“I am but a man. I am not immune to temptation. Stand however close to the Light you will, a man can still turn his back on it.” His face creased unhappily. “I have waited so long for you, the paragon of our faith. I thank Armes that I have lived to see a genuine prophesied hero of the church, irreproachable and destined, standing before me.” There was a hurried, desperate tone to his voice, and she felt she was not the person he was at heart trying to convince.

“But you are the Potentate… ,” she said in a small voice. “Armes stands beside you,” she ventured. “He guides your hand so you can be sure…”

“I try, child, I do.” He was looking past her, perhaps into a reflection of his own soul. “Every day I fight my own failings and strive to do what Armes would have wished, and I fight the predilections of those beneath me too—their tendencies to pride, bias, preference, and ambition. Did you think the power given to us as priests could not itself lead us from the Light? I have read the secret histories of my predecessors. Even Potentates have died in Darkness. Champions of the Light cast deep shadows. And such shadows! I have rooted out evils from within the very church that even Darvezian might blink at, and the work is eternal. I know that Armes is at my elbow, and that he guides me, but even then he must fight the nest of worms that are my own desires! And I cannot know, when my hand moves, whether it is he or my base urges that truly govern it.” His eyes were tortured as he stared at her. “But you, you are the Light’s champion.” His expression desperately invited agreement. “You are destined, the sword that will cut the heart out of the Dark. How could you have got so far, without divine guidance? If there is someone in this room that Armes stands beside, it is you.”

Dion by now wanted to be anywhere but in that room. Here was where priests came, once in their lives, to know that they were right. She did not want to stand before the Potentate and have to weather the storm of his own anguished doubts.

Abruptly the rush of his confession had ceased, his words lying between them like stones. “But please, you wanted to speak,” he said heavily, seeming exhausted by his outburst.

Of course she wanted to speak. She had been about to tell him just how she was going about her oh-so-very-holy mission.