The memory of that night flickered in Eovin's eyes; the emotion in his expression caused a change in the atmosphere, as if the ghost of the woman both of them had loved stood there at his shoulder. "She had been ill. That much is true. Do you remember?"

Matei nodded. He had been just a boy, and selfish. He had always adored his mother, and he had been a dutiful, affectionate son, but how could a woman's changing moods capture the attention of a young prince with so much else to absorb his time? Still, he did remember. In the months leading up to her death, Esaria had been distant, tired, and had often complained of headaches.

Eovin seemed to choose his words very carefully as he continued, "We were not...as close as we had been. Sometimes I wonder what might have happened had we never chosen to part ways."

"What do you mean? I thought you said you loved her above all else?"

"I did. Do not misunderstand me, Matei; I loved her as dearly and as deeply as I ever had. Have you—?" It was out of character for the lorekeeper to stumble so over his words. He did not seem to know what to say. "Forgive me, I should not— ...What I mean is, perhaps you might understand it."

"What, have I what?"

"Loved a woman."

Matei's mother had died when he was only thirteen. He had been on the brink of manhood, but still very much a boy. To think of Esaria as a woman, as a human creature with her own passions and sorrows and yearnings, made him uncomfortable in a way it might not have had he matured at her side instead of with her memory alone.

He fumbled for an answer to Eovin's question. When Matei had come into manhood, he'd been living as a peasant boy; without the weight of the crown hanging over them, the girls and boys in the Arcborn quarter and in Hanpe had been freer with their affections than young people of noble blood. One or two of the girls had turned Matei's head. But love?

"I don't know. I suppose not. There was never...time." Even if there had been, Matei thought he understood what Eovin meant to say. For his part, Matei had always remembered the sin that have given him birth. However hot his blood had run in the company of a comely lass, he had never lain down with a woman—would never, unless he wed. He would never risk bringing a bastard child into the world to grow up with no true name.

Eovin smiled a distant smile; he did not seem to sense Matei's dark thoughts. "We had nothing but time. She often complained she had nothing to do but walk in the gardens and sew, and I...I had my books. That is how we first came together, you understand. Of course I thought her beautiful, and good-hearted, too, but I knew her only as an empress when she came to the palace as Emperor Korvan's young bride. Later, after she had borne him two children and found her life in the palace somewhat—difficult—she sought to occupy herself with an education. So there were books. Histories. Poetry."

Again, Matei was blindsided by a painful memory of his mother, resplendent in sumptuous cloth of gold, crossing the worn carpet of this very chamber to return a book of poetry to the lorekeeper. He and Mhera had been visiting that day. What had they spoken of? He could not remember; he could remember only Esaria's glowing figure, spectral now in his memory, and the sweetness and spice of ginger cookies.

"Anyway, Matei, I simply mean to explain the course of things for those of us who have the great fortune and misfortune of falling in love. At first, it is spring. Flowers bloom, birds sing, the sun glows warm and golden, and it seems that every person, every act, every minor slip of chance all falls into a grand and perfectly orchestrated pattern: the universe bringing two hearts together. And then the brightness of it all fades, leaving the true strength of love to endure without flowery trappings and songs.

"What I mean to say is—" he hesitated again, stumbling— "after...you...Esaria and I were lovers only in the truest and noblest sense of the word. In our hearts, we were for one another and no one else, but our affections were reserved. You must understand that we had cause then to realize the danger of the game we were playing."

Matei nodded, looking down at his hands. He knew; his very existence was treason, and a much more sinister crime, too: the mingling of Starborn and Arcborn blood was one of the darkest sins known in Penrua. "So you made a bastard princeling and then let us all live a lie. Her. Yourself. Me."

"I had no choice. When we were first in love, we were fools. Having you...having a son..."

"But I wasn't, was I? I was never your son." 

Eovin gave Matei a sad, tired smile. "I never called you my son—never could. I was never able to treat you like anything but a prince. A boy, but my better. A child, but a future sovereign. There was always a veil of deception lain across everything I said to you. I could never say to you, 'My son,' never tell you how proud I was of you. And I never embraced your mother where any other living soul could see, no matter how badly I wanted to. So how could you know?

"But I knew, Matei. Koreti. I knew, and every time I saw you, I saw you as my son. I loved you, and I was fiercely proud of you. I felt the pain of my secret down to my bones every day of my life because I could not give you the love that Korvan—"

Eovin fell silent. Matei looked into his cup of wine, pushing away the confusion and pain. He knew what the lorekeeper had been about to say. The love that Korvan never gave.

