The Horns of Ruin (21 page)

'wen 'wen really had been sent
to look after me by his boss. I wasn't _ sitting in the local station more than
five minutes before he came rushing in. Like he was just in the area. Sure.

"Gods, Forge. You look like hell."

"Hell is filled with trite expressions," I said,
wincing as I stood. "You my ride?"

"I don't think you're going anywhere. Honestly, you're
barely able to stand."

"Yeah. That's why I called for a ride." Truth
was, I had stumbled into this station to give them the word on my Elder. They
had rushed out with medical bags and trauma machines, out to where I had told
them Simeon was lying. They hadn't come back yet. In the meantime I had sat
down, and just hadn't gotten around to standing up again. Long as Owen was
here, though, I figured he could make himself useful. "Let's get
going."

He tugged at the leather shoulder strap of my holster as I
tried to get by. I turned to him.

"Seriously, what went on out there? I've got reports
on the rig of a roughed-up Elder of Morgan and a lot of dead bodies."

"That's what happens, usually. One of us, lots of
them." I rested against the counter for two long breaths. "Is he
going to be okay?"

"The Elder? I don't know, honestly. Who is it?"

"Simeon. He was out there ... talking. Trying to do
what he thought was the right thing." I looked Owen briefly in the eye,
then tugged free of his grasp and started toward the door. "Anyway. We've
got some ground to cover."

"There more bodies you need to lead me to, Paladin?"

"Not yet. But there will be." That got him to
follow me.

The ride over was quiet, quiet as it can be in a patrol
wagon with blaring sirens. The Chanter's island home wasn't too far, but it was
a lot farther than I was going to walk. On the way I gathered what strength I
could. Meditated. Thought about Simeon and Elias, put down by Betrayers'
blades. Barnabas. Wherever he was. I thought about those strange tattooed men,
and the cold, dead eyes of the coldmen as they came at us in the Amonites' cistern.

"What happened?" Owen asked, sternly. "What
are you driving us into, Eva? What am I going to lose my boys to this
time?"

I opened my eyes and looked down the length of the wagon.
Owen's patrol was strapped in, trying hard to keep their eyes forward, the fear
off their faces. Trying, and failing. Some new faces, to replace the boys we
lost in the cistern. Owen sat next to me, his hands crossed over the biggest,
widest shotgun I had ever seen. Boy had upgraded. Not so much of the Healer in
him now, perhaps. That was good.

"Who attacked the Elder, Eva? Must have been a hell of
a thing, to take down one of your old men."

"I don't know. Seems to be more and more common all
the time. As to who they were ... I'm not sure. I don't know, and I'm praying
like hell that you don't know them either."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"One of them was dressed as a High Elector of your
Cult. Guy's name was Nathaniel. He was in charge of security at the Strength,
around the time that Elias got killed." I gave Owen a sharp look.

"You're saying a scion of Alexander attacked you?
That's ... it's not true. It can't be."

"No, not saying that. I'm saying it looked like that.
But him and his dogs, they were Betrayer kin. They bore the icons, and they had
the invokations. Amon's folk, and no doubt about that."

The wagon got tense. Owen leaned close to me, his voice a
harsh whisper.

"Eva, if what you're saying is true-"

"Forget it. Forget I said anything. If it's true we're
going to have to root the whole damn Cult out again, I know it. We thought we
had them nice and safe in their black robes with their chain-bound souls. Lazy.
That's our mistake, Healer. We got lazy."

Everyone settled back into their seats and listened to the
sirens for a while. I didn't have to tell them what we might be going into. We
all knew the stories of the Betrayer. We knew this was the kind of fight that
ended with one side all dead and the other with plenty to mourn.

The Chanters sect of the Cult of Alexander has its own
island. It's the kind of thing you really hope for, when you're setting up a
mysterious religious order. Your own island. This particular island was really
just a floating tower, much more of it below the water than above, bobbing
peacefully in the wide bay that was formed by the two horns of the city of Ash.
It looked like an iceberg of stone, held in place by a flat ring of landing
platforms and docks that met the face of the water.

We took a ferry over, cranking up the wagon and bursting
along the dock with our sirens blaring as soon as we touched the artificial
shore. The Wardens of the Chanter's Isle didn't know what to make of that,
other than to give us funny looks and stay out of our way. Good enough for me.

The main gate of the Chanters' detention facility was a
facade of unbroken marble, smooth as the first snow. The wagon chattered to a
stop where the gate was supposed to be and the patrol piled out, Owen in the
lead. Beside the gate there was a marble figure, the barest features of a face
on a square column. I walked up to it and tapped it on the forehead.
Disrespectful, but I never was much of a fan of the Chanters and their pretty
little tower.

"Hello, inside. We'd like to come in now. Okay?"

The column shivered and the face moved. You could taste the
understated irritation.

"Entrance to this facility is limited to the highest
initiates of the Cult of Alexander, godking of all Ash. All others must request
special privileges. These requests may be filed-"

"Eva Forge here. Last Paladin of the dead god
Morgan." I bounced my sword lightly against the figure's face. "Open
up."

