'Enjoy your damnation, my friends.' Hrathen whispered. then motioned for the guards to shut the gate.
'I really shouldn't be doing this. you know,' the captain said. 'Once a man is thrown into Elantris.'
'Jaddeth rewards those who obey Him, Captain,' Hrathen said. 'Often at the hands of His servants.'
The captain's eyes brightened. and Hrathen was suddenly very grateful he had begun bribing the man. 'Where are the rest of your men, Captain?' 'Protecting the new king.' the captain said proudly.
'New king?' Hrathen asked.
'You've missed a lot, my lord. Lord Telrii rules in Arelon now-or. at least. he will as soon as Iadon's funeral is over.'
Weakened as he was, Hrathen could only stand in shock. Iadon dead? Telrii seizing control? How could five days bring about such drastic events?
'Come,' Hrathen said firmly. 'You can explain it to me on the way to the chapel.'
The crowds gathered around him as he walked; the captain owned no carriage, and Hrathen didn't want to bother waiting for one. For the moment. the exhilaration of a pIan fulfilled was enough to keep him moving.
The crowds helped as well. As news spread, the peopIe-servants, merchants, and nobles alike came to stare at the recovered Elantrian. All parted before him. regarding him with looks that ranged from stunned to worshipful, some reaching out to touch his Elantrian robe in awe.
The trip was crowded, but uneventful-except for one moment when he looked down a side street and recognized the Teoish princess's head poking out of a carriage window. In that moment, Hrathen felt a sense of fulfillment that rivaled the day he had become a full gyorn. His healing wasn't just unexpected, it was unfathomable. There was no way Sarene could have planned for it. For once, Hrathen had total and complete advantage.
When he reached the chapel, Hrathen turned to the mass of people with raised hands. His clothing was still stained, but he held himself as if to make the grime a badge of pride. The dirt signaled his suffering, proving that he had traveled to the very pit of damnation and returned with his soul intact.
'People of Arelon!' he yelled. 'Know ye this day who is Master! Let your hearts and souls be guided by the religion which can offer evidence of divine support. Lord Jaddeth is the only God in Sycla. If you need proof of this, look at my hands that are clean from rot, my face that is pure and unblemished. and my scalp rough with stubble. Lord Jaddeth tested me, and as I relied on Him, He blessed me. I have been healed!'
He lowered his hands and the crowd roared their approval. Many had probably doubted after Hrathen's apparent fall, but they would return with renewed dedication. The converts he made now would be stronger than any that had come before.
Hrathen entered the chapel, and the people remained outside. Hrathen walked with increasing fatigue, the energy of the moment finally giving way to five days' worth of strain. He flopped to his knees before the altar, bowing his head in sincere prayer.
It didn't bother him that the miracle was an effect of Forton's potionHrathen had found that most supposed miracles were either natural or the result of human intervention. Jaddeth was behind them, as He was behind all things, using natural phenomena to increase the faith of man.
Hrathen raised praises to God for giving him the capacity to think of the plan, the means to execute it, and the climate to make it succeed. The captain's arrival had certainly been a result of divine will. That the man would leave Telrii's camp just when Hrathen needed him, and that he would hear Hrathen yelling through the thick wood. was simply too much to be a coincidence. Jaddeth might not have 'cursed' Hrathen with the Shaod. but He had certainly been behind the plan's success.
Drained, Hrathen finished his prayer and lurched to his feet. As he did so, he heard a chapel door open behind him. When he turned, Dilaf stood behind him. Hrathen sighed. This was a confrontation he had hoped to avoid until he'd had some rest.
Dilaf, however, fell to his knees before Hrathen. 'My hroden,' he whispered. Hrathen blinked in surprise. 'Yes, Arteth?'
'I doubted you, my hroden,' Dilaf confessed. 'I thought Lord Jaddeth had cursed you for incompetence. Now I see that your faith is much stronger than I realized. I know why you were chosen to hold the position of gyorn.'
'Your apology is accepted, Arteth, Hrathen said, trying to keep the fatigue from his voice. 'All men question in times of trial-the days following my exile must have been difficult for you and the other priests.'
'We should have had more faith.'
'Learn from these events then, Arteth, and next time do not allow yourself to doubt. You may go.'
Dilaf moved to leave. As the man rose, Hrathen studied his eyes. There was respect there, but not as much penitence as the arteth was trying to show. He looked more confused than anything; he was amazed and unsettled, but he was not pleased. The battle was not over yet.
Too tired to worry about Dilaf for the moment, Hrathen stumbled back to his quarters and pulled open the door. His possessions were piled in one corner of the room, as if waiting to be hauled away for disposal. Suddenly apprehensive, Hrathen rushed to the pile. He found the Seon trunk beneath a pile of clothing: its lock was broken. Hrathen opened the lid with anxious fingers and pulled out the steel box inside. The front of the box was covered with scrapes, scratches, and dents.
Hurriedly, Hrathen opened the box. Several of the levers were bent, and the dial stuck. so he was extremely relieved when he heard the lock click open. He lifted the lid with anxious hands. The Seon floated inside, unperturbed. The three remaining vials of potion lay next to it: two had cracked. leaking their contents into the bottom of the box.
'Did anyone open this box since I last spoke through you?' Hrathen asked. 'No, my lord,' the Seon replied in her melancholy voice.
'Good,' Hrathen said, snapping the lid closed. After that, he drank a careful amount of wine from a flask he got from the pile, then collapsed on the bed and fell asleep.
IT was dark when he awakened. His body was still tired, but he forced himself to rise. A vital piece of his plans could not wait. He summoned a particular priest, who arrived a short time later. The priest, Dothgen, was a tall man with a powerful Fjordell build and muscles that even managed to bulge through his red Derethi robes.
'Yes, my lord?' Dothgen asked.
'You were trained in Rathbore Monastery, were you not, Arteth?' Hrathen asked.
'I was. my lord,' the man responded in a deep voice.
'Good,' Hrathen said, holding up the last vial of potion. 'I have need of your special skills.'
'Who is it for, my lord?' the priest asked. Like every graduate of Rathbore, Dothgen was a trained assassin. He had received far more specialized training than Hrathen had at Ghajan Monastery, the place Hrathen had gone after Dakhor proved too much for him. Only a gyorn or a ragnat, however, could make use of Rathbore-trained priests without Wyrn's permission.
Hrathen smiled.
CHAPTER 37
It struck while Raoden was studying. He didn't hear himself gasp in agonized shock, nor did he feel himself tumble from his seat in a spastic seizure. All he felt was the pain-a sharp torment that dropped upon him suddenly and vengefully. It was like a million tiny insects, each one latching on to his body-inside and out-to eat him alive. Soon he felt as if he had no body-the pain was his body. It was the only sense. the only input, and his screams were the only product.
Then he felt it. It stood like an enormous slick surface, without crack or pocket, at the back of his mind. It pressed demandingly, pounding the pain into every nerve in his body, like a workman driving a spike into the ground. It was vast. It made men, mountains, and worlds seem paltry. It was not evil, or even
sentient. It didn't rage or churn. It was immobile, frozen by its own intense pressure. It wanted to move-to go anywhere, to find any release from the strain. But there was no outlet.
Raoden's vision cleared slowly as the force retreated. He lay on the cold marble floor of the chapel. staring up at the bottom of his table. Two hazy faces hovered above him.
'Stile?' an urgent voice asked, as if from far away. 'Doloken! Raoden, can you hear me?'
