Jovan’s brow furrowed. “They should be executed for such gross neglect.”
Leif nodded. “This man will answer swiftly for his betrayal, my lord.” He bent his knee to Jovan, holding forth both hands. “With your sword, if I may?”
The king unbuckled the sword at his hip and handed it to Leif. It was Aeros Raijael’s blue sword, Sky Reaver. Leif drew the blade with a crisp rasp from its sheath and ordered the remaining Dayknight guard to remove his helm and kneel. The man removed his helm, face slackening in horror. He knelt. Leif reached out and forced the knight’s head forward with one gauntleted hand until the back of his neck was exposed.
The Dayknight did the three-fingered sign of the Laijon Cross over his heart, pleading, “No, Ser, please. You know that we did not let Hawkwood escape on purpose. You were there—”
“You are naught but a traitor.” Leif raised Sky Reaver high, dark-rimmed eyes fierce and pointed. “Who would believe what lies are in you?”
And he brought the sword flashing down, striking the neck of the kneeling knight, slicing halfway through. The man’s head drooped as he fell forward to the floor. Blood pumped black and thick over the gray stone as the body twitched under Leif.
In the end, the guard had placed his faith in Laijon, and to Gault’s clear estimation, that man’s god had failed him miserably today. Gault had learned the hard way, there were no gods out there to help anyone in need, to soothe the souls of the tortured, to spare the lives of the raped and soon to be slain. There was no Laijon. No Raijael. No Blessed Mother Mia. There never was, nor ever would be. Every innocent child who’d ever prayed to escape the unbearable horror of the molester or the painful blade of the murderer had wasted their breath, just as this Dayknight guard had. Power did not reside with the gods. Power ofttimes lived in bumbling idiots like Leif Chaparral, the liars, the cheats, the nobles, and sometimes those with the wherewithal to keep their wits about them and their swords honed and ready at all times.
“Perhaps we shouldn’t have acted so hastily?” Jovan said, pale faced. He glanced at the twelve other Dayknights standing at attention behind him. They were nothing put pillars of black, unmoving. He turned back to Leif. “Perhaps we should have interrogated him first?”
“We would have been given naught but lies.” Leif’s attention was now on the guard he’d first slapped, the one lying on the floor of the chamber, unconscious. With a flick of Sky Reaver’s sharp tip, Leif sliced the unconscious guard’s exposed throat. Blood pooled thick and red under the man’s head.
When Leif looked to his king, satisfied, the sickly fervor in his gaze reminded Gault of Aeros Raijael in battle. Some divine malevolence would overtake the Angel Prince during war, not madness or anger, but a savage zeal—a zeal like that in Leif’s dark-rimmed eyes now.
“Better a swift justice than a pointless and drawn-out interrogation that will likely lead to naught and end in lies,” Leif reiterated. “There were two others who escorted Gault and Hawkwood into the dungeons, they were assigned rotating shifts to watch over him. They too could be in collusion with Hawkwood. Do you desire that the other two guards also be found and killed?”
Jovan’s brow furrowed even more. “Yes, perhaps so.”
“As you wish.” Leif bowed, his eyes feverish with victory. “I shall see it done myself.” He cleaned Sky Reaver’s bloodied blade on the dark cloak of the murdered Dayknight guard at his feet. Once done, he handed the sword back to his king.
Jovan sheathed the weapon and addressed the Dayknights behind him. “Six of you will now stand guard over Gault. My sister, Tala, and Leif’s brother, Glade, went missing down in these dungeons not long ago. So far we have kept that secret safe within the ranks of the Dayknights, and for that your king is grateful. Do any of you want everyone in Amadon to know that Hawkwood has escaped Purgatory a second time?”
Jovan paused for a moment, looking at the two bodies on the floor. “You have seen the price of betrayal. None of you speaks of what you have seen or heard here today. Let the two men lying in pools of their own blood at your feet be a grim reminder of your fate if you disobey my order.”
