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  Hederick the Theocrat

  ( Villains - 4 )

  Ellen Dodge Severson

  Ellen Dodge Severson

  Hederick the Theocrat

  Prologue

  Astinus, leader of the Order of Aesthetics, surveyed the three apprentice scribes before him. The historian's face, as usual, wore the expression of a man taken unwillingly from his beloved work for something annoyingly trivial.

  The three scribes, a middle-aged woman and two younger men, shifted from foot to foot beneath his gaze and darted cautious glances at each other. Each was sure the other two possessed extraordinary training and expertise. Each was sure that it was his or her mere presence in the Great Library ofPalanthas that had brought the dissatisfied gleam to Astinus's eyes. They all were convinced that their own appointments as apprentices to the premier historian on Krynn would soon be found to be a mistake. All that work, all those years of preparation and study, would be found inadequate. They were unworthy. Each steeled for disappointment, afraid of being sent home in humiliation to

  become a store clerk or street vendor.

  In truth, Astinus was not annoyed with the apprentices but merely anxious to be back at work, writing down the history of Krynn as it occurred. Even as he stood here assessing the guarded expressions of these three, details of fact were going unrecorded in the scrolls of the Great Library.

  It was difficult to catch up once one was behind, as Astinus knew only too well; it was almost better to skip what one had missed in one's absence and go on to pen whatever was happening at the moment. Unlike the other scribes, who worked in shifts, Astinus had never been known to sleep or to step away from his work for more than a few minutes. There were some among his helpers who whispered that Astinus was no mortal, for hadn't his name been found upon scrolls dating back thousands of years? Unless, they speculated, every chief historian's name, since the beginning of time, had been Astinus.

  Actually, Astinus was well-pleased with this crop of apprentices. These three, however they quailed before him now, had come on the highest recommendations of Astinus's far-flung advisers. They needed only seasoning, he'd been told, before they could take their places among Astinus's dozens of assistants in the Order of Aesthetics.

  What was needed was a task that would test their ability to cooperate as well as to chronicle history, Astinus thought as the three suffered silently before him. It must be something, of course, that the historian could check for accuracy against his own knowledge of events as they unfolded. He narrowed his eyes and nodded as he surveyed the trio. "Hederick," he murmured. "That's it." The scribes exchanged more glances, each wondering which of the others was named Hederick.

  "Sir?" the middle-aged woman finally ventured. She had the pale ashen complexion common among those who spent their lives prowling through the dimly lit corridors of libraries. She was of medium height and average build and wore her brown hair gathered with a simple length of blue yarn at the nape of her

  neck. She wore the same type of sleeveless, togalike outfit that the other two wore-indeed, that Astinus himself wore. "Sir," she said again hesitantly, "is there something we…?"

  The remaining two apprentices lost no time interrupting the woman's query. In this competition for a coveted position in the Great Library ofPalanthas, none wanted to be left at the starting line. "You have a task for us, master?" broke in the younger of the two men, a tall, red-haired youth with creamy skin, copious freckles, and blue eyes.

  "We stand waiting to serve you," interjected the other man. He had eyes as black as his curly hair and skin the color of cinnamon, marking a sharp contrast to the youth beside him.

  Suddenly, all three apprentices were speaking at once.

  A new frown descended over Astinus's already stern features, and the three apprentices faltered in their chatter. "You are delaying me," Astinus declared in irritation. "Give me your names, quickly, that I may sort you out and assign you tasks. And be brisk about it."

  "Marya," replied the woman.

  "Olven," the dark-haired man said proudly.

  "Eban," the redheaded youth answered last.

  "Fine," Astinus said, noting their names for inclusion in his history of the Great Library. "Your task, then, is this: to chronicle the doings of a man named Hederick, recently named High Theocrat of Solace. I believe the scheming of this man will someday have great import in Krynn." His penetrating stare raked the three aspiring historians. "First you will research Hederick's past and set it out. You, Eban, will take charge of that." The youth stood up straighter and cast a triumphant look toward the other two.

