Demon Rider

by Ken Hood

  "After this? I'd be eating the heather in a week! What are we going to do now, Longdirk?"

  "Eat, I hope. Sleep. Think again in a week or two."

  Hamish's eager grin faded. "But this crusade the don—"

  "Demons! You go crusading with him if you want. It's been a stressful day, but I haven't lost quite all of my wits."

  "Senor?" said a childish voice near Toby's elbow.

  It came from a cropped-headed novice who clutched a lantern in both hands as if he found it heavy. He could be no more than twelve and was either remarkably brave or unaware that he was addressing a convicted incarnate. "Will you be kind enough to follow me, senor?"

  "I shall be honored. Lead the way."

  Leaving Hamish staring after him with a perplexed frown, Toby followed his guide along a maze of corridors, up several flights of stairs, and finally to a low oaken door. By then he had discovered that the boy's name was Alfonso, he was a choirboy and would be chief soloist as soon as Felice's voice broke. With little less confidence, Alfonso also explained that he intended to be the abbot when he grew up.

  Toby expected a monastic cell and would be surprised if he could stand upright in it. A cot long enough for him to sleep on would be astonishing. What he found when he ducked under the lintel was a chamber fit for a king, larger than Granny Nan's cottage and four times the height. Being careful not to laugh, he peered around so he would be able to remember it all and share the joke with Hamish: a fire crackling in a huge stone fireplace, candles gleaming in silver holders on the table, velvet drapes hanging beside real glazed casements, the walls hidden by tapestries—thick rugs on the floor, a basin and ewer and neatly folded towel, two padded chairs, and a four-poster big enough to take him and several friends. He had never merited such a room in his life and never would.

  "I fear you have made an error, friend Alfonso. I am not the viceroy."

  The boy's face crumpled in worry. "No, senor! Brother Tomas pointed you out to me himself. 'The big one,' he said!"

  "But this room?"

  "Yes, senor! The royal chamber, he said. For the big man—begging your pardon, senor."

  "Oh, I know I'm the big one, so don't worry about that."

  "We are very cramped for space just now," the boy suggested nervously. "With so many refugees. Er, I mean no offense, senor! I am certain this is the correct place."

  What game was the tutelary playing now? Such effusive hospitality must come with a monstrous bill, to be presented on the morrow. He padded over the rugs and laid the casket on the table. This would be only the fourth time in his life he had ever slept in a real bed, and last night he had been chained like a dog. Hamish was right—life in Tyndrum would seem very dull.

  "Well, if you're quite sure..."

  "Quite sure, senor. I shall come back later to guide you to the refectory."

  Could he stay awake that long? "That is very kind of you. It is a magnificent room, but I still think there has been some mistake." He heard the door close.

  "Indeed there has," said another voice, a familiar voice, clear like a silver bell.

  He spun around. Alfonso had shut the door with himself on the inside and was standing there with a faint smile fixed on his face and a golden shimmer around him. Bracing himself for more treachery, Toby went down on his knees, which put their eyes at about the same level, although the boy seemed to be staring through him rather than at him.

  "The mistake was ours. It has been many centuries since we had to apologize to a mortal, Tobias."

  "I am grateful to you for sending the don to rescue me, Holiness." What did it want of him now?

  "It should not have been necessary. We misjudged you. We have not met anyone quite like you before, you see."

  "What does that mean?"

  The spirit chuckled, although the boy's expression did not change. "It means that even we should not claim to be infallible. Our knowledge is confined to our experience, which is vast but not infinite, and there are exceptions to every rule. And that rule we overlooked! We have some questions to ask you."

  Questions? Montserrat was as close to omniscient as it was possible to be. Toby suppressed an aching yawn. Why couldn't this wait until morning? "There are others who need you more than I do tonight—the baron, for instance."