Each Dayknight bowed in acquiescence. Jovan continued, “Each of you is now guarding the remaining prisoner, Gault Aulbrek. You will work in shifts. Six at a time, twelve hours each, rotating. You will each of you sleep down here in this room. You will all eat here in this room. You will defecate down that hole in the center of Hawkwood’s empty cage. In fact, none of you is to leave this chamber until the first day of the Fire Moon. Do you understand?” They each bowed a second time.
Jovan went on, “After I am gone, four of you will see to the dead bodies of your fellow traitorous knights. They will be stripped of their armor and hauled from Purgatory and thrown into the Vallè River for the oghul witches and thieves to do with as they please. Understood?” They bowed again.
Gault wonderd if the day’s entertainment was now over. Either Jovan was too stupid to see through Leif’s manipulations, or the loyalty and closeness of their friendship blinded him. There will always be those out there like Leif Chaparral, whose majestic cruelty and deceit would hold more power than the gods.
Enna Spades was one such godlike monster. Gault recalled his dream, the oxcart journey through Amadon and the impossibly large temples and cathedrals along the route. Spades often talked of desecrating all the grand edifices in Amadon like the Hall of the Dayknights and the castle, taking a shit in each one of them, defiling the Temple of the Laijon Statue and the Palace of the Grand Vicar. She wanted to crush everything all the time. Yes, Leif Chaparral and Spades were the same in many ways.
But Gault knew what motivated Spades’ anger, what tore at her heart—or what little heart she possessed—and that was Hawkwood, the man who’d escaped the cage next to him. Every other handsome face that had crossed Spades’ path was mere fodder for her lusty whims. All her twisted complexities stemmed from this one man’s betrayal. Her overt sexuality and her brutality in war stemmed from a desire to gain control, to wield power over others, whether it meant fucking them or dismembering them. As she will fuck this entire city with her rage once she arrives, dismember it and brutalize it in ways only she can.
But what motivates Leif Chaparral’s cruelty?
Jovan and Leif stepped up to Gault’s cage, boots clicking against the stone floor.
Hands behind his back, the king glared at Gault coolly. “Did you see where Hawkwood went?”
Gault stared back blankly for a moment, then asked. “Do you have an extra tray of food?”
“Do you think this is a joke?” Jovan snarled. “You’ll soon be begging for your life in the arena.”
Good! Gault thought. Put Squireck Van Hester before me and I will slay him for you! The smell of blood pooling on the floor lingered in his nose, reminding him of his ten years of war. Give me a sword and an arena to fight in! Yes, Leif’s murder of the two guards had been entertaining, for a moment anyway, a way to kill time at least. A means by which to confirm that the world was full of fools and his own soul was bereft of any remaining affection for the saving graces of Laijon or Raijael.
Yes, put me in the arena now!
“What did you see?” Jovan asked him again. “How did Hawkwood escape?”
Would he believe me if I told him the truth, that Hawkwood had escaped because of Leif’s ineptitude? That his own sister had gotten lost down here because of Leif’s stupidity in leaving her alone? Will he believe that his friend is a liar and a murderer and completely incompetent? Likely not.
Still, Leif’s ridiculous lies and murder had broken up the day’s boredom. At least there was that one solace. Boredom. It was the worst part of captivity. It caused the mind to imagine peculiar things, conjure up unsettling thoughts.
Gault recalled a conversation he’d had over beers late one night in a Sør Sevier tavern. Bogg, the warden of the Rokenwalder dungeons, had explained that prisoners would ofttimes entertain themselves by tormenting the guards with endless menial tasks
of inconvenience and stupid questions. And after so many days locked up, Gault could see the allure of that.
“Answer me!” Jovan shouted. “What did you see?”
Gault smiled. “Will you pen a letter to Aeros Raijael for me, then deliver it—”
“Shut the fuck up!” The king’s face was red with rage. “What did you see?”
“I’m a tad confused.” Gault spoke slowly. “Am I supposed to shut the fuck up, or tell you what I saw?”
Jovan’s face twisted in frustration.
“Fact is . . .” Gault paused, gaze traveling to Leif. “I saw nothing. One moment Hawkwood was here. Then poof! He was gone.”
* * *
Be wary of belief, cautious of faith. For one’s identity can only be killed from within. We become what we think.
