The Seer King: Book One of the Seer King Trilogy by Chris Bunch Read Free Book Online Page B

potion or his future cast, and slowly, slowly, began to amass the clients I needed. At first it was a rich man wanting to know if the gods favored a course of action, or a merchant who wanted spells to keep his caravan safe when it went out. I helped, sometimes with sorcery, more frequently with common sense. Then came others, still more highly placed, men in the government. First they wanted potions or spells, then they stayed for my advice on other matters.
    “Two of the Rule of Ten I now count as buyers of my wares who also, and more importantly, seem to be listening to my ideas.
    “That was why I was sent out from Nicias, Damastes. The others in the Rule of Ten, and those in their hierarchy, are afraid of my words, afraid that the truth they hold will ring true for all of Numantia.”
    I looked about nervously, making sure no one else was within hearing. Tenedos saw my concern.
    “Don’t worry, Damastes. I’m no streetside crazy, collaring anyone who comes close and spouting his babble. What I am saying is for your ears only.
    “In its proper time, though, it shall be heard throughout our entire kingdom!” His eyes flamed as they had when first we met.
    “My beliefs are simple,” he said. “Our country has held too long in the comfortable furrows of the past, like a farmer’s ox pulling the plow every season through the same field. Umar the Creator is not paying attention to this world now. We must turn away from Irisu the Preserver, who we’ve followed too long, and instead follow the Supreme Spirit’s third manifestation, Saionji. It is time to destroy, and
then
we shall be able to see clearly how to rebuild!
    “Numantia has been too long without a king!”
    This was more than just radicalism, but very close to high treason. I should have told him, as an officer of the army, granted my sash by the Rule of Ten, that he must say no more, or I would be forced to take appropriate action, and then spurred my horse away.
    Instead, I listened on because, in truth, his words were no stronger than I’d heard my father and others say.
    Numantia had been built by royalty, and ruled by several dynasties over the centuries, sometimes changing rulers by violence, sometimes by intermarriage, occasionally when a line died out. Although this is not how history was taught, about 200 years before I was born the king had died in battle, his only son far too young to take the throne. As is common, a regency was appointed. But uncommonly, it was not one man, but a group of ten of the king’s most trusted counselors.
    Three years later, the heir also died, and the kingdom faced disaster, since there was no one left in direct descent. Whether there were other septs of the family, and whether they had acceptable candidates for the throne, our writings are silent, although years later I had scholars search the archives to satisfy my curiosity, and they said the records had been thoroughly cleansed of any reference to other kinfolk.
    In any event, these counselors, who called themselves the Rule of Ten, took charge, and ruled in the beginning with at least as much wisdom and consideration as many kings. The problem arose — and you must remember I knew none of this at the time — when they did not formalize their position, but insisted on the fiction that they were merely caretakers for Numantia until a proper ruler was found. As time passed the counselors grew old, and appointed successors, and so it had gone until the present, never legitimized by law, but limping onward, improvising, through the years. Since the Rule of Ten were always going on about the need for a king, custom did not make their rule familiar, and Numantians were always reminded of their supposedly temporary authority.
    Numantia still existed as a country, but barely. Dara, the biggest state, and also the seat of the Rule of Ten in Nicias, was the flagship, although of late our neighboring state of Kallio had stirred awake, led by a firebrand of a prime