CHAPTER 8

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Plaisaunces was in an uproar. Courtiers huddled together in alcoves, speaking in urgent whispers. Messengers hurtled past, clutching dispatches. Ruaud could sense the growing tension as he made his way through the palace. At every stair and doorway, he was challenged by King Gobain’s household guards and obliged to show his papers, as well as the letter from Maistre Donatien requesting—no, demanding—his presence. Ruaud’s lieutenant, Alain Friard, followed him, his face a mask of bewilderment as he gazed at the chaotic activity.

“Something’s happened, Captain. Is it the Tielens?”

Ruaud nodded. “This doesn’t bode well.” In his opinion, the king’s decision to send the fleet to challenge Prince Karl was ill judged.

“Here we are.” He stopped at a great door of gilt-encrusted wood, guarded by halberdiers of the King’s House, resplendent in their coats of royal blue and gold.

“Captain de Lanvaux, Lieutenant Friard,” announced one of the guards as he opened the door to admit them.

Ruaud noticed Alain Friard’s eyes widen as they entered the chamber; the room was hung with martial tapestries and every wall bristled with crossed swords, spears and scimitars, delicate chain mail and plumed helmets, all trophies from the Holy Wars in Djihan-Djihar and Enhirre. A magnificent table dominated the center of the chamber, its surface polished to a mirror sheen.

Grand Maistre Donatien entered, imposing in his black robes. The golden Order of Saint Sergius hung on an emerald ribbon across his breast. The color of the ribbon did not escape Ruaud’s keen eye; it was the same green as the insignia of the Francian Inquisition. This obvious declaration of a new allegiance disturbed Ruaud, yet the benign expression on Donatien’s face as he greeted him was like a mask, giving nothing away.

“Maistre,” said Ruaud respectfully, dropping to one knee to kiss Donatien’s ring of office. “May I present my new lieutenant, Alain Friard?”

“Congratulations on your promotion, Lieutenant,” said Donatien, extending his hand. “You served us bravely in Ondhessar.”

Blushing, Friard knelt in his turn and touched the Maistre’s ring with his lips.

The formalities completed, Ruaud rose. “Do you know why the king summoned us, Maistre?”

As he spoke, the door opened again and another black-garbed priest entered, followed by a young secretary clutching a fat folder of documents. As the priest turned to nod them a curt acknowledgment, Ruaud recognized the hooded, watchful eyes of Inquisitor Visant. But before he could ask why the Inquisition had been invited to this meeting, the inner doors were drawn open and King Gobain strode in. One glance at his face was enough to tell Ruaud that his majesty was in a furious temper.

“Sit, gentlemen!” It was a command and the priests and Guerriers swiftly obeyed. “I won’t waste words. By now you’ll have heard of our humiliating defeat. By God, the whole quadrant will have heard!” His strong, strident voice boiled with barely restrained fury. “The flagship’s sunk, along with nine other warships. My wife’s brother, Aimery, is missing. Every remaining ship in the fleet is damaged—we’ll be lucky if half of them limp back to Fenez-Tyr.”

This was a comprehensive defeat. Ruaud, dumbstruck, stared at his reflection in the glassy tabletop. The thought of so many sailors lost in the sea battle, so many families bereaved and grieving, bruised his heart. Even the king had fallen silent, his chin sunk on his chest. No one spoke until Donatien cleared his throat and said, “Prayers will be said for the admiral and his men throughout Francia; I’ll send word to all the parishes directly. And would your majesty like me to conduct a service here at Plaisaunces?”

Gobain slowly raised his head. His eyes burned. “I want you to find me the man who caused this conflagration, Donatien.”

“Me, majesty?” Donatien said in tones of mild surprise. “But what can I do against Prince Karl?”

Gobain leaned across the table toward Donatien and spoke in a low, grinding voice. “Not that upstart Karl, but his damned Royal Artificier or whatever fancy name he’s known by.”

A slight frown furrowed Donatien’s smooth brow. “I beg your pardon, majesty, but I don’t quite follow—”

Gobain let out a snort of frustration. “Visant! Tell the Grand Maistre what your men have uncovered.”

