true that there is a renegade Reader who has gone over to the savages and learned their magical powers?//
//Where did you hear such a thing?//
//Alethia told me. Is it true?//
//How could it be? Two Readers have been exiled. The savages kill Readers-they are terrified of us. This is some half-truth blown all out of proportion along the Path of the Dark Moon. The failed Readers have little accuracy, Melissa. They often get even important messages wrong-always check such information carefully. I will find out the truth of this matter.//
It was nearly ten days before Jason worked with Melissa again. She had made no gains; it was as frustrating as the last time. Before they returned to their bodies, however, she asked him, //Did you find out about the renegade Reader?//
There was mental silence for a moment. Then, //The tale is partly true. Master Florian is reluctant to discuss it. There is no truth to the story that Master Lenardo has learned savage sorcery-but he has broken his Oath, and taken a wife among the savages. There is some garbled story about his having a daughter, which is simply not possible, as he has even now not been out of the empire nine months. He seems to have made a pact with the savage Adepts, to Read for them against the empire. He came back to Tiberium recently, and stole away one of his former students-but not by magic. They fought their way to the border, and the boy was killed at the gates. Lenardo escaped, but he has broken his Oath in every possible way. His powers cannot but be diminished severely. The Council of Masters is watching the situation closely, fearing he may lead an attack against us.//
This was bad news indeed. The savages had been driving back the walls of the empire for many years now, led by Adepts with powers of sorcery unknown in the empire. They could throw thunderbolts, make buildings topple, kill people-all with the power of their minds. But they could not Read-they had to see what they were attacking. With a Reader to be their eyes at a distance-
Jason followed her train of thought easily. //Yes-it could mean the end of our civilization. Please do not discuss this with other trainees, Melissa. We must wait and see what the Council of Masters decides.// He added, //We should not discuss it, even here. It is unlikely that anyone else is out of body just now, and might intrude on us-but it is always possible. You must learn to achieve a plane of privacy. There is no other way for us to discuss anything that we do not want another Reader to know about.//
When Melissa returned to her body, she discovered to her horror that it had moved! Her head was turned to one side, and her left arm was tight against her body, the right flung out, elbow bent. What had happened?!
She was unharmed, although the panic of fitting her «self» back inside a body that was not as she had left it gave her a ringing headache. She found the hospital in the throes of recovery after a small earthquake. It had been only a minor shock, but it had frightened many of the patients. There was broken crockery and glassware to clean up, but otherwise no damage.
Melissa went through the wards, reassuring patients, and was soon back to her daily routine. Just before noon, she received a message she had been expecting for days: Alethia was in labor. Her pregnancy had been perfectly normal; any midwife would do, but Alethia wanted Melissa, and her teachers had given permission. Despite the morning's excitement, her duties for the day were covered, and she went off to her friend's house.
It was an easy birth. Rodrigo was home in time to witness his daughter's entrance into the world, and Melissa watched the family with great pleasure. The neighbor who cared for Primus brought him home, and he looked curiously at his little sister, then demanded supper. By the time Melissa left, Alethia was sleeping with the baby by her side, safe in a world in which earthquakes were minor matters.
The earthquakes continued, minor but annoying-perhaps ten days would pass, perhaps almost a month, and again the ground would shake beneath them. Aventine history recorded nothing like this; there had been major earthquakes, even volcanic eruptions from time to time, spaced generations apart, but never such a series of minor shocks. Eventually, though, people became used to them, and hardly noticed when they happened.
Autumn passed and winter brought cold rain. Melissa spent her time off in Alethia's cottage, thoroughly enjoying that happy family. Primus was back to full health. The baby grew and prospered. Life was good.
Melissa's life at the hospital, though, was not so good. She still had not achieved the plane of privacy-which meant that she could not learn the difficult task of maneuvering on the varied planes of existence. Without that ability, she could not begin the second part of her medical training: ministering to sick minds.
Some part of her was content with what she had achieved. She was an excellent healer of sick bodies; surely that would be enough to keep her here at the hospital… with Jason.
//That is your problem,//he told her. //You have not made a commitment. One day you want to be a healer, the next you want to be a wife and mother like Alethia. One day you are satisfied with surgery, and the next you want to be a Master Reader-until you try the exercises again.//
But she could not tell him that he was a major part of her problem. If she could only detect any certain sign, beyond the interest he took in her as a student, that he really wanted and needed her-
Then one day, as she was walking toward Alethia's house, a boy came up to her. 'You Melissa?'
'Yes,' she replied.
'Here.' He shoved a note into her hand, and ran off. She read it: 'Meet me at the quay.' There was no signature. Yet she had no doubt who had sent it.
//Alethia.//
//Melissa! I've been expecting you!//
//I'm sorry-I've been called away. I'll come back if I can. Hug the children for me.//
Today she huddled up in her woolen cloak against the sea wind, sharply different from the breeze last summer. Jason was already there, in her spot on the rocks under the pier. So she went up into the street and out onto the pier, kneeling above him, drawing her cloak about her. Now she was not Reading, and neither was he. 'What's wrong?' she asked.
'I'm not certain,' he replied. 'A number of things. A date has been set for my testing, although I did not request it.'
'Testing?'
'For the rank of Master.'
Glad they were not Reading, she considered why she was startled. She had always thought of Jason as permanently fixed, a healer at the hospital. Few Readers became Masters, and testing for that rank was usually done when they were between thirty and thirty-five years old, at the peak of their powers. It suddenly occurred to her that she had no idea how old Jason was.
For just one moment she allowed herself to Read-to «see» him. She had never done it before; she had never allowed herself to think of his physical being. He was sheltered on the rocks as she had been last summer, his cloak pulled about him-not an official black Magister Reader's cloak, but a plain heavy brown wool cloak such as everyone wore in the cold weather. As Melissa was bundled up the same way, the boy who had brought her the note probably had no idea they were Readers.
She could not judge Jason's height, nor much of his build without probing. But she observed his face-a dignified face, younger than his graying hair suggested. The hair was thick and crisp, cut short in the prevailing style. His eyes were brown, like her own, and troubled. His mouth was meant to smile-its grim set now belied both the prevailing upturned lines and the tone she «heard» most of the time when she Read him.
'Don't you want to be a Master Reader?' she asked, realizing that he was, indeed, of the right age for testing.
'It would never have occurred to me to request testing, nor has Master Florian suggested it to me. I am a good Reader, Melissa, well worthy of the rank of Magister. However, my powers are not exceptional. The word is that only the most exceptional Readers are being accepted into the Council of Masters now-so why have they called for me?'
'Your healing skills-often they are allowed to compensate for other Reading powers.'
'At Magister rank, yes, but not Master. I… wonder if this testing is somehow related to the other matter-the reason I wanted to speak with you privately today.'
She realized that, indeed, nothing he had said so far warranted this strange, uncomfortable meeting. Why could he not have called her into a privacy room? 'What is the other matter?'
'The renegade Readers.'
'Readers? More than one?'
