“Do not question me, Hollander,” Caroline replied. “Four still remain. And they will recover in time. Won’t you, sodomite?” she asked Magnus, kicking him in the ribs.
“Is that you, Caroline?” Magnus asked, his breath rasping from a collapsed lung—courtesy of a spear wound that had torn open one side of his chest. “I would know your shrill, jealous voice anywhere....”
Caroline kicked him again and raised the hammer to strike him, but she was interrupted as Zabel, struggling to push away Jan’s sword, shouted:
“I will kill you, you traitorous Frank!”
In a fury, Caroline turned toward Zabel, drew a pistol from her belt, and shot the woman in the head.
“I am Burgundian!” she shouted.
Jan sighed and withdrew his sword. “Again, My Lady, perhaps some restraint is in order.”
“She will recover,” Caroline replied. “One bullet through the brain will not kill someone of her age.” She looked at Amadeus. “What a difference a few hundred years makes.”
“Indeed, My Lady,” Jan said. He glanced toward the door, forcing Varanus to duck back into hiding. “Where are my reinforcements? You!” He pointed at one of his soldiers. “Get to the nearest guard post. Find out what is taking the others so long. I require hands to carry bodies.”
“Yessir,” the soldier replied, hurrying for the door.
“And have someone ready the cells!” Jan called after him, before turning back to Caroline and Magnus.
Varanus pressed herself against the wall to avoid detection as the soldier ran past her. Glancing into the hall to be sure that no one was looking, she scampered after him and drew her knife. The soldier paused and started to turn at the sound of her footsteps, and Varanus jumped upon him and drove the knife into his throat before he could scream. Varanus glanced back in case someone had heard, but to her relief, she remained undetected.
Creeping into the Moravian Hall, Varanus weighed her options. She was in no condition for outright fighting, certainly not against someone of Caroline’s age. She approached the remaining soldier and readied her knife for a throw. If she could kill him and catch him before he fell, it was possible no one would notice. Of course, if the soldier’s metal armor or sword hit the floor....
“Allow me, liebchen,” Korbinian said, gently taking the knife from Varanus’s hand.
He gave her a tender kiss upon the lips and crept up beside the soldier. There was a pause, and then as the soldier began to turn, Korbinian drove the knife into his throat.
The blow was a good one. The spray of blood went against the wall, and though the soldier gurgled as he fell, his noises were soft enough that it did not draw the attention of either Jan or Caroline. Varanus hurried forward and caught the man’s body as it collapsed. She grabbed for his sword, but it slipped through her fingers.
Merde, merde, merde!
Varanus cringed, waiting for the inevitable clatter of steel on stone, but it did not come. Surprised, she looked down and saw the sword hanging just above the floor, clutched in the hand of Djata of Mali. Though too injured to rise, Djata met Varanus’s eyes and gave her an understanding nod. Varanus nodded back and carefully lowered the dead soldier to the ground. Retrieving her knife, she approached Jan and Caroline.
Ignorant of Varanus, Caroline knelt over Magnus and prodded him with her hammer. Dried blood had caked over Magnus’s face, sealing his eyes shut, but the sneer he gave Caroline was as good as any defiant look.
“I can make things very pleasant for you, Magnus,” Caroline said, “or I can make them very painful. All you need to do is tell me where your friends are hiding.”
“Every conversation with you is painful, Caroline,” Magnus replied. “No amount of treason will alter that.”
Caroline snarled and struck Magnus in the ribs on his injured side. Magnus shuddered and made a noise, but his expression remained the same.
“You will tell me what I want to know,” Caroline said. “Or I will pry it from one of your companions. But know that it will go easier on you the sooner one of you tells me.”
Magnus sighed wistfully and said, “Oh, Caroline, Caroline....” He coughed violently before he continued in a weak if jovial tone, “Have I ever told you of my illicit tryst with the Duke of Buckingham? Oh Lord, poor King James was most distressed. He had me banished from England for fear that I would steal his favourite away from him.”
