Enchantress from the Stars Read online

  What could I say? I had been warned, certainly, that I would be hurt. Yet you just don’t take it in beforehand! Choking back hot tears, I looked down at the Emblem, and for the first time the sight of it didn’t give me any sense of elation at all. Above all other considerations … but I hadn’t thought in terms of these considerations. Perhaps I shouldn’t be on a Youngling planet! Perhaps taking the Oath had been a terrible mistake. But I had done it, and tomorrow it would be Georyn whom I would have to send into a danger that had now been proven to be even greater than we had guessed.

  THE STONE

  It would be nice to be able to say that once you become an agent, you are always very dignified and mature; but you are not. At least I’m not. The day Terwyn was killed I stayed in my hut most of the afternoon, and I cried harder than I had for years. Agents can, of course, get into much worse situations, situations involving innocent bystanders instead of enthusiastic volunteers. But my eyes had been opened to the possibilities. Besides, there was the prospect of Georyn’s venture; and for me, that was a matter of feelings more personal than those involved in my mourning for Terwyn.

  When I finally went outside, I saw that the sky had clouded over completely for the first time since we had been on Andrecia; the wind was from the east, and it carried the scent of rain. I wrapped my cloak around me and went to look for Georyn, but he was nowhere in sight. Father, however, came immediately to meet me. He took my arm, and we walked slowly along the path by the river, for a time not saying anything, although I could see he had something on his mind.

  Then Father began, “I’ve been giving some serious thought to where we stand. All along, the worst part has been the fact that I couldn’t predict how our Andrecians would react to the problems they’d run into. Now, I’ve been able to analyze the reasons why Terwyn failed.”

  “I don’t want to talk about it anymore,” I told him.

  “Elana,” he insisted, “we must talk about it if we are to see to it that Georyn isn’t defeated by the same things.” When I didn’t answer, he went on. “Before Terwyn panicked and used his sword, he tried the ‘charm’ twice; both times it was a failure. There were three main reasons, I think. First, in spite of the fact that we warned him that he would be paralyzed by the Imperials’ stunners, the actual shock of it was too much for him. Second, the sight of so many things utterly alien to his past experience unnerved him; the colonists have all kinds of stuff besides their land-clearing machine, and Terwyn had never seen any products of a mechanized technology before. And finally, he was so busy watching the ‘dragon,’ not to mention the Imperials themselves, that he couldn’t turn the force of his mind to psychokinesis.”

  “Those sound like three good reasons for calling the whole thing off,” I said.

  “In the usual case that might be true,” Father said. “But with Georyn, I think we can overcome those obstacles. I’ve figured out a way to prepare him for them. Originally I wouldn’t have considered anything of this nature, because the average Youngling wouldn’t adapt quickly enough; but Georyn has some special qualifications.”

  “What way?” I asked, hoping that it would mean putting off the hour I dreaded. “How long will it take?”

  “Just tonight. It’s rather risky, but I’m going ahead with it, because I think this is a time when we’re justified in gambling.” He broke off, seeing the look on my face, and laughed grimly. “Risky for us, for the mission, not for Georyn. I’ve been in contact with the starship; they’re going to send our ship back down.”

  I was caught between relief and astonishment. “The ship? But why?”

  “Because we haven’t the facilities to do what needs to be done without it,” Father told me. In detail, he described what he was planning to put Georyn through. The idea didn’t please me one bit; it involved the use not only of drugs, but of some quite rigorous conditioning techniques.

  “That’s awful!” I exclaimed.

  “It’s not awful, Elana. It’s merely an adaptation of the methods used at the Academy for the training that’s given in psychic control. We’ll make it simpler, naturally, since we don’t need to give Georyn as much control as an agent needs and we don’t have all the proper equipment.”

  “It will be terrifying, though.”

  “Yes, and that’s exactly what it’s got to be,” Father agreed. “That’s how it’s designed, because Georyn must be taught to respond to the type of terror he’ll face later in the way that he must respond if he is to survive.”

  “How many times does he have to prove himself?” I demanded, close to tears again. “Hasn’t he been tested enough?”

  “This isn’t a test. It’s training, and more than that, it’s a way of helping him learn what not to be afraid of, familiarization, so that when he meets the real thing he won’t panic.”

  “I’d rather not send him up against the real thing at all,” I said.

  “But we must, and he has volunteered for it. He wouldn’t back out now even if we asked him to. So let’s give him all the preparation we can.”

  “You can give it to him,” I conceded.

  “No,” he said slowly, “I can’t. It must be you, Elana. At least you must be the one to explain it to him and get his consent.”

  “Why me?”

  “Because only you can give him the confidence he’ll need. There is a—a bond of trust and understanding between you and Georyn, a bond that will enable you to present this in such a way that he’ll know, underneath, that he will come through it all right, no matter how hard parts of it may seem. It’s because of that bond, even more than because of Georyn’s innate courage and intelligence, that I feel he can adapt to this form of training in time for it to do him some good.”

  I hesitated. Father’s description of the procedure had been full of innocent-sounding technical terms, but I’d had enough experience to know pretty well what he had in mind. “Will you use pain as a stimulus?” I asked directly.

