Angel's Truth (Angelwar Book 1)

by A. J. Grimmelhaus

  He preferred the second option.

  The footfalls were soft and quiet on the carpeted floor, but their cadence was familiar, and Stetch knew before he glanced at the reflection in the window that the room’s latest visitor was no threat. Except, perhaps, to his sanity.

  Katarina sidled up to him, her head barely reaching Stetch’s chin.

  ‘Are you slipping, Stetchy?’

  He saw a playful smile on her reflection’s lips. The second option was still a consideration.

  ‘What if I’d been an assassin? I could have snuck right up to you’ – her finger darted up to poke him in the temple – ‘and buried a dagger in your head.’

  Not for the first time, Stetch considered hurling his charge through the window. It became more tempting with every passing day. He raised a finger and pointed to her reflection in the glass.

  ‘Well, even so,’ Katarina said, ‘you really should show a little more concern for your surroundings.’ She smiled sweetly. ‘If the cook finds out what you’ve been up to with his daughter, it might well be someone else coming through the door next time.’

  Stetch shrugged his shoulders and went back to watching the mercenaries as they approached the docks, almost at their destination now.

  Katarina saw them, too. Her brow creased into a frown, and her reflection pouted back at Stetch. ‘There are fewer returning than left.’

  Stetch nodded. He knew exactly how many were missing. Numbers like that were important.

  ‘Are you not curious where they’ve been, or what they’ve been doing?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘They only left this morning,’ she said, ‘I don’t think they could have got further than that abbey on the mountain, do you?’

  Stetch shook his head. Seemed pretty clear they’d been dying, which was about what he’d have expected.

  ‘You aren’t curious why they’ve been to the abbey? Or what they were doing there?’

  He grunted, but wondered if she might still not get the message. ‘No.’

  ‘Well… it is on our way,’ Katarina said. ‘Surely it couldn’t hurt to have a look?’ She nudged him with her elbow. ‘It could be an adventure.’

  Stetch sighed. Adventures, he had found, always involved people dying. Good adventures were the ones where his companions weren’t among the dead. He glanced at her reflection. Good adventures were ones where his companions weren’t usually among the dead.

  ‘Our business here is now concluded,’ Katarina continued, utterly unfazed by his lack of interest. ‘Be a good man and pack our things,’ she said, heading back towards the hall. ‘We’re going out into the freezing cold again.’

  He sighed in relief as the door slammed shut behind her, and set about gathering up her belongings. There were, he noticed, considerably more clothes than they had arrived with. He picked up a thin cotton dress and frowned; if they were stuck in this frozen hole of a country till summer people were definitely going to die.

  It was tempting to weigh down her pack with a rock or two, but there was a good chance the annoying woman would notice. Stetch wasn’t afraid of her - never that - but the woman’s voice reached a high-pitched whine when she was angered, and Stetch in turn began to feel an overpowering need to silence her. Usually with something sharp. Tempting as that option was, Stetch knew that if he returned home alone, he would end up wishing he had died in this frozen wasteland. The Black Duke of Sudalra was not someone who brooked disappointment or failure, and Stetch knew better than to return home cloaked in either. His companion, of course, seemed completely oblivious to his predicament. And now she wanted to visit the site of a massacre. It was about as foolhardy an idea as Stetch had ever heard, but he didn’t waste his time voicing this. He’d tried that once before, when they had first arrived in Findhel and the fool girl had decided to visit a tavern to, as she put it, “sample the local culture”. The argument had been fierce, loud, and thoroughly one-sided. Everything he said was either discounted as paranoia or just ignored as if the damned woman hadn’t heard a thing.

  Stetch smiled. The only good thing about that night was the bar brawl that had very quickly followed their arrival in the tavern, so far the highlight of Stetch’s trip to Norve. Of course, Katarina hadn’t seen it that way, and had even had the temerity to reprimand Stetch for stopping the would-be suitors and their clumsy attempts to batter her into submission.

  ‘I’m sure it’s just a local custom,’ she had told him with a sickly smile.

