Even if I could still feel his touch on my face.
You’d think the sparring afterward would have cleansed my palate. After all, there had been other fit, fine men fighting. My blood had been up and coursing through my veins with the joy of competing. My eyes had sparkled with the joy of it. That ought to have put him from my mind. It did not seem to have been enough.
Eventually, I blocked out my thoughts and the spirits’ bickering well enough to fall asleep.
I woke to Brindle whining in my ear. He’d kept me warm through the night, the good doggy, and now he rolled over and presented his belly to be scratched. I obliged, but I gave him a long look. I still refused to kill him, but I recognized how terribly impractical this relationship was. A cunning woman would have killed the dog in the first moment. A smart one in the first hour. A practical one before the next day had passed.
I suppose I’d lost claim to being any of those by keeping him alive.
With a rueful smile, I leaned in close enough to smell his doggy breath and whispered, “So who’s an almost good boy, then?”
I scratched him behind the ears and nearly leapt when a voice broke into my mind.
You’re awake. Quick, little snack. Look at the door frame. Look! I swear a dog’s eyes are not what they ought to be.
I tried not to sigh. These two were already wearing on me without ordering me like a slave.
Don’t waste time sighing. You sigh like the bellows of a blacksmith’s shop and look just as beguiling. Use your eyes.
I looked up. After the past week I’d had, it felt good to be able to lift my head without searing pain in my ribs. A stab of guilt shot through me. What I’d felt before was now taken by the Poisoned Saint.
He deserves none of your pity. Your pain feeds his power. Just as his beauty feeds your desire. That’s selfishness, whatever pretty facade you try to paint over it.
No.
Trust me. As a denizen of hell, selfishness is my specialty. I am a master of it. An artist. An unparalleled practitioner.
The door was lit with soft pink light from the rising sun. Something had been carved into the frame. Letters — and if I had to guess, the same kinds of letters we’d seen at the other pillar. Ancient Indul.
Call it what you like. We always called it the Tongue.
As in the only tongue? Did they not have multiple languages when this monastery was in the world?
We had many languages, but this one was the common language. The one everyone knew on top of whatever language they were born to. The crass language. The Devil’s speech.
He started to laugh as my finger traced them again. They were so worn that they were hard to feel, even standing out starkly in the dawn light and thick black shadows.
It says, “Confession Door. Speak your sins and gain entry.” Oh, now this will be a lovely treat. What sins are housed in you, little delicacy? I can guess a few, I think. But it will be tastier to catch them as they slip between your lips.
Why would it want that? Sir Branson sounded worried. That’s not a very … godly thing to want. Victoriana, I mislike this place. Perhaps you should ride off. Leave this to someone else.
And risk censure by the aspect? When I’d only just become a paladin? They’d not just strip me of my title; they might strip me of my hands and send me begging in earnest without even the means to labor at something else.
Is confession not godly? It bares the soul. And it keeps the confessor under your power. What could be more religious than that, paladin? After all, isn’t that how you have been whittling me down? By finding each vein and rooting it out?
To me, it sounded like a trick. Who would willingly speak aloud their sins in front of their rivals? And would saying them change them? Some things died in sunlight … but others thrived when the sun shone full on them. Would whatever was in my heart and hands perish, or surge with renewed energy? And would I be able to tell which before I opened the door?
No, and that’s the magic of it. It can take you where you want to go — into the Aching Monastery — but it has a price. Just like all of us do. And you must pay it.
I didn’t have a price.
The laughter in my head told me that my watchers didn’t believe me.
I ignored them and made ready, going to the creek to tend my horse, wash, and refill my water skins. If we were going into unfamiliar territory, I meant to be prepared. I didn’t care if it was a monastery rather than a battlefield, nor did I care that I would be among fellow paladins who worshiped the God the same as I did. I had learned the cold lesson of the road — don’t have it with you and it’s lost forever.
Which is why you must be sure to keep me with you.
And who was that?
