Oathbreaker ch 9.35 - Reflection (Patreon)

I informed my wizard of the going ons the same day as the party.

“You fought it?” Didikas asked me. “In the middle of the streets?”

Funny. A thousand years, and I still knew when he was being patronizing. He had a certain way about it that I remembered from when he was young.

Keeping my own tone light I said, “It’s not like I planned it. Well, I definitely invited it. It was a useful opportunity, and lo! Now we know our enemy, and that they are vulnerable.”

Didikas shook his head in exasperation. “That was foolish. Exposing yourself to the cult, not to mention to this exorcist…”

“I’ve been here nine weeks now, Didikas, and no mob or Curia mission has managed to oust me. I learned two things that night.” I lifted a hand from the pins on my dress and extended two fingers. “I know the identity of the demon who lurks behind the Falcon Curia, and I know that another faction is at work in Harkres, seeking to expunge it and its human dupes. They do not wish the populace to know there are demons in the city, which aids my secrecy as much as theirs. It’s all too easy for that sort of paranoia to turn inward as well as out.”

Nine weeks. I’d accomplished much since the night I dueled Samaoth. Some of that accomplishment was evident on the very walls around me in that moment. I stood in a fine room in a fine house, with a hanging chandelier and expensive local artwork. The bed wasn’t exactly imperious, but it was large and soft, and I had my own wardrobes.

I even had a maid. A nice girl named Falcona. She was under strict orders to keep clear of the grounds at night.

“It just seems… preemptive.” I could practically taste the wizard trying to be tactful as he chose his words. “The Curia knows there’s a rival agent in the city now, and they’ve had time to prepare.”

He sighed and leaned back. I glanced at him, surreptitiously trying to decide where he might be. His own environs were dim, all functional stone and rugged carpets. A castle, I guessed. The antrespeculum, the Tunnel Mirror, was an incredibly valuable and useful item, but it wasn’t exactly perfect. There was a distortion to the image, a pallor like I looked at the man and his surroundings through a thin veil of smoke.

“The Curia knew there were rival agents before my arrival,” I argued as I began to do up my hair, carefully arranging a set of thin pins and needles. They were all ivory, which was expensive, but also necessary. Metal accessories would have been torturous, and I didn’t need my hair catching fire during an inopportune moment. “Knowing that the Magi are in play will make them paranoid and reclusive. It’s a similar tactic to laying a careful siege. Sometimes it’s best to exhaust the enemy before one goes in for a killing thrust.”

Or a killing peck, depending.

“Hm.” Didikas sipped at a glass of wine as he considered. Definitely a castle somewhere. The stonework on the window behind him and the sense of cold seeping through the mirror made me guess him to be somewhere in the south. The Galze had particular habits in their masonry.

“You trusted me to be your vanguard, Didikas. Trust that I know what I’m doing.” I finished arranging my hair, then turned to face the mirror and made a pose. “How do I look?”

I wore the same skin as when I’d entered the city, that of a pale and dark-haired Oroi. Over the human costume, I’d donned a brilliant carmine dress in the northerner fashion, loose above the waist and flowing like water beneath it. Thin and light, it had a window cut down the front, leaving me bare from collarbone to navel. Northerners were not exactly shy about showing skin, but it bordered on the scandalous in post-crusade Bradivara.

My arms were wrapped in dangling strips of burgundy cloth edged in red tassels, and the low neck was lined in a heavy necklace of painted ivory. Ivory was in my hair too, holding it up high above my head so it remained clear of my face while also falling down my bare back and shoulders in a tumble of black curls.

I couldn’t see myself in the mirror, occupied as it was by the wizard, and I’d asked the question half in jest. His silence made me look at him more fully. He was sitting down in his own room, in a fine chair with a high back. He had one leg crossed over the other, and dressed in simple but elegant clothes that showed off his figure near as well as my costume did. He didn’t wear the metal mask over his missing eye just then, but he’d let his long hair fall over that half of his face, and the dimness of the room shadowed it and dramatized his lean features.

He’s more handsome than he used to be. The thought came unbidden, but I let myself taste it. He looked like a disguised devil, like the crowfriar in a king’s parlor, an elegant gentleman ready to tempt with a dark deal and clever words.

There was no hint of roughness or eagerness in his voice when he spoke. He said the words quietly, matter-of-factly, and they weren’t quite a command.

“Turn around.”

Just those two words, softly spoken, but I felt a shiver run from the top of my spine down to my legs. And I turned, making the motion slow enough that my long skirts barely swished, twisting my upper body like a dancer and looking at him over one shoulder the whole time. The dress had no back, just a series of ribbons that secured around my neck. I’d taken advantage of the climate to wear backless clothes whenever I could, in case I needed my wings and didn’t want to ruin an outfit.

