“I seek the one who seeks the light.”
There was a pause, and then the man continued.
“How do you mean to seek him?”
“By following the Path myself.”
“How do you hope to see the one who seeks if you do not see the Path?”
“I seek the Path so that my eyes may be opened to the Light.”
There was a snap as the hole closed back up, followed by a brief period of silence in which time the Prince was left waiting anxiously out on the street. Before long, there was a series of metal clangs and the clink of chain links being undone. The door swung inward just wide enough for the Prince to enter, and then was quickly shut after him, leaving him in total darkness.
“You seek a path to light?” a soft voice asked him.
“Yes,” the Prince replied simply.
“Then you are in luck,” replied the voice, dropping the formality.
A flame appeared, followed by the sharp smell of burning sulfur, and the Prince saw a man-shaped figure lighting a small oil lamp across the room at alarge desk where there stood a second figure, hands folded inside his robes of plain brown homespun. The man bore a thin golden rope around his neck—a Lesser Seeker. The Prince looked around the room, making note of the bare furnishings and the dark shadowed corners where a person might stand concealed.
You’re on the Path of Light, he reminded himself.No need to be uneasy.
And yet he was.
“Please, come forward, my son.”
The Prince did so, his boots treading on a soft rug—a plain brown color that might be seen in the humblest of houses. Living like the poor was a mark of the lower orders of the Seeker society who sought to understand humility and a way to the Light. But like any order, the higher up one went in the Seeker organization the more lavish the decorations and accolades became. Dysuna had often commented that joining the Seekers was akin to making a long-term investment: be poor today to be rich tomorrow.
“The Path lies up these stairs. Go, and do not halt.”
Without a word, as per the ritual, the Prince crossed to the simple wooden stairs to which the man had motioned and began to climb. They ascended around a corner of the room, and then curved again at what the Prince assumed was the second story, and then again when it came to the third, where he emerged into a long hallway lit by a single oil lamp in a wall bracket. There was a wooden door at the far end with a simple wooden latch handle. He quickly crossed the distance and reached for the handle.
A glint of gold caught his eye. He looked down, then bent to pick up the object: a golden coin, inscribed with an eye on one side and a key on the other. He would need one from each station in order to gain access to the Seeker.
One.
He pushed open the door and found himself on the roof of the building. He strode forward, the dark wall of Banelyn rising in the distance before him.
Another glint of gold caught his eye, and he looked across the street.
Two golden daggers, points down, were hung from large nails on either side of a window in the building in front of him. The building looked as if had been built upon and extended several times—perhaps it was a series of smaller homes for the Commons all strung together.
The daggers were the second sign.
The two buildings were close together, close enough for the Prince to take a running jump and leap from one roof to the other. He readied himself with a quick breath, then ran forward and pushed off into the air. Wind whistled in his ears and pulled at his clothes, and then with a solid thump of his boots that sent a burning shock up through his shins, he was once more on solid wood. His heart beat quickly, but he ignored it. He had no time for fear.
He scaled down the side of the building and swung in through the open window framed by the two daggers, the wood scraping his hands. He landed in a crouch and found himself looking at a single golden coin on the floor in front of him. He grabbed it.
Two.
A voice greeted him as soon the skin of his hand felt the cold imprint of the metal.
“What do you seek here?”
Surprised, he spun and looked to his right. He saw an old woman, older than any he had ever seen, sitting in a large rocking chair. Her eyes gleamed, even in the dark room, with a blazing light, and illuminated a face creased and lined with age. There was madness in those eyes, pure and unadulterated. They were the same eyes his sister Dysuna had, and they struck him with fear and misgivings.
This is the Path; these things are meant to frighten lesser men.
