There was a chorus of grumbling at the mention of the accursed counsel and the knights who had sworn him their swords. Dominic knew what such men and women they were: mercenaries, sellswords, smugglers, and flesh traders. To him, their defacement of church had to end; and whatever toll exacted would be gladly paid.
“These are men who marauded for pleasure. Ser Elin was not enough—Lutessa brought a legion of them! No, friends, the time for words is over: the faithful must rise to action, and cast them back into the prisons where they belong. If they must breathe Darkness, let them cower in it for the rest of their lives while we rebuild our Faith! Let us send them to the gaols!”
Support began to rise from the assembled. When more raised their voices, it seemed to embolden the others.
“I decry Counsel Stephen Francis and his Faithsworn!” The response was deafening. “He is a catspaw, a war monger, a cardinal sinner.” He could no longer hear his own voice; he shouted his lungs out. “To him and his kind I say: no more! To him and his kind I say: your service is at an end. To him and his kind I say: you are the darkness that will be purged from our hearts!”
Father Augustus stepped forward and withdrew from the folds in his robes a wrapped scabbard that he presented to Dominic. Drawing the steel clear from its sheath, he raised the weapon high above his head. It felt so strange in his hands, but he stood there for what seemed like an eternity, until every eye took him in, and the gathering swelled in hushed silence. He was the only priest in recent memory to wield a weapon, and he knew what it would do to the faithful.
“Three hundred years ago, our ancestors fled from the cruelty of Trechtian kings and nobles. We came to this land, built our cities, erected out churches. Darkness was in the lands all around us then, as it is now. Justine the Indomitable, the first Voice of the Faith, she, too, raised a sword high, and carved out our kingdom in the name of the Light, and Mother God who provides it. We must do the same!”
He looked out at the crowd and saw beaming, enthused faces. Absent was fear and trepidation; they had seen the truth of his cause: that this had to be done, even if it meant taking arms against those who blindly followed the Voice, unaware of her misdeeds.
Legions are for more than you, Lutessa.
With voices stretched and parched, the clamor settled down. He eyed a single priest with arms crossed, who stood in the shadow of the earthen passage, whose seeking eyes fixated upon him. He swallowed hard.
“It is Light that I bring, not Darkness: a force that you cannot understand,” the priest intoned. “I fear the dark god as you do, Father Dominic. I have seen what is coming, but have you?”
What the faithful did or said was lost to Dominic. If Fathers Augustus and Buchanan stirred or called out, he was deaf to their cries. The dread of this moment superseded every other movement and inclination. “Counsel, I did not think to look for you.”
Counsel Stephen Francis sauntered past the benches. The heretic glanced at every man or woman who had gathered, as if he meant to commit them to memory. Dominic felt sweat dripping down his face, facing the full realization of what he had done to his brothers and sisters.
“It is I that looked for you,” Counsel Stephen declared. “I had thought for all your subtlety you must have fled. But I knew better than that. You would not abandon the Faith when it needed you most.” The counsel paused, and the only sound was the shuffling of robes. “I must ask again: have you seen what is coming?”
Dominic hardened in the face of his foe. “We have all seen it. It has unfolded for years now. We cry against it, but you and Lutessa are blind to it. Your hearts are black as you push us towards our doom. If the Faith is to persevere, this road cannot be walked down, not anymore. Whatever must be done, will be done.”
“What would you know of what must be done?” Counsel Stephen asked. “You beg and pray, close your eyes to the tribulations of the realm, and think some answer will come from the divine. That is not the way of faith. I keep Mother God in my heart, and She guides my every action.”
“You are a servant of Sariel!”
“I am wholly Hers.”
“I know what Darkness is when I see it.”
“Do you?” Amusement glittered in the counsel’s eyes. “None of you saw the Calamity. I did.”
“What do you mean?” Father Buchanan blurted out.
Counsel Stephen Francis stopped and turned, facing the assembled. Dominic feared what the heathen would proclaim, but he could not demand silence.
