The Orb And The Spectre (Book 2)

by Martin Ash

  Pader nodded.

  "You weren't told everything, Pader. I knew more, but I told no one. Not Leth, not Mawnie, not our mother and father. Ressa made me swear." She hesitated a moment, frozen in the horror of recollection. "I was at her bedside just a couple of days before she passed away. She had been in a feverish, unbroken sleep for some time. But she woke, suddenly, and looked at me, and said, quite clearly, 'Iss, when my baby comes, tell no one. They will be shamed. Tell no one.'

  "I took her to be in a delirium. We knew nothing of a pregnancy, and there were no signs. Duke Hugo was courting her, was besotted with her and had let it be known that he intended to ask for her hand, but even so . . . . I began to say something, something to do with Hugo, but she grasped my hand, fiercely. I can feel it now, burning hot, and the intensity in her eyes. 'It’s not Hugo. No one must know, Iss. No one, but especially not Hugo. Promise me. Swear to me that you will never tell a soul. And promise me you will take care of my baby. Take it somewhere, in secret. Look after my child, Iss, dear Iss, but let know one know. I’m trusting you, you alone. Not Mawnie, no, never tell Mawnie. Do you promise?'

  "What else could I do?" said Issul to Pader Luminis. "It made no sense. She was fevered and deluded, but I promised, mainly to calm her. She gripped my hand even more tightly, then closed her eyes and slept again. Two days later she was dead."

  Issul paused, gathering the courage to continue. "On the day before Ressa's funeral I went to her room to be with her one last time. She lay upon her bed, draped in her funeral gown, so peaceful, too young and beautiful. I stood there and wept silently, enraged at a world so cruel as to permit such an injustice as this. I spoke to her, a few final parting words, and was about to leave. But as I turned away. . . Pader, it is so painful to describe. As I turned away, she moved. Ressa moved. Pale and still and dead, yet her body gave a twitch and then was suddenly convulsed. Her back arched; something shifted beneath her gown. She seemed to be undergoing a most terrible, terrifying struggle, yet her face remained serene and lifeless, her arms limp at her sides.

  "I don’t know what I did, Pader. I was transfixed, I think, rooted to the floor. Ressa's poor body writhed and bucked, her legs. . . splayed. It was terrible, Pader! Terrible! Terrible!"

  Pader Luminis took the young Queen's hand in his, calming her with soothing words yet barely able to contain his own feelings, so shocked was he at what he was hearing. Leth's fears had been borne out.

  "And then the blood," continued Issul, her face haggard. "Dark blood, soaking through her pale gown, so much of it, soaking the bed beneath her. And Ressa was still. Nothing was moving. I don't know how long I stood there, just staring, sobbing, so terrified, not knowing what to do. And then, a sound. A thin, tiny cry. And the smallest movement, almost nothing at first, beneath her gown where the blood still spread between her lifeless thighs. And the cry again. I did not know. . . oh, I was so frightened. But I stepped forward, so afraid, and reached for her gown, lifted it, exposing her, not knowing what I would see. And there it was. I could not. . . I didn't. . . a baby, perfectly formed, so small, smaller than any child I had ever seen. A boy, impossibly. Pader. How? How? Ressa's son!"

  Issul voice had risen to a querulous soprano, and now she broke down, the tears streaming freely down her cheeks, her hands rigid before her face.

  Pader sat in numbed, troubled silence, grappling with the images she had presented. Presently he rasped, "You are saying, this child, this baby, was the result of Ressa's having been raped upon Sentinel's Peak? But that happened just weeks earlier."

  "It was an unnatural child, Pader. It had given birth to itself, three days after Ressa's death. There was no indication - she did not swell, nor lactate. Yet there it was, a tiny baby boy, human in every respect, except. . . ."

  "Except?"

  "Oh, I don't know, but its eyes. The way it looked at me, intelligently, as though it knew me. As though it was fully aware. But I was distraught, I hardly took anything in. I gave no thought to the father at the time. Only afterwards did I admit to myself that it must have been that monstrous thing on Sentinel's Peak."

  "You are positive it’s not Hugo's?"

