"NIGHT WAS A good two hours off when it happened," Gabriel said. "I was riding north through ruined farmlands, soaked with grey drizzle. The first bitter bite of winter was in the wind, and the land about me had a haunted air. Dead trees were hung with ropes of pale fungus, the road naught but miles of empty black slurry. The villages I passed through were ghost towns—buildings empty and cemeteries full. I hadn't seen a living person in days. It'd been more than a decade since I traveled through the realm of Emperor Alexandre, Third of His Name. And all seemed worse than when I'd abandoned it."
"How long ago was this, exactly?" Jean-François asked.
"Three years back. I was thirty-two years old."
"Where had you been?"
"South." Gabriel shrugged. "Down in Sūdhaem."
"And why did you leave your beloved Nordlund?"
"Patience, coldblood."
The vampire pursed his lips, but made no reply.
"I wore my old greatcoat to keep off the rain. Faded bloodstains. Black leather. Tricorn pulled low, collar laced high, like my old master taught me. It'd been years since I'd put that kit on, but it still fit like a glove. My sword hung in a beaten scabbard at my waist, my head bowed against the weather as we rode through the miserable so-called day.
"Justice hated the rain. Always had. But he rode hard as he always did, on into the cold and empty quiet. A beauty he was: black and brave and solid as a castle wall. For a gelding, that horse had more balls than most stallions I'd ever met."
Jean-François glanced upward. "You still had the same horse?"
Gabriel nodded. "He was a little creakier than he used to be. Just as I was. But it was as Abbot Khalid had told me—Justice was my truest friend. He'd saved my life more times than I could count by then. We'd ridden all the way through hell together, and he'd brought me all the way home. I loved him like a brother."
"And you kept the name that foulmouthed sisternovice gave him? Astrid Rennier?"
"Oui."
"Why? Was the girl of some significance to you?"
Gabriel turned his eyes to the lantern, the flame dancing in his pupils.
"Patience, coldblood."
Quiet hung in the cell, the only sound the whisper of nib on parchment. It was a long while before the silversaint continued.
"I'd been riding months without much rest. I'd planned to be over the Volta before wintersdeep struck, but the roads were harder going than I expected, and the map I carried well out of date. The locals had ripped down the tollway at Hafti and destroyed the bridge over the Keff, for starters. There were no ferrymen plying trade that I could find, no living soul for fucking miles. So, I'd been forced to double back and head upstream."
"Why?" Jean-François asked.
Gabriel blinked. "Why did I double back?"
"Why did the locals destroy the bridge over the river Keff?"
"As I said, this was just three years ago. It'd been twenty-four years since daysdeath. The lords of the Blood had turned the realm into a slaughterhouse by then. Nordlund was a wasteland. Save for a few coastal duns, the Ossway had fallen. The Forever King's armies were drawing ever closer to Augustin, and masterless wretched crawled northern Sūdhaem like lice on a dockside jezebel. The locals had smashed the bridge to cut off their advance."
The vampire tapped his quill, brow creased. "I told you, de León. Speak as if to a child. For what reason did the locals tear down the bridge?"
The silversaint stared hard, his jaw clenched. Then he spoke, not only as if to a child, but as if to one who'd been dropped repeatedly and enthusiastically on the head by its mother.
"Vampires can't cross running water. Except at bridges, or buried in cold earth. The most powerful among them might manage it with a supreme act of will. But to the newborn Dead, a fast-flowing river may as well be a wall of flame."
"Merci. Please, continue."
"You sure? No other fuckmumblery to which you already know the answer?"
The vampire smiled. "Patience, Chevalier."
Gabriel breathed deep and marched on. "So. I hadn't smoked since morning, and my thirst was quietly creeping up on me. I knew I'd not make it much farther that day. But consulting my old map, I saw that the town of Dhahaeth lay not an hour's ride north. Presuming the place was still standing, the promise of a fire and something hot in my belly was enough to keep the shakes at bay. So, hoping to make up lost time, I cut off road, through a rolling carpet of whitecaps and into a forest of living fungus and long-dead trees.
"I was barely ten minutes into the woods before the first wretched found me.
"A woman. Perhaps thirty when she was murdered. She was silent as ghosts, but Justice caught wind of her, ears pressed against his skull. A second later I saw her, moving like a hunter, right at me. Her hair was a wild blonde tangle, and she came at me wolf-quick, thin and naked, skin hanging in damp folds around a gaping wound at her neck.
"She was running quick. Far quicker than a mortal man. I'd no fear of a single wretched, but these bastards are like minstrels—where there's one, there's always others, and the more that find you, the more aggravating they get. So I gave Justice a nudge and we were running, off through the shipwrecked trees.