Visant beckoned the secretary to open the bulging folder. He removed a file of papers and smoothed them out with neat, precise hand movements. “Alchymy,” he said. “The first reports from the survivors bear out my worst suspicions. Shells that exploded, letting off a pale, choking gas that caused confusion, blindness, and debilitating nausea among the sailors. Mortars that burst, setting fire to sails and rigging with flames that could not be extinguished with water. Sophisticated weapons that gave the Tielens an extraordinary advantage over our fleet.”

“And your point, Inquisitor?” said Ruaud.

“Alchymical weapons, without a doubt, Captain,” Visant said coldly. “Manufactured by one Kaspar Linnaius, late of the College of Thaumaturgy in Francia.”

“You told me all the magi were dead, Visant.” Gobain’s voice was quiet now, ominously quiet.

“Indeed, I believed so myself,” said Visant. “We tried Gonery, Maunoir, and Rhuys, with all their apprentices. Every man was found guilty and burned at the stake. But it seems that one escaped our raid…”

“Seems?” echoed the king scornfully. “D’you mean you don’t know?”

“What the Inquisitor is saying, majesty,” intervened Donatien, “is that when his men raided the college, there was an almighty explosion followed by a conflagration. When the Guerriers sifted through the rubble, they found some charred human remains in the West Tower. We assumed that both Kaspar Linnaius and his apprentice, Rieuk Mordiern, were killed in the blast.”

“An almighty explosion, hm?” the king repeated. “The very same alchymical firepowder that the Tielens have just used against our ships with such devastating effects.”

“Powder that can reduce a tower to rubble,” said Visant, a little defensively, Ruaud noted, “leaves very little behind of a body that can be positively identified. We’re talking fragments of charred bone.”

“Indeed,” added Donatien, coming to his rescue, “the magisters evinced some considerable distress when confronted with the evidence, leading us to construe that Linnaius had destroyed himself and his apprentice rather than be taken alive. However…”

“He played you all for fools,” said Gobain, sitting back in his chair and crossing his arms. “He faked his own suicide—and went off to Tielen, to sell his services to Prince Karl.”

“He’s still alive?” Ruaud and the other officers gazed at one another in consternation.

“Very much so, and enjoying the protection of his royal patron. It seems it pleases Karl to encourage the pursuit of such heretical sciences. He’s even created a special position at court for Linnaius.”

“So even though his wretched apprentice perished, he escaped?”

“My agents were a little more diligent than yours, Inquisitor.” Ruaud saw a triumphant gleam in Gobain’s eyes. “You assumed Linnaius was dead. But it seems that a certain Sieur Guirec, a clockmaker from Kemper, made a trip to the college to deliver parts to Linnaius. He never returned home. He must have been waiting to meet with the magus in the West Tower when your men stormed the college—and the explosion took place. Poor devil.”

An embarrassed silence followed. Ruaud studied the tabletop, aware that Visant and Donatien must be furious at being humiliated by the king in front of their inferior officers.

“How can we make up for this grievous oversight, majesty?” Donatien’s smooth tones were at their most placating.

“I want Linnaius. The man’s a traitor. Betraying his own countrymen—it’s outrageous! Burning’s too good for him. I want him to suffer!”

“With respect, majesty,” said Visant, reading from the open file, “Linnaius is not, technically speaking, a Francian, although it seems he has resided here for well over one hundred years.”

Alain Friard stared at Ruaud. “How can he be so old?” he whispered.

“By foul and unholy practices,” said Donatien, overhearing. “By use of the Forbidden Arts.”

“We have no record of his true nationality. Although some say he may be Tielen by birth, others say Allegondan, and others still have even suggested that he was born in Khendye—”

“What matters,” interrupted the king impatiently, “is that we stop him. Before he teaches all the Tielen scientists his deadly alchymy and Prince Karl invades Francia.”

“Perhaps such a situation could be avoided,” said Donatien, “if your majesty were to agree to talks with Prince Karl—”

The king’s clenched fist came down with a loud thud on the table, making the silver inkwells jump. “I will not parley with Karl or his ministers.”

