The Silver Scar Read online

  He pushed past frightened prisoners to peer into each cell. Hands and bodies pressed against his naked body. Terror rose up in him as the crowd carried him for a moment. A hallway bent to the left and Castile fought to move that way, if only to escape the terrified mass for a moment.

  He heard a voice and stopped. It was deep and earnest. And he knew it; thank the Lady and her Lord, he knew it. He could taste relief on his tongue as surely as if he’d swallowed sweet wine. Castile crept closer, behind a guard standing in an open cell doorway.

  “I swore my soul and blood to Saint Michael the Archangel, Lord Christ, and Holy God. I defend the helpless. I make my oath again, before you.” A rattle of chains broke off the rough voice.

  The guard took a step back. “I … I can’t. Orders. I’m sorry. I just …”

  Smoke billowed around Castile. A guard shouted out orders from down the corridor, cutting off the guard’s excuses, and the tide of prisoners roared a protest, swelling down the short corridor. Castile pressed the bat to the back of the guard’s neck and followed him to the stained concrete. Then he shoved his hair from his face, and grinned. He couldn’t help it; he was that relieved to see Trinidad.

  “Did you actually think he’d let you go because of that pretty little speech?”

  The ghost of a grimace, a flash of white teeth. Dirt shadowed the cleft in Trinidad’s chin and hollowed his cheekbones. His face was bruised and he hunched. His stare had a desperate edge. He rattled the chains holding his hands behind his back and securing him to the wall. “You going to just stand there looking at me all day?”

  Castile patted the fallen guard and found the universal magnetic key they carried for shackles. “I think you meant to say, ‘Thanks for freeing me from this disaster. I’m forever in your debt.’ Are you all right?”

  Trinidad winced as his bound hands came forward. When he was free, he laid a hand on Castile’s bare chest as he peered past him into the chaotic hall. “Yes. You?”

  “Still standing.”

  Trinidad stripped off his black wool tunic, wincing again, and shoved it at Castile. “Cover up that scar.” He wore a tight synthetic under the tunic. It slipped up, revealing more dark bruising on his lean stomach.

  “They worked you over, yeah?” Castile said, holding the shirt and staring at him.

  Trinidad pulled it back down. It clung to his muscled chest and revealed the ridges of his pentacle if you knew to look for it. “Not as bad as you. Put that on.”

  The handmade shirt hung to mid-thigh on Castile, still warm from Trinidad’s body. They’d surely beaten Trinidad, but he moved all right, not hesitating as they joined the throng of prisoners out in the corridor, shoving through inmates intent on freedom. The press of unwashed bodies, dust, smoke, and the acrid scent of human flesh cooking turned Castile’s stomach.

  Trinidad tripped over some rubble and a prisoner clutched at him, dragging him to his knees. Blood streamed from her chin as her lips formed the word like a prayer: archwarden. Castile shoved her away and hauled on Trinidad’s arm.

  Another explosion blasted some distance away. Maybe the courthouse or out on the street. Trinidad ducked as the crowd roared in fear, twitching free of Castile’s grip. Another blast rocked the building, throwing them to their hands and knees. A gust of heat and then bitter cold swept over them. Dust and smoke clouded the air. Castile fumbled through the haze for Trinidad. He found him huddled against the wall, head ducked down. As the dust cleared, Castile pulled him to his feet. He shouted to be heard over the terrified voices around them, but Trinidad didn’t even look at him. He dragged the archwarden along a few steps until they stumbled over a prone woman with blood running down one side of her face. Trinidad stopped and stared down at her, swaying like a reed in the heavy current of prisoners pushing past them.

  “Do you want to stay here? Herne’s balls, man, move.”

  Castile hauled Trinidad upstream past more panicked inmates, shouting to let them pass. One attacked Trinidad full on, screaming something incoherent. He tried to fight back, raining mismatched blows, until Castile stepped in and rammed the live shockbat under the man’s chin. The inmate dropped without a sound.

  Castile grabbed Trinidad and dragged him into another cell. Even against the wall, cold air, dust, and ash blew against them in a steady stream, stinging their eyes and airways.

  Trinidad scrabbled at the wall, coughing.

