Satan's Gambit (The Barrier War Book 3) (13 page)

“They were
innocents,” the pastor wept, “and they were slaughtered for no better reason
than the color of their skin.”

“You used to
believe denarae were little more than animals,” Brican said, not as an
accusation, but an affirmation to the man’s thoughts. In a distant part of his
mind, he heard the angry shouts of humans looking for him and felt the pain in
his leg as blood oozed onto the ground. He saw again his parents’ bodies broken
and bleeding before him. He felt again the suffocating terror that choked off
his cries for fear he’d be discovered.

“I learned
otherwise when I forced myself to live among them, trying to understand their
lives,” Father Charles said. “I saw and felt the truth.”

“And then the
mob came, men from your old parish,” Brican said.

“They attacked
the denarae village, screaming curses, calling them Satan’s children; things I
had preached to them and told them as God’s truth.” Father Charles paused and
looked away from Brican in shame.

“When they came,
I tried to speak to them and tell them the truth, but they hurled my own words
back at me with fanatical fervor and threw me to the ground,” he continued.
“They would not harm me, but neither would they heed me. In the end, all of the
denarae were slain, and I was left alone to weep in the ashes of my foolishness
and blindness.”

Finally, Father
Charles looked back up at Brican, his eyes pleading.

“Can you forgive
me?” he asked.

“It wasn’t my
village,” Brican replied in a broken voice as he tried to compose himself. He
banished the haunting memories with a fierce shake of his head.
Wings and
demons, what is wrong with me?

“But they are
your people,” the pastor protested. “Please. I have carried this grief and
guilt hidden within me for years… decades. And yet here you are, knowing the
secret truths without even being told. God has brought you to me so that I
might be at last forgiven for my sins. How else to explain this miracle?”

Brican closed
his eyes, fighting the pain that surged through him. His own grief mingled with
the pain he had seen and felt in the old human’s mind until they were so
inextricably bound together, he no longer knew where one ended and the other
began. The children he saw in his arms were no longer faces he knew, but the
two children held by the pastor in his memories. The hate-filled voices he
heard were the same, but now they mocked him for turning on his own teachings
and protecting Satan-spawned vermin. The hatred toward humans he felt was
mingled with self-loathing and piteous despair.

“I cannot
forgive you,” Brican said in a hoarse whisper. Father Charles groaned in pain.

“I cannot forgive
you, because it is not my place, nor is it in my power to grant absolution,”
Brican said.

“I am damned!”
the priest wailed and collapsed to his knees. “I am damned.”

“Then tell
people,” Brican said on sudden inspiration. He opened his eyes and knelt so he
was looking the old man in the eyes. “You have kept this guilt bottled up,
slowly poisoning you. Today, you have lanced the wound, but it will build again
unless you drain it again and again.

“Those people
died because of blindness and intolerance. You have seen through those sins,”
Brican said passionately, clutching Father Charles’s hands. “You have it within
your power to tell other people the truth. You cannot avenge the deaths of
those children you held, but you can make their deaths mean something. Do not
hide your past, use it as a shield against future injustices.”

Father Charles
wiped the tears of grief from his eyes and stared at Brican in wonder. His eyes
welled up again, this time with tears of wonder and joy.

“God has indeed
brought us together,” he whispered. “He has forgiven me and shown me the path
to my soul’s redemption. Thank you, my son,” he said, and reached up to pull
Brican’s head down lower so he could kiss the denarae’s forehead. “Thank you,”
he repeated.

Brican slowly
stood. He stared at the aged human for a moment, then turned and walked away in
silence. He wasn’t convinced God had taken any personal interest in bringing
them together, nor was he certain the old man had received any sort of divine
message of redemption. Brican’s actual beliefs were loose at best, but the
experience shook him to the core of his being, and Brican felt something within
him had been profoundly changed by the strange encounter. Hauntingly, his words
and thoughts from only a short time ago came back to haunt him.

What the Hell
is God waiting for? Why not go ahead and start fixing it right now?