“Very well,” said Donatien.

“Captain de Lanvaux—you’re due to return to Enhirre next week, I believe. I want you to stay here in Francia.”

“Me, sire?” Ruaud had not been expecting this and he could see from Donatien’s look of surprise that neither had the Grand Maistre.

“Now that the rebels have been brought under our control, a man of your ability is wasted on guard duty.”

Ruaud tried not to wince at the king’s lack of tact. To make a pilgrimage to protect the holy shrines was a task that all Guerriers of the Commanderie viewed as an honor, not a duty. But then, Gobain had never shown himself interested in matters of faith.

“Surely the Inquisition is better equipped to deal with this matter, majesty,” said Visant.

“But the point, Visant,” said the king, leaning across the table to stare bullishly into his face, “is that the Inquisition has failed. A powerful alchymist escaped your net. And now he harbors a grudge against us because we executed his colleagues. We have made a formidable enemy for Francia.”

“And while he remains in Tielen under Prince Karl’s protection, there’s very little we can do about it,” said Visant dryly.

“Which is why I’m choosing you, de Lanvaux, to set up a new detachment within the Commanderie,” Gobain continued, ignoring Visant. “I want you to choose and train agents. Agents clever and committed enough to outwit a magus.”

“Sire—” began Visant but Gobain held up a hand to silence him.

“Your agents will liaise with Inquisitor Visant’s men, of course,” he continued, “but you will train them to work undercover. Abroad, if need be.”

Ruaud was trying to digest this information. The appointment was an honor—but in favoring him, the king was snubbing both Visant and Donatien, his superiors. “And how will I select these agents, majesty?”

“Whatever way you please.” Gobain rose. “I leave the details to you. Funds have already been allocated to cover your expenses.” As his guardsmen opened the inner doors, ready to escort him to his private apartments, he called back over his shoulder, “You will base your operations at the Forteresse, but you will also have an office here, at Plaisaunces. I shall expect a weekly report on—”

“Gobain!” Queen Aliénor appeared in the doorway, a letter clutched in her hand, her face streaked with tears. “Aimery’s lost. He’s gone down with his ship.”

She ran up to the king, thrusting the letter into his hands. The king cast a quick glance over it. “This confirms what I feared from the first dispatches.”

“Why did you send him, Gobain? You sent him to his death!”

The king flushed an angry red. “I sent him? The navy was his own choice, Aliénor.”

“But if you knew we were going to war, you could have ordered him to stay behind—”

“The Tielens got the better of us! God knows I didn’t want to lose so many men and ships. We’ve been thoroughly humiliated.”

Aliénor took a little step backward as though she was about to faint. “Aimery,” she whispered. “Oh Aimery, why did it have to be you?”

“A chair for her majesty!” Ruaud hurried over to her side but she gave him a look so forbidding that it stopped him in his tracks.

“Dear majesty,” said Donatien, his voice suddenly warm and compassionate, “I am here whenever you wish to discuss arrangements for your brother’s funeral. But if you need time to grieve alone, my private chapel is at your disposal. I can ensure that you are left undisturbed for as long as you wish.”

“Thank you, Maistre Donatien,” said the queen, placing her hand on his. “You have always been so understanding.”

The king gave a grunt of exasperation at this, turned on his heel, and left the chamber without another word to his wife. She gave a sad little shake of her head. “Will you accompany me, Grand Maistre? Let us pray for Aimery’s soul together.”

Ruaud and the others bowed as the queen left, supported by Donatien. He was aware that Visant was looking sidelong at him, as though assessing his new partner. “What did you make of that?” he asked casually.

“A sad loss for Francia and for the queen.” Ruaud said, unwilling to speak his thoughts aloud where they might be overheard.

“You defeated the magi in Ondhessar; I defeated their Francian brothers at Karantec. But in Kaspar Linnaius we are dealing with a very powerful adversary. There was more to this attack on our fleet than the king was prepared to tell us. A fierce storm blew up out of nowhere and drove several of our ships onto the rocks.”

