SWORDS (The Paladin's Thief Book 3)

by Benjamin Hewett

  I glance around, because the evidence would suggest otherwise. There’s a corpse in black on the floor and another trail of blood, presumably the one that continues on the other side of the door. There are two shattered blades along the stairs inside the torch-lit vault, and metal trefoil stars, throwing knives, buried in the table, the iron inner doors, the stone, and Sephram’s armor. One of them is lodged in the joint of the shoulder, preventing his full range of motion. His armor has been punched through in several places, with small, metal bolts that look like spear-tips.

  Sephram’s face is unmarred. He seemed cold and stern before, but now is peaceful, almost warm and inviting, as if all the justice drained out with his blood and all that is left is some immortal kindness he was too afraid to show in life. He is definitely smiling.

  It’s a little sick to say, but Sephram seems nicer dead. I hope I look at least half as happy when I die. And I hope today’s not the day, either.

  “What did you mean?” asks the Mitre Animus. “Seems to me he acquitted himself pretty well.”

  The Mitre Tactus shakes his head darkly. “Sephram was trained specifically to guard the rings. I dueled him personally every day in a closed room. He was lightning quick. He could fight off four men on his own, even with a rope around his neck to restrict his airflow. It was his blessing. I’ve seen him dodge arrows from ten yards and cut down a ring-bearing Nightshade like the man was sitting in a pine-tar barrel. He should have been more than a match for anyone ripping the door off its hinges like that. Something must have slowed him down.”

  “Magii?”

  “Definitely. See the smokey residue on the hinge clasps? Each one was struck from a different angle. They were too thick to hit all at once.”

  The Mitres don’t know what they’re talking about if they think the Magii slowed Sephram down. They might have blown him about a bit, but from everything I’ve heard (and now experienced), Magii work best on inanimate objects. The Nightshades were brought to keep Sephram busy while the Magii hid in the eaves and took their time on the thick and heavy hinges of the inner door. Melted? Lightning blasted? It looks like a combination of the two. If they had time to blast each of the ten hinges on the inner door, that means Sephram was pinned down by more than three men, or he was having a slow day, or he’d been poisoned, or he’d lost his nerve.

  With Nightshades involved, poison is always a good place to start. I drift towards the table and the remnants of the meal scattered about, but one of the door sentries notices me and intercepts. He’s embarrassed that I slipped past, and determined to do his job right.

  I sigh. Every moment of muddling around is time wasted, details damaged, and trails going cold. I don’t have time to search out Magnus and get him to vouch for me, or Father Loring, who needs to stay hidden and protect the rings. This will only make things more difficult.

  “I’m sorry, sir,” he says reaching for my shoulder, “this isn’t one for recruits. Please step back outside.”

  “It’s a good thing I’m not a recruit, then,” I say. “I’m a private consultant. I’ll have this sorted in no time.” I duck under his hand and grab the tankard from the table and take a sip. No aroma. No bitterness. No poison, or none that I’m familiar with. I spit it back out anyway, just in case. The bread and cold meats seem fine too, though it’s harder to tell with the smell of death in the room and the sentry making a second grab for me. I do my best to swagger confidently while staying just out of arm’s reach. I know his type. His desire for decorum will play to my advantage, and buy precious seconds.

  Hugues and Edward notice me for the first time as I make a quick circuit around the room, with the sentry in hot pursuit. They’re each mildly surprised, possibly angry, but I pay them no mind. I’ve got thirty seconds before Sentry-Man realizes I’m going just slow enough to string him along. Then he’s going to go for me in earnest, and all bets are off then as to whether I can scrape together any more clues because the other Paladins will get involved. Fortunately, a good aquisitioner can do plenty in thirty seconds . . .

  Against the wall there’s a copper pipe coming through the ceiling, conduit for a narrow steel chain to the alarm bell. At least ten feet of it has gathered on the floor haphazardly. Cut. Clipped in advance I’d guess, so that it would fail at the slightest tug.