  “What a mess. I don’t even know if—” Castile peered at him, teeth knocking, body shaking in the bitter, dirty air swarming around them. “What’s wrong with you? You look like you’re about to pass out.”

  “I saw Magpie.”

  A beat. Two. Castile shook his head. “No. No. She’s at the hospital.”

  Trinidad drew in a breath, coughed again. “We’ll get her out, Cas.”

  “Did you see that big hole back there? Bodies everyfuckingwhere.” Castile ran his hands down his chest and slapped his cold, bare thighs. “Curse me, what if she’s dead? I swore—”

  “Castile!”

  Castile blinked at him. Trinidad’s eyes were wide. His body visibly shook. Without a word Castile took his wrist and led him back through the labyrinth of cellblocks, shoving past terrorized inmates. Heart jack-hammering, pain stabbing ribs and bruised knees, he pulled him deeper into the smoke, toward the bomb crater. Smoke and dust wavered on the air, his eyes streamed tears, revealing limbs and blood littering the floor. An almost whole torso of a woman was still propped in a corner where the blast had shoved her, her prison issue curiously clean except for blood staining the hem of her shirt. Below, everything blown away. Castile shoved the images to the back of his head, burying them deep as he hurried Trinidad past the damage and the dead.

  Then a familiar face refused to be obscured by his will, fingers in fighting claws, her cheek rent and gaping raw flesh from eye to jaw. Magpie had been thrown against the bars of her cell and was held at upright by rubble. Blood painted her torn face and body, a graffiti of gore. Cold swept in from the broken ceiling, carrying the putrid scent of her death with it.

  Abrupt bullets pinged around them, scattering chunks of the floor by Castile’s bare feet. Fifty strides ahead, the rest of the building had fallen away, revealing smoky skies and a street teeming with a desperate, screaming horde. Wailing sirens drowned out the crowd noise and then faded. Castile felt Trinidad pulling his arm, he stumbled alongside the archwarden without thought. He knew there should be sounds of chaos, but he heard none of it.

  They had to crawl through a ragged opening in the building, Trinidad shoving him through first. Castile glanced back and realized the jail and courthouse had been punctured like someone had sprayed it along the bottom with giant bullets. Shrapnel from the bomb, rusty nails, and bits of blackened metal scattered the ground. Somewhere deep, beyond his grief and shock, his mind processed the damage. The scavenged remains made the blast feel hurried or inexperienced. Homemade, amateurish, without precision. His mind whirred over what it all meant, but his body simply followed Trinidad.

  Free of the direct blast zone, Trinidad seemed to revive. He led them west at a dead run, away from the damage. The dusk-shadowed streets teemed with people, some injured, prisoners running, marshals and parishioners coming toward the explosions. Trinidad glanced at the people running by and hesitated. But he didn’t stop moving until Castile could barely breathe, his lungs stinging from smoke, his feet so cold and battered that every step was agony.

  Trinidad led them down a long, quiet alley, slowed, and caught Castile’s arm. He hardly sounded winded at all. “We have to keep moving.”

  Castile stared up at him, bewildered. Magpie’s gory death reeled through his mind. “I swore, between Herne and me. Sealed with a circle. I couldn’t handfast her, not with any honor, yeah, but I could damn well protect her.”

  “I’m sorry she died,” Trinidad said. “But it doesn’t change anything.”

  A caustic laugh escaped Castile at the archwarden’s perfunctory sympathy. He leaned a
gainst a building and closed his eyes. Tried to breathe, but his throat closed. Magpie had been nude, battered. Not just from the explosion. From torture. Rape. He’d refused the bishop, and Magpie had paid. “She died for me. Because of me.”

  “Sometimes a soldier’s job is to die.”

  “No. She never should have been here at all. I never should have let her come. She only came inparish because she loved me—”

  Trinidad caught Castile’s head between his callused hands, fingers tangled in his hair. “Maybe she did love you. I don’t know. But she came inparish because you and Lord Hawk ordered her to come. Roman always says commanders forfeit the luxury of grief.” He kissed Castile’s forehead, dry lips pressed against dusty skin, and released him. “Honor her for dying a soldier and forget the rest, Cas. She’s at peace now.”

  It might have been the most words he’d ever heard Trinidad string in one go since they were little kids. Trinidad’s breath on his face, his lips on his forehead. A quiver settled in his belly. Maybe it would never go away. “You do have a true heart, yeah?”

