The Vampire & He Chapter 998: Snapping A Bow (Part One)

Chapter 998: Snapping A Bow (Part One)

Few of the humans present looked comfortable after Loman declared himself and everyone else present sinners for surrendering to save their lives.

Germot looked like he’d swallowed an insect, and that the greatest struggle of his life had arrived in the form of a stomach that wanted to empty itself on the stone floor in front of the powerful vampire.

Roseen’s face had gone deathly pale, but inside her chest, sothing else was welling up and threatening to burst forth, and unlike the sickly looking Head Priest, it wasn’t her dinner.

"He thinks we’re sinners for not wanting to die?" Roseen hissed, barely able to keep her voice to a whisper as she clenched her fist hard enough for her fingernails to bite into her palms. "For wanting our families to live?"

"He sounds like he believes it," Cossot said, and there was sothing broken in her voice. "He really, truly believes that we should have all died fighting rather than surrender. He, he probably even thinks that I’m a sinner for helping Da Sybyll tonight," she realized, half convinced that Loman would have rather seen her die to Da Sybyll’s axe than reveal where Ian and Bastian Hanrahan had gone during the battle.

"That’s insane," Roseen hissed, more forcefully than she intended. Several people glanced their way, and she quickly lowered her voice again. "My mother didn’t raise

to throw my life away for nothing. Neither did yours."

Cossot nodded slowly, but her eyes remained fixed on Loman’s face, watching the zeal burning there along with a good amount of self-loathing. The man she’d once admired, the powerful lord who seed so certain and strong when he stripped off his lordly tunic to don the robes of his faith, now looked like soone who would gladly lead everyone she loved to their deaths if that very sa faith demanded it.

He’d seed like a savior co to rescue them from the jaws of darkness and evil... but the darkness turned out to be a woman who had been badly wronged by the lords of Lothian March... and if there had been any evil on display tonight, it had co from the man who sat upon a stolen throne.

So what then, was Loman Lothian? Had he ever been a savior? Or had he always been this... this wretched, tattered thing who would see everyone die instead of yielding even one inch of ground?

Liam Dunn and Hugo Hanrahan, on the other hand, frowned deeply as they listened to the n of faith debating doctrine with their Eldritch peers. Both n had co close enough to leaders of the church to see beneath the surface of the church’s teachings and to understand that the church served its own interests first, before it ever served the interests of the people.

Yet Loman struck them differently than any of the high church officials they’d encountered in the past. More than either of the young lords, and much more than the aged officials of the Church like Head Priest Germot, Loman truly believed...

The revelations that the Eldritch shared so traditions with the Church did little to shake either man, but seeing the zeal burning in Loman’s eyes, and even a bit of self-hatred, shook both n to their cores. After all, if Loman represented the true will of the Church, and the Church would follow the dictates of the Ascended Archer, Ceslovas Beksa, to pursue their enemies until they were utterly destroyed... then there would be no hope for peace once Lady Ashlynn concluded her war. The Church would never let them rest!

"I understand ye have a good deal ta’ discuss," Sybyll said, interrupting the scholars and stepping into the silence created by Loman’s condemnation of surrender. "Yer welco ta’ continue yer conversation fer as long as ye wish after we conclude our business," she said, calling their attention back to her original question.

"Dawn waits fer no woman, an’ I need an answer soon," Sybyll said firmly. "Is there any reason I shouldn’a judge Loman Lothian a murderer fer sacrificing my people ta’ fuel his sorcery?"

Sybyll’s question brought everything back into sharp focus. As interesting as it was to hear the similarities between the traditions Jalal’s people had ticulously preserved since the end of the Age of Ice and the early days of the Church, there was a pressing question that demanded an answer.

"I’m sorry, old friend," Jalal said as he looked at the tattered and ragged priest. "I wanted to understand if the power and traditions he invoked were the sa as ours or different. Not because I’m curious, but because aligning ourselves with the stars aligns our bodies, our minds, and our hearts with the guidance from above."

"Young Hugo," Jalal said, flashing a slight smile at the young man he’d lent a blade to at the start of the battle. "How did you feel after using the ritual I taught you tonight?"

"Sharper," Hugo said after thinking for a mont. "I, I’m not ant to wield a sword or charge into battle with a lance," he admitted. "No matter how much Sir Rain and Lord Owain beat

in the na of ’teaching’, I was never going to be a real knight, no matter what title my father gave ."

"But the ritual you taught ," he said, placing a hand over his heart. "It helped

cut through my fears and doubts. The blade in my hand felt more comfortable than any sword ever did. I was... ready to face what was ahead, even if I was still frightened of it."

"That’s part of what it ans to be a warrior," Jalal said, using his only remaining hand to clap the young human lord on the shoulder. In an odd way, he realized, he’d beco so kind of kin to the human when Sybyll gave him the surna ’Hanrahan’, and sohow, he felt even closer to Hugo than he had at the start of the evening... as though he were a young kitten in need of guidance.

"Sybyll," Jalal continued, as he finally arrived at the answer he’d been looking for when he asked about the teachings of the ’Ascended Archer.’ "When Stargazers in my clan invoke the First Hunter, they gain a determination to finish their hunt, to complete what they’ve started because people depend on their success. Their world narrows, distractions fall away, and they beco better hunters in a number of ways."

"I have not seen the ritual that this priest used, but once he set his arrow to the string, he may have lost his ability to change his mind," he said. "From the way he speaks, I do not believe that the person who taught him this ritual gave him the freedom to set his own conditions or limit the scope of his hunt. In a way, he is both the archer taking aim at , and the arrow in his teacher’s bow."

"You’re suggesting that what Loman did was an extension of Exemplar Domas’s will?" Diarmuid said, horrified by the implications of that statent if it were true. "That the rituals he used were... were homicidal traps that would consu the lives of the people who supported his own disciple?"

"No, it wasn’t like that at all!" Loman insisted, trembling in fury as the conniving demon sought to move the bla from his own shoulders onto his teachers. "Exemplar Domas warned

that the rituals he taught

could claim the lives of n with weaker faith. He told

that if I ever needed to fill my quiver with arrows, I should choose the strongest, most devout n available."

"Those were the n whom Head Priest Germot sent ," he said as he looked at the head priest with a ripple of doubt suddenly sending his heart beating faster and turning his palms slick. "Those were the most devout n of your temple, weren’t they? You chose them all personally?"

"I, I told my acolytes that a Disciple of Exemplar Domas needed our most faithful n at his side to repel the demons," Germot said, awkwardly wringing his hands. "The ones I sent were the ones who volunteered. But if I’d wanted to, I could have sent twice as many n," he added quickly. "No one would have turned away from your request, your Worship."

"But, you chose among those volunteers for the strongest and most devout, didn’t you?" Loman repeated as his stomach plumted. He didn’t need to hear an answer from the Head Priest to know that he hadn’t... Just looking in the other man’s eyes told him everything he needed to know.

Head Priest Germot had sent him a dozen n who volunteered, but beyond that... if Loman was lucky, the decision had been random. But watching as the Head Priest squird against the chains that bound him and struggled to provide an answer, Loman suspected that the n he sent were the ones he would have been happiest to be rid of should Loman have taken them into his service after the battle...

So of them may have had strong faith, but none of them were people Germot would have minded losing from his temple.