  The Nightshades could have blown an airborne poison through the chain pipe, but something like that would take time to spread to the entire room, affect the target, and then dissipate. Any poison that disables a Paladin will do a number on a Nightshade, too, if he doesn’t wait a bit first, and it doesn’t look like they did much waiting around once they “opened” the front door. Further, the mess they left here has “smash-and-grab” all over it. They blew through like a hurricane.

  And then there’s the rug. It’s been moved. Flipped, actually.

  I pull it up, backpedaling, tripping Sentry-Man, but he still manages to get a hand on my collar. I catch a glimpse of a bloody bootprint on the underside of the rug, the side that should be facing up. It’s large, probably about the thirteenth size, but particularly narrow. The fact that someone has flipped the rug to hide it is significant.

  “Is this an unusual size?” I ask pointing.

  Sentry-Man glances at it accidently. “What?”

  I drop the rug and punch the hand holding me by the collar, hitting a nerve.

  “Pan’s beard!” he swears, dropping me and reaching for his sword.

  “That’s enough, Mr. Steeps,” says Father Hugues, rising from his crouch near Sephram’s body. He and Father Edward approach from opposite sides of the central table, and they don’t look happy. I shift right, feinting towards the Mitre Tactus, and then cut the other direction, catching the larger Mitre by surprise. It’s not dignified, but I tuck and roll sideways, beneath the table. I’m not making friends today, but if Loring is right about “the end” and all that business, then friends in Fortrus aren’t going to be worth much.

  I come out of my roll in a sprawl and bounce up next to Sephram, having changed places with the Mitres. His hand around the sword has relaxed, but there are grip-pricks that have torn off in his white leather glove, penetrated and made him bleed a little. I look carefully, tensing to jump away, but the sword hilt holds me spellbound. Some of the grip-pricks are too long. And they’re off center as well, oddly placed. I grab the handle and lick it.

  There is suddenly fire in my mouth, and I spit repeatedly until the fire gives way to numbness and an awkward twitchiness.

  “Aenese f-fplower,” I mumble to myself, tripping over my own numbing tongue and lips, thankful it wasn’t something worse. I won’t need an antidote because Aenese isn’t strictly a poison. It’s used in Ector for numbing pain and brewed in teas or chewed directly. Applied as it was to Sephram, it would numb the muscle and make the hand less responsive.

  I turn and stand to face the Mitres. I’ve bruised their egos, and now it’s time to make peace. Besides I’ll never make it past the crowd out front without a better diversion than the one that got me in.

  Still, letting myself be caught hurts.

  The Mitre Tactus is faster than he appears. His iron fist closes around my shirt, and I can’t help wondering if I’d have been able to escape, though he looks surprised as well. He jerks me off the ground one-handed. Involuntarily, I try to slither out of my shirt, but his huge fist twists and immediately all the slack in the fabric disappears.

  There’s no malice in his voice. “Why did you lick Sephram’s sword?” His tone is quiet, commanding.

  “F-f-fpoisen,” I say spitting to the side again. My lips and tongue are still numb, but my saliva is washing away the worst of it.

  “What?”

  “Ffpoison on the handle. Aenese”

  “A pain remedy?” Father Animus asks. “Why would they use that?”

  Father Edward nods, forgetting for a second that he’s holding me aloft or that he’s already told me to get out. “Because it would make it more difficult to hold the swor
d with muscles numb and twitching,” he says, snapping to my logic once he’s seen the clue.

  “I’m uncomfortable,” I say, swinging my feet above the floor. “Can I get down now? You’ve proved that you’ve got more muscle than Pan.”

  Father Edward lowers me to the floor and I suppress the urge to run. That would be the worst thing to do right now.

  “How do we know you aren’t part of the problem?” he says carefully. “Maybe you brought us the rings so you could scout the Reliquary for them,” Tactus says softly. “And then they sent you to clean up the evidence. Nightshades survive on secrets, and don’t take kindly to those who understand their methods.” Father Edward’s accusation has a certain logic to it.

  I spit on the ground again. “You think I’m part of the problem? I brought you thirteen rings and fulfilled part of your damn prophecy.”

  Edward and Hugues look at each other with horror. Evidently, Loring has kept this part to himself. “Thirteen?” Tactus asks, carefully.

  “Yeah. Anyone care to tell me what that’s about?”

