Joachim lifted an eyebrow. “You seem to have thought of a number of possibilities. I shall have to give the question of seminary classes some consideration. Many of the students are still trying to reconcile themselves to giving up close association with women…. But then they will have to deal with women as well as men through their ministry for the rest of their lives,” he added briskly. “Yes. When we are all home again, come talk to me at the cathedral office, and we will see what can be arranged.”
Celia kissed his ring with a barely concealed look of glee and hurried over to finish settling children onto the carpet. At last I had the bishop to myself.
For several minutes, surrounded by people who, if not reaching their hearts’ desire, were at least working out compromises that might temporarily satisfy, I could put the demon out of my mind. But he was still there, trapped in the pentagram in the ruined chapel, not thirty yards away. He still had Antonia’s soul. And unless I did something very soon, my nerve would fail me completely.
“I’d like you to give me the last rites, Joachim,” I said quietly. “Though it’s not going to do much good. Antonia has sold her soul to the devil trying unsuccessfully to save Cyrus from his demon-Theodora can give you the details-and it’s going to take my life and soul together to redeem her.”
He was going to give me an argument. I just knew it. “There’s nothing you can do,” I said, speaking rapidly. “You know priests can’t exorcise people who have summoned demons themselves, only those who have been invaded by free-roaming demons. And you could use the liturgy to drive the demon out of this castle, certainly, but he would have her soul just as certainly.”
Before Joachim could reply-and he looked very ready to do so-I heard a step in the passage leading to the chapel and whirled to see Elerius emerging through the doorway.
He was so haggard he could hardly stand. “Maybe you’d better try again yourself, Daimbert,” he gasped. “That demon intends to drive a hard bargain.” He noticed with vague interest the others who had arrived and then looked back at me from dark-rimmed eyes that had lost all their irony and calculation. “I haven’t given in to his offers, if that’s what you’re wondering. It’s the raw terror, I think, that wears you down, until he hopes you’ll agree to anything just to get away. Watch! I can still walk right up to a bishop.”
He staggered more than walked. “Even Cyrus can walk up to the bishop,” I snapped, not completely sure whether to believe him, then stopped.
“Help me!” a voice echoed down the passage from the chapel. “Help me!” That was Cyrus’s voice.
What could I do? For twenty-five years I had been trying to help mankind, sometimes with limited success but trying. Without even making a conscious choice I flew down the passage into heat and darkness, gritting my teeth against the wave of evil waiting for me. And then I realized that Cyrus was not calling for my help.
“I can’t go on without my powers! Help me get them back!” He was calling to the demon.
I dropped to the ground just inside the passage from the chapel and leaned my forehead against the stone doorframe. This was it. No matter what Cyrus was trying to talk the demon into, successfully or unsuccessfully, when I went in there to join him I wasn’t going out. I hadn’t gotten the last rites from the bishop, I hadn’t said good-bye again to Theodora, but twice was all I could manage. If I had to face that raw terror and raw evil a third time, I would just have to let Antonia be lost.
“And why should I grant any particular powers to you?” the demon was saying. “It is not as though you still possessed a soul with which to bargain!”
I looked a last time up the passageway, in the direction of daylight and the people I hoped I would never see again, because they, unlike me, would be in heaven. Elerius put his head into the passage but I waved him back, and he retreated, looking relieved.
“But I used to be able to do things!” cried Cyrus. “Good things! I helped children! I rebuilt the high street of Caelrhon, and they loved me for it! And now,” his voice cracking, “the angels won’t listen to me, and my demon is gone, and I can’t do
Let the demon explain it to him, I thought, trying to take deep breaths to steady myself. The poisonous fumes floating across the room didn’t help.
“You wizards really are difficult to deal with,” said the demon, sounding irritated. “You always try to pin us down with specious protocols and bargains you have no intention of keeping, and then make ridiculous demands. Can’t you understand that the demon who used to help you is no longer here?”
I was barely listening, trying instead to rally what little strength I had left. No more of this non-binding conversation, in which a demon might blithely offer anything. I would force him to accept binding negotiations, in which he would swear by Satan’s name to release Antonia in return for my immediate death and the reception of my soul in hell.
IV
There was a step behind me, and I whirled to see Theodora striding determinedly toward the chapel. She saw me but didn’t stop until I wrapped my arms around her.
“Please, Daimbert,” she said in a very small voice. “The bishop thinks I’m here to talk you out of it. My courage is going to evaporate in about thirty seconds. Let me go.”
I knew immediately what she meant. “Joachim told you? But you can’t! You don’t know the terms for binding negotiations!”
“Then tell me,” she said against my chest, “and tell me quickly. If one of us has to die to save Antonia, it has to be me.”
“No, I can’t let you!” I whispered. “Theodora, my last happy thought before descending into eternal torment is going to be knowing that you and Antonia are safe. I couldn’t go on living if I knew that either of you was in hell.”
“And you think I could if you were there?” she said, almost angrily but also in a low voice. “The demon may be satisfied with my life and not insist on my soul. The bishop and Elerius told me that this demon already knows and distrusts you, but he’s never met me. And listen,” wiggling an arm out of my embrace to cover my mouth, “even in this world you’re a lot more important than I am. I’ve thought all this through, so don’t argue. The whole kingdom of Yurt needs you. The only person who needs me is Antonia, but she can live with you. The king might still be uneasy about a married wizard, but he’d be happy with the wizard’s daughter.”
She didn’t want me to argue so I didn’t, but there was no possible way I could agree. I held her so close that for a moment I imagined we might fuse into a single person. Life, even in a dark and fetid passage, seemed at the moment almost unbearably sweet. “I’ve loved you ever since I met you,” I murmured. “In six years you’ve given me more delight than most people experience in their whole lives. I do wish we might have been married, just so I could say before God and all our friends how much I love you, but it’s still all been worth it.”
She tried to struggle but not very convincingly, and she couldn’t speak with my mouth on hers. In the chapel, Cyrus and the demon were still talking. “Well, maybe there is something you could offer,” the demon said cunningly. “I could at least
I spun around so fast that I knocked Theodora bruisingly against the doorframe. She gave a brief cry, but the sudden terror in her eyes was not of me. Still holding onto her, I plunged into the chapel.
It was too late. As I raced across the floor Cyrus finished rubbing out one of the main chalk lines. “I have indeed ‘considered’ giving you your powers back,” said the demon to him with a leer that showed all his razor-sharp teeth, “and I have decided not to!” And with a white flash and a smell of brimstone, he vanished.
Cyrus gave a heart-wrenching cry as daylight reasserted itself in the room. No demon in the pentagram meant that the miasma of evil was rapidly draining away from here-and going wherever the demon was hiding now.
I advanced toward Cyrus, slowly now. He was huddled on the floor, his face on his arms, but he looked up as I reached him. I must have looked even worse than I felt for he gave a screech and fled up the passageway.
Theodora and I collapsed where we stood. She rubbed her shoulder absently. “I’m sorry if I hurt you,” I said. It seemed so inadequate a comment that she didn’t even respond.
