Iona scowled. She had seen many things in her time, but an angelic shotgun would be something new. There was, however, that strange altar in the church.
‘I saw a shotgun on the altar in the church.’
‘I ain’t seen no one go in or out of that place in all my visits here. These folk ain’t religious, Iona, but they got themselves a big old church just the same.
‘For some reason,’ he added.
‘We could use that right now.’
‘I don’t know why we’re still jawin’.’
Iona saw to Duncan’s wounds. None were serious―the dog knew how to protect himself in a fight. He wouldn’t let her spend much time fussing over him.
With Jarisus’ help, Iona carried Nihilan back to town. She promised herself she’d come back and inter Lotus when she could. Duncan, as always, watched her back. Despite the time it took to cross that single mile, they neither saw, heard, nor smelled sign of the hemovores.
With no better place, they put the sorcerer back in the shed, and tied him back to the post.
Watch over him, Duncan. We’re going to see about this so-called angelic shotgun.
This new fellow, Iona. He smells… all right. For what it’s worth.
That’s worth a lot to me, Duncan.
Iona and Jarisus crept toward the dilapidated church at the center of Sorrow’s Hollow. Both had a weapon in hand.
Jarisus told Iona that he would look around back. Iona moved to the front of the structure.
She found the main door of the church open, this time. Dim light filled the interior of the one-room building. Claris, the woman Iona had spoken to when she arrived, stood there, holding an old but clearly functional rifle.
‘You can’t come in here,’ Claris said. ‘This ain’t yours.’
‘I’ve come for the shotgun.’
‘Ain’t yours.’
‘We need it. The hemovores are swarming out there. They’ll kill us all.’
‘Nope. Just you. That sorcerer you brought into our midst called them up. This time they ain’t our never-mind. Shotgun’s ours. We’ll use it if they ever threaten us. But not this time.’
While Claris talked, Iona saw Jarisus creep in behind her. She could not imagine where he had slipped in, or how he was moving so quietly now, but Claris gave no sign that she was aware. Was Jarisus going to take the woman out from behind?
Jarisus did not approach, but instead slunk like a weasel toward the old church altar and the silver shotgun atop it. He looked up once toward Iona, motioned toward his mouth and then toward Claris.
Keep her talking was the message Iona took from that. ‘What if you’re wrong,’ she asked her. ‘What if they do come after you and your families once they’re done with us?’
‘Don’t believe it,’ she replied. ‘But if they do, then we’ll use our weapon. Not before.’
Jarisus’ hands moved across the altar like a lover. He appeared to find some hidden latch and smiled.
‘Where’d you get the shotgun?’
‘Ain’t your business.’
‘Did you folks actually get it from an angel?’
‘More complicated than that. But it ain’t your business.’
Jarisus lifted the weapon gingerly from the arms holding it. He stood, the shotgun with its twin barrels gleaming like silver held lightly in his hands. Strange writing ran the length of each barrel. Then, with a wink, Jarisus disappeared into the shadows with his prize.
‘Well,’ Iona said, ‘I’ll leave then. But I’ll remember your unwillingness to cooperate.’ She’d never been very good at deception, but figured it didn’t really matter what she said at this point.
She met up with Jarisus near the shed. He handed her the shotgun.
‘You’re likely a mite better with somethin’ like this than me.’
She took it, and marveled at its warmth. It felt good in her hands. She reflexively checked and saw that it was loaded with a golden slug in each barrel. ‘Thanks,’ she said. Then, ‘You don’t have to stay, you know. You’ve already endangered yourself enough.’
Jarisus smiled, then nodded. ‘Maybe I’m lookin’ for a little redemption. Figured you were the only one ’round here handin’ it out.’
Iona did not know exactly what to make of that comment. She wanted to ask what he needed to atone for, but thought better of it. It didn’t really matter. And besides, she didn’t know anything about redemption.
Before she could say anything, however, Duncan’s barking alerted them both. Iona heard the sound of breaking wood. The hemovores were tearing their way into the back of the shed. She started to move around the small building to the left when she saw three of the hideous things rounding it toward her, teeth bared and hands reaching for her.
