The Silver Scar Page 17

  Outside they kept to the shadows, but Reine forced herself to walked with purpose, as if she belonged, making Javelot to trot to keep up with her longer stride. She could see the shaggy-haired shadow in the guard hut by the gate, but whoever it was never swiveled their way. That made sense. The guard would be watching for danger from outside the gates.

  “How do you know where to go?” Javelot whispered.

  “Papa had maps from old recon.” Another thing Javelot didn’t know.

  The door to the other building was locked. Reine studied the windows. There were a few at ground level that appeared to lead to the basement. A few steps around a corner led to a perfect, quiet entry spot. She knelt and felt around the edges of a couple of windows, seeking one that wasn’t latched. Unlikely, in this weather, but it was an old building … ah. The window frame gave under her hand, rusted metal flexing against the glass and creaking. She stopped and listened, but no one had noticed. She shoved the window open with her boot, cracking the glass, and slipped inside before anyone could see her. She landed in an awkward crouch on the ground, and Javelot followed.

  The barest trace of light followed them from the window, fading fast. Reine’s cut finger left a smear of blood on the glass. She turned to study the small room. Two narrow cots, rumpled covers. Clothes in neat folded stacks on a table. Archwarden quarters. Trinidad’s?

  The lever on the door rattled. Reine and Javelot sank back in the shadows, behind the swing of the door. Her back found cloaks and coats hanging from hooks on the wall. She reached back to feel for a weapon, eyes never leaving the door. Her fingers found a sword hanging in its scabbard from a hook as the door squealed open on its hinges. She closed both hands around the hilt and drew it, whisper quiet.

  The archwarden was Mexican-dark like Trinidad, but rougher in the face, older. He reached for his sword in the same instant that his eyes fell on them. Reine swung before his blade escaped its scabbard.

  She caught him in his bare throat, left open by a man not expecting violence to greet him in his own bedroom. He hit the concrete floor without catching himself, though he gaped up at her, gagging on his own blood. It had been a killing blow, but she stepped forward and ripped through his jugular again to make sure he’d stay dead. The scent of blood filled the room as she dragged his body to a far corner, leaving a wet trail of red to avoid on her way out the door.

  Javelot stared at her, still pressed against the wall.

  “What? No stomach for it?” Reine thrust herself through the door without a second glance back at the dead archwarden or her sister.

  Wolf—teenaged and big but she’d recognize him anywhere—stood in the corridor, blinking at the bloody sword in Reine’s hand. His hand went to the sword hilt at his belt, but she shook her head at him.

  “Put it down,” she said, gesturing with the tip of her blade to the floor.

  He drew his sword, a double-edged blade, shorter than most archwardens used, though he had most of the height and breadth of an adult. He hesitated like he thought of challenging her with it. But he knelt and laid it down, kept his eyes rolled up under his shaggy bangs like he expected her to lop his head off.

  “I guess John is … dead,” he said, twitching his chin toward the door.

  She nodded. The scent of blood already thickened the air. “Where is everyone?”

  He blinked rapidly and his shoulders sank. “The jail.” His voice broke. “And the crusade.”

  “Good. Just us, then. Very good.” She bared her teeth in a grin. “Israel. Time to hunt.”

  He blinked at her, shook his head slightly. His expression slackened.

  “You remember,” she said.

  His eyes blinked, once, slow.

  She eased out a breath. The chemwiping cocktail and extensive priming had worked. His subcognitive was still solid, after all this time.

  “You know where to go,” she said.

  He turned and walked down the hall, never turning his head right or left, taking even steps. Behind her, Javelot followed, a silent shadow. Reine left the bloody sword. She wouldn’t be needing it any longer.

  The priest, Trinidad, and their Church had raised Israel into a strong near-man. Reine had to give them credit for that. After they broke into a shed at the graveyard and found a shovel, he dug with powerful, even strokes, tearing up the hard ground over the false grave without a word. But then, it was as Papa Roi had trained him to do, to work with silent determination, just as he’d laid a minefield of violence in his child-mind.

