The Yngling

6.

Consciousness came gradually. First Nils was aware of his body, then of voices. After a bit he focused on the voices, and their Anglic began to take meaning.

"So we have a psi who is also deadly," a female voice was saying. "But why does it have to be a filthy, ignorant barbarian?"

Nils opened his eyes.

Raadgiver, in his blue velvet robe, sat beside the cot looking down at Nils and smiling slightly. A young woman, taller than the counselor, stood at the window looking out, her black hair in a braid down her slender back.

"Signe, our patient is awake," Raadgiver said in Danish. He pulled on a velvet cord and somewhere a bell rang. Signe turned. She was not much more than a girl-perhaps no older than Nils-and handsome, but her startling blue eyes bespoke dislike.

"Nils Savage, this is my daughter and apprentice. I need not introduce you to her, for she has shared the job of watching over you since you were brought to the castle earlier this morning. I have been your other nurse."

Nils sat up on the edge of the cot thoughtfully. He wore only his breeches; his other things lay on a nearby bench. "I don't seem to be injured, only weak," he said. "The troll must have died almost as soon as I lost consciousness."

"Troll!" said Signe, turning to her father without trying to hide her scorn of such superstition.

"Do you believe it was a troll, Nils?" asked Raadgiver.

"Not in the sense of the fairy tales," he answered. "But it's useful to have a name to call it. It's not an animal from this part of the world; if it was, we'd know about it, and not by grandfathers' tales but by its deeds and attributes.

"Brave men who saw it and what it had done weren't terrified by the sight. They believed they could kill it. But when it howled, they were filled with terror, and their minds were like eyes that had looked at the sun. And it wasn't the howl that did it, really, at least not by itself. If I made the same sound, no one would panic."

Nils looked calmly up from his seat on the cot. "And I could see through its eyes, and knew it was coming before it was seen or heard."

"Why didn't you panic?" Raadgiver asked. "You were the only one who didn't, you know. Did you feel no fear?"

"I felt the fear all right," Nils replied. "But it wasn't my own. I think that somehow it was from the others as well as from the troll. It was like a wave washing over me without wetting me."

There was a rap on the heavy door of the chamber, and Raadgiver spoke. A servant entered and left a platter with a steaming roast, mushrooms, a loaf, and a large mug.

"Well," Raadgiver said, "we'll leave you with this, for we have eaten and will return when you've finished." He held the door for Signe, at the same time turning again to Nils. "Do you speak Anglic, Nils?" he asked.

"Some," Nils answered. "I've been learning it for several weeks."

Raadgiver almost grinned for a moment, and nudged his daughter as the door closed behind them. "I believe your 'filthy, ignorant barbarian' heard and understood that little remark just before he opened his eyes," he thought to her. "And what do you think of him now, my dear? He is hardly more than a boy, a very large boy, but he has a mind like a razor."

Signe's answer was a flash of irritation.

Nils chewed the end of the loaf, which held all that was left of the gravy, then tipped the last of the ale from the mug and wiped his mouth on the back of a thick hand. Standing, he pulled the bell cord and walked to the narrow window. The thick stone walls restricted the viewing angle, but the room was high and he could see over the castle wall. The patchwork of fields and woods, so different from the endless forests, bogs and lakes of Svealann, lay peaceful and warm in the sunshine of an August afternoon.

He did not turn when a servant entered and took out the platter. A moment later, Raadgiver and Signe returned.

Without preliminaries, Nils asked, "What is it you want me to do?"

"Why do you think we want you to do anything?" Raadgiver countered.

Nils, leaning casually against the wall, said nothing, simply folding his muscular arms across his chest.

Raadgiver laughed suddenly and addressed his daughter out loud. "My dear, this would be the man we need, even if he wasn't a psi. If I praise him, he won't be embarrassed because he'll know it's merely the truth. And if you insult him, he won't be irritated because it won't matter to him, being untrue.

"And besides, I can't read his thoughts except when he speaks."

Raadgiver lowered himself into a cushioned chair and looked up at Nils more seriously now. "Do you know the word 'psi'?"

"No."

"Psi is the ability to read minds, to converse silently or to look into the future. Very few can do these things. Small children with the potential to learn aren't rare, but in most cases the potential is lost if it isn't developed by the fourth or fifth year. Among the occasional adults who retain it, it is almost always erratic and usually weak, unless trained."

"I've had that sort of experience only twice," Nils said. "In my dream two nights ago, when my mind was in the peasant hut, and last night, when the troll was swimming from the island."

"Only twice strongly," Raadgiver corrected, "but perhaps many other times less obviously. I read the minds of those who were at your audience with the greve. You had handed Jens Holgersen his sword after beating him, and then you sheathed your own. Wasn't that reckless? He could easily have killed you then, and many men would have. Yet bravado and foolishness are as foreign to your nature as weakness is."

"I knew he wouldn't," said Nils.

"Good. But how could you be so sure? You hardly knew him," Raadgiver pointed out. "When we say that an untrained psi shows erratic ability, we refer to conscious psi experience. Most such people, or probably all, receive many other psi impressions unconsciously-that is, psi messages enter their minds, but they don't recognize them for what they are. But the information is in their minds anyway. That is-" He paused. "It's very hard to explain to someone who has no concept of the subconscious mind."

"I understand you," Nils said.

Raadgiver leaned back in his chair, his intensity suddenly gone. "Of course," he said. "You would."

"And now, back to my question," Nils reminded him.

"Ah yes. What we want you to do. We're working up to that." Raadgiver shifted in his seat, looking tired now and no longer meeting Nils's eyes. He spoke quietly. "What is the most important thing to a man next to life itself?"

"For many, what he really believes is true."

Raadgiver stared up for a moment, then looked down at his nails. "Only if he isn't suffering. If he's suffering enough, the most important thing is for the suffering to stop. It can be more important than survival. And if he lives in constant fear-fear of terrible pain, of the real and imminent threat of physical and mental torture-then the most important thing becomes freedom from that threat."

Nils had never heard of such a situation.

"Now suppose there was a land where all men were thralls. No, less than thralls, because thralls at least have some rights and protection in law. Suppose all men were slaves except for one master and his soldiers. And suppose that master had the worst kind of madness, finding his greatest pleasure in the misery and degradation, the torture, of his slaves. An emperor who conquered only to enjoy the cries, the whimpers, the begging for mercy of those he ruled. A man who had lived very long and has a great army." Raadgiver leaned toward Nils. "What would you do if you lived in a land like that?"

"I have never thought of such a thing," Nils answered. "It would depend on the possibilities."

"But suppose that lord offered to make you his lieutenant?" Raadgiver asked.

"The lieutenant would still be his thrall. Where is that land?"

"Right now it is far to the southeast," Raadgiver answered. "But someday, perhaps soon, it may include all of Europe, even Denmark.

"And what we want you to do is kill that man."