Two Kingdoms 46 - Seeker

[DoctorM]

TWO KINGDOMS 46 - SEEKERS

This is the forty-sixth part of an AU construction about a Gwynedd where the duel at Kelson Haldane's coronation went very differently indeed. We are now almost three years into the Gwynedd Wars-- Charissa's new kingdom at Valoret against the Haldanes in the south and the kingdom of Torenth in the east. This episode takes place a few days after "Roadways". As always, comments and suggestions are appreciated.

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Bishop Brechlin is tapping a stylus against his notes. Kheldour and the Grey Death are across the great desk from him.  It's a summer morning in Valoret, and outside the great windows there's a cool wind in from the northwest. The bishop looks across at Kheldour.

"This man Stefan Coram," Brechlin says. "Who is he and what do you know about him?"

Kheldour picks up his cup and sips at it. It's kahwa this morning, dark and rich and thick. "A scholar," the Shadow Queen's husband says. "He's been a scholar since he was very young."

Brechlin frowns. "What does he read? Where did he teach?"

Kheldour looks over at the Grey Death and smiles. Meetings with Brechlin always feel like being a boy and being examined in front of your tutor.

"Philosophy," Kheldour says. "He reads Philosophy and Law. Some History. He was at Laas for a while. Maybe at Remigny, a long time ago. Maybe at Beldour when he was first a Magister. He was always itinerant. He likes being an enigma."

"Of course he does." Brechlin taps at the desktop again. "But never at a court?"

Kheldour shrugs. "Not that I've ever heard. His admirers— and he does have them —call him a fearless seeker after truth."

Brechlin makes a face. "One of those."

The Queen's husband nods. "Oh, yes."

The bishop leans back in his chair. "I know the kind. It's always the fearless seekers after truth who end up killing more people than quartan fever and the summer plague combined. What else?"

"The story is that he was born in Torenth, but that's doubtful. He's supposed to be in his forties, but that's doubtful, too. He's probably older. One story is that he was a tanner's son, but nobody believes that. He's gentry-born; you can always tell. He took minor orders once upon a time, too."

Brechlin raises an eyebrow. "A Deryni? That has to be in the Eastern Church."

Kheldour opens one hand. "In Tigre, I think.That's quasi-Western, anyway. Looser standards and less rigor, too. And, you know, the rules don't really apply to Coram."

"They wouldn't. I know his kind: a scholar and a fanatic. And he's head of this Deryni high council."

Kheldour looks over at the Grey Death and back. "He is now. He's had his own coup. He's taken charge and he's replacing everyone who might not follow him."

Brechlin looks down at his notes. "That would include this Lord Hagen from Autun and the Lady Roiste from the Connait. I understand they'll both be returning to Valoret with the Queen."

Kheldour draws in a breath "They are. They're both particular friends of the Queen."

"I'll need to talk to them."

"You'll have to ask the Queen directly about that. Especially about Kyri de Roiste. And... the Council is a badly-kept secret, but I think Kyri and Lord Hagen won't be willing to just defy their oaths to it."

Brechlin looks at him hard. "This Deryni council, my lord Kheldour— exactly what is its remit?"

Kheldour holds Brechlin's stare, "Two things. It was supposed to give aid and comfort to Deryni in the days of the Harrowing. It was supposed to help them escape persecution, help them re-settle, help them hide. And maybe defend them as well. It just didn't do a lot of defending, and it hasn't done much providing aid lately, either."

"What else? What's the second thing?"

"Discipline Deryni who wouldn't keep their heads down. Discipline Deryni who don't follow the approved narrative of how to behave and think. Discipline Deryni who behaved badly."

Brechlin's face sets. "Its own laws, its own enforcers, am I correct? It claims to govern Deryni apart from the crown."

"That's not wrong. The council isn't what it once was, but you're not wrong."

"Does it claim to govern all Deryni?" The bishop is looking at the Grey Death.

Aurelian shakes his head. "The Council of Saint Camber is an Eleven Kingdoms thing. Maybe just a thing west of the Rheljans. We didn't have it at home, and we didn't have anything like it. Not in my home city."

The stylus is tapping again at the notes. Brechlin looks up. "And this Stefan Coram and you crossed one another's paths before, I believe. What happened?"

Kheldour takes a breath. Yes, I'm a schoolboy again. "My lord bishop, I wrote a book. Coram had me called up in front of the council for writing it. He told me that I was undermining the council and that I was a threat to all Deryni."

