Vlad Li Tam returned the bow, careful not to incline his head more than what was proper. After the
general left, he sat again and finished his drink.
Later this week, one of the two Popes would be dead. Once the Named Lands heard the details of the note Resolute would leave behind, no one would doubt that Sethbert had brought down the City of Windwir and its Androfrancine Order. Resolute’s grief-stricken confession would lay out his shame at having told Sethbert of the spell’s existence and speak of the guilt that gnawed at him until he could no longer bear to live with it any longer. It would point to accounts at House Li Tam that even now were being carefully created and funded to point accusing fingers at a man whose paranoia and ambition had nearly cost the world the light of knowledge, and at a cousin who would be his puppet Pope, doling out what little light remained for profit.
After this, Sethbert would lose his following and the war would lose its grounding.
The Overseer would be stripped of his lands and titles, reduced to flight. And that was as much as Vlad
Li Tam would do for now. But he was certain that it was enough. Rudolfo and Petronus would take care of the rest.
Resolute
A warm spring rain fell beyond the opened windows of Oriv’s makeshift office. When the Entrolusian insurrection had started heating up, Sethbert had insisted that his cousin return to the city states with him. He’d told the Pope he thought it would bolster his people’s morale and possibly quell the fighting, but Oriv suspected it had more to do with keeping him nearby and easier to watch.
So now Oriv-he no longer thought of himself as Pope Resolute-spent his days working at the small desk or making speeches that he did not believe in.
And drinking too much. He stared at the empty cup and reached for the bottle of brandy. Since that winter day when Petronus declared himself, Oriv had found himself drinking more and more. It was an easy snare to fall into. The warm sweet liquor, in sufficient quantities, promised to blur the edges of his memory and take the teeth out of it.
And there was a lot he wanted to forget, to not feel. First and foremost, there was Windwir. From a distance, he’d seen the gravediggers’ camp and the scars in the snow where the filled-in trenches hid the bones of a city. He’d needed to prove to himself that it was really gone. And now, more than that, he wanted to forget it had happened at all.
There was also the war to forget. Because even though on the surface this was called a war between two Popes, at the heart of it he knew it wasn’t. There was one Pope-Petronus-and Oriv knew he could bring the violence to an end quickly by simply bending his knee and accepting Petronus’s authority over him. And yet he wouldn’t. Partially at his cousin’s insistence. Mostly, though, because he did not know how to stop.
But there was even more to forget than these things. There was the deeper truth beneath it all. Oriv could no longer dismiss Rudolfo’s charge: His cousin, Sethbert, had destroyed Windwir.
He’d had his suspicions shortly after reaching Sethbert’s camp seemingly so long ago. He’d overheard bits of conversation between the Overseer and his general Lysias. Grymlis and his Gray Guard had also brought him rumors froy som among the soldiers. And once Petronus left Windwir for the Ninefold Forest Houses, that crafty old fisherman had turned in his shovel for a pen. His tracts and proclamations were riddled with accusations against the Entrolusian Overseer, though always careful not to implicate Oriv.
Those tracts were everywhere in the Named Lands now. Combined with the blockade and the devastated economy, those damning pamphlets fueled the Entrolusian insurrection. Civil war had already swallowed Turam, and even what little remained of the Order was divided. Those of the Androfrancines who had not found their way back to the Papal Summer Palace were now in the Ninefold Forest. And with winter now past, there were rumblings that some of the higher ranking arch-scholars and bishops-men old enough to remember Pope Petronus-were planning a migration eastward.
He filled the cup to the brim, lifted it and tipped it back. It took most of a bottle now for him to forget. Half of another for him to sleep.
Oriv heard a knock at his door, and tried to stand. He swayed on his feet and sat down heavily. “Come in,” he said.
Grymlis pushed open the door. “Excellency, may I have a word?”
The old soldier looked more tired than usual. His eyes were red-rimmed in the flickering lamplight, and his shoulders slouched.
Oriv waved him in. “Grymlis. Come. Sit. Have a drink with me.”
Grymlis walked into the room, pulling the door closed behind him. He sat in the chair across from Oriv, and their eyes met. Oriv looked away, then pointed to the bottle. “Help yourself.”
Grymlis shook his head. “I don’t need it.”
Oriv thought for a moment that the old soldier would suggest that perhaps Pope Resolute didn’t need it, either. He’d certainly been free enough with that opinion in days past. But instead, he watched the old soldier pull a flask from his pocket and pass it across. “Try this,” Grymlis said. “It’s got more kick.”
Oriv accepted it, unscrewed the cap, and sniffed it. “What is it?” “Firespice-a Gypsy brew. Very potent.”
Oriv nodded, took a sip, and felt it burn its way down his throat. He stretched the next sip into a gulp, then screwed the cap back on and held it out to Grymlis.
“Keep it,” he said.
Oriv wasn’t sure why, but the generosity moved him. “Thank you. You’re a uYouidtgood man, Grymlis.” The general shrugged. “I’m not sure about that.” He leaned forward. “But I want to be a better man than
I am. And I want the same for you as well, Oriv.”
He used my given name. Oriv chuckled. “We all could do with being better men,” he said.
Grymlis nodded slowly. “We could.” He paused and looked around the room. “Tonight,” he said. “We could be better men tonight.”
Oriv leaned forward. “How?”
“We could leave this city,” Grymlis said. “We could flee to Pylos and denounce Sethbert for the traitorous whore-child he is. We could end this war and go help rebuild what can be rebuilt. Keep the light alive.”
Even as Grymlis said it, Oriv knew it was true. He’d thought the same thing a dozen times in the last few months. Since winter, the war had spread. Everyone had their side and everyone made their warfare in service to their so-called light. But it didn’t take a Pope to figure out that what the New World had fallen into had nothing to do with light and more to do with fear.
He wanted to tell Grymlis that he was right, that they should pack what they could carry and quietly gather the contingent. Sethbert’s men were tied up putting down riots and quelling revolution. They could reach the ruins of Rachyl’s Bridge easily by dawn and trust the rangers to ferry them across.