Hands touched, gripped, firmed. Helbah held his right, his mother his left.
The agony faded. His heart resumed beating normally. Strength came back in waves that were positively exhilarating.
"There," Helbah said, dropping his hand. "We are now whole again, thanks to some help from a friend."
That was an overstatement, for she still had a crossbow wound in her arm. But now she was able to attend to it.
Jon appeared suddenly, breaking through some brush. In her arms was Katbah. Over her left shoulder hung the sling that had saved all of them.
"Kelvin, we did it!"
"We did, Sister," he agreed. He was thankful that Jon hadn"t arrived a moment earlier, for then she would have seen what pitiful shape they were all in. How had she gotten here, anyhow?
"She inherited some of her mother"s latent talent," Helbah said. "Katbah recognized it. Smart Katbah."
"It was awful!" Jon said, looking happy. "I looked for another rock after I changed, but I never found one. I knew all the time she"d only stay down so long. If you hadn"t lightning"d her, Kel..."
Katbah, who had been contentedly snuggling in her arms, suddenly stiffened and jumped down. Every hair on the familiar"s body stood out. The hair on Helbah and Charlain flared as well.
"There"s a presence," Helbah whispered. "A presence whose energy I utilized."
Kelvin"s heart resumed pounding. Did this mean Zoanna had somehow survived the lightning? Had they been cruelly tricked?
"Calm yourselves," a feminine voice said. It seemed familiar, yet strange. It wasn"t Zoanna, or Helbah"s or Charlain"s or Jon"s. Yet he knew that voice! It- "Mervania?" Kelvin exclaimed.
"Perceptive!" Mertin"s voice said. Then there was a growling, as of a dragon.
"But I hear you!" Kelvin said. "Why aren"t you in my head?"
"Because I"m here outside your head, inferior life-form!" Mervania said. "I came to tell you that you needn"t bring those dragonberries. One of you planted some seeds, maybe accidentally. I"ve now got plenty of them."
The seeds they had carried with them and that Kian had lost? They had somehow come up in the chimaera"s frame?
"You catch on eventually, human foodstuff."
"Then I won"t need to return to your frame? Ever?"
"Don"t say it!" Mertin said.
"No," Mervania said. "You won"t have to return, Kelvin."
There was a growl of disappointment. "d.a.m.n it, Merv, if you"d kept your mouth shut he might have come, and we could have eaten him."
"I know, Mertin. But leave me my foibles. He"s a cute boy."
Kelvin sighed, thankful. "You came all the way here, astrally, just to tell me that?"
"No trouble, Kelvin. Actually I thought I might give you some help, but you seem to have done well enough on your own. Not without the use of my present, though."
"Yes." A horrid thought hit him. "Will you stick around? Do you mean to stay here?"
"Calm yourself again, Kelvin," Mervania said, amused. "No, you won"t see me again unless you come visiting, which I wouldn"t advise. I want to find my own kind. In an infinity of frames there has to be one where an intelligent life-form is dominant. Where one of our kind may have hatched and survived in a civilized manner, instead of degraded by savages. Here the only intelligent beings are houcats and dragons."
"I... see."
"Unless your wife would like to visit."
"What?"
"Don"t be concerned. We wouldn"t eat her. But we could give her more of the powder, so she could birth one of our kind in a suitable environment. It"s a rare talent, to be able to-"
"No!" Kelvin cried, echoed by Jon.
"Well, I did help her," Mervania said, sounding hurt. "Considering that I already had the dragonberries, I really didn"t have to."
"You already had-when you-the birthing-?" he asked, stunned.
"Her and her d.a.m.n-fool sentiment!" Mertin exclaimed angrily, accompanied by a similarly outraged growl.
Kelvin realized that Mervania had indeed been generous, by chimaera definition. She had no longer needed him for the berries, yet she had done him a singular favor. She had saved his wife"s life.
"Well, actually, I did it mostly for the offspring," Mervania said. "This is no frame for a Superior Life-form."
"All the same, Mervania, thanks," he said sincerely.
"Now see what you"ve done, Merv!" Mertin said accusingly. "You"ve made him grateful. The mush is so solid you could bite it!" And the dragon growled with similar disgust.