  Astinus went on, "All of you are students enough to grasp that without knowing a man or woman's past, it is impossible to understand that person's present."

  "Oh, yes," said Eban.

  "Certainly," Marya chimed.

  "Without a doubt," Olven added.

  "You two"-Astinus thrust his chin at Marya and Olven- "will concentrate on recording the present exploits of High Theocrat Hederick." He pointed to a wooden desk in the corner of the library. "One of you-and you, too, Eban, when you complete your research-will be seated at that desk at all times, day or night. This spot must never be empty."

  Three pairs of eyes widened, but the historian continued speaking regardless of their surprise. "History occurs in times of darkness as well as at noon, as you all know. Even now, events are sweeping on unrecorded as you dally here."

  Eban gasped and swept up a scrap of parchment and a quill pen from a counter. He scurried between two stacks of books and was gone. Astinus marked the red-haired youth's industry. Surely the background material would be ready soon at that pace, he thought with satisfaction.

  Astinus made his way to the door of the Great Library. "I leave it to you to decide how you will divide the day," he said over his shoulder to Marya and Olven. "Whoever is not recording currently transpiring events should help Eban with his research, for that must go first in your written account, of course. Now I must return to my tasks."

  "Ah… sir?" Olven said quickly. "A question? Quickly?"

  Astinus halted, his hand on the doorjamb.

  Olven cleared his throat and looked embarrassed. "How will we know what's happening now, so that we may record it?" the man asked.

  "After all, it hasn't been written down anywhere yet," Marya added helpfully. "And it appears that you want us to stay here. In the library, I mean."

  Astinus, expressionless, gazed at the two for a long, silent moment, then the briefest of smiles crossed the historian's face.

  "Sit at the desk," the historian said. "You will see, soon enough. If you are meant to work here." Then he was gone.

  Marya looked at Olven, who gazed back at her. They both swiveled about to thoughtfully survey the padded chair drawn up before the desk.

  "It looks ordinary enough," Marya said in a small voice. Just a chair.

  Olven nodded. "Magic, do you think?" he whispered "Has Astinus ensorceled us without our knowledge?"

  Marya shrugged, but swallowed twice before going on Maybe. You go first."

  Olven bit his lips, took a deep breath, and slid into the chair.

  Chapter 1

  The scream invaded hederick's very bones and blood, coming from nowhere and everywhere.

  The sound reverberated again. Hederick raced across the prairie toward a grove of trees, where his sister Ancilla had hidden ten years earlier. He was still quite a distance away-too far, by the god Tiolanthe! Feet pounded behind him, and with them, thunderclap after thunderclap from the approaching storm.

  Time after time, Hederick stamped on jagged rocks and stumbled over upthrust roots. Bloodstained footprints marked his passage.

  Then trees lo
omed. Hederick dove into Ancilla's Copse as though it were a church and Hederick a penitent-as though whatever tracked him dared not enter such a holy place.

  His lungs burned. His ribs ached. The boy landed facedown in soft dampness and tensed for the cry that would tell him the creature was upon him. But there was silence; only an intermittent popping sound broke the hush of the glade.

  Hederick sat up warily and peered around in the flickering light. Large trees with rough bark towered over him, interspersed with saplings that thrust upward through the ferns. The rich smell of hickory mingled with the odors of fragrant moss and moist soil. Surrounded by dark shapes that seemed to dance in the wind of the approaching storm, the boy fearfully scanned one shadow after another.

  The yellow eyes of a gigantic lynx glared at him.

  The dappled brown beast was easily ten feet from nose to bobbed tail. The great cat crouched fifteen feet above him, wedged in the crotch of a tree. Its eyes were enormous, forelegs heavy, padded feet huge.

  Thunder shattered.

  The lynx and Hederick screamed at the same instant.

  "Begone!" A sword appeared above the boy, interposed between his crouching body and the giant predator. Red light played on the weapon's edge. A gauntleted hand grasped the hilt; an arm corded with muscular sinew held the blade steady. Hederick sat, powerless with fear.

