The Demon of Darkling Reach (The Black Prince Book 1) (29 page)

“Of course. I
am
sorry,” Isla said. An errant gust blew, and she shivered.

“No doubt.” Father Justin’s tone, unlike his pleasant expression, was difficult to interpret. “I thought we could use your father’s study,” he said, leading her out into the hall. Isla nodded, and let herself be led.

She wondered where her father was; she realized now that she hadn’t seen him in the chapel. Apple had been there, half asleep and with dark smudges under her eyes from a night spent carousing. The young, strapping bowman sitting next to her had looked equally worn out. He was one of Tristan’s men, one of the large contingent that had stayed behind when Tristan himself had left.

Well, Isla mused, she was glad that her stepmother was having a good time. No wonder her father had made himself scarce; he’d probably spent the night in the stables with his horse and wouldn’t have the courage to show his face before dinner. Or maybe he’d slept with the pigs, in their sty; they were friendly enough creatures and he’d done that before, too, emptying his flask as he regaled them with his various woes. Sometimes he sang.

“What, child?” Father Justin asked, seeing her change in expression.

“I was merely wondering what had become of my father,” she replied.

“He did, I believe, imbibe a powerful draught last night for his stomach ailments.” Later, Isla would wonder how Father Justin had known that. At the time, following him down the shadowed main hall, she took his explanation for granted.

He stopped at the door to her father’s study, a great iron-banded thing. Producing a key, he fitted it into the equally massive iron lock that protected the room within. She stepped inside.

The Church of the Renunciates, as their faith was officially known, taught that there were two gods: the Light One, and the Dark One. The Light One, or the good god, was the force for good described in scripture and the creator of the spiritual realm—and of the soul. The Dark One, meanwhile, was the creator of the physical realm. Which meant that, therefore, the physical realm and everything in it, including the human body, was tainted with sin.

Thus, the belief that the sexual act in all its forms was irredeemably evil: it stemmed from the urge of lust, a wholly
physical
urge and thus one stemming from the Dark One’s influence. The most devout members of the church refused to even eat anything that might exist as the byproduct of sexual reproduction, such as meat. They lived instead on a vegetarian diet, some even eschewing things like dairy products and honey due to their association with the tainted animal. In order for a cow to produce milk it must first give birth—and have been given birth to.

The church taught that all human beings, even women, contained within them a divine spark: an element of the Light One trapped within their fleshly prisons. While the Dark One sought constantly to tempt them away from realizing this, the Light One fought to save them. Through some kind of agreement between the Gods, the precise nature of which was not understood, they produced an offspring: the Mediator. Made from spirit
and
flesh, he was sent down from the heavens—or up from Hell, depending on how one looked at it—to help mankind realize his true nature and, in so doing, achieve freedom from the cycle of rebirth and thus salvation.

The Prince of the Gods, the Mediator, was worshipped both as principal god and savior, a combination of spirit and flesh who, for a brief time, had served as the Light One’s emissary on earth and whose teachings should be regarded evermore as essential to salvation. The church further held to a doctrine of reincarnation, whereby human beings were born into this world of pain, suffering, and corruption over and over until they achieved total liberation—liberation coming, naturally, in the form of renouncing one’s connection to the world.

An especially helpful form of renunciation was giving all of one’s property to the church. If one felt that there might be a
better
recipient, or that one wished to provide for one’s children rather than provide worthy men like Father Justin with new robes, then one clearly
wasn’t
liberated. Occasionally, some poor fool claimed that following the Mediator’s teachings had led him to a different result than whatever the church taught. Such individuation was…discouraged.

“Sit down, please.” Father Justin gestured toward a chair.

Isla sat.

Father Justin, however, did not sit but continued to pace around the room. Isla listened as he laid out the importance of listening respectfully during services, of appreciating the vital nature of the Mediator’s teachings, and so forth. So far, this was exactly what Isla had expected to hear and she felt comfortable enough.

