The Winter Vow

by Tim Akers

  “It seems the deeper we get into this, the further we get from the truth,” Gilliam said. He gestured in frustration toward the cages. “I would not have thought LaGaere capable of such heresy. But your methods have proven very effective, Frair Morrow.”

  “It is your wisdom that guides us,” Morrow said. “My methods are mere tools in your capable hands.”

  “Still, it troubles me we did not root out this corruption earlier. What horrors could we have prevented? How many deaths?”

  “You mustn’t let that weigh on you, frair,” Morrow answered. “The things that could have been are not. We can only do as the gods ask us.”

  “It will weigh on me, no matter what you say.” For the first time, Gilliam noticed the activity at the gates. “What business is this? Another gheist? You there, what is happening?”

  The soldier Gilliam addressed stopped trotting toward the gates, saluting as he pulled up short. “A column of riders at the gates, pagan rangers, harassing the outriders. We have seen no siege equipment, and they are staying just out of bowshot.”

  “More of Blakley’s rebels,” Morrow whispered. “You were wise to expel him. A pity there was not a more permanent solution to that problem.”

  “I should have executed him when I had the chance,” Gilliam muttered. “But there was just no evidence of heresy. We must stay within Cinder’s will.”

  “We must, we must. And yet, the deaths we could have prevented, if unfettered from the need for reason…”

  “Yes… yes…” Gilliam answered quietly, as though in a daze. “Another regret.”

  “Your justice will be served soon enough, my lord,” Morrow said. Gwen could barely see him from her hiding place, but his voice was as smooth as silk. “Once we have brought enough of the penitent into our ranks, we can ride to Houndhallow and burn the Blakleys from this land once and for all.”

  “We can’t go anywhere until we’ve purged these walls,” Gilliam said, and Gwen detected something of the dreamlike in his voice, as though he was repeating something he had heard in his sleep. “The corruption runs deep. Never where you expect. Not even the faithful are safe from its taint.”

  “Yes, my frair,” Morrow purred, and stroked the iron box in his hand. “But soon. Soon you will be done with it.”

  “Soon,” Gilliam answered, though there was no emotion in his voice. He turned to the soldier, who was still waiting. “Have the penitent take care of this nuisance. We must not be disturbed. Not until the shrine is cleansed.”

  “They have already defeated a column of the penitent. We cannot—”

  “Do as you are told,” Gilliam snapped. He whirled away from the soldier, and Gwen caught a brief glimpse of his face. The priest’s eyes were red-rimmed and wide, and his features slack. He looked like he was wasting away. For a moment, Gwen thought he was looking directly at her. She ducked behind the barrels and started praying, but no alarm sounded, no footsteps approached. When she heard them again, their voices were farther away, and muffled. She glanced up.

  Morrow was leading Gilliam into the tower keep, guiding him by the hand, almost supporting him as he walked. Gilliam was now carrying the iron box, but its weight seemed to drag him down. As they were about to disappear into the keep, Gilliam paused and turned around, peering in the direction of the cages.

  “I swear I saw something back there. A spirit among the dying. I should—”

  “You are mistaken, frair. Your place is in the shrine. Doing Cinder’s work.”

  “Yes, but…” Gilliam’s voice trailed off. He took a step forward, directly toward Gwen. She gripped her spear, preparing to defend herself from whatever horror the frair summoned.

  Morrow gestured with his hand, and the shadows of the courtyard deepened. The dozen prisoners in the cages moaned as one, and then the shadows lurched forward, darting across the courtyard and into Frair Gilliam. He shuddered with each impact, though there was no sound or fury to their charge. One slithered through Gwen on its way to the frair, and she caught a breath of cold stones and the grave. It reminded her of the witches’ hallow, the quiet tomb of Fomharra, where all of this had begun. The shadows passed, and Gilliam shook his head.

  “In the shrine,” he said weakly. “Doing Cinder’s work.”

  The two priests disappeared into the keep. Outside the walls, horns sounded, and the song of steel and hammering hooves. Battle had been joined, though Gwen hadn’t seen anyone go out the sally, or over the wall. But that didn’t matter now.