"Entrance to this facility-"

"For the love of the Brothers," I swore, then
bent at the knee and incanted something from my childhood. A trick we only used
when the brothers weren't looking. Mostly strength, but a lot of brute
violence, too. I put my shoulder against the pillar, grunted, and pushed. The
whole thing creaked and then splintered at the base. I was still smiling to
myself when the pillar tore free and went spinning against the smooth marble
wall.

"What the hell was that?" Owen asked.

"Morgan used to knock trees over with his shoulder,
when he was a kid," I answered. "He wasn't always a god. But he was
one hell of a strong kid."

"And you have an invokation for that?"

"Not something they teach you in the sanctuary, but we
figure it out." I stretched my back and smiled. "You can only use it
for frivolous things. For giggles. You probably don't have anything like that
in the Healers."

"Nothing about knocking trees over, no." He
squinted up at the quiet wall of the Chanters' tower. "And I'm not sure
your trick got us anywhere with our potential hosts."

"Well, yeah. Probably not. But it needed doing. It's
not like that conversation was getting us anywhere either."

"New plan. You're not the one doing the talking from
here on out."

And, of course, that's when the marble gate cracked open
and the Chanters came out to see who had knocked over their pet statue. I
turned to Owen and smiled.

"Newer plan. We skip the talking part next time."

"Gods and Brothers above," he said, sighing.
"Why do you encourage her?"

"Who did this thing?" the lead Chanter asked. She
was wearing a dress of iron plates, sewn onto cloth of steel and rattling like
loose shingles as she moved. There was a mask over the lower half of her face,
a series of baffles that stole the power from her voice and diffused it into
the air like wind chimes. The soft glory of her words did not match the fury in
her eyes.

"If you'd been listening," I said, raising my
sword to repeat the ritual of forehead knocking, "I am Eva Forge, last
Paladin of-"

"Right, right." Owen stepped in. "I am
Justicar Owen LaFey, sworn scion of our lord Alexander. I am escorting this
Morganite to an appointment with the Amonite, Cassandra. You are holding her
here at our will."

"Cassandra," the woman answered. "Yes. She
is in ritual right now. You may speak to her when it is complete."

"We'll speak to her now," I said. "I have
reason to believe that there are Betrayers among you, working to kill the
girl."

"Betrayers? In the House of the Chanter? No, such a
thing is impossible."

"Look, I'm pretty much going to insist on seeing the
girl, and standing guard over her." I rested the tip of my sword on their
nice lawn, threw my arm over the hilt, and smiled. "So you can get over
that and just let me in now. Please."

The Chanter glared at me, then at Owen, then at the rest of
the world.

"You will see the girl," she said, sharply.
"But that is all. The ritual is not to be interrupted."

"It's a good start, but I need to do more than see
her. I need to know that she's safe."

The Chanter held a hand up to me, as much a warning as a
benediction. "Silence, woman. Walk with me."

We walked. The marble gate closed behind us. Owen's patrol
kept close to him, right up until one of the Chanters made a sign and escorted
the boys away. Owen gave me a look, then went with them. I was alone with the
creepy Chanter girl and her mask of chimes.

"You have been to the Chanter's garden before,"
the woman said in her breathy, muffled voice.

I shook my head. "No. Never had reason to come
around." We entered the inner court of the castle, and even I'll admit it
was a beautiful place. Topiaries and pebble-lane mazes that wound around marble
fountains and statues that looked like dancing chandeliers ... it was eerie.
Nightmare in a tactical fight, too. I'd hate to try to hold a line among all
the hedgerows and tiled canals. "Nice place, though."

She gave me a strange look, muffled surprise wiped away
with a blink.

"Never had reason. I suppose not." She kept her
hands in the sleeves of her robe, but I could see her fists bunching under the
fabric. "No need for Morgan in a place like this."

Our path led us away from the gardens, then opened onto a
shallow lake with a bed of copper. There were rafts on the water. I squinted at
them, and could barely make out short, thin men with large heads working the
lines.

"Are those Feyr?" I asked.

"They are visitors. Let us call them guests."

I looked beyond the lake and saw marble walls and guards,
if Chanters with ornate poles could be called guards.

The woman noticed my attention. "They can leave when
they want, whenever they are able. We guard against them, that is all."

"They're that dangerous? Those guys are all around the
city."

"What they are is not dangerous. What they are doing
... Never mind. It is no matter to the House of Morgan. You are here to see the
Amonite, yes?"

"Yeah. You cracked her yet?"

"Cracked, no. But we have begun a conversation that
may lead to the story we need." She led me away from the lake and into a
building, finally. All these open spaces inside walls felt so unnatural to me.
"Is that why you are here? For a progress report?"

I hadn't really thought about that. I was there to pry
Cassandra out of the Chanters' creepy little hands and get her back to the
Strength. I don't know when my thinking on this had changed. When I had started
feeling more in union with the Amonite than the Healer. It wasn't like I didn't
trust Owen. Completely.

"I'm here to see her, to make sure she hasn't been
mistreated." I adjusted the holster on my belt. We were in a long, arched
stone tunnel. The air was cool and wet, and I thought maybe I could smell the
lake. "There have been threats."

"We don't threaten, Paladin. That is not our
way."

We walked in silence, our boots crunching on the gravel
path. She and I meant different things by threat, I think. There was more to
the process than physical violence. It was the kind of thing that could be
ugliest when it was pretty.