The Silver Scar

  Copyright © 2018 by Betsy Dornbusch

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any manner without the express written consent of the publisher, except in the case of brief excerpts in critical reviews or articles. All inquiries should be addressed to Talos Press, 307 West 36th Street, 11th Floor, New York, NY 10018.

  Talos Press books may be purchased in bulk at special discounts for sales promotion, corporate gifts, fund-raising, or educational purposes. Special editions can also be created to specifications. For details, contact the Special Sales Department, Talos Press, 307 West 36th Street, 11th Floor, New York, NY 10018 or info@skyhorsepublishing.com.

  Talos Press is a trademark of Skyhorse Publishing, Inc. ®, a Delaware corporation.

  Visit our website at www.talospress.com.

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available on file.

  Cover design by Claudia Noble

  Cover illustration by Chris McGrath

  Print ISBN: 978-1-940456-78-2

  Ebook ISBN 978-1-940456-79-9

  Printed in the United States of America

  Deus vult! God wills it!

  BOULDER PARISH

  EASTERN FRONT RANGE

  COLORADO ROCKY MOUNTAINS

  WESTERN TERRITORIES

  2170

  ONE

  Ash blackened the pentacle graven in the tombstone, but all the angels and crosses in the churchyard cemetery had been scrubbed clean recently. To Trinidad, whose family lay under the Wiccan marker, this reminder of Christian hatred for his abandoned religion twisted his typical low-grade anxiety into a coil of pain in his gut. He tightened the magnetic latches on his armor, wishing he’d drawn any duty this morning but pulpit guard.

  Bells rang a strident call to mass, pulling his attention away from the cemetery nestled near the door of the church barracks. Trinidad glanced at the twin towers fronting the sanctuary. Two centuries before, architects had used crenels as decoration to enhance the gothic look of the church buildings. They’d since been reinforced with composite shielding to protect the marksmen positioned there.

  Icy wind tugged at his black woolen archwarden’s cloak and stung his face as he strode across the churchyard from the barracks to the sanctuary. Overhead, a thick bank of clouds threatened snow. To his left, parish archwardens flanked the gates to the street, looking like black-draped statues as they greeted congregants with unsmiling courtesy. Adults muttered in tense knots under the shelter of the cloister. He paused his trek at the meditation labyrinth in the center of the yard. Children giggled along the winding paths of flagstone laid into gravel.

  “Trinidad!” They surged toward him, little hands pulling on his legs and sword belt.

  He ignored their parents’ frowns and tossed a handful of coins. They flashed like shrapnel against the gray light as they scattered over the labyrinth. The children scrambled on the ground, grabbing and squealing. But one coin landed on the low wall topped with memorial bricks.

  Trinidad moved toward the wall, his lips framing the name carved into the brick beneath the coin. Israel. The world conspired to keep his family in his thoughts this day. He bent and pocketed the coin. The boy who had claimed it was dead.

  The bells ceased. Incense and cavernous organ music wafted through the churchyard. The kids ran to their parents and he hurried to the sanctuary, checking his weaponry with numb fingers: sword secure in its scabbard, knives in wrist bracers, pistol snug at the small of his back. Inside the narthex, he had to struggle to make his way through the gathering processional. Two women in the center aisle stepped aside at his approach. He inclined his head politely. They nodded back but whispered in his wake. Even though he’d been inparish a dozen years, they never ceased gossiping about Trinidad, the son of ecoterrorist suicide bombers who had taken sixteen Christian souls, the Wiccan orphan turned Christian archwarden.

  The air in the stone church felt cold and damp, but Trinidad’s skin prickled with sweat beneath his armor and the cloak draping his shoulders. Congregants crowded into the pews and quieted. Feeling eyes on his back, Trinidad genuflected to the altar, drew his sword, and kissed the blade before raising it in offering to Christ. Then he took his place before the pulpit. He realized he was holding his breath and exhaled.