  "We are attending to him now in the basilica. Your case is urgent, too. So listen. We first heard of you when reports came of the slaughter at Tortosa, obviously the work of a demon. It did not seem to concern us, for it happened far outside our domain, but a few days ago the Inquisition appealed to us for help, something it has never done before. We do not approve of the Black Friars' methods and frequently not of their choice of victims, but they perform a service in hunting down demons as they flit from one spirit's haunt to another. This one, we were told, had escaped to the north, to Lerida, and now appeared to be heading in our direction. Furthermore, although their reports were scanty, the friars believed that it had taken hostages. So we were concerned.

  "Soon it became clear that the viceroy was also concerned. Instead of the handful of yokels the Inquisition is usually granted to aid it in making arrests, he assigned a troop of professionals under the competent Captain Diaz. He also had the insolence to demand our assistance. As it is Oreste's fault that there are so few tutelaries left in Aragon at the moment, we were even less inclined to cooperate with his men than we were with the Inquisition, but it was made plain to us that the consequences would be drastic if we refused."

  All of this sounded very much as Toby had worked it out for himself. What was so urgent? Why must it be tonight?

  "When you drew closer, though, we saw that you were far from a typical case of possession. Your companions seemed to be under no compulsion. They evidently accepted you as human, and that was worrying indeed, because only supremely crafty demons are capable of that deception. The most egregious such imposter is Nevil the Fiend, of course."

  Toby had not foreseen that view of him. "But could I have misled Montserrat?"

  It did not answer that question. "The other possibility was that you had somehow managed to gain control of your demon after the massacre, but that theory was so improbable that we did not consider it. The cooks are basting the roast geese, and you will not want to miss dinner. Go and get ready."

  Disconcerted, but aware that some of his weariness came from hunger, Toby rose and went over to the stand with the basin. He would have to turn his back on the tutelary! Undress in front of it?

  "This feels wrong, Holiness, disrespectful!"

  The boy was still staring woodenly at the fireplace, but the spirit laughed joyfully.

  "Since when have you worried about being respectful, Tobias? No, you have earned a little ease, and rules do not apply to you. We shall talk while you wash, for this is a long tale. Your arrival happened to coincide with a raid by a band of brigands. We decided to kill two birds with one arrow and regret to say that this may have been a lapse into vanity. We nudged matters a little, so that you encountered the brigands on the road just below here. We prepared to defend the hostages from harm and waited to see what would happen, fully expecting that you would deal with the villains as you had dealt with the landsknechte and thus relieve us of the need to do it ourselves."

  Toby tossed his shirt on the bed after his doublet. He tipped water into the basin. It was hot. There was real soap!

  So the tutelary had been testing him? It had not been as mistaken as it was making out, because it had sent Jacques to meet him and show him what exorcism could do. It was not being completely honest with him even now. It wanted something of him, but what? What would be written on the bill?

  If it read his doubts, it did not comment on them. "The results were surprising. You did not invoke your demon. In fact you were prepared to die rather than try to use gramarye, so you had not yet lost your humanity, and that meant there was still hope for you. This was a complication, because you would lose that chance if the Inquisition got its hands on you, and of course von
Münster and his troop were also after you by then. Consequently we offered you an exorcism. Our real intention was to give you sanctuary and our guidance in dealing with the hob. The exorcism itself would have been a last resort, only to be applied if we could not help you come to terms with—"

  "If you had said so—"

  "If we had said so, there would have been violent objections from the Inquisition and Captain Diaz and Hauptmann von Münster. But you amazed us again. In the end you chose the Inquisition! We regret the ordeal you have been through, Tobias, but you did make your own choice."

  He did not believe any of this, not for a moment. Montserrat had manipulated them all, and especially him. It was still doing so. Then the glowing embers under the logs on the hearth reminded him of the braziers in the crypt, and he shivered.

  "You did very well to defang Baron Oreste," the spirit said.

  It did not say that it was surprised, though.

  "That was all the don's doing."

  "Oh, was it really?"

  "Yes. I am grateful to you for sending him."

