The Wounded Shadow

by Patrick W. Carr

  My guard shook his head. “Where did you learn how to do this?”

  “From the man Bishop Gehata took.”

  “Volsk.”

  Bolt released Mirren’s arm, shoving her toward the stairs. “Run, girl.”

  We went down the dark rock steps, splashing accumulated water with every other stride, passing the level where I’d been held to the one beneath. In the light of Mirren’s lamp it was indistinguishable from the others, but it held the sense of occupation, a hint of warmth or breath that belied the initial impression of emptiness.

  Mirren took a dozen steps and opened the door on her right, raising the lamp, but no one ventured forth. “He’s weak,” she said.

  We stepped into the cell and drew in a collective breath. Bolt reached down and lifted Volsk as easily as I would a young child, but his head lolled as if his neck were broken. “He’s not weak,” Bolt said. “He’s dying.”

  For a moment Peret Volsk’s eyes roamed over us, plainly trying to make sense of what he saw. His gaze had been dark to match his hair during his time as apprentice to the Vigil. Now it matched the color of obsidian, set by lurid bruises on his face. Blood discolored his mouth.

  I shook my head, confused. “Why would they bother to beat him?”

  A coughing sound filled the cell, and Volsk bent with the effort as fresh droplets of crimson stained his lips. No. Not coughing. Laughing.

  “Lord Dura,” Volsk wheezed, “we seem to have a penchant for meeting in prisons. This cell is slightly larger than the one I occupied in Bunard. I managed to solve the measurement problem. Would you like to know how I did it?”

  Bolt and Mirren looked at me, and with effort I pulled a memory out of my past. “He’s not from Moorclaire, but he enjoys the mathematicum just the same.”

  “What did you do to him?” Bolt asked. Mirren took a step back at the threat in the question, but Volsk waved him off.

  “Not her,” he said.

  For some reason I couldn’t identify, Volsk’s appearance roused a protective anger in me. This, for the man who’d tried to arrange my death so that he could inherit the gift of domere. The idiocy of that struck me. Would there be some set of circumstances that would lead me to pity Bishop Gehata? And if so, what would those be?

  “Fool men,” Mirren said, “talking when you should be moving. Save your questions until we’re safe.”

  Bolt moved to lift Volsk from the floor. “Stop,” Volsk said. “If you move me I’ll die that much sooner.” He coughed again, weaker this time. “I made a mistake.”

  “Only one?” I asked.

  A bit of his former arrogance flared in his eyes before it turned to ash. “I mocked the bishop one time too many,” he said. “I thought I would be a healer, once. My ribs are broken. My lungs are bleeding.”

  “We can’t stay here,” Mirren said.

  Bolt rose, his movements unexpectedly gentle as he rested Volsk on the floor. The traitorous Vigil apprentice closed his eyes, his breathing quick and shallow, but a moment later his hand twitched, hardly more than a flutter.

  Instinctively, I knew what he wanted. Reaching out, I laid a hand on his head and fell into the dying ruin of his mind. He wasn’t there to greet me. The dim color to his thoughts bore witness to his passing, but there was a book floating before me. With the barest touch of thought it flared into light, and Volsk’s most precious memories became my own. Darkness descended within his mind and I broke contact.

  The Vigil’s apprentice lay dead. I created a door within my mind and interred his memories within the room beyond. Then I marked it with Toria Deel’s name and sealed it shut. I might never have the chance to give them to her, and I wondered if she would want them.

  We left the cell after Bolt closed Volsk’s eyes.

  I’d expected Mirren to take us to the next level beneath, but instead she led us thirty paces down the hall and stopped to open a door on the left. I darted in, my mind conjuring images and revenge. In the light, Custos blinked at me. Though he looked wan and hungry, he didn’t carry the mass of bruises Volsk did.

  “Hello, Willet.” His voice rasped with disuse.

  “Let’s leave the joyful reunions for later,” Bolt said. “I don’t fancy trying to fight off any of the cosp without a sword. ‘Long odds make for bad outcomes.’”

  I nodded as we made what speed we could up the stairs toward freedom. “I like that one.”

