She is frowning, looking at the knife in his hand like one might look at a tool that has just broken while you’re using it. She’s too new. She must not realize what’s happening here. It’s that very innocence that pierces my heart.
“I have considered all night,” Sir Kodelai says slowly, with a kind of finality. “I have prayed all night.”
“And did the God speak to you?” I ask, desperately.
“Adalbrand.” Hefertus’s warning is low and urgent.
He’s friend enough to me not to want me to wreck my life upon the rocks. I glance to where he stands, shifting uncomfortably, scratching his beard with one hand and twisting his triple strings of pearls with the other. He’s added a string of black pearls to the mix. He’s not even looking at me. His eyes are fixed on the falcons carved and set in a shape of guarding over the locked door, as if they might come to life and attack him.
“I am the Hand of the God in this matter,” Sir Kodelai says in a low voice. “And all present are under my hammer.”
I look around the circle, but no one is looking at me. They will let this play out. My blood roars loud in my ears. A wise man would let this drop. Who am I to interfere with the judgment of the God? All evidence speaks against me. The girl herself has shown herself capable of murder.
And yet.
I have healed her. I have felt her soul.
This was not her.
There was a Poisoned Saint caught in treason when I was a squire, and a Hand of the God was sent for. The Hand prayed seven days in the halls of our aspect and then declared that he had word from the God. We were roused from our beds in the second hour, yawning and confused. My paladin superior had held my shoulder tightly and whispered in my ear.
“Do nothing, Adalbrand. Say nothing. Close thine eyes if thou must.”
And then the Hand had said, “This is the Vengeance of the God.”
He drank from a small ceremonial cup as his power went out from him. It tangled around the accused paladin’s throat and the man fell to the ground, writhing, and died there on the frosty cobbles before us all.
I look back and forth between Sir Kodelai and the wide-eyed Beggar Paladin. And in my mind’s eye, I see her writhing on the white marble ground, magic tangled around her throat, and I know that this is one thing I will not stand by and witness.
It is not compassion that guides me now. It is not kindness, though a kindly or compassionate man would feel the same. It’s not even this sprouting interest — delicate and new though it is — that is already bending my heart in her direction. It’s honor that bids me speak. Chivalry that refuses to allow injustice.
“Stand before my judgment, Vagabond Saint,” the Hand of the God says, and just like that, power arcs out from him like soft, wafting white smoke. It reaches out in tendrils and wraps around the Vagabond, sweeping her off her feet, drawing her forward, and then forcing her to her knees before him.
My hands clench but I don’t move yet. Think, Adalbrand, think!
Victoriana’s spine straightens. There is no fear in her eyes. But there wouldn’t be. Not from her. And yet her chin trembles vulnerably. Her eyes are wide even if they are bold.
Her dog leaps forward, snapping, and the same gossamer, smoke-like tendrils wrap him up, too, but they do not bring him to his knees. Instead, they stretch and pull, lifting him to hang over our heads, ineffective, held by a single back paw. His snarls rip through the air, punctuating the emotions swirling in the faces around me.
We’re all tense and there’s a taste in the air of blood, thicker and brighter than the taste that already lingers from the actual blood spatters around us. I have a creeping sensation up my spine, a feeling I can’t explain that tells me this beautiful temple adores the bloodlust in this circle. It feeds on it as ravens feed on the corpses of the fallen. And like instruments tuned to a single note, some of the paladins ring with that taste. Anticipation is foremost in their expressions. They want this. They feel it is right and good. One of the Engineers taps his chin with a single finger.
This is madness. I must speak even if my argument is not fully formed.
The words tear from my throat as quickly as I can disgorge them.
“I throw down a preemptive challenge, Aspect of the Vengeful God.”
Across the circle from me, Hefertus rolls his eyes.
Chapter Eighteen
Vagabond Paladin
The dog cursed in my brain so intensely that one curse rolled over another. I gritted my teeth against the mental maelstrom, shifting my weight from knee to knee. All my senses prickled, demanding my attention, insisting a blow was coming quickly, that they could feel the rush of the air, smell the sweat of the attacker. I shook myself free from the onslaught and forced my brain to focus. There was no attack yet, though even if there was, what could I do about it? I couldn’t even draw my sword properly from this position.
How could Sir Kodelai think I was guilty of such a grisly crime on the scant evidence of a knife found here? Was I to have sawn off her head with my belt knife? Not that I couldn’t, exactly. I’d seen pigs butchered with a knife no longer than my palm and I could only assume people were the same. But I had never engaged in such mad butchery, nor would I, God forfend. Besides, what motive could I possibly have to kill the Seer? I did not know the woman.
And now what? I wasn’t even sure what happened next. I’d never seen a Hand of Justice perform his duties before.
