Miserere: An Autumn Tale Page 5

  “Foundling.” The bed was empty. God, had she dreamed it? She touched Peter’s wallet for reassurance. “Where is he?”

  “Outside. We cleaned him up and gave him a shroud so we can get him to the Citadel.” Caleb reached out to her, but she stepped away from him. “Why didn’t you send for me?” he asked.

  Rachael plucked at the bloody sheets, pulling them off the mattress. A strand of Peter’s hair drifted through a shaft of sunlight. Even Lucian with all his healing skills couldn’t have brought the boy through those injuries. “There was nothing you could have done, Lucian.”

  “Caleb,” he said.

  “Caleb,” she dutifully replied, looking away from him.

  He took the sheets from her and tossed them to the mattress. “Come on, Rae. Get yourself together.”

  He had no business patronizing her. Even debilitated with the Wyrm, she stood above him in rank. When Caleb had first brought her out of Hell after Lucian’s betrayal, she’d been grateful to him, but over the years, he’d misinterpreted her gratitude for something deeper. She refused to foster his hope for any relationship other than a professional one and discouraged his attempts at familiarity.

  Before she could answer him, the front door closed. Rachael snuffed the candle on the nightstand with her fingertips, pinching the wick and not letting go. The pain oriented her mind.

  “Master Caleb, I’ve fed the animals.” The soft voice announced Caleb’s oldest foundling Victor.

  Caleb went to the hurricane glass to blow out the flame. “Okay. Victor, go down and saddle Ignatius for Judge Boucher; she’ll be riding back with us.”

  “Yes, sir.” The youth left the house, and Rachael glimpsed him on his way to the stables. He was a tall, handsome young man with auburn hair and olive skin, about the same age as Peter. Caesar trotted at Victor’s heels and the youth bent down to scratch the dog’s shaggy ears.

  “Rae? Are you paying attention?”

  She focused on Caleb and frowned. The Wyrm had yet to blind her soul’s eye. To anyone else Caleb would appear to be the epitome of calm, but she sensed apprehension hunkering beneath his facade. “What?”

  “The Seraph wants you at the Citadel.”

  She barked a short, nasty laugh, unable to remember the last time anyone wanted her at the Citadel. She kept her apartments there and attended the quarterly Council meetings but that was all. More and more she felt like the discarded piece of a puzzle, swept into a corner away from all the other joined pieces. “It’s Lucian.”

  He wouldn’t meet her gaze. “You know it is.”

  God, she had escaped him never to escape him. “And John is issuing a directive for you and me?”

  “Yes.” He sighed and gestured at her filthy clothes. “You can’t go like that. You look awful. And you’ll need to pack. Looks like we’re going on a long trip. Lucian is northwest of us in the Wasteland.”

  “All right, all right,” she murmured, but it wasn’t all right. It would never be all right again. Lucian Negru had seen to that. “Give me a few minutes.”

  “Sure, I’ll make you some coffee.”

  Caleb had thoughtfully placed two large buckets of water in her room. She must have been in a coma for him and Victor to move around her for so long, but when was the last time she’d slept? The unmade bed gave her no clue as she closed the door to her bedroom and pulled the curtains across her window. She tugged her shirt off and tossed it into the corner.

  On her right arm her flesh suddenly rose as if there was a pebble just beneath the surface of her skin. The pigmentation around the blemish became discolored. Before she could clamp her hand over the bump, it moved up her arm to disappear into one of the raised scars mapping her body. The disfigurements became more pronounced as the Wyrm gained another inch of her with every passing year.

  Hands shaking, Rachael made certain to choose a shirt with loose sleeves. She pulled on the gloves she’d made to hide the joining of her pinky and ring fingers on her left hand. The physical deformities were not readily noticeable, but nothing hid the pall of the Wyrm’s resonance, which hovered over her like a shroud.

  She finished dressing and packed. When she opened the curtains again, she caught a quick glimpse of herself in the glass. The scars on the right side of her face and neck undulated where the Wyrm crawled beneath her skin. The movements were barely perceptible unless someone looked very close. Rachael never allowed anyone to get too close.

