Percival sought the Grail, and he had hoped to find it in Kiev.
“We have protected many things over the march of years,” Vera replied. “But the Holy Grail is not amongst them.”
Percival gave a respectful nod, though he could not hide the look of disappointment that flashed briefly across his face. “But you do protect something.”
Vera said nothing.
“We will help you regardless of whether you divulge your secrets,” Percival said quietly. “Know that.”
A look of consternation—or was it well-hidden exasperation?—flashed over Vera’s face. She had said moments ago that this was a good place to speak of secrets. Clearly—to Raphael, at least—she had been urging Percival to divulge his secret. But he had taken it the other way and leapt to the assumption that Vera had something to reveal.
She considered his words in silence, the only sound the faint hissing of the melting tallow in the rushlight that illuminated her face. She looked next at each of them and finally relented. “I will tell you the closest thing we have to a holy secret in this place. According to legend, the grave of Saint Ilya guards the Egg of Koschei the Deathless.”
Percival did not try to hide his interest. “Tell us more of this sacred egg.”
Roger, unable to contain himself, turned his back on them, stalked to the nearest wall, and pressed his forehead against the cool stone.
“It is not sacred,” Vera said. “Rather the opposite—it contains the soul of the evil spirit Koschei, and whoever has it in his possession has Koschei in his power.”
“Is it perhaps contained in a sacred relic—something shaped like a goblet or chalice?”
Vera was now looking at Percival very oddly indeed and seemed unwilling to speak plainly for once.
Roger turned to face the center of the chamber and stepped slowly toward Percival. “My brother!” he exclaimed. “How can you not understand her words? It is not here. We have come all this way to hear a fairy story about a hobgoblin who keeps his soul in a fucking egg! Whatever purpose led you to steer our path toward Kiev had some other end in mind—some end that is going ignored and untended to while we stand in this sewer prating about Koschei the Deathless.”
Another man might have been offended. But no anger was on Percival’s face as he locked eyes with Roger. Long was the silence that followed.
It stretched out even longer as first Vera, then Roger, then Percival, and finally Raphael began to glance toward the chamber’s exit, distracted by approaching sounds that could not possibly have been made by rats. At first these were human voices, echoing distantly along the intestine twists and bends of the cavern’s walls. But as they listened, they began to hear too the metallic clank and jingle of steel—steel worn on the body as armor and steel carried in the hand.
“We are not alone down here,” Raphael said.
CHAPTER 33:
AND THEN THERE WAS LIGHT…
The monastery gate was as weak as Finn surmised, the timbers splintering after three strong kicks from Finn’s boot. Using his spear as a wedge, he ripped and tore the rotted wood away until there was a large enough hole to pass through. After ducking and looking, he went first, leaping nimbly through the gap. Cnán followed, more readily and eagerly than she had anticipated, and Yasper came close on her heels.
Seeing the slaughtering grounds up close, Cnán was repelled at the number of bodies strewn about the ground. Blood, caked and dried to a black tar, was smeared everywhere, and in some places, it still had a sheen of dampness. Black clouds of flies hovered over carcasses, and some of the bodies wriggled with a false skin of maggots. The noise of the flies was a drone in the air.
Had she been by herself, she would not have been able to compose herself in time to address the approach of the two Livonians guards. However, Finn and Yasper were not as incapacitated, and as the two Livonians charged, the Shield-Brethren were ready.
The first Livonian never reached them. Finn’s thrown spear struck him forcefully in the throat, lifting him off his feet. He collapsed, squirming and clutching at the shaft of wood protruding from his neck, his bright blood spattering on the ground.
The second, sensing the sudden disappearance of his comrade, hesitated, and Yasper flung out his left hand. The Livonian cried out, ducking his head as something flew into his eyes. He never saw Yasper’s quick sword thrust.
Finn went to retrieve his spear, twisting it slightly to finish his man. “Come,” he said. “Let us not tarry to meet the monks who haunt this place.” He led them toward the well house.
It seemed almost too easy, and Cnán eyed the monastery buildings with some suspicion as they ran toward the tiny shack. She couldn’t help but wonder about the residents. Were there more? Where were they hiding? And were they allies of the Livonians or were they like the rest of the locals—frightened and eager to please?
Finn yanked open the door of the well house and ducked inside. Yasper waited at the door, panting slightly. “Awfully quiet,” he said as she reached the well house. The glee he had exhibited earlier was gone, and his face was a mask of shadowed grooves.
In spite of the tense silence in the courtyard, Cnán was gladdened by the Dutchman’s concern.
“It’s very dark,” Finn announced, appearing in the narrow doorway of the well house. “And there is no well.”
“Ah yes, in that case, the Virgin has blessed us and our inquiry,” Yasper smiled.
Someone screamed, and even though they had heard this voice—this cry—before, they flinched. They were much closer to the throat from which it originated, and the howl was such a blend of human and beast that they could not tell from which type of throat it issued. It had to come from a man, Cnán found herself hoping as she caught sight of the black-robed apparition who had emerged from one of the buildings. To believe otherwise would be to believe in monsters.
The scream was a signal, for out of the other buildings poured a host of ragged men. They were more than filthy, their threadbare robes encrusted with shit and blood. Hair and beard were tangled and matted into one another, and their mouths were dark holes. Arms and legs, streaked with raw wounds that looked as if the skin had been flayed off by a ragged whip, poked out of the robes like broken sticks. They carried all manner of implement: knives, sticks, scythes, cudgels, awls, anything that could cut, smash, or tear an enemy’s flesh.
“Defilers,” the screamer shouted in heavily accented Latin, his voice like the wail of a dozen frightened children. “They must not interfere with God’s holy warriors.” He raised a long stave; mounted on its end was the horned skull of a ram, doused in some black, slick substance that dripped ichor onto the ground.
“Well,” Yasper noted dryly, “I guess that settles—”
From within the building, another monk emerged, a lit torch clutched in his bony hands. He lifted the torch toward the end of the apparition’s staff, and with a whuff, the ram skull burst into flame.
“Oh,” Yasper noted, “how clever.”
“Inside,” Cnán shouted. “Now!” Grabbing a handful of the alchemist’s tunic, she dragged him toward the shack.
Finn was waiting for them inside, and she stumbled as her feet collided with a hard surface. Her eyes adjusted maddeningly slowly to the dimness. Finn had said there was no well, and what she found was a ring of raised stones. Rough steps, hewn out of the rock, led down into nothingness.