Merrick shook his head, terrified and hopeful. “I don’t know if that is even possible—we still don’t understand what she was.”
“But what if it is true?” Sorcha returned. “What if Nynnia is on the Otherside, and she wants us to stop Raed’s murder?”
Outside, the bells began to ring, summoning the Initiates to their classes. Merrick had very recently been among their number, and yet now he was preparing to go against all those years of training. Again. Still, he too was bound to Raed and knew him for a good man.
So, pushing off from the wall, he smiled at his partner. “Then let us do just that.”
The brightness of Sorcha’s smile could have melted winter ice.
Merrick held up his hand. “On one condition—we do not go haring off without preparing properly.”
Sorcha’s lips twitched, but she sketched a bow in front of him. “Whatever you say, my lord Chambers.”
That one gesture brought up long-forgotten memories, which he struggled to stuff down. With a cough he turned away. “Let’s adjourn to my cell and see if we can find out what that message of yours really meant.”
The dormitory was quiet at this time of day, with most Deacons being on duty, but a few retired to their cells to study or mediate with the talisears of trof their art. Sorcha had moved from a large cell shared with Deacon Petav to a smaller one next to Merrick’s. It was a significant sign that he knew had caused the birth of many rumors.
Despite being serious people dedicated to protecting the world, Deacons were just as prone to foibles as the rest of humanity, and gossip could be as rampant in the dormitory as at any boarding school. Though Merrick had gotten over his fear of his partner, he was not going to reach out to her in that intimate way. They already had enough complications in their lives.
His cell was just like every other one in the dormitory: whitewashed, narrow, containing a bed and a set of camphor wood drawers. A Deacon was only supposed to have enough possessions that could be carried in saddlebags—a throwback to their history of wandering the land serving the people. It was all very different from his childhood as a young aristocrat.
Merrick rolled the meditation rug out on the floor. It was a fine piece of tapestry with the Ten Runes of Dominion and the Seven Runes of Sight on it. It was woven by the lay Brothers with fine Frigyian wool and was the only splash of color to be found in the room. The runes themselves, unlike cantrips, held no particular power—only when carved on the Gauntlets or Strop by a Deacon were they given potency—but they did serve the purpose to concentrate a Deacon’s mind. In the days before the Break of the Otherside, the ancient days when the Order had been a religious one, it would have been called a prayer rug.
Sorcha knelt on it, her fingertips brushing the Runes of Dominion, while Merrick took up a mirror place next to those of Sight. He did not need to work hard to find the rune Sielu, the First. Activating this old friend did not require the Strop over his eyes.
“Think of the spectyr,” he said in a soft undertone. “Think of what it showed you.”
Sorcha sighed, sounding exasperated, as if she would rather be running to the stable for their horses. The Bond suggested that was exactly her immediate instincts.
“Sorcha,” Merrick snapped, closing his eyes, “concentrate!”
Sinking back on her heels, he was surprised when she didn’t reply. Against his eyes the images she had been fed by the spectyr danced. They were quick, like a flicker of cards in the hands of a master player.
Merrick invoked the rune: capturing the images, holding them, and then seamlessly playing them back through the Bond. Sorcha hissed over her teeth, and that was the only admission of admiration his partner would give.
Indeed, there was a lot of blood in the imagery—and a lot of it was flowing from Raed. The Rossin was also there—dying. It was a great red room, but the details were obscured. The flicker passed on, and he saw something that he immediately recognized. It was not anywhere that he had been, but as an avid student, Merrick had no trouble identifying the Hive City.
“ Orinthal.” It sat on his tongue like a foreign fruit, full of mystery and promise. His great-grandmother had come from there, bringing wealth to his great-grandfather’s meager estate—and adding a little dark coffee to their skin tone. He recalled the heavily wrought gold chain nestling against his mother’s collarbone as she told him bedtime stories that, to his childish imagination, had smelled of spices.
