Sin Eater

by Shel, Mike

  “Nor do I, Auric Manteo,” the old man said, his face inscrutable. ‘I do as the spirit leads me to do.”

  “This divine spirit of creation. This is whom you serve?”

  “I do. As best I can.”

  Her father’s hand tightened on Szaa’da’shaela’s grip. A tremble in Agnes’s gut warned of an outburst. She spoke to stay his anger. “Who is this Videna of whom you speak?”

  “A great diviner and oracle, highest priest of Pember’s cult, chief augur of the temple caves at Gnexes. How you gain her blessing to pass her is beyond my vision. The deeper places are sacred to the cult and forbidden to all but the Videna.”

  Agnes’s father still stared at the old man. She saw some other question or comment on his lips as he absently fondled the emerald of the Djao artifact with the fingers of his left hand. But instead of speaking it, he turned his intense gaze from the Aerican, nodded to the countess, and put a too-parental hand on Agnes’s arm to guide her from the chamber.

  The first half of their walk back to the Citadel was in silence, her father’s hand never leaving the pommel of the Djao weapon. Agnes’s mind was reeling, but she was having difficulty untangling the mix of uncertainty, trepidation, and exhilaration that danced in her heart. When her father finally broke the silence, she was blindsided.

  “What did those two sorcerers show you?”

  She froze, her godmother’s bloody smile flashing before her.

  “Agnes?”

  She felt sick to her stomach, part of her wanting to vomit the knowledge out: Lenda Hathspry lives! Her disembodied head speaks dark secrets in the bowels of the Citadel to this day! But a memory of her father arrested the impulse: returned from the Barrowlands after his disastrous expedition four years ago, the drunken rages, the haunted and haggard look of despair in sleepless eyes. He must be spared the knowledge. It was her burden to bear.

  “Papa, I need you to trust me.”

  “What could possibly—”

  “Trust me!” she shouted, feeling a wild edge in her words that frightened her. He pursed his lips, but nodded, saying nothing more.

  They made the rest of their way back to the Citadel without speaking, though she had to bite her tongue three or four times to keep it that way. The anger she saw in her father’s face fueled her own. Why couldn’t he understand how difficult this was for her? The adolescent still lurking inside wanted to slap him in that stern, disappointed face with the knowledge of it. Here! You too can have Aunt Lenda’s severed, chattering head in your mind’s eye forever, Father!

  But just before they parted, Auric off to speak with Lictor Rae about their departure, he gave her a fatherly kiss on her forehead. Part of her wanted to keep hold of her anger, but it was melting. His ignorance and frustration were a part of the burden, she decided. Grow up, Agnes, she thought to herself. Act the woman, for Belu’s sake!

  When she reached her cubicle, she removed her shoes and lay on her bed, a tiredness deep in her bones. She lay there for an hour, replaying the events of the past several days, finding her godmother’s unholy visage returning again and again. She entertained heading to one of the Citadel’s many libraries, to start research on this place to which the old man was sending them: Gnexes. Sacred to Pember, a god she found exotic; it was said the god was both male and female at once. Agnes had had little time for him or her, for she was neither an actor nor an astrologer. She had passed temples and shrines dedicated to the god, garishly colored, priests clad in brightly hued, translucent silks, masks on their faces, like those actors used when staging old-fashioned plays in the theater. But those temples honored Pember as a god of the arts. She had never seen a purpose in divining her future, content to let it unfold with surprise. Those devotees, augurs, crossroads astrologers, somber in their robes of white or green, she had no truck with them.

  Agnes couldn’t muster the energy to walk to the library, stretching out on her bed, listening to her vertebrae crack as she slowly turned her neck in a circle. After a while she fell into a shallow and restless sleep.

  She was awakened in the early hours of the morning by a bang on her door. She stumbled over to it, ready to skewer the fucker who had disturbed her, but found the doe-eyed novice standing there too much like a little boy to vent her wrath.

  “P-pardon me, Miss Agnes,” the lad stuttered, kneading his hands together with almost comic discomfort. “The back-door clerk sent me to fetch you, to gather up your deliveries.”

