Larin had not believed him, knew they were doomed, knew those who had promised to aid them had abandoned them to their fates. He started forward, down the hill, meaning to die with his men if die he must, then froze at the sound of shouts. As if by magic, soldiers poured from the forest from either direction, flanking the nightlings and driving into their ranks, cutting down the creatures—who were now surrounded on three sides—in great, bloody swaths of destruction.
He turned back to the others then, Tesharna, Alashia, and all the rest, and he saw a surprise and giddy relief on their faces to match his own. All, that was, save for Brent, who didn’t seem surprised in the slightest. “Do you see, Larin?” Brent said, smiling. “You have to trust someone, sometime.”
That memory, as real and as vivid as the day he’d lived it, overcame Larin and, for a time, he only stood there, gripped by it. Then, finally, the ghost of his friend’s face, so kind, so knowing, faded until it was gone completely. “Alright then,” Larin muttered, more to Brent than to the Bishop. “Alright.” He turned back to Orren then and, with a nod, he sat. “First, I’ll need to tell you what’s happened.”
***
Orren sat and listened to the Chosen’s tale, careful to keep any trace of his excitement from his features as he nodded along. He’d heard Amedan’s Chosen were able to know when someone was lying, and there’d been a moment there when the giant had clearly intended to walk out, that Orren had thought there might be some truth to that claim. Now, he knew it to be just as false as the many other beliefs Amedan’s fools held. Still, when the man had studied him with those hard, cold eyes, eyes holding no forgiveness or mercy within them, it had taken everything within Orren, every ounce of strength and willpower he possessed, to keep from fleeing.
It reminded him of a time years ago, when he had fled from another house, wounded, blood pouring from the hole in his throat where the light merchant had stabbed him. He had been sure he would die then. Yet he had put one foot in front of the other, had continued to do so until he had finally made it to safety, and though he could not speak at the time, it had been his writing that had doomed the merchant and his wife. He had survived then, had thrived because of his singular will, and he would do so again.
Orren realized the giant had stopped speaking some time ago and was now studying him suspiciously. He gave the man as reassuring a smile as he could manage. “That is quite a tale, Chosen Larin. Had I not already received word of strange happenings—and had the tale not come from you, of course—I might have found it hard to credit. An army of Redeemers chasing a few outcasts across a continent, men giving themselves to the Dark…you must admit, it sounds like some children’s story.”
Larin leaned forward in his chair, his expression sending a shiver of fear up Orren’s spine, and he quickly held up his hands. “Of course, I do believe you—only a fool would doubt one of your…magnitude. And I think I can help you.”
The giant seemed appeased by that. “What did you have in mind?”
“Well,” Orren said, tapping a finger on his chin, “it seems to me the first matter of business ought to be to make sure your friends are safe. Once that’s done, we can figure out what we need to do. I will check my sources—circumspectly, of course. I have heard some rumors to indicate Chosen Tesharna and Chosen Kale have succumbed to the influences of the Dark, but we will need to be sure before we move on them. Well,” he went on, as if he’d just had the thought, “I suppose first I’ll need to know where they are. I can send men to gather them all and bring them to the Church—they’ll be safe here, of that I’m sure.” He grabbed a blank sheet of parchment from his desk and his pen, “Just tell me their location, and I will send a letter to some trustworthy men who—”
“No.”
“I’m sorry?”
“No letters,” Larin said. “I’ll show your men where they are personally.”
Orren fought to keep the frustration off his face. “As you wish, Chosen Larin. I will send my best men with you and—”
“You’re coming.”
“Excuse me?”
“You’re coming with us,” Larin repeated, and the tone of his voice made it clear there would be no arguing the point. “I am going to trust you, Bishop. Mostly because I have no choice. But I want you close, and I want you to understand if you bring any harm to my friends, I’ll make sure you suffer before you die. Do I make myself clear?”
Orren didn’t have to fake the fear on his face. “Of course, Chosen, as you wish. But, I assure you, I mean you and yours no harm.”
