Kyri, to Thorne’s right—she of the tawny hair—frowned lightly and touched his arm. “Surely that cannot be,” she said. “How could they be full Deryni? ’Tis inconsistent with what we know of their parentage.”

“Well, their mothers are certain,” Vivienne scoffed. “And we know that they, at least, were full Deryni. As for the fathers—well, how certain can anyone be?”

She cocked an eyebrow, prompting a low, appreciative chuckle that rippled around the table. Tiercel reddened.

“If you intend to cast aspersions on the parentage of Morgan and McLain,” he said, “I should like to remind you that there are some of us whose ancestry might not bear close scrutiny. Oh, we are all Deryni; no one could argue against that. But who among us can be absolutely certain, beyond any shadow of a doubt, just who his father was?”

“That will be enough,” Coram said sharply, laying his hand on his ivory wand in a gesture of authority.

“Peace, Stefan.” Barrett’s voice. “Tiercel, we shall not indulge in verbal innuendo.” He turned his blind face slowly toward the younger man, as though the emerald eyes could see. “The legitimacy of Morgan or McLain’s birth—or yours or mine or anyone else’s—is not pertinent to this discussion, except as it may touch on the point just raised by Thorne. If, as he has suggested, the two in question have been exhibiting abilities that were deemed lost, that are inconsistent with those normally associated with their supposed bloodline, it behooves us to inquire how this can be possible. The discussion does not require impassioned rhetoric from either side. Is that clear?”

“I beseech pardon if I have spoken rashly,” Tiercel said, though the ritual phrase was not consistent with the tight-jawed expression on his handsome face. “But I exercise my right to inquire further regarding what Laran has reported.” He turned his head in Laran’s direction. “You say that Morgan is reputed to have healed?”

“So it is said.”

“By whom? And whom is he said to have healed?

Laran cleared his throat and glanced around the table. “You will recall reports of an attempt on the king’s life on the night before his coronation. To gain entrance to his chambers, the would-be assassins overpowered the night guards and killed or wounded them. Among the wounded was Morgan’s aide, Sean Lord Derry.

“One of the attending surgeons states that he examined this same Lord Derry shortly before Morgan came out of the king’s chamber, and that the young man was very near death. When Morgan arrived, the surgeon told him as much, then moved on to treat those who could be helped. A few minutes later, Morgan was summoning another surgeon to attend, telling him that the young lord was not wounded so badly as had been feared.

“It was not until some days later that the two surgeons compared notes and discovered that something approaching a miracle had occurred. For though Derry had been wounded to the very brink of death, and no medical procedure known to them could have saved him, yet he lived. He attended Morgan at the coronation the next day.”