Blood Of Gods

CHAPTER 33

Veldaren was bordered to the north by a thick wood that stretched all the way from the river in the west to where it ended when it curled around the Road of Worship. It was through that wood that Laurel, Pulo, Roddalin, and Jonn marched, silence among them as the gray day slowly darkened. Hunting had become a rare occupation of late, what with it being winter and there being few experienced hunters remaining in the city. Even the women who’d learned the art of trapping stayed away. It was tough enough to catch a squirrel or rabbit during the warmer months; in the snow and cold, it was a useless endeavor, a waste of good traps and precious time. So for two hours they walked in silence, seeing nothing, hearing no one, until the wood ended and Karak’s Temple loomed before them.

“There’s still time to turn back,” Pulo said.

Laurel shook her head. King Eldrich had pleaded that it needn’t be her to do this, and now Pulo was doubtful as well.

“Someone needs to drive a knife into Joben’s chest,” she said, “and tonight that privilege is mine.”

They hid there in the wood, huddled at the bases of four separate trees. For a fleeting moment Laurel feared Joben Tustlewhite had become suspicious and altered his schedule, which would have wasted four days of planning. Just the night before, Karl Dogon and Ennis Coldmine had been attacked by the Judges on their way back from this very temple, with Ennis dying and Dogon almost perishing as well. What a waste of a good man it would be should the priest not arrive. But finally she heard wooden wheels rolling over the packed dirt road. Laurel inched along the hard, snowy ground on her elbows and then peered over the bank she’d built. She watched the priest exit the wagon, climb the steps of the temple, and disappear inside. The acolytes closed the door behind him. The wagon carrying the Sisters turned about and headed back the way it came.

Still they waited. The minutes ticked by, and the sky darkened even further. Again Laurel worried something had changed, but sure enough the acolytes began to sing. Peering over her mound of dirt and snow, she saw the window to the priest’s study swing open. The four conspirators then exited their cover and gradually approached the western side, where Karl had told them the wall along the roof was highest.

The land was barren around them, and a chill worked its way up each of their spines. It seemed they all shivered at once as they stepped onto the road and approached the temple stairs. It was eerie to feel so alone, even with the singing coming from the roof. It was as if the world had gone and died on them. The feeling worsened when they scaled the steps and passed between the two onyx lions. The statues’ black eyes seemed to stare at them accusingly. She glanced up at the open window of the study, and for a moment she thought for sure that Joben Tustlewhite’s pale face would emerge, staring down at them. Again a quake ran through Laurel’s body.

They reached the entrance, and Laurel took a deep breath. Behind her, the other three men tensed, hands on their swords. Laurel grasped the handle of the massive door. She had with her tools to pick a lock, yet when she twisted the handle to the side, it opened.

“Well, at least we have some measure of good luck,” whispered Roddalin.

The interior of Karak’s Temple was as vast and desolate as the land surrounding it. The antechamber was empty save a stack of cloaks off to the right and a rod resting against the far wall. As Jonn gently closed the door, Laurel glanced about. The ceiling was high, at least fifteen feet, and just ahead of them was another set of huge double doors. She assumed those were the ones Harmony had said led to the monastery. To the right of the doors was a passage lit by torches resting in elegantly carved vases. At the end of that hall was a stairwell leading up. They went that way, walking lightly and trying not to make any noise, though a glance back showed they were leaving behind wet footprints. Hopefully, no one would be seeing those until the priest was dead and they were long gone.

The stairs were steep. They passed the second floor and then stepped off on the third, hastening their steps. Though the acolytes still sang on the roof, their song seemingly coming from the polished stone walls of the temple itself, Laurel and the men had no way of knowing when the musical rejoicing would end. The last thing they needed was for the faithful boys to stumble in on them while they were doing the deed.

The third level was carpeted, thick fibers that concealed their movements even more than before. Laurel quietly exhaled. The corridor was lined with doors, fifteen of them on either side. Most of the doors were open, and she poked her head in to see a small bedchamber containing a single dresser, four skinny cots, and a shrine on which a sculpture of a lion rested. The acolytes’ rooms, obviously. She backed away from the chamber and moved on, signaling for her colleagues to follow.

