By Heresies Distressed (5 page)

Lakyr swallowed hard, and Rock Point twitched his head in Graivyr's direction.

“For centuries the Inquisition has meted out the Church's punishment. Perhaps there was once a time when that punishment was true justice. But that time has passed, Sir Vyk. God doesn't need savagery to show His people what He desires of them, and these men—and others like them—have hidden behind Him for far too long. Used Him to shield them from the consequences of their own monstrous actions. Used their office and their authority in the service not of God, or even of God's Church, but of vile and corrupt
men
like Vicar Zhaspahr. Now it is time they, and everyone like them, discover that the vestments they have perverted will no longer be permitted to protect murderers and torturers from justice. These men never dreamed
they
might face death for their crimes. They are about to discover differently . . . and perhaps at least some of their fellow inquisitors will be wise enough to learn from their example.”

Lakyr stared at him, then cleared his throat.

“My Lord,” he said hoarsely, “think before you do this!”

“Oh, I assure you, I
have
thought, long and hard,” Rock Point said, his voice as inflexible as his title. “And so have my Emperor and my Empress.”

“But if you do this, the Church—”

“Sir Vyk, ‘the Church' sat by and watched when the Group of Four planned the slaughter of my entire kingdom. ‘The Church' has allowed herself to be ruled by men like Zhaspahr Clyntahn.
‘The Church'
has become the true servant of darkness in this world, and deep inside somewhere, all of her priesthood must know that. Well, so do
we
. Unlike ‘the Church,' we will execute only the guilty, and unlike the Inquisition, we refuse to torture in God's name, to extort confessions out of the innocent. But the guilty we
will
execute, starting here. Starting now.”

Lakyr started to say something else, then closed his mouth.

He's not going to change his mind
, the Delferahkan thought.
Not any more than I would, if I had my King's orders. And
, he admitted unwillingly,
it's not as if Mother Church hadn't already declared herself Charis' enemy. And he's not wrong about these men's guilt, either
.

A spasm of something very like terror went through Lakyr on the heels of that last thought, but he couldn't unthink it. It echoed somewhere deep down inside him, reverberating with his own anger, his own disgust, when Graivyr and his fellow Schuelerites turned what ought to have been—
could
have been—the bloodless seizure of the Charisian merchantmen here in Ferayd into bloody massacre.

Perhaps
, a tiny little voice said in the shadowed stillness of his heart,
it really
is
time someone held those who do murder in the Church's name accountable
.

That was the most terrifying thought of all, for it was pregnant with the dreadful implication of other thoughts, other decisions, looming before not just Sir Vyk Lakyr, but every living man and woman. As he watched the nooses being fitted around the necks of the struggling men on HMS
Destroyer
's upper deck, he knew he was witnessing the seed from which all those other thoughts and decisions would spring. These executions were a declaration that men would be held accountable as
men
for their actions, that those who exhorted murder, who tortured and burned in “God's name,” would no longer be permitted to hide behind their priestly status. And that was the true iron gage the Charisian Empire had chosen to fling at the Church of God Awaiting's feet.

The last noose went around the last condemned man's neck and drew tight. Two of the priests on
Destroyer
's deck were frantically trying to fling themselves from side to side, as if they thought they could somehow break free of their rough-edged hempen halters, and it took a pair of Marines each to keep them on their feet as the drums gave one last, thunderous roar, and fell silent at last.

Lakyr heard one of the condemned inquisitors still babbling, pleading, but most of the others stood silent, as if they were no longer able to speak, or as if they had finally realized that nothing they could have said could possibly alter what was about to happen.

Baron Rock Point faced them from
Destroyer
's after deck, and his face was hard, his eyes bleak.

“You stand condemned by your own words, your own written reports and statements, of having incited the murder of men—and of women and children. God knows, even if we do not, what other atrocities you may have committed, how much other blood may have stained your hands, in the service of that man-shaped corruption who wears the robe of the Grand Inquisitor. But you have convicted yourselves of the murders you did here, and that is more than sufficient.”