Without hesitation, she raised the shotgun to her shoulder and fired. It packed a tremendous kick, and it forced her back a step. There was a bright flash of golden light which caused all three hemovores to recoil. The lead creature looked down to see a large hole in its chest, from which the glow continued. And spread. The hole widened, as if the light from the wound was consuming the creature.
Which, in a manner of seconds, it did. Every bit of the hemovore disappeared as it disintegrated from the inside out, leaving a momentary image of fading light in its shape behind before even that vanished.
‘Sunlight,’ Iona whispered.
The remaining two creatures screamed and charged toward her frantically. She fired the other barrel and blasted the head off another. It, too, was devoured by the light. The third reached her. It grabbed her by the arm, pulling her in toward its gaping maw. Its stench, which seemed to come from deep within that horrible dark mouth, almost made her gag. She swung the shotgun around like a club, striking the hemovore in the neck with the butt. To her surprise, it staggered back and then began to glow brightly like the others.
Even the merest touch of the shotgun spelled the end of these things.
Iona cracked the shotgun’s break action. It was still loaded with two slugs. Nothing about this weapon was natural. She ran around to the back and rained death upon the hemovores there which had torn the back from the shed. She fired and fired, never needing to reload.
When she had cleared them away, she saw Duncan tearing the throat out of one of the things tugging at Nihilan’s still unconscious body. They were acting on the sorcerer’s behalf. Trying to free him.
When the horribly wounded hemovore attempted to run, Iona blocked his way and finished him off with a shove from the shotgun.
Wow, Duncan said psilently.
It’s handy, Iona replied.
She heard more of the creatures outside the shed. She exited through the door in time to see two of them covered in fresh blood. She blasted them into glowing oblivion before they could even react to her.
Behind where they stood, another knelt over something in the darkness. She approached, and then bashed the blood-covered thing with the shotgun’s butt.
Jarisus lay on the ground, multiple bite wounds having removed a great deal of his flesh. He looked up at her with pained eyes, but still managed one of his charismatic smiles.
‘Jarisus,’ Iona whispered, kneeling.
He tried to respond, but only blood came.
‘Shhh,’ she told him, touching his forehead. She couldn’t bring herself to tell him he would be all right. He wouldn’t.
‘Thank you,’ she told him. ‘Whatever you’ve done in the past, you got your redemption, as far as I’m concerned.’
Iona didn’t know if he heard her.
She stood over Jarisus’ body and looked around. If there were more hemovores, they had fled. Dawn wasn’t far off.
Looking down at the marvelous weapon in her hands, she contemplated keeping it. She knew, however, that she would have to give it back to the folk of Sorrow’s Hollow. They needed it. For its return, she’d ask for a pair of horses―Nihilan’s sorcery surely affected only Lotus.
Back at the shed, the sorcerer was finally conscious.
He grinned through the debris of his face, but as he met Iona’s gaze, his smile faded into the realization that his plan had failed. Iona had nothing to say to the man. He would meet a fate beyond words of recrimination soon enough. She was certain of that. She walked back out to watch the sun rise. Duncan at her side, Iona mused over all she’d lost in Sorrow’s Hollow. It was aptly named. She knew she’d never come back.
A Man of Vice
Alexandra & Peter Freeman
I well recall my first encounter with Violet Meeks, although I did not know her name at the time. She stood among the tombs, as quiet and pensive as if she were a stone angel. Only her eyes betrayed her vitality, watching me as I passed between the lichgate and the rectory. I recall that she was barefoot, her dress no more than a limp rag of black cotton, as if she was some vagrant child. Dark hair hung straight and unkempt to the level of her knees, and her stare made me wonder if she was entirely sane. When I emerged from the rectory, just minutes later, she was gone.