The door to the priest’s study was obvious; nailed to it was a plaque on which the Laws of Karak had been carved. Laurel stopped before it. Pulo pressed his back to the wall on one side of the door and drew his shortsword; Roddalin and Jonn did the same on the other. Laurel took a moment to fluff up her wavy hair. She undid the clasp on her cloak, shrugged it off her shoulders, revealing a sheer, barely there ensemble with thigh-high boots and a firming leather bustier. She had borrowed the clothes from a girl named Famke, a whore from one of the brothels along Merchants’ Road, who sought protection in the caverns. Laurel placed her hands beneath her breasts and shoved the bustier up, making her bosom swell in an obscene way. She glanced at Pulo, who retained his air of dignity, though his cheeks were red. She didn’t want to see how Roddalin and Jonn were reacting.

Now or never. She reached out and rapped her knuckles on the door.

Nothing happened.

Laurel bit her lip and frowned. She knocked again, but still nothing. She pressed her ear to the door and listened, but not a sound could be heard on the other side. Taking a step back, she looked over at Pulo. He was scowling.

“He’ll call for the lions the moment he sees you,” Pulo whispered. “Even with you wearing. . that.”

“I only need a moment,” Laurel whispered back, glad the singing easily drowned out her whispers so that there was no way Joben could hear from the other side of his door. “Just one moment of confusion and lust.”

She grabbed the handle, pressed down the latch, and swung open the door.

There was no priest. Instead, what she saw were lions, one male and one female, each of them six feet tall while standing on all fours. Their golden fur shone in the torchlight, and their eyes glowed with intelligence. The heads of both lions swung her way, and an expression that she didn’t think possible for a feline came over their snouts: they smiled. The male then took a menacing step toward her and opened a mouth filled with giant, sharp teeth.

“Laurel,” said Kayne.

“Lawrence,” answered Lilah.

“Betrayer,” they both said at once.

Laurel shrank back in horror, her heart hammering at the inside of her ribcage.

The Final Judges slowly sauntered toward her as she backed away from them. Their heads lowered to the ground, their nostrils flared. Yet they didn’t charge. Laurel tripped as she backed out of the room, and she almost fell. Jonn was there to catch her from beside the door. His arm wrapped around her waist and seemed to suffocate her.

“Laurel, what is-”

He glanced up, and his words became nothing but a wet whistle. Jonn released Laurel, letting her fall to the floor. She landed on her elbow with a thud. Finally her throat unlocked and she yelped. Jonn quickly sidestepped in front of her, his shortsword held before him, pointing at the lions as he blocked the exit. His sword arm trembled.

“Um, Pulo. . Rod,” he said, his voice cracking and shaky. “Some help would be nice.”

The two other men joined him, forming a human shield before Laurel, though she could see their knees knocking. Laurel rose to her feet, cringing at the pain in her sore elbow. The Judges had stopped advancing and now sat on their haunches, looking like living statues as they stared at the four intruders.

“You have defiled the Divinity’s temple,” came a voice deep in the room. From beyond sight of the door stepped the priest, joining the lions. Joben Tustlewhite was gaunt and pale as a ghost. His robe hung open, revealing a skeletal chest scored over with four gigantic scars.

Roddalin’s lips parted as if he was about to say something, likely a bit of ill-timed wit, but only a feeble whimpering left his mouth.

The priest began to pace, the Judges’ eyes following him, though their bodies never moved.

“The flesh is a funny thing,” Joben said, staring at the floor. “On its own it is innocuous, simply a shield for what lies beneath, but that also makes it the most important substance in the universe. Flesh feeds the beasts of the wild; flesh holds our insides within our bodies; flesh both quells the desires of men and leads them to betrayal.”

“Betrayal,” said both lions at once.

“Flesh is also a great teller of truths,” the priest continued as if the lions hadn’t spoken. “It reveals all our past iniquities, like living memory. Should you be cut by a blade, a scar will remain. Should a woman be unfaithful to her husband, her inner flesh will be marked by another male’s entry. We forget sins with ease, but the flesh remembers; the flesh bears its marks, an undeniable truth. Yet if you strip it away, the pain will bring forth the forgotten memories, the lying tongue made to speak without lies.” The priest stopped pacing and finally looked up at them. A broad smile stretched his lips. “And the flesh of the guilty is the easiest to strip away, as my masters will surely show you.”

“Guilty,” said Lilah.

“Flesh,” said Kayne.

Roddalin took a deep breath and somehow found the nerve to speak. “How?”

“It matters not.”

