“And how is that?” I put a little steel in my voice. It was as much my duty to keep a fear of paladins in the hearts of the people as it was to aid them in need. Failure meant the next paladin might see her armor stripped away and her horse stolen.
“I had a vision,” he said, his milky eye on me. “A vision of hands reaching out — hands that looked like tree roots — and they held within them a bitter cup. Do not drink the cup.”
“I’ll be glad to avoid it,” I agreed. “Blessings be on you for your prophecy.”
He laughed then and shot a look at Brindle, who I’d laid across the front of my saddle for our walk through town. I still didn’t trust him near people, even with the vow in place. He did that thing dogs do that is half whine and half yawn, ending it with a snap of his jaws. If I squinted, I could still remember what those jaws had done to Sir Branson’s face. Fortunately, his eyes weren’t glowing demonically. Even a half-blind man might be startled by that.
“You think you can avoid it, but some of us carry our own evil around with us, don’t we, Lady Paladin?” His gaze looked like it was trying to light Brindle on fire. “And yours might yet tear your throat out.”
I gritted my teeth harder as the old man rolled his good eye. My belly rolled along with it. How did he know?
Well, he is a seer. Look carefully, pretty Seer. Enjoy your stolen glance before I rip out your throat.
Pretty? Who would have thought the demon had such odd taste.
He cackled in my mind and I gritted my teeth. If an old man had known, what would prevent the other paladins from knowing?
If they do, then they’ll know also that you have chosen to bear a burden for the sake of mankind. There’s no shame in that.
I had considerably less faith in my common man. You heard stories, after all. Stories of people being burnt at the stake.
You’re too damp to light up easily. A true wet blanket among women. You should have more fun, enjoy a little fire. Taste the world a little — as I shall taste your flesh.
Or you heard of them being hung up in crow cages. Was that worse or better? I wasn’t sure.
Your imagination is too small, snackling. Think of what I’ll do to you when I take over your body, the demon purred in my mind. I will make you dance unspeakable paths. I will baptize you in cruelty and wash you in heartlessness and make your name a byword of terror whispered in the darkness. You shall be the sweetest dainty I ever feasted upon. Your dearest dreams I shall twist until they choke you.
I shivered.
“There were two paladins in that last group that went through here,” the old man said, suddenly clear-eyed and sober-speaking. “If you aim to follow them, mind the tracks. Beelder, the hunter’s boy, says they’re clear and easy to follow from the end of the main road, though what fool would follow a dozen paladins is the real question. The church wouldn’t have sent so many on a mission of peace, yes? No sane man would go to new lands without the paladin’s blessing first. No sane man would follow holy knights into the blind night, either.” He opened his mouth as if he’d say more but then shut it with a snap and said curtly, “Go with the God.”
“And you as well,” I told him, and then I rode out from the thin village as quickly as my horse would take me, taking care to light a lantern and hang it from my lantern pole before I was far beyond the feast lights.
I did not want to stop anywhere near that hamlet. Or any hamlet. People made me nervous. And now, I felt as though my sin was writ large upon my forehead for anyone to read.
Maybe I’ll make your eyes glow to betray you, too.
I didn’t think he could do that. Probably.
My eyes drifted several times to the sorry clumps of white snow along the path, hoping that any glow might be reflected there. I saw nothing.
By the time I left the hamlet behind, I found myself at the end of the road. My map showed all the details of the rest of the route with question marks added to the ends of names and the features sketched vaguely by an uncertain hand. Unhelpful.
The other map was a suggested layout of the monastery, though it seemed to me that any map of a place that existed ten thousand years ago would likely bear little resemblance to reality. It was the typical collection of cloisters, cruciform main floor, bell tower, and sanctuary. I’d seen the same pattern a hundred times before.
“It was a great civilization that lived there,” someone had scrawled on the bottom of the scroll. “We know little of it beyond this single monastery and a few scraps of recorded history that depict this place as devout and possibly more advanced than we in both technology and faith. One historian claims it was the source of ‘miracles and powers beyond anything seen in this world before or since.’”
We would see about that.
Look, and not to be morose here or anything, but I don’t like the sound of that, Victoriana. If they’re so powerful, why are they not around today? Why did they not bring such wisdom elsewhere with them? I have no recollection of these people even mentioned.
When the Rim moves, no man may stay the change of the shape of the world, the other voice in my head argued.
But the God may stay it.
Certainly. But why would he? There’s no fun in that.
The God does not exist for fun.
