Robot Adept Page 20

  “And I love thee,” she said, with similar lack of ripple. That was not necessarily cause for suspicion; the splash showed only at truly seminal declarations, and like other magic tended to fade with repetition.

  Now he sought to embrace her more intimately, but still she demurred. “Hast forgotten thine own mode of play?” she inquired teasingly.

  Was she still stalling, or trying for perfect realism? He wasn’t sure, but realized she was right either way. Tania still had not arrived, and regardless. Translucent was probably watching on his water-screen.

  Translucent? Tania could be watching it too! Why should she come here physically, when she could learn what she needed at a distance?

  He stroked her breasts. Oh, she was well formed! He had seldom really looked at her recently, and now appreciated in a rush how nicely she had shaped her girlform. He kissed them, then moved up to kiss her ear. “I think we be on stage now,” he whispered.

  “Ah, Mach, how I have longed to hear thee say that!” she replied aloud with a straight face. Then she became an animal indeed, hugging him, kissing him, stroking him, rubbing her torso against his, wrapping her legs around him, mimicking the height of passion, human style.

  This was the same body he had embraced when Agape occupied it. Now it became confused in his mind, and he feared he would cry out Agape’s name and betray himself.

  “Mach! Mach!” she cried, but it sounded like “Bane, Bane!”

  “Fleta!” he responded, keeping it straight. Then, overwhelmed by the passion of the moment, he took her, not quite caring in that instant who it might be.

  And the guilt surged up as his passion ebbed. He had felt too much.

  But it seemed that his demonstration had been effective. Time passed, and Tania did not show up. She must have been satisfied that he was Mach, after she saw his demonstration.

  Fleta still lay in his embrace, and he could not tell her to go. He had to be consistent to his role. But what was that consistency costing him? What was it costing her?

  Tormented by his uncertainty of feeling, he lay for a time, then drifted into sleep.

  Later they woke. Fleta did not look happy, but in a moment she assumed a cheerful expression. “Mach, thou didst promise me a foal,” she said.

  He was silent, not certain what she was leading up to.

  “Now thou art back,” she insisted. “Now be it time to do it.”

  “Fleta, this is no simple matter,” he demurred. Was she serious?

  “I know thy magic be not yet great,” she continued. “But the Red Adept doth have the Book o’ Magic, and methinks a spell might be there. My time o’ heat be coming in due course, and if thou couldst breed me then—”

  A pretext to visit Trool the Troll! Now he had the gist. “If I promised, I promised,” he said. “We shall ask the Red Adept for a spell.”

  “Aye, I thank thee!” she exclaimed, and kissed him with such conviction that he realized this was no ploy. She really did want Mach’s baby, and thought she could get it.

  On the following morning they set out, Fleta in her natural form, Bane riding. Translucent did not interfere; the Adept was satisfied that Mach was in his camp regardless where he might travel. That much was true, and when Mach returned, he would continue to represent the Adverse Adepts. Bane really had no quarrel with that—and none with Translucent, who was behaving decently. Had Tania caught Bane in his masquerade, it would have been fair play: he had tried a deception, and paid the price.

  In Proton, Citizen Blue knew of the masquerade, but would not try to hold Mach captive; that was understood. This was a ramification of the truce: to let things be until they could be better resolved. Bane hoped that Mach was not having too much trouble maintaining the pretense with Agape.

  And what if he was? It was no bad thing, making love to Agape! Bane could not hold that against his other self any more than Mach could hold Bane’s act with Fleta against him. It was understood that this was necessary.

  Still, it bothered him. Not the act itself, but his attitude about it. He had tried to make himself believe that it was Agape he embraced, but he had known it was not. He had made love to Fleta, and it had been wonderful. That was the problem. Exactly why had it been so good?

  She had been his companion in childhood, and in young adulthood. He had always liked her, and she had liked him. But he had never loved her. She was, after all, an animal.

