“We all have been told that the priest arrived in D’alwah, throwing years of patient work by our minions and allies into confusion. For lo, as we could never have guessed, the ragged slave woman this woods rat had found in the distant North was the lost princess, daughter of D’alwah’s stupid king, one thought by us to be dead in the jungle long ago. The priest knew this, nurtured her, and finally married her by their absurd rites. Thus in one incredible stroke, he had himself made the de facto ruler of the kingdom.
“I had ascribed much of this creature’s past success to sheer luck and, I honestly confess it, to complaisance and bad planning in the North.” He looked around, meeting every eye firmly before going on. “I offer my profound apologies to any here who may have thought me somewhat disdainful of their efforts in the past. This stroke of genius, this mating with the seat of power, changed my views of Per Desteen overnight. If he was a mere Abbey servant—and I know little of them, save what is passed to me from your realms—who and what are they in turn? Yet if, as I suspected, he was a strange mutant, a spontaneous appearance, as it were, unplanned and unplanning, then some opportunity might present itself.
“I too took counsel and devised a plan. We have powerful allies in that kingdom, even among what they call royal blood, and their strange church is rotted with our servants, who are deep in its secrets. A new drug was under experiment in our hidden centers, a drug which kills the mind powers, even of the most powerful. We have experimented on such.” That the experiments probably had involved the death of at least one Brother of the Order who had merited Slorn’s displeasure seemed obvious to all there. It meant nothing to them. Thus was power attained and kept.
“I met with our allies far from their city,” S’lorn went on. “For I allowed no mind work near this priest creature at all. I wanted him to find nothing to suspect, and that is what he found—nothing!
“Now listen to this good cheer, Brothers. Today I have the following to tell. Per Hiero Desteen—this prince of D’alwah, this titan who has so shaken our great Order—is dead!”
There was at least one gasp. It did not come from S’duna of the Blue, whose cold face was unchanged.
“This prince-priest, this vagabond ruffian, this mental giant, was simply struck on the head, drugged with the new drug I spoke of, and spirited far away into the wilderness. He was not killed at once, lest his wife, the royal slut, sense his passing and attack our allies before they were ready. But that is the real and inescapable fact. He is dead, finally, totally, completely dead. He is gone from the gaming board, Brothers, and we can once again plan as in the past, this random and ruinous factor forever disposed of!”
This time the silence was not brief. The purring voice of S’duna cut in, and there was no pleasure in it, only coldness.
“Before we rejoice, Elder Brother, I, the youngest of you, but nevertheless the one who knows this man best, indeed the only one of us ever to see him and live, have some small questions. Who saw the body? Yes, and also, how and where was he slain? Do your allies have the body in their possession? And if so, what was done with it? When I hear answers to these humble questions, I too shall perhaps rejoice.”
A faint hint of red colored the pale cheeks of the Green Master. It was obvious that S’lorn was both angry and unaccustomed to be so taken to task. There was a noticeable rasp as he answered.
“Our chief ally in the kingdom was trained under me as a child. He sent the drugged priest under guard far to the west, by hidden paths known to none but himself. He sent trusted men, childhood servants, in two parties. This proved wise. For the second party found the bodies of the first. All, I repeat, all were reported dead and still warm. I see no reason to doubt any of this. Who slew them all is not know, but is thought to be local outlaws who haunt the western marshes. Are you answered?”
“Yes,” S’duna said slowly, “I am answered. But I warn all here, with due respect to yourself, Eldest Brother, that this man is very hard to kill. I would a Brother, and a high one at that, had seen the corpse. I shall be honest, if nothing more. I like it not. Yet 1 may be wrong, and none hopes this more than I. That, at least, you may believe.”
“Should it prove in error, then I will answer for it,” the other snapped, annoyed by the doubt thrown on his triumph. “But we have wasted far too long on this matter already. The fact that the priest was what he was and did what he did is part of a much larger scheme. We have an organization, Brothers, now plotting against us, moving actively to challenge us, who have always been unknown to our enemies. Seldom even has an enemy ever glimpsed a Brother and lived to speak of it in the past. None knew of us, save the Eleveners, curse them, and them we scorned. Their creed of nurturing all life, of harming nothing—that, we thought, was sufficient protection from their lurking and prying. Let them skulk about, we thought, until the Great Plan comes to pass, and then let them be swept away, along with all the other vermin of no use to us!
“But now…” His voice hardened. “What do we learn? At least in part, they have abandoned their foolishness at last. They are actively helping our foes. And this is bad, could not be worse. They know much of us, and only the fact that they were passive and stupid held our hand in the past, for they have studied us a long time, longer maybe than we know. Their mere knowledge, imparted to others more prone to violence, could be a deadly weapon against us.” He paused, then went on.
“The priest is dead. But what sent him is not. He came from the North, from your Abbeys that were thought under control, Brothers. Two states of the North, both under Abbey rule or guidance—the Metz Republic to the west and the League of Otwah in the east—are the source of this one deadly troublemaker. Whence came he and—more to the point—are there more like him? We must plan quickly. This peril must be crushed at its roots—at once! It is for this, I know in my inner being, that I was told to summon this Council.”
The other three leaned forward and listened as he began to expound his plan.
In another place, far from the dark and gloomy tunnels of the Unclean, stood a grove of mighty pines or related conifers. Of vast size, their immense boles were stained with lichen and hoary with age. In the heart of the grove lay a ring, bare to the rising moon and padded with many layers of fallen needles. Nothing grew in the ring, though the bed of needles was always fresh and clean.
No sound broke the silence of the night, save for the faraway hooting of a hunting owl and the sough of the soft wind in the lofty branches. Yet the glade was not empty. Here, too, there was a meeting. Shadowy, ursine shapes lay about the ring, only their glowing eyes proclaiming life. Great, furry sides heaved as the bear people kept their attention on the smaller figure of Gorm in the center.
Deep thoughts moved through mental circuits that others in the wild could not follow. Patiently, these Wise Ones of their people studied the new information brought to them. They had long remained hidden from the other sentient races of the world. Now they were not to be hurried in any decision which might affect their future.
The night passed slowly as thoughts moved from one reflective mind to another. The moon waned. After a time, it vanished behind a large drift of cloud. When the white light illumined the clearing once again, the smaller figure of Gorm was gone from the center, but the outer ring of bodies remained, fur-covered sides heaving gently.
A still pool lay deep in the jungle, as far from the tunnels of the Unclean or the grove of the bear people as those places were from each other. Here the trees which arched over the brown water were of such size as to make the great conifers look like saplings by comparison. Their incredible branches did not start to leave the main trunks until they were almost out of sight from the ground below. Vast cables of liana and veritable forests of parasitic plants clung to the towering sides of the giant trees. In the noon warmth, insects buzzed busily and bird calls rang out.