Admissions
Sable Palace, March SY153
The evening after Rupert's wedding, I was working late in my office, finishing up the list of promotions I remembered from my brother's gift-fest for my now-mollified Head of Intelligence, when I heard a knock at the door. I called out for whoever it was to come in, and wasn't really surprised when Andrew entered. Given his fury the night before, and then his reaction to the 'present' Rupert had invested me with, I had been expecting him to want words with me all day. If anything, I was surprised it had taken him this long to come and see me.
He closed the door behind him, and as he came in he seemed tense, despite the fact that he was out of uniform and dressed more casually than usual, and showed all the signs of being a man who had made a decision, and was hoping it was the right one. He sat down unbidden in one of the chairs in front of the fire, and surprised me by beginning with:
"I probably owe you an apology for last night."
I stood up from behind my desk and walked over to join him, stopping via the drinks cabinet for a cognac and a whisky.
"It was an impressive sock on the jaw, that's for sure," I answered, handing him the cognac, "but no lasting harm's been done. One of the advantages of being a shape shifter is that you don't bruise so badly...and although the bloody thing still aches, I suspect that's surprise as much as anything else. I imagine the grapevine's been buzzing all day, though: General Prince Andrew assaulting the King of Sable...for pretty much anyone else, that would have been treasonable."
He looked at me, trying to figure out if I was joking, and so I smiled to let him know he was off the hook.
"Has Claire forgiven you?" he asked.
"Depends on your definition of forgiven," I replied, "I slept on the couch last night, although she seemed less angry this morning. She still wasn't speaking to me, but at least she wasn't shaking with rage anymore."
"Oh, she must have been pissed at you," he commented with a wry smile, "not that I blame her. When did she last kick you out of bed?"
"About twenty-five years ago, when I forgot her birthday," I said, with a chuckle, "I didn't even warrant this particular demonstration of her displeasure when I brought Alban home, or after my 'duel' with Herr Reichsführer a few days later."
"Ouch."
"Still, hopefully she'll be okay again in a few days. I think I just need to give her a little space," I said, more quietly. I studied at the amber liquid in my glass and swirled it around idly, contemplating life in general and the love of my life in particular, then I took a slug from my glass and met his gaze once more.
"So, is this going to be another of those 'when are you going to learn about Rupert' talks?"
"In a manner of speaking," he replied, taking a drink, then placing his own glass on the table beside him, "but this time it's also something else."
"As I've told you, and Claire, and Gray in the past, I am well aware of who and what he is. I don't need the constant lectures."
"But going to his wedding?" he snapped, his voice rising slightly. Then he got a grip on himself and became calmer again. "He isn't your brother, Robert. He's your Dark Side. Even his so-called children, poor bastards, have to have been built in a test tube, probably using the kinds of magic you and I have been trying to stamp out for four hundred years."
He paused a moment, then continued.
"Every time you meet with him you legitimise him and what he stands for. I've even begun to wonder if you've not only forgotten what he is, but that you're beginning to actually like him. Or at least, no longer consider him an enemy. In his charming, convincing and completely plausible way he's won you over. And that is why he's the most dangerous snake ever to slither on God's green earth."
"This still sounds like the standard lecture," I commented, although I had noted the reference to God's earth, rather than just to Sable. It was almost unheard of for him to even refer to a higher power, except in profanity, "it's complicated and I have my reasons."
"And I have mine for wishing it were otherwise," he replied, "my mistake is that I've never told you what they are before. In fact, I swore to myself that I never would. But when you came home last night waving around the rank insignia of the organisation which I hate more than any other in this or any universe, save for the Machine, and you and Gray were acting as if it was some kind of big joke, I realised that it's time I did."
Since his return, I'd made a few guesses about what had happened to Andrew in the years he'd been missing, and what had caused him to become so fanatically anti-Reich, and specifically anti-SS. I'd liked none of them. However, I'd never had confirmation of any of them in the thirty plus years since he'd come home, and I'd almost given up hope that he would ever open up to me on the subject. He was right. This lecture was going to be different.
