He definitely hadn’t seen me, then.
I was starting to wonder how long we were going to be stuck in this doorway together when I felt the revenant stir, feebly clawing at me for attention.
“Nun,” it hissed. “Watch out. Relics…”
A hush had fallen over the street. In the newfound quiet came the chiming of bells and the haunting rise and fall of voices harmonizing in a sacred chant. Gooseflesh pricked my arms. I pressed my back against the stones as a slow-moving procession of white-robed priestesses came into view, their veiled faces downcast, gently swinging silver censers. Pearl rings gleamed on their fingers. As incense fogged the street behind them, the shades lurking in the shadows mingled with the smoke and dispersed.
They had to be orphreys, priestesses who devoted their lives to purification. Their undine relics allowed them to submerge themselves in sacred pools for hours on end to prepare for cleansing rituals like the one they were currently performing.
And they weren’t alone. At the end of the procession, six knights carried a litter. The parted curtains showed glimpses of a woman within, resplendently robed in silk and brocade. A miter rested atop her head, heavily embroidered with gold. Onlookers touched their foreheads in reverence as she approached.
It was the Divine. To my eyes she appeared no older than she had in Naimes four years ago, though her age was difficult to tell for certain. With her hair pinned up beneath her miter and her delicate features caked with white maquillage, she looked more like a painted wooden doll than a person. Her many relics completed the effect—rings on every finger, an amber pendant at her breast, and a jeweled scepter across her lap, encrusted with diamonds.
My gut clenched as the litter drew level with the archway. The smoke that curled from the censers burned my throat and stung my eyes. If the Divine happened to be using any of her relics, I doubted that the revenant would be able to hide itself in its current condition. But as I waited, holding my breath, her white face didn’t turn. She was speaking to someone on the other side of the litter, their identity concealed by its frame. Whoever it was, it was clearly someone she admired. Gone was the air of loneliness that had haunted her in Naimes. Her wide eyes looked eager, even devoted. Tension bled from my body as the litter moved past, until its changing angle revealed the figure walking alongside.
Leander.
His gaze was fixed on the Divine. If he moved his eyes even a fraction, he would see me standing in the doorway beside Charles. I knew I shouldn’t stare, in case doing so alerted him to my presence, but I couldn’t look away.
He looked unwell. One of his hands was resting on the side of the litter as though conscientiously helping guide it forward, but there was a subtle strain in his pale hand and rigid posture that suggested he was instead using it for support as he walked.
Now that he was no longer traveling, he wore his full confessor’s vestments. I could see why he hadn’t donned them on the road. The elaborate silver stole draped over his robes would have gotten dirty in the countryside, the matching cincture likewise. The robes themselves were identical save for a silver oculus embroidered at his throat just below his collar, bright against the black fabric, framed by the stole on either side—whose pattern, I realized, depicted interlocking chains.
I wondered how many people he had hurt yesterday to have strained himself so badly. How many more he would hurt pursuing me, if he found out I was still alive. Though he had to be in pain, his expression was as calm and remote as a carved saint gazing piously down from a vault, untouched by the suffering below. His holy-seeming composure made him appear more the Divine’s equal than her subordinate.
The litter passed around a bend, vanishing out of sight behind a group of stalls. I loosed a breath as the eerie chanting faded, replaced by the voices of the vendors hawking their wares.
But I felt the revenant’s attention following the procession long after the traffic resumed and Charles led me back out onto the street. It remained strangely alert as we wound through the noise and stink of the city beyond, my eyes fixed on the cobbles.
“I need to tell you something,” it said finally, “but you have to promise not to react.”
I glanced at Charles, then dipped my chin in a nod.
“I’ve figured out where the smell of Old Magic is coming from in this city. Nun, it’s been right in front of us all along. It’s coming from the priest.”
ELEVEN
I haven’t smelled Old Magic this powerful since the Sorrow,” the revenant continued, sounding almost excited by the development. “He positively reeks of it. He must have resumed practicing it upon his return to the city. He didn’t smell of it on the road.”
So much for not reacting. I almost tripped over a cobblestone. I waited until a cart rattled past to speak, watching Charles out of the corner of my eye. “Why didn’t you notice yesterday after the battle? I thought you said you were paying attention.”
“Through your senses. I wasn’t using my own. But I assume he smelled of it then, too. It’s the same scent that I detected from beyond the walls, and on every spirit we’ve fought since Naimes.”
I forced myself not to glance over my shoulder, a useless reaction; Leander had long ago passed from sight. “How is he doing it?” I managed. “Why?”
“Don’t ask me. If I could read humans’ minds, I wouldn’t have ended up trapped inside a little girl’s finger bone. You’re the one with the meat brain. Why don’t you take a guess?”
“But—”
“We’ll have to speak later, nun. We’ve nearly reached the convent.”
I opened my mouth to ask how it knew, but frustratingly, it had already gone. I looked up to discover that we had entered an older, quieter section of the city, the buildings constructed uniformly of the same plain gray stone and the cobblestones worn nearly smooth underfoot. The daylight hadn’t dimmed, but I felt as though a shadow had fallen over the street. A chill hung in the air that hadn’t been there before.
I wondered if this was how Loraille had felt before the Sorrow. There must have been rumors, whispers. A sourceless darkness. A nameless fear.
Charles led me around a corner, and the convent’s moss-speckled walls came into view. They looked like they had once stood outside the city, only to be later absorbed by Bonsaint’s sprawl. The lichgate stood open, its gateway wide enough for two corpse-wagons to pass abreast, and refugees were being helped inside: some walking unaided, others limping with an arm draped over a companion’s shoulders. One lay swathed in blankets, carried on a makeshift litter—their single exposed arm appeared dead, purple from shoulder to fingertip with blight. Sobs and moans of pain filled the air.
As we approached the gate, a sound drew me from my thoughts. A hostile whispering was emanating from inside the convent, like a group of sisters feverishly reciting litanies under their breath. Though it grew louder and louder the nearer we drew, no one else seemed aware of it. I glanced at Charles, but he only gave me an encouraging smile, oblivious.
Beyond the entrance, I saw nothing out of the ordinary—nothing that might explain the mysterious whispering. The hair stood up on my arms. I wondered if I was losing my mind.
The lichgate’s tarnished iron throbbed strangely in my vision. The air thickened, growing difficult to breathe. As its shadow fell over me, individual voices resolved from the confusion of sound, some calm, others angry, leaping out as though hissed directly into my ears.