Vespertine (Vespertine #1)(91)

As I stood gazing at the wheel, a chill crept over me. I had an eerie premonition of spirits swarming the countryside unchecked with only antiques left to battle them. Of the pipe organ’s ancient, groaning bulk dragged beneath the sky for the first time since the War of Martyrs, dusted off like the harrow, turned to as a last resort. That could be Loraille’s fate if I failed.

We made it the remainder of the way to the living quarters without incident, except once when I had to hide to avoid the sacristan. I watched him go past through the crack behind a door, muttering endearments to the raven on his shoulder, its loud croaks and warbles a counterpoint to the quiet scuff of his velvet slippers. The candles flared to life at his approach and snuffed out one by one after he had gone.

The clerics dwelled in private chambers in a wing of the cathedral that reminded me of a dormitory, though vastly better appointed. I found a lantern and used its light to peer inside the doors I found ajar, discovering that some were full apartments with their own sitting rooms and garderobes. The revenant directed me past them and down a few more halls, where the surroundings grew noticeably plainer. When it guided me to Leander’s room, at first I thought it had made a mistake.

Like most of the other chambers, the door wasn’t locked. I found myself in a plain cell with a single bed and a tiny latticed window, bare of decoration except for a small painted icon hanging on the wall above the writing desk—Saint Theodosia, the patron saint of Chantclere. The room looked unused, the wardrobe shut, the bed neatly made.

I looked around, frowning. “Are you sure?”

“It might not belong to him, but he’s certainly sleeping here. The stench is unmistakable.”

Skeptically, I set down the lantern and opened the wardrobe. Leander’s clothes hung within: two sets of severe black travel robes and an empty space for his full regalia. There weren’t any signs to suggest that he shared the room with another priest or priestess, a friend or lover he visited from his own more lavish quarters. The room belonged to him and him alone.

As a confessor, he should have had his pick of any apartment he wanted. He wouldn’t have been forced to take this room. For whatever reason, he lived here by choice.

Thrown off-balance by that idea, I searched his robes, which looked oddly lonely hanging amid the unused space inside the wardrobe. I found nothing, but once accidentally stuck my finger through a rent in the cloth whose placement matched the wound he had received from one of the traps in the sacred chambers. Judging by its size, he had been injured more badly than I had thought. Afterward, I fruitlessly checked the drawer at the bottom of the wardrobe, which contained his smallclothes, undershirts, stockings, and a pair of black leather gloves. On the revenant’s advice, I felt across the drawer’s underside. Still nothing.

We searched beneath the mattress, under the desk, behind the icon of Saint Theodosia. We paced the room for loose floorboards. I was starting to wonder if he hadn’t kept the page—if he had tossed it down a well or burned it—when the toe of my boot struck something that went sliding under the bed.

Bending to retrieve it, I discovered that it was a slim, ordinary prayer book. I turned it upside down and shook it, but nothing fell out. Rifling through its pages likewise yielded nothing. It contained columns of common prayers, its margins crammed with notes written in a precise, angular hand that I guessed belonged to Leander. The only other writing belonged to a dedication inside the cover: Study hard. I’ll see you soon. —G. Frustrated, I sat down on the bed.

But the revenant seemed interested. It urged, “Take another look at those notes. The ones near the end.”

Of course. Back home, novices had passed notes to each other during lessons by writing inside prayer books and swapping them around when the sisters weren’t looking. Scanning the pages, my eyes caught on a particular phrase.

Leander had written, A. of N.—not possessed? Deceived by R.? What does it want? Biding its time? No mass murder thus far.

“Not for lack of enthusiasm,” said the revenant, at the same time I realized the “R” stood for either “revenant” or “Rathanael.” Given Leander’s status, not to mention the research he had been doing, it wasn’t surprising that he knew the revenants’ names and which one was bound to Saint Eugenia’s relic. Still, the idea made me uneasy.

The next several lines of notes were crossed out too thoroughly to be legible; the revenant emitted a flicker of irritation. Then they continued in an unsteady hand, the ink blotted: A. not deceived—willing ally? Underlined, In control?

That was where the writing ending. A bloody thumbprint marked the bottom of the page. He must have scribbled those final notes today after our encounter in the catacombs. I sat looking at the thumbprint for a moment, imagining Leander stumbling into the room, scrawling those words, the book falling from his fingers to the floor. Unsure what compelled me, I drew back the bed’s neatly made coverlet.

Blood spotted the linens. When I had fought Leander earlier, he had already been wounded, perhaps seriously. He couldn’t have gone to a healer without drawing attention, so he must have treated the injury himself, alone. Concealed the evidence beneath his spotless robes, his carefully made-up bed. Hidden it from everyone but me.

His voice echoed in my mind: You know about the altar. The dark thoughts circled. I couldn’t put them off any longer.

“There’s something I want to know,” I said. “How did Saint Agnes die trying to bind Sarathiel if the altar destroyed it instead?”