The boy watched the distant flames that consumed the small township. By rights, he should feel sorrow, this place was his new home, far from the north. Instead, all he felt was a rising disgust. From here, he could see King Caradoc's Knight, towering like a fearsome demigod.
King Caradoc truly looked noble at this moment, but the boy knew he was only here because of cowardice. He refused to leave his realm out of paranoia, a belief his neighbors would swoop in and snatch up his supply of ammunition and grain. He had allowed many of his bannermen to leave, of course, so as to have some chance of winning the High Kingship.
It was all so slimy, the boy thought. Certainly, Caradoc would be claiming it had all gone for the best. He had been here to slaughter whatever enemy had hit his village.
The rumors spoke of a new High King, barely a grown man. That was what had set off these events, celebrations and bloodshed in equal measure.
He fumbled with the oversized aquila round his neck. His robes were tailored for an older person, and he was small and skinny for his thirteen years. He wasn't a priest, really, he was just…
"Gildas!" The elder priest was tall and sour looking, skinny from degradations he insisted on performing, almost to the point of illness and physical injury.
Gildas knew things about Father Dylan that the geezer had kept hidden. He knew about the man's ties to the Redemptionists, his growing fanatic obsession with daemons both real and imagined, the addiction to substances that could be driving him to madness. "Yes, Father?" he asked with a bow.
"Get my instruments together," the man sneered, "the King will want an explanation, and we will give it to him."
You knew your friends would die, Gildas thought, you knew they would get slaughtered eventually, but you decided that their use had ended. The instruments, the Imperial Tarot mainly, would serve no purpose, they would say whatever means Dylan wanted, push King Caradoc in the direction he desired. It wouldn't work, not entirely. King Caradoc wasn't a very faithful man, and not stupid. He knew full well no one had any connection to the God-Emperor, not now.
Dylan's instruments were heavy, and Gildas sagged under their weight. One of the reasons he had been so unceremoniously kicked out from his father's house had been his sickly body and lack of endurance. He was sweating and gasping before they were halfway down the stairs.
"Hurry it up, boy," Dylan snapped, "you'll make me look like a fool!"
Gildas bit back his retort, stumbling on the stairs and barely managing to not fall and die.
Dylan reached the bottom of the stairs, and glared at the boy as he made it down. He reached out, and gripping Gildas' arm in a tight grip, continued to rush along. "Drop anything, and I'll give you a flogging," the priest snarled.
The bastard almost made him drop them, but Gildas was used to such abuse and kept his balance, clinging tight to the instruments of faith as he was tugged through into the courtyard.
When King Caradoc rode to battle, his people would stand near the front gate, watching and waiting. His lovely wife, Queen Ysave, stood towards the front, in front of the gate. She was younger than the King by a decade and half, and Gildas liked her. She was certainly more pious than her husband, but was more importantly kinder and more aware of suffering happening within her household. Often she slipped him extra food, during times when Dylan insisted on harsh starvation.
A series of cracking shots made everyone jump, and the veteran armsman Poul scowled, making his harsh leathery face look all the more threatening. "Laslocks, by the Throne! Where in the Otherworld did they get laslocks?"
Ysave, heavily pregnant, rubbed her belly. "Laslocks can't harm a knight?" she sounded worried, scared. For all that King Caradoc was older than her, and a rough provincial noble, she loved him dearly.
"Of course, Lady," answered Poul. "It would take a damn sight more than a laslock to so much as scratch the chassis of a shining knight!"
"Don't be so prideful, Poul," Dylan sniffed, "the knight's chassis is only strong in the physical sense. The only way the King will be fully safe is through prayer to the most blessed God-Emperor!"
Ysave blanched. "Oh dear," she quailed.
Poul glared at Dylan. The two older men loathed each other, and Gildas was certain it would come to violence eventually. "I know war, priest, so leave that to me. You know how to leech off the faithful, so I'll leave that to you."
"The Emperor protects the Righteous," sneered the priest.
"You say King Caradoc isn't righteous?" Poul boomed. He didn't reach for his sword. His fists clenched. Gildas had once seen Poul punch a drunkard who'd made foolish advances on the Queen so hard he'd almost died.
"Nothing of the sort," Dylan lied, "though let us check the tarot…"
"Your damned tarot," muttered Poul.
Many of the more superstitious members of the court drew closer, though Ysave was conspicuously not one of them. She rubbed at her belly again, and moved closer to Poul and his armsmen.
Gildas was in the center, but not really the center of attention. They were all only interested in the holy instruments he carried. It made him ill, they all on some level knew that even if the Emperor still existed, this planet was outside his reach. The tarot wouldn't reflect his will, it would either reflect Dylan's or something far more malign.
