by Ari Marmell
Julien's fists clenched. Injured? She? Assuming it wasn't a fellow member of the Guard—and the constable would surely have said so, were that the case—he knew pretty damn well who it had to be.
“Major?” he asked.
Archibeque nodded brusquely. “Go on, then. We'll fill you in on what we decide.”
Bouniard held himself to a moderate (if stiff-legged) pace as he departed the room and followed the constable, even as every muscle twitched, demanding he break into a sprint. After what felt to be about three or four years of passing along the drab, flattened carpets, and the pockets of greasy smoke belched forth by the cheap oil lamps that were the hallways' main sources of illumination, he finally reached the door to his own office.
“Didn't know where else to put her, sir,” the constable said in response to the unasked question. “I didn't think we ought to have a young woman bleeding in the foyer, right?”
“You did call for a chirurgeon, I assume?” Bouniard demanded.
“Of course, sir. Not sure why he hasn't arrived, but—”
“Then go see what's taking him!”
The constable recoiled from the abrupt shout, then offered an abortive salute and sprinted away. Bouniard grunted and threw open the door.
Yep, that's who he'd thought it would be.
“Hey, Major,” she said weakly.
“Widdershins, I…Gods!” It was only as she turned away from his desk, on which she'd been leaning (and probably looking for confidential papers, no doubt) that he saw the sheer quantity of blood plastering her tunic to her skin.
“We've got to stop meeting here,” she said with a pale, shaky smile. “I keep mixing with questionable elements like the Guard, my reputation's going to—to…”
Julien caught her before she hit the floor, but it was a very, very near thing.
From yet another rooftop—one several dozen yards from the action, but near enough to make out the gist of what was going on—three fleshy masks of terror had observed the bloody confrontation. They'd marveled at Widdershins's dramatic entrance, widened at the appearance of her opponent, cringed at the horrid death he'd delivered to the first of the black-garbed pair, and struggled to keep up with the inhumanly swift duel that followed. Some long minutes before, the inhuman creature had freed himself from Widdershins's rapier, yanking it free of the stones between which it was wedged and leaving a ragged tear in his coat. Head tilted and muttering to himself, he'd wandered off—perhaps in pursuit of the fleeing thief, perhaps merely on his way to whatever endeavor might appear next on his itinerary.
And still they gawked, unable to quite believe what they'd seen, until the stench of spilled blood and freshly slain bodies wafted over to them on the gentle breeze.
“Well,” Squirrel said, trying to keep his voice from quivering (and, it should be noted, failing miserably). “I guess we have some idea of what's haunting the streets, huh?”
“Are you fucking joking?” This from the larger, lumbering thug on the left. “Yeah, we saw it, but I sure as hell have no idea what the hell it is!”
“For that matter,” said the third, “what's going on with Widdershins? Sure, I've heard she's a fast little scab, but that…”
Squirrel shrugged. “I don't know. Maybe she's a witch. Hell, maybe she's linked to that—that whatever it was. All I know is, we've gotta report all this to Remy, maybe even the Shrouded Lord. They'll know what to do.”
“I don't think anyone's gonna know what to do.”
“Oh, but you're so wrong!” All three Finders went stiff, petrified at the voice that drifted over the eaves. “I know what to do. I always know what to do!”
The wide-brimmed hat hove into view first, followed by the rest of the creature's form, until it crouched upon the shingles, knees and elbows jutting at impossible angles. For a moment only it held that pose, then rose to its feet, seemingly oblivious to the precarious slope at the roof's edge.
“Spying eyes are naughty eyes,” the creature scolded, wagging a single, dagger-long finger at them. “They shall perforce have to be plucked.”
Unlike his two panicked friends, who immediately bolted for opposite sides of the roof, Squirrel held his ground. It wasn't bravery, not in the least; rather, his own dread caused him to freeze instead of flee. But whatever the cause, it saved his life, at least for a moment.