“The magus who stole Azilia’s crystal used the power of the wind to escape from Ondhessar.” Ruaud felt his shoulder begin to ache again at the memory; the bones damaged in his fall had taken a long time to mend. “I did all I could to stop him but…” His hand had moved involuntarily to touch the old injury. “And now he dares to destroy our fleet by such underhanded means?” He was more determined now than ever to take on the king’s mission.

“You’ve been matched against a formidable opponent, Captain. Your bravery is not in question. But are you sure that you’re ready for this task?” Visant gave him a hard, questioning look. “Don’t be in such a hurry to throw your life away. You have much to learn.” And before Ruaud could reply, the Inquisitor turned and left the council chamber.

 

“Why do you want to train as an exorcist, Captain?” The old priest stared at him through pebble-thick lenses. “What makes you think you’re suitable for such a challenging role?” In spite of Père Judicael’s calm manner, Ruaud was not deceived. The elderly father had a formidable reputation as a most rigorous and tenacious fighter of evil.

“It’s not the path I had seen myself following when I joined the Commanderie. But his majesty has requested me, so…”

“You served with great distinction at Ondhessar. You were awarded the Order of the Golden Staff.”

Ruaud, not certain what Père Judicael was implying, acknowledged the compliment with a nod.

“And you never encountered anything strange or inexplicable in the Holy Lands?”

Ruaud blinked. “Strange?” For days, he had been studying arcane and esoteric manuscripts kept locked away in the vaults of the Commanderie Library.

Père Judicael pushed himself to his feet with the aid of an ivory-handled cane and limped over to Ruaud. “To defeat a magus, you must learn to think like a magus. Do you really want to look into the depths of your soul? Aren’t you afraid what you might find there?”

“But the magi are born with the taint of evil in their blood. A taint that gives them unique powers. They’re different from us.”

“Are they, indeed?” A strange little smile appeared on the exorcist’s lips. “Ask yourself, Captain, what drives them to act as they do? Love, greed, hate, fear…all mortal emotions. They are not so different from us. And we can use those emotions to bring them down. Follow me.”

Père Judicael led Ruaud into a black chamber, lit only by a single high, barred window. The instant the door was shut, the old priest pulled a lever and the light from the window was extinguished as a shutter came down. Ruaud, cast into pitch-darkness, felt as if he were falling into a lightless pit. The sensation was disturbing, stirring up memories of long-forgotten childhood nightmares.

“What can you see?” asked Père Judicael’s dry voice.

Slowly, as Ruaud’s eyes became accustomed to the lack of light, he saw that he was standing at the center of a circle that had been painted on the black boards with a luminescent silvery substance. Unfamiliar sigils were painted in different sectors of the circle.

“What does this mean?” he asked warily.

“Don’t worry, Captain. If you were possessed by an evil spirit, it would have reacted quite violently to those signs by now. You are standing in the Circle of Galizur, one of the Seven Heavenly Guardians.” Père Judicael operated the lever again, letting a wan daylight back into the room.

“Ah.” Ruaud was still not entirely convinced by the theatricality of this effect. “So you practice exorcism by angelography. Can you actually communicate with the angels?”

Père Judicael pursed his thin lips as if Ruaud had suggested something blasphemous. “Only the Blessed Sergius was pure enough in heart to summon the Heavenly Guardians to his aid. The rest of us blemished mortals must manage as best we can.”

“But you can invoke their protective powers?”

Père Judicael only answered his question with another. “Are you prepared to undergo the ordeals that a trainee exorcist must endure?”

“The king has given me an order; I’m duty-bound to obey.” Ruaud wondered exactly what the old priest meant by “ordeals.” “Besides, how can I expect my Guerriers to respect me as a leader if I haven’t undertaken the same training?”

“Even though you may not emerge the same man that you are now?” The old man’s cormorant stare unsettled Ruaud even more than his ominous words.

“I place my trust in God,” he answered simply. “He will guide me; He always has.”

 

“You may be wondering why I’ve summoned you all here in secret,” said Grand Maistre Donatien. Ruaud took in a swift glance at the other members of the Commanderie assembled in Donatien’s rooms in the Forteresse: Inquisitor Visant; Lieutenant Konan; and Père Laorans. As they seated themselves around the table, he sensed that Donatien’s mood was far from welcoming.

