The Hallowed Hunt c-3

by Lois McMaster Bujold

  “Someone has to be realistic, in the midst of this madness!”

  Now her brows rose, too. She was laughing at him. “Utterly bleak and black is not the sum of realism. All the other colors are real, too. It was my undeserved redemption as well.”

  He ought to feel offended. Not buoyed up by her laughter as if floating in some bubbling hot spring.

  She took a breath. “Ingrey! If one soul trapped in the world by an anchor of animals is such an agony to the gods that they make miracles out of, of such unlikely helpers as us, what must four thousand such souls be?”

  “You think of your Wounded Woods? Your dream?”

  “I don’t think we’re done. I don’t think we’re even started yet!”

  Ingrey moistened his lips. He followed her jump of inspiration, yes. He wished it wasn’t so easy to do. If freeing one such soul had been an experience of muted terror to him… “Nor shall we be, if I am burned and you are hanged. I do not say you are wrong, but first things first.”

  She shook her head in passionate denial. “I still do not understand what is wanted of me. But I saw what is wanted of you. If your great-wolf has made you a true shaman of the Weald, the very last—and the god’s own Voice said it was so—then you are their last hope indeed. A purification—the men who fell at Bloodfield were never purified, never released. We need to go there.” She jerked in her seat as if ready to leap up and run out the door at once and down the morning road on foot.

  His hands tightened on hers, as much to hold her in place as anything. “I would point out, we have a few hindrances here. You are arrested and bound for trial, and I am your arresting officer.”

  “You offered to smuggle me away once before. Now I know where! Don’t you see?” Her eyes were afire.

  “And then what? We would be pursued and dragged back, perhaps even before we could do anything, and your case would be worse than before, and I would be wrenched from you. Let us solve this problem in Easthome first, then go. That is the logical order of things. If your men have waited four hundred years for you, they can surely wait a little longer.”

  “Can they?” Her brows drew down in a deep frown. “Do you know this? How?”

  “We must concentrate on one problem at a time, the most urgent first.”

  Her right hand touched her heart. “This feels most urgent to me.”

  Ingrey’s jaw set. Just because she was passionate and loving and beautiful and god-touched didn’t mean she was right in all things.

  More than god-touched. Personally redeemed by miraculous intervention. No wonder she seemed a conflagration just now. He might melt in her radiance.

  But only redeemed in her soul and sin. Her body and crime were still hostage to the world of matter and Easthome politics. Whatever he was called to, it was not to follow her into plain folly.

  He drew breath. “I did not dream your dream of the Woods. I have only your—admittedly vivid—description to go on. Ghosts fade, starved of nourishment from their former bodies. Why have not these? Do you imagine they’ve been stuck in the blasted trees for four centuries?”

  He’d meant it for half a joke, but she took it wholly seriously. “I think so. Or something of a sort. Something alive must be sustaining them in the world of matter. Remember what Wencel said, about the great rite that Audar interrupted?”

  “I don’t trust anything Wencel says.”

  She regarded him doubtfully. “He’s your cousin.”

  Ingrey couldn’t decide if she meant that as an argument for or against the earl.

  “I do not understand Wencel,” Ijada continued, “but that rang true to me, it rang in my bones. A great rite that bound the spirit warriors to the Weald itself for their sustenance, until their victory was achieved.” A most unsettled, and unsettling, look stole over her face. “But they never achieved victory, did they? And the Weald that came back, in the end, was not what they’d lost, but something new. Wencel says it was a betrayal, though I do not see it. It was not their world to choose, anymore.”

  A knock sounded on the street door of the narrow house, making Ingrey flinch in surprise. The porter’s shuffle and low voice sounded through the walls, the words blurred but the tone protesting. Ingrey’s teeth clamped in irritation at the untimely interruption. Now what?

