Jafeth shifted uncomfortably. “Do you suppose they’re still looking for him?”
“Aye, they’re lookin’.”
“If they find us, I mean, with him and all-“
“They willna find us.” The bigger man headed back for the bales.
“They’ll kill us if they do, won’t they?”
“They willna find us.”
“But-“
“It’s the storm, Jafeth?” the older man cried sharply. “By the Words, think The birds want to go to ground. Even if they force ‘em, the wind and rain will make ‘em nearly useless. All they have right now is human legs and eyes. And thousands of places to search. They willna find us.”
A blinding flash attended by a wall-shaking crack punctuated his claim. Then the heavens opened in earnest and the roar of a violent downpour obliterated all other sound. Rain pounded the roof, gusted against the windows, and smacked the streets outside. The Terstans paused, apparently to appreciate its intensity, then returned to their game.
Eldrin lay still, sick with dread. He did not know what all the talk of birds meant-probably nothing; all Terstans were mad-but he did know the man was right about the number of potential hiding places in Southdock and the limitations of human legs. It could be hours, even days, before he was found.
The storm continued for some time, lightning and thunder rolling back and forth across the wide valley in which the royal city of Springerlan sprawled. Eldrin’s hands went to sleep first, then his arms. His neck ached like fury, but when he tried to sit up to ease it, he found himself unable, could only lie in his own blood and misery and pray. His Light will be my refuge. His name will be my joy.
Eventually the celestial fireworks ended and the rain eased. Jafeth disappeared into the growing darkness and soon returned with a lantern, a loaf of bread, and a jug. The lantern he hung from a rod jammed between the bales of wood. The food and drink he shared with his companion.
Far off across the bay, the cannon at Kildar Fortress boomed, signaling day’s end. By now Eldrin had added a powerful thirst to his list of discomforts and, ironically, the desperate need to relieve himself. He had been squirming and trying not to moan for some minutes when the older Terstan suddenly looked round at him, glaring. “What’s the matter with you?”
In a rasping voice, Eldrin explained his need.
The Terstan glowered at him for a long time, Jafeth watching warily. Then he grunted and picked up the jug. “‘Fraid you’ll have to wet yourself, highness,” he sneered. He considered a moment, then started to chuckle. The jug gurgled as he lifted it and took a long swig.
Watching him drink was torture. Eldrin swallowed on a raw throat and closed his eyes. A sudden crash followed by a rumble of footfalls and jingling metal jerked them open again, in time to see his two guards spring to their feet. A moment later three men burst from the dark aisle between wool bales and wall, rapiers drawn. Eldrin’s captors sprang to cut them off.
“Meridon?” the older one grated.
“What have you done with him??” the lead swordsman-apparently Mer- idon-demanded. “If you’ve killed him, so help me-“
“We’re no murderers,” the big Terstan protested. “If anythin’ we saved his life.”
`After putting it in danger to begin with?” Meridon, rapier still drawn, peered around the Terstan’s shoulder, and Eldrin got another shock. It was the red-haired man he’d seen at the wharf.
“So what do you intend to do with him now that you have him?” Meridon asked.
“Sell him, o’ course.”
A moment of silence followed. Meridon’s voice, when it came, sounded strangled. “By the Words, man? He’s the king’s brother?”
“He’s the Mataio’s pawn. And do na say you wouldn’t be happy if he disappeared.”
“It’d be a death sentence.”
Finally Eldrin grasped what they intended and the shock overwhelmed his poor bladder, a warm dampness permeating the front of his robe. He was not to be converted but rather sold to Thilosian slavers and borne across the sea to the lands of the south.
“He’s too skinny for the Games,” the Terstan said. `And he can read and write. He’ll sell as a scribe right off. That’s na so bad a life.”
Assuming they don’t guess who he really is,” Meridon said grimly.
“How would they guess?”
“One look at his face and it’s obvious.”
“To a Kiriathan maybe, but how many Thilosians know Kiriathan royalty?”