  Now Mach had fallen in love with her, and she with Mach. That caused Bane to see her differently. In what way was Fleta inferior to a human woman? He needed no thought to answer that: the answer was no way. Just as Agape was not inferior to a human woman. Perhaps he loved Agape as an unconscious analog to Fleta: the nonhuman creature who seemed human.

  Now he was back with the original, his emotional barriers down. Had he merely done with her what he had always wanted to do? Had he used this masquerade as a pretext to do it?

  What had he accomplished in his spying mission? Only the discovery of Tania’s threat—which would have been no threat at all, had Mach been with Fleta. In short, he had accomplished nothing—except sex with his alternate’s beloved.

  So Bane’s thoughts ran, as he rode the unicorn from the Translucent Demesnes. He had no doubt of Fleta’s constancy; she had done only what she agreed to do, her heart not in it. But his own was suspect. He might as well have raped her.

  No, even that was not the whole of it. The sex had been a concomitant of the mission, supposedly of little importance in itself. Certainly Fleta had no use for it, when not in heat, except as a way to please her lover or to maintain a masquerade. It should have been little more for him: a pleasure of the moment, done for other than emotion. Instead he had been eager for it, and had found it not only physically satisfying, but emotionally fulfilling. As though he had truly meant the words of love he had spoken to her.

  Was he falling in love with Fleta?

  Bane closed his eyes, trying to drive away the specter of that forbidden emotion, but could not. He knew he should never have undertaken this foolish spying mission; he should have stayed well away from his other self’s chosen. Now it was too late.

  Fleta turned her head, glancing back at him with one eye. She was aware of the reactions of his body, and knew that something was bothering him.

  And what could he tell her? Nothing! She was innocent; he could only bring her grief by expressing his illicit passion. So he simply petted her shoulder. “You are a truly good creature, mare,” he said. “I would not cause you harm for all the frame.” That much was true.

  They camped for the night near a stream. Instead of grazing, this time, Fleta became the hummingbird and filled up on the nectar of flowers, while he made a fire and roasted wild potatoes he dug out. Then she assumed girlform and came to join him for sleeping.

  “But I thought thou wouldst graze,” he protested weakly.

  “Nay, I prefer to be with thee, Mach,” she said, removing her cloak and spreading it as a blanket for them.

  Another night with her body warm against his? He owed it to her and to his other self to avoid that! But what could he say? The Adepts were surely still checking on them.

  Unable to find sufficient reason to demur, and uncertain whether he even wanted to, he acceded. He lay down with her, and she embraced him, nuzzling his ear.

  “There be spoor,” she whispered. “There be scent. We be followed.”

  This was completely unexpected. She had had reason of her own to get close to him! Her attention, at least, was where it should be.

  “Canst make love to an unconscious man?” he whispered back.

  “Aye.” She chuckled.

  He smiled. Any Adept watching them would have no concern; they would be obviously engaged in romance. Meanwhile, he would find out what was going on.

  He murmured a spell of separation, and his spirit traveled up out of his body. He looked down: yes, it certainly looked like active sex from here! At least he need have no guilt for this; it was none of his doing.
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  He oriented, making a swift circuit of the region, and in a moment he spied it: a party of goblins camped not far away. But why hadn’t he been aware of them? He had not been paying proper attention.

  He moved close up—and discovered why. There was Adept magic protecting the party—a spell of concealment. Fleta, being a unicorn, was resistive to magic practiced on her, so had been able to pick up hints, while Bane had not. However, his spirit was not subject to the same limits as his body. He could perceive the shimmer of the magic force; indeed, he passed through it with extreme caution, for his presence could disturb it, alerting the Adept who had set it.

  This party could only be here to spy on Mach and Fleta. The Adepts were not merely watching, they were keeping a force close by. Why?

  He infiltrated the main tent. There was a goblin chief. He was settling down for the night. Goblins were more at home in the dark than the day, but since these were evidently following Bane and Fleta, they had to match their schedule to that of the day-dwellers; otherwise they would get no rest at all.

  That meant there would be no real activity while he spied. He could not learn why these goblins were following him. Surely they had better reason than just keeping track of his whereabouts, that the Adepts could do more efficiently from a distance!