  Chapter Fifteen

  Aperfunctory rap shivered the parlor door, and it swung inward. The porter’s voice carried from the hall, “… no, Learned, you daren’t go in there! The wolf-lord ordered us not—”

  Learned Lewko stepped around the frame and closed the door firmly on the porter’s panicked babble. He was dressed as Ingrey had glimpsed him earlier that morning, in the white robes of his order, cleaner and newer than what he’d worn in his dusty office but still unmarked with any rank. Unobtrusive: against the busy background of Templetown, surely nearly invisible. He was not exactly wheezing, but his face was flushed, as if he’d been walking quickly in the noon sun. He paused to reorder his robes and his breathing, his gaze on Ingrey and Ijada penetrating and disturbed.

  “I am only a petty saint,” he said at last, signing himself, his touch lingering on his heart, “but that was unmistakable.”

  Ingrey moistened his lips. “How many others there saw, do you know?”

  “As far as I know, I was the only Sighted one present.” He tilted his head. “Do you know any differently?”

  Wencel. If there had been signs apparent to Lewko, Ingrey rather thought Wencel could not have been unaware. “I’m not sure.”

  Lewko wrinkled his nose in suspicion.

  Ijada said tentatively, “Ingrey…?”

  “Ah.” Ingrey jumped to his feet to perform introductions, grateful to take refuge for a moment in formality. “Lady Ijada, this is Learned Lewko. I have, um… told you each something of the other. Learned, will you sit…?” He offered the third chair. “We expected you.”

  “I fear I cannot say the same of you.” Lewko sighed and sank down, flapping one hand briefly to cool his face. “In fact, you become more unexpected by the hour.”

  Ingrey’s lips quirked up in brief appreciation as he sat again by Ijada. “To myself as well. I did not know… I did not intend… What did you see? From your side?” He did not mean, from Lewko’s side of the chamber, but from the look on the divine’s face Ingrey had no need to explain that.

  Lewko drew breath. “When the animals were first presented at the prince’s bier, I feared an ambiguous outcome. We do try to avoid those; they are most distressing to the relatives. Disastrous, in this case. The groom-acolytes are normally under instruction to, ah, amplify their creature’s signs, for clarity. Amplify, mind you, not substitute or alter. I fear that this habit became misleading to some, and led to that attempt at fraud the day before yesterday. Or so our later inquiries revealed. None of the orders was pleased to learn that this was not the first time recently that some of our people let themselves be tempted by worldly bribes or threats. Such corruption feeds on its own success when it meets no correction.”

  “Did they not fear their gods’ wrath?” asked Ijada.

  “Even the wrath of the gods requires some human opportunity by which to manifest itself.” Lewko’s eye gauged Ingrey. “As the wrath of the gods goes, your performance the other day was remarkably effective, Lord Ingrey. Never have I seen a conspiracy unravel itself and scramble to confession with such alacrity.”

  “So happy to be of service,” Ingrey growled. He hesitated. “This morning was the second time. The second god I’ve… crossed, in three days. The ice bear now seems a prelude—your god was there, within the accursed creature.”

  “So He should be, for a funeral miracle, if it be a true one.”

  “I heard a voice in my mind when I faced the bear.”

  Lewko stiffened. “What did it say? Can you remember exactly?”

  “I can scarcely forget. I see my Brother’s pup is in better pelt, now. Good. Pray continue. And then the voice laughed.” Ingrey added irritably, “It did not seem very he
lpful.” And more quietly, “It frightened me. I now think I was not frightened enough.”

  Lewko sat back, breathing out through pursed lips.

  “Was it your god, in the bear? Do you think?” Ingrey prodded.

  “Oh”—Lewko waved his hands—”to be sure. Signs of the Bastard’s holy presence tend to be unmistakable, to those who know Him. The screaming, the altercations, the people running in circles—all that was lacking was something bursting into flame, and I was not entirely sure for a moment you weren’t going to provide that, as well.” He added consolingly, “The acolyte’s scorches should heal in a few days, though. He does not dare complain of his punishment.”

  Ijada raised her brows.

  Ingrey cleared his throat. “It was not your god this morning, though.”

  “No. Perhaps fortunately. Was it the Son of Autumn? I saw only a little stir by the wall when you collapsed, a felt Presence, and a flare like orange fire as the colt signed the body at last. Not,” he added, “seen with my eyes, you know.”

