Geist

NINE The Thunder of Destruction

Merrick held tight to Nynnia’s hand, or maybe she was holding tight to his—whichever the case, he was glad of it. He had not pulled his Center back, from the moment they had entered this place. Ahead, Sorcha was a smoldering scarlet ember, the Bond running back to him twisting like living lava, while Raed flickered like hot silver flame. Prior Aulis was also scarlet, but flecked through with blue fire: the mark of a Sensitive.

This confused Merrick. While he knew that Sensitives were usually in high positions in the Order, he had never thought to find one so high in both Active and Sensitive in such a remote outpost. Deacons like the Abbot, with such high ratings in both, warranted positions in larger Priories or Abbeys. To find Aulis tucked away here was rather strange.

These concerns were shoved to one side when she led them into what had to be the infirmary. Merrick immediately yanked his Center back; too much human pain could overload his senses. This, then, was where the remaining Deacons were.

The room reeked of so much sweat, urine and fear that it was like a blow between his eyes. If he had been viewing this with his Center, it would have been unbearable. All four of them stood in the middle of the chaos, while the Prior watched their reactions. Doing a quick head count, Merrick reckoned that pretty much every Deacon and lay Brother was in the infirmary, apart from three or four. After the destruction out in the Hall, it wasn’t difficult to imagine what had happened to them.

Several lay Brothers, also bearing wounds, were trying to hold down a young man wearing the blue of an Active, yet he seemed to have no physical injury. His eyes were bulging from their sockets, and with a start Merrick realized that the Brothers had gagged the struggling man. Froth was starting to leak from the corner of his mouth and stain the leather bit.

“Father!” Nynnia let go of the Deacon’s hand and dashed over to a bulky older man sewing up a gash on a lay Brother’s head. Merrick was relieved that she had not traveled so far only to face grief at the end of her journey. He watched as the old man tenderly pressed his daughter to him and kissed the top of her head. She smiled at him so broadly that it was like the sun had dawned in the small infirmary. “Father, this is Deacon Merrick Chambers—he is responsible for me being able to get back to you—and this is my father, Kyrix Macthcoll.”

The stout man’s hands were covered in blood, so he did not offer a hand for Merrick to shake, but his smile was a smaller reflection of his daughter’s. “Then I thank you, Deacon Chambers—I need my girl home.” He turned and looked over his shoulder. “Now more than ever.”

Nynnia was rolling up the sleeves on her dress. “Who can still be saved, Father?”

“There are several Brothers in the other room who could use your talents.” He patted her on the shoulder and then gave a slight bow to Merrick. “Excuse our rudeness—but as you can see we are both needed here.”

The Deacon, who was feeling particularly useless, tucked his hands under his cloak. “Please don’t stand on ceremony on my account.”

The girl’s eyes darted to Merrick, soft brown and—he wasn’t imagining it—warm. She turned away with a swirl of her dress.

He hated to leave her, but it was obvious that Prior Aulis needed him, for there was one thing he had noticed: all of the Deacons here were Actives. Not one Sensitive remained; had any been alive, they would have been here watching over their brethren.

Sorcha was voicing the very question that buzzed in his head. “What the hell happened here?” She moderated her tone slightly since they were in a heaving infirmary, but still, the edge of panic was audible.

The short gray haircut that Priors often favored made the older woman look somewhat masculine, Merrick noted as he took in the deep wrinkles on her forehead. This woman’s life had been hard to begin with, and it looked like it hadn’t been any easier in the last few days. “What do you think happened?” she snapped, her tone belying her grandmotherly looks. “We were attacked by the unliving!”

It was the one thing no one wanted to hear. Even with all the evidence out in the main hall, it was not a pleasant thing to have confirmed. An attack on a sacred building of the Order had not happened since the dark ages. Not in Arkaym, not in Delmaire. Powerful runes were carved into Priory and Abbey foundations and walls—kept active by constant reworking by the Deacons. Their protection was immutable, more so than water. A huge chasm opened up in front of Merrick as he realized the training he had so recently completed was not proving as useful as he’d imagined.

