A Devil's Lullabye

On the eve of battle Morris lulls the duchy near to sleep.

The night before battle. I checked my son's room to assure myself that Drensen, my boy, and his friends would not be here when Count Aldredge brought siege to Westwood.

My family were safe, but nearly everyone else I had ever loved remained.

The glories of battle, the chance to throw off Aldredge at last—or at least to grind his face in the truth of Westwood power. Yes—all very exciting.

Once again I swallowed the urge to reverse my decision, to call forth Lumoc, my father's dread sword, from deep in the vault. But I counted well my father's warning, that an easy victory was rarely afforded either ease or victory.


Far better to kneel before an Aldredge than to open the vault and dredge up the horrors of hell myself. I wondered whether Aldredge also kept a secret arsenal of things too dreadful to use—or if he would rush to overplay his hand.

I went to watch the preparations. Freeman Merrick tying the armor of one of the still-younger soldiers into place.

Merrick moved with firm assuredness, tying knots that just the other day would have tricked and tangled his hands.

"I see you've listened. The urge to leap ahead is our greatest enemy."

Merrick looked up with confusion, and then a beatific calm. "We do what we can for those we leave behind."


That sounded like Vicar Morris' eulogy of my father, more than something the ever nervous young Merrick would say. "Don't pack your bags I'm not letting you move on today."

"Yes, your grace," Merrick answered, finishing the procedure with an almost supernatural calm.

The soldiers beside him seemed unusually serene as well.

Surely Morris had steadied their hands. Sure enough. I was surprised that he had such a reach, that he could touch every one of these without wearing out his spiritual powers, sure.

I turned the corner.

The Vicar walked gently away, just past the magically veiled drawing room.

"Morris!"

He turned, his gentle smile soothing me as it always did. "Your grace. Shall we confer?" He pointed to the door of the grand confessional—where no spy, magical or natural, could ever penetrate.

I joined him.

The room glowed with the light of the sun piped in by magic, over the shelves laden with sacred and arcane books. I took my place in the easy chair, and Morris sat in the other. "I have been spreading peace over your people."


I nodded. "The calm I saw in Merrick's hands, I didn't think I would see him move like that for another generation."

Morris poured me an herbal infusion from a steaming pot. The leafy, musty brew smelled divine. I sipped at it.

"I know you don't like being 'bewitched,'" Morris said, laying his palm on my knuckles, "but I really think that I can reduce your struggles."

I knew well the advantages of blessings. However I might resent the intrusion of Morris and his, did he ever claim to be with the gods? But he had brought me from the verge of death often enough to make me trust him. "Do you have any prayers for me now?"

He nodded, and touched me in the heart. "Know that you are loved and watched over."

I felt a cooling in my chest roll all over my body. My hands and teeth unclenched.

Everything about me felt settled, as if this had all been done long ago. The men in the grand confessional–Me, and Morris—seemed suddenly small, their lives however beautiful, had never been so important.

"I call upon the divine to prepare a place for you, one grander and more valid than ever." The vicar opened his eyes. "it is done. The way is prepared."

I had not felt so safe since the first moment I had picked up a sword for training. I knew that nothing I could do would change the fate of myself, or those around me, and that everything was truly in divine order. "Thank you, Morris."

I stood up. The armor I wore suddenly weighed far less, even if my arms were too heavy to lift. It seemed odd to me that this had been my father's private sanctum, and now I was begging audience with this man. But odder still was the idea that I cared anything for this world.

Vicar Morris gently guided me out of the latibule.

A soft spoken voice in my head said, "This is not the blessing for a hero on the verge of battle, but for a fallen foe." The easy path.

A dagger hid in the Vicar's sleeve.

I wandered helplessly about the halls of my castle, looking for someone. Raphael. Or one of his blasted 'Rats' that stole everything of moderate value left laying about.

"Your grace!"

The voice from the shadows had never been more condemning. "Raphael, thank the light."

"I think you've had enough 'light' for one lifetime." He pulled me to him and slapped my face.

It didn't even hurt as it should. I raised my hands to fend him off.

"Your grace would never let that land." He took a potion, then shook his head. A needle blade which Raphael punched through the cork in the bottle. He scratched my palm, writing in some vile language.