  "Thank his mother," the spirit said with amusement. "A most valiant lady! Not that Ramon needed much persuasion once she suggested it."

  But who or what had put the idea in Doña Francisca's head? "Holiness, can you help him?"

  "The don? Help him in what way?"

  Toby stared across the room at the boy's blank face. Conversations with mystic voices were very frustrating. "Well... Untangle his wits."

  "Ah. You mean he does not draw the line between fantasy and reality in the same place you do?"

  "Yes."

  "Who is to say which of you is right? If you gave him the choice, would not he choose to have his reality made more like his fantasies, rather than the reverse?"

  "I suppose so. But..."

  "Have you ever seen him attacking a windmill, Tobias?"

  "Attacking a windmill, Holiness? Why would anyone... No, I haven't."

  "Then he is not as mad as he might be. Does he not always behave as if he knows a windmill is a windmill, however he may choose to describe it? Ask not what we can do for Don Ramon, but rather what will you do for him!"

  "Me? I'm just a big stupid—"

  Again the spirit chuckled. "You're not at all stupid when you think no one is watching. We are giving you answers, but soon we shall demand answers from you. You see that silver box on the table? Go to it."

  Tossing down the towel, Toby walked over to the table. The box was finely crafted but small enough to fit in his fist. He had disregarded it, assuming it was only a tinderbox, but when he opened it now he found it to be empty. He turned to frown uneasily at the incarnation.

  "This would hold a ring, perhaps? It is warded?"

  "Very good! Yes. The demon that controlled Baron Oreste is named Avernus, and it is immured in a beryl. He describes it as a square, greenish stone held by eight claws in a gold setting."

  Toby began to untie the binding around the ivory casket. "How dangerous will this be?"

  "There is some danger," the spirit admitted. "You must be as quick as you can. We can keep the demon from Oreste, but we may not be able to prevent it from striking at you. You may see strange visions or feel the building shake. It may even hurt you. Try not to let these things distract you."

  He undid the last knot and took hold of the lid. "Hurt me how badly?"

  "Perhaps quite badly. The pain may be severe."

  Oh, it must be nice to be an immortal and order people around like that! Toby opened the casket and nothing terrible happened. He fingered quickly through the glittering hoard inside until he found a gold ring with a square, greenish stone. He put that in the silver box and shut both of them. Then he turned around to glare at the paralyzed Alfonso.

  "Well, did I pass that test? That's all it was, wasn't it? You were testing me again!"

  "Partly. And yes, you passed. Your heartbeat never changed."

  Upstart, overgrown elemental! "Blast you and your sleazy tricks!"

  Alfonso suddenly turned his head to look straight at him. "Not all trickery, Tobias. The demon was loose, but we were able to contain it. Now we can put it where it will do no more harm."

  "Then let's talk about the amethyst. Who stole it?" He took off the locket and opened it. A purple gem rolled out into his palm. He stared at the incarnation in bewilderment.

  "The locket has been hexed, Tobias. If anyone but you opens it, they just find a black pebble—a very subtle piece of gramarye!"

  "You did that!"

  "It was none of our doing."

  "Then who? The hob isn't capable of subtlety. It doesn't care about the stone anyway. Not Oreste. Some other spirit in Barcelona?"

  "No. Oreste has subverted all of them."

  Toby waited for more and nothing came. He hung the locket around his neck and stalked over to the bed, where garments lay waiting. They looked large enough, plain but well cut. He began to dress. The choirboy was still frozen in place, so the audience was not over yet.

  "What happens next? Will you defend me from the Inquisition?"

  "We will," the spirit said. "But we think you are safe from the Black Friars now. Having lost you twice, Vespianaso will be in deep disgrace—under suspicion of collusion, even. He may well learn something about the rack himself."

  "That poor old man? Dear, dear!"

  "We shall assign you a penance for that remark," the spirit said, "but not a very hard one. His brethren will hesitate to meddle with you. When you leave us we can certify that you have been cleansed of your demon."

  "That's assuming I can learn to keep the hob suppressed?"

