Paladin's Strength

by T. Kingfisher

  “Ah,” said Clara. “And Brant’s barrels?”

  “Oh, very real. But they’re our cover story. I really did want many fewer guards, too.” He grimaced, and she suspected that he was thinking of Haller. “We’ve been trying to keep it secret because we literally do not know who or what is behind these things. Rogue wonderworker? Cult? A golem-maker?”

  “I thought the secret of making golems had been lost centuries ago.”

  “So did everyone else.”

  “Hmm.” Clara gnawed on her lower lip. “Interesting. You think they’re going to Morstone?”

  “No idea. We had planned to follow the trail. Brant knew that we might be taking detours. Now it looks like we might still be behind them.” He rubbed the back of his neck. “Morstone would be a good place for them to set up shop again, anyway. Big city, huge slums, lots of people who can vanish without anyone kicking up a fuss. Even the White Rat hasn’t made much of a dent there.”

  And my sisters are likely headed for the fighting pits there. The shudder that went through her was not from the exhaustion of too many changes. She breathed in, and caught another whiff of the burnt smell.

  “Ahead, I think.”

  It was farther away than she expected. The smell was so strong that it carried. She was glad, by the time they reached the source, that she wasn’t the bear. Her human nose was running and her eyes were burning. To a more sensitive nose, it would have been nearly intolerable.

  “Dammit,” said Istvhan softly, looking down at the headless corpse. “Sometimes I hate being right.”

  Nineteen

  The body looked the way that all the smooth men’s victim’s looked—headless, half-rotted, with a deep hole running from the stump of the neck into the body. The smooth men had a tapered spike in place of a neck. The amount of both force and precision it took to jam that spike into the body was astonishing. Doctor Piper, the surgeon to the dead in Archon’s Glory, had had a lot to say about that. “Could a human do it? Sure. Humans can do all kinds of things, particularly when they aren’t held back by moral compunctions. Could they do it consistently and well, on the first try, every time? Definitely not.”

  “Hmm.” Clara studied the body dispassionately. “Rotten, but the scavengers haven’t done much.”

  “They don’t, as far as we can tell. They don’t like the smell. Not even vultures will touch them. Useful for us, insomuch as we’re more likely to find the heads, but I don’t like what that says about the smooth men themselves.” He coughed.

  “So there’s a severed head around here as well?”

  “Probably.”

  In fact there were two, a man and a woman. Istvhan looked down at them and groaned.

  The necks were ragged, the eyes staring sightlessly at the sky. Neither matched the body and they were a great deal fresher.

  Clara crouched down, her sleeve over her mouth, and studied the heads. “That’s a ragged stump. If they used an axe, they didn’t use it well.”

  “It’s not an axe.” Istvhan. “They open their jaws somehow and bite the heads off. It’s pretty horrible.”

  “…ah.”

  Her voice was absolutely inflectionless. Istvhan cursed himself. “Not like that,” he said. “I mean, not like you do. Like you did. Oh, hell.”

  Making a bit of a mess of things, he observed internally. Keep talking, though. I’m sure you can make it worse.

  “I know it shouldn’t matter,” he said hopelessly. “About you and the—the—with the teeth—”

  Clara gazed at him in silence. Istvhan talked to fill it, which was the worst possible thing he could do and he knew it was the worst thing he could do and yet he seemed to be doing it anyway. “He’d be just as dead if I ran him through with a sword. It doesn’t matter to him. I’m trying not to let it matter to me.”

  “No,” said Clara, “biting people’s heads off should matter, I think. You don’t want to start doing it for fun.”

  “Well, no, of course not. But…” He rubbed both hands over his face, mostly to shut himself up. After a moment he dropped his hands and said “I’m going to stop talking now.”

  “That would probably be for the best, yes.” She stood up, dusting off her hands. “I suspect that lump over there is our second body.”

  Istvhan turned and followed her gaze to a crumpled shape under a low pine tree. It might have been a log or a rock, except that it appeared to be wearing ragged clothes.