"You'll just have to be patient with me if I go about this in a rather roundabout way, though. This is difficult for me."
He took another drink, perhaps trying to garner courage, and then began.
"Did you realise I was the one who asked Gray to wait for you when you go to take tea with Bloody Rupert? For that matter, whenever you go and see him, if we find out in advance."
"Not specifically, although it doesn't surprise me. In fact, the only thing about it that does surprise me, is that you don't do it yourself."
"Then you obviously haven't noticed that I make a point of making myself scarce every first of the month. Even the ones when you go to visit him."
"You're busy. Often you're on duty or you're back in the Technocracy."
"Oh, I can find any number of legitimate reasons to be elsewhere," he answered, "but the honest truth is that I can't bear to be here and watch you blithely deal with the Devil. Because on the one side, I don't trust myself not to kill the bastard if I see him..."
"I'd got that impression when you broke his ribs at your wedding," I said, trying to make light of his comment, but underneath I was disturbed by what he'd said. In return, a shrug was his only acknowledgement of my interruption before he continued.
"...And on the other, I'm afraid that one of these days you aren't going to come back. "
He looked at me, and I could see the utter conviction in his eyes as he said that. It startled me.
"He'd never be that much of a fool, Andrew," I protested, firmly believing it to be true.
"Really?"
"He doesn't take family. It's part of our agreement. He doesn't touch my kin, and I don't harm those he cares for."
"Bollocks to your agreement!" he snapped, with amazing vehemence, "open your eyes, Robert. He took Joss, and he took Richard, and he tried to grab Cerian."
"He'd been courting Joss for a long time, and to be honest that particular young man was happy to be courted, until we finally taught him the error of his ways. And the attack on Cerian was Andreas, not him."
"So he says...And Richard?"
"A slightly different situation, given that I imagine he felt that being shot down was provocation. Not that that excuses him for what he did, of course."
"And what about your 'duel', as you so quaintly put it."
"That one was probably my fault: that time I really did go after what he considered to be his family, and even then I came home in one piece."
"Mostly."
"Okay, mostly, and nothing that didn't heal quickly."
"But let's be honest, you've just admit that the agreement is open to...interpretation."
"What's that got to do with any of this?" I answered, trying to ignore the fact that he was right.
"Because as I said, I'm afraid that one day you won't come back. And the fact that you have so little care for your own life, and that he's lulled you into a false sense of security such that place your trust in his 'hospitality', makes me angry."
"You know, I spotted that last night," I commented, conspicuously rubbing my jaw again, although he refused to take the bait.
"Do you know what he could do to you?" he said, an earnestness in his voice that was frightening, "Do you know what use he could make of you? Ritually, magically, or just plain for the fun of it, if he decided to take the gloves off? You are the Creator of Sable, not him. You are what makes this universe we live in what it is, not him. Yes, he's part of it, but the Design was yours and you are the key to its stability. Hell, he's told you to your face that he'll behead you if Sable ever surrenders, to give him the time to mould this universe to his Pattern – capital and small p. And if anything were to happen to you, we would all end up stomping around in jack boots, assuming we weren't used for breeding stock for the furthering of the greater Aryan race, or thrown in the camps which we both know the Reich has, or just plain executed by the Einsatzgruppen as too dangerous to live."
"He isn't suicidal, Andrew. He knows your feelings towards him as well as I do, he knows how devastating the de Lacy family can be when they get mobilised, and he knows that if he did do anything to harm me at our monthly meetings he'd be bringing vengeance firmly down on his head. He isn't going to do it."
He looked at me, complete conviction still in his eyes, as he uttered a single word.
"Yet."
His vehemence scared me. This wasn't some kind of irrational hatred of the Reich for hatred's sake. He believed what he was saying. The question was, was he manifesting the mental instability, even psychosis, that I had suspected he had periodically suffered from since his return (I'd seen flashes of it over the years, most memorably on another public occasion fairly soon after his first return, and later in his obsessive crusade against the SS). Or was he right?
