Chosen of the Gods

gaze over the approaching party, and his face reddened to match his beard when he saw the hierarchs and Lord Holger. Finally, as the group halted before the dais, his eyes settled on Beldyn. Cathan shivered. He had never seen hate so intense, so unreasoning.

“So,” the Kingpriest sneered, “you’re the whelp who plots to steal my throne.”

The Knights and bandits muttered at this, but Beldyn held up a hand, stilling their noise. On his brow the Miceram blazed a bright light. Next to it, Kurnos’s tiara seemed but a trinket. When he smiled, it was as though his blazing eyes could cut steel.

“I am the Lightbringer,” he said, the crystal dome ringing with his voice. “I wear the Crown of Power, lost long ago. The god has chosen me to rule.”

Kurnos frowned, then barked a derisive laugh. “Idiot boy. I am Paladine’s voice upon Krynn.”

“Blasphemer!” Beldyn snapped, his face suddenly becoming a terrible mask of rage. “You say such a thing, you who used dark magic to murder Lady Ilista and tried to kill me as well?”

The hierarchs started, glancing at one another in shock. The Kingpriest stiffened, the color draining from his face.

“I did it for the good of the empire,” Kurnos muttered.

“No. You did it for yourself.”

For more than a minute, silence reigned within the hall. Cathan held his breath, waiting-for what, he didn’t know. Finally, Beldyn spoke again in granite tones.

“Uncrown, Usurper. Leave my throne, or I will drag you from it.”

Kurnos sat still. Muscles jumped in his face, and the fingers of his right hand worked restlessly, toying with a ring on his left mounted with a huge emerald. Finally, with a shuddering sigh, the Kingpriest rose to his feet. Bowing his head, he stepped away from the throne, lifted the sapphire tiara from his head, and set it on a golden armrest. His eyes glistening, Kurnos stepped off the dais’s highest stair.

“Very well,” he said. “The empire is yours, Lightbringer. I would ask one thing of you, though, before your men take me.”

Beldyn nodded. “Speak.”

“I ask for mercy,” the Kingpriest said. “I have sinned. Absolve me, Beldinas.”

Gasps echoed through the hall as all eyes turned toward Beldyn. For a moment his brows knitted as though he might refuse, but then the Lightbringer spread his hands.

“So be it,” he said. “Bridud.”

Approach.

Smiling, Kurnos started down the stairs. At Beldyn’s gesture, Cathan moved to meet him and searched him for weapons. He was loath to touch the false Kingpriest, but he did so and not gently, grabbing Kurnos’s arms and legs, then stripping off his jeweled breastplate and checking beneath. He was sure he would find a dagger somewhere among the man’s vestments, but even though he searched a second time, he found nothing.

“Well?” Beldyn asked.

Cathan hesitated, uncertain, every instinct telling him something was wrong. There was something in Kurnos’s eyes that troubled him-a hidden smile, lurking deep beneath the mad sheen. Finally, though, he stepped back.

“He is unarmed, Holiness.”

Smiling, Beldyn beckoned Kurnos to him.

Mistrust simmered in Cathan’s breast as the Kingpriest stepped forward and knelt before the Lightbringer. Slowly, Kurnos bowed his head. He twisted the ring on his finger again, Cathan noticed, moving the emerald around and around in curious fashion.

“Usas farno,” Beldyn intoned, his eyes shining as he signed the triangle, “tas adolam aftongas?”

Child of the god, dost thou forswear thine evil?

Kurnos took a deep breath, let it out. “Aftongo,” he murmured.

Around and around the emerald went. Around and around…

“Tas scolfas firougos, tenfin ourfas?”

Wilt thou repent thy misdeeds, as long as thou livest?

“Firougo.”

Cathan’s eyes locked on the emerald. There was something wrong about it, a strange flashing in its depths. Like lightning, he thought, his heart lurching within his breast as Beldyn reached out and laid his hand on the Kingpriest’s head, speaking the rite of absolution.

Kurnos brought up his hand, pointing the ring at the Lightbringer’s heart. “Ashakai,” he said.

Cathan surged forward with a shout.

Beldyn’s eyes widened.

Lightning, green and blinding bright, flared from the emerald. Thunder roared, filling the hall.

The next thing Cathan knew he was lying on the ground, with Kurnos beneath him. The tiles were smeared red where the Kingpriest’s head lay crooked-unconscious, but not yet dead. The stink of ozone filled the air, and with it the sickly smell of charred flesh. Terror seizing him, Cathan rolled off Kurnos and looked up, expecting the worst.

The Lightbringer was unhurt.

The pain hit, hot and sharp. Cathan looked down and saw the wound, his leather breastplate and the padding beneath that had burnt away, the flesh beneath it seething red and black, smoke curling from his side.

It seemed everyone started shouting at once. Men ran forward, seizing Kurnos and hauling him away. He heard Holger barking orders, saw Tavarre dashing toward him, his scarred face twisting as he fell to his knees to try to help. He ignored them all, staring at Beldyn. The Lightbringer looked back, his face white, horror staining his diamond-bright gaze. Suddenly the regal figure was gone, and he was a young monk once more.

“Holiness,” Cathan said thickly. There was a warm, iron-tasting wetness in his mouth. Blood, some distant part of his mind said. “Are you all right?”

Stunned, the Lightbringer didn’t answer.

“Beldyn!” Tavarre shouted, cradling Cathan’s head in his hands. “Get over here and heal him, damn it!”

Cathan smiled. “It’s all right,” he whispered. “Actually, I feel fine.”

Letting out his breath, he died.

Chapter Thirty-One

A thousand blasphemies whirled through Tavarre’s mind as he stared at Cathan’s lifeless face. The lad’s breast had stilled, his gaze fixed, staring blindly at the crystal dome above. Cathan was gone.

Stung with tears, the baron closed those sightless eyes, then laid Cathan on the floor, smoke still curling from where the magical lightning had struck him. The wound was ghastly. Tavarre took the time to cover it with Cathan’s hands, folding them on top of the horrible sight. Drawing a shuddering breath, he looked up at the others.

Everyone else-the hierarchs, his men, even Lord Holger- was too aghast to move or speak. Their eyes showed white, their mouths hung open. Among them, the Lightbringer too was aghast. His glow seemed to dim as he realized what had happened.

“He saved me,” Beldyn said, his brow furrowing as if he didn’t understand. “He saved my life…”

You let him die! Tavarre wanted to scream. You had the power to heal him and you did nothing! He wanted to smash the basilica’s dome, tear down the Temple stone by stone. He wanted to pull Paladine down from the heavens and beat him blue.

Tavarre rose, twisted, and stalked to where Kurnos lay. The Kingpriest was stirring now, moaning in pain. The blow against the floor had rattled his wits, but it hadn’t killed him. Another injustice, there. Snarling, Tavarre yanked his sword from its scabbard. The hall rang with the scrape of steel as he raised it above the groaning figure.