Hart's Hope by Orson Scott Card

said. “You worry because you think you don’t believe enough to be a priest. It’s a disease of the age of fifteen. When the flesh is stirring, the spirit seems unreal.”
    â€œIf my flesh stirs I don’t know it,” said Orem. “My problem is not unbelief. My problem is too much belief.”
    Dobbick’s eyes narrowed. “You were a child when you came here. Haven’t you broken yourself of foolish superstitions?”
    â€œThere is magic in the world. The women who love the Sweet Sisters don’t deny God. Why must Godsmen deny the Sisters and the Hart?”
    â€œThe world is more complicated than you think.”
    â€œNo, Halfpriest Dobbick. The world is more complicated than you think. I will not live in one-third of the universe when I might wander through it all.”
    â€œSo you’ll leave the benison and orison and psalm in order to do obeisance to a household gom?”
    Orem laughed. He could not help laughing when Dobbick went into rhyme, and Dobbick knew it.
    â€œCome, Orem. There’s no choice that must be made today. As long as you’re not bored with it, there’s plenty of copywork to be done. When a man is certified a master cleric, he usually takes the vows or leaves, but we can make you a brother unsworn—it’s an honorable role, and it recognizes that you are our equal in education, if not in holiness. But I’ll no longer pretend that I’m your teacher. I don’t read your manuscripts to correct them—I read them to learn what bright new things you have made them mean.”
    Orem spoke the blunt truth then, though he knew it would hurt Dobbick. “How can you look at my work and find truth, when I am only playing games? If my jokes and riddles and puzzles look like truth to you, what can I think but that all your other truths are nothing but jokes and riddles and puzzles?”
    Dobbick again fell silent, until he finally said, “Or perhaps you are too young to know jokes and riddles are the only truth we have, and so are precious to us.”
    Ashamed at having hurt his teacher, Orem again walked to the window and looked outside. There was a stir, a hurry about the people passing back and forth, and it wasn’t even a market day. And then trumpets in the distance, getting closer. Was the army coming early, then? And would King Palicrovol ride in at their head? It was the only thing that really interested Orem much these days; the mere mention of King Palicrovol’s name awakened something in the boy. What sort of man is King, Orem wondered, what sort of man is it who speaks and armies obey, who calls out and a thousand priests pray for him?
    â€œYou seem drawn to the window.”
    â€œIt’s the banners caught my eye. You can close the window.”
    â€œWhich means you want it open. Do you think I don’t know your way?”
    You don’t.
    â€œYou are not different from other boys. You dream of Palicrovol and his wicked and hopeless quest for a city he stole in the first place.”
    â€œHe’s a Godsman, isn’t he?” Orem retorted.
    â€œIn name only. He keeps a few priests for show. It’s with wizards that he guards himself against the Queen, more fool he.”
    Outside the window, the gate of the town’s stockade was opening—yes, the King was coming, for outside the gate were soldiers ahorse and soldiers afoot, shining with steel breastplates and helmets. It was a dazzling sight, but soldiers held little glamour for Orem. It was the magic that drew his dreams. Not the magic of the Sweet Sisters, but the magic of the hundred-pointed head, the Antler Crown. It was King Palicrovol, whose wizards battled daily with the Queen. And as he thought of the King again, Palicrovol rode through the gate of Banningside, on a high saddle on a tall grey horse, and on his head the gilded Antler Crown of Burland. He looked every inch a king. He turned his head not at all,