
At that, Camber had begun to hope—both that the king's condition was not
so grave as he had first been led to expect, and that Cinhil might have reached
the decision which Camber, as Alister, had been urging for more than a decade.
And so the Bishop of Grecotha had summoned his household guard and set
out for the capital just after first light, riding hard through the snowdrifts of late
January and pausing only to change horses and occasionally take a hot meal.
At this pace, they would be in Valoret before nightfall. As they rode, Camber
had time for reflection, for wondering, for playing the tempting game of if only.
If only Cinhil were not dying. If only his final illness might have been
delayed, even for a few more years. For that matter, if only Cinhil had been
younger when they put him on the throne. A man in his mid-forties was hardly
of an age to be starting a royal family, especially if he hoped to see that family
grow to maturity.
His eldest son had been poisoned as an infant, before Cinhil even came to
the throne. The twins, next in age, were not quite twelve, a full two years and
more from their legal majority. The youngest was just ten, and their mother
dead these nine years of bearing a final son who outlived her by only a few
months. Even when the twins came of age, it would be several years before the
first of these, young Alroy, could be expected to rule competently on his own.
Until that time, Gwynedd would continue to be effectively governed by a council
of regents.
Camber had feared that this day would come; had known, when he and his
children had placed the reluctant Cinhil on the throne, nearly thirteen years
ago, that it would likely come far, far too soon—but he had never given up hope
that the inevitable might be delayed for yet a little longer. Even now, a potential
regency council not entirely of Camber's liking had been named by Cinhil; and
many of them watched and plotted and waited for Cinhil to die, solidifying their
influence over the three young princes, prodding and undermining the spirit of
human-Deryni coexistence which wise men of both races had tried for years to
inculcate both in the future heirs and in the people of Gwynedd—and Cinhil
would not see the danger.
Now the anti-Deryni factions were about to get their wish. Cinhil would die
within the year, probably within the month, if Rhys' estimates were correct,
and young King Alroy would be ruled by his regents. The last of the Deryni
loyal to the Crown would be ousted from their offices, their positions of
influence, no matter that many of them had served Gwynedd and its present
king well and with distinction. And then the ostracism would begin, and the
persecutions, and finally the bloodshed. It had happened before, in other
lands, in other times. Perhaps it was happening already.
And so Camber hurried along the Valoret road to the summons of his king,
himself still young for his seventy years, in the guise of a man ten years
younger still, and by appearance and action no more than fifty or so, to meet
his children and his king and try to accomplish the goal they had set when
they began this road, now fourteen years before. Then they had made a former
priest a king and given him powers equal to any Deryni—though the king had