Their enemy sprang, a single leap carrying him halfway across the roof, and a few sprinting steps were more than enough to catch up to the slower of the two fugitives. Those terrible fingers lashed out, snagging Squirrel's companion at the neck and the right side of his ribs. He screamed, even as Widdershins had screamed, as those fingertips fastened themselves to his flesh.
The creature flexed, swinging his hands until his arms crossed at the elbows, and the victim's scream grew shrill as entire swathes of his flesh simply unraveled, peeling away like the outer layers of an onion. The body, glistening in fascinating spiral patterns where raw muscles and organs now lay exposed, convulsed as it hit the rooftop, and the shriek swiftly went silent.
But the thief's murderer wasn't through with him. Allowing the streamers of flesh to flutter away into the darkness, he lifted the twitching body overhead and hurled it just as the other fleeing Finder had begun to clamber over the edge of the roof. The two bodies collided with a dull thump, followed by a second, wetter slap as both hit the ground beside the structure. The sound of children cooing and applauding echoed from the distance. And then, for a moment, there was silence.
The dark figure stared at Squirrel, his head once again slightly tilted as though not quite certain what he was looking at. Squirrel stared back, unable to blink. His entire body shook with the beating of his heart, and he was only scarcely aware of the wet warmth running down the inside of his leg.
“You…you…”
“I, I?” the creature asked, advancing in one of his peculiar dancer's steps.
Simon swallowed hard. “You don't want to kill me.”
“I don't?” The head straightened, then cocked to the other side. “I'm rather certain—entirely positive, in fact—that I really, really do.”
“That's—that's because you haven't thought it through….” The thing was closer already, so much closer than he should be.
“Oh, I haven't?” Another surge, and he was right there, filling Squirrel's field of vision. His right hand lashed out and those impossible fingers cupped Simon's face—almost. They hovered, half an inch from his flesh, close enough that he could feel the wind of their twitching in the scruffy hairs on his cheeks. “And you're going to explain it to me? I'm so excited!”
“Um, it's just…I can help you! You need someone who knows this city!”
“I do? I seem to be doing fine without one.” Again the fingers twitched, and Squirrel twitched with them.
“What about her?” he shrieked.
“Her? Her, her, her? Her who?”
“The girl you just fought! Widdershins!”
The fingers vanished from around his face with a series of rapid snaps. “Widdershins? Her name is Widdershins?”
“It's—it's what she goes by, anyway.”
“Goes by? Goes by? A name is a name is a name! Is this hers?”
“Yes! Yes, it is!”
“Widdershins…” His mouth moved around the syllables, bending and twisting. “And her god? Do you know her god?”
“I…You mean the Shrouded God?” Then, at the narrowing glare, “No! That is, I don't, but I can help you find out! I know people who know her! Know her very well! Know where to find her!”
“I see…Little god, tiny god, where have you been? Out and about in a silly girl's skin! Little god, tiny god, where have you been…” The figure began capering about the roof, spinning in ever-widening circles—and just as abruptly, after a full minute of rhyming, stopped.
“Very well.” A single step, and he once again loomed over Squirrel, blotting out the moon and stars. “You will be my vassal, my guide, my northern star. Tell me what I
want to know. Show me where I want to go. And learn all you can about this…Widdershins.” A fingertip tickled the skin beneath Simon's ear, drawing only a faint line of blood. “You have my oath, Boy-Thief. No harm will come to you, so long as you remain my servant.”
“I…Thank you. Ah, my lord.”
“Splendid!” The creature stepped back and clapped his hands. “We have a friend! Oh, goody, goody!
“Tell me, friend…. What's a nice place to find someone to eat around here?”
So wrapped up was Bishop Sicard—apparently in reading the holy treatise that lay open before him across the desk, but more accurately within his own tumultuous thoughts—that he failed to notice the first two knocks on his chamber door. Only the third sequence of raps penetrated the cloud of cotton encompassing his mind. He grunted once, smoothed his bushy beard with one hand while rubbing at bloodshot eyes with the other, and called, “Enter!”
