Fields were small, their yields meager. The few scattered villages of the district eked out their livings through the sheep and goats they herded, and the Sunpriests who lived among them lived as simply as they. Save for the Hierophant. The Hierophant Virtulias’ Palace was an enormous manor house, and the attached Chapel of the Sun had a roof covered in pure gold. And yet, for all the pomp and glory of the Hierophant’s Palace, all Virtulias’ flock knew that a bowl of bread and milk would be readily given to any who asked at the kitchen door, and his household was filled with foundlings he had rescued. He did it because he was a good man, even though he was a Priest-Mage. He did it because he believed that the Writ and the Rule were simple truth. He did it for love of Vkandis Sunlord. And he would never know that in saving one child, he had saved not only all of Karse but perhaps all of Velgarth as well . . . * * * It was early on a midsummer’s morning when word reached Hierophant Virtulias that Artiolarces, Son of the Sun, lay dying.