  So far so good, she thought, glancing around at the empty graveyard, but she couldn’t shake off the feeling of wrongness. The Flatirons loomed against the haze to the west. A tangle of skeletal tree branches made a barrier around the graveyard. No grave-robbers perused inparish cemeteries as they did in the county dead-fields. No marshals patrolled nearby; no vigilantes peered through the gates. Besides, every man and childless woman between twenty and fifty was at the crusade camp just inside the eastern wall, taking the cross. Israel had said so in his short chemwipe speak.

  Still, she couldn’t help the feeling this was all going wrong somehow.

  Thud. Israel’s shovel had found its goal. He stopped and blinked at her. Reine suffered a wild terror that he was coming back to himself. Next to her, Javelot caught her breath.

  Reine muttered the cues at him again: “Israel. Time to hunt.”

  His expression relaxed, but he still didn’t move.

  “What are you waiting for?” Javelot said. “Open it.”

  Israel ducked down and went back to work, having to scrabble in the soil with his fingers to unlatch the box. Reine shifted from foot to foot and surveyed the area again. Raw dirt covered a fresh mass grave nearby. She sniffed at that. How many people lay here, souls disintegrating in lime-crusted pits? She could almost smell the rot. Indigo souls floated through the Ancestor’s Veil on the wings of the body’s ashes, purified by fire.

  “At least we burn our dead.”

  Javelot ignored her.

  Reine felt a hand on her boot and realized Israel had stopped messing with the box of explosives. He gazed up at her again with the expression of blank expectation that Papa Roi had trained him to with chemicals and harsh physical reinforcement.

  “Move over. I can’t see,” Javelot said.

  Israel moved.

  Reine frowned. He’d been conditioned to take orders only from Reine and her father, unless … “Papa Roi set you as a prime.”

  Javelot shrugged. “Papa always took precautions.”

  But you never thought to tell me, did you, sister? Clear insubordination, requiring punishment. Not now, though. There wasn’t time.

  Reine leaned back to let the clouded skies shed a little light down into the hole. Javelot lay on her belly and sifted through the wires, starters, and explosive compounds. “It all looks good.” She picked up a vest and held it out to Israel. “Put that on.”

  He obeyed, sparking another flare of anger in Reine. She bit down on it.

  Packets of compound explosives were sewn into the fabric. The threads seemed stable, fine. The wires were good. He put it on. Where had the time gone? The vest had swallowed him as a child. But he was nearly a grown man who wore a sword on his hip. Soon, he would have earned the archwarden tattoos, she knew. He probably looked up to Trinidad, not even knowing they were real brothers. Javelot had looked up to her like that once.

  He was probably dedicated to his Church, like Paul had been.

  “Do you pray?” Reine asked him.

  He just looked at her. It wasn’t a question in his sublexicon.

  “Stop talkin like that,” Javelot muttered. “You’re gonna distract him.”

  Reine squatted down next to her sister, her gaze still fixed on Israel’s face. The shadows hid the burn scars, betraying how much he looked like his brother. Javelot might have been positioned as another prime, but she hadn’t seen Israel when he’d first been brought to the freehold as a child, burned beyond recognition, screamin
g for his family when he wasn’t passed out from the pain. She hadn’t been the one to cradle the broken child when no one else could quiet him during long weeks of conditioning and chemwiping. Javelot hadn’t lost herself to their father’s schemes.

  “What?” Javelot asked, not disguising her impatience.

  “This won’t work,” Reine said. “Won’t stop anything.”

  Javelot grunted. It was Reine’s only warning of attack. Her sister leapt on her, punching, kicking, her hard, trained body produced killing blows. Reine fought back, but she knew deep inside that Javelot had been right in the end. She didn’t have the stomach for it.

  THIRTY

  After a planning session late in the afternoon, Bishop Marius felt confident. Scouts had reported back on the Indigo defensives, which seemed meager at best. Archwardens she trusted held the new army well in hand, though she missed Paul’s steady hand on the tiller. They still hadn’t found Castile’s coven yet, or any others, but there was time for that. Doubtless the crusade would draw them out.