He broke my gaze and emptied his glass and put it down again, before crossing to the drinks cabinet and bringing back both bottles. He topped up my whisky, refilled his own cognac, and then placed it down on the table, although he didn't sit again himself.
"I want to show you something."
"Okay..."
"In November 151, Kaiserin Elsa tried to have me assassinated."
"I remember that only too well. She had an agent take a leaf out of Claus von Stauffenberg's book, and you were in the hospital for three weeks. But I'm honestly not sure why this is relevant. We pretty much proved that Elsa was working on her own on that one, and that Rupert wasn't involved."
"You were attending physician, though, once I was brought back to Sable."
"Of course. Helped by Claire and Michael, but primarily. Maybe technically not ethical, being your father, but I wasn't going to pass that one to anyone else."
"What did you see?"
"I'm not sure I understand the question."
"Injuries. What did you see?"
"You were at ground zero of a bomb blast. What do you think I saw? Massive burns, broken bones, crushing trauma – you were lucky you weren't blown to bits."
"And you healed me."
"To the best of my ability, yes."
"No scarring, no nothing?"
"I thought I did a pretty good job of avoiding such things. Yes."
"Now correct me if I'm wrong, but when a shape shifter is badly injured, sometimes those injuries leave mental wounds which translate into scarring or injury remaining part of the shifter's self-identity, and therefore never healing away."
"Absolutely right," I answered, "hence I've still got scars from when Paolo tried to blow my brains out."
"And from when Heydrich slit your throat. And a couple of others. And let's not even mention Finndo's wake"
"No. Let's not."
"Now I'm not a trained shifter..."
"That can always be remedied."
"I know, and actually, that's one of the things I was going to ask you about fairly soon. But laying that aside for a few moments, while I'm not trained, I have the inherent ability, otherwise I could never have become a Pilot. And therefore, presumably scarring can become part of my self-identity."
"Theoretically...but I'm afraid I still don't know where you're going with this."
"As I said at the outset, I want to show you something," he replied, and rather to my surprise he slipped his shirt over his head. As he did, I noticed that the movement was obviously uncomfortable for him. Which is when I saw what he'd obviously been leading up to.
His torso was covered in scars from knife wounds, as if he'd been systematically flayed, healed and flayed again. As if someone had spent a long, long time letting blood with a very, very sharp dagger. And around the area of his heart was an old injury which looked like a healed stab wound. The detached, clinical part of me knew that the many of those wounds had been made with the sole intention of prolonging the process over months, perhaps years, and that every cut would have been agony for him. The emotional, paternal part of me was horrified. What I was seeing was way worse than my most pessimistic guesses of what had happened to him, and that obviously showed on my face.
"I can see I've finally scored a point," he answered, quietly, and put his shirt back on, before sitting back down and taking a long drink.
"But that isn't possible."
"Unless, of course, they're so much a part of my self-identity that however well I was healed, my inherent shifting would just bring them back again, and again, and again. Rupert Delatz did this to me, and he enjoyed doing it. And even my physical body won't let me forget. And that is why I hate him so much."
"Christ, Andrew," I said, shocked rigid, "when...?"
"He picked me up the day I left Sable. Trumped me, grabbed me and locked me away. If case you've ever wondered why I never take Trump calls directly any more, that's the reason Martin screens them for me, because I can't do it myself, and I'm never going to get burned like that again."
I stared at him in silence, knowing there was nothing I could say which would help.
"You see, the trouble with your 'agreement' is that it only works if someone is going to be missed. Joss was missed. Richard was missed. Cerian was missed before she was ever smuggled out of Sable. But I wasn't going to be missed. I had declared my intention to lose myself in Shadow, possibly permanently, and so he saw an opportunity and he took it."
