Alan Foster - Krull

Figures stood there, one that she recognized instantly. Colwyn was leaning back against the shaggy bark. She had no doubt that it was the real Colwyn, her Colwyn, and not some false image conjured up by the Beast to deceive her.

But who was the lithe young woman who clung so tightly to him, and whose embrace he did not reject?

She whirled to confront the Beast. "It's a lie! You say you can assume any form. I have heard of how you manipulate faces and bodies as easily as a sculptor plays with clay. Why should I believe that that"—she gestured at the image before them—"is any more real than the form you cling to now? You are as full of lies as a solicitor. You think to fool me with clever prevarication, but I am not so easily swayed."

"Indeed you are not, for you refuse the evidence of your own eyes. These walls do not lie. I have no reason to deceive you now, not when the truth works for me. Your Colwyn will betray you."

"He will not!"

"Then he will die," said the Beast calmly. "Either way, you will be rid of this silly, immature human infatuation. It will simplify your future."

Lyssa turned back to the image, unable to tear her eyes from it. Go away, she shouted silently! Vanish, disappear! I don't want to look upon you. But the image did not vanish, and she continued to stare at it.

The woman in Colwyn's arms was crying. Lyssa noted out of the corner of an eye that the Beast seemed to be observing the scene with equal interest. Even as she stared, the pale blue of the woman's eyes turned to black. Lyssa would have screamed save that she knew her warning cry would go unheard. Black eyes—as black as those of the Slayers, nearly as black as those of the Beast. The woman was something other than she appeared, and Lyssa had no way of alerting Colwyn.

Vella clasped the man tightly against her. She could sense that he was wavering, but still he resisted. "I have not held a man in my arms since my lover was swallowed up by the sea. It is good. You are a strong man, Colwyn. Lend me some of that strength."

"I know how painful it is to be far from the one you love," he murmured uncomfortably. "We share a common pain."

"Then, comfort me for one night, and let me comfort you. Share your strength with me, Colwyn. Have pity on me."

"Would that I might, but I can't betray my bride."

"One night is no betrayal. None need know what transpires in this place. I have listened to your men talk, and they say you are not truly married yet."

"It is true the ceremony was not finished."

"Then how can you speak of a betrayal?"

Colwyn's hand moved to touch first his chest, then his forehead. "Betrayal is more than a word. It is a thing that lies here and here. Not in the loins. I could comfort you as you desire, but you are wrong when you say none would know of it. / would know. That would be betrayal enough. I feel sorrow and sympathy for you, but I do not put aside a great trust so easily. Nor love. I can't take comfort with you when my true love has none."

"You will not, then?"

"Vella, in another time, another place, another existence, I would gladly lie with you. But that would be a different Colwyn, and you would be a different Vella. I cannot."

"Truly, I would be a different Vella," she whispered. Her right hand was behind him. It blurred, distorting. The fingers extended and the soft flesh turned to a horn-tough, scaly substance.

Lyssa could not stifle the useless scream in her throat, but Colwyn could not hear her as the claw rose toward his neck.

It stopped there, hesitating. "My master told me," Vella muttered with difficulty, as though talking to herself unwillingly, "make him betray her. If he will not, kill him."

Colwyn frowned down at her, his eyes telling him one thing, his ears another. But he'd already learned that where possible manifestations of the Beast were concerned, it was best to trust nothing, least of all one's own senses. He jumped away from her, his hand reaching toward the dagger at his belt, ready to cry out and alert his companions.

Yet still, sweet little Vella stood before him. Not even the inhuman claw she showed him changed that image, though his mind knew better.

"Yes," she said tightly, "he is my master. These talons were a heartbeat from your throat. I could have killed you in an instant."

"Could have." He did not draw the dagger, though his fingers hovered near the hilt. "You're still crying. Are those tears manifestations of the Beast as well as that claw?"

She wiped at her eyes and her voice was confused and angry. "They could be, but they are not. Nothing is as I was told it would be, nothing is as it seems. Uncertainty rules all. I long for the comfort of chaos." She smiled at him and her expression was distorted and torn. Her face seemed to blur as he looked at her.

"I am his creature that he fashioned too well. To tempt you he had to make me human, and in making me human his hold strayed. Now I am neither human nor his. I am a cruel joke, a pitiful jest." The smile broadened, giving her face a lopsided look. "I have had an hour of life, an hour of love, and this is better than all the days I have spent as his creature. That love is life for you but death for me. The last joke is on him, and that is best of all. I cannot comfort you, Colwyn, nor you me, but neither will he be comforted. Remember me."

In the Fortress Lyssa turned triumphantly to her jailer. "It is you who are betrayed, by a thing of your own making. Power is fleeting. Love is eternal. You cannot even control your own creature. Do not think to control me."

The Beast's only reaction was to wave a hand at the opening in the wall. The pulses of light from his body increased in frequency and intensity. The gap closed, shutting out the scene in the distant woods, but not before Lyssa had watched the unwoman Vella crumple and die. Poor thing, she thought. Neither human nor monster, but stuck somewhere pitifully in between. Better to die than live a pawn's life. She wondered if she'd have had the strength to make Vella's decision.

"Show me Colwyn again. Show me his reaction." There was no response from the Beast. Could it be that his powers to bring distant scenes near was limited? It must be, else Colwyn would have no chance to approach undetected. His lack of response encouraged her.

Then she was backing away as the false Colwyn shuddered and expanded. The red eyes bulged and rose. Once more the Beast confronted her in its true form.

"You are ignorant in the ways of power, Lyssa of Eirig. There is power such as shattered the wall behind you, power such as that which initiated and ended the brief existence of that slave—and then there is the power to withhold the use of power.

"Consider then this power. If you consent to join with me and be my human queen, I will halt all the attacks of the Slayers. It is in your power to stop the killing and burning. Each hour you delay, more people will die. Think hard on what I offer you. No more fields sent up in smoke, no more villages destroyed, no more children trampled underfoot. Delay and a little more of Krull perishes. Consent and guess how many more will live. An interesting game, is it not? , "Take all the time you wish. You cannot escape from here, nor can your lover save you, for he cannot even find this place. Relax and consider the number of deaths that can occur in an hour, in a day. You might even save his life, for at your consent I will call back all the Slayers.

"It is better, Lyssa, to exercise power than to abjure it. Better to be a god than a martyr. I leave you now to idle contemplation." The red eyes turned away from her. She could not see a far door open, could not hear one close behind her captor, but she sensed that she was alone once again, sealed in the room that could be marriage chamber or tomb, according to her own wishes.