The Glass Warrior (Demon Crown Book 1)

by Vardeman, Robert E.

  “She is of no importance. It is Oprezzi who occupies my thoughts and prayers. I seek guidance in that matter,” said Archbishop Nosto, “and the saints have failed to answer. I drift on a sea of heresy and know not how to proceed.”

  “Truly, a serious concern for everyone in Porotane. This lieutenant must not contaminate Johanna, should her claims to the throne prove valid.”

  “He must be put to the Question immediately. There is no other way to know his involvement with demonic forces.”

  “No!” Theoll said, too abruptly, too forcefully. He wanted Oprezzi in the hands of Nosto’s Inquisition, but not yet, not until Freow died. Only in that way could he indict Johanna and remove her. A premature questioning of the young lieutenant would allow her time to respond and sway others to her favour.

  “I have no choice, Theoll. None. By the saints, I shall find out about his involvement with demons!”

  Archbishop Nosto pulled free of Theoll’s grip and stalked off. Theoll controlled his anger. This precipitous questioning would remove Oprezzi, but not when the baron desired. Freow’s death and Oprezzi’s torture must come within hours if Johanna was to be discredited.

  “Damn you, Nosto, damn you and all your fornicating saints!” Theoll bit his tongue and looked around to be sure that no one overheard his outburst. Still seething, he stormed off. New plans had to be made. He had to profit from Oprezzi’s death. But how?

  Baron Theoll slipped from the secret passages, his heart pounding furiously from his spying. This night proved exceptionally active in the castle’s bedchambers. His eye hurt from being forced against too many spyholes and his legs throbbed mercilessly. Only his left arm gave him true difficulty, however; it hung useless and twisted at his side. He emerged into the corridor outside Nosto’s quarters. For a moment, he considered slipping back into the secret panel before the red-clad Inquisitors in the corridor challenged him.

  Too late. The one at the far end of the hall tugged his blood-red hood down so that the eyeholes were in place and pointed a ceremonial dagger at Theoll. “Halt!” the Inquisitor cried. “Halt and be identified to the Inquisition!”

  “Baron Theoll of Brandon,” the small noble said. “I come to speak with the archbishop on a personal matter.”

  “He is occupied with clerical matters.”

  “Does it have to do with a guardsman being put to the Question?”

  Both Inquisitors adjusted their hoods and shuffled nervously from one foot to the other. A silent decision was made. The one closest to Theoll grabbed his good arm and swung him toward the door leading to Nosto’s chambers. “Inside,” ordered one. Theoll did not resist. Both Inquisitors had drawn their daggers and were ready to use them should he protest. He shrugged off this lack of respect and pushed through the heavy door and into Nosto’s sitting room.

  “Archbishop?” he called. “I’d speak with you.”

  Nosto emerged from an inner room wearing a hood similar to those of the guards outside, except his had the bone-white sigil of the True Path imprinted on the face. Theoll blinked in surprise, not at this but at Nosto’s muscular development. The archbishop was naked to the waist, displaying power Theoll had not even guessed at. Tightly cinched around the cleric’s waist was a hair belt.

  Human hair, Theoll saw. He did not doubt that Nosto had taken it from previous victims — heretics — of the Inquisition who had confessed their heresy before dying.

  Skintight breeches the same colour as the hood disappeared into the tops of soft leather boots, also adorned with the white sigil of the True Path. In the top of the left boot was thrust a dagger like the ceremonial implements carried by those outside.

  “You come at a bad time, Theoll. The work of the Inquisition requires my full attention. Come back tomorrow. Tomorrow afternoon.”

  “Nosto, wait. Does the Inquisition go to put the Question to Oprezzi?”

  “Yours is a secular realm, mine is religious. My duties as Inquisitor do not concern you, Baron.”

  Theoll’s mind raced. He saw that nothing would dissuade Nosto from torturing the lieutenant. He had to turn this to his own benefit.

  “Do you know the questions to ask?” he demanded of the archbishop. “Not the religious ones, but the secular. Who seduced Oprezzi? I have reason to believe that Lady Johanna is a demon in human form.”