“We’ll see,” Larin growled. “Now, let’s go.”
“Very well only…I need a few moments alone, if it pleases you, Chosen.”
The giant rose, looming over him with a scowl. “Why?”
Orren wracked his brain for some excuse to give the man, but with his massive frame hovering over him it was difficult to think clearly. “I…that is…I would like to send some letters to my colleagues in the surrounding area. Nothing to do with your friends,” he said hurriedly. “Only so we might be warned if this Ekirani you spoke of or any of the Redeemers are headed in this direction. Also, I would like to attempt to ascertain the veracity of Tesharna’s and Kale’s betrayal.”
Larin studied him closely, watching him as if trying to detect some sign of falsehood. But Orren was used to hiding the truth of his nature and his loyalties in the shadows, had done so all his life, so though he was afraid, his outer appearance remained calm. “Very well,” the other man said after a time. “I’ll be out front.”
With that, he turned and walked out the door, and Orren breathed a heavy sigh of relief, collapsing in his chair and running the sleeve of his robe across his sweat-covered forehead. Once the man was gone and he had a chance to think, his mind whirled with the problem before him. Here was the chance he had been looking for, the opportunity to get Shira’s favor, to secure himself a place in the top echelon of the goddess’s servants. Things could have been so much easier, but the damned Chosen and his suspicions, asking…no, that wasn’t right. The man hadn’t asked, at all. He had demanded Orren be present as they went to get the others. Demanded it, as if Orren were not a bishop at all, but some lowly first-year acolyte to be ordered about. Oh, the man would pay for that. But first, he had to figure out how.
Possibilities rose in his mind, one after the other, and he dismissed each. If only the gray-haired bastard hadn’t been so damned suspicious, if only he had told Orren where Alesh and the others were, the problem would practically solve itself. And what was even worse, Orren would have to put himself at risk, would have to travel with the man and…an idea struck him then, and he grinned slowly. Had Chosen Larin been there to see that grin, full of malevolence and ambition with no sign of compassion or humor, he would not have been suspicious, not any longer. He would have known the truth of Orren’s loyalties, would have cut him down in a moment. But he was not.
The door opened, and Fairn peeked inside, his young face pale and sickly-looking. “B-Bishop? What are we to do? If we help them, Shira will be—”
“Shut your mouth, you fool,” Orren hissed., and the younger man recoiled as if slapped. “You do not speak of the goddess where others might hear of it, not ever. Now, get out of my sight. But first…” He paused, scribbling down a quick message on a blank sheet of parchment. At the bottom of the parchment, he drew a quick series of looping whorls, cut through with several diagonal slashes. To most, they would have seemed like no more than doodles, but to those who served the goddess, they served as a sign of the loyalties of the letter’s author. “Tell me, Brother Fairn,” he said, suddenly pleased, “are Zane and his men still sheltering at The Polished Pearl?”
The young priest’s face seemed to go even whiter. “I believe so, sir.”
Orren’s smile widened. “Good. I have a task that requires their particular…skills.” He read over the letter he’d written then paused and wrote another line. Once that was finished, he held it out to Fairn who took it with ob
vious reluctance. “Bring this to him and quickly. Tell him I will stall here for half an hour—that much, at least, I think I can do without drawing undue attention. Then we will depart.”
“Sir,” Fairn said, “are you sure—”
“Yes,” Orren snapped, “now go and do as I say. Oh, and Fairn?”
“Yes, Master?”
“Wake the brothers before you go and send them to me.
“Which, Bishop?”
Orren grinned. “All of them.”
Chapter Eleven
Alesh walked up the tavern stairs toward the room he and Katherine would share, each step harder than the last, the aches and pains of his body he had largely ignored on their flight from the Broken and the Redeemers now making themselves known in this moment of relative peace.
