by Ari Marmell
“Yes, he indicated that as well.”
“All right, so…” Widdershins took a deep breath, and then regretted it instantly as she spent the next twenty or thirty seconds choking on the smoke. With the exception of a faint tapping of fingers against armrests, the Shrouded Lord waited patiently for her to recover.
“So,” she said again, her voice rough, “you know that Iruoch—or whatever we want to call him,” she added with a sneer at the priestess, “killed two Finders?”
“I know.” All humor was gone from the Shrouded Lord's voice. “Aubin and Raviel.”
“Raviel? Was that his name? I could have sworn it was two syllables…. Uh, that probably doesn't so much matter right now, does it?”
“Not to any great extent, no.”
“Uh, yeah. Well, the thing is, my lord, they weren't just in the wrong place at the wrong time. I mean, they were—I don't think you could argue that being caught by Iruoch is ever in any way the right place…” She grinned faintly, and then, as both the Shrouded Lord's and the priestess's glowers threatened to actually light her on fire, she rushed ahead. “But my point is, they weren't just out and about. They were pretending to be Iruoch!”
“What?!”
And, simultaneously, “That's nonsense!” from Igraine.
Widdershins raised a hand. “Hold on. I don't mean they were pretending to be Iruoch personally. I just…You know how, for the first few weeks, nobody was ever actually killed, or even badly hurt? And it was only in the last few days that our brand-new monster began leaving shriveled bodies behind it?
“Well, I think that's because, until a few days ago, Iruoch—or whoever—wasn't even in Davillon! The earlier attacks were Aubin and Raviel!”
“This is the stupidest thing I've ever heard,” Igraine snapped. “I don't know what you're trying to—”
“Igraine, a moment.” The Shrouded Lord leaned forward in his seat, a motion made visible only by the swirling and darkening of the smoke before him. “Widdershins, this is a serious—to say nothing of utterly bizarre—accusation. What's your reasoning?”
“Just that I saw what the two of them were doing before Iruoch arrived, my lord. I don't know how they were doing it, but they were definitely masquerading as something unnatural. They were terrorizing their victims, without actually robbing them. And the descriptions that we've been hearing of our ‘phantom’? They don't match Iruoch, but they do match what Aubin and Raviel were wearing!”
“I find this entire supposition to be awfully shaky,” Igraine protested. “You're drawing a lot of conclusions from one encounter, and that's assuming it happened the way you claim it did!”
“All right, then,” Widdershins challenged. “If you have a better way to explain why the attacks suddenly turned lethal and blatantly magical, and why our guys were dressed as ghosts and tormenting pedestrians, I'm dying to hear it. My lord, can we possibly have some chairs, and maybe refreshments, brought in? I just love story time!”
“You impudent little—!”
“Igraine, enough! Widdershins, you will speak to your priestess with more respect. Is that clear?”
Widdershins bit her tongue just before saying In this room? Nothing's clear! “Yes, my lord.”
“Good. I agree that this scenario sounds improbable—but if it is true, and if others make the connection, it could indeed spell a great deal of trouble for us.” The Shrouded Lord reached behind him and yanked on one of several ropes. Widdershins didn't hear any bells chime, but a moment later the door slid open and Remy Privott entered the chamber.
“You sent for me, my lord?”
“Yes, Taskmaster. I want to know what Aubin and Raviel were working on the day they were murdered.”
“Hmm. I think Golvar was on shift that day. If they were on Finder business of any sort, he'd be the one to ask.” Then, after a long and pregnant pause, “So, uh, I imagine you want me to go ask him.”
“Your imagination is impressive indeed.”
Remy offered a shallow smile.
“While you're at it,” the hooded figure continued, “put out the word that I want Simon Beaupre brought to me as soon as he can be found. Our little Squirrel is apparently keeping some very poor company.”
“Right. I'm on it.” With that, Remy was gone as abruptly as he'd appeared.
“So,” the Shrouded Lord said, his wide grin evident in his voice despite being hidden behind layers of smoke and fabric. “Is there anything else you ladies would care to discuss while we wait? Perhaps you'd care to tell me what it was you were doing before you arrived at my door?”