She found herself examining her father’s study: the old, pitted desk, the bookshelf with its row of ledgers, most of which she’d filled out for the past few seasons, the flagstone floor, the massive fireplace. Someone had set a fire, which surprised her; she didn’t think anyone had been in here yet this morning. Wood was dear, and people didn’t light fires for no reason. Even in the wealthiest households, fuel—for cooking, lighting, heating, and all manner of other things—was carefully rationed. But this fire burned merrily and had, judging by its well-established nature, been burning for some time.

Isla found herself mesmerized by the leaping flames as Father Justin lectured on, about the importance of prayer and contemplation—especially for women, who were the original temptresses. Isla had never understood how
that
was supposed to work. Rarely in her life had she seen a woman throwing herself at a man, but practically every time she left her room she saw some poor woman being chased around. She thought about the barmaids at the tavern in the village, serving tankards of ale with fixed smiles on their faces.

The lock on the door clicked shut with a loud snap. Isla’s head shot up, and her eyes met the priest’s. They were watery, and rimmed with red. Deep within their gray depths, fire lurked. She saw it now, as she’d never seen it before: the fanaticism. The insanity.

“And now,” he said, the sheer calmness of his tone searing terror into her heart, “you’re going to do your penance.”

But he doesn’t even
like
women
, was Isla’s fractured thought.

She tried to get up and, striking as quickly as a snake, he slapped her. Her head snapped to the side as she fell back into the hard wooden chair. He slapped her again, hard enough to make her ears ring. No, she realized, hit her outright. She tasted blood inside her mouth, and one of her molars was loose. She tried to call out, but no sound came.

The priest smiled. “Even if there were anyone to hear you, child, which there is not, and even if there were anyone in this house with enough spine to defy me, which there is not, no one could get in here fast enough. They’d need to break down that door with an ax and by then”—his smile deepened—“we’ll be done.”

He was right—that was the worst part. She knew, in her bones, that Father Justin spoke nothing but the truth. She was trapped in her father’s study,
in her own home
, with a madman. And she had no one to blame but herself. Blithely, she’d assumed that the priest had only wanted to lecture her. After all, what else could he possibly have wanted? She was no one! And priests…didn’t do things like this!

“What…” she managed finally, the words coming painfully through swollen lips, “do you want?”

“For you to tell me what I want to know, you disgusting little whore.”

She just stared at him.

“About your lover. The demon.”

“He’s not—”

The priest hit her again. Isla was perilously close to losing consciousness, and she fought against the gray haze that threatened to envelop her. The Gods only knew what he’d do to her if she passed out. Isla had never been so scared in her entire life; she was too scared to even register how scared she felt. All this time, she’d thought she’d known what fear was: when her mother died, when Jasmine died, when her father remarried a mysterious and much younger woman. When Tristan Mountbatten turned his dark gaze on her for the first time. When he’d glamoured her. She’d had her heart in her mouth then, but none of that—
none
of it—could hold a candle to this.

And only the day before, she’d thought she’d never be scared again.

At that precise moment, she would have done almost anything to see Tristan walk through the door—and she didn’t even know why such a thing should be, when she hated him so. She couldn’t explain her feelings, even to herself. All she knew was that Tristan, if not a known quantity, was at least…himself. Nothing intimidated him.

She touched her fingers to her lip, shock warring with disbelief. As much pain as she was in, some part of her couldn’t actually believe that this was happening. She felt like she was floating near the ceiling, staring down at herself. This priest, this
authority figure
, had her trapped in her father’s study and there was
nothing she could do about it
.

She’d always felt safe in her own home, growing up, even when the people around her had begun having accidents. It had honestly never occurred to her that
she
might be hurt, that
she
might die. But, gazing across the room at Father Justin, she understood for the first time that dying was a real possibility.

He turned his back to her, stoking the fire with an iron poker until sparks shot up. The poker was a wicked thing with a pointed hook on the end, meant to catch at the logs for ease of moving them around.

Isla swallowed.

