Volume 2 - Chapter 120 - A guilty pleasure repeated

The two would-be assassins had clammed up now, neither of them so much as moving, although that might have to do with the knife against the boy’s throat.

Not that the girl would be any luckier off if she decided to ignore the threat to her compatriot’s life. My tail cradled another knife I’d made out of my bone, and while I wasn’t as accurate with it, especially after it grew fins, she didn’t know that.

“Well,” I said brightly. “Normally I would be offering tea, but we seem to be lacking any of the tools to make any, and I don’t feel like letting either of you two out of my sight. So, how about you take a seat? Might as well be comfortable for this.”

“We won’t tell you anything,” the boy tried to growl, and I felt a hand shift.

I put an end to that, the point of my knife digging gently against the skin of his neck.

“On the contrary, you’ll tell me plenty,” I said as he went still. “Whether it’s of any use in addition to what you’ve already let me know, that we’ll find out together.”

“We haven’t told you anything,” the girl hissed, and I resisted the urge to roll my eyes.

“On the contrary, the fact that some of Forcreek’s least trusted friends got left here to kill me says much,” I said. “Depends on how much you know, of course. Or him. Depends on if you all think he’s the one doing the killings, or if he talked you into thinking I did them. Or if you have any clue at all what’s going on.”

“We were trusted,” the girl said, but it was shaky, and so was her hand. “He trusted us to end you, to make sure you couldn’t interfere with the work-”

“They trusted you to die,” I said, as softly as I could, but it still landed like a blow to both of them. The boy’s throat nearly hit my knife, the war his body jerked, and I tightened my grip on him warningly.

“Take it from someone who has been used as a pawn many times before,” I continued. “They might have thought you capable of killing me, sure, but surviving? Even if you had gotten the drop on me, did you expect to escape this alive? Surely not. What even was the plan? Kill me? Hope I didn’t scream? Leave your posts early and hope no one noticed as you made your way out? And if I did kill Bishop Gallaspie, why does Forcreek need to run? Why do I need to die?”

Prodding the lie did it. It was the only thing keeping either of them going with what they themselves probably doubted. The boy broke first, maybe because of the knife against his throat, but the girl joined soon. Both of them babbled out nonsense thick and steady, some conspiracy that the Bishop had entrusted them all to look into, infiltration of the worshippers of Halspus. Part confession, part an angry, exasperated venting of bile against the damnable thing across from them.

I didn’t move, just kept the knife in place and let it drain out of both of them. Most of it was interesting, in giving a picture of some of the interiors of how the church operated, but clearly biased and deliberately cultivated by the departed Bishop Gallaspie.

I didn’t think I’d get much I could use out of it, and since Hamiltar hadn’t intervened before I heard anything I shouldn’t, he probably agreed.

Forcreek was more interesting. Forcreek had left with two others, claiming innocence the entire time and that the conspiracy went deeper than any of them could imagine. That I needed to be killed before I could poison the minds of the elders and others.

I wasn’t sure when the need to establish how wrong I was turned into a confession, but not long after. Hamiltar turned up then, along with about a dozen in armor that had been old when I was a child. Most of them glared at me, probably not happy at what they were witnessing, as eventually, at Hamiltar’s prompting, names came out of the pair of fools.

Eventually they were led away by half the soldiers, leaving me with Hamiltar and the other half.

“A light touch for a creature of your reputation,” Hamiltar said, and I shoved down a tide of indignation. Why did everyone act like I was Colgraves?

“No need for it,” I said. “Not for people that fragile. Now, since you got what you wanted out of this, Father, may I be allowed out of this cell and lovely cathedral of yours?”

His entourage tensed, realizing by now that I was well outside the cell. I ignored them, focused on the man who, apparently, despite having a lower rank than Gallaspie, wielded quite a bit of influence here. He was mulling it over. Likely thinking about whether there might be others, what trap might be laid next. Or if I was a bargaining chip worth giving up. Might I know what information he wanted on Imperial Intelligence?

I kept an easy grin on, despite my own instincts screaming to run now while I had a chance. Any reasonable person would see that it wasn’t worth the risk.

I did not consider myself among sane people in here. It would be good to get outside.

After far too long, he nodded.

“Yes, I think we have determined by now that the likelihood of you being behind the bishop’s death is low compared to the risk of having you be kept here,” Hamiltar said. “The Dawn Council agrees and thinks that now is quite the fitting time to release you.”

‘Fitting’? He’d allowed himself a little too much relish with that word. What in the hells were they planning?

***

“There’s one of them!”

You know, I really should have expected this.