  He snorted, and I could see the grimace on his stony face as we turned on one of the landings. “That’s a surprise, coming from you. You don’t hope for miracles—you rely on them.”

  We released Hradian from his cell and soon came to the top. I could feel a difference in the stone. Even though I suspected dawn had yet to break, I sensed I was once again in the presence of sun-warmed rock. The guards at the entrance to the prisons stood facing away from us, blinking and swaying on their feet.

  Mirren held out a hand, then raised a finger to her lips. We waited as she went forward, her steps almost too light to hear. Almost.

  The guards turned, their motions sluggish, and made to draw, but when they saw her they faltered. Mirren extended her bare hand, first to one and then the other, and the stares of the guards became as glass.

  “She’s good at that,” I said.

  Bolt nodded. “She’s had a bit of practice.”

  Mirren pointed. “That’s the closest way out.”

  Thoughts still churned in my head, like silt stirred from the river bottom, but I knew enough to ask Custos for confirmation. It was only after he nodded that it occurred to me that Mirren would only point out the closest avenue of escape if she didn’t mean to come with us.

  “It’s been hours since I touched Gehata,” she said. “If I don’t return, his memories will settle and he’ll know what I’ve done.”

  “What did you see in Gehata’s mind?”

  She shook her head. “I didn’t take the time to delve him.”

  “We’re going with you,” Bolt said. “Lieutenant, you must find Bishop Serius and bring him to Gehata’s quarters.”

  Hradian nodded, relieved one of the guards of his sword, and strode down the passageway. As he turned a corner, Mirren hissed, “I didn’t go to the trouble of getting you out of prison just so you could put yourself back.”

  Bolt gave her a quick nod before relieving the other guard of his weapon. “We won’t be going back.”

  Mirren’s expression matched her laughter, but she didn’t get the chance to put voice to her objection.

  “I think it’s better than fives that Bishop Gehata already knows who holds the gift of kings and that he’s taken them prisoner,” Bolt said. Since it had more possible combinations than any other number, five was the most common roll in bones. The combinations of a pair of four-sided bones ranged from two to eight, but a quarter of all throws would come up five, if the dice were fair.

  “I’ve played,” Mirren said. “That’s still three times out of four that he doesn’t know. What was it you said about long odds?”

  The duration of their argument set my skin itching. “Custos, take me to Gehata’s office.”

  He smiled, but my heart quailed at how pale he was. Even so, he turned and started down the hallway to the right, away from our escape.

  Mirren and Bolt fell in behind us. Except for the occasional priest in red who eyed our strange company with curious suspicion, the hallways were empty.

  “Why is the cathedral so empty?” I asked.

  “It’s still a few minutes to sunrise,” Mirren said. “Everyone needs sleep.”

  “That’s the truth of it,” I said.

  Mirren cut her gaze my way, suddenly uncomfortable. After delving me, she knew of my peculiar affliction. We came to Gehata’s quarters, where a pair of cosp were posted outside the door. At the sight of Bolt, one of them sprinted away from us.

  “Cosp! Guards!” His voice faded with the speed of his departure, but his screams continued.

  The other moved to block our way, and
we stopped. Bolt drew and advanced, his sword point down in a way that might have been intended to be less threatening. The guard didn’t seem to take it that way. He coiled, waiting for the last Errant.

  “I’ve sworn not to kill any of the church,” Bolt said to the guard. “That’s a vow I’d prefer to keep if I can.”

  The guard, a rangy fellow with a thin face, licked his lips. He was outmatched and knew it. “Then put away your sword.”

  “Hmmm,” Bolt said, still closing. “If I do that, your bishop will put me back in prison.”

  I didn’t see him move so much as I sensed it. The air exploded with violence as Bolt launched at the guard, his sword coming up in an attack on the high line.

  Right at his head.

  The guard was good, and he probably had enough fear coursing through him to fuel a whole company of soldiers. He parried Bolt’s first strike. The air whined in complaint as Bolt riposted toward the opposite side, and the guard managed to block that strike just short of his skull.