Caroline growled in frustration and struck Magnus again.
“Sodomite,” she repeated.
“Frank,” Magnus replied, laughing.
“I am Burgundian!” Caroline shouted, drawing back her hammer and preparing to bash in Magnus’s head.
Varanus darted forward and drove her knife to the hilt into Caroline’s throat. Taken by surprise, Caroline lashed out blindly with her hammer. Before Caroline could properly recover from the shock, Varanus twisted her knife to increase the wound and pulled the weapon free, giving Caroline a solid kick for good measure. Blood sprayed into the air, and Caroline fell backward onto the floor.
Jan had also been taken by surprise, but it was not enough. He turned on Varanus and lunged at her, cutting her across the back. As Caroline’s blood sprayed everywhere, some of it fell upon Varanus’s wound, which stung angrily and boiled. But thankfully there was not enough blood to cause any more harm than the pain.
Varanus lashed out with her knife, trying to keep Jan back. She had taken her opportunity, but it would do her no good if she could not bring Jan down before Caroline recovered. But as Jan came at her again, she saw one of Zabel’s eyes open and blink a few times. The hole in the woman’s head had not yet healed, but she seemed to retain enough coherence to realize what was happening. As Jan withdrew and made ready for another attack, Zabel kicked him in the knee, unsettling his balance and making him stumble.
It was the opening Varanus needed. She leapt upon Jan and drove her knife into his throat again and again until he fell to the ground. She kept stabbing until he stopped moving.
There was a breathless pause, and then Varanus heard the sound of Caroline struggling to rise. She turned and saw the woman crawl onto her knees, clutching at the deep gash across her throat.
“You...die...” Caroline gurgled, struggling both to speak and to maintain consciousness from the sudden loss of blood.
Varanus was in no mood to mince words with her, not after Vaclav’s death. Caroline was not Thoros, but she would do for now.
Snarling in guttural tones that she had meant to be words, Varanus charged into Caroline and knocked her to the ground again. Caroline struggled, and for a moment she held Varanus back, using her superior strength to level painful blows with her hand against Varanus’s chest and neck. But each time Caroline moved to strike Varanus more blood spurted free, and it was soon a fight she could not win.
Howling with fury, Varanus brought her knife down upon Caroline in jagged cuts that tore and tore until it looked like the Burgundian had been set upon by a wild beast. Only when Caroline stopped struggling and collapsed did Varanus finally stop. She slowly rose to her feet, drenched in Caroline’s blood. It was some mercy that the fresh wound across her back had not been exposed to the fruits of her violence, or else Caroline’s blood might have done her grave harm in such quantity.
It took Varanus a short time to regain her senses, heady as she was with the thrill of slaughter. But presently, she realized that the others were slowly picking themselves up off the ground. Djata and Joan supported one another, while Zabel sat up with the aid of the barricade. Magnus clawed at his face to clear the blood from his eyes, and he slowly sat up as well.
“Doctor Varanus?” he asked, sounding surprised.
“Hello, Doctor Eriksen,” Varanus replied, offering him a hand up.
Magnus stood with difficulty, being careful not to let his open wounds touch the blood that drenched Varanus’s clothes.
“From the sound of things, I took you for a tiger,” he said.
“I shall take that to be a compliment,” Varanus told him.
“Good,” Magnus replied. “It is one.”
Varanus smiled at this.
Magnus looked around the hall, searching for someone who was missing. “Where is Vaclav?”
“Yes, where is he?” asked Joan as she and Djata reached them. “Did he not come with you?”
“He...I...” Varanus stammered. She could not bring herself to say the words.
But Magnus understood all the same. His face became pale—even for a Shashavani—and his hands quivered.
“No....”
“Yes,” Varanus said. “I tried to save him.”
“Of course you did,” Djata told her, his mouth twisted with anger but his eyes sympathetic. “You are so young, Varanus. If Vaclav could not have withstood it, there was nothing you could have done.”
Magnus shook with anger as he asked in a low tone, “Who did it?”