"But why? He was still taking a Hell of a risk. What if I'd decided to ignore your wishes?"
"Why does he ever do anything? Power. You'd restored me. My body was laced with the residue of the power and the Pattern that you'd used to do it. I wasn't planning to come back for a very long time, and he knew you would respect my decision. And of course, there was also the added bonus that while I was his prisoner he could address the problem of a lack of blooded individuals within the Reich: with me at his mercy, he had DNA on tap which could be grown into children who could walk the Sable Pattern. So in a flash of rainbow light, there I was gone."
"How did he know you'd be vulnerable?"
"I don't know. My guess is that he had an agent in Sable Palace who was keeping him informed. No idea if he still does, as it was a long time ago, and Gray is nothing if not efficient at rooting such people out."
He leaned back, drained his glass again and refilled it once more. I thought about commenting on the speed of his alcohol intake, but decided to hold my tongue. He obviously felt he needed it to get through the conversation, which was obviously painful for him.
"And you're afraid he might do this to me?"
"Among other things."
"But it was a long time ago, and he's changed...he's not the same person now that he was back then."
"And still you defend him," he answered, shaking his head with something akin to despair, "For fuck's sake, father. Of course he's the same person. Never let yourself forget the parable of the Scorpion and the Frog. It's in his nature. Just because he's fallen in love, and somehow fathered children, and married, it doesn't change what he is. Not who. What. He's your Dark Side, Robert. His purpose in life is to be your enemy."
"I think you're wrong," I protested.
"I hope you see the truth before he stings you," he replied simply, "You're a scientist and a forensics mage. You rely on hard facts and evidence. And guess what. I'm a lawyer, so I'm trying to show you those facts. Giving you the case for the prosecution. Because I'm sick and tired of the case for the defence."
He emptied his glass down his throat again and refilled it before continuing. As he did, I topped up my own glass, and sipped it gently as I watched him, my emotions in turmoil. He paused for a few moments, before continuing.
"What Seska did to me was nothing compared to the products of his twisted imagination. That was a few days. Delatz had me for years."
"How long?" I asked, dreading the answer.
"I'm not entirely sure, as I rather lost count in the middle, what with the merasha, the torture, the despair and the pain," he replied, and while he was trying to make his tone light, underneath he was deadly serious, "I left here in '69, and the next time I consciously remember a date, it was '80. Last night, you were celebrating the fact that you'd identified the Black Lodge, but following on from that conversation, I would be very interested to find out how many of the Black Knights were born in the '70s. I suspect it's quite a few of them, because he enjoyed sending people to harvest me of DNA almost as much as he enjoyed bleeding me within an inch of my life every Celtic Quarter Day, and every Solstice and Equinox, as the focus of his rituals."
"God Almighty..." I exclaimed, as an overwhelming feeling of guilt took hold of me, and I felt vaguely ill, "Why did I listen to you when you said you wanted to be alone? If I'd called..."
"Don't go there, Robert," he said, quietly, "or you'll never forgive yourself. You listened because you respected my decision. The trouble is, he knew you would. And even if you had ignored it, the Wewelsburg is so well warded by the Black Lodge that you'd never have reached me."
"Andrew, why have you never told me any of this before?"
"As I said, I never intended to tell you this at all. Because once you've gotten through denial and guilt, you're going to get to anger. And last night showed, among other things, that you are still quite capable of the searing fury which caused you to kill Wolfram. There was murder in your eyes after I hit you. And it scared me, which is why I broke the mood. Now point that anger at Rupert Delatz, and we're going to be picking up the pieces for a long, long time. Assuming there are any pieces left to pick up. Because he'll throw the same back at you."
"Which, ironically, is the reason we try to keep on good terms. Because when we fight, other people die."
"When anyone fights in a war, people die," he replied, "but yes, you and he would be a different case."
"How many people know?"
