Histories of King Kelson

A powerful cleric plots the ultimate treason against a medieval realm's young king in Katherine Kurtz's breathtaking return to the fantasy world of the Deryni For centuries, a powerful faction of the Holy Church in Gwynedd has been at war with the Deryni, the mysterious race whose magic is despised and feared by those who lack their remarkable arcane abilities. The bloodshed ended with the coronation of the popular young King Kelson Haldane, himself a possessor of Deryni magic-but the peace is short-lived. Dark rumblings of secession are coming from northern Meara as support strengthens for Caitrin Quinnell, the cunning and ruthless pretender queen. But an even greater threat is emerging from the shadows of orthodoxy. The treacherous Edmund Loris, onetime Archbishop of Valoret and the Deryni's most virulent foe, has escaped from confinement-and, with a cabal of like-minded conspirators, is preparing to undertake an act of blackest treason: the craven murder of Gwynedd's rightful liege.   With the first book in the Histories of King Kelson trilogy, acclaimed fantasist Katherine Kurtz continues her sweeping and magnificent history of a feudal society on an alternate medieval Earth-a complex world of war, political intrigue, faith, romance, and magic, where the courageous and enlightened are called upon to take up arms against the entrenched forces of ignorance and intolerance.

A young liege goes to battle in a medieval land teetering on the brink of civil war and church-sanctioned genocide in the second chronicle of the reign of King Kelson In troubled Gwynedd, the crown sits heavy on the head of King Kelson Haldane. In a realm historically torn asunder by deep-seated suspicion and fear of the magical Deryni who live among them, young Kelson is both beloved for his humanity and abhorred for his Deryni blood. Now, the traitorous cleric, Bishop Loris, has joined forces with Queen Caitrin, the Pretender of Meara, in her attempts to rip her homeland away from Gwyneddan rule. But Loris has even darker intentions. His scheme to reignite the terrible flames of holy civil war against the Deryni, coupled with Caitrin's campaign of violent secession, draw Kelson and his army away from the royal court-where, in the king's absence, an assassination plot is brewing. An extraordinary world-builder, acclaimed fantasist Katherine Kurtz returns readers to the Middle Ages of an alternate Earth in her continuing chronicles of the Deryni. Kurtz's second history of the troubled reign of King Kelson is a breathtaking tale of majesty, magic, war, treachery, faith, and intolerance that once again brings a fascinating world and its diverse peoples to glorious life.

A medieval kingdom is thrown into chaos by rumors of the death of its liege in the final volume of the Histories of King Kelson King Kelson Haldane of Gwnyedd knows he owes much to the legendary Camber of Culdi, the most revered of the magical Deryni race. Having suppressed the rebellion that threatened to tear his realm to pieces, Kelson, himself a possessor of Deryni magic, is now dedicated to exploring the history and legacy of the man who returned the Haldane line to the throne two centuries before. But word reaches the royal court that, while on their noble quest to help restore Camber to the sainthood he was stripped of by a virulently anti-Deryni church, King Kelson and his blood brother, Dhugal, have perished. Now, for the lost king's ambitious rival a pathway exists to the throne-and to the bedchamber of Rothana, Kelson's intended queen. But there is more to the king's "accidental demise" than initially meets the eye, and a powerful unseen player in this drama that no one could have ever suspected. Katherine Kurtz brilliantly concludes her acclaimed fantasy trilogy of the reign of King Kelson with The Quest for Saint Camber-ending but one remarkable chapter in her breathtaking history of the Deryni in the Middle Ages of a magnificently imagined and brilliantly constructed alternate Britain.