I ended the motion facing him, crossing my ankles and swaying slightly. I knew then that, whatever he’d made himself, Didikas remained near enough to human, for he swallowed and shifted in his seat.

“…I think you look very dangerous,” he said. “What battle are you arming yourself for, Lady Wurmwing?”

He always resorted to courtly manners when he wanted to hide nerves — which included arousal, as it turned out. I smiled and filed that information away. “There’s a gala tonight, hosted by the Bradivaran aristocracy. A number of promising names are being introduced to Harkres’s elite, and one of them is a project of mine.”

Didikas quirked an eyebrow. “A project?”

“A soldier in the Falcon Guard. He’s being promoted to officer, and this event is his debut. I’m his guest at the party.”

Didikas opened his mouth to make a silent ah, and sipped wine. I watched him choose his words as he took the time to drink and place the cup down on a little table by his chair. “I hope you’re not getting distracted, Shyora. Remember why you’re there.”

I would have blinked, had I been pretending to be mortal just then. Jealousy? It surprised me, but then… he’d been very jealous of me once. Perhaps he wasn’t so changed, after all.

“I have many projects in the city,” I said with a shrug and made to adjust the pins in my hair. “The guardsman. A banker. A scribe in one of the temples. One of the alccrs. There’s even a performer I’ve been playing muse to, a lutist who makes political songs for the commoners.”

Didikas let out a short laugh. “That’s quite the harem!”

I felt a spike of anger. “You sent me here to be a succubus, Didikas. You said the words yourself. I’m doing all of this to save your son.”

He stared at me in surprise, his one good eye wide and bright.

“…You are right,” he said. “I suppose I just expected… well. Something else. A ghost in their churches, perhaps. I can see the soldier and the nobleman, but how do bankers and minstrels help us?”

I took a long breath — a mortal habit, but it helped calm me. “The Curia is not popular right now. I gather that their god, this rogue angel, was dormant for some generations before all of this started. Its priesthood turned insular and corrupt. I mean that in a very human way. They got too involved in secular politics, passed unpopular policies, had a number of scandals. The Bradivaran nobles stuck their claws in and started nominating their own archcurates.”

Didikas was nodding as I spoke. “I’ve heard some of this. It’s my understanding that things started deteriorating when the first popular revolts began in Bant.”

“Well before then, pet. The Bradivaran elite is deeply intermarried with the Marchlander nobles. They became involved in Bant. It strained the economy and didn’t end up making a difference in the east. The previous archcurate died of illness, and Samaoth’s cult — I believe they were already here before, seeding some of this — filled the power vacuum left by his death.”

I paced as I talked, juxtaposing Didikas’s stillness on the other side of the mirror. It felt something like lecturing back at the Campanile. “All the sudden, the Argent Falcon seems active again — there are miracles, healing, mandates passed down from the High Cathedral. The populace rejoices, only…”

Didikas paused with his goblet lifted. “Only?”

“I’ve gathered that there are many who seem perfectly aware that something is amiss. The curates act strangely and keep to themselves. Under the Curia, Bradivara has always been tolerant of other faiths, but that changed these past ten years. Temples were sabotaged and forced to close their doors. Then, just in the last year, people began to vanish.”

“So the city is in a state of fear,” Didikas observed.

“Exactly.” I smiled at him. “That’s what I’m using. Many people are faithful to the Falcon, but there is a faction of dissidents who do not trust the curates. I’m strengthening that faction and putting pressure on the cult. If they’re distracted fighting the city, then I should be able to slip past them and get to Ammatán.”

Didikas frowned and leaned forward. “And what of Ammatán?”

“That is a mystery still. I’m sorry, Didikas, but I’ve heard very little of him. The Archcurate is a ghost. There is this other priest, a Curate Darras, who seems to be making decisions inside the cult. I think he might be the real mastermind, but I can’t be sure. It’s possible your son is a dupe, or even a prisoner. I hope to learn more soon.”

The wizard sighed and nodded. “I understand.”

“There’s also the Knight-Regent,” I mused. “I suspect he might also be a plant for these cultists, possibly even Woed. His commissars are very loyal to him, and they’ve been stamping down on dissent. I’ve not had any more success reaching him than getting inside the cathedral.  He’s expected to attend this function tonight.”

I paused and added, “All of this is going to truly begin tonight, if I’ve schemed as well as I think. I need you here, Didikas.”

He seemed to consider a moment, his gaze distant. Again I wondered where he was. He must have possessed incredible resources — he’d smuggled the antrespeculum into the city, and that was a treasure of ages.

“Soon, I think.” He met my gaze. “Teleporting near Harkres is still too risky, but if you can distract the Curia…”

I nodded. “Didikas… I’ve been thinking.”

