Chapter 16

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On a ten-point scale of failure, Celesta rated last night a nine. If she'd anticipated the consequences of trying to brainwash the fanatics, she'd have given up on the problem in a heartbeat. Her rational worldview, shaken a good deal over the past year, had made her forget just how real the supernatural forces were here. That was entirely her fault. It's a pity, but the past cannot be changed - all that remains is to find a way to correct the stupidity that has been committed. And henceforth to be more critical in assessing the ideas arising in the subconscious.

The first item on the loss column was the death of all Morvanites. Of course, sooner or later they would have to be disposed of, but at this particular moment, the disappearance of their most loyal adherents was a great hindrance to the rebels. Celesta had counted on the cultists for help in building the inn, had hoped to use them for some operations in Pit - the plans were in their infancy and would now have to be abandoned entirely - and simply valued a convenient, free, and loyal source of food. Where to get a replacement for them was unclear. Only a madman could trust the alcoholics from the wasteland, it was irrational to create a new cult from scratch, and it would take a long time to gather desperate loners like Varek. She was going to have an assistant spy for the latter, but after last night she had no suitable candidates left.

Much more unnerving was the attention to the incident on the part of the authorities. It was as if Hustin had foreseen, saying that the palace mages would sense a surge of power. When the next night the undead arrived at the site of the ritual, they found the palace guard in full force. The duke's elite warriors cordoned off the block and systematically searched it, and they didn't miss the sewers. It is not known whether or not they have discovered the hall, which had been turned into a temple, but if they haven't, it won't stay hidden for long. When the investigators see the bodies of the Morvanites, they will immediately have confirmation of the magicians' words. What do they know now and what will they know later? A sect of Dark God worshippers successfully existed in a city seemingly cleansed to the ground by the efforts of the spiders. Yesterday, on a day dedicated to their Lord, the Morvanites had performed a failed ritual that had ended in the deaths of the sect's rank and file. The investigators couldn't find the priests' bodies, so they'd consider the leader a survivor.

They don't know what ritual it was yet. Maybe it was the first, maybe not...

If Celesta had been a security guard, she would have taken it as a spit in the face. In a territory that they thought was completely under their control, and indeed it is, they suddenly find an active group of people successfully practicing magic. All right, even if not successfully, they definitely possess some knowledge. And the sect is skillfully concealed, otherwise, it would have long fallen into the field of view of the relevant services. The Duke, to put it mildly, will be dissatisfied with the actions of his subordinates, who have allowed as many as two failures in a matter of two days: the murder of the underling of one of his favorites and the appearance of an unknown factor in political life. The local intriguers take any magical exertions more than seriously, and they have their reasons. Especially after a catastrophe where the tiniest crumbs of working spells are literally worth their weight in gold. More precious than gold: the bulk of the population is absolutely certain of magic's disappearance. So do most of the undead.

The only way to deflect the superiors' wrath is to present the perpetrators of both events to their illustrious eyes as soon as possible.

Having searched her memory and imagining herself in the place of the investigators, Celesta decided that the first thing the spiders would try to do would be to identify the dead. Faces of the fanatics were preserved, the artist in the security service was for sure, so it would take about twenty-four hours to find out the names. Another day would be spent on checking possible connections, questioning acquaintances and friends, and unsuccessfully trying to identify other cult members in their social circles. At the same time, they would comb Osilti's home for evidence for a second time and question neighbors to see if they had seen anything suspicious. Hustin set fire to the house, the fire should destroy all traces, but if something was left? Or is there an attentive sufferer suffering from insomnia? Good questions.

What else will they do... They'll pick up all the rumors and gossip, shake down the agents looking for any leads. They hadn't paid attention to reports of ghouls operating in Talea before, but now they'll pick up the thread and start pulling it out. First, they'll go out to the homeless people in the vacant lot and beat the information out of them, which would take... an hour. Two hours, given the sluggishness of the bureaucracy. So, henceforth it must be assumed that one must not show his face among the homeless: there would be an ambush waiting for him. Most likely, the other agents would be found out very soon. It is comforting that the girls recruited quite a lot of informants, all of whom acted autonomously, reporting only to the ghouls, and did not suspect the existence of each other. The investigation will not be able to catch all of them: at least a couple of them will be at large. We should warn them to lay low, then the losses would be minimized.

