Chapter 81 Antonio
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.
My own mask is borrowed. My robe is a shade too long, and it whispers against the cold stone floor as I shift my weight. Right now, I am a wolf in sanctified, stolen clothing.
And at the centre of it all, moving with an unnerving, deliberate grace, is our Grand Master.
His vestments are a cascade of crimson and cloth-of-gold, a heavy chain of office resting on his shoulders, each link a carved obsidian skull.
He holds his masked head high. A gilded sunburst with slits for eyes, as he processes toward the high altar.
Behind him, a dozen priests chant in low tones, their voices weaving a sonic wall of devotion that seems to press against the very stones.
Underneath their chant, beneath the rustle of silk and the echo of footsteps, another sound loops endlessly in my mind. His voice. Calm, mocking, utterly assured. It’s as if he’s walking beside me, his lips brushing the shell of my ear beneath this damned mask.
‘You will not kill me. You’re too pragmatic.’
The words are a worm, burrowing deep. They are not a plea, but a statement of fact, delivered with the cool finality of a man who has already read the last page of the book. Killing him, he all but assured me would be an act of passion, of ideology, of something I supposedly lack.
He is wrong.
Or he was.
The knife presses against my thigh, hidden in the voluminous sleeve of this robe. Cold, hard, and terribly real. It is the absolute antithesis of pragmatism. This is madness. This is the kind of gamble that unravels empires and gets men flayed alive in public squares.
Yet, here I stand. Because of her.
The necklace around my neck, that mix of her and me, seems to press down on me like a millstone.
The procession reaches the altar, a massive block of white marble veined with blood-red jasper.
The chanting priests part, bowing low. The cathedral falls into a silence so profound I can hear the sputter of individual candles.
Our Grand Master ascends the three shallow steps, his back to the assembled Lords.
He stands before the altar, a colossus and for a long moment, he is impossibly still.
Then with a slow, theatrical turn, he faces us.
His hands rise, gloved in finest kidskin, and lift the gilded sunburst mask from his face. He places it gently on the altar, and he reveals himself.
A collective, shuddering sigh ripples through the chamber.
It is a sound of awe, of reverence bordering on ecstasy.
I know this face. The sharp, intelligent features, the hawk-like nose, the eyes that are the colour of a winter sky and just as unforgiving.
But to the Brethren Lords, it is more than a face.
It is a symbol. It is the face of the man who holds the strings of nations in his fist, who has shaped the course of history from the shadows.
As one, the hundred masked figures drop to their knees, their foreheads touching the cold stone in an act of worship.
I drop with them, the movement automatic. My knees hit the floor with a jarring thud that echoes the frantic beating of my heart. I keep my head bowed, but my eyes are locked on him. On the exposed column of his throat, on the spot where the crimson vestments part over his chest.
Pragmatic.
The word is a taunt. Killing him now, in this sacred space before his most ardent followers, is a suicide mission. It is the single most impractical act of my life.
Every logical thread I’ve ever followed leads away from this moment.
But logic is ash.
And Grace is fire.
I think of her face not as it was in the end, a mask of cold hatred, but as it was in the before that.
The stubborn set of her jaw when she argued with me.
The unexpected softness in her eyes in a rare, unguarded moment, the warmth of her skin under my touch.
A woman who almost certainly still hates me.
A woman for whom I am about to burn my entire world to the ground.
Is this love? Or is it just another, deeper form of insanity?
The priests step back from the altar, melting into the deeper shadows of the apse. This is the moment. The space around him is clear. He stands alone, bathed in a pillar of candlelight, his arms slightly raised, accepting the silent adoration of his flock.
I take one slow breath, drawing the incense-deep air into my lungs.
I hold it.
I let it out.
Then, I move.
I am not a large man, but I am swift and I am trained. The rise from my knees is a single, fluid motion. I do not shout. I do not roar. Silence is my ally. I cover the ten paces between us in a heartbeat, the borrowed robe whipping around my ankles.
