Saint's Blood: The Greatcoats Book 3 (12 page)

We’d never been friends, Allister and me. We had nothing in common, for one. And I had long suspected that he thought I was an arrogant, moralising show-off who spent my life trying to prove to everyone else I was better than they were. My suspicions about this came from the number of times he’d said these very words, or some variation, loudly and forcefully to my face.

I wasn’t overly fond of Allister, either. He reminded me too much of the boys who’d pushed me around when I was young, jeering about my father leaving my mother and me and coming up with an endless variety of unpleasant reasons why. So we didn’t like each other very much.

But we were Greatcoats, and in the end, that’s all that mattered.

‘I don’t know what the King’s plan was,’ I admitted, ‘but right now I don’t care.’ I held up the iron mask Allister had given me. The carvings on its face had the same rough, almost haphazard quality as the one Saint Birgid had been wearing, though I thought perhaps the eyes and mouth were portraying a slightly different variation of terror and madness. It had the same clasping mechanism on the sides to hold it in place, and the same iron funnel fused to the inside.

‘The plan I care about right now is the one that belongs to the man forcing these onto the faces of the Saints.’

We brought Saint Anlas’ body back into the martyrium with us. Some of the pilgrims took a few tentative steps in our direction, maybe having some spiritual intuition as to what we carried, perhaps just curious as to why we were walking so boldly back into their midst. Kest and Brasti stood on the other side of the gates, weapons in hand, eyes on the crowd, ready to take on anyone who might make a move on us. But I wasn’t the least bit concerned. As soon as we’d come in sight of the entrance I’d spotted Quentis Maren and his Inquisitors, and it was clear he’d noticed that we were carrying a body with us. He opened the gates immediately and some of his men rushed to assist us, confirming what I’d already suspected.

‘How many?’ I asked, as we passed into the martyrium and the gates closed behind us.

The Inquisitor looked as if he was considering feigning ignorance.

‘How many what?’ Brasti asked. ‘And who is that?’

I waited until we had moved out of view of the pilgrims before taking the dead Saint off the horse and setting the body gently on the ground. I motioned for Quentis to examine him, and he knelt and carefully unfolded the cloth, just as I had done.

‘Saint Anlas, I believe,’ the Inquisitor said after a moment. He hesitated. ‘Though I’d never met him personally.’

Obladias, the old man who was still doing his best impression – not that it was very good – of an uneducated country monk, confirmed it. ‘That’s him. I knew him well enough.’

‘Really?’ Allister asked. ‘He never mentioned you.’

The monk responded with a brief chuckle. Maybe he knew the Saint hadn’t been one for conversation; maybe he didn’t care if we believed him. I didn’t particularly care, either.

‘How many,
Cogneri
Quentis Maren?’ I demanded, making the name of his order into an insult.
It feels good.
No wonder people do it to us so often.

The Inquisitor remained silent for a long time.

‘You might as well answer him,’ Duke Jillard said, walking down the path towards us. ‘Falcio has likely figured out a great deal of what you’ve been hiding. He’s a little slow sometimes, but he usually gets there in the end.’

‘Do any of you work for him?’ Brasti asked of the grey-robed Inquisitors standing around us, and when none of them responded he looked at me and asked, ‘Any reason I can’t shoot Jillard, then?’

I kept my attention on Quentis. ‘
How many?
’

Finally, the Inquisitor spoke. ‘Twelve.’

Twelve
 . . . I was struggling to grasp what it would take to . . .

‘Twelve
what
?’ Brasti asked. ‘Would someone
please
tell me what we’re talking about so I can decide if I care?’

Obladias snorted and said to Duke Jillard. ‘Hard to imagine how that Ducal Council of yours thought to restore order to the country with geniuses like this on your side.’

Brasti shrugged. ‘I leave the details to these two,’ he said. ‘Mine is a more infallible intellect.’

‘He means ineffable,’ Kest remarked.

‘Which one’s ineffable?’

‘Shut up,’ I said to them both, then to Quentis, ‘Twelve dead Saints and you didn’t think to inform the Realm’s Protector?’

‘Or the Ducal Council,’ Jillard added.