  The lynx screamed again, and the hand tightened on the hilt. "Leave us, cat!" came that same booming voice. The lynx tensed to spring, and the man swore fervently, invoking gods Hederick had never heard of. Just as the giant feline leaped, the man's other hand swept up, raising a flaming torch.

  Light exploded. Red and yellow sparks burned pinpricks into the ferns. The lynx twisted away in midleap and crashed through a maple sapling and onto the ground off to one side. The man dropped the torch and whirled to meet the cat, sword ready, his body between the boy and the lynx.

  Then Hederick was up. His left hand caught up the sputtering torch from the wet moss, and he ran to the man's side, bellowing a battle cry. Hederick threw anything and everything his right hand could grasp. Rocks, branches, leaves, mud, moss-all were hurtled toward the snarling lynx.

  His tall rescuer remained poised with his sword. "By the New Gods, the boy's feisty!" the man said.

  The only thing left was the torch; Hederick prepared to throw that as well. The man swore again, fumbled at his belt, and tossed something at the cat just as the boy released the fiery brand.

  Another explosion of scarlet and topaz flashed through the trees. Bigger and louder than the last, it knocked Hederick flat on his back. When the smoke cleared, there was no sign of the lynx.

  "Did we kill it?" Hederick could barely get the words out. His tongue seemed stuck to the roof of his mouth.

  The man sheathed his sword and laughed uproariously, then shook his head. "By the New Gods, that pussycat must be halfway to the Garnet Mountains by now! If her feet touch the ground every six furlongs, if 11 be a miracle."

  Hederick shook uncontrollably. Blood streamed into his eyes from a cut on his forehead. "It's still out there?" he wailed. "It's not dead?"

  "Not dead, lad, but she won't be coming back here soon." The man extended a hand to help the boy up. Hed-erick's knees shook so that he could barely stand. "I can't imagine what the she-cat was doing so far from the Garnets," the man mused, "but who knows how great a distance the creatures travel to hunt? Perhaps she sought food for kits."

  "But it was hunting me!" Hederick shrieked. The man shrugged. "You escaped."

  Wordless, Hederick studied his rescuer. The man couldn't have been much more than twenty. His face was long, with a dark beard neatly trimmed to a point and gray eyes that seemed both humorous and kind. A rough brown robe stretched to cover powerful shoulders.

  The man submitted to Hederick's frank inspection without embarrassment. "By Ferae, you're a small one! How old are you? Eight? Nine?"

  "Twelve," Hederick muttered.

  "Your name, son?"

  "Hederick."

  "I'm Tarscenian," the man said. "Let me invite you to supper, young Hederick." Tarscenian placed a strong arm about the boy's still trembling shoulders and guided him deeper into the grove, where a small campfire blazed cheerily. The fire popped as they approached, the sound Hederick had heard as he entered the copse. Tarscenian urged the boy to sit against a fallen log and handed him a wooden trencher. Three pieces of meat swam in greasy juice.

  "You can dine like a theocrat on fresh roast rabbit," Tarscenian said, "and then tell me how in the name of the Lesser Pantheon you ended up alone in the middle of nowhere."

  Soon Hederick had all but licked the trencher clean. The hare's picked bones blackened in the fire. Tarscenian lounged on a blanket across from the boy, watching with amazement. "Whatever you take on, lad, whether it's lynxes or supper, you certainly do it wholeheartedly," he commented.

  Hederick bristled. The man had offered him dinner. What was he supposed to do-admire it until it congealed? The man laughed and held up his hand. "Calm down, lad. I mean you no insult. You showed more spirit in facing that she-lynx than many full-grown men would have."

  Mollified, Hederick leaned back against the log, regarding his rescuer with awe. Tarscenian was a far cry from the men of Hederick's isolated home village of Garlund. The young man's eyes glittered with life, his gaze was direct, and his movements vigorous. If the god Tiolanthe ever took human form, he would look like Tarscenian, Hederick decided.

  "So, Hederick, what were you doing alone on the prairie in the dark of night?" the stranger asked. "Assuming that you weren't hunting lynxes, that is."