For a moment, Sicard thought that a complete stranger had stepped into his study, even though he couldn't imagine a circumstance in which the guards would have allowed such a stranger to wander in alone at this time of night. He was just rising to his feet, whether to call for help or defend himself he wasn't certain, when the newcomer doffed his ragged cap and filthy cloak to reveal the blond, tonsured head and lanky frame of Brother Ferrand.
“Well.” Sicard returned slowly to his chair, struggling to keep a scowl of embarrassed anger from his face. “I see you've got the ‘incognito’ bit down.”
“I assumed, Your Eminence, that wandering around town in a monk's cassock would probably not be conducive to my efforts.”
“Right, fine.” Sicard waved distractedly at the nearest chair, into which Ferrand allowed himself to slump. “So I assume you've learned something about the young noblewoman?”
“Uh…” Ferrand squirmed in the chair, causing the wood to squeak, and coughed once.
“Succinct,” Sicard noted, “but not precisely helpful.”
“Her name is Madeleine Valois,” the monk told him. “Something of a social butterfly. Popular enough at parties, but without many close personal friends that I could find. Nobody actually seems to know her all that well.”
Silence for a moment, broken only by Sicard's fingers drumming on the desk. “And?”
“And, well, that's all I've found so far, Your Eminence.”
“That's all?”
“She is, as I said, not especially well known on anything but a superficial social level. Shows up at all the right parties, says all the right things, and is otherwise about as forgettable as day-old bread.”
“There's something unusual about her, Ferrand. I felt it.”
The monk shrugged. “I'm not doubting you, Your Eminence. I'm simply saying that nobody else seems to have noticed.”
Sicard grimaced at Ferrand for a moment, then at the small chandelier that hung from the ceiling—as though seeking answers or inspiration from what was, at this hour, the room's only illumination—and then back at the monk once again.
“And this riveting report couldn't have waited until a decent hour?” he asked finally. “I'm fairly certain that nothing you've just told me qualifies as especially urgent.”
“That's, um, not precisely what I came to tell you, Your Eminence.”
“Oh? Then get to it, man!”
“Well, it seems that there have been a few deaths….”
“Deaths?”
Ferrand nodded. “As regards your, um, ongoing project.”
“Bah.” Sicard returned to the book on the desk, reaching out for a quill to make a few notes in the margins. “I've heard the rumors, too. Utter nonsense. Just the sort of exaggeration we expected from this sort of—”
“All due respect, Your Eminence, but it's not. I'm not speaking of whispers on street corners. I've spoken with City Guardsmen who were at the scene. Who observed the—well, the bodies.”
Sicard straightened, slowly letting the quill topple to the desk. “That's not possible, Ferrand.”
“Nevertheless…”
“My instructions were specific!” The bishop was slowly standing now. Papers crumpled beneath his fists on the desk, and his cheeks flushed red above his beard—whether with anger, with shame, or a combination of both, even he couldn't honestly have said. “Nobody was to be killed, or even badly harmed! Nobody! Terrorized, yes. Even slightly injured, gods forgive me, to make it all seem real, but not…Gods, what are they…?”
“It's not precisely what you think, Your Eminence. Your, ah, ‘assistants’ weren't responsible.”
“I don't understand.”
“Two men clad in strange, flowing black garb—including full face masks—were among the dead. I wasn't present when you made the arrangements, but they certainly sound like what you've described to me.”
Sicard fell back into his own chair with a muffled whump. “But…I don't understand. Who…?”
“That's what the Guard is investigating.” The monk rolled his head back, trying to stretch away some of the tension in his neck. “Rumor going around the Guard is that a young thief by the name of Widdershins was somehow involved in what happened, though few of the stories agree on precisely how.”
“Widdershins? That's an odd…Why do I know that name?”
“Brother Maurice's report,” Ferrand said gently, “of William de Laurent's murder.”
The clench of Sicard's teeth was a crack audible throughout the room.
