"I know where I'm safe. You don't, Travis. You never did, or you never would have come looking for me."
"I have my reasons."
"What do you want with me?"
"There's a man in Turnitia who takes a vested interest in certain things associated with members of your jolly little profession."
"Pro or con?"
"Both, depending on the circumstances."
"And he's interested in me?"
"Not unless you were in Kalten for the Ducal wedding."
"Ah," Batsen said with a smile. "Ludwig Rhodon."
"Was that you?"
"If it was, it would be between me and my paymaster. But, as it happens, no. Not my doing."
Crowe heard footsteps behind him and turned to see Gabriella.
"What did you say about Eminence Rhodon, scum?" She said, rushing over to Batsen. "Were you behind it? Is that why came after me and Erak?"
"I've no idea why I was hired to kill you. It doesn't matter in any case; all that matters is that I complete my contract and collect my fee." Batsen said blandly, then he exploded into action, a spinning kick sending Crowe's blade flying. The rope binding his wrists burned to ashes in a second. Eyes closed, Batsen leapt high into the air, hurling a sizzling blizzard of sharp hail from his body. The ice storm coiled its way to Crowe, who lashed out at a brazier with one foot. The ice flashed into steam as the hot coals met it head-on.
Batsen cupped a small flame between his hands before hurling it at Gabriella.
She turned her head away instinctively, but too late to stop the fire from hitting her. She didn't feel a thing, though green and purple spots danced in front of her eyes when the brightness of the flame disappeared. Cursing herself for being taken in by some mere distraction, she lunged for him.
Batsen skipped backwards as she attacked.
"What are you?" he hissed. "The darkness, the fire — "
A punch in the face ended his question, but he rolled with it, spinning away and coming into a guarded stance.
He gathered his powers around himself, rising into the air as it crackled with energy. Gabriella ran, stretching up one hand to grab at his ankle. The instant her fingertips brushed the cloth of his trews, he plummeted down onto the ground.
Gabriella wasn't going to give him a chance to use any more magic, but immediately rammed her blade through him.
Batsen, looking utterly surprised, spat out blood. Breathing seemed to make him wince and Gabriella could tell he was barely managing to cling to each second of life. He would be lucky to draw more than half a dozen more breaths.
"I know you're working for Goran Kell" Gabriella snarled. Batsen only laughed, an agonised, bubbling sound. "But you're not going to stop me finding him."
Batsen struggled for another breath. "Who would have… thought? Brotherhood and Faith, working together. You and Travis."
"What?"
"Sister DeZantez… and Brother Crowe. It won't last." Batsen's laughter dissolved into bubbling coughs. "Give my… regards… to Kell…" With a final cough of thick, almost black blood, he fell silent.
Gabriella stood and wiped the blood from her blade before turning to Crowe.
"So, 'Brother' Crowe?"
"You're making a big mistake."
"No." She stalked towards him. "You did that."
He backed off. "Don't do this, pet. I've almost gotten to like you. There aren't many people who get to there and it'd be a shame to have to keep their numbers down, even by one."
"I wish I didn't have to do this."
"You don't."
"I have a duty to God."
"God never asked you to kill me."
"He just did." She stepped into his path, one blade going for his sword hand, the other, drawn quickly, for his throat. He deflected the shot at his throat and suddenly the blade heading for his hand was slashing across his shirt at gut-level.
They danced back and forth, he trying to use his longer sword to block both of hers, she trying to get around his from two directions at once. They were quite evenly matched, but Crowe could already see blood seeping though her surplice from her earlier wounds. Quick as a flash, he shouldered forward. He struck home accurately, causing pain to explode across her body.
Gabriella fell and he batted her swords away. He stood over her, one boot crushing the hand that was reaching for one of the felled blades. He rested the point of his broadsword against her throat. "All I have to do is push."
"Then do it," she snarled. "I'm your enemy and you're the self-proclaimed murderer. Get on with it."
"I'm no more a Brother of the Divine Path than I'm an Enlightened One of the Final Faith."