“Thoros,” Varanus replied. Speaking the name made her clench her fingers around the hilt of her knife.
“Then there truly was nothing you could have done,” Joan said. She sighed and shook her head. “We should have gone with them,” she told Djata. “I had thought our route would be the more dangerous.”
“As did I,” Djata said. He turned to Varanus and Magnus. “I am sorry. Vaclav was a friend, and I know that he was dear to both of you.”
“I will kill him!” Magnus roared, the anger making him forget the severity of his wounds. “I will kill Thoros with my bare hands for this!”
“If I do not reach him first,” Varanus said.
“No one will be killing Thoros today,” interrupted Zabel, who had recovered enough to sit up. She clutched at her stomach to keep it intact, but the bullet hole in her head had almost closed. “None of us are in any condition for more fighting.” There was a pause. “Could someone fetch me a clean cloth to tie around myself? I would like to keep my insides...inside.”
“Allow me,” said Joan. She released Djata and hobbled over to the nearest wall, returning with a set of curtains that she began to tear into large bandages.
As Joan bandaged her abdomen, Zabel sat up and her eyes fell upon Amadeus’s body. Her face remained emotionless, as was common among the Living, but her anger was palpable. Magnus knelt by the body and searched for any signs of life, though it was an unlikely hope, and in the end it proved to be unfounded.
“I am sorry, Sister,” Magnus said.
“He was too young to survive it,” Zabel said, her voice cold but shaking with anger. “I knew it when she struck his head.” She looked away, her mouth twisted in a frown. “He was a good man and my finest student. Such waste.”
“At least Caroline was punished for it,” Djata noted. “Vengeance is something, if only a little.”
Zabel nodded, but said, “Cut off her head.”
“Surely there is no need,” Djata replied. “She has been...well slaughtered by the hand of young Varanus.”
“It was well done, truly,” Zabel said, giving Varanus an approving look. “But Caroline is our age. She may survive this. I was shot in the head and I am well enough.”
“Ah, that is true,” Djata agreed.
“I will handle it,” Varanus said, before anyone else could volunteer. She had set out to kill Caroline and saw no reason not to finish the job. She drew her sword and hacked at Caroline’s neck until she finally severed the spine at the joint—the vertebrae themselves were far too strong to cut. Kicking the head away, she said, “Done. Now we should go.”
“Agreed,” said Zabel. She looked at her student’s corpse. “What about Amadeus?”
“We must leave him,” Joan answered, tying off the bandages and helping Zabel to stand. “I am sorry, Sister, but we must move quickly to avoid capture, and none of us is in a fit state to carry his body.”
Varanus cleared her throat. “Speaking of capture, Jan the Hollander seemed to be expecting reinforcements. As I said....” She pointed toward the door.
“Yes, of course,” Djata said. “Leave it to the child to remind us of our predicament.”
“I—” Varanus began to protest, but she thought better of it and held her tongue. The child? she thought. What nonsense!
Zabel leaned on Joan and clutched her bandaged stomach with her other arm. “Magnus, fetch the food. We will eat on the way.”
“Eat?” Magnus asked, surprised. “What about the others.”
“We are wounded, they are not,” Zabel replied. “Though if anyone complains, I will amend the situation.”
Magnus nodded and grabbed two large sacks from behind the barricade. The arm on his injured side did not rise properly, and Varanus crossed to him and took one of the sacks to relieve the burden. She opened it and took a moment to savor the scents of baked bread and roasted meat: it seemed that before the ambush, Zabel’s party had enjoyed better luck in their kitchen. Varanus took a piece of cooked lamb and held it out to Magnus.
“Eat,” she said.
Though momentarily surprised, Magnus cracked a smile at her and took the meat with his teeth.
“Thank you, Doctor,” he said out of the corner of his mouth before he began chewing.
Varanus nodded and ate a piece herself. The flavor of meat was very pleasant after a week of deprivation, and the rush of energy that followed was remarkable. Within moments of swallowing, Varanus actually imagined that she could feel the wound across her back closing. She quickly distributed more morsels among the others and led the way to the door.
