master of statecraft. 'Tis Merlin who gathered the knights of my liege's Round Table.'
Dodger recognized the new face: Hyde-White the fat druid.
The light died over Merlin and the figure to the king's left was bathed in light. Cai continued. 'Foremost among the knights of the hall is Lancelot.'
The seated knight bore the face of Andrew Glover. Dodger's expression tightened but Cai apparently didn't notice his audience's reaction.
'He and the Orkney Knights are all the remain in the inner circle of knights, Arthur's closest confidants and staunchest defenders.'
Lights played across faces. All were those Willie had tagged as druids. 'All that remain?'
'Alas, some of Arthur's truest knights have recently fallen in battle. There is evil abroad in the land, foul foreign knights who would frustrate Arthur's dream and throw the land into turmoil. This must not be.'
Cai's eyes narrowed in sudden suspicion.
'The land is all,' Dodger said quickly. Cai smiled, and Dodger relaxed. He had chosen the right password to escape the intruder detection routine. For the moment, he was still safe. He didn't know for how long. The Cai program obviously had triggers near sensitive points, or a random check function on interfacing users, or both. Already Dodger had gathered a lot of information, even if it was couched in arcane form. Analysis would surely straighten some of it out.
What else could he do here that would not raise immediate alarms? What might a travelling knight be free to see? Not the defenses certainly, or the treasury.
'Cai, I have travelled a long way and seen many strange things. Have you a sage or a chronicler to whom I relate my tale?'
'Certes. Do you wish to see him?'
'Iso wish.'
They turned around to find a page standing in their way.
'Sir Dodger, I bear a gift from an admirer,' the young boy announced in a reedy voice.
Beware of constructs bearing gifts, a wise decker had once said. What was going on now? Was this some sort of subtle attack by the ice?
'I may not accept a gift,' he said, improvising. 'I have made a vow.''
'You cannot refuse,' Cai said. 'This page is in the service of the Lady Morgan Le Fay. None may refuse her gifts.'
' 'Tis true, Sir Knight,' the page concurred. 'Accept the Lady's gift, given in all honor and courtesy, for she sends it with all good will. She knows of your recent victory and is impressed by your skill with the lance. She finds you worthy of reward. Please, Sir Knight.'
The page held out the packet. Wishing he could think of something else to do, Dodger took the offering. When it did not discorporate his construct, lock the persona into stasis, or send him into instant brain seizure, he felt relieved. He unfolded the wrappings to reveal a jumble of computer chips, credsticks, and corporate identification cards. A quick survey showed that they all had the same codes; he held in his hands the complete Matrix record of one Samuel Verner.
'What is going on?' he asked aloud.
The page answered, obliquely. 'My lady wishes as well to apologize for her lack of courtesy when last you met. She thought that this offering would please you and demonstrate her good will.'
'The last time we met?' Dodger felt faint, but persona constructs don't pass out. He didn't like the way this new twist pushed against the limits of the imposed imagery.
'She comes now.' The page bowed and indicated an approaching figure before vanishing as if he had never existed.
The woman wore a long, flowing dress that fit snugly to her full and fetching figure. The gown was midnight itself, swallowing all light. The skin of her throat and neck was brilliantly contrasted against the fabric. It seemed to gleam. It did gleam. Her skin was not the pale tone fashionable in the court, but a faint silver. As silver as her perfect face and delicately rounded, hairless skull.
He recognized the woman identified as Morgan and felt his loins heat up.
This is impossible!
When last they had met, she had effortlessly hijacked him through the Renraku Matrix and held him prisoner. He didn't know why; he didn't want to know. The thing calling itself Morgan Le Fay was neither decker nor system construct. Though he was not sure, he suspected it was something that should not exist; an artificially created machine intelligence, an AI, a real ghost in the machine. During his first encounter with it, the AI had presented itself to his perception as a female counterpart of his own persona construct while simultaneously displaying an entirely different image to another decker. This thing had abilities he couldn't understand. It was apparently sentient, but if its actions were any indication, it was slightly crazy. But crazy was defined by the human norm, and who could know what the norm was for an entity dwelling totally within the electron space of the Matrix? He had thought the AI confined to the Renraku Matrix.
He was obviously wrong.
Morgan Le Fay smiled warmly at him. He fled the only way he could be sure to evade her. He jacked out.
Sam didn't like Dodger's analysis one bit, but it made sense. It matched too well against the data they had gathered while Dodger was pursuing the blind shunt that had led him to the Camelot system. It fit with the police cover-up. Most of all, it explained the strange alliance of corporate and political figures who made up the Hidden Circle.
The druids were apparently operating in the interests of Gordon, Their patron wasn't the crowned king, but only barely. In the turmoil of political compromise and under the economic pressure of the corporations, Windsor-Gordon's faction had lost the bid for his affirmation as the true heir to the throne. George Edward Richard Windsor-Hanover, the other principal claimant, had been crowned instead.
Since his ascension to the throne, George Hanover had often favored corporate interests. No doubt, the European Corporate Community was pleased at having found the technical loophole that assured the superiority of Hanover's claim to Gordon's. But minor technicalities couldn't change Gordon's bloodline. His connection to the House of Windsor made him successor to the throne should George VIII and his children die without heirs. Given Gordon's strong association with the Green Party, the ECC would find him an uncooperative king. Thus, while the ECC made sure that their boy George and his family were well protected, they would not mind seeing Gordon do something to bar himself forever from the throne.
Their attitude was not universal. Gordon's bloodline was more than enough for royalists like Burnside. Whether they favored the current king or Gordon, the royalist factions had worked too hard in restoring the shattered monarchy. The last thing they wanted was to see their handiwork be swept away in a scandal. They would do whatever they could to cover up Gordon's misdeeds and polish his image as a suitable member of the royal family. The inspector and his cronies would suppress Gordon's part in the killings if they could.
The whole arrangement stank. It was a stench Sam was coming to know well, the corruption of power. Power was what it was all about. Gordon grasping for the throne and the druids of the Hidden Circle reaching to further their own interests. It was just barely
conceivable that they sought to install Gordon as king because they believed he was the rightful king. More likely, they wanted a puppet who owed them everything.
Gordon courted the druids for the power they represented. No doubt, he expected to control them once he was king. No ambitious man could ignore the power a circle of druids offered. The Hidden Circle commanded considerable magical power as well as substantial mundane power through their advantageous placement in political and corporate struc tures. So great a concentration of influence would be hard to duplicate in such a small number of British citizens.
Sam didn't know who was using whom in this arrangement, and it didn't really matter to him. They were all participating in the magical sacrifices. They were all guilty.
Justice seemed further and further away, as the runners' forces disintegrated. Two nights ago they had disrupted the druids' ritual and achieved one confirmed kill and a second probable, but it had cost them. Estios, Chatterjee, and O'Connor were still missing. Dodger was fretting and had abandoned his affectation of ornate speech. He had to be pulled away from his cyberdeck to eat, and he barely stuffed down food before jacking back
