Which was the first time he had formally acknowledged Prophetess as such. It was a heck of an introduction. I hoped Tess didn’t spoil it by falling off her horse.
She didn’t try to stand in the stirrups, which was almost certainly for the best. Instead she merely said, “Thank you, Your Eminence. As you said, God gives us no cross we are unable to bear. A year ago our forces numbered in the hundreds. Now by the grace of our Lord they number in the thousands, and they are led by Judge Minos who knows the ways of the enemy like no other.”
Which was a really slick spin to put on the fact that for a while I’d been working for the other side.
She continued, “We are truly the light of the world, a light that will never be overcome. But as the Metropolitan has said, the darkness will not accept the truth that challenges its lies. Yoshana may offer peace, but her promises are false, as evil’s promises always are. She will always seek to extinguish our light.”
Her voice rose. “But we will not be extinguished! The light of truth will not be dimmed. God has worked through me to stand against the Darkness and cast it out. As by his grace I cast it out of Judge Minos, by his grace we will all stand against it again, and cast it out of this nation. Be strong. Be faithful. And trust in the Lord!”
That was the signal, and the troops clashed their spears against their shields. We couldn’t quite make it simultaneous, since only the men in the front could hear her, but the sound carried back in a wave all along the column.
“For God and Our Lady!”
That was spontaneous, and I couldn’t tell who started it, but it was brilliant. I should have thought of it. The shout went up throughout the massed troops, spread to the surrounding civilians. Crash, crash, crash, went the spears on shields, and then, “For God and Our Lady,” and it repeated. It went on for a full minute. It was amazing. It was a triumph.
And it worked like a charm to restore morale.
Until the next day when townspeople began to disappear.
3. Under Pressure
"In contests of strategy it is bad to be led about by the enemy. You must always be able to lead the enemy about.”
“Sun Tzu again?” General Hake asked. He knew where most of my military quotes came from.
“Not this time. Musashi, from the Book of Five Rings. Although Sun Tzu said pretty much the same thing. I’m getting really sick of being a step behind, and I’m damned if I see how we get ahead.”
I stopped myself. Under the circumstances I should be more careful with my swearing. It probably wasn’t appropriate for the leader of the armies of God, and considering what I’d been, I should be careful what blasphemies I invoked. Although I really might be damned if I couldn’t defend the civilians under my protection from Yoshana.
There had been nearly two dozen disappearances, mostly farmers vanishing from their fields, but also townspeople going to visit nearby villages who had never made it to their destinations.
We had a thousand men patrolling the roads and outlying farms in platoon strength. It was the only way we could reassure the population. But I figured it was only a matter of time before one of those platoons got ambushed and cut apart. The Darkness Radiant would get to pick the time and place of their attack, and would employ overwhelming force.
“You are afraid of Yoshana,” BlackShield Jarl Lago said.
“Of course I’m afraid of her,” I snapped. “Every sane person is afraid of her.”
He shook his head. “You are allowing your fear of her to cloud your judgment. You assume she is always superior, always a step ahead. She has defeated you in your own mind. You were clever in manipulating my forces when we were at war. She is doing the same to you. You are letting her.”
My face heated. “She’s the greatest military leader of the modern age, and in case you hadn’t noticed, I don’t command the Darkness anymore. She does. So do her lieutenants. And they’re all better at it than I ever was.”
The bearded soldier scowled. “You had the Darkness when we engaged you at the battle of the Cleansing. We were still winning.”
“There were more of you, you had better troops, and the casualty ratios were still in our favor. She outnumbers us three to one, and I’ll bet you anything she has better equipment and probably better readiness.”
“We are led by a prophet,” Lago said stubbornly.
“So are they! The loyalty she commands is like nothing you’ve ever seen. Her men worship her like a god.”
Tolf stood abruptly. “Minos, you’re acting like we’ve got no chance at all.”