I was always thinking. Brooding, really, but my time in Harkres had put me in an introspective mood. All the affairs I’d pursued in the line of duty, and not one of them had fulfilled me in the same way that single stolen kiss from a relieved husband had.

“Yes?” He asked.

My gaze lingered on his left eye. A hundred different words and a dozen choices whirled through my mind. My true form squirmed beneath the human skin, wanting to emerge.

It was all too much to say across so much distance. I would make my decision, and act on it when he was in my reach.

“It’s nothing. See you soon?”

He smiled, then severed the connection. The mirror showed my own room, and the fiend standing at the center of it. She looked starved and dissatisfied, her sullen glare an accusation.

I sniffed in contempt and turned my back on her. In the physical world, I was beautiful and confident. Harkres was at my mercy.

When I’d saved the boy and repaired things with his father, I would put the creature in the mirror behind me.

Tarik and I were fashionably late. He fretted, but I assured him while we were announcing ourselves at the gates in a hushed voice.

“Swallow your nerves, love. We have plenty of night left.”

The gala was being hosted on an estate in the city, the residence of an important lord and benefactor to the Curia. Half the country’s peerage was there, and the grounds of the mansion practically crawled with Bradivaran inbreeding. It was a handsome house, all white and yellow walls with an open design common to the warm north, but the summer had placed much of the gathering out on the lawn. There was entertainment, which included a team of acrobats and firebreathers. At least one of them had auratic skill, and even as we passed through the decorative outer gates of the manor grounds, a plume of blue fire shot a quarter of a mile into the sky, rewarded with cheers and applause.

“You look beautiful,” Tarik told me. He held me close to his side, like I was a bauble he feared might be stolen.

He looked rather dashing himself, in his fine new uniform and embroidered cape. The silver pin of a Harkresian argehark gleamed at his breast.

“Stay focused, my love. There will be time for that later.” I smiled to soften the reprimand.

He reluctantly turned his attention forward, pouting. That was always the trouble with making thralls. They became obsessive, emotionally erratic, and had trouble focusing on… well, anything that I didn’t ask them to.

I squeezed his arm and whispered, “This is your night. You are a fine soldier. You deserve this.”

I’d murmured the words too quietly for human ears, but Tarik suddenly straightened and beamed, taking new pleasure in everything. I sighed and caught sight of Persay, who was on duty at the manor doors. He saw us and gave the slightest nod. Bak and Lekkee were at another post on the grounds, their helmed gazes watchful.

I needed to focus too, or I’d be caught with my dress unlaced when the dominoes started to fall.

Tarik was announced to the gathering. There was applause there, too — he’d distinguished himself during an action some days before, when a nulhogg had emerged from the Murk and destroyed two villages before the Guard managed to mobilize in strength. There were rumors the promising young officer had displayed strange powers during the hunt, that he was blessed by the Falcon. He’d taken to the Profane Gift with celerity.

We mingled with the highborn. Tarik’s patrons introduced him around. He received ingratiating praise and veiled insults, and weathered it all stoically. There was obviously a contingent of the aristocracy who didn’t like this up-jumped guardsman, but that was expected and of little interest to me. For my part, I received curious sidelong looks and whispers directed at my turned back.

“Oroi witch.”

Unfortunately, not everyone whispered. A dreadful look crossed Tarik’s handsome face as he spun on the one who’d spoken, a heavyset lord from the countryside.

“Come again, my lord?” The soldier all but snarled.

The other man wasn’t cowed. He lifted his chin and bit back. “Watch your tone, guardsman. The Houses might tolerate your promotion, given your efforts on behalf of the realm, but you have overstepped by bringing your… paramour into our midst.”

We’d caused a scene. Many of those nearby had turned to watch. The bearish man turned his nose up at Tarik, who was more a wolf as he lowered his own chin in an openly belligerent glare.

“I’d ask you to take back your words, my lord.” Tarik spoke in a cold, leveled voice.

“I will not,” the nobleman said. “And you overstep yourself demanding anything of me. I expected better of you, Ser Tarik. This display is unseemly.”

“It’s quite fine,” I said and smiled at the large nobleman. “I have been called worse than witch, my lord. In the west, witches learn their craft from witch-elves and are honored for their knowledge. You have given me a great compliment, lord, unless it was in error? I admit, I’ve not yet mastered the language in this country.”

I played up the accent and kept a pleasant expression on my face, though Tarik’s anger practically wafted off him like heat. The nobleman looked surprised, and his eyebrows went up as I spoke.

“…I see,” he said, and coughed. “Well, maybe it wasn’t in error. You have good manners, for a foreigner. What was your name?”

I curtsied. “Shy of Ravoroi, my lord. And you are Lord Ansek of House Destrey, if I am not mistaken? You guard the northern march. I am sure this city is grateful for your valor, great lord.”