“Why is no deal I make ever simple?” Raed muttered grimly.

Prior Aulis’ attention turned swiftly on him. “Who is . . .” Her voice trailed off. “Raed Rossin!”

The Pretender threw his hands up in the air. “Is there no such thing as anonymity anymore?”

“We were also attacked.” Merrick stepped forward in front of their rescuer. “Captain Rossin saved our lives when a possessed sea monster attacked and destroyed our ship. We made a deal with him, or we wouldn’t have been able to get here at all.”

He expected surprise from the Prior, but perhaps her experiences of the last few weeks had softened her attitude to the impossible. “I see,” she said, without any sign of emotion in her tone.

The chaos of the infirmary swirled around them while all three of the Deacons silently contemplated what to do next. Merrick wondered what the point of those years of study had been, if none of the rules held true any longer.

It was Raed who broke the stalemate. “Is there somewhere else we can discuss this?” He jerked his head toward the Deacons around them.

Prior Aulis nodded mutely and led them through the stone corridors deeper into the keep, away from the smells of charred flesh and blood. Her second-story chambers were small and modest, looking out over the windblown courtyard. Without needing to be asked, Merrick opened his Center to see if there was any threat around them.

Through that double vision, he let his perception stretch out as wide as it would go. The three people in the room with him, the mad scramble in the infirmary, the damaged silhouette of the lay Brother with the horses out in the stable, even the chickens in the yard, all became immediately obvious to him—but no taint of the unliving. He was becoming less and less sure of his own abilities, but his search did confirm that one disturbing fact he had already guessed.

“You really don’t have any Sensitives left within the Priory.”

Aulis folded her hands, the tension apparent in the set of her shoulders. “They were the very first target of this attack.”

“Start from the beginning.” Sorcha stood next to Merrick at the window, almost as if she was lending him some sort of support.

“At first, there were only small attacks,” the Prior said, rubbing one hand wearily over her mouth before continuing. “Shades seen in the graveyard, farm animals shocked out of milking.”

“All low-grade incidents.” Merrick nodded, feeling like he should at least be taking notes, but Sorcha kept her arms folded and he couldn’t write properly while using his Center. He knew which was more important at this moment.

“They increased, more and more, until we were drowning in them; that was when we sent word to the Mother Abbey for help.” She opened a drawer in her desk and pulled out a sheaf of papers. “Read some of the reports if you like.”

Sorcha made no move toward them, instead dipping into her pocket and removing a cigar. She was polite enough not to light it, but seemed to gain some calmness merely from rolling it in her fingertips. “I think what happened after you sent that weirstone message is more important.”

The Prior’s lips tightened, and her frown deepened.

“The townspeople lost faith in you.” Raed took a seat and shot Sorcha a sharp look. “After all, they must have been disappointed when their protectors weren’t up to the task.”

Aulis half rose out of her chair, her face glowing red under her cap of gray hair. “They did more than lose faith—they turned on us! Why do you think we have the gates barred? That isn’t against anything unliving!”

Merrick narrowed his Center on the Prior, feeling her rage flare up to strangely high levels. Aulis cleared her throat, regaining her composure slightly before taking her seat once more. Many of the Order were a little arrogant; the sad fact was that it often came with power.

The cigar in Sorcha’s fingertips stilled as she too concentrated on the riled Prior. “And what happened after that?” she asked softly. Along the Bond, Merrick felt her own Center reach out to him. It was a strangely comforting, and yet frightening, gesture. She trusted him enough to give it to him, but felt in enough danger that she thought it might be needed. The situation felt as desperate to her as it did to him.

“Morning Matins.” Aulis’ hands were clenched tight on each other, her eyes unable to meet anyone else’s. “It came for us at morning Matins.”

“In what form?” Sorcha’s voice was flat and expressionless, but Merrick felt her tension in the Bond, and observed the way her fingers unconsciously arched toward where her Gauntlets lay at her side.

