“At the Blue Parrot?” Red Dog asked.
“No, not there. Wallace might see us and give us the slip. We will meet at the Masons’ Guildhall. It’s a block north of the Parrot.”
“What about Captain de Guichen? Should I leave people to watch his bo at?”
“Forget him. He has served his purpose.”
“What about them demons?” Red Dog asked.
Dubois had actually forgotten the demons in his excitement. He brought to mind the report the grand bishop had sent him. The nun had described the abbey’s attackers as “demons hurling balls of green fire.”
“We will deal with them later,” said Dubois. To his mind, Sir Henry was the primary devil.
“I guess the boss’ll take care of ’em,” said Red Dog, referring to one of the heads of the criminal gangs that ran Westfirth.
Red Dog left to assemble his comrades. Dubois, who was not an exclusive customer of the bordello, had to summon his own cab. As he rolled off toward the Blue Parrot, Dubois reveled in his victory. At long last, he would have enough evidence to send Rosia’s most dangerous foe, Sir Henry Wallace, to the gallows.
What were fiends from Hell compared to that!
Chapter Thirty-Four
In my years serving the Arcanum, I have seen enough evil in this world to know that we do not need the Devil to create Hell. Hell is the destruction of hope and the loss of faith brought on by man’s inhumanity to man.
– Father Jacob Northrop
DAG AND BROTHER BARNABY WERE ON THEIR WAY to Bitter End Lane and were still several blocks away when they heard the first explosion and saw green fire light the sky.
“Demons!” Brother Barnaby gasped.
Dag shook his head and muttered, “Damn!” He had been planning to approach cautiously, holding back, not wanting to make his presence known until he first ascertained that Father Jacob was truly in danger.
No need for caution now. Dag broke into a run.
“Stay put, Brother!” he shouted behind him.
Brother Barnaby had no intention of staying anywhere. He paused only long enough to hike up the skirts of his long robes. Frantic with fear for Father Jacob and Sir Ander, he fumbled at the cloth. Suddenly other hands were helping him, deft fingers tucking folds of the hem securely into his belt.
Brother Barnaby looked into Gythe’s blue eyes. Startled, he seized hold of her.
“Child, you shouldn’t be here!” Brother Barnaby said in dismay.
Gythe’s fingers were cold. She was shivering with fear. She shook her head, however, and gave him a tremulous smile. Wrenching free of his grasp, she ran after Dag.
“Gythe, come back!” Barnaby shouted.
Dag heard the monk’s shout and glanced over his shoulder. Seeing Gythe running toward him, he scowled and motioned peremptorily that she was to keep out of the fight. Gythe stopped and stood in the middle of the street, staring in horror at the demons. Brother Barnaby caught up with her. Not knowing what else to do, he shoved her into a recessed doorway.
“You will be safe here,” Barnaby said, praying he was right. “Stay until we come for you.”
Gythe gave a shuddering nod and Barnaby left her to follow Dag into the smoke and fire.
Gythe remained crouched in the doorway where Brother Barnaby had told her to stay. She saw bright flashes of green light, but this time the magic didn’t hurt her, not like when the magic was hitting the protective spells she’d woven around her boat. She had trusted that she and Miri and the others were safe on the boat with the spells wrapped around them, like silkworms in a silken cocoon. But then the cocoon had caught fire.
She ran away from the fire, hoping to find the time she had been happy and unknowing. But the world was dark. She couldn’t find the path. And she could still feel the pain, no matter how far she ran. When the pain finally stopped, Gythe realized she didn’t know how to get back. She huddled in the darkness, alone and terrified, and then she heard a man’s voice, gentle and soothing, calling her name.
She was afraid to answer, but she hoped the man would find her, for he sounded warm and caring. She began to hum a little song to keep up her spirits, and the man heard the song and found her in her hiding place. A monk held out his hands to her, and she took his hands and he led her safely home.
But the monk had not been the only one to hear her song. Far, far, far away was a drumbeat, soft as a heartbeat, but not as steady. The beat was slow and erratic and frightening. And there were the voices far away as the drumbeat. The voices were not gentle. They were terrible voices: hurtful and cruel and filled with hatred.
The voices ebbed and flowed like the currents of the Breath. Here in the street the voices were suddenly strong, voices of fury and rage. Voices of killing. Blood and death and hatred.
Gythe began to hum a song, a little song. Whenever she sang in the park and played her harp, people stopped talking. They fell silent to listen. She hummed desperately, hoping the voices would fall silent and they would stop hurting her friends.
The voices didn’t grow silent, but they changed. They sounded bewildered. They called to her. Like the demon who had come on board the ship. The demon had been trying to find her.
Gythe hummed her little song to try to drown out the sound of gunshots. She put her fingers into her ears and closed her eyes, and the voices were again talking about pain and death and hatred.
Accusing voices. “You left us to die here below!”
“It wasn’t our fault!” Gythe wept, her silent voice answering all the others, those who were also silent. “We couldn’t hear you. We didn’t know…”
When Dag saw Father Jacob and Sir Ander lying in the street, he was certain they were dead. He could not see them clearly, with the smoke swirling about, but neither man was moving. Dag had made a swift assessment of the situation as he came up on it. Two demons were on the rooftop of a warehouse with what appeared to be a mounted swivel gun. They had not yet seen him. At the end of the lane, a man stood with his hands in the air. Two demons were in front of him, their weapons aimed at him. He was obviously pleading for his life. In a bold move, the man fired at one of the demons and threw whatever he’d been holding in his other hand at the second demon.
Dag did not know this man, but any enemy of the demons was a friend of Dag’s. He shouted for the man to duck. The stranger reacted with a speed which indicated he’d done this sort of thing before. He hit the pavement. Dag fired his musket and had the satisfaction of seeing half a demon’s head dissolve into a bloody mess. The man was on his feet before the smoke cleared. The man fired another pistol at someone who had apparently been hiding in the alley and then kept on going, leaving Dag and his friends to fend for themselves.
Dag shrugged. He supposed he couldn’t blame the gentleman. He looked up to see the demons training their swivel gun on him and made a backward scramble to take cover against the same warehouse the demons were using to mount their assault. Expecting grapeshot, Dag was startled to see the swivel gun shoot a ball of green fire. The flames struck the pavement right where he had been standing. The blast flattened Dag back against the wall. Smoke stung his eyes; chunks of cobblestones slammed into him. Fortunately, his steel breastplate protected him from the worst.
Dag swiftly and expertly reloaded the musket and looked up to see what the demons were doing. They had mounted the swivel gun on the roof directly above him. The demons could look down and see him, but they could not bring their weapon to bear on him. Dag had counted on this when he chose his cover. Seeing their heads poking over the edge, Dag fired the musket. The heads vanished.
Dag reloaded. So long as he stood in this place, directly beneath the swivel gun, the demons could not hit him. The moment he moved, the green fireballs would blow him apart. He was considering his options when suddenly he didn’t have any.
Brother Barnaby came running into Bitter End Lane, heading straight for Father Jacob. Dag looked up to see the gun’s muzzle swinging about, taking aim at the monk. Dag swore roundly and fired the musket at the demons. Not waiting to see if he’d done any damage, he slung the gun by its strap over his shoulder, lowered his head, and
