced out the sacristy door and almost collided with Jebediah. The Michaeline knight had his sword drawn and a murderous expression on his face, and he grabbed Tavis by the upper arm and shook him like a terrier.

  “What the hell are you doing here? Get back to Javan!”

  “I’m going now,” Tavis managed to mutter. “I—wanted to be able to report what had happened to Javan. Besides, you might need a Healer.”

  “We have Rhys!” Jebediah retorted. “Now, will you go? If you should be taken, or even seen by one of the regents’ men, Javan will have no one!”

  “But Rhys can’t Heal right now!” Tavis protested. “And it’s my fault!”

  “And it will be your fault if you leave Javan stranded. Now go, or I’ll knock you senseless and take you out of here myself!”

  Against that kind of determination, Tavis dared not protest further. With a little sob of fear, he gave a quick nod and drew himself up on the Portal square. Jebediah released him and stepped back, his attention already turning to the sanctuary, where foot soldiers and a few mounted men had now penetrated and were taking clerics into custody. A number of priests and three of the more timid bishops—Turlough and Davet and Ulliam—had surrendered, but those remaining were putting up a resistance.

  Tavis craned his neck. He saw Joram lay about him with the heavy processional cross, and the new archbishop thrust his crozier under the nose of a startled warhorse, which immediately reared and slipped, falling and dislodging its rider.

  But then he saw another mounted man urge his horse around behind Rhys, shouldering him aside with the heavy destrier and sending the Healer sprawling. Rhys slipped in blood and fell without being able to break his fall, the back of his head hitting the edge of one of the altar steps with a sickening, hollow crack.

  Tavis cried out and started to go to him, but Jebediah’s face had gone white at the sound, and he now brandished his weapon as if he would enjoy using it on Tavis. With a sob, Tavis hugged his arms tightly around himself and closed his eyes, forcing himself to make the jump back to the safe Portal in the archbishop’s apartments.

  And out in the sanctuary, close by the sacristy door, Camber saw and heard Rhys fall. Using his crozier like a pole weapon, he fought his way past the horseman who had been responsible and even managed t
o unhorse him before ducking under Joram’s guard to kneel by the fallen Healer. Joram continued to fend off wouldbe assailants with the processional cross, and Camber could see Jebediah fighting his way to them. Gently he touched the Healer’s forehead, trying to force himself not to acknowledge what he had felt as Rhys fell.

  Throwing aside his crozier, he stripped off the rich cope of white and gold and wrapped it around the fallen Healer, gathered Rhys tenderly into his arms and staggered to his feet, to begin pushing his way to the sacristy, now guarded on both sides by Joram and the grim-faced Jebediah. His face was terrible in his grief as he eased his way through the doorway into the tiny corridor, then into the sacristy itself.

  Half a dozen priests and deacons were already gathered there for safety, though all of them knew it was only a matter of time before the soldiers won through. They parted before him like water, none daring to ask his intention as he stumbled to a halt on the Portal square.

  “All of you, out!” he managed to croak, Joram and Jebediah reinforcing his words as he swayed under the weight he carried. He lowered Rhys’s feet to the floor, then held the limp, cope-wrapped form hard against himself as the room cleared, reaching out with his mind across the miles to Dhassa.

  Eager, caring hands were waiting at the other end, there in the little side chapel at Dhassa, but Camber shook his head and carried his burden a few steps outside the mosaic boundaries of the Portal, finally to drop to his knees before the altar and lay his burden on the soft carpet. Almost immediately he was aware of Joram and Jebediah dropping to their knees on either side of him, Jebediah already stripping off his grey mantle to make a pillow for Rhys’s head.

  “It wasn’t even a weapon that did it,” Camber whispered plaintively, taking the slack head between his hands and probing with fingers and mind. “He fell and hit his head on the step.”

  “He’s still breathing, but not very well,” Joram murmured, running his fingers through the thick red hair and closing his eyes for better concentration. “Damn! He’s got a depressed fracture here big enough to put an egg into!”