Sacred Fire

floor, they stepped aside and the doors swung soundlessly open. Silence covered the room like a shroud.

Wentha MarSevrin stood in the entrance, Lord Tithian in his gleaming mail beside her. She swept the court with her gaze, an imperious look for one who had been a poor villager in the empire’s borderlands when the Lightbringer healed her. Now, almost forty years later, she looked a queen as she stepped into the Hall.

Three men followed her and Lord Tithian as they crossed the floor. The first two walked on her left: one, darkly handsome and muscular, shirtless in the Lattakayan style; the other, fair-haired and plain, dressed in the robes of a Revered Son of Paladine. The third, walking slightly behind them on the right, wore a scholar’s robes, worn and frayed at the hems. The courtiers paid the others only passing attention; their gazes remained on the Weeping Lady as she stepped onto the mosaic before the dais. Bowing her head, she genuflected toward the throne. None missed that her knee did not quite touch the floor.

“Lady Wentha, beloved of Paladine,” Beldinas declared, his voice like golden bells. “You are welcome back to my Temple. It has been too long.”

“Holiness,” she declared without feeling. “Allow me to present my sons, Rath and Tancred.”

The two young men stepped forward, bowing. “Pilofiro,” they murmured together.

“Ah, yes,” said Beldinas, signing the triangle to the priest. “I know Tancred well, of course … the Patriarch of Falthana speaks highly of you. And Rath-” his gaze turned to the other, whose chest puffed out proudly “-I remember you too, though you were but seven when we met last. You have grown into a fine man.”

“Thank you, Aulforo,” said Wentha’s sons.

Beldinas’s head turned toward the scholar. “But who is your other companion, Efisa? You do not have a third son …?”

Wentha shook her head. “He is not of my family, sire. This is Varen, formerly of the university at Tucuri.”

The scholar shifted uncomfortably as hundreds of eyes, from all over the room, settled on him. “H-Holiness, ” he murmured.

“I have brought him here because he has a tale to tell,” Wentha continued. “One I think you will find interesting to hear.”

Beldinas studied the scholar a moment longer, then nodded.

“Very well, then, Varen. Speak, and let none interrupt until you are finished.”

The courtiers leaned forward, imperceptibly. The scholar licked his lips, the look on his face saying he wanted nothing more than for the floor to split open and swallow him up. It took Varen several tries to find his voice.

“It happened six months ago, at midsummer,” he began.

No one spoke for several minutes after Varen ended his tale. In the silence, the Hall seemed to roar with every quiet cough, every rustle of robes. Many of the elder courtiers’ mouths had dropped open, while the younger ones looked confused. Tithian stared at Varen with wide eyes. Tears coursed down Lady Wentha’s cheeks.

It was impossible to tell what the Kingpriest was thinking or feeling. The holy light obscured him, hid any sign that what the scholar had just told troubled him. He looked down from his throne, one hand stroking his chin. Rath MarSevrin glowered around the room. “Someone say something,” he muttered.

That drew scandalized looks from the courtiers. Quarath stepped forward, a dark line appearing between his brows. “Be still, boy,” he declared. “That is not how to speak in the Lightbringer’s presence.”

“He speaks his mind, and mine,” Lady Wentha snapped. Her voice was cold, but as she turned from the elf to the throne, it became something else: small, pleading, like a child’s. “Holiness, I beg you. I cannot bear this stillness.”

But Beldinas still didn’t answer. Slowly, he pushed himself to his feet. All around the Hall, men and women dropped to their knees. Only Lady Wentha remained standing, staring at him with pain-filled eyes as he signed the triangle over the congregation.

“I must think on this,” he said, the music of his voice muted. “Come to the manse at dusk, Lady-and you as well, Varen. We will sup together, and you will tell me all you know.”

With that he withdrew, down the steps of the dais and back the way he’d come. An acolyte opened the door for him, and he was gone. The courtiers watched him leave, still stunned. Then, the moment the door clicked shut again, they exploded-shouting, arguing, every one of them jostling to get near the Weeping Lady, and the scholar who had located Cathan Twice-Born.