“Their queen is a Kalladorne,” Meridon pointed out. “They’d get top price from the Esurhites for him.” He paused. “Do you have any idea what they would do with a prince of Kalladorne blood? Especially one as weak as he?”
Eldrin shut his eyes again, choking on his terror. Sweet Elspeth, have mercy! Lord Eidon, please, not that!
The Terstan said nothing.
“You know I can’t let you do this,” Meridon said softly. “Make it easy for me, and I’ll tell the king you got away.”
Trembling, seized with a deep nausea, Eldrin listened and prayed and went limp with relief when the Terstan sighed and apparently gave in. He heard a receding shuffle, and when he looked again only Meridon and his two companions remained. The men sheathed their rapiers and Meridon stepped to Eldrin’s side, bending over him and slicing through the bonds on his wrists with his dagger. Then strong hands gripped his shoulders, lifting him up to a sitting position.
“Rest easy, my lord,” his rescuer said as Eldrin’s world kaleidoscoped around him. “It’ll pass.”
When at last Eldrin dared open his eyes, the first thing he saw was the bloody river that soaked the left side of his tunic. He touched his ear and stared at the blood on his fingertips.
“Scalp wounds bleed like fury,” Meridon said. “Seem worse than they are.”
Eldrin blinked up at him. He was definitely the man from the dock, though he appeared younger than Eldrin had first thought him. Freckles spattered his upturned nose, and wide brown eyes might have imparted a look of scampish innocence were they not so cold and hard.
He wore the short-cropped hair of a rank-and-file soldier, and in addition to the sheathed rapier, a shorter blade hilted with the golden likeness of a ram’s head was scabbarded at his right hip. The hand resting on its hilt was callused and webbed with the scars of constant sword work. His leather jerkin was likewise scored from longtime abuse and stained now with fresh blood.
“Captain Trap Meridon, at your service, my lord,” Meridon said coolly. “With the King’s Guard.”
King’s Guard? No wonder the Terstan had given in.
“You were at the dock.”
Meridon eased back on one booted heel, resting a hand on the opposite upraised knee. His expression was stony, his eyes like flint. “We figured they’d take you off early. So did the others, apparently.”
“The Terstans, you mean?”
Meridon nodded.
Eldrin fingered the cut again. “I don’t understand,” he said finally. “I’ve been disowned. I’m out of the succession. Even if I hadn’t renounced it all, I’m still ineligible.”
Meridon’s eyes hooded. “The Table of Lords voted six months ago to restore your inheritance.”
Eldrin stared at him, nausea clawing once more at his gut. Blood pounded a tympani in his ears. The iron bands were back on his chest.
“You didn’t know,” Meridon said.
Eldrin shook his head. “I only learned about my brothers this afternoon.” “You had no need to know.” He swallowed. “Well, it changes nothing. Once I have touched the Flames and taken my vows, I will return to Haverall’s Watch, and that will be the end of it.”
Meridon raised a mocking red brow. “I doubt very much you will return to Haverall’s Watch, my lord.” He exchanged a glance with his dark-bearded companions. “Forgive my bluntness, Your Highness, but the measure to reinstate you was sponsored by lords of Mataian persuasion. They pushed it through the Table with the High Father’s blessing
. Don’t tell me you aren’t destined for more than meditations in a distant Watch tower.”
He held up a hand, stopping Eldrin’s indignant protest.
“Think, my lord Abramm,” he said forcefully, no longer bothering to hide his impatience. “Do you not find it significant that your father and all the brothers between you and the Crown save one have died? And that, only since you joined the Mataio?”
Gooseflesh crawled up the backs of Eldrin’s arms. “What are you saying, Captain?”
“That your kinsmen were murdered, my lord. And Raynen will follow, once you take your final vows.”
Eldrin looked away from Meridon’s piercing gaze, glanced uneasily at the other men, then at the bales of dirty wool. The rat had returned, watching warily from within the shadow.
“You’ll be granted special dispensation to rule,” Meridon went on. “The Guardian-King who will deliver the realm from evil. There’s already talk of it, and at the rate Beltha’adi is expanding his empire down south, it won’t be long before the realm may well need a deliverer.”