Still, for all that his body ached, he felt better than he had in a long time. The stew he’d eaten coupled with the bath he’d just taken to wash off the accumulated filth of weeks spent on the road, made him feel almost as if he had been born anew. It also, by some way he couldn’t quite define, made his exhaustion much more noticeable, and he feared if he stopped on the stairs, there were even odds he’d fall asleep standing up and wake to a nasty tumble.
So he trudged on, up the stairs and down the hallway toward his room, fishing in his pocket for the key the innkeeper had given him as he did. His fingers felt clumsy with his weariness, but he finally managed to grab it and draw it out. He opened the door as quietly as possible, so he wouldn’t wake Katherine if she had fallen asleep, then slipped the key back into his pocket.
No lanterns burned in the darkness of the room, and the only illumination came from moonlight shining through a small window. Katherine lay on the bed, the covers pulled so high as to nearly obscure her face, as if she were a child seeking shelter from the dangers of the world underneath her blankets. Her long dark hair spilled onto the pillow, lustrous and shining in the moonlight, so beautiful Alesh found it difficult to breathe.
He could see the shape of her underneath the blankets, and for a time he only stood there staring, thinking of what Larin had said, of how he had called him a fool. The Chosen said Katherine liked him, that it was obvious, but Alesh didn’t see it. Maybe, he couldn’t. For he felt then much as he had the first time he’d seen her when she’d come on the stage in that rundown inn in Ilrika. Unworthy.
A wild thought came to him then, a dangerous thought. He could go to her, could take her in his arms, not with any ulterior motive, but only to hold and to be held, so she might know how he felt. He’d had such a thought before while they traveled together, sometimes feeling certain she wanted him to, certain she was waiting for him to. But now, as then, he banished it, shoving it away the way a man might try to put distance between him and some wild beast, for such a thought was dangerous, and he thought, could wound him more deeply than any nightling.
For what if he did go to her, what if he told her how he felt, only for her to push him away? What would she do, if he sat on the bed beside her, if he tried to take her hand in his? Would she shake her head and tell him there had been some mistake, that he had misunderstood? Would she scream? Was he, in fact, one of those monsters which sent her burrowing so deeply under the bed’s coverlet? And the worst of it was if she did scream, if she railed and called him a monster, he would not even be able to deny it. For he knew what he had done over the last weeks, remembered all too well the men he had killed, the blood he had spilled, rejoicing in all of it, in the pain he’d caused, in the finality of one sword stroke after another.
He suddenly realized his breathing had become ragged. He brought his hand underneath the clean tunic Hank had let him borrow, one left by one of his patrons. The scar was still there; he did not need to see it, for he could feel the puckered wound, the same as it had been ever since he could remember, since the day his parents died. He knew, too, that should he look at it, he would see those black lines radiating from it like veins filled with darkness. True, those lines would not be encompassing nearly all his body as they had when he’d given in to his lust for violence, when he’d become little more than a beast of wrath and fury. But they would still be there. A darkness without to match the darkness within, one he had carried all his life.
No. He would not go to her. Just because there was beauty in the world, that did not mean a man had a right to it. He thought if he should grasp it, he would be like some filthy beggar pawing a priceless painting. His dirty fingers would serve only to mar that beauty, to lessen it, and the best he could hope for, should he try to take it, was that he would not destroy it altogether.
Besides, he told himself, you have more than enough to worry about already. So does she. That made him think of Larin, the old giant, who had grown so sick of the world he had sought shelter from it in the wilderness of the desert reaches, had found his own sanctuary away from it all. He had found his own beauty in the world, had carved it out of the shifting sand, had fashioned it brick by brick, stone by stone, and there he had lived. At least, that was, until Alesh had brought death and destruction to his door. His fault, then, the destroyed beauty, the broken peace.
I am like fire, he thought darkly, and everything I touch turns to ash. Perhaps the fire had no malice in it, perhaps it was only doing what was in its nature, what it was made to do, but that would make little difference to those who were burned. And now, after all he had lost, after all Alesh had taken from him, Larin was out in the city, trying to find some help for them. Trying to put out the blaze I myself have started, he thought, and whatever optimism, whatever good mood the food and bath had given him dissolved. So much pain, so much hurt, and he the cause of it. He, who was meant to save, to protect, who had been Chosen and gifted with powers by the gods themselves to do so. And yet all I do is burn. Destroy.