  “Ridiculous, even I — ” Archbishop Nosto cut off his words. Theoll stared at the tall, thin cleric. Had even Nosto succumbed to Johanna’s influence? The vision he had of this whipsaw-muscled cleric and the lovely, lush-figured, frosty blonde Johanna together turned his gut to jelly. What a powerful alliance those two would make if he did not stop them!

  “These are matters to investigate,” said Theoll.

  “What is the source of your accusation?”

  “A dying messenger,” Theoll lied. “He crossed a strife-torn Porotane from the lady’s province to tell of demonic deeds before her departure. Many died, some horribly with boils disfiguring them. Each had been touched by Johanna.” Theoll said no more. To do so would prejudice Archbishop Nosto against him. If Johanna and the archbishop shared a bed, it was better to let Nosto’s imagination fill in any discrepancies. Because of his work as Inquisitor, he did a fine job of jumping to conclusions based on the flimsiest of evidence.

  “Perhaps you speak the truth. You have always walked the True Path, and often revelation is given to the faithful.”

  Theoll bowed his head.

  “Stay here. The Inquisition seeks Oprezzi. He will be put to the Question this night and truth will flow from the heretic’s lips!”

  “May I…” Theoll cut off his request and bowed his head again when he saw the determined set of Nosto’s lean body. Religious matters brooked no interference by a mere baron. Theoll bowed even lower as Nosto left abruptly, the loose fabric of his hood snapping as if in a high wind.

  Theoll released a pent-up breath, then counted slowly to one hundred. He peered into the corridor and saw that Nosto and the two Inquisitors had left on their mission of righteous interrogation. Even if Oprezzi sat surrounded by his fellows, none would dare defend him against the Inquisition.

  Theoll almost laughed when he thought of the possibility that Oprezzi lay with Johanna. The notion of Nosto plucking the lieutenant from the blonde’s bed amused the baron greatly. But he knew such was fantasy only. The guardsman patrolled the battlements, as was his duty. All day long Dews Gaemock’s rebels had beer, sighted riding across the burned-out farmland surrounding the castle. What this scouting on the rebels’ part portended, no one knew. Another siege? Doubtful. Trouble? All agreed on this point and vigilance rather than dalliance ruled the guardsmen this night.

  He considered going to the battlements and waiting for Nosto and his Inquisitors to take Oprezzi into custody. He reconsidered. It would appear that he maneuvered the archbishop into the action. Theoll wanted no hint that he had been responsible. He turned to his secret ways in the castle walls and found a spiralling staircase leading four levels lower into the dungeons.

  He went quietly along a passage so narrow that his shoulders brushed the walls. Occasionally he dallied to peer through a spyhole. Nothing caught his fancy. Theoll finally stopped behind a large wooden panel with a dozen different cut-outs. He slid back several and peered through, finding the few that gave him the best view of the dungeons used by the Inquisition.

  Theoll waited only a few minutes before loud shouts and the scrape of metal against stone alerted him to Nosto’s entrance. He bent forward, eager eyes pressed against the wood panel. With a vantage point better than if he’d been in the room, Theoll saw Oprezzi being dragged between the two hooded Inquisitors, Archbishop Nosto following closely behind.

  “There,” ordered Nosto. “Place him there.”

  “I am a guardsman,” protested Oprezzi. “You cannot take me from my post without imperilling the entire castle! What if the rebels attack? Who would command?”

  “What if a lieutenant of the guard strays from the True Path
and has congress with demons?” Nosto parried.

  “I am no heretic!” cried Oprezzi. “I know nothing of demons. Praise be to the saints!”

  “Blasphemer!” Archbishop Nosto struck the helpless soldier with the back of his hand. Oprezzi’s head jerked back and a tiny trickle of blood ran down his chin.

  The Inquisitors heaved the guardsman onto a wooden platform and fastened him spread-eagled on it to stare in fright at the cold stone ceiling. While Nosto watched, his eyes gleaming through the eyeholes of his hood, the other two stripped Oprezzi of his uniform. The naked man struggled futilely.

  “What do you want of me?” he asked, fear tingeing his words. “I am no heretic.”

  “The Question will be put to you later. Now we need know of your involvement with demons.”

  “There isn’t any. I know nothing of…aiee!”

