Book Six. Æsir and Vanir

1

Outside the roundhouse Nat Parson stood up on legs that felt like wet string. Audun Briggs had almost passed out-whether from fear or from too much ale he could not say-but Jed the smith was sober enough and grasped the implications of what he had just seen with commendable agility.

“Did you see her?” demanded Nat. “Did you see the girl?”

Jed nodded.

Nat felt some of his agitation recede. He was aware that Maddy had been in his thoughts rather often in the past few days and had secretly feared that his obsession might have clouded his mind. Now he felt vindicated. The girl was a demon, and there could be nothing but praise for the man who brought her to justice.

That he himself should be that man was never in doubt. With the Examiner dead, Nat Parson unilaterally proclaimed himself in charge and appointed Jed Smith (for want of anyone else) his second in command. Besides, thought Nat, Jed had every reason to want an end to the bad blood that shamed his family, and when the reinforcements from World’s End finally arrived, he would want to make it clear that his loyalties had been with Law and Order from the very beginning.

He turned to Jed, who had moved back toward the roundhouse building and was watching the fallen Huntress through the open door. Jed had never been a perceptive man, being blessed with more muscle than most but somewhat less brain, and it was clear from his expression that events had left him at a loss. Examiner dead, lawman injured, and here they were, outside a building wherein lay a demon who might awake at any time.

Jed’s eyes found his crossbow, which had fallen to the ground during his flight. “Shall I go in and finish her?”

“No,” said the parson. His head was spinning. Ambitions that had once seemed as distant as the stars now lay almost within reach. He thought fast and saw his chance. He would have to be quick. And it would be dangerous, aye-though the rewards could be great. “Leave me here. Get clothes for the demon woman. You’ll find some in my house-borrow one of Ethelberta’s gowns. Take Briggs home and sober him up. Don’t speak of this to anyone. Either of you. Understood?”

“Aye, Parson. But will you be safe?”

“Of course I will,” said the parson impatiently. “Now off you go, fellow, and leave me to my business.”

Skadi awoke and found herself in darkness. The roundhouse door was shut, the Æsir were gone, she was mysteriously clothed, and she had a headache. Only the runes she carried had prevented it from being worse-her attacker had taken her entirely unawares.

She snarled a curse and raised her glam, and in the sudden flare of light she saw the parson sitting there, looking pale but quite calm and watching her through the spyhole of the rune Bjarkán.

In a second she had reached for her glam, but even as it took shape in her hand, the parson spoke. “Lady,” he said. “Don’t be alarmed.”

For a second Skadi was astonished at the fellow’s presumption. To imagine that she feared him-him! She gave a crack of laughter like splitting ice.

But she was also curious. The man seemed so singularly unafraid. She wondered what he had seen and whether he could identify the person who had knocked her down. Most of all she wondered why he had not killed her when he’d had the chance.

“Did you put this on me?” She indicated the gown she was wearing, a blue velvet with a bodice of stitched silver. It was one of Ethelberta’s best, and although Skadi despised a lady’s finery, preferring the skins of a wild wolf or the feathers of a hunting hawk, she was aware that someone, for some reason, had attempted to please her.

“I did, lady,” said Nat as the Huntress slowly lowered her runewhip. “Of course, you have every reason to be suspicious of me, but I assure you, I mean you no harm at all. Quite the reverse, in fact.”

Using the truesight, the Huntress looked at him once more with curiosity and contempt. Surprisingly his signature-which was a strangely mottled silver-brown-showed no attempt to deceive or betray. He genuinely believed what he was telling her, and although she now saw him to be wildly excited beneath his appearance of calm, she perceived astonishingly little fear.

“I can help you, lady,” he said. “In fact, I think we can help each other.” And he held out his hand, wherein lay a key, its teeth still red with its master’s blood.

Now, the parson had always been an ambitious man. The son of a potter of modest means, he had decided at an early age that he had no wish to follow in his father’s footsteps and had become a parson’s prentice at a fortunate time, taking over from his erstwhile master just as the old man was growing too feeble for the task.

He’d married well-to Ethelberta Goodchild, the eldest daughter of a rich valley horse-breeder. To be sure, she was nine years older than Nat, and there were some who considered her a trifle muffin-faced, but she came with a handsome settlement and excellent connections, and her father, Owen Goodchild, had once had high hopes of promotion for his new son-in-law.

But years passed, and promotion never came. Nat was already thirty-one years old, Ethelberta was childless, and he told himself that unless he took matters into his own hands, the chance of achieving something more than a simple parish in the mountains seemed distant indeed.

It was at this point that Nat began to consider the Order as a possible career. Knowing little about it except that it was for the spiritual elite, he set out on a pilgrimage to World’s End-officially to replenish his faith, in reality to discover how he might access the secrets of the Order without having to devote too much of his time to study, abstinence, or prayer.

What he found in World’s End filled Nat with excitement. He saw the great cathedral of St. Sepulchre, with its glass spire and brass dome, its slender columns, its painted windows. He saw the Law Courts, where the Order dispensed justice, and the Penitents’ Gate, where heretics were led to the gallows (though sadly the Cleansings themselves were not open to the public, for fear the canticles might be overheard). And he frequented the places where the Examiners went: he walked in their gardens, ate in their refectories, drank in their coffeehouses, and spent hours watching them in the streets, black gowns flapping, discussing some element of theory, some manuscript they had studied, waiting for his moment to discover the Word.

But of the Word itself he received no sign. The elderly Professor to whom he finally voiced his ambition told him that a prentice must study for a full twelve years before reaching the level of Junior in the Order, and that even at Examiner level it was by no means certain that a member would ever be granted the golden key.

His hopes dashed, Nat had returned to his parish in the mountains. But the image of the key had never left his mind. It became an obsession, the symbol of all that life had denied him. And when Maddy Smith had refused to break the charm upon the golden lock…

Nat looked at the key in his hand and smiled-and Skadi wondered briefly how such a fatuous smile could also appear so wolfish.

“You? Help me?” She began to laugh, an unsettling sound.

The parson watched her patiently. “We can help each other,” he said again. “The Seer-folk have something both of us want. You want revenge against those who attacked you. I want the Smith girl brought to justice. Each of us has something the other needs. Why not cooperate?”