Eldrin stared at the soldier in spite of himself, part of him incensed, derid ing the notion, another part held in horrified abeyance. It was possible. The High Father had the power to grant such dispensation. And everyone knew that the ancient, allegedly immortal Lord Beltha’adi and his soldiers of the Black Moon served the Adversary-steadily expanding his kingdom of darkness and tyranny with their might. But it went against all he believed in, all he had built his life upon these last eight years.
“I seek only to serve Eidon,” he said. “I don’t want to be king.”
Again that mocking brow came up. “Not even if the High Father told you it was Eidon’s will?”
Eldrin did not answer. That would never come to pass. He could accomplish far more in Eidon’s service as a full Guardian, nurturing and protecting his Flames in the Keep, than he could playing politics on the throne. “What are you going to do with me?”
“What do you want me to do with you, my lord?”
“Bring me to the Keep.”
“Very well.” Meridon stood and offered him a hand, his eyes still cold.
Eldrin almost refused his help, but rising turned out to be harder than he expected. Reluctantly he grasped the man’s hand, the palm hard and rough, the grip steel-strong. Meridon hauled him to his feet. The world swam briefly, then settled.
Eldrin loosed a breath and straightened the tunic around his bony frame, cringing with distaste and mortification as he recalled how the garment had come to be so wet.
“This way, my lord.”
“Captain, I am not your `lord.’ My name is Eldrin now.”
Meridon regarded him stonily, then turned away with a snort. He headed toward the dark aisle, only to stop and fling his dirk into the shadowed corner behind them. A screech pierced the building’s heavy silence as in the corner the rat squirmed out its life, impaled by the captain’s blade.
Meridon walked over to it, removed the dirk, wiped it on his britches, then continued wordlessly on his way.
Eldrin swallowed, trailing his guide more reluctantly than ever.
Meridon brought him to the Avenue of the Keep without incident, stepping out a mere twenty feet from the Keep’s tall wrought-iron gates. “Here you are, my lord. I recommend you not venture into Southdock after this. You might not be so fortunate next time.”
“If I ever go there again, it will be too soon,” Eldrin assured him. “Thank you for your help.”
The soldier bowed, his sword scabbard jingling. “Good night, Your Highness.”
“One thing more, Captain-“
Half turned, Meridon glanced back.
“If you honestly believe those things you told me,” Eldrin said, “why didn’t you let them sell me to the slavers? From your standpoint it would seem the practical thing to do.”
Meridon’s dark eyes narrowed. “Because you are the king’s brother. And because he still has hope you will change your mind.” He hesitated; then that mocking brow came up and he added, “If it is truly Eidon you seek, my lord, you are looking in the wrong place.” He bowed again and walked into the night.
Eldrin watched him go, at first in shock, then in rising anger. Looking in the wrong place? How dare he? Did he think being captain of the King’s Guard gave him leave to spout blasphemies?
Thunder growled as another gust of sprinkles spattered the already wet cobbles. Drawing a deep breath to calm himself, Eldrin turned back toward the Keep looming on the hill above him, the white square forms of its library and dormitory flanking the gleaming, gold-plated dome of the Holy Sanctum. The dome’s mullioned glass pinnacle glowed redly against the dark sky, revealing the everlasting light of the Sacred Flames within.
Looking in the wrong place indeed! And where else would I look, Captain Meridon? Shall I ask the Terstans?
He frowned as a sudden notion occurred to him-Meridon had spared the kidnappers, had been almost solicitous to them, when he should’ve killed them or at the least arrested them for having threatened a member of the royal family. Moreover the kidnappers had clearly known him better than would be expected of a pair of Southdock ruffians. And hadn’t the one said that Meridon would be as happy as they to see Eldrin gone? He thought of the man’s hard eyes, the cold distaste in his manner, the clear communication that he did not like Eldrin or anything that Eldrin represented. “If it is truly Eidon that you seek, my lord, you are looking in the wrong place.”
Was it possible that Meridon was… ? No. Raynen would never allow a man so openly allied with the Evil One to command his own guard.