Still, he opened the case, setting it on its legs. There was an old bottle of holy water that Dylan claimed to have been taken from water in which Saint Celestine had once bathed. Dylan's tarot was also ancient, scrounged from some ruin or taken from the corpse of a wealthier priest. There was an oversized fingerbone that belonged either to a Blood Angels warrior or an Ogryn, and several other relics beside.
For now, only the holy water and the tarot was necessary. With skilled hands, Gildas unstopped the bottle, revealing the fresh scent of herbs and flowers. He anointed the tarot cards, a drop on each, then shuffled.
He was barely finished when Dylan snatched them out of his hands, and began dealing them so swiftly they were placed crooked.
Dylan began to rave about the meaning of the cards, most of which, Gildas knew, was entirely the incorrect conclusion from how they were placed. He tuned it out, so was surprised when a firm but gentle hand set itself on his shoulder.
Poul's pugilist face looked down at him, the man's light purple eyes gentle. "The Queen wishes to talk to you."
Gildas was led over to the young woman, as the preacher's voice grew in mad fervor. Of course, in the divination, King Caradoc came out righteous, as this was Caradoc's court, and it wouldn't do to insult the man in front of his retainers.
The young Queen smiled at the boy gently. "He is a fraud as ever, isn't he?" her voice was perfectly modulated to only carry to him.
Gildas nodded, a little shyly. It felt strange agreeing to that, while the fraud in question had his nose firmly up King Caradoc, Ysave's husband,'s ass.
"He is most convincing, sometimes," she said diplomatically. "Of course, my husband wouldn't fall to a bunch of foolish zealots, no matter how well they are armed."
"Don't mother the boy," Poul said gruffly, "give it to him directly." Poul's clan was said to have off-world origins, and they were prone to harshness.
"Does your master have anything to do with their arms?" She gave Poul a rueful look.
"No," Gidlas said truthfully, "Father Dylan and myself are poor men, we wouldn't have the resources to provide a militia of zealots with black-powder weapons, much less laslocks."
"But does he still have some connection," she said. It wasn't a question, she already knew the answer
He nodded. "He has met with some leaders. Of several different sects."
Poul scowled darkly. "Damn. No discipline anymore. We need a Pontifex or some central authority." He looked over to Queen Ysave. "Lady. Say the word and I'll kill him."
"No," she hissed, "that should be left to the King." It was probably as much preservation as anything. Ysave was new to the region, and wasn't sure what would cause an incident.
Poul grinned. "Well, you know, I could make it look like an accident. He's an old fellow, I could shove him down some stairs or something."
She looked decidedly uncomfortable at that. "As I've said, I will speak to my husband when he returns."
Poul nodded. He was, perhaps, not as loyal to Ysave as he should have been. She wasn't his warleader, and was still new. She understood this clearly. So she deferred to the more familiar King Caradoc.
The preacher was on to more complicated subjects now, about the return of the God-Emperor, how of course King Caradoc would stand at the right hand of the victorious Imperium Returned. He began to really overdo it now, rambling something about holy saints emerging from the Otherworld.
At this point, Gildas could tell the court was rapidly growing bored and annoyed with the man. Dylan simply didn't know when to shut up, to quit when he was ahead. It had gotten him in trouble before, and now it might get him to lose his head.
Several of the court began to disperse, heading toward the hall. Ysave touched Gildas' shoulder. "Come Gildas, it is time for breakfast."
"It's a fasting week," Gildas said flatly.
The Queen scowled. "I don't care." And led him gently away.
**************
Gildas was eating porridge, recalling that in fact it wasn't a fast week by any religious measure, when there was a loud cheer from outside.
"The King has returned victorious," Poul said immediately. He shook his head. "As if there was any doubt."
Ysave smiled at the armsman, rising awkwardly to her feet to greet her husband. Two of her ladies-in-waiting moved to help her, aware keenly of her pregnancy.
The door swung open. King Caradoc entered the hall. He was a short man, with a thick red beard and hair that went wild around the implants that let him link with his mount. He was growing thick around the middle as he neared his forties.
Beside him was the largest man Gildas had ever seen. He towered over the King, dressed in the thick leather belt and bright blue tattoos of a local hillman. A sword was belted at his hip and swung across his back was a massive longbow. A bloody bandage was wrapped tightly around his arm.
There was another man, a young knight in arms with a finely waxed mustache and a shield marked with the emblem of the Lady. Gildas flinched. Dylan would take umbrage with that, for all his borderline heretic insanities he was stridently against the local curiosity.
But it was the last three, behind the knights and the hillman but ahead of the servants, that were the most striking. A hulking abhuman wolfman, heavily armed and carrying a large bag over his shoulder, and two young women.
One was an ordinary young lady, wearing a simple dress and looking around the room with frightened eyes, but the other caused people to gasp in confusion.