"Niamh of course, as I had to explain the scars, and I'd lay odds that Gray knows quite a bit of it, as some of the details have come out in my work with his Hunting Party. On my staff, Martin Carragher and Joachim Berger, the former because I had to make him understand why I was asking him to potentially take the brunt of something like that for me again; the latter because he is the only reason I'm still alive, as he was the one who busted me out. Dominic, as I owed at least a brief explanation to him after a blow-up I had in front of Joanna and Carl while you were hors de combat in 151. And Adam Sinclair."
"Adam?"
"You don't think that after something like this I didn't need a therapist?" he retorted, "I put myself under his care for a year to try to work through what had happened, and I've seen him regularly since, especially when things begin to get too much for me again...although that's been happening less often since I married Niamh."
"He's never mentioned it."
"Of course he hasn't. Doctor-patient privilege."
He paused a moment, then gave a weak smile.
"You know, I probably have the best knowledge of Thulist black ritual of anyone in Sable. Because I've pretty much been to every one of their major 'celebrations'. Several times. Admittedly, I wasn't at my best, so the details are a rather fuzzy. But I think that if I put my mind to it, I'd probably a damned good blood mage, as subconsciously all the details are there."
"Andrew..." I warned.
"No, I'm actually serious. How many blood mages does Sable have?"
"Three fully versed in it...Francesco, Gray and John de Lyon. And Francesco's been training another, Philip Ross. Then a few others like myself who know the theory but have only practiced very occasionally."
"Ross is a good choice," he answered, "but given how many of them there are in the Reich – thirteen if you only count the Black Lodge, and they are far from the only ones – we're very undersupplied. I should probably put myself on the list."
"Andrew, don't..." I protested.
"Why not? I have a unique perspective on the subject."
"Stop...you've made your point."
"Really?" he answered, mildly, but I could feel the iciness in his tone, "I've made my point that Rupert Delatz is an evil son of a bitch, and a practising black magician, and he should never, ever be associated with socially?"
"You think I can forget his magical inclinations?" I replied, hotly.
"You've done nothing about them," he answered, just as hotly, then collected himself again, "We set up the Council on Terra Magica to fight people like him. But here, you take tea with him. I want to remind you what a black magician actually is. They aren't tame. They aren't quaint. They're bastards and they need stamping out."
I could tell he wasn't going to let it lie. There was something else he wanted to prove. And I was becoming more and more uncomfortable as he spoke, because what he was saying resonated deep inside with my own doubts and fears.
"Our arrangement has been in place for as long as Sable has existed..."
"I'm well aware of that," he snapped, his eyes narrowing, "but you're long overdue knowing what that arrangement means. Hence this conversation. There is one more thing I want to show you, if you're willing to make a mental link with me. It was pretty fuzzy for a long time, but Adam forced me to work on the recall of it, as he considered it the key to what I experienced, and recently I've found I'm remembering the details much better."
"You've fanatically resisted my making a mental link to you since you came back."
"Because I didn't want you to see by accident what I want to show you now. "
"Which makes it sound worse than anything else you've said up until yet."
He met my gaze and held it, and he didn't deny what I'd said.
"What if I refuse the link?"
"Then our conversation is finished," he answered with a shrug, but there was something in his tone, in his body language, which filled me with a deadly certainty that more than the conversation would be finished. If I didn't do as he asked, he would walk away and never come back, because he would feel I had betrayed the courage which had brought him to me in the first place. In the end I looked at him, and gave a nod of agreement.
"Finish your demonstration."
"Thank you," he said, quietly. Then he rose, warded the areas around us, pulled a footstool in front of where I was sitting – the way I had done so often in the past when I had worked with him – and made himself comfortable.
"I presume I don't need to put you into a trance?"
"No. I think I can manage that myself," I answered, and proceeded to do so. Then, once I was relaxed, I felt him place his hands on my wrist, and he established the mental connection. It was disorientating at first: I hadn't worked with him on a mental level since he'd built the Nexus, and in the background I could feel the information streams connected with his Creation, and the other consciousnesses linked into it, and found myself wondering how he could process and keep track of so much data. However, he deftly isolated those impressions from me, and soon all that remained in the link was the pair of us.
