He that justifieth the wicked, and he that condemneth the just, even they both are abominations to the Lord.

- Proverbs 17:15 The news of Duncan's consecration to the episcopate came as no great surprise to the would-be Mearan court in Ratharkin. Creoda had warned them to expect that. It was merely another justification for war, so far as Caitrin and Sicard were concerned, though it vexed Loris and Judhael greatly. Equally antic.i.p.ated was Kelson's renewed demand for Caitrin's submission by Christmas, with its hints of dire consequences to his hostages if Caitrin did not comply or if further harm came to Istelyn.

But Archbishop Bradene's writ of excommunication, read aloud with increasing disbelief and horror by an appalled Judhael, came as a total shock. So enraged was Loris that he overturned his chair in his haste to get to Judhael and s.n.a.t.c.h the offending doc.u.ment.

"How dare they?" he gasped, his breath coming in sharp, rasping wheezes as he scanned the signatures and seals appended at the bottom, little droplets of spittle spattering the parchment and his purple ca.s.ssock. "Who do they think they are?"

Brandishing the writ as if he wished it were a physical weapon, Loris stalked across the room to where Caitrin and Sicard stood staring blindly out an oriel window, arms around one another's waists for comfort, devastated by the treble blow. Back a few paces, a pasty-faced Ithel divided his attention between watching his parents, Loris, and Judhael, and nervously twisting the end of one of his cloak strings.

"How dare they?" Lons repeated. "Excommunicated, by G.o.d! Me! And by my own former subordinates! I am outraged! I am speechless!"

"Hardly that," Sicard muttered, though Loris did not hear him, caught up as he was in further diatribes against the bishops in Rhemuth and the Haldane royal house.

But Sicard shared the tight-lipped anxiety of his wife and liege lady, and the helpless confusion of his son. When Loris at last ran out of expletives and holy oaths, Sicard let fall the drapery he had withdrawn to gaze out at the morning snowfall and turned back into the room, taking Caitrin's elbow to guide her back to the chairs before the fireplace. At his gesture, Ithel hurried to upend the chair Loris had overturned.

"Enough of self-indulgence - on all our parts," Sicard said, glancing pointedly at Loris and signing for Judhael to join them. "We have heard the response from Gwynedd. Now we must decide what to do about it. Sit here, my dear."

Composing herself deliberately, Caitrin sat, carefully spreading her fur- lined skirts around her feet and arranging her hands just so in her lap. When she looked up, Sicard had dropped to one knee beside her, one hand resting on her chair arm, and Judhael stood expectantly behind him. Ithel waited at her right.

Loris, with ill-disguised resentment at Sicard's tone, came to stand in front of the chair Ithel had just set back in place - though something in the family tableau before him cautioned him not to presume by sitting until invited.

"My queen," Sicard said softly, before Loris could choose a suitable remark, "we are yours to command, as you know well, but I fear the Haldane has struck a telling blow this time. Is it your wish to continue as we have thus far, knowing that we He under the ban of the Church?"

"Not the ban of the Church!" Loris snapped. "The ban of a handful of outlaw bishops who have betrayed their oath of obdience to me! He remembered himself sufficiently to bow slightly in apology. "Forgive me. Highness, but there can be no question of capitulating simply because of a bit of parchment and wax.

This is what I think of it!"

With a grandiose flourish, he flung it into the fireplace but at Caitrin's urgent gasp, Ithel scrambled onto the raised hearth and rescued it, pinching out the embers along the edges where it had started to b.u.m and stifling an oath as molten wax dripped on his hand from one of the seals.

"That is not the answer," Sicard said, rising to pull a straightbacked chair beside his wife's. "And that bit of parchment and wax, as you call it, seemed to give you cause for consternation. Archbishop. Nor does denying it make it cease to exist, unfortunately."

He took Caitrin's hand in his as he sat, chafing at it in futile attempt to comfort. Loris scowled.