The door behind me slammed shut, the pair of Halspusians who’d ripped the diabolism-blocking artifact off hurriedly shutting the little postern. I forced down the urge to start hammering on it and screaming for it to be opened back up.

People. Far too many people. Nearly all of them humans. Well-dressed. Upper middle-class.

Absolutely furious and surrounding the entire damn cathedral!

That initial exclamation was just the beginning of a roaring peal of accusations and screams that one of them had exited the cathedral. Screams for someone to shoot it before it sprayed them with hellfire.

What the hells happened while I was locked up?

I forced myself not to freeze. Freezing would just mean death. Look. Think. Observe.

Most of them had been keeping a respectable distance from the cathedral, and the scorch marks on the ground gave me a good idea why. Whatever the Halpsusians had done to save their hides was the only thing keeping me among the living.

Never put that on yourself again! The Imp shrieked inside my head. Pay me back for the hells of silence you just subjected me to by eating them! All of them!

Ah, right, couldn’t forget about that.

I kept the easy grin on, and inwardly screamed at myself for believing their damn excuses of Gregory being given my weapons. Even if it was the truth, I should have made myself a nuisance until they gave me something.

That was the side of me that wanted to lash out. Drawing a weapon, even conjuring Hellfire, there was no coming out of that. Even if I could win. Which was doubtful. I didn’t see many guns, but I did see plenty of makeshift clubs and sharper things.

So, I was down an arm, tired, without weapons, and likely to be executed if I sprayed Her Majesty’s subjects with hellfire. And they had the entire square surrounded. And the size of the crowd, massive. No way through.

The only thing keeping them from charging me this very moment was fear of what those inside the cathedral might do. And that would last seconds before the mob realized the answer was nothing at all.

Hells, I was going to have to talk my way out, wasn’t I?

Smiling politely, I stepped forward. “Good eve to all of you-”

Someone threw a brick. I hurriedly stepped to the side, then got ready to call on diabolism as the front ranks surged.

A Watch coach careened around the square, the driver roaring orders to desist as the person next to him cocked a shotgun. Protesters scattered, screaming curses at the coach driver as he drove straight for the cathedral.

It was a prison transport, covered in steel plates. A steam engine on the back roared as it skidded across the cobbles. People dove out of the way as fast as they could. The driver wasn’t even trying to slow down until he got through the crowd, and the damn thing was on the verge of tipping as it turned.

I refused to believe Tagashin was on average for how safe drivers were in this city as the prison transport came to a halt a dozen paces from me. No matter how much the world tried to prove me wrong.

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I hesitated until the door swung open enough for me to see who was inside. And also for the next rock to land nearby.

I sprinted for the carriage, cursing the driver for leaving even a few paces to it while the shotgun blasted up into the air.

“This seems dangerous,” I told Metrill as I slammed the door shut behind me. The noise of the crowd outside was deafened, but it was still thunderous. And joined by a drumbeat of things hitting the side of the carriage.

Shit. Not the kind of thing you'd expect even a mob to do this close to Halspus’ cathedral.

“Necessary, at the moment,” she, I presumed because Metrill had a nice afternoon dress on, said. “I bet the other temples are wishing they had something like this, and the Watch is too busy to notice.”

Shit. That sounded as if the world had refused to stop turning while I’d been in the cell.

“They’ll notice when they have to do inventory,” I told her.

She smirked. “There’s no law about armoring your own carriage and putting insignias that happen to look just like the Watch’s on it. And if there were, we’d just keep it more hidden than normal. Now, what do you say to the nice lady who just rescued you from the mob?”

“Thank you,” I said earnestly as I settled down on my seat, tail curling around my waist,

I grabbed one of the knives I’d made out of my bones, and with a pained grimace started shoving it back through flesh. Flesh parted, but that didn’t make it hurt less, nor my elbow as bone jostled against it.

“You know,” Metrill said drily as I pushed it through skin and started putting the next one in. “You could at least ask before you start doing things like that. I might have just eaten.”

“Pardon,” I said. “But it is going to be a long, painful process forcing my bones back into the right shape, and I want to be able to use both my arms again as soon as possible.”

It was still going to be an hours-long process. And more than a little pain reconnecting nerves and making sure flesh fits right. Like hells was I risking losing any of them. I did my best to keep myself as close to my original pieces as possible.

“So, things look like they’ve degraded since I’ve been locked up,” I said as I shoved another knife into the loose flesh of my arm.

It sounded like it, too. Muffled by the steel of the carriage, but the same low hum of many, many voices in the distance. Angry, shouting voices.

“Your lad and I have been raising all kinds of hell to get you out,” Metrill said with a mirthless smile. “Looks like the hells themselves decided to take charge of the effort.”