  The Fen Gate was in the hands of Frair Gilliam. And Frair Gilliam was in the hands of a demon.

  * * *

  The keep was much as she remembered, only empty of life. The last time she was here, the halls were crowded with the dead and dying. Her father among them. Gwen was momentarily stilled by this thought. She hadn’t been here when they died. Well, not all of her. Trapped in a gheist, rampaging against the outside of the castle. Gwen had few memories of that day. Still, she knew they were dead. Knew it from the god of death, who she had tried to lock into the hallow, and failed.

  “Get a hold of yourself, Gwendolyn,” she muttered. “Mourn them later.”

  There was no sign of the two frairs, but Gwen knew where they would be. Morrow mentioned the shrine, and purging the corruption from the castle walls. With the doma destroyed, there was only one shrine in the Fen Gate; the pagan altar, hidden deep in the catacombs, the heart of the Adair heresy. She hurried toward it.

  They didn’t rebuild the doma, Gwen thought as she snuck through the abandoned corridors of her former home. I wonder why not?

  It was a question that would have to remain unanswered, for now. Through the catacombs and to the stairs leading down into the shrine, Gwen’s attention sharpened, and her pulse increased. It was strange that no soldiers walked these corridors. At the very least there should be priests, guarding against pagan manifestations. Hadn’t Bruler claimed they bricked over the stairway? Why would the Orphanshield reopen that barrier? Why was he in the shrine at all?

  Gwen had her answer when she reached the top of the stairs. A steady cloud of incense blossomed up from the depths, but it wasn’t frairwood. It smelled like hot metal and blood. Chanting drifted through the incense, words in a language Gwen didn’t recognize. She started down, spear in hand, heart in her throat.

  The way was lit with torches, and the walls were plastered in bloody handprints, long dried. Deep gouges scored the stone. The stairs themselves were soft with moss, and the sound of splashing water carried up. She smelled dry leaves and mildew. The chanting settled into two voices. Morrow, in the unknown language, followed by Gilliam, in high celestial.

  At the bottom of the stairs, Gwen peered around the corridor and into the chamber. It was larger than she remembered. The walls were rough-hewn, the runes and sacred niches of the pagan shrine obliterated by the excavation. At the center of the room was a new altar, made of driftwood and lashed together with chains. A second look revealed that the driftwood used to make the altar was taken from the Sedgewind throne; the holy icons still dangled from their cords. Why would they use the ancestral seat of House Adair to make an altar? And why here, in the shrine to Fomharra, the pagan god of autumn?

  Gilliam and Morrow stood on opposite sides of the altar, with the iron box between them. They were just beginning their ritual. With each iteration of chants, one of them would place his hands on the box, drawing power into the container. It was no surprise to Gwen that while Gilliam was channeling naether, the natural power of Cinder and the inquisition, Frair Morrow was drawing on the everealm. The everealm was home to the pagan gheists, the source of their power and their life.

  How is the Orphanshield not seeing this? How is he so easily deceived? Gwen wondered.

  Morrow finished his invocation, and Gilliam began his. But as the Orphanshield spoke, Gwen realized that Morrow’s mouth was moving, whispering the words Gilliam breathed. Something was badly wrong here. Gwen wasn’t sure what to do. The inquisition was no friend to her, b
ut she was bent on stopping Sacombre’s void priests wherever she found them. Was Morrow one of them, or did he belong to the pagans, another hidden priest of the old ways, like Gwen? She hesitated.

  As Gwen watched, the iron box folded open, a complicated matter that looked more like a flower blossoming than a lid, much too organic for iron. The twin voices of the frairs rose, and lines of power erupted from the walls. The bloody handprints warped and shifted, peeling away from the stone and drifting toward the box. As they fell, they turned into autumn leaves, brilliant in the reds and oranges and yellows of that dying season, glowing with inner light. They fell into the box. Gwen straightened, trying to get a look inside.

  Inside the box was a heart, made of leaves. It was enormous, and growing with each leaf that fell into the box. Veins of growing roots spread out from the heart, snaking rapidly across the face of the altar, to twine themselves into the driftwood. The heart beat with a slow rhythm. A familiar rhythm.