“Why are you yammering and not getting busy with the killing?” asked Jonn. Though his words were confident, his body shill shook.

“Because Karak is just, and Karak is fair,” the priest answered. “Just like all betrayers of the faith, you will be given the chance to repent before the Final Judges. They will seek out the faithfulness in you. . and tear the impure flesh from your bones.”

Roddalin and Jonn exchanged a look, then glanced at Pulo. The man who had once been the captain of the Palace Guard frowned at them, but still he nodded. His free hand snaked behind him, grabbing Laurel’s.

“Pulo, what-”

Before she could finish her statement, Roddalin and Jonn bellowed at the top of their lungs and charged into the room, swords raised. The priest never moved to defend himself. As Pulo whirled around and shoved Laurel down the hall, she couldn’t help but watch as a pair of blades arced downward for Tustlewhite’s bald pate. They never reached their mark, for the Judges were upon them, leaping over the priest’s head and knocking both men over with powerful swipes of their oversized paws.

Laurel saw no more, for she was running, Pulo dragging her along. But she heard, yes she did. Heard bones breaking. Heard flesh tearing. Heard her friends screaming.

Heard lions roaring.

Down the stairs they flew, seeking the door and desperate for the safety beyond. Fear clawed at her throat, and she thought there was no way she would reach it in time, but then the door to the temple was before her. Pulo grasped for the handle, but there was nothing but an empty hole where it had once been. His eyes widened in horror and he shoved her aside, hands searching all over the enormous surface, seeking a way to get it open.

“No, no, no!” he said. His fingers dug into the crack where the door met the frame, but nothing he could do would make the door budge. Finally, he started flinging his body against it, hoping to break it open with his weight. Laurel swallowed her fear and joined Pulo in trying to get the door open, hoping two bodies were better than one.

Still it refused to budge.

“This temple offers no escape for you,” Laurel heard Joben say, and she turned to see him emerge from around the corner. “Just as the caverns beneath the Black Bend hold no safety for your fellow blasphemers.”

The female lion rushed past him, her golden skin soaked with blood. Laurel screamed, and Pulo turned just in time to see Lilah leaping toward him. He fell to his back, jabbing his sword at the beast, trying to keep its snapping jaws at bay. Its claws raked down his chest, shredding his leather armor and opening gouges in his flesh. Joben Tustlewhite shook his head in disappointment as Kayne joined his side from the staircase, Jonn’s severed arm hanging limp in his mouth.

Seeing the look on Joben’s face, and hearing Pulo’s continuing cries of terror, urged Laurel to act. She scampered to her feet, only to be knocked back down again when the temple door suddenly swung outward, and a long, heavy object was thrust inside. The wide lance, the object she’d run into, thwacked against the female Judge, causing Lilah to leap off Pulo, hissing at the now opened door.

The lance retracted, and two Sisters of the Cloth entered the temple, one large and one small, covered head to toe in wrappings and each carrying a pair of curved daggers. The large one reared back and tossed her dagger at Lilah just as she was readying to leap, the spinning blade striking her dead on in the nose and sinking in deep. The lion squealed and roared and swiped at the hilt sticking out of her face. The cry of distress angered Kayne, whose glowing eyes expanded in fury when he saw his injured mate.

“False faithful,” he roared from his blood-soaked snout. Jonn’s arm flopped to the carpet.

Hands fell on Laurel’s shoulders, tugging her across the floor. She looked up to see Lyana’s familiar deep blue eyes peering out at her from the gap in the wrappings. The priest was shouting. Laurel struggled to her feet, feeling lightheaded, and heard a woman scream. She looked on in horror as the large Sister, Harmony Steelmason, met the charge of the lion head on. She slashed with her dagger, scoring tiny cuts that seemed to do no damage as she leapt around, pushing her large frame to move in a way that didn’t seem possible.

“No!” Laurel shrieked, and almost ran toward her, but a firm hand gripped her by the back of her bustier, choking her of breath and will and ripping the skimpy garment in the process. She was hauled outside, slipping and sliding on the icy staircase. She fell to the side and had to grab onto the rear leg of one of the onyx lion statues to keep from tumbling down the stairs.

The door slammed shut a second later, and that sound was followed by Harmony’s screeches. Laurel stared straight ahead in shock, her mind racing.

“Laurel, we must go!”