“Never heard of it.” Sorcha eased herself off the rug. “Damn it, I think my bones are getting older.”
Merrick refrained from making any jokes about his partnr’s not so really advanced years. She had a good ten on him but was still a handsome woman.
“The capital of Chioma. I will need to do some research, but I am sure that is what you saw.”
Sorcha leaned across to touch Merrick’s shoulder. “I know this sounds ridiculous . . . I admit we didn’t know Raed long, but—”
“I share the Bond with both of you,” he reminded her somewhat awkwardly. “I don’t want him to die either.”
“We’ll make sure that doesn’t happen,” Sorcha said, stretching her back.
“To Orinthal, then,” he replied, and despite everything, he felt his own excitement rise.
Up there on the dais everything probably looked very simple. Sorcha, standing below on the mosaic floor of the Chapter House, tilted her head skyward and tried not to feel intimidated. She also tried not to glance to her right and see Kolya. Much as she’d hoped that her soon to be former husband would not be present at this hearing, he had found out. It was easy to guess who had given the game away.
Arch Abbot Rictun, wrapped in his cloak that was both blue and emerald green, sat on his newly carved chair and smiled down at her. Two chairs on his left and two chairs on his right held the rest of the Presbyterial Council. The only one Sorcha did not know well was Thorine Bolzak, the new Presbyter of the Actives. She was young and had been chosen by Rictun from one of the outlying Abbeys. When Zathra Trelaine had been promoted to Presbyter Secondo, Bolzak had been brought in to take his place. She was remarkably quiet for an Active, but maybe that was merely the shock of such a sudden elevation to power. And now she was one of the five people who held Sorcha’s future in her hands.
Merrick had not been included in this hearing. Having just finished her defense of the decision to stay with the younger Deacon rather than return to Kolya, she was feeling confident. That was until she locked her gaze with Rictun. Multicolored light from the windows gleamed on his golden hair, but there was no reflection in his eyes. With an inclination of his head, he let his words fall on her like little sharp stones. “We have still to decide on this issue, Deacon Faris.”
Kolya shifted beside her. Once, his attention was the only thing she wanted, and she had dreamed of her husband fighting for her. However, he had let those times pass by, and now he couldn’t seem to understand that she no longer cared. Sorcha carefully tucked her hands under her blue cloak, behind her back, and squeezed them so tightly her knuckles cracked. She counted her breathing, one, two, before opening her mouth.
Melisande Troupe spoke before any words could escape Sorcha. The Presbyter of the Young brushed her white gold hair from her eyes and spoke in a gentle tone. “You must not think us unmoved by your plight, Deacon Faris and Deacon Petav.”
Yvril Mournling, the Presbyter of the Sensitives, fixed Sorcha with a hard gray gaze. “We are still looking for precedent for your . . . peculiar situation.” He gestured to the stack of leather-bound books piled by his chair. “The partnership between Active and Sensitive is sacred—even if you think of it a tad more lightly than we do.”
“Thank you, Your Grace,” Kolya broke in, his voice calm and dispassionate. “While our marriage vows may be broken with ease, the Bond we made within the Order should not be so lightly abandoned.”
“The Bond can be broken by death or madness—lack of love should b another reason.” Sorcha cleared her throat. “With respect, while you wait to test our case, neither of us can move on. Do you not think this a waste of our talents?”
Rictun snorted, but when Presbyter Secondo Zathra Trelaine spoke, he was abruptly silent. The old man’s voice was cracked like a piece of sun-dried leather, but it had the weight of authority and wisdom. “She does have a point. Deacon Faris is the most powerful Active we have—having her sit idle goes against good sense.”
Sorcha caught a breeze of a chance. She dipped her head so that the Arch Abbot would not see how much she needed this. “I would like to get out of Vermillion for a while, Presbyters. Just for a time, to let the dust settle and while you decide. Having Deacon Chambers, Petav, and me in the confines of Vermillion has become
