The Warlock Heretical (31 page)

hear me!"

"Wee Folk, hear!" Brother Clyde called.

"I beg thee, call the High Warlock! Bid him bring our Father-General to us as soon as he may, for we have

grievous, woeful tasks laid upon us now! Call him, I beg thee!"

"Call him, call him," Brother Clyde echoed with tears in his eyes. Moonlight striped the middle of the bed, enough to show Rod and Gwen, loosely embraced, deeply asleep.

A small figure approached their bed slowly, then climbed the headboard to call softly, "Lord Warlock." Rod lay absolutely still, but his eyes opened wide. He glanced about until he saw Puck. The elf laid a finger

across his lips, then sprang silently to the floor, beckoning.

Rod slid out of bed, stepped to the closet, and pulled on his

doublet and hose. He stepped out into the main room, buckling his sword belt. "Speak softly; we have a guest."

"I am awake," Father McGee's voice said in the dark. "May I light the lamp?"

"No need." Rod frowned at a candle and its wick glowed to life.
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Father McGee stared at the foot-and-a-half-tall humanoid before him. Puck glared up at him, arms akimbo. "At what dost thou stare?"

"Oh! Pardon my rudeness." Father McGee pushed himself to a sitting position and looked up at Rod.

"It's

reassuring to know how accurate Father Uwell's report is."

"That may be the only thing that's reassuring about seeing Puck in the middle of the night." Rod turned to the elf.

"What moves, hobgoblin?"

"Bloody murder," the elf answered with a scowl. "Thou must needs come to the friars, Lord Warlock, and be not

anxious for the harmony of thy garb."

Somewhere the monks had found some black cloth to drape on the wall in a makeshift archway. The dead monk

lay under it, hands folded over his breast, hjs robe neatly patched where the knife had entered. McGee stood over him, burning with suppressed rage. "An abbot! That an abbot could so forget morality as to

command the murder of one of his own monks!"

"He wasn't one of the Abbot's own any more," Rod pointed out. "Widdecombe thought of him as a traitor."

"As Christ thought of Judas, Lord Warlock! Yet He did not slay His betrayer, and neither should have Abbot

Widdecombe!"

Rod wondered why he was taking the Archbishop's side. Pure cussedness, probably. "But the Abbot thought of

him as a heretic."

"The unity of the Faith is not worth men's lives, Lord Warlock, as Rome has learned to its sorrow."

"Just because they lost the Beta Crucis Crusade—"

"Yet we did learn! When faith is used as an excuse for war, the warriors have lost faith, and morality has been

corrupted into immorality!"

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Rod felt the impulse to continue the argument, but recog

nized McGee's wrath from his own paternal instincts—the Father-General was filled with grief and guilt because

one of his spiritual sons had died. For a brief, dizzying moment, Rod had a glimpse of what it must feel like to be

responsible for hundreds of thousands of monks on fifty different planets, and shuddered. McGee didn't have to

take his title so seriously.

Or did he? Judging from the man, he didn't have much choice.

Rod looked for a change of subject. "I think one of your monks is managing to dredge some information out of

the would-be mass murderer, Father. Could we go eavesdrop?"

"Mm?" McGee looked up, frowning, then nodded. "Yes. Of course. There may be something we should know."

He turned away from Rod, Father Boquilva beside them.

Brother Janos lay on his side on a cot, eyes closed, chest rising and falling with the rhythm of sleep. Brother

Somnel sat beside him, sad gaze fixed on the assassin's face. He didn't seem to be doing anything, and Rod

wondered why he was there. Another monk sat beside Somnel, murmuring, "He did command thee to slay us

all?" Then he waited patiently; finally, Brother Janos nodded. Rod stared.

"Who did so command thee?" the inquisitor asked gently.

"Brother Alfonso," Brother Janos answered with a sigh.

McGee stood, face wooden.

