Mark Newton - The Book of Transformations

Urtica issued a professional grin, and an obviously rehearsed speech. ‘My Villjamur Knights, how splendid you look.’ His voice was richer than she remembered. ‘You have been instrumental, if not the sole reason, in reducing crime in this city in such a short space of time. Your citizens hold you in high esteem, as does the Council — and as do I.’

‘Thank you, my Emperor.’ Lan could sense Vuldon’s snort of disdain, even though no one else appeared to notice.

‘Today, as you know, is important. I am about to open this incredible iren — what a structure! There are soldiers from the city guard and men from a Regiment of Foot stationed on every floor of the building, but I have been receiving certain… threats of late.’ His voice betrayed him and Lan could suddenly see the sleepless nights in his eyes. ‘The anarchists seem to think today represents everything they disapprove of. I cannot allow such a rogue minority to ruin this for the good people of Villjamur. This iren is to be a symbol of our wealth, status and pride.’

Lan smiled but inwardly questioned: who exactly was the majority? The people starving outside the city gates? Those trying to make a life for themselves Caveside? Or those privileged few crowded below them to celebrate the opening of a building created for the sole purpose of pleasure and image?

Fulcrom stormed across the city, through a light shower of snow.

All around this region of Villjamur, the city was in the midst of being reconstructed. Horses dragged gargantuan carts of stone and wood precariously across the cobbled roads. Scaffolding webbed over and across buildings as if woven by some monstrous machine, whilst masons and labourers climbed up into celestial mists.

Fulcrom arrived at the hotel where Ulryk was lodging, a rickety, whitewashed building typical of the lower levels. Fulcrom banged on the door to his room, but there was no reply. In the small, tastelessly decorated lobby, decorated in deep reds, with old furniture and garish paintings, Fulcrom enquired of the landlord of the hotel if he’d seen the priest.

‘Nah, not seen the guy,’ he replied.

‘Have you heard anything strange from his room perhaps?’ Fulcrom pressed. ‘Or have there been any visitors?’

‘He’s a quiet one, aye, keeps himself to himself mainly. No friends, no visitors. Don’t eat with the other residents in the dining room — who’d want to, mind, they’re a freakish lot — but he’s always smiling whenever I pass him.’

‘Are his movements strange?’ Fulcrom asked.

‘What, like the way he walks?’

‘No,’ Fulcrom sighed. Idiot. ‘I mean, the hours he leaves and returns, are they strange?’

‘Up and down with the sun, mainly. Though I’ve not seen him return for the last two days.’

‘Thanks for your help. If you see him, send word by a messenger to the Inquisition headquarters. We’ll cover the cost.’

‘Will do, sir.’

Fulcrom headed to the Inquisition headquarters. There, in the sanctuary of his office, he sat upright at his desk for nearly an hour, staring into space, turning things over in his mind.

Warkur poked his head in through the doorway, then knocked on the frame. For a big rumel, he certainly moved with surprising stealth. ‘Fulcrom, got a minute?’

‘Of course, sir, come in.’

Warkur closed the door carefully, then approached lugging a thick bundle of papers. He dumped them on the desk in front of Fulcrom.

‘What are these?’ Fulcrom asked.

‘Statements from last night,’ Warkur ventured, although he seemed disturbed. ‘You’re in charge of weird shit. Well, here’s a big pile of weird shit.’

‘I’m not sure I follow.’

‘We got a stack of witness statements last night, and they’re from people who…’ Warkur leaned in as if ashamed to speak the words ‘.. who claim that the dead visited their houses. If it was one or two people, I’d have slapped them in a cell and let the silly fuckers sober up. But we got over forty declarations that the dead — or people believed to be deceased — were up and about, hassling the citizens of this damn city.’

Fulcrom breathed out slowly. ‘Right you are, sir, I’ll look into it.’

‘Don’t let this get out anywhere, and don’t put too much effort into things. We don’t want to be seen to be wasting our resources on shit that might not even be real.’

‘Understood, sir,’ Fulcrom reassured him.

Warkur retreated from the room. At the door he paused. ‘I know you’re not their babysitters, but are those damn Knights of yours prepared for today?’

‘I believe so, sir.’

‘Good. I never trust it when matters the Inquisition should be overseeing fall under the control of the city guard just because the Emperor is present. They’re an arrogant and unsubtle bunch. We should be there — feels like a threat whenever they suggest we don’t get involved.’

As Warkur left, Fulcrom lowered his forehead to the desk.

Things were no longer looking so good.

His problems would not go away. He had loved Adena more than life itself, and it took him weeks to even speak to another person after her death. Her life gone, Adena had been framed for a crime she didn’t commit. It was a savage end for such a beautiful, delicate human.

People began to talk about him behind his back — sentiments of sympathy at first, and then something more serious, questioning his fitness for the job of investigator. Fulcrom threw himself into his work assiduously, and discovered it was the only thing that would keep him from thinking about her. Eventually the pain diminished, but he was left with a residue in his mind that he couldn’t scrub away, no matter how hard he tried to force the matter from his thoughts. Then years later, there was Lan with her eccentricities and her charms and her differences from anyone he’d met in a long time. Something close to hope had reared itself in his mind.

And then last night, of all nights to visit, she came back…

Fulcrom glanced through some of the reports from the previous night.

‘My Jed was there — it’s been nearly twenty years, but he was there, still a boy, at the foot of my bed.’

‘I was in the bath and this presence crept behind me and tried to kiss me!’

‘Two of them — the ones that robbed me blind last year, standing there all glowing white and with the knives they carried that same night. They taunted me and my wife and we didn’t sleep at all afterwards.’

The stories were very similar to his own — visitations and phantoms haunting the living of Villjamur. What the hell had that priest been doing?

The path inside the iren was lined with numerous ornate cressets that each held a fat-based flame. Across a white marble floor, with mica-covered walls and ceilings, the place was assiduously clean and gleaming, and across such surfaces the echo of their footsteps ricocheted down the corridor.

Lan felt nervous as the weight of expectation dawned on her.

Not only were the Knights celebrated by the people of the city, but they would be in the public eye once again. If something should go wrong, the people would not look to the city guard for assistance, they would look to the Knights — the manufactured symbols of hope.

The corridor didn’t turn at right angles, it curved gently, implying the vast size of the structure. Soon they found themselves at the top of an iron spiral staircase and, together, they descended, passing portraits of the great icons of the military dressed in various regalia. At the bottom of the stairs the city guard boxed around Urtica, obscuring him with their crimson and grey colours, guiding him forwards, their dull steel shields held aloft as if they were heading into a fracas.

Then a lower level, wider, lighter, with skylights, wooden rails and gold cressets. Everything here seemed to glitter, as if they were in some heady dream.