The Trials of Empire, page 28
The sheriff looked incredibly unamused, to my great mirth. “Whereas you smell like shite,” he retorted.
I looked past him to see that candles were lit in the hallway. “What time is it?”
“The ninth bell just tolled,” Sir Radomir said. “You have slept the balance of the day. Sir Konrad wishes you to attend your research. Have you eaten? I know you have not washed.”
I shoved him, putting on false airs. “I am a lady,” I said.
“Aye. A stinking one. Come; wash and eat. I shall see you in the Hall of Solitude when you are ready.”
I did indeed wash and eat. Servants attended me at every step of the way, servants who had long been sidelined in these tumultuous times and who seemed pleased to have something to do. A small army of matrons drew me a scalding hot bath infused with wildflowers and herbs and scrubbed every inch of my skin, tutting over my scrapes and bruises and looking pointedly at the mark of the Trickster on my chest, which they clearly considered some sort of ill-advised tattoo. Fresh clothes were brought for me, the first an absurd court dress which I eschewed in favour of a simple kirtle, smock and headband. Then, once I was dressed, Heinrich and I made our way to the Hall of Solitude, where we ate heartily in a temporary mess which the Guard had set up in one corner.
So sated, and with my sword buckled about my hips, I joined Sir Radomir and my life guard, and soon we were making our way down the Saint Slavka the Martyr High-Way, across the Miran Bridge, and to the Law Library.
Like much of the rest of Sova, the place was quiet and dark, its staff of fussy librarians barred in their homes awaiting the end of the curfew – though, given the lateness of the hour, it wouldn’t have been open anyway. The Imperial Guard ripped away the hastily erected barricades which crowded the main entrances, mostly boards hammered into the jambs with large iron nails and stacks of crates and barrels filled with sand. I looked around at the tangle of buildings to the south which lined the Petran High-Way, and saw that many windows were gloomily lit with candles where families huddled in fear. The news of the city’s temporary liberation had not yet spread to the wider population, and probably wouldn’t now until the following morning. I wondered what fresh horrors were in store, what reprisals the citizenry had in mind. The commonfolk were a vengeful mob, and simply because the traitor Imperial Guard had been dealt with – for now – did not mean that the violence in Sova was over. Sir Gerold and his city watch were about to have a hell of a time keeping order.
We entered the Law Library. The Guard fanned out and quickly searched the place, but it was clear that it was empty. Lighting a torch, I gave the mandatory bucket of sand to Sir Radomir to lug around, and then I began the search for the books Vonvalt had told me to look for.
The bells were tolling midnight when it came time to sit down and read. I had recovered perhaps half of the books from the list; we had summoned several Guardsmen to assist us in getting down to the Master’s Vaults, but only one of the books Vonvalt had asked for was there.
I set the lantern down and began to read, whilst Sir Radomir played a game with Heinrich. They were being too loud, so I sent them further afield.
The books were old and managed to take some extremely interesting and frightening concepts and render them unreadably boring. I leafed through the pages, poring over paragraph after paragraph of dry philosophical text written by the Order’s many jurists, each more in love with the sound of his own voice than the last. But there was no denying that Vonvalt knew his books. Each work, each section to which Vonvalt had directed my attention, spoke to a number of common themes: séance, communicating with the dead, a process called “channelling”, by which necromancers could direct and divert the energies of the afterlife in novel ways, and the different Draedist runes. But these were not instructions; the books discussed these things in academic terms, in terms of jurisprudence, and their efficacy as investigative tools.
After several hours, during which I heard both Sir Radomir and Heinrich snoring – ironic, given that their sole purpose in accompanying me was my protection – I stood up to stretch my legs, when I heard a thump from somewhere in the nearby shelves.
Immediately I dipped into a half-crouch, hand on the hilt of my sword. My blood sang in my ears as I strained to hear more, but the only other sound was the soft footsteps of an Imperial Guardsman walking quietly through the shelves at the very end of the row, and the ongoing, undisturbed snoring of man and beast.