“We should hurry,” she said. She held up one bloody arm. “We must clean ourselves before we venture back to the chapel, and we will be hard pressed to do it without discovery.”
Covered in blood as they were, the stench would follow them and lead the enemy to their hiding place unless something was done about it.
“She is right,” said Djata. “And with reinforcements coming, we must hurry indeed.”
Chapter Twenty-Five
•
That night, Varanus joined Reza and the others in the chapel to discuss what was to be done. Even with the foodstuffs provided by Zabel’s party, there was little to go around and certainly nothing to last until rescue. And, as the day’s events had shown, obtaining food from then onward would be a difficult task, one met with ambush and bloodshed at every turn.
“We must strike, My Lord,” Joan said to Reza. “Whether we attack and seek escape or simply endeavor to die in glorious combat, there is no choice.”
“No choice save starvation and inevitable surrender,” Reza agreed, “which is no choice at all.”
There were murmurs of agreement from the others.
“We must attack soon,” said Djata, “while we still have some strength in us. The longer we remain, the more it will dwindle.”
“You will find no dispute with that, Brother Djata,” Reza said. “Let us attack before the week is out. The only question is when and where such an attack will strike the enemy most harshly.”
There was silence as the others looked at one another. It was both wise and necessary to make such an attack, but in truth it would be an act of suicide. The question that remained was how best to make their deaths count; how best to make the enemy suffer in trade for their own lives. It was a grim realization and one that was not easily answered.
“If I may, Lord Reza...” Varanus said, stepping forward. As the youngest member of the survivors, she had kept out of the discussion until now.
“Sister Varanus,” Reza answered, nodding. “Come forward and speak. What do you have to say?”
Varanus approached Reza and bowed her head.
“My Lord, before Father Vaclav was killed....” Varanus flinched at the words, remembering her friend’s death too clearly. “He and I overh
eard Margaret speaking to her fellow conspirators. She spoke of holding a feast in the Great Hall to celebrate Christmas. She intended it to...to confirm her authority, to make her the new Sophio in the eyes of the House.”
Reza considered this quietly for a little while. At length, he nodded.
“That does seem like her,” he said. “And truly, it would help grant her some illusion of legitimacy, mimicking the protocols of the rightful Eristavi. Christmas, you say?”
“It will be late Christmas Eve or early Christmas morning,” Zabel said. “The occasion will be nothing but a justification. With so much recent unrest and bloodshed, the sooner she reaffirms her control, the sooner she strengthens her hold.”
Reza thought for a little while and nodded. “Christmas Eve, then. We will arm ourselves, eat our fill from what stores we have, and assault the traitors in the Great Hall.” He looked at the others and said, “I will not order any of you to join me in this. I will go, and I will give my life if it means seeing Margaret and her cohorts slain. But any of you who choose to remain here, to carry on as best you can in the hope of Lady Sophio’s return, you have my blessing.”
The others looked at one another, and there were murmurs of uncertainty from those scholars who were unfamiliar with war. But Judith of Prague stepped forward and spoke:
“We may not be warriors, My Lord, but we are Shashavani. We will all gladly give our lives if it means the destruction of these Basilisks and the liberation of our House.”
“What a day it is when scholars speak the words of soldiers,” said Magnus, laughing. “And what better cause for which to die than one that will drive the peaceful to wrath and the treacherous into Hell!”
* * * *
Turkestan
Iosef sat with Sophio at the edge of the Aral Sea, watching the waves break upon the frozen shore as the sun set behind them. Iosef’s bones ached. The agonizing fatigue he had felt midway through their journey had increased tenfold, and his very body cried out with pangs of hunger. It was a remarkable experience, as intriguing as it was painful. In his mortality, he had only known hunger with his stomach; now it revealed itself to him with every part of his being.
The Ouroboros Cycle, Book Three: A Long-Awaited Treachery Page 26
