Dominion by Fred Saberhagen (spiritual books to read TXT) 📗

Hawk. He’d be free to fade away.

   The cop two paces from his cell door was sitting in a schoolroom chair, one of those things with one broad flat arm, for doing paperwork. He was working away at some kind of record or report, and meanwhile keeping an eye on the few occupied VIP cells. Hawk wasn’t left unobserved for more than a minute at a stretch. It would just be too damn spectacular, it would draw too much attention to him, if he simply vanished now. Sooner or later, though, this close surveillance was going to flag.

   Then, if he knew where Carados was…

   Hawk cleared his throat, and made himself as comfortable as possible sitting on the edge of the jail cot. These cells were sure a great improvement over the drunk tanks downstairs.

   Now…

   His vision went farseeing, through the concrete wall that was not much more than an arm’s length in front of him as he sat on the cot. He stared for a little while into the mists that he saw beyond the wall, then shook his head in puzzlement. He was having a hard time locating Carados. Was that because Nimue needed Carados in her plans?

   Hawk really didn’t want to think about Nimue. Dark and extremely ugly things were going on round her, as usual. Meanwhile there was a young woman whose welfare somewhat concerned him. He’d find her, and also take another look at the insulting vampire. It was good to be doing something again, at last, after all the centuries.

   The centuries of what? Just what had he been doing for the past thousand years? Nothing, it seemed, but rolling in an alcoholic fog from one gutter to another. He didn’t want to think about it.

   He started over, by rubbing one horny thumbnail reasonably clean on the sleeve of his new blue jail shirt. Then he oiled the nail as shiny as possible by rubbing it on the side of his nose. Whispering a few words, Hawk settled down to stare into the dull mirror thus provided.

   “Oh,” he added a moment later under his breath. “There you are.” He tried to chuckle wickedly at first at the girl’s predicament, when he saw where the backblast of his own broken transportation spell had tossed her up. But instead of chuckling he moaned inwardly, in sympathy. Then he cursed inwardly, at himself, knowing himself, knowing how even an unconscious appeal from an attractive young woman could twist him from his purposes, force him into doing madly dangerous things.

   And then Hawk drew breath with a gasp. Of course he ought to know, even without farseeing, where this particular girl was in the sixth century. Because he’d once met her there… oh God.

   It was all the vampire’s fault, the goddam bloodsucker, the—but later he’d worry about the vampire.

   He gazed into his thumbnail at the young girl’s face. “Thanks for giving me the nice robe, pretty one,” he breathed, wheezing. “Now I have a little something for you in return. Send you something that you’ll find useful, where you are. That’s about all I can do for the moment. Later maybe I can do more. Now here it comes.”

   Hawk spoke the words of sending, and watched with satisfaction. Then he turned from the past and looked into the future, just a little. He marveled. And felt a deep and fundamental chill. The laws of magic were inexorable. It wasn’t only the girl’s life that was in jeopardy. It was his own as well.

SEVENTEEN

    On her first night in the past, Marge tossed and turned on her straw pallet, and had bad dreams. Simon was calling her, from some vast distance, and she had to go back to him at once, but her arms and legs were paralyzed and it was impossible to move.

   “Are you there, Marge? Marge, answer me clearly please.”

   She couldn’t see Simon but his voice was coming to her clearly, drifting from beyond massive dream-walls and squat towers of timber and earth and stone. And there were also tall stone castle walls, and wooden screens of maze-like fretwork.

   “Simon, I’m here, I’m here.” Now Marge was able to stand, but the ground was very slippery and slid out from under her feet whenever she tried to move, and if she fell it would mean her total and eternal ruin. She had never wanted anything more than she now wanted to get back to Simon, and yet she knew that was impossible.

   His voice still drifted to her over parapets, under a starless sky. “Marge, I want to know about the guest that our hostess is expecting here. Can you see him from where you are?”

   Marge was about to call back no, when in dream fashion the question arranged its own answer. “Yes, Simon, yes,” Marge called instead. A presence was standing near Marge now, a man. He was dressed somewhat in the manner of the man of the village who had taken her in, only his clothes were richer than any of theirs. He was at least a head taller than the short leader who had questioned Marge. She could not really see the tall man’s eyes. His lightly bearded face was very handsome, but Marge could feel a sickness radiating from it like a glow of ugly light. The man moved past her, starting up the same slippery slope on which she struggled for a foothold. His hands were raised before him, holding things that she knew were magically powerful, though she could not see them clearly. He totally ignored Marge as he passed her.

   Simon’s next question came distantly: “Is it a man or a woman?”

   Whether it was a man or a devil was the only real question. Sickness and hatred played from it like the beam of a dark searchlight. But Marge had no way to cry a warning. It was as if she and Simon