  The heartbeat matched Gwen’s own, speeding up as she realized what she was seeing. This was the heart of autumn, the soul of Fomharra, the goddess of autumn, linked inextricably to Gwen’s soul. When she tore her gaze away from the box, her eyes locked with Frair Morrow.

  “We have been waiting for you, huntress. What is a heart without blood, after all?”

  31

  ELSA FOUND THE cadre of vow knights sitting in meditation around their bonfire, ritually sharpening their swords and reciting the liturgies of the bright lady. Most of them were unknown to her, too young to have been in the field for long. Some looked like they were barely out of their initiate’s robes. But one old face warmed her heart.

  “Sir Voight,” Elsa said as she approached the circle. “Of all the zealots I thought to find in Sophie Halverdt’s mad army, you are the last.”

  “But still a zealot,” he said. Tomas Voight was older, not quite Malcolm Blakley’s age, but his copper hair was shot through with white, and his neatly trimmed beard was gray. He had been one of Elsa’s mentors at the Lightfort. In her memory, his hair shone like fire, and his bladework was the finest she had ever seen. “Elsa LaFey. Gods be good, but when they told me you had joined our crusade on the outskirts of Greenhall, I could scarcely believe it.”

  He set aside his blade and stood, no sign of age or fatigue in his limbs. Elsa shook his hand, smiling. “I would not say that I have joined you, Tomas. Some of your number captured me, just before the whole—” she gestured in the direction of the plain of dead flowers that was slowly wilting to the south “—whatever you want to call that. Ritual of burning. I’m not here of my own free will.”

  “Lady Halverdt is arming her prisoners, then? These must be desperate times.” He held up his hands at Elsa’s protestations. “No, no, I know the story of your capture. I’m the one who gave the order. Be at peace, Elsa. I’m glad to see you didn’t bolt when you had the chance.”

  “I haven’t settled on that, yet,” she said. “That’s why I’m here. You lead this cadre?”

  “By the grace of Strife and the will of my brethren, yes. I was on my way back to the Lightfort when word reached me of the tragedy at Greenhall. I came north to seek revenge on the pagans who attacked Halverdt’s throne, only to find them already fled. But I found a better purpose. A higher calling.”

  “What higher calling is there than protecting the faithful from the gheist?”

  “Ending the gheist, once and for all,” Voight answered. “Ending the need for the winter vow, and the inquisition.”

  “That’s what Sophie Halverdt told me. You know she’s calling herself an avatar of Strife. You know that’s heresy.”

  “It’s heresy to claim that falsely, but she hasn’t made the claim at all. Others have made it in her name.” Voight shifted on his feet, looking over his shoulder at the rest of the vow knights. Most of them were watching the conversation with curious eyes. He took Elsa by the shoulder and turned her away from the bonfire. “What else would you call her? You have seen what she can do.”

  “I have seen nothing. Or worse, I’ve seen nothing that could not be accomplished by a witch.” Elsa’s words stopped Voight in his tracks. “I’m serious. You’ve spent more years in the field than I have, but we both know the pagans hold real power.”

  “Sophie Halverdt was raised in the church. She spent her youth in a convent, studying the rites of Strife, under the tutelage of the holiest souls from the Lightfort. And you accuse her of heresy?”

  “Who was Tomas Sacombre, but a holy man? And look what became of him.”

  “Sacombre was an inquisitor of Cinder. The high inquisitor, at that,” Voight said. “Why should I be surprised he fell into darkness?”

  “You are missing the point! Cinder and Strife stand together. We always have, and, gods ordain, we always will. If Sacombre was a heretic, there is nothing to say that the high elector, or the celestriarch, or Mistress LeViere, or any of us can’t also be deceived.”

  “Is that an accusation, or a confession?”

  “Neither, and both,” Elsa stepped back. “What are you doing here, Tomas? How can you follow this girl, when gheists are still rising throughout Tenumbra, and the whole of the north is at war?”

  “I am fighting the battle at hand,” Voight said. “You saw the army we face. Sophie Halverdt led us here to destroy that army, and burn the corruption it represents out of the church. Only then will Tenumbra be safe.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean? Are we fighting demons, or fighting the church? I look around and see a lot of banners of Strife, but where are the inquisitors? And how do you claim to stand for the church when none of Cinder’s faithful dare join us?”