Rod regarded Brother Somnel, puzzled. "Are you a hypnotist?"
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Brother Somnel looked up at him, silent for a moment, then slowly nodded. Rod felt his spine prickle. "Well. Your Order is just full of surprises." Brother Somnel gazed at him a moment longer, then turned back to Brother Janos.

"He did not, then, have his orders from the Abbot," McGee said slowly. "Who is this Brother Alfonso?"

"The Archbishop's secretary, Father-General," Boquilva said at his shoulder.

"McGee," the Father-General replied absently.

Rod leaned closer to McGee and muttered, "We have reason to believe Brother Alfonso is the agent I mentioned

earlier."

"Oh. You have a spy in the monastery?" McGee murmured,

and when Rod didn't answer, he nodded. "So the orders may have come from the Abbot, or may not."

"Ask, Brother Comsoph," Father Boquilva instructed. The inquisitor leaned forward again. "Did Brother Alfonso

say this was the Archbishop's will?"

After a moment Brother Janos breathed, "Nay. He did say we must protect our Lord Archbishop from his

enemies, for he is too kindly to take arms against them." "I wronged the man," McGee admitted. Rod frowned.

"Sounds as though Brother Alfonso did a full-scale persuasion job on Brother Janos."

"Do not doubt it, Lord Warlock." Brother Comsoph looked up at him. "Brother Janos was ever a good and gentle

man, but scholarly and quite naive."

"He always tried to see the good side of everybody around him, hm?" Rod knew the syndrome. "But if he was so

gentle, how could he be maneuvered into murder?"

"He was very fervent in his faith," Father Boquilva explained. "Such zeal can be twisted." Rod murmured into McGee's ear, "If it helps any, we should have Brother Alfonso in custody soon."
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Father McGee looked up at him in surprise, then nodded slowly. "That may go a long way toward solution of the

problem, yes—if Brother Alfonso is as bad an apple as he seems to be."

"Very bad," Rod assured him. "In fact, we're pretty sure he lied his way into the monastery."

"Lied?" Father Boquilva asked. "Dost say he had no true vocation?"

"Oh, he has a vocation, all right—but I don't think it's very holy. I'm saying he lied about wanting to live the pure

life, and deliberately wormed his way into the Abbot's favor so that he could manipulate His Lordship."

"Then the oaths he swore were falsely taken," Father Boquilva said, wide-eyed.

"And therefore have no validity." Father McGee's face had turned thunderous again. "He is a Judas priest

indeed."

Rod looked down at the sleeping monk, his face grave. After a minute he said, "How did he get in here?"

An explosion rocked the hall, and a young man stood in its center, glaring about him in anger.

The monks leaped to their feet, all shouting and demanding at once. Rod was on his feet, too, staring, dumbfounded. He had never, but never, seen Toby angry before. Then he found his voice. "Toby! What do you think you're doing!"

"Fear not, Lord Warlock." The young man's lip curled. "There is no longer need to fash ourselves over scandalizing these monks!"

Father Boquilva reddened and looked away.

Rod noticed it, frowned, and turned back to Toby. "Want to tell me what's happened?"

"Brom O'Berin's folk have brought him a witch-moss crafter, Lord Warlock. He did make false monsters to

afright the villagers."

"Well, we suspected that was how it was done." Rod shrugged. "What's so outrageous about that?

Because he

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was working for the Archbishop? We knew the monks were using witches."

"Nay, Lord Warlock—the monks are witches. For thy wife hath read the mind of this rogue, and hath seen there

the memory of the Archbishop's secretary commanding him to go forth and wreak havoc—and not him only, but

many others too. And all were monks!"

Rod's eyes widened. "All?"

Toby nodded, watching Father Boquilva coldly.

"Wait a minute," Rod protested. "There couldn't be a lot of espers in the monastery, without the other monks

knowing about it."

Toby still watched Boquilva, waiting.

"But who says there were any others, eh?" Rod said slowly. Then the full impact of the idea hit him.

"Holey

soles! It's not just one esper in a monastery—it's one monastery full of espers!" He turned on Father Boquilva.