That leaves Fakasius. He knows an incredible amount about Celesta, and not only about her. If the guards nailed him, he'd give up his partners to the bad guys in exchange for his skin. But if they don't press him too hard, he'll keep quiet, again out of self-interest - the ghouls will also have something to say about his affairs. Let's hope Holiness does not keep snitches among his inner circle.

As disgusting as it is, they must leave. Avoid the familiar neighborhoods and temporarily relocate to the local slums. Probably escape to Pit for a week and a half. I would ask Hastin's relatives to stay on as a reserve, the last chance. Get Varek on the line and get him to start building immediately. No matter how events turn in the future, it is obvious that the former methods of hunting will become known and they will have to be abandoned. So today Celesta would give him half the money she had, nearly five hundred dinars - the funds she considered the only positive outcome of the whole operation - and order him to hire laborers. The money would be more than enough.

But time is running out.

"Hastin!" Having made a decision, she acted immediately. "Go to your family - explain what our situation is. On the way, stop by Varek and give him the money, telling him to start immediately. If there's a problem, tell him to go to Holiness, and I'll coordinate with him today. If you make it, come to the shelter under the third pier for the day, if not, sleep at your place. Medea, you carry the agents. You round up the most valuable and tell them to lay low: we're leaving town before the Great Hunt begins. We'll be back when it's over."

"Leaving Talea?" Medea repeated in amazement.

The undead gathered in one of the sewer passages to discuss their plans. More precisely, to listen to Celesta and get instructions from her. The other two had not yet realized how complicated their relatively peaceful existence had become and hoped for the best.

"That's what they must think. Be careful: informers may be followed. So if you think, even a shadow of suspicion, that there's an ambush nearby, run immediately. Well, I've got Fakasius on me."

"Maybe it'll be all right."

"It won't work," Celesta interrupted her friend sharply. "The spiders will shake the city from top to bottom, if we don't lay low, we're dead. We'll have to hunt for sailors in the slums for a while, until the raids pass. That's it, meet me under pier three."

Oddly enough, they made it. Celesta even had time to return home, carefully lock the doors, and grab two bottles of drug concentrate for Fakasius. The sweating crime boss had the good fortune of waking up a second time in the company of a ghoul, and this time the bars in his room were intact: the girl had entered the house through the attic window. His Holiness had already been questioned about Osilti, but he swore that he knew nothing. They'd asked about the ghouls, too, and got the same answer. Celesta was completely satisfied with her business partner's position. She had no doubt: Fakasius would remain silent as long as his fear of the authorities did not outweigh his fear of the undead.

Medea, of course, could not go around everyone, but she left notes in the hiding places she had agreed upon. Trying to communicate with the eighth agent, she noticed some unfamiliar men, suspiciously comfortable around the meeting place, and immediately hid in the shadows. Once again her night vision served her well: the woman was not detected. The guards couldn't possibly track them all down, and no one would allow them to conduct total interrogation. The most talkative ones, like Laskash, would suffer, while the experienced and clever ones would be spared the trouble. In short, the ghouls considered the network of informants torn, but not destroyed, and hoped to create a new one on its basis in time.

Hustin was the first to take care of things, taking on the honorable mission of putting the shelter in order. Only the gods know how long they'd be here, so it was at least worth dusting and making the bedding arrangements. The next night he was joined by Medea, who had brought a couple of blankets with her - she'd slept in a nearby hiding place halfway through the day-sleep had knocked her out - later came the remarkably energetic Celesta. Yesterday she'd talked to Fakasius, and she'd also run through the poor neighborhood, and she'd seen a few of the people who'd been doing the girls some favors. She advised them to watch out for strangers in the neighborhood, and also warned them of a possible raid. As soon as she saw Hustin, a thought that had been tingling in her head lately finally took shape: "Can the school be identified by your signs?"

"What?" The guy didn't understand the question.

"You said you copied the designs on the altar and the victim's body from the ones you spied at Granny's," Celesta explained patiently. "Can an expert tell by the runes which system the caster belongs to?"

