“I was not aware you had a visitor,” the monk heard his master lie. “The fool seemed very upset. I apologize, Urion.”
“Well, yes, Yordin is a fool. When he notified us about Corvany’s killer, he associated the thing with you and one of your men. I’m sorry someone tried to kill you, but I resent your insinuation, Elia. As you no doubt resented Yordin’s.”
“I apologize again, Your Eminence. I do wonder if Yordin himself wasn’t behind it. But we’ll let this wound heal. And now, Urion, will you also heal the Church by paying homage to His Holiness? I know how you must feel, and while the election was very irregular, it’s plainly valid. Be generous! The new Pope wants to go home to New Rome, unconditionally, where the Empire wants him, without demands. You have gotten what you wanted.” There was such a stoppage of Brownpony’s breath with the word “wanted” that Blacktooth could almost hear the except the tiara which did not follow. “He makes no demand for a withdrawal of Texark troops, Urion.”
There was a long silence. “I shall consult with many other cardinals, Elia. Thank you for your advice,” the big man said at last. “I don’t like what I’m hearing, but let’s not be enemies.”
“What have you been hearing?”
“That you stirred up the city, that your agents caused the riots. Or that the, uh, hermit himself did.”
“You have been lied to. The people had to drag that ‘hermit’ to the conclave. Talk to Jarad. Talk to Bleze. Then talk to His Holiness, that hermit, for love of the Church. A love we share.”
“Oh, yes, Elia! I know you love the Church. It’s what else you may love that I wonder about. We’ll see, we’ll see.”
On his way out, Brownpony found that Blacktooth had been joined in the outer office by three frustrated electors who had come to Valana as Texark allies. One of them, however, had already knelt at the feet of Pope Amen and been embraced by His Holiness. Brownpony exchanged weather opinions with them and hurried on.
“Why did you want me to go with you there, m’Lord?” Blacktooth asked innocently.
“Because I knew Yordin was there, of course. I wanted him to fear we were going to accuse him. And frankly, I wanted to get him in trouble with the archbishop.”
“You think he hired the men?”
“If not, he knows who did, but he knows it was a mistake. I think we’ll be safe now. It just proves they’re dangerous. Now we all need a rest after the worst conclave I’ve ever seen. Take two or three days off.”
As Blacktooth was leaving the Secretariat, the receptionist guard at the entrance handed him two letters. One was a note from Ædrea. He glanced at the guard, who was watching him with an expression that made Blacktooth ask:
“Did the sender give this to you personally?”
“It was handed me by a young sister in a brown habit, Brother St. George. May it not displease Your Reverence that I did not ask her name, for she was silent herself and I did not wish to spoil it.”
“Spoil what?”
“Her silence.”
Nimmy studied him in surprise. He was a beefy man of mature years, and looked like a retired soldier. His name was Elkin. “You’ve been to a monastery, haven’t you?”
“I was at your own abbey for three years in my youth, Brother, at the same time as the cardinal. Of course, he wasn’t a cardinal then, or even a deacon. And I wasn’t yet a soldier. But we left at the same time. He had been there to study, but I was there to—” He shrugged.
“Find a calling or not,” Nimmy finished, and resolved to be amazed later by this information. “About the silent sister. Does she come here often?”
The guard’s expression blurted a yes before he caught himself and said, “You should question His Eminence about things like that, Brother St. George.”
“Of course, thank you.” He turned to go. The other letter was a note from Abbot Jarad apologizing for being unable to meet with him as promised. I am writing to His Holiness on your behalf, my son, and you may be sure I shall write only what will be favorable to your good intentions.
Whatever that means.
The note from Ædrea said: I shall leave your chitara in the crack in the ledge below the waterfall up the hill from the Pope’s old place. Blacktooth began walking in that direction. He wondered why she hadn’t left his g’tara with the guard instead of the note. It was a five-mile hike to the falls, and the climb made him dizzy. When he arrived, a white horse was drinking at the pool under the falls, and he froze for a moment; but then he saw that it was a gelding rather than a mare, and wearing a bridle but no saddle; it snorted at the sight of him and trotted out of sight around a curve in the trail. The waterfall was hardly more than a shower, and it fluttered in the wind, producing an occasional flash of rainbow. He walked around the pool, fearing and half hoping to find her behind the falls. The g’tara was there as promised. It was slightly damp from the mist of the falls, causing him to grunt irritably and wipe it against his robe. Why had she made him walk so far?
He glanced at the hoofprints in the sand as he walked around the pool again. Then he stopped. The hoofprints of the horse crossed and partly overlaid a set of human footprints, smaller than his own. Both led in the same direction away from the pool. He wrestled with himself for a moment, then followed the trail.
Her footprints led him into a wooded ravine, then under a low ledge which overhung the sandy bank of the swollen creek. He had to duck low to walk, then dropped to his knees and crawled. Then he found her. He had heard of this place, but never seen it. The small cavern under the ledge was said to have been the home of Amen Specklebird before Cardinal Brownpony bought him the remodeled cavern closer to town.
Slanting sunlight filtered through the foliage and made delicate patterns on the stones and the bare thighs of Ædrea, who was no longer wearing the nun’s robe but the leather skirt and a halter above her waist. She sat with bare flesh on bare sand. He had been following her trail on his hands and knees, and at the sight of her bare legs he paused to look. She laughed at him, and put away a handgun she had been holding in her lap.
“You might as well admire the rest of me.” She pulled up her skirt and spread her legs to let the dappled light shine on her crotch, then closed her thighs quickly. He had seen it before, dimly, in a barn. Her vagina was small as a nail hole because of the stitches, but her clitoris was as big as Nimmy’s thumb, and maybe because he loved her he could see nothing repulsive about her crotch, however embarrassing, and she could see that he was not repelled but sad and curious, and embarrassed. She smiled wickedly and patted his arm.
He sat in the soft sand beside her. “Why do you tease me?” he asked wistfully.
“Now or back home?”
“Then and now.”
“I’m sorry. There was a runaway monk from your Order who stopped at our place once. He didn’t like me, not at all. He was in love with another monk. I wondered if you were like him. And your gap was showing.”
“Gap?”
“The gap between what you are and what you try to let show. I’m a genny, remember. I see gaps. Some call me a witch, even my own father when he’s angry.”
“So what did you see in this gap?”
“I knew you weren’t just a runaway like the other, but something was wrong. You were some kind of fake. I wondered if you weren’t the cardinal’s prisoner.”
Nimmy’s laugh was remote. “Something like that. I was in disgrace.”
“Are you still in disgrace?”
“As soon as the cardinal finds out I’ve seen you, I will be.”
“I know. He ordered me out of town. That’s why I didn’t stay by the falls, so that you could go back the way you came.”