  “I know now,” sighed Ingrey. “Ijada was there. In my vision.”

  Lewko’s head whipped around.

  “Let her tell of it,” Ingrey continued. “It was her… it was her miracle, I think.” Not mine.

  “You two shared this vision?” said Lewko in astonishment. “Tell me!”

  She nodded, stared a moment at Lewko as if determining to trust him, glanced again at Ingrey, and began: “It came upon me by surprise. I was in my room upstairs, here. I felt odd and hot, and I felt myself sink to the floor. My warden thought I had fainted, and lifted me to my bed. The other time, at Red Dike, I was more aware of my body’s true surroundings, but this time… I was wholly in the vision. The first thing I saw was Ingrey, in his court dress—what he wears now, but I had never seen it before.” She paused, eyeing his garb as if about to add some other comment, but then shook her head and went on. “His wolf ran at his heels. Great and dark, but so handsome! I was leashed by a chain of flowers to my leopard, and it pulled me forward. And then the god came from the trees… “

  Her level voice recounted the events much as Ingrey had experienced them, if from another angle of view. Her voice shook a little as she quoted the god’s words. Verbatim, as nearly as Ingrey could recall—it seemed she shared the effect he’d felt, of speech that wrote itself across the mind in letters of everlasting fire. He looked away when many of his own graceless comments were quoted back at him as well, and set his teeth.

  Tears glistened at the corners of her eyes as she finished, “… and Ingrey asked him what happens to the last shaman left, if there are none to deliver him, but the god did not say. It almost seemed as if He did not know.” She swallowed.

  Lewko leaned his elbows on the table and rubbed his eyes with the heels of his hands. “Complications,” he muttered, not approvingly. “Now I remember why I fear to open letters from Hallana.”

  Ingrey asked, “Could this affect Ijada’s case, do you think? If it should be brought to testimony? How goes the preparation for her case? I think—I am guessing—you hear all such news early.” If Lewko’s subtle resemblances to Hetwar extended beyond age and style, that is.

  “Oh, aye. Temple gossip is worse than court gossip, I swear.” Lewko sucked on his lower lip. “I believe the Father’s Order has empaneled five judges for the pretrial inquiry.”

  That in itself was news of significance; minor cases, or cases that were to be treated as minor, would only get three such judges, or one, or if the accused was especially unlucky, a junior acolyte just learning his trade. “Do you know anything of their characters?” Or against them?

  Lewko raised a brow at that question. “Highborn men, experienced in capital cases. Serious-minded. They will probably begin to question witnesses as early as tomorrow.”

  “Huh,” said Ingrey. “I saw that Rider Ulkra had arrived. All of Prince Boleso’s household will have come from Boar’s Head with him. Nothing to delay the inquiry, then. Will they call me to testify?”

  “As you were not there at the time of the prince’s death, perhaps not. Do you wish to speak?”

  “Perhaps… not. I’m not sure. How experienced are these serious men in matters of the uncanny?”

  Lewko grunted and sat back. “Now, that’s always a problem.”

  Ijada was following this with a frown. “Why?”

  He cast her a measuring glance. “So much of the uncanny—or the holy, for that matter—is inward experience. As such, testimony about it tends to be tainted. People lie. People delude themselves, or others. People are swayed or frightened or convinced they have seen things they have not. People are, frankly, sometimes simply mad. Every young judge of the Father’s Order soon learns that if he were to dismiss all such testimony at the first, he would not only save endless time and aggravation, he would be right nine times out of ten, or better. So the conditions for acceptance of such claims in law have become strict. As a rule, three Temple sensitives of good reputation must vouch for each other and the testimony.”

  “You are a Temple sensitive, are you not?” she said.

  “I am only one such.”

  “There are three in this room!”

  “Mm, sensitive perhaps, but somewhat lacking the further qualifications of Temple and good reputation, I fear.” His dry glance fell as much on Ingrey as Ijada.

  Hallana, it occurred to Ingrey, might be another valid witness. But difficult at present to call upon. Although if he wanted a delaying tactic, sending all the way to Suttleaf for her would be one, to be sure. He filed the thought away.