"Ready?" he said, quietly.
"No," I answered.
"Neither was I," came his matter of fact reply, with no trace of apology, and he began to send me the memories...
* * * * *
Darkness. Confusion. I could feel the drugs in my system which kept me powerless, as I lay naked in my cell. Trapped. Abandoned by those I held dear. But at least the pain wasn't too bad today, and as I came slowly to my senses, my head felt a little clearer. Apart from my jailers, I hadn't seen anyone for quite a while: long enough to let my body heal, albeit I could feel the scar tissue the injuries had left behind, which made my movements stiff unless I was very careful. If the bastard ran true to form, he'd probably start sending me female company again in a few days. A couple of hours of pleasure for them. A relief from the pain for me. I'd fought that at first, but they had only drugged what little food they gave me such that it was agony for me to resist when he sent the women to harvest my seed. Now, however much later, I'd come to the realisation that it was easier to let them do as they wished. It was better than the pain. It was better than the knives.
Idly, I wondered what the date was. There were no windows in the cell – the chill told me it was underground – so I had no means of marking the passage of time. And as I'd spent long periods either unconscious or delirious, I could have been there for months or even years. Outside, voices were speaking German. Guards on shift, chattering about inanities. And then they suddenly became alert.
The cell door opened, and he walked in. The man I hated from the peak of his death's head cap to the toes of his well-polished riding boots.
"Hello Andrew," Delatz said, pleasantly, squatting down beside me, two of his bodyguard flanking him and ready in case I made a move. His expression was paternal, but his eyes were cold, "I trust you're feeling better. I know it's been a little while, but I wouldn't want you to feel that I'd neglected your wellbeing."
"Go fuck yourself, Delatz," I croaked, and tried to spit at him, but my mouth was so dry that it was a wasted effort.
"I prefer the company of others when I indulge in such pursuits," he answered, with a slight smile, "and given how tense you seem, you're obviously in need of some companionship yourself. I'll have to send Maja to you again. She so enjoyed your company the last time, and little Mattie is a couple of months old now."
I garnered what energy I could, brought my hands around, grabbed for his throat and began to squeeze. But as I did I met his gaze, and he brought his mind to bear against mine to make me quiescent once more, knocking my resistance aside as if he was a giant and I was a child. I felt the desire to fight leech out of me, and I fell back to the floor. Of course, that didn't stop one of his goons giving me a solid kick in the privates for my presumption. Instinctively I curled up into a ball, and I heard the bodyguard laugh.
"Tut tut..." Delatz said, standing in one smooth movement and waving his finger at the offending soldier, in mild rebuke, "I don't want him any more damaged than he is already. Pick him up. Bathe him. Then take him to the Chamber. We will meet you there."
"Yes, Herr Reichsführer," they answered, saluting in unison.
"Oh Andrew, I'm looking forward to this," he said, with an ice cold smile, and then he turned on his heel and strode out, two other members of his protection detail falling into step beside him as he left the cell.
The ones left with me bent their minds to obeying his orders with Nazi efficiency. Still, it felt good when the accumulated grime was scraped from me for the first time in what seemed an age. Then my arms were bound to my sides, and my feet were shackled, and I was half walked, half dragged, still as naked as the day I was born, down the stairs to the chamber I had come to loathe: the unholy chapel beside the Black Pattern room.
The Lodge were already there. All except Delatz. To my surprise, though, instead of being hooded, their features hidden, only two of them had the cowls of their black robes up. For the first time, I saw the faces of my antagonists. Aryans to a man (or in one case, woman). And I knew that if I was being allowed to see them, I wasn't going to leave that room alive. Then my escort cut free my arms and pushed me down onto the stone altar on my back, and two of the lodge members bound me in place, arms out wide at my sides, legs together. Out of the corner of my eye, on a stand to the side, I could see the chalice they often used in rituals to collect my blood, clean and ready for service, and I tried to prepare myself for whatever he had planned for me this time.