A gust of wind whipped around him, lifting his hair over his shoulders and piercing the thin weave of his tunic. Shivering, he hurried up the sidewalk toward the Keep’s iron gates.
Inside he was welcomed with open arms, Rhiad and his men having returned after a fruitless search to gather a larger force. Belmir was there as well, and Eldrin learned he was not the only Initiate to have had a bad day. As feared, the Procession had been disrupted by rioting and somehow a fire had gotten started. The flames and smoke had sent half the Initiates scurrying for the Keep, while the other half retreated to the safety of the barge. The storm had put out the fire and doused the riot, but the ceremony was in a shambles.
Bathed and wearing a fresh tunic, Eldrin was with Belmir in one of the private chapels recounting what had happened-and confessing his many sins-when Rhiad burst in upon them, trailed by his two shadows and demanding to know if it was really Captain Meridon who had rescued him.
Annoyed in spite of himself, Eldrin breathed out a long breath and said that it was. “Or at least that’s who he claimed to be.”
A simple description convinced Rhiad the man was indeed Meridon, and the three Guardians exchanged grim glances.
“Saints, they’re getting subtle,” one of them murmured.
“You know this Meridon?” Belmir asked.
Rhiad grimaced. “Captain of the King’s Guard? Who doesn’t?” He looked at Eldrin. “Meridon’s as much a Terstan as the men he rescued you from-if it was a rescue.”
“You’re saying it was staged?” Belmir asked.
“Of course it was staged. Meridon probably wanted to get to him alone.” He turned to Eldrin again. “I’ll wager he filled your ear with all manner of crazy stories, too-about your family being murdered and the High Father wanting the Crown?”
Eldrin stared up at him in surprise.
Rhiad chuckled. “Yes, I see he did. That tale’s been around for years.” He shook his head. “The evidence doesn’t support the theory, though. There are no suspects, nothing to indicate anything but that the deaths were accidental. And your father and Aarol were most certainly not murdered by a man. Their mauling is well documented.”
“Then how can they claim-?”
He shrugged. “They’re all mad. And they lie as easily as they speak.”
“I don’t understand,” Eldrin said. “Why would my brother make a Terstan the captain of
his own guard?”
Rhiad lifted a dark brow. “Because your brother is a Terstan himself” He smiled at Eldrin’s unveiled shock. “Don’t tell anyone, though. He still believes it’s a secret.”
C H A P T E R
3
Eldrin jerked awake and back to the reality of the cold stone beneath his knees, the draft at his back, the flickering oil lamp on the stand before him. Heart drumming, he groped at his chest, shuddering with relief when his fingers slid over smooth skin. There was no shieldmark. It was only a nightmare.
He sagged back onto his heels, wincing at the painful tingling in his legs. Afterimages roiled in his mind: his hands reaching into flames, a searing flash of red, an overpowering sense of evil that seized him and burned a Terstan’s shield of heresy onto his chest before he could pull away.
Eldrin swallowed hard, stroking the thin, hairless skin over his breastbone as the images faded into the familiar reality of the Penitent Cell’s stone walls. He had confessed his fear and anger to Belmir last night, his discipler transferring the sins to the aergon for judgment. Once laden with sin, the handlong consecrated oak slats were then cast into the great Flames and consumed. His penance was a night’s worth of prayer, meditation, and praise in one of the solitary cells surrounding the Great Sanctum.
The lamp guttered, the yellow droplet of flame perched precariously on its lip. In the distance, the university clock tolled: one, two, three, four. Outside, up under the eaves, pigeons rustled and cooed, and the faint tang of the sea drifted down to him.
This was not the first time he had dreamed of the Flames finding him unworthy, especially of late, but it was by far the worst. To have dreamed they made him a Terstan? It was an unthinkable, hideous blasphemy and deeply shaming. No truly worthy Initiate would conjure such a heresy, even in his sleep.
And certainly yesterday’s events revealed serious flaws in his character. When he’d grabbed that rod from his assailant he’d had every intention of hurting someone, eagerly feeding the power of Eidon’s enemy with his own malicious passions.