"That's not what your Shadowmage friend said."
"You're going to take the word of a man who's tried to kill both of us over mine?" Crowe shrugged. "All right, love. I never claimed to be the world's most trustworthy man. But neither is your average hired assassin. Think about this one, right? This bloke was hired to kill you, and failed. With his dying breath, he got you into another fight, against a man who was a better fighter than he was." He paused to let that sink in. "Against a man who, being a better fighter than him, might have more chance of killing you than he did." He could see in her eyes that this was making sense to her. "Not many people get recruited as a willing participant in their enemy's revenge, Dez. But it is a pretty bloody good trick if you can manage it."
"And what's this speech meant to do?"
"Save your life. I will kill you if I have to, but I'd rather not have to."
"Why? Don't you want me off your back?"
"Sure I do. But that bastard just did his damnedest to kill me as well as you and I'm in no mood do him any bloody favours." He spat on Batsen's corpse.
Gabriella relaxed slightly. "All right, so you're not a Brother, but you've worked with them."
"Their money's as good as anyone's. I've worked with the Faith too. That's why they call it being a mercenary, love. The clue's in the name."
"And are you working for the Brotherhood now?"
"If I'm not working for them I'll say no and if I am working for them I wouldn't want you to know, so I'd still have to say no."
"So, someone, who may or may not belong to some religious organisation of which I can't approve, paid you to do a job…"
"I ain't in the habit of risking my life for free, Dez. Or fraternising with members of the Faith's military order for free. Actually I should have charged double for that."
"What sort of job?"
"I was hired to find out who hired the man that shot Ludwig Rhodon. I'm told Goran Kell's the one who wants to know, for some reason."
"You're working for Kell?" She was astonished and reached for her sword.
"I'm not working for Goran Kell, Dez. Not directly, anyway. I'm working for a man who Kell went to, to try to find out who's making him look like an arse. Sandor Feyn," Crowe went on. "You won't know him. He usually goes by aliases.
Gabriella grimaced. "I've heard enough bedtime stories, sinner. Karel Scarra already told us that he and Kell — "
"Hired a bloke called Lukas Bertam to off an Eminence? I heard that too. What you don't seem to have heard is that Lukas Bertam isn't the assassin who took the shot and isn't the bloke you and Brand killed."
"Of course he is!"
Crowe radiated smugness. "Did you get a relative to identify the body? Didn't think so. Bertam got himself fished out of Turnitia's harbour two weeks before the big day and someone took his place. Anyway, so Kell's worried that someone is setting him up and he goes to his opposite number in Turnitia. Kell asked him to find out who hired the assassin that took the shot and Feyn asked me, as I do a run between Turnitia and the Huntress. Apparently Kell wanted to ask me himself, but Feyn isn't stupid enough to put us together. Kell doesn't know who I am and I don't know any more about him."
"Can you arrange a meeting with Sandor Feyn?"
"Why?"
"Maybe I can help him out."
Crowe laughed. "You
? Help the naughty Brotherhood types? Bollocks, love."
"It's not unknown. We both worship the same God and sometimes we share a common enemy."
He scanned her face, trying to analyse her expression. "No… There's something else, God-girl."
She nodded slowly, as if admitting defeat. "I still want to find Kell. Perhaps Feyn can point me on the way."
Crowe didn't know that she had good cause to place Kell at the Glass Mountain so recently cleared of goblin-kind. He knew she had an ulterior motive for wanting to see Feyn, so she gave him an ulterior motive; one which anyone among the Swords at Solnos could confirm.
Crowe thought about it. "And what are you offering?"
"The face of the assassin from Kalten."
They buried Erak the next day, under a flagstone in the plaza. Crowe hung back, because it just wasn't his place to be in a Final Faith ceremony. It wasn't that he didn't believe in God — like most soldiers, so likely to meet the Lord of All at any moment, he had his beliefs — but Makennon's rules were another matter.
