The Sapphire Rose. David Eddings
it then?’ Sparhawk asked him.
‘He used to visit his mother in that cloister at Demos,’ Vanion replied. ‘Arissa’s reminiscences were rather wide-ranging, I understand, and she was quite candid with her son.’
‘That’s revolting,’ Bevier said in a sick voice.
‘Princess Arissa has a peculiar kind of morality,’ Kalten told the young Arcian.
‘At any rate,’ Vanion said, ‘Sparhawk’s father stepped in at that point. I knew him very well, and his morality was much more conventional. He was greatly offended by what Aldreas and Arissa were doing. Aldreas was afraid of him, so when he suggested a marriage to a Deiran Princess instead, Aldreas rather reluctantly agreed. The rest is fairly well known. Arissa went into an absolute fury and ran off to that brothel down by the riverside – sorry about that, Sephrenia.’
‘I’ve heard about it before, Vanion,’ she replied. ‘Styrics are not nearly as unworldly as you Elenes sometimes believe.’
‘Anyway, Arissa stayed in the brothel for several weeks, and when she was finally apprehended, Aldreas had no choice but to confine her in that cloister.’
‘That raises a question,’ Tynian said. ‘Considering the amount of time she spent in that brothel and the number of customers she had, how can anyone be sure just who Lycheas’s father was?’
‘I was just coming to that,’ Vanion replied. ‘She assured Lycheas during one of his visits that she was pregnant before she went to the brothel. Aldreas married the Deiran Princess, and she died giving birth to Queen Ehlana. Lycheas was about six months old at the time, and Annias was doing his best to get Aldreas to legitimize him and make him his heir. That was too much even for Aldreas, and he flatly refused. It was about at that time that Sparhawk’s father died, and Sparhawk here took his hereditary position as King’s Champion. Annias began to grow alarmed at Ehlana’s progress after Sparhawk took charge of her education. By the time she was eight, he decided that he had to get her champion away from her before he could make her so strong that he wouldn’t be able to control her. That’s when he persuaded Aldreas to send Sparhawk into exile in Rendor, and then he sent Martel to Cippria to kill him to make sure he’d never come back and complete Ehlana’s education.’
‘But he was too late, wasn’t he?’ Sparhawk smiled. ‘Ehlana was already too strong for him.’
‘How did you manage that, Sparhawk?’ Kalten asked. ‘You’ve never really been what you’d call a very inspiring teacher.’
‘Love, Kalten,’ Sephrenia said quite softly. ‘Ehlana’s loved Sparhawk since she was very young, and she tried to do things the way he’d have wanted her to do them.’
Tynian laughed. ‘You did it to yourself then, Sparhawk,’ he said.
‘Did what?’
‘You made a woman of steel, and now she’s going to force you to marry her – and she’s strong enough to get away with it.’
‘Tynian,’ Sparhawk said acidly, ‘you talk too much.’ The big Pandion was suddenly irritated – all the more so because he privately had to admit that Tynian was probably right.
‘The point here, though, is that none of this is really very new or surprising,’ Kurik noted. ‘It’s certainly not enough to keep Lycheas’s head on his shoulders.’
‘That came a little later,’ Vanion told him. ‘Ehlana frightened him so much when she seemed on the verge of having him summarily executed that he was babbling at first. Anyway, after Annias had forced Aldreas to send Sparhawk into exile, the king began to change. He actually started to develop some backbone. It’s a little hard sometimes to know why people do things.’
‘Not really, Vanion,’ Sephrenia disagreed. ‘Aldreas was under the thumb of the Primate, but in his heart he knew that what he was doing was wrong. Perhaps he felt that his champion might have been able to rescue his soul, but once Sparhawk was gone, Aldreas began to realize that he was totally alone. If his soul was going to be saved, he was going to have to do it himself.’
‘She might be very close to right, you know,’ Bevier marvelled. ‘Perhaps I should make some study of the ethics of Styricum. A synthesis of Elene and Styric ethical thought might be very interesting.’
‘Heresy,’ Ulath observed flatly.
‘I beg your pardon?’
‘We’re not supposed to consider the possibility that other ethics have any validity, Bevier. It’s a little shortsighted, I’ll admit, but our Church is like that sometimes.’
Bevier rose to his feet, his face flushed. ‘I will not listen to insults directed at our holy mother,’ he declared.
‘Oh, sit down, Bevier,’ Tynian told him. ‘Ulath’s only teasing you. Our Genidian brothers are much more deeply versed in theology than we give them credit for.’
‘It’s the climate,’ Ulath explained. ‘There’s not a great deal to do in Thalesia in the winter – unless you like to watch it snow. We have a lot of time for meditation and study.’
‘For whatever reason, Aldreas began to refuse some of Annias’s more outrageous demands for money,’ Vanion continued his account, ‘and Annias started to get desperate. That’s when he and Arissa decided to murder the king. Martel provided the poison, and Annias made arrangements to slip Arissa out of that cloister. He probably could have poisoned Aldreas himself, but Arissa begged him to let her do it because she wanted to kill her brother herself.’
‘Are you really sure you want to marry into that family, Sparhawk?’ Ulath asked.
‘Do I have any choice at this point?’
‘You could always run away. I’m sure you could find work in the Tamul Empire on the Daresian continent.’
‘Ulath,’ Sephrenia said, ‘hush.’
‘Yes, ma’am,’ he said.
‘Go ahead, Vanion,’ she instructed.
‘Yes, ma’am,’ he duplicated Ulath’s intonation perfectly. ‘After Arissa had killed Aldreas, Ehlana ascended the throne. She turned out to be Sparhawk’s true pupil. She absolutely denied Annias access to her treasury and she was on the verge of packing him off to a monastery. That’s when he poisoned her.’
‘Excuse me, Lord Vanion,’ Tynian interrupted. ‘My Lord of Lenda, attempted regicide is a capital offence, isn’t it?’
‘Throughout the civilized world, Sir Tynian.’
‘I thought that might be the case. Kalten, why don’t you put in an order for a bale of rope? And Ulath, you’d better send to Thalesia for a couple of spare axes.’
‘What’s this?’ Kalten asked.
‘We have evidence now that Lycheas, Annias and Arissa have all committed high treason – along with a fair number of other confederates.’
‘We knew that before,’ Kalten said.
‘Yes,’ Tynian smiled, ‘but now we can prove it. We have a witness.’
‘I was sort of hoping to take care of suitable rewards myself,’ Sparhawk objected.
‘It’s always better to do such things legally, Sparhawk,’ Lenda told him. ‘It avoids arguments later on, you understand.’
‘I wasn’t really planning to leave anyone around to argue with me, My Lord.’
‘I think you’d better shorten his chain a bit, Lord Vanion,’ Lenda suggested with a sly smile. ‘His fangs seem to be getting longer.’
‘I noticed that,’ Vanion agreed. Then he went on. ‘Annias was a little confounded when Sephrenia’s spell kept Ehlana from dying the way her father had, but he went ahead and set Lycheas up as Prince Regent anyway, reasoning