Chapter Fourteen: The Hall of Lords
The oak doors closed with a low, rumbling thunder, giving way to a thick and heavy quiet. A single brazier hung from the vaulted ceiling of the barren entrance-hall, shivering through the darkness in a cold glow. I had been in here before, not too long ago, but although the stone had not changed, it wore a different cloak, with gaps and holes and tears through the cloth that had not been there before.
The philos stopped me before we went any further. "I've convinced my brother to allow you a trial. He would not have it any other way."
I looked at him in honest disbelief. "I'm to be on trial?"
"To join his company you've to have a trial," the philos said, matter of fact. "They will decide whether you are able to leave as the lord's man or remain an exile because of your father's suicide. The law states that any man in the relation of a Damned is to be rejected any rights of association and recognition with and by the royal courts."
I breathed deeply. "Who's deciding?" I knew well as anybody my jury was more important than anything I could say in defense. Corruption at its finest.
"The Keepers," he said. "As they do with all formal trials. You're lucky it wasn't the Alyins, being this a matter of religious punishment. You'd have had no chance, but the Keepers, they'll at least hear your plea. Whether you will be admitted is another question." He pursed his lips.
"Is it possible?" I asked, my face gone hard.
"Possible, yes," said the philos. "Just unlikely. The Lords of Raenish have served under the assumed guidance of Aylar for hundreds of years now. Back then, you'd have been burned at the stake for your father's crimes, Damned just like him. But times have changed." He held me tight in his hands. "Let us hope you change the times again."
I nodded heavily, a great weight with my movements. "What if I'm not allowed?" I said. "What happens then?"
The Bastard of Riveiar looked me in the eyes and I saw things I wished I hadn't, but in the end, all he said was: "I don't know."
I bit my tongue, suddenly angry. I don't know where the anger came from, probably somewhere deep and true, from the places we visit scarcely, but it came, hot and fuming and wild. I think, it meant I cared, that I truly cared. "You don't understand," I heard my voice say. "I need to go. I need to find this out. These people, they stabbed a pike through my father's heart! He knew that would happen! Why would he take his own life if he knew that was going to happen!"
"I don't know," said the philos again. And it was, for all the world, the only thing he could have said, but I did not listen to logic. I listened to madness.
"That's not good enough!" I said, hard as iron through smoke. "I need to find this book, I need to find answers, but what if I can't? 'I don't know' isn't helping me find any answers, and it never will!"
Then the philos pushed me against the wall, with a strength I never knew he possessed, and I froze. "I don't know what will happen, that's the truth, Kaedn. If you're scared of the truth, then you shall never find the answers you seek. Understand? To find, you must lose. You will never find anything without losing something. Never. It's about time you understand that."
He released his grip, and I slumped back to the ground, body trembling. The fury of quiet men is a thing to start storms. It should be avoided at all times. If I only I knew that then.
"Let's go," he said then, picking me up. "If you want something, you must take it, and face the punishments of defeat, for without defeat there is no victory." He held me again, rough and true, like a father would. "Follow me."
I simply nodded. In the deep, echoing quiet of the entrance hall, it was all I could do as he pushed open the doors of my fate.
Night cloaked the Hall of Lords in long, heavy shadows and I drew my own shadow, weak and pale in the silver light. It was bigger than I'd remembered, bigger than it appeared from the outside. A white marble floor ran down the length of the hall, slashed with a rich red carpet through its heart. At the end of the carpet, rose the dais, all of dark stone, and upon the dais, sat the willow-wood throne of Raenish, bent and twisted. Before it, a curved oak table was set, nine men in black cloaks waiting in silence at its face, their own faces cast under hoods of wool.
Lord Riveiar stood as I approached. In the pale red glow of the braziers, he stood tall and gaunt, his face hard as stone and white as milk, long black hair parted, a rich, silver doublet catching the light. "Nice of you to fetch him, bastard," he said first, his voice cold, but strong. He turned to me then with hardened brown eyes. "What has he told you, my wretched brother? I doubt much. For all his studies, he still remains ignorant of even the most trivial matters."
"The boy has come to your trial," said the philos in answer, a distant hatred fuming between them. There was a palpable history there, tense and eager in audience. "He does not wish to hear anything else. And nor do I."
"He will hear what I speak," said Lord Riveiar with spite. "It is beyond the will of Aylar for him to even be on trial, and yet you speak to me as though you were the lord of this city, my father's son."
"I am my father's son, as much as you are," said the philos. "That is not for you to challenge. Begin the boy's trial. That is all that needs be done."
"Very well, bastard," said the lord, and he straightened, and glared down at me. "Kaedn Fallow, son of Ederan Fallow, philos under patronage of the Lord Acaton Riveiar and sinner under the laws of our god Aylar and his Children, you seek to gain atonement for your father's sins. You wish for Aylar and the Court of Raenish to see the folly in his actions and allow you the right to act in the name of your lord once again, as you had."
