Is This Apocalypse Necessary? - Wizard of Yurt - 6 by C. Dale Brittain Read Free Book Online Page B

their caution is salutary."
    I didn't answer. For all I knew he was being amused again.
    He turned his enormous black eyes on me. Even after all these years, I still sometimes found Joachim's gaze disconcerting. "So, Daimbert, what are you planning to do to stop him?"
    First the Master, now the bishop. What had I ever done to make the two men I respected most think I might somehow be able to stop the best wizard ever to come out of the school? "I'm not going to do anything ," I snapped. "You priests can try to find a way to keep his influence out of the Church, but there's nothing I can do to keep him out of the direction of the wizards' school. I guess there's still a chance that the citizens of the City will have too much sense to elect him mayor, and maybe King Paul and some of the other western kings can prevail upon his royal family to have someone else act as regent there, but all the faculty at the school will be delighted to have him as their new Master."
    "I can see this will be very delicate," said Joachim thoughtfully. "I am sure you wizards don't think of God as speaking through the electors, as cathedral priests do when they elect a new bishop, but it may still be difficult, at least at first, to persuade others to join you in opposing a man whom they have just chosen to head organized wizardry."
    "Didn't you hear me?" I burst out. "I just said I wasn't going to oppose him. Even if I didn't know perfectly well that any magic I tried against him would blow up in my face, at least I'd recognize the horrible danger—to Theodora and to Antonia, and for that matter to everyone in Yurt, as well as to me. I'm going to stay quietly at home and hope he doesn't think about me at all."
    "Yes," said Joachim as though I had made a different comment altogether. "I understand that you might not want to trust even me with your plans, at least at this early stage. Secrecy may be vital, though I rather doubt Elerius has spies here in the cathedral. But I do want you to know that I shall always pray for you and will help you in any other way that I can. All you need do is ask."
    It was a good thing, I thought as I flew home to Yurt, that I hadn't told Theodora all of Elerius's plans. Normally I hated to keep things from her, but this was different. She— and for that matter Antonia—would probably have offered their help too in what could only be a suicidal effort. The thought of Antonia trying to oppose Elerius, armed only with a few transformations spells he had taught her himself, made my blood run cold.
    But it wouldn't hurt, I thought grumpily as the air cart banked over the castle, to take a look at the ancient wizard's spells. Then, once it was conclusive that what the Master seemed to think was my only hope was instead completely impossible, the issue would stop nagging at me.
    King Paul met me in the castle courtyard as I carefully set my air cart down outside my chamber doors. "How is your wife?" he asked with what seemed unusual enthusiasm. "It must be delightful to be married—being with the one you love best, acknowledging your love to all."
    "Theodora is fine, thank you," I said, wondering what could have caused this sudden interest. He had been a witness, standing next to me at a side altar in the cathedral when Joachim married Theodora and me, but he had never before burst into paeans in praise of matrimony.
    "You wizards probably don't know what it is to be afraid," he added in an apparently abrupt change of topic.
    "Actually I have an excellent idea," I said testily, but he gave no sign that he'd even heard.
    "I'm going to do it, Wizard," he continued with a rather forced grin.
    "But I may want you there in case I start to get cold feet."
    I didn't have the slightest idea what he was talking about and told him so, just barely keeping full-blown irritation out of my voice. He still didn't seem to notice.
    "It's wondering what Mother is going to say about my choice that's the worst," he said. It slowly dawned on