He folds his fingers again. ‘What am I, Shipwright?’
Her eyes take in the journals, his posture. That one bright eye.
She drinks from the cup. The taste reminds her, a little, of home.
‘A spy, perhaps. But I think more than that. A historian maybe or a broker.’ She shifts in the chair. ‘If I didn’t know better, I’d say a priest.’
Heartshamer is silent for a second. Then he laughs. ‘She’s good, Fallon.’
He turns to fix her with his eye. ‘You’re good. They’re right to talk about you, I think. Would you like to know why Fallon’s brought you here?’
‘Desperately,’ she sighs.
‘Always one for cheap theatre, our lord,’ Heartshamer murmurs. ‘He loves the suspense.’ His fingers waggle.
Fallon looks like he’s about to object, then shrugs. ‘You’re not wrong. I get my kicks where I can.’
Heartshamer scratches at his jaw. ‘I am or was all of those things, once, Shipwright. I am a historian. And I am certainly a spy, which is why I am not welcome amid those maudlin archivists, with their glass and silence. I believe most information should be free. I merely like to select the channels it travels in with a little care.’
He sighs, fingers massaging the scar tissue by his eye socket. ‘However, the reason our melodramatic lord has brought you here, is because of who I used to be. Or rather what.’
Shipwright watches those fingers, the barest shake in the bone.
‘I was a host.’
He watches her face. ‘It means little to you?’
She looks at Fallon, shakes her head. ‘Not much. We had nothing like that back east.’
Heartshamer looks faintly relieved. ‘Perhaps a Hesper term. Or a western one. What do you know of the gods?’
She thinks. ‘A little. They were a belief system here. Until three years ago. Until the south.’
Heartshamer nods. ‘Until Crowkisser. I still haven’t solved that mystery. History requires sane sources. But, I’m wandering. A belief system.’ His leg jitters. ‘A belief system, yes, in the way that a leaf believes in the tree.’
He refills his cup, barely a drop spilt. ‘Our gods were close to us. They could be propositioned. For miracles. For healing, or strength, or knowledge.’
His hands steady as he talks. ‘Magic, effectively. But not weaving, like your lover. His is a magic of edges, of the between spaces. Of will. The gods.’ He sighs, places his fingers against his temples. ‘Theirs was magic of the body. Of love. Of partnership. Sacrifice. They were golden. Beautiful.’
Shipwright listens, a suspicion unfurling in her heart like a fern. ‘Shroudweaver mentioned a little of this, but you talk about them like you saw them.’
Heartshamer laughs. ‘Saw them? Iwasthem.’
He reaches for Shipwright’s hand, places it against his ribs. ‘The gods didn’t reach out to everyone. They chose people. People who called to them. Who needed them. Or,’ he laughs ruefully. ‘Who thought they would never need them. And they entered into them. Into us.’
He lets her fingers fall. ‘Host is a literal term, Shipwright. We could feel them in our heads, in our bodies, on our lips. They taste of spice and honey.’
She twitches at that, a jolt of recognition. Remembering tower steps under her feet, light pouring into her. But that had been shroudweaving, surely.
Heartshamer watches her, tilts his head curiously, moves on when she stays silent. ‘We lived with them, within our bodies. We gave them our breath and our blood and in return, they gave us whatever they felt we needed.’
He settles back into his chair, crosses his legs. ‘For me, that was knowledge. I was full of questions. At first about myself, about the world. Soon, I began to wonder about others. The great. The good. The people who claimed to be great and good.’
Shipwright shakes her head in amazement. ‘And the gods—yourgod told you these things?’
Heartshamer smiles. ‘I’d like to pretend I used the power responsibly. But I used it like most people, I suspect. I gathered all I could on my friends, my enemies. I asked my god for the secrets of the rich and powerful, and I kept them close against my chest like a hundred sharp little knives, ready to cut and wound.’
He sighs again, refills the cup. ‘I like to tell myself I guided things in their correct direction. That I used the sins of the wicked against them, that I gave the good the knowledge they needed to win. I like to tell myself that I was a sword. Ethical when used in the right cause.’
