Painted Devils, page 6
For a moment, the words rattle around the rite hall. Then every flame in the room goes out, plunging us into darkness. That familiar jangling whisper sweeps the room as Kirkling and Helga both jump.
“You called, my prophet?”
Red mist rolls across the floor, weaving into the too-sharp, too-bright vision of the Scarlet Maiden. This time she’s suspended above the granite altar, her eyes glittering like broken glass.
A wire-thin smile flexes over her face. “And you’ve brought my servant. To what end?”
“Well, I’ll be damned,” Helga breathes.
Emeric is fixed in place, almost frozen, until I brush his knuckles with my thumb. Then he takes a deep breath and pulls out the prefect coin, lighting it once more. “We have questions about the, er, sacred feast, your divinity.”
“Among other things.” Kirkling rolls her charcoal stick between thin fingers. “How is it, precisely, you aren’t bound by the same rules that govern every Low God regarding their prefects?”
The Scarlet Maiden tilts her head. “Prefect? What is a prefect to me?”
“‘Claims … ignorance,’” Kirkling mutters into her notes, “‘of basic knowledge.’”
“By the Accord of Prefectorial and Godly Alliance,” Emeric says diplomatically, “a prefect is sworn to investigate crimes of extraordinary magnitude and harm, to gather the facts of the case to the fullest possible extent, and, if necessary, to call the Godly Court to present their findings. We are bound to the rules of conduct as established by the accords, and in exchange, we are granted limited use of the Low Gods’ powers.”
“I recall no accords.”
Emeric purses his lips. “How long would you say you’ve been asleep?”
“Too long. The world is strange now to me.” The Scarlet Maiden’s mists coil tighter. “Your questions do not concern the sacred feast.”
Emeric adjusts his spectacles. “I do apologize; this is an unusual situation and we’re just trying to learn as much as we can. Do you know why you went dormant?”
“Have a minstrel sing you the song,” the Scarlet Maiden says tersely. The mist twines into tendrils, almost like vines.
“I’m afraid I’m not familiar—”
The Scarlet Maiden’s nostrils flare. Fast as a whipcrack, a needle-sharp red spine thrusts from the altar and spears Emeric through the throat.
There’s a scream that I do not know as my own until much, much later.
Emeric’s eyes, whites and all, burn with crimson light. So does the handprint on his chest, blazing even through the shirt. Somehow, he’s still on his feet.
“Do not waste my time further, servant,” snarls the Scarlet Maiden. “I have brought great fortune to this town, but do not mistake my generosity for patience. Ask of the ritual, or leave me be.”
The vine dissolves into curling mist, and the blood-red light vanishes from Emeric’s eyes. He lurches, but I’m already there to steady him, my own knuckles creaking from my grip.
There’s not a mark on him beyond the handprint, no trace of broken skin on his throat. He’s—he’s breathing. He’s alive.
I still can’t make myself let go.
Emeric’s jaw stiffens. Then, to my astonishment, he gently extracts his hand from mine and pulls out his own notebook and charcoal, his face a steely sort of unperturbed. “Could you please elaborate on this sacred feast?”
“Do you maybe … want to take a moment?” I nearly wheeze.
“I would like,” he says, in the pleasantly stiff way of someone vexed beyond reason, “for the Scarlet Maiden to tell me about the sacred feast.”
The Scarlet Maiden sighs. “Perhaps this age does not remember, but once I made the river run silver with fish and the fields all but sink beneath the abundance of crops. Such was my blessing … but the beast of the Kronenkessel devoured the fish and drank my power from the soil.”
“‘… blessing … abundance…’ Right.” Emeric nods, jotting even faster than Kirkling. “And how does that involve me?”
“In the days of old, well before midsummer, I chose one yet unclaimed among the people of the gorge and bestowed the honor of my mark, the same you bear now. It is their duty to either vanquish the hellhound or sate its hunger another year.”
Emeric’s charcoal stick goes still as he looks at her over his spectacles. “To vanquish…? Vanquish. A hellhound? Did I hear that correctly?”
