Cardinal Sin I: Six Little Lambs

The Twelfth Day of the Second Moon, 873 AD.

Athio, Aegan Hills, Western Dathan.

The stones clacked beneath his cane as he stalked the streets of his city. Athio, the Sleeping City, was his to command. So it had been for two years, and if he was lucky this way it would remain for twenty years more. Athio. Athio. A smile came to his face. What a beautiful city. He'd lived here before he took control of the city, half his life all told. Not even once had he ever been anything less than surprised at the beauty that greeted him when he stepped outside. Ancient cathedrals and church spires dotted the cityscape, imposing monastic covens and secret meeting places for those men of faith who preferred their meetings to have a more... covert aspect. But even these buildings were far from austere, beautiful gothic carvings adorning their walls.

Most of the city was like this. Great and intimidating statues lined the streets, carved images of saints, of battles, of miracles covered the sides of stone buildings, black slate roofs atop grey granite walls painting a picture of intimidation and almost otherworldly fervour. Every city in what had once been the Republic of Aegos had taken on a far more religious aesthetic since the civil war that had seen the Arch-Cardinal and his Cardinals ascendent, but none of his colleagues had created a place of such beauty like he had. What could propaganda posters and shrines do in comparison to such dark and majestic architecture?

There was no need for pyres upon which to burn dissidents. What need had he for such primitive means of execution when the fear he could inspire through simply making people disappear could render an entire populous servile? He was an artist of crowd control, a sculptor of human fears. Everything about him, his clothes, his mannerisms, the cane of sloe wood he carried with him, the pallor of his skin, everything was dedicated to maintaining an image of otherworldliness. Even his colleagues thought him to take his duties too far; Cardinals Admeta and Trios viewed him with thinly veiled disdain, and his old friend Cardinal Spyridon had withdrawn much of the gestures that had drawn the two of them together over the years. Adikos saw him differently though. To the Arch-Cardinal, he was a blunt tool to show to his foes, a promise of violence and of bloodshed to those who crossed the Most Devout Church of Aegos.

None of them are correct, he thought to himself as he stalked with purpose through the empty avenues of Athio. He didn't know exactly what he was, and had never really understood how he should view himself, but he did know he wasn't the zealot he pretended to be. If he was blessed by the Saints, then why did he sequester himself away from the light of day and walk the streets of his city at night? The curfew he had put in place served both to make unrest more manageable and to reinforce the image that he was no mortal man, but some monster born of faith and malice. He would work through the day in his keep, and when the hours of the day had passed and the fearful citizenry had bolted shut their doors, he would make his journey to the cathedral at the heart of his city. Sometimes people would catch glimpses of him in the night, but those people were quick to retreat from their windows and hide themselves away, praying that they would not hear the sound of a demure knock at the door in the dead of night. Even his own guards patrolling the streets of the city at night to make sure no-one broke curfew did their best to keep a wide berth from him, crossing streets as he approached and pressing themselves against alley walls to gain a precious few more centimetres away from the creature of the night that they saw him as. Good. So long as the people remained too frightened to leave their homes at night, and the guards to fearful to even dream of questioning his actions, then the image he had conjured up was working. Word would trickle to the other cardinals, and Arch-Cardinal Adikos himself, and all would continue to see him as a gothic lord of death in a city that would never wake.

The truth was a rather different matter, of course. He wasn't sure how much longer he could spend doing this. He was so tired all the time, the price he paid for working through the day and living his second life at night. He arrived at the cathedral, the huge oak doors engraved with the images of saints swinging open with a great resounding 'boom', his black velvet cape swaying in the breeze that the movement created.

"Well, let us see what we have for me tonight, shall we? Come now, little lambs. Your saviour stands before you."

He took an exaggerated, mocking bow as his eyes swept over the six terrified figures in front of him. Two wore pendants of the Old-Church, a few the makeshift bracelets and jewellery of the Agiathos Epithymounterus, and one man that seemed, unless his eyes were mistaken, to be a priest of the Cult of Aenethar. How the hell that one had slipped through his fingers for so long was truly a mystery to him. Ah well. He'd rectify that tonight. There were only so many religious non-conformists in the city, after all, and every group he got out was one more group moved further from persecution, towards safety.

His movements and the theatrical inflection he put into his voice were certainly unneeded, since he was no angel of death nor a zealot of Adikos, but he couldn't help himself. Being able to act like some creature of myth was about the only fun he was able to have in his job. Cardinal Spyridon had once referred to him as 'extra' through tears of laughter when the two of them were younger, and that particular label hadn't gone anywhere. He couldn't even remember why he'd been called that, he must have made some spectacular and over-the-top entrance to announce his presence at an event that really didn't require it. Yeah, that sounds like me.

"Now, you do seem to be a fright-filled bunch, don't you? Come now, you needn't fear me. Confess your desires to me. Confess your darkness to Cardinal Sin."

Several people shuffled back a little, but a few remained frozen to the spot. One in particular, a boy just on the cusp of manhood and wearing an eight-coiled pendant, caught his eye.

"You, little lamb. What is your greatest desire?"