  A change in organ music cued the procession to begin. Led by an acolyte carrying the golden cross, it centered on the visiting bishop. Her Grace had graying hair and rigid posture. But it was the silver scar that captured Trinidad’s attention. It slashed her forehead like a lopsided crown, glowing in the dim sanctuary. Candlelight rippled through it, turning it into a molten sterling stream.

  The rumors had proved true. Trinidad, his blood roaring, struggled to remain still. There was only one way she could have such a scar: someone had roved Bishop Marius to the Barren. But that was impossible. As far as he knew, the only person alive with the magic to rove her there was himself.

  Bishop Marius’ voice boomed from the pulpit at Trinidad’s back. “The angel ordered crusade against the heretics. I, in my pride, dared to argue. It smote me with its sword, leaving me scarred, and bent me to God’s will.”

  She paused, every eye in the sanctuary locked on her. Trinidad felt a frown forming and schooled his face back to blank as she continued.

  “And so, I argue today as Saint Bernard argued for crusade centuries ago: The enemies of the cross have raised blaspheming heads, ravaging with the edge of the sword the land of promise. Alas! they rage against the very shrine of the Christian faith with blasphemous mouths.” She launched into lengthy accountings of Indigo raids, ecoterr attacks, the recent church bombing in Denver, slave raids, and the heresy of Wiccan magic.

  The very magic she had used to get to the Barren and earn that scar.

  She made the case that if they had the crusade well underway before Lent they could expect to make an official end on Palm Sunday. She asked them to imagine celebrating Easter with such purity and triumph.

  At last she stepped down from the pulpit to lay her hand on Trinidad’s armored shoulder. His fingers tightened on the hilt of his sword, but he stared unblinking down the center aisle as she quoted from the ancient call to crusade:

  “But now, O brave knight, now, O warlike hero, here is a battle you may fight without danger, where it is glory to conquer and gain to die. Take the cross and you shall gain pardon for every sin.”

  She released him and turned back to the altar to prepare for communion.

  Trinidad eased a breath from his chest. Pardon for every sin. Tempting thought, but he would find no salvation in lies and violence. Those days were long past.

  Never mind. His vows to Christ bound him to protect and obey the clergy. He had to have faith that God would see the truth out. In the meantime, he would take the cross alongside the rest of his order. He would kill who they required him to kill. And he would say nothing as the heretical witchcraft from his past became a weapon in the bishop’s crusade.

  Father Troy and the bishop joined the final procession and disappeared amid the crowd. Their archwardens followed, the long white crosses on the backs of their cloaks glowing in the candlelight. When the last of the parishioners filed through into the narthex, Trinidad slid his sword into its scabbard and rolled the stiffness from his shoulders.

  Dressed in homespun acolyte robes, his foster brother Wolf tended the altar, folding the cloths and collecting the melted candles. No one knew quite how old he was, but he’d grown tall enough to look Trinidad in the eye and his shoulders filled Trinidad’s old practice armor. His shaggy hair mostly hid the red burn scars that mottled the right side of his face and neck.

  “Wolfie,” Trinidad said. “Go rest. You look like death.”

/>   Wolf had been fighting a fever for two days. His good cheek flamed as crimson as his scars and he coughed constantly. He picked up another candle-nub and scrunched his runny nose. “Practice. Roman’ll kill me if I skip.”

  Trinidad frowned and nodded as Father Troy, his white beard stretching around a smile, came down to join them. He gave Wolf a one-armed hug. “Quick work, lad. Well done. Go on, now. I need to speak with your brother.”

  Wolf looked at Trinidad. “About what?”

  “You heard him,” Trinidad said.

  “Yes, Father.” Wolf sighed and went out the side door.

  “I know what you’re thinking,” Father Troy. “But it’s not ashrot. Wolf is too young. Besides, Roman will send him to the infirmary if he gets bad.”

  Trinidad suppressed a snort. A novice had to be practically bleeding to death before Roman would let him out of practice.

  The priest gave him a close look. “Tired this morning?”

  “Wolf’s coughing kept me up.” Wolf woke screaming from bad dreams almost nightly now. But Father Troy had enough on his mind these days—the crusade and his cancer—and Wolf had begged Trinidad not to say anything to anyone.