“Literally or figuratively?” I asked. Considering the situation, either was possible.

“Figuratively,” Metrill said. “Essentially, we got as many people as we could making a fuss, but then the world decided that there were more important things than your freedom. No offense.”

I tried and failed to not take any. I’d been stuck in the Halspus cathedral, I’d be more forgiving if the apocalypse was actively happening, but it clearly hadn’t been.

“Things have gone to the hells in the last twelve or so hours while you were locked up in that cathedral,” Metrill told me. “First, another one has bitten the dust. That worshipper of Ixillae with that scandal, Kexsmith? Found dead, half-transformed, being feasted on by minor devils. They got loose, and they went rabid on everyone they could before the bobbies got involved. That and people didn’t take long to put together your trap with the bobbies, and Mourner Kelson was something diabolic as well.”

“Shit,” I said tonelessly. “How bad once-”

“Getting there. Some bright idiots had the idea to start organizing to go into the Quarter, or protesting outside the Coffin, the Armory, the Palace, anywhere they could think of calling for it to be purged with fire and sword,” Metrill said with a humourless grin. “Some of them even tried taking a run at where the Queen has been allowing some of her Infernal veterans to settle. That ended poorly for all involved. The only thing keeping the Bobbies from arresting everyone involved is the Coats coming in to stop them touching their lads and lasses, so now those two were on the verge of butting heads, and it was looking like one of the royals might finally look outside their palace.”

She exaggerated. Not by much, in recent years, but the royals did actually go outside the palace.

“Then half the city’s newspapers released a special afternoon edition, all trying to get the drop on each other,” Metrill said. “Someone had sent them copies of something very special.”

Oh. Well, fuck. Not that I couldn’t have guessed from the crowd around the cathedral.

“How much of the confession was included?” I asked her.

“Pretty much all of it,” she said. “Some of the papers admit the first two pages were recreations left along with the copies, but the contents of the rest are more than enough to make those first two pages sound right.”

“Copies?” I said tonelessly.

“Someone decided they didn’t want level heads asking if it was fake,” Metrill said. “They had a spirit copy the confession, signature, and seal the idiot had stamped it with at the bottom.”

Well, fuck again.

“Expensive,” I muttered, happy to have some minutiae to try to focus on instead. “You can technically train a spirit to copy pages exactly, but the effort and cost compared to just having a printing press is rarely worth it. "

“Not unless you want it to capture something to prove authenticity,” Metrill replied humourlessly. “Credit to them, some of them made sure the signatures matched first and hadn’t been magically tampered with yet, but after they knew it was real, I can imagine even those that take their marching orders from the Crown couldn’t resist publishing. Gallaspie didn’t name exact names, for the most part, but there are enough hints to get some ideas, and people’s imaginations are doing the rest. Every temple of the pantheon has been dealing with a flood of people demanding answers, and some just wanting violence.”

“Worshippers turning so easily?” I said, then immediately regretted the words.

Metrill just laughed. “Not how you’re thinking. Even when you worship an entire pantheon, it doesn’t mean there aren’t some deities you think shouldn’t be involved. Including some whose clergy were never involved in this mess to begin with.”

“Ah,” I said, the implications sinking in. Without any specific names named, ire would be aimed at the least popular deities, meaning those like Lareran and Baltaren.

“Good news, the Quarter is small potatoes now to everyone upset,” Metrill continued mirthlessly. “Oh, there’s still people upset, but that’s kind of mild compared to the entire pantheon turning to diabolism. Or so the papers say. If it had only been a few of them, or there had been contradictions, folks might have waited. But with a devil attack, more priest killings, and the fact the papers all ran the same confession-”

“Is there anything suspicious there?” I interrupted. “That they all went ahead with this? They had to know what panic this would cause.”

Metrill snorted. “Would you prefer a world where they all sat on it and pretended it never happened?”

Fair point. I leaned back. Outside, I could hear the city. There was noise, first the ever-present sounds of the steam engine, and then, easiest to hear besides that, the driver and the person next to him, yelling at people to clear the street or threatening them with the watch’s ire. There was yelling, but no screaming. No gunshots.

“For all of that, there seems to be a distinct lack of rioting going on,” I told her. “Or are we just in one of the calmer spots?”

“Snow still being around early on helped,” Metrill said. “That and the Watch being very aggressive with their leg-breaking. Rumours that Her Majesty is going to start bringing in more troops into the city by train to help with the ‘investigation’ and implicitly crack down on any rioting helped as well. Worse, it burned itself out before any chance of seeing something like what happened during the Black Flame Rebellion. Still going to be hell to pay if something else starts a spark in this city. Wouldn’t take much. But again, most people remember the response to the Flame”

I nodded slightly, although I doubted even the worst of rioting would ever get a response like that. Never anything close to the Imperial navy bombarding parts of the city from the Nover.

