The Blood Princess (Part 2)

After the mass ended, they all left the church, their heads lowered, lips sealed. The majority of townsfolk had already left to continue their day, but these three were lingering around.

“You okay, Leo?” Mira asked him after a while.

“I was never the Silgorod patriot, but hearing them talking about the deaths of people fighting alongside me felt unpleasant. I wonder if I will be able to look at these people properly.”

“I need to study more about their religion,” Mira said. “It is the first time I heard about god, who is being called the Shrouded One.”

“It does feel ominous,” Leo agreed with her.

“There is also another ominous thing about this place,” Kasian added. “The whole town is swarmed by the dead.”

“What do you mean?” Leonard asked him.

“The priest? Dead,” Mira said. “Some of the folks attending today's mass were dead as well. I wonder if they were part of the war with the Silgorod.”

“How can you tell?”

“I feel it,” Mira said. “And also, most of them have the souls of their dead ancestors waiting for them, accompanying them the whole time.”

“Are you saying that a dead priest healed my wound?” Leonard could feel his skin crawl. “I don’t want to catch any zombie infection!”

“Zombie,” Mira said, stopping.

“Do not try to remember,” Kasian told her gently. “It is a word from our world.”

“It does sound kinda familiar,” Mira said. “Either way, going back to our topic, remember that undead priest we found in the village? These guys are the same, I guess.”

“But who could have killed them and raised them?”

“A very powerful necromancer,” Mira said. “And I need to find this person. Apart from Severian, I never met another warlock. I need to have a long talk with this person.”

“How to find such a person? Magic is also banned in Lunaria, right?” Leo asked.

“Magic is banned, but miracles are not. Therefore, we need to find rumors about any priest who can perform even more stunning miracles. If this person is living in this town, we will hear about it soon.”

“So are we going to the tavern now?”

“Yes. Fortunately, your wound is now healed, so we do not need to search for a doctor. We can pay for two rooms and find a nice place to eat. Hopefully, we will be able to hear something. I would recommend a shady pub hidden in the corner. That would be the best.”

Leonard laughed.

After renting two rooms for sleeping over, they found the most suspicious tavern and entered. It was only the afternoon, and they would have to wait a long time for the first people ending their day with a glass of beer, but they did not mind.

“Do we still have enough silver to travel to Lunareth?”

“We will have to be more careful from this point on,” Kasian said. “But we still have a few coins left.”

“Hmm, we will have to fly then. If we had to walk or pay someone for driving us there, it would get more expensive.”

“I don’t know if I want to ride the Sanguis anymore,” Leonard sighed. “It doesn’t care that I am its master at all.”

“And we will have to find work in Lunareth,” Mira said, ignoring his comment. She turned to Kasian. “You will need to woo some maidens in the capital to get a good job.”

Leonard was confused. Wasn’t she angry at him for having lovers? And now she was telling him to pick up on girls? Was this the result of her distorted memories?

“Hey, you must be new here!”

Mira smirked at Leonard, turning to the man who came closer to them. It was only an afternoon, and he was already drunk, a good sign.

“We are travelling to Lunareth,” she said to the man, “we decided to take shelter here for a while.”

They ordered him a drink and let him sit next to them.

“What do you seek in the capital?” the drunk man asked them, once he saw a free beer sitting before him.

“Work, mister. My husband and I, and my brother, are looking for work.”

“All folks looking for gold end up in Silverhold.”

“Where does the Moon Princess live?” Mira asked.

“Moon Princess? Heh! More like Blood Princess. But you folks don’t know yet.”

The trio looked at each other.

“Since we won the war against Silgorod and the saintess returned to her tower, strange rumors started circulating about her. She was wed to the high priest, but he died soon after, during his travels. She became the sole head of the Lunaria. If you want to find a job that pays well, visit the Silverhold, but I tell ya, you will go insane in there!”

“Why is she called Blood Princess?” Mira asked.

“Rumors were going on that in order to use the holy powers, you need to spill blood. The high priest was too arrogant and greedy. He was using the blood of the saintess to become more powerful, tainting her body and risking that she won't be able to awaken and save us before the calamity. Once he died, all his sins came to light.”

Mira looked at them, a smile appearing on her face. Bingo! This was exactly what she wanted to find out.

Leonard did not believe her luck. How are they always able to find the most gossipy man in the tavern they go to?

