Eldrin rolled his eyes. “Yes, yes. Carissa’s already sung this song. I don’t need to hear it again.”
“I don’t think you heard it the first time.” Raynen folded his arms, scowling.
Eldrin scowled back. “Saeral is High Father of all the Mataio, Eidon’s Hand and Voice in the land. He could not possibly be the murderous manipulator you’re making him out to be.”
“Our kin were not the only casualties, you realize. Did you know that of the fourteen Guardians ahead of him in succession, nine fell into disgrace or madness and three died? The last two were so intimidated they readily stepped aside.” He paced back up the row of chairs, waving an arm. `Ask around. It’s easy enough to prove. Of course, nothing can be traced directly back to him. The deaths were `accidents.’ And one can’t blame madness on a man in court.”
“Indeed.”
Raynen stopped behind the chair across from Eldrin, gripping the tall back with both hands. “But the accumulation of evidence, the sheer coincidence of it-“
“Perhaps it is indicative of Eidon’s hand in the matter, promoting the man he would have at the head of his Mataio.” Eldrin frowned at him. “You ask how I can know I am not being deceived. Well, I could ask you the same. Father hated Saeral from the day he arrived, and you were always Father’s son. I think you believe he’s evil because you want him to be.”
“I believe he’s evil because he is. I saw him kill our Father, Abramm. And Aarol. I was there.”
That gave Eldrin pause. “I thought they were mauled.”
“Yes, but not by creatures of this world.” He whirled to pace alongside the table again, stopping halfway back to glare out the window, arms once more folded across his chest, features reflected in the glass. For a long time he stared into the darkness, and just when Eldrin had decided he was not going to continue, he spoke. “Shaped like night herons, but not herons. Not birds of any kind.”
In the reflection his face grew vacant with remembered horror. “Black as ravens, with needle-sharp beaks and white-hot eyes. Tens of them, stabbing at him, at his face and arms and chest. When he went down, Aarol tried to drag him to safety, but they turned on Aarol, too … both of them screaming and screaming, and I …” He braced a trembling hand on the window frame.
Eldrin stood rigidly, chilled to the core. Black as ravens, needle-sharp beaks, white-hot eyes. “Feyna.” The word whispered out of him.
Raynen’s head snapped around. “They are not myth.”
Perhaps not, but Eldrin had never seen one, had never known anyone who had. The First Word warned of them frequently, creatures spawned by Moroq’s rhu’ema. Born of the passions and blood of human flesh, they had flesh themselves and thus the power to strike directly, blow for blow in the physical world, something the rhu’ema themselves could no longer do. The Flames supposedly kept Kiriath clean of such things.
Uneasily, Eldrin glanced at Meridon, still standing beside the hearth, watching them closely.
“I was hiding in the bushes,” the king said, looking back into the night. “I couldn’t move, though I wanted to run for my life. When the screaming stopped, I watched the creatures fight over their bodies. Suddenly they all took wing. I thought they had sensed me, that I would be next, but then a man came out of the wood, cloaked and cowled. Several came and perched on his shoulders. The others just kept flying. He stood over the bodies for a long time before he began to laugh. And there was nothing human in it. As he left he walked past where I crouched, and I saw his face clearly.” Raynen’s gaze came back to Eldrin’s. “It was Saeral.”
His words plunged into silence. Eldrin stared at him, rooted to the floor, shaken by the conviction in his brother’s voice, the certainty in his eyes, but unable to accept this final, damning accusation. At length he forced a laugh. “But, of course, there’s no proof, is there? And no one but you saw this awful thing.”
“No.” Raynen turned from the window. “No one but me.”
“Well then …” Eldrin gestured vaguely. “It’s your word against his.”
Not to mention all common sense.
Frustration darkened Raynen’s face. “You think I’m lying?”
“No.” He believed his brother was telling him the truth so far as he understood it. But it was night, and he’d just witnessed a monstrous evil. He could have seen anything. “I just don’t believe it was Saeral you saw.” He wondered if his brother had been a Terstan as long ago as when their sire had died.
