Chosen

by Jolea M. Harrison

  “You shouldn’t.”

  “I’m going to anyway,” he said.

  Melgan Lon was the next to suspect a problem. Ambrose hadn’t left Dynan’s side for three days, except once, so the Captain was surprised to see him now, and by the way his eyes shifted back and forth he was trying to think why. Melgan was as politically astute as the next guy. He reasoned it out.

  “Wait.”

  “I’m going for some air.”

  “No, you’re not,” Melgan said, though he didn’t try to stop him.

  Brendin was posted at the far corner and he knew. “I’m sorry.”

  Ambrose waved him off and kept going. Alse wouldn’t have gone too far. It seemed likely he was counting on Ambrose hearing about this affront, and would fully expect some sort of response.

  Ambrose stopped just short of the exit from the family section, which was nothing more than one hall intersecting with another, and paused to consider that last thought. “Where were they?”

  “Here,” Brendin said. “He walked in with Vindal and Messeric. I was at the other end of the hall until I realized what they were saying. Shalis was in this little side room. I don’t think Alse knew she was—”

  “He knew it. She wasn’t the target though,” Ambrose said, and glanced back at Kamien who was following.

  “What does he think Kamien is going to do?” Brendin asked. “Alse knows what’s in the resolution.”

  “Maybe he thinks he can have it overturned.”

  “Governor Taldic would disagree.”

  Ambrose nodded. “Maybe that’s the point, the ulterior motive to the whole thing; to put me at odds with Governor Taldic.”

  “Or with Kamien,” Melgan said, glancing back at him too. Kamien’s response to that was to roll his eyes.

  “All aimed to give Alse the leverage he wants,” Brendin said.

  “That’s only if he can actually have Kamien reinstated,” Ambrose said. “If he really has the support for it. He knows I wouldn’t oppose it.”

  “He’s trolling,” Brendin said. “And if you go out there-”

  “I’ll put myself in the position of having to listen to him,” Ambrose said. He turned around and started walking back the way he came. “Melgan, I want the perimeter expanded to include the closest exit and all the halls from here to there. No one but Palace staff, Medics, and family beyond that point. There are health concerns about possible contaminants being tracked in. That’ll be my answer to Governor Alse.”

  He stopped at the doorway that would take him back to Dynan’s room, weariness descending like Melgan’s chainmail across his shoulders. Ambrose leaned against the doorframe, activating the first of three decontamination fields. They couldn’t be avoided, there to fight the real danger of infection that could kill his son.

  Ambrose decided just then that he really did need some air, and turned back around again. Kamien almost ran into him. “What now?”

  “I’m going out.”

  “You’re looking for a fight,” Kamien said.

  “Melgan is going to go make sure the area is clear of anyone I shouldn’t be around right now,” Ambrose said, looking to his Captain, who turned to go do that. “Care to join me?”

  “Not really.” Kamien nodded to Dynan’s rooms. “I’ll sit with him.”

  “What will you do when they find out you were worried?” Ambrose said, smiling at the glare he got for that.

  “They won’t believe you, so say whatever you like.”

  “Send Roth out. I know he needs some air.”

  Kamien nodded, and a moment later Roth took his place, walking with him down the hall toward the door. Ambrose stopped at the new demarcation line, which was another intersection down another hall.

  Glancing that way, beyond the very large guard posted to keep everyone out, Ambrose saw the High Bishop talking to a man and woman. She was crying. Gradyn was trying to give her some comfort, speaking to her in a low tone. Whatever affliction had struck him during the oath ceremony, he seemed recovered from. For the last three days, the High Bishop had remained, coming into Dynan’s room every morning to offer up a prayer for his recovery.

  “I wish he’d crawl back into his cave,” Ambrose muttered to himself but Roth heard him and chuckled under his breath.

  “It’s not every day that regular people have the attention of the High Bishop. They’ve been extremely grateful for his presence.”