Over the years, Lord Cathan MarSevrin had become a figure of myth, a legend like Huma Dragonbane. Once, he had been Beldinas’s right-hand compatriot, having sworn himself to be the Lightbringer’s protector after Wentha’s miraculous healing. He’d been at the Kingpriest’s side when he made his triumphant entry into the Lordcity, and had saved his life in this very Hall when Kurnos the Deceiver tried to kill him with a magic-poisoned dagger. Instead, Cathan had taken the blade himself, and it had killed him.

But though Cathan had indeed died, right on the blue mosaic before the throne, Beldinas had still saved him. Crying out to the gods-not just entreating them, but commanding-he had worked a wonder that had never happened before, or since. Armed with righteous fury born of grief, the Lightbringer had poured all his power into Cathan and restored his life, making him the Twice-Born.

After his resurrection, Cathan became the greatest hero of the empire. He was the first knight of the Divine Hammer, dubbed by the Kingpriest himself, and helped lead Beldinas’s war against evil. Countless monsters, dark cultists, and black-robed wizards had fallen to him and the sacred order, and in time he became Grand Master of the Hammer. But then something had gone wrong.

It happened during the war against sorcery. At the dawn of that crusade, a surprise attack by demons summoned by a vengeful wizard had led to the slaughter of many knights-and a later assault upon the Kingpriest himself caused many more deaths. In the end, the Twice-Born had led a small army to Losarcum, to assail the Tower of High Sorcery there. But the wizards had had the final say, destroying both the Tower and the city around it to keep its secrets out of the church’s hands. Cathan’s entire force had perished in that final stroke-all save Cathan himself, and Tithian, once his squire. Together they had returned to Istar, and Cathan-ashamed and angry at what had happened to his soldiers-had torn off his Grand Marshal’s tabard, walked out of the Temple, and disappeared.

Until now.

Tithian moved quickly, getting himself between Lady Wentha and the gabbling masses of courtiers. Everyone wanted to know more-where was this cave of people trapped in glass? Why was the Twice-Born there? Why had he stayed out of sight for so long? Tithian gestured to Rath and Tancred, who helped him form a protective ring around their mother and Varen, and together, they made their way away from the chaos of the Hall of Audience.

Ordinarily, a large part of the court attended the evening banquets in the imperial manse’s great dining hall: the hierarchs of the great churches of light, dignitaries from the realms of Solamnia and Kharolis, who followed the Istaran faith, the few nobles who were fortunate enough to have earned a place, and a regular contingent of high- ranking knights. On this day, however, as the sun gilded the city’s rooftops, the company was only seven: Beldinas, Quarath, Lady Wentha and her sons, Tithian, and-sitting in the chair of honor at the Kingpriest’s right hand and looking like he would rather be at the bottom of the Courrain Ocean-the scholar Varen. The scholar ate sparingly, his face coloring every time the Lightbringer glanced his way. His silence drew little note, however; the court followed the Taoli tradition that it was ill-mannered to speak of grave matters during a meal. Course after course was brought of fine, rich fare: fresh shellfish spa drenched in butter and the juices of Maeloon blood-limes; black- veined cheese dusted with ground vallenwood nuts; small pastries called Arathi from Midrath, crammed with minced pheasant and forty different spices.

Finally, as the servants were clearing away the main dish-a roasted haunch of gorgon, infused with black pepper and mead-Varen spoke up.

“There really is little more to tell, Aulforo,” he ventured, bobbing his head toward Beldinas. “I fled the Tears at all speed. Thank Paladine the Dravinishmen were still close, or I would not have survived. As it was, by the time I reached Attrika I was half-dead of heat poisoning. I had to rest for a month in a Mishakite hospice before I could travel again”

“And yet you did not come here,” Quarath noted tersely. “I should think that, bearing such tidings, the Temple would be the first place you stopped.” The scholar looked down, biting his lip as the servants poured moragnac brandy around the table. He downed his drink in a swallow, then shook his