  One of the hooded clerics used the tip of his blade on the man’s bare chest, inscribing the sigil of the True Path.

  “What of Lady Johanna?” came Nosto’s query.

  “What of her? She’s a lady of the realm. She’s of royal blood. What do you want from me?” Again Oprezzi shrieked in pain 21s the Inquisitors drew their knife-points over his flesh and duplicated the sigil on his trembling arms and legs.

  “She is a demon. Admit it.”

  “I know nothing of that. She does not seem to be.”

  “Beneath you,” said Archbishop Nosto, “are cages of famished weasels. The blood from your wounds drives them wild. Small panels in the wooden platform on which you lie slide back.” Nosto gestured. An Inquisitor pulled a thin wooden sheet away, leaving no protection between helpless flesh and savage fangs.

  Oprezzi shrieked in true agony now as the weasels ripped his flesh. He surged and strained, trying to break the bonds holding him to the table. He stood a better chance of pulling his arms from their sockets. Nosto nodded. The panel was slammed back into the platform, denying the weasels their meal of human flesh.

  “The doors open the entire length of your body. We can open them singly or in concert with others. No portion of your body will be denied them if you refuse to speak truthfully.” To emphasize his determination, Archbishop Nosto drove his dagger between Oprezzi’s legs. The lieutenant tried to move; his bonds prevented it. “The dagger sticks in the last door we shall open — unless you speak now.”

  Baron Theoll moved to other spyholes to get a better view of the torture. He hoped that the lieutenant did not die of fear before he confessed. So many of those facing the Question expired from sheer fright. Theoll needed Oprezzi to curse the Lady Johanna, to condemn her, to declare her a demon.

  After that, Theoll was willing to let the archbishop have his heretic.

  “Anything,” Oprezzi said. “I’ll confess to anything you want.”

  Theoll was disappointed in the young lieutenant. He had hoped the man would show more courage. He could have at least tried to protect his lover’s honour. But no, the presence of voracious rodents beneath him produced a torrent of words.

  Before Oprezzi stopped to catch a breath, he had condemned Johanna as both a demon and a poor lover. Theoll smiled wickedly when he saw Nosto begin to twitch in anger. The archbishop had shared Johanna’s bed! Oprezzi’s denunciation on that score did nothing to gain him mercy from the cleric.

  “You have spoken enough of these matters,” Nosto said to his victim. “What of your congress with demons?”

  “I know nothing of it. I swear!”

  Theoll’s heart raced as one door after another opened. Bloody strings of flesh remained before Archbishop Nosto ordered the doors closed.

  “Are you a heretic? This is the Question. Are you a heretic? Answer truthfully and beg forgiveness.”

  “No!”

  Theoll knew the guardsman had had no demonic contact. But Archbishop Nosto had seen with his own eyes the demon in the wall of the pantry, heard the naming of Oprezzi, seen heretical activity.

  Oprezzi denied it, blaming all on the Lady Johanna.

  “Roll him over on the table,” ordered the cleric. The hooded Inquisitors did as they were ordered, falling to their task with a will. Face down, Oprezzi was dangerously exposed to the weasels and their ripping teeth.

  One by one the doors were opened, Nosto saving the one at Oprezzi’s groin for last, as he had promised. Oprezzi confessed everything, but he never provided the details Nosto knew to be true.

  Lieutenant Oprezzi died a heretic.

  CHAPTER X

  Vered cursed to himself as he tried to put the fine edge back on his sword. The whetstone seemed less the tool to use than a coarse rasp. The acid blood from the apelike creature had permanently ruined the cutting edge and the temper of the blade. Vered did not even look at his dagger. Most of the hilt had vanished because of the sizzling yellow blood.

  “What do you mean you won’t turn back?” Alarice demanded. The Glass Warrior stood and stared in disbelief at Birtle Santon. The man rubbed his withered arm with his left hand. A slight smile danced on his lips.

  “Life’s never been easy for me and Vered,” he said. “That hasn’t meant it’s been interesting. Fact is, of late life has been dull.”

  “That’s not what you told me before,” she said, exasperated. “You said the constables track you mercilessly — ”

  “They do,” cut in Vered.