"The writ is an annoyance. It has no force," he said. 'Those who issued it had no authority to do so."

"What matters authority?" Caitrin whispered. "One needs no authority to make a curse - and that is what it is, for all its highflown language. We folk of the hills understand such things. Archbishop. You cannot dismiss a curse as lightly as that."

"Then we must counter it as you think appropriate," Loris said, easing into the chair behind him and studying them both carefully. "Shall I curse them back?

It would give me great personal satisfaction. I can and shall countermand the writ and proclaim the same against the House of Haldane and her outlaw bishops. But you must do your part as well. Highness. Ibis needs must be the spur which drives you to give the king the answer he deserves. We must not be intimidated by Haldane threats anymore."

"The Haldane has learned to threaten well, for all that he is hardly grown,"

Caitrin replied dully, picking up the other doc.u.ment which had accompanied the excommunication: Kelson's answer to her last defiance. "He repeats his demand for my surrender. Archbishop. And he still holds my Llewell and Sidana to hostage."

"You yourself pointed out not a fortnight ago that they are of age.

Highness. They knew the dangers."

"But they are my children!" Caitrin said. "Shall I abandon them to their fate? Shall they suffer the wrath of the Haldane usurpers and die the death so that I may wear a crown?"

Grim and determined, Loris slipped to his knees before her, lifting his palms in entreaty.

"Do you not think they would willingly give their lives to secure the throne of Meara for its rightful queen?" he countered. "This land has lain under the rule of foreign princes for far too long already, n.o.ble lady. Malcolm Haldane wrenched it from the lawful heiress a century ago, and he and his heirs have kept it in thrall ever since, despite the cries of your people. You have the means to bring an end to Haldane tyranny. For the sake of your people, you dare not shrink from your sacred duty."

White-faced, Caitrin listened to his words, fingers intertwined with those other husband, her one remaining son crouched beside her with the scorched scroll of excommunication all but forgotten in his hands, her nephew standing silent and stricken behind them in his episcopal purple. When the archbishop had finished, Caitrin bowed her head. After a moment tears splashed on her and Sicard's joined hands.

"It appears that I must offer my children's lives on the altar of my aspiration," she finally said, shaking her head bitterly. "But you are right.

Archbishop. I have a duty."

With her free hand, she reached across to take Ithel's and bring it to her lips, then held it cradled against her breast as she looked up.

"Very well. The writ must be reversed, and you shall p.r.o.nounce the ban against the Haldane court and bishops. What else?"

Loris inclined his head in acknowledgment, folding his hands precisely on his upraised knee.

"You must give the Haldane your answer in terms that will leave no doubt of your resolve. Highness," he said. "And you yourself must carry through with the threats that you have made."

"What - threats?" Caitrin breathed.

Controlling a smile of triumph, Loris rose and returned to his chair, setting his hands precisely on the arms.

"Istelyn, Madame. He must be executed. You have said you would do it.

You must follow through. Istelyn is a traitor."

Caitrin blanched. Ithel gasped. Sicard looked decidedly uncomfortable.

"But, he is a priest, a bishop!" Judhael whispered, equally horrified.

"He has betrayed his oaths and is no longer fit to be regarded as other than betrayer," Loris retorted. "If you like, I shall degrade him from the priesthood and excommunicate him as well."

"Can this be done to a bishop?" Caitrin asked.

"I am the apostolic successor of Saint Peter, given authority to loose and to bind," Loris said haughtily. "It was I who consecrated Istelyn bishop. What I created, I can also uncreate."

"Then he would be executed as a layman," Sicard said.

"As a layman and excommunicate." Loris shifted his gaze deliberately to Caitrin. "You are aware of the penalty for treason. Highness?"

Caitrin stood, turning slightly away to wring her hands.

"Must he suffer that?" she whispered.

"He is a traitor," Loris said. "And the penalty for treason - "

"I know the penalty for treason. Archbishop," she said steadily. "To be hanged, drawn, and quartered - I know."