  Both men shake their heads. “No.”

  “Not even the man who fulfilled it?”

  “Especially not!”

  “Well, you don’t know toad shistle about Nightshades if you think I’m part of the problem. Ask around. I went white as a sheet when Father Loring brought me the news about Sephram. Those buggers have been chasing me from the south side of Teuron. Only an idiot would put me in their camp.”

  “Where is Father Loring?” Father Hugues asks, uncomfortable with the fact that I’ve just called young Father Edward an idiot, albeit indirectly. “We can’t find him anywhere.”

  “He’s safe.” It occurs to me that Hugues and Edward probably still think that the rings have been stolen, so I set them straight. “The rings are safe, too.”

  Both Mitres appear visibly relieved. “Where?”

  “No disrespect,” I say, “but if Loring wanted anyone else to know that, he’d have left a note. And tell the Brothers that Sephram died of blood loss and that you suspect poison but haven’t found the delivery mechanism yet.”

  “That’s would be a lie,” Father Hugues says.

  “Yes, I say, irritated. “A temporary one. And I can only hope you two are more nuanced about delayed honesty than Brother Magnus is.”

  “We can be,” Edward nods, giving Hugues a look, “If it helps us draw them out again.”

  “Exactly. Put a watch on the sword, but not an obvious one. Tail anyone who tries to tamper with it.”

  For a second Father Edward stares at me, trying that piercing-eye trick. He’s not very good at it, not like Loring.

  I make it easy for him. “I’m not a saint, Mitre.”

  “No,” he finally agrees. “You aren’t. It would be best if you continued your investigation elsewhere. If you find anything else, let us know, but don’t step past our sentries again without being invited.”

  I shrug. “Okay.” I’m not sure I’ll follow the spirit of promise.

  I’m already pushing through the crowd when I remember the bloody footprint. I’m not about to go tangle with the sentries again. Instead I scribble a note and slip it under the door to Hugues’s quarters.

  I get one more glance of the room as I walk up a little rise in the cobbles, just beyond the crowd. I’ve got nothing else to go on: an alarm chain made to fail, bloody-patterned footprints, a poisoned sword grip, and the knowledge that whoever tampered with his sword might come back. I consider going back to investigate a little more, but decide against it. I note the wicked trefoil knives, the blood, the smashed table, and dash for the rooftops.

  So much for morning prayers.

  I steer clear of the mess and confusion of the food markets. I look for flower and herb vendors who sell Aenese, and ask them for names and descriptions of buyers each time I find one carrying the flower and admitting to selling the buds in the last couple days. I get three leads: one old woman who works as an apothecary, a tall, slender man with a bent nose, and a short, “well-built” young man with a long sword. All three bought Aenese yesterday, none from the same vendor. I know who the last is. Dammit.

  Magnus returns exhausted, and starts when he sees me sitting on his bed.

  “Teacup!”

  “Are you alone?”

  “Yeah. Lucinda’s been hounding me all day, but I think she’s finally had enough.”

  “Were you the idiots following the chicken blood?”

  “No. We were the idiots that burst in on the tanner’s convention.”

  I shake my head. “They played us, Magnus.”

  “What does that even mean?”

  “It means they anticipated our every move.”

  I’m nervous. I get up and move around Magnus’s small room, glancing under his desk, prodding the window, examining the hinges. It’s a nervous movement. Inspections are what I do when something is bothering me.

  “Then you’re correct. We’ve been out-foxed.”

  “Maybe,” I say. “They got past the sentries and clipped the bell chain.”

  “I don’t understand. Nobody has ever breached the castle wall before . . .”

  “. . . and left a mess for someone to find,” I mutter to myself, but I don’t want to get mired in that.

  “What’s that?” Magnus is washing his face with a small washcloth and water from a bucket near the window.

  “I don’t think it was a breach.”

  “You’re saying?”

  “It was an inside job.”

  “Are you sure?” he says. He doesn’t want to believe. “The gates are closed at night, the walls are slick as polished marble, and the patrols are random and well-positioned. Even you would have a tough time making it in and out without causing an alarm, especially after killing a full-bladed Paladin, and you’re one of the cleverest climbers I know.”

