Chapter 27

"McAllister," the soundless voice of the Mother came to him in the morning, half a day from Marcelon.

"Yes, Mother?" Sleep for McAllister, always hard to come by, had been scarcer the last two days, his dreams filled with concern. The despair Sable felt as the Demon Lord's captive weighed on him deeply.

"I am given dispensation to help you slightly, if it will encourage you to rid the plane of the Demon and end the assault from Hell at the congruence. It's all I and others could argue for you."

As she finished her words, McAllister's sense of Sable through the brooch on his collar grew greatly. A fraction of a second later he felt her hope blossom and grow, and McAllister knew the love of his second life could feel his mood as well.

"I may now answer you, also," the Mother continued, "my relative position in the affairs of gods has changed. You are carrying the news that the Church is broken and reformed to the new Seat, and there are many who were junior in the old Hierarchy who are carrying the word to the other corners of my domain. As the Church is restored, the genuine worship of my people will increase my reach and stature. This brings me to Madelle."

Nodding, McAllister replied with a single unspoken word. "Savonne."

"Savonne, indeed. She should marry the man immediately."

Despite his formerly black mood, McAllister laughed, and felt Sable's spirit lift, also. "Mother, thank you," McAllister said, more seriously. "As you have reminded me, Sable and I have friends, and while we are still free of Hell there is hope. And maybe even after."

"That's all I hoped to accomplish," the Mother said, lightly, and was gone.

The troop certainly felt the change in McAllister's mood. Glancing about himself, McAllister caught several smiles and heard a more than a few laughs.

The afternoon flew past, and by nightfall, they entered the East gate into Marcelon.

"Something has changed," the Greater Demon said to Sable, his gaze pinning her own.

Sable made no answer, staring defiantly back at the smooth-skinned aristocratic face, the dark skin almost glowing in the lamplight of the library. Behind him, where the two walls, the bookcases, and all the furniture had been, was an empty void. The stone floor was missing eight inches of material from a large square area, and the dining room behind the library was missing its back wall. The entire effect was of one cavernous room, and the remaining lamps struggled mightily to fill the space with light.

Sable had been sleeping at the foot of the demon's bed, the bed formerly occupied by his grand-nephew Azer. The demon held the leash of Fire, even in his sleep.

"Tell me, or I can make things hard for you," the demon said mildly.

"My lover has accomplished his mission and redeemed my bargain with one of the gods of this place."

"It is more than that, I think," the demon said, thoughtfully. "There is something ... richer about your sense of your place. You seem more confident of rescue. Hold still," he commanded, and Sable bore his inspection.

"Almost I would say a deity of this world wed you to him, though how that could happen without the two of you in proximity?" His puzzled look cleared, then. "My clever little Horse," he purred. "You had a bond with him all this time, and he knows where you are and what you are feeling. Whatever the god gave him, you feel as well." He paused then, considering. "No, I shall not torture you, not yet. He will come to me."

Sable said nothing, though she wished for wine. The quality and potency of the stuff increased dramatically since the Greater Demon stepped into the house. Sable gave a sniff of derision for the sprites of the house.

Absently, the demon caused the decanter and her goblet to float across the room, having heard and correctly deduced the meaning of the sniff. With her manacles loosened, Sable was free to drink the wine, which she did slowly, so as to prolong the time her hands were loose.

The next morning, he found the clothing Ban-Den had bought her in Sea's Home, and watched pointedly while she dressed. He releashed her by her foot this time, and brought her to the central courtyard of the house, whereupon he tossed her sword to her.

"Fight," he ordered, and proceeded to test Sable to her limits. Only twice did she come within six inches of his skin with her blade, and his dark eyes glittered in appreciation both times.

Finally, the ordeal was over, and she rested, sides heaving. "You have a fine grasp of the physics of these lower planes," he observed. "You could have changed your mass, though I would have also. That you did as well as you have without doing so speaks well of your training. I suppose I shall have to congratulate my nephew."

Sable risked a response, then. "If ... he ... gets back," she managed between breaths.

"Oh, the mage he is with shall see to it," the demon assured her. "I won't want to tangle with that one later in his career," and laughed at Sable's surprise.

"Why does he help us?" Sable asked, then.

The Greater Demon nodded, fingers drawing at his sharp chin. "He feels he is rebelling, to spite the family that does not regard him. We call this the Wandering, the phase where he will come into his own."

Sable endured the laughter as she endured everything else. McAllister was, in a very real sense, only an emotion away.

McAllister stood on the deck of the sailing vessel Fairwinds, and waved a goodbye to Marcelon. Nearly the entire town turned out to see him off, it seemed, though why many should know him was beyond his ability to comprehend. The Deaconate and the Priestesses moved through the streets on the way to the docks en masse, and perhaps that was why the crowds formed.

Savonne's soldiery lined the streets also, along with the city's small guard. It had not taken very much of a display of divine-inspired ethereal ability from the deaconry to convince the court of Savonne-the-duchy that merging the duchy with Marcelon and blessing the marriage of their Duke to the head of the New Church was in their best interests. Having the commanders of Savonne's army assume command of the joint forces could not have hurt the decision process either.

