Death of an Adept

Angela Fitzgerald, meanwhile, was standing by with the flask of well-water, watching Raeburn for her cue. His chanting had not changed while his two male associates made their preparations; but as he suddenly directed the point of the dagger in Angela's direction, eyes still closed, she gave a slight involuntary gasp, her lips parting in an instant of near-sexual arousal. Only belatedly did she move forward, as if in trance, to empty the vessel of water into the cauldron. The oil broke and swirled, the water sinking out of sight as she dropped the empty flask amid the kindling of rowan wood and raised her hands in invocation.

"By the power of this water, drawn from this unhallowed ground, I summon to this time and place William de Soulis, Lord of Hermitage! As he is named, so let him appear!"

Her voice reverberated hollowly around the courtyard. As the echoes died away and she stepped back, eyes still lit with the power stirring in the circle, Barclay moved to the fore. From a pouch at his side the pilot took out a handful of earth which had been gathered earlier that day from the hill at Nine Stane Rig, the place of Soulis's execution, and cast it into the cauldron's mouth.

"By the power of the earth that received his ashes," he declared, "I summon to this time and place William de Soulis, Lord of Hermitage. As he is named, so let him appear!"

The earth sank sluggishly beneath the glistening slick of oil floating upon the water. Barclay yielded precedence in turn to Mallory, who was standing by with a lighted black taper.

Deadly focused, the young physician circled the cauldron once widdershins, touching flame to the kindling laid about the base, then set alight the oil lying on the surface of the cauldron's contents. It had been laced with something more combustible than mere oil, and a harsh yellow flame licked upward around the roll of chain-bound lead as Mallory drew back a pace to raise both hands in invocation.

"By the power of fire which devoured his flesh and left his spirit anchorless," he cried, "I summon to this time and place William de Soulis, Lord of Hermitage. As he is named, so let him appear!"

Raeburn came last, with a handful of sulphur and saltpetre which he cast into the flaming cauldron. As yellow fumes roiled upward, he breathed deeply of their fetid perfume before raising hand and dagger in further exhortation.

"By all infernal powers of the air and all the many works of Darkness, I summon to this time and place William de Soulis, Lord of Hermitage! As he is named, so let him appear!"

The power being summoned had increased exponentially with each elemental invocation. Prevented from dissipating by the confines of the circle, the power hung crackling in the air like the build-up of a static electrical charge. Raeburn could feel it beating about him like a strong wind, stirring the hackles at the back of his neck as his pulse rate quickened to match its rhythm.

Half-intoxicated, he seized hold of the power with his right hand and began channelling it into the dagger in his left, molding it by the force of his will, pointing the dagger at the cauldron. The dagger-hilt began to quiver in his grasp like a live thing, aglow with arcane energies.

The metal grew hot to the touch, but Raeburn, his face contorted in ecstatic endurance, continued to hold the power in check until it threatened to scorch his palms. Then, abruptly, he released it like a psychic probe, launching it with single-minded intent into the abyss of the Inner Planes, whose physical focus now was the cauldron.

Eternity seemed to hang suspended before his far-ranging senses registered a response. So faint was the signature that at first he found it difficult to distinguish from the background shimmer of so many overlapping realms.

But the locus of movement grew progressively stronger, homing in on its summoners with a speed outside normal time. No physical manifestation heralded its arrival, but Raeburn became abruptly aware of a sentient presence focused on the cauldron, malignant and hungry - Soulis, beyond any doubt, and too hungry to manifest without sustenance.

"Bring him!" Raeburn rasped, jerking his chin toward Tal-iere.

Immediately Mallory yanked the old man to his feet and hustled him forward, forcing him to his knees before the cauldron and then snapping a capsule of ammonia under his nose. The old man recoiled with a jerk of his head, animating the ceremonial bird headdress he wore, but Barclay had already sidled into position behind him, armed with a stream-smoothed stone the size of two fists. The blow he dealt to the back of the old Druid's head sent the bird headdress flying; and as Mallory caught the victim's wrists to keep him from crumpling, Barclay tossed his stone aside and whipped a length of knotted rawhide around Taliere's throat.