“Surely his highness has enough judgment not to—”

“Of course,” the king agreed, too quickly. He gave Dain a fleeting, insincere smile. “I was speaking in exaggerated terms. No doubt only the architects have been consulted.”

“Savroix seems large enough to stay lost in for days,” Dain remarked. “I have not seen half of the palace yet. Has anyone said why his highness thinks it needs to be bigger?”

The king grunted as he ducked beneath the delicate silver leaves of an ancient olive tree. Its massive, twisted girth supported a widespread canopy. Sunlight dappled through the leaves and spangled the king’s face, bringing to life the mysterious colors of his eyes.

“I do not understand him these days,” Verence complained. “This hunt was organized for his pleasure as well as my own, yet he said he could not leave Savroix after having just arrived home. Something else occupies him, I know not what. Do you think him too much in the company of priests and scholars? You have been with him more than I in the past year. Has he grown overly studious?” Uneasy about being asked such questions, Dain frowned. “Nay,” he said honestly.  “His highness is not bookish. When he was at Thirst, he spent nearly every day outdoors, gone on horseback to hunt.”

“Ah, he is hunted out, then.” The king nodded. “If I had known it, I would have planned some other outing for us. Now that he is grown, this is the time to mold him, to begin his advanced training in statecraft. He and I have much to talk about, for it is not easy to be a king, even in a peaceful kingdom such as mine.”

“Your word is law,” Dain said. “You can do anything you please.” “That is the common man’s view, Dain. As a chevard, surely by now you are learning differently.”

Dain sighed. Yes, it was true. He had more responsibilities than he’d felt he could adequately cope with, and they were not one-tenth what the king handled.  “There is an even stronger reason to hasten my return than the wayward projects of my heir,” Verence went on. “Muncel of Nether has sent me the offer of a new treaty between our countries. I thought my mind would clear on this hunting trip and I would return with a decision, but it has not been so.” Dain frowned, listening with attention as he steered Soleil along a row of carefully tended vines. Bunches of huge, heavy grapes in dusky hues of lavender and purple hung ready for picking. The fragrance of the ripening fruit filled the warm air with a heady sweetness while bees droned amidst the wildflowers growing in the tall grass.

“Is this treaty so wrong, then?” Dain asked.

The king cast him a sharp look. “It does not seem so. I have read its terms a dozen times. Yet when Muncel first took his throne, the treaty we had was more than adequate. I mistrust his reasons for wanting a new agreement now, when Gant is so restless on his other border.”

“I’ve heard the Gantese are often in Nether,” Dain replied.  “It is rumored that he has formed an alliance with Gant. That is intolerable to me. His diplomats give me no straight answer on the matter.” The king slammed his fist on the pommel of his red saddle. “I will not be linked to Gant, not even indirectly.”

Dain found a break in the row of vines and turned his horse through it. The king followed him. It was always thus: They rode as far away from the others as they could, then it was left entirely up to Dain to figure out their way back.  “If you distrust this king,” Dain replied carefully, aware that Verence wanted to think aloud, not receive advice from his newest chevard, “then do not treat with him.”

“Mandria and Nether have been allied for nearly a hundred years,” Verence replied. “It has served both our countries well. We have both prospered. There has been no need for war between us, not even when my father was subjugating the uplands once and for all.

“Ah, Dain, I was not on my throne long following the death of my father when King Tobeszijian was crowned. We met soon thereafter at the Nether-Mandrian border to renew terms. Thod’s bones, but it was cold that day. A snowy wind tried to tear the roof off our lodgings. Servants carried endless supplies of firewood to keep the hearth warm. I thought my fingers would snap off from being so frozen. And although I wore furs and every layer of clothing I could pull on, nothing warmed me. Nothing. It’s a damnable place, the uplands in winter.” Dain grinned, knowing the cold all too well. “Aye, majesty, it does turn bitter when winter comes on.”

“And the rain... morde! When it was not snowing, it was drizzling and pouring, and if there was no snow or rain, then there was sleet.” The king’s frown deepened in memory. “But Tobeszijian, like all Netherans, must have been born with ice in his veins. He strode in, that first day of our meeting, clad in a cloak of splendid pale lyng fur, and frost hanging on his eyebrows from the ride. He was an enormous man, taller than you, Dain, and as broad in the shoulder, with black hair and eyes as blue as the sky. He looked at me while the chamberlains and ministers were still bowing and bleating their ceremonial drivel, and he asked me to come out and hunt with him.” The king laughed aloud. “We coursed a stag for the rest of the afternoon. My ministers were furious, and I thought I would die of the cold. It took me hours of sitting near the fire to thaw out that night—that, and plenty of mulled wine.  But, damne, the man could hunt. Now there was a king. We were both glorious in those days, young and in our prime, utterly fearless. We formed a friendship in an instant. I never met a more decent or honorable man. His word was inviolate.  We forged a treaty fair to both our realms. And when we shook hands across our signatures, we did so without deceit. To this day, I have kept those terms.” Dain listened to his account in fascination. He thought of the vision, of the ghost-king who had appeared to him twice. My father, he thought, and shivered.  “King Tobeszijian was lost, though.”