"But he has such a charmingly foolish image of me!" Mervania said defensively.
All too true! Kelvin swallowed, then uttered a difficult truth. "I-I think my daughter does look like you, Mervania, and I-I don"t mind."
"Why thank you, Kelvin," she replied, sounding genuinely touched.
"Goodbye, Mervania."
There was silence. After a moment he realized that the chimaera was gone.
The others were staring at him, but Kelvin didn"t mind that, either.
EPILOGUE.
It was not a big, fancy wedding. Certainly nothing to compare with what Kian"s had been. But when John took Charlain"s hand, pushed back her copper hair, gazed into her violet eyes, and said, "Charlain, we are again wed. For always, you and I," and she replied, "Yes, John, always, you and I," there was not a dry eye in the ballroom of what had been Kelvinia"s palace.
Later, after the formal reception and the shaking of hands of all well-wishers, the bride, groom, their family and closest friends sat together in the lounging room.
Jon still wiped at her eyes. It was apparent that she had been moved even more than she might have wished, and in more ways. Brave, tomboyish Jon, holding Lester"s hand and trying valiantly to stem the tide.
"How come Easter"s pregnant and I"m not?" she demanded in a whisper of Lester. "She"s younger than I am!"
Startled, Lester turned to her. It was evident that a certain att.i.tude had changed somewhere along the way. "We"ll discuss that later," he whispered back.
"We"ll do more than that!" she muttered. Then she looked around as if fearful that someone had overheard, or had noticed her tears. It seemed that no one had. At least, no one gave any sign.
Kelvin noticed, though. He was tempted to say something brotherly, but then thought better of it. He and his sister were getting on famously these days and he didn"t want to wreck it. So instead of telling her that she had a right to weep, or whatever, and that the wedding made it legitimate, he turned to Morton Crumb.
"It was a nice wedding, wasn"t it?"
"Yes, very nice." Beside Mor sat his Mrs., fat and comforting Mabel, whom Kelvin hardly knew.
Kelvin turned to his wife. She had recovered so nicely during the past weeks. No nightmares, though he hardly understood how that was possible. Maybe it was the efficiency of the chimaera"s powder. She sat there calmly nursing Charles, whose pink, chubby expression never betrayed what he might have been. Twin Merlain lay sleeping beside her. They were to be Knights, by mutual agreement, now that the marriage of their grandparents had been restored.
"You comfortable, dearest?"
"You ask me that so often! Yes, of course. But I"ll be more comfortable once we"re home."
Kelvin smiled. There was a type of comfort that he had not had recently that only she could supply.
"Well anyway," Rufurt spoke up from across the room, repositioning the crown on his head, "that"s another two words of your prophecy. "Uniting four" means Kance, Klingland, Hermandy, and Kelvinia. We"re one confederation now, each with one vote, with brothers Kildom and Kildee having the power to veto all the rest of us. In all of history there"s never been such an arrangement, but Helbah wanted it."
"It"s for the best," Kelvin said. "I trust Helbah. Kelvinia never had any difficulties with Klingland and Kance that Zoanna and your look-alike didn"t invent. And with those boys in charge you know Hermandy will behave itself."
"They already got rid of their dictator," St. Helens said. "I say hooray for them."
"I"m sure we all do," Kelvin said almost automatically.
"And Kelvin," his father-in-law said, leaning forward, "you know what"s next for you. The prophecy says "Until from Seven there be One / Only then will his Task be Done." Well, there are still three kingdoms left for you to conquer."
Kelvin considered carefully before he spoke. St. Helens was not an evil man, though he did sometimes talk like what his father called a war hawk. Those two young fellows in the twin caps had many, many years to grow, and he was certain Helbah wouldn"t let them declare war yet if ever. All in all, one pleasing solution as far as he was concerned.
"I"m glad it"s only old words some people believe in, and that I"m not even nominally in charge," he said.
No one looked disappointed with his answer, not even St. Helens. They were all too polite to speak the obvious: as a hero, he was an inferior life-form.
It was a great, fine time in Kelvinia and the confederation.
Copyright 1990 by Piers Anthony Jacob and Robert E. Margroff ISBN: 0-812-50915-3.