Wolfbreed (45 page)

Günter lacked the wit to form any response at all in the face of that assertion. The premise was so absurd, and voiced with such conviction, that it seemed an assault on the very basis of reason itself.

“Despite his motives, this turn of events is favorable. The search for this creature took men away from the investigation.”

Günter resisted the urge to look back toward the door, to see if there was something to mark the threshold between the world of sense and the world he found himself in. “Investigation?”

The bishop nodded. “We will find every grove, every idol, and every helpmate of Satan. Do you understand, Sergeant?”

“Yes, Your Grace.”

It was clear that the bishop would release no one—not until he was satisfied that they were Christian enough. Günter had the sick feeling that in the world that the bishop lived in, a Prûsan
couldn’t
be Christian enough.

“May I ask a question?”

“Yes, Sergeant?”

“The spring planting. There are too many farms left unattended—”

The bishop picked up the letter he had been drafting. “Do not worry for that. There are plenty of lords in Christendom who can donate serfs to assist us with planting and harvest.”

“I understand.” He did. The bishop meant to appropriate what land remained in Prûsan hands. And if serfs and slaves tilled the land, not free men, it left little debate as to whose hands would then own that land.

This wasn’t a hunt for a monster, or a battle with Satan. It was all a pretext. This man wanted Johannisburg for his own fief.

“Good, Sergeant. I will need the few good Prûsans to be clearheaded as we go about this. I think Uldolf and the rest will make a fair demonstration of the seriousness of these matters.”

“Demonstration?”

The bishop nodded. “Their punishment should help encourage the true Christians to come forward and expose the remaining idolaters in their midst.”

“I see.”

The bishop waved a hand, dismissing him. “Please, go see to the youth. I need to finish this letter and see to Brother Erhard.”

Günter spoke the three most difficult words he had ever uttered. “Yes, Your Grace.”

He turned and left, before he could do something rash in the bishop’s presence.

Good Prûsans?

Demonstration?

For once, Günter prayed to no gods at all. They were worse than deaf—they were actively hostile.

“But the question remains,” he whispered to himself, “what do I
do
about it?”

hings had come full circle. Erhard stood within a cell in the lowest level of the keep in Johannisburg Castle. When he had first left her here, Lilly had been clothed like a typical Prûsan peasant woman, with only the token restraint of a silver manacle on her ankle. She had been standing when he had left her.

Now she was at his feet, naked, curled on the floor, bound by thick leather straps that tightly wrapped her legs and arms together. Around her neck was the silver torc that prevented her from changing to her true form.

Lilly looked up at him in a way that almost begged him to correct her. She had always been distant and cold, and seeing a human emotion in her face was wrong.

“You are going to be punished,” Erhard said.

“I am going to be killed,” Lilly replied. It was the first time she had ever directly contradicted him, and it was almost as shocking as the fact that she had escaped. He reached down and backhanded her, splitting her lip open.

“You do not talk back to me!”

“Am I wrong?” she whispered.

Erhard raised his hand again, but stopped himself.
What is the point of this?
He lowered his hand. “Why did you do this?”

Lilly shook her head. “It doesn’t matter anymore.”

“It’s the only thing that
does
matter!” He wanted to strike her again—not to discipline or correct her behavior, but simply to vent his own frustration. He turned away, because he was frightened of the anger that welled up inside him. He asked God for some semblance of composure. “For years, you worked in God’s service. Why would you now turn on everything you’ve ever known?”

“I’ve turned on everything that ever loved me.”

“What?”

“It’s my purpose, isn’t it? It is why you value me at all. I can kill.” She looked up at Erhard, tears in her eyes. “My worth is measured in the blood I shed in your God’s name.”

“Why did you escape?”

“You abandoned me here. Of all places,
here
! I tried to forget what you made me do. For
years
I tried.”

“Forget what?”

Lilly closed her eyes and shook her head.

“You need to tell me why you escaped.”

“Your God will forgive you?”

“What?”

“Your God will forgive your sins?”

“If I truly repent and do penance.”

Lilly looked up at him with shimmering green eyes. “You are the only God I have. Will you forgive me?”