“It has starved for too long,” the Scarlet Maiden continues. “I fear if it is neither fed nor defeated—”
“Definitely fed,” Emeric says under his breath.
“—it will soon turn its wrath upon Hagendorn. I am not strong enough now to restrain the beast, but I, too, take strength from the sacred feast, as a sacrifice in my honor. So, live or die, my chosen servant will serve us all. But we must have a feast by midsummer, or it may be too late.”
There’s a knot in my belly growing heavier by the second. I’d strongly considered resolving this situation by hitting Emeric over the head with a rock and smuggling us out of Hagendorn before he woke up. That gets less … ethically viable if a hellhound will raze the town in our wake.
This feels too close to the December morning in Minkja, standing on the gallows, the noose a scratching torc resting on my collarbones, the hangman’s hand at the ready.
I had a way out. I’ll find one again.
“Why does it have to be Emeric?” I blurt out.
At that, the Scarlet Maiden tilts her head, and another serpentine smile bares its fangs. “Because I chose him, Prophet. That is enough. Besides, it is always one unclaimed. Would it not be cruel to send someone claimed by another?”
There it is again. Claimed and unclaimed. Maybe it’s a loophole. “What does that mean?” I push. “What kind of claim?”
I really, truly, should have left it alone.
The Scarlet Maiden titters as she lifts a hand to her face, scattering phantasmal rubies from the wound in her palm. “Why, the claim of a lover, of course; the one made by man and wife in a marriage bed. My servant must have never known such a claim.”
It clicks.
The scratching of both charcoal sticks crashes to a halt, and a wretched, excruciating silence blasts through the rite hall. No one so much as moves a muscle; I feel all the blood drain from my face, only to come rushing back at once in a boiling flood.
Emeric snaps his notebook shut, saying faintly, “I have to go.”
Then he turns on a heel and strides out of the room.
I start after him. “Emeric—”
A hand closes around my wrist. “Trust me, he doesn’t want to talk to you right now,” Helga hisses. “Give him some space.”
She’s right. I yank free anyway, scowling.
“Teenagers,” she mutters.
“Do you have any further questions?” the Scarlet Maiden prods, a bit testily.
I open my mouth to thank her for ruining both my love life and my everyday life, but Helga speaks first. “Actually, yes. Midsummer is two and a half months away, and”—she eyeballs me—“circumstances may change. What if your servant is, uh, claimed before then?”
The Scarlet Maiden’s mists begin sharpening to thorns once more.
“Then I would require,” she says slowly, “a greater sacrifice.”
To my surprise, she reaches out and snaps a long, slender thorn from the mist. The color begins to bleed out, seeping into the air like dye.
“You must not only answer for the insult of denying me my servant, but also grant me the strength to hold the beast of the Kronenkessel in check.”
She slashes the pale thorn along a sleeve. A perfectly square section of fabric slices free and flutters onto the granite altar, also leaching red until there’s nothing left but undyed cambric. The thorn is laid beside it, now so pale it looks to be an awl carved from bone.
“The blood of seven brothers will suffice.” The Scarlet Maiden’s words slither and ring around the stones. “Use my awl to collect a drop from each upon this cambric, and render this sacrifice unto me by midsummer. Then I will have no need for the servant, and Hagendorn will be spared my wrath and that of the beast.” The mist begins to contract and fade. “I have overexerted myself. I will rest now. Do not disturb me again before the feast.”
“Hold on,” Kirkling starts, raising her charcoal. “What kind of power—”
“Farewell, Prophet. Watch over my servant.”
As abruptly as she arrived, the Scarlet Maiden vanishes.
Another brutal silence frosts over the rite hall. I try to gather my thoughts, but that would require thoughts for me to gather in the first place; right now we’re back to goat screams. I make myself take a long breath.
The awl. The hellhound. The god I made up. Maybe a way out.
I did this. I did this. I did this.
I have to fix it. Somehow.
I point at the altar, where the cambric and the awl lie in wait. “Nobody touch those. I’m going to find Emeric. He … needs to know his options.”