  “Magnus, the Nightshades have made it their practice to infiltrate strongholds. And I know Father Valoris can do it. I watched him.”

  Magnus seems surprised as he considers this.

  “They can climb a slick stone wall if they have a pair of shadow gloves, and even your abbey locks are plain compared to the intricate traps they make to keep each other out. It’s a dysfunctional family, but they’re more than capable of getting in.”

  “Then why do you think it was an inside job?”

  I tell him about the boot print under the mat, the Aenese, and the description matching Cobalt. “I realize the boot doesn’t fit Cobalt, but we’ve got to tell the Mitres. He’s run free for too long, Magnus.”

  Magnus heaves himself up. “We need to tell the Mitres.”

  “We should start with Hugues.”

  Magnus, whose boots were half off before, has jammed his feet back into place as he heads for the door. I have to run to keep up with him. We stop at Father Hugues quarters but his oldest son, Frédéric, says while blinking away sleep that his father hasn’t returned from Sephram’s Wake.

  “Good evening, Mr. Steeps,” he adds belatedly. “He’s probably still sitting with Sephram’s body in the Assembly Hall. Said he didn’t trust anyone else to do it.”

  Frédéric watches me for any hint of displeasure, any clue as to what’s going on. It seems he likes knowing what’s going on almost as much as Val. “Is everything all right, Mr. Steeps?”

  “Everything is not alright, Frédéric. If we aren’t back in an hour, sound the alarm.”

  “And say a prayer for us,” Magnus adds.

  In the Assembly Hall, the Mitre Animus lurches to his feet the moment we push through the giant double doors in the back. He’s upon us in seconds, looking around wildly, and glancing to see if we’re being followed.“It’s Hawkwood,” he says breathlessly. “Hawkwood came in at second bell and ‘said prayers’ over the corpse.”

  “Did you follow him?”

  “My son Frédéric did. All the way to the North Cliffs. There’s a lighthouse manor out there.”

  Magnus nods. “I’ve been ne
ar there. Cobalt told me he was going to buy that house one day.”

  “Anything else?”

  “Hawkwood came back. He’s with the Altus. I would have gone myself, but your friend Cobalt is there as well and I didn’t . . . I didn’t trust my skills.”

  Magnus spins on his heel. “I do.”

  His face is furious, and Hugues and I have to run to keep up.

  I tell them my plan on the way down, but I’m not sure if Magnus will play his part.

  The Altus Mitre’s door-watch seems flabbergasted to see us so late. It’s Roland again, and someone I don’t recognize. “The Altus is meeting with the Mitre Clinicus and Cadet Cobalt,” Roland says. “Perhaps you should return in the morning.”

  Father Hugues’s enormous face is red. His pent-up fury must have been building all the way down the stairs, as he anticipates bringing Hawkwood to justice with Magnus’s help. “If I’m out of my bed at this hour, you son of a goat,” he roars, “you can bet there’s a damn good reason for it. Now open the door before I kick it in.”

  The door-watch complies.

  Inside, Cobalt is kneeling, Hawkwood is circling him as if questioning, and the Altus Mitre is sitting at a writing desk taking notes. I am struck by the bent shape of Hawkwood’s nose. Hawkwood bought Aenese as well. Cobalt seems almost relieved to see us, but he doesn’t say anything.

  The wind gusts and there is a flutter of movement behind a hanging tapestry. For a moment, I see a Father Valoris-sized bare foot poking from beneath it.

  “What’s going on here?” Hugues asks suddenly.

  Hawkwood glances up easily. “In light of recent events, the Altus Mitre asked that we conduct a more thorough interview of the young probationary cadet.”

  “Without a triumvirate? Without the Mitre Tactus and I?”

  “Father Valoris appears to be running late,” Hawkwood nods.

  Magnus’s question is less direct. We’ve agreed that he should be the one to ask it. “Father Hawkwood, what size boot do you wear?”

  For a moment Hawkwood grins as if Magnus is playing some sort of silly prank. He opens his mouth to respond, and suddenly his face goes white. In a flash he’s moving for the door, flowing like a Nightshade, albeit in white robes.