“It has been brought to my attention, Laorans,” continued Donatien, “that you made a singularly disturbing discovery in Ondhessar.”

“Disturbing, Grand Maistre?” said Laorans, looking puzzled.

Donatien let out a little sigh. “The Codex—or, indeed, codices, for I understand that there are more than one.”

“Indeed, Maistre, this is the most significant collection of writings to fall into our hands in many centuries!” Laorans’s face lit up with a scholar’s enthusiasm, and Ruaud felt a sudden pang of alarm, sensing that Donatien was laying a trap.

“How would you assess yourself as a scholar of Old Enhirran?” asked Inquisitor Visant smoothly.

“I am accounted one of the best in the field,” said Laorans, modestly lowering his gaze.

“Then how do you explain this?” Donatien pushed a folder into the center of the table.

“Surely my translation is self-explanatory?”

Ruaud saw Donatien exchange a glance with Visant. Then he leaned forward and said quietly, “Do I have to remind you of the Sacred Texts, as translated by the Blessed Sergius? ‘In the beginning, the Winged Guardians who watch over our world walked among mortals and taught us to obey Divine Law.’”

“I take exception to your implication, Grand Maistre!” Laorans’s eyes lit with that same obstinate, obsessed expression Ruaud remembered from Ondhessar. “I learned the Sergian Texts by heart at Saint Argantel’s Seminary when I was ten years old.”

“‘But some of the Guardians were proud and disobedient,’” continued Donatien relentlessly. “‘Their sin was to disobey Divine Will, the Will that forbade any union between them and the mortals in their care. Children were born of this union, mortal children with unnatural powers.’”

“Yes, yes, I know the passage as well as you,” interrupted Laorans impatiently. “‘So the Divine Will spoke to Galizur, charging him to seek out these accursed children and destroy them. For if they are not stopped, they will use their powers to unravel the natural forces that bind the worlds together and become instruments of destruction.’”

Visant opened an ancient illuminated copy of the Holy Texts, one of the Commanderie’s treasures, and pointed to a passage scribed in ink as red as fresh blood. “‘Great then was the woe of the transgressors as they were cast into that place of dust and shadows, there to repent their sin throughout all eternity.’”

“So by your own admission you know that this Codex from Ondhessar is heretical!” declared Donatien triumphantly. “And yet you still continued with your translation?”

“I considered it my duty as a scholar to do so.”

“What if it got into the wrong hands? It could seed dissension throughout the whole quadrant!”

“Forgive me, Grand Maistre,” broke in Konan’s deep rumble of a voice, “but you’ve lost me completely. Are you saying that the manuscript we found in the Shrine at Ondhessar is a fake? A forgery? Or worse?”

Ruaud looked at his lieutenant, grateful that he had voiced one of the many questions that someone needed to ask.

“This Codex undermines our most fundamental beliefs.” Donatien’s habitual amiable expression had gone, replaced by a look of grim determination.

“Magic is forbidden, because the Divine Will forbade it,” said Visant. “Mortal man was never meant to wield magic.”

“Why else does it tell us of the terrible punishments inflicted on the Guardians who transgressed? Yet this Ondhessar Codex says that those Fallen Guardians not only had forbidden congress with mortals, but they taught their children how to use their magical powers. It even asserts that the magi are none other than the children of the Fallen Guardians!” Donatien’s face had turned an angry red and he brought his fist down on the table. “This Codex is blasphemous! It goes against everything we believe. It goes against the Sacred Texts.” He turned on Laorans. “Your translation must be at fault.”

“I agree, it is an obscure variant of Old Enhirran. Some of the characters are ambiguous. But the names—the names are undoubtedly the same.”

“Then what we have here is nothing but an apocryphal text, written by an obscure, heretical sect. A sect that has been wiped from mortal memory because they practiced the Forbidden Arts.”

“But, Maistre—,” began Laorans.