Something in his face must have given his thoughts away, for Raynen’s expression soured. “You think I’m mad. The crazy Terstan king.” He shook his head, turned again to Meridon. “You were right. He’s beyond hope.”
“Maybe not, Sire. May I have leave to speak?”
Raynen gestured for him to proceed. The Terstan turned to Eldrin. “You asked for proof, Your Highness-that Saeral is not who he seems to be, that you are being used…. There is a chamber below the vesting rooms that encircle the Well of Flames. A secret chamber, reached only by a hidden passage.”
Eldrin cocked an ironic brow. “I’m just a Novice Initiate, Captain. I’m not allowed into the vesting rooms.”
“Take the south opening, go down three doors. You’ll find the panel in the wardrobe at the back of the room. Make sure you go during the day.”
And how is it that you know about this place?”
“I have been there in my service to your brother. More than once, in fact.”
Eldrin started. A Terstan in the heart of the Holy Keep? Impossible.
“It’s very important that you go during the day,” Raynen reiterated soberly.
Eldrin scowled at him. “Don’t worry. I’m not about to violate Eidon’s rules of sanctity just to prove this madness wrong. I already know it’s wrong.”
“Not Eidon’s rules, my lord,” Meridon corrected, drawing his gaze. “The Mataio’s.” The Terstan paused, his brown eyes deep and strangely piercing. “When you were touched this morning-did it really feel like Eidon? You’ve studied the Words for eight years, and I am told you’ve longed to know him all your life. Do you really believe revulsion and terror would be your strongest feelings if you were truly meeting him?”
Eldrin’s heart suddenly thundered in his ears. How did he know? How could he possibly know?
“Go to the room, my lord. Then you’ll know for sure, one way or the other.” He glanced questioningly at Raynen and, when the king nodded, stepped to the door and pulled it open. Clearly the interview was over, but for a long moment Eldrin couldn’t move, unnerved, still, by the way the man had hit so precisely on the discomfiting elements of this morning’s touch. Elements he had refused to identify until now. But how had this man, this Terstan, known that?
“Highness?”
With a scowl, Eldrin broke free of his thoughts, bowed his good-bye to the king, then strode past the captain into the weapons-lined antechamber and back to Brother Rhiad.
C H A P T E R
6
The Midnight Hymn crescendoed as the Flames surged upward in the midst of the bowl-shaped Sanctum, a scarlet column reaching for the high, domed window. On the third and highest tier, standing among the other Novices, Eldrin gripped the railing before him and stared in awe, his skin prickling with its power. He had never seen the Flames burn so brightly. From the lower levels they must be breathtaking, a beacon of hope that chased away the darkness.
The Flames subsided as the hymn’s last notes faded to a hum, and Guardians from the lower tiers poured into the aisles, descending to the Sanctum’s central floor. Encircling the dais, the holy men formed into lines at the four compass points and converged on the Flames, each quartet casting their sinladen oaken slats down the slope of the white marble moat toward the central Flame.
Eldrin watched from the lofty tier, his eye held by the cross-shaped pattern of light and shadow moving both toward and away from the leaping Flames, the slats fluttering through the air as they were cast into the well. Visually mesmerized, he found his tho
ughts returning to the inner turmoil that had kept him awake since he had returned from the palace over three hours ago.
Brother Rhiad, still smarting from the way he had been treated and incensed that a dangerous heretic like Meridon should be so close to the king, had questioned Eldrin closely on the ride back. It had taken Eldrin’s full powers of wit and self-control to keep the man from guessing just how much the meeting had distressed him-and how much of it Eldrin kept to himself. He said nothing of Raynen’s probing with regard to his being touched by Eidon, nor of Meridon’s uncannily precise description of that troubling experience.