  “Don’t go all soft on me when I’m telling you to toughen up.”

  That made Castile smile, a little. “Sorry.”

  Trinidad turned away and started to walk. “I did want to run you through after I learned about Father Troy….” He shrugged and let the words die off.

  If he kept Trinidad talking, he could avoid thoughts of Magpie, the blast, what it all meant. “Who is Roman?”

  “My armsmaster. Who betrayed me today, I think.” Trinidad’s attention caught on someone lingering at the other end of the alley. Castile followed his gaze and felt the last his anger and hurt fall away in his surprise.

  The scarred boy from the dreamscape staggered down the alley, leaning to one side. He had an odd shape about him, like he wore oddly bulky armor. The kid’s scars looked different in true light, harsher, uglier. Or maybe it was his dull expression. Warning flared through him. Trinidad bolted forward to catch him by the shoulders. “Wolf. What are you doing here?”

  Castile followed but stopped as he realized it wasn’t armor that made the bulge around the boy’s chest. Wires wrapped Wolf’s torso, binding explosives to his back. “Trin. Let him go. Get back. Now.”

  “What?”

  “Do it! Now!”

  Trinidad released his brother and stepped back.

  Wolf blinked at Trinidad. His scarred face stiffened, he balled his fists, and threw himself at Trinidad.

  THIRTY-TWO

  Trinidad pulled Wolf forward into a choke-lock to suppress his struggles, but Wolf fought him, clawing at his chest. He reeked of smoke and another foreign acrid scent.

  “Let him go, I said.” Castile shoved between them. “You’ll set him off!”

  He caught Wolf’s arm and pulled him away with a firm grip. As soon as Wolf’s back was turned on Trinidad, his fight melted away. Castile led him a few steps. Wolf went docilely. He tucked his chin against his chest, huffing air through his snuffly nose.

  “Set him off …” Trinidad stared. A bomb was strapped to his brother’s back. He forced himself to take a deep breath, though it didn’t dispel his panic. “Who did this?”

  “Shut up,” Castile said. “I’m thinking.”

  Trinidad obeyed, but his blood roared. He swallowed hard. The cold started to seep in, and he rubbed his hand over the faint ridges of the pentacle on his chest. Wolf had bruised him. They hadn’t wrestled in a long time. He hadn’t realized the strength in Wolf’s growing body.

  Castile sniffed, coughed, and sniffed again. He frowned at Wolf and lifted the boy’s hand to his face. They were black with grime. Wolf didn’t fight Castile’s touch. “Yeah, smells like chemicals I worked with back in the glory days.” He knelt to look at the vest from a different angle. “Easy, kiddo.” But Wolf didn’t move, just stared past them blankly.

  “He must have been near the jail,” Trinidad said. “But he should’ve been at school or …” What day was it? What time? He had no idea. “At the church. Why isn’t he talking?”

  “We have bigger problems,” Castile said. “The vest is still armed. Can’t see the trigger. Usually a suicide will just carry it. In his case, I think someone else has it.” He cupped the boy’s jaw and lifted his chin. “Who did this to you, buddy? Did they tell you anything? Like how much time you have? Or how to disarm the fucking thing?”

  Spittle dripped from Wolf’s loose lips. Castile wiped his face with his sleeve, gently. “Doesn’t seem like he’s in any condition to tell us. He’s drugged or something.”

  The wind whipped up, whistling down the alleyway. A shiver racked him once, a violence that rattled his teeth. “Wolf doesn’t do drugs.”

  Castile cast him a smirk. “Right. And I never played with bombs as a teenager.” He looked up and down the alley. “I need tools—pliers, wire cutters, a blade. I have to get it off him.”

  Wolf glanced at Trinidad when Castile did and gave a drunken lunge in his direction. Castile caught his arm. “Whoa there, kid. I’ll stay with him, Trin. You go.”

  Wolf focused vaguely on Castile and calmed.

  Trinidad felt a burgeoning sickness rising in his gut. What was wrong with him? And what had Wolf done with his blackened fingers?

  Castile’s sharp voice cut through his anxiety. “Quick-like, yeah? Go!”

