It was here that Adlar lost his struggle to contain his gorge, spilling the contents of his guts on to the body of the man he had slain. “Tiler,” I called to the outlaw as he tugged his falchion free of the corpse. “Take half our number. Scour the gardens and the sleeping quarters. If you find any Luminants or senior clerics, make sure they remain alive and unmolested to greet the dawn.”

  I turned to the Vergundians, finding my former captive eyeing me with a mix of eagerness and tense suspicion. “Stay away from the chapel,” I said, gesturing to the cathedral. “Any relics or holy objects are not yours to take. Otherwise, help yourself.”

  They were already swarming up the steps before I finished speaking. I had little doubt that, come the dawn, we would discover more than a few supposedly divine Covenant treasures missing and found I couldn’t care less. Faith resides neither in gold nor in craft, Sihlda had always said. But in the heart and the soul, neither of which can be stolen or falsified.

  “Master Spinner!” I said, turning to see the juggler still staring at the vomit-spattered corpse at his feet. He looked up at me with the expression of a child caught in the aftermath of a terrible transgression. “Follow close, if you please.” I started up the steps. “And don’t forget your knife.”

  CHAPTER SIX

  The interior of the cathedral was all gloom and angular, multihued shadows cast by the numerous stained glass windows. Torches sat unlit in stanchions, and not even a candle flickered in the alcoves and sconces. Our boots echoed loud as we made our way from the great arched entrance to the high vaulted chamber of the main chapel. There, a single figure knelt before the altar, its marble slab laden with a dense array of gold caskets of varying dimensions.

  Striding along an aisle flanked by empty pews, my pace increased as I discerned the identity of this supplicating personage. I had expected his capture to require many hours of searching the hidden corners of this vast building, should we find him here at all. But there he knelt, head bowed and unmoving in apparently serene acceptance of his fate.

  I stopped a dozen paces short of him, holding up a hand to halt the others. “Check the vestry and the crypt for any hiders,” I instructed, gesturing for the Widow and Adlar to remain where they were as the rest of the Covenant soldiers hurried off.

  My sword dripped blood across ancient, intricate mosaics as I took the last few paces to the altar. The kneeling figure didn’t turn at my approach, which I found stoked my anger to a fiercer heat. He wore just plain clerical garb and I stared at his exposed neck, memories of the Dire Keep rising. When he slowly raised his head and began to speak, his voice was thick and laboured, as if in pain, but lacking the fear I expected, and wanted.

  “Tell me, my lord Scribe,” Arnabus said, nodding to the altar, “have you ever before beheld the relics of Martyr Athil?”

  I said nothing, but I couldn’t resist shifting my eyes from his inviting neck to the shiny reliquaries arrayed on the marble platform before us. Each stood with its doors opened, their sacred contents lost to the shadows that dominated this unlit space. There were more than I thought existed, stirring a blasphemous notion that there might be enough body parts here to fashion at least two Martyr Athils.

  “The most holy objects in all Covenant-dom,” Arnabus continued in his aggravatingly untroubled tones. “As a servant of the Martyrs’ example, do you not feel compelled to kneel before them as I do? There—” he raised a hand, finger quivering to point at a tall, narrow casket at the edge of the altar “—Martyr Athil’s thigh bone. Next to it—” his finger shifted to a less impressive box “—the small toe from his left foot. Wars have been fought to possess these treasures and yet you show no reverence. Why is that?”

  I said nothing, instead focusing my scrutiny on Arnabus, seeing how he clutched one hand to the knotted jumble of the robe covering his belly. Below his knees the tiles were dark with a spreading pool of viscous liquid.

  “A disagreement with my esteemed captain,” Arnabus explained. He smiled, but I saw the pain in his narrow, pale features. “Not a fellow to take criticism lightly, it transpires.”

  The anger leached from me then, the old, familiar urge towards retribution that had fuelled much of my life fading to a small itch. I detested this man a great deal, but confronted with the stricken, broken creature he had become, the need for blood abated.

  “Finish the bastard,” the Widow stated. “Or let me do it. Woodsman is owed a reckoning, and so are all the folk we lost this night.”