"Actually, maybe," Hustin nodded slowly. The Ghoul question made him uneasy, but then, remembering something, he relaxed a bit. "But there was so much blood, I doubt the palace mages could have made any sense of it. The bandit had been stripped completely of his skin, and there was a puddle of it on the floor. Well," the boy was a little embarrassed, "I was a little scared. As soon as I woke up, I erased the circle, and there weren't any signs left."

"You did the right thing. But just in case, warn your father in case they ask about you."

"What's asking? Why?"

"The runes are northern, and there's only one clan of northerners in town. Who do you think they will come to?"

Hustin hurriedly took off, Celesta stopped him: "Calm down, it's not that bad. He reported the disappearance of his youngest son two weeks ago, didn't he? So there shouldn't be any questions about your family. Besides, Tarrasch is a valuable specialist, the head of the whole workshop, they won't interrogate him on the basis of shaky suspicions. But if they do come... They might say you longed for magic, but you were hiding it. Do you understand?"

"Uh-huh. But why?"

"Then the investigators will think that you were lured into some kind of cult, and the family has nothing to do with it."

After Hustings left, Celesta sat down next to Medea, sprawled out on the blankets. She was lying on the floor, poring over the contents of a small box she'd been keeping lately. There she kept cosmetics and all kinds of useful little things that had fallen into her hands by mysterious means. The woman took the next blow of fate with remarkable calmness and after a short mild hysteria actively started to rearrange the nest.

"You don't seem too upset."

"I'm surprised it took them so long to notice us," Medea responded. "We've been in contact with a lot of people, after all. In a way, we could even consider such a spectacular statement about ourselves a success."

"Why is that?" Celeste wondered.

It seems to me that now, before the spring offensive, the spiders are busy. Many new people have joined the army: they need to be checked, evaluated, and at the same time continue to monitor the intrigues of the Duke's cronies. They have no time to check the gossip circulating among the poor. But sooner or later the guards will have urgent business to attend to, or they will simply be interested in too persistent a rumor. Who knows, we might not have to wake up one dreary morning in our cells and find that we have been watched for more than twenty-four hours...

The little ghoul shook her head. She didn't see the situation that way. Though she thought her friend's optimism was farfetched, she didn't want to spoil the mood. She wanted to see the bright side of what had happened, fine. Celesta had something else in mind: "What worries me is the strange rush of strength after the sacrifice."

"Why should it? On the contrary, you should be happy."

"I do not understand its nature and, therefore, cannot predict the consequences."

"I don't see anything unusual about this situation," Medea smiled. "That's how all the undead exists. We're dead, but we keep on living - isn't that strange? Be glad that the Darkness has granted us a reprieve and is not demanding further sacrifices. You don't feel hungry either, do you?"

"It is very weak."

"Exactly. We have time to settle in, to wait out the spiders' attention span, to keep an eye on Varek. In fact, why not visit the Pit?" Medea hesitated but continued. "You know, I.... am still afraid of the priest. I'd like to know for sure that he's dead."

The girls called Carlon the priest. The older one, out of some childish superstition, avoided mentioning his name as if she feared being overheard, Celesta tried not to frighten her friend unnecessarily. When she heard the suggestion, the small undead was frankly surprised: "Are you suggesting we go back to the monastery and kill everyone there?"

"No, no! It's just that one of Hustin's relatives is in the guard. What if you told him about the monastery? He could take soldiers, go there during the day, and slaughter all the ghouls while they sleep soundlessly."

"Even Artak?"

Medea sighed, reluctantly shrugging: "If he meets me, he will kill me. In his eyes, I am a traitor and a heretic."

There was a silence, which was interrupted by Celesta: "The lieutenant is too small a position, he doesn't decide anything. I intended to talk to Richard about it, he has more freedom of maneuver. It is dangerous to contact Tarrasch now, though it is a pity. The idea of dragging the books hidden in the Pit with his help seems more appealing by the day."

"Do you really think that Hastin's family would be suspected?"

"I don't exclude this possibility. We know absolutely nothing about magic and the mages living in the palace, their knowledge, and abilities."

"If I had known what fate the gods had prepared for me before, I would have studied better," the former singer smiled sadly. "But I had always dreamed of singing, not charming. To perform in front of kings, to participate in temple mysteries, to receive invitations to the most famous salons..."