  "If it was, he knew nothing of it. I observed him, then and since, and I’m convinced. I’ve even, on occasion, made oblique references in his presence. He made no response whatsoever. And even if I’m wrong, there is no explanation for the mode and manner of its birth. But no, it was that thing upon the Peak."

  "What did you do?"

  "I minded Ressa's request. Innocently; I suppose foolishly, I took the child and hid him in my own rooms. Fortunately he slept for much of the time. When he woke I gave him goat's milk. I wanted to tell someone. I desperately needed help, but I was confused and could think only of Ressa's insistence that no one know."

  "But what of Ressa's body? The blood?"

  "I went to my father and told him I had found her thus. He was stricken with horror when he saw, and of course there was no explanation. I longed to tell him, but did not dare. It would not have helped. Between the two of us we removed the bloodstained bedding and clothed Ressa in a new gown. Not even my mother knew. Father did not want her to suffer. He has never spoken of it since, not even to me. He has shut it out.

  "Immediately after the funeral I returned to Orbia. It happened that someone known to one of my staff had a sister who had just given birth to a stillborn child. Her name was Ohirbe. It is she who I went to see at Lastmeadow. I went to her, disguised as a woman of wealth and some status, and arranged for her to take the boy and raise him more or less as her own. Understand, Pader, I knew the child to be unnatural. I also knew something of the tale of the Legendary Child, as propounded by the preachers of the True Sept, but I was not a follower of the Sept, and I could not believe this could apply. It was far-fetched, impossible. Perhaps I simply did not want to believe it. The baby, unnatural though his birth was, was my nephew. I could not admit his existence, but I had promised to keep him safe. This seemed the best way. Only now have all my worst, half-realized fears come true and I can see that I acted wrongly, yet still I know so very little."

  "And did you meet the Child, in Lastmeadow?"

  "Yes, and he knew me. He had seen me only at his birth, but he knew me. Pader, has there been any word from the True Sept in my absence?"

  "You have not been told? King Leth visited Overlip. He spoke with Grey Venger there and persuaded him to come here, to Orbia."

  "He was here? Venger?"

  "And is now. Surprisingly, he came as a guest, for constructive talks, acknowledging the fact that what is happening now precludes his remaining hidden. What he has told Leth is far from comforting. But now he resides in the Lord High Invigilate's dungeons, against Leth's wishes, and who knows what Fectur has done to him?"

  "The gods! Fectur told me nothing of this. He was to have brought me a full report this evening, but he excused himself on a pretext and a promise to present his case first thing in the morning." She rose and hurried to the door, passed through her apartment to the main entrance and summoned the captain of her personal guard. "You will go immediately to the dungeons of the Ministry of Realm Security. Upon my authority you will secure custody of the prisoner, Grey Venger, and take him to the guest's apartments. Guard him well and let no harm befall him. Take sufficient men and if you meet resistance taking him from the cell, mount an armed guard about him. I will join you as soon as I can."

  Back with Pader she enquired about Leth's discussions with Grey Venger. Pader told her all he knew, and as he did so Issul's last desperate hopes that they might not be dealing with the Legendary Child were finally dispelled. And still she knew so little. And the Child, Moscul, her nephew, was gone. In her grasp, then gone.

  "What are we to do, Pader?"

  The Murinean ran his hand over his pate, shaking his head gravely. "I don’t know, dear Issul. I truly do not know."

  Issul stood in renewed agitation, walked towards the window, then halted half way. "What do you make of Fectur's
account of Leth's and the children's disappearance?"

  "He hasn’t spoken of it to me directly. I am told the King has 'escaped', or more mysteriously, simply vanished with the Prince and Princess while under guard in your apartments."

  Issul nodded.

  "Prior to your return it might have been in Fectur's interest to permanently remove Leth, and his heirs. Even so, it is highly unlikely that he would have acted so swiftly. He would have been very foolish to have committed murder at this time, even disguised as accident. It would seriously undermine what has been a quite brilliantly expedited coup on his part. No, he is not by any reckoning a foolish or impetuous man. He should have been carefully biding his time, consolidating his position. Furthermore, I think there was much he wished to learn from Leth." Pader slowly shook his head. "He has backed down almost graciously now, wrongfooted and embarrassed not only by your return but by his inability to explain the disappearances."