His conscience pricked him for that. Were not sins of omission as bad as flat-out lying? And yet he would have told the Haverallan everything had the man asked. He just hadn’t asked, being more concerned with debunking the king’s tale of their father’s death. And with whether they had given Eldrin anything. That seemed a particular concern. “You’re saying they gave you nothing, then?” he’d asked for the third time in a row. “No trinket? No gift? No family heirloom?”
“No, sir.”
“How about a brooch or a signet? Or … or a good-luck stone.”
A good-luck stone? “No, sir, they gave me nothing at all.”
“Nothing. You’re sure?”
Of course I’m sure, Eldrin thought. How could I not be sure? What’s the matter with him? But he only said, “Yes, sir.”
Rhiad had stared into his eyes as if searching for the lie in his words. But truly they’d given him nothing. Only an uncannily accurate description of his troubles with Eidon’s touch and an admonition to search for a secret chamber beyond the vesting rooms. An admonition he had kept to himself, as wellwhich troubled him more than any of the rest. For why would he hold that back, unless some part of him believed the room was real?
As the last four Guardians cast their slats into the moat, the humming silenced, leaving the great chamber filled only with rustlings and an occasional cough as the lines of holy men withdrew up the aisles. The bell of dismissal tolled and Eldrin’s companions began to slip away, back to their pallets. Eldrin let them move past him, shoulders bumping him slightly from time to time, until all had gone and he alone remained.
Even then he stood listening and waiting-for what he did not know. Thunder rumbled outside, remnants of another evening storm. The Flames barely flickered above the lip of the brazier now, and shadows hung heavily over the Sanctum. Silently he slipped along the tier to one of the eight aisles that stair-stepped down to the marble moat. At the bottom he stood again before the brass railing, staring into the Flames, recalling how he’d started the day here, full of the anticipation of reaching his goal….
The dancing, throbbing colors pulled at his eye and mind, inviting him to enter. He held back, aversion shivering through him. It was possible another touch would put all his fears to rest, but somehow he could not make himself seek it.
“You’ve studied the Words for eight years … longed to know him all your life. Do you really believe revulsion and terror would be your strongest feelings if you were truly meeting him?”
He swallowed hard. His gaze fixed upon the tier above the moat where the curtained doorways led into the vesting rooms. The south one lay directly across the Flames from him.
This is madness, he told himself. You can’t go in there. The man must’ve put a spell on you. Go back to your cell and read the scriptures if you cannot sleep.
Thunder rumbled again. He drew a long breath and let it out, then turned from the rail to climb back up the stair. And stopped, startled. From the corner of his eye he was sure he had glimpsed someone retreating suddenly behind the curtain covering the alcove just behind him, as if whoever it was hadn’t wanted to be seen.
He thought at once of Brother Rhiad, watching him, suspecting he had held back during the interview in the coach….
Nothing moved. Darkness pressed around him, its silence filled only with the soft staccato throb of the Flames and his own beating heart. Slowly he let out his breath, and then annoyance eclipsed the subsiding fear. What was wrong with him? Did he honestly believe Brother Rhiad, right hand to the High Father himself, had nothing better to do than follow an insignificant Novice Initiate around in the middle of the night? It was as ridiculous as all the rest of the suspicions he had entertained this day. He’d become altogether too paranoid. He absolutely must retire to his pallet and cease this uselessdangerous-mental labor.
He awoke the next morning to the predawn bells calling the faithful to worship, feeling unexpectedly refreshed. Time and sleep had so dulled the seeming significance of the previous day’s events that he could almost discount them. After all, one day’s happenings could hardly overturn the accumulated power of eight years of days’ happenings.
Sunpraise was especially poignant. The dimly lit Sanctum held a peaceful air that presaged the gentle break of dawn. And Saeral himself conducted the ceremony, offering the golden oil of Spirit that sent the crimson Flames leaping skyward. The Morning Song filled the air with sweetness as their united voices anticipated the ultimate return of Eidon’s Light in full power, chasing away the darkness and establishing his rule forever.