"And shall it be done?"

Shoulders slumping, Caitrin of Meara bowed her head in reluctant agreement.

"It shall be done," she said in a low voice. "And may G.o.d have mercy on his soul."

Sentence was carried out the following morning, just past dawn.

Impressed by Loris with the importance of witnessing the execution, to underline the fate of future traitors, the Mearan royal family watched from a doorway overlooking the snowy castle yard. Loris and his bishops waited restlessly at the foot of the steps. Out in the wan sunlight, ranks of soldiers in the livery of Culdi, Ratharkin, and Laas lined up along either side of the execution area. Four teams of horses, restless under the hands of their grooms, stood ready behind the ranks nearest the stables, tossing their heads and stamping and snorting in me cold morning air, harness all a jingle. Snow still lay thick in the center of the yard where black-clad executioners waited around a hastily erected scaffold, anonymous behind their masks.

m.u.f.fled drums rolled as the condemned man emerged from a doorway across the yard, surrounded by guards, blinking in the sunlight, barefooted in the snow. The cold December wind stood his hair on end and plastered his thin gown to his body. His hands were bound behind him. He stumbled a little as his escort led him toward the scaffold.

He appeared pale but composed as he walked to his fate. He had been stunned by the harshness of his sentence, but it had come as no real surprise, knowing Loris' spite. He had never expected to leave Ratharkin alive. He had known a brief, soul-wrenching moment of despair when he learned they had set aside his priesthood, for he had thought they would leave him that comfort, at least; but the excommunication which followed had only renewed his conviction that any pretense of episcopal authority on Loris' part held no validity whatsoever. Henry Istelyn was a priest and bishop despite anything Loris might say or do. His captors might kill his body, but his soul was answerable only to G.o.d.

He had been briefly troubled that they would not allow him the solace of another priest in those final, predawn hours, for a last confession and communion. It was an almost automatic reaction for any pious man facing death.

But then he reminded himself sternly that it was only the outward forms of those sacraments which were being denied him. Just before the dawning, having made his own examination of conscience and act of contrition, he knelt and kissed the earthen floor of his cell in commemoration of the Body of his Lord, and drank of melted snow in remembrance of His Sacred Blood. Then he sat quietly to watch the lightening sky and await the earthly reckoning, all at peace.

He was calm when they came to fetch him, his escort four smartly turned- out soldiers and one of his own former captains, none of whom would look him in the eyes. He bore their rough handling without comment or protest as they bound his hands behind, only wincing once when someone jarred the bandage on his right hand where once he had worn a bishop's amethyst. The stairs up from his cell were slick with melted snow and slush, but the men steadied him when he slipped and would have fallen. He hardly felt the snow beneath his feet as he emerged into the open courtyard, or the cold wind knifing through his thin gown.

Nor did he give the scaffold more than pa.s.sing notice, or the executioners and their shining implements.

Loris he did note, meeting the archbishop's frigid glare with a serenity and even compa.s.sion which made Loris drop the contact first, to gesture brusquely to the guards. Caitrin and Sicard likewise avoided his gaze, but young Ithel stared at him in confusion as Istelyn smiled gently to himself and shook his head.

The scaffold steps were wet and slippery. He stubbed a toe on the way up.

His murmured apology put his guards off balance, and they backed off uneasily once he was standing in the center of the scaffold. The masked executioner who came to place the rope around his neck would not meet his eyes either, and himself apologized as he slid the knot snug against the back of the prisoner's neck.

"You must do what you must do, my son," Istelyn murmured, giving the man another gentle smile. "I forgive you freely."

The man retreated in confusion, leaving Istelyn alone in the center of the scaffold once more. Serenely, he turned his eyes toward the winter sky as the sentence was read, hardly even minding the pressure of the ropes around his wrists or the noose closed harsh around his neck.

