Should a door be opened...close it. Part 4

This the the fourth part of a story began and inspired by the Small & Scary/ Big and Beastly event. There is yet more to come...

Jun 19, 2025

Previously, in Part 3

“Our Bannermen; the ones that were not slain? The ones in hiding? Tell me where. Tell me the names and the honour call of but five good and true swords. These will I need to execute my plan. It is best you know very little of it lest the Count seek to test your mettle with hot metals of his own. Suffice it to say that I have learned of a means to secure a treasure of gold. And gold will buy us our answer.”

Part 4

Corbis stood in the shadows watching the Sisters:First attend to Inquisitor Belsay who lay insensate in his cot. He stood so that exhaustion would not take him; there were things to do, but in his present state, he would not be fit. I must rest, but yet… His head slumped then jerked back up as sleep’s hand caressed him; then he noticed Annick, Belsay’s newly appointed aide, hovering at the chamber door. Corbis motioned to him.

“Annick, I am in need of rest and must retire to my cell. Can you wake me once a quarter day candle has burnt out?” Annick nodded, seizing upon anything that gave him a sense of purpose at last.

“Of course, Brother Corbis. It will be the least trouble.”

“And, whilst the good Sisters tend to your Maestre, could you assist me with most urgent tasks that he bid me undertake?”

“What would you have me do?”

“I need you to fetch vestments for travel and provisions for two days upon the road. I need a fit steed and a bird for the Mines of Mount Amiata. Can this be done?” Annick nodded eagerly.

“Good. When all is ready, make sure to wake me; do not let me sleep on any account. If there should be time before you fetch me, write a message for the bird to carry to Ogune, Artificier of the Wizards:Alchemical. Tell him this:

Inquisitor Belsay, to the honour of the Last of Guyzance, Inquisitor:Defunctis, recommends to you the welcome of Corbis, Discipulus. He seeks that which was entrusted to you by Guyzance. I pray you lend him all assistance at your disposal in the matter of which he will recount on his arrival.

Then, seal that with the Maestre’s ring. He sleeps, the Sisters have given him a draft; he will not wake.”

Six hours later, Corbis woke to a rapping on the door of his cell. His eyes ached and his mind railed against waking, confusion dragging him back towards the slumber it craved until another, louder fist sounded upon his door and a voice calling his name prised open his eyes again.

“Discipulus Corbis, I bid thee rise. Are you awake?”

Corbis rose and plunged his head into the stoneware bowl of water, then, red eyed and dripping he opened his door. Annick stood there, a bundle of clothing in his arms and a waxed cloth pack upon the floor.

“Everything is ready, Brother, as you asked.

In the Hortus Veneficia the Countess Livia Drusilla paced between the planted beds. Feet covered by her long robes, she floated amongst the dense and deadly greenery, wisps of hemlock and soft, lilac belladonna flowers brushing her. She stopped to pluck a bloom from a stramonium creeper, crushing the flower and releasing its earthy scent of madness.

She came here to think; it was the quietest of all the gardens of the Hospitium for all that it’s residents were the most potent medicines. Her nephew’s arrival had unsettled her. He was proud, but weak; eschewing the sword. He was intelligent, yet greedy; his cunning head turned by promises of gold. Such a poor mix of traits…what manner of plan could he have and what has he done to draw Otho’s sword against him?

Her thoughts were disturbed as another Sister approached; it was the Hortolana, the Mother of this garden.

“Sister Livia, greetings. Do you seek medicine for any particular ailment? May I offer help –my daughters here demand a careful and familiar hand.” She reached for a cluster of darkly glistening berries, weighing the strig of fruits in her cupped hand as if to measure their potency.

Livia smiled. “It is not an ailment that I have in mind,” she lied, imagining Otho’s blackened tongue, lolling from his foaming mouth while he jerked and spasmed at her feet. “It is more …a tonic…to stir the soul of a particular occasion; but as yet, I am undecided as to what the occasion should be. Nor who will attend it.”