“Maurice swore,” Ferrand continued, “that this Widdershins was a friend to the archbishop, that she actually thwarted a prior attempt on his life. But he also admits that he knows little else about her, as William dismissed him from the room during the bulk of his conversation with the young woman.”
“Could she be responsible for what's happened, then?”
“I couldn't begin to guess, Your Eminence. But if she's involved in this, and in what happened with the archbishop last year…Well, I find it difficult to write off as coincidence.”
“As do I. Is the Guard currently hunting for her?”
“I wasn't able to learn that, I'm afraid.”
“All right.” Again the bishop's fingers drummed across the desk, this time in a rapid patter much like hail, or the impact of a blunderbuss's lead shot. “If she's responsible for what's happened, then either she's attempting to use our ‘haunting’ for her own schemes, or she's learned what we have in mind and is trying to prevent it. Either way, she cannot be allowed to continue.”
“And if she's not responsible, but involved in some other capacity?” Ferrand asked.
“Either way, we can't afford to have her interfering until we know more.”
Ferrand nodded and stood, recognizing the cue when he heard it. “What would you have me do, Your Eminence?”
“Davillon and our Mother Church are only just starting to mend their disagreements, correct? We should make it clear to the brave and noble Guardsmen that such efforts could only benefit if they were to arrest this Widdershins with all speed—and that said efforts could well suffer should they fail to do so.”
The monk's expression flickered for the barest instant, and Sicard wondered if he was actually preparing to question the propriety of using a Church office to bring such pressures to bear. But instead he finally shrugged, offered a shallow bow, and departed, leaving the bishop alone with thoughts far darker and more brooding than they had been only a few minutes before.
She dreamt of the pain.
It ran deep, burning, searing, itching, aching, no matter how her mind struggled to escape. She dreamt of herself as a child, and it was there. In winding alleys that never ended; on wooded mountainsides; in a cathedral that became the Finders' Guild; in the Flippant Witch, which became a house; while desperately searching for a chamber pot and some privacy in which to use it; when locked in the embrace of a man whose face she couldn't see, and wasn't sure she wanted to know; through it all, the pain remained. Though she never, during or between any of those dreams, fully awakened, she c
ould feel herself tossing and turning, her skin burning with what may or may not have been fever, clammy against the sweat-soaked sheets, trying and failing to find comfort; and the pain remained.
Until, finally, her mind began to quiet, and she felt the balm of Olgun's tranquility, his concern, his protection wash over her. And the pain remained—but finally, it began to lessen.
Consciousness was a sickness, at first, a parasite that she wanted nothing more than to fight off. After a few moments, however, as mind and body adapted to the idea that perhaps waking up wasn't the worst possible fate in all of recorded history, the final fog of dreaming faded.
Widdershins licked lips that were as dry as parchment and opened her eyelids, squinting against the light.
She realized three things in rapid succession. First, that she was not in any room with which she was especially familiar, as the ceiling—apparently rough, cheap stone—wasn't one she knew. She might have thought that she was in a prison cell somewhere, except that most prison cells didn't have mattresses this comfortable, and smelled a lot worse.
Two, that her chest and shoulder hurt a lot. A lot. More than she'd have expected, if Olgun had indeed been working to heal her, though certainly less than any normal person would have felt under the circumstances.
And three, her left hand was aching pretty fiercely in its own right. What could she possibly have done to her…?
Oh.
“Robin?”
“Shins! Oh, my gods, you're awake!” The pain in Widdershins's hand actually grew worse. “Guys, she's awake!”
“Robin, you're crushing my fingers….”
“Oh!” The girl's grip slackened, much to Widdershins's relief, but she refused to relinquish her grip entirely. “I'm sorry.”
“’Sall right. Where…?” She tried to sit up and fell back, biting back a groan, as her shoulder flared anew.
“Stay still, my dear lady. You need your beauty sleep.”
That voice—most certainly not Robin's—was quite enough to spur her into doing the precise opposite. She sat up once more, this time ignoring the tightness and the pain, and examined the room over her young friend's shoulder.