  “Meaning I ought to be?” Ambrose said, and turned the corner for the door. More guards were on the other side, standing out in the cold. “I don’t like that he’s waiting here for news, good or bad. There are too many memories.”

  “He’s just trying to help,” Roth said, looking out at the glaring lights that brightened night to day on the other side of the property fence.

  Masses of people stood waiting on the other side, and behind other barricades that had been erected to keep them back. The Information Bureau was set up and broadcasting on a continual basis.

  Ambrose had known and approved it, but he hadn’t known about the sheer numbers of people who had gathered. They were everywhere he looked. A line of them snaked into the compound to a place where the guards stood, stopping them while the King was outside. They carried flowers in their arms by the bundle or by just one. They had notes in hand and candles waiting to be lit.

  “You should have told me,” Ambrose said.

  He hadn’t been thinking about being seen. There was a sense of vulnerability in being in front of these people that he hadn’t known in a long time, not since he was Dynan’s age. He remembered what it was like being that exposed, and thought about the things he’d said to his son about it.

  “Like the High Bishop,” Roth said, “they are only trying to offer what comfort they can, even if it’s only a prayer.”

  “I told him he had to get over it,” Ambrose said, thinking of Dynan, and then he had to explain. “I told him the day of his oath and he was mad when we all barged in on him the first time he’s ever talked to a girl. He was mad because he didn’t want to take that oath as the High Bishop...the High Bishop suggested.”

  His voice trailed off and he heard his father’s voice telling him of the death of the anointed child and his eternal torture on the altar of darkness.

  “Ambrose?” Roth set a hand on his arm.

  “Maybe we should go back inside,” Brendin said.

  “No, I’m just tired,” Ambrose said, shaking the images from his head and chiding himself for allowing coincidence to so affect his thinking. “That’s all. The cold feels good. I’m fine.”

  “Then you should go look,” Roth said, pointing down the side of the building to an area made for people to go sit in fine weather. There were walkways and benches and trees that were now completely bereft of leaves, but in warm weather provided ample shade.

  In every space off the walks there were flowers and printed messages. There were piles and piles of them stacked up in the snow drifts along the iron fence that went the length of the block, eight kem deep and at least three high. They were imported from the other side of the world where it was spring. The fragrance of them filtering through the frozen air was pungent and full of memories.

  “There are thousands of them.”

  Ambrose turned, and Melgan came over, a few of the notes in hand. Ambrose stood at the corner of the building looking down the block at the display. “You should get Ames and Lyle, and the rest of the boys out here to collect the notes. Give them something to do other than sit.”

  Melgan held up the cards in his hand, pulling one out to hand over. “One of these is from a twelve-year-old who wants to marry him. She left her contact id. Another is a regular get well soon note. The other is indecent, from a sixteen-year-old. That’s the one you have.”

  Ambrose laughed at the graphically detailed proposition and handed the note to Roth. “Someone needs to talk to that girl’s mother.”

  “Well, that’ll make him feel better for sure,” Roth said, and gave the note to
Brendin, whose mouth fell open and eyes widened as he read. He was the least jaded of them, and retained the capacity to be shocked.

  “There’s no way she’s sixteen knowing about that,” he said and read it again.

  Everyone laughed. It felt surprisingly good to have a second of amusement. Melgan looked behind him. “The High Bishop is coming over,” he said, and left to do guard things, stationing himself a short distance away.

  Brendin handed the explicit note back to Roth as if he expected the High Bishop to catch him with it, making Ambrose laugh again. But they both abandoned him with deference to the old man as he joined them. It was difficult not to groan out loud.

  “Your Majesty.” Gradyn nodded his head, looking to the display of flowers. “It’s quite an outpouring, isn’t it?”

  “Yes, Eminence,” Ambrose said. “It’s nice.”

  “And perhaps a comfort for you. Clerics from around the System and indeed all through Brittallia report Temples over flowing and prayer books filled to capacity. The whole Kingdom is thinking of you and your sons.”