That was at the Church of the Blessed Heart, during those events which culminated in the death of the Rector, the Reverend Piers Myton, by suicide as I believed. It was the first such event of my career, and while my training had to some extent prepared me for such tragedies, it was nevertheless a considerable shock. Perhaps I should explain. I am, by profession, a lay brother in the Church, a Quæstor. It is my specific responsibility to ensure that those funds distributed to the parishes are put to their proper use and, when necessary, to bring to the attention of the authorities any peculation or other financial misdemeanour.
As you can no doubt imagine, it is a vocation which meets with little gratitude and not infrequent hostility. I invariably find myself junior in both age and dignity to those I am duty bound to investigate, and if my status as a Quæstor of the Church ensures cooperation, it does not ensure a warm welcome, rather the opposite. In the case of Rector Piers Myton he had done everything in his power to obstruct me, up to and including the destruction of those ledgers on which any case I might have brought would necessarily have rested. What he hoped to achieve by this I was uncertain, and only later realised that it was an act of desperation. He would have been doomed in any case, having relied on the isolation of the parish and his high dignity, making little effort to conceal his redirection of funds towards what proved such horrible vices. Once my attention had been drawn to him exposure was inevitable, and yet I was still surprised that he took his own life, choosing eternal damnation in the next world over disgrace in this. Only when I later came to examine the crypt beneath his church did I realise that he had already assured himself of a place far deeper in the pit than that reserved for those who take their own life.
It was some months later, in the fall of my third year as a Quæstor, that I was sent to Saint Petroc’s in the Diocese of Bodmin. The parish had for many years been under the care of the Reverend Stephen Harland, but he had at length gone to receive his reward. His replacement, the Reverend Saul Bulmer, had been in residence less than a year. When a long established and popular incumbent dies it is the rule rather than the exception that a few complaints are made, generally by those who had grown comfortable with established ritual and enjoyed the patronage of the departed.
Normally such matters would be handled within the Diocese, but in this case a specific accusation of personal indulgence with Church funds had been levelled at the Reverend Bulmer and so at length it fell on my desk. I in turn would have smoothed the matter over with a suitably worded missive, but important feathers had been ruffled and influence was duly brought to bear. Even then I might have passed the matter on, but my superiors felt that I would benefit from the experience of having to apply tact rather than pure arithmetic.
I was duly dispatched to Cornwall, and as I travelled down my spirits were high. Michaelmas had passed, bringing an abundant harvest and leaving the red soil of the Devon fields in plough. I was obliged to change trains at Exeter, and again at Okehampton before my arrival at Bude, allowing me to enjoy the fresh air and the sight of the great green locomotives at their work. From Bude I engaged a vehicle to travel north along the coast, an engine wagonet painted in the smart black and gold livery of the county. The driver already had the steam at good pressure and we set off immediately, through bright sunshine that lit the sea and lent such beauty to the scenery of harsh cliffs and verdant fields that I found my voice lifted in song. With the glory of the Lord’s creation all around me it was hard to image the existence of malice or vice at all, until I once more recalled events at the Church of the Blessed Heart.
The Reverend Saul Bulmer proved a large man, round of face and round of body, his expression beneficent and his manner avuncular. He greeted me cordially, calling for cider and cakes as I entered the Vicarage, a reception quite different to what I had come to expect. I could see no reason to refuse his hospitality, so long as his offers remained within the bounds of propriety, and so accepted with pleasure. His was an old residence, the main part a long, low house built into a hollow in the ground to protect early incumbents from the Atlantic weather. This had been a wise choice, as a space of but two fields separated church and living from Youlstone Cliffs, a great grey-brown buttress of rock rising three hundred feet from the sea. Since that time additions had made as man’s demand for comfort and space grew over the centuries, and what had once been the entire house was now a single room, furnished with comfort but never extravagance in tones of rich brown, red, and old gold. A great table ran the full length of the room, set with ornaments, books, papers and two vases, each containing a neat arrangement of autumn anemone and black roses, which I thought in peculiar contrast to both the Reverend Saul Bulmer and the rest of the room. He noticed the quality of my attention as he indicated a chair.
‘My housemaid has somewhat individual tastes, but she’s a good worker. Do make yourself comfortable.’
