02.44: The Enemies We Make — 3
The occasional droplets had turned into steady rain by the time Falkenheim came into view.
Water ran in silver threads down the carriage’s window, blurring the city built on the hill into a gray, looming shape.
Only when we approached did the wall surrounding the city became clear, and so did the head of a column of soldiers.
Decked in colors of Nordhaven.
The knight at their head rode forward, posture straight despite the weather.
“My lord, I’m Sir Thurvald. Dowager Nordhaven has sent us, as requested.”
“Welcome to Falkenheim, Sir Thurvald.”
I gestured toward the city, its gates open.
Moore was already there, barking orders.
While he guided the soldiers into the garrison, my carriage continued its journey to the castle.
By the time we reached it, the entire city was rumbling, downpour hammering against stone and wood.
I shivered from the cold. Apparently I was now overly sensitive to temperature as well.
Rainy season was now in full swing.
I hurried from my carriage into the castle.
Elric was standing by the doors, composed and dry.
“This is Ansel,” I gestured to the thin man beside me. “He will be my personal glassmaker. He will give you a list of items he needs.”
Elric bowed, then handed me a piece of parchment.
“All items Baron Wulf sent to Nordhaven.”
I looked at the list.
Forty cartloads of seasoned wood.
Thirty of coal, three of lead, one of iron and nine of pyrite.
A cartload was roughly a thousand kilograms.
My eyes widened.
“That’s a lot of pyrite.”
“There was a surplus in the stores, and you told me to acquire as much as possible, so I bought all of it.”
Almost five tons of sulfur. There should be plenty left after making gunpowder. Hello sulfuric and nitric acid.
I folded the parchment.
“Good job. What about other items?”
“Forty cartloads of barn topsoil has been already deposited close to Nordhaven, and covered properly to keep it dry. At expense.”
The words seemed to cause him pain.
“I’ve also acquired a cartload of sinew, four dozen cattle, a dozen draft horses and five cartloads of grain.”
I took out a gold crown and pressed it in his palm.
He looked down at it, then sighed.
“Sire, it’s worth twenty gold. Twice my annual salary.”
“I know. For your hard work. Keep it up.”
“You have reduced the milling fee to 1%, hired a large permanent military and announced pensions. How will the county afford all this?”
“I’m leaving you with enough money. And now we have Blackrain back.”
“It will tide us for a year. Not beyond.”
“You’ll be rolling in coin in the long term, Elric. Trrussst me.”
He looked unconvinced, but nodded in defeat.
I met Baron Wulf for a private lunch.
The dining chamber was warm and dry, thick with the smell of roasted meat and spiced wine. Outside, the rain still battered the stone.
“Apologies for running off like that,” I said, inclining my head and taking my seat. “Let us continue our previous discussion.”
He didn’t touch his drink.
“My lord, you have reduced milling fee for your peasants to almost nothing and you are paying generous pensions to the fallen soldier’s families.”
No mincing words as ever. That’s why I liked him.
“It makes the rest of us look… inadequate. We cannot match you even if we wished to. Maybe Nordhaven could, but the rest of us would go bankrupt.”
I took a sip, letting the spice linger on my tongue.
“I understand your concern, Baron. Can it not be framed as the generosity of the soon-to-be Prince Consort?”
“It could,” he said, leaning in, “but it is the other matter that which is more pressing and would alarm other nobles. House Nobart’s personal forces never crossed a hundred fifty outside of wartime. And now you have more than doubled them, while the rest of us are still weakened by your father’s folly.”
“Two hundred seventy-eight,” I clarified with a raised finger. “Twenty-two of them died reclaiming your town.”
His jaw tightened.
“I am very grateful for that, which is why I am speaking my concerns out loud and not behind your back.”
“And I appreciate your candor,” I said, leaning back.
“What do you think I intend to do with these men?”
“I believe you when you say you want peace in our lands, but… others will not. They will see it as you amassing power in preparation to subjugate them.”
I almost scoffed.
“With three hundred men?”
“Those weapons of yours make each man worth three.”
“Baron, no one is getting their hands on them until our frontier force is fully equipped.”
He shook his head.
“That won’t matter.”
He met my eyes.
“They will act on fear, not reason.”
A log crackled in the hearth.
He was right.
“I was strongly advised to convene a meeting with all the vassals and make it a joint declaration, but Dowager Nordhaven would have dragged the negotiations.”
“You should still have tried.”
“I’ve already spent too much time in the county. I need to get back to Chadom and oversee the production of weapons I promised our Queen. That cannot be delayed.”
He let out a long breath and leaned back.
“If I may be so impertinent, I wish you would be more patient in these decisions.”
“Rest assured,” I said, smiling, “I have already been chastised. I promise to be more careful in the future.”
He nodded, then hesitated.
“There is also a… personal matter I wished to discuss.”
“Go on,” I said, taking another sip.
“Your sister is unwed,” he said, watching my face, “and not promised to anyone. So is my heir, Wigmar. They are close in age.”
Ah. If you can’t beat them, join them.
Not a terrible match politically, since Ironfeld and Stormhaven were both out.
I pursed my lips.
“I promised my sister I would not marry her off for political gain.”
His face tightened.
“She will have a say in who she marries. Your son will have to ask our mother’s permission to court Isanna. If they choose each other, I will not oppose the union.”
