Tenzin Geshe sat in a lotus posture, his open eyes unseeing. What he saw, he saw psychically, in his trance realm.
Meanwhile, around him the Circle of Power knew nothing, directly, of what he sensed or what he did. He’d briefed them beforehand, but in their power trance they wouldn’t remember that. With a little effort, they could review the session later, but just now their sole function was to blindly channel power through their leader, and stabilize his psyche against possible assault.
He was cautiously probing the demon they’d admitted into the fabric of the Tao the night before.
Tenzin’s trance was not a power trance, nor was it the trance of meditation. It was simply a means of gaining access, and began with a directive, an intention. Nor did it still the mind. It began with stillness, but once submerged in that stillness, he perceived, analyzed, and made decisions. Thinly, he even felt emotions.
The demon was still somewhat numbed. It had no real notion of what had happened to it nor where it was. Like a week-old infant, it experienced its new environment vaguely and with only a beginning of understanding. But there was that beginning.
Like a week-old infant. It had been “born” less than twenty-four hours earlier, in a trauma more severe than childbirth, and into a situation for which it had not evolved. Yet it felt to Tenzin that it might develop its potential rather rapidly.
He probed its nature, looking for weaknesses that he could exploit. He’d sensed almost at once that it was or had been human. A demon then, by his definition. He’d examined demons before, while exploring the lower astral realm. They’d been crafty but mostly weak, working their petty or occasionally ugly evils on humans of weakness.
This one had power. Power he and the Circle had given it by opening to it the fabric of the Tao.
Gradually he unraveled its nature by probing its memories of what had brought or sent it there. Actually they proved to be the memories of many individuals—memories consistent, memories primitive, memories brutal and degenerate. He was dealing with a compound demon!—a number of human psyches that had merged in a moment of jubilation and terror and death. Death to all at once, in a unifying moment of ritual evil. A death that seemed to them stupendous and enormously meaningful. And—
They didn’t realize they’d died! To them it seemed a transformation without death!
That explained much of what he felt in contact with them: they thought they’d been taken up and transformed by their god. A concept of god which was not the Tao, but some phenomenon of nature, deified in their minds. At the moment they’d been terrified, but now it seemed like victory to them. Like success. Because they could sense the power they’d been given, even if they didn’t know how to use it yet.
He continued to probe. Their unity was the result of one psyche, who as a man had been powerfully charismatic, dominating the rest absolutely. Then, trapped in the fabric of the Tao, it had been he who’d begun to function mentally. He who’d decided they’d been transformed by their god. And he who sensed their potential power. The rest, merged with him, had simply accepted.
And it would be he who learned, bit by bit, how to use that power; that much the geshe was sure of.
It seemed to Tenzin that what had been born was like a new organism. And its leader had become its sole functional mind.
He withdrew from his trance and from contact; the demon had sensed him dimly, sensed his probing. It was necessary now to plan, to find a means of removing it from the fabric of the Tao and send it as individual souls to the astral realm where they belonged. Until they could confront the physical realm again, and the karma they’d created, and be reborn to begin paying it off.
He also needed to inform the emperor. Something like this could not be hidden from Songtsan Gampo; he was too good a telepath. Better to tell him than have him discover it himself. But he would be angry.
Tenzin ate a supper of barley and vegetables, then went to report. He found Songtsan Gampo in an expansive mood. A member of the Korean royal family had agreed to take the throne there as the emperor’s tributary. Even now his three sons were on their way to Miyun as the emperor’s wards—his proteges and hostages. While just that day, a courier had ridden in with the news that district headmen had begun to arrive in Seoul to pledge the new king fealty.
Also, a few days earlier, ravens had found the “star man” and the barbarian youth, though not the barbarian wizard. Now a courier had arrived from the troop he’d sent to capture them. They’d captured the star man basically uninjured, and were bringing him to Miyun. The barbarian youth had escaped, but he was of little importance.
It seemed to Tenzin that the emperor was as pleased by this as by the major news from Korea. “Wonderful, Your Magnificence,” he said. “The star man should prove a wellspring of information.”
“Indeed. The emperor raised a knowing eyebrow. “Meanwhile you are worried, and come to tell me of some calamity you’ve created. It can’t be as bad as you think, dear geshe.”
The comment brought the situation to the surface of the geshe’s mind. Songtsan raised both eyebrows, then laughed. “Tenzin, Tenzin! You are a remarkable wizard, but—” He shook his head. “Evict your demon from the fabric of the Tao? Nonsense, Tenzin! You’ve done wonderfully; far better than you realize. What you must now learn to do is rule it, not evict it!”
Songtsan Gampo habitually thought behind a screen when other telepaths were with him, though he denied them the privilege. An emperor had his prerogatives. Thus Tenzin Geshe didn’t know what his emperor failed to say: That Songtsan Gampo intended to bond the demon to himself, once Tenzin and the Circle had established control of it. He would bond the demon to himself, and tell it he was its god.