  Her long hair looked like she had cut it in the dark with a dull knife. She reached up and dragged the ragged layers over to shadow the right side of her face. Maybe she couldn’t hide the Wyrm’s resonance, but she obscured the demon’s physical presence.

  Satisfied, she left her reflection and went to collect her sword. She loosened the strap of the scabbard and slung the blade over her shoulder, then grabbed Peter’s wallet and pushed it into her pack. Whether his death was her fault or not, he was the first foundling she had ever drawn through the Veil. Since he had no other family on Woerld, she’d hold on to his personal possessions. The wallet might give her some small comfort in the night.

  In the kitchen, Caleb poured her a cup of coffee, and she could tell by his appraisal that she looked presentable. She would have to rely on him because she removed all the mirrors from her house years ago.

  She paused by the table where the account book for Cross Creek was open. She set her pack down, unable to recall leaving the book there. Her eye was drawn to the heavy slashes of ink scarring the paper. The pages that had once held neatly spaced columns of handwritten numbers were now filled with nightmare sketches of incomprehensible violence. She turned the leaves slowly, marveling at the detail of familiar faces pulled in agony. Sickened, she slammed the book shut and took it to the stove where she shoved it into the fire.

  Without a word, Caleb took the poker and mashed the curling paper deep into the flames, making certain they burned. “Blackout?” he asked. He likened her episodes of dreaming to alcoholic blackouts. A fitting enough description of the times when she dreamed and the Wyrm took her for its own.

  She nodded. “Did Victor see that?”

  “No. It was on the table, but it was closed. While Victor fed the animals, I flipped through it and saw, well, you know.” He shrugged.

  She took her cup and steadied her hand to drink.

  Caleb looked at her.

  She shuddered. “You know it’s worse when I’m alone. I fell to dreaming. That’s all. It’s nothing. A minor fugue. I’ll be all right.”

  “Is there anything else here that might be like that?”

  She felt sure there was nothing. “No.”

  “Good, because John’s sending Sara and Stephan to steward Cross Creek while you’re gone.” He closed the stove.

  Rachael grabbed her pack and went outside with Caleb following her. She lashed her saddlebags to Ignatius’ saddle as the dapple gray fixed his one brown eye on her. The constable mounted his black mare, and Victor turned the buckboard carrying Peter’s body. The youth was obviously eager to be away from Cross Creek and the sour stench of the Wyrm’s magic.

  Caleb said to Victor, “Judge Boucher and I are going to ride ahead. You take your time.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  They soon left Victor and the plodding wagon behind. They rode in silence, keeping a steady pace. As they neared the Citadel, the congestion on the road became thicker with merchants and local farmers coming and going either to the Citadel or the Semah River with their wares. Most of them remained on the central road to the Citadel to enter the main eastern gate. A few followed another narrow side-road to the village of Banias, a dirty river village that snuggled up to the Citadel’s western wall like a tick.

  Rachael and Caleb followed a less traveled road to enter the Citadel’s northern gate. Not one of the better-maintained thoroughfares, the road boasted less traffic but became a mud-hole during the heavy autumn rains. Rachael didn’t care; she was glad to be out of the crowds.

  They crested a small
hill and on the plain below rested the Citadel, high on a manmade mound. In spite of her years on Woerld, the sight of the bastion never failed to take her breath away. The Semah River sparkled, a jeweled necklace that curved behind the Citadel. A fortified outer wall gave the Citadel its first line of defense, and a second inner wall encompassed the cathedral and grounds.

  The cathedral faced the east where the basilica rose to form a dome between two towers. At the top of the dome, the lesser spires of adjacent buildings surrounded a great resurrection cross. The towers contiguous to the cathedral housed the apartments and offices of those Katharoi who resided at the Citadel.

  Most of the Katharoi lived on their holdings and only reported to the Citadel for council meetings or in times of war. The supplies from the holdings kept the Citadel functioning so that in Woerld, the Katharoi stood outside of Ra’anan’s local government. They supported themselves and rarely interceded in Woerld’s political arena. To keep Ra’anan’s King Phillip happy, the Seraph sent an annual tribute and helped in years of famine or plague.

