Neal Stephenson - The Mongoliad - Book One

Finn nodded, a wide grin spreading across his face.

Yasper turned his attention to the decrepit wall around the monastery. “Should I bring some rope…?” he offered.

“You think too much,” Finn snorted. “Door is weak. Go up, knock it down, fight Livonians.”

“I would have thought you a subtler man, Finn.” Yasper chuckled.

Finn raised an eyebrow at the alchemist and hefted his boar spear. “Subtlety is for when you are stalking fleet prey. It has no purpose otherwise.”

A slow smile spread across Yasper’s face as he turned to address Cnán. “How many of those ragged…monks…did you see?”

“Just one, but there must be more,” Cnán reluctantly replied. “Unless they went with the Livonians.”

What Yasper was suggesting seemed like madness, but she could see some virtue to his plan. They had given no thought to the Livonians’ purpose previously, and the raiders had managed to disappear from under their very noses. If they were to follow the Livonians, there might be no other way to catch up to them quickly enough to discern their purpose. “The hide workers,” she pointed out, “they skin the animals up there, so I presume they have some tools…”

“Lead us,” Yasper said, exchanging a glance with Finn that was half mad excitement, half fear.

Cnán felt the same emotions rising from the pit of her stomach. Was this the infectious spirit of her companions driving her into like-minded madness?

“If Saint Ilya offers you no guidance, Brother, then perhaps what… we …seek is not down in these caverns, and we should allow Sister Vera to resume her normal duties above,” Raphael suggested. “Unless you can supply some meager hint as to what the object of your quest might be.”

“Hints, perhaps. I have seen little and been illuminated as to its meaning less,” Percival said, getting to his feet. “There is a relic guarded ardently in a secret place. A chalice—searched for by many, protected by the worthy—I had hoped that perhaps it might be found here.”

At this, there was silence. Raphael recalled a conversation he’d overheard between Percival and Taran, wherein the late oplo had been questioned at length by Percival about cauldron myths from his native Ireland. They’d talked late into the night as Raphael had tossed and turned, wishing they’d shut up. Raphael had thought naught of their conversation until now.

Percival sought the Grail, and he had hoped to find it in Kiev.

“We have protected many things over the march of years,” Vera replied. “But the Holy Grail is not amongst them.”

Percival gave a respectful nod, though he could not hide the look of disappointment that flashed briefly across his face. “But you do protect something.”

Vera said nothing.

“We will help you regardless of whether you divulge your secrets,” Percival said quietly. “Know that.”

A look of consternation—or was it well-hidden exasperation?—flashed over Vera’s face. She had said moments ago that this was a good place to speak of secrets. Clearly—to Raphael, at least—she had been urging Percival to divulge his secret. But he had taken it the other way and leapt to the assumption that Vera had something to reveal.

She considered his words in silence, the only sound the faint hissing of the melting tallow in the rushlight that illuminated her face. She looked next at each of them and finally relented. “I will tell you the closest thing we have to a holy secret in this place. According to legend, the grave of Saint Ilya guards the Egg of Koschei the Deathless.”

Percival did not try to hide his interest. “Tell us more of this sacred egg.”

Roger, unable to contain himself, turned his back on them, stalked to the nearest wall, and pressed his forehead against the cool stone.

“It is not sacred,” Vera said. “Rather the opposite—it contains the soul of the evil spirit Koschei, and whoever has it in his possession has Koschei in his power.”

“Is it perhaps contained in a sacred relic—something shaped like a goblet or chalice?”

Vera was now looking at Percival very oddly indeed and seemed unwilling to speak plainly for once.

Roger turned to face the center of the chamber and stepped slowly toward Percival. “My brother!” he exclaimed. “How can you not understand her words? It is not here. We have come all this way to hear a fairy story about a hobgoblin who keeps his soul in a fucking egg! Whatever purpose led you to steer our path toward Kiev had some other end in mind—some end that is going ignored and untended to while we stand in this sewer prating about Koschei the Deathless.”

Another man might have been offended. But no anger was on Percival’s face as he locked eyes with Roger. Long was the silence that followed.

It stretched out even longer as first Vera, then Roger, then Percival, and finally Raphael began to glance toward the chamber’s exit, distracted by approaching sounds that could not possibly have been made by rats. At first these were human voices, echoing distantly along the intestine twists and bends of the cavern’s walls. But as they listened, they began to hear too the metallic clank and jingle of steel—steel worn on the body as armor and steel carried in the hand.

“We are not alone down here,” Raphael said.

The monastery gate was as weak as Finn surmised, the timbers splintering after three strong kicks from Finn’s boot. Using his spear as a wedge, he ripped and tore the rotted wood away until there was a large enough hole to pass through. After ducking and looking, he went first, leaping nimbly through the gap. Cnán followed, more readily and eagerly than she had anticipated, and Yasper came close on her heels.

Seeing the slaughtering grounds up close, Cnán was repelled at the number of bodies strewn about the ground. Blood, caked and dried to a black tar, was smeared everywhere, and in some places, it still had a sheen of dampness. Black clouds of flies hovered over carcasses, and some of the bodies wriggled with a false skin of maggots. The noise of the flies was a drone in the air.

Had she been by herself, she would not have been able to compose herself in time to address the approach of the two Livonians guards. However, Finn and Yasper were not as incapacitated, and as the two Livonians charged, the Shield-Brethren were ready.

The first Livonian never reached them. Finn’s thrown spear struck him forcefully in the throat, lifting him off his feet. He collapsed, squirming and clutching at the shaft of wood protruding from his neck, his bright blood spattering on the ground.

The second, sensing the sudden disappearance of his comrade, hesitated, and Yasper flung out his left hand. The Livonian cried out, ducking his head as something flew into his eyes. He never saw Yasper’s quick sword thrust.

Finn went to retrieve his spear, twisting it slightly to finish his man. “Come,” he said. “Let us not tarry to meet the monks who haunt this place.” He led them toward the well house.

It seemed almost too easy, and Cnán eyed the monastery buildings with some suspicion as they ran toward the tiny shack. She couldn’t help but wonder about the residents. Were there more? Where were they hiding? And were they allies of the Livonians or were they like the rest of the locals—frightened and eager to please?

Finn yanked open the door of the well house and ducked inside. Yasper waited at the door, panting slightly. “Awfully quiet,” he said as she reached the well house. The glee he had exhibited earlier was gone, and his face was a mask of shadowed grooves.