  “Deliveries? What on earth are you talking about?”

  “Afraid I don’t know what it’s about, ma’am. Mr. Ashter said it comes from the palace and I should be quick about it.”

  Chalca. And the broken sorcerer, Qeelb. Released from the queen’s dungeons and brought here to the Citadel. She slipped her shoes back on and walked with the boy, whose slight build, short stature, and timid demeanor likely earned him more than his fair share of bullying from the other novices. She tried to remember her own early months in the League, a gangly, freckled sixteen-year-old girl with much to prove, soon saddled with the nickname Peregrine. She remembered her father’s response when she told him of it, fighting back tears: “You’ll grow into it,” he had said, and kissed her on the top of her head. Whether he meant the name or the nose, she wasn’t sure, now or then.

  Agnes found Chalca on a bench in the hall outside the loading docks at the rear of the Citadel, which saw all manner of cargo pass through its doors. When she saw him, she ran to the bench and sat down next to him, putting a palm tenderly to his brutalized face. It looked as though the ruffians had had another go at him since they first discovered him in the dungeons. His right eye was swollen shut, his lower lip split in two places, a mottled bruise on his neck, as though brutish fingers had wrapped themselves around it.

  “Blessed Belu, Chalca, look what they’ve done to you!”

  Chalca gave her a weak smile, still charming, but winced with the effort. “Afraid I made no friends in that terrible place, Agnes Manteo. Thank you for rescuing me from it.”

  Agnes directed the novice to escort Chalca to a priest, to tend his injuries. “Once you’re healed up, we’ll settle you in your own room, with a proper bed and food to eat. Gods! Was it the jailer? Or the fucking clergy of Tolwe?”

  “Oh, the jailer was gruff, but dutiful. The priests of Tolwe sought to secure my repentance before I left their care.” He touched his cheek. The beginnings of a beard poked through the remains of days-old cosmetics. “Sweet mercy of Lalu,” he said with a chuckle, “I’m sure I look frightful. If I don’t get myself a razor soon, I’ll look like your brooding brother Kennah.”

  Agnes smiled and kissed Chalca on the cheek, then waved them on when she heard her name called. It was the back-door clerk, coming through a nearby doorway, wiping something on his hands with a rag so filthy it seemed unsuited for the task. He was a sour man—Ashter was his name—with pinched features and a permanent expression of exasperation. But the look on his face carried an additional emotion: fear. “Miss Manteo,” he began, his voice grating and nasal, “I have the other half of your…delivery in here, and palace men in need of a signature.”

  There was a large warehouse at the rear of the Citadel, divided into many sections by low walls. It was all overseen by Ashter, a Syraeic League washout who had taken up the post after many years under his predecessor. Housed in the one he led her to were crates and animal cages. It stank like a barnyard. A few head of beef cattle were lowing mournfully, as though they knew their destination was the kitchens. There were delicate, beautiful birds in ornate brass enclosures, imported from the east through Warwede’s stealthy black markets, the clandestine funnel for goods from Azkaya. And she spied a lion, stalking its pen, having sailed across the sea from hidden Aericum. But the most exotic creature there was Qeelb, the broken sorcerer. He stood between two wary palace guards, clad in a ragged hooded cloak his jailers must have provided. His face and the
tell-tale shattered black jewel set in his forehead were covered by the shabby cowl, and in addition to the sorcerous restraints of plates and wires on his hands, both wrists and ankles bore heavy black manacles.

  The skittish guards stood up straighter and gripped their polearms more tightly at her approach. Neither was older than she was. Agnes had the sense that they were saddled with a task more senior men had gladly passed on. The taller of the two, with close-cropped hair and buck teeth, tilted his head back to assume an air of authority that was as false as a courtier’s compliment. “We seek Manteo. Can you direct us to him?”

  “I am Agnes Manteo, sir,” she answered. “And you can release this man and the other who came with you to me.”