Celesta had already learned that art in this world was strictly regulated into two unequal categories. The first, publicly available, was in the realm of entertainment, a kind of pop music. Musicians gathered gigantic stadiums of fans, received huge royalties, were written about them in newspapers, and shown on television. They did not, however, enjoy influence and were not allowed into "the best houses" except as an exception. Their singing was considered entertainment for the crowd, for the lower classes.

The noble descendants of Firiza the Windy were treated differently. Mages, whose skills were often realized through sound, could both heal and kill with their voice. Their abilities were considered a gift from the gods, and the priests specifically sought out children from among the noble families who, after long training, were allowed to sing religious hymns. Temple singing was truly divine, weaving together the inordinate skill of the performers and the manifestation of the talent of the sorcerers. Making money from it was considered blasphemy, a crime. Therefore, singers like Medea had various restrictions on the demonstration of their art. For example, the number of listeners could not exceed a certain number of people, differently on different days, with servants entering the hall only during breaks. Singers were obliged to keep fasts, lived periodically at the shrines, and could not marry or be married until a certain age. There were other restrictions as well.

The nights passed monotonously as the undead continued to hide in the dungeons. They gave up the idea of walking to Pit. It was unwise to move through an area teeming with troops without a good reason. All the more so since the march had already begun. Except it didn't look like marches in columns of shining armor, but rather the slow trickle of small groups of ten to fifteen men. They explored the ruins, suppressing the weak resistance of local gangs and destroying small monsters, but if they met serious resistance, they rolled back to wait for the main force to arrive.

The scouts were followed by heavily armed regular squads. They finally cleared the land, using a variety of methods - from massive round-ups with dogs to real sieges with the use of heavy equipment. Blacksmiths had built two ballistae a year ago, though they'd never been needed until now. Dens and lairs of mutants were filled with combustible material, poison baits were scattered in the streets - in short, each commander acted in a variety of ways.

On special occasions, the duke's guards came to the aid of ordinary troops. Rumor had it that the surviving sorcerers had become adept at pinpointing the presence of the creatures of darkness, and were even somehow capable of destroying them. In the wake of recent events, Celesta had been paying close attention to such rumors. She had discovered a lovely spot in the sewers that allowed her to eavesdrop on the conversations of visitors to one of the taverns, and she spent most of her time near the cracked brick wall. People rarely talked about mages, almost always in whispers and curses. They also learned that the dastardly murder of his lordship's loyal servant Count Maulvlar had been found and that the criminals had been executed by beheading in the central square of the port. A milestone event: before, the government had punished without theatrical effects.

The undead doesn't care who was sentenced in their place.

Thus, both the security service and the wizards temporarily can not be afraid. They are busy with other things. However, Celesta decided to play it safe and wait until her establishment was finished. Varek worked like the damned man, happy to have an opportunity to escape the pestering poverty, the main repairs finished in just a week. The required papers were drawn up by Fakasius, who received another bottle of concentrate for his labors, all that remained was to finish minor details and hire people. By the way, things were going quite well with the manufacturing of the drug. Hustin remembered Stash's explanations and managed to repeat the process.

Hunting in the slums proved easy. Either Celesta or Medea lured tipsy fishermen into a dark corner, stunned them, ate, and robbed them, mimicking a robbery. This could not last long: the people began to fear the elusive gang, so the ration of ghouls was diluted with long-forgotten rats. Hustin had the hardest time, but after a couple of days of starvation, the guy began to look at sucking the vital juices out of the filthy bodies of the rodents in a completely different way. More pragmatic.

Of the three of them, idleness was the easiest for him to bear. He had the alchemist's legacy to sort out, so Hustin spent most of his time in the primitive laboratory, studying the few remaining literature. Once in port, the ghouls continued to gather whatever books they could, though they had much less success compared to their monastic days. Most people continued to blame the wizards for the catastrophe, and they strenuously destroyed their knowledge, except for sacred texts and innocuous children's books. The authorities, however, were also concerned with the preservation of knowledge: the city archives contained a good selection of materials. It was purely of practical nature - the undead did not see much use in it. In fact, why would a ghoul need to know the subtleties of growing cabbage?