McAllister was certain that the commanders would, in due time, learn the deaconry could not be lied to by deed or omission. Until then, each unit larger than twenty men had a deacon as second-in-command. Given their previous profession of intelligencer and spy, McAllister was positive they and their units would do well.

Madelle had very little time to enjoy courtship with Savonne, though his interest had been plain even before leaving with McAllister for Saint-Raphael. Apparently Lelainde and Madelle had considered the situation, and Madelle had let herself hope he would return.

During the wedding, the last doubts of Madelle's legitimacy were erased. The brilliant silvery spark had officiated at the state wedding, and two days' worth of reveling at the end of winter did much to relieve the combined population of Marse-Savonne.

So it was that McAllister stood then, on the deck of the Fairwinds. The brilliant silvery spark hung in the space between the ship and shore, plain for all to see.

The rich alto timbre of the Goddess sounded then, rolling across the harbor for all to hear. "To McAllister, go, and with my good graces and thanks, know that you are ever welcome in my lands and my houses. To the people of Marse-Savonne, know you are blessed in your leadership and that your Goddess loves you."

McAllister knew with a farewell like that, the ship's crew would have a difficult time treating him as merely a man, though for this voyage he had twenty-two cavalrymen who did not treat him as a living saint.

The thought was comforting.

Carus watched the crew balefully. There were more than he could dispatch if it came down to it, and he regretted the decision which had him travel with the fat and disgusting Karsu more than words could say. The crew didn't care for Karsu, and Carus had the definite sense that Savonne's troop hadn't either, when he first saw him.

McAllister bested Karsu twice, and, unless Karsu were strongly reinforced with competent help, Carus would bet heavily on McAllister doing it a third time.

Carus had even seen the aftermath of the first altercation between McAllister and Karsu, eleven dead bodies on the street, when McAllister summoned Carus for the first time. McAllister had ignored the bodies, and only asked about the apple tree in the Bronze god's court. Carus could appreciate a man's dedication to a goal, and there was a lot to appreciate about McAllister's ability to achieve his goal.

Later, he even had gotten Carus laid in a brothel in the gods-forsaken city of Bhangda, a place Carus absolutely hated, but Raphael had ordered him to. Exile was perhaps not too strong a term for it, as Carus spent fifty years in the damnable city, dying there in his old age. It was McAllister who had called Carus back again, to walk under the sun, and undo the life's work Raphael's casual order to secure the three artifacts of power had turned into.

Carus was still bitter at Raphael's casual dismissal. And of course, Raphael trusted him with the Rod of Irel, trusted him to carry his orders out and not die until his orders were set irrevocably along their path. A small matter of enlisting a nation of millions to guard the Rod was a trifle, compared to the strict geas Raphael had placed on Carus' soul. Carus had felt the weight of it for over a thousand years during what should have been bliss in the Blessed Fields of Elysium.

Then McAllister had broken the geas.

Carus had felt it in the instant McAllister gazed upon the pillar hiding the Rod in its depths. Some profound magic expenditure had happened at the time. Carus recently warned Karsu that McAllister was Sorcerer and Mage both, and frighteningly effective at what skills he had. Though McAllister often used his talisman to focus the magery in subtle ways, the freeing of the bonds which Raphael had placed on Carus with the Rod had been anything but subtle.

Though McAllister seemed to only know three uses of sorcery, the thought of the feats he accomplished with those three uses caused Carus' bowels to turn into water.

Now, here Carus was, protecting the loathsome Karsu from the ship's crew, who took a nearly instant dislike to the fat man. The sailors muttered not-so-thinly veiled comments about his bulk and eating habits, and his seemingly-endless supply of wine entirely too often for Carus to ignore. He had taken to sharpening his short sword on the deck by the ladder down to the crew's berth. Not-so-coincidentally, this was by the berth-house on the deck where Karsu's cabin was, along with the first officer and Captain. The crew ran about and did whatever it was sailors did, to the music of Carus' whetstone as accompaniment.

Carus' danger sense had been constantly triggered during this passage, and so it was with great relief that, on the thirty-third day of their voyage, the lookout cried, "Land afore!"

"Captain, Helmsman," Carus said as the worthies named had turned the ship north to beat up the coast. "My companion and I will depart your vessel here, if it pleases you. Would you set a sea anchor and detail a boat crew to send us to the shore?"

The Captain looked at the shore, dense forest meeting the rocky beach, without a sign of habitation from horizon to horizon, and then back at his crew, gauging their mood. "It's your coin," he said at last.

Karsu, predictably, argued with Carus, shoving his fat jowls and fetid breath in Carus' face until Carus had pricked one of his chins with the point of his short sword slid up between the two men. Karsu's eyes bulged out, though his voice was, thankfully, stopped.