Eldrin sang with the rest of them, comforted by the familiar stirring of his emotions, the familiar certainty that this was right and true and good. When the first ray of sun caught on the mirrored glass of the high, domed window, igniting it in a blaze of white fire, his heart soared, and he threw up his hands with the others, offering his praise to the Creator. Whatever spell the Terstan had worked upon him, the service and the morning light banished it. He could see clearly again. The Terstan had lied. There was no mysterious room; he had been touched by Eidon, and all was well.
The day proceeded quietly, through the morning meal of biscuit and tea, the Initiates’ choir practice, and several hours spent studying the Books of Rule and copying out that portion of the Law he had most recently learned. Even to write the holy statutes, St. Haverall had said, was to smite the darkness. And writing was particularly pleasurable to Eldrin-the stroke of the pen, the mindless movements of the arm, the way the ink flowed in dark, wet lines, thick and thin, swooping gracefully across the page. The words sprang from his head, ran down his arm, to return to him through his eyes, a circle that ran upon itself, burning truth into his recalcitrant soul, chasing away the doubts and confusions.
He first heard about the body in the garden just before midmeal, the incredible rumor relayed softly by a fellow Initiate as they stepped through the door of the dining hall. Forbidden to talk once over that threshold, he could not ask for details, and the elders who oversaw the noon repast made no mention of it.
The dark bread and vegetable soup was served out in a customary silence, broken only by the reading of the Praises. But midway through the meal a Haverallan hurried in, spoke quietly into the ear of one of the elders at the head table, and unleashed a relay of whispering that resulted in fully half the elders leaving the room.
Those who remained ensured that the reading of the chapter continued undisturbed, though there were many exchanged glances and lifted brows among those of lower ranks, and concentration upon the Praises was poor.
Finally they were dismissed into the halls, and the rumor mill exploded. No one seemed to know much, and the tales all contradicted one another. An Initiate/elderly Brother/lesser Haverallan had died in the garden by the back wall-burned to a crisp/frozen stiff/stabbed through the heart. All agreed the man had been the victim of the king’s evil henchman, Captain Meridon.
It was said he had flown over the wall on the back of a great feyna and done the deed early this morning. The plants surrounding the scene had been scorched by his power, and the wall as well. Several claimed to know others who had seen him do it, but nobody among the rumormongers in the hall had actually seen anything themselves.
An hour later Eldrin was summoned to a private cubicle on the library’s fifth floor, where Belmir told him the full story. Saeral, Belmir explained, was at the palace
even then, seeing that justice was done. There had indeed been a murder-a young Initiate, Brother Damon-and Captain Meridon was the primary suspect. His distinctive ram-headed dirk had been found in the victim’s chest, and footprints by the garden wall exactly matched Meridon’s boots.
The captain was, of course, already in irons, and the High Father meant to petition the king for a speedy trial. Raynen would no doubt try to free his friend from judgment, but both enemies and supporters were already warning him off that tack. The court was in turmoil; a special meeting of the Table of Lords had been called, and the trial would probably be held tomorrow.
The old man shook his head wearily. “It’s a grand mess.”
Eldrin had listened to his report in thoughtful silence, and now, at Belmir’s leave, he spoke. “But why would Meridon murder Brother Damon?”
“You do not know Damon, I take it?”
“No, sir.”
“He hails from Fairfield Watch, a slender man, tallish, with hair the same color as yours. Not as long, but he could be taken for you in the darkness, I think.” He eyed Eldrin expectantly from behind his round spectacles, waiting for the meaning of his words to sink in.
“You mean they think Meridon was trying to kill me and got Damon instead?”
“That seems the likeliest scenario.”
“Not if you know Meridon.”
Belmir arched a bushy brow at him. `And do you know him, son?”
“Enough to know he’s not the kind of man to leap over the garden wall and kill the first initiate with blond hair he comes upon. He knows very well what I look like. And I can’t imagine him leaving his personal dagger behind as evidence. He may be evil, but he’s not stupid.”