  Ijada rubbed her forehead, and asked plaintively, “Do you not believe us, Learned?”

  Lewko’s lips compressed. “Yes. Yes, I do, Bastard help me. But belief enough for private action, and evidence sufficient for a court of law, are two separate things.”

  “Private action?” said Ingrey. “Do you not speak for the Temple, Learned?”

  He made an equivocal gesture. “I both stand within and administer Temple disciplines. I am also barely god-touched, though enough to know better than to wish for more. I am never sure if my erratic abilities are my failure to receive, or His failure to give.” He sighed. “Your master Hetwar has always resisted understanding this. He plagues me for aid with unsuitable tasks and dislikes my telling him no. My order’s sorcerers are at his disposal; the gods are not.”

  “Do you tell him no?” asked Ingrey, impressed.

  “Frequently.” Lewko grimaced. “As for great saints—no one commands them. The wise Temple-man just follows them around and waits to see what will happen.”

  Lewko looked briefly introspective: Ingrey wondered what experiences he might have had in this regard. Something both rare and searing, at a guess. Ingrey said, “I am no saint of any kind.”

  “Nor I,” said Ijada fervently. “And yet… “

  Lewko glanced up at them both. “You say true. And yet. You have both been more god-touched than anyone in the strength of such wills ought to be. It is the abnegation of self-will that gives room for the gods to enter the world through saints. The rumors of their spirit animals making the Old Weald warriors more open to their gods, mediating grace as the sacred funeral beasts do for us, have suddenly grown more convincing to me.”

  So is my dispensation as much in danger as Wencel asserts? Ingrey decided to probe the question more obliquely. “Ijada is no more responsible for receiving the spirit of her leopard than I was my wolf’s. Others imposed it upon her. Cannot she be granted a dispensation like mine? It makes no sense to save her from one capital charge only to lose her to another.”

  “An interesting question,” said Lewko. “What does Sealmaster Hetwar say of it?”

  “I have not mentioned the leopard to Lord Hetwar yet.”

  Lewko’s brows went up.

  “He does not like complications,” Ingrey said weakly.

  “What are you playing at, Lord Ingrey?”

  “I would not have mentioned it to you, except Hallana’s let
ter forced my hand.”

  “You might have undertaken to lose that missive on the way,” Lewko pointed out mildly. Wistfully?

  “I thought of that,” Ingrey confessed. “It seemed but a temporary expedient.” He added, “I could ask the same question of you. Pardon, Learned, but it seems to me your allegiance to the rules flexes oddly.”

  Lewko held up his outspread hand and wriggled it. “It is murmured that the thumb is sacred to the Bastard because it is the part He puts upon the scales of justice to tip them His way. There is more truth than humor in this joke. Yet almost every rule is invented out of some prior disaster. My order has an arsenal of rules accumulated so, Lord Ingrey. We arm ourselves as needed.”

  Making Lewko equally unpredictable as ally or enemy, Ingrey realized unhappily.

  Ijada looked up as another knock sounded at the street door. Ingrey’s breath stopped at the sudden fear it might be Wencel, following up this morning’s events as swiftly as Lewko, but judging from the muffled arguing in the porter’s voice, it could not be the earl. At length, the door swung inward, and the porter warily announced, “Messenger for Learned Lewko, m’lord.”

  “Very well,” said Ingrey, and the porter retreated in relief.

  A man dressed in the tabard of Prince Boleso’s household shouldered past him; a servant, judging by the rest of his clothes, his lack of a sword, and his irresolute air. Middle-aged, a little stooped, with a scraggly beard framing his face. “Your pardon, Learned, it is urgent that I speak—” His eye fell on Ingrey, and widened with apparent recognition; his voice ran down abruptly. “Oh.”

  Ingrey’s return stare was blank, at first. His blood seemed to boil up in his head, and he realized that he smelled a demon, that distinctive rain-and-lightning odor, spinning tightly within this man. One of Lewko’s sorcerers in disguise, reporting Temple business to his master? No, for Lewko’s expression was as devoid of recognition as Ingrey’s, though his body had stiffened. He smells the demon, too, or senses it somehow.