The knife is in my hand now, the polished bone handle familiar, a promise fulfilled.
Those cold, knowing eyes find mine. There is no surprise in them. No fear. There is only a flicker of… what? Disappointment? Amusement?
Time dilates as the world narrows to the space between us. I see the intricate embroidery on his stole, the individual grey hairs at his temples. I hear the sharp intake of breath from the Lord closest to me.
Then, the knife finds its home.
I drive it forward with all the strength of my body, all the fury of my broken vows. There is a resistance, a sickening, wet pop as the blade parts fabric, flesh, and gristle, seeking the frantic engine of his life beneath. The sound is obscenely loud in the holy silence.
His body jerks. A small, almost polite sound escapes his lips, a faint ‘oof’ of expelled air. The winter in his eyes clouds with shock, then with a profound, final understanding.
He falls backward, not with a dramatic crash but with a heavy, graceless thud against the base of the white marble altar. The red of his vestments is now a deeper, wetter crimson, spreading like a blooming rose from the hilt of the knife that stands upright in his chest.
For one heartbeat there is utter, deafening silence, as though the world holds its breath.
Then, chaos screams to life.
A woman’s shriek shreds the air, followed by a roar of fury from a hundred throats. The scene erupts. From behind pillars, from shadowed alcoves the guards spring forward, their own masks cast aside. Their eyes are wild, fixed on me - the blasphemer, the assassin.
But just as they surge toward the altar, other figures move. Men who moments before were kneeling in worship now spin, drawing concealed blades of their own.
My unlikely, unnamed allies.
They throw themselves at the guards, and the cathedral floor becomes a butcher’s yard. The chant of priests is replaced by the clash of steel, the guttural cries of combat, and the wet, meaty sounds of blades finding their mark.
A guard lunges at me. I sidestep his wild thrust, grab the arm that holds his sword, and use his momentum to slam him face-first into the corner of the altar.
I feel the crush of bone, see him go limp, but don’t check if he’s dead.
There is no time for mercy, for quarter.
My vow of measured violence is ash, along with everything else. I am a creature of pure instinct now.
I rip a dagger from the belt of a fallen Lord and now I am armed with steel in both hands. I become a whirlwind of survival. Another Lord charges me; I duck under his swing and open his throat with a backward swipe.
The blood is warm on my hands, but I don’t feel it. Another guard falls to a punch-dodge-stab combination so ingrained in me that it feels like breathing. I am a machine built for this, stripped of hesitation, of thought.
All I can think about is her.
It is a mantra, a lighthouse in the storm of my violence.
Each parry is for her, each lethal thrust is for her.
The blood I spill, the sacred peace I have completely and utterly obliterated, and the eternal damnation I have surely earned is all for a woman who almost certainly still fucking hates me.
I fight my way toward the great oak doors of the cathedral in a slow, brutal progression. I am not a hero in a saga; I am a rat in a trap, chewing its own leg off to get free. I use the chaos as my shield, letting the Esau fighters engage the bulk of the guards while I move along the periphery.
I see an Esau man, his mask torn away, take a sword through the gut. As he falls, his eyes meet mine. There is no camaraderie there, only a bleak acknowledgement of a shared, desperate purpose. He bought me two seconds, so I’ll use them.
I reach the immense doors, and they’re barred from the inside by a heavy wooden beam. With a strength born of pure adrenaline, I heave it aside. The sound of it crashing to the stone floor is louder than any death cry.
I wrench one door open. The cold night air hits me after the incense-thick atmosphere of the tomb I’ve just escaped.
I don’t look back.
I plunge on into the darkness of the adjoining alleyway, the sounds of the slaughter fading behind me, replaced by the beating of my own heart and the ragged saw of my breath.
And I run. I run until the muscles in my legs scream and my lungs burn.
It is done. Konstantine is dead. I killed him. I, the pragmatic man, the calculator, the survivor, the fucking Kingmaker has seemingly committed the most gloriously impractical act of rebellion imaginable.
And all for a woman who hates me.