‘I don’t report to her,’ Quentis replied. ‘Nor, your Grace, to you. The Order of Inquisitors—’

I cut him off. ‘The last time I checked, the “Order of Inquisitors” had been reduced to a handful of angry old men sitting in their little dungeons staring at rusted implements of torture and trying to remember which one to brush their teeth with.’ I motioned to Quentis’ men. ‘I see newly trained guardsmen here, in newly made coats and armour and carrying weapons that must have cost your churches half their reserves. So tell me,
Lord Inquisitor
, when did you first discover that someone was murdering Saints?’

It was, I felt, an impressive interrogation. I don’t know why, but Inquisitors really piss me off. And Quentis actually bristled, which pleased me more.

‘We found the first body a year ago,’ he said at last. ‘The second, six months later. After that, a month, and then . . .’

My temporary sense of self-satisfaction faded as the full force of his words began to take hold of me. A year ago, someone had found a way to murder a Saint. No doubt, when it was one Saint, Quentis and his Inquisitors had thought this was something they could manage – an aberration that could be kept secret. But now more dead bodies were turning up and soon everyone, noble and peasant alike, would find out that the beings they prayed to for safety were no safer than they were. I looked at the gates, and out at the pilgrims on the other side.
Hells. They already know something is wrong.

‘The pace of the killings is increasing,’ Jillard said, ‘but why?’

My exhaustion returned and my wounds stung as if they were fresh. I glanced at Quentis and then at Obladias, wondering if they had already figured it out. I knew the answer because, as Jillard had already pointed out, I might be a little slow, but I get there in the end. I knelt down and picked up the body of Saint Anlas. Cradling him in my arms, I started towards the cathedral.

‘The answer is simple, your Grace,’ I said. ‘Whoever is behind this is getting better at killing Saints.’

*

I found Ethalia waiting outside the cathedral for me. Barely an hour had passed since I last saw her, and yet she looked as if a week had passed. Her hair was dishevelled, her arms hung limp at her sides and her cheeks were streaked with tears.

‘Birgid?’ I asked quietly.

‘She’s awake,’ Ethalia said, which surprised me, then she murmured, ‘but . . . it won’t be long.’

I felt a fool standing there with the rotting body of one Saint already lying dead in my arms while the woman I loved was breaking into a thousand pieces, already mourning the next one. Kest came and took the body from me, and I took Ethalia in my arms. She let me hold her, though only for a moment, then she stepped backwards, away from me. ‘Birgid wants to see you,’ she said.

‘Not alone,’ Quentis said, coming up the path towards us with Obladias close behind.

‘She has asked to speak with Falcio,’ Ethalia said. ‘Not you.’

The old monk showed not the slightest deference to either Birgid’s wishes or Ethalia’s grief. ‘The Saints, little girl, are the province of the church,’ he started. ‘Now step out of the way and—’

His words were cut off by the sound of wood creaking as Brasti bent his bow. The arrow nocked to the string didn’t move an inch. ‘I really don’t care how many pistols your men have, Quentis,’ he said conversationally. ‘They won’t be fast enough to keep me from sending the old man to whatever hell most deserves him. And whilst I might not be a progeny at deception—’

‘He means
prodigy
,’ Kest pointed out.

‘Which one means I’m clever enough to figure out that the old bastard isn’t just a monk and they probably don’t want him dead?’

Quentis Maren’s look of concern confirmed Brasti’s suspicions, but the Inquisitor kept his eyes fixed on me. ‘Falcio, you know how serious this is. You can’t expect us to—’

‘You’ll come with me,’ I said. I turned to Ethalia. ‘Did Birgid specifically say I was to come alone?’

‘No, but . . .’

I took her hands in mine. ‘I’m sorry, but Quentis is right. If our situation was reversed I would never allow him to speak to the only witness . . .’ I cringed at the use of the word.
This is the woman she looks up to more than any other person in the world.
‘He needs to hear what Birgid has to say.’

Ethalia acquiesced reluctantly, but let go of my hands.

‘I’ll be coming along as well,’ Obladias announced.

Damn right you will.
I looked from him to Quentis and gestured at the pistol hanging at his side. ‘How fast are you at drawing that weapon?’

His eyes narrowed. ‘Fairly fast. Why?’

I opened the door to the cathedral – the one behind the statue of Death. ‘Because if Birgid recognises either of you as the man who hurt her, you’re going to find out you aren’t nearly fast enough.’