  In return, King Phillip never interceded in the Citadel’s business and trusted the Seraph to keep the Fallen from corrupting his lands. The War of the Great Schism had made a deep and abiding impression on all of Woerld’s kings, and none wanted to see their countries turned into a barren wasteland like Norbeh. They left the bastions to their own devices so long as taxes were paid and the Fallen remained in Hell.

  The Citadel and the Katharoi who lived there formed a splendid machine that never seemed to lose its way. Even when a piece falls from the cogs, the wheels continue to turn, Rachael thought as she and Caleb approached the postern gate to the outer wall.

  She bit down on her self-pity and nodded to the guard who motioned them through the open portcullis. The sun disappeared as the long, dim tunnel swallowed the light. They emerged back into the brightness of the middle ward and passed through the second gate into the crowded courtyard.

  The alley between the summer kitchen and the bake-house was congested with a few Katharoi and staff on their way out of the Citadel. The crowd parted reluctantly for Rachael and Caleb. Rachael ignored the three Katharoi who made the sign of the cross as she passed.

  They hated her, and those that didn’t hate her feared her. She carried the stench of the Wyrm on her like a vile perfume, and they sensed it the same way they sensed one another’s magic. Rachael turned her face away from them and guided Ignatius to the right, toward the cathedral.

  The courtyard was busy with Katharoi and staff members who served the Katharoi going about their daily business. Katharoi from other bastions moved amongst the Citadel’s members. Emissaries from the Mosque and the Rabbinate laughed together as they walked toward the Citadel’s great library to the left of the cathedral. The blue robes of an Avalonian priestess contrasted with the red clothing worn by a Deg Long from the Tibetan temple as they wound their way through the crowd, heads bent close to converse over the racket.

  Members of other bastions came from all over Woerld to visit the Citadel’s famed library like they traveled to the Mosque to learn astronomy. In her youth, Rachael had journeyed to the bastion of the Hindus, the Mandir. There she had studied the Dharmacakra and the confluence of energy that created the spokes of the Dharmacakra’s wheel. Under the guidance of the Mandir’s Seraph, Rachael had come to understand how the realms of existence—Heaven, Earth, Woerld, and Hell—interrelated with one another. The four realms were like four lakes joined by tiny streams; toss a pebble into Hell and the ripples would extend to the farthermost reaches of Heaven.

  Rachael scanned the crowd to see if any of the Citadel’s visitors were disturbed by Lucian’s opening of the Gate, but the only tension she sensed came from the Citadel’s Katharoi. Everything else seemed normal. The steady ring of metal against metal announced the blacksmith was well into his day. Four women wearing cooks’ aprons whispered amongst themselves as they sauntered to the gardens swinging empty baskets. Rachael ignored their stares, wishing she didn’t have to undergo this indignity every time John needed her.

  When she and Caleb stopped at the western entrance to the cathedral, grooms came forward to take their mounts. Caleb ordered a third horse be saddled and brought to them, and one young man took the animals to the shade while the second ran to the stables.

  Over the doors of the cathedral’s entrance was a relief carved in stone. With his great wings outstretched and his sword drawn, Saint Michael pressed his foot against the fallen Satan’s throat. Satan’s eyes were defiant, in spite of his crushed wings and Michael’s obvious rage, the fallen angel exuded confidence. His gaze promised he would rise again.

  Rachael instinctively crossed herself as she approached the steps. The doors were open to take any breeze up to the highest floors. They stepped into the coolness of the atrium where tall arched windows allowed natural light to spill into the cathedral. Approximately twenty feet ahead, another set of doors opened into the nave, an area almost as busy as the atrium.

  The nave extended for several yards before an ornate wooden screen interrupted it. Through the latticework of the screen, Rachael glimpsed the quire and high altar where the Katharoi held both Mass and court.

  She turned away from the nave and looked beyond the carved colonnades to the arcades that melted into the shadows. With Caleb on her heels, Rachael slipped around a small group of protégés.