“The proctor and I can take a closer look,” Helga states more than suggests. “And, er.” She coughs. “I am a trained midwife. If you have any questions—”
“None,” I snap. “No questions, thank you, goodbye.” I start marching out, then stop to add, “Don’t come after us. I’ll bring him back here.”
Kirkling’s and Helga’s voices fade behind me as I make my way out of Felsengruft. There’s no sign of Emeric, but that’s not too surprising. If I were in his shoes, I’d want to put plenty of distance between myself and, well, the rest of the world.
It isn’t hard to guess where he went when I see it: the rune-covered hut a little ways from the rope bridge, the one meant to shelter people caught out after dark in lands overgrown with old magic. Private, but close enough that he’d hear the rest of us coming. Sure enough, when I push on the heavy door, it cracks open to show Emeric leaning against a sturdy dust-draped table, spectacles pushed up into his hair, hands plastered over his eyes.
The door judders to a noisy halt before I can slip in, though, sticking on a rut in the dirt floor. Emeric jolts to his feet and hurries over. “Oh—hold on, here—”
“No, I’ve got it—”
With a tortured squawk, the door grinds free and swings wider, Emeric still clutching the handle and standing in the doorway. There’s a pause.
“Can … can I come in?” I ask, tentative.
He ducks his head and steps aside. “Right. Yes. Of course.”
It’s cooler inside the little hut, not the mortal chill of Felsengruft but the relief of shade and stillness. A few small windows let in just enough sunlight to navigate by. There’s a crude fireplace with a well-stocked pile of logs, a short stack of carved plates, an ancient pot, a chair beside the table, and a heap of blankets and furs that could suffice for a bed.
I’m not sure I want to think about beds right now.
No, this is silly. Just hours ago we were sharing a bed. But that was before we had to dissect exactly what might happen there.
The crackle in the air says we both know where this conversation is going. I still try a sideways approach. “How are you doing?”
Emeric wavers, then leans against the table’s edge once again. “I mean…” He shakes his head. “It is what it is. What about you?”
I sit on the table next to him. “Fine enough,” I say carefully, “except the human measuring stick I’m inexplicably fond of is dodging my question.”
He gives me a sidelong glance, bitterness seeping into his attempt at a smile. “You really are worried. I know you can do better than ‘human measuring stick.’” It’s my turn to give him a pointed look, and he sighs, then turns his gaze away again. “How am I doing? Well, the god that’s marked me for death just announced to a relative stranger, the proctor of my career-deciding trial, and the girl I’m trying to court that I’m a—that I haven’t ever—” He throws up his hands. “And that apparently qualifies me to fight a hellhound to the death. My death, because between me and what we saw at the waterfall, my money is on the hellhound.”
I brush his sleeve. “There may be another option. Helga asked what would happen if—if you were … disqualified.” My face is burning, and my only consolation is the flush I see rising up his neck too. “The Scarlet Maiden said we can make it up to her by bringing her a drop of blood from each of seven brothers instead, by midsummer. That would be the sacrifice.” I frown. “She said she wouldn’t even need a servant that way, so nobody would have to…”
“Claim me,” he says with a hoarse, humorless laugh, but his hands are knotting viciously in his lap.
There are moments when, as divergent as our lives are, I still see something in him so familiar, it might be cut from my own heart. I know this unease in him because it took root in me years ago, and I may never burn it out. It’s defiance and humiliation in one: I haven’t bedded anyone yet because I haven’t desired it, and for much of the world, that means there must be something wrong with me. That the older I get, the more it becomes something to get over with instead of something to want for myself.
That the reason can’t be because I rarely desire people that way; it must be that I’m undesirable.
I slip off the table and stand in front of Emeric, lay a hand on his face, wait until he meets my eyes. Half sitting as he is, we’re nearly the same height.