  “Yes,” he admitted. “It will be mild, though, and of course absolutely harmless. Elana, pain’s not categorically bad any more than fear is. Where the aim is to build a person up rather than to break him down, it can serve a constructive purpose.”

  “But Georyn won’t know that!” I objected. “I can’t bear to have him think that I’d deliberately let him be hurt.”

  “He’ll agree to it of his own free will,” Father pointed out. “I haven’t ever asked you to deceive him, you know. You will tell Georyn quite openly that the ordeal will be a grueling one, but that it will be ultimately to his benefit. And that’s the truth.”

  Lowering my eyes, I said desperately, “Don’t ask this of me! It’s—not just a job anymore.”

  Father looked at me rather strangely and then for a long time was silent; we resumed our walk. Finally he said to me, “I’m afraid this may seem hardhearted, and I don’t want it to, but I’ve got to use my best judgment as to what’s the right thing to do. So I’m making it an order, Elana.”

  “What if I refuse it?”

  “I’m not going to answer that, since we both know that you won’t. If you did and Georyn failed through lack of the support you could have given him, you would never forgive yourself.”

  There was no argument to that. Resignedly I said, “What sort of explanation can I give him?”

  “Simply say that you’re going to teach him more magic.” With an encouraging smile, Father added, “You know, Elana, the harder a thing is to come by, the more valuable it seems. If Georyn suffers a little to gain ‘magical’ knowledge, that in itself is going to increase his trust in its power, and he will feel better and stronger for it.”

  I shivered and pulled my cloak tighter against the chill wind. Father went on, “There’s one more thing. Georyn’s faith in the ‘charm’ may be shaken when he hears that it didn’t protect Terwyn.”

  “That would be surprising,” I murmured, not without irony.

  “So we’ve got to give him something to replace it, something concrete to hang o
nto, I think, as a focus for his belief in his ‘magic’ powers.”

  “How do you mean, a focus?”

  “Oh, some small object, a talisman. Something like a magic ring. Only we can’t give him any artifact of ours, since he’ll have to take it to the invaders’ camp with him.”

  My hand, warm in the pocket of my cloak, closed on the stone I’d put there my first night on Andrecia, the lovely reddish-brown stone I somehow hadn’t wanted to toss aside. “An enchanted stone,” I said thoughtfully, drawing it out. “This stone?”

  “That’s fine!” Father said. He gazed at it thoughtfully and, taking my hand in his, declared, “Who can guess what powers lie hidden in that which is native to this world?”

  “Just a minute! Do you mean I’m to tell Georyn that the Stone, in itself, can work magic?”

  “Yes, exactly.”

  “But it can’t.”

  “No, but if he believes it can that’s all that matters. And if you present it in the right way, he will believe it.”

  “Now you are asking me to deceive him,” I protested.

  “Symbolism isn’t deception! People need symbols, Elana. Why else do you wear the Emblem?”

  “Oh, but that’s different!”

  “How? Because you know it’s a symbol, while Georyn will believe literally in the power of the Stone? That’s irrelevant! In both cases it’s the idea that is potent and not the talisman, but knowing this is only a matter of sophistication.”

  It was true enough, I realized, that Georyn had believed all along that the Emblem was the source of my power. The use of the Stone would undoubtedly make him more confident of his own. Yet it did seem like fakery somehow.

  And there was another point that disturbed me; it had been disturbing me, in fact, ever since I’d let Terwyn go with such vague parting instructions. “We’ve already deceived Georyn in one way,” I said to Father. “We’ve let him think that eventually he will ‘kill’ this ‘dragon’ when we know that he won’t be able to do anything remotely resembling that. Even if the colonists do leave, it won’t be the sort of victory he’s expecting.”

  “Elana, that’s a thing we can’t possibly explain. He’s got to have an immediate goal that he can visualize; without it he couldn’t approach the job with any assurance at all. You must not take that from him, even though it is stretching symbolism a bit further than you might wish.”

  All right, I thought. I can’t tell him that he won’t kill the dragon. But somehow, I’m going to give him fair warning—not only about failure, but about success.

  Upon a day of gathering clouds, as afternoon was waning, Georyn was told that Terwyn had been unable to prevail against the Dragon and that in the attempt to do so had been slain. And at these tidings Georyn’s heart was heavy, for he had loved his brother; and moreover, despite the warnings of the Enchantress, he had not believed that there was true danger of her magic failing so long as his purpose did not falter. When the Starwatcher assured him that Terwyn had displayed great valor, the quest began to seem hopeless indeed.

  Nevertheless, he deemed that it had been laid upon him to continue it without delay, however little liking he had for the job. Unlike Terwyn, who had gone to the Dragon in anticipation of winning a reward, Georyn knew that for him victory might be no less bitter than defeat. Yet his success would be the Lady’s success, while his failure would be hers also, and perhaps in truth the world would be consumed if the evil was not stopped; so what choice was there in the matter?

  As darkness fell that evening, Georyn went to the hut of the Enchantress, where she sat bathed in the magical white radiance of her captive piece of the Sun, and he said to her, “Lady, I have come to bid you farewell. I will set forth at first light tomorrow, for I must try the thing, now that all depends upon me.”