  Ambrose nodded to all that, but didn’t know what to say. It didn’t feel as much of a comfort as it should have. Maybe it was the reminder for the same outpouring that came in for his young wife, a few days before she died.

  “I couldn’t help but discover the reason for Governor Alse’s visit,” the High Bishop went on.

  “I want to ask you something,” Ambrose said then, wondering at the same time if he should. “You were there when my father died and heard what he said. He was consumed by fear of it. As you know, Dionin wasn’t a man frightened of much.”

  “He wasn’t.”

  “Nearly all the things he warned me about have happened.”

  “The world has not ended, though I imagine it must feel that way to you,” Gradyn said, leaning down to pick up a single blue rose to smell. “I don’t know where Dionin had the idea it would.”

  “He got it from Alurn,” Ambrose said, careful to keep his voice down. “Dionin heard it from his father, who was told by his father, and so on back down the line all the way to the First King is where.”

  “Yes, I’m aware of those stories. I ask you to recall the games you played as a young boy, tell the secret, pass the secret or some such as that, where the end result sounded nothing like the original whisper. Think about the hundreds of people these stories have traveled through to reach us.”

  “So it’s all just coincidence and not Alurn foretelling the end of time?” Ambrose thought those two choices were seriously lacking. He wanted other options, but the attack on his son seemed to have nothing of coincidence to it.

  “How could Alurn know?” Gradyn said. “There’s little true evidence to make a reasoned judgment with. There was a group once.”

  “Yes, the Disciples of Alurn,” Ambrose said. “They later changed their name to Disciples of the Word, who raised him up to be something more than a man. Some suggest they exist even today.”

  “They thought of him as a God,” Gradyn said. “They claimed to have his written word and protected it with their lives.”

  “They were executed for attempting to usurp the Throne,” Ambrose said.

  “The book they claimed to have was thought to be destroyed.”

  “Or taken from them,” Ambrose said.

  “After all this time, there’s no way to know what Alurn said, or anyone else from that time. I don’t hold him up as a God, despite previous teachings from previous High Bishops who started that whole movement. Dynan will recover from this, and you’ll find Dain. The men responsible for this atrocity will be found and dealt with to the utmost extent of the law. The world will go on. It wasn’t ever in danger of stopping.”

  Ambrose nodded, embarrassed now that’s he’d brought it up. Still there were stories that persisted down through the ages, of mythical creatures and savage times.

  “You mentioned Governor Alse,” he said to get off the subject.

  “I feel my presence here has given people the wrong idea, and maybe you as well. I would never want to do anything that caused you more difficulty. And if I may offer you some advice, which I know you don’t need, but if I may, I would suggest to you that there is no reasonable call to have Dynan removed as your heir, even while some question his survival. I hope you don’t listen to them.”

  “I wasn’t planning to.”

  Gradyn seemed relieved to hear it, but he only nodded. “I’ll return later today for a visit, if you feel it appropriate.”

  “Of course.”

  “Then I’ll take my leave of you and wish you a pleasant morning,” he said, nodding to the sky and the coming dawn.

  It really was exactly what Ambrose wanted. He wondered how the old man knew. “Thank you,” he said as the High Bishop turned. “We may not always see things the same, Gradyn, but I appreciate your being here.”

  Gradyn smiled at that. “I will do whatever you need of me, Your Majesty. Rest assured of it.”

  It was difficult to suppress the sigh of relief that welled up, but Ambrose managed it while the High Bishop was within sight and then still while the IB imagers recorded every movement. It wouldn’t do for the entire System to see him happy over the old man leaving.

  Ambrose wasn’t left alone long. The other old man in his life joined him in the wake of the High Bishop’s departure. Xavier Illothian wasn’t as ancient as Gradyn Vall. No one was. He was the only Lord Chancellor in Cobalt’s history to serve two Kings, which made him old enough. His hair was solid gray, but his eyes were clear and his mind still sharp as ever. Ambrose considered him more a father than his real one had been. Nothing ever seemed to rattle him. He had never, in all the years Ambrose had known him, raised his voice in anger.