  The third landed, and the guard crumpled, blood coming from the split in his scalp. I didn’t want to look, but I knew his gaze might tell me something, however unlikely, as he died. Only . . . he didn’t. The cut on his head hadn’t broken through the bone. I looked at my guard.

  “I took him with the flat,” Bolt said.

  Custos nodded. “Interesting. That would explain why your strikes were so noisy. I’ve read about that, of course, but I’ve never seen it before.”

  The sound of boots, lots of them, sounded in the distance. Mirren bent to the guard. “Don’t bother,” I said. “One more or less won’t make a difference now. We have to get to Gehata.”

  We locked the heavy door behind us, Bolt and Mirren disappearing into the interior. I tried not to stare at the opulence of Gehata’s quarters, but there was enough gilt in his rooms to cover a wall. “He’s an unassuming sort of fellow, isn’t he?”

  “These rooms are nearly a thousand years old, and the wealth is held by the church,” Custos said. “Over that period of time, even incremental decoration accumulates.”

  “You’re defending him?”

  He shrugged. “I’m sure Bishop Gehata is as venal a man as you’ll find, but most of this wealth predates him.” He looked around. “I prefer figs, myself.”

  Bolt and Mirren came running out of separate rooms, their faces wearing different versions of the same emotion. “He’s not here,” they said in unison.

  The boom of impact and the splintering of wood filled the air.

  “They have us now,” Bolt said. As slowly as a normal man, he drew his sword. “You were right about those long odds.”

  Chapter 35

  The door didn’t last through the next blow. Whoever had trapped us in the bishop’s quarters had planned ahead—they’d brought a battering ram. Cosp filled the room, but they didn’t strike, only set themselves with their swords and waited.

  Bolt crouched, but a moment later he shook his head and tossed the sword onto the table in the middle of the room. “‘If there’s a choice between dying now and dying later . . .’” he murmured.

  “‘Choose later,’” I finished. I’d first heard that saying from the southern mercenaries who entered the Darkwater with me ten years ago. It didn’t seem like a good omen.

  A wall of cosp surrounded us and spilled out into the hall, cutting off any hope of escape. Bishop Gehata threaded his way through the soldiers, wearing that same smile of superiority that made me want to punch his face, but I noticed his eyes held a bit of the unbalance that probably still showed in mine.

  “How?” Mirren asked.

  The bishop’s smile grew. “You were a calculated risk, Mirren—one that I was almost unwilling to take. Letting you inside Lord Dura’s mind was a gamble, but necessary. I told my guards to watch me for any behavior that seemed out of place.” He turned to me. “After I’ve disposed of your friends, Lord Dura, I’ll be relieving you of your gift.” He looked around. “I’ll have to have my quarters cleansed, of course, but as we say, the growth of the church is watered by blood.”

  If there was a means to redeem Gehata from his ambition, it eluded me. I looked at the guards around him, as stoic and uncaring of his blasphemy as stone. “Do none of you care that he’s going to destroy you all?”

  The bishop’s laughter mocked me. “Like you, Lord Dura, I prize loyalty, and I’ve gone to great lengths to ensure it.” He sighed, almost purring his pleasure. Then he pointed at Custos. “I think I’d like that one to die first—the librarian. Kill him. Now.”

  Bolt moved to intercept, weaponless, but a half-dozen swords swung his way, and their owners positioned themselves so they each had a clean line of attack.

  Before the guards could get to Custos, I stepped in front and pulled my gloves. “I won’t stand idle while you kill him. I don’t expect to win, but if this goes badly, I will die before you can take the gift. Your apothecary is not here.”

  A sharp retort of sound echoed in the room, and I saw Bishop Gehata applauding. “This is better than a play.” He pointed to Custos. “Isn’t it ironic that as the curtain goes up on the next act, it’s actually coming down on his life?”

  Bolt shifted closer to me, and the cosp closest withdrew a step, nervous. For months he’d been my constant companion, the purity of his gift an illustration of just how far humanity had fallen. But in all that time, even during the fight with Duke Orlan’s pet killer, I had never seen the focused intensity, the capacity for explosive violence that I saw now.

