“It’s not a warning,” I snap, the ice in my voice cracking. “It is a statement of fact. They have my wife, who happens to be pregnant.”
His face hardens at those words, at that revelation as his body morphs into something of pure rage. “She is enemy blood, Antonio. You swore an oath to me, when you married her. You swore she would never bear you a child.Thatwas the deal we made. That was the price you agreed on.”
“I might have made that deal then,” I say, and my voice is low, a guttural thing I barely recognize. “But circumstances have changed.”
“Circumstancesneverchange.” he thunders, and for the first time his voice booms, echoing off the stone walls, silencing the birds in the trees. The guards around us tense almost imperceptibly. “The war does not change. The divide does not change. Our sacred duty to purge their filth from this earth does not change. You allowed sentiment to cloud your purpose. You became weak, you broke your vow. I’ve sent men to Oblivion for less.”
My eyes sweep over the guards. Four of them. All highly trained, all armed. The closest is six feet to my left, his hand resting near the butt of his holstered pistol. Another is behind Konstantine’s right shoulder, a submachine gun held loosely across his chest. I calculate angles, vectors of attack. The iron table between us. The heavy marble base of the fountain.
Oh, I could do it.
The thought is cold, clear, and lightning-fast. I could shatter the table into the face of the guard on the left, use the distraction to close the distance, and snap Konstantine’s reinforced neck before the others could even bring their weapons to bear. The surgery has made him stronger, but he is still fragile. I have killed stronger, faster men with less provocation.
But what would it achieve?
The second thought is colder, more brutal. If I kill him, the guards’ bullets would tear into me a microsecond later. I would die here, on this pristine gravel surrounded by the stink of jasmine, and Grace would still be in their hands. They would carve my child out of her and send the pieces to the next Grand Master. My death would be a footnote. Theirs would be a tragedy of my own making. A final, ultimate failure.
No, I need him alive. For now.
Konstantine watches me, and I swear I see a flicker of disappointment in his eyes. He saw the calculation. Did he want me to try? Did he want the excuse to have me ended?
He leans back, sighing to himself, shaking his head. “Your predicament is regrettable, but it is of your own making. The solution, however, is simple.”
“Simple?” I echo, the word tasting like ash.
“We give them a death.” A cruel smile plays on his lips. “We have a ready-made substitute, do we not? We give them my brother, we let Lazarus be the sacrifice for us and in return, we not only get your whore of a wife back but we destroy them, we destroy the last of the Esau.”
“How?” I reply. It sounds like bullshit. Complete and utter bullshit.
“The Brethren will believe me dead, and in the carnage that unfolds, you and Devin can take your vengeance. It will be a final purge. Every traitorous bastard will reveal themselves, and you can gut them in their sleep.”
“There isn’t time for that, they’ve already mutilated her once,” I say, taking a step forward, and the guards shift their weight just a little. I ignore them, my eyes locked on Konstantine. “They are not bureaucrats. They are butchers. It will not take much for them to lose patience and carve my baby right out of her womb and sendthatto me next. Your brother’s corpse will be cold by the time their package arrives.”
He looks away from me, towards the laughing cherubs on the fountain. “What is your alternative, Antonio? You will not kill me. You are too pragmatic to die for such a gesture.”
“I will consider your plan,” I lie. The words are ash in my mouth. Considering it is all I can offer him to get me out of this garden, out from under the gaze of his guards.
I need to move.
I need to think.
“Do not consider for long, Antonio,” he says, dismissing me with a wave of his hand. “The Esau’s patience, as you note, is finite. And so is mine.”
I do not consider his plan. Instead, I rage against the confines of it, against the cage of loyalty and duty I have built around myself my entire fucking life. The Brethren has been my meaning, my purpose, just as it was my father before me and his father before that. We are not just Lords, we are Guardians, holy fucking custodians of the Order chosen by God himself.
But now my god is a pregnant woman held by monsters worse than even myself, and my prayer is a vow of annihilation. Konstantine, the Esau, the entire bloody history of this war, they are all just obstacles between me and what is mine.
And it’s clear that I have to kill him.
I have no other choice.
The incense fills the air in a blue-grey haze, coiling up through the cavernous vault of the cathedral. Each breath I draw is thick with myrrh and sandalwood. It’s a cloying sweetness that coats my throat and sits heavy in my lungs.
It’s the scent of sanctity, of ancient rites and tonight, of a profound and terrible blasphemy.
One of which I am the sole architect.
A hundred Brethren Lords, maybe more flank the nave in two silent, shimmering rows. Their robes are of the finest velvet and silk, embroidered with thread-of-gold sigils that gleam in the flickering light of a thousand beeswax candles. Their masks are works of art: polished silver etched with leering demons, gilded faces carved into the serene image of saints. They are a pantheon of monsters and martyrs, and I am one of them.