Had God answered
him? Brican was, by nature, impertinent and disruptive toward most authority
figures. Had his brash challenge been accepted and his scorn thrown back in his
face? Part of him wanted to fall to his knees in awe, while another part wanted
to scream in frustration, “Is this what it takes to get you to act? Must we
question and challenge you?”

Through his
doubts and even
fear
of the meeting, one hope shone through that perhaps
the old man’s message would make some sort of difference.

Juries can be swayed by clever arguments, judges can
be bought or intimidated, and evidence can be lost or falsified. Thus, a
paladin of justice is – under the guidance of God – a force of law unto himself
and must be free to render an impartial decision.

- “Teachings of the Blue
Facet” (456 AM)

- 1 -

Flasch grumbled
good-naturedly to himself as he walked through the halls of the chapterhouse.

“Why couldn’t
Danner just crash somewhere by the main gates?” he muttered. “Or maybe even
just fall down on his face in a courtyard somewhere? Uncomfortable for him,
maybe, but it would save me a bit of walking. Damn selfish, that’s what it is.”

The Violet
paladin chuckled to himself as he considered thumping himself in the head for
making such a ridiculous statement.
There’s no one
else
around to
thump me,
he thought to himself,
and that’s half the fun.

“Brican, am I
getting anywhere close?”
he asked. The denarae officer was supposed to be
attuned to his thoughts and helping him locate Danner. No one knew where their
friend had gone, but a young Orange paladin said he’d seen an exhausted-looking
Danner looking for someplace to sleep, and he’d headed in this direction.
Brican zeroed in on what he thought was Danner’s mind, but it was hard to tell
for sure at a distance when he was asleep. And even if it was Danner, his being
asleep made it impossible for Brican to pass along word of their arrival so he
could come meet them.

Which would have
eliminated the need for Flasch to walk through half the corridors in the Prism
looking for his slumbering friend. Of course, Brican was busy taking statements
from his platoon and distilling them into a report, so he couldn’t just go find
Danner himself. So he said.

“Quit
whining,”
Brican kythed.
“You’re getting close, though. Feels like
you’re within a couple dozen yards, slightly to your right. Look for a hallway
that direction and start opening doors.”

“What if some
woman is staying here and I walk in on her changing?”

“I won’t tell
Deeta,”
Brican replied with a slight mental chuckle.
“Or you could just
knock first.”

“Thanks.”

Flasch was
relieved to hear the customary humor in Brican’s voice. When the denarae showed
up at the Prism, he’d been abnormally subdued and thoughtful. Flasch wondered
what had happened during his investigations that could have such a sobering
effect on the normally brash and playful denarae.

Ahead of him,
the hallway opened to the left and right in a T-intersection, and Flasch
immediately turned to the right, following Brican’s guide. He knocked and got
no response on the first two doors, then heard a low voice somewhere behind the
third door.

“Danner?” Flasch
asked, opening the door.

A woman’s scream
caused Flasch to jerk back in surprise, and he quickly averted his eyes from a
woman clad only in a towel who was sprinting toward a privacy screen on the
other side of the room. Flasch immediately shut the door and grimaced in
embarrassment.

“Problem?”

“Just shut
up, Brican,”
Flasch thought irritably.
“Don’t say a word. Don’t think a
word. Just shut up and leave it alone.”

Brican was
silent, but Flasch thought he felt amusement trickle through the denarae’s
mental link.

Flasch moved to
the next door and knocked, then slowly opened it when he heard only light
snores.

The room was lit
primarily by the dim glow from a half-covered gnomish chemical light set on the
wall, and it was starkly devoid of unnecessary decoration, as befitted a
paladin’s chambers. Simple white, linen curtains obscured the only window,
blocking most of the light from the early evening sky. A hand-woven rug –
probably made by northern denarae village-folk, judging by the pattern – was
laid just beyond the doorway, and another was laid between the bed and a small
bathing room. The bed was made up with sheets of Tallan cotton; cheap but
comfortable and long-lasting

Lying sprawled
across the bed was Danner, his feet sticking awkwardly out into the air (boots
still on) and his sword buckled on at his hip. Flasch seriously considered
playing some sort of prank on his friend, but the very real possibility that
Brican might then decide to tell everyone about Flasch’s… mistake… caused him
to skip an otherwise golden opportunity.