  "Of course. We shall help you as much as we can, but you must not remain very long with us. We cannot defend you against Nevil, whether he brings his army or sends his legions of demons. A solitary assassin may evade our attention. You must leave soon. Now, we grant you one more question and then it will be our turn to ask."

  Toby took a hard look at Alfonso's face, but of course it revealed nothing. What question was he supposed to ask? And what questions was he going to be asked?

  "The locket, then. Who hexed it?"

  "You did. We don't know when, but it doesn't matter. The fences are falling, Tobias. You and the hob are becoming dangerously close. You must not use it like that! If you were not aware that you were doing so, that merely shows the extent of your peril. Even an innocent little enchantment like that one may offer it an opportunity to take you over completely."

  "And I must stay away from women, and danger, and try to be a saint like Brother Bernat!"

  "Women, yes. Danger maybe—you are remarkably resistant to fear. Most of all stay away from demons, for they rouse the hob as nothing else does. Now we have three questions for you. First, what you are going to do about the demons in that casket?"

  "Me? I give them to you! I have no need for demons."

  "Nor do we. They are yours, because you won them, but they are useless without their names, and only Oreste knows those. The jewels themselves are worth a fortune, of course."

  Toby had never thought of that. Riches? Before he could even start to comprehend what wealth might feel like, the melodious voice spoke again:

  "Our second question: What are you going to do about the baron?"

  "Me? It is you who must help him. I know what it is to be enslaved as he was."

  "We have managed to bring him some comfort already, but he needs time to heal. And he is in danger here, like you, probably danger much greater. He wants to make recompense, but without his demons he is only a tired old man. Our third question: What are you going to do about the don?"

  "Me? Kiss his hand and depart. He is a fine fighter and likable in his way, but I need lunatic noblemen no more than I need bottled demons. I was hoping you could cure him."

  The spirit uttered a very human-sounding sigh. "Tobias, it is almost time for Alfonso to return and take you to dinner. We need answers. You cannot just parrot, Me, me? We say, Yes, you! Now decide!"

&n
bsp; "Decide what?" He sat down on the edge of the bed. Taken unaware by the softness of the down, he sank into it much farther than he expected and toppled back on his elbows. It felt like a swamp, and he knew he would never be able to sleep on it, tired though he was.

  He stared in perplexity at the oblivious boy. The boy stared in the general direction of the fireplace. The fire crackled, wind wailed through a gap somewhere, and that was all.

  "Tobias, we cannot prophesy, but we can make very good guesses. We do not know that you will master the hob, but we are prepared to gamble on it. Europe is about to fall to Nevil, the demon incarnate. The people call out for a leader, and you have more potential than any man we have met since Charlemagne called in here in 778."

  "Now it's flattery, is it?" Toby sneered. "You'll find I have a large hide to butter."

  "And a thin one. He who will not take orders must give them. We have helped you, have we not?"

  "So now you present the bill. How much do I owe you?"

  "Everything," said the spirit. "And nothing, for we did not plan to offer you our help. You have won, Tobias—won!"

  He struggled up out of the bed. "I had help."

  "Of course you had help!" Now the spirit sounded exasperated. "All mortals need help! There is no shame in accepting help, especially when you have earned it. Loyalty begats loyalty. You went to a terrible death to spare your friends. It was you who inspired the don to hazard his life for you, not us. That was the only way he could admit that you had saved him from the brigands. It was you who defeated Oreste, just as once you defeated Valda. The victory is yours."

  It was a strange notion. He stood for a moment, letting that concept soak through his weariness. Victory? Oreste, the Inquisition, the landsknechte—even Montserrat itself. He had won! He squared his shoulders.

  "And?"

  "That is what we ask of you. What will you do with your success?"

  Must he decide now, tonight? So tired. But yes, of course! "The iron is hot? The tide runs?" It must be tonight, before the glow of victory faded, while everyone was still here.

  That was what Hamish had seen.