“
Blasphemer!
” Graivyr shouted, his voice half-strangled with mingled fury and fear. “You and all your foul ‘empire' will burn in Hell forever for shedding the blood of God's own priests!”

“
Someone
may burn in Hell for shedding innocent blood,” Rock Point said coldly. “For myself, I will face God's judgment unafraid that the blood on
my
hands will condemn me in His eyes. Can you say the same,
‘priest'
?”

“Yes!” Graivyr's voice gusted with passion, yet there was something else in it, something buried in its timbre, Lakyr thought. A note of fear that quailed before something more than the terror of impending death. At least one thin sliver of . . . uncertainty as he found himself on the threshold of mortality. What
would
he and the other inquisitors discover when they found themselves face-to-face at last with the Inquisition's victims?

“Then I wish you pleasure of your confidence,” Rock Point told Graivyr in an iron-hard voice, and nodded sharply to the parties of seamen who'd tailed onto the ends of the ropes.

“Carry out the sentence,” he said.

Sergeant Seahamper was a natural shot, Merlin Athrawes decided as he watched Empress Sharleyan's personal armsman at pistol practice.

And so
, he reflected wryly,
is Sharleyan herself! Not very ladylike of her, I suppose
. He chuckled silently.
On the other hand, the lady
does
seem to have a style all her own, doesn't she?

Had anyone happened to glance into Merlin's small, cramped cabin aboard HMS
Empress of Charis
, he would undoubtedly have assumed Merlin was asleep. After all, it was already two hours after sunset aboard the fleet flagship, even though there were still several hours of light left back home in Tellesberg. That might be a bit early, but Captain Athrawes had the morning watch at Emperor Cayleb's back, so it made sense for him to get to bed as early as possible, and at the moment, he was stretched out in the box-like cot suspended from the overhead, swaying gently with the ship's motion, eyes closed, breathing deep and regular. Except, of course, that, whatever it looked like, he wasn't actually
breathing
at all. The individual known as Merlin Athrawes hadn't done that in the last nine hundred years or so. Dead women didn't, after all, and PICAs had no need to do anything so limiting.

There was no real need for him to be feigning sleep—or breathing, for that matter—he supposed, either. No one was likely to barge in on Emperor Cayleb's personal armsman during his off-duty time, and even if anyone had, Merlin's reflexes were as inhumanly fast as his hearing was inhumanly acute. Someone whose “nervous impulses” moved a hundred times more rapidly than any organic human's would have had plenty of time to get his eyes closed and his “breathing” started up again. But Merlin had no intention of getting sloppy about the minor details. There were sufficient peculiar tales already circulating about
Seijin
Merlin and his powers as it was.

Of course, even the most peculiar tale fell far short of the reality, and he planned to keep it that way for as long as possible. Which meant
forever
, if he could only pull it off. That was the entire reason he had decided at the outset to assume the persona of a
seijin
, one of the warrior-monks who came and went through the pages of legend here on the planet Safehold.
Seijin
were reputed to have so many different marvelous capabilities that almost anything Merlin did could be explained away with the proper hand-waving.

Assuming the hand-wavers in question can keep a straight face while they do it, at any rate
, he reminded himself.

So far, the tiny handful of people who knew the truth about Merlin had managed to do just that . . . helped, no doubt, by the fact that the truth would have been even more bizarre. Explaining that he was a
seijin
was ever so much simpler than explaining to a planet systematically indoctrinated with an antitechnology mindset that he was the Personality Integrated Cybernetic Avatar of a young woman named Nimue Alban who'd been born on a planet named Earth . . . and been dead for the better part of a thousand years. All too often, Merlin found it sufficiently difficult to wrap his own mind about that particular concept.

His artificial body, with its fiber optic “nerves” and fusion-powered “muscles,” was now the home of Nimue's memories, hopes, dreams . . . and responsibilities. Since those “responsibilities” included breaking the Church of God Awaiting's antitechnology stranglehold on Safehold, rebuilding the technological society which had been renounced a thousand years ago in the name of survival, and preparing the last planet of human beings in the entire universe for the inevitable moment in which it reencountered the species which had come within an eyelash of exterminating humanity the first time they'd met, it was, perhaps, fortunate that a PICA was the next best thing to indestructible and potentially immortal.