Delatz came in a few minutes later, clad as usual in the claret red robes of the High Priest of his Order. Of course, he had no need to conceal his identity. On the contrary, he flaunted it.
"Ah, everything's in place," he said as he saw me, his tone conversational and his stance relaxed, "marvellous."
Then, in front of my eyes, he became all business, switching persona smoothly and easily, as if changing masks.
"Brothers. Even as we meet, our armies are massing on the borders of a number of worlds which are rightfully ours. Our soldiers await the command to strike and take them back. We are Protectors and Warriors in our Fatherland's cause. The Work we do here tonight will be vital to the future and security of the Reich. Because our actions here will give them success. Are you ready?"
"Yes, Master," they answered, together.
"Then we should begin."
And he drew the SS officer's dagger he used as an Working focus, and began the ritual. I couldn't struggle: it seemed as if when his mind had met mine in the cell he had taken my free will. I wanted to pray, but I knew that the higher power my father served, but I had never understood, could never reach me in that place. And in the end I found my gaze following the black lines of Pattern tracery on the silvered blade of his dagger, as if hypnotised, because there was nothing else I could do.
What was worse, was that I knew the ritual was going according to plan. I could feel the black energy he was gathering as he Worked, first with my blood, then joining his own to it to give the ritual more power, while the others chanted and lent him support, especially the woman, who obviously functioned as some kind of priestess in conjunction with Delatz as high priest of the ritual. They added their psychic energy to help power the ritual and their own lifeblood to the chalice beside my head, and when all of them had bled in the cup, it was put to my lips. I gagged, but they forced it down my throat, so that part of them was within me, linking me to what they were doing. Then Delatz added some kind of powder to it, before he put the remainder to his own mouth and emptied it, solidifying the specific connection between him and me still further. And it worked. The energy was redoubled, and engulfed and surrounded me as he pulled the last reserves of that with which my father had restored me out of me and added it to the rest. The blackness weighed me down, almost crushing me and making it hard for me to breath. So much potential energy, just waiting for release.
Then he brought the dagger over my chest, and rolled it between his hands, invoking the final incantations. He was going to kill me, and my death was going to be the trigger for the power to flow. My eyes met his, and in them I saw...nothing. They were dead. Cold. I tried to bring the Blood Curse of a Cornelian to bear on him, so at least he would suffer from my death. But nothing came. And as if he knew what I'd tried and failed to do, he gave a smile which chilled my blood, and he brought the knife down.. With a strange clarity, I felt the skin of my chest part, and the Pattern dagger burst my heart...
* * * * *
I crashed out of the link and the trance gagging, and it was all I could do to stop myself throwing up there and then. I felt disorientated and was shaking, partly from what I had seen, and partly from breaking out of the arcane link so precipitously, and I could feel my heart pounding in my chest.
"For fuck's sake, Andrew," I exclaimed, "you could have warned me."
"No," he replied, "you would not have agreed to let me show you."
"Too bloody right I wouldn't," I answered, "forcing something like that on another person is illegal."
"Robert, I don't give a shit whether it was legal. I wanted you to experience what I experienced. I wanted you to understand, because obviously just showing you the results of what he'd done didn't convince you."
"Andrew, you died. He stabbed you through the fucking heart."
"Yes he stabbed me, but no, he did not let me die. He needed the energy which the act of sacrificial murder released, but he was very careful, so that he could save me for another day. I was a unique resource. Why waste it all at once? From what my work with Adam has revealed, I think that moments before my spirit left my body he put me into suspended animation. And then he healed my heart and set it pumping again. Of course, he didn't heal anything else. Just that which I would have died without."
Finally, the bravado which had been keeping him going was fading, and I could see him tiring in front of my eyes, as if the nervous energy he'd been drawing on to give me his little demonstration was finally depleted. Although perhaps counter-intuitively, it seemed as if a weight had been lifted from him.