  “Why would I kill him when he still has so much to tell me?” I replied. “There’s bound to be a healer among the clerics Tiler’s turfed out of this place. Find one.”

  “Sadly, brother…” Arnabus rasped. “I doubt I have the… time for further conversation.” He slumped forward, setting his head on the edge of the altar’s dais as if it were a pillow.

  I crouched at his side, myriad questions buzzing my head but finding I could articulate only one. “Why? Allying yourself with a half-mad rebel outlaw, hiring mercenaries you must have known could never be trusted. This was always a hopeless prospect. So why?”

  Arnabus’s voice was a whisper, shot through with a familiar taunting lilt. “You know why… Scribe. So did… our elder sister. Perhaps now, she’ll…” He paused to convulse, spitting a glob of blood from his mouth then drawing a ragged breath to speak on. “She’ll remember me… with a fonder heart.”

  “You did all this to win the Sack Witch’s favour? Torture, murder, war. She would have no part of this.”

  A sound that was a mingling of a groan and a sigh came from his lips. “I forgot… how young you still are. Still so… innocent.” He gave a feeble flap of his hand, beckoning me closer. His features hardened as I leaned towards him, voice the forced rasp of a man determined to imbue his final words with significance. “You know what Evadine Courlain is, Scribe. Even though you won’t admit it to yourself. Not yet. My sister once told me it would be this way… that we must await your…” Arnabus’s lips twisted into a smile “… epiphany. As ever, I didn’t listen. I thought if I could stop it… she would love me again.”

  The smile faded and he looked into my eyes, gaze unblinking. “The Isidorian Codex… Scribe. Look there for…” a pulse of his old sardonic wit passed across his face “… illumination.”

  I thought he would die then, but it had ever been the role of this man to frustrate me. So, instead of peacefully slipping into the death he had earned, Ascendant Arnabus dragged a final parcel of air into his lungs and craned his neck to address my companions. “Now,” he told them in a loud, agonised grunt, “I think… I should illuminate your friends in the true story of Martyr Evadine’s resurrection. You see… my children… it was not the work of the Seraphile at all…”

  My sword descended with enough force to not only cleave both his neck but also chip a decent-sized chunk from the dais beneath. Apparently, this vandalism has never been repaired and you can still see it today. Arnabus’s blood seeped into the very fabric of the stone and his end is forever marked by a dark, triangular notch in otherwise pristine marble.

  I stooped to gather up a portion of Arnabus’s robes, using them to wipe clean my longsword. “You two stay here,” I told the Widow and Adlar. “Ensure the plainsmen don’t take any of the relics. I’ll be back shortly.”

  I started along the aisle but halted at the Widow’s strident question. “What did he mean?” Glancing back at her, I found her features set in a demanding scowl. “What he said about the Anointed Lady. What she is, and her resurrection.”

  My gaze slid briefly to the juggler who, fortunately for him, seemed more interested in gaping in horrified fascination at both Arnabus’s disembodied head and the collection of relics. “The maddened ramblings of a dying man,” I told the Widow. I made sure to meet her eyes before adding with careful emphasis, “Best forgotten and never spoken of again.”

  Not one to be cowed, in truth I had doubts she was even capable of fear at this juncture, Juhlina returned my stare in full measure. She did, however, say nothing more as I strode from the chapel.

  By dint of sheer violence and force of will, Danick Thessil managed to survive the night, an example of martial courage and ferocity those under his command signally failed to match. After Ayin had completed a full accounting of losses, it became clear that the Divine Captain’s host had been a mostly hollow contrivance. The bulk of the hired blades disappeared the moment Evadine led the crusade into the trenches. Many of the Council soldiers, unwilling conscripts from the city or surrounding villages, were equally quick to throw down their arms and beg mercy. Despite this, Thessil had succeeded in holding up the advance for a time. Clustering his most ardent fanatics together at the crest of the central earthwork, he beat back two assaults and might have defeated a third if Dervan’s Chosen Company hadn’t appeared to strike at his rear. With the last of his soldiers slain, Thessil remained atop the mound, hacking away with a sword in one hand while holding aloft a banner in the other. It bore a cup and flame and, I would learn later, stood as the sigil of what had been termed the Reformed Orthodox Covenant. I would guess it stands as one of the most short-lived factions in Covenant history. Evadine forbade her archers from taking Thessil down, instead insisting this worst of heretics be clubbed to the ground, there to be roped and hobbled like an unbroken horse.