"Henry Istelyn, formerly bishop and priest," the herald read, when the drums had given another m.u.f.fled roll, "having been adjudged traitor, it is the sentence of the Crown of Meara that you be hanged by the neck and cut down while still living, your members cut off and your bowels taken out and burnt before you, and then to be rent by horses and your head and pieces of your body to be set on display at such places as the queen shall a.s.sign. Thus shall all know the fate of traitors to Meara!"

There was no plea for G.o.d to have mercy on the soul of the condemned, for excommunicants were judged to have forfeited all hope of that. Istelyn had not expected it so he was not disappointed. As the drums rolled again, it became clear that he was not to be allowed any final statement, either - nor had he expected that. He kept his gaze lifted to the heavens as they stripped him naked and made sure of the rope around his neck, only a strangled little gasp escaping his lips as they hoisted him off his feet and the world began to go dark.

He prayed as long as he could. Only dimly did he feel the jolt as they shortly cut him down and pinned him spread-eagled in the snow. He let the cold and the shock claim him, slipping gently beyond the reach of his torturers, and was never even aware of the knives, much less the fire - or the snorting horses, maddened by the smell of his blood, who ripped his bleeding body limb from limb. The smile on his lips, even after they severed his head from what was left of his body, sent a cold chill through the heart of more than one witness to his judicial murder.

The following week saw the arrival of increasing numbers of Kelson's va.s.sals in Rhemuth, all come to keep the feast of Christmas with their king as was customary, no one in Rhemuth yet aware of Istelyn's fate. Kelson held daily courts to greet the newcomers, with briefing sessions each afternoon, while Morgan, Nigel, and the other senior members of his staff continued their planning and preparation for the projected spring campaign. The bishops had their own affairs to attend to, but exchanged progress reports with the king and his chief advisors each evening after dinner. Tension grew as Christmas Day approached, for all their futures would be affected by the expected reply from Meara.

Burchard de Varian, Earl of Eastmarch since the conclusion of the war with Torenth two years before, arrived at midweek as expected with Generals Gloddruth, Remie and Elas in his train, along with half a dozen barons and other lesser lords. A few days later, the Earl of Danoc came with two more of Kelson's generals, G.o.dwin and Perris, and also the young Earl of Jenas, whose father had fallen with Jared McLain at Candor Rhea. Not at all expected was the man waiting for Morgan outside his quarters when he returned alone from Ma.s.s on Christmas Eve.

"What the - who's there?" Morgan demanded, hand reaching warily toward the hilt of his sword.

Sean Lord Derry, the young n.o.ble who once had been Morgan's aide and now served as his lieutenant in Corwyn, stood away from the wall where he had been leaning and held out empty hands, a sheepish grin flickering across his earnest face as he inclined his head in salute.

"Christmas blessings. Your Grace. I hope you don't mind that we didn't join you for Ma.s.s, but we only arrived just on midnight."

His blue eyes held a twinkle of mirth at Morgan's surprise, but also a note of apprehension. He flinched as Morgan seized him by the shoulders to stare at him, but he did not avert his gaze.

"Sean, what on earth are you doing here?" Morgan murmured, though he had an idea exactly what the younger man was doing. "And what do you mean, we?" Good G.o.d, you didn't bring Richenda, did you?"

Derry raised one eyebrow in an expression he had picked up from his former master. "Your lady wife decided she'd like to keep Christmas with her husband. Your Grace. If I hadn't brought her, I suspect she would have come on her own."

"Aye, she probably would have," Morgan muttered under his breath. "I wish you could have tried to talk her out of it, though."

"Do you think I didn't try?" Derry asked indignantly. "I know what your orders were. I can't say my heart was really in it, though. I think she's about had enough of Coroth for a while."

Morgan sighed, awareness of that situation catapulting hack to consciousness as it had not for several weeks, so far from home himself. For all the personal satisfaction his marriage with Richenda had brought him, there were still vast areas of their relationship which had not yet come into balance.