  "Then how, Pader? Magic? Your magic, the illusions you produce so effortlessly, can something of the kind have been used to transport Leth and Galry and Jace? Or to conceal them?"

  Pader Luminis smiled sadly and shook his head. "No, child. I have told you before, what I produce are fripperies. They can’t be sustained for more than a few moments, and they take years of study and practice to produce. King Leth has never seriously studied magic. Yet magic, I’m quite sure, is at the heart of this. Something more powerful than anything known to us."

  She looked at him curiously. "You know something?"

  "It may not help you. But I spoke with Leth on more than one occasion in recent days. He had become deeply worried, tense, distracted and mistrustful of almost everyone. We spoke of many things, largely related to the scourge that has befallen Enchantment's Reach, and the many baffling forms it seems to be taking. Like you, Leth was keen to discover all I might know about the Legendary Child and the gods of Enchantment. On the way to attend a Special Assembly he said something which, whilst not particularly odd given the circumstances, did strike me as portentous. He told me that he might come to me with an unusual request, and that if he did I should not question him about it. Subsequently, only hours before Fectur moved against him, he did come to me in my private apartment. He said he feared the inexplicable, and would not elucidate. But he said, 'Pader, if anything should happen to me, there is something you must do.' And he took me to his study and showed me something which he said under specific circumstances, if you ever returned, I was to pass into your hands."

  Pader hesitated.

  "Pader, what? What was this thing?"

  "I will have to show you. I believe - hope - it is in the study still, but I lack the authority to go there."

  Issul grabbed a shawl. "Quickly. Show me."

  Inside Leth's private study there was no evidence of the rigorous searches that had taken place just hours earlier. As far as Issul could tell nothing had been removed, though she was not familiar enough with the chamber to be sure of every article.

  "Strange," mused Pader as they entered, his eyes upon Leth's workdesk. "Leth took the object from a secret compartment in the wall over there. He told me that, were I ever to have to find it, that was where it would be. Yet it is here, upon the desk." He raised the blue casket almost reverentially in both hands, gazing at it, then at Issul "Child, he told me that should anything happen to him I was to take this and ensure its safety, and give it to you if you returned."

  Tears stung Issul's eyes. "He believed I would return?"

  "He hoped beyond hope."

  "But if I didn't?"

  "I was to safeguard it and pass it to Prince Galry upon his accession. 'This casket is more precious than you can imagine, Pader,' he said. 'It is fragile, mysterious, wonderful, and perhaps to be feared. It is also easily destroyed. It must be protected at all costs, for it is perhaps the means by which we will be saved'."

  Wonderingly, Issul took the casket. It was light in her nervous hands. "What does it contain?"

  "The King would not say. He told me it must not and may not be opened, save by the right person at the right time, but if it comes to harm we will be lost."

  "He knew? He knew something was going to happen to him?"

  Pader gave a shrug. "Perhaps a premonition, or simply a reasonable precaution. He was highly emotional and plainly suspicious of something, or someone. But. . . I don’t think even he knew what, or limited his suspicions to any single individual. My Queen, this is truly a rare and extraordinary object. I sense. . . I sense its nature, its power. You must safeguard this as you would your own children."

  She flinched at that, and Pader looked away, regretting the choice of words.

  "Can you tell me anything more, Pader?"

  "Leth offered nothing more, and forbade me to ask further."

  Tentatively Issul tried the catch on the casket, but as Pader had predicted the lid was fast.

  "Let us hope that the King - and your children too - will quickly return to us. Then the mystery may be explained."

  Issul held back the lump that swelled in her throat. She turned the casket over in her hands, examining its outer casing. "Of what is it made?"

  "Uncommon material, some sort of shell or keratinous substance I think, set with stones I cannot identify. There can be little doubt that it originates from Enchantment."

