Bradley, Marion Zimmer - Shadowgate 02 (45 page)

 
          
What
should she do? Should she summon the
magickal
child
here?
This was the place of her greatest power, where her mother's and father's
heritage combined—if she had any hope of containing or commanding the creature
her hope was here, not at the Institute.

 
          
But
there was only a slight chance she could prevail, even here. The Elemental had
been sent against Winter; it drew its power from the very fact of her existence
to such an extent that Truth wondered if anyone but Winter could possibly
destroy it. If only Winter were willing to accept her link with that nightmare
sending, and use it. ...

 
          
Truth
remembered the steely ice-maiden who had come to the Institute for help. Even
at her most vulnerable, Winter Musgrave did not seem to be the sort of woman
who could yield, gracefully or otherwise. The Elemental would surely destroy
her before she would ever accept it into herself. Truth leaned against the tree
and closed her eyes.

 
          
.
. .
Wait. . .

 
          
It
might almost have been the wind in the leaves that carried with it that sense
of hushed expectation. Truth cocked her head, listening, but heard nothing
further. Still, she had the answer she'd instinctively sought. This fight was
not hers. Not yet. Perhaps never.

 
          
Truth
circled the trunk with her arms, and rested her cheek against the bark of the
tree. For a long time she stood like that, unmoving, the sun that shone down
falling equally on her and the great oak. The sense of peace that she felt
welled up from the roots of the earth, carrying with it the promise that there
was time for all things. Time, even, to discover her own purpose in the world.

 
          
At
last Truth roused herself from her trance and stood away from the tree. She
felt rested, refreshed—and certain, at last, of her proper course. She turned
to go, but before she left the enchanted circle Truth spoke aloud for the first
time.

 
          
"Thank
you, Father."

ALL THE WORLD IS WINTER

He disappeared in the dead of
winter.

—
W. H. AUDEN

 
          
DRIVING ONCE MORE THROUGH GLASTONBURY IN THE
direction of the college, Winter wondered if coming back here had been a
mistake. It felt too much like saying good-bye.

 
          
She
had never said good-bye to Grey.

 
          
Winter
set her jaw and concentrated on moving her car through the light traffic on the
road approaching
Glastonbury
. Her bandaged hands were slippery on the wheel, and she grasped it
carefully. It had been weeks since she'd left; it was late spring now, less
than two months to the end of the school year. There was a certain grisly
justice to coming back here now: It was almost as if she were returning to
college after spring break, fourteen years too late. She had never finished the
part of her life that
Taghkanic
represented.

 
          
And
now, when desperation compelled her to go back to what should have been over
long ago and stir up old ghosts, she found that the shades of those innocent
college days had become something . . . darker. If coming here felt as if she
were saying good-bye, it was because she was. All that was left after she'd
seen Truth was to go back to San Francisco, find Rhiannon somehow and receive
Cassie's message, and then—

 
          
Grey.
The Elemental. Images tangled in Winter's mind, a web of choking guilt and
responsibility that seemed as if it would grow tighter forever. What could she
have changed in the past to make the present other than it was?

 
          
There
was no answer to that; there never had been an answer for as long as people
have been asking that question. But if Winter could not find some way to change
the present, there would be no future at all.

 
          
For
anyone.

 
          
She
pulled her latest rental car into the guest parking lot facing the Institute
and parked, an action which brought back the memory of her previous visits
here. Despite her constant overwhelming impression of inadequacy, Winter knew
rationally that she had come a very long way in a few short weeks—from
dependent ex—mental patient to a woman who could reclaim—and take
responsibility for—the demons of her own past.

 
          
Now
all that was left was to say good-bye.

 
          
Winter
gathered all her poise and self-possession and walked up the steps and into the
building.

 
          
School
was in session; the Institute's outer office was filled with milling students,
all of whom seemed to have some urgent business with the
Bidney
Institute staff. As she came in, Winter glanced at one girl with flaming red
hair who wore a brilliant blue stone at her throat.
CZ,
Winter thought automatically—the pendant was far too brilliant
to be blue topaz. With some difficulty, she pushed herself to the front of the
crowd and got the receptionist's attention.

 
          
"Is
Truth
Jourdemayne
in?"

 
          
Meg
Winslow's startled glance was one more confirmation to Winter of how much she
had changed—or perhaps only a tribute to her new wardrobe; Ralph Lauren instead
of Calvin Klein; soft, romantic pieces in hopeful pale colors, like the flowers
that bloomed in the spring. Winter smiled tightly to herself. Even if the rest
of her life was to be a losing fight, she intended to make a good showing. Jack
had always said that showing up for the fight won half the battle.

           
She wondered where he was now. Jack
Thoroughgood
, her earliest mentor, had retired from The
Street after a career of many years a few months before she'd left for
Fall River
. He'd lasted at
Arkham
Miskatonic
King long enough to become a legend; job
burnout on The Street was nearly as high as it was for cops and air-traffic
controllers, and to survive at all was itself a victory.

 
          
With
a wrench, Winter brought her mind back to the present. She couldn't afford to
go drifting off here.

 
          
"Just
a minute, please," Meg said. She started to turn away to deal with someone
else.

 
          
It
was irrational, after Winter had come through so much, that a brush-off from a
harried receptionist should have the power to upset her, but it did. As Meg
turned away, Winter felt the thrill of power spider-walk up her spine.
Ignore me, will you?
She thought
longingly of raising Cain— in a psychic storm Meg's phone would shatter, her
computer explode, all the electronic marvels of the twentieth century turn
against her. . . .