  Tarscenian listened with growing astonishment to the boy's story. Hederick told him about his mother and father, Venessi and Con, who, after walking for weeks due east from their home city of Caergoth, had founded the village of Garlund just south of Ancilla's Copse. Their purpose was to provide a place where they and their followers could worship Tiolanthe, the god that regularly appeared to Venessi and Con, but only to them. Then Hederick had been born, the first baby delivered in the new village.

  Two years later, when Con disagreed with Venessi over some matter of Tiolanthean doctrine, Hederick's mother had ordered the people of the village to kill her husband. Hederick's sister Ancilla, fifteen years his senior, had fled Garlund moments after Con's death.

  "She promised to return for me, but she never did," Hederick said simply.

  Tarscenian interrupted only once-when the storm broke and the pair took shelter under oiled canvas stretched from tree to tree. Each sat wrapped in a gray woolen blanket that smelled of incense and horsehair. Hederick talked until he could barely put words together, he was so sleepy. "And now I've been banished," Hederick said, "by Venessi."

  "Your mother sent a twelve-year-old into the prairie alone at night?" Tarscenian demanded with a frown.

  "I must learn humility, she said," Hederick explained, his words slurring. "And then the lynx came after me, and I ran to the only place I could think of-Ancilla's Copse. This is where Ancilla hid when she left Garlund, when I was two."

  "You must not remember very much about this sister," Tarscenian said sympathetically.

  "Oh, no!" Hederick exclaimed, shaking himself awake. "I remember her well. She had eyes as green as grass, and she was pretty-oh, so pretty, Tarscenian. She knew all about plants and herbs and things, and when Con beat me for sinning, she would give me things to take away the pain. Ancilla was wonderful."

  "But then she left."

  Hederick's face fell, and he nodded. "She was afraid the villagers would kill her as they had killed our father. So she left. And then she forgot all about me. I… I guess I was too sinful to come back for."

  He remembered the night before Ancilla had left. For some minor infraction, Con had beaten young Hederick mercilessly. Ancilla, achingly beautiful at seventeen, defended him and treated his wounds. Hederick had begged her to stay with him. "You won't ever stop being my sister, will you?" he'd cried.

  "Clo
se your eyes, little brother," Ancilla had answered, rocking him by the fire. The little boy, safe in the comfort of his sister's arms, resisted sleep. She murmured words Hederick had never heard before, tenderly stroking his face and wispy reddish-brown hair. She fed him cold tea from a spoon, and when he tried to speak again, covered his mouth with a gentle hand and hushed him.

  Once she rearranged the blanket to cover Hederick's feet, then she spoke fiercely. "I promise you this, little Hederick: I will always be your sister. / will never hurt you. I will protect you with every power I have. I will do all I can, even from afar, to keep Con and Venessi from turning you into… into what they are. You need never fear me.

  That I vow."

  That memory was too holy to share with this stranger, however. And besides, Hederick was so tired; he felt himself sinking into sleep. Then Tarscenian's voice roused him.

  "This village of yours, is it large?" the stranger asked.

  "Large and wealthy?"

  Hederick shook himself awake. "Sixty people, maybe."

  "Prosperous?" the man asked.

  "Venessi has plenty of food stored in the barns, but the people don't know that. They're restricted to two meals a day. No one in the village is well-fed except my mother, but she's in Tiolanthe's graces. Other than the food, there's nothing but a few candlesticks in the prayer house, and some icons."

  "Steel icons?" Tarscenian asked quickly. Since the Cataclysm, steel had been the most precious metal on Krynn.

  Hederick nodded. Tarscenian didn't speak for a while, and Hederick thought he'd fallen asleep. The boy had nearly followed suit when the man's deep voice resounded again.

  "Lad," he said, "I believe it's time for me to rest in my travels. And it's time the people of Garlund learn about some new gods."

  Hederick jerked upright, bumping the oiled canvas and sending a splash of cold water down his left leg. "New

  gods?"

  Tarscenian smiled impishly and extended his blanket to cover the boy's soaked leg. "You've not asked me about myself, lad."