“None I know of.”

Merrick felt his mouth go dry. The geist by the roadside, the one summoned from the bodies of the Tinkers; that too had been a new form. He licked his lips. “Could the Sensitives identify it—”

“They had no time,” Aulis replied shortly. “They were the first to burn. You saw what was left of them in the center of the Hall.”

“Sensitives being attacked, unliving forms we’ve never seen before . . .” Sorcha took a long, slow breath.

“And don’t forget, ones that can travel over water,” Raed offered, his jaw tightening under his narrow beard. “I take it, Prior, that you have a plan to survive all this?”

Her eyes flitted to Merrick and Sorcha seated in the stone window. The glance was almost embarrassed.

“Oh, now I know you are joking!” Raed kicked the chair away and jerked to his feet. “Those two? I had to pull them out of the sea myself.”

Merrick clamped his arm down hard on his partner’s shoulder, fearing she would beat ten kinds of revenge into the Pretender. But, strangely, she attempted no such thing. Her body was tense, but she was not even looking at Raed.

Out in the courtyard, the crippled lay Brother was running toward the sound of a bell once more at the gate. Through his Center Merrick could sense nothing unliving, but something very human and very angry.

All three members of the Order leapt to their feet, sensing a conflagration of rage from beyond the walls. Together they bolted for the door, Raed shouting after them, “What? What is it?”

Neither of the women was going to enlighten him, so Merrick barked what they’d all sensed. “The locals are at the gate, and they are very unhappy.”

As he raced down the stairs, Merrick heard Sorcha ask the Prior how many of her lay Brothers and Actives were ready to defend the Priory. Another first for the Order, he thought miserably.

“We have five Actives uninjured, and maybe seven lay Brothers, all in the infirmary.”

“No time for that.” Sorcha ran ahead of them and he noticed that her Gauntlets were already in her hand. Merrick had to remind himself that she was an experienced Deacon, with years of dealing with people in a crowd situation, thanks to her time seconded to the Imperial Guard—at least, that was what he hoped.

He and Raed followed the Prior and Sorcha. The terrified lay Brother was racing back to them, his hair flying loose about his shoulders, and his eyes were wide circles in a pale face. “Prior, Prior!” A thin trail of spit ran down his cheek. The poor man was probably used to a very quiet life in this remote corner of the world; the shock looked like it might kill him. “I shut the gate as you told me to . . . I did . . . but they want to talk to you. They’re shouting so loud!”

Indeed they were, jumbled words and threats that made for an animalistic roar. The lay Brother had managed to get the huge oak gates and the thick iron bar down, so most likely the portcullis was still secure.

“Quickly.” The Prior gathered her habit around her knees and scrambled most inelegantly up the walls to the parapets. Night was drawing on and, as they reached the top of the walls, the raw air wrapped itself tight around them. Snow could not be far off, but the cold had done nothing to cool the anger of the crowd below.

It seemed every citizen of the town had climbed the hill. Many were carrying lit torches and shouting up to the Prior. The crowd’s words were mostly blended together into a primitive growl, but he heard many of them screaming for Aulis to come down to them. She stood there staring, her lips pursed in real anger, and looked ill moved to do so.

“I’ve never seen a person pulled apart by a crowd.” Raed put one foot on the parapet and tilted his head down. “Exactly how many of them have died thanks to your inability to protect what you are supposed to?”

Merrick could understand that the Pretender had no love for those who worked for the Emperor, but he found himself defending the old Prior. “We’ve all been surprised by the events of the last week or so. It’s unprecedented—the Prior Aulis can’t be held responsible for that.”

“Watch out!” Sorcha slammed into Merrick just as he was getting into full diplomatic flow. Together they smashed into the stone of the parapet and tumbled away, just as fire burst right where he’d been standing.