“But that is not the only thing. The servants working for the saintess cannot even endure one week there. They run away, talking that the saintess has lost her mind due to the constant torture she had to endure and the things she saw on the battlefield.”

“Mister, how do you know all of this? Won't priests be angry that you are saying this?” Leonard asked him.

The drunk man went quiet for a while. Looking at the empty glass in his hands. “M-my son,” he said after a while, “became the priest in this town. He marched with the army to the battle. Once he returned, he was… acting strange. He was always a devoted person. I am a simple man, and I never understood where his strong faith comes from. But now, it is not only the faith. It looks like he is possessed. He stopped visiting me and my wife. He forgot about his younger sister. His grandmother died, and he held a funeral for her, not showing even a hint of sadness. It was his most beloved person in our whole family. Since when did he become such a cold person?”

Tears were now welling in his eyes. Mira touched his shaking shoulders softly.

“Then… after the funeral… I had a dream. My mother, his grandmother, had appeared in it. She told me that… that… my son had died on the battlefield that day.”

Of course, he was dead. Mira was able to tell immediately.

“I did not believe it at first. But I confronted him and… it is not him anymore. I don’t know how to say it. My wife doesn’t believe me, and my daughter thinks I am crazy. But seeing him hold mass every week like nothing happened is like a never-ending nightmare.”

Leonard went quiet, thinking. He had a necromancer on his side, so telling apart alive from the dead was easy. But for normal folks, this was hard to do. He must have loved and known his son so well to be able to tell that something was not right.

“That must have been hard on you,” Mira said softly. “Your mother is probably waiting for him, wanting to help him cross over to come to the other side.”

Her red eyes flashed.

Leonard blinked.

The crimson light was now gone. She was still patting the shoulder of the crying man, but she did not order another beer for him. She was patiently waiting for him to calm down. Kasian was trying to stab her with his gaze, though.

Leonard kicked him under the table, getting his attention.

“What has happened?” he mouthed to him.

Kasian ignored him, catching Mira's forearm and squeezing it firmly. She turned to him, annoyed. “Will you stop?” she asked.

“You are too soft,” he said.

“And you are too afraid.”

A loud sound of footsteps echoed from the street. Someone barged into the tavern, looking at the guests. His eyes stopped at the crying man holding the empty glass of beer.

“Lado, your son!”

The man raised his head, recognizing his friend: “What is with my son?”

“He collapsed outside the church. We already sent for a doctor. Go, quickly!”

The man stood up quickly, running from the tavern. He was drunk and he almost fell multiple times, but he ran like his life depended on it. Other guests from the tavern also went outside, curious about the sudden ruckus.

“We should go, too,” Mira said. “So we won't be suspicious.”

Leaving the now-empty tavern, they did not hurry. There was already a big crowd gathered near the church.

“What did you do?” Leonard asked Mira quietly.

“I disabled the magic that kept him undead,” Mira said.

“Did you sacrifice some of your memories again?” he pressed further.

She did not respond.

“Of course she did,” Kasian responded, hint of anger in his voice. “She always has to. No need to ask about that.”

“Why did you not stop her if you knew she was planning to do something?”

“He cannot reject me,” Mira said plainly, “because he is my servant. Now be quiet.”

Shouts and gasps were now much louder. The trio came closer, seeing the poor young priest sprawled on the ground before the church. Near him, the big brass key was lying. He was probably just in the process of locking the church and going somewhere when this happened.

The doctor was already bending down to him. Suddenly, he jumped away, horrified. A few women in the crowd almost fainted. The pool of foul-smelling blood started growing under the corpse, an army of maggots crawling over.

“How is that possible?”

“I was on the mass this morning. He looked fine. He even healed someone.”

“But the maggots.”

“It looks like he has been dead a long time.”

“Didn’t his father say that he died in the war?”

“Do not take seriously that drunkard.”

“Doesn’t it look like he was right the whole time, though?”

Mira pulled Leoanrd by his sleeve, gesturing to him that it was time to disappear, before someone would recognize him as the healed one from this morning. They slowly backed out of the crowd and decided to return to the inn. Once they safely closed the door behind them in Mira’s room, Leonard turned to her.

“The same case as before?” he asked quietly.

“Yes,” Mira said. “But now I know who the grand mage is in this. Our Blood Princess.”

“You think the saintess did this?”

“I am nearly certain now. Looks like the Moon Princess invented her own style of forbidden magic.”