Walking down the stone stairs of the passari deo and into the shadows below reminded me that my primary aversion to religion was the practice of praying below ground. I mean, what sort of God thinks it’s a good idea for their followers to entomb themselves, and
then
ask for health and long life?

‘The sanctuary is not far,’ Ethalia said, steering me along the trail of candles that began at the bottom of the stairs and led into the darkness.

‘They go first,’ I said, and stood aside to let Quentis and Obladias pass in front of us. If Birgid recognised one of them, I didn’t want him behind me. I reached inside my coat and loosened the first of the six throwing knives in my leather bracer. For all my threats to Quentis, I was pretty sure I’d have a devil of a time drawing my rapiers inside the confined space of the sanctuary.

‘Does it help?’ Ethalia asked, her voice flat. She didn’t turn to look at me and kept her eyes to the front as we entered the passage.

‘Does what help?’

‘Making yourself angry. Making yourself hungry for violence. Does it make you faster or stronger?’

‘I . . . No, not especially.’

She still wasn’t looking at me. ‘Does it make you more cunning in battle, or shield you from pain? Or is it the pain itself that makes you—?’

‘What? No, why are you saying this?’ I started to take her by the arm, but stopped when she flinched. ‘Ethalia, what’s wrong?’

She finally stopped and turned to face me. ‘I spent half my life cultivating peace inside myself, learning compassion, so that I might master the healing ways of my order. All those years . . . and now, when I need those skills the most – when
she
needs me the most – I find that I lack the strength because I have compromised my spirit with violence.’

I looked for words of comfort and reassurance, for some clear, logical argument why Ethalia shouldn’t blame herself, but none came, because I realised that she
wasn’t
blaming herself. ‘You mean me,’ I said. ‘You think that being with me, with my . . .
violence
. . that it’s weakened your abilities?’

Ethalia wiped a hand across her eyes. She looked like she hadn’t slept in far too long. She stepped aside and gestured for me to enter the sanctuary chamber. ‘Go to Birgid. She wants to speak with you and that is the only gift left that either of us can give her now.’

*

The sanctuary was a large chamber dug out of the dirt and rock, looking more like the abandoned den of some massive burrowing creature that had long ago left for more promising territory than somewhere to feel a God’s touch. I dragged my boot heel against the floor for a moment, and then stopped myself. I didn’t need to test whether the surface might be slippery; it wasn’t going to come to a fight, not here. I did it by reflex, because there’s nothing quite so embarrassing as falling on your arse when you’re trying to draw your weapon at speed. Having done that, unintentionally, I could feel the ground was smoother than the walls, no doubt worn over time by the knees of however many thousands had come here over the years to pray. The only decorations were the silks in the six colours of the Gods of Tristia, hanging loose around the walls and shifting lazily in the faint breeze caused by our movements; I felt like I was entering a tent. Scattered candles had been lit around the chamber, but they provided little illumination and my eyes hadn’t yet adjusted to the darkness.

‘We pray in the shadows that we may summon the light,’ a voice said from the far side of the room. I recognised the voice as Birgid’s, though only barely.

A brief flash of white light filled the room and then just as quickly disappeared, leaving me twice as blind as I’d been before. I was halfway to drawing a knife when I realised what had caused it. ‘You would think that if the Gods intended Saints to be candles in the dark, they might have made them a little more reliable.’

‘Had the Gods made the Saints,’ Birgid replied, ‘then I’m sure they would have done a more thorough job.’ I saw the blurry outline of an arm reaching up from a sleeping pallet at the far end of the room. ‘Come then, man of valour. I have little enough time left to me without you standing there like a tree waiting for the woodsman.’

With the room blanketed in darkness once again, I picked up one of the little candles on the floor and walked over to where Birgid was stretched out on a pallet. ‘You know, if you keep talking like an old granny, people are going to think you’re . . .’

The words left me as I reached the bed and saw what had become of the Saint of Mercy. I’d known she was dying, and I knew well what dying looked like. But I hadn’t expected this.

When I’d met Birgid-who-weeps-rivers for the first time, just a few months ago, she had looked to be no older than twenty, with hair so blonde it cascaded over her shoulders like white gold, resting against skin of a pure, pale honey lit from within by the morning sun. Even a week ago, when she’d turned up at the Palace of Baern, her face and body covered in filth and wounds, some of that ethereal beauty had remained. The woman on the sleeping pallet was not the Birgid I knew.