he going to be okay?'
'The Elder? I don't know, honestly. Who is it?'
'Simeon. He was out there… talking. Trying to do what he thought was the right thing.' I looked Owen briefly in the eye, then tugged free of his grasp and started toward the door. 'Anyway. We've got some ground to cover.'
'There more bodies you need to lead me to, Paladin?'
'Not yet. But there will be.' That got him to follow me.
The ride over was quiet, quiet as it can be in a patrol wagon with blaring sirens. The Chanter's island home wasn't too far, but it was a lot farther than I was going to walk. On the way I gathered what strength I could. Meditated. Thought about Simeon and Elias, put down by Betrayers' blades. Barnabas. Wherever he was. I thought about those strange tattooed men, and the cold, dead eyes of the coldmen as they came at us in the Amonites' cistern.
'What happened?' Owen asked, sternly. 'What are you driving us into, Eva? What am I going to lose my boys to this time?'
I opened my eyes and looked down the length of the wagon. Owen's patrol was strapped in, trying hard to keep their eyes forward, the fear off their faces. Trying, and failing. Some new faces, to replace the boys we lost in the cistern. Owen sat next to me, his hands crossed over the biggest, widest shotgun I had ever seen. Boy had upgraded. Not so much of the Healer in him now, perhaps. That was good.
'Who attacked the Elder, Eva? Must have been a hell of a thing, to take down one of your old men.'
'I don't know. Seems to be more and more common all the time. As to who they were… I'm not sure. I don't know, and I'm praying like hell that you don't know them either.'
'What's that supposed to mean?'
'One of them was dressed as a High Elector of your Cult. Guy's name was Nathaniel. He was in charge of security at the Strength, around the time that Elias got killed.' I gave Owen a sharp look.
'You're saying a scion of Alexander attacked you? That's… it's not true. It can't be.'
'No, not saying that. I'm saying it looked like that. But him and his dogs, they were Betrayer kin. They bore the icons, and they had the invokations. Amon's folk, and no doubt about that.'
The wagon got tense. Owen leaned close to me, his voice a harsh whisper.
'Eva, if what you're saying is true-'
'Forget it. Forget I said anything. If it's true we're going to have to root the whole damn Cult out again, I know it. We thought we had them nice and safe in their black robes with their chain-bound souls. Lazy. That's our mistake, Healer. We got lazy.'
Everyone settled back into their seats and listened to the sirens for a while. I didn't have to tell them what we might be going into. We all knew the stories of the Betrayer. We knew this was the kind of fight that ended with one side all dead and the other with plenty to mourn.
* * *
The Chanters sect of the Cult of Alexander has its own island. It's the kind of thing you really hope for, when you're setting up a mysterious religious order. Your own island. This particular island was really just a floating tower, much more of it below the water than above, bobbing peacefully in the wide bay that was formed by the two horns of the city of Ash. It looked like an iceberg of stone, held in place by a flat ring of landing platforms and docks that met the face of the water.
We took a ferry over, cranking up the wagon and bursting along the dock with our sirens blaring as soon as we touched the artificial shore. The Wardens of the Chanter's Isle didn't know what to make of that, other than to give us funny looks and stay out of our way. Good enough for me.
The main gate of the Chanters' detention facility was a facade of unbroken marble, smooth as the first snow. The wagon chattered to a stop where the gate was supposed to be and the patrol piled out, Owen in the lead. Beside the gate there was a marble figure, the barest features of a face on a square column. I walked up to it and tapped it on the forehead. Disrespectful, but I never was much of a fan of the Chanters and their pretty little tower.
'Hello, inside. We'd like to come in now. Okay?'
The column shivered and the face moved. You could taste the understated irritation.
'Entrance to this facility is limited to the highest initiates of the Cult of Alexander, godking of all Ash. All others must request special privileges. These requests may be filed-'
'Eva Forge here. Last Paladin of the dead god Morgan.' I bounced my sword lightly against the figure's face. 'Open up.'
'Entrance to this facility-'
'For the love of the Brothers,' I swore, then bent at the knee and incanted something from my childhood. A trick we only used when the brothers weren't looking. Mostly strength, but a lot of brute violence, too. I put my shoulder against the pillar, grunted, and pushed. The whole thing creaked and then splintered at the base. I was still smiling to myself when the pillar tore free and went spinning against the smooth marble wall.
'What the hell was that?' Owen asked.
'Morgan used to knock trees over with his shoulder, when he was a kid,' I answered. 'He wasn't always a god. But he was one hell of a strong kid.'
'And you have an invokation for that?'
'Not something they teach you in the sanctuary, but we figure it out.' I stretched my back and smiled. 'You can only use it for frivolous things. For giggles. You probably don't have anything like that in the Healers.'
'Nothing about knocking trees over, no.' He squinted up at the quiet wall of the Chanters' tower. 'And I'm not sure your trick got us anywhere with our potential hosts.'
'Well, yeah. Probably not. But it needed doing. It's not like that conversation was getting us anywhere either.'
'New plan. You're not the one doing the talking from here on out.'
And, of course, that's when the marble gate cracked open and the Chanters came out to see who had knocked over their pet statue. I turned to Owen and smiled.
'Newer plan. We skip the talking part next time.'
'Gods and Brothers above,' he said, sighing. 'Why do you encourage her?'
'Who did this thing?' the lead Chanter asked. She was wearing a dress of iron plates, sewn onto cloth of steel and rattling like loose shingles as she moved. There was a mask over the lower half of her face, a series of baffles that stole the power from her voice and diffused it into the air like wind chimes. The soft glory of her words did not match the fury in her eyes.
'If you'd been listening,' I said, raising my sword to repeat the ritual of forehead knocking, 'I am Eva Forge, last Paladin of-'
'Right, right.' Owen stepped in. 'I am Justicar Owen LaFey, sworn scion of our lord Alexander. I am escorting this Morganite to an appointment with the Amonite, Cassandra. You are holding her here at our will.'
'Cassandra,' the woman answered. 'Yes. She is in ritual right now. You may speak to her when it is complete.'
'We'll speak to her now,' I said. 'I have reason to believe that there are Betrayers among you, working to kill the girl.'
'Betrayers? In the House of the Chanter? No, such a thing is impossible.'
'Look, I'm pretty much going to insist on seeing the girl, and standing guard over her.' I rested the tip of my sword on their nice lawn, threw my arm over the hilt, and smiled. 'So you can get over that and just let me in now. Please.'
The Chanter glared at me, then at Owen, then at the rest of the world.
'You will see the girl,' she said, sharply. 'But that is all. The ritual is not to be interrupted.'
'It's a good start, but I need to do more than see her. I need to know that she's safe.'
The Chanter held a hand up to me, as much a warning as a benediction. 'Silence, woman. Walk with me.'
We walked. The marble gate closed behind us. Owen's patrol kept close to him, right up until one of the
