At length, the one who wore the hellish green turned away from the screen and examined his fellows thoughtfully. Just as the one who wore the blue seemed in some indefinable way the youngest, so did the creature of the green seem older than the others, though exactly why, no one could have said.
“I will speak, according to the rules of the Great Council, where no mind can be deemed safe and thoughts cannot be trusted with our deliberations.”
It was clear that this was a formula being recited, a formal opening of the meeting. The voice of the speaker was thin yet resonant, toneless and yet vibrant. It was also chill, the timbre gelid and ringing like the slow grinding of ancient glacial ice.
“As the Senior among you, I call on the Lord S’duna, First among the Brotherhood of the Blue Circle. Upon him mainly has fallen the brunt of the most recent events. He and his bear much of the responsibility for them. This is said not in blame, but only is strict accountability. This is also said,” he added as S’duna stirred and shrugged, “under orders.”
As the others looked up in sudden interest, the green-symboled man touched his brow and inclined his head toward the large and empty chair at the head of the table.
“Yes,” he went on, “to me, S’lorn, First of the Green, in my fortress in the South there came in the night, on the One Circuit, a message. The Unknown One, That Which Is Not To Be Named, that which is not, but was and will be, sent a message. Any of us could have received it. Why I was chosen, save for age, I know not, but can perhaps guess.” He paused. “I think, and I have spent much thought on this matter as I journeyed, that I received the message to summon the Council because I am the farthest away in the body. My thought, and it is no more, reads thus: In many, many lives of the outer world, we four, or they who taught and preceded us, have seldom found it necessary to meet in the flesh. Now, I think, the matter grows urgent, and thus the importance is stressed that I who live the farthest off should summon us together. The Nameless One, the Chosen of the Chosen, has many secrets. There may be other explanations, but I think mine will suffice.” He folded the pale hands in the lap of his robe. “Let the Lord S’duna speak to us and unfold his reading of the recent past.”
The Master of the Blue Circle did not flinch. While he was not on trial, still the others were watching and judging. All were equals, the Great Council having been devised to still the ceaseless internecine warfare which had so long crippled the Unclean plans in the past. All were equal, but it was not in the nature of such beings to spare another pain, nor was it the way they had all been taught since birth. The troubles of the recent past had involved S’duna far more than the others. So they would watch, not being hostile, but if there were any sign of weakness, or indecision…
And then there was the Nameless One, their unknown ruler, who had sent instructions. Could those instructions have to do with the failures of this time, and might they also carry orders on dealing with faulty leadership?
If a shudder ran through the Blue Master’s frame, it was not detectable. He began. “First, we had warning that all was not well from the death of S’nerg of the Red Circle. For long, his body was not found, though we knew that he must be dead or somehow taken, for his self-seeker was moving away from us. We loosed followers, mere animals, on the track. They too were slain. That was the second warning, though the death of a high Brother was more than that, surely.” No one said anything, no features moved, but the point had been taken. The Blue Circle was not the first to be struck.
“Next, the creature or creatures vanished into the Palood, the great marsh where even we do not go. Yet we alerted something which had dwelt there from time out of mind, a thing we feared and scarcely understood, yet thought could be used for our purposes. And it too was slain.” The level voice paused. Another point made.
“Now we began somewhat to worry. The thing or things had entered the area. I control. It or they had managed to pass through the marsh, no mean feat in itself, as all here know. I estimated the track it might take, for it had discovered and destroyed the self-seeker it bore and we could no longer follow it. And, as all know, I trapped it.
“Surprise upon surprise and wonder upon wonder! What had we caught but one of the despised Abbey priests of the soft religion of the past, the cross worshippers. One of the vagabond pack of woodsrunners, half soldier, half hunter, whom they send about on their stupid errands. For allies, it had two animals and a slave girl, the latter seized from savages on the coast as they were about to eat her. And this motley crew was what had shaken the North and frightened our Councils to their depths!” He stared at each of the others in turn, as if weighing his next words before continuing.
“And there I erred, I freely admit. And if the Great Plan has suffered for it since, I accept my full share of responsibility. For I simply could not believe that this very ordinary human, however brave and skilled in the combat of the forests, could be the thing he was. I felt, as did all who studied the matter, that the Abbeys, or perhaps this man alone, had found a secret in a Dead City of the past, something to enhance the mind powers, some machine, perhaps, or even some strange drug. This secret we would extract at leisure on Manoon, the Dead Isle, whence none had ever gone, save at our bidding and direction. We completely ignored the escape of the slave girl and the two animals; let them perish in the wastes, we thought. They meant nothing.” His ivory skull wagged slowly as he shook his head.
“Mistake upon mistake, error upon error. The man had inborn or somehow inbred powers locked in his skull, some of which, with training, might have brought him here, into this chamber, my Brothers, even as we. That was the sum of our greatest error—not ( to realize the appalling strength that this seeming woodsrunner, this half priest, masked and kept hidden in the inner part of his mind!” The emphasis, even the passion which had crept into his voice, drew a faint hiss of incredulity from S’lorn, but the older man suppressed it when he saw the expressions of the Masters of the Red and Yellow Circles. For they seemed in total agreement.
“What occurred next, alas, is too well known,” S’duna went on. “He escaped. Escaped from the Dead Isle, taking his weapons and slaying still another Brother! A dumb brute, the captain of my Howler pack, sensed the escape on some level we could not and he too was slain, though a doughty fighter trained by me for many years. Now, think on this matter, Brothers, and think hard. We have not yet discovered how or by what powers this was done! All of our science, all of our records, which we thought the entire sum of knowledge here today—all of these tell us nothing useful. Oh, yes, the man used his mind. He slew the Brother with it. That was obvious. But without weapons or machines and hardly even with them, could we do the same? No, you all know we could not.
“What next? More by guesswork than by anything concrete, we traced him again, this stupid priest-assassin, this Per Hiero Desteen, of whom we now know so much. And what occurred this time to the band of ragged wanderers? For he had found the girl and the animals by mind touch, though again we do not know how. What next? This time a whole shipload, one of the very few new ships, driven by the powers of The Death itself, ship, crew, and yet another high Brother, S’carn, third under me in rank and no weak foe, all vanished!” This time his pause was both unstudied and longer. Nor was he taking such trouble to conceal his rage and bafflement. The others listened soberly, their own faces now eager as they digested all the meaning of his words. S’lorn of the Green was as attentive as any.