  Seth gave a little knock and stepped inside Father Troy’s office. Someone had been to clean it, and clear off the desk. The windows let in the last of the fading daylight. Seth’s black cloak and armor drank it in, all but the crimson cross, turning him into a stern shadow. He pushed back his hood and let his hands rest on his weapons belt, fingers curled around the sweat-stained leather-wrapped hilt.

  Seth had taken Trinidad in hand and managed his transfer to the jail. He’d been gentle, speaking quietly to Trinidad, who was docile and confused from the shockbat. It had made his ramblings about the Barren easy to write off to anyone who overheard.

  “Well?” she asked, wondering how Seth felt about taking his brother-in-arms into custody. Badly, she assumed. Seth hadn’t admitted as much as all that, and his face was set. Just as well, she didn’t have time for hysterics. “Trinidad is more lucid now,” he said. “He’s admitted to killing Paul, Your Grace.”

  She frowned. Maybe he was just trying to protect Castile. “Details?”

  Seth nodded. “He described the fight, knew the wound had taken a lung and heart. I’m inclined to believe him.”

  “Fine. Arrange for his execution at sundown.”

  “Your Grace, all respect, but despite his confession, the fight sounded like self-defense on Trinidad’s part. And the order’s charter requires a trial even in cases of confession. I can contact the mayor’s office—”

  “In times of war and severe unrest, regional laws decree the Church provides the justice system. I am the Church, am I not?”

  Seth dropped his gaze. “Yes, Your Grace.”

  If it was up to her, she’d make Trinidad suffer. She’d hang the Wiccan first, let Trinidad watch his friend die. But she needed Castile to rove her. She wasn’t about to take a chance with Trinidad roving her, though he’d proved he could by admitting he’d killed Paul. He was far too independent of a thinker.

  Still. A simple hanging wouldn’t satisfy the grief clawing at her belly like famine. But there wasn’t time. Trinidad’s revolt had to be put down today.

  “And the Wiccan, Your Grace?”

  She sighed, contemplating potential leverage against Castile. He couldn’t outlast her forever. Maybe Trinidad’s capture would help matters, a few hours of watching Trinidad scream. Something about the two of them … Trinidad had reacted so violently at the mere mention of Castile.

  “His coven is at the root of Trinidad turning against us. We’ll let him watch Trinidad hang, see if that doesn’t persuade him to cooperate—”

  She heard footsteps on the porch and the door swung open again. She rose to meet Malachi, who kissed her ring and provided her a proper, respectful space, retreating to stand next to Seth. “Your Grace, the civilians are starting to balk at the wait. We might see some of them slip away.”

  Not entirely unexpected, but she let a frown settle on her mouth. “Fine,” she said. “We already outnumber the Indigos ten to one as it is. Do we have them mapped and scouted?”

  Malachi’s turn to frown. “The latest scouts report the Indigo freehold has banded with two more tribes. They’ve wagons set up on the outer fields, horse squads gathering, war tents and soldiers. They’re digging trenches and laying razor wire.”

  This was new. He paused and she tipped her head at him, waiting.

  “There are fires burning all the time inside the freehold. Forges.”

  She propped her chin on her hand, thinking. Indigo spearguards were notoriously vicious fighters, no matter their weapons. Their spears were specially designed to pierce modern armor, made of scrap building metal with balanced shafts, and they practiced long hours at perfecting their throws. Every tribe had a stockpile of stolen guns and crossbows. They had defense down to a science, even schooling their young children in hand-to-hand with knives.

  But none of that mattered. The army outnumbered three tribes of Indigos … they outnumbered ten tribes of Indigos for that matter. And she had troops who could take more injury than most, providing Castile was brought to heel, which gave her pause.

  Perhaps letting him watch Trinidad die would be a mistake. If she led the Wiccan believe she’d let Trinidad live in exchange for his cooperation roving—

  The boom of an explosion punctured her musings.

  Marius leapt to her feet. Malachi spun, striding to the door. He swung it open and clattered down the cracked concrete steps, weapons jingling, sword in hand. Two more archwardens came running toward her but every other face turned toward downtown.

  Seth took a moment to find binoculars and lift them to his eyes

  “I can’t see much, Your Grace,” he said. “Smoke is rising. We should get you to a more secure location.”