She turned her head and there was Lyana, a badly injured Pulo leaning on her. The girl’s wrappings had come undone around her head, and bits of dark hair sprouted out like so many dead saplings. Much to Laurel’s shock, thirty other men and women stood at the bottom of the stairs behind them. Most of them were those Laurel had brought to the caverns beneath the Black Bend.

Inside the temple, Harmony had ceased her screaming, joining Roddalin and Jonn in death. The lions roared, the sound shaking the door of the temple. Laurel didn’t need to be told what to do next. She slipped around Pulo’s other side, threw his opposite arm over her shoulder, and together she and Lyana hauled the wounded man through the snow and toward the wood. The others who had come with the two former Sisters hacked away at the statues of the two lions with mauls, rocks, and anything else they could get their hands on, until the onyx bases broke. They grunted as they heaped the two statues in front of the closed temple door. After that, half of them stayed behind, fear in their eyes while they held their weapons at the ready, while the rest rushed toward Laurel and Lyana to help with Pulo’s wounded form. From atop Karak’s Temple came a series of gasps as the acolytes, their song long finished, stared down at them as they fled.

For the first time since the brothers Connington had opened her eyes to the sins of her god, Laurel began to pray. Only this time, it wasn’t to Karak.

The caverns were mostly quiet when Laurel, Lyana, Pulo, and the rest who had helped them flee the temple descended the stone staircase. They had fled through the wood, seemingly blind, the fear of being mauled from behind by the Judges making every shadow in Laurel’s vision become threatening. But luck was with them, and they returned to the Black Bend without further incident. Only time would tell if those who had stayed behind would arrive as well.

Laurel shook her head. They were dead already, and she knew it.

She glanced at Pulo as they entered the caverns, his normally tanned flesh appearing pale and clammy in the sparse torchlight. His body was raked with slashes and gouges from Lilah’s claws, and he had lost copious amounts of blood. Both Lyana’s wrappings and Laurel’s tattered whore’s garb were covered with it as well. Together, the two women guided the injured man and those who carried him toward the cave that Harmony had once called home. The large former Sister had kept a bevy of salves and healing herbs among her belongings, and now, being dead, she would have no need for them any longer.

Laurel’s spirits sank even lower at the thought. Her staunchest supporter, the mighty Giant, was gone. A part of her wanted to lash out at Lyana for disobeying her order and following them, but she knew that was folly. She and Pulo would be dead if they hadn’t. I will remember you always, Harmony, she told the dank cavern air, and then pushed those thoughts from her mind to focus on their next step.

After leaving Pulo in the care of Lyana and those who knew better than she how to deal with the injured man, Laurel snatched up one of her young companion’s daggers, straightened herself, and began marching through the snaking caverns. For a brief moment she considered going to her own private grotto and changing her clothes, but decided against it. She was an open wound now and would be seen as such. She clutched the dagger tightly, turning it over and over in her hand, feeling its weight.

She remembered Joben’s words: “. . the caverns beneath the Black Bend hold no safety for your fellow blasphemers. . ”

The constant bruises, the flayed strips of skin, the mysterious contact within the castle. It was all too obvious to her who had betrayed them.

She entered the large central hub, and sure enough, there was King Eldrich Vaelor, sitting at the long table and nursing a cup of some sort of alcoholic beverage. The gaunt king never slept when she was out of the caverns, his concern for her growing by the day. Karl Dogon was with him, the bodyguard looking worse for the wear, with his arm in a sling and his face mottled with bruises. His sword rested on the table before him, still in its sheath. Vaelor’s gaze lifted to Laurel at the sound of her entrance, and his eyes bulged in their sockets. She didn’t know whether he was reacting to her scant clothing or the sight of blood drenching her, but it didn’t matter. She stepped up to the table and slammed her fist down on it, making the gaunt king flinch. She tapped the tip of the dagger against the table. Dogon’s eyes found hers, looking tired yet surprised. It was on the bodyguard that she focused her attention.

“Why did you do it, Karl?”

Vaelor tilted his head at her and squinted, but said not a word. Neither did Dogon.

“You told them everything. From the beginning. Why?”

King Vaelor seemed puzzled, his eyes flitting from Laurel to Karl and back again. “What’s the meaning of this?”

Laurel peered at the king. “They knew we were coming, my Liege. The Judges were waiting for us. They know about the caverns. I’m sure they even know we’ve been gathering people here.” She pointed an accusatory finger at the bodyguard. “All because of him.”

