Mortal Heart

Except, if they are hunting for me, it would be beyond foolish to dangle my identity in front of them like raw meat before a wolf. Instead, I swallow my pride—which burns mightily as it goes down—and try to look like the sort of woman who would allow a man (a hellequin!) to make her his. To distract myself, I turn my attention to the rest of the hunt. While dawn is still a way off, the sky has begun to lighten enough that I can see the whole of them somewhat better than before.



They number between sixty and eighty, all of them men. Some look like outlaws and brigands, unkempt and bearing every manner of weapon. Others are concealed in darkness, their black cloaks and hoods the only things giving them form and substance. A handful of the riders are striking in their beauty, looking almost like the fallen angels the Christian priests speak of. Some look like fallen warriors, rough, scarred, and gruff of manner.



My rescuer—Balthazaar, the giant called him—comes riding back to my side just then, and it is the first time I am able to get a good look at him. He is breathtakingly handsome in a dark, almost broken way. He wears his hair long, and his jaw and nose are strong and sharp, as if chiseled of the finest marble by a master stonemason. His eyes are deep-set and so dark they look like pools of night without so much as a star shining from within their depths. Even more intriguing, there is something vaguely familiar about him. Although I know I have never seen him before in my life, there is some thread of recognition, a hidden connection between us, as unwelcome as it is unnerving.



He looks up just then and catches me staring. I long to glance away, to hide the boldness of my perusal. Sister Beatriz says that is the first step in the complex dance of ensnaring a man with one’s charms, but I do not wish to ensnare him—or even have him think that is my purpose—so I raise my chin in defiance and leave my gaze on his face.



“It is too late to turn back.” The left corner of his mouth tightens in what could be either amusement or annoyance.



“I’ve no wish to turn back. I merely wished to see what manner of man I had thrown in my lot with.”



Without even moving, he does something so that his great black horse takes a step toward me, then another, crowding Fortuna so that she must back up or be trampled. “And have you passed your judgment? Detected the reek of sin and evil and found us lacking? Condemned us all over again in the court of your mind?”



I meet his gaze steadily, doing nothing to hide my irritation. If he—if they—are hunting me, I cannot afford to show fear and act like prey. “No. I myself know something of darkness and sin and am not so very quick to judge others.”



Balthazaar turns from me to the small crowd that has formed around us. “Be gone,” he growls.



They all scatter except for the longhaired giant, who lingers a moment, giving the other man a long, hard look. “It is not fair. To the others.” His voice is so deep, it seems as if it rises up from the ground beneath our horses’ hooves. “She is too great a temptation to them.”



Balthazaar does his thing with his horse so that it tries to crowd the other man, but it is like trying to crowd a mountain. “This is no country jaunt, Miserere. It is meant as penance and atonement. Being surrounded by temptation is part of the indenture.”



The giant stares a beat longer. “There is temptation, and then there is taunting.” His impersonal gaze flickers over me once more, then he turns and rides away, his horse managing to send a shower of dirt our way as they depart.



“And so you meet Miserere.”



“He is an impressive greeting party. Are all the men as pleasant as he?”



“No, but there are others who will be more dangerous to you, so you will do well to stick by my side.”



“Like a thorn,” I say with false cheer.



“A long, sharp, inconvenient thorn,” he mutters.



I gape at him. “This was your idea, not mine.”



He shrugs that truth aside. “Now that you have seen them, do you really think you would have been better on your own?”



“No.” Even so, I am already questioning the wisdom of my plan, for these are not merely servants of Mortain but dark, tortured men who reek of threat and danger. Once it is full light, I will slip away. None of the old tales speak of the hunt riding during daylight. Surely I will be able to escape then.



Balthazaar leans across his saddle, putting his face close to mine. “Do not even think it,” he says. “They have your scent now and can hunt you anywhere. No matter how much of a head start you think you have, they will find you. And they will not stop until they do.”



I am saved from replying when all around me, the hellequin begin dismounting. Eager to be out of my saddle, I remove my left foot from the stirrup. It takes me two tries to actually dismount, and then—at last—my feet are once again on solid ground. I cling to the saddle, waiting for my legs to remember how to unbend at the knees. Balthazaar looms over me like a specter of the night. “Are you all right?” His voice is brusque.



“Of course,” I reply lightly. “If you would show me where to tether my horse, I would like to tend to her. She does not have as much practice with nocturnal hunting as your horses do.”



I am fairly certain I see a pinch of regret cross his face, and it heartens me, even if it is for my horse. “I will have one of the others tend her—”



“No!” The force of my refusal surprises us both. “I would rather do it myself.” I need something to focus on besides the strange group of men in whose midst I have found myself.



He nods, then motions to the right, where the other horses are being picketed.



I glance at them dubiously. “Will she be all right with the others, do you think?”



He arches an eyebrow. “They are only horses, demoiselle, and not even flesh-eating ones at that.”



“I am not so sure,” I mutter, then I lead Fortuna away, my body grateful to be moving again. Balthazaar follows me. In spite of his words, I am careful to choose a spot as far away from the others as I can. As I reach down to unbuckle Fortuna’s saddle strap, he directs his gaze to the surrounding countryside, as if he cannot bear to look at me a moment longer.