  He decided to ask for a posting on the Spur when they got home. The Desolate Cities ought to be far enough away to get some peace. And if they weren’t, well, people died in the desert all the time.

  First, though, he had to get the damned woman home before she got them into a situation he couldn’t cut his way out of.

  *

  The wind was colder than Katarina had imagined possible, the thick furs she wore making little difference to the chill that had already seeped deep into her bones. The further up the mountain they went, the stronger and colder it became. Twice on the narrowest stretches of path – the edge crumbled where falling rocks had struck – the wind seized her fully, and only Stetch’s strong hands kept her from falling. They were so high up by then that the fall would have killed her, so Katarina forgave him for letting his hands stray. Thanking him, though, would have been too much, so she concentrated on reaching the path’s summit as quickly as possible, the thin mountain air searing her lungs and making it difficult to breathe.

  She rounded a large outcrop, and the abbey came into view, frost-shattered gates forty yards ahead, and the glinting, ice-rimed windows of the abbey dotting the mountain beyond. Staring up at the forbidding edifice of the abbey, Katarina didn’t see the carnage until she almost tripped over the first body, Stetch’s hand snatching the scruff of her collar long enough for her to regain her footing.

  So many, she thought as her eyes swept over the pile of bodies in front of the gate. They looked like broken dolls, bodies deformed and defaced with red finger-paint. The snow around the corpses was stained bright scarlet, fading to pink as it radiated out towards the path’s jagged edge. Katarina felt bile rising in her throat as she saw the gaping wounds and sightless eyes, forcing it back down as Stetch stepped forward to stand beside her. If I vomit, he’ll never let me forget it. He probably wouldn’t say anything, of course, but Katarina knew he’d find ways to remind her.

  Once her stomach settled, Katarina stepped over the nearest limb, making her way to the courtyard beyond the pile of dead. Her foot never reached the ground, an arm barring her way.

  ‘Are you making free with my person?’

  Stetch winced, but at least had the decency to remove his arm from her bosom. Then he spoilt it by glaring at Katarina as if she was a child.

  ‘There’s nobody left to hear,’ she snapped.

  Stetch gave an equivocal grunt, and started picking his way through the corpses, his eyes sweeping left and right over the dead. Katarina followed him, stepping where he stepped, but not looking too closely; the unfocused stares of the dead were unsettling. The crackling of blood-soaked ice breaking beneath their boots threatened to bring the gorge again, so Katarina kept her mind busy by thinking of ways to torment Stetch for his fondling – inadvertent, perhaps, but still meriting some form of punishment. She nearly smacked into him as he stopped under the heavy stone arch. The fighting had been fiercest here, so much blood spilt that pools of it had formed in the snow, the surface already frozen over.

  Stetch knelt down, no hesitation as he rolled over a gore-riddled carcass that barely looked human anymore. ‘Reve,’ he grunted, finger pointing at the stained surcoat, its device of a silver winged sword atop the orange moon of Ammerlac completely obscured by a dark stain. Stetch leaned over, his fingers closing the dead knight’s eyes. It was the only tender action Katarina had ever seen him perform. Stetch rose slowly, the frozen blood beneath him cracking like old bones. ‘Three,’ he added, finger indicating two other bodies, simila
rly disfigured. His eyes swept back over the bodies surrounding the three knights and Stetch gave a tight nod of satisfaction. ‘Did well.’

  *

  Within the courtyard, the carnage was even worse. Bodies were strewn across the snow-dusted square, pink tendrils connecting them like a haphazard spiderweb. The corpses were spread far and wide, fighting spreading out once the invaders had breached the narrow gates. Katarina saw a half-dozen monks among the dead, their weathered faces slack in death. The rumours are true then, she thought, noticing the swords and pikes in frozen hands. Most of monks bore scars, and a couple were missing fingers, skin long since healed over the wounds. Former knights and warriors who took vows. This is the place, she thought, the place where the Reve trains its next generation of knights.