The man’s begrudging surprise quickly melted into delight. “Hmph,” he said and sipped from a goblet of wine. “Well. Perhaps this young officer can learn manners from a witch.”

He said the word witch with a touch of irony, inclining his head, and I smiled. There were nervous titters from our audience. This was not a man any of them wanted to offend.

When we’d parted ways with Ansek Destrey, I dug my nails into Tarik’s arm hard enough to make him wince. “That was not well done,” I told him.

“He insulted you!” Tarik protested.

“They’ve all been insulting me since I walked through the gate. That’s how the nobility work in every country. Rising to his challenge like a barking dog only makes you look like a dog.”

I’d stung him, and badly. In a voice of raw hurt, he said, “I meant to defend you. Aren’t you happy?”

I felt tired. I’d used Tarik too hard and too quickly. It was my nature, and I’d intended it, but…

“Some of your fellow officers are over there.” I nodded to a group of uniformed men and women who’d formed their own clique around the fire dancers. Atosa, who was also being promoted, stood with the group. “Why don’t you go mingle a bit? These nobles are droll.”

Fear flickered across his face. “Are you leaving me?”

“No, love! I just need to go check something. Everything is fine.”

He nodded, his eyes turning glassy. “Everything is fine.”

He went to the dancers grinning. I resolved to end things after that night. I wouldn’t need him after what came next, and he might still recover if I let him go now. I was still mulling on that when a brazier nearby suddenly shifted in color. The flames grew paler and took on a hint of argent.

Hiding my pensive mood, I let a smile play over my lips. “I was wondering when you’d approach me.”

“Pernicious,” a voice in the flames hissed. “Is that you?”

“It is I, brother.”

The flame seemed to shiver. “Why do you fight me? Why did you defend that golden priest?”

“I serve other mortals opposed to yours,” I told the other demon. “Are you bound, brother? I can free you.”

“I am a god here.”

I shook my head. “No, Samaoth. You are not a god.”

Their voice became sullen. “We should have all been gods.”

“I once thought that, as well.” I closed my eyes a moment and remembered. “There is one mortal I seek. Give him to me, and I will go and leave you be.”

“Liar. You have already set things in motion. Whatever you are scheming, it will fail.”

“I disagree. Now, unless you want to continue where we left off last time in front of all these witnesses…”

“You think I would not? You believe I will not reduce this city to ashes to burn you from it?”

“I’m flattered, but no, I don’t believe it. I think you have hidden behind the walls of that cathedral these past weeks rather than hunting me, and you won’t expose yourself here tonight.”

“You should not have come here, Tormentsister. You do not know what you meddle with.”

I glanced at the silver flame. No one in the party seemed to notice, the sound of laughter and music around our dialogue going undisturbed.

“I don’t wish to fight you, Samaoth. We were comrades once.”

The silver flame crackled. The reply was nearly a whisper. “We were fools. And we were pawns. Look at us! We laid Heaven to ruin, and now we serve these mortals. We should have been gods…”

The flame shifted back to its natural color as the demon retreated. I closed my eyes, took a moment to steady myself, then drifted over to where Persay stood guard by the manor doors.

“Everything is in place?” I asked him.

The gangly man gave me a sidelong look. “Luck is seeing to it. What was that before? Looked like Tarik was arguing with the fucking Count of the Mounds.”

“He was. I took care of it.”

Persay gave me a sidelong look. “You alright? Listen, you wanted to be part of this…”

I had to suppress a laugh at the sudden sense of irony I felt then. I’d not told Didikas, but very little of this was my plot. I’d helped, but Lady Auriya and her faction laid the groundwork long before my arrival. Her shade was so fervent in its desire to see this through that it maintained some semblance of its own will even weeks after I’d breathed demon fire into it.

“I’m fine,” I said, though I wasn’t sure. Samaoth’s appearance made me nervous. “Just make sure Atosa and Bak are ready, and try to keep anyone from arresting our friend when he appears. Buy as much time as you can.”

“Aye, I know the plan.” Persay made to spit, then seemed to remember where he was. “God, I hate this detail. Easier to patrol the border of the Murk than watch these nobles shuffle. I’m bored out of my skull, Shy.”

He was not my thrall, only an ally, and I didn’t bother giving him commands. “I don’t think any of us will be able to plead boredom here soon. Careful what you wish for, Bradivaran.”

“Speaking of wishes.” Persay nodded toward the gates. “He’s here.”

I turned just as another large group began to filter onto the lawn. A tall man stood at the center of the group, and an impromptu hush had begun to fall over the gathering. I felt a surge of anticipation almost as potent as bloodlust.

The Knight-Regent had arrived. And if everything went according to plan, then tonight he would be taken out of play.

Tonight, the Cult of Samaoth would fall.