  The last Errant stood beside me.

  Instead of being chagrined or angry at the prospect of more than a little violence in his quarters, Bishop Gehata looked pleased. He held the tip of his tongue against his upper lip as if in anticipation of some delicate morsel he’d never tasted before, and the pupils of his eyes had dilated like a lover’s.

  “Excellent,” he said. He raised his hand, pointing at Bolt. “Let us see what the Errant—”

  A clatter from the hallway interrupted him, the shock of a single sword rebounding from the stones of the corridor like a clarion. Its ring hung in the air—a repudiation—before being joined by another and then more. The cosp filling Gehata’s quarters thinned as they moved to investigate. Then I saw them dropping weapons and kicking them away.

  The six cosp closest to Gehata closed in, forming a ring around him, tense, as the rest moved away. I still couldn’t see the reason for the surrender, but the clatter of dropping weapons continued to sound.

  “Bishop Gehata,” a voice rang from the hallway, “you are commanded to surrender yourself to the authority of the Merum church.”

  Bolt straightened from his crouch. “Serius.”

  “I am the church now, you fool,” Gehata snarled.

  A crowd of soldiers moved into view, filling the doorway, each one of them leveling a loaded crossbow at the bishop and his remaining men. Bolt pulled me and Custos out of the line of fire. The remaining cosp surrendered, their swords hitting the carpet with muffled rings. One by one they were manacled and led away, stripping Gehata of his protection. When one of the guards signaled Mirren to step forward, I held up a hand.

  “Not her,” I said. “She freed us.”

  Serius entered the room, his eyes clear, lucid. “My thoughts and reason have returned to me, Bishop Gehata.”

  Gehata laughed. “Do you expect me to grovel, Serius? You’re a fool, like Vyne before you, wasting an opportunity for the true church to take control of the north and erase the errors of the past.”

  Serius didn’t bother to answer but turned from Gehata as he would an object that held little significance. “Are you well, Errant Consto?”

  Bolt nodded as he stepped forward with his eyes on the floor, examining the swords. He stooped, selecting one and then fastening it to his belt. “This will do until I find Robin’s.” Turning, he pointed through the floor. “There’s at least one man dead by Gehata’s order in the prison cells below us.”

  I searched Bolt
’s face for some satisfaction or regret over Peret Volsk’s death, but he’d always been hard to read, and now was no exception.

  Serius nodded. “I grieve your loss.”

  Bolt’s expression didn’t change, but his chin dropped toward his chest, and his eyes narrowed momentarily. “Do I?” he whispered too softly for any to hear. Except me.

  “What will you do with him?” I asked Serius as I pointed at Gehata.

  Serius mused for a moment before answering. “With your aid, Lord Dura, we will question him to determine just how far his influence has spread.”

  I noted that he’d addressed me, not Bolt. He knew about my gift. Confirming my suspicion, I heard Rory’s voice coming from the press of soldiers in the hallway.

  “It’s over, you stupid kreppa. Let us through.”

  A moment later he and Gael shouldered their way into the room. In the tales, whenever a woman discovers her beloved has survived, she falls into his arms. I wouldn’t have minded that, but the writers of those tales had obviously never met Gael. She noted Gehata, her blue eyes darkening to the shade of an overcast sky, and took my hand, the bare one.

  Divining her intent, I let myself fall into her mind, where I became one with her memories and emotions. In an instant, I knew what she and Rory had done, how they had retrieved Bishop Serius and, after his muddled mind had settled, convinced him of the danger Gehata represented. Emotions swirled among her memories, anger, and enough fear to cripple anyone, but Gael had channeled all of them into action.

  Just before I surrendered our communion, one last thread of emotion washed over me. I blinked and found myself looking at my beloved in the midst of a sea of armed men and women. “You wouldn’t really want me to do that,” I said. “Not here and now.”

  No one outside of the two of us would have any context for the remark, but Gael only favored me with a smile and a lift of her brows. I tried to maintain some measure of reserve, but I must have failed.

  “Bonkers,” Rory snorted. “You’d think they’d been apart from each other for a lifetime instead of a few hours.”