  Rather than take the straight path to the Seraph’s formal entrance where emissaries from other bastions might be waiting, she veered right toward an arcade that led to a dim passageway. Tapestries depicted battles from the War of the Great Schism when the Fallen had almost destroyed the Zoroastrians by dividing their ranks over theological differences.

  The Fallen’s adherents had infiltrated the Zoroastrian bastion and convinced the Seraph that the unity of Woerld’s religions betrayed their beliefs. The Zoroastrian council voted to separate from the Council of Seraphs and their respective bastions. Not even the most passionate pleas from the Mandir’s Seraph had swayed their hearts. From the moment the Zoroastrian bastion divorced itself from the Council, it had only been a matter of time before the Fallen attacked, and without being able to rely on the other bastions, the Zoroastrian fortress fell to the powers of chaos.

  By the time the surviving Zoroastrian Katharoi reached the other bastions with news of the breach, the Fallen had secured their defenses in the city of Melasur. John was a foundling during the last years of the War, and he recounted how the ripples from the War of the Great Schism had extended into Earth’s realm in the form of World War II. John never wanted his Katharoi to forget how close they’d come to losing Woerld and Earth to the Fallen.

  Rachael and Caleb passed the last of the tapestries and the chattering crowd thinned as they reached a plain door that connected the cathedral to the adjoining tower. The next corridor ended at a narrow stairwell used by the Katharoi and serving staff to access the Seraph’s chambers. The less she was seen, the better.

  The ride to the Citadel along with the climb to the fourth floor cleared her head. Once John heard about her latest blackout combined with the loss of her foundling, he would surely rescind his directive. Then she could go back to Cross Creek, raise warhorses, and drown herself in forgetfulness again.

  Rachael stepped into a passageway lit with a few scattered sconces. No ornamentation lined the stone walls. The only occupants of the hall were the two guards who flanked the side-door to John’s office and a line of three empty chairs. The guards came to attention as Rachael neared them.

  She said, “The Seraph has summoned me.”

  The soldier bowed and knocked before he opened the door. He returned and gestured for Rachael to enter. “Judge Boucher. Constable Aldridge, you may wait there.” He gestured to one of the empty chairs.

  Into the abyss, Rachael thought, steadying herself for the interview to come.

  In the expansive office, she inhaled the scent of leather and tobacco tinged with the faintest odor of incense. It
was a smell she had long associated with John’s book-lined shelves in the well-lit room. When she was young, this chamber had been her sanctuary. With the coming of the Wyrm, she had sought comfort from her Elder’s presence less and less.

  Parallel to the door she had entered was another entrance, which led to a comfortable antechamber where formal guests awaited their private audiences with the Citadel’s Seraph. Flanking the door were two large globes atop brass stands. The globe on the left was of Earth and the one on the right represented Woerld. The thirty-one spokes of the Dharmacakra’s Gates crisscrossed both globes and reflected what John believed were the corresponding sites of power between Earth and Woerld.

  To her left, natural light from three tall, arched windows flooded the room. The rest of the chamber was given to bookshelves except for the one wall farthest from the door, which sheltered the hearth. Cushioned chairs surrounded the open fireplace where John often entertained the visiting emissaries of other Seraphs. Seated in one of the chairs was Reynard Bartell, the Citadel’s Inquisitor, and he rose when she entered.

  At the center of the chamber was John’s desk, as ornate as any throne, the wood burnished to a deep cherry. As soon as she shut the door, John said, “You took your bloody time getting here.”

  John Shea’s voice had been the first Rachael heard in Woerld, and as her Elder, she had come to know his moods better than her own. He wasn’t angry with her for her tardiness, but he intended to know the reason.

  He was seated behind his desk, looking up from the paper he held. He wasn’t a large man physically, yet he commanded the room nonetheless. Though he was well in his seventies, he could still put one of the younger Katharoi in place with either sword or argument.

  Reynard Bartell clasped his hands before him as he moved into the light. His cassock and crimson scapular were immaculate. In spite of her recent washing and clean clothes, Rachael felt dingy.

  As if sensing her discomfort, Reynard smiled benevolently. Her gut constricted. A master courtier, Reynard had been a judge when he’d used Lucian’s trial to secure his position of Inquisitor, chief Citadel judge.