Deryni Rising by Katherine Kurtz

I wouldn't want this to get to be a theme here, but, like the last one, I haven't read this one in years. A copy of it turned up on the freebie table in the lobby and I snagged it for a student/friend that I thought would enjoy it - and made the mistake of opening the cover.

I remember that I bailed on the series somewhere in the first or second trilogy of prequels because they just got so gruesome, but the beginning trilogy is excellent heroic fantasy.

King Brion is murdered by magic and his fourteen-year-old son, Kelson, must take the throne. The king's most trusted advisor is Alistair Morgan, one of the hated Deryni - a group with magical powers who at one period in the history of the kingdom ruled brutally. They were overthrown and almost all were killed.

Paranoia regarding the Deryni runs high - but Morgan knows that young Kelson cannot hope to survive, let alone reign, without the assistance of magical powers.

One of the things I noticed on this rereading is how tightly the story is written. Most fantasy trilogies run to years of "story time." This one has a brief prelude giving us the day of the hunt in the course of which Brion, Kelson's father, is murdered, then picks up in the final hours before Kelson's coronation and covers approximately twenty-four hours.