He dimly heard Raed’s shocked oath, while Sorcha helped him to his feet. A portion of the parapet was now a puddle of flame, almost like a geist attack of some sort . . . yet he had sensed nothing.

Raed was shielding Prior Aulis. “Felstaad fire.” She darted closer to the Deacons. “The local alcohol is deadly stuff. It makes for excellent missiles.”

They heard the clatter of other incendiaries smashing and burning against the wall. Obviously the first had been the best aimed. Cautiously, Merrick dared a glance over the edge. The locals did look very well armed, and in the flickering light of the torches they could be seen lighting rag wicks on small pottery jars. Most of these they hurled at the gate, but they also sent a fair number flying in toward where they’d last seen the Prior.

“Let them see how they like Chityre,” Aulis growled, yanking her Gauntlets out of her belt.

“What do you mean?” Sorcha actually grabbed hold of her superior, stopping her before she could put them on. “You cannot use the runes against civilians!”

Turning the power of the Order on the locals could ruin all the work the Mother Abbey had done. In the falling dark, the Deacon and the Prior stayed locked in a tableau of tension. Merrick knew what his partner meant; the powers were never to be used against people, only against the unliving. Aulis must have been half-maddened by her terrible situation to even contemplate it. Sorcha’s fingers stayed locked around the Prior’s wrists.

Shots rang out now. Wealthier townspeople often had guns, for hunting and protection. Merrick, for one, had hoped Ulrich was a poor town. The snaps of bullets reported off the stone, while Aulis and Sorcha went through their silent battle of wills. If either of them managed to get her hands on her Gauntlets, bullets would be the least of anyone’s worries.

If it came down to it, Merrick realized with surprising calm, he would give his Center to Sorcha. Then they would be battling a Prior in her own jurisdiction. Another first for the Order, one that would rock its very foundations. Merrick held his breath.

“Venerable Aulis,” Sorcha hissed in a voice that had not an ounce of deference in it, “let me deal with this.” A long moment passed, and Merrick was not sure which he was more afraid of: the two women or the mob screaming for blood outside.

Finally, Aulis let out a ragged sigh and gave a short nod to the tense Deacon. Sorcha rose cautiously to her feet and slid on her Gauntlets.

Still crouched on the parapet, Merrick touched her leg, afraid of the sudden expressionless glaze over his partner’s features. “Sorcha?” It was a personal address that he hoped might snap her back.

She looked down at him, and he recognized the gleam of something in those vivid blue eyes; he’d seen it on the stairs in his father’s castle, just before everything had gone mad.

“Trust me,” Sorcha said through a grim smile. “You have to trust me.”

Slowly, Merrick let his hand slide away from her. Despite everything—or maybe because of it—at this moment, he did.

Thrusting on her Gauntlets, Sorcha opened a tiny pinprick to the Otherside and summoned Chityre. Her hands lit up like popping fireworks in the half-light, flashing and burning like embers snapping from a brilliant fire. Stepping to the very edge of the parapet, Sorcha held up her hands as they writhed with power. Against the dying sun, her form was dark with only her Gauntlets burning. Glancing to his right, Merrick saw Raed’s face outlined by the light. He could tell by expression alone that the Pretender had not seen an unveiled Active up close like this. The air prickled with heat, as if a storm was coming. In a way, one was.

With a jerk of her hands, Sorcha let a surge of power break from Chityre into the sky. It ripped through the air like the boom of a cannon, accompanied by a flurry of bright fire. It was a display that would not have been out of place at one of the Imperial celebrations, and it had the desired effect.

Below, the crowd was suddenly silent. Merrick wanted to stand up and see the expressions on their faces, but he made do with reaching out with his Center. The waves of anger washing off the mob were fluctuating, replaced with eddies of fear.

Sorcha let another explosion flow through her Gauntlets; this one was louder and seemed to rock the wall. Merrick’s ears rang and through his Center it was like a pulse of light that momentarily blinded him. When he recovered, he feverishly checked; still no sign of the unliving.

