Chris Pierson - Divine Hammer

The Kingpriest stirred. His eyes did not focus, but he turned his head toward Cathan.

When he spoke, his beautiful voice was thin as spider’s silk.

“My friend. I am glad-glad you are here.”

Cathan wept. “Holiness,” he said. “You must tell me how to help you. I would give my life, if I could.”

A smile twitched the Lightbringer’s lips. “You already did that once,” he wheezed. “I have no strength to heal myself. Give me your hand.”

Gently, Cathan gripped the Kingpriest’s fingers. They were cold, as frail as bird bones.

Beldinas smiled, then shut his eyes and let out a breath. For a moment Cathan’s heart seized, but then he saw the Kingpriest’s lips begin to move, forming words only he could hear.

“ Palado, ucdas pafiro, ” he prayed. “ Tas pelo laigam fat, mifiso soramflonat. Me cailud, e tas or am me lud bipum. Sifat. ”

Heal me…

Cathan felt a tingle at the back of his mind, a tingle that grew into something greater, a torrent that coursed through him like cool flame. He knew it to be the god’s presence, Paladine’s energy flowing through his body. It was pain and joy, all at once, completely different from any mundane sensation … yet it was still familiar. He had felt something like it before.

The cold fingers twitched. The Kingpriest’s eyes widened as they stared at him. Cathan felt cold, suddenly. Beldinas knows, he thought. He knows I used magic once before. He knows I corrupted myself with the sorceress.

Before he could think anything else, the healing light flared around him. The cool, soothing glow drew gasps of astonishment from the others. The attar of roses filled the air.

He tasted honey and wine on his tongue. It lasted a moment and an eternity, both at once, then faded again-but not completely.

Beldinas’s aura began to return. The bloody wound was closed. The Lightbringer breathed a sigh and looked at Cathan, a sudden, odd expression in his eyes. A fear. He jerked his hand from Cathan’s grasp Palado Calib, Cathan thought. He’s afraid of me now. “Holiness,” he began.

Sighing, Beldinas closed his eyes, slipping into peaceful sleep.

The Lightbringer would live.

Quarath and Yarns and Serl all gathered around, awestruck by the miracle they had just witnessed. Others came running too, asking what was happening and crying out in joy when they heard the news. Cathan didn’t hear anything. He only stared at Beldinas’s face, biting down hard on his lip.

It was the same feeling, he thought, thunderstruck. The god’s touch and magic were the same-like different facets of the same jewel. What could that mean?

He could think of no answer.

The Lordcity was quiet that night, its plazas empty and its gates sealed. Scores of knights and Scatas walked the boulevards, their boots rapping a steady cadence on the marble-paved streets. There was a curfew in place. Those who went out into Istar’s streets at such times only asked for trouble. Defying the Church was a risky business at the best of times, but when the Kingpriest had nearly fallen to an assassin, the best one could hope for was arrest and imprisonment in the city jail. The worst was the kiss of a crossbow bolt.

Draconian as such measures were, they were better than the alternative. Istaran history was filled with stories of rioting in troubled times. At the outset of the Three Thrones’ War, half the city had burned before order could be restored. That had been a hundred years ago, but folk still spoke of it as if it had happened last summer. Of all the forces in Istar-the Church, the knighthood, the armies, even the High Sorcerers-none was more powerful than the mob.

Cathan walked the streets alone, his thoughts darting about like the hummingbirds in the Great Temple’s gardens.

As he walked, his eyes strayed again and again to the Temple, the basilica dome shining mourning-blue in the city’s heart. The First Son and First Daughter were dead. A shudder ran through him at how close things had come for Beldinas. The bloody-fingered Tower stood silent, showing no sign that the sorcerers grieved as well. But grieve they did, surely.

The word was that the highmage was dead, killed in the battle by the Eusymmeas.

Cathan stopped, stiffening. He had just left a courtyard where silver and lapis dragon-statues fought among blossoming cherry trees, and was starting down an avenue where the mudubas were thick on both sides of the road. Robbed of business by the curfew, the wine shops stood quiet, lamps doused and gates locked-all except one. Down the way, light blazed from one of the taverns. Shouts and laughter rang out, echoing weirdly among the walls and pillars. A scowl found its way onto Cathan’s face. What fool would open his wine shop on a night like this? It was asking for trouble. Unless …

He heard the booming voice, though he couldn’t make out the words-only the proud, boastful tone and the answering shouts and laughter. Sighing, he shook his head. Of course, Marto. Angrily, he strode down the street and flung open the wine shop’s gates.

It was the Mirrorgarden, where the old woman had cursed him after Tithian’s dubbing.

There were around a dozen knights there now, perched on benches with wine cups in their hands, their attention turned to the towering Karthayan standing on the table. The tavern keeper shot Cathan a look as he came in, a mix of apology, guilt, and pleading. Cathan waved him off as he started forward.

The knights’ laughter faltered and died as they saw him. Though most were off duty, he marked a couple who should have been on patrol. There would be reprimands later. For now, though, his attention fell full on Marto, who looked back with the red face and bleary eyes of a man who has crawled too deep into his cups.

“What are you doing here?” Cathan demanded.

Marto blinked, looking around as if to make sure he was the one being addressed.

“Celebrating, milord. What else?”

“Celebrating?” Cathan repeated. “Marto, the Kingpriest nearly died today. Adsem and Farenne did die … and others, too, your brothers in arms among them.”

“So did wizards,” Marto shot back, his chest puffing with pride. “We taught the treacherous bastards a lesson today, milord, and sent that highmage of their howling to the Abyss besides. Lost my favorite axe doing it, too.”

A few of the knights chuckled at that. Cathan’s scowl deepened. “It will be war now, Marto. Many will die.”

“Holy war,” Marto shot back. “Fighting evil in the Lightbringer’s name. It’s what we’re for, milord. We are the Hammer-about time we struck a proper blow.”

A murmer of agreement escaped the other knights. They were behind Marto, and not just because of the wine, either. The big knight had a point. Beldinas had formed the knighthood to smite darkness. Another time, Cathan would have rejoiced with his comrades. Today, though, he’d felt the god’s power and hadn’t been able to tell the difference from Leciane’s magic. Nothing seemed as clear now as it once had-or as it still did to Marto and his cronies.

They were all looking at him, waiting for him to speak. If he showed weakness in front of them, he would lose them. Perhaps he already had. Marto was the hero now, the one who had avenged the knights’ honor when he struck the highmage down.

“Go back to the Hammerhall,” he said. “All of you. You’ll get to strike your blow soon enough.”

You, not we. They all heard it. The knights exchanged glances, then set down their cups and rose, filing past him as they left. Marto went last of all, his eyes glinting. He slammed the mudubo’s silver gates behind him.

Cathan stood quietly in the courtyard, drinking the wine his men had left behind.