  And she answered, “You are right, Georyn, you must. But not tomorrow. For you are not yet ready; the Starwatcher and I have learned from Terwyn’s death that the Dragon is guarded by an evil spell that is stronger than we had believed, and the charm that you have mastered is not in itself enough to challenge it.”

  “What is to be done, then?” Georyn asked. And as he said this, he sat down beside her, for he was no longer in awe of the strange enchanted things within her hut.

  The Enchantress bowed her head, and he could see that she was troubled. At last she said, “We are going to give you something else. But Georyn, I will not deceive you, there will still be danger. It is all too likely that if you attempt to complete this quest, you too will die. Even if you vanquish the monster, you may be slain in so doing.”

  “I would willingly die, if I could free the world of this evil by it; and I know now that enchantments are less infallible than they first seemed. But, Lady, I shall not abandon hope so long as I have your good will.”

  “You will always have that, Georyn,” she said softly, and her eyes glistened with tears. Then, hesitantly, she went on. “There is indeed hope that the spell that guards the Dragon may be broken, but the conditions are very hard.”

  “Lady, I have met such before. Tell me the conditions!”

  “They may not all be told at once. They are very complicated and concern the uses of enchantments. Yet I warn you that the final condition is so difficult that we had not planned to disclose it to you, for we feared that you would be discouraged. I now believe, however, that you have the right to know of it; so although the Starwatcher is still opposed, I will tell you, if you wish.”

  “I wish to know the truth, even if it is not pleasant knowledge,” said Georyn, “for I am loath to meet it blindly.”

  “You still must meet it blindly, for the condition is very cryptic. It is this: he who breaks the evil spell will be required to give up that which he deems most necessary to the triumph of good, and to face what appears to be a grievous failure. But as to how and when this must happen, that will remain hidden, for part of the condition is that the circumstances may not be known in advance.”

  “But how then can I tell what I must do to bring them about?” Georyn protested.

  “You cannot. I have revealed the requirement as a warning, not as guidance, and you must act as if you had never heard of it!” exclaimed the Enchantress. “It is best forgotten now; but when the condition has been fulfilled, you will know.”

  Georyn frowned, thinking that this was the most perplexing idea that had yet been presented to him. “It seems a paradox, Lady, that the triumph of good should be brought about through giving up something that appears necessary to that triumph,” he said.

  “Yes. But it is ever true that what looks like a paradox is merely a thing that cannot be understood by means of our present knowledge. Of this one I can say no more, for I myself cannot predict exactly what is going to happen.” The Lady sighed. “Perhaps the Starwatcher was right, and I should never have mentioned this. Yet I—I care about you, Georyn, and I could not bear to let it come to you as a shock in the end.”

  “I am happy that you told me of the condition,” he assured her. But he was happier still at the other thing she had told him.

  Then the Enchantress rose and, going to the cloak that lay upon a bench in the corner of the hut, she drew something from its pocket. And she said, “Now I shall entrust to you magic far greater than a simple charm; but I must have your promise that you will never employ it lightly, nor in an unworthy cause, for much evil could be wrought by its misuse. It is meant to serve you only in the most desperate necessity.”

  Willingly did Georyn give the promise; whereupon the Lady held out to him a small, smooth stone, very like to those found along the banks of the river, a stone with a hole through its center. Reddish brown in color, it shone softly under the dazzling white light. And a wonder came upon him, for despite its commonplace appearance, he knew that it was no ordinary stone.

  “It is enchanted,” the Enchantress told him, and he could not read her smile. “It looks simple, does it not? Well, I will tell you frankly that it is a thing that learned men of more than one
world would find very hard to understand.”

  “I am honored that you should consider me worthy,” said Georyn gravely.

  “I fear that it is not a matter of my considering you worthy, but of your proving yourself. I give you final warning, Georyn: if you accept this thing, you do so at your peril!”

  “If it were not perilous, it could not be very powerful,” Georyn observed. “For does not power always carry some sort of danger?”

  She laughed. “Georyn, did you once seek the King’s wisdom? I think it would have been better had it been the other way around!”

  Georyn flushed and quickly asked her, “What powers has this Stone?”

  “Many; but they cannot all be released at once. Its strength will grow as you learn to use it.”

  “Will it ever approach the strength of—of the Emblem, Lady?” Georyn ventured. And he asked not because he wanted such power for its own sake, but because a sudden wild hope had come to him that he might be permitted to share that which was uniquely hers.

  “No, Georyn, it will not,” she told him honestly. “The Emblem reaches beyond space, beyond time, into another scheme of things; and such power cannot be embodied in any object of this earth. But the Stone will have a power that the Emblem does not have: the power to act directly in this world to save it from evil.”

  For a long while Georyn stared at the thing; then he took it into his hand, knowing as he did so that he was committing himself irrevocably. One could never cast aside a responsibility such as this, having once accepted it. The stillness of the night was suddenly broken by the echoing cry of a forest bird, and the Enchantress looked up with a startled glance of recognition, or at least of memory. Then her eyes met Georyn’s and there was fleeting elation in them. “We have much in common, you and I,” she whispered.