  “You know what I mean.”

  “Tomas? Where is your inquisitor? Francis Thieppe, that was his name.”

  Voight’s expression grew sour, and his hands curled into fists. “We separated. There was an argument, a gheist that he would not tame, and I left him on the road to Gallowsport.”

  “But he lives, as far as you know.”

  “What sort of monster do you think I am? Of course he lives. I have fought and bled and prayed at that man’s side for decades. I wouldn’t cut his throat as he slept.” Voight drew himself up straight, glaring at Elsa. “This is a war, not a cull.”

  “And when it comes to that? When Sophie Halverdt finishes whatever she’s doing here, and marches this army to Cinderfell, and starts stringing up every priest and saint of Cinder that she comes across, what will you do then?” Elsa narrowed her eyes, hand casually on her sword. “Because that’s where this ends, Tomas. That’s where this is going.”

  “Who are you to make accusations? Show me your flame, draw summer into your blade, and then we can talk about who is walking on Strife’s path, and who has gone astray.” He waited a long moment, finally smiling cruelly when Elsa didn’t move. “No, you can’t do those things. Because the bright lady has abandoned you. I suggest you think long and hard about that, Elsa.”

  “Sophie has gone mad, Tomas. You must see that.”

  “Perhaps. But sometimes madness is of the gods. I may not trust Sophie Halverdt, Elsa. But I certainly trust the goddess who is working through her. It’s not my fault you’ve lost faith.” Voight was about to turn away, but he paused. “One last word. Even the tamped flame can be rekindled. Do not throw away Sophie’s help, just because you don’t trust the child. Our enemy is great. But we are greater.”

  With that, he turned on his heel and marched back to the bonfire. One of the young vow knights asked him a question, but Voight’s answer was lost. Whatever he said, the young knight looked back at Elsa with shock and fear on his face.

  * * *

  Elsa stumbled through the camp, ignoring young Morganne’s protests and the stares of the people she passed. Tears stung her eyes, but she refused to acknowledge them. She skirted the edge of the wilting plain of flowers and walked into the forest. She could see the Reaveholt to the south, and the rocky bluffs of the Tallow at its feet.

  Ever
ything had gone upside down for her at some point. When Elsa tried to think back to when that had begun, she couldn’t quite fix it in her mind. When she had come out of the Lightfort, it was to a life that she understood. Hunting gheists, protecting the faithful celestials throughout Tenumbra, tracking down pagans and keeping them from endangering their neighbors with heresy, or worse. Straightforward.

  Even when her assignment took her north, Elsa was glad. She preferred the thick forests of Tener to the perfumed courts of Suhdra, and if the risk of gheists was greater, so was the need for holy protectors. That was where she had met Frair Lucas, in the quiet halls of Cinderfell, itching to be on his way.

  At first, Elsa didn’t understand Lucas. Most of the inquisitors that she had known were zealous to a fault, committed to the dangerous balancing act of worshipping a god of death and judgment. Lucas was different. His worship of Cinder was earnest, but his judgment was more lenient. He was more likely to understand why people did things, rather than simply condemning them for what they did, or how. While many in the north feared the inquisition, Lucas was loved in certain parts of Tener, and if their hunts didn’t always lead to pagan henges, it often brought her face to face with gheists in need of putting down.

  The business with Gwen Adair still bothered her. Elsa had never been convinced of the girl’s innocence, or the necessity of her hidden god. Lucas had a theory about the gheists, that their endless slaughter and seasonal rebirth was what was driving them mad, and could even be destroying the land as well. So when he learned of Adair’s heresy, Lucas wanted to observe, rather than arrest. They had followed Gwen all the way to the witches’ hallow, and watched as the child summoned and bound one of the great old gods of the pagan faith.

  Perhaps that was where she had gone wrong. It was not the vow knight’s mission to stand idly by while pagan gods roamed the earth, and yet that was what Elsa had done. Even after the heresy of the Adairs was revealed, as well as that of Tomas Sacombre, Elsa had not struck. She had let Gwen escape, and the god with her.