Eldrich pushed himself away from the table, the legs of his chair scraping against the stone. “This cannot be right.” The king gawked at his longtime guardian. “Tell her this isn’t true.”

Karl Dogon chuckled. It was deep and throaty, and in a way he almost sounded relieved.

“With all due respect, my Liege,” he said, “you’re an idiot.”

The man stood up sharply, kicking his chair so that it tumbled and crashed behind him. He pressed the knuckles of his left hand into the table and leaned forward, squinting at Laurel. She took a single step back, holding the dagger out before her. I am the daughter of Cornwall Lawrence. I will show no fear. Yet she still couldn’t stop from glancing at the sword on the table, inches from the large man’s knuckles. She should have thought to bring Lyana with her.

“You were supposed to protect the king,” she said, summoning her strength, “not betray him.”

“You understand nothing,” said Karl. His gaze lingered on hers. “I’ve always protected my king, and always shall.”

“Then why give our secrets away?”

The man laughed, winced, and shook his head. “Secrets? We have no secrets, girl. The priest knew about the caverns from the start. Joben grew up a child of the Bend. He knew it was the most logical place for us to go when we fled.”

“When were you planning to turn on your king?” asked Laurel, waving the dagger before her.

“Never,” Karl declared.

“Bullshit.”

Karl scowled at her. “Eldrich was never in danger. I love my king, no matter how foolish he may be. The pact was long ago sealed, back before Karak marched his army into Paradise. How else do you think we could have escaped the throne room when the Judges and Sisters attacked? Do you really think that Joben would fail to leave the only other exit out of Tower Honor unguarded? The only reason we lived was because Joben allowed it.”

King Vaelor gaped at him.

“It was all for you, Eldrich,” the man said, turning to the king and dropping to a knee before him, his face twisting in pain as he moved. “We were raised as brothers after your father brought me out of the gutters. Never once would I allow harm to come to you. That is why I have done what I have done.”

“I still don’t know what it is you’ve done,” the king said.

“He’s signed our death warrants,” declared Laurel.

“Yours, perhaps.” Karl glared at her. “But not yours, my Liege. You were to be protected, no matter the outcome. You may not have been allowed your station, but you were to be allowed to live.”

“And the others?” Eldrich asked.

“Fuck the blasphemers,” spat Karl. “They’re the useless fodder of gods and lions. It is to you I’ve pledged my life, not them.”

“That’s it,” said Laurel, and both the king and Dogon glanced over at her. “That is why they haven’t assailed us even though they knew where we are. They were waiting for us to collect all of those who turned against Karak’s law.” She looked at the king, saw the horror in his eyes. “We haven’t been building a rebellion, my Liege. We’ve been packing a slaughterhouse.”

Dogon opened his mouth as if to retort, shut it again, and then moved for his sword. Even wounded and with his sword arm in a sling, he was still as quick as could be when he snatched the hilt with his left hand and flicked the scabbard aside. Laurel backed up a step and hunkered down, the dagger shaking in her hand. She was half Karl’s size. Even as hurt as he was, if he decided she needed killing, she was a dead woman.

Yet Karl didn’t move from behind the table. Instead, he gawped at her, his eyes watering and his lips trembling. A thin trickle of red liquid dribbled out the corner of his mouth. Laurel glanced to the left and saw the wrapped leather handle of King Eldrich’s knife sticking out the side of Dogon’s neck. In a violent motion, Eldrich swung his arm outward, showering the table with blood as Karl’s throat tore open. The man fell backward, clutching at the gushing wound, kicking so hard that he almost upended the table. King Vaelor took a step away from him, bloody knife still in his hand, a look of dejection on his gaunt mug.

“My Liege. . ” Laurel said.

“Laurel, what’s done is done,” said the king. His voice trembled with disappointment and agitation all at once.

“What do we do now?” she asked.

He looked up at her, his gray eyes distant and fierce.

“Now, we wake everyone in these caverns. They’re no longer safe.”

“But what then?” Laurel asked. “Where is there left for us to flee?”

A sad smile crossed King Eldrich’s lips. “Flee? No, dear Laurel. It’s time we stopped being the sacrificial lambs of the gods. It’s time we showed Karak’s faithful just how lethal the free citizens of Veldaren can be.”