“I knew I was your first kiss, and you knew you were mine,” I tell him quietly. “And we’re both smart enough to have figured out the implications. So yes, you’re a virgin. Yes, so am I. And yes, this is miserable and awkward because we have to talk about it instead of just”—I flap my free hand—“letting things happen.” Then I realize I’ve neglected one very critical point. “I’m assuming you want, er, things … with me.”
“Yes,” Emeric says, so swiftly I almost jump. Even he looks startled, his ears turning red. “I mean, at some point, yes, I—” His voice cracks. “I’ve … given it some thought.”
“Oh,” I say, cleverly. Even though that’s the answer I was hoping for, hearing him say it still sends a giddy shock through my veins.
His mouth twists. “The thing is … Do you remember in Castle Reigenbach, when you said your first kiss would have mattered to you, but you could have faked it to save us?”
“Because I was used to all the choices being bad,” I finish, nodding.
Emeric wraps his hand around mine and reaches for my other one, so our linked hands are strung between us like a bridge. “Vanja, I never want you to have to make that kind of choice for me. You deserve so much more than the least terrible of your choices. Especially with something like this.” He swallows. “That is … if you want, er, things yourself.”
“I do want,” I blurt out, and suddenly understand how Emeric could answer with such immediate certainty before. I want him, pure and simple, in a way I haven’t wanted anyone else. It’s somewhere between hunger and curiosity and something else entirely, and it wakes in me even when he’s not here, like a memory written in my bones.
But …
“But?” Emeric does not miss my hesitation.
And that nervous unease climbs back up my throat. I shift in place, trying to pick my words like a surgeon chooses instruments, only to become increasingly aware of how long it’s taking me to answer. I panic and instead flip the metaphorical tray.
“It hasn’t even been a day,” I say in a rush, “since we’ve been together again. And I want this, I want you, I just … I don’t know if I’m…” It’s my turn to duck my head. This is the part that matters most, but it’s funny how those parts are always hardest to say. “Have you ever wanted something, and you knew you wanted it, but you were still … scared of getting it?”
Emeric lets out a breath. A moment later, the air warms on my cheeks as he rests his forehead on mine.
The relief in his voice is almost palpable when he says, “I know exactly what you mean.”
“Really?” I ask, a little stunned.
“Really. I don’t think I’m, well, ready either. You said it yourself, this is all moving so fast—”
“So fast!”
He draws back to search my face. “And I don’t want you to feel rushed or like I don’t want—things—but this time yesterday, I thought I might never see you again. Now I’m just trying not to lose you.”
“We don’t have to figure it all out now,” I say.
“Just … by midsummer.”
I shake my head. “If we go straight for the blood sacrifice—oh, that doesn’t sound good, does it?”
“It’s not great,” he says dryly.
“Then we don’t have to worry about any timeline at all. Unless we want to be, er, cautious. Or … if it happens on its own.”
He huffs another laugh, still bitter, but at least with a hint of humor this time. “We can barely get in a single kiss without being interrupted by bad omens and blood sacrifices. How are we supposed to, to do more?”
“I don’t know,” I admit. It’s hard not to be overwhelmed with all that’s been uprooted in the storm since I walked into the barn last night. If Emeric weren’t here, I might have let myself be swept away entirely.
But he’s still with me. Even after the Scarlet Maiden, even with Kirkling hounding us for any opening—despite everything, he’s been with me. Just like in Minkja.
“Here’s what I do know,” I say softly, summoning his own words from a winter night months ago. “As long as we’re in this, we’re in it together.”
Recognition sparks in his eyes, and the smile that follows breaks my heart in a way I never want to end. “Then ‘drag this out as long as possible’ is what you’re telling me.”
“Something like that.” I return his smile, then sober. “So, how’s this for a plan: We go along with the blood-of-seven-brothers thing to get you out of the sacrifice entirely. And in the meantime, it won’t hurt if we, uh, disqualify you, but … only at our own pace. Is that better?”
“Yes—” His voice cracks, and he shakes his head. “Yes. When we’re both ready.” Then he frees a hand to lay on my face, thumb tracing my cheekbone, expression softening. “I’m so lucky it’s you.”
