Elon unlocked the door and went in. A fire burned steadily upon the hearth and the well-trimmed lamps were lit but turned down low, ready for him to adjust as suited his purpose. A bottle of claret had been decanted and set upon the oak sideboard near the fire.
This was the first visit he had made to this room since his arrival in Ballinrigh. He did not know how Thomas had guessed he would do so tonight; he had not known himself until the carriage ride back from the cathedral. The question he had posed to Thomas about precognition had been a jest, but for a moment Elon was not certain where jest ended and truth began.
On the table next to the chair burned one of the lamps, situated for ease of reading. Under it was the very book Elon had planned to study tonight. Once again, Thomas had anticipated him—and again Elon wondered how Thomas could have known. How long has he been doing this and I’ve not noticed? Elon wondered.
There was a soft knock on the door, and Thomas entered carrying a tray with the bishop’s dinner—which he placed on the sideboard just where Elon would have told him.
“Come over here, Thomas,” Elon said, “and have a seat. I want to talk to you.”
“As you wish, Your Grace,” came the always-subservient reply.
Elon waited until Thomas was seated comfortably. He waited, watching his manservant more carefully than usual, noting the signs of age that had touched Thomas’s hair and face. Then he rose and went to the sideboard. He filled another goblet with wine and handed it to Thomas.
At first Thomas was hesitant. “Go on, take it,” Elon pressed. “For a little while, let’s put status aside and talk together. We’ve certainly known each other long enough for that.”
Once Thomas had accepted the goblet, Elon went back to his chair. As he sat, he picked up his own goblet and sipped from it, watching Thomas above the rim. The servant sat ramrod straight, obviously ill at ease with this sudden change of venue.
“Relax, Thomas,” Elon said. “I mean you no ill will.”
“I know that, Your Grace.”
“And for now, here in private, call me by my name,” Elon continued. “We’ve been together for a quarter of a century—longer than I’ve known anyone steadily, even my own parents. For the sake of those years, let us forgo formality for a time.”
Thomas nodded silently, as if unsure how to answer. Elon sighed but accepted it, hoping relaxation would come.
“You were what, twenty-four, when you came into my service?” Elon asked. “So you’re… forty-eight, forty-nine now?”
“Forty-nine next week, Your—Elon.”
“Forty-nine—a good age. Still strong enough to enjoy life but without the follies that mark one’s youth. You’re of the laity, Thomas—did you never think to marry?”
“Never. I think that to marry, to be a husband, one needs to feel completely loyal to one’s wife. I knew that my loyalty would always be divided.”
Elon could see Thomas slowly beginning to relax. That would be necessary for what Elon hoped to accomplish tonight. He decided to keep up the casual conversation for a while yet.
“But you do not try to live by the rule of celibacy imposed on the clergy?” the bishop continued.
“Well… no,” Thomas answered slowly. “No, I don’t. I am a man, after all.” His mouth quirked quickly toward a smile and back. “There are a couple of women in Ummera whom I… visit.”
“A couple,” Elon said, smiling himself. “Very good, Thomas. Who are they—anyone I know?”
“No one within the household, if that’s what you mean. I would never… One is a serving maid down at The Fox and Eagle, and the other is a well-landed widow who lives across town. They don’t expect more than I can give them—and neither do I.”
“Just a bit of… warmth and companionship, shall we say?”
“Just so,” Thomas agreed. “’Tis a sensible arrangement that suits all of us. They’ve no desire to give up their freedom, and neither do I.”
Elon allowed himself a smile as he took a long sip of his wine. Thomas’s posture had relaxed as he sat back in his chair. It was time to ask a few different questions.
But gently, gently, Elon told himself. He got up and went to the sideboard to retrieve the decanter of claret. Then he refilled both his own wineglass and Thomas’s.
“I think, Thomas, I’ve come to take you for granted over the years,” he said as he sat back down. “An easy thing to do after so long together. But I can’t help thinking how often you have things exactly as I want them before I tell you—almost before I know. Such anticipation is a great talent… and it could be a sign of an even greater gift.”
“What gift?” Thomas asked. Elon did not miss the touch of wariness that sprang into his eyes.
“I mentioned precognition before. Do you know what that is?”
Thomas shook his head.
“Well, I suppose it can seem like just a guess,” Elon began, trying to keep the explanation simple for now. He did not want to destroy the relaxed atmosphere. “But it’s the right guess and the right time, more often than not. I think you have that ability. With a little training, it can be developed to serve more useful purposes than opening my study or laying out my clothes.”
“What sort of training?” Thomas asked. His wariness had diminished, slowly being replaced by curiosity.
“Oh, nothing too difficult—and certainly not dangerous. Just some mental exercises to build what is already there, such as a soldier exercises to build his muscles or his skill with arms.”
This explanation seemed to satisfy Thomas; Elon was gratified to see the last of the wariness fade and a burgeoning look of eagerness replace it.
“Tell me, Thomas—I know you’ve some interest in the… things I study here. Do you ever read these books on your own? It’s all right—tell me the truth.”