I opened my mouth, shut it, and took a deep, shuddering breath. Railes had one eyebrow raised, which distorted the skull inked on his face. I didn’t have a formal adjutant, but the tattooed captain was pretty close. Hake and Lago each had his executive officer present. Tolf represented the Order of Thorns and, in a strange way, Prophetess herself. They all stared at me, some more outwardly calm than others, but all at least mildly horrified.
I dipped my head to Lago. “I apologize, Black.” I used the informal term a Monolith soldier would adopt in addressing an officer of the BlackShield’s exalted rank.
“You’re right, I’m letting her get into my head. I’m frustrated. The Metropolitan and Prophetess did a masterful job rallying the town and the troops, and then Yoshana threw it all over in a day. I’m afraid she’ll do the same again. She’s drawn a thousand of our men out of the citadel, where they can be defeated in detail. I can see what she’ll do next, but I can’t see the countermove.”
Lago nodded back. “We know what we are facing. We know the battle will not be easy. But we must not let her defeat us before the first crossing of swords.”
“You’re right, of course.”
“So. If we know where the stroke will fall, let us decide how to counter it, and perhaps how to strike a blow of our own.”
It was absolutely sound strategy. We spent hours late into the night discussing how to react. We designated the Shadowed Hand and Monolith rangers as the core of a rapid reaction force. The rangers were able horsemen, and we decided on a crash course of riding for the Shadowed Hand. In turn, my former unit would train an ever-growing cadre in unconventional operations against the Darkness.
Of course, we were completely wrong about what Yoshana would do next.
“Minos!”
“Huh? Whuzzat?” I said. Or something to that effect.
My bedroom door shook again under the pounding of a fist. “Minos!” The voice was frantic.
I sat up. Aquinas’ Summa Theologica slid off my bed onto the floor with a resounding thump. I tried to read a little of the massive book every night. If nothing else, it did tend to help me get to sleep.
“I’m coming.” I staggered forward in darkness relieved only by faint moonlight leaking in through the window. My room was small, and in the army I’d developed the habit of getting my gear squared away. So I made it to the door without tripping over anything, even groggy as I was. I took a quick inventory of myself and verified I was wearing clothes, if only undershorts and a night shirt.
In the old days, inhuman senses would have alerted me before anyone got close enough to beat on my door. I was a lot less impressive now.
I peered through the peephole. Seeing Tolf outside, I shot the heavy brass bolt.
“It’s Prophetess,” he gasped.
I delayed only long enough to grab my katana.
Two floors down in the residence hall, half a dozen soldiers of the Order of Thorns stood nervously outside Prophetess’ open door, blades in hand. Three of their fellows lay unmoving in the corridor. Another slumped against a wall, sobbing uncontrollably.
I pushed through them into her bedroom, sword drawn. If I’d allowed myself to think about going in there in my nightclothes, this wouldn’t have been the way I’d have chosen to do it.
A pile of sheets burning on the floor shed the only light in the windowless chamber. I’d insisted on limiting access, over her objections. Obviously it hadn’t been
limited enough. In the flickering shadows I saw Cat crouched on the bed, one arm around Tess, the other clutching the glassy-bladed dagger I had given her. The knife dripped blood. The paleo’s teeth were bared in a snarl, the skin of her face torn with dozens of tiny, bloodless gouges.
God’s prophet on earth stared over Cat’s shoulder with fear-widened eyes.
“What happened?” I demanded.
Cat growled wordlessly.
“Tess?”
Prophetess shook herself. “A maid came in with fresh sheets. She dropped them and she had a knife under them. She just looked at me and said, “Sorry,” and then she came at me. Cat threw the oil lamp at her. While she was burning, Cat stabbed her in the chest.”
“We’re about one corpse short.” When Cat stuck a knife in someone, they didn’t live to tell about it.
Prophetess swallowed hard. “She just slapped Cat away. It made those marks on her face. The woman was on fire. She bolted. I screamed, and Keeley came.” Keeley was a sergeant in the Order of Thorns. He wasn’t the most brilliant of men or the best of soldiers, but like all the Order, he was devoted to Prophetess.