  At the moment though, his lips were pursed and his brows drawn down. He glanced after the High Bishop’s transfer that had already pulled away, lost from view behind a sea of people.

  “I just spoke with a gentleman,” Xavier said, “who tells me that on the night of the attack, he saw a man carry Dain to a transfer marked with the seal of the Temple and that a Palace Guard saw this too. The guard talked to the monk and then let him go.”

  “That’s...No, that’s not possible,” Ambrose said, unable to believe it, except he knew Xavier wouldn’t bring him something like this if it wasn’t true.

  “I hope that it isn’t,” Xavier said. “At the moment, I’d like you to come inside where you’re less in the open. Now, please, Your Majesty, in case the guard is compromised.”

  “You’re saying the High Bishop has Dain? To what purpose?”

  Xavier didn’t answer, taking him by the arm in a surprisingly firm grip, urging him to turn and move. “There’ll be time for questions in a moment.”

  The movement drew Melgan’s attention, and Brendin and Roth, who immediately followed. “Xavier?” Melgan asked.

  Instead of answering, Xavier drew out his comboard and using the optic function, sent them a silent message that stunned them all.

  “The King’s life is at risk.”

  ~*~

  Chapter 18

  Carryn stepped back, afraid to try and stop Dain, he was that out of control, smashing his fist into the barrier, once, twice, three, and then four times before the pain of doing so seeped through. His knuckles were bloodied.

  The wall encroached on them, until he gained some measure of control and pushed back. He was shaking from anger, and for a moment, when he turned on her, she thought he might strike her.

  “Who was that man?” he said, and stopped in front of her, as close as he could get without touching her. She felt exposed. For a second, she wished she were armed. Dynan’s sapphire sword stood leaning against the wall. Dain looked at it too.

  “I don’t know,” she said. “It was just darkness to me.”

  His eyes narrowed at that, but he read the truth in her mind. Over the last three days she let him explore her thoughts, or some of them. He’d never been in anyone else’s head but his brother’
s, so it was new to him, alien and enticing.

  “You don’t know anything do you?” he said. “You just follow them, blindly going along with it.”

  “I know some things,” she said, backing up a step. It was like being in a hot oven having all that rage directed at her. “I know that if you go through the vortex, the world will end. Literally.”

  “He said he found Alurn.”

  “The First King?”

  “No, the butcher down the street. What other Alurn is there?” he said. “What does he have to do with any of this? He’s been dead forever.”

  Carryn wasn’t sure she should guess. She didn’t understand how it would be possible that Alurn Telaerin was held there, but it made sense if he was and that was why they sent Dynan. She didn’t want to believe it either since having the two of them together just made the world that much more fragile. She realized this was information being withheld from her, and didn’t know why.

  “I...”

  “Don’t know?” Dain said. “Like I said.”

  The wall took his attention again, and took her mind off things she didn’t want to think about. He was getting better at it, holding his concentration while he did other things like accuse her of being clueless. This time, it took some effort for him to make the advancement stop.

  She wondered as she watched him what made him so angry all the time, not over this situation, but in general. Her vision blurred and she was shown Dain as a young child of five, walking behind the bier of his mother with Dynan right beside him, deep into the tombs under the Palace for her burial. The pain of that moment struck her, but while Carryn wondered if this was an answer to the question, the vision shifted to the present. The King stood outside in the glare of lights with the Lord Chancellor telling him that Dain was at the Temple.

  “Oh...that’s...not...” Carryn blinked in the dull light, the stone wall returning into focus, replacing candle flame and flowers. “That’s not good.”

  “What are you muttering about?” Dain said, and before she could stop him from reading these thoughts, he had them all.