"This is true," I said, and my voice felt weak in the immensity of the hall. I cleared my throat and spoke louder, stronger. "This is what I seek."
"Speak your testimony, then," said the lord and the Keepers leaned close to listen in judgment.
I swallowed and thought for a moment, thought of my father, and I thought of the human heart.
"You all knew my father, I trust," I said, my voice echoing through the emptiness. "I could say many great things of him, his character, his intelligence, his heart. I could say he never hit me. I could say he never yelled at me. I could say he was a man of his word, true and honest and righteous. But those things do not lift his sin. Nothing will lift his sin. It is final, it has been done, and he is gone because of it. What I ask is humanity; what I ask is morality."
I walked slightly closer to the dais, looking up as I talked, but before I could say anything, one of the Keepers spoke in a heavy voice: "You accept your father's sin? You accept he willingly took his life?"
I nodded. "Yes, with hemlock poison."
"Your father was a philos," said another Keeper through the dark. "Not an alchemist, nor even an apothecary. How did he come by this deadly and rather deleterious herb? Hemlock is a rare and lethal substance...Not found in Raenish."
"I do not know," I said.
"Was your father a religious man?" asked another Keeper. "Did he believe in Aylar?"
"I am not sure," I said. "There are times he would call upon him, use his name, but no, I do not believe he truly believed in his existence."
Silence endured, and I continued. "My father committed suicide, yes, and as much as it is a sin against Aylar, it has hurt me just as much." I paused. "I never knew my mother. Never knew what she looked like, never heard her voice kiss my ears. My father was all I had. When he was gone, I had nothing. Nothing but a book, and the belief I could find answers, maybe a reason for his death."
"And how do you know this book, this lost book, will provide answers," asked another Keeper. "That is, if it is even there."
"I don't," I said.
"True," said the Keeper in the middle. "How do you know about this book?"
"I found the first volume," I said. I didn't want to bring the philos into any of this. I needed to keep him out, for his sake. "There was no author, and it was written in a strange form of Old Lentish, like the book described to be found in the cavern north of here."
"And this book, may we see it?" asked a Keeper. "It may help decide your ultimate fate."
"I don't have it," I said. "I lost it."
Lord Riveiar laughed at this, but did not speak further. He was not permitted.
"How did you lose it?" asked a Keeper.
"I was attacked in the streets," I said, pointing to my scar.
"Lies," spat a Keeper.
"Truth," I said.
"What proof do you have?"
I remained quiet, yet the emotion boiled deep within me. I breathed, letting myself calm. I needed to act rationally.
"Why do you seek the answer to your father's suicide?" asked a Keeper, his question final and ultimate. "What drives your search?"
I could have said a lot of things, I could have said nothing, but I said the first thing that came to my mind. "Because I loved him, and he loved me."
I waited through the silence and when nothing was spoken I said at last, bowing my head: "Please."
There was a whisper that followed, which slithered through the night like mist and then there was a silence as Lord Riveiar stood and cleared his throat. "We shall decide." He seated himself again and the buzz of quiet whispers stirred to life once more, like bees around a honeycomb. I stood and waited, watching each of the Keepers as they leaned across the table and locked eyes with each other, almost talking without speaking.
In that instant, I felt powerless, not the sort of physical powerlessness that comes to the bones and the muscles, but the mental sort. I felt I was alone within a dark room, and the darkness decided if I would ever see light again, not me, not by my own will, and that hurt.
"Step forward, Kaedn Fallow, Ederan son," Lord Riveiar announced and I took a step further. He waited for the hall to quiet to an almost painful level, and waved his hand. "Let us begin, shall we?" He looked at the end of the table, to his right. "Keeper of Coin, what say you? Shall this child be accepted to represent the city of Raenish in our affairs?"
I looked down the table. The Keeper of Coin was a round man with many chins, and a thin, patchy beard that turned to wisps down his neck. He straightened before he spoke and placed his hands on the table. "Nue," he said, the Emic word for "no". All formal decisions before the Lenitsh royalty and Aylar must be spoken in his language. It was custom, dating back to the beginning of time, or so say the Aylins. No matter what language, however, his denial still hit hard.
"Keeper of Arms?" said Lord Riveiar.
The Keeper of Arms, quite drastically in comparison, was a muscular man, tall and clean-shaven, balding. His eyes were hard as stones and his hands looked harder. "Kere," he said, and I felt a flutter. I was one and one. Seven men remained.
In the end, I received four and four, setting my fate in the hands of the last Keeper, who sat at the end of the table, and whom I had been watching closely. He hadn't moved or undone his hood, not until he was called upon, anyway.
"The final decision," said Lord Riveiar. "Keeper of Secrets and Shadows, what say you?"
The man withdrew his hood and I felt my heart skip, my throat clench, and my breath wheeze.