He stared at her lying in the bed for one more moment, allowed himself that second of weakness, then he forcefully pulled his gaze away, stepped inside the room and closed the door behind him. He would sleep on the floor, of course. After all, it was where beasts belonged.
***
Katherine lay in the bed, her eyes closed but not asleep, not quite. She heard him opening the lock, knew it was him and no other by some way she could not define. She felt him watching her, and her heart raced in anticipation. He would come to her, she thought, would come and bring to light, in the darkness, that which stood between them. She decided she would meet him halfway.
A thrill ran through her at the thought. There had been so much death, so much pain in the last weeks, blood and screams and little else, and it had left her feeling weak, feeling cold. Even the thick blankets, drawn to her chin, did nothing to banish the chill the recent horrors had left in her, but she thought this might, that he might. It would be so good to be warm, to feel a kind touch, one not meant to hurt or wound, and not just any touch but his. A brave man, strong and powerful and courageous and just as unaware of his own strength. Brave and strong, but vulnerable too, fragile in a way she thought she understood.
He would come and—something like a low growl came from him, barely audible at all, and she almost rose then, almost went to him, but she did not. He stood only a few feet away, yet what they had experienced over the last weeks made the distance feel long. Too long.
A second passed, then another, and she heard the soft click of the door closing, heard him locking the latch. Then a footstep, and another, and her body seemed to practically thrum with an excited nervousness making her slightly breathless and dizzy. One, maybe two more steps, and he would be there, and she would rise to him, would bring him into the softness of the bed, underneath the coverlet with her and, for a time, they would forget all about the pain and the blood. They would make each other forget.
A step, then another, but he did not stop, and the bed did not creak under his weight. Instead, he took another step, and risking a peek, she saw him lying down on the floor, his back to her as if to banish even the knowledge she lay there, so close. Suddenly, she felt like wee
ping, and she took a shuddering breath.
She lay there in silence for some time, trying to come up with the courage to talk to him, to say what she was thinking, maybe even go to him. Finally, after what might have been five minutes, she did manage to speak. “Alesh?” Her voice was no more than a whisper in the darkness. He did not answer, did not so much as move.
Yet the sound of her own voice gave her courage, and she did rise then, sitting up in bed and staring down at him. “Alesh?” Still, he did not respond until, in another moment, she heard the soft, unmistakable sound of snoring.
Running a finger along her watering eyes, she lay back. The bed did not feel as soft as it had, and whatever warmth the blankets had held, they seemed to have lost it. No longer was the night full of promise and expectation. Instead, there was only the darkness, that and nothing more. It was a long time before she finally fell asleep.
Chapter Twelve
Larin paced impatiently while the priest went about whatever business he had. He had considered walking out at least a dozen times, but each time Brent’s words had rung in his mind, and he had decided to stay. You have to trust somebody sometime. Of course, part of him thought doing so hadn’t worked out well for Brent, but he decided it didn’t matter. He had spent the last twenty years not living, not really, only existing. Waking alone, eating alone, and with no company but his own bitter memories. It wasn’t a good life or a bad life—it wasn’t a life at all. And that, he thought, was what Brent had been trying to tell him so many years ago. A man could survive on his own, sure, but he couldn’t live.
Larin had been that man for twenty years; he would not become him again. Still, that didn’t keep him from being annoyed at being kept waiting, and he was just considering going back into the bishop’s office and telling him to hurry up whatever he was doing when the man stepped from the doorway at the back of the church, followed by four other priests. They all wore serious, almost cold expressions, not the welcoming, kind-hearted looks he was used to seeing from priests. Normally, that might have given him cause for concern, but if Orren had told them of the news Larin had brought then it was a wonder they’d agreed to come at all. He figured he could forgive them not looking particularly kind.
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