  By dawn the city entire was in our hands, what survived of it at least. In the Fjord Geld and Alundia I had witnessed the fate of cities fallen to storm and, even though this havoc was born of Covenant devotion, Athiltor proved no exception. Fire tore through the rows of houses where the layfolk dwelt, consuming all within, including a good number of townspeople who had taken to their cellars for shelter. Others, those either foolish enough to venture forth or driven from their homes by the conflagration, were slaughtered in the streets by the Anointed Lady’s Crusade. When presented by inarguable evidence of her divine favour, all semblance of the military order I and Wilhum had tried to instil on the march abruptly vanished and they became a mob.

  Upon leaving the cathedral I had been forced to intervene to stop a cluster of crusaders tearing the robes from a group of captured female Supplicants. The intent of their tormentors was plain in the wild-eyed, desperate cast of their faces, besmirched by battle and the urge towards domination of the vanquished that arises in victory. My authority proved sufficient to forestall their impending crime, even dispelling their madness to a certain degree. I ordered the half-stripped clerics be taken to the cathedral and the crusaders to stand guard on the steps, promising the worst of punishments should I discover they had failed to comply.

  Other horrors confronted me as I went in search of Evadine. Some I prevented, others I could not. The larger the group, the more likely they were to turn on anyone who sought to interrupt their amusements. I saw several minor shrines consumed by flames, though took some relief from the sight of the Covenant Library standing still intact and guarded by Lilat and her small cluster of archers. This night, at least, would not bring a repeat of the crime against history that had occurred when Olversahl fell to the Ascarlians.

  I found Evadine atop the mound where Thessil had made his stand. She stood with her back to the flames, head cocked at a curious angle as she looked upon the Divine Captain. Bound hand and foot, he thrashed on the ground, all the while unleashing a torrent of defiant abuse that caused me to wonder why she hadn’t seen fit to have him gagged.

  “Cowardly bitch!” Thessil’s teeth shone white in a face blackened by soot and congealed blood, eyes bright as he voiced his challenge. “Loose these bonds and fight me, whore! We’ll see who has divine favour! Let all know your claims are false!”

  “Filthy cur!” a crusader sergeant grunted, face dark as he emerged from the cordon of onlookers, bloodied halberd raised.

  “No, good soldier,” Evadine said, smiling and waving the fellow back. “Tarnish your steel no further this night, I beg you. Especially not with the blood of one so wicked as this.”

  “Tarnish, is it?” Thessil let out a shrill laugh. “She tarnishes you all, you fucking fools! Can’t you see her for what she is? This is no Martyr! She damns you all with her lies!” His fevered gaze fixed upon me as I climbed the slope and, to my surprise, calmed a little. “Scribe,” he grunted, sagging in his bonds, “if you still harbour any regard for all Deckin taught you, you’ll cut this bitch down where she stands.”

  “He once showed me how to sever a man’s tongue so that he won’t choke to death on blood,” I replied. “So I’d advise you to curb yours, Captain.” I turned to Evadine and bowed. “The cathedral is in our hands, my lady. All relics are secured. Also, the library is intact and under guard.”

  She nodded in vague approval then raised a quizzical eyebrow. “Arnabus?”

  “Dead.” I inclined my head at Thessil. “By this one’s hand, apparently.” A lie, to be sure, but not completely.

  Thessil jerked on the ground, growling a sullen interjection. “That faithless dog deserved worse. Wanted me to sully my honour with craven flight.”

  I ignored him and extended a hand to the city. The flames were rising high now, spreading from the lay-folk’s quarter to the artisans’ district. “I’ll need Davern’s and Wilhum’s companies to put a stop to this.”