It was Aryl; his dark and wild hair, his pale face, his stony green eyes. He was the last Keeper. He would decide.
At first, he didn't look at me, and for a brief second, I stopped breathing altogether. He wasn't saying anything...I thought for sure he would allow me leave, allow me passage. I was sure...
Then he stood, and looked me in the eye for a brief flash of a second, and at times I doubt he even looked at me, as though he glared right through me. He stood there for all the world it seemed, and said one simple word I will never forget: "Kere."
Nothing happened after that. Nothing. There was an enveloping silence, like the breathe before the plunge, the calm before the storm, but the storm never came. Only quiet, only stillness.
Lord Riveiar stood, announcing the Keepers leave, thanking them. Then he turned on me and raised his voice, just once. "Meet in my chambers. You have one hour."
***
I found my way to Lord Riveiar's chambers easily enough in the hour, and with time to spare. It was on the second floor of the estate, directly above the Hall of Lords. I'd hoped to find the philos as I made my way through the maze of passageways and corridors, getting lost only once, but I didn't. I'd also hoped to find Aryl, but a man without a shadow is hard to spot, especially at night.
In my relative solitude, I tried my hardest to close my eyes and sleep. My body needed it, as well as my mind. I'd been through a lot. I'd been attacked, woken by a fool, and had a trial before the Keepers and the Lord of the City. It was the least I could do.
But sleep is a hard thing to find when you search for it. It hides and taunts you, weaving in and out of your body, lending the slightest charity. I closed my eyes, and set my mind blank, yet it did not stay blank for long, and my eyes soon opened again. But, such as its way, sleep sneaks itself inside you when you least expect it, when you have renounced all will over your body, and I found myself in a deep and dark place.
I was kicked awake by a small foot, like a child's. But when I opened my eyes, I did not see a child.
"Awake, yes?" piped the boy who called himself Fool, tilting his head, his hair pale and straw-like.
"Yes," I said through gritted teeth, the kick still hurting. "I'm awake, thank you." There were certain words I left out.
"Good, good," said the fool, and he tugged my arm. "Now we go, yes."
"No," I said. "I need to wait until Lord Riveiar arrives. I'm not going anywhere, sorry. Find somebody else to go with you."
"Bastard begs you come," he said. "Bastard says important, yes."
I stood. "The philos?"
He nodded, grinning.
I didn't know how much time I had between now and the meeting, but I dearly wanted to speak with the philos, almost more than I wanted to speak with Aryl. "Did he say why?"
Fool shook his head. "Only important, yes."
"Where is he?" I asked.
"I show you, yes," said the fool, grabbing my arm and pulling me along like he had before. "This way, yes." I only hoped this time I wouldn't be on another trial.
The fool, you should know, walked with a strange gait. His legs would cross each other as he stepped and he would step softly, without a sound, his legs making quick, small movements. Where I took one step, he took three.
With our quickened pace, we arrived at a small side-chamber on the first floor, to the left of the Hall of Lords in little time. Fool knocked at the oak door rapidly, until the door swung open, knocking his hand down to his side. The philos stood in the threshold, his face dark in the ruddy glow of the chamber. He waved me inside and sparked a dozen candles to life so that the shadows danced about our faces. He was the first to speak.
"The place of meeting has changed," he said.
"What!"
"My brother's moved the meeting."
"He never told me," I said. "How was I supposed to find out?"
"You weren't," said the philos, picking up a candle and lighting another. "My brother doesn't want you to leave the city. He's made that obvious enough."
"Then why did he allow me a trial, then?" I said.
"Two reasons," said the philos. "It was the lordly thing to do. It was his duty, as Lord of Raenish to hold a trial for you, and if anything, my brother is lordly, or at least attempts to be." He paused. "I also had a say in the matter, but that is all you need to know for now."
"So he's trying to make me seem a fool and miss the meeting," I said.
He nodded, but before he could talk, the fool peeped up. "Fool, yes, I Fool."
"Yes," said the philos, and the Fool smiled, and went silent again. The philos turned back to me. "And yes. The meeting is still the same time, just in the Silver Hall, an ancestral armory, from back when the swords in Raenish were forged of silver. It's just to the right of the Hall of Lords, you'll see it clearly."
"You're not going?" I said, somewhat shocked.
"No," he said, laughing quietly. "Gods no. My brother let you go. He would never have let me go, no. I'm the bastard." He quieted and coughed. "It is better you go anyway. He was your father, after all. I knew him, I loved him, but he was your father."
I nodded and smiled. "Yes, yes he was." It was a painful thing to say, and yet so simple and true and honest. We met eyes, understood each other, and I made for the door, but before I left, the philos grabbed my hand one last time, his face sincere and dark. "Return to me," he said. "When all is done, when all is found, when all is over, return to me so that I may know."
He released the grip of my hand, and a cold rush fell over me, broken and shattered.
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