“She stabbed him. She didn’t even slow down. She just kept going, and then she stabbed Torrel, and then… I don’t know. Who else is dead out there, Minos? Who else did she kill?”
The hair on my arms rose. “What did this woman look like?”
“Short. Dark. Pretty. Beautiful, really, if you like them curvy…” her voice trailed off. “Oh my God.”
“She was wearing armor the last time the two of you met.”
Prophetess nodded. “I didn’t even recognize her, but you’re right.”
Tolf grabbed my shoulder. “Who the hell are you talking about?”
I shook him off. I didn’t want anyone binding up my arm. “Roshel. We got lucky. Incredibly lucky. She would have scanned the room before she went in, but didn’t realize what Cat was. She thought Cat was just a maid. If it had been anyone but Cat in here, Tess would be dead.”
I gently touched the paleo’s wounded face. “Are you okay?”
“Hurts,” she said, and shrugged. “Hurt before.”
This would scar. Wounds inflicted by the Darkness didn’t heal normally.
“Quick thinking to throw the lamp at her,” I added. “It suppressed the Darkness. Otherwise she would have killed you both.”
“Genius, me. Shadow killer, me.” She barked out a little laugh. “Just lucky.”
I shook my head and repeated myself. “If anyone else had been guarding Tess, she’d be dead. But Roshel isn’t going to get caught off guard twice. Stay here.”
In the corridor, I snapped at the nearest guard, “Go get four oil lamps, and then I want four of you in there with Prophetess until I tell you to leave. Move it.” He hurried off.
Two soldiers were trying to comfort the one slumped against the wall. I knelt in front of him. “What happened?”
The man’s face was wet with tears. He snuffled loudly. I didn’t need the mind-reading powers of the Darkness to tell he was crippled with terror and humiliation. I stood, giving him a moment to collect himself while I quietly asked Tolf to remind me of his name.
“Mellar, what happened?” I repeated.
He briefly met my eyes, then looked down again.
“She just walked right past us,” he said softly, addressing the ground. “I’d never seen her before in my life, but I didn’t even think to question her. Going in, I mean, sir. It was just like she was supposed to be here. I swear, it didn’t even occur to me she wasn’t.”
“No. It wouldn’t have. It’s not your fault.” The brunette Overlord generally used the Darkness to project an aura of overwhelming physical desirability. She’d obviously tweaked it to create the impression she belonged, so no one would question the stranger in their midst. “Go on.”
“She just went on in to Prophetess’ room, sir. We didn’t think anything of it, none of us did, I swear. Torrel was saying to Keeley that she was a fine-looking woman, and then we heard the scream, and Keeley was at the door, and she walked past him, and her clothes were on fire, and he pitched over on his face, and I didn’t even realize she had a knife until she stuck it in Torrel, and then she threw it and took Jaren in the eye. And she bent over him then and took the knife back, and pulled off her blouse that was on fire, and just kept walking.”
I was ashamed to admit that in the midst of the carnage, I was very distracted by the idea of Roshel being topless in our dormitory. It wasn’t just her Darkness-spawned aura that inspired feelings of lust. She was an incredibly beautiful woman.
I dragged my treacherous mind out of the gutter as Mellar continued. “Sir, I was behind her the whole time, and, and she didn't see me, and… sir, and I didn't do anything. Sir, I was too scared.”
His voice caught and his eyes filled with tears again.
I patted his shoulder. “You couldn’t have touched her. She knew you were there. The only reason she didn’t kill you too is because she was in a hurry and she didn’t think you were a threat. If you’d taken a step toward her, you’d be another body on the ground.”
Or if Roshel hadn’t been on fire. If the Darkness had been operating freely, not suppressed by the burning oil Cat had flung at her, it would have snuffed Mellar out in passing.
“So all we need to do is look for a beautiful girl with no shirt. Shouldn’t be hard to get a building full of soldiers organized around that,” Tolf said.
