Chosen of the Gods Read online

  “It must be difficult to fail and fail again,” Kurnos said, swirling his brandy. “What if she doesn’t find him?”

  Symeon rubbed his brow. The headache was worsening again. It made it hard to think, but he fought through the pain.

  “Then she comes home,” he said softly. “That’s not what’s troubling you, though, is it? You’re not wondering what we’ll do if Lady Ilista fails—you want to know what happens if she succeeds.”

  Kurnos bowed his head. “Sire, your perception humbles me.”

  “Quite.” Symeon reached down, plucking his Guardian from the board. The tiny dragon writhed a moment, then stiffened, becoming cold crystal in his hand. “Who is to say what will happen? If this man truly does wield Paladine’s power, he may rise high within the church—perhaps even to the throne.”

  “A Kingpriest from beyond the empire?” Kurnos asked.

  Symeon shrugged. “It wouldn’t be the first time.”

  That much was true. A century and a half ago, the dying Kingpriest Hysolar had chosen Sularis, then the High Clerist of the Solamnic Knights, to succeed him. It had been a controversial choice, though, and only Sularis’s reputation for impeccable honor had won over a skeptical church and laity. Whoever Ilista’s man of light was, he wasn’t likely to have such a fine pedigree. Kurnos’s scowl spoke more than words.

  All at once, Kurnos vanished from Symeon’s sight—as did the khas board, the balcony, and everything else, swallowed by an angry red flash as the throb in Symeon’s head became an inferno. He heard himself grunt in agony and tasted bile as sweets and brandy tried to force themselves back up his throat—but the strange thing was the smell. For some reason, the aroma that filled his nose was that of baking bread.

  “Majesty?” Kurnos asked, sounding very far away. “Sire, are you all right?”

  Symeon wasn’t all right. The pain didn’t subside as before. Instead it grew stronger, stronger, until it felt as if a second sun had kindled amidst his brain. His right hand went suddenly slack, dropping into his lap. The Guardian tumbled from his limp grasp, and he felt it spring to life as it fell, imagined its wings spreading to fly back to its place on the board. The dragon he saw, however, wasn’t made of white crystal—it was platinum, shining in the sun.

  So beautiful, he thought.

  The sun in his head burst, and he knew nothing more.

  * * * * *

  Kurnos leaped to his feet, his eyes wide, as the Kingpriest slumped sideways in his chair, then fell to the floor. The sapphire tiara tumbled from Symeon’s brow as he lay on his side, twitching. The twitches slowed, and he was still.

  It happened so quickly that Kurnos could do nothing at first but stupidly stare. Then, shaking himself, he ran to the Kingpriest’s side and grabbed him by the shoulders, trying to pull him upright. Symeon sagged in his grasp, his face the color of cold ashes. Desperately, Kurnos fumbled at his throat, seeking the a lifebeat. He found it, weak, faltering.

  Nausea gripped the First Son. He glanced around, looking for help, but there was no one. Even the servant who had poured their brandy was gone. Fear ran through him, then, and his eyes darted toward Symeon’s snifter—poison! his mind cried—but a moment later he dismissed the notion. He’d been drinking the same moragnac, eating the same sweetmeats. No, something else had struck the Kingpriest down—a fit of some sort, swift and deadly.

  No, not deadly—not yet. If a healer came soon, Symeon might survive. Kurnos turned toward the manse, opening his mouth to cry out—

  Let him die.

  Kurnos caught his breath. The voice sounded horribly close, as if someone had whispered in his ear, and there was something about it, a coldness and cruelty that made it sound familiar. He furrowed his brow, wondering, then his insides turned to water as memory came back to him. He was back in the garden, snow on the ground, looking at a dark hooded figure under an ebony tree. He glanced around, seized with panic, but there was no one to be seen. There were many shadows on the balcony, though, and more still in the gardens below. The dark hooded man was near.

  Let him die, the voice said again. You will be Kingpriest.

  He held his breath, suddenly afraid of the noise that might come out of his mouth if he tried to speak. The voice was right—if he stayed silent, Symeon would be beyond help in moments. No one would know—no one would even question. The throne would be his. All he had to do was wait. He stared at the sapphire tiara, glittering where it had fallen… .