I relaxed slightly, and moved carefully and quietly to the source of the noise. The enormous shelves loomed over me like giants. There was so much here, so many books and scrolls and ledgers, thousands and thousands of words which would never be read. Millennia of Sovan literature, just quietly gathering dust.
Eventually, I came to the place where I thought I had heard the noise, and saw a volume lying in the middle of the aisle. My brow furrowed; nothing had disturbed the shelves that I could see, although the volumes were packed rather chaotically in this section.
I turned sharply. I was certain someone had whispered in my ear.
“Who’s there?” I hissed into the darkness.
At the end of the row, perhaps fifty feet away, I saw a Guardsman poke his head around the bookcase. I waved him off, and he resumed his quiet vigil.
I approached and picked up the volume from the floor. It was a thick tome entitled The Art of Phantasmic Conjuration & Binding Using Runes & Other Ideogrammic Symbols, and looked as though it would fall apart with a sharp glance.
I looked at the shelves either side. It appeared to have been wedged in a gap between several dusty scrolls, certainly out of place here, for such a volume clearly belonged in the Master’s Vaults. That was the only reason why it was not a smoking pile of ash in the bowels of Keraq, for it was of undoubted importance to Claver’s war effort.
“‘A volume of esoteric lore’,” I breathed to myself.
My hands hurt faintly as I handled the volume, as though it were bound in nettles. I realised then that what sounds had filled the Law Library had died away. Gone was the snoring of Sir Radomir and Heinrich, of the occasional bootstep from a weary Guardsman, of the sound of a book being snapped shut as my life guard occupied themselves. In fact it was so quiet it felt as though someone had stoppered my ears with wax.
I was sure I heard a whisper from somewhere amongst the shelves. In the dark silence, my flesh crawled.
I took the book back to my desk and opened it. There, someone had affixed a much newer piece of paper. It read:
This book contains extremely dangerous magicks and is for academic interest only. Its use is restricted to the highest tier of necromantic practitioners. Permission from the Master must be obtained before this book is consulted. Failure to do so will result in immediate, irrevocable disbarment from the Order.
I shuddered at this stern injunction, but morbid curiosity compelled me to turn the pages. In the table of contents was a list of ideograms, and I compared these to the sketches of the runes that Vonvalt had provided. Then, with slightly trembling hands, I flicked to the relevant pages to read what was written there.
My eyes widened. I flicked back to the table of contents, checked the sketch and the ideogram, and then flicked back to the chapter on the rune. I checked all of them in this way, over and over again, until there could be no mistake.
I closed the book, feeling sick.
“Nema,” I breathed. I stood and found Sir Radomir, kicking him roughly awake. Heinrich leapt to his feet.
“Are you finished?” the sheriff asked, rubbing his eyes. He looked up at me, slowly, and then quickly scrambled to his feet. “Gods, what ails you?”
But I was already sweeping down the nearest aisle, towards the exit.
“We need to speak to Sir Konrad, now.”
XX
Fresh Devils
“To effect even the most extraordinary and profound evil will seem like a good idea to someone.”
SIR WILLIAM THE HONEST
Vonvalt was in the strategium, asleep on a chaise longue in a chamber filled with lit candles. In spite of the rancorous clattering of the horse-operated winch which provided the only access to the room, he had not stirred, and was only roused after I prodded him awake.
“Helena,” he said blearily. “What time is it?”
“’Tis gone two the morning,” I said, flustered. “Claver is attempting to summon a greater demon.”
Vonvalt jerked awake, scrabbling into a sitting position.
“What?” he demanded, and immediately held out his hand. I stuffed into it the notes I had made, including a number of sketches of the runes. Doing so had given me a nasty headache, as though the runes were trying to avoid being read.
Vonvalt spent a few minutes in silence examining my notes with great intensity. He picked up the tome and flicked to the relevant pages of that as well. He glanced up and briefly bade Sir Radomir and I sit, for we were “annoying him”, and then he pulled out his pipe, lit that, and read some more. He muttered to himself, occasionally swearing softly.