She was tall, taller even than the tattooed warrior and thin as a willow branch. Her hair and skin was pale and her eyes cold. A headband was wrapped tightly around her forehead. Like the other woman, Gildas saw a hint of fear, of checking every corner in her eye, and he wondered if she was a prisoner. Perhaps they were hostages, held by these strange men for some reason.
King Caradoc embraced his wife with surprising gentleness, kissing her on the cheek and stroking her belly. Arm around her, he turned to the court, grinning broadly. "Twenty five of the fanatics lie dead in the field!" He reached down, lifting a heavy tanker filled with mead. "The village will be rebuilt, the survivors given aid and succor, the Redemptionists will have no safe haven in my land."
Before this, of course, the Redemptionists were hardly welcome, but also kept to the woods in their mad little communes. Many woods, Gildas knew, were as impenetrable as any fortress, and nearly as durable.
"Greetings to the worthy visitors, Sir Pelleas, Sword of the Lady, Herne the Huntsman, and Manw the Champion of the Wolves." Caradoc grinned toothily. "Their attendants, and their ladies."
Neither woman reacted to Caradoc's words, noted Gildas. He had an immediate suspicion that they didn't speak avallic. He watched them both with even more curiosity.
The knight, huntsman, and wolf sat near the King himself, their attendants scattered about the hall. The two women sat near Gildas, to his slight interest.
One of the women looked up, and seeing Poul seemed startled. "Cadian!" she gasped.
Poul looked curiously at her. He was fluent enough in gothic, though a little halting. "The 9th Cadian," he says slowly, "are my ancestors." He shrugged. "When you've been here so long, you are as local as off-worlder, even if it remains important."
The woman pointed at herself, and quickly said, "Trooper Brandaine. Anguish Heaven Dancers."
Poul shrugged. "That means nothing to me. I'm not Militarum. None of my kin have been Militarum for centuries. The head of my family probably has some relics stashed away, but I've never seen them myself."
She blushed, bowing her head. "Still. Good to see something familiar here."
"You two don't speak avallic?" Gildas cut in, leaning over his porridge. "Where are you from?"
"The Imperium," the strange tall woman said softly. She looked at Gildas flatly. "We came here by accident."
Gildas grinned. "I could help. I tutored younger acolytes sometimes."
"You are what, ten?" the Militarum lady asked.
"Thirteen," Gildas answered, "small for my age, that's all." He grinned, nodding towards King Caradoc, who was regaling the visitors with no doubt exaggerated stories of his exploits. "He'll have them here for a week at least. Has someone tried to teach you the basics already?"
Poul burst into laughter, before taking a massive mouthful of porridge. "You do have some energy then, Gildas lad? Perhaps teaching is your calling."
Before Gildas could reply, Father Dylan barged into the hall, wild-eyed from his divinations, breathing heavily. Perhaps he had been so involved he had failed to notice his audience leaving. He lifted a finger, quivering, at the tall woman. "Tuatha!" he shrieked. "Tuatha daemon!" He turned on Caradoc. "You must burn her, now! The wolf as well!"
Caradoc surged to his feet. His face was red, his infamous temper flaring up. "You dare order me?" he roared. "You barge into my hall, and command me, you miserable freak? When I pulled you and your boy out of the woods, you were fleeing from what little authority remains in the church on this planet, and you have the gall to command me like a pontifex? The woman is no Tuatha, you dunce, she is a sanctioned mutant, as is the abhuman." He gestured at the woman's ears. "Tuatha have ears like birch leaves, and hers are normal."
Dylan opened his mouth, "Yo-"
Caradoc started to move down the hall, almost knocking over several plates, beginning to draw his sword. "Not a word," he snarled, "not another word out of your heretic mouth!"
It seemed for a moment Father Dylan would push his luck, and Gildas almost hoped he would. The priest grew pale, then turned red as his robes, then swung about and sat sullenly at an empty seat.
"What happened?" stammered the guardswoman.
Poul grinned. "The King stood up for your friend there, best be pleased for that."
"Is that wise?" the sanctioned mutant asked. She seemed to be quite aware of what just occurred. "Threatening a priest with violence seems dangerous."
Caradoc returned to his seat, his wife lying a comforting hand on his shoulder.
Shrugging, Gildas said, "There is little wisdom in priests these days. So I don't see anything wrong in calling one out when he is being quite obstinate." He grinned. "You just don't know him yet, that's all."
Both of them gave him a somewhat aggrieved look. "If you are sure," murmured the pale woman.
"What kind of sanctioned mutant are you at any rate?" Gildas asked. "And your name, of course," he added quickly, hoping he didn't seem too rude.
"Navigator, and my name is Diane."
Gildas noticed, out of the corner of his eye, that Poul dropped his spoon in surprise. He wondered what that was about. No doubt the old armsman knew something, perhaps even drew together some threads. It annoyed Gildas a little, to not know something. Still, he smiled at the women. "I'm Gildas. Just an acolyte, that's all."