  He considered a moment, then decided to go for double or nothing. The Adepts were taking an extraordinary step, having a physical presence near him, protected by their magic, so it had to be worth his trouble to find out why. Maybe they just wanted to protect Mach and Fleta from possible harm—but maybe they had some treachery on their minds.

  He returned to Fleta. She was still working over his inert body. Well, almost inert; it seemed that certain reactions could occur even in the absence of consciousness, and she was evoking one of those.

  “Fleta!” he said.

  She did not hear: he had no voice in this state. But if he returned to his body to talk to her, he would lose the rest of his spell, which would be a waste of onetime magic.

  He drew close and overlapped her head. “Fleta!” he said.

  She jumped, looking wildly around.

  “It’s me, Bane,” he said. “In spirit. I need thy help.”

  She stilled. “Bane,” she whispered. “I hear thee.”

  “A party of goblins is tracking us. I need to know why. Canst get up and cause them to react while I listen? Mayhap they will utter what I would hear.”

  “Aye,” she whispered. “This body be not much fun, anyway.”

  “Good thing, tease! Thou dost not want me in love with thee too.”

  She looked thoughtful, and he feared he had said too much. Then she drew herself up, picking up her cloak. “Do thou wait here, beloved,” she said aloud. “Must needs I go do what none can do for me.” She became the unicorn.

  “That way,” Bane said, overlapping her head again. “I think they mean us not harm, but push not thy luck. If thou canst make them stir, to avoid discovery—”

  She made a nicker of acquiescence and set out for the goblin camp.

  Bane hurried back to the camp ahead of her. In spirit form he could fly, for his spirit weighed nothing; whether he could travel more swiftly yet, but imagining himself there, he wasn’t sure, and wasn’t inclined to experiment at the moment. This was magic his father had devised: he did not grasp all its aspects.

  He entered the chief goblin’s tent and hovered. Suddenly he wondered: could he overlap the goblin’s head, as he had Fleta’s, and read its thoughts? Probably not; he had not read Fleta’s. All he might do was give away his presence.

  A goblin sentry burst into the tent. “Kinkear!” the sentry exclaimed. “The ‘corn be coming toward us!” Kinkear roused himself with a start. “Why?”

  “She has a load to drop.”

  “And she’s going to drop it here?” Kinkear cried. “What a mess, an she blunder across us by sheer chance! Our whole plan could be discovered! The spell be not effective an a ‘corn step straight into it!”

  “Aye. What must we do?”

  “Alert the others. Break camp instantly. Stay clear o’ her!”

  The sentry disappeared. Kinkear hastily rolled up his bed and hauled down his tent. “Just my luck,” he muttered to himself. “She drops dung, and my mission be in deep manure! Tan’ll tan my hide, an I bungle his trap!”

  So the Tan Adept was behind this! Already this device was paying off. But why should Tan be after Mach? His daughter had already verified Mach’s authenticity to her satisfaction; it was Bane she was after.

  Now he heard Fleta. She was coming through the grass, evidently looking for just the right place to do her job. She sniffed the air. This camp was downwind from Bane’s body, by no coincidence, and the unicorn’s coming in this direction was no coincidence either; who wanted to spend the night in the breeze from her own manure?

  “Get it o’er with, mare!” Kinkear muttered. “Return to thy stud, let him screw thee to the turf—and when he change back to his opposite, then shall we screw him to the turf.”

  So it was Bane they were after! They wanted to be on hand after the exchange, and catch him. That was exactly the treachery he was looking for.

  The goblins had dispersed through the field, leaving no sign of their camp. But in so doing some of them had strayed beyond the limit of the concealment spell. Fleta, with her sharp senses in the unicorn form, had to have spotted these, but she gave no sign.

  She wandered over to a spot where one goblin cowered under a tangle of grass. For an instant it seemed she would stumble over him. Then she turned around, set herself—and let go her dung directly on top of him. He couldn’t even curse, lest he give away his presence.