“Didn’t you hear me? It’s not the true Word! We are faced with an impossible decision.” Donatien began to pace the narrow chamber, his hands behind his back. “Do we destroy it? Or, since you’ve blabbed the news to half the scholars in the quadrant that you’ve found an ancient sacred scripture dating from before Artamon’s reign, do we have to lie? Do we announce that it disintegrated before you could complete your translation?”

“But is it truly blasphemous?”

“Listen to yourself!” Donatien stopped and stared into Laorans’s face with a look so chilling that Laorans shrank away. “Already it’s made you begin to question your own faith. If these dangerous words were read by our congregations…”

“I would never d—dare to question,” stammered Laorans. “But suppose—just suppose for one moment—that this is right, and the Sergian translation is the heretical version?”

Laorans, you idiot. In the ensuing astonished silence, Ruaud felt as if the temperature in the room had plummeted.

Visant recovered the first. “You may give thanks to God that only the four of us heard you say such a sinful thing. Men have gone to the stake for less. On what possible grounds, Laorans, do you base such a suggestion?”

“I—I was merely hypothesizing. I never intended—”

“We are carrying out Divine Will in eradicating the magi, the last few survivors of that accursed bloodline.”

Laorans would not give in so easily. “Yet suppose that the children with angel blood in their veins were not accursed, but gifted? And that they were meant to use their gifts to help us, as this Codex suggests?”

“Gifts?” Visant pulled out a thick leather-bound folder and began to read aloud from it. “‘Nine years ago, incident reported in Vasconie—a young boy is said to have caused a rockslide, burying several of his companions. One pulled dead from the rubble; two others crippled for life. Villagers said that the boy was often shunned and taunted by his peers because of his “weird eyes.” Mother reported to have died in childbirth, “screaming in agony.”’ Or this one. ‘Forty-one years ago, province of Armel. Devastating flood washes away crops and livestock; little girl drowned. Older brother found weeping near local lake. “I was only trying to help end the drought. I never meant for anyone to be hurt.” Grieving father described son Goustan as, “different from my other children, especially his strange blue eyes.”’ And ‘Earthquake in Allegonde, twenty-two years back.’ Shall I go on?” He thrust the folder toward Père Laorans. “These are just some of the children born with ‘angel blood.’ How can you possibly suggest that such gifts are of benefit to mankind?”

Donatien placed a gilded casket on the table and opened it. Inside, cushioned on ivory silk, lay fragments of wood, charred and ancient.

“Sergius’s Staff?” said Ruaud, staring in wonder. This priceless relic of their patron saint was so fragile that it was kept hidden away and was rarely brought out, even by the senior members of the Commanderie.

“Before you leave this chamber, I’m afraid I must ask you to take a vow on the Staff, gentlemen. A vow never to reveal—on pain of death—what we have discussed today.”

“So you are suppressing my translation?” Laorans stared challengingly at Donatien.

“When you became a Guerrier, you promised to obey me, as representative of Divine Will here on earth.”

Ruaud caught Konan’s eye; the big man looked distinctly uncomfortable.

“Believe me, Laorans, this grieves me almost beyond words.” Donatien’s tone had become softer, almost appeasing. “I’ve never had to impose my will on any of my fellow Guerriers before.”

Laorans placed his hand on the casket. “I swear to you, Maistre, by Sergius’s Staff, never to reveal the results of my researches and translations.” The vow was made, but Ruaud had heard the suppressed rage in Laorans’s voice.

“Now you, Captain.”

Ruaud closed his eyes a moment in silent prayer. In making this vow, he was betraying the trust of one of his own men. Yet Donatien was his spiritual leader and commanding officer; he must obey him or face ignominious court-martial. He stretched out his hand and began, “I swear, by Sergius’s Staff…”

“And now that I have your vow, Laorans, I have exciting news. I’m sending you to set up a new mission in Serindher.”

“Serindher?” repeated Père Laorans dazedly.

“You will leave Saint Argantel’s Seminary and lead a group of ten priests to spread our missionary work far beyond the western quadrant.”

“And far enough away,” murmured Konan in Ruaud’s ear, “to cause no further trouble.”