Widdershins and Igraine traded glances, and shook their heads as one.
The following minutes passed in brittle silence.
It was over an hour later, just as the combination of acrid smoke and awkward quiet was about to drive Widdershins from the chamber, when a heavy tapping on the door finally heralded the taskmaster's return. Remy seemed clearly bemused—no, more than bemused, positively befuddled, very nearly stunned—as he entered. His entire bald pate, from his eyebrows to the nape of his neck, was furrowed in contemplation.
“My lord,” he began, “perhaps we ought to consider some, ah, adjustments to our process of reports and assignments.”
The Shrouded Lord blinked languidly through the holes in his mask and looked a question first at Igraine, then at Widdershins, both of whom just shrugged. “I take it,” he said, “that you've learned something?”
“Uh, yeah. Yeah, you could say that.”
“And are we to learn it, too? Or are you merely bragging?”
“Oh! Sorry. Well…It didn't take me long to track down Golvar. He was in the map room on the second level, talking—well, it doesn't matter. Point is, I found him, and we had ourselves a little chat.
“So, seems that some weeks ago, a guy approaches Golvar and asks to hire on some of our boys. This guy's doing all the stereotypical ‘you can't know who I am’ horseshit: hooded cloak, baggy clothes, whispering voice, the works. Real amateur hour, right?
“But he's offering a hefty bag full of five- and ten-mark coins, and he's got all the right answers to Golvar's usual questions. He wants to hire six or eight Finders, and they've got to come in pairs who are accustomed to working together.”
“And,” Widdershins piped up, “if I guessed that one of those pairs happened to consist of Aubin and Raviel…?”
“Heh. You wouldn't be wrong.”
“So, what,” the Shrouded Lord asked, “was the job?”
“Well,” Remy answered, “the guy wouldn't say exactly. But he'd satisfied Golvar that this wasn't some trick of the Guard, and that it wouldn't be targeting anyone on our ‘don't touch’ list. So when all he'd explain was that he needed these guys for some long-term con game, Golvar didn't press any further.” Then, as though feeling the need to defend his fellow Finder, “He wasn't breaking any rules…”
The partially obscured guildmaster waved a hand in dismissal. “Go on.”
“Anyway, so Golvar gathers the boys and offers them the assignment, and of course, they all take it. Long-term job with that kind of up-front? Who wouldn't? But Golvar, even though he doesn't much care what the actual job is, he decides he really wants to know who the boys are working for. So he has one of his people—not someone involved in the job—follow Monsieur Hooded-and-Oh-So-Mysterious, until he's able to identify him.”
“And?” Widdershins finally asked after a sufficiently dramatic (and obviously expectant) pause.
“And,” Remy told them, “turns out the guy's name is Ferrand. Brother Ferrand.”
Igraine choked on an errant wisp of the room's thick smoke, and even the Shrouded Lord recoiled. “‘Brother’? As in…”
“As in, my lord. Brother Ferrand is the personal assistant to His Eminence, our city's very own Bishop Sicard.”
“Aha!” Widdershins straightened, practically bouncing in place. “I knew there was a reason I didn't like the guy! He—uh…Yeah.” Staring sheepishly at her sh
oes—and very much away from the astonished expressions surrounding her—she returned to slouching against the wall.
Again a great many moments came and went, lived and died, trooping mutely past as everyone present wrestled and debated with their own thoughts. (Or, in Widdershins's case, with her own thoughts and those of her incorporeal patron.)
“Just to be clear,” the Shrouded Lord said eventually, “Golvar hired out six Finders for a confidence job to a member of the clergy, and this didn't seem unusual enough for him to think it worth reporting? Isn't this precisely the sort of thing you're supposed to stay on top of, Taskmaster? What sort of discipline are you enforcing, exactly?”
Remy's entire head went so red, Widdershins was convinced it was turning into some sort of root vegetable. When he spoke, the words were sharp and jagged, having had to drag themselves out from between his teeth. “My lord, nobody has violated any of the rules. I had no reason to think that Golvar was keeping anything from me. And Golvar maintains that he was planning to report all this, but saw no reason why he should consider it urgent.”