  Trinidad ran down the alley a block, paused at the crossroad and checked for archwardens or marshals. He caught sight of black marshal uniforms, shields up against the chaos, directing traffic down the main streets. No one was looking away from the bomb site. He trotted down the next block, checking doors. One opened to a candle shop. Trinidad frowned at the mess of a storeroom and rummaged through shelves. He came up with a hammer. Great. But, convinced he was on the right track, he kept sifting through boxes of raw wax, balls of string, and other debris.

  “What are you—oh!”

  Trinidad spun. A slight girl with long blonde braids stood in the doorway between the storeroom and the shop. Her mouth hung open and she held a knife in one hand. For the first time he realized how he must look, covered in dust and soot, bootless. He supposed he was lucky to still have trousers on, unlike Castile. Her eyes flicked over him, taking in his tattoos.

  Trinidad drew a breath and jerked his thumb over his shoulder. “I’m trying to help … with the bombing.” True enough. “I need tools. Pliers. A knife, maybe, or a …”

  His voice fell off as she walked to a shelf on his right and came up with pliers. He tried them. They were tough to open, nearly soldered shut with rust, but they would clamp on a wire well enough.

  “Wire cutters?” he asked hopefully. She shook her head. He looked down at the knife in her hand.

  “I … it’s my papa’s,” she said. “He’s out helping, checking on things.”

  “I’ll make sure he gets it back,” Trinidad said. “I wouldn’t ask if it wasn’t important.”

  She nodded and gave it to him, looking up at him. She stood very close to him, smelling good, soap and candlewax.

  “What’s going on out there?” she asked.

  “I wish to God I knew,” he answered, and paused. “Sorry. I must go. Things are … urgent.”

  She nodded again.

  “You’ve been more help than you know. Christ’s peace upon you.” And he fled.

  On the way back down the alley, he thought he should have warned her to stay indoors. Slavers operated better under cover of disorder. He could only hope the bombings would afford him the same opportunity against the crusade.

  Wolf had sunk down to sit against the wall backing the alley. Castile lingered some distance away, his face white, his bare, muscled legs corded with tension under Trinidad’s shirt, rubbing his hands together to keep them flexible in the cold, no doubt. He trotted over to greet Trinidad, took the knife and the pliers.

  “How is he?” Trinidad said.

  “You just stay well back,” Castile answered as he approached Wolf. He started crooning, wordless. Wolf slumped
over the vest, still enough Trinidad wondered if he was asleep.

  “You going to disarm it?”

  Castile grunted. “I cut this thing off him and we run like Dark Horns is on our tail.”

  “I thought you were an expert in explosives.”

  “I am,” Castile said. “But this is some old-style rig—before my time. Get back, like so. Farther. And stay quiet so you don’t rile him.” He was already sawing through the wires and straps holding the explosives on Wolf’s body. Wolf stayed slack, not protesting, but not helping either.

  It might have only taken a minute or so, but in that time, Trinidad’s joints locked and he swallowed down bile. Scenes from the prison bombarded him, body parts, terror, and blood, so much blood. The sound of the bomb kept ringing through his head. He trembled, thinking of the blasts rocking through him. He still smelled the tang of death and smoke on his skin. He lifted his hands to his nose and dropped them. He always smelled like death. Killing was dirty work and it didn’t wash off. He still wished for his sword though.

  He blinked. Castile was gently peeling the flattened, flexible explosive away from Wolf. A snarl of tangled wire lay by Castile’s bare feet and he laid the explosives next to it. He whistled, low. “It’s enough to level this building.” He slipped the blade under a wire pressed into the explosive and yanked. It snapped.

  Something caught Trinidad’s eye. A female figure a half-block down, hooded with a blue scarf concealing her face. She slipped out of sight around a building.

  “Come on,” Trinidad said, turning away. “We have to go. Now.”

  “Don’t have to tell me twice,” Castile said, urging Wolf into a clumsy, lopsided run.

  THIRTY-THREE

  Trinidad led them on a roundabout route, approaching the church grounds from the back. They’d been lucky so far in not getting spotted; the bombings had driven most parishioners indoors. But Castile kept thinking they couldn’t expect it to last. Of course, maybe it seemed longer to him; he had charge of Wolf—no easy task since he kept wanting to stop and sit down.