Carus looked down upon the boat being lowered into the water, the sailors' backs willingly bent to the task if it meant getting rid of the unlucky one the sooner. Especially as it meant the fat man would leave his wine behind, though the foodstuffs and his other trunks were loaded into the boat.

"I'm sorry to see you put ashore here," the Captain apologized, "you were a decent sort, at least, if there were ill will on the boat, it wasn't at you."

"It is necessary I travel with him," Carus half-explained, and the Captain nodded.

"Good luck to you," he said, as Carus descended the netting over the side, the pack on his back lurching with his movement.

McAllister was aware of the effect he had on the Captain, having gone through much the same with Burnsby, the Captain of the SV Beaualito months before. He amused himself with watching Emile and Nasic order the ship's crew about. Both were natural-born Marine Sergeants, hard on disobedience, and instantly asserted their authority over the Fairwinds' crew.

Before the griping got out of hand, Nasic had ordered the deck sanded, much to the Fairwind's captain's surprise. Twenty sailors against ten cavalrymen, each with half the deck to sand from stem to stern.

Not a single cavalryman complained. Unused to the back-breaking labor, with flat planks and buckets of sand and water, the cavalrymen finished the port side of the Fairwinds in less than four hours, while the sailors finished in a day and a half. The sailors withstood the silence of the cavalrymen with fair grace, though McAllister would bet money the sailors would have preferred taunts and jeers.

The improvement in his crew's discipline and efficiency was hard to ignore.

More annoying, McAllister knew, was his penchant for suspending a lodestone-rubbed needle from a string, and making notes on a sheet of paper with a charcoal stick. McAllister was waiting for a clear night, rare in the winter in these northern climes, to check the stars. This was something the Captain did only on occasion, trusting instead that he would eventually hit the Western Continent, and then turn north to Cap de Moireau and the cities there.

Finally, the night was clear, and McAllister was able to see the stars. The night watch on the ship watched McAllister covertly, though he didn't move. He sat on a barrel of freshwater, leaning against the deckhouse, watching the sky above the ship until dawn.

"Captain, turn north," McAllister ordered, and to the crew there was no mistaking the voice of command.

Shrugging, the Captain did so, and McAllister showed him the marks he had drawn on the wheel coping, and handed him the lodestone needle on a thread.

"Why are you so sure this is the proper heading for the Cape, sir?" the Captain asked.

McAllister looked around at the crew of the ship, who were artfully engaged so as to appear as if they weren't listening, and gave a quirk of the lips. "I suppose it doesn't matter what's said about me," and turned back to the Captain. "The stars can be a guide in more ways than one. In this case, they showed me much. Not only are we now on the proper course, but I am in a race I didn't know I was in, to arrive at a place still further north than the Cap de Moireau."

Only partially mollified, the Captain let it drop.

"Well, little dragon-ling, I have been considering matters," the Greater Demon said the next morning. They spent the night in the courtyard, with its limited view of the sky, since this was the first night devoid of cloud cover in many days. The demon had, coldly, Sable knew, decided to leave the trap in the stone of the house which trapped her in place. This was in addition to his shackle on her ankle, piling insult upon injury.

Sable said nothing, which was not unusual.

"I have watched the stars of this world," the demon said, "and learned much. They have a great regard for your fellow fugitive, did you know?"

Sable still made no response, only returning the demon's words with her stony glare.

The demon sighed. "I could use a pair of capable and dedicated instructors in my household, to teach the young ones how little they really know. They tend to become dangerously defiant, as my puling little grand-nephew has." He sighed again, and opened his hands expressively. "I'll make you an offer I seldom make, though you may not believe me. I offer you positions in my household, with all the same opportunities and risks accorded to persons of station therein."

Despite herself, Sable gave the proposal consideration. "It would solve many problems," the demon continued, reasonably. "Your mate has fulfilled his obligation to that goddess," and Sable believed the stars had, indeed, shown the Greater Demon what McAllister had done on this plane.

"It would satisfy the demand of Hell to avoid being seen as expansionist and reclaim it's own," the demon continued, "and you would be trusted to leave Hell on official embassy, in due time." Seeing Sable consider it, the demon furthered his argument, "Your mate would not be stifled, and both of you would find the work exciting," he promised. "It would add legitimacy to your union," he pressed.

What the Greater Demon did not and could not know of were McAllister's private agreements, though Sable did. Sable betrayed nothing upon her face. "What," she finally said, when the silence had grown long, and she realized the Greater Demon was prepared to wait for her response, "shall I use for your name?"

If the demon were disappointed she hadn't committed, or even indicated interest, he hid it well. "You know," he smiled, canines showing toothily, "I've been fond of the name 'Azer' when traveling."

Sable laughed outright, to the demon's surprise. "Your grand-nephew chose the same name," she explained, between bursts of laughter, "You should know that my mate is a student of language, though he knows only a little Mabrahoring. I think Azer is a short form of a longer word, one that probably means 'born of fire'. Wouldn't you say that that name fits me and mine better than any of you or yours?"