The Cardinal's Blades

21

Holding a lantern in one hand and his sword in the other, Savelda kicked open the door to an empty, dusty room, dimly lit by the nocturnal glow coming from its sole embrasure. He examined the premises from the threshold, while hired swordsmen came and went behind him on the stairway.

“No one here!” he called out. “Keep looking. Search the keep from top to bottom. Laincourt can’t be far.”

Then he closed the door.

Silence returned and a moment went by before Agnes let herself drop from the ceiling beams she had been clinging to. Stealthily, she went to press her ear to the door and, reassured, returned to place herself at the embrasure. She did not know who this Laincourt was and the news that Savelda was hunting for someone other than her was only a small comfort. Granted, her escape had so far gone undiscovered. But the freebooters combing through the keep were still very much a threat to her.

Outside, in the lower part of the ruined castle, about fifty metres from the keep, the ritual was proceeding.

It had started at moonrise, led by Gagniere, who officiated bare-headed, dressed in a ceremonial robe. He chanted in the ancient draconic tongue, a language which his audience did not understand but whose power, beyond its actual meaning, resonated in the depths of their being. Their souls aquiver, the candidates for initiation listened, taken over by a sacred fervour.

Then the vicomtesse, still masked, solemnly entered the pool of warm light from the torches and bonfires, and took up her place behind the carved altar. There was a heavy silence while Gagniere stepped back to her side and, with lowered head and hands crossed upon his belly, adopted a meditative pose. She then began, also using the draconic tongue, the long litany of Ancestral Dragons, invoking their true names and asking for their protection. This took some time, as each Ancestral Dragon had to be addressed by its title and its closest family ties. And the names she pronounced before each panegyric were moreover repeated by Gagniere in his role as First Initiate, and then taken up in chorus by the entire audience.

Finally, the vicomtesse opened a casket placed on the altar and took out the Sphere d’Ame which she brandished in her outstretched arms. Still speaking in the draconic language, she called upon Sassh’Krecht, the Ancestral Dragon whose primordial essence haunted the globe with its black turmoil. Now, she recited all of Sassh’Krecht’s parents and descendants, titles, legendary exploits, and, as she declaimed them, the atmosphere around her filled with a presence that was as exalting as it was frightening, originating from the beginning of time and soon to be resurrected in defiance of the laws of nature.

At this point, beginning with Gagniere and with Saint-Georges just behind him, the faithful filed past the altar in good order, each knelt at the vicomtesse’s feet, placed their lips upon the Sphere d’Ame which she had lowered to their height, and then went to stand in a long row. By their kiss, they had signified their assent. Ready to sacrifice a part of themselves, they waited for Sassh’Krecht to manifest itself and impregnate their soul.

In a trance, the vicomtesse de Malicorne raised the globe toward the moon. She shouted a command. Whirlwinds lifted around her. Above the castle, the clouds in the sky suddenly dispersed, as if driven away by a centrifugal force. Black and grey plumes escaped from the paling Sphere d’Ame. They rose in long ribbons as a dull noise filled the night and, little by little, they formed the shape of a giant spectral dragon which reared up, deployed its wings, and occupied an immense span of the sky. Sassh’Krecht had survived death for centuries now, a prisoner of the Sphere d’Ame where all of its power had been concentrated. It gloried in the freedom which it had now almost completely recovered, only its tail still attached to the relic the vicomtesse gripped in her hands, her body traversed by ecstatic shivers. It simply needed to take possession of the souls that its disciples were offering freely.

No one heard the shot, but all of them saw the Sphere d’Ame, now milky white, burst into shatters.

The vicomtesse screamed and collapsed. The entire gathering suffered an enormous shock that left it reeling and Sassh’Krecht emitted a cavernous howl that shook the members of the Black Claw to the core. Detached from the Sphere d’Ame before it had managed to become fully incarnate, the Ancestral Dragon contorted like an animal trapped in a blazing fire that was devouring it.

Gagniere was the first to react.

He rushed over to the unconscious vicomtesse, crouched down, lifted her up slightly, saw that she was still breathing, and, at a complete loss, looked about him in an effort to comprehend.

Had the ritual failed?

The skies grew dark. Still howling, the spectral dragon twisted in pain as shreds were torn from its ghostly silhouette like wisps of mist. Stormy rumblings were heard. Gold and crimson flashes ripped through the night sky as Sassh’Krecht liberated energy that had to find an outlet.

Gagniere saw the vicomtesse’s dragonnet flapping in the air around them. It hissed at him furiously, and then flew off toward the keep. He followed it with his eyes and saw the thin stream of smoke that filtered from an embrasure.