"I loosened my sword in its sheath as I saw another wretched off to my right. A little Sūdhaemi boy, dashing through the tall spires of tubers and toadstools. I spied another ahead, then. And another. All quiet as corpses. All running swift. None of them moved quick as Justice, mind you. But I could tell they were a pack. Each at least a decade old."
Jean-François raised one eyebrow, tapped his quill. "As if to a child, de León."
Gabriel sighed.
"Newborn wretched are dangerous, don't mistake me. But on a scale of one to ten, with one being your average Ossway pub brawl, and ten being the most fearsome nightmare hell's belly can spit, they rate about a four. Not even the eldest among them is a match for a highblood. But older wretched can't be underestimated. Your kind grow more powerful the longer your blood has to thicken. These ones were dangerous, and they were many. But Justice charged on through the deadwood, weaving through the mushroom thickets at full gallop. His hooves were thunder and his heart was dauntless, and we soon left those bloodless bastards in our wake.
"We burst from the woods a while later, damp with sweat, out into the rain. A chill grey valley lay below us, thick with fog. A little way northeast, I could see a dark ribbon of road in the gloom. A few miles beyond lay the river ford, and safety.
"I patted Justice as he galloped down into the valley, murmured into his ear.
"'My brother. My best boy.'
"And then his hoof found the rabbit hole. His foreleg sank into the earth, the joint snapped with an awful craaack, his screams filling my ears as we fell. I smashed into the ground, felt something break, gasping with agony as I rolled to rest against a rotten stump. My sword had slipped from its scabbard and was lying in the muck. My skull was ringing, fire raging down my arm. I knew in a heartbeat I'd snapped it—that familiar broken-glass grind under my skin. Not so bad it wouldn't be healed by morning. But the same couldn't be said for poor Justice."
Gabriel sighed, long and deep.
"I rose up from my boy's wreck, hands and chin blacked with mud. Looking at the shank of bone torn through his fetlock as he tried to rise, brave to the last.
"'Oh no,' I breathed. 'No, no.'
"Justice screamed again, wild with agony. I turned my face to the heavens above, a familiar rage swelling in my chest. I looked down at my friend, my arm bleeding, throat tightening, heart breaking. He'd been with me since that first day in San Michon. Through blood and war, fire and fury. Seventeen years. He was all I had left. And now … this?
"'God fucking hates me,' I whispered.
"And why think ye that might be, m-might be?
"The voice came as it always did. Silver-soft ripples inside my head. I ignored it best I could, watching as my brother tried to stand on his broken leg. His fetlock bent wrong, and down he went again, big brown eyes rolling in his skull. His agony was my agony.
"Know ye what must be d-done, Gabriel, came the silvered voice again.
"I looked to the longblade at my feet, naked and spattered with mud. The double-handed haft was bound in black leather, its silvered hilt crafted like a beautiful woman, her arms spread to form the crossguard. The blade was curved and elegant, shaped in an archaic Talhostic style, but still possessed of a deadly grace. Forged from the dark belly of a fallen star in an age whose name was legend. But it was broken. Lifetimes ago, it seemed now.
"Six inches snapped from the tip.
"'Shut up,' I told it.
"They shall smmmell him. Tear him to p-pieces, aye, sticky red, red sticky, as he screams and screams and screeeeams. This be sugarsweet mercy.
"'Why do you always tell me what I already know?'
"Why do ye always n-n-need me to?
"I looked my horse in his eyes, the pain of my broken arm forgotten. Of all those I'd called friend over the years, Justice was the only one who remained. And through his pain and fear, in the darkest of all his hours, he looked to me. His Gabriel. The one who'd met him as a boy in the stables at San Michon, who'd ridden him from that place into exile when not a single one of his so-called brothers had come to say farewell. He trusted me. Despite his hurt, he knew I'd somehow make it all right.
"And I put my sword right through his heart.
"It wasn't the swiftest end I could've gifted him. I had a shot loaded in my wheellock. But nightfall was only two hours away, and the town of Dhahaeth was at least four on foot. The wretched were apparently thick as flies on shite around these parts now, and a man unhorsed is just a meal uneaten.
"Always better to be a bastard than a fool.
"But still, I sat with Justice as he died. His head sinking heavy into my lap as he bled his last out into the mud. The sky was dark with shadow, my tears hot in the freezing rain. My broken longblade was stabbed into the muck, bright with my friend's blood. I stared up to the heavens above, the God I knew was watching.
"'Fuck you,' I told him.
"G-Gabriel, the blade whispered in my head.
"'And fuck you too,' I hissed.
"Gabriel, she repeated, more urgent.
"'What?' I glared at the sword, my voice choked. 'Can you not give me one breath to mourn him, you unholy bitch?'
"The blade spoke again, chilling my blood.
"Gabriel, th-they are coming."