Christopher Stasheff: The Warlock Unlocked

“I agree. Could this conference between the Abbot and Their Majesties signal the beginning of such an offensive?”

Rod scowled. “It could, now that you mention it. The totalitarians have pretty much exhausted the ‘Peasants’ Revolt’ motif for the moment, and the anarchists have ridden the ‘Barons’ Rights’ movement into the ground. They’ve got to try a new theme, don’t they?”

“The Church-State conflict has a long tradition, Rod. Henry II of England had a protracted feud with St. Thomas a Becket, Archbishop of Canterbury, because the Church’s authority obstructed Henry’s attempts to centralize government. The feud ended with Thomas’s murder, and Henry’s public humiliation; he was forced to grant concessions to the Church. His son, King John, was more obstinate; John’s feud with the Pope resulted in England being laid under the Interdict, which meant that no baptisms, weddings, or funerals could be held—no Masses could be said, no confessions heard; none of the sacraments could be performed. To the medieval mind, this was disaster; most of the people of England felt they were being doomed to Hellfire eternally, because of their King’s sin. The resulting pressure was so great that John had to publicly repent, and do penance. The Protestant movement in Christianity succeeded partly because the German princes welcomed an excuse to oppose the Holy Roman Emperor. England became Protestant because Henry VIII wished a divorce that the Pope would not grant him. The Inquisition, the Huguenot Rebellion… the English Civil War occurred partly because the nation was Protestant, but ruled by a Catholic King… The list goes on. It is small wonder that, when the United States of America was established in the 18th Century, the founding fathers wrote a separation of Church and State into their Constitution.”

Rod nodded grimly. “It’s a potent force, no question about it—especially in a medieval society, where most of the people take their religion superstitiously. Just the kind of a conflict to topple a government, in fact—if the Church can drum up enough popular support, and an army.”

“With the futurians’ propaganda techniques and weaponry, neither should be too great a problem.”

“Not if it gets that far.” Rod grinned. “So it’s up to us to head it off before it gets to that pass, eh, old circuit rider? ”

“So many human battles could be averted by a little common sense,” Fess sighed.

“Yes, but the King and the Lord Abbot aren’t common—and when religion and politics are involved, no one’s got much sense.”

Travel light, don’t you, Father?” the spaceport guard commented.

Father Al nodded. “It is one of the advantages of being a priest. All I need is a spare cassock, a few changes of underwear, and my Mass kit.”

“And a surprising amount of literature.” The guard riffled through a book from the stack. “ Magic and the Magi … Little odd for a priest, isn’t it?”

“I’m a cultural anthropologist, too.”

“Well, to each his own.” The guard sealed the suitcase. “Certainly no weapons in there—unless you come across a devil or two.”

“Hardly.” Father Al smiled. “I’m not expecting anything worse than the Imp of the Perverse.”

“ ‘Imp of the Perverse?’ ” The guard frowned. “What’s that, Father?”

“An invention of Edgar Allan Poe’s,” Father Al explained. “To my way of thinking, it nicely explains Finagle’s Law.”

The guard eyed him warily. “If you don’t mind my saying so, Father, you’re not exactly what I expect in a priest—but you’re clear.” He pointed. “The shuttle gate’s over that way.”

“Thank you.” Father Al took up his suitcase and headed for the boarding area.

On the way, he passed a fax-stand. He hesitated; then, on an impulse, he dropped in his credit card and punched up “McAran, Angus, ca. 1954.” Then he leaned back and waited. It must have been a long search; almost five seconds passed before the machine began humming. Then the hard copy emerged slowly—about a meter of it. Father Al pulled it out and devoured it with his eyes.

“McAran, Angus, Ph.D., 1929 - 2020: Physicist, engineer, financier, anthropologist. Patents…”

“Excuse me, Father.”

“Eh?” Father Al looked up, startled, at the impatient-looking gentleman behind him. “Oh! My apologies. Didn’t realize I was in the way.”

“Perfectly all right, Father,” the man said, with a smile that contradicted the words. Father Al folded the hard copy in thirds, hastily, and moved off toward the boarding area.

He sat down in a floating chair and unfolded the copy. Amazing what the PIB had stored in its molecular circuits! Here was a thumbnail biography of a man who’d been dead more than a thousand years, as fresh as the day he’d died—which was presumably the last time it’d been updated. Let’s see, now—he’d patented five major inventions, then set up his own research and development company—but, oddly enough, he hadn’t patented anything after that. Had he let his employees take the patents in their own names? Improbably generous, that. Perhaps he just hadn’t bothered to keep track of what his company was doing; he seemed to have become very heavily involved in…

“Luna Shuttle now boarding.”

Drat! Just when it was getting interesting. Father Al scrambled up, folding the copy again, and hurried to tail onto a very long line. The shuttle left once every hour, but everyone who was leaving Europe for any of Sol’s planets or for any other star system had to go through Luna. Only half a percent of Terra’s population ever left the mother planet—but half a percent of ten billion makes for very long lines.

Finally, they were all crowded onto the boarding ramp, and the door slid shut. There was no feeling of movement, and any sound from the motors was drowned out by the quiet hum of conversation; but Father Al knew the ramp was rolling across a mile of plasticrete to the shuttle.

Finally, the forward door opened, and the passengers began to file aboard the shuttle. Father Al plopped down into his seat, stretched the webbing across his ample middle, and settled down to read his hard copy with a blissful sigh.

Apparently having tired of inventing revolutionary devices, McAran had turned his hand to treasure-hunting, finding fabled hoards that had been lost for centuries; the most spectacular was King John’s treasury, but there had also been major finds all the way back to the city of Ur, circa 2000 BC. This pursuit had naturally led him into archaeology, on the one hand, and finance, on the other. Apparently the combination had worked well for him; he had died a very wealthy man.

All very impressive, Father Al admitted, but not when it came to magic. How would the man have been able to identify a wizard, even during his own time? Father Al had searched history assiduously, but had never come up with anyone who could have been a real magic-worker—they were either tricksters, espers, or poor deluded souls, almost certainly. Of course, in the very early days, there were a few who might have been sorcerers, tools of the devil. Opposing them, there were definitely saints. And, though the saints were certain, Father Al doubted there had ever really been any “Black Magic” witches; it made very poor business sense for the Devil. But magic without a source in either God or the Devil? Impossible. It would require someone who was an esper, a medium, and had some unnamed power to break the “Laws of Nature” by, essentially, merely wishing for things to happen. That was the stuff of fairy tales; neither science nor religion even admitted its possibility, had even a chink in its wall of reason through which such powers might seep.