Although I remembered nothing of D’Natheil’s life since I was twelve, Dassine had told me that it had only been a few months since I-D’Natheil, a prince of some twenty-odd years of age-had been sent onto the Bridge a second time, crossing into the mundane world on a mission I could not remember. These people had witnessed my departure. But the details of that journey were embedded in the lost years of one life and buried under twenty missing years of another. Spirits of night… what had happened to me?
My tongue stumbled onward. “I’ve worked hard at improving myself and continue to do so.” Without further word, I moved on to Exeget.
Permit no questioning. Keep silent. Satisfy them. Get rid of them. These commands burst into my head as if I had thought them myself. Concentrate, fool. That command was my own.
“Our hopes and good wishes are with you, my lord Prince”-Madyalar spoke quietly to my back-“and, of course, the wisdom of Vasrin.”
I nodded, hoping I hadn’t offended her.
By an immense act of will I did not flinch when Exeget laid his perfectly manicured hands on mine. I knew he watched for it, hoped for a hint of cowering to demonstrate that he had power over me. For the greater part of the three years I’d spent in his custody, I had devoted my entire being to making sure he never received such a demonstration. I had never feared him, only despised him, but his hands had been heavy. Neither cold nor warm, neither soft nor hard, no roughness or other mark of age marring their smooth perfection. He took great pride in his hands, and had always required a servant to bathe and care for them after he beat me. In those vile years he had claimed that he could allow no one else to take on the onerous task of my discipline, as only a parent or mentor was permitted to chastise a child of my rank. But his apologetic disclaimers had not deceived me. He had enjoyed it immensely.
I confess I left him kneeling longer than the others, not so much to prove I could, but for the simple fact that I didn’t want to touch him again. Perhaps he felt the same. I had scarcely brushed his shoulder when he popped to his feet.
“We rejoice, my lord, in the happy outcome of your journey.” A nice sentiment, belied by his demeanor that expressed little of rejoicing and much of suspicion and arrogance.
I kept my mouth closed and my expression blank.
He spoke as much to the others as to me. “Master Dassine says that your ordeal in the mundane world has been a great strain, requiring a period of withdrawal from your duties, duties you’ve scarcely begun. Will you require ten more years in Dassine’s care before your people have the benefit of your service?”
“I’ll do whatever I think best, Master Exeget,” I said. To speak in calm generalities with a straight face is much easier when one is absolutely ignorant. An advantage in a confrontation such as this. It’s difficult for barbs and subtle insinuations to find their mark when the expected mark is missing.
“Whatever you think best? Please tell us, my lord Prince, what is it you think best? For more than three months we have sought your counsel and have been rudely put off by our brother, Dassine. For ten years before your journey, you failed to seek any counsel but that of this same man, and we were not allowed to speak with you unsupervised. You had no experience before you left us and have had no experience since your return. What assurance can you give us that your ideas of what is best have any foundation in reality? Why does Dassine keep you hidden?”
Ce’Aret and Ustele had not moved a step, yet I felt them close ranks, flanking Exeget like guardian spirits. “The Heir of D’Arnath is the servant of his people, yet he does not even know his people, nor do his people know him,” croaked Ce’Aret. “As Madyalar says, you are much changed. I wish to understand it.”
“Perhaps Dassine has hidden him all these years so we would not know him,” said Ustele. “Can any of us say that this is, in fact, D’Natheil?”
The room fell deadly silent. Expectant. I knew I should say something. What sovereign would permit such an accusation? But my head felt like porridge, leaving me unable to summon a single word of sense.
“Master Ustele, what slander do you speak?” To my astonishment it was Exeget who took up my cause, donning the very mantle of reason. “Who else would this be but our own Prince? True, his body has aged, and his manner is not so… limited… as it was. But he has fought a battle on the Bridge-done this healing that has preserved and strengthened the Bridge and given us hope. Such enchantments could surely change a man.”
“As a boy he was touched by the Lords. We all knew it,” snapped Ce’Aret. “Never did this prince demonstrate any gift of his family. He killed without mercy and did not care if the victim was Zhid or Dar’Nethi or Dulcé.”
“And where was it the beastly child finally found some affinity?” asked Ustele. “With our brother Dassine who had just returned from three years-three years!-in Zhev’Na. Dassine, the only Dar’Nethi ever to return from captivity. Dassine, who then proclaimed wild theories that contradicted all our beliefs, saying that our determination to fight the Lords and their minions was somehow misguided, that training our Prince in warfare was an ‘aberration.’ And when he could not convince us to follow his way of weakness, of surrender, he took the Heir and hid him away. What more perfect plot could there be than for the Lords of Zhev’Na to corrupt our Prince?”
The others talked and shouted all at once: denials, affirmations, and accusations of treason.
“Impossible!” shouted Exeget, silencing them all. “D’Natheil has done that for which we have prayed for eight hundred years! The Gates are open. He has walked the Bridge, healed the damage done by the Lords and the chaos of the Breach. We have felt life flow between the worlds. He has foiled the plots of the Lords that would have destroyed the Bridge. All we ask is to understand it. His duty is to lead us to the final defeat of the Lords of Zhev’Na and their demon Zhid. We only want to hear how and when that will come about.”
I couldn’t understand why Exeget was defending me. Their arguments had me half convinced.
“We’ve all heard the rumors of what passed in the other world,” said Ce’Aret. “That D’Natheil allowed three Zhid warriors to live, claiming to have returned their souls to them. That the only ones slain in that battle were the loyal Dulcé Baglos and a noble swordsman from the other world. Has anyone seen these Zhid who were healed? Was D’Natheil successful? Perhaps the victory at the Gate resulted from the sacrifice of another of the Exiles and not D’Natheil at all. Perhaps the Prince failed at his real task-his traitorous task-of destroying the Bridge.”
The accusation hung in the air like smoke on a windless day. Gar’Dena’s broad face was colorless, his eyes shocked. “Tell them these things are not true, my lord,” he said softly. Exeget spread his arms wide, waiting for my answer. Madyalar’s face was like stone. Even Y’Dan’s head popped up. They were all waiting…
Permit no questioning. Keep silent. Dassine stood just behind me. Though his fury beat upon my back like the summer sun, he held his tongue. No one spoke aloud. Yet from every one of the Preceptors came a similar pressure, the throbbing power that was so much more than spoken anger or demanding trust, the battering insistence that I speak, that I explain, that I condemn myself with truth or expose myself with lies or justify the faith some held in the blood that filled my veins. These seven were the most powerful of all Dar’Nethi sorcerers. I felt myself crumbling like the wall of a besieged citadel. I had to end it.
“Master Exeget, I’ll not explain myself to you…” I began, wrapping my arms about my chest as if they might keep me from flying apart.
“You see!” said Ce’Aret, shaking her finger at me. “Dassine has made us a tyrant!”
“… until I have completed my time of recovery with Master Dassine. Then I will appear before the Preceptorate to be examined. If you find that I am indeed who I claim to be, and you judge me worthy of my heritage, then I will serve you as I have sworn to do, following the Way of the Dar’Nethi as holy Vasrin has freed us to do. If you find me wanting in truth or honor or ability, then you may do with me as you will.”