Death of an Adept

This man McFarlane has fallen into the hands of those who serve the Patrons of Shadow, he prayed silently. For his own sake, and the welfare of many innocent others, I earnestly desire to discover his whereabouts in the outer world, together with the reason why the Shadow desires him.

An answering glow enveloped him, his inner vision steadying into focus as he found himself weightlessly suspended in the celestial firmament of the Inner Planes. McFarlane's journal floated before him, against a shimmering backdrop of stars. As he gazed at it, he became aware that there were in fact two books, the second surfacing through the first like sunlight breaking through a cloud.

For a brief moment longer, they glimmered like hyacinthine reflections of one another, before a subtle attraction of light drew them together and made them one. In that selfsame instant, in a dizzying shift of imagery, Adam found himself standing in a marble-walled chamber somewhere deep within the infinitely convoluted halls of the Akashic Records.

Before him on a lectern of silver lay the chronicle of lolo McFarlane's existence. The slenderness of the volume confirmed what Adam had surmised earlier - that the young Druid was a very new soul, with no past beyond the span of his present lifetime. A survey of the book's contents revealed that lolo had only just begun to grow into those talents which would blossom later in the course of his maturity, perhaps not even until another lifetime. Beyond this, Adam could find nothing in the young man's record to explain Raeburn's unwelcome interest.

Which suggested an alternative possibility - that whatever had recommended him to Raeburn must lie buried not within the limited scope of lolo's own experience, but elsewhere, among the history of his antecedents. The names of McFarlane's parents were included in the current record. Adam decided to take up the inquiry with them.

His quest took him backward in time, through the labyrinthine tangles of McFarlane's physical genealogy. The process was laborious, but out of these tangles of kinship an array of shining threads began to emerge, like fibers of gold mingled amongst the warp and weft of a greater tapestry, lost at a distance but visible at close range. As Adam pursued these threads back through the centuries, they gathered themselves together to form weightier filaments, strand joining up with strand until all at once they met and merged in a single skein of Orient splendor.

The brightness of this life-line hinted at an illustrious soul, of more than ordinary abilities. Following this golden clue, Adam arrived at the threshold of a new chamber of record. The chronicle enshrined in the chamber beyond was a dense compendium of many chapters, each one relating to a different incarnation. When Adam stepped into the room, the book fell open of its own accord to the chapter detailing events in the life of one Sir Andrew Kerr, McFarlane's physical ancestor from the fourteenth century.

Before Adam could commence to read, a sudden brightness suffused the chamber. The source of this radiance was a pillar of light that materialized before him as if out of thin air. Even as Adam instinctively warded his eyes from the brightness, the pillar coalesced into human form. Fully manifest, it took the shape of the knightly figure described in McFarlane's dreams.

And not just any knight. Sir Andrew Kerr was a Knight of the Order of the Temple.

The formal dissolution of the Order early in the fourteenth century had made it necessary for the survivors to modify their traditional livery, but there was no mistaking the significance of the medallion that hung around Sir Andrew's neck from a golden chain: a cross formee, of red enamel over gold. Adam had seen and handled a similar cross in the keeping of John Graham, and himself had been a Knight Templar in a previous life.

Taking on the semblance of that other lifetime, in the full panoply of his knighthood, Adam rendered appropriate salute to his fellow Templar. Even as he did so, his eye was drawn to the ring Kerr bore upon his sword-hand - of burnished gold, and set with a shallow, cabochon sapphire that glowed with an inner fire proclaiming it no ordinary gem. Seeing it, Adam realized that he was in the presence of one like himself, a Master of the Hunt - and one very senior to himself.

"I acknowledge your authority," he told the other man, "and I yield me to your instruction. Tell me what you would have me know."

Kerr's dark eyes sought and held his in wordless yearning. Then he lifted his hands in entreaty, gesturing first to his own lips, then toward Adam's. At once Adam realized what Kerr was trying to convey - that he wished to speak with Adam's voice.