“Danner,” he
said softly, shaking his friend’s shoulder. Danner moaned and shifted in his
sleep. Flasch tried again, louder this time. “Danner.”

Danner murmured
something in his sleep, too low for Flasch to make out. Flasch shook him again,
and suddenly Danner’s entire body spasmed and he rolled over. Flasch jerked
back and reflexively put a hand on his sword, but Danner lay still for a
moment, wide eyes staring hollowly at the ceiling. Then with a rasping gasp,
Danner’s back arched upward as though he was being lifted at the waist by some
invisible force. His arms were pinned rigidly at his side, leaving him
precariously balanced on his heels and shoulders. His face was a mask of fear,
and he yelled out hoarsely.

“Thanatos eilient!
Thanatos ventriis eilist! Thanatos sasilius mortitus.”

He continued to
stare at the ceiling blankly, and Flasch was shaken by the intense look of
horror on his friend’s face. Danner’s body twisted in its rigid contortion,
then abruptly he collapsed back to the bed and lay limp. His eyes were shut,
and while his face still looked troubled, he no longer looked…
possessed
was the only word Flasch could think of that fit.

“Holy crap,”
Flasch muttered. He hesitantly reached out again and shook Danner’s shoulder.

“Danner,” he
said softly.

Danner’s eyes
immediately snapped open, then drooped again in weariness as he stared at
Flasch.

“Damn it,” he
groaned, rolling to look away. “I was just trying to get some sleep. Can’t you
come back in an hour when I’ve had a chance to rest?”

Flasch shook his
head, even though Danner couldn’t see him. He was still a little stunned from
Danner’s sudden episode, but for the moment he decided it would be best if he
pretended nothing had happened.

“Danner, you
came to the Prism almost two hours ago,” he said in what he hoped was a normal
tone. “You’ve been asleep most of that time, probably.”

The Blue paladin
turned back and stared at Flasch. “That can’t be right,” Danner said grumpily.
“I feel like I just laid down and closed my eyes, then suddenly there you were
pawing at me.”

“Nevertheless,”
Flasch said, shrugging in apology. “Sorry, buddy. I hate to do this, but you
need to get up and come meet for a quick debriefing. It’s getting toward
nighttime anyway, so maybe you can crash again once we get back Home. I’m sure
Garnet won’t mind.”

“It’s not Garnet
I’m worried about, it’s Alicia,” Danner grumbled as he rolled himself out of
bed. He fumbled with his sword, which had gotten twisted about, then finally
stood up straight.

“Alicia?” Flasch
asked.

“I don’t think
she’s feeling well, and the last thing she needs is me suffering from some
bizarre insomnia around her,” Danner said. He sighed. “I’m getting sleep,
though. I don’t toss and turn, at least not that Alicia’s complained of, and I
don’t wake up in the middle of the night. Still, no matter how much I get, it
feels like I haven’t slept in days.”

Flasch looked at
his friend sympathetically, but shook his head.

“I wish there
was something I could do to help,” he said, “really, I do. But right now, we
need to high-tail our asses to meet the others, okay?”

And I need to
ask Marc what in the Hell you just said,
Flasch added mentally.

“Fine,” Danner
grumbled.

They closed the
door behind them and started down the hallway. Flasch pointedly ignored the
door next to Danner’s. Just before they reached the intersection where Flasch
had turned, though, Danner stopped and his breath hissed in surprise. He
pointed down the hallway, and Flasch felt a sinking feeling in the pit of his
stomach as he saw a pair of legs protruding from a doorway with a pool of blood
coating the floor.

“Damn, another
one, here in the heart of the Prism,” Flasch cursed. He sent a mental message
ahead to Brican warning him of the situation.

They hurried
down the hall, even though there was clearly nothing to be done for their slain
brother. From the consistency and sheer volume of blood pooled on the floor, he
had been dead for some time. Flasch avoided the crimson coating on the floor
and grasped the door jamb so he could twist around to peer into the room. He
looked down at the face of the slain paladin and recoiled in horror.