  “No,” he gasped. A shiver wracked his body. Then, easing the Kingpriest back down, he ran back into the manse, shouting for the servants.

  * * * * *

  Three hours later, Kurnos stood outside the Kingpriest’s bedchamber, his mind roiling. Symeon was within, in his bed, with Stefara of Mishakal at his side. Brother Purvis had sent acolytes to fetch the high healer as soon as he heard of the attack, and she had taken the Kingpriest into her care at once. Before she began her ministrations, though, she had insisted he and Purvis leave the room. Now Kurnos paced back and forth across a small, comfortable salon, his eyes moving again and again to the bedchamber’s golden doors.

  A door opened, but not the golden one. At the other end of the chamber Brother Purvis appeared—the man looked wretched, his face contorted with grief—and waved in Loralon. The elf signed the triangle as he strode forward, the door clicking shut behind.

  “The hierarchs have been informed,” the elf said. “No one else knows.”

  Kurnos nodded. Symeon’s illness would remain secret for now, until the court prepared a proper proclamation. Nearly two hundred years ago, half the Lordcity had burned when Theorollyn I fell to an assassin’s dagger, and since then the imperial court had taken great care when misfortune befell a Kingpriest. Triogo ullam abat, the saying went.

  The mob rules all.

  The candles burned lower. Finally, after what seemed half the night, the golden doors opened and Stefara emerged, beckoning them in. She was exhausted, her plump face pale and shining with sweat as they followed her toward the golden bed. No one spoke as they looked down on the figure lying among the sheets and cushions.

  Symeon looked like a corpse. He was wan and haggard, and the right side of his face drooped in an unpleasant grimace, paralyzed by the attack. His chest rose and fell, weakly.

  “There’s nothing more we can do for now,” Stefara said. She touched her medallion, the blue twin teardrops of the Healing Hand. “It is only by the grace of the gods that he still lives. He’ll regain consciousness in time, but he won’t live long. Autumn, perhaps, but no more.”

  She left them alone with the Kingpriest. The sound of the door shutting behind her echoed in the stillness. Kurnos swallowed, glancing at Loralon. He could see his thoughts reflected in the elf’s sad eyes. Symeon’s vision was true, after all. The god had called him to uncrown.

  “You must rule now, Your Grace,” Loralon said. “As heir, it falls to you to assume the regency.”

  Kurnos bit his lip, staring at the unmoving form in the bed. He considered telling the elf—about the strange voice, the dark figure, how close he had come to letting Symeon die—but set the impulse aside. Better that no one knew. Instead, he reached down, to brush the Kingpriest’s left hand. On the third finger was a ring of red gold, set with a large, sparkling emerald. Swallowing, he pulled the ring off.

  Loralon said nothing, only waited patiently, his hands folded before him.

  For a long moment Kurnos hesitated, staring into the emerald’s guttering depths. Finally, he sighed and slid the ring onto his finger. It felt strange—too heavy, too tight, still retaining the warmth of Symeon’s body. His eyes shifted to the Kingpriest, lying weak and vulnerable in his bed … and then he heard it again, the voice, chuckling coldly in his head.

  Very well, the dark man said. That will do … for now.

  Chapter Six

  The sun sank behind the Kharolis mountains, setting the clouds ablaze and flooding the valleys with shadow. On any ordinary evening, the town of Xak Khal
an, a scattering of slate-roofed houses nestled in one of those valleys, would have been thriving: children playing beside the riverbank while their mothers stirred pots over outdoor cooking fires; rough, bearded woodcutters sharpening their axes for the next day’s work; old graybeards sitting on logs and swapping tall tales about how, when they were young, they’d spied a band of centaurs or kissed a dryad in the wild woods to the west. Later, folk might have gathered about a fire to dance or gone to a nearby hollow to listen to a wandering poet, while the moons’ red-silver light streamed down through the boughs of aspen and oak. It was a small town, and poor—particularly compared with the pillared, greenstone halls of the city of Xak Tsaroth two days to the south—but the people were happy with their simple lives.

  Tonight, however, was no ordinary night.