—THE ANGEL STONE CODEX
* * *
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
LINDHOLF LE GRAVEN
2ND DAY OF THE ANGEL MOON, 999TH YEAR OF LAIJON
AMADON, GUL KANA
Looks more oghul than man, at first glance anyway,” said Ser Tolz. The Silver guardsman was sitting at the head of the oxcart between Glade Chaparral and Ser Alain. Glade snickered, gazing at the small portrait in Tolz’s hand.
“That there is one gruesome face no girl would want.” Ser Alain snapped the reins, urging the oxen on over the cobbled path, looking at the portrait from the corner of his eye. “I wager the lassie who gets stuck with such a deformed freak cuts her own wrists rather than have that thing slobbering over the top of her.”
“Nah.” Ser Boppard said. Boppard sat in the back of the oxcart with Lindholf. “There’s a girl for every mutation of a man. When it comes to humping, rank fetishes know no bounds. There’s a sloppy wet twat awaiting every legless fat freak out there.”
“And off to the whorehouse we go!” Alain shouted.
The alleyway echoed with their laughter and the clomping of oxen hooves.
“We’re not talking about you, you know.” Glade craned his neck and looked to the back of the cart, his laughing eyes meeting Lindholf’s.
“I didn’t think you were,” Lindholf answered sheepishly. Without the Shroud of the Vallè in his system, he had scant confidence to verbally spar with Glade. All he could think of was getting more of that white powder. But he hadn’t seen Seita or Val-Draekin in what seemed like forever. Do they expect me to go to the Hallowed Grove and sniff it right off the Atonement Tree itself?
Glade was dressed in full Silver Guard armor, as were the three knights in the oxcart with them—Glade’s new lackeys: Tolz Trento of Avlonia, Alain Gratzer of Knightliegh, and Boppard Stockach from Reinhold. All three were tall. All three had rakish good looks. And all three seemed less mature than Tala’s younger brother, Ansel. They were veteran Silver Guards, each of them nearly ten years older than Glade and only kissing up to him because he was younger brother to Leif Chaparral, the man who would soon be the new Dayknight captain.
Two nights ago, Glade and his three cronies had dragged Lindholf down to a dock-district brothel and forced him to watch as they all four fucked a string of gap-toothed whores, each whore older than their own mothers. Lindholf had been disgusted and humiliated by the whole debauched affair. He hated being around Glade and his three new friends.
And now they were on their way to the dock district and the whorehouses again.
Lindholf had not yet been invited into the ranks of the Silver Guard as Glade had two weeks ago. But he desperately wanted to be invited. It’s why he agreed—against his better judgment—to accompany Glade and the three Silver Gaurds to the whorehouses. He hated Glade. He hated everything about him and his bawdy new friends. But how else does a young man move up the ranks? So here he sat in the back of an oxcart, fingers wrapped around the hilt of the small black dagger hidden in his pants pocket, wearing naught but a simple shirt and tan pants, wishing to be a Silver Guard. . . .
His parents were readying the family to go back to Eskander. His Ember Lighting Rite was over, and that is what they had originally come to Amadon for. And Lawri was no longer ill. Plus both Lorhand and Lilith needed to get back to their tutors. His family would be leaving Jovan’s court soon. And he would no longer be able to see Tala. Unless I can make Silver Guard like Glade. Then he could stay.
“Come up here and look at this portrait.” Glade beckoned Lindholf. “It’s Ser Tolz’s nephew down in Avlonia. A real looker.” Lindholf stayed where he was, leaning against the sidewall of the cart. “Since cousins can’t marry,” Glade went on, “perhaps Jovan can arrange a marriage between Tala and Ser Tolz’s nephew.” The three knights snickered.
Lindholf, shaking with nerves, ignored the comment. Why am I here?
Shroud of the Vallè. That’s why. It had made him do some foolish things. It was still making him do stupid things.