I made a face at him. “She’s long gone. She’ll have found something to wear and gotten out. If we’re lucky, she didn’t kill anyone else on the way.”
The soldier I’d sent off came trotting back, gingerly balancing four oil lamps.
“You and three more men get in there with Prophetess,” I ordered. “If anyone comes in who isn’t with me, throw the lamps at them and stab them until they stop moving. Then stab them some more.”
“I thought she was long gone,” Tolf said.
“I’ve been wrong a lot lately. And Roshel isn’t the only person in the Darkness Radiant. Or the most dangerous.”
If Grigg or, God help us, Yoshana herself came for Prophetess, not even four soldiers and Cat were going to keep her alive.
I went on, “Tolf, get General Hake, BlackShield Lago, Railes, and Tarc to the war room. Then wake the rest of the Order up and get them on guard. If they see any Select that isn’t Tarc or me, they should kill him on sight.”
He pursed his lips and said, “I’m not a hundred percent sure all the guys can tell Select apart that well, especially by torchlight…”
“That’s why you’re getting Tarc to the war room before you give that order.”
He nodded. “What about Yoshana? Should I tell them to watch out for her?”
“Wouldn’t do any good. She won’t look like herself anyway. I’ve seen her change her appearance at will.”
“So if she’s here…?”
“If she’s here then, to quote our dear friend Colonel Raji, we’re screwed.”
I took a perverse satisfaction in the looks of horror on every face in the room. At least everyone else finally understood what we were fighting. The torchlight was weak, but if anything my officers’ fear was all the more obvious in the flickering shadow.
“That’s what I’ve been talking about,” I said.
“But… I don’t understand,” Hake muttered. “If they can just walk right past our defenses like that, why bother trying to turn the people against us? And why the hell do you look so happy, Minos?”
“Because now I do understand. Yoshana’s been worried about making Tess into a martyr. So first she plants the idea that we’re leading everyone into an unnecessary, unwinnable war. Then she shows we can’t even defend our own population. When Tess goes down to an assassin’s knife, everybody’s quietly relieved. We make a big show of outrage, but the fight has gone out of us.”
Hake glared. “And why are you happy about that?”
“Two reasons. First, she swung and sh
e missed.” I nodded to Lago. “You were right. In my head I’ve been making Yoshana ten feet tall and invincible, but she makes mistakes too. And second, she’s trying to do this on the cheap.”
“What do you mean?”
“She hasn’t committed any forces at all. She’s got us outnumbered and outclassed, but she’s trying to avoid a stand-up fight to save resources.”
“That does not sound like her,” Lago rumbled.
“That’s exactly like her. She’ll send every man in the Darkness Radiant to his death if she needs to, but she won’t sacrifice a single soldier she doesn’t think she has to. If she’s trying not to fight us, I’ve got an idea.”
“Prophetess won’t stand for surrender or Yoshana’s terms,” Tolf warned.
“Not what I was planning. I need two thousand soldiers all over this compound and the town, bellowing at the top of their lungs. The message is, ‘Roshel, Minos wants to talk. Same place as before.’”
Tolf goggled at me. “You want to meet her?”
“Yup.”
Lago said, “And if you are wrong? If this was a trick to draw you out?”
I shrugged. “Then after I’m dead you can find yourselves a smarter commanding officer.”
The hours dragged by. She might have already left the town. She might ignore my invitation. She might fear a trap - though there was no trap I could set now that she couldn’t detect.
It was late. The tavern where Grigg had taken me to meet Roshel, Yoshana, Erev, and the other Knights of Resurrection had been closed. They’d reluctantly opened up when I’d pounded on the door, offered quite a bit of silver, invoked the Metropolitan’s name, and reminded the owner that his failure to report Yoshana’s presence a year ago was likely treasonous.
I sat nursing a mug of hot but not particularly good cider, now gone lukewarm. The tavern keeper had been more than happy to return to his bed upstairs and leave me alone in darkness broken only by one small lamp.
Passing Through Darkness- The Complete Cycle Page 59