  The two exchanged looks. “We were told to deliver the prisoners to Auric Manteo,” said the other man, whose eyes wandered from her face to her chest. “If you’d just run along and fetch him for us—”

  The man’s lecherous scrutiny annoyed her. She reached up and gave him a smack on his cheek, hard enough to leave the skin stinging red. “Hey! Agnes Manteo here, sir, and I said I’ll take delivery of former prisoners Chalca and Qeelb. Now give me your fucking paper to sign and the keys to these bonds, you stupid twat.”

  The taller one’s hand shot out with a key on a ring while the other sputtered like a child caught misbehaving. Agnes stared back at him, her lips a straight line. After a moment, he held out a slip of paper. Ashter, who had been standing behind her the whole time, handed her a quill already dipped in ink. She scratched her name at the bottom of the paper and handed it back to the man, her handprint still livid on his cheek. She snatched the key from the other. Agnes looked up at Qeelb. Then she took hold of his hand and led him from the warehouse like a little boy. She was unnerved by the coldness of the so-called witch-braces encasing the hand she held, as well as his childlike compliance. She glanced at the face beneath the hood, catching hints of Qeelb’s haunted, pale gray eyes and the cracked opal, muted by shadow. Her discomfort soon led her to break the silence.

  “I’ll take you to a priest of Belu first, sir,” she said, striving for casual confidence in her tone. “Tolwe’s acolytes have practiced their sacraments on you even more than poor Chalca.”

  “No,” he said, his first word to her.

  Agnes stopped and looked at him, letting go of his metal-clad hand. He dutifully stopped with her. It didn’t feel like defiance. “No? Have you not been abused?”

  “Oh, this body has been brutalized, yes. But I will not avail myself of heavenly aid.”

  “Why not?”

  “If I understand our charge, Agnes, if I may call you that, we are deputed to kill a great god. Do you think that his divine siblings will have nothing to say about it? I would think calling on the gods would be a delicate matter for us, now and in the future.”

  A chill raced up Agnes’s spine. Perhaps for the first time she realized the irreligious import of their duty. Qeelb was considerably taller than her, and from her vantage she now could see how badly his face was bruised. While she pitied his injuries, his deep-set eyes and gauntness gave him an otherworldly aura, one she found disconcerting. She spoke again to dispel her anxiety. “Will you not call on Belu’s bounty at all?”

  “In extremis, perhaps. But the contusions and cuts on my body will heal in their own time. They won’t kill me. However, I would like you to remove these manacles, and bring me to a sorcerer, to deal with the braces.” He held up his hands, presenting the chains to her as a penitent might before a sin eater. She hesitated, feeling a twinge of apprehension. A slight smile touched his cracked lips. “You liberated me from the dungeons, Agnes. I am your ally. I promise I will do nothing to harm you or our allies.”

  Agnes grimaced, embarrassed by her uncertainty. She crouched on the ground and used the key given her by the palace guard, undoing the manacles around his ankles, then disposed of those on his wrists. He massaged and flexed his wrists, wincing and closing his eyes for a moment. He smiled at her again and touched her cheek with one of his chilly, witch-braced hands; she willed herself not to flinch.

  “Better,” he said. “And now, that sorcerer, perhaps?”

  “They’re in short supply here since the plague last year. We can seek out Helmacht. But first, let’s settle you in a room, where you can rest, and have a decent meal.”

  For a moment it looked as though the gaunt and abused man would argue with her, but then he nodded. “Very well, Agnes,” he said, gesturing with his metal-encased hands that produced a discordant jingle, like a set of chimes. “I am in your hands.”

  After finding a room and a meal for the broken sorcerer, Agnes sought out Lictor Rae. She was in her own cubicle, abed, weak, and unwell again. The woman looked every year of her age, with dark circles beneath her eyes, their sclera yellowed, skin slack and pale. Dead before the year is out, thought Agnes, angry at herself for its ugliness. But a realistic prediction.

  “We have our dungeon recruits in residence, Lictor,” she said, resisting an urge to make some solicitous comment about the old woman’s health. “Both have a cubicle and are being fed, though the sorcerer…he won’t allow a priest to heal his injuries.”

  Rae frowned and coughed. “Did he say why?”

  “He believes we should exercise caution availing ourselves of divine aid while we’re on a mission to murder a god.”