  Satisfied, perhaps in more than one sense, she walked back toward her camp.

  The goblins busied themselves reforming their camp. They all had a good chuckle over the fate of the unlucky one. Their crisis was over.

  Bane heard no more key remarks. But he had already heard enough. This effort of spying had been worth it!

  He returned to his body. Fleta had changed back to girlform, and was lying with his body under her cloak.

  “They be setting a trap for Bane, when he returns,” he whispered. “Tan be behind it.”

  “Then mayhap will they conjure Tania to eye thee, in the moment thou dost return unguarded,” Fleta whispered back. “That must they do just then, for thou wouldst be else caught not. With Mach loving me, and thou loving Tania, then have they both.”

  “Then have they both,” he agreed. “But how can I foil their plot?”

  “An thou dost, will not they then know how thou didst know?”

  Excellent point! “But an I foil it not, I be trapped, for I fear Tania’s power. She could not hold me long, but she might coerce me into what would compromise me.”

  “Such as making love to one thou dost love not?” Fleta asked.

  “Such can happen, on occasion,” he said wryly.

  “An I be not in a position to know better, I could have thought thy words to me, a day agone, were true,” she said.

  Did she suspect? “Just so the Adverse Adepts think so.”

  “Aye.” Did she sound disappointed?

  “But whate’er I said about thy body, that were true,” he said. “It be sheer delight.”

  “Aye.” This time she sounded satisfied.

  They did not resume their effort of love-making; the purpose of that had been accomplished. Bane relaxed, relieved on two accounts, concerned on the third. One: he had finally justified his spying effort by uncovering an enemy trap. Two: Fleta did not suspect his true feeling. Three: how could he withstand Tania, if his love for Agape was not secure?

  Fleta made good time, and on the third day they reached the Red Demesnes. The goblin party continued to track them, falling behind by day, catching up in early evening, evidently assisted by magic, for no goblin could keep pace with any unicorn otherwise. Apparently the goblins had to keep close enough to be able to pounce the moment Mach exchanged wit
h Bane.

  They had, it seemed, tried to capture Agape before; failing that, they were taking no chances with Bane.

  A bat flew out to meet them as they approached the castle. In a moment lovely Suchevane stood before them. Fleta changed to girlform, giving Bane barely time to dismount. The two young woman forms embraced.

  “Be thou Fleta?” the vampire asked.

  “Dost know me not?” Fleta asked, laughing.

  “Last I met Agape, in thy body. I owe her.”

  “I know naught of this.”

  Suchevane cast down her gaze, coloring slightly. “I be resident at the Red Demesnes, now. To assist the Adept.”

  Fleta surveyed her, comprehending. “Thou dost have a thing for…?”

  “Aye. It were Agape put me on it, speaking the common sense I saw not for myself. And now—”

  Fleta hugged her again. “O, Suchy, how glad I be for thee!”

  “And not for him?” Bane inquired. He knew the Red Adept to have been the strongest and most lonely of creatures, surely eager to have a creature like Suchevane near, if she but showed the slightest inclination.

  They laughed. Then Suchevane escorted them into the castle.

  Bane had not been here for some time, but he recognized improvement. Suchevane had evidently wasted no time in setting the castle in order. Even the old troll looked better; his red robe was clean, and he stood with a certain pride he had not evinced before, despite his enormous magic. A woman could do that for a man; Bane was in a position to know. He had never anticipated such a combination, but it seemed that Agape had engineered it.

  “We come on business,” Bane said. “I be Bane, not Mach; we have maintained a masquerade to ascertain the threat posed against thy side by the Adverse Adepts. But Mach promised, and so did I, to seek a way that Fleta might breed with a man and bear a foal. Fleta has helped me in my mission; now I would help her in her desire, and for this I ask thy help.”

  “Thou shallst have it,” Trool said. “What be the threat against us?”

  “They mean to smite me with the evil eye, and enamor me of the Tan Adept’s daughter, that I may change sides and work with Mach for them. They know not that I be not Mach, at the moment.”