“Aye,” Verence said sadly. “It’s a strange legend of deceit and betrayal, the downfall of a good man with too many enemies who beleaguered him. He was betrayed by his own half-brother, this Muncel who now sits on the throne. Or at least I believe so; there is no clear proof of the matter. Nether was once a land of honorable and valiant men. Now it festers with pestilence, failing crops, corruption, and foul misdeeds. The serfs are starving, and most of the nobles who were loyal to Tobeszijian are dead or exiled.” “What happened to the royal family?” Dain asked softly.  Verence cast him a sharp look. “The queen died, taken by a sudden illness. Yet she was of pure eld blood, and they do not suffer fevers.” Dain thought of Jorb, who used to contract miserable colds in the winter, sneezing and coughing in his bed while Thia nursed him with herbal teas. He thought of how Jorb used to curse them for being eldin and thus immune to such maladies as he suffered.

“Then,” he asked carefully, “was the queen murdered?” “Probably by poison.” Verence cleared his throat. “And what I tell you is not for chattering about with your friends, young Dain. Tis unseemly to talk publicly about the untimely deaths of monarchs.”

“No, majesty,” Dain said at once. “I won’t discuss it.”

“There were two children,” Verence continued. “Very young, a girl and a boy.  They disappeared with their father into thin air, right there in Grov Cathedral, before the entire assembly. It is said that Tobeszijian appeared in a flash of magic, riding a foul darsteed with his babes perched on the front of his saddle.  He stole the Chalice of Eternal Life from the service and vanished with it, never to be seen again. It must have been fearsome magic he used that day.” Dain listened, enrapt. As the king talked, he could envision it all, for he had seen Nonkind burst from the second world in just such a way. This account of the deeds of Tobeszijian made him, for the first time, seem real to Dain, a man of flesh and blood rather than a ghost.

“And the legend says he remains lost in the second world?” Dain asked. “He is not hiding somewhere instead, in exile?”

“Never!” Verence declared. “Tobeszijian was no coward. He would never abandon his realm to the evil which has overtaken it. Had he died, his bones would have been found. No, he is forever lost within the spells he cast that day. He is said to have used much magic, so much—he and his queen—that the people turned against him in favor of reformation.”

“What sorts of magic?” Dain asked in curiosity. “Besides commanding darsteeds and being able to travel within the second world?”

Even there, riding alone in the golden autumn sunshine with not another soul nearby, the king hesitated and glanced around before replying, “Many of the greatest warriors of Nether have carried magicked swords.” “Aye,” Dain said, nodding. He thought, And now your son carries one too. Do you know that, majesty? But he dared not say it aloud. “They are the best defense against Nonkind.”

“No, Dain. They are not,” the king said sternly and with a sudden frown. “Let not a churchman hear you say that. It is faith that defends a man, faith that strengthens his arm.”

Blinking, Dain could not help but wonder how many battles with actual Nonkind the king himself had fought. Perhaps none at all, he decided, for him to make such a foolish statement. Dain remembered Gavril’s brandishing his Circle at the shapeshifter that night in Thirst Hall, but it had been god-steel and salt that had saved the prince’s life. Later, on the banks of the Charva, it had been the magic forces in Tanengard that saved the prince. Why could these Mandrians not accept what was demonstrated to them over and over?  “We digress,” Verence said into the silence. “Tobeszijian was not of the reformed faith, and not only did he carry a magicked sword, but it is said his armor was magicked as well. And he wore a ring of tremendous powers.” “A ring, majesty?”

“Aye. I myself saw it on his finger. Cast of eldin silver, with runes carved on the band and a large, smooth, milky stone in the setting.” Dain stared at Verence, and his mouth went dry. He knew that ring. He had seen it in Sulein’s strongbox. The physician had asked him to translate the runes, and when Dain had spoken the word aloud, the very walls had trembled around them. Dain felt cold to his marrow. How was it that Sulein came to have his father’s ring of power? How was it that Dain had come to Thirst, the one place in all the world where the ring could be found?

He felt suddenly dizzy, with little spots dancing before his eyes, and realized he had stopped breathing. He blinked and sucked in a deep breath, forcing his lungs to work.

Staring into the distance, Verence seemed unaware of Dain’s reaction. “It is one thing,” he said thoughtfully, his gaze still far away, “to gossip about spells and talismen with potent powers, but—” “What,” Dain asked hoarsely, “did the ring do?”

The king shrugged. “In the legends, the ring and the Chalice of Eternal Life were given to Solder First by the gods—” “Solder?” Dain whispered in shock. That was the word spelled out by the runes.  He half-expected the ground to rumble beneath his horse’s hooves when he said it, but nothing happened.

“Aye,” Verence said impatiently. “Solder, first king of Nether. With the power of his ring and the Chalice, he united the tribes of Nether into a country and made himself king over all. But enough of this kind of talk. Old legends do nothing but pull wayward minds into further weakness. Tobeszijian, a man of tremendous abilities, put too much store in his magical possessions and spellcraft. Ultimately they led to his downfall, for he is now lost forever. It is a great pity, but he should have heeded the reforms.” Dain felt renewed shock. “Does your majesty mean that what happened was his own fault?”

“Of course. He clung to the old ways and would not heed the fact that reform was needed. Religion must grow and change with our further understanding and enlightenment. By rejecting the teachings of Tomias, King Tobeszijian doomed himself and his family.”