Heartland

lines, I began to see the hierarchy in a different light. Given the circumstances and rampant paranoia now sweeping the rank, suddenly the distinction between schools of thought looked a lot like battle lines.

Is this what you wanted? I asked the spirit hiding in the Chorus. Is this your master plan? To force everyone to chose a side?

A dark whirlpool swirled in my skull, and the Chorus vanished like smoke into the yawning mouth. Lightning arced from my anger, lighting the mouth of the hole, and the outline of old spirits lit up in the smoke. I reached for them, my current electrifying their shapes. They whined and tried to slip down the hole faster, but I had a chain now. One and another and then another. Like tiny cut-outs for a Christmas tree, little children all holding hands.

Tell me. I need to know. Tell me what you want from me.

The whirlpool shivered and white ice formed on the rim of its lip. The hole closed and opened again, a parody of a mouth. Tell me what you want, it parroted back at me.

You came to me. You wanted me to kill you. In a time and place of your choosing. Away from their eyes.

The body must be destroyed, the whirlpool hummed.

Is this your answer? I demanded. Your Architects were supposed to Witness your death. They were supposed to be on hand to elect a successor. By dying out of sight, did you bring on this chaos?

Opportunity, Philippe whispered through the swirling motion of the Chorus. I gave them opportunity.

'Opportunity,' I whispered, the word slipping out of me.

'Pardon,' Lafoutain said, reminding me I wasn't alone.

The Upheaval, Cristobel reminded me, flitting across my perception like a ghost of a hummingbird. A trickle that became a flood. A crack in a dike means the wall is no longer strong; time becomes its greatest enemy.

'It was just a matter of time,' I said.

'What was?' Lafoutain glanced at Marielle, who was toying with her food, not really eating much. 'What does he know?'

'More than he realizes,' she said. There was a strange expression on her face, a mixture of confusion, fascination, and a glimmer of something else. Revulsion?

Lafoutain stepped closer, his voice dropping into a near whisper. 'Who is he? He said he came from Portland. We didn't have anyone in Portland.' He looked at me. 'Not anyone we could trust.'

Marielle laughed, a hard bark of sound ripping out of her chest. I flinched at the sound, and Lafoutain grew more agitated. 'What is going on?' he demanded. He blinked heavily, and his forehead was shiny with sweat.

I put my finger on Spiertz's name. 'The Mason,' I said. My hand drifted on its own accord across the map. Ulrich Husserl. 'The Scryer.' R. A. Kircherus. 'The Thaumaturge.' And three makes seven. Seven Architects.

But my hand kept moving, sliding across the page until it landed on Lafoutain's name. 'The Sch-'

Lafoutain stepped forward and slapped my hand away from the map. He threw a nervous glance at the kitchen. 'Enough,' he hissed.

The Scholar. The whirlpool broke, scattering like snow in the mind.

Each of the nine has a distinct title, Cristobel's voice echoed in the fading spray of snow.

'There are nine,' I said, staring at Lafoutain. 'Not seven.' The Chorus darted around the implications of the number nine. The rank was organized on the mystic resonance of sevens and threes. Seven ranks, seven sub- degrees. The higher ranks contained three times seven members. A third of the Preceptors were Architects. Threes and sevens. Nine was the cube of three, but it was an anomaly in the structure. It didn't seem to fit.

And Lafoutain wasn't a Preceptor. He was a rank below. A Protector of the Archives. But he was the Scholar. I knew it as concretely as I did the other names. I knew it because Philippe had known it, and that made it true.

'Your father named nine men as Architects,' I said to Marielle. 'Not the traditional seven. He built his own secret within the secrets.' I indicated the map. 'Visionary, Mason, Hermit, Scryer, Navigator, Crusader, and Thaumaturge. Those are the seven. But Philippe had two more.' I looked at Lafoutain. 'The Scholar. And the Shepherd. Who weren't Preceptors.'

Lafoutain made a shushing motion with his hands. 'Okay, okay. I hear you. Now shut up about it.' He glanced toward the kitchen again. He was sweating clearly now. 'They don't know.' He glared at me. 'No one knows.'

'Except the three of us,' Marielle said. I tried to get a read on her as something in her voice had made the Chorus shiver, but her expression was unreadable. She hadn't known, the Chorus hinted, not until you just told her. She didn't know about either of them.

But why did that matter? I asked the spirits in my head.

'Let's keep it that way.' Lafoutain raised his eyes toward Heaven. 'Let's keep it a secret. For now. Okay?' He swiped a hand across his forehead and when it came away wet, he looked at it dumbly as if he didn't know how that moisture had gotten there. He wobbled for a second, leaning forward against the table. 'That panang.' His mouth crooked into an awkward smile. 'Spicier than I thought.'

I pulled a chair closer and he sat down. His face was red, and his breath rasped in his throat. 'Maybe some water,' he said, tugging on Marielle's arm. 'Could you get me a glass of water?'

She nodded, her face clearly showing concern now, and went to fetch the Bear a glass.

As soon as she was gone, Lafoutain grabbed my arm and pulled me close, his face next to mine. His eyes were clouded with pain, but they cleared for a second, filling with violet light. 'Quickly,' he said. 'There isn't time.'

'It's just a curry-'

He shook his head, sweat flying off his brow. 'No, it's something else. Damnit. Undone by my stomach.' A spasm of pain ran through his frame, and I felt his hand tremble on my arm. 'Those little pricks betrayed us. I knew they were gone too long.' He shivered. 'They dosed the food, probably all of it.'

I stared at the plates on the table. How much had I eaten? Had Marielle?

Lafoutain leaned heavily against me, his hand moving to my shirt so that he could bring my head close to his mouth. 'The Shepherd,' he hissed. 'Do you know who the Shepherd is?'

The memory was there. Now that I knew what to look for. The burned face upraised, the eyes closed. The skull showing through the ravaged flesh. My hands touching his eyes and lips, delivering the benediction of rank. After the fall. So recently elevated, as if, in having survived being burned, he had proven himself capable.

I nodded. 'I do.'

'Does she?'

I shook my head. 'I don't think so.' The Chorus crawled under my skin. 'She didn't know about you.'

A crash of falling china came from the kitchen, followed by shouts. The Chorus flared into the peacock shield as they felt magick blossom in the other room. Instinctively, I moved toward the fight, toward Marielle, but Lafoutain held me tight.

'No man is an island,' he whispered. 'Not even Philippe.' His grip faltered, and I nearly tore out of it, but he summoned strength from some reservoir and held me tight. 'Do you trust her?'

I hesitated for a second, all this secrecy about the hidden Architects giving me a moment of pause. But only a moment. Speak what lies in your heart, wolf. Be true to me, and to yourself.

'Why shouldn't I?'

A spasm of pain wracked his face. 'Don't be obtuse, Michael. Answer my question.'

'Yes,' I said. Committing myself. Making a choice. Be true.

He tried to nod his head, and only managed a slight tremor of his neck muscles. ' 'It is more difficult to live with a woman without danger than to raise the dead to life.' Do you know who said that?' His voice was fading in and out, like the fluttering edge of foam on a wave, as his life ebbed. 'Bernard of Clairvaux.' He managed to tilt his head to the side enough to look up at me. The light glittering in his eyes gave his face some of its old humor back. 'So very medieval of him, and yet so. . ' The light faded, taking with it most of his remaining strength. His head fell forward again, and his voice was almost lost in his throat.'. . daughters, not our sons that will. . Oh, my