The Vampire & Her Witch

”We’re just humble frontier lords. What can we possibly do against the might of the Inquisition and the will of our Marquis?”

Ashlynn smiled slightly and tipped the brim of her cavalier hat in Loghlan’s direction as he delivered her the perfectly articulated position she needed to destroy in order to take control of the Lothian Court.

For a moment, her eyes flicked over the faces of the men and women sitting at the High Table, taking in their expressions and reading the set of their jaws, the rhythm of their breathing, and the motion of their eyes, the way Marcel and Nyri had taught her to.

Most were on edge. Too many of the women at the table were holding themselves back in fear. Some of that fear, Ashlynn could forgive. She’d lived most of her life in fear of the Inquisition. It was the furtive glances a few of the women gave their husbands, however, that poured fuel on the fire burning in her heart.

”What can you do?” Ashlynn asked rhetorically. ”You can start by drawing a sharp line between corrupt men and the faith they profess to serve,” Ashlynn said, rounding on Recared. ”Then, you burn it all down,” she added, clenching her hands into fists as she resisted the urge to unleash her fury directly, to show these people that there was a power in this world that refused to be bound by the Church’s rules.

She couldn’t. Not yet, and she knew that, but holding herself back took tremendous effort, and the strain grew greater by the moment. She needed a moment to pull herself back and to refocus before she lost control, and as she looked out over the Great Hall, she found a voice that she hoped could give her that time... One who had given her sister the shelter that Jocelynn desperately needed until Ashlynn could arrive to rescue her.

”High Priest Aubin,” Ashlynn called, looking at the white-haired priest whom she had last seen on the day of her wedding to Owain Lothian. ”Tell me, do Abbot Recared’s actions, and the actions of men like Percivus, represent the teachings of the Church? Is this how the Holy Lord of Light calls on his faithful to meet their struggle?”

All eyes in the Great Hall immediately shifted to the High Priest in his gleaming white and golden robes. The fact that he’d accepted the High Inquisitor’s offer to sit at the table the Blackwell retinue had seized from the Inquisition already said a great deal about where Aubin stood on matters, but now, he’d been called to opine directly on the issue, and the entire hall seemed to hold its breath in anticipation of his answer.

”I am not an Inquisitor,” Aubin said slowly as he stood to address the hall. ”I am a Guide. We all have our roles to play in the grand design of the Holy Lord of Light, and the struggle given to the Inquisition is among the hardest any who serve Him may face. There is little danger in what I do. Even Confessors, like the blessed Lady Eleanor, put themselves in more danger to help the broken and the lost than men like me will ever face.”

”Everyone faces choices that will define their life,” the High Priest continued, turning his answer into a small sermon intended for everyone in the hall tonight. ”Do I stand up for what is right, or submit to what is easy? Do I explore the unknown and dangerous or remain in the place I understand where I am safe?”

”These are the choices that form the shape of our path across the heavens and determine whether or not we will reach the Heavenly Shores at the end of this life,” Aubin said.

”The Inquisition faces different choices,” the High Priest continued as he looked at the captive members of the Inquisition, who huddled under the watchful eyes of the Blackwell knights and Templars. ”Can I be cruel in the service of a greater good? Should I break one innocent man if it lets me save one hundred, or one thousand?”

”Abbot Recared believes that all that he has done is in the service of the light,” Aubin said, pursing his lips so tightly that they vanished underneath his bushy mustache and long beard. ”In his heart, I’m certain he holds a set of scales that balance the wickedness he allows his men against the good they achieve.”

”But just because the Abbot believes that the scales are balanced, does not make it so,” Aubin continued. His voice nearly broke on the last five words, and he clutched at his chest as though he were in physical pain as he forced himself to say the words he should have said long ago.

”The Holy Lord of Light calls on all of us to struggle toward the Light,” Aubin said. ”He challenges us to chart a path through the stars that may be difficult and filled with hardship, but He reminds us of the virtues we hold dear, and when we get lost, He sets the stars in the sky to guide us back to the Light.”

”Recared, my child,” Aubin said. ”I wish that you had come to me for guidance long ago. I waited, but you never came. Even when, even when Percivus snuffed out a bright light like Lady Eleanor, still, you never came.”

”Lady Ashlynn,” Aubin said, standing up as straight and tall as he could at his advanced age. ”The Holy Lord of Light fills the sky with stars to guide us, but when a man believes that he has become the sun itself, he cannot see their light. He is lost, consumed by his own flames, and he has led his people astray...”

”Thank you, High Priest, Aubin,” Ashlynn said, bowing her head at the white-haired priest before turning briefly toward Baron Loghlan Dunn. ”You see, Lord Loghlan? This isn’t a matter of defying the faith of the people, or the Holy Lord of Light. This is about consequences for a man so lost in his own self-righteousness that he would sacrifice half the people of the march if it brought him power, glory, and the chance to achieve his ambitions,” she said.

”When a leader is so lost, and so drunk on his own power that he believes he can do as he pleases, murdering, plundering, and manipulating the people he was supposed to protect,” Ashlynn said. ”When the rot he spreads has consumed everyone and everything around him, there’s only one thing we can do to save ourselves from being consumed by it.”

”Burn it to the ground,” Ashlynn said in a voice that resounded off the walls. ”Every tainted, twisted notebook filled with lies, every dungeon cell soaked in blood, every monument to obedience and fear... And every man who filled the pages of those notebooks with blood and pain and loss...”

”Burn it all down, until nothing remains but stones, bones, and ash...”