  “Come. Sit,” Father Troy said.

  Trinidad eased down onto the steps leading up to the altar, elbows on his knees, facing Father Troy, who levered himself onto a pew.

  “We’re not going to Denver today,” Father Troy said.

  “But you have to, you—” He pressed on despite the priest’s frown. “—you need your treatment.”

  “I must stay here. Her Grace is auditing the parish prior to placing a new rector this week.”

  “This week?”

  “She wants the new rector to take the cross right away, as she assembles the army. You realize Denver Parish is already gathering at the south wall.”

  For a crusade based on a lie. He hadn’t dared a close look at the bishop’s scar, but he knew where it came from. No angel, for sure. But who had learned the magic to rove? Everyone who knew it was dead, save Trinidad.

  The truth rushed from his mouth without his planning it. “That scar isn’t from an angel.”

  A beat. Another. Father Troy’s eyes narrowed. “You’re accusing Her Grace of lying?”

  Trinidad lowered his gaze at his priest’s sharp tone. Didn’t he even wonder about the scar? It was all the talk inparish. “No, Father.”

  “Mystical meetings aside, she makes a good argument for war. Rumors have it the Indigos are out for blood since Roi d’Esprit went missing.”

  “Sounds like Indigos, blaming us with no proof.” Trinidad knew the Indigo leader was dead. Roi d’Esprit had dared openly threaten Father Troy, and rumors of an assassination plot had become too prevalent to ignore. Trinidad had killed Roi and hidden the body far in the mountains in a deep cave. Indigos never strayed past the front range and the cave was too well concealed even if they did.

  Troy leaned forward with a weary frown. “It makes an old man worry for his son, Trin.”

  Trinidad hoped his dark skin, part of his Mexican heritage, hid the flush warming his cheeks. “I’ve had a price on my head since I took vows, Father, like all archwardens. Indigo attacks are no reason to worry.” Or crusade. Not now Roi was dead. His daughter seemed much more restrained, so far.

  “How about ecoterrs setting bombs at the power plant last night? Is that reason enough to worry?”

  Trinidad couldn’t help raising his brows. “They were Wiccan?”

  Father Troy nodded. “Most of them were captured.”

  “Even so, it’s no reason to go to war.”

  Wind whistled around the metal plating protecting the stained-glass windows as Father Troy fixed Trinidad with the steely glare that used to root him to the floor as a kid. “If you don’t want war, son, you should have left it alone.”

  Trinidad reminded himself he was no longer that kid. But still, chills prickled his spine. “Left what alone, sir?”

  Father Troy leaned forward and rubbed at his arthritic knee, bunching his vestments and then letting them fall smooth. “Wiccan magic.”

  The prickles turned to a wire brush.

  Father Troy searched his face. “There’ve been disturbing rumors. Accusations. Concerning you.”

  Suspicion of heresy was far, far worse than Father Troy learning he had killed Roi d’Esprit. “You can’t believe that.”

  “The diocese claims to have a witness.”

  Trinidad shook his head. “Not true or I’d be in chains right now.”

  Father Troy lowered his gaze to his folded hands. “It might be meant more as a warning. Your adamancy against crusade has not gone unnoticed among your order.”

  “They have to know I’ll fight as I always have, as I’ve sworn to do.”

  “Will you?” The astute, watery gaze lifted to hold Trinidad’s. “It is, after all, your people who will die. I could hardly blame you for refusing to take the cross.”

  Trinidad had already taken the cross, tattooed on head and hands for all to see. He saw no use in pinning another one to his cloak. “My people, yes. Christians will die in the crusade. Archwardens will die.”

  Father Troy’s face softened. “It’s perfectly understandable that you might succumb to the temptation of your old ways. Maybe you thought you could prove something, maybe you thought you could help your coven survive. I am sure your intention was pure, but witchcraft, Trin? I fear for your soul.”

  “Father! I didn’t do anything! I haven’t worked the craft, not since—” Trinidad broke off at a movement in the shadowy narthex. He realized too late how his voice echoed against the stone walls of the sanctuary.