  Rae coughed again and spat the mucus produced into a tin cup on the nightstand beside her bed. “Well, that makes a certain sense, I suppose.”

  Agnes shifted uncomfortably, tugging at a lock of her hair. “They’ve got braces on his hands, Lictor. To prevent him employing sorcery. He’s asking that I take him to one of our sorcerers to remove them.”

  Rae gave her a weak smile, noting her discomfort. “He’s not much use to your expedition if he can’t cast spells, Peregrine.”

  “No.”

  “But it worries you.”

  “He’s broken. We don’t know fully what that does to a sorcerer. They’re bound for a reason, after all.”

  “To prevent unchecked use of their abilities, yes. You think he’d turn on you?”

  “He assured me he was our ally, because we liberated him from the dungeons. And he seems keen on the expedition’s goal.” Agnes sat down on a chair near Rae’s bed. She decided in that moment she had to unburden herself. “All of this frightens me. The Aerican, the malice of Timilis and his devotees, the supernatural portents around every corner…”

  “Your Aunt Lenda…”

  “Yes!” she cried, tears bursting forth. “All good gods, Lictor Rae, it’s a goddamned nightmare!”

  “I know, dear, I know. But waking nightmares are a feature of our province. To date, you’ve acquitted yourself well: in Busker ruins, and in the way you conducted yourself during the plague last year. You are our most promising agent in a generation: quick-witted, brave, with a bit more wisdom than many your age. I’ve laid a terrible burden on you, but you understand why it had to be you and not your father.”

  “Gods, yes. It would destroy him.” She wiped her tears with the sleeve of her tunic, feeling like a child.

  “Perhaps. But you didn’t have to carry it alone. You made that choice. I’m sorry, but she wants to speak with you again.”

  It was as though a cold, dead hand wrapped itself around her heart.

  “Helmacht is with her. He can remove the braces from your broken sorcerer. And Lenda can tell you what she needs to tell you. You remember the way to the chamber below?”

  Agnes spoke slowly. “Lictor Rae…”

  “Your godmother has offered us much assistance, not only with your father’s tumultu and deciphering Higher Djao. She has made predictions—poor Ruben’s death, for instance—and provided other bits of direction and advice. She has yet to steer us wrong. Both she and Helmacht are expecting you.”

  Agnes buried her face in her hands, weeping.
Then the lictor’s bony hand was on her head, smoothing her hair, like her mother did after she had had a bad dream. She found it soothing, and it calmed her tears. Part of her wanted to be the little girl, to flee from these responsibilities. But she couldn’t, she knew that. What she and her father were being asked to do would change the very course of history. If they succeeded.

  Agnes fetched Qeelb from his cubicle, where he was finishing up a bowl of beef stew provided by the kitchens, slurping up the last bit of gravy with enthusiasm. She led him wordlessly down into the lower levels of the Citadel, remembering the way as though she had made the journey many times before. When they reached the door, the gaunt man caught his breath and grabbed Agnes’s arm, a look of apprehension on his face.

  “Necromancy,” he said. “Dark necromancy.”

  She gave him a simple nod. “Yes.”

  “I didn’t think you Syraeics consorted with such magicks. It’s a…risky thing, you know.”

  “It’s something my father brought back from the Barrowlands…someone, I should say. It’s easier to show you rather than explain.” But she wasn’t sure if that was true, even as she spoke the words. She wondered if some cruel part of her wanted someone else ambushed by the horror, as she was. The impulse brought her a measure of shame, but not enough to enlighten him much further. “It’s…shocking stuff.”

  “Agnes,” said the man, his lips pursing as though he tasted something sour, “all I witnessed in the east…the Azkayans do more than dabble in necromancy. It walks the city streets and swims on the air. I am beyond shock, I’m afraid.”

  “Well, I guess we’ll see, then,” she replied. She rapped on the door, knuckles brushing the Middle Djao drawn there in glowing alchemist’s chalk.

  “Who is that?” came a male voice from inside, followed by muffled conversation. “Agnes? You bring the sorcerer with you?”