As I sat down, the girl herself entered the room. I did not recognise her immediately, as she was now dressed in a prim black and white uniform, while her long, dark hair was coiled onto her head and confined within a well starched cap. She was also heavily laden, supporting a tray on which stood two ample flagons of rich gold cider and a plate of honey cakes. Only when she glanced at me did I recognise her as the girl from the tombyard at the Church of the Blessed Heart, that pensive stare unmistakable, although I had not realised that her eyes were deep violet in colour, something I had never seen before. She placed the tray on the table and left the room without a word, her slender hips barely stirring the material of her long black skirt as she moved. Again the Reverend Saul Bulmer noticed my attention.
‘Toothsome little thing, isn’t she? If you like ’em skinny that is.’
It was an extraordinary remark, coming from a man of the cloth, and I felt myself colour a trifle before finding an answer.
‘I was struck by the colour of her eyes.’
‘Ah, yes. Remarkable. That’s why we call her Violet. It may even be her real name.’
‘She has references, I would suppose?’
‘Nothing of the kind. Mrs Penreith, who used to do for old Harland, was far too set in her ways, and a bit of an eyesore, so I gave her the push. Violet answered my advertisement. She’s pretty and she does as she’s told, so I took her on.’
As he finished speaking he emitted what honesty forces me to describe as a lewd chuckle, again making me wonder as to his suitability for the church. He had also touched on one of the various complaints which had brought me to Saint Petroc’s, allowing me to broach the subject without seeming unduly impolite.
‘Ah, yes, Mrs Penreith. I regret to say that her dismissal has caused a complaint to be raised against you, one of four.’
Most of my accused, whether innocent or otherwise, would have bridled at such a remark. Not so the Reverend Saul Bulmer. He shook his head, smiling in wry amusement, took a swallow of cider that drained half the pot and helped himself to a honey cake before he troubled to reply.
‘That’ll be Lady Morwenstow,
eh?’
‘I fear I am not at liberty to divulge the sources of complaints.’
‘Of course you’re not, but it’ll be Lady Morwenstow none the less. She’s not sister to a bishop for nothing. Who else in these parts has the influence to have a mighty Quæstor sent all the way from Canterbury just because a rural vicar enjoys the odd glass or two? Daft old baggage. She used to employ Mrs Penreith, you see, and that’s really the width and breadth of the thing.’
‘You also stand accused of peculation.’
‘I had gathered as much from your presence.’
He spoke without rancour, and as he did so he reached out to take up a set of ledgers, their black leather binding and discreet symbol unmistakable. These he pushed towards me, his manner so casual that I immediately wondered if he had not taken the precaution of falsifying his records. Certainly his bonhomous manner hid considerable intelligence, while he had already shown himself remarkably perceptive. Yet to the trained eye the misappropriation of funds leaves certain distinctive patterns, and it was these I sought as I began to examine the first and most recent of the ledgers. He watched me, his rubicund face showing no trace of concern, nor irritation, but only amusement. I had turned to the third page and he had consumed a second honey cake before he spoke once more.
‘You won’t find anything amiss, you know. In fact, I’ve scarcely had time to indulge myself in the way the foolish old witch implies. Most of that is from old Harland’s time, by the way.’
So far as I could tell, at least from the figures before me, he was being entirely truthful. An ascetic would no doubt have judged him guilty of gluttony, and perhaps also sloth and lust, but these were matters between him and his Bishop, and, ultimately, the Lord. His dismissal of Mrs Penreith also seemed somewhat uncharitable, but it was not illegal under the law of the Church and certainly not a matter for my attention. Nevertheless, I was bound to make a full investigation, and told him as much.
‘I shall need to study these, and to compile a complete report in answer to the accusations made against you.’
‘Naturally, you are very welcome to examine whatever you please, and you can be assured of my full cooperation. The innocent need not fear justice, as the Blessed Augusta remarked, but let me tell you a little about myself in order to facilitate your investigation. More cider?’
The New Hero: Volume 1 Page 24