  “Since we don’t have to go to Denver, you can help Roman with fight practice. That way you can keep an eye on Wolf.” Father Troy rose and headed back to the narthex, his quick gait belying the arthritic cant to his body and weakness from the disease that would soon take his life.

  Trinidad rubbed his hand over his mouth and clenched his fingers into a fist. The day had dredged up long-buried memories. When he and his childhood friend Castile had been kids, roving through other peoples’ dreams seemed a game. The otherworldly silver graveyard they called the Barren was their private playground, until one of the older kids heard them talking about their secret place and tried to beat the truth of it from Castile. Trinidad had put the kid’s curiosity to bed with his first real violence. But it tarnished the Barren’s allure. He looked at the silver scar on his left palm—so small and darkened with age no one had ever noticed it. He thought of it rarely—he and Castile panting from pain as they stabbed their palms, smeared their blood together, and swore never to tell anyone about the Barren. The graveyard sand had burned as it seared their wounds closed.

  That blood vow had made it strangely simple to forget the Barren ever existed once he’d come inparish. Forgetting and the grace of Christ were the only ways a boy witch could shed the craft for his new faith. But Trinidad was no longer that boy, and Bishop Marius, too, now bore a scar healed by the silver sand.

  The bishop. She made no secret of her hatred for witches, having lost her husband and child to a Wiccan ecoterrorist’s bomb. She’d never admit to engaging in magic. No wonder she’d made up the story about the angel.

  And Trinidad could say nothing. Accusing a bishop of lying or other sin without proof was high treason against the Church, and the only proof he had on offer required him to draft spells, heresy punishable by death.

  Bishop Marius obviously didn’t expect his archwarden vows to bind his tongue. She had already taken the offensive, dishonoring him with rumor and innuendo. If the bishop was willing to use private lies to destroy him and public lies to start a war, she was more than willing to condemn Trinidad for heresy. The bones of deception had already been laid.

  TWO

  Reine d’Esprit climbed the ladder of the guard tower near the gates of her Indigo freehold. The Wiccan called Castile sat on his horse outside, gazing upward, steadying a big, awkward bundle tied acro
ss the horse’s rump with one hand. His fringed scarf hung loose around his neck, accommodating her tribe’s custom of baring faces to indicate respect.

  Her spearguards muttered among themselves.

  “Fuckin brought us a body.”

  “Knowin Castile, it’s a bomb.”

  That was just a joke, really, even with the Wiccan’s hard-won reputation as an ecoterr assassin.

  Reine sighed. “That’s no bomb. Let him in.”

  One of the spearguards signed a salute in her direction. “Will do, Reine d’Esprit.”

  Hinges squealed as the gates swung open. Reine climbed down the ladder to greet him. Castile rode through, slung a leg over his horse’s hindquarters, and slipped to the ground. He heaved the bundle, stiff, man-shaped, and bigger than him, over his shoulder.

  “We might want to do this in private,” he said to her.

  She turned and led him to her house.

  Castile followed, unsteady under his heavy load. He didn’t ask for help and no one offered, but all eyes followed their progress. She opened the door for him and let him pass into the cold front room. No fire burned, not even in Reine d’Esprit’s hearth. They saved their scavenged combustibles for the common house where the children slept.

  Castile laid the body on her table with a thud and rubbed the cold from his bare hands.

  A knife of fear twisted in Reine’s middle. She caught her breath as Castile undid the rope and pulled the fabric free. Face waxy in death, Roi d’Esprit’s blue eyes peeked between half-open lids. Castile kept ripping the fabric, baring her father’s naked body from his stiff face to his little worm of a prick. She barely noticed any of that, though, for the Christian cross carved into his chest and stomach.

  Reine stumbled forward, but Castile caught her arm. “I’m sorry, Reine. I thought you would want him back.”

  She closed her eyes too late. The profane symbol defacing her father’s body had already branded itself on the inside of her lids. The Ancestors would never let him pass through the Veil marked like a Christian, not until his murderer had paid a steep toll in blood. And it was up to their tribe’s spirit queen, Reine d’Esprit, to claim it.