The Hortolana fixed her with a questioning stare by way of reply, seeking out some clue in Livia’s eyes; but, finding none, and not wishing to press the aristocrat –who was more patron than true Sister, she bowed and glided away.

Livia watched her depart through the leafy avenues of the garden. Could she trust the Hortolana, if she went to her for guidance on matters of…medicine? Otho had spies everywhere; perhaps even here amongst the Sisters. She turned again to thoughts of Baron Vastus. Headstrong Nephew…what is your destination? What is this plan you will not share?

She had given her nephew the honour call of three loyal Bannermen; told him that no more could be spared. They were hidden far apart –a fisherman, a miner and a shepherd; his quest to gather them to his cause would take him several days; time for her to think on plans of her own.

“I must know more,” she muttered, then walked with purpose, out from the garden and through several courtyards to the dovecot. She had messages to send.

“This is not the way of the Sisterhood,” said the Matriarch, standing without fear before the trio of Count Otho’s guards, blocking their passage. Several Sisters stood behind her and more began to filter into the cool hall. The guards said nothing.

“We are called for the dead, and a dozen must bring them. That is the way. Men cannot carry them within the Mortuarium. All know this.” She swept an arm from her robe towards the bodies on the grey slate floor. Dim light from candle sconces made black the bloodstains on the rough sheets which covered the two corpses.

“We were sent. By the Count. We do his bidding, and he bid us bring them here, to be taken to the Isle. To be honoured.” said one of the guards.

“No. This is not the way. You must take them away.”

“We cannot return with them and defy our master. That is not the way of a guard.”

The Matriarch glared but did not move.

“We have brought them,” he said, eventually “They are in your domain now.”

With a snort, the Matriarch turned to sisters behind her. “Bring winding sheets and oil of mortis.” Then she turned back to the guard, and laid a hand on him, her face softening. “Return to your master, then. Let your bidding be done. But give him this message from the Sisters:Last: The Orders are sacred –Sisterhood and Brotherhood alike. As sacred as the Throne. A Count he may be, but no throne can he claim. Word of his transgression will find the ears that need to hear them.”

She saw the guard struggle with this, sensed his fear at the prospect of delivering such a message to the Count, even though his face was obscured behind the chain mesh of his helmet. Then one of the sisters cried out, and others began to clamour; they had pulled away the sheets that the dead had been wrapped in, to prepare them for the proper shroud. The sight of the butchery, brought gasps and wails. The Matriarch knelt, looking from one body to the other, hands roving across them moving from wound to wound then standing, in a whirl of robes, as if the number was too many, too terrible to count.”

“How came they by this…death!?”

The guard said nothing.

“They are but boys; their faces are painted; their hair is oiled, their heads unshaven. These are not soldiers; how came they to suffer the ravages of the battlefield within the bed chamber?”

The guard looked down at the seeping bodies, the scene of their brutal slaying, their calls for mercy drowned to a bloody gargle echoed in his mind. His silence said everything.

“This is murder. This is not a death upon which honour or prayers can be spent. They are not warriors. They are not martyrs. Their souls …their souls! How could he think to send them to us?”

The Matriarch pressed bloodied palms to the sides of her head. She wailed, then brought down her arms rigid by her side, hands clenched to fists. She began to chant and the Sisters in the hall keened and wailed in answer. They formed into groups of four, standing in a close square, each with their left hand on the left shoulder of the sister in front; each sister facing to the left of her so that each one of the four faced a cardinal point. They followed the chant of the Matriarch, each singing into the left ear of the sister before her; each with a sister singing into her ear. The sound of their singing moved from harmony to discordancy as each singer knew the tune of their own part. The Hall filled with the sound of it, reverberating in waves of sweetness and bitterness.

“How long ago was this death?” hissed the Matriarch to the guard “There is little time…the bodies must be consumed, their souls must find another body, lest they be lost, to wander, broken and tormented for eternity!”

to be continued…