When the funeral party broke up and the Knights relieved their fellows on guard duty, Gabriella stayed where she was, by the fountain. She dropped to her knees, but when she tried to summon the words of a prayer, she couldn't think of a single one. Oh, she could have recited any of the Faith's standard prayers easily, but she realised that she simply didn't know what she wanted to pray for. For Erak to survive? Too late. For his resurrection? The Lord of All didn't work that way. For him to be with the Lord of All, flying through the clouds of Kerberos? That went without saying and to pray for it would be to insult Erak by suggesting that he had not been a worthy enough man, to have achieved that. Pray for the strength to carry on without him, or to bear the loss? She was strong enough, or she would never have been confirmed as a Knight of the Swords.
So, what to pray for? Nothing, she realised. She didn't need to pray for anything, she just needed to pray and to know that she could always feel that connection to the Lord of All. Perhaps, she thought, her prayer had been answered before she even recognised its nature herself.
"I miss him," she said softly. And she felt that the Lord of All had somehow responded that He knew and that He understood and that Gabriella shouldn't be ashamed.
Crowe appeared beside her.
"I'm sorry, you know." He said.
Gabriella nodded. "I know. We'd made the Pact, Erak and me."
Crowe looked blank. "Pact? You mean like a marriage Binding?"
"More or less. Whatever branch of Faith the faithful work in it is the duty of each couple to produce one child between them."
"One?"
Gabriella nodded. "One only. One to carry on God's work and spread His word."
"Wouldn't a whole brood do that more?"
"More would distract from God's work."
"Too much pleasure, eh?"
"You mock my grief! What do you know about grief, anyway?"
"If you think I haven't lost a loved one before, you're wrong. You don't grow up in my business without that happening a few times."
"Why are you still here?" she asked at last.
"There are two things nobody should do alone. Nobody should die alone and nobody should grieve alone."
DeBarres came over and Crowe nodded to him before leaving the Knight and Preceptor in private.
"I don't know what to say. 'I'm sorry' is just nowhere near enough. Nowhere near." DeBarres said, putting a hand on Gabriella's shoulder.
"Seeing you helps."
DeBarres hesitated. "This Travis Crowe… Who is he?"
Gabriella held her tongue. Crowe. Crowe the heretic. Crowe the immoral. Crowe the murder and corruptor. Crowe the man who knew such a high figure in the Brotherhood.
"He's a mercenary who helped with the defence of Solnos."
"Good man?"
"Professional. Good fighter."
"Then he has the thanks of the Order. Now…"
She looked at DeBarres sadly. "No rest for the… Well, anyway. I have a lead on Goran Kell. Sandor Feyn."
"Feyn? DeBarres was either shocked or impressed, but Gabriella wasn't sure which it was. A mixture, perhaps. "One of the legends, Gabriella, equal in notoriety to Kell. We've wanted to bring him down for years."
"I remembered his name. Apparently he's in Turnitia. Crowe and I will be following that up in the morning."
"Do you need any reinforcements?"
"I don't think so."
"If you insist. Excellent work, as always." He straightened out a crick in his back. "What about Kell?"
"We'll have to deal with the goblins first to get near him. I know where I can probably find a map to his more precise location. I'll be fetching that after I've visited Feyn. Also, Feyn apparently has been in contact with Kell. If he still has a contact, I'd prefer that contact to stop before we get near Kell."
"Good thinking. The Lord go with you."
A few days later, after a long and painful ride northwards, Gabriella was wearing nondescript black and grey armour. Some of it, including the cloak, had belonged to Kannis' fallen man. Beside her, Crowe wore the same colours as they rode westward through the southern end of the Anclas territories. Gabriella scowled, her nose wrinkling as the stench of rotten fish rolled from the Turnitia docks as they entered the city.
They dismounted outside a tavern squeezed between two ship owner's offices. The ruffians lounging outside let them through without a word, as soon as Crowe said: "It's raining blood out here."