He sighed with relief.
“Thank you.”
I leaned forward, meeting his eyes.
“Do tell him to keep his hands to himself.”
No words left him, but the look he was giving me was enough to convey his words.
“I know I’m a hypocrite, but I’m also an older brother. If I find out Wigmar was unchivalrous with my sister, I will come after him.”
Hard eyes bore into me.
“My son is a gentleman. He won’t do anything to besmirch your sister’s virtue.”
“Good. Now let’s dig in.”
We had just stepped out of the private dining hall when Elric found me again.
“Sire, Father Korric is here to meet you.”
I stopped in my tracks.
A thread of unease slid down my spine, colder than the rain outside.
They shouldn’t know about the microscope. Boiling bandages and cleaning hands isn’t dangerous to anyone besides the microbes. My unnaturally fast healing?
I adjusted my sleeves as we walked. The corridor smelled of damp stone and incense.
A tall but thin man in his late forties with cropped brown hair stood next to the door of the meeting chamber.
His robe was plain, brown wool, but hung neatly against his frame.
I realized too late I should have called for Reshma. Fumbling this talk could lead to more trouble than I could handle right now.
As we approached, his eyes turned to look at me.
Piercing.
Are those the eyes of a smart man, or a zealot?
He inclined his head, just enough to show deference. “My lord.”
I returned a proper bow. “Father.”
“A matter of concern was brought to my attention recently. I wish to discuss it with you.”
I led him inside.
The room felt colder than the corridor.
The moment we were seated, his eyes set upon me.
“I was informed that you have dismissed your physician Brother Soren from your service.”
“I did relieve him of duty.”
“May I ask why?”
“I had… my reasons.”
Bloody snitch. Shouldn’t have paid him anything.
“You replaced him with your surgeon.”
“I did.”
“My lord, your surgeon might have experience staunching soldiers’ wounds, but he is not suitable to examine noble personages. Brother Soren has served your house for three decades. He is a learned physician with years of study and training.”
He said it in a tone used for dim children.
“I don’t doubt that, Father, but my surgeon has decades of experience of saving hundreds of lives. Men suffering from all sorts of injuries and ailments. I’ve seen him at work.”
“The care of the sick belongs to God’s servants, my lord, not soldiers with knives. They take care of your soul, not just your body.”
“And you want to do that when a man is bleeding to death?”
His face remained impassive.
“That question reveals a dangerous assumption.”
“What?”
“That preservation of life is the highest good.”
“I do not think that, Father. I have ordered the deaths of many men myself, but a man can only be saved if he is alive. I am not going to let him suffer pointlessly.”
“If suffering leads to humility and acceptance of God’s will, it’s not pointless. It refines the soul. It is not an error to be corrected, but revelation. When you intervene in that moment, you silence the body before it has spoken. To remove it without understanding that purpose… is not mercy.”
Piercing eyes bore into me.
“It is interference in divine judgment.”
I wonder if you would think the same if you were the one dying.
“So we should do nothing but pray while someone’s dying?”
His eyes narrowed.
“Do not reduce doctrine to mockery.”
“Then do not reduce life to sin.”
He exhaled slowly.
“The Church does not teach inaction, but rightful action. Ordered beneath God. With the understanding that the outcome rests in God’s will, not in the cleverness of the practitioner.”
I shrugged.
“You won’t find me disagreeing. Any practitioner arrogant enough to guarantee an outcome is usually a fraud.”
“Yet the man you are replacing Brother Soren with cuts the temple of the soul like a butcher trimming meat.”
“Churches have to hire masons to do repairs, don’t they?”
His eyes hardened.
“That is not the same. Churches are, in the end, mere stone. This,” he pointed to his chest, “is God’s design, but your surgeon interprets it without doctrine. Without guidance.”
“So only you are allowed to understand the body?”
“I am saying that knowledge without moral framework is not knowledge, but corruption wearing the mask of insight.”
I wonder if I can cave this idiot’s skull in a single punch.
His gaze didn’t leave mine.
“There are also rumors… that you healed from a mortal wound in a matter of days.”
I almost smiled. Almost.
“Apparently it didn’t cut anything critical. God must have smiled upon me.”
“Then you acknowledge that healing is God’s mercy, and yet claim authority over it.”
“Father, God gave us minds far more capable than every other living being’s for a reason. I am only using mine to help his children.”
“Even if it places you above doctrine?”
“I don’t claim to be above anything, but I won’t let men who could survive die.”
Closing his eyes, he took a long breath.
“You are as sharp-witted as everyone says. But understand clearly, my lord.”
Before I could say anything, he got up.
I remained seated.
I let the loser loom.
“You are not merely choosing a different physician,” he said, looking down, “you are asserting authority over matters the Church has governed for centuries.”
He paused.
“If your surgeons act without sanction, they act in defiance. If they act under your protection…”
He left the threat unsaid.
“So sanction them.”
“No.”
He spoke again, as if delivering a verdict.
“Dismissal of a loyal servant and replacing him with a butcher is no small matter, my lord. I am obliged to report this to the Bishop.”
I didn’t respond.
He made a perfunctory bow and walked out.
I let out a breath I had been holding. The tension in the room didn’t leave.
The door opened with a low creak, and shut with a soft click.
And there are many like this zealot.
“I need a Martin Luther of my own,” I murmured to myself.
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