  “And that more nobles want to break you on the wheel than there are fiefdoms in all Porotane!”

  “A sorry state when you have so many pretenders to minor posts,” said Vered. He thrust his sword into the muddy ground and drew it back, as if this would produce a new edge. It only left the blade more nicked and dirty than before.

  “You owe me nothing!” cried Alarice. “You shouldn’t have come this far. This is my duty, not yours.”

  “We go where we choose,” said Santon. “That’s the kind of life we want to lead. We’ve been fleeing. That’s no fit existence for anyone. Even us.”

  “I don’t understand this. Not at all,” the woman said. “You have only savage death to look forward to in this saints-abandoned swamp. How does this allow you to lead a ‘fit existence’?”

  “Because we’d be doing what we want, not what some scurvy ruffian of a rebel leader or a petty baron or count wants us to do. They chase, we run. What life is that? We’d rather stay in one place and…ply our trade in that fashion.”

  “You want to steal without being punished?” Alarice shook her head. This made no sense to her.

  “A notion worthy of consideration,” said Vered.

  “But…”

  “We go where you go, Alarice,” said Santon. His eyes locked with her steel-grey ones.

  “There is nothing binding you to me,” she said, not sure she truly meant this. Birtle Santon pretended to be old and tired, he had an arm withered by war, he stank of animals and dirt and sweat, his manners were crude — and she found herself liking him. And more.

  The Glass Warrior dared not believe the feelings she felt for him were returned. Yet this seemed to be what the man implied.

  “You mistake our wandering thoughts for real logic,” said Vered. “Consider: We return one twin to the throne. A reward? Possibly. Certainly, we would gain a royal pardon for past crimes. Even better, Porotane would be united, freeing us from the warlords and annoying rebels.”

  “You seek only to rob and plunder without interference from other thieves?” Alarice asked, amused now. She heard the steel under Vered’s bantering tone. He desired a peace for Porotane as much as she. Commitment to a cause lay within this one’s breast, no matter how he tried to hide it with ignoble reasons.

  “Of course,” Vered said. “Looting, robbing, a bit of purse-cutting. That keeps Santon and me alive. Why shouldn’t we want free rein to continue?”

  “No reason, save that the course through the swamp will be infinitely more dangerous than Dews Gaemock and his band of rebels or your petty barons threatening to put you on the rack.”

  “This Tahir d’mar,” sai
d Santon. “Are these his magical creatures?”

  “The ape is not of this world. I can only surmise that Tahir conjured and sent it. The swamp swimmer is a harmless resident in these ponds.”

  “Harmless,” snorted Vered, staring at the ass-stabbed monster. “Crowds of whacking big oafs would part in front of me when e’er I passed if I were half that harmless.”

  “The spells,” said Santon, drowning out his friend’s complaints. “Can you counter them or must we suffer their full impact?”

  “I can use my own limited sorcery,” Alarice answered. “It might not work as well as a quick blade, though. It takes time and preparation to cast most spells powerful enough to benefit us. I have neither the ability nor the strength to cast those able to win us free of the swamplands and their magical protectors.”

  “This blade is better used to pry open doors,” said Vered. His work had availed him little. The sword was useless as a precision fighting tool.

  “You begin to understand my fondness for glass weapons,” she said. “Here, Vered. Take this short sword.” She handed him a weapon drawn from a sheath on her saddle. “Use it as you would a regular blade, except in hammering nails with the flat.”

  Vered made a face as he swung the short sword. To be of use, he would have to crawl within the arms of the ape creature before lunging. Vered did not think this was a proper use — or a decent way to die.

  “And you, Santon,” she said. “Your battle-axe is still useful. Its edge hasn’t corroded as badly as Vered’s sword and the heavy spiked ball is still formidable, but your infirmity works against you. We must change that.”

  “You can fashion a glass arm?” Santon lifted his right arm. “Truly, you would be a sorceress second to none if you do that for me.”

  “That lies beyond the power of any wizard,” she said. “However, I have something which might serve you well.” She pulled a small round woven glass-fibre shield from her saddle and motioned to the man. Alarice worked to fasten the straps around his upper right arm so that he could twist and turn the shimmering glass shield.