"Isn't it?"

The monk glanced at Father McGee. The Father-General nodded, very slightly, and Boquilva said, " 'Tis true.

Lord Warlock, and hath ever been. Yet I could not tell thee, for we arc all sworn to secrecy when we take Holy

Orders."

"My lord!" Rod's eyes widened. "No wonder they can tell, just from a simple interview, which postulants qualify

for the cloister and which ones don't! The interviewer knows whether or not he's talking to a telepath within the

first two seconds!"

"There is always some feedback effect, yes," Boquilva admitted.

"Feedback?" Rod said. "Kind of a funny word fora simple medieval friar!" He turned on McGee.
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"Anything else

your people haven't been telling us, Father?"

"Such as the monks having kept knowledge of technology?" McGee nodded. "Yes, Lord Warlock. But they only

begin learning science and engineering after their final vows, when they have been sworn to secrecy."

"How nice of them to wait so long! May I ask how you knew about it? Wait a minute, strike that—Father Al

included it in his report, didn't he?"

"He did, yes. But he saw no reason to burden you with the information."

"Gee, the good guy didn't want me to worry! Do me a favor, Father—give me an anxiety attack!"

"Why, so I do," McGee said calmly. "You, at least, should have full knowledge of the situation, Lord Warlock."

"I trust you will not divulge it," Father Boquilva said.

Rod glanced at Toby, then back to Boquilva. "Any reason why I shouldn't?"

"Excellent reasons, as Father Ricci told us when he founded our chapter."

"The original fugitive from Terra?" Rod asked. "How did he keep his knowledge of technology?"

"An accomplice reprogrammed the computer that erased the colonists' memories of technology, ensuring that he

would retain his mental records intact."

"No Cathodean could have volunteered to come here otherwise, Lord Warlock," Father McGee said quietly. "We

are an order of priestly engineers, after all." "Did he consider staying at home?" "He did," Boquilva said,

"but

was the only priest available when the Romantic Emigres left Terra; and he thought that a priest was a necessity

for a medieval colony." Toby looked up, frowning.

"They have succeeded in the task he set them," Father McGee explained, "permeating this society with Christian

ideals, ameliorating the brutality of a medieval culture."

"Great!" Rod burst out. "Why don't you ameliorate some of the squalor, while you're at it? Cure some of
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the

sicknesses? Prevent a few deaths?"

"We have done what we can," Boquilva grated. " Tis why our folk do ever go about among the people, cloistered

or not. We wreak 'miracle' cures when we can—but dost thou truly believe there would be more of us if we let

modern knowledge

be open?"

Rod hesitated. There had always been a very limited number willing to go to the mental toil of learning medical

science.

"And there are cures, too, that we know of, yet know not how to effect," Boquilva went on. "Father Ricci was an

engineer, not a physician. Yet some of our Brothers, with the necessary gift, have sought to discover these

cures."

Rod lifted his head, eyes widening. " 'Discover'? You mean

research?"

"Of course, Lord Warlock," McGee said. "Every Catho-dean has always had the duty of attempting some form of

the search for knowledge."

Puzzle pieces connected in Rod's mind. "And . . . just what sorts of knowledge would a monastery full of espers

be looking for?"

"You have the answer, Lord Warlock, or you would not ask the question." McGee nodded. "Yes. Most of the

Cathodeans in the monastery research new psionic techniques."

"Monastery?" Rod exclaimed. "That isn't a cloister—it's a research lab!"

"I would be indebted to you if you could explain the difference between the two," McGee said with
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irony.

"My lord!" Rod stared at a vision of a voracious theocracy gobbling up all the planets of the Terran Sphere. "That

means the Archbishop isn't just a threat to the King, he could be the death knell of democracy for all of humanity!"

"Yes, Lord Warlock." Father McGee nodded gravely. "That is the other reason I've come."

" 'Other'?" Rod glared. "Not too worried about the truth, are you?"

McGee lifted his head, eyes widening with outrage.