I fiddled with the hem of my kirtle as I waited for him to say something. Eventually, I could bear it no longer.
“Well?” I demanded.
Vonvalt held up an index finger. He turned the page, finished his reading, and then closed the book.
“Where did you find this?” he asked. He looked worried.
“In the Library,” I said, my gut churning. I didn’t want this. I wanted Vonvalt to admonish me for overreacting, not to confirm my fears.
“In the Master’s Vaults?”
“No, in a different section. On the ground floor.” I gestured to my notes. “What of my findings?”
Vonvalt thought for a moment. “This was not taken to Keraq?”
“Patently!”
Vonvalt looked serious. “It should have been. I did not even ask you to look for this book, so certain was I that it would have been taken by von Geier.”
“It was concealed,” I said, “I think. Behind some other books – scrolls. Just completely misplaced. I think this may be—”
“The book Aegraxes and Resi alluded to?”
I nodded, swallowing. “Yes.”
“I think so too. I think this—” he tapped the cover of the book “—is what Claver has been working towards. Not initially, but certainly for some time.”
“The fuck are you talking about?” Sir Radomir rumbled, gesturing roughly to the volume.
Vonvalt shook his head. He clacked his tongue. “Think on it. We have long known that Claver is receiving patronage from some… entity. Some creature. We have known that since the illegal séance we disrupted in the Temple of Savare. Consider what has happened since then: Ghessis, ambushing us in the Edaximae; the appearance of Claver in the City of Sleep; the manifestation of him in the Spiritsraad; and now this latest heresy in the temple. An attempted summoning, I would guess led by the Prognosticators and directed by Claver from Saxanfelde.” He massaged his chin. “The real question is, who is controlling who?”
“What do you mean?” I asked. I felt as though my brain were about to boil out of my ears.
“Something is trying to manifest its way on to the mortal plane. One has to ask the question how this assists Claver.” He took a draw on his pipe, but it was mechanical. He did not savour the leaf; I realised he was calming his nerves. “Is he doing this deliberately, or has he lost control of the situation? His original goal was one of absolute orthodoxy across the Neman Church in the Empire of the Wolf. Now he is consorting with Kasivaran entities.”
“You’ve lost me,” Sir Radomir said.
“Then turn your mind to it!” Vonvalt snapped. “Claver’s goal – ostensibly – has been to transform the Empire of the Wolf into a theocratic dictatorship. He has always been a zealot! A true believer. Nema, he wanted to burn the villagers of Rill for prancing about in the moonlight! How can a man who takes only the strictest, most orthodox reading of the Neman Creed ally himself with its sworn enemies?
“Think of the steps he has taken, the people he has killed, the magicks he has learnt and employed. Claver is the most evil man in existence. He practises the very opposite of what Saint Creus preached. He is an agent of Hell, not of Nema. How has this happened? How has a man whose beliefs were so unwavering become such a parody of himself? Lunacy may describe one aspect of it, but I think something else is at play here. I think he has allied himself with entities he did not fully understand – whose motivations he did not fully understand. Perhaps several months ago he was seeking power to further his own aims, but now… It seems as though he has become a vessel. A conduit. How else could one describe his actions?”
“Naked hypocrisy,” I said. “Does that not explain it? There are good and noble churchmen, of course, but there are plenty who are greedy and unscrupulous. Monasteries stuffed with gold whilst the Neman Creed preaches poverty. There are plenty of lecherous patrias, whilst the Creed preaches chastity. Perhaps Claver was never a zealot. Perhaps it was always just a tool. Perhaps his goal has simply been power. Plenty of people go to abominable lengths for a bit of power.”
Vonvalt shook his head. “There is more to it than that. Or perhaps it is a mixture of the two things. But this,” he said, gesturing to the book, “this is really dangerous. Claver has either completely lost his mind or he has been fooled into attempting this.”