Medea was impatient to return to the familiar neighborhood and find out how the informers who were left unattended were doing. Celesta held her back: "Don't be so hasty. It's not much time passed yet."

"But we have to let people know that we remember them! Otherwise, we risk losing them all! They will move to new places how to find them."

"They're not going anywhere. And in general, we should change the way of working. It's not good that we have to talk to every agent personally: it's troublesome and time-consuming."

"But it reduces the risk of failure."

"Wrong," She began to spell out the obvious truths. "It's enough to expose one informer, and they'll come after us. I don't like feeling under the radar. We need to introduce an intermediate link between the leadership, which is us, and the executors. And the work would be easier."

Medea snapped her fingers: "Like those bandits... Well, you told me!"

"Caporegime".

"That's it."

"Maybe we should call them otherwise," Celesta grinned. "We'll keep an eye on the old informers for a month, make sure they're not being followed, and then we'll start to form a new network. We'll think of something to occupy them. Now they come in, pouring out a lot of information, and we have to fish out of the pile of garbage useful crumbs. It is better to let them earn money - for themselves and their masters!"

"How that?"

"I don't know yet. But I have some ideas."

There were certain ideas. Only now Celesta was thinking mostly about other events. Phenomena, to be precise. She was worried about the changes that had happened to her since the ritual. Her earlier ambivalence was gone, her mood swings and change in her ways of thinking no longer bothered her. She should be glad because she was no longer in danger of suffering from multiple personalities or going insane. But it was embarrassing. She used to know exactly who she was: Andrew, an alien from another world, accidentally trapped in the body of a ghoul and looking for a way to return home. "Celesta" was just a mask, worn for ease of communication, nothing more. Then gradually the mask began to grow as if enveloping the main core. The dead body was independent of hormones, the conventions of human society, and the roles it dictated had no effect on the consciousness of the newly created being. However, memory stubbornly resisted the imposed image, inevitably provoking an internal conflict.

Now the ambivalence is gone.

Feeling herself a kind of sexless homunculus, undead felt a certain embarrassment and a slight sadness. If she'd been attracted to Medea or Hustin, it would have been easier for her to make up her mind. But it was extremely rare for ghouls to feel carnal attraction. Yes, Medea did have sex, already in Talea she sometimes seduced men, but not so much out of love for the process as out of a sense of self-gratification. She liked to seduce, to realize her attractiveness, the woman used her beauty as a weapon. The bed itself, in fact, she did not need. Moreover, she was wary of men, remembering the last days of her life.

Celesta attributed the change to the recent ritual and the sensations she had experienced. The touch of the demons had changed her mind. She wondered if the messenger of Darkness had left something else behind. Other gifts would manifest themselves at some unknown moment. So she carefully monitored herself, her behavior, looking for atypical reactions and with fear and hope not to notice the emergence of strangeness. The best way out of the situation of uncertainty would be to talk to an expert, but the two priests she knew who could give advice were not fit for the role of confessor. Carlon would kill her without talking - Garresh was serving a hostile force. There were still palace mages, but Celesta had no idea how to reach them.

There were only books and experiments of her own, the thought of which sent shivers down her spine. No, she should know as much as possible about the undead forces that spawned them, but she had to act with the utmost caution and rely on at least some basis. Otherwise, the next ritual might end up with much worse results: luck is a fickle thing. So Celesta saw no choice but to wait, to gather information, and to hope that, in time, the ghouls would have a chance to gain the knowledge they needed.

Richard listened to the servant's story, gradually filling up with a tight, hot rage.

"So the noble mister bastard orders me - me! - to take my men away from the stadium?"

"Yes, master," the faithful Borak nodded somberly. "He says he'll finish the cleanup himself."

"Bitch! He wants to get his hands on my booty!"

Richard cursed for about five minutes, kicking everything around in a rage.

"We've torn down the lair slaughtered the strongest monsters, and he comes here and gets it all for nothing?!"

"He is an officer, master..."

"I know it!"

"Yesterday, Zatik of the Sixth Squad was executed for insubordination."

"Shut up!"

