Carol Berg - THE SOUL WEAVER

Just as we were ready to step from the passage, someone came up the stairs from the council chamber. “… called in every commander for new orders,” said a male voice. “It’s going to be all or nothing, I think. Ce’Aret is about crazy with it. I heard her tell Preceptor Mem’Tara that” - the voice dropped to a whisper as the speaker stepped into the echoing foyer - “he’s gone off his head since his lady died. He can’t grieve for her. He can’t follow the Way.”

“It’s as Men’Thor says,” said a much older man, wheezing slightly. “It’s no good when we get mixed up with mundanes. They’re not like us.”

We held back in the dim passageway. The unseen speakers could be no more than twenty paces from us.

“When the Prince first came back from Zhev’Na, all of us in Terrison could see how he followed the Way. So much hardship… so much pain and grief… but it had made him stronger… kinder… and such power… Just to watch him work a healing filled my heart with peace. It’s what made me come to serve him here, so maybe I could learn how it was done.”

“It ate away at him, though,” said the second man, “the other world… the woman… the boy that was snatched by the Lords and rescued. I’ve heard he keeps traveling across the Bridge to that place. The Bridge wasn’t meant to be crossed. Who knows what harm might come from such doings?”

“But - ”

“Hsst! Someone comes.”

A tall, large-boned woman with a long dark braid strode past not five paces from me, emerging from the very stair that was my goal. “F’Lyr! Kry’Star!”

“Yes, Preceptor?” Two men in light blue robes stepped into view at the top of the Chamber steps.

So the woman was Mem’Tara, the Alchemist Karon had named the newest Preceptor. I could see only her back. She wore a dark green robe of the formal style that the Dar’Nethi Preceptors wore on solemn occasions, draped gracefully about her large frame and belted with a silken cord.

“Please send word to Men’Thor that his steward may inspect the residence on the day after tomorrow. The Prince wants everything in Master Exeget’s library moved to the storage room nearest his apartments in the palace. Bareil will know where to put it all. Beyond that, my lord says that everything in Exeget’s workroom and apartments can be burned for all he cares.”

“Yes, ma’am. As you say. Is the Prince coming down to speak with Ce’Aret? She awaits him in the council chamber.”

“The Prince has already returned to the palace. He said” - the tall woman hesitated - “to inform Ce’Aret he has nothing to say to her at present. The Preceptorate convenes at sixth hour, and she may voice her opinions then.” Shaking her head, she added, “Offer my apologies to Preceptor Ce’Aret.”

The two men bowed again, and the older one followed Mem’Tara out of my sight in the direction of the front door. The younger man adjusted his robes and hurried down the wide marble steps.

I peeked carefully from my hiding place, whispering over my shoulder to Bareil. “No one there.” Only the mask of the god Vasrin that hung high over the downward stair, the two perfect faces serenely unaware of the apprehension choking the city.

We hurried around the corner and up the stairs. Though the first and second floors of the Precept House were quiet at the moment, they looked well used. Open doors gave glimpses of furnishings and rugs. Closed doors were well polished and marked with symbols I didn’t know. Books were stacked on narrow tables that lined the passages, alongside carafes and teapots, rolled maps and pens and inkwells. These rooms would be the studies and workrooms of the Preceptors and those who worked for them overseeing the training and practice of sorcery throughout Gondai.

At the second landing, Bareil pressed my arm, pointed to the first door in the passage, and then motioned me to continue upward. The Dulcé guided Roxanne through the door and closed it behind her. He snatched a book from one of the tables and leaned casually against the door, ready to watch the stair behind me.

I tiptoed around the corner, up the last stair, and down the passage. The wood floor of the third-level passage was thick with dust, unmarked by footprints. The dim sunlight from a grimy round window at the far end of the passage revealed no furnishings but a scuffed leather trunk shoved to one side, its brass fittings tarnished to the color of iron, and two broken chairs, shoved into one corner. Open doors revealed a series of small, unfurnished rooms. Closed doors were plain and unmarked. Storage rooms and student rooms, Bareil had said.

The last door on the right appeared to have been attacked by an army of small boys. Dents, gouges, and scorch marks marred its plain surface. A closer look revealed the traces of a large, flamboyant V that had been boldly incised into the door panel and then painstakingly scraped away.

Carefully I pressed the latch and swung the door inward. Unlike the other rooms I had glimpsed off this passage, this chamber was large and bright. Its furnishings were simple - little more than bed, table, two chairs, well stocked bookshelf, and a patterned rug of green and yellow. But its grace was a ceiling-high window that overlooked a sparkling lake surrounded by green hills, a living landscape that, as it happened, existed nowhere near this particular room… this sorcerer’s room. Ven’Dar stood gazing out of the magical window, his hand stroking his short beard. The afternoon light bathed him in a golden glow, restoring his graying hair to its youthful coloring. He did not move when I stepped into the room.

“Master Ven’Dar,” I said.

He jerked and spun about. “Lady Seriana! What are you doing here? How did you find me?”

“A friend’s surmise.”

“Bareil… He shouldn’t have. You ought to be at the palace.”

I closed the door behind me and walked as far as the patterned rug. “Why should I? Explain it to me.”

He turned to the window again. “You haven’t spoken with him?”

“Not since he told me to run from Calle Rein and hide. I don’t even know from what or whom I was hiding.”

“The Prince had informed Men’Thor and Radele that he would meet with his son on the third day from my ‘death.’ The two of them came to the caves, hoping to meet with him as soon as the rite was completed. To ensure his resolve had not wavered, of course. The Prince managed to evade them when he set out after you, but he commanded Bareil to leave the caves at the expected time and reveal his destination. He could not give the Preceptorate reason to doubt either his loyalty or his intent. Not until he knew more. He just didn’t expect them to catch up with him so quickly.”

“What have they done with Gerick? What’s Karon’s plan?”

“My lady, I - ” Ven’Dar had been so much at peace, so sure of himself in his tower and in the Caves of Laennara, but now his quiet was the uneasy stillness of a summer afternoon with thunderheads looming black on the horizon. He tugged at his beard, and his gaze flicked from me to the window and back again. “Your son is in the palace. Many years ago a cell was built there for Dar’Nethi who must be held… powerless.”

“He is imprisoned, then.”

With a slight movement of shoulder and hand, Ven’Dar acknowledged it.

“What’s to happen to him? I know Karon was here not an hour past. What did he say?”

Ven’Dar grimaced. “I can tell you nothing more.”

“You cannot or will not?”

He shook his head and pointed to a chair. “Sit down with me. We’ll have a glass of wine and talk for a while. Perhaps I can help you understand.”

I remained standing. “Gerick is my son. I have a right to know what’s going to happen to him.”