My hand burned, in needles and pins as the blood came into my whole body. My jaw clenched, and my lungs shuddered from an acrid smoke that made me cough.

Suddenly I felt myself lost in another world, the land of vengeance. The window to return to my life was closing about me and yet my arms throbbed to life.

I threw Raphael up against the wall.

The old devil smiled. "That's my duke."

I smiled. "You know I don't like being bewitched."

"Unless it's the Vicar?" Raphael smoothed the place on his jaw where I'd hit him. "Do tell me I'm not going to have to escape your dungeon after I put an end to the traitor."

"Hold your vicious blue blade just a moment, Raphael." I took a vile, angry breath. "Getting rid of Morris doesn't solve the damage he has already done. And do we know that this is baneful?"

"I wasn't sure until you let me slap you, to be honest." Raphael shrugged.

"I've seen him cast his healings on captured enemies. It never occurred to me that he rarely healed us."

"I always thought he was more my type of person than yours." Raphael shrugged. "It's a shame he has chosen Aldredge."

"But how can we know?"

"I'll search his room."

"Very well." The smoky scent of brimstone and rotten egg slowly coughed out of my lungs as I considered. "Meet me in a quarter sandfall at his door. And no forgeries."

The time it would take to empty a standard sandglass timer a quarter of the way.

***

I opened the door to the arsenal and brought my father's sword.

I felt the minty freshness enter me the moment I touched the handle. As the purple velvet crumbled to blackened dust, I felt a wave of cold stoke my internal fires. The dust blew away in the breeze as I resheathed the weapon.

Lumoc, also known as Dustmaker or Livestealer. I affixed the weapon to my belt.


Raphael waited at the door, with a simpering little servant boy pulling as Raphael gripped his wrists. The moment Raphael saw me, he released the boy.

As the boy scampered away, he hissed, "You'll regret this. The Vicar will be warned!"

"Even with the Vicar routed, we stand no chance as we are."

Raphael sneered. "Not letting Aldredge have our duchy."

"Why not? Your guild deals with him equally."


"I'm thinking of my daughter. She rather fancies young Drensen." The lock on the Vicar's room practically fell open the moment Raphael began to minister to it.

In the time of a leaf drop, Raphael returned with a letter.

"Vicar Morris,
Your efforts will not go unrewarded. Our rats are finding the secret entries as I write. We attack on the night of the full moon. Be sure to restrain the spirits of all of the good duke's men."
Yours truly,
Count Melwin Aldredge."

Just then Vicar Morris cried out, "How dare you?"

The serving boys behind him drew knives.

Vicar Morris sneered. "Boys? You employ the boys for this?"

Raphael matched his sneer. "They don't work for the Duke." He beckoned.

As the blades touched Morris' robes, smoke rose from the tips.

"I wouldn't test my flesh against that, were I you."

The Vicar walked forward. "If you strike me down, I shall be well."

"I wouldn't be so sure," Raphael growled, the blue fire inside his sleeve being the deadly magic dagger.

Meanwhile I unsheathed a few inches of Lumoc.

Vicar Morris blanched and stepped back.

One of the boys stabbed him in the butt.

He didn't flinch, eyes glued to the weapon at my waist. "You … if I'd known you still had Livestealer."

"The souls devoured by my blade don't make it to the white gates."

The Vicar licked his lips. Sweat beaded on his brow. "That's not entirely determined."

Raphael whispered, "I heard that they live on in the wielder."

My stomach lurched. I didn't need Morris' many crimes added to my own. The man disgusted me.

Raphael's dagger swirled around his wrist under his sleeve, excited, thirsty for Morris' blood. "We have more important things to do than parley with this traitor."

"I have to mount a defense. I have a lot of work to do, and this isn't doing anything to stop Aldredge."

Morris cleared his throat. "I can still send a message."

"How would you do that?"


"Magic mirror. I can tell him that you stopped me too soon."

"And why would you do that?"

"Because your dungeons are … the men I ministered there, not bad off."

Raphael waved his finger. "If you betray us—if we cede the castle for any reason—nobody will find you and feed you."

"How can you do that?"

"I don't tell you all our secret chambers."

A fire went out in the Vicar. "I'll send you a new priest."