“My life is much more than that of a counsel, or even a humble priest,” Counsel Stephen began. “When I had learned that Isilia’s fallen knights had broached our lands, I thought only of the darkness that swept her people into such cruelty. I was never a warrior, nor would I brandish a blade like a fool seeking glory. Like all of you, I entrusted my life to the Voice, and our own blessed knights to drive them back—and they did, if at much regrettable cost. My thoughts drifted not to the war—such matters were beyond my humble faculties—but what good I could do. I was one of the hundreds who answered the call of Mother God, and ventured to Isil itself. To guide those in the ways of the Light who had lost it.”
“None survived the Calamity in Isil,” Dominic declared stubbornly, aware of the shameless guile of the counsel’s silver tongue. “Do not believe the lies of a man whose perverse pleasures would bring us all to ruin.”
Counsel Stephen made a tsking sound. “I do not lie, whatever you may think of me. Ser Johnathan Falenir returned from that land.”
“In chains for heresy and deception to Mother God.”
“How little you understand.” The heavy gaze of the counsel’s eyes fell upon him now. It was unnerving. “Ser Johnathan was spared by Mother God to bring us a gift to use against the Darkness. Far more potent than the sword you wield now. The truth of our past that you refuse to speak of.”
“And you? Why were you spared?”
The counsel smirked. “To do what you cannot.”
There were two piercing sounds followed by soft gurgling noises and deafening thuds. Dominic turned to and fro, and saw that Fathers Buchanan and Augustus had hands on their throats, vainly grasping at crossbow bolts. Screams followed as arrows rained from either side of the room, and the Faithsworn suddenly swarmed from openings in the walls with drawn swords, halberds, spears, and long-handled axes. The priests, stewards, and scholars came unarmed, and died with sickening shrieks and wails. Dominic could do naught but watch and ponder the incredulity of it all.
No. Mother God no. This, not this, this cannot. He is a priest. He cannot be doing this. I have killed them. Killed them all. Mother God no.
The screams resonated inside his skull, wracking his mind with pain and sorrow that he never felt before. It was like Zelen was burned and defiled again, over and over, him no more than a feeble boy unable to do aught for the faithful ringed with fire. It was too much for him, as he collapsed upon the floor, closed his eyes, and put hands against his ears. No matter what he did, the cruel clamor grew louder and louder; the butchery surreal before his closed eyes.
Sin has dismantled our church. Sin has blackened the ground to which we walk. Sin has purged the faithful forever. Sin has laid to waste all we hold dear. Sin has killed Mother God.
The terror became soundless, and opening his eyes, he stared listlessly towards his brothers and sisters of the Faith. They were all dead. There were naught but shattered skulls and stained robes all piled on top of each other. The marauders turned the bodies over, cleaning their blades against the little white that remained. At the edge of hearing, some of these monsters remarked at the fragility of the faithful, the lack of fight they showed, and the cowards the sons and daughters Mother God had bred. He tried to push himself to his feet, grip the hilt, but no strength or force of will could move him.
Amidst the sea of blood and gore, his eyes stared daggers through Counsel Stephen Francis, as the heathen walked towards him; the heretic’s robes more crimson than white. Dominic thought him no more
than a daemon; a feral beast that ravaged maidens and children.
Just like Damian Dannars.
“This is a time of unity, not segregation,” the counsel proclaimed solemnly. “You were warned of what would come to pass of this deception. The Faith stands upon the precipice. It will not survive without us.”
“Th-this bloodshed has ended the Faith. Ended it, Stephen! Justine did not sacrifice herself for this mockery. It is you who are the blight upon us all. You defiled the Faith today. Not I.”
“Every Dalian would be buried, if not for my actions.”
“Every man and woman worthy of the Light of Mother God is dead, you cursed animal.”
Counsel Stephen Francis stood a foot away, and he pried the freshly forged steel from Dominic’s limp fingers. He no longer cared what would become of life; all that was good and true in the realm was gone.
“It is good steel that you had forged,” the heretic said, admiring the blade, like some master swordsmith.
Not a warrior, indeed. Every word you breathe is a lie.
“Darkness will flee at its sight.”
“Then why are you still here?!” Dominic screamed as tears rolled down his face.