  “Do we do something with these bodies?” asked Clara. “Burn them or put a stake through their heart or something?”

  “If we had time and tools, I’d want to bury them. But as it is…” He shrugged. “We’ve got our own problems right now, and I don’t believe in any god that would punish two souls for not getting a proper burial when they were murdered.”

  Clara smiled. It was a genuine smile, which surprised him, given that he’d just made a spectacular ass of himself. Not a nun, but she takes faith seriously nonetheless.

  “What else have you learned about them?”

  “We know there’s at least two of them. They can’t replace themselves, it takes two. They seem to go inert once they’re pulled out.” He stared down at the second head. “I suspect they caught two people traveling together and took both their bodies.” He tried not to imagine what it must have been like for the second of the two, seeing their partner slaughtered in front of them and knowing what was coming next.

  “Convenient for them. Will they be able to pass as human?”

  Istvhan frowned. “No, but also yes? They’re clearly wrong if you look at them up close. No one has skin like clay. No pores, nothing. And they don’t have hair, so they wear hats or hoods. But how many people really say anything? You’re not going to point at someone in the street and yell, “That person isn’t right!” In small towns, no, they’d stand out, but in a big city, all they have to do is walk away. Civility and not wanting to get involved does the rest.”

  “So why keep it a secret, then? Why not spread the word as far as you can?”

  Istvhan scowled. It was a point of contention between himself and the Bishop. She was right, and he knew she was right, but it galled him to let people carry on in ignorance when knowledge might have saved them. “We spread word about the smell, and told people there was a new type of creature out there. A perfumer mixed us up vials that replicate it, and the Temple of the Rat had them out to every town large enough to field a constabulary so that they’d know if they found signs. That’s how we picked up the trail here in the first place—you can get slewhounds on it. But we were vague about the description beyond the smell. Bishop Beartongue is of the opinion that if you tell people that someone who looks different is possibly a supernatural murderer, it will lead to a bloodbath.”

  Clara inhaled sharply, then coughed and covered her face with her sleeve again. “Arrgh. Let’s move away from these poor people before I get sick.” They tromped down the hillside together. Istvhan wasn’t sure how close to stand to her. Did she want him to stand farther away? Would she think that he was disgusted by her if he did? Dammit. This wasn’t the sort of thing a person should have to worry about when there were decapitating monsters running about. He gave up and just followed her downslope. She was better in the woods than he was. He wondered if the bear part helped, or if she’d simply spent a lot more time in the countryside. He’d started life that way, but his country was drier and full of chaparral, not hundred-foot pines.

  When they were far enough away that the smell had faded to a lingering unpleasantness in the back of the throat, Clara said, “I don’t let it eat them.”

  “What?”

  “When the bear kills someone. It doesn’t usually want to fight. It would much rather run away. If that man hadn’t been blocking the way from the den, so that it felt cornered…” She shrugged, looking uncomfortable. “But if it does bite someone’s head off, I don’t let it eat them afterward. You don’t want the beast to get a taste for flesh.”

  “Oh,” said I
stvhan, which seemed woefully inadequate.

  “It doesn’t happen often. I’ve only had to do it twice before.”

  “Ah.”

  “Your bishop is right,” she added, which seemed like an abrupt change. “It would be a bloodbath. People are already…not kind to difference. If you sent out messengers saying that there were murderers and all you could say was that they looked a bit strange? It wouldn’t end well.”

  “You’re not wrong,” Istvhan said. “But it galls me. We know that they’ll keep killing, and this way maybe we could get ahead of them somehow. I keep thinking if we could get the description right…”

  Clara snorted. “There is no description so perfect that a mob will step back and say, ‘Oh, sorry, wrong person.’ Trust me.”

  It occurred to Istvhan that maybe she hadn’t changed the conversation at all. Clara might have a pretty good idea of how people reacted to frightening differences. Maybe, once again, he should just shut up and listen.