  Word had spread quickly when the First Daughter of Paladine came to town, accompanied by a dozen Knights from the fields of Solamnia to the north. That had been yesterday, and today the lumberjacks hadn’t gone out into the forests, keeping near home to see what was afoot It had been years since any priest higher than Falinor, the local Revered Son, had come to Xak Khalan, and talk had flown thicker among the villagers than the blackflies that hummed in the summer breeze. At last, as the westering sun began to dip behind the jagged peaks, the sound of silver bells filled the valley, and folk answered the call, flocking out of town until all that moved in Xak Khalan were a few stray goats and the creaking wheel of the mill. They went east, roughly six hundred in all, following a stone-paved path up the edge of the valley to where the church stood.

  The town’s houses and shops were plain, but its temple was not. When Kharolis adopted the Istaran Church as its faith more than a century ago, the people had abandoned the forest glades and stone rings where they once worshiped, choosing to build high, domed halls in Paladine’s name. Xak Khalan’s church was nothing beside the cathedrals of Xak Tsaroth and downright tiny compared with the sprawling temples of the east, but it was still fine, its seven copper spires burning crimson in the twilight. Lush ivy crawled up its stone walls, and its tall, brass-bound doors stood open, beckoning. Within, its stained windows cast shafts of blue and green light through the worship hall, falling over oaken pews and frescoed walls, serpentine-tiled floor, and a triangular altar of white stone. Smoke from a dozen incense burners and scores of candles eddied in the glow, making it look as if the vaulted chamber were underwater. The bells chimed on, falling still only when the last of the pilgrims from Xak Khalan had taken their seats.

  Ilista stood by the altar, clad in her ceremonial vestments— silvery cassock, white surplice fringed with violet, and amethyst circlet—and laving her hands in a golden bowl. She kept her back to the villagers, staring up at the domed ceiling. The mosaic there was crude by Istaran standards but had a primal force the eastern artisans lacked. It showed Paladine as the Valiant Warrior, a white-bearded knight astride a cream-colored charger, thrusting a lance into the heart of a five-headed serpent. She focused on the god’s image, her lips moving in prayer.

  “Please,” she implored. “Let this be the one.”

  She had first performed the Apanfo, the Rite of Testing, in Palanthas, two days after she and Sir Gareth made port. The patriarch there had listened to the tale of her dream, and the figure of light, and told her yes, there was one among his clerics who might well be the one she sought. He was called Brother Tybalt, a middle-aged priest who could conjure water out of dry air. If anyone in Palanthas was the one she sought, the patriarch told her, it was him.

  She had looked on as Tybalt prayed to the god, holding his hands over an electrum basin, and watched with amazement as the flesh of his palms opened and clear, cold water instead of blood flowed forth to fill the bowl. The miracle was one thing, however; the Apanfo was something else. The Rite of Testing had found him wanting, his character flawed with pride in his own powers. Ilista wasn’t sure how the rite would reveal the Lightbringer to her, but whatever the case, by the time the prayer ended she had known it wasn’t him. Disheartened, she had assured the patriarch that while Brother Tybalt was a fine priest, he was not the one she sought. After that, she had turned her eyes hopefully to the road before her.

  So it had gone, as she and Sir Gareth’s Knights wended their way across Solamnia’s plains, from city to town, castle to monastery, never staying in one place for more than a day or two. Time and again, the clergy had brought forth its brightest lights, men and boys who could work all manner of wonders through their faith, and time and again they had failed. Always, there was something lacking. The old graybeard in Vingaard loved his wine too much; the young initiate at the abbey near Archester nurtured lustful thoughts about a girl in town. The tall, swarthy deacon at Garen’s Ford doubted his own faith, questioning whether he’d chosen rightly in swearing his vows, and the cherubic scholar in Solanthus had once struck a novice in a rage. They were good men all, but the hoped-for revelation never happened when she spoke the Rite. None was the one, and each time it grew harder to look ahead with hope as she and the Knights set forth again.

  Finally, they had left Solamnia, passing beneath the tall, white arches that marked its border. The fields gave way to hills, and then to mountains. That had been eight days ago, and she had tested no one in that time. Kharolis was a sparse kingdom, with only two great cities: Xak Tsaroth in the north and seaside Tarsis in the south. Other than that it was wilderness, deep forests and rolling grasslands where barbarian horsemen ruled. The hinterlands seemed an unlikely place to find the man she had dreamt of.