“I once thought myself a slave to Darkness,” the counsel whispered, almost inaudible. “Darkness that is what the Calamity was, and will be again, should we ever allow it. I have seen what it truly is, and decried it for its malice and cruelty. I defied the Voice, enlisted the Faithsworn for the very purpose of casting down that Darkness. These lives, they mean naught to me, to Mother God. I will save our Faith in a way you never could.”
Dominic shouted back. “You are no better than Ser Elin! If Mother God ever hears my prayers, it would be that you will join him.”
The tip of the steel rested against his chest then, and the counsel spoke. “A man once asked me what I thought of Ser Elin, and Lutessa’s judgment. I told him it was not for me to decide. Since then, I have learned much and to you I say: I am not Ser Elin Durand. I am the savior that blind men could never see.”
The blade pierced Dominic’s heart, and he saw the counsel’s face rise against a mosaic of pure Light.
Chapter Eight
Friends and Foes
Aerona still held the watch.
She chewed dried strips of meat and listened to every noise and disturbance. The waves crashed against the rock wall below, and the call of birdsongs carried on the wind. The shadow of a hawk soared past the lip of the cave, but when she glanced upward, the bird was no more than a speck on the horizon. Ere long the reverberations of nature were naught more than harmonic ambiance.
Hours passed into hours. The waves crashed. The birds called. Shadows lengthened.
Where are they?
The sun was beneath the horizon when she heard the shuffle of feet and muffled speech. Ashleigh thrust the game bag at Aerona.
“That all?”
“It is enough,” the sentinel insisted, tossing weapons into the corner. “You would not have done better.”
“We will eat for a few more days,” Jaremy protested. “There is little enough out there.”
“Where is Daniel?” Aerona asked, suddenly aware that the Corsair had not returned.
“Said he had to see to the longboat,” Ashleigh said, shrugging her shoulders. “Eat, Aerona. I will take the watch.”
In the back of the cavern the fire was naught but dull, blackened embers. Jaremy gathered some wood and kindling, grasped the flint and tinder, and got a fire going. Aerona sorted through the game, choosing a few fat rabbits, and began storing the rest of the meat in larger bags.
A few days—a week if we ration it.
Alarmed, she discovered thicker meat, bloody and raw, and leered at Jaremy questioningly.
“Best not ask about that,” the islander offered before she could say a word. “You will not like the answer.”
“I told you—”
“It was driven north, or so my lord thought. You are sorting through it. Look at what else there was. The forest is near dead. Dead as the people who were once here.”
He is not far wrong. Though if the storm has pushed the great beasts north, every venture out there might be our last.
“What was it?” she asked while skewering the meat on the spit.
“A black tigron. Never seen one in my life. My lord though, he knew, and how to slay it.”
She had not seen one, though her own whisperers had told her folktales from villages and their mortal fear of them. “Might be what scared away the game. You may have done us a favour.”
“Tell that to the sentinel.”
“I may, if you wish it.”
“Only if I can watch from afar.”
She began to laugh, and a smile cracked across Jaremy’s lips. She imagined the implacable stone face of the Isilian.
Meat and mirth with one of Damian’s dogs. The thought is so appalling, but good. “Do not let her bother you, Jaremy. She has lost more than any of us.”
He did not look up while turning the spit. “Hearth and home. All her people. Much as we have.”
“We fled under shadows. Our people are smugglers and pirates. We are not the last. Nor do I think that is Trecht’s way. We are more than just Lanan.”
“Call it a premonition.”
“You? A premonition? Are you a sea witch now? An oracle?”
“I lack the teats for either, if tales be true,” Jaremy insisted, face reddening. “Here, now, enough of that. Take your serving. You need more than strips of meat.”
Aerona thought it a humble, but satisfying supper of greasy rabbit meat, some roots and herbs. She drank warm water to wash it down. Once or twice she saw Jaremy look to her, but then away. She looked down, and saw her linens were damp, clutching against her damp skin, and she felt a pang of guilt.
The only man I will ever take is gone.