"This would be...The Venture of Caeriesse, no?  Not Philosophy, I think. Nor Law. Neither of which would interest you. So it's History." He smiles bleakly. "Whose story were you telling? And Caeriesse is...what?"

Kheldour slides down a bit in his chair. He slides the cup away from himself on the desk. "The book was about the origins of the Deryni. Caeriesse is a place, or maybe was a place. It's supposed to be where the Deryni came from. There's a bad poem about it. It's the missing Eleventh Kingdom. It sank beneath the sea, all in a day and a night. Or maybe over a few dozen years.  Maybe. The Deryni fled from there to what turned into Gwynedd. None of which I particularly believe."

"Where was it, your missing kingdom?"

"That's a open question, my lord bishop. Maybe far out in the Western Sea. Maybe in the Kheldish Gulf. Maybe anywhere. If you sail around west by Ballymar, just before you turn south to go down by Kilarden, there's a chain of little islands that go out north-northwest. They're Les Escaliers, the Stairsteps, mostly called The Skaleers. The story is that if you sail to the end of the Skaleers you can look down in the water and see Caeriesse."

"Can you?"

Kheldour shrugs again. "It's open ocean there— black water. Out there, it must be a couple of miles down, maybe more. You could sink all Rhemuth and all Beldour there and no one would ever find them. Again, it's not something I much believe."

Brechlin is looking at the Grey Death. "My lord Aurelian, in your home city, where do they say the Deryni come from?"

Marc-Friedrich Aurelian shrugs. "We've always been there, my lord bishop. The city's been there something like eight hundred years. House Aurelian have been there for something like seven hundred of those years. My tutors told me that there were newer Deryni houses that came over the Grand Channel about six hundred years ago. I never heard about Caeriesse until I came to these kingdoms."

"The Moors say that there were Deryni in the far south long before the Messenger of God came to the Moors." Kheldour looks around. What he wants is a map, or maybe a lectern. "The Furstans came out of the East. Their own legend is that they followed a ghostly white hart all the way over the steppe to where Torenth is now. They were already Deryni." He smiles. "Coram hated that. He hated that I used Moorish records. He hated that I said that Deryni grew up alongside non-Deyni from the beginning. He hated that I said that Deryni weren't supposed to be something special and didn't have some ordained special purpose."

"That matters to Coram...why?"

"Stefan effing Coram wants to be God's red right hand. He thinks that the Deryni are tools God's given him to make a new world. Caeriesse explains why Gwynedd is special, and if it's special, it needs someone like him. He thinks the Haldanes are the link between ordinary people and the Deryni. Bad metaphor, and I'm sorry, but he thinks Deryni and non-Deryni should be linked together and he should be holding the chain."

"So he wants to kill you."

"He wants to kill the Queen. He wants the Haldanes, or maybe just the right Haldanes, ruling Gwynedd. He wants me dead because I'm the Queen's husband and because I talked back to him in front of the Council. You've been to Church debates— schoolmen and bishops calling each other names in Latin. Coram and I said a lot of nasty things in Latin and Torenthi to each other. I mean...that doesn't matter. I've been called worse all the time I was a light-horse captain. But he talks about making a new and hallowed world, about making Deryni see what they should be. Let's emphasize the should."

Brechlin's own smile is bleak as the northern sea. "What I'm hearing," he says, "is that he'll do a new Harrowing. Everyone says the Shadow Queen wants to burn the world down, but what the Queen wants is to re-draw the maps and set up a new dynasty and government. What your Master Stefan wants is something different." He tosses the stylus to one side. "I told the Queen once that the aim of any government should be to make life ordinary and boring. There's stability and order and ordinary people can lead ordinary lives and never have to think about grand delusions. Hallowing the world and renewing souls brings on harrowings. Always. This man Coram— he's a threat to the Queen, and to order. And that's a truth I know."

"I'm going to kill him. That's as certain as anything can ever be."

"Let's not wait. We'll be fighting in the Rheljans soon enough. It looks like the Duke of Corwyn is finally closing in on Warin de Grey and his rebels, so we'll be fighting in the south, too. One fanatic gone, and we don't need another. I know you're going up to Gwernach soon, but...as Queen's Justiciar and her first minister...use whatever resources you need." He raps with his episcopal ring on the desk. "Let's clear away at least one set of enemies before the storm breaks."