  Then they had come to Xak Khalan, and things had changed. Revered Son Falinor, a bald, stoop-shouldered priest of more than eighty winters, had listened to her tale, then nodded, telling her of one of his charges, a young priest who could purify spoiled food with a kiss. As always, she had demanded proof of the boy’s powers and watched, impressed, as he pressed his lips to a moldy ear of corn and the blight lifted from it, leaving ripe, golden kernels behind. So, here she stood in Xak Khalan’s hillside church, ready to work the Rite one more time.

  She removed her holy medallion and dipped her fingers in the bowl, dripping water on each of the amulet’s three corners. “Patodo Calb, flina fo,” she prayed in the church tongue. “Mas auasfud, tus mubofesum.”

  Blessed Paladine, I am blind. Be thou my eyes, that I may see.

  She turned, looking out at the expectant faces of the townsfolk. She had looked at thousands of those faces, these past months, watched their anticipation change to disappointment again and again. Behind them stood the temple’s clerics, three dozen in all, the bent form of Revered Son Falinor smiling toothlessly in their midst. On her left were Sir Gareth and his men: ten young Knights of the Crown, their armor gleaming in the turquoise light. To her right was an alcove, separated from the rest of the worship hall by a curtain of pale blue velvet. She could sense the man behind it, waiting as she signed the triangle over the assembly.

  Merciful god, she thought. Let it be him… .

  Among the holy items laid out on the altar was a chime of violet glass. She lifted it and flicked it with her finger, three times. Its pure tones filled the hall.

  “Aponfud, tipobulfatfumgonneis,” she intoned. “Bridud,e tambimud.”

  Come hither, thou who would be tested. Approach, and name thyself.

  The blue curtain pulled back, and a stout, fair-haired man appeared, clad in heavy robes covered in gold embroidery. A murmur rippled through the onlookers as the young priest stepped out of the alcove and crossed to Ilista. His eyes were downcast and stayed on the floor as he knelt before her.

  “Fro Gesseic, usas lupofo,” he murmured. “Praso megonnas.”

  I am Brother Gesseic, beloved of the gods. I ask to be tested.

  Ilista nodded, examining the young man’s face. He was handsome, in a rough way—a woodsman’s son who had heard Paladine’s call. There was a humility about him that she hadn’t seen often in Solamnia and rarer still in Istar. It was a good sign. She caught herself biting
her lip as she set down the chime and took up a golden ewer filled with sweet oil. Carefully, she raised it, saluting the silver triangle over the temple’s entrance, then poured a dollop on Gesseic’s head. As it dripped, glistening, from his sandy hair, darkening his robes where it fell, she touched her medallion to his forehead and closed her eyes.

  The church fell silent, the townsfolk watching in open-mouthed awe as the Apanfo began, but Ilista didn’t notice. A wizard could have cast a fireball in the middle of the room and she wouldn’t have flinched. She turned inward, focusing, and felt her breath slow as she reached out, through the medallion. Gesseic’s mind lay before her, many-layered, like the petals of a white rose. She had seen many such roses lately, all of them beautiful, but each hid a blemish—some small flaw that marked them as impure. Holding her breath, she reached out to peel back the first layer… .

  … the rose vanished, and she was somewhere else: a mountaintop, mantled in snow, looming so high clouds scudded beneath her. The air was sharp, chilly, the sky dark and dusted with more stars than she had ever seen—great clouds of them, as dense as sand on a dune. She cast about, startled. This was new, different.

  Something stirred in the corner of her eye, and she saw him, standing in the snow, watching her. Gesseic did not speak, but a glad smile lit his face as he stepped toward her.

  It’s him! she thought, triumph surging through her. After all the time she’d looked, she’d found the one. The lightbringer. The god’s chosen. She imagined him mantled in light, stopping armies with a wave of his hand. They would return to the Lordcity together, welcomed with song and laughter, the streets adrift with rose petals. She lifted her gaze to the starry sky. It’s him, Paladine be praised, it’s him, it’s him!