Valdemar 06 - [Exile 01] - Exile’s Honor (33 page)

The Temple itself, though modest in size, did not skimp on illumination. In fact, it showed itself to be a most hospitable neighbor; at the gates of the forecourt, directly under the two large oil torches, were benches that were, in nearly every kind of weather but rain or snow, occupied by one or more of the neighbors taking advantage of the “free” lighting to read by. The forecourt was illuminated by six more torches, and there were benches beneath them as well, although normally only a member of the temple congregation was likely to venture in there to read. Or socialize; Henrick encouraged people to feel as if the temple was an extension of their household, and there were plenty who lived tightly packed into a couple of rooms with their entire family who were happy to use the space in good weather. The forecourt was a good place for meeting friends, taking very small children to play, or just to get away from the rest of one's family.

They weren't uncomfortable benches either; of wood rather than stone (though wooden benches would have been more in keeping with Karsite custom anyway) and constructed with a subtle curve that welcomed a sitter. They glistened wetly in the rain, like great, sleek river beasts looming under the torches that had been extinguished by the first of the downpour. With the torches out, the only illumination came from two lamps on either side of the door of the temple itself. That wasn't a lot, and Alberich cursed the invisible bumps and cobbles that made for unsteady and slightly slippery footing.

He pulled open the wooden door and slipped quietly inside, trying not to disturb anyone who might be there. But the place was empty, holding nothing more but the Presence Flame on the altar, and the sharp scent of the oils used to polish the wooden interior. The aroma sent a shiver and a pang of homesickness over him. All Temples of Vkandis had this scent, since (except for the Great Temple in Throne City), all Temples of Vkandis were made of wood. Polishing some of that wood had been one of his tasks as a child. . . .

Not that his old priest had any notion of taking him in as a novice. It was only too clear from the very beginning that Alberich had no vocation, and at any rate,
he
would not have lasted five marks in the cutthroat game of politics that most Sunpriests played.

But the scent brought back memories of his childhood, pleasant ones, in fact, which would have surprised people had they known it.

Well—not his four agents. Thanks to his memories, they now knew what a Sunpriest
should
be like. A little stern, perhaps, but
not
unforgiving; a truly upright person.

Geri came in after Alberich let the door fall closed again, and it did so with a hollow
thud.
The priest—for Gerichen was a full Sunpriest now, just as Alberich was a full Herald—peered toward the shadows enshrouding the door, and made out at least the basic form enshrouded by a rain-cape. “What can I do for you, my s—” Geri began, as Alberich threw back the hood of his cape and stepped forward so that Geri could see
who
it was.

“Don't call me your son, Geri,” he admonished in Karsite, “You're nowhere near old enough to be my father.”

“Keep coming at me out of the dark like that, and my hair will soon be white enough to pass for your father,” Geri replied. “Of all people, you were the last I would have expected to see tonight.”

“A mutual friend suggested that I don't come visit nearly enough.” Alberich felt himself relaxing in the familiar surroundings that said
safe haven
to his younger self, no matter what had happened to him later at the hands of Sunpriests.

“Ah?” Geri raised an eyebrow, and then a hand. “Well, in that case, since this is a social call, shall we take this to my quarters?”

“Lead on.” Alberich came up the aisle toward the altar. The sanctuary, the entire temple in fact, was a harmonious construction of carved and shaped wood, from the vaulted roof to the parquetry floor. The bench pews were finished with finials carved in the shape of a torch flame, and the Sun-In-Glory was inlaid in very subtle parquetry behind the altar. The several woods used to create it were of shades so near in color that you had to
look
for the pattern, and know what you were looking for, in order to see it. More patterns, geometric this time, were inlaid in the backs of the bench pews, in the floor, in the altar itself—and these were anything but subtle. Every color of wood possible had been used here, and Alberich reckoned that the artisan in question was either now a very wealthy man, or else was a devoted member of the congregation doing it for the glory of the One God, for it was quality work, and wouldn't have come cheaply.

Geri led him in past the altar and the door behind the altar itself. This was a kind of robing room, with vestments hung up all over the walls. A door in the opposite wall led to the priests' quarters.

“Here,” Geri said, motioning him into a tiny kitchen. “It's warmer in here than anyplace else. Have a seat; Henrick's asleep, but don't worry about waking him. He could sleep through a war and a tempest combined. Do you want anything to drink? Beer? Tea?”

“Tea, please,” Alberich replied, and watched with interest as Geri moved efficiently about the tiny kitchen, heating water in the pot over the hearth and getting mugs for both of them. “I don't know why I haven't come here before, instead of making you come up the hill.”

He said that, because the kitchen
smelled
right. Those were Karsite spices he could taste faintly in the air, and a uniquely Karsite black tea that was steeping in that kettle. There were sausages hanging up in the corner of the hearth—both for further smoking and because the smoke kept insects away—sausages Alberich would bet tasted like the ones from the inn where he'd grown up.

“So what is on your mind?” Geri asked.

“A great many things,” Alberich replied, now fully relaxed, with Geri's good tea on his tongue. “Tell something, though. What do you think about Myste?”

“I like her, but she's deceptive. I don't mean that she lies, I mean that her appearance is deceiving. She looks and sounds harmless, but she's a hunter,” Geri said instantly. “She won't let anything stand in her way once she's on a scent. Though I'm not sure what quarry she's stalking. Probably a lot of things, one of them being answers.”

“Ah, but to what questions?” Alberich replied.

“She's stalking those, too. Why do you ask?” Geri responded curiously.