“What happens if he succeeds?” I asked.
“If he completes the summoning ritual?”
“Aye.”
“It depends what it is he is trying to summon. My sincere hope is that it is something minor, some…” he cast about the room “… devil, some malignant sprite, some creature which would go out of its way to consort with him. I know these bindings are for a greater demon,” he said, gesturing to my notes, “but I just cannot conceive of a demon of that pedigree treating with him. It has never happened before. There is no precedent. These bindings, these runes, they are an exercise in caution. Overkill. That is all.”
“‘That is all’?” Sir Radomir snorted. “You yourself have seen what happens when some mindless sprite is summoned, stuffed into a corpse and bound there.”
“Do not mistake me: it would still be remarkably dangerous. We can assume Claver is attempting to summon a being of great malignance. Such a creature would still need a human host, but… well, I should imagine its power would be beyond measure. It would be practically unconquerable. If I can bend a man to my will with words alone, what peerless death magicks could such a demon bring to bear?”
“It would be mortal, though, would it not?” I asked. “You said once that when creatures cross over into the mortal plane, they themselves become mortal.”
“It would be. But even Claver can stop a sword with nothing but his mind.”
“What about the Codex Elementa? Does that not assist us?”
“The only pages that might have assisted us are the ones which remain in Claver’s possession,” Vonvalt said, trying – and partly succeeding – to sound like he was not blaming me. “The rest is about major and minor elementals. A taxonomy of them. Some information about hexes and the like. Not conjuration and binding. Not to the mortal plane.”
“So we’re fucked, then,” Sir Radomir said. “As in, completely, irreversibly fucked.”
“We have to do something!” I shouted.
Vonvalt nodded. “We absolutely do,” he agreed. He was now outwardly calm, but it was not having the effect on me that it usually did. Panic bubbled within me, ready to foam over at the slightest provocation. “We will move on the Prognosticators at first light. Attack in strength. Round them up. Kill them. Burn the place down – whatever it takes. But,” he added.
“What!?”
“The dispersal of the traitor Guard is a problem. If they are sensible, they will keep their heads down, accrete in small groups in secret areas, and attempt these rituals with the Prognosticators in private places. We have disrupted them, that much is certain, but they will try again – and they will keep trying until they have succeeded. We must root them out. That must be our priority. And, I am sorry to say, Helena, that we shall have to think about reaching out to Resi. She will undoubtedly have more information. We will need to make plans on both sides of the mortal plane if we are to succeed. You will need to lead this effort.” He gestured generally to the city. “I have to plan the Battle for Sova.”
There was a long, heavy silence.
“When all this is over,” Sir Radomir said, “and if I am still alive, I am going to fuck off to the smallest seaside village I can find and spend the rest of my days doing nothing at all.”
Vonvalt gave the sheriff a sympathetic look. “And I would not blame you. Though I very much doubt any of us is going to survive.”
“Aye,” Sir Radomir said bitterly. “On that, at least, we can agree.”
The sheriff left to rally men for another attack, and I remained with Vonvalt. He did not seem surprised that I had stayed. He gestured to a jug of wine on a side table, and I poured us both a drink. We sat in silence for a while. My nerves had frayed to the point where I was either over my fear altogether, or it was simply so constant that it had permanently altered my constitution.
“What of you?” I asked quietly, eventually. “What is your plan, if you survive this? A hermitage, as you intimated in Port Talaka?”
Vonvalt smiled sadly. “You do not want to join me, Helena,” he said.
I shook my head. “No. I think you are right.” The admission surprised both of us. But Vonvalt and I had not spoken candidly on the topic since Südenburg, and it was time to put it to bed. “For the longest time I did. For the longest time I thought I… loved you.” I chuckled to myself, and the ridiculousness of it all.
Vonvalt looked at me. “Don’t do that. Don’t laugh. Don’t cheapen the strength of your feeling. You did love me, and I loved you. I still do love you, in many different ways.”
