Faith Hunter - Host

I threw open my cloak to reveal the black dobok beneath, and the amulets of my office. I gripped the visa and drew on it. “Stop!” Amplified by the visa, the word rang in the tall-ceilinged room. Yelling real loud was about the only thing I had learned to do with it. That and ask it for advice in diplomatic situations. Avoiding civil war seemed to have been left out of its library, however, as it was oddly silent. Releasing some of my pent-up anger, I shouted, “Stop!” A window shattered; children covered their ears. But the crowd went still, fearful eyes on me.

“Sit down,” I snarled; then, softer, “All of you.” The visa throbbed in my hand, insistent, and I added, gently, “Please.” The near-mob slowly settled, all but the EIH, until Eli tilted his head a fraction. It could have been a coincidence that the operatives sat as one, but I doubted it.

I looked out over the crowd, the tears that had gathered gone, my eyes hot and painful in their aftermath. I had their attention. Now what? I drew on the visa for advice, my hand holding the four-inch-diameter pink tourmaline ring. Family, community, history, it suggested. Well, duh. I had that one figured out already.

“This town has fought in the war against Darkness for over a century. You have stood together, friends and neighbors, on the battlefield, when many others fled in fear.” I saw some heads nod. People were settling into their seats, their weapons disappeared from sight. I nudged Audric, and he sheathed his sword. The two humans followed his lead. But they didn’t sit down. Good. They could be a shield in front of me and hide my shaking knees from the camera.

“One hundred years ago, when the Darkness seemed to be defeated, when the rest of the world began to divide into religious factions, when the rest of humanity turned on itself, this town met together instead. In this very building.” I let my voice mellow into a soft rhythm as I spoke. Mage storytelling cant. And if most of what I said was true, so much the better. As some Pre-Ap person had said, spin is everything.

“Your ancestors—Christian, both Protestant and the one Catholic family, Jewish, and the Cherokee—sat down together and worked out a system of kirk services that was fair to all. They built a new building that had no Pre-Ap religious symbols, and yet had room for all of them.” I looked across the crowd, assessing. “It wasn’t easy. But they did it. And they didn’t fight among themselves. You never have fought against each other, from the very beginning.”

That part wasn’t the complete truth about the town history, but at least no one had died while the discussions took place, so it wasn’t a total lie either. “In the kirk, you all meet, at different times and days, to worship in the forms you adhere to, all in one building, the kirk, the symbol of peace, just as the seraphs instituted in the rest of the world. What the seraphs had to impose on others, you figured out for yourselves.” More heads bobbed as the history of Mineral City and their ancestors took place of pride.

“You had only just settled the matter of kirk when the battle of the Trine took place. I don’t have to tell you about that struggle. You teach it in grade school. Your children learn of the heroism of their ancestors and the sacrifice of Benaiah Stanhope, the Mole Man. You know your own history, your own bravery and self-reliance. That conflict, fighting alongside the seraphs, a battle fought without army troops, without air support, without high-tech weapons, but fought with faith and sacrifice, was the turning point of the war on the North American coast. Your ancestors were peaceful people who did what had to be done.

“Now the orthodox are trying to convert the progressives and the reformed. The progressives and reformed are trying to shut out the orthodox. The three Christian groups are at odds because of styles of dress, because of the foods you eat and the clothes you wear. You’re dividing over the inconsequential.” Heads were nodding throughout the old church building now, a few looked abashed, some were defiant. I noted who they were, and wasn’t surprised to find them mostly orthodox, the religious group who had stood up against me in the past. Tears of Taharial. What do I have to do for them to like me? Die? Not a happy thought.

“Neighbors have begun to turn away, to refuse to speak when they pass on the street.” They refused to speak to me too, but I didn’t add that. I was learning to keep my mouth shut. “The Cherokee have withdrawn to the nearby hills to practice their religion, and that saddens me, because they too have a place to worship in kirk.”

Because I was getting ready to tread on quicksand, theologically speaking, I took hold of an amulet that contained a shield big enough to protect my champards and me. It seemed every time I came in here I was prepared for fighting. I centered myself, ready for an outburst at best, violence at worst. “Are seraphs and the High Host really the spiritual beings, the angels, depicted in the ancient scriptures? Is the Darkness really the devils who fought against them in the heavens? Were they really defeated on a spiritual plane and cast to Earth? Or are they invaders?” Dozens of shocked exclamations sounded as I said aloud what the EIH believed. The heresy. But I had timed it right. “I really don’t know. None of us does.” No one screamed or jumped up and down or started civil war. No one shot at me. That was the best part.

I let a smidgen of my neomage attributes shine through my skin. Mage showmanship. “My stepdaughter assures me that I have to have faith. Mages who have no souls. Have faith,” I said, making a small sad joke. A ripple of amusement followed. And pity. Good. Pity me rather than fear me. It might keep me alive a day or two longer.

“The Most High offers us no power, no help in times of trouble, save the use of his leftover creation power, which is there for the taking. Only seraphs, upon occasion, provide us power to draw upon, just as the seraph Mutuol allows us to call on him for exorcism of demons from the innocent.”

I considered the assembled. “Maybe the seraphs are ready to allow humans to question where they come from. We’ve seen some evidence of change this winter. Maybe they’re ready to be asked when the Most High will show his face. They’ve allowed other changes over the last hundred years. TV. Pre-Ap music.” I smiled. “Rock and roll.” The crowd laughed softly.

“But history tells us one thing absolutely. No matter who the seraphs are, they will not allow violence”—I paused—“between us. Between humans and mages. Nor between humans and humans in the name of religion.” I set my face in stern lines. “They. Will. Not.” I let my skin glow a bit, a roseate hue. My scars shone, the one at my throat bright as the face of the moon.

Slowly, I drew my longsword from its walking-stick scabbard. In my other hand, I drew my tanto, its blade the blue glow of a Minor Flame. I held it up so the entire town could see the blue glow of the High Host. “During the fight last night, seven Minor Flames came to help us. I didn’t call them,” I said before the question could be asked. I didn’t volunteer who did. “But they came. They fought beside us. With us. And one, of its own free will, joined to this blade and helped to kill dragonets.

“With the seven Flames, we of this town once again slowed and stopped the Major Darkness that was fighting free of its bonds. A Dragon that appeared in the form of a whirlwind. It vanished but it isn’t defeated; it’s just delayed. It will be completely free soon, and then it will come this way, to this town. You know that.” I sheathed the longsword with a scritch of sound and lowered the tanto to my side as the crowd stirred uneasily at my words.

Obligingly, Audric and Rupert stepped away a bit. Rupert was moving with noticeable stiffness. His back had been partially repaired, but he should be in bed. I hoped he didn’t pass out before we got out of here.