Richard needed money. He needed it badly. Very much. Gifts to the staff patrons were expensive, but the benefits were insignificant. He had already been promised a warm position as captain of the second-line fort. The first line, called "Jasper Line," consisted entirely of villages and settlements spread among the duke's loyal vassals. It was the richest and, more importantly, the safest of all, so Dinar's cronies fought tooth and nail to gain a piece of land a day's journey from the city. After the Hunt, there would be no monsters left, except for the most fearsome - humans.

Further ahead were the few remaining fortifications of the Jade Line, which was scheduled to be cleared of mutants by the end of the year so that after the following winter they could begin systematic settlement of the desolate lands. These lands were not highly valued - it was not known how successful the army would be in establishing a foothold here soon. However, the holdings were given in large chunks, and each fort had a couple of villages attached to it. In fact, the fort's captain was given enormous power, making him a small autocratic feudal lord. And the authorities made it clear in advance that the officer's position would be inherited, unless, of course, the new baron failed in his service.

With this approach, no one was surprised by the distribution of posts. Naturally, the Duke's closest entourage got the Jasper lands - those who had originally been waiting out the catastrophe in the palace. Counts Lash, Molvlar, and other minions whose loyalty Dinir had no doubt. The Jade Line went to the retinue of the most powerful vassals and promoted officers - the closer they got to Talea, the more valuable the land was. The fact that Richard had managed to get in was his greatest achievement, and he was absolutely right. After all, usually, junior officers, especially those like him, former gang leaders, were offered places like guardians of the forts of the third, Turquoise Line. And life there was sure to be hard. Constant skirmishes, no opportunity to advance at court and get rich, stupid and spiteful exiled settlers, world-hating jackal soldiers...

The fortifications of the Turquoise Line were not meant to be used against monsters alone. Small towns, once abundantly scattered across the fertile lands of Salvatia, were mostly abandoned after the disaster, their populations either dead or migrating to more livable places like Talea. However, some settlements survived, with strong, strong-willed leaders who united the people around them. Gradually they adapted to the new world, learned to fight hostile creatures and bands of marauders, and organized warrior detachments on the model of feudal vigilantes. Some of the newly minted "rulers" led up to two hundred swordsmen. Of course, it would be foolish to compare the training and arming of these soldiers to even the duke's regular army, but they could do a lot of damage.

"What else does he want?"

"The centurion orders us to clear out some monastery. There are bad rumors about it among the locals, so I brought a hundred arrows with silver-plated tips."

Silver still had a poison-like effect on dark creatures, making it more expensive than gold. Even more expensive than dinirs. Silver-tipped arrows and silver spearheads were handed out for a receipt, and accounting was rigorous, but they were still often "lost". That is why the smiths quickly switched to silvering - it was the only way the army could save valuable metal.

"What monastery?! A nest of monsters again?!" Suddenly it was as if something moved in his memory. "Wait a minute... What monastery did you say? Wasn't it the Judges'?"

"That's right, master," Borak nodded. He turned around and looked around carefully. Only when he was sure they weren't being overheard did he continue in a whisper: "The one the old ghoul was talking about."

"Interesting..." stretched out Richard. "Very interesting."

"That's not a good place, master."

"Every place here is a bad place. Better think what a bitch our noble centurion is. He knows that half of my men are wounded and the other half are exhausted, and he sends me where even ghouls don't dare to go! Well, you bastard, I'll remember everything..."

"So what to do, master?"

"We'll sleep here tonight, we'll rest, get some sleep. We'll go to the monastery tomorrow afternoon, while the bloodsuckers are asleep. We'll slaughter the dead men in their beds!"

"What if there's someone else there?"

"I don't think so, Celeste didn't tell me about anything like that. And we have enough men in armor. No, we'll clear the monastery in no time, and we'll even make a profit-- think of all the valuables the ghouls have dragged up there! Don't worry, Borak, tomorrow will be a good day."

Richard had no doubts about success: he had never met a mutant in his life that would survive a good sword blow. Dead or undead, what the hell difference did it make? That's not what pissed him off. The commander must have known about the big dead colony, the intelligence gave the officers some good maps, but he didn't see fit to warn his subordinate. Did he think Richard could be treated as a common peasant? That a man who had survived a three-year nightmare would allow himself to be ignored, despised with impunity?

Okey.

It's fine.

It's time to put an end to the arrogant bastard.

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