  She noticed some of the invaders among the dead, but Katarina saw the majority of corpses were different again: smaller bodies, not yet fully formed. Ripped and frayed clothes clung to waif-like frames. Many of them had trousers too short, ankles bare to the winter sun.

  ‘Children,’ she whispered as she reached the first, ‘they’re barely more than children.’

  Stetch had already moved on.

  She picked her way between the bodies, trampled snow crunching underfoot as she followed Stetch to the portico steps where one last body awaited, Stetch’s frame leaving just a pair of twisted legs visible.

  Katarina reached his side and felt bile rise in her throat as she saw the frail old man, propped up against the outermost pillar in the middle of dark, frozen pool, the edges tinged pink as it merged with the trampled snow at the base of the steps. The old man had fought hard, half a dozen fresh wounds on his arms and upper torso, though none looked fatal. His lower torso was a ruined mess, skin torn and shredded around a gaping wound. It looked like an animal had reached the corpse before them, widened what Katarina guessed was the killing wound, then buried its muzzle in the warmth.

  Katarina looked away, fighting the rising nausea. She saw Stetch staring at a patch of snow by the body’s thigh, and followed his gaze. Boots had trampled the snow surrounding the abbey’s entrance, but a small patch next to the corpse was undisturbed except for a single print, too large for a wolf, too small for a bear.

  She cleared her throat. ‘An animal? Could an animal have done…that?’

  Stetch shook his head, his expression thoughtful.

  Katarina touched his sleeve. ‘Are you sure?’

  He glanced back at the bodies littering the courtyard and nodded. ‘Tortured.’ He gestured at the old man’s hands, and Katarina saw it: the ink-stained fingers on both hands were broken. What did they want so badly? she wondered, gaze drifting back to the strange footprint. And did they find it?

  Katarina looked away, her companion frowning as he surveyed the carnage within Icepeak’s walls. ‘Stetch? What is it?’

  ‘Bodies,’ he grunted. He strode back towards the gates. ‘Not enough.’

  Snow squealed beneath her boots as Katarina hurried after him. ‘Not enough? What do you mean?’

  He stopped beside one of the attackers, turning the body over with his boot. He grunted, and moved on to another, repeating the process.

  The attackers, Katarina realised, as Stetch rolled over a third body, another one of the invaders. He thinks they should have lost more men. She counted half a dozen in the courtyard, the same number of monks, and twice as many students. Katarina followed Stetch to the next body, an attacker’s body fallen atop a much smaller student. He expected the boys to hold their own against seasoned men, she realised. ‘Are the church knights really that dangerous?’

  Stetch nodded.

  ‘As deadly as the Sworn?’

  Stetch paused, boot poised to roll the attacker’s body. He scowled. ‘Maybe.’

  He rolled the body off the fallen student, a loud curse echoing through the courtyard. Katarina followed his gaze, her eyes drawn to a bright strip of red cloth tied around the man’s arm.

  ‘The Band of Blood,’ she whispered, closing her eyes. Valdur was here. Her favourite cousin had disappeared four years earlier amid rumours of disgrace and exile. One moment, her best friend had been there; the next, gone, as if he’d never existed. Long weeks later, whispers of Valdur’s travels reached her father. He’s joined a bunch of bandits, her father had told her one day. He’s joined the Band of Blood. We won’t see him again.

  Katarina opened her eyes. It made sense now: the abbey had been attacked by the world’s deadliest bandits, a bunch of madmen and murderers who occasionally masqueraded as mercenaries. She shivered; if even half the stories about them were true it wasn’t surprising they had lost so few.

  And who else would try this? she thought. Who else would be mad enough to attack the Reve’s stronghold?

  ‘Kenzin Morrow,’ Stetch growled, his gaze turned south, back towards Findhel.

  It was them, Katarina realised. That’s who we saw marching back.

  Stetch took a step towards the gates, and she snagged his sleeve, understanding his intent. ‘You’d have to go through a dozen of his men to reach him.’

  Stetch shrugged and reached up to pluck her fingers from his arm.

  ‘You can’t go,’ Katarina told him, tightening her grip. ‘You hear me? You can’t go.’