  However willing he was to listen, she did not add anything else. Nor did she turn back into a beast. Instead they slipped and slid down the slope, the pine needles crunching and sliding underfoot. The snow thinned out as they descended, first into gritty drifts, then into white shadows under the trees, then gone completely.

  “I miss shoes,” muttered Clara, stopping to rub her feet. “It’s the worst of the change. You always end up somewhere without shoes.”

  “And clothes.”

  “Oh, well.” Was that an actual grin? Yes it was, however quickly she tried to hide it. “It turns out that if you walk up to someone, look them in the eye, and say, ‘Pardon, I’ve just been robbed. May I borrow your coat?’ they almost always oblige. The trick is to not look even remotely ashamed. Then you ask them to direct you to the local constable’s office, then the constables panic and get you a blanket, you give them an entirely fictitious description of the thieves, and they escort you back to your barge, or to an inn, or whatever. As long as you’re indignant, everyone else falls in line. But no one ever has the shoes.”

  Istvhan laughed. “Or socks, I should imagine. One of my fellow paladins knits socks at an alarming rate. He says it soothes him. Keeps us all in socks, anyway, although sometimes his choice of yarn is…idiosyncratic.”

  “Useful friend to have, though.”

  “Oh, very.” Istvhan wished Stephen were here now. Stephen took the weight of the world on his shoulders and never complained, which could occasionally be annoying but was also useful when things were spiraling out of control. On the other hand, he was terribly bad at talking to women. Fortunately, he had fallen passionately in love with an odd little perfumer, the same one who had mixed up the scent vials to help track the smooth men. Istvhan quite liked her. She wanted to spend the majority of her days locked in her workshop and then come out and be with Stephen, and then go back to her workshop. Right before he’d left the city, Stephen told him that she had moved a second chair into the workshop so that he could knit in the same room with her, which, judging by Stephen’s reaction, was a declaration of affection unmatched in modern times.

  Clara stopped moving suddenly and put up a hand. “Do you hear that?”

  Istvhan cocked his head and listened. After a moment, a thin thread of human voices came through the muffling trees. “Someone talking,” he murmured. “No, someone yelling. Up ahead?”

  “Downslope,” said Clara.

  “Did they get ahead of us?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe. It’s also possible we’ve reached the road.”

  “I’ll scout ahead. They’ll be looking for you, not me.”

  “Pretty sure they got a good look at you when you drew a sword at them,” said Clara, a bit dryly. “I’ll come with you, but I’ll stay in the trees until we’re sure.”

  Istvhan nodded. They moved toward the voices, as quietly as possible. A dry pine forest was the very worst thing for stealth. Everything crunched and snapped underfoot. Nevertheless, the trees began to thin and Istvhan caught a glimpse of packed mud and gravel. He felt weak-kneed with relief. Roads he understood. People, for the most part, he could deal with. Forests were difficult. It was very hard to negotiate with pine trees; they didn’t want to come to the table at all.

  He gestured to Clara to wait and crept up the last lines of trees. The voices were louder now.

  “Da,” said a woman’s voice wearily, “it’s stuck up to the axle. You can’t pull it out and you’re going to kill yourself trying.”

  “It just needs a little wiggling,” said a querulous male voice.

  “And if you throw your back out, I’ll be trying to lift both you and the wagon, and how will that help?”

  Istvhan reached the road and looked out onto a wagon. The side was painted with the words, “Doctor Mason’s Genuine Herbal Medicines,” all lettered in a riot of colors that practically glowed in the afternoon sun. The wagon was tilted at an angle and one of the front wheels had sunk deeply into the mud. Two surly-looking mules stood at the front, their ears half-back and expressions of deep annoyance on their faces. An old man was trying to dig the wheel out, and a young woman stood over him, her hands on her hips, wearing an expression not unlike the mules.

  “Da, I swear by the Lady of Grass that if you throw your back out, I will leave you here and run away to start a new life as a dancing girl.”