“I'm not sure. Now that I'm not having to browbeat her into training properly, and she's a full Herald
and
Elcarth's Second, we're peers, so we're no longer in conflict with one another; she intrigues me, I suppose. It must be that instinct, one hunter recognizing another. She's the one who sent me here tonight, in fact.” He took a sip of tea and savored the flavor. It was the
right
flavor, the one from his childhood although the flavor from his childhood was a diluted version of this. “I'm hunting answers myself.”

Geri regarded him with a somber gaze. “You, of all people, ought to know that you aren't going to find many of those
here.
Questions, certainly, but precious few answers. Ours is a
faith,
Alberich, not a map or a guide, and certainly not a set of certitudes. At least, that is the way it should be—”

“Not what it has become.” He said that sadly, and once again, he was back in childhood, with that kind, yet stern priest, who tried to show him in ways a child would understand, just what the Sunlord was and was not. “We are the mirror of Valdemar—”

“More like the twin. Or we were, before things disintegrated.” Geri sighed. “I've had this discussion with Henrick, actually.
He
is of the opinion that the long slide began with a will to power. I think it's more complicated than that. I think that the priesthood was corrupted by the congregation.”

Alberich blinked. “How, exactly?”

“The laity wanted absolutes, answers, and the priesthood finally elected to
give
them answers, the simpler the better,” Geri replied. “The Writ took second place to the Rule, and a poor second at that. The answers took away all uncertainty, and what is more, took away the need to think.”

Alberich frowned; not for nothing had he spent so much of his childhood under the tutelage of a priest who knew—and lived—the old ways. “Above all, the Writ demands that a man—or a woman, for that matter—learn how to think.”

Geri nodded. “You see? The
old
ways require that each person come to the Sunlord having thought through everything for himself. The current Rule requires that men become sheep, herded in one direction, following one path, pastured in one field, ever and always, so will it be.”

“Sheep.” It occurred to Alberich that it was probably no coincidence that the Sunpriests of Karse had taken to calling their congregations by the name of “flock.”

“Sheep don't
have
to think for themselves, do they?” Geri made a face. “The Sunlord was reshaped from the Unknowable into the remote but predictable Patriarch, from the Whirlwind to the windmill that grinds—exceedingly small. Do this—you are gathered unto His bosom. Do that—you are cast into the outermost hells.” Geri shook his head. “Answers are terribly seductive. The simpler they are, the more seductive they become.”

Alberich turned that over in his mind, and found it certainly matched some of his own experience. “But that isn't the whole of it,” he objected.

“Of course not. I just suggest that
this
was where the corruption started,” Geri replied. “
Then
came the power, power that came from giving people what they wanted instead of what they
needed,
and power is just as seductive and even more addictive than any drug. Now—I don't know, Alberich. I don't know how it can be fixed. Or even if it can. It would take the Sunlord Himself in manifestation, perhaps. And someone as the Son of the Sun who is willing to hold to the hard course and be disliked, even hated.”

“And loved.”

“And loved,” Geri agreed. “At one and the same time, and probably by the same people. Because when you demand that each situation be considered separately, and not responded to with the predigested Answer, you are always going to anger
someone
since you're always going to disagree with someone. Probably even someone who agreed with you the last time, and now takes this new response as a betrayal.”

Alberich smiled sourly. “It would take the Sunlord Himself to protect someone like that.”

“I fear so, and I am very, very, glad it isn't me.” Geri drained his cup and poured himself another, then smiled. “So, since I am
not
going to give you any answers, what can I do for you?”

“Give me an opinion.” He outlined, as best he could, what he was doing with his four putative agents. “They have seen the very best that Karse is, in the form of Father Kentroch, my protector and teacher, and if I'm reading them correctly, they have warmed to him just as I did, and more importantly, responded to his ideas of responsibility and honor. We're just about up to the point where I first learned I had a witch-power; I suppose each of them will have a similar experience, but the witch-power will be his or her own Gift in real life.”

“If you're wondering if you have somehow betrayed your vow to protect the people of Karse, let me tell you now that both Henrick and I are
positive
you are doing nothing of the sort,” Geri said firmly. “If anything, you are going to put four more protectors in place, just as you had hoped. Did you know that all four of them have been coming down here for practice in the language? Or so they say.”

Alberich shook his head, surprised.

“Well, they have—and what Henrick and I figured out after the first two visits was that they didn't want lessons in Karsite—their accents are impeccable, by the way—but an understanding of how
our
version of the Sunlord differs from what they're going to encounter in Karse.”

Something about the way he said that made Alberich stare at him. “Oh, no—” he said, feeling his heart sink. “Please do not tell me that they want to convert.”

“We wouldn't accept them as they are now if they did,” Geri said with a laugh. “No, actually, I think they're integrating their two personae;
then
once they know how things are now, they'll react as a Karsite who was brought up in the old ways would.”

Alberich felt a profound relief. The last, the
very
last thing he had wanted to do was to change anyone's religion. “That's sensible. Geri—” he hesitated.

Only now did Kantor interject something.
:Geri is your priest. This is surely a question for your priest.:

“I'm torn,” he said at last. “It feels as if there must be something more I can do, for Valdemar. Valdemar has given me so much—what should I be doing in return?”

Geri considered that question carefully. “Alberich, my friend, it is also my duty to tell you things that are true. You
are
doing as much as any other Herald; someone has to be helping to keep the peace here in Haven, and you are doing that. You still serve as Selenay's bodyguard, and thus free someone else to go South. And in case you were wondering if you should offer your military expertise—no.”

“No?” That surprised him. “But—my training—”

“One of the things that is true is that you are
not
a great general. Not yet, anyway. Valdemar has great generals, and it doesn't need you in that capacity.” Geri gave him a look shaded with pity and understanding.

“Ah.” He felt deflated. But—well—