“Well,” Thomas spoke hesitantly, “sometimes, when I’m opening the room and waiting for the fire to set, I look through one or two. Most of them are in foreign tongues, and those I can’t read at all. But the ones I can—well, you told me I might, years ago.”
“And I meant it.” Elon got up and crossed the room to the chest where some of the books he had brought with him were stored. He knelt and lifted the lid, then carefully rummaged through them until he found the slim volume he wanted. It was a very old book from the land of Cilicia, handwritten and bound by leather that was tied together by a tarnished silver cord. Loose pages had been tucked into the back, where Elon himself had added a translation.
He brought the book back to the table. “I have here a book I want you to study. Every day. We will be here in Ballinrigh for—who knows how long. While I am gone each day, you are to find time to come in here and read… of course being careful that none of the other servants sees you.”
“I understand,” Thomas replied, his eyes focused greedily on the book.
Elon handed it over to him. Carefully, Thomas undid the cord and opened the volume. Then his expression changed as he saw the foreign writing.
“I… I can’t read this,” he said.
“No, I didn’t expect you to,” Elon replied. “It is the pages in the back you are to study. Those I translated, and those you can read.”
Eagerly, yet still being careful of the aged pages, Thomas turned to the translation. One glance and his face lit up with anticipation. Elon was glad to see it. A plan was forming in his mind, one in which Thomas might well play a key part.
“I think it best if the book does not leave this room,” Elon said. “We would not want the wrong eyes to see it. But put it aside for now, Thomas. There is something else I would like to try.”
He noticed how the servant’s fingers lingered on the ancient volume. But he put it aside as Elon had requested.
“Now, Thomas, this is just one of those exercises that I mentioned. Nothing to be concerned about.”
Elon took a candlestick from the mantel and lit the candle it held. Then, after turning down both of the lamps in the room, he put the candle on the tab
le by his chair and moved it to be in front of Thomas.
“There,” he said. “Now, Thomas, I want you to listen to the sound of my voice while you look at the candle flame.” As he spoke, he came around Thomas’s chair and placed his hands on the younger man’s shoulders.
“Just relax,” he continued. “Let your mind be free, empty, open. Feel the warmth of the fire, the comfort of the chair, the silence of the room. There is nothing but the sound of my voice and the candle flame. Watch the flame. There is only the flame and my voice. Let your body feel as if it is floating, warm and safe. Comfortable. Relax… relax… relax…”
Elon heard Thomas’s breathing change. At the same moment, the man’s shoulders went limp beneath his hands, and Elon felt a little burst of triumph. Ever since he was a young man, he had known his true sources of power were his intelligence and his voice, and he had learned to use them both to his advantage. But only once before had he used his skills as he was now with Thomas: on the woman who had been Aurya’s mother. Even she had not responded so quickly or as completely as Thomas.
“Thomas, do you hear me?” he asked softly.
“Yes, Your Grace,” came the reply. Elon smiled; even in this entranced state, Thomas thought of him by his title. Perhaps that was the reason he responded so well; he was preconditioned to obedience.
“Thomas, are you watching the flame?”
“Yes, Your Grace.”
“Good. Now, still relaxed, open your thoughts to whatever impressions might come. Tell me what you see in the flame.”
There was silence for a moment. Elon kept his hands on Thomas’s shoulders, but now he closed his own eyes and tried opening his own perceptions to see if he could share whatever vision Thomas might gain.
The silence deepened as the seconds ticked by. Elon refused to give up; even if nothing happened today, this was only a first attempt. Thomas was so receptive, Elon knew he could become far more valuable than just a manservant.
“I see,” Thomas said hesitantly, “something… but it’s not clear.”
“It’s all right, Thomas,” Elon said, using his most soothing voice. “Relax… don’t strain. Just watch the candle and let it come.”
Inside his own mind, Elon could also see the beginnings of a vision, transmitted through his contact with Thomas. But it was too clouded to reveal more than indistinct blotches of shadow and light moving somewhere, somewhen.
Elon went on waiting, but the vision would not clear. Finally, it faded and disappeared. He was far from discouraged, however. This proved that Thomas had untapped potential—potential he could use in the quest for power ahead.
“Relax, Thomas,” he said again as he lifted his hands from the man’s shoulders. He came around and resumed his seat, thinking.
“Listen to my voice, Thomas,” he continued. “When I tell you, you will awaken and you will remember what we accomplished here tonight. It will not frighten or upset you. Instead, you will be eager to train your mind for future use and greater control. Do you understand?”
“Yes, Your Grace.”
“Very well, then—Thomas, wake up now.”
The unfocused stare in the man’s eyes changed. He blinked once, twice, then looked at Elon with a slow smile spreading across his usually reserved features.
“Did I really do that?” he asked. “Did I really see something in the flame?”
“Yes, Thomas—today you took a first step. But as I said, you now need to train your mind so that the images become clear. Soon you will not need my aid to reach that receptive state. But I think we have done enough for one day. Tomorrow, while I am gone, you will come here and begin your studies. For tonight, consider yourself off duty.”
“Thank you, Your Grace,” Thomas said as he stood and gave Elon a little bow, “and may I say, I enjoyed our conversation.”