  He froze, head turning slowly towards her. It felt like he was making a decision. A life or death decision. Maybe hers.

  ‘They were looking for something,’ she said quickly, ‘and we don’t know if they found it. The Black Duke will want to know.’

  He grunted, somehow conveying in that single sound the duke would be happier with a dead mercenary leader at his feet.

  ‘My duty is clear,’ Katarina told him, ‘is yours? Would you disobey orders and abandon me in a foreign land? What do you think the duke would say?’

  The warrior was quiet a long time, eyes fixed on the distant port. Eventually, he ground out two words. ‘Now what?’

  Katarina looked down at the dead mercenary, the strip of cloth that identified who had carried out this slaughter. Valdur is with them, she thought. My cousin is out there.

  ‘Take that cloth off the corpse,’ she said. ‘We’re leaving.’

  3.

  The world was bright and luminous, just like how the priests described Heaven. He couldn’t feel anything and The Names of Salvation said the world after life was one without pain, without suffering. Except for those bound for the Pit.

  It was bloody cold though, colder than he’d expected. The church’s text didn’t mention that.

  A gust of wind struck his face, and Tol shivered.

  I’m not dead. Sensation was returning; he still had his body. He was on his front, one side of his face on a pillow of snow. He tried to push himself up, and found his right arm wasn’t on the ground. He felt around, discovered a patch of hard ice by his shoulder and levered himself up an inch. He froze in place, memory striking him like an avalanche as the view snapped into focus.

  I’m still on the mountain.

  He rolled away from the edge, and ended up on his side as his hips hit cold stone.

  I fell, he remembered. He glanced up, but couldn’t see the narrow ledge or the tunnel entrance. But not far. It was luck he had fallen on another ledge; he was still hundreds of feet from the ground.

  Family luck, Tol thought sourly. The snow had broken his fall, but the cold had seeped deep into his bones, working in concert with the mountain wind. How long was I out? he wondered. His fingers were already turning blue, and he barely had any feeling in them at all. He struggled upright, and felt a weight on his back. Sir Brounhalk’s pack, he realised.

  Maybe the family isn’t cursed after all.

  Minutes later, ensconced in furs, Tol shuffled over the lip of the ledge.

  He regained some measure of feeling in his frozen body as he descended, the numbness in his limbs replaced by prickling pain where he had lain in the snow or bare skin had been lashed by the high mountain winds. Beneath the knight’s furs he could feel where hi
s body had struck the ledge after falling, and figured the bruises would be dark as his mood, maybe dark as the Pit itself.

  The hurts threatened to overwhelm Tol, and he turned his mind to his destination. If he could reach the convent, reach a building full of nuns, it would all be worth it.

  Think of the convent.

  Tol smiled. They wouldn’t have many visitors, not if the woman in charge was half as strict as the abbot.

  Think of the convent.

  It became a mantra.

  *

  What secret?

  Tol had made it back to the ground in one frozen piece. It had taken a long, long time, and the sun was low in the sky, his shadow stretching out across the snow in front of him. It was getting colder.

  What secret? His mind was slow, every thought half frozen, but he kept coming back to that question. Icepeak Abbey had stood for a hundred years. Or a hundred and fifty; Tol didn’t remember. It was old though, maybe nearly as old as the Church itself, and he felt sure he’d have remembered if anyone had ever been stupid enough to assault it. It was the kind of thing the abbot would have a saying about: might as well attack the abbey with a horde of demons, or some such nonsense. Tol could almost hear the old man saying it, another of his little wisdoms delivered to drive home some dumb point or other.

  The north face of the mountain loomed over his right shoulder, the abbey somewhere on the other side of Icepeak. They had to be mad to attack, he thought. Mad or desperate.

  The secret at the heart of the Knights Reve. That’s what the abbot had called it.

  A secret worth killing for? Tol wondered. A secret worth losing half your men over? That, he figured, is what it would take to breach the abbey. There were three Reavers there, too - almost certainly not expected - and Reve knights were as hard as they came.