Free Awakening by William Horwood Page B

said, backing off still further, her hands unclenching, a strange softness coming to her eyes and a flush to her cheeks, ‘are you being masterful with me?’
    Stort, who had never been masterful with another in his life, supposed he was but felt it best to say nothing. She filled the silence herself.
    ‘Mister Cluckett was very masterful,’ she said with unexpected compliance, ‘and I do so miss that now he is gone!’
    ‘Cluckett, stop talking,’ said Stort, who felt suddenly tired, ‘and please make a brew that we may discuss how best we are to continue together in this humble now that I am getting better.’
    ‘I will, sir, at once! I like an employer who knows his own mind.’
    ‘And I, Cluckett . . .’
    He still felt queasy so she took his arm and helped him to a seat at the kitchen table. She made the brew and poured them both a cup.
    ‘You were saying, sir?’
    He looked around at the clean and tidy kitchen, the neat shelves, the breakfast things all ready.
    ‘I am grateful for the care you have shown me and . . . and I like such a home as you have made for me in so short a time!’
    ‘Oh sir!’ she said, turning from him with emotion and dabbing at her eyes with the crisp, new-ironed kerchief she pulled from her sleeve.
    From that moment on Stort became master of his house once more and both he and Cluckett respectful of their different domains.
    He permitted her to tidy his books, and his parlour too, though he insisted that the dresser, filled as it was with a clutter of plates, cups, a teapot with a broken spout and other mementoes of his past, was left just as he liked it.
    ‘As for my laboratory, if you place a waste bin by the door I shall endeavour to remember to put rubbish into it!’
    ‘Thank you, sir, that is kind of you. And, sir . . .’
    ‘Cluckett?’
    ‘Wet towels. May I ask that you hang them up rather than leave them in a heap upon the floor?’
    ‘You may and I shall do as you suggest.’
    From that day Stort slept well again and his recovery was almost complete.
    ‘Cluckett,’ he said some days later, ‘if Brief and the others call I shall wish to see them.’
    She smiled happily.
    ‘It is already arranged, sir. They are coming to tea tomorrow and it is not a social call.’
    ‘It is not?’
    She shook her head.
    ‘Master Brief wishes to convene a summit conference in your parlour and I told him that I judged you well enough now for that. Does that have your approval, sir?’
    ‘It does,’ said Bedwyn Stort happily.

11
     
    N IKLAS B LUT
     
    I t was several days before Emperor Slaeke Sinistral was ready once more to try to signal to the outer world that he was awake and needed rescuing. He had only to raise a finger and press a button to summon instant aid, but his reserves of energy were so low that each attempt robbed him of almost all he had left. He was also taking his time. He knew that the return to the real world was going to be painful, a rebirth, in body, mind and spirit.
    Meanwhile the helpers who had tended him for eighteen years past, who were inhabitants of the vast complex of tunnels of which his Chamber was a small part, continued to do so. They came when he was asleep or nearly so and he knew neither their names nor faces. They did their best to slow down his foul decay, but since he had begun to wake and his mind and body grown more active the rate of his decline had speeded up and they could not keep up with it. It was not these creatures of the dark he needed now but the hydden of the day and light, and the stimulus and nourishment they could provide.
    Yet though Sinistral knew well that when he woke from a period of deep sleep it was essential he returned to normal health and life as fast as possible, the Chamber held a continuing allure. This had to do with the beauty of its extraordinary acoustic as, from every crevice and crack, fault and fissure in the vast roof so high above, water dripped.
    Drip . . . drip . . . drip . . .
    The ever-changing