  “Nonsense. Out of my way.” She shoved past him. The evening took a breath before another explosion rumbled. A second plume of smoke rose over the city like a ghost.

  “Not far. Center of town,” Malachi muttered. “The church, maybe?”

  “The courthouse has always been a target,” Seth answered.

  Or the jail. The Wiccans had come to free their imprisoned comrade.

  THIRTY-ONE

  Castile woke with a jolt. The world rocked beneath him and he ducked his head under his arms as loose cement from the ceiling dusted his bare back. He registered: bomb. His training in the ecoterr movement, even after years away from it, banished panic. His brain took over, all calculating thought, processing the firepower in the explosion, sniffing for smoke to determine the chemicals used, listening for aftershocks and more bombs. Silence followed. Either the bomber had mistimed his explosives or he was out. Castile climbed to his feet and stumbled to his cell gate. Voices crescendoed in terror. He tried to pick out words amid the shouts and chaos. Lights flickered on and off in the corridor.

  Another explosion made Castile duck back. Chunks of concrete stoned him from overhead. A massive crack split the ceiling and metal screamed as pressure twisted it. It ran down the wall toward his cell gate, nearly reaching the hinge. He thrust his cold, aching limbs into motion and rushed the gate, hoping to take advantage of the weakened wall before someone else took notice. The gate slipped free of its hinges but held fast, wedged against the warped frame. He slammed his palm against the metal in frustration.

  Voices echoed in the hall, authoritative. On instinct, Castile dropped to the floor amid the heaviest rubble, closed his eyes, and fell still.

  Someone paused outside. “Should we move him?”

  “Probably. Bishop said to take special care with him.”

  The lock clunked open, though with more squeals of protest and a good deal of cursing from the guards. “Bomb killed the power,” one of the marshals observed as he yanked the gate free with a violent clang. “Be hell to pay if we lose the important ones.”

  “Better grab Trinidad next.” Feet drew near Castile. “Talk about hell to pay. The bishop will have our heads if he goes in this. I heard she wants a public execution.”

  Trin. Castile’s battered b
ody coiled. One of his legs sprang out at the nearest guard. He drove his bare foot into a groin and the guard dropped with a muffled curse. Castile leapt at the downed man, seeking a weapon, anything. His hands closed on a shockbat and his thumb found the switch. It shocked the guard from the loop on his belt, sizzling through trousers where no armor protected him. The man stiffened and fell back, mouth wide in a silent scream.

  He yanked the bat free of its loop as the other guard came at him with his own bat. It brushed Castile’s free arm but momentum carried him forward. He thrust the shockbat up at the guard’s throat. It landed awkwardly, but one touch made the man fall into a convulsive heap. Castile followed him down. His thumb jostled from the switch and the man moaned. Castile pressed the bat against his throat again and threw the switch, holding it until he smelled shit and piss. He repeated it with the first guard.

  Neither guard was breathing when he finished, but Castile didn’t care. He’d heard one of them raping the female prisoner in the cell next door the night before, recognized his husky voice. For all he knew, these guards had been part of his own torture. As he searched them for keys, shouts of terror rose all around the jail.

  Wielding the bat and keys, he walked out into the hall and looked up and down. One end had been reduced to rubble and dust. Cold swept along the corridor in a stiff breeze, chilling his bare skin. Prisoners rattled their cages at him as he passed. He told himself he didn’t have time, he couldn’t free them all. Trinidad was here.

  But prisoners reached for him and pleaded, rending something in his heart, opening him to the familiar Presence behind him, this time one of reasoned urgency.

  “I thought you left me, Dark Horns,” Castile muttered, and then he saw the Hunter’s wisdom in shielding his escape with the other prisoners. “Ah. I won’t make the mistake of doubting You again soon.”

  He unlocked cages as he went. Only one was too warped to open, but the prisoner inside didn’t seem to mind: he bled from a head wound and he was covered in rubble. At first Castile warned off the prisoners with the shockbat, but they had only escape on their minds. The corridor filled with shouting people. Another explosion clouded them all in dust from shattered walls and shaken foundations. Castile was among the few who didn’t scream. It threw him to his battered knees, but he scrambled up and staggered on.