David Farland - The Sum of All Men

King Sylvarresta, the young man, and the young woman crossed the bridge, rode high up in the pine woods toward a mountain's summit. Then the horses raced under the trees.

Huge birds, the color of sky, flitted overhead, calling among the trees, and the wind came fresh and cold. Then they reached a mountaintop and rode down from the wooded hills, to a land where fields of crops checkered the downs.

A castle loomed up from the fields, a tall edifice of gray stone. Horns began blowing on its battlements at Sylvarresta's approach, and a dimly remembered pennant flew—the midnight black with the silver boar.

Men stood on the walls of the castle by the hundreds—men with bows and helms with wide brims, men with spears and hammers. Other men wore surcoats with the image of the green man, and they bore bright shields that shone silver like water.

The men all cheered and waved as they saw him, and King Sylvarresta waved back and cheered himself, until the huge drawbridge on the castle opened, and they entered.

The horses walked up a short, steep hill, hooves clanking over cobblestones. Men shouted joyfully at him and clapped, until an odd look came over their faces.

Some pointed at him, faces pale with emotions he did not recognize—horror, shock, dismay. They shouted, “Dedicate! He's a Dedicate!”

Then his horse stopped in front of a gray building, a small keep. King Sylvarresta sat for a moment watching a reddish-brown lizard, as long as Sylvarresta's finger, sun itself on the stones in the rock garden beside the door. He could not recall having ever seen such a thing, and wondered.

Then, in all the commotion, the lizard raced up the side of the building and over its gray roof. The King knew it was alive and he began shouting and pointing.

The young man behind King Sylvarresta had dismounted, and now he helped Sylvarresta down from his horse.

Together with the young man and the ugly woman, Sylvarresta walked under the eaves of the building, up some stairs. He felt so tired. Walking the stairs hurt his legs, made them stretch uncomfortably. He wanted to rest, but the young man urged him forward, into a room thick with good smells of cooked food, where a warm fire burned.

A pair of dogs thumped their tails as King Sylvarresta approached, so that at first he did not really notice the two dozen men sitting at a table, eating things that smelled good.

Then he looked across the table and gasped. There sat a tall man, dark-haired and beautiful, with wide-set blue eyes and a square jaw beneath his beard.

Sylvarresta knew the man, knew him better than he knew anything else. A green man. In a green tunic, with a shimmering cape of green samite.

A warm sensation filled King Sylvarresta's heart, an overwhelming joy. He recalled the man's name. “Orden!”

At King Sylvarresta's side, the young man shouted, “Father, if you want this poor man dead, at least have the decency to kill him yourself!”

King Orden half rose from the table, stepped hesitantly forward. He glanced back and forth between Sylvarresta and the young man. His eyes looked pained and angry, and his hand went to the hilt of his short sword. He struggled with it, as if he could not draw it, brought it halfway out.

Then in rage he slammed the sword back into its sheath and staggered forward, threw his arms around Sylvarresta's shoulders, and began to weep.

King Orden sobbed, “My friend, my friend, what have we done? Forgive me. Forgive me!”

Sylvarresta let King Orden hold him for a long time, wondering what was wrong, until his friend's sobbing lessened.

Gaborn had never seen his father cry. No tears of sadness escaped him when Gaborn's mother and infant brother were murdered. No tears of joy had ever glistened in King's Orden's eye when proposing a toast.

Now, as Gaborn's father hugged king Sylvarresta, he wept tears of joy and relief.

King Mendellas Draken Orden cried in great racking sobs. Orden's sorrow was such an embarrassing sight that the two dozen lords and dignitaries who had been breakfasting in the room now all took their leave, so that only Iome, King Sylvarresta, three Days, and Gaborn stood in the room.

For the barest moment, Gaborn glanced across the room, saw his Days and felt uncomfortable. He had been without a Days for nearly half a week, and had found it pleasant.

Now he felt like an ox waiting to be yoked. The small fellow nodded politely, and Gaborn knew he would not be left alone again for a while. Another Days in the room was a matronly woman in her forties, a woman with reddish hair going silver. She'd have been Emmadine Ot Laren's Days when the Duchess still lived. Now she nodded a greeting at Iome, perhaps all the formal introduction the woman would ever give, yet with that introduction she spoke volumes: I am assigned to you.

So the Days watched, and recorded.

Gaborn felt grateful that the Days had not had to record how King Orden murdered his best friend in his hour of greatest need. Instead, in some far day when his father died and his chronicles were penned, it would be told how Orden hugged Sylvarresta and sobbed like a child.

How odd, Gaborn thought, that he cries no tears of relief at seeing me.

Sylvarresta let King Orden hug him until he could no longer withstand the power in the King's arms, then tried to pull away. Only then did King Orden grasp Sylvarresta's biceps, feel the lack of muscle there.

“He's lost his own endowments?” Gaborn's father asked.

Iome nodded.

Gaborn added angrily, “They both have. Borenson was at Castle Sylvarresta yesterday. He stayed behind when we left. You sent him to kill them, didn't you?”

Gaborn watched his father's eyes as he considered the accusation. Gaborn had foolishly believed—when Borenson had said that he was under orders to kill Raj Ahten's Dedicates—that he spoke only in general terms. He hadn't imagined that one man alone would be sent to kill those in the Dedicates' Keep at Castle Sylvarresta.

Now his father's expression confirmed it. His father glanced down, but recovered quickly, looking sorrowful instead of guilt-ridden. Gaborn gave his father time to consider the implications. All the Dedicates in Sylvarresta's keep had died. Even if Iome and the King had become vectors for Raj Ahten, now they gave him almost nothing, only their own endowments.

“So,” Gaborn's father asked, “did Raj Ahten leave all his Dedicates behind when he fled Castle Sylvarresta?”

“Almost. He took his vectors—” Gaborn answered. His father raised a brow. “But I managed to get Iome and King Sylvarresta out.”

King Orden titled his head, considering. He must have recognized the struggle Gaborn had gone through. “I—wonder...” He cleared his throat. "...why Borenson would let these two go. I ordered him to do otherwise.”

“I countermanded your order,” Gaborn said.

His father's reaction was so swift, Gaborn had no time to react. His father lashed out and slapped Gaborn's face so hard that when spittle and blood flew from his mouth, Gaborn thought it was a tooth.

“How dare you!” King Orden said. “You may disagree with me, and belittle me, and even second-guess me. But how dare you fight me!”

Rage burned in Orden's eyes.

Then his mouth opened in a little O of grief at what he'd done. He turned away and walked to an archery slot, stood with both hands on the stones of the casement, gazing outside.

“Iome and her father were under my protection, bound by oath,” Gaborn said hastily, realizing that he'd just broken his promise to Borenson. He'd told Borenson that he'd not let his father know that they'd met. Yet, at the moment, Gaborn felt so betrayed he did not much care if he broke his word. “I'd have fought him for them. I told him that I would take the matter up with you.” He hoped these final words might appease his father.