  "Enchantment?" Her eyes widened. What can this thing be? She clasped the casket to her bosom. Oh Leth, I am so alone! Why did you not say more? Leth, my babies, where are you? Where are you?

  Quickly she removed her shawl and spread it upon the floor, then, kneeling, placed the casket at its centre and carefully wrapped it in the shawl. "Pader, no one must know of this."

  "I swore as much to Leth. He bade me warn you, or whomsoever I eventually passed it on to: its existence must always remain a secret."

  Issul stood. She glanced towards the door. A shadow had settled there. She all but gasped at the sight of the figure in its frame. "Lord Fectur!"

  Fectur's eyes were slits, flicking from the bundle in her arms, to Pader Luminis, to Issul. Issul's heart raced. What had he seen? What had he heard?

  "What do you want?"

  "Your men have removed a prisoner from my custody, apparently on your authority."

  "That is correct. I am told that Grey Venger came here voluntarily, a guest of my husband."

  "He is a dangerous subversive, a madman, an assassin."

  "Ahem!" Pader Luminis cleared his throat. "It has been established that the assassination attempt upon the King was a sham. The plan was not to murder the King but to establish conditions permitting the advent of the Legendary Child, following prophecies contained in the screed of the True Sept."

  This was news to Issul. She flashed Pader a grateful glance. Fectur glowered, a sneer upon his thin lips. "You place great trust in the words of a common criminal. I suspect him rather of bargaining for redemption."

  "It is irrelevant," said Issul. "He was the King's guest. Now he is mine. His incarceration was unnecessary and presumptuous."

  "He holds information that both King Leth and myself consider crucial to the wellbeing of the realm."

  "All the more reason to make available to him the hospitality normally accorded a respected guest."

  "I was making progress. I had released Venger from his bonds, gained his trust. He was on the point of opening up to me. Now I fear the information is lost."

  "We will discuss this further when I have spoken to Venger. In the meantime you may relinquish all responsibility for him. I consider that done. Now, there is the matter of the report I asked for."

  Fectur ground his teeth. "It will be done by morning."

  "Good. I will speak to you then. Thank you, Lord Fectur."

  Fectur's eyes went briefly to the bundle she was pressing unconsciously to herself. He seemed on the verge of saying something more, but bowed his head instead and withdrew. Issul released a long, pent-up breath. Her stomach and hands were damp where she clutched the bound casket. She ex
changed a gaunt, haunted look with Pader Luminis.

  III

  They returned to Issul's chamber and for some minutes Issul listened nervously as Pader recounted all that had taken place in her absence: the renewed attempts to have the Deist Edict repealed, and Leth's declaration of Emergency (which, under Fectur's auspices and pressure from the factions, had now been withdrawn); the slooths' attack and the Karai's encirclement of Giswel Holt; Leth's conversations with Grey Venger, the King Without A Soul and the Legendary Child; Fectur's briefly triumphal overthrow of the King.

  "Was there any justification, Pader, in what Fectur did?"

  Pader slowly kneaded his jaw with one hand. "He acted, strictly speaking, within the law, I’m afraid. But the case against Leth was tenuous; he was quite viciously and calculatedly exploited."

  "But was he sick?"

  "I believe not. He was, though, exhausted and severely distracted. Your disappearance, combined with everything else, affected him badly. And . . . something else. I think now it must have had something to do with this."

  He nodded at the blue casket which lay upon a table at Issul's side.

  "What does Fectur know about this?"

  "As far as I am aware, nothing. He searched the chamber and must have seen it, but attached no importance to it."

  "Did he see us, Pader? Did he hear?"

  "I pray not."

  Issul sat in silence, her head spinning. Finally, after profound consideration, she made the statement: "Pader, I have been to Enchantment."

  Pader stared at her in sudden consternation.

  "It’s true. I was captured by the Karai. There was an underground chamber, and within it a strange thing, a Farplace Opening." She related her experience within the tower chamber, her encounter with the three white-haired, blue-eyed children who called themselves by the single name of Triune.

  Pader stood and paced the room, his head bowed and brow furrowed in deepest contemplation. "I am astounded. A way into Enchantment?"