“Here,” Jaremy said once they were done, handing her a plate. “Ashleigh will want to eat. I have given her enough reasons to cut my throat. Not wanting to give her another.” Aerona laughed and took the hot meal.
The sentinel was not at the lip of the cave. Aerona shouted out, but there were only the echoes rattling off the ceiling. Pushing the plate aside, she drew Vindication. She took a few steps forward, listening for any movement or sound.
Naught.
A few more paces, and there were sounds of struggle, and grunting. Running heedlessly, she saw three figures, all weaponless.
“Put that way and help us. Put pressure on his throat. He’s lost too much blood already.”
Daniel and Ashleigh were struggling with a thin, shaggy man. The only words seemed to be groans of pain as he took in ragged breaths. The pair of them were holding the stranger by his arms and legs, though he must have been draped over their shoulders to make the descent. Aerona sheathed her blade and pressed the layers of linen against his throat.
“Blankets, Jaremy!” Daniel called out. “Against the fire. Boil water. We have to clean and cauterize the wound.”
“You are not a hero, Daniel.” Ashleigh declared scornfully. “Someone will come looking for him.”
“That someone will never find us.”
The water boiled, Daniel reached into a pouch at his side, crunched some herbs and deposited it into the water, mixing it. Jaremy passed to him a dry cloth as, and Daniel soaked the gash in the man’s throat, before Aerona layered the linens against his skin, matting the blood flow.
“That was from a steel blade, Daniel,” Aerona said, suspicion boiling inside of her.
“Yes, it was,” Daniel replied. “Mine own. He washed up where we made landfall, alone, some shipwreck. I was tempted to cut him, throw him back to the sea. Seems he had the same idea.”
The man’s face was still swollen and puffed, and the creases of age stretched and wrinkled his skin. His long and shaggy hair made him seem like a beggar, though if cut, he would have a dignity that came with age. Aerona was sure she had never seen him before.
“Who is h
e, my lord?” Jaremy asked. “Some common sot?”
“Ser Johnathan Falenir. Or so he claims.”
Aerona doubted it the moment the words passed Daniel’s lips. When she met Ser Johnathan inside of Isil’s walls he was strong, stern, determined, and protective. They had stared at each other dubiously. More than once, she thought he would pull a sword and gut her there, disregarding the consequences. He never did, but wrought something much worse. The knight left her and her Brood to die. If this washed-up shell of a man was him, I will repay him in kind.
Daniel and Ashleigh stripped Ser Johnathan of his rotten, torn rags, washed him down with the warm water, and cleaned the cuts and bruises. A line of scars rolled down his back: half healed and gruesome.
You slew them. All of them. You deserve far worse.
“Watches must be kept by the door and in here,” Daniel declared flatly. “Ser Johnathan must return to us. I care little for these holy defenders, but what he knows could mean life and death. It would not hurt to learn what churns in Dalia, not told by prophets.”
Aerona fingered the hilt of a dirk beneath the folds of her leathers. “He would have been kept in all of the Voice’s counsels—for a time. You said he was shipwrecked, and by his garb, a prisoner seems likely. What could he know?”
“Much,” Daniel insisted. “You know the laws of Dalia better than anyone, Aerona. The lord protector is much more than a field commander. Even imprisoned, there is a lifetime of knowledge lying at our fire.”
“If someone comes looking for him?” Ashleigh asked.
“If they can find us, we deserve a descent to the Deep Below.”
Days seemed to meld into each other. Aerona awoke in the morning, and asked whoever had the watch if any change had come to the old knight. It was always the same: mutterings were louder, he had more colour, and his body seemed to heal. It disappointed her, though she masked concern as to not give away her intent. I will see to the consequences later. He has no right to draw breath.
One day she hunted with Jaremy Dahk. It was clear that most of the wildlife was either dead or fled. She flushed rabbits out of their holes, who seemed to want nothing more to do with the realm at large. Her partner had less luck. When she joined him mid-afternoon, and she heard his heavy breathing from thirty yards away, she spent most of the remaining afternoon instructing him on his breathing, a lighter tread, and what on the forest floor would scare game away.
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