As she looked at his black eyes, he studied her grey ones.
He did not smile. His face showed no emotion at all. Not even a hint of surprise. He spoke again, and this time it was a challenge.
“I’m Sally Faye Vierra.”
He looked at her hands and saw her ring. “Grimnoir?”
“Yes.”
“English?” His accent was harsh, like gravel.
“American.”
The Black Monk nodded. It took him a moment to switch languages in his head. “So, the Grimnoir know I still live?”
“I don’t think so. Just me.”
“They thought they killed me before, but I am too strong. My countrymen poison me. Stab me. Shoot me. Drown me in river. Bury me, and burn me. But I not die so easy. The Pathfinder showed how to grow new body, copied from others. I have hid, very long time. Hid in this tiny place.” He gestured around the church dismissively. Faye didn’t think it was so bad. The stained-glass windows were very old-fashioned and pretty. “I hide from Grimnoir like all the other magical factions. I hide from Stalin. I hide from the Cult, I hide from Machine God and the Shaper and the Order, and most of all, I hide from the Chairman. I hide from any who would take mine things, and I wait… And I study, and I prepare, but for long time, I wait.”
Faye had no idea who some of those folks even were. “Who are you?”
He cocked his head to the side, seemingly curious. He was certainly no simple village priest, that was for sure, especially if the Grimnoir knights had gone through all that effort trying to kill him. “You do not know who I am?”
“You’re the Black Monk.”
“That is one name I called. Man with so many enemies must change bodies every generation. Today I am a simple priest. I took this new body so I could hide. Before that I used another name to rise to greatness, that name Grigori Yefimovich Rasputin…” He waited for a reaction.
Faye shrugged. It wasn’t ringing any bells.
“Really? Huh.” the Black Monk scowled, now seeming a little less sure what Faye was doing there. “Before I take this body, I was one of very first wizards in world.”
She didn’t know what he meant by taking bodies, but Faye knew he was telling the truth. She could practically feel the magic boiling under this man’s skin. He was powerful, more powerful maybe than anyone she’d met since the Chairman. And she wanted nothing more than to take that Power away. Faye shook her head and cleared her thoughts.
The Black Monk continued, “I was not the first. That is Okubo Tokugawa.”
“Him, I’ve met.”
He tilted his scraggly head the other way. “Yes. I can see it on your soul. Knowing Tokugawa changes you. I fought for his cause once. I was member of the Dark Ocean.”
“You were there when they killed the last Pathfinder?”
“Yes. But it not really killed. Body killed, but it never left. It has been here, hiding, whispering, ever since. Tokugawa did not realize this. During the battle, it hurt me. It crawled inside my mind, made a nest, and hid. It did that to a few of us. Those harmed by it… It remains in your head, always a little piece. Always… chewing. I think am not alone in this. That is why you come? The Pathfinder?”
“Yeah. I’m off to fight the new one now.”
“Ah, yes.” He stroked his unkempt beard. “I knew this day would come. I knew it well for so very long. I have spoken to it in my dreams. It talked to me for years after the battle. For a time, I believed it. I listened to the words in my head and did as it asked. It wished me to help build an empire for it to use. It had plans. For a time, I did as it asked. I helped it. It gave me magic to heal the hemophilia of our heir. It helped give my words magic to make influence. Some I swayed, others I seduced. It put me in place to fulfill its wishes. I followed its counsel, and gave that counsel to the rulers and nobles who would heed me. I became great and important.”
“You listened to the Pathfinder?” Faye was shocked. “Why would you ever do that? It wants to kill us all!”
“Not all. It will change things. Kill many, yes. Not kill all the things. It whispered secrets. Offered me much. You try to resist. You know it speaks in lies, but the lies become comfort. Soon, you bend, then you break, and you do as it says. I see now that it used me, but back then, I could not.”
“What did it want you to do?”
“Counsel the Tsar to bring all the wizards together. Make them live in one place… Make them easy for harvest.”
This was horrible, and then she thought of Zachary’s pictures showing the skinless men carrying people away. “So when it finally attacks it can scoop up all of the magic it needs all at one time and nobody will be able to stop it in time!”
“Yes. Before it came boldly, but Okubo won. Now it creeps, ever so slowly.” He made a little chittering noise through his teeth. “Battles everywhere… The Power must win every fight. The Pathfinder only must win but one.”
“Is it still talking to you now?”
“No longer.” He touched his thumb to the center of his forehead. “When Grimnoir murder me, the ghost in my mind, gone forever… It knew I could no longer serve. My chance at empire, ruined, so it go elsewhere… Whisper to others, corrupts them, gives them same counsel… I not know who. Does it matter? Look around, child. Every land does this thing now. I was murdered. My empire died, yet the empire which replaced it has gone on to realize the same goals, only bigger… Stalin has done more than I ever could have. This time, the harvest, very swift. I knew it would come back.”
Now Faye understood. She understood the picture of the old samurai with the shadow in his head. She understood the picture of the skinless man, wearing a suit made out of a person, telling lies in Washington, and she realized that they were all in even greater danger than they’d expected.
She knew how all the pictures ended with the Black Monk, but she refused to believe it had to end that way. He had helped her, given her new information, regardless of what he’d done in the past or how much incredible Power he had for the taking, Faye did not want to kill him. “The time’s come to fight the Pathfinder again. You were Dark Ocean before. Will you help us?”
“Help, child? You do not know its promises. You did not hear the whispers.” The Black Monk chuckled. “Now you tell me Pathfinder has returned, I will go to it and offer my services. For this, I thank you.” He extended one long arm, spread his fingers wide, and the incredible wave of force that issued forth shattered every stained glass window in the church.
Faye saw it coming and had even run all the calculations in her head as the benches were lifted from the floor and the tiles were peeled off the walls and the statues were blown to bits. She stepped through space, just ahead of the wave, and appeared behind the Black Monk. Lance’s knife came out of the sheath and she put it square between his shoulder blades.
He turned, snarling, more magical energy building. Faye tore the knife out in a spray of red, and Traveled just as the altar was smashed into splinters. She’d never seen the like of this kind of magic. It simply seemed to make things come apart. She appeared on his other side and slashed the knife down one arm. He responded with more crackling energies, but Faye was already on the other side running the razor edge across his wrist.
The Black Monk took a few halting steps away from her. Calm, Faye lifted the dripping knife and followed him. The church was crumbling, hammered to its foundations over the course of a few seconds. She had just given him a couple lethal wounds, but the Black Monk wasn’t showing it. Whatever his Power was, he was tough.