 
          
Suddenly
Winter realized how easy doing just that would be: Her
psychokinesis
was truly an extension of her thoughts now. Hers was the power, under the
control of her conscious mind at last: to punish, to avenge. . . .

 
          
Very
slowly, Winter set her bandaged hand on the counter that separated them and
pressed, welcoming the pain of her wounds. Yes, she could hurt Meg and everyone
else in this room. With a snap of her fingers she could summon the lightning
and turn this room to a storm of poltergeist rage worse than the one that had
destroyed her apartment. But if she did, for the first time in her life it
would be she, Winter
Mus
-grave, who was
consciously
responsible—not the
hate-serpent, whose spasmodic bursts of psychokinetic rage had randomly
tyrannized her through childhood and beyond.
Her.

 
          
Winter
drew a shaky breath. She had the sense of stepping back at the last instant
from the brink of some unimaginable abyss that had opened just beneath her
feet. She had claimed her power and acknowledged her anger. Now Winter had to
admit that her anger could kill, and vow to chain it forever. Any other choice
would make her no better than the monster who had sent the artificial Elemental
to stalk her. With an effort, she stepped away from Meg and took a deep breath.

           
"Winter! I'm so glad you came
back!" Truth cried warmly. She stepped through the press of students,
holding out her hand in greeting. "Isn't it a zoo today? Dr.
Roantree's
running an opening screening, and everybody
wants to be psychic," Truth finished with a sigh.

 
          
"Why
do it?" Winter wondered.

 
          
"It's
the closest thing to a cross-section we're going to get in this field, and if
you don't have a statistical baseline, how can you tell when you've deviated
from it?" Truth said wryly. "But come on back to my office; I'll get
us both coffee."

 
          
Leaving
Winter in her office, Truth headed back to the coffee machine. She'd actually
been watching for long enough to see Winter win the struggle with her own
anger. If it had been necessary, Truth would have intervened—in the last
several months, she had set enough wards around the Institute to enable her to
pull the plug on most consciously directed psychic assaults—but she was glad
she had not had to. Self-control was the first step on the Path; to see that
Winter had come so far on her own was a greater relief to Truth than she would
have realized.

 
          
"I'm
so glad you came back," Truth said, coming back into her office a few
moments later with precariously balanced cups and a plate of cookies. "I
like your new look," she added.

 
          
"I'm
afraid my old look—what's left of it—is locked in a car trunk somewhere in
San Francisco
," Winter said.

 
          
"
San Francisco
? Was that where you went? I didn't know
what to think when you went off that way. ..."

 
          
Winter
made an abortive gesture, rising to unburden Truth. "I had to find the
others," she said, setting the cups carefully on Truth's desk. The
bandages made them slippery to handle, but she knew she was lucky to have
escaped as lightly as she had. The glass on her apartment floor could have
sliced through tendons as easily as through flesh. "Find them. Talk to
them. Find myself—and doesn't
that
sound
like something our mothers would say? Not that my mother ever would
have," Winter finished with a trace of bitterness.

 
          
"It
sounds as if you've been busy," Truth said neutrally.

 
          
Winter
looked away, her manner suddenly stiff. "Not busy enough," she said
roughly. "Cassie—I knew her in college—is dead."

           
Truth was nearly as familiar with
Winter's
Taghkanic
days by now as Winter was. "
Cassilda
Chandler?" she asked carefully. Winter
nodded. But Cassie, like Winter, was in her thirties.

 
          
"It
killed her," Winter said, and there was no need to explain what
"it" was. "It burned her to death in her bookstore in
San Francisco
. They said she knew it was coming. . .
." Abruptly Winter covered her face with her hands and wept; the fierce
angry pain of one who took every loss as a personal failure. After a few
moments she sat up and took a deep breath, wiping at her eyes. Truth pushed the
box of Kleenex across her desk, and Winter pulled out a fistful and dabbed at
her face.

 
          
"I'm
sorry. But it's my fault she's dead."

 
          
"I
don't know whether it is or not." Truth selected her words with careful
honesty. "But I do know that you didn't deliberately choose her death. I
know it sounds inadequate, but would you like to talk about it?"

 
          
"I
don't know." Winter drew another deep breath. "I don't know if I can.
Cassie was a—" She waved her hand helplessly. "I don't know what to
call it without being rude. Her friend Rhiannon said she was a witch."

 
          
Truth
smiled faintly. "They do call themselves that," she admitted.
"But wasn't Cassie involved in the Blackburn Work when she was here?"

 
          
"With
Grey," Winter agreed, pronouncing the name with only the slightest of
hesitations. "Rhiannon said that Cassie—I'm not sure I'm remembering this
right—had decided that it was more important to depend on yourself than on any
gods at all, so she'd sort of
adapted
the
Blackburn Work? I hope that doesn't offend you," Winter added dutifully.

 
          
Truth
smiled to herself. "It's more or less what Thorne did with the
magickal
tradition
he
was trained in," she said. "Change is usually a good thing, when
it helps people and organizations adapt to new truths. But tell me more about
Cassie, if you can. You said she was still involved with the Work. Do you know
if she tried to summon or stop the Elemental?"

 
          
Winter
frowned, trying to remember what Rhiannon had said. At the time she'd been to
caught up in her own emotions to listen. "I think it sought her out. I
think it sought them all out." Winter drew another long shuddering breath.
"Oh, Truth, everything's gone so
wrong!"