“As did I, Thomas—as did I.”
After Thomas left, Elon blew out the candle and turned up the lamps again. Then he brought his supper from the sideboard to the little table. The way to the Archbishop’s triple-crowned mitre suddenly seemed all the clearer.
With a true smile, Elon attacked his evening meal.
Chapter Twelve
With Father Renan now in the lead, Lysandra and Cloud-Dancer headed north out of Ballinrigh. Renan had first thought to head for Yembo in Lininch. But something—some personal intuition or divine guidance—told him that destination was too straightforward a solution to Tambryn’s words. Oblique references to the forgotten, the hidden, and those who dwell in the heart of the land made him think there was another path to follow.
When he had first read those words, he thought they might refer to all the people of the kingdom whose voices were never heard at court; the farmers and shepherds, the hunters, merchants, crofters, craftsmen, and all the others who went about their business living quiet, simple lives. These were the “common folk” whose generations knotted the kingdom together, and who suffered most in the game of politics played by those who had vowed to undertake their care. Yet, as the miles went by, Renan began to believe that Tambryn meant something else entirely.
He possessed copies of all thirteen of Tambryn’s scrolls. They were precious to him, reminders of both good and evil, and the only things from his previous life that he had kept when he entered the Church. Although some priests first join an Order, feeling the call to the priesthood only after life as a Religious, Renan had never felt compelled to become a monk, and therefore personal possessions were not banned to him. Still, the scrolls being what they were in the sight of the Church, they were the one thing he owned that he kept carefully out of sight.
Having a small parish in a poor area of the city allowed him to continue studying the scrolls without fear of discovery. Most of his parishioners could barely read, and none, he was certain, understood the ancient language in which Tambryn had written. Nor was the Archbishop likely to appear at his rectory door; like every other parish in the cathedral city, when the people had episcopal needs they went to the cathedral, to the Archbishop, not the other way around.
But though he had read all thirteen of Tambryn’s scrolls it was this final one that time and again compelled him to unlock its secrets. It was almost as if a voice whispered constantly in his ear, demanding that each night, when all of his other duties were done, he turn again to the scroll. In these last seven months, since King Anri died, the whisper had oft times felt like a shout.
Yet there had been so much he did not understand—until Lysandra appeared. As they had talked, piece after piece had fallen into place. And as understanding had dawned, a new compulsion filled him, telling him not only that here indeed was Prophecy’s Hand, but that he must go with her and help her as she undertook the fulfillment of Tambryn’s visions.
But how? For that he still did not have the answers. Yes, he could read the scroll for her, as he had said, and help ease the journey as best he was able—but the same small voice that had directed him to study Tambryn’s words now told him there was something more for him to do. He hoped he would have the strength for whatever lay ahead, and yet he feared it, too; he feared he might be called to break the one vow he had made in his life before the Church, the vow he held more dearly than his life.
But did he hold it more dearly than hers? More dearly than this kingdom’s? How many lives were worth his vow?
They kept off the main roads and away from the heavy traffic, traveling by back routes as much as possible. By the third day they reached the more rural areas of Urlar. Here, many of the roads were little more than cart tracks, and buildings became dots viewed from a distance amid large tracts of farmland where trees had been cleared.
By the fifth day, they had reached the foothills where the mountains curved west like a hand cupped around Urlar. To the east, these mountains created the border between Urlar and Lininch; to the north, the direction they were now headed, the mountains extended part of the way along the Urlar and Rathreagh border as well.
There were well-trave
led passes leading through the mountains, and, until he knew better, Renan was heading in their direction. But he did so reluctantly, still feeling they would do best to avoid being seen.
The more time he spent traveling with her, the more fascinating Renan found Lysandra. At their first meeting, during their long talk after Evensong, Lysandra had told him all about her blindness and its cause, about the inner Sight that helped her function as a healer, and about the wondrous gift of being able to share Cloud-Dancer’s vision. But hearing of them was different than witnessing the abilities in action.
It is often as if she sees better than I do, he found himself thinking on more than one occasion. I can only see a thing’s form—she can see its Truth. She has the experience of beholding how this world is “beautifully and wonderfully made.” I envy her that joy.
Renan also admired Lysandra’s tenacity. Walking all day was proving to Renan that he had spent far too much time in the city and in his church. He no longer had the muscular vitality of his youth.
Lysandra, on the other hand, trudged along as if covering twenty miles in a day was nothing out of the ordinary. With her bag slung over her shoulder, her walking stick in one hand and the other usually resting on Cloud-Dancer’s head, she walked as if fatigue was something unknown to her.
Well, it’s known to me, Renan thought as he adjusted the weight of his pack, silently apologizing to his body for all the exercise he had not given it over the years.
It was time to call a halt—and not just for the sake of his aching muscles. Renan felt the need to consult the scroll again. Now that they were entering the foothills, he could not shake the feeling that there was something near, something for which they should be watching. Unfortunately, he had no idea what that something might be.
As they finally neared the large stone outcropping Renan had been using for a reference, he called the day’s halt.
“What do you think of this for our campsite?” he asked Lysandra while he gratefully eased the burden from his shoulders.
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