In the ensuing silence, I quickly finish tending to Fortuna. When I am done, Balthazaar motions for me to follow the other hellequin, who are milling at the far end of the copse, where two great stones frame an opening that seems to lead into the earth. With a start, I realize it is a doorway to the Underworld, just like the one at the convent.



So that is where they go during the day, why no one ever sees them once the sun has risen: they return to the Underworld. Which means there must be many such passageways throughout all of Brittany.



Once inside, I see that it is not a narrow cave or a tunnel leading to the Underworld as I had always imagined, but something far more immense. An antechamber, is my first thought. It is hard to tell with the shadows and darkness that swallow up the contours of the place, but the cavern appears to be as large as the convent. The walls are carved out of raw earth, and the ceiling . . . I look up, but there is only darkness and shadows overhead.



At the far end of the chamber, it narrows again into a much smaller doorway than the one we entered through, one that seems to hold back a thick, almost living blackness.



“While you may move freely about the cromlech, do not cross that doorway.” Balthazaar speaks from just behind me. “For once a mortal crosses the threshold of the Underworld, they may not return.”



I study his face to see if this is a jest, but it does not appear to be.



Once they have gathered inside the cromlech, the hellequin sit and lean against the walls of the cave, stretch out on the floor, or huddle in groups of twos or threes. One or two even light a fire.



“I would not think that hellequin would need fires to warm themselves.”



“They do not need them, precisely. It is more a source of comfort. And to remind themselves they were once human.”



His words make me aware of how very much I do not know about these servants of Mortain, for all that they serve the same god that I do. I open my mouth to ask one of a dozen questions that crowds my head, but he holds up his hand. “You are hollow-eyed with fatigue. Your questions can wait until nightfall.”



Nightfall. Their morning, when they begin their day.



Balthazaar chooses a spot near the front and drops my saddlebag on the floor. “You will be safe here. But if you do not feel safe, come find me. If you cannot find me, find Miserere, for he is to be trusted most of all of them.”



“That does not comfort me as much as you think it should.”



He grunts, then strides off to join the others, his black cloak rippling behind him like a piece of the Underworld itself. Unsettled, I turn my attention to my own needs. I am near the front, but there are over a score of hellequin between me and the exit. I do not think I will be escaping tonight—or this morning, I correct myself, adjusting to the upside-down rhythms of the hellequin.



I long to get up and explore. To be this close to the Underworld, to Mortain, has me nearly restless with a longing to peer into His realm and see what mysteries I may discover. It is hard to be so close to answers and yet be unable to pursue them. But it is possible the answers might not be to my liking. Perhaps Mortain has sent the hellequin after me, and if I poke my nose in His domain, He might spot me Himself.



Besides, Balthazaar’s warning still rings in my ears, and even if it did not, I am not foolish enough to go cavorting among all these rough men. Many of them still watch me—I can feel the weight of their gazes as they alight upon me, much like the wings of the small dark moths I use to chase as a child. There is a wildness here—everyone is a collection of hard broken edges and sharp prickly spines. Wholly bathed in sin, and still seeking redemption in spite of it. It puts my own smaller sins in perspective and makes me proud to serve a god who is so forgiving.



Then another thought comes to me—perhaps Mortain has answered my prayer. At the start of my journey, did I not pray for His guidance and protection? What if He has given it to me—in the form of His hellequin? It is a startling thought and makes me fully aware of just how hard it is to determine if one’s prayers have been answered.



After my flight from the convent, the gallop through the night, and minimal sleep, I am well and truly exhausted. I do not even bother to eat but simply lay out my bedroll, then collapse upon it. Sleep overtakes me before I can so much as kick off my boots.



Some hours later, I come awake. Pale fingers of daylight penetrate the darkness of the cave, but I cannot tell what time it is. I blink in confusion, trying to get my bearings, and realize someone is next to me. I freeze. Every muscle in my body tenses—not in fear, but in anticipation. Moving as little as possible, I reach for the knives at my wrists. When my hands are firmly wrapped around their handles, I turn and look.



It is Balthazaar, sitting on the floor with his back against the earthen wall. He is so close to me that his hip almost touches my shoulder. My grip on the knives loosens. Annoyed at the faint feeling of comfort his presence brings me, I allow myself a small, private defiance and roll my eyes in the darkness. “You’re smothering me,” I whisper under my breath.



“I’m guarding you.”



My head whips around. He was not supposed to hear that; indeed, I barely heard it. “Can’t you guard me from farther away?”



“No.” Not so much as a muscle moves; he does not open his eyes, and I cannot even see his lips forming the word.



“I thought you said I’d be safe here.”



“And so you are. Because I am guarding you. Go back to sleep—we don’t ride for hours yet.”



I struggle to get comfortable again, but the cave floor is hard and my bedroll thin. “Don’t you need to sleep?”



“I was sleeping. Until you woke me. And if you’ll stop talking, I will sleep some more.”



For some reason I cannot explain, as I finally begin to drift off to sleep, I can feel a faint smile tugging at my mouth.