Erhard took a step back from her. “Don’t speak such blasphemy.”

“I’m giving my life in penance for my sins. Are you so cruel to deny me absolution?”

“You cannot ask for absolution.”

“Why?”

“Because animals have no souls.”

Lilly looked down at the floor.

“Why?” Erhard repeated. “Why did you escape?”

“Because I am an animal,” Lilly said. “Because I have no soul. Because I am beyond the forgiveness of even the men who raised me.”

“Lilly—”

“Kill me and be done with it!”
she screamed. And in that moment, Erhard didn’t see the creature he had trained, the wolf thing that Brother Semyon had bequeathed to him. He couldn’t see the emotionless thing he had taken from battle to battle.

What he saw was all too human.

No, the Church ruled on what they were. Just animals …

But the pope had changed that ruling. What basis did Erhard have now to say
what
she was? If she could
ask
to receive God—

“The bishop is right,” he whispered. “You are born of the Father of Lies. You’ve twisted me against the Church, against God. You are the work of the devil.”

Lilly shook her head. “
You
did this to
me
!”

“I have been misled.” Erhard backed to the door, staring at the naked succubus, beating down every sympathetic impulse, every merciful thought.

“You told me I was serving your God!”

Erhard didn’t trust himself to say anything more. He knocked on the door so the guard would let him out.

The confusion in Lilly’s face was painful to see. Erhard turned away from her as the door opened. As he left, he heard her call out, “If I belong to the devil, it is because you gave me to him!”

Then the guard closed the door behind him and Erhard was able to breathe a sigh of relief. But only for a moment.

“Brother Erhard,” spoke a painfully familiar voice.

Erhard looked up. “Your Grace.”

The bishop stood in the hallway, his rich clothes and jewels
giving him the appearance of a grotesque apparition in the plain stone corridor. He smiled at Erhard. “I see your Sergeant Günter spoke truth. The beast is again in your hands.”

“Yes, Your Grace.”

“I heard some of your conversation.”

“I see.”

“You’ve satisfied yourself of your error?”

“Your Grace has proved wiser than I in this matter.”

The bishop chuckled to himself. Erhard couldn’t help but think it unseemly.

“I am about to order her execution,” Erhard said.

“You forget that
I
now dispense authority in Johannisburg. I shall direct the disposition of any prisoners.”

Erhard bent his head. “Forgive my imposition. What would you have me do?”

“She will meet her fate with those who gave her succor. My inquisitor has identified the family that fed and clothed her, and they will all face the flames as one.”

When the bishop said that the family belonged to the young man, Uldolf, Erhard found that he was not surprised.

ome with us.”

In response to the broken Prûsan, Uldolf looked up from the floor and saw a quartet of armed men. The one speaking wore the black cross of the Order. Uldolf stared a moment at the unfamiliar knight and said, “I am supposed to see my family.”

“You will see them, in time.”

He looked at the four of them and realized that this was not going to go well. But since there was little else he could do, he stood and said, “Take me, then.”

The four men arranged themselves on both sides of him, making
sure he followed precisely where they led. Uldolf asked them where they were going, but the men were unresponsive.

He was only partly surprised when they took him outside, across the bailey, and toward the keep. He looked across at the mass of Prûsans still gathered here. Seeing the prisoners extinguished whatever small hope he had that giving the Germans their monster might have ended this nightmare. He saw a few faces he recognized—mostly farmers for whom he had done leatherwork.

More frightening was what was happening on the other side of the bailey, by the walls of the keep itself. A rough platform had been erected about waist height off the ground. In the middle of the platform, four stakes half again as tall as a man formed the outline of a diamond. Men piled wood around the base of the platform and the stakes. Uldolf looked from the stakes, back to the crowd, and saw in his countrymen’s eyes all he needed to know.

For the briefest instant, as the stone pile of the keep towered over him, he considered trying to run for it. It was only the briefest of flashes. Even if there weren’t four guards escorting him, there was nowhere to run to. Then they led him through the door to the keep, and he lost even the illusion of escape.

ldolf
…