It was also fortunate that no more than twenty-five people in the entire world knew the full truth of who—and what—Merlin was, or about his true mission here on Safehold, he reflected, then frowned mentally. All of those twenty-five people happened to be male, and as he watched Empress Sharleyan's personal detachment of the Imperial Charisian Guard punching bullets steadily through their targets on the palace firing range, he found himself once more in full agreement with Cayleb that there should have been at least one
woman
who knew the truth. Unfortunately, deciding who was to be admitted to the full truth about humanity's presence here on Safehold—and about Merlin—was not solely up to them. If it had been, Sharleyan would have been added to the ranks of those who knew both of those secrets long before Cayleb had sailed from Charis with the invasion fleet bound for the League of Corisande.

You can't have everything, Merlin
, he reminded himself once again.
And
sooner or later, Maikel is going to manage to bring the rest of the Brethren of Saint Zherneau around. Of course, just who's going to do the explaining to her with Cayleb—and you—the better part of nine or ten thousand miles away is an interesting question, isn't it?

Personally, Merlin was of the opinion that Archbishop Maikel Staynair, the ecclesiastic head of the schismatic Church of Charis, couldn't possibly convince his more recalcitrant brethren soon enough. “Captain Athrawes” sympathized completely with the others' caution, but leaving Sharleyan in ignorance was shortsighted, to say the very least. In fact, the word “stupid” suggested itself to him rather forcefully whenever he contemplated the Brethren's hesitation. Sharleyan was far too intelligent and capable to be left out of the loop. Even without full information, she'd already demonstrated just how dangerously effective she could be against Charis' enemies. With it, she would become even more deadly.

Which doesn't even consider the minor fact that she's Cayleb's
wife,
does it?
Merlin grimaced behind the composed façade of his “sleeping” face.
No wonder Cayleb's mad enough to chew iron and spit nails! It'd be bad enough if he didn't love her, but he does. And even on the most hard-boiled, pragmatic level, he's still right. She has a
right
to know. In fact, given the risks she's chosen to run, the enemies she's
chosen
to make in the name of justice and the truth, there's no one on this entire planet—including Cayleb himself—who has a
better
right! And if I were she, I'd be pissed off as hell when I finally found out what my husband's advisers had been keeping from me
.

Unfortunately, he thought, returning his attention to the images of the practicing guardsmen relayed through one of his carefully stealthed reconnaissance platforms, that was one bridge they'd have no choice but to cross when they reached it. All he could do now was hope for the best . . . and take a certain comfort from the obvious efficiency of her guard detachment. They wouldn't have the chance to explain
anything
to her if some of the lunatics who'd already attempted to assassinate Archbishop Maikel in his own cathedral managed to kill her, first. And given the fact that even with all of the advantages of Merlin's reconnaissance capabilities he still hadn't been able to determine whether or not those assassins had acted on their own, or how big any supporting organization might have been, Captain Athrawes was
delighted
by the evidence of Sergeant Seahamper's competence. He would have preferred being close enough to protect Sharleyan himself, but not even he could be in two places at once, and Cayleb needed looking after, as well. And at least if he couldn't be there in person, Seahamper made a satisfying substitute.

While Merlin watched, the sergeant finished reloading his double-barreled flintlock pistol, cocked and primed both locks, raised it in the two-handed shooting stance Merlin had introduced, and added two more petals to the ragged flower of bullet holes he'd blown through the target silhouette's head. He was firing from a range of twenty-five yards, and the maximum spread of the group he'd produced was no more than six inches. For someone who'd never even fired a pistol until less than four months ago, that was a remarkable performance, especially with a flintlock he had to stop and reload after every pair of shots. Merlin could have produced a much tighter group, of course, but
Nimue
wouldn't have been able to when she'd still been alive. Of course, as Merlin, he had certain advantages which Seahamper—or any other mortal human being—lacked.