Gabriella tried to keep her emotions in check. As the equivalent of an Eminence in the Brotherhood of the Divine Path, Sandor Feyn had been responsible for more heresy than she could possibly imagine. A great urge to step forward and cut him down where he stood was barely tempered by a sense of satisfaction at having tracked him down and tricked her way into his confidence. The Faith had been looking for him for years. Now she was standing right in front of him. At heart, only the thought of the information he could supply was saving him right now.
"So," Sandor Feyn said, eyeing Gabriella appreciatively as she sat before him, "who's she?"
Crowe looked casually at Gabriella. "Who, the skirt? She's just a Knight of the Swords Of Dawn who's walked right through all your security by the clever scheme of not wearing a big sign over her chest."
Gabriella couldn't believe her ears, and stiffened, ready to spring for the window.
Feyn laughed at the obvious absurdity of the answer and Crowe joined in.
"You want anything, just ask Erno at the bar." Feyn said, before leading Crowe to a back room.
"So, who is the girlie then?" Feyn said once they were in private. "Really, I mean. And is she for sale?"
Crowe grinned. "She's a Knight of the Swords who just walked in — "
"You did that joke already."
"Not everything I say is carefully calculated to make you laugh."
"Eh?"
"She really is a Knight of the Swords," Crowe said. "I wasn't joking." "What…" Feyn managed hoarsely. "What in the name of a demon's balls did you bring her here for?"
"Oh, well, I know how much you enjoy having a pretty face around."
"And you also know how much I hate having to bury a pretty face. Which I'll now have to do!" Feyn glanced towards the door, looking as if he expected a troop of soldiers to kick it down at any second. "How much does she know about me?"
"Pretty much everything. If I was you I'd be pretty bloody worried right now, mate."
"If you — " Feyn rose, kicking away the table and drawing a dagger.
Crowe punched him in the face and easily wrested the dagger away.
"Yeah, I'm quaking. Is this really how you do business here? Maybe there's something in this religion stuff after all, because, frankly, it's a miracle you're not dead." He slipped the dagger into his sleeve and shoved Feyn back into his chair, then set the table upright again. "I brought her here because you and her both have a common purpose."
"We worship the same God, if that's what you
mean, but, believe me — "
Crowe shook his head. "I meant an immediate practical purpose, Sandor. You and she both know that Goran Kell's man didn't pull off that shot at Ludwig Rhodon. She and Kell both want to know who did and who actually hired him."
Sandor Feyn was silent for a moment, glaring at Crowe. "Go on."
"She's the one who caught the bloke who took the shot. You can put names to most of the faces in this part of the world."
"But I didn't see — "
"I told you, she caught him."
Feyn suddenly took on a queasy green pallor. "Oh no, tell me she hasn't brought the head?"
"I wish. That'd be easy. The face is in her head, though. All you need to do is get her to remember it right and draw it."
"Draw it?"
"She's good." Crowe promised.
"All right. We'll try it, but you know I can't let her walk out of here and go looking for Kell. She's not leaving this tavern alive."
"That's between you and her. None of my business."
Gabriella was leaning casually against the bar top, dipping black bread into gravy, when Crowe and Feyn returned. Feyn looked at her with a mix of curiosity and fear, and Gabriella knew instinctively that Crowe had made clear to him that the apparent joke he had told about her was indeed the truth.
"It's all right, God-girl," Crowe said, as if reading her mind. "We're all looking for the same truth today."
"It must rankle you, being in here." Feyn said.
"I didn't come here to cause trouble." Gabriella said.
"No, so your friend — my friend here, actually — has told me." Feyn sat on a stool next to her and nodded to the man behind the bar. "Bring us some paper and charcoal sticks."
"Is one of us writing a confession?"
"The deal is this," Crowe said. "Feyn is going to talk to you, set your mind at ease. He'll help you remember."
"I remember perfectly well." She saw his face in her dreams now and again, whether she wanted to or not.
"Forgive me for wanting to be sure you're not wilfully misleading me," Feyn replied.
Crowe cleared his throat. "You, Dez, will scribble down the face of the assassin you caught. Hopefully, Feyn here will recognise him."
The Light of Heaven tok-3 Page 20
