Closing my eyes, I sat down in my desk chair. “You are telling me that a High King has never died during the winter before? That seems hardly possible. The winter is called the dying time for a reason, Horace.”
“At least not in his first year as Sept Son,” he protested weakly.
Leaning forward, I looked up into Horace’s thin face. “I am leaving to attend the High King’s deathbed, Horace. If I do not do this, there will be no next year for me as Sept Son. Mesitas will flay me raw and then lay me on the altar before the goddess as a sacrifice, and the lower kings will cheer him as he does it. This is my final word. I am leaving and I am leaving now.” Buckling the flap of my watertight document pouch, I rose. “Farewell to both of you and pray that the Almighty will bless me and keep me.”
Horace frowned, but he nodded his farewell. Tristan offered a formal salute. “May He guide your steps, Sept Son.”
I recognized his blessing. “Thank you, Tristan. I shall see you both soon.” Then before either of them could offer another word of comment, I left the office for my quarters after leaving a message for Renato to meet me there instead. Tristan and Horace were only the first in the long line of differing opinions I would receive if I waited for Renato in my office. At least this way I would only have to deal with Giles’ complaining until he showed up at the door.
Chapter VIII
Zezilia
“Just a little higher,” Candra called down from the tree house. I concentrated harder and the board lifted two inches. “Now a little to the left.” The board shifted. “Perfect.” The sound of metal striking metal rang out as she pounded one of the nails that Selwyn made us into the wood.
“Hurry up,” I called. It wasn’t that holding the board in place was difficult. She was always quick with the hammer. However, I was eager to get back to our conversation. All afternoon I had been prodding her for information on Ilias, Errol’s elusive and mysterious former student.
Usually, such questions got me nowhere. A family pact to tell me nothing useful about Ilias always stopped me from finding out anything interesting and Selwyn was a tomb, sealed tight about anything to do with his brother. I couldn’t even find out if Ilias was his older or younger brother. It was all extremely frustrating, and I was about to give up until this morning.
Candra and I were working on the tree house as we always did on my days off. The structure was growing. We had a floor, well supported by the branches beneath and strategically placed braces. The walls progressed slowly though. Each board needed to be hoisted from the ground to the floor of the tree house. Then it took both of us to wrestle it into place. Once there, one of us had to manage hammer and nails single-handedly to nail it into position. After the twentieth or so nail dropping into the mud below, Candra lost it.
“Stinking board, ornery nail, and slummy hammer,” she cried and let go of her end of the board. It fell to the floor, cracking my knee on its way down.
“Ouch,” I cried. “What did you do that for?”
“I am sick of this. Nothing stays still. We are going to have to quit because I am not going to keep losing nails like this. I will just have to beg Selwyn to help me tomorrow while you are studying.”
“How could Selwyn help?” I asked as I nursed my throbbing knee. It was cold out, which made the pain worse.
“He could matter lift them for me and then I would have both hands for the hammer and the nail.” She frowned at the board. “It will go much faster.”
Suddenly she smiled. “You are matter lifting now aren’t you?” she asked slyly. “I know you are. Father mentioned it at dinner months ago that you had your first lesson. Lift the boards for me, please, Zez, please.”
The Code of Talents filled my head. One of the first rules for trainees was the limitations on matter lifting. ‘A trainee is only allowed to lift, manipulate, or move matter when his trainer or a talent authorized by the trainer is present. This is for the protection of both the trainee and the non-talented.’
“Please. You can do it can’t you?”
“Yes,” I admitted reluctantly. I hadn’t disobeyed Errol before and I was nervous about it. But it wasn’t disobeying Errol. It was stretching a rule. Candra had grown up around talents. She knew the risks and she could take care of herself. Besides, I had done it perfectly every time in practice.
“Please, Zez. I will give you anything in return.”
That caught my attention. “You will tell me about Ilias? Answer any questions I have?”
She looked uncertain at that. “I promised my father that I wouldn’t talk about him.”
“Well, the code book says I shouldn’t matter lift things without your father here.”
We looked at each other for a long time. Candra’s eyes moved to the board on the deck before us and then to the already placed two at the base of the wall. “Without doing it, this is going to take forever to finish this isn’t it?”
I nodded.
She sighed. “I will do it if you will.”
“Deal,” I agreed.
That was five boards ago. We were working on the second wall and I had found out gobs about Ilias. He was the best tree climber that Candra had ever met, even better than Selwyn. He once sneaked off with Errol’s favorite writing pen and held it captive for ransom for three weeks. Errol finally paid the ransom, which was allowing Candra to go on the yearly camping trip with the trainees. Every time he sang, Eloine got all cow-eyed and drooled. And most important, Ilias was Selwyn’s younger brother.
Now, as I lifted the next board,