Chief among them was the question of how much authority his new wife should a.s.sume during his all too frequent absences from his own court - and that decision, to Morgan's continued dismay, was not entirely his to make, for all that he was Corwyn's duke.

In the ordinary course of things, certainly within the first year of their marriage, Morgan's d.u.c.h.ess should have become his chatelaine at Coroth and regent of Corwyn in his absence. Morgan had not granted Richenda that status.

The fact was that many of his own men distrusted her - not because she was Deryni, for probably no one at Coroth even suspected that - or would have cared, if they had, since Corwyn's duke was Deryni anyway - but because her first husband had betrayed the Crown.

Perhaps she was tainted with treachery as well, they reasoned - perhaps even plotting revenge for her first husband's death, for the sake of her son by him. As Dowager Countess of Marley, she already had young Brendan's guardianship jointly with her new husband, with virtual freedom to manage the lands and income of the six-year-old earl as she chose. If anything were to happen to Morgan, Her Grace the Dowager d.u.c.h.ess of Corwyn and Dowager Countess of Marley would have access to Corwyn's vast wealth as well, until the infant d.u.c.h.ess Briony came of age. For such power and position, what might the former wife of a known traitor not do?

It was all utter nonsense, of course; but convincing his men of that, other than the few officers close to Morgan, had proven far more difficult than Morgan ever imagined. He had expected some controversy and suspicion when he first brought his bride home to Coroth, less than a year after Bran Cons' death, but he had thought the suspicion would diminish as they came to know and trust her.

They had not.

They did not trust her because they did not know her. They did not know her because when Morgan was away, which was far more often than he would have liked, she kept largely to herself, having no authority to exercise in his absence. He could not give her authority, since they did not trust her - and they did not trust her because they had no opportunity to observe any behavior that might have confirmed her stated loyalty to her new lord. It was an unfortunate vicious circle that Morgan had not yet figured out how to break.

Hence, Richenda had remained a mere resident of his castle at Coroth, treated courteously enough by the immediate ducal household, but given no responsibility. Explanation had been easy enough in the beginning, when Richenda was at first new to Coroth and then pregnant with their first child - both good reasons for letting Morgan's seneschal and garrison commander continue to run things in his absence as they had for years; but Briony was eleven months old now, and Richenda had been d.u.c.h.ess of Corwyn for nearly two years.

The old excuses had grown lame, and Morgan could not bring himself to admit the real reasons to his wife. Small wonder that the intelligent and capable Richenda chafed increasingly under what appeared to be irrational restrictions on her role as his wife.

"You know what the problem is, Derry," Morgan said with a heavy sigh.

"There just hasn't been time to do much about it. I don't want to hurt her."

Derry averted his eyes and hooked his thumbs in his sword belt, chewing at his lower lip.

"Do you think it doesn't hurt her, not knowing why you shut her out of your affairs?" he said quietly, looking up again. "Forgive me, sir, but in the past year I've spent far more time with your wife than you have. She's far too well-bred to pry, even though she easily could, but she senses the distrust on the part of the men. And if you don't tell her that you don't share their distrust - " He swallowed.

"Sir, I - thought being Deryni was supposed to make it easier to work these things out."

"Sometimes that makes it harder, Derry," Morgan whispered. "Don't you reproach me, too."

"I'm sorry, m'lord."

"It isn't your fault," Morgan said after a few seconds. "Maybe her coming here is for the best, though. With a spring campaign almost inevitable, I was already planning to have you bring her to court as soon as the weather broke again. Kelson has made it clear that she'd be welcome on his council as Brendan's regent - and I suspect her presence would be doubly welcome now that we have Sidana of Meara to hostage."

"Sidana?" Derry said. "Here? How did you manage that? Is he going to marry her?"

Morgan chuckled despite his concern over this new turn of affairs. "Odd how that proposition seems obvious to everyone but Kelson himself. He may. A lot depends on the answer we get from Meara tomorrow."

"Ah."