“You dedicated your life to the study of relics, so I think you’ll always be part of the Order.”
Seraphina bit the inside of her lower lip.
“Thank you for saying that,” she whispered.
“He’s holding out his hands,” Rune explained what he was seeing. “Like he’s making an offering.”
“What’s he holding?”
“I don’t know. It’s too small.”
“Every day, you fear that the Blasphemer’s army will march to our walls and tear down our gates. Yet, they cannot take cities smaller than ours only a day away from Ingolstadt. Trust that sacred relics are keeping them away, keeping them weak and disorganized. Have faith! Mark this day as a promise to you and your children: the Blasphemer will not prevail!”
A collective groan shuddered through the crowd. Seraphina sensed a few people in front of her doubling over, clutching at their stomachs. Someone to her right fell to their knees and heaved.
She reached behind her and grabbed hold of Rune’s cloak. She tugged at it until Rune leaned over her shoulder, and she could turn her head toward him and whisper.
“He’s holding the relic. The one we call The Voice of God.”
“Oooh...” That was all he could manage at the revelation.
Seraphina chuckled.
“It’s a parlor trick. And a cheap one at that. But I have to admit it was smart of him to choose this particular bone to display today. People are easily impressed by amplified sound because they don’t understand what they’re hearing. When a voice becomes loud enough to shake the ground and rattle yourorgans, the mind wants to believe it’s divine. And Headmaster Wolff is especially good at using it. He can speak without moving his lips.”
“Is that possible?”
“With practice, yes. Just another gimmick. It was recorded, you know. In the greatest book of all.” She said it with mild sarcasm. “The Old Testament describes it in Exodus, chapters nineteen and twenty, when God gave Moses the Ten Commandments on Mount Sinai. The Israelites heard thunder and trumpet blasts, and a voice so terrible they begged Moses to be their intermediary because they couldn’t bear to hear God speak directly. Then in the Gospel of John, chapter twelve, verses twenty-eight and twenty-nine, a voice spoke from the heavens, and the crowd couldn’t agree on what they’d heard. Some said it thundered. Others said an angel had spoken. None of it was divine intervention. It was the amplification relic. It projects sound in such a way that it seems to come from everywhere at once, and the vibrations cut through flesh and make people sick with terror and wonder.”
“That is fascinating.”
“It’s a hyoid bone,” Seraphina continued. “It’s a small, horseshoe-shaped bone that sits at the front of the throat, just below the jaw. It’s the only bone in the human body that doesn’t connect to any other bone, and it supports the larynx and the tongue when a person speaks. The saint is unknown. The relic is so ancient that it’s impossible to determine when it appeared or from whose body it came. It was lost for centuries, then reemerged a few decades ago. The academy acquired it, and the curators catalogued it as a greater relic because of the dramatic effect it produces. But in my opinion, it’s no more than a lesser relic. I hope that one day, we’ll become evolved enough to see it for what it is and reclassify it.”
With that, she turned on her heel, as if she were disgusted. It was sad to see the academy put on a show of smoke and mirrors for the crowd. The people were worried about the war that raged – like the headmaster had said – only a day away from Ingolstadt. Something nagged at her, though. Because there was one thing he’d said through the Voice of God that was true. Cities smaller and less fortified than Ingolstadt held and were still holding fast, refusing to fall. Ingolstadt sent reinforcements whenever they were needed, and daily, wounded poured through the gates and into the city’s hospitals. From the south, Ingolstadt was surrounded, but the front line hadn’t moved closer than a day away – two days at most – since last winter.
Something was amiss. Gladly, to their advantage. Now she was out of the loop, but she’d been on the inside two years ago, and sometimes she wondered if she hadn’t missed things then. Obvious things. Or if she simply hadn’t been told.
“Everyone is here,” she told Rune as they walked. “Which means no one is where we need to be.”
They wound through empty alleys. It was dark out; Seraphina could tell by the ashy smell of the night air. She found the tailor’s stop by memory and signaled for Rune to break the lock. For him, it was nothing, and within less than a minute, they were inside among bolts of fabric and clothes hanging in neat rows.
Seraphina moved deeper into the shop, trailing her fingers along the walls until she found a rack of dresses. The fabric was smooth under her fingertips, softer than anything she’d worn in months. She gathered a handful and brought it to her face, breathing in the smell of wool and dye. It reminded her of another life, one where she’d owned nice things and didn’t have to steal to survive.
“Don’t light anything,” she said.
“I wasn’t going to.”
She heard him moving through the shop, his footsteps cautious. Seraphina kept exploring, running her hands over dresses, cloaks, and shirts, marveling at the quality. Some of the fabrics were heavy and thick, others light and delicate. She used to have dresses like these when she lived in London. But then she’d come to the academy, and it was all gray and black robes. She’d been proud of her house colors, had worn them with dignity, but she wouldn’t lie, they’d been drab and hadn’t complemented her at all. Too severe, too dark, making her already pale skin look sickly.
But now wasn’t the time to choose something pretty. She needed something functional that would keep her warm.
“Freising is only two days away,” she said. “But the weather is getting worse, so we need to make sure we’re dressed well. Warm clothes. Sturdy.”
“All right.”
She also needed clothes that fit her properly. She was tired of wearing things that were too big and hindered her agility. The cloak she’d stolen the day she’d escaped prison dragged on the ground. She needed something that wouldn’t get in her way.
On the other side of the shop, Rune gasped. A moment later, he murmured words she couldn’t make out.
