It’s only when the High Saint slides in, slips a cup under the Beggar’s eye, swipes a tear, then flicks a knife across her cheek and takes her blood with it that I realize he has used his boon from the God against them.
“Go in peace,” he intones, making the sign of the God self-righteously. At least he didn’t kill her for it. I should be thankful for that, right? Count my blessings? I am counting only how I might get revenge, a cut for a cut, a wound for a wound.
These fools are using their God-given gifts most flagrantly and someone must call them to account.
The High Saint whirls away, prize in hand. I taste the violation of Victoriana’s person like rotted meat in my mouth. There will be war between the High Saint and me. I shall press him until he comes to her on his knees. Until he stands vigil for three nights in prayerful repentance. Until …
Swords clash again between the Majester and the Vagabond, released suddenly from the High Saint’s grip.
This is the High Saint’s gift, exercised now in a harsh way. If he keeps his sacraments perfectly — and we all know he has — he may ask a request of any other follower of the God and they must give it. In this case, standing still in the middle of a fight while he raids the Vagabond’s tears and blood. But this is an abuse of the power bestowed on him. A blasphemy.
The God will judge.
I hope.
I channel my anger into forcing the veiled maiden back. I lose track of the Majester and the Vagabond as I push forward, noticing, out of the corner of my eye, how the Penitent is taking blood from the fallen Inquisitor. The milky paladin must have spilled tears as he lay there, crushed, for they are raided — most indecently.
I feel a pull, dragging me toward him. Perhaps it is not too late to save him? But if I divert my path, it may be too late for Victoriana.
I’ve always hated prioritizing those who need my aid. I hate it now.
“I’ll have your tears, girl,” the Majester is saying grimly as I finally break free from the attack of the veiled maiden. “It won’t hurt you, so why deny me?”
“I’m not your adversary!”
“Then what would you call this dance?”
I can’t see them.
The statues of the Saints are too thick for me to catch a glimpse as I try to push past a robed Saint waving a censer. He thrusts it at my face and it’s all I can do to dance back from the lunge.
I split his censer with my sword, spin a second Saint statue over my shoulders in a move I haven’t had to use in battle since the Sixth Plague War, and then aim a careful blow at the delicate ankle of the trident-bearing Saint just in front of me.
He tumbles to the ground in a heap and I leap onto his shoulders just in time to see the Vagabond on her knees, straddling the dog, sword held in both hands as she blocks a blow from the Majester with all her strength.
She’s bleeding freely from one side and for a moment I’m shocked that the Majester has managed to bring her to her knees … until I see that her head is caught in the pale marble hands of a statue. The curving female Saint looks past me as she holds the Vagabond in place, a look of empty nothing in her eyes. Beside her, a second empty-eyed statue makes a grab for the paladin’s off-hand, catches her forearm, and levers it backward. She cries out in pain.
And that is too much for me.
I fling myself forward, uncaring of the blows aimed at me.
One takes me hard on the left scapula, barely deflected by my breastplate. I stumble, but move with the blow, forcing myself forward despite the flaring pain in that side.
Another knocks my right hip. Not enough to stop me. I’ve battered my way through worse.
I see the Majester raise his sword in what is clearly meant to be a killing blow, but I ram my blade through him before he can bring his sword down, right beneath the heart.
And now I’ve committed murder, too. Not my first. Never my last.
He stumbles.
I feel the tremor in my grip, through the sword, as his quaking flesh makes my blade shiver and buck. His collapse pulls the blade down with him, but it also drags down the statues he was maneuvering. I snatch my sword free before it can be further harmed.
My heart stutters in my chest as my lungs heave with effort. I swallow down bile. I hate killing. Hate wounding. I’m not sure which I’ve done now. Not sure.
I think I’ve killed him, but there isn’t time to check.
With a shuddering breath, I step back from his body and toward the Vagabond.