“And,” the Shrouded Lord added, “I imagine he was looking for some way to turn his knowledge of Church involvement to his advantage. And perhaps the deaths of Raviel and Aubin also made him somewhat reluctant to come forward?”
“Even if that's true, my lord, he came clean willingly enough when I confronted him with it. Like I said, maybe we ought to reconsider some of our policies—but none of them were broken here. Bent a little, maybe, but—”
“Fine, fine. You're right; there was no reason for Golvar to believe the job was anything of particular import. We're only just now theorizing about its possible connections with this ‘Iruoch,’ ourselves. But he should have come forward with it as soon as he learned that two of the men involved were among the dead. Please make it clear to him, Taskmaster, that any such lapse in the future will be met with severe repercussions.”
Remy bowed, albeit stiffly.
“And draw up whatever modifications you feel we should make to our procedures. We'll discuss them next week, and implement those with which I agree.”
“Understood, my lord.” A second bow, rather less rigid and reluctant than the first, and Remy—clearly having recognized the dismissal for what it was—once more retreated from the chamber.
“I assume,” the voice said from within the smoke and hood, “that I needn't point out to either of you that the timing of this ‘con job’ coincides neatly with the start of the initial, nonlethal attacks on Davillon's citizens?”
“I'd noticed that,” Widdershins said flatly.
Igraine was chewing on her left thumbnail. “It doesn't prove anything,” she muttered obstinately. Then, with a sigh, “But I admit, it's certainly suspicious. If nothing else, we should look into it enough to ensure that we do not, in fact, receive any of the blame for what happened next.”
Widdershins smiled sweetly. “I bet that hurt you to say. You look like you just swallowed a monkey.”
“Widdershins…”
“A poisonous monkey.”
“That will do, Widdershins,” the guildmaster warned.
“Yes, my lord.”
“So what are we thinking?” he asked, shifting in his chair. “Is this some scheme of the Church as a whole? Something Sicard has put into motion? Or is Ferrand acting on his own? Igraine? You'd know better than the rest of us….”
The priestess nodded and began to pace, leaving whorls of haze in her wake. “I think we can rule out the notion of this being officially Church sanctioned. They have other resources on which to draw, without taking the risk of involving any outsiders, let alone a bunch of Finders.
“But as to whether this is something put in motion by Sicard or Ferrand—well, I can't imagine what either would have to gain, and it's not precisely in character for either a bishop of the Pact or a brother of the Order of Saint Bertrand, so I'm at a loss.”
Widdershins raised her hand like a schoolgirl. “So what's stopping us from finding out?” Then, beneath the weight of twin glowers, “Well, I mean, how hard can it be to spy on a couple of clergymen? Shouldn't be too hard to follow them long enough to figure out what they're up to. And besides, if this is something they started, maybe they'll have some idea of how to stop it, yes?”
“Much as I hate to say it,” Igraine admitted, “I haven't any better ideas.”
“Well, if you hated that, you're going to loathe this…”
“Oh, gods…”
Widdershins offered a shallow smile. “I think we should bring the Guard in on this.” And then, “Uh, Igraine? If your jaw drops any farther, we'll actually be able to see your brain….”
“Widdershins,” the Shrouded Lord asked, his voiced vaguely strangled, “are you completely insane?”
“This is even a question?” Igraine muttered.
“Maybe,” Widdershins admitted readily. “But I'm also right.”
“I await your efforts to convince me,” the guildmaster told her, “with breathless anticipation.”
“That'd be the smoke, I think. But, uh, it's just…Even if we learn something, Sicard and Ferrand will just deny it, right? If we don't have some pretty unimpeachable witnesses, we can't exactly make use of whatever we learn. I mean, I'm assuming the Finders' Guild isn't planning to just ‘disappear’ the bishop, so we need a way to handle this legally, right? Right?”
Then, having not exactly gotten the unambiguous agreement she was looking for, she hurried on. “Plus, what's the point of working to show that the Finders' Guild isn't responsible for what's happening—that we even tried to help stop it—if nobody knows about it?”
