“They trade in forbidden coinage, in which His Majesty surely has an interest.”
“Only in seeing good silver come out of hoards and into his revenues, ifit were traded, which it is not. The amulets are half at least fraudulent, copper, brother, mere copper, which raises the worth of the copper, but the silver when they do find it is commonly melted and worn for bangles and rings here, as by your long tenure you might know.”
“The king’s law forbids that traffic! As you should know in your tenure in the capital, sir!”
“The late Lord Heryn enforced the king’s law only when the king’s son was in the town to see it, and the king has no interest whatsoever in confiscating trumpery trinkets and piddling rat-charms. Ask where half the Amefin treasury found its metal. There’syour question.”
“This is pointless talk! The issue is the law, brother, however blithely your all too tolerant order may wink at sorcery, both as a concept and a practice!”
“Sir,” Tristen said. “Master Emuin will not countenance sorcery. Nor will these women.”
“Selling charms!”
“Wizardry,” Emuin retorted. “Honest wizardry, which is within the tenets of their faith, recognized by the king and council and perfectly legitimate, however you disapprove it.”
“It’s a thin line,” the patriarch said stiffly, “crossing right over to blackest practice.”
“No, sir,” said Emuin, “it is not. It is not a thin line, it’s a gaping chasm! That’s the very point here, and those women with their little charms work againstsorcery, not for it… as good maintain a rushlight against the darkest night of winter, but there they are, these poor folk, to tend a baby with the colic or drive the rats from a poor man’s store of seed grain. Sorcery destroys. Sorcery corrupts. Sorcery empowers the shadows and a man whether gifted or not is a fool, sir, who seeks to reach into the shadows and gain knowledge. A greater sorcerer is still a fool, who seeks to reach there and bring something across for his own benefit. Greatest of allfools, Hasufin Heltain, who sought to steal himselffrom the shadows and have them all, the living and the dead, in the clutch of his greedy fingers!”
The walls rang with Emuin’s anger, and silence followed it, a deep, troubling silence. Emuin had never been so forward with the truth, and Tristen heard it in a profound distress.
No less so the patriarch, whose face had gone red with anger, then pale with what he had heard.
“And what brings such dangers, but wizardry!”
“The greed of men, of which we have plenty in the world! And, aye, I practiced wizardry in those days, and do now, brother, and shall continue to do, whereby we shall not see another shadow roll down on Amefel, to gobble up the defense of good men and pious. Your Duchess Orien was the one to look to, subtle anddangerous, but ultimately evident to us by her workings, as I assure Your Reverence any sorcery in the lower town would make itself felt in short order.”
“You say so. I don’t have your source of confidence, I thank the gods for it.”
“Thank your young Lord Tristen, who stood between you and the fall of this province. Thank those of us who detected sorcery in practice and stopped it! And thank your Lord Tristen and His Majesty, bearing arms against an invasion that would have swept through this province like flood. And yes, thatwas sorcery, on its way to Guelessar and all provinces else. It was that near a thing, this summer, brother, and whether or not you compass it with your philosophy, those selfsame women with their little charms likewise prayed with you, along with the incense that went up from Amefin shrines of every sect, while the Quinaltine sat ignorant on its hill in Guelessar and knew nothing of the threat until it was banished. Youwere a hero among the rest, brother, along with those who took up arms; you kept the candles lit and raised up prayers in thisprovince against the danger we all faced. Stand with us. Let us have no quibbles of old women and charms in the marketplace, when your temporal lord could well use your prayers.”
“His Grace is Sihhë,” the patriarch said in a faint voice, as if that argued all; and perhaps it did: Tristen heard, and knew that, Prince Efanor’s little book availing what it could, this man had set him on the side which that little book called evil.
“I shall never,” Tristen said, “work any sorcery, sir. And these women are not our enemy,” he added, to have that clear. “I read your book of devotions. His Highness gave it to me. Doesn’t it say that the gods made all the world and the rain and the mountains? So surely they made Sihhë, too.”
He had hoped to turn the patriarch’s sure conviction at least to some doubt; and saw that he had had effect, at least that the patriarch seemed taken aback. So did Emuin, which warned him that it might not be the effect he had hoped.
“His Grace will attend the matter,” Emuin said. “I assure you no sorcery will have effect in this town, nor anywhere His Grace can find it. He may be Sihhë: that remains unproven; he is certainly Mauryl Gestaurien’s successor, legitimate and a friend to the realm, and will not permit harm to the souls or substance of honest folk.”
“These things bring no good fortune,” the Quinalt father said. “His Grace can have little sympathy in such practice, himself, but for the sake of the common folk of this town who have no commerce with wizards and who petition me with prayers for the safety of their souls, I beg you ask His Grace, since you have influence with him, to honor His Majesty’s well-thought and reasonable laws and forbid the display of such symbols.”
“Difficult, since the ducal arms contain them, at His Majesty’s gift.”
The patriarch drew in a breath. “Within the religious context, sir!”
“No common coin will damn any of your flock, father, nor lead any astray to Bryalt beliefs except they be Bryaltine from the cradle, which Your Reverence must admit is tolerably common in Amefel.”
“I beg you take this seriously,” the Quinalt father said. “And lead His Grace at least as strait and seemly a path as may be.”
“His Grace has all manner of favor in His Majesty’s eyes, andthe approval of the Holy Father in Guelemara, who blessed him at his oath-giving, and commended him to Your Reverence’s hands in all good faith. I will tell you, brother, for fair judgment and care of your flock’s rights and dues, and for keeping the less savory influences… wizardous and sorcerous alike… from out of the dangerous marches westward, you should be grateful to him. There’s none of the haunts and unhallowed goings-on as mightfind opportunity here, considering the very injudicious activities of Her now deposed Grace Orien Aswydd.”
“We have never countenanced Her Grace’s doings.”
“Well enough, since she let the very fiend into the apartment His Grace has now warded beyond any opportunity for such maleficent spirits. I’ve tested his wards, and they are subtle and wonderfully made… should you wish to know?”
“I do not!” It was strange to stand to the side and hear himself discussed and argued about. But now the Quinalt father looked at him with a wide and distraught stare, and matters had gone askew from what was prudent, and at Emuin’s hands, none other.
“Sir,” Tristen said with a nod and a will to placate this distressed man, “if I have done anything amiss, I will always hear you, and tell me, tell me if I do wrong. I don’t think Cefwyn ever feared the women in the marketplace, and I know there’s no sorcery that I can feel. But if you have misgivings, I’ll certainly walk there myself and see if there’s any cause for alarm.”
“Your Grace. In your gifts, in your observance of protocols, I find no fault. But I doubt Your Grace will take alarm in such small matters as frighten my flock.”
That last was pointed and sharp-edged: he was not so naïve as to miss it. “His Highness instructed me and gave me a book of devotions. He said it was good I read it, and find the gods, and avoid evil. I agree. I by all means wish to avoid evil.” He had asked himself why the priest came to him now about the market just when the market and the grandmothers had entered his concern, and if it was not magic that made the connection, it was Men. “There was a boy, wasn’t there, Your Reverence?”