“You seem remarkably calm about it,” I observed. “If the military really is coming in-”

“Expected,” Metrill said with a crooked grin. “Not that we ever expected the news to be broken like this when we signed on, but we expected Her Majesty to find out sooner or later. Most of the rest of them probably figured if they had results, they’d get a clap on the back and let bygones be bygones. Some of the rest of us weren’t so optimistic. Our casino is locked up tight, and right now I’m probably the easiest to find member out of all of us.”

I nodded. “Okay. And everyone else?”

“Derrick is who knows the fuck where, probably trying to salvage tomorrow’s holiday so the dead don’t get uppity. Your fellow Infernal popped up to collect your Tarver buddy, and no one has seen anyone from Imperial Intelligence. Baltaren’s cathedral is fucking empty. The mob stormed there first, and by the time the Watch was done getting them out, all of Baltaren’s clerics were just gone. Given what your Tarver friend had time to tell me, someone probably figured it was time to cut and run.”

On the one hand, damn it Gregory. On the other hand , Metrill was probably one of the better people to have told that to.

“No idea?” I asked her.

She grimaced. “I had people looking. We can make educated guesses from the people who failed to show back up on time. I passed the information to the Watch, but right now no one had the force to pursue it, and even if we did, they can just claim they went into hiding out of fear of the mob. Most of them might even think that’s the actual reason. Timmel may have even left them, as another layer of security. Wherever they are, don’t think anyone who’s not a fellow Cleric of Baltaren knows.”

“It gets worse,” I admitted. “Forcreek escaped.”

Her expression turned dark. “You are fucking with me.”

“No,” I said. “Not my choice. Hamiltar didn’t secure Forcreek as well as he thought. Or maybe he let him go on purpose. Someone let slip that they have a way to track him.”

She looked at me incredulously. “They let that slip in front of you? And it wasn’t a nice juicy piece of meat?”

“It wasn’t in front of me,” I said with a small grin. “I have my ways of picking things up. And it doesn’t really work as bait.”

No need to tip her off about my enhanced hearing if possible. Not more than I had, as we careened around a corner, the driver screaming to clear the road.

“Fair enough,” she said. “You got your own way with that bowl, right?”

“Yes,” I said. “Hence why, as soon as we can lose whoever might be tailing us, I want to head back to the square. Alice was watching it when me and Gregory went inside. But it does have limitations. It can’t tell elevation.”

“You think he’s underground then?” Metrill said.

“They’re definitely working with Versalicci,” I said. “The Flame are hardly the only people to have explored it, but they are some of the best. And if I were them, I’d keep him in motion until they’re ready to strike. And he’s only got two targets left.”

Metrill nodded. “My people haven’t found that one priest of Daltaren who you said might be mixed up with this. Mallet. But he’s friends with Brexington, and those are some deep pockets he could be taking advantage of.”

Maybe deep enough to keep Forcreek out, but I wouldn’t be sure of that.

“Watch and Semiv’s temple is taking the opposite approach,” Metrill continued. “Most of the names on that list, they’ve been out with large Watch patrols. Except that one they stopped working with, Julian Gray. He’s nice and secure in a cell in the Coffin.”

“Still far too many ways this can get worse,” I muttered. “Especially if the Watch is trying to bait traps.”

“More ways than you might think,” Metrill said. “Seems that ol’ Brexington isn’t going to let devils and rioting interrupt his plans.”

I frowned. “Meaning?”

“Meaning that he’s announced he’ll be not canceling the party he was going to hold for the opening of his new factory complex,” Metrill said. “And he is mum on if Mallet is still the guest of honor.”

I groaned, letting my head fall into my hands. “Someone is playing very stupid games. At least when I did this, it was in an abandoned neighborhood!”

“Don’t tell me,” Metrill told me drily. “Tell whoever is having Brexington do this. Even split it’s your friends in the Watch or Brexington himself if Mallet told him what’s going on. Man really wants the royal favor.”

I lifted my head from my hands, thinking.

“He might not be keeping Mallet in or near his home,” I said. “He’d be an idiot to.”

“Or arrogant,” Metrill said. “Say, arrogant enough to try hosting this in the middle of this whole mess?”

I groaned. Hells damn it! Again?

“Come on Harrow,” Metrill said, enjoying every second of this. “What’s one little party? Break a leg.”