Runecarver Volume One

Chapter Eleven

Following our conversation, I immediately accompanied my father to breakfast. The dining room was quite massive, with a long table large enough to seat twenty people taking up a good bit of the room. The walls were covered in paintings and tapestries, and there were a number of decorative sculptures in the space. A golden chandelier with dozens of candles hung over the table.

Because of the length of our conversation, the two of us were last to arrive. Eleanor seemed annoyed that we were arriving together, but she made no comment. My father sat at the head, with Simon on his right and uncle at his left. Simon's wife, Penelope, sat beside him, with Eleanor sitting beside her. I sat beside uncle. We had used this seating arrangement for the past five years, since Simon's marriage.

Once the first course was served, my father decided to simply inform everyone what had happened. There was no buildup or preamble. He simply said in a calm voice, "Annabelle became Exalted last night."

He'd fortunately began speaking before there was food in anyone's mouths, but there was a sharp clatter as Eleanor dropped her silverware on her plate. Simon was rapidly looking between father and me with an open mouth, and uncle had fixed father with a quizzical expression. Penelope, ever a bastion of calm, placidly cut at her breakfast sausage as if father had simply been commenting on the weather.

Once the initial shock had faded, father continued. "Her powers have increased by much more than we had anticipated. As such, she now has the right to succession." He directed his gaze to Simon and continued, "Before, Annabelle did not have the mana to be the Duke, and Eleanor did not have the talent. But with Annabelle's new abundance of mana, you will need to prepare yourself for the Rite of Ascension."

"Father!" it was both Eleanor and I who simultaneously interjected. We turned to look at each other, her glaring at me and me looking at her in exasperation. Father indicated for me to speak, and so I continued, "I have no desire for the succession! There's no need for Simon to go through the Rite of Ascension."

"It is precisely because you have no desire for the Dukedom that he must perform the Rite," father replied calmly. "The laws are clear: if two or more children have the ability to serve as Duke, one of them must undergo the Rite of Ascension so that he can inherit the Will of Pen Draig when I die. Otherwise, it will decide for itself who will be Duke, and it may choose you."

I hadn't realized this. My understanding of the Rite was that it was a competition between heirs to decide which was to be the next Duke, but apparently this was not the case. I still felt sorry for Simon, however — the Rite was no easy task to perform, and now he had to do it because I became Exalted.

"Father, this is absurd!" Eleanor said once he had finished speaking. "How can being Exalted have increased her mana to that extent? I've had more mana in my little finger than she's had in her entire body from the day my powers manifested, and you mean to tell me that mana now rivals Simon's and mine?"

"That is not your concern, Eleanor," father said with a stern gaze. "How many times must I tell you to focus on yourself, rather than your sister? Eleanor is responsible for Eleanor, Annabelle is responsible for Annabelle, Simon is responsible for Simon. And I am responsible for all of you. Leave these concerns about your sister's mana to me."

"How can I focus on myself when he always compares me to her?" Eleanor demanded. Her eyes were beginning to glisten, and she rounded on uncle. "Just yesterday, when I was transcribing runes, he told me that Annabelle had memorized the runes of healing when she was ten! Why do you not tell him to focus on me when he's teaching me runecraft?"

Father fixed uncle with a withering gaze. Uncle looked down at his plate and muttered under his breath. "Well it's true." When the gaze only intensified, my uncle shot back his own glare, "Desmond, I'm saying it to motivate her. I have attempted every technique I can think of, but the only one that has ever gotten Eleanor to put in the effort befitting a Pendragon is telling her that Annabelle can do something that she can't. If I did not go that far, she would be just as incapable as Annabelle, only because of a lack of skill rather than mana."