“Why on earth would I do that? Are you mad?”

“Not mad, my lord. But I shall be very angry if you do not accede to this request.”

Loris sputtered and grew red in the face. “You are mad! Conlan, call the guards. We need not subject ourselves to this—”

“Paul, bar the door,” Warin countered, cutting across Loris’s fulminations. “And you, my lord Archbishop, hold your tongue and listen. Your Majesty, would you care to join us now?”

Warin’s words elicited a gasp from the prelates, as a sacristy door beside the altar opened. Through it stepped a red-cloaked Kelson, followed closely by Morgan, Duncan, Cardiel, and several of Morgan’s rescued castle officers.

Kelson’s raven head was crowned with a golden circlet, and silk and cloth-of-gold gleamed beneath the crimson cloak. Morgan had donned one of his formal gryphon tunics, the winged beast worked in gold and emeralds on the breast of the silken cloth. Duncan was in black, with the bright plaid of his McLain ancestors secured to one shoulder with a heavy silver brooch. Cardiel wore clerical attire again, black under a magnificent cloth-of-silver cope, with a miter of silver and white on his steel-gray hair.

The significance of this unexpected intrusion took but an instant to register with the watching prelates. Conlan and Corrigan had gone noticeably pale, several other bishops crossed themselves furtively, and even Loris was at least momentarily speechless.

Before that could change, Warin and his men sank to one knee in homage, the armed men raising mailed fists to chests in earnest salute. Kelson let his gaze touch on the motionless bishops, who could not seem to move from their places, then signed for Warin and his men to rise. As he and his followers moved across the chapel floor to join Warin, the bishops shrank back uneasily. When Kelson had gained the company of Warin, he turned to face Loris and the others, his people grouping themselves at his back in a show of solidarity.

“So, my lords, have you forgotten the oaths of allegiance you swore to us and our crown?” He surveyed them from beneath the golden circlet with cold gray eyes.

Loris drew himself a little straighter and gathered up the shreds of his dignity with visible effort.

“Sire, with all due respect, you are excommunicate. Excommunication removes from you certain prerogatives that would ordinarily be yours to command. You are dead to us, Sire.”

“Ah, but I am not dead, Archbishop, in body or in soul,” Kelson countered. “Nor are Morgan, nor Father McLain, nor any of the others whom you have anathematized on the basis of one misunderstood incident. Even Warin now does us honor.”

“Warin is a traitor,” Loris said coldly, with a sidelong glance at the rebel leader. “He has been deceived by your Deryni tricks. You have corrupted him!”

“On the contrary, Warin de Grey is a loyal subject,” Kelson replied. “He now understands the error of his previous belief, and has voluntarily joined us. The unfortunate incident at Saint Torin’s, upon which you appear to base your retribution against my loyal subjects, has been explained to his satisfaction and that of the bishops at Dhassa. The matter is closed. If you continue to justify your disobedience by dwelling on that incident, we can only conclude that there is some other overriding motive behind your continued defiance of your king. It is not Warin who is the traitor. He has not chosen to continue to defy us.”