His supply was long gone—he’d burned most of it to light his way in the dark passageways under Purgatory. All Lindholf knew was that he needed more of the white powder Seita had supplied him with. I’ll likely soon go mad without it. The powder was the only thing in life that had ever made him forget the pain of his loneliness, made him feel pleasure, and most of all, made him confident. He could not challenge Glade without it. He could not talk to Tala without it. He was always lethargic and sleepy and could not keep awake without it. The bottom line was, Shroud of the Vallè had become his sustenance.
The sun was going down over Amadon, casting a rose tint over the cloudless sky and vast stone buildings. As the heavy oxcart trundled over the cobbles, Lindholf wrapped the bitterness and anger around himself like a suit of armor. Probably the only type of armor he would ever wear. His fingers twitched and fidgeted with the bottom hem of his shirt. He couldn’t settle his nervousness. He fondled the black dagger in his pocket. Then the hem of his shirt again. Back and forth.
It didn’t seem like anything made sense anymore. Nor could his mind focus on any one thing for long. Did I really escape from Purgatory through underwater caves? The very notion just seemed so insane, like some kind of hallucination. But the reality was, he had found Ethic Shroud and an angel stone.
The shield and the stone were now hidden between the wood slats and crumbling mortar in the wall of the chamber adjacent to his own—the chamber Tala had hidden Lawri in whilst she was sick.
As the cart passed through the warrens of crooked stone buildings and narrow, winding pathways, Lindholf looked on the city with two parts revulsion and two parts excitement. The Grand Vicar’s Palace, sheathed in white marble gilded in gold, rose up just beyond the rotund Royal Cathedral. The cathedral, shaped like a crown, the sanctuary where the Blessed Mother Mia was buried, dominated the skyline in the distance. Next to the Royal Cathedral was the Temple of the Laijon Statue, equally as tall, and equally visible. For all those in Gul Kana, the cathedral and temple were the physical monuments of the great Laijon and the Blessed Mother Mia. Pilgrims from the breadth of Gul Kana flocked to worship at these two massive edifices. Worship and gaze upon the statue of Laijon, a statue that only he knew was flawed—another crazy thing that had happened to him in a list of crazy things. Climbing the Laijon statue! Discovering its secret! Escaping Purgatory! Finding Ethic Shroud! All the insanity could be traced back to Tala.
He had no idea how or when Tala and Glade had made it out of Purgatory. Tala just assumes I followed Leif to the castle like I claimed. Lindholf didn’t know whether to be hurt by that or not. Nobody would notice if I was here or gone.
Lindholf’s concentration was broken when he glimpsed a familiar face in the street behind the oxcart. A pale-faced girl wearing a crown of white heather.
But as soon as he glimpsed her, she was gone, vanished into the swirl of people.
Now I see more visions!
His mind traveled back to Memory Bay and the mermaid’s cold, slithery clutch.
The distant bark of a dog echoed off stone walls, bringing him back to the present. The cart rumbled under the crenellated bastions marking the inner
wall of the old city and then clattered by the columned gladiator arena, which rose up to his right. It was early evening, and citizens of every stripe—sailors, dwarves, urchins, oghuls, and thieves—had crawled out of whatever places they dwelled to do their business in the streets. The cart passed under a section of Amadon’s aqueducts, and the stench of the city began to hit Lindholf full force. They were nearing the River Vallè. The aqueducts, from as far away as the Autumn Range and the northern Sky Lochs, brought cool mountain water into the city. But judging by the smell, it seemed the river was mostly for sewage and other human waste, and as Leif had explained, covens of witches and other such grotesques.
He took one last look back at the castle as dusk crawled over the city. It seemed no matter where you were in Amadon, the crenellated black fortress that encompassed the slopes of Mount Albion towered over all. He wanted to be back in the castle. Not here with Glade. Not heading to the brothel where he would once again be forced to watch Glade and the others fuck whores, never invited to participate himself.
It’s like they only fuck the whores to mock me. . . .
As the oxcart jostled along, people in the roadway scurried from its path.
And then he saw her again—the girl with the crown of white heather.
Lindholf would not let his gaze lose her a second time. The girl wore a dark blue cape, tied at the neck, its hood thrown back. He watched her, trying to place her face, and soon realized she was following the cart. The busty barmaid from the Filthy Horse Saloon!
The Blackest Heart Page 33