  This brought a crease to Evadine’s brow and she spared the growing inferno a short glance, as if noticing it for the first time. In the past the sight of wanton destruction would cause her distress. Not so now. I saw a narrowing of her gaze and a twist to her mouth, the light of the flames dancing in her eyes, and was that beginnings of a smile? In truth, it was just a flicker of expression, quickly vanished, but I had seen it and, of all terrible things I witnessed that night, I felt this to be the worst.

  “Indeed, my lord,” she told me with grave conviction. “I will not have the first day of my reign marked by the destruction of the holiest of cities.”

  “Reign, is it?” Thessil cried out from the ground, twisting to cast his words at the surrounding crusaders. “You hear that, you servile dogs? She intends to make herself queen! This is not a crusade. It’s a rebellion, for which you’ll all hang…”

  His words became a discordant jumble as Evadine delivered a hard kick to his back, sending his bound form tumbling down the flank of the earthwork and into the midst of the crusade. I heard Thessil scream out some additional furious denunciations even as the first blows were struck. But soon, as more blades rained down, defiance turned to brief, shrieking agony, then silence.

  “A trial would have suited us better,” I advised Evadine. “A demonstration that the Ascendant Queen will be the upholder of laws in this land, not a tyrant.”

  “A fair point, Alwyn.” She inclined her head in faint contrition. “But he tried to kill you, and that will be the worst crime in my realm. Come—” she started down the slope towards the burning city, beckoning for me to follow “—and let us calm this tempest.”

  In all, five Luminants were found alive in the aftermath of Athiltor’s fall. Only one had been executed during Arnabus’s brief tenure. The unfortunate fellow continued to hang inverted and rotting from the cathedral spire until I had him cut down and consigned to the crypt. Others had fled when Arnabus first made his play for ultimate power over the Covenant, leaving this lot behind. I suspected because all but one was too old and infirm to mount an escape. Despite their age, the Luminants displayed swift efficiency in reasserting their authority. By noon they had assumed their seats in the council chamber and set about reassembling the coterie of Ascendants and lesser clerics that once saw to the administration of the holy city.

  Evadine and I found them busily sorting documents and assigning tasks amid a gaggle of functionaries, though they deigned to afford the Anointed Lady a warm welcome.

  “Your swift action and undaunted courage will never be forgotten, Ascendant Evadine,” a tall Luminant with steel-grey hair assured her when Evadine strode to the centre of the chamber.

  “My thanks, Luminant Daryhla.” Evadine bowed with gracious humility “And I have little doubt your own actions in the face of this outrage will stand as an equal example of faith and fortitude.”

  To this the Luminant responded with only a distracted nod before returning her attention to the ledger before her. Although the youngest of the surviving council, she was Evadine’s senior by at least two decades and, I assumed, a cleric of considerable experience. However, I saw little real intelligence in her countenance. Instead, there was only the stiff presumption of one accustomed to power. To her and the other clerics present, Arnabus’s heresy had been merely a bizarre if frightening interruption in the flow of normality. None had yet to realise that he had been but a minor obstruction and the true harbinger of change had just walked into their chamber.

  Had Sihlda ever taken her rightful place upon this council, I felt certain she would have paid far more heed to the Mounted Company soldiers filing in to line the walls. It was only at the echo of their boots as they stamped to attention that Luminant Daryhla and her aged colleagues consented to afford the Anointed Lady their full notice.

  “My thanks, Ascendant,” Daryhla said, using her quill to gesture at the soldiers, “but with the Great Heretic and his vile captain slain, I feel such protection is not warranted.” She smiled. “We thank you once more for your service and command that you garrison your soldiers within the cathedral precincts to await further orders.”

  “Orders?” Evadine repeated. “From whom?”

  “The council, of course.” A certain irritation crept into the Luminant’s voice then, but her gaze also showed a burgeoning alarm as it traversed Evadine’s soldiers.

  “What council?” Evadine spoke with soft deliberation, but these two words succeeded in heralding an abrupt silence in the chamber. All eyes turned to her, the various clerics straightening from their ledgers and documents, some in grim awareness, others in blank mystification.

  “We may be reduced in number,” Daryhla said and I felt a twinge of respect for the steadiness of her tone, “but it behoves all true servants of the Covenant to lend their strength to rebuilding…”