Pistol still smoking in her hand, Agnes dashed down the steps of the tower from where, both hidden and able to observe every detail of the ceremony, she had opened fire. Aware of what was at stake and doubting she would live to see the dawn, she had resolved that as she had nothing to lose. She would wreak as much havoc as possible and wait for the ritual to reach its critical point before she intervened.

Now, she had to make an effort to survive and, perhaps, even to escape.

She descended one floor, then two, and had reached the first floor when she heard hurried steps climbing toward her from the ground floor below. She cursed, tore down an old drapery from a wall, and hurled it like a fishing net over the first swordsman who presented himself, delivering a kick that broke his jaw. Her victim fell backward, toppling his comrades who became tangled up with him and the dusty piece of cloth, which they ripped at without managing to free themselves. Those jostling with one another behind them were forced to retreat back down the stairs and Savelda’s angry voice could be heard shouting.

Agnes immediately reversed course and climbed the steps two by two. Her only hope was to reach the top of the tower and the walkway along the keep’s ramparts. She suddenly came face-to-face with a lone freebooter. She drew her sword to block his blade, violently drove the butt of her pistol upward into his crotch, and sent her opponent tumbling down the stairs, breaking his neck in the process.

With Savelda’s men now at her heels, she arrived on the last floor of the tower when a hand on her shoulder drew her behind a wall hanging and through the little doorway which it hid. Agnes found herself in a narrow, shadowy corridor, pressed up against someone who murmured to her: “Silence.”

She closed her mouth and remained still, while on the other side of the door, the Black Claw’s hired swordsmen ran over to the keep’s walkway without stopping.

“My name is Laincourt. Don’t be afraid.”

“And of what would I be afraid?

At which point, Laincourt felt the nip of a dagger that had reached high up between his thighs.

“I am in the cardinal’s service,” he whispered.

“They are searching for you, monsieur.”

“So we have something in common. What’s your name?”

“Agnes. I thought I heard a shot just before the ceremony began. Was that you?”

“In a manner of speaking. Come, it won’t take them long to figure things out.”

They advanced silently down the dark corridor, passing before a triple-arched window.

“You’re wounded,” said Agnes noticing the Laincourt’s bloody shoulder.

“I didn’t fire the shot.”

“Can you move it?”

“Yes. It’s not broken and the pistol ball passed clean through. Nothing serious.”

They pushed a little door open and then followed a passage lit in the distance by some square openings looking out into the courtyard. The ceiling was so low that they could only progress bent double.

“This passage runs beneath the walkway. It will take us to the next tower. They’re probably yet not looking for us there.”

“You seem to know the premises well…”

“My knowledge is newly gained.”

At the end of the passage they came to another door.

They listened, opened it cautiously, and emerged behind a sentry. Laincourt slit his throat and held him as he sagged. They heard a great commotion on the lower floors, found only locked doors, and were forced to climb some very steep steps in order to raise a hatch that gave them access to the roof.

They were fortunate it was deserted, although they could see torches and silhouettes moving about on one of the other towers, the one where Savelda and his men were finishing their search. Beyond, in the tormented sky, the spectral dragon had been replaced by a fury of uncontrolled magical energy. The red and golden flashes had redoubled in intensity. Interspersed by thunderclaps, a deep roar rumbled above them that could be felt in the gut and increasingly threatened to unleash itself upon the castle itself.

“Quick!” yelled Laincourt.

Seeking cover behind the crenellations, they took the walkway toward the third tower. They went as fast they could without running upright and started to believe that they might make good their escape when a strident cry rang out nearby: the vicomtesse’s dragonnet was beating its wings level with them and giving away their position. Heads turned their way. A hue and cry was raised.

Laincourt brandished his pistol and shot the reptile down with a single ball that ripped off its head.

“A wasted shot,” commented Agnes.

“Not entirely,” replied the cardinal’s spy, thinking of the hurdy-gurdy player who had been captured thanks to the dragonnet.

They were halfway between the second and the third towers, toward which Savelda’s swordsmen were already hurrying. They ran under sporadic and badly aimed fire, reached the tower before their enemies, and tried to open the hatch.

Locked.

“Merde!” Laincourt swore.

Agnes took stock of the situation. Savelda and his freebooters were coming toward them from the first tower by the walkway. Others were already emerging from the second tower and blocked any possibility of retreat. The ground was fifty metres below. They did not have time to force the hatch.

They were trapped.

Agnes and Laincourt placed themselves en garde, back to back… and waited.

Cautious now, the hired swordsmen slowed down and surrounded them, while Savelda, calm and smiling, walked up to them.

A circle of blades closed in on the fugitives, who were resolved to die rather than allow themselves to be captured.

“Usually,” Agnes muttered to herself, “they show up about now…”

Laincourt heard her.

“What did you say?” he asked over his wounded shoulder.

“Nothing. Delighted to have met you.”

“Same here.”

And then rescue came from the sky.