“I hope you get my point!” Sorcha yelled from the parapet, her Gauntlets still pulsing with Chityre.

The crowd below muttered, but at least they weren’t screaming.

“You may have a couple of guns,” Sorcha continued, the air around her warm and smelling faintly of almonds, “but you are attacking a Priory full of Active Deacons. How many different ways do you think we have of killing you?” She gestured with one burning Gauntlet.

The night sizzled, warm now despite the wintry chill only minutes before. And just as suddenly, the mood of the crowd also changed, its rage dissipating into the night. A mob, Merrick considered, was an ethereal thing that could turn on a heartbeat, and the unveiled power that Sorcha was displaying was enough of a catalyst.

“We’ll be back,” one last brave soul screamed at them, and then they turned and descended back down the road. Merrick got to his feet, while at his side Sorcha stifled Chityre.

“They’re only retreating,” he observed. “They’ll take some time to get their bravery back, but at some point they will.”

His partner stripped off her Gauntlets with a terribly grim expression. He felt through the Bond that even this empty display had cost her. It had cost him too. It seemed that there wasn’t a rule that couldn’t be broken.

Aulis was still crumpled against the wall, perhaps waiting for someone to help her up. After a second, realizing that no one was going to, she started to get to her feet. “You see now,” she said in a low, angry voice, “what we have had to deal with these last few weeks. Unconscionable.”

No one answered.

It was the Pretender who found his voice first. “I don’t care about your impotent Deacons—my crew are in danger.” Raed’s expression dipped away from rakish, toward deep concern. Merrick could understand; no one could see the harbor clearly from up here.

“The townspeople won’t let you leave the Priory.” It was now Aulis’ turn to grin; a hard, bitter expression. She pointed to the road and it did indeed seem that the mob had retreated only to the bottom of the hill. The Prior gave a short laugh. “It won’t matter to them one little bit that you aren’t a Deacon. You’ve been in here; our taint has rubbed off on you.”

Raed let out a sharp oath, took a half pace and then jerked around. “I will get back to them, you know—whatever it takes.”

Sorcha ran a hand through her hair. “This is an old castle, no doubt with many secrets. No self-respecting lord would let himself be trapped up here.”

The Prior tucked her hands into her long sleeves. She remained silent for a moment, as if she wanted to hold on to something. Finally she let out an annoyed sigh. “There is an underground passage—an escape route that the Felstaads built.”

“That’s all I need.” Raed turned and took the stairs down into the yard once more.

“I will go with him,” Sorcha said bluntly, tucking her Gauntlets away.

Merrick couldn’t believe what his partner was saying. “You can’t!”

Her blue eyes were pools of darkness in the drawing night. “You were the one who made the bargain, Chambers. The Order does not go back on its word.”

“Deacon Faris is right,” Aulis chimed in, apparently having recovered some of her commanding nature. “Much as I dislike your companion, he should not be abandoned to those evil townspeople, or to the unliving.”

Merrick was glad at least to hear something like compassion from his superior. “Well, then, we should get after—”

“Not we.” Sorcha caught his arm before he could follow Raed. “Just me.”

“But we’re partners—we shouldn’t get separated.”

“Would you leave the Prior undefended?” Aulis snapped. “You are the sole Sensitive left!”

“Deacon Faris could run across this geist that attacked you—”

“I will manage on my own Sight. By the sounds of it, even I should be able to See the cursed thing.” Her eyes locked with his, a hint of a smile playing on her lips. She knew she had him beaten.

Merrick’s mouth worked, but the two women pinned him with their stares.

Sorcha gave him a nod. “It won’t take us long to get the Pretender’s crew to safety. Keep your Center wide-open, and you can still reach me.” She clapped him on the shoulder.

She was the senior partner, more experienced than he—this time he would have to trust her instincts. The Priory could not be left blinded. However, Merrick could not let her get the last word. He leaned over the wall and called after Sorcha. “Just remember, Deacon Faris—no Teisyat. Absolutely no Teisyat!”