Mercedes Lackey - Exile's Honor

"Powers?" Alberich said, feeling very stupid all of a sudden, as his anger and resentment drained away, leaving nothing behind. "Inconvenient?"

Father Henrick looked as if he had gotten a mouthful of green mead. "Those abilities that you have been taught are witch-powers, and signs of the contamination of demons, are nothing more than—than inborn powers that a child has no more control over than he does over whether or not he will be a great musician, or a great cook, or a great swordsman."

"He doesn't?" Alberich asked, dumbly.

"Of course not," the priest snapped. "And when these powers are something that the Voices find useful, if the child is young enough to be trained, it is whisked into the temple rather than being burned! It is only those whose powers are of no use to the Son of the Sun, or who are too old to be molded into a pleasing shape, that are sent to the Flames!"

Alberich was glad that he was propped up by pillows, else he would have been reeling. The priest looked as if he had plenty more to say, but his assistant placed a cautionary hand on his arm. "Father, enough," the younger man said in Valdemaran. "This poor fellow looks as if you had just stunned him with a club."

In truth, that is exactly what Alberich felt like. "I—" he faltered. "I—had no notion."

"You are not a stupid man, Captain," the old priest said roughly. "And you have a mind young enough to be flexible, if you will it. Try opening it."

He flushed at the rebuke, and felt horribly uncomfortable. This priest reminded him all too clearly of the old priest of his home, a crusty old man who had the respect of everyone in the village, and whose speech was as blunt as his common sense was good. So well was he regarded, despite a short temper and curmudgeonly demeanor, that when a Voice wished to have him replaced by a younger man, the entire village rose up in protest, and the scheme was abandoned.

"But—" he began, in an attempt to explain himself that he knew before he started would be futile.

"But, indeed. You have been given a great gift, Alberich of Karse, a gift that can serve you and our people, an opportunity that will lead—well, I cannot tell where it will lead." The old man glared at him from beneath bushy eyebrows. "There is a reason for all of this, I am sure of it, as sure as I am that it is men, and not the Sunlord, who have made Karse and Valdemar enemies. You say that you want to help our people? Our people are led by frauds and charlatans! Half, if not more, of the Voices are false, and every high-ranking priest is corrupt! And now this happens, a soldier of Karse is Chosen to be a Herald of Valdemar, and I doubt not it is by the will of the Sunlord himself. Does that not seem like the Hand of the Sunlord Himself to you?"

Alberich was covered in confusion. "I cannot tell—"

"Well, then trust that I can," the old man snapped. "This is a gift, an opportunity beyond price. If you piss it away, I shall be most angry with you. And rest assured that when the time comes and you stand before Vkandis' Throne, He will ask you why you threw away the gift He placed in your hands. For the God's sake, man, can't you see your sacred duty when it stares you in the face?"

Faced with that stern face of authority—of legitimate authority—what could he do or say? He tried to wrench his gaze away from the priest's eyes so that he could think—and found that he couldn't. "But I was given no choice —" he tried to protest.

The priest snorted. "Don't be daft," he retorted. "You could have stayed there to die, and you didn't. You made your choice when you sensibly took the rescue that was offered. And as for having your life interfered with, balderdash. If your Companion had never sought you out and that particular Voice hadn't discovered your Gift—the thing you call a witch-power—another would have. Only this time, there would have been no rescue. And what is more, your so-called guilt could have been used to bring others to the Fires, others who were innocent of anything except supporting you."

Talamir was standing very patiently to one side, pretending to pay no attention to what was going on. Although—Alberich had to wonder, given what he'd said about the Companions talking to one another and to him, if he wasn't managing to follow the entire conversation despite having no working knowledge of Karsite.

The priest glared a moment longer, then abruptly, his expression softened. "Lad, you're angry and resentful that your life has been turned upside down; you wouldn't be human if you weren't. You're bitter and in despair at being betrayed; you should be, but be bitter at the right people, not those who want only your welfare. If you're not frightened at being caught up in something you don't understand, I'd be very much surprised, and I'd suspect that one of those blows to your head had addled your wits. Now you think you're utterly alone. Well, you're not."

"I didn't know about you until a moment ago," Alberich began.

The old man shook his head. "That wasn't what I meant. I've been living here for better than forty years, and I've learned a thing or two about Heralds. No—I meant something else entirely. Open your heart—and I mean, really open it—to your Companion, and you'll see what I mean."

Alberich meant to shake his head in denial, but another stern look from the priest killed the gesture before he could make it. "Don't argue," he said. "Don't think of an excuse. Just do it. And while you're at it, open your mind as well as your heart."

The old man rose. "I'll be going now, but if you need me, they know where to find me, or where to send you if you'd prefer, once you're on your feet. For that matter, I'm sure your Companion would have no difficulty finding me wherever I happened to be without you having to ask anyone but him."

With that, he nodded to Talamir and shuffled out, followed by his acolyte. The door closed behind them, and Alberich stifled a sound that was midway between a sigh and a groan.

His sacred duty to join the Heralds, was it?

Hard words, thrown in the face of one who had lived his life by cleaving to duty, sacred or not.

Hard words, spoken by one who had been forced to abandon a potentially better life than anything ahead of Alberich, because he could not reconcile orders with duty. If anyone had a right to be bitter, it was the priest, but there was no bitterness behind that rough-hewn exterior manner. And no duplicity either. Nothing but unvarnished, unadorned truth, as the old man had seen it.

As he sees it —

But with forty years more experience of this place than Alberich had.

He swore under his breath.

"Pardon?" Talamir said. "I didn't quite hear what you said."

Alberich was going to growl "Nothing—" and then changed his mind.

"I said, make a trial of you, I shall," he answered—so brusquely, even rudely, that he was surprised that Talamir didn't take offense.

But the Herald didn't. "Good," he said instead, and moved to follow in the steps of the priest and his helper. But he turned when he got the door opened.

"In that case, there is one thing I should like to ask you to do," he said, with another of those measuring looks. "Before the Healer returns, 1 should like you to open your mind to Kantor. Completely. I think—I hope it will make a difference to you."

He left the room then, without waiting for Alberich's answer.

But then, given that the priest had virtually ordered Alberich to do the same thing, he probably didn't need to wait. He already knew that—eventually, at least—Alberich would make a trial of that, too.

Eventually. In his own time.

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