"What about the Blood Curse?" I asked, quietly.
"I couldn't manifest it. I don't know if I was too weak, or if it was the drugs in my system, or if it was the fact that the whole purpose of the ritual was to channel the energy generated for his own purposes, and the reserves which would have powered my Curse were channelled right away with the rest, or if it was plain and simply because when he'd taken control of my mind, he turned off that ability. But as you felt, nothing happened."
He stared into the fireplace for a few moments, watching the dying embers, before continuing.
"He was there when I awoke. Not in a hospital...far too easy. Back in my dark, dank, squalid little cell. He told me that it was Easter Day...and wasn't it appropriate that I'd been as if dead since the preceding Friday. I could feel that nothing remained of the energy he had collected me to use, and I wondered why he'd bothered to keep me alive. But no explanations were forthcoming. Instead, he merely thanked me for my help in promotion of the cause and then left, sending Maja Kapler in to tend me. And if I've read my briefings correctly, little Mattie was head of the Waffen-SS until last night."
He looked up at me and met my eyes once more.
"After I got free, and regained some measure of sanity, I did some research. Do you remember the Black Friday offensive?"
"Good Friday, '75. O'Connor was badly injured and nearly died in that one: he only just managed to teleport out in time. And the Reich forces simultaneously overwhelmed us on what, twelve different Shadows?"
"Thirteen. One per Black Knight. March 29th SY075. The day he sacrificed me for the good of the Greater Reich to make that offensive happen. So in a way I was responsible for the ending of all our people who fought and died in that offensive, and I will bear that guilt until the end of my days."
I had no words to answer him, and as if he realised that, he continued.
"After that, I was there in body, but not much else. Despite the fact that I was still breathing, and my lovingly repaired heart was still beating, something had died inside me. He even used me less in his rituals, as I think he'd milked me for everything he was going to get in that regard, not that that stopped him causing me pain for pain's sake, and of course I still had my DNA to offer him.
Once Joachim had got me free, and I'd spent enough time in hospital to recuperate physically, I went to Adam. The mental trauma of ten years of abuse and mistreatment in prison aside, as Master of the Hunt, with a duty of care to the souls of those in his charge, he was the only person I could think of who had any chance of helping me get back in touch with my inner self. To remind me what it was like to be human."
"But..." I began but he held up his hand.
"No. Don't say it. I could never, ever have come to you."
He paused, then added.
"Gray's mentioned in the past that you have wondered if I was so changed since my return, because you had screwed something up when you restored me. But believe me, Robert, when I say that it wasn't your fault. Now you know why and I hope that, at least, brings you some comfort. And as to whether Adam did a decent job of repairing the broken soul which used to be Andrew de Lacy..."
He shrugged.
"I think the jury's still out. I'm alive. I'm functional. But I'm not the man I was before, and I never will be again."
Then he downed his drink and stood, dropping the wards as he did so.
"The prosecution in the case against Rupert Delatz rests. Good night, Robert. And please, remember what I've said come Saturday week, when I will be elsewhere, and he will be here. And never, ever, wear the insignia he gave you in my presence."
And with that, he bowed his head in my direction and headed for the door, leaving me too stunned to know what to say. As he left, I heard another voice by the doorway.
"Andrew, is Robert...?"
"He's inside, Claire. And right now, he needs you."
And then his footsteps were retreating down the hall, and I felt my wife's arms wrap around my neck and rest on my shoulders, her cheek warm against my own. The tension of earlier in the day was gone, and she seemed her usual self once more.
"The emotions I've been feeling from you have been like a being on a rollercoaster. And then, about ten minutes ago, I thought you were going to be sick. Are you alright, Robert?"
"No, my love," I said quietly, "I'm not."
But I couldn't bring myself to say anything else. I just leaned back into her embrace, took comfort from her presence, and let myself weep for what had become of my son.