  “You’ll never do it, girl, you’ve got bad ankles. So did your mother, the gods keep her. Whole family, really. Faces like angels, but bad ankles.”

  “Think it’s a trap?” murmured Clara in Istvhan’s ear. Her breath was warm against the side of his face, and Istvhan wished that he was in a position to appreciate that more.

  “If it is, it’s a very strange one.”

  “My ankles will hold out longer than your back.”

  “Don’t sass me. Do we have a board we can fit under the wheel?”

  “Only if I start tearing open crates.”

  “Don’t you touch those crates. That medicine can’t be jostled or exposed to light.”

  “It’s getting jostled plenty with all that heaving you’re doing.”

  “That’s fine, as long as they’re in the crates. I’m going to try again.”

  “Da…”

  The old man set his back to the wheel and began to strain. His face turned an alarming shade of violet. Istvhan decided that this had gone on long enough and emerged from the trees. “Pardon, gentlefolk,” he said, “but perhaps I can be of some assistance?”

  Twenty

  “Sir!” The old man straightened. His mouth stretched into a broad smile and his eyes positively twinkled. Istvhan recognized the effect immediately. This is the face he shows to strangers. Interesting.

  “You are a strapping young fellow, aren’t you?” said the old man. His voice had rounded out and become positively theatrical. “And I fear that you find me temporarily embarrassed by the condition of my wagon. But I gaze upon your muscles, my good sir, and it comes to me that perhaps you might be the answers to my prayers. Yes, truly the gods have shined upon the hour of our meeting!”

  “You need me to get your wagon unstuck,” said Istvhan, amused.

  “In a word, yes. In a word. I could not have put it better myself, and I have, if you will allow me to boast, a vocabulary the breadth of which has never been fully plumbed.”

  The young woman put her hand over her eyes.

  “You see before you the illustrious Doctor Mason,” he continued, “purveyor of the finest herbal treatments for all manner of ailments. If you will but aid me in freeing my wagon, I would be delighted to offer you a free bottle—no, two free bottles!—in gratitude.”

  Istvhan was reasonably familiar with such medicines and wondered if the bottles would prove fatal or only make his hair fall out. “No need,” he said. “Let me take a look at your wagon.”

  “Of course, of course! But what is your name, young sir?”

  “Istvhan.”

  “Tolly,” said the young woman, nodding toward Ist
vhan. She had a wary but appreciative look. Istvhan was used to seeing women look at him that way, and took no offense at either the wariness or the appreciation.

  “My beloved granddaughter, light of my life, joy of my heart, comfort to my old age. And you may call me Doc Mason, as I feel we shall all be great friends. Particularly once the wagon is unstuck.”

  The comfort to his old age gazed at the sky as if contemplating braining him with a bottle of his own medicine.

  Istvhan inspected the situation. The wagon was well and truly stuck. The wheel had gotten jammed deeply into mud, and no amount of forward momentum by the mules was going to help if it didn’t also get some lift upwards. He grabbed the wheel and hauled. It budged, but only enough to let him know that it was theoretically possible. The mud was nearly at the axle. Perhaps if the weight was off on the wagon side…hmm…and I had a lever…

  A familiar voice said, “Let me get that for you.” Clara stepped up beside him, hooked her hands under the back of the wagon, and threw her weight into it as well.

  It moved a little more, but not enough. “Levers,” said Istvhan. “Also, you were supposed to wait in the woods.”

  “Was I?” She rubbed her hands across her thighs. “Can’t imagine why you’d think that.”

  “No, neither can I.”

  “Madam!” said Doctor Mason. “My goodness!” His eyes swept over her torn robes, much the worse for wear for having had a bear erupt out of them twice in as many days. “Has some ill befallen you? May we offer our assistance?”

  “Set upon by bandits,” she said smoothly. “My bodyguard here stood them off.”

  Demoted from captain to bodyguard. Ah, well. “Yes, indeed. How many did I stand off, do you remember?”