“Maybe I'm going mad,” Igraine said to the Shrouded Lord, “but she's actually making sense.”
“Oh, good,” he replied. “I was worried it was just me. Widdershins, I hear what you're saying, but…the Guard? Really?”
“I'm pretty sure I can get them to give us a fair hearing. I have, uh, friends…”
“Yes.” The Shrouded Lord's voice once more went flat, even frosty. “Yes, you do.” He heaved a sigh, made ragged by the fumes in the air. “Very well. Widdershins, you'll contact your…friend. Igraine, you'll accompany her.”
“I—what? My lord—”
“This isn't open for discussion. You're a priestess of a god of the Hallowed Pact. Your word will carry some extra weight, if we do indeed have to make accusations against the bishop or his assistant.”
Igraine bowed her head. “As you wish.”
“Good. I expect the two of you to cooperate. And I'll be sending along someone to provide extra muscle, in case things go poorly.”
The priestess smirked tightly. “‘Muscle.’ By which I assume my lord means ‘babysitter’? Widdershins, I don't believe he trusts us to get along.”
“I am shocked at such an insinuation. Truly scandalized. Possibly appalled, even.”
The pair of them aimed matching grins and wide, innocent looks at the smoke-wrapped figure.
“Get out of here,” he ordered, “before I come to my senses and realize what an abominably bad idea this is.”
The pair of women bowed, still oddly in unison, and turned. They had just about reached the door when, “Widdershins, Igraine?”
Two necks twisted as they both looked over their shoulders.
“We don't know what we're dealing with. We don't know who this conspiracy entails, other than that it's someone highly placed in the Church—a Church, I would remind you, that is not especially popular in Davillon at the moment. We don't know what their masquerade was intended to accomplish, or why it appears to have gone so horribly awry. Be careful—not just for your own sake, but for the Finders. This city is desperate for a scapegoat for our recent woes. Let's not volunteer for the position, hmm?”
Two deep nods, doubling as final bows of farewell, and they were gone.
The hum of conversation slithered from several of the rooms they passed on their way, and the halls were, if not full of Finders going
about their business, then at least sporadically occupied. Plus there were the occasional guards, the chime of bells indicating that someone had failed to pick the pocket or slit the purse of a practice mannequin, even the hiss and spit and crackle of the oil lamps.
Yet, to Widdershins, it felt as though she and her reluctant companion were traversing the entire length of the Finders' Guild sanctum in utter silence. Whatever thoughts the priestess had, she hoarded them to herself as if they were pure gold and uncut gems.
For a time, Widdershins felt that allowing said silence to linger was the best option, but eventually…
“I'm not the enemy, Igraine.”
“Hmm?”
Widdershins shrugged without turning or pausing in her stride. “I know you don't trust me.”
“Why, whatever gave you that silly idea?”
“Call it a hunch. I'm just sensitive that way. But look, I'm really not. I'm loyal to the Guild. I always have been.”
“And that's why you led a demon into our halls last year, is it?”
“Didn't have a choice. I know you think there's something weird about me, but I'm no traitor and I'm no danger to the Finders. I'm not responsible for what's happening out there on the streets, and I really am trying to stop it. The sooner you get that, the happier we'll both be.”
“I don't think there's something weird about you, Widdershins. I know there is. I sensed it even before I heard the rumors of your impressive physical feats—to say nothing of that little display of inhuman speed you put on for me earlier. The presence of the unnatural is one of the first things priests of the Pact learn to sense.
“But,” she continued as Widdershins drew breath to speak, “as far as what's happening now, I do believe you. Or, rather, I'm willing to entertain the possibility that you're telling the truth. You'll have to be satisfied with that.”
Widdershins finally halted, albeit only for a few seconds. “The Shrouded Lord trusts me. Why don't you?”
Igraine's face twisted briefly into an expression that Widdershins couldn't possibly interpret—though she saw, among other things, a barely suppressed amusement hidden within—and then went blank just as swiftly. It was, then, Igraine's turn to shrug and march on ahead, and Widdershins's turn to trail behind, her thoughts once more her own.