His tone, when he spoke, was conversational. Pleasant. Almost cheerful. “Don’t dissemble,” he advised, his eyes still on the fire. “If you would be a Good Woman”—the church referred to its members as
Good Men
and
Good Women
, respectively—“then you must follow the rules.” He turned, his pale eyes fixing on her. “You’re very bad at following the rules, Isla. Very bad indeed. You laugh out loud in the middle of services, you find humor in inappropriate remarks at dinner. Now, all of this might be forgiven, seeing as how you’re young and naïve and a woman”—he sighed in mock regret—“if it weren’t for the fact that you’re also consorting with hellspawn.”

He’s not my lover
, she thought. “I’m not a whore,” she said quietly.

Father Justin ignored her. He kept his place by the fireplace, toying idly with the poker as he talked. “That tells me, child, that your disregard of church doctrine is quite intentional—and that your place in Hell is assured. But you can save your soul if you tell me what I want to know: where your lover is now, what business he’s on for the king and what his plans are for his hostage. The nephew of our
true
king,” he added, “the rightful heir to House Terrowin.”

With those last words, Isla understood. This wasn’t about witchcraft, or demons, at all. This was about power. Father Justin might or might not believe in his church’s teachings on the nature of demons, might or might not believe in their existence, but he certainly believed in the divine right of kings. And in the gifts they bestowed on their favorites.

“I don’t know where he is. And I don’t know anything about Asher.”

Father Justin’s eyes widened fractionally at this mention of the boy’s given name, and Isla realized that she’d made a mistake. “You’ve spoken to him, then. You know him. Does he assist in whatever rites the duke practices, in his worship of the Dark One? In your lovemaking, perhaps?” he asked suggestively. He went on, in a honeyed tone, to make several suggestions so lurid as to be stomach-turning. Isla suppressed the urge to gag. That anyone could
think
of such things said, in her opinion, a great deal about their character.

But she refused to give him the satisfaction of a response, only listened in silence and watched as he twirled the poker in the fire.

“You sit with him at table. You feed each other bites of food.” His tone turned to one of disgust. “It’s well known by the entire household that you visit each other at night and that he’s quite…solicitous of your welfare.” The priestly mask returned, as he once again changed tack. “Child, if you value your soul, you’ll free yourself from whatever hold he has on you and tell me what I want to know. It’s not too late to return to the light.”

“And then you’ll let me go?” she asked, even though she knew the answer.

“Of course not.” His chuckle was quite pleasant. Indulgent, even.

“You’re making a mistake,” she said, willing her voice not to waver as she faced down the creature across from her. “I promise you, I don’t know anything. And even if I did,” she added defiantly, “I wouldn’t tell you.” She couldn’t explain why she’d told him what she had, only that she meant it. She hated the church, hated its hypocrisy and its lies and its disinterest in its parishioners, but something more had motivated her words—something hidden, from a deep place that she didn’t visit very often.

“That,” Father Justin said, “is unfortunate.” He pulled the poker from the fire in a shower of sparks. A log popped and disintegrated. “Although the path of pain can be, in the end, even more clarifying. In your suffering, child”—he turned—“you shall see the Gods.”

“You mean…?” He was going to
torture
her?

Isla screamed.

She tried to get up again even as her head swam and he jabbed the poker toward her. Almost casually, indicating what would happen if she continued to be so foolish.

“Unfortunate,” he murmured again, moving closer. “Manifestly unfortunate.”

Her eyes focused on the tip of the poker, bright white fading slowly into to a dull, infected red.

“If you lack the will to free yourself, then
I
shall drive the demon out of you. Pain is cleansing. You will tell me what I want to know—and you will repent.”

“Repent of what?”

“Your lack of belief. Your evil association. Your refusal to do as your elders and betters command.”

“What…are you going to do to me?” she breathed, unable to wrench her eyes from the approaching poker and barely daring to ask the question. The entire world had been reduced to that evil, glowing tip.