"I named you—did you know that? Of course you had to take part of your name from Korvan, by tradition, but I named you. Esaria suggested Koreti as if it were her own idea, and Korvan consented, never knowing that your name was my gift to you."

"Then you named me twice," Matei said. He tried to retain his composure, tried not to show Eovin how this knowledge moved him. He looked across the room at the monumental painting of the Blessed Sovereigns that dominated one wall, commanding more attention even than the floor-to-ceiling shelves of books. "That night..."

"I am not so arrogant as to believe that Mother Zanara would align the stars for an adulterous sinner like me," Eovin said, "but I thank her nonetheless that you ran into me that night."

Matei smiled. He had literally collided with the lorekeeper as he raced down the hall on his way out of the palace the night Korvan had threatened his life and cast him out, having discovered Esaria's secret. The lorekeeper had been the one to send Matei in secret to the Arcborn Quarter, to ensure he had a place to stay, that he was safe. "I always wondered why you never seemed surprised about my running away that night."

"I knew what must have happened to you."

"And to my mother, too."

Pain crossed Eovin's features. He looked down into his goblet; his eyes were haunted. "I wanted to save her."

"Is that where you went when you'd tucked me away inside the hidden library? To my mother?"

"I was too late." He closed his eyes. "By the time I crept into her chambers...I didn't even know what I expected to do. I would gladly have given my life for hers, Matei. But had I done so, the emperor would have known what I was, and it could have compromised centuries of careful deception. The histories of an entire people are my sacred charge."

He fell silent for a moment, deep in thought. At last, he shook his head. "It doesn't matter what I might have done. When I came to her, she was already dead. I had no choice but to leave her there. No choice but to pretend I knew nothing."

"You did not even tell me." In his mind's eye, Matei pictured Eovin slipping into Esaria's room. He had never seen his mother in death; by the time it was announced that she had died, Matei had been well away from the palace. He could only picture her sleeping, her peaceful face calm in repose. With an effort, Matei thrust away the constructed memory.

"How could I have? Had I told you she was dead, you never would have left her side. I needed to keep you safe."

"Did she know? Did she know you were Arcborn?"

Eovin shook his head. "That was the one thing I kept from her. All the other secrets of my heart I laid bare, but only those among the rebellion who were trusted knew the truth of my lineage. We have always carefully guarded every scrap of Arcborn history, including that."

"Why didn't you tell me then, when I was scared and lost? You gave me a new name, got me out of this forsaken place—why not tell me you were my father?"

"Fear," said Eovin. "Such a small thing."

"Fear?" echoed Matei in disbelief.

Pausing to take a sip of wine, Eovin seemed to reflect for a moment before continuing, choosing his words carefully. "You loved your mother more than anyone else in this world. As I did. I could see it in your face every time you looked at her. You know she was a good woman, and even as a child you must have seen that she was unhappy. I did not want to tarnish your mother further in your memory by giving her lover a face. And you were still your father's son, betrayed by his abandonment and his wrath, terrified, heartbroken. You needed to focus on the future. Not the past.

"I longed to tell you the truth. I was on the brink more than once that sleepless night. But I forced myself to keep my secret. I hope you can understand why I did. Telling you would have been a gift to me, Matei...not to you. To you, it would have been bitter and cruel. It still is, after all."

Matei reflected for a moment, gazing down into his empty goblet. Then he reached for the decanter and poured more wine for himself. He filled Eovin's goblet, too.

"It's a strange thing, growing up," Matei said. "Sooner or later, one realizes that one's idols are not idols at all. When I was young, my parents—the emperor, the empress—the priests, my teachers, you...all of these people shone like stars, unable to do wrong.

"Then I grew up. I learned how it was between Mother and Father—Korvan. And then the world fell down around me and I discovered that the Arcborn I had feared and wanted to fight were the only ones who would take me in when I had nowhere else to turn. I made my own mistakes, suffered more of my own heartbreaks, lived for a while with my own regrets.

"So no, Eovin. I do not think the truth is still quite so bitter and cruel. The truth is just real. It's just true. That's all."

Ah, Master Eovin...

He is one of my favorite characters, but as @AnnaQuin07 pointed out to me, he has is flaws. It seems he led with his head when he should have led with his heart, and he made choices with his heart when he should have made them with logic.

What do you think? Had you been Eovin, would you have made the same choices as he did? Why, or why not?