The boy's mouth opened and closed a few times as he tried to formulate an answer. When one was not forthcoming Sin tapped the butt of his cane against the tiled floors of the cathedral. It was a truly magnificent building, possibly the single greatest building in the city. Dark grey stone lined the walls in the forms of a dozen carved masterpieces, hooded saints forgotten by time and all who lived today immortalised in guise of a faceless, hooded statue, a book in one hand and censure in the other. Another such hooded saint carried a sword and a torch, another held a brazier behind them with one hand whilst the other remained outstretched in a gesture of warning, a gesture to that told you to stop, to halt. The no matter what was in their hands or by their base, the statues all faced north. It was as though they were warning against some unseen threat from that direction, some terrible threat that even the saints had once feared. Sin scoffed to himself. Really, where was he allowing his mind to run? They were statues, carved by human hands and immovable as any other statue or gargoyle he had seen. The entire inside of the cathedral was a work of grim art, an extension of the artist's soul that did not dominate the inside of the building, but rather seemed to have a symbiotic relationship with the cathedral itself. He kicked himself to cease his dramatics and return to his work. These people were relying on him now even if they didn't know it, and he enjoyed toying with them. Still, he had work to do, and that began with preparing them to leave the city.

"To live, Father."

The boy's voice was a quiet thing, but there was a level of certainty in the voice that Sin rarely heard from the lost few that ended up here anymore. Quiet it may have been, but it snapped him from his thoughts nonetheless.

"Good. A solid wish, a good wish. Life is a precious thing, is it not?"

Someone else broke in, a man approaching his forties if Sin got his measure right.

"Oh, we'll live alright. I've heard what you do with the people you catch. We'll live for a long time, but by the end of it we'll wish we hadn't."

Sin raised an eyebrow at the man, gesturing for him to continue with a flourish of his cape. Heh. Extra.

"And why may that be, little sheep?"

"Torture." The man spat out. "You'll have us taken back to your keep, and we'll never be seen nor heard from again. You'll garner all you can from us with all the sick shit you keep beneath the keep, then we'll be thrown in cells far below the city and left to rot."

Sin snorted. People's rumours had certainly gotten more imaginative than they had the last time he'd heard any. Before it was just-

"No, it's not below the keep! There's a hidden chamber you can reach through one of these statues to lead below the ground. There's a torture chamber down there, far below the pulpit and the pews. That's why the guards herded us into this cathedral. That's why we're all here."

Yep, that was the rumour he remembered. 'Torture chambers beneath the cathedral'. Honestly, he had to wonder how people came up with this stuff. It wasn't like he was exactly one for such methods anyway; torture was so dull. He hadn't the patience to waste hours tormenting someone who likely knew nothing that he didn't already know! If he really was the butcher people thought him to be, he'd simply order the non-conformists purged by spear and quarrel. No sense on such inefficiencies. A gust of wind from a window blew his cape around him, half-obscuring his face. Okay, maybe he wasn't overly worried about inefficiency. He was, at the end of the day, an actor, and he could never bring himself to act pleased as people were kept in pain on his command.

"Nope!" He said, popping the p.

"No?"

"Nope! You're both wrong! I get bored far too quickly to spend ages torturing someone. Besides, I'm here to get you out of the city. You're a motley group of minor sects and cults, and that's what I'm trying to preserve out by the coast. There's a village out there. They can help you."

"You... know of our faiths?"

Sin laughed.

"Of course I do! You think the icons you're wearing are inconspicuous? Come on! No-one would have looked twice at the pendants and jewellery you wear back before the republic fell, but I don't know if you've noticed, everyone's insistence on wearing a fucking sign of their faith had made it quite easy to tell one sect from another. Believe me, people are looking, and they've noticed. If you were in any other city in the theocracy, you'd be dead by now. The fact you haven't been strung up from rafters or flung off bridges should tell you that I'm not interested in killing you."

He allowed the silence to stretch out a few beats when he finished. He hoped they took his word as truth, cause if they didn't then his job was about to get a hell of a lot harder. He liked the pendants and jewellery, in all honesty. Even when he'd been a child destined for the church, he'd always been fascinated by how the other sects operated, by the vibrancy of Athio's religious makeup. By the time he was fourteen he had already converted to another of the sects in secret, remaining as a priest of the New-Church despite his soul following another. For years that seemed to be fine. The church wasn't really worried what its members did in the privacy of their own homes so long as they showed reverence and obedience in public, and there were priests that Sin knew to have committed far worse crimes than simply worshipping another branch of the faith.

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That had ended with Adikos' declaration to the senate in the heart of Aegos that he had been chosen to purge corruption from the heart of the republic, and that a new golden age for the faithful would come around with the death of the old ways. Sin had been right there, watching with wide-eyed idealism as his Cardinal, his hero, tore down the great edifice to corruption that had once been the senate. Sin had worked hard to climb the ranks in record time to stand by the now Arch-Cardinal's side, genuinely believing that, despite the fact that Adikos was the head of the New-Church, he would bring about a new age for all the followers of that hanged martyr, the First Saint. His dream of the church truly bringing about a new age for the people of the hills of Aegos were so close to being realised! But of course, by that point, the dream had already died. Sin had not noticed it then, but looking back now it seemed painfully obvious that any chance for a better life had wilted even as Adikos delivered his proclamation to the senate. If only Sin could have seen then what he saw now. He would never have fought for such a monster.

"So you're going to help us?"

The voice of the young lamb rang out again, this time edged with something dangerously close to hope. Sin did his best to give a cocky smile.

"So long as you aren't a member of the Church of Bloodied Purity, sure. Anyone a slave-driver here?"

The assembled six all shook their heads, some with a great deal of venom in their eyes at the very idea of forcing men into chattel.

"Good! Fuck those pricks. Now, you all want to survive, right? Listen to what I tell you, and do what I say. If the Saints are good, you'll be out of the city by dawn."

"I don't understand."

"Hm?" He turned to face the young man once more. "What don't you understand?"

The boy looked up at him, a mix of emotions swirling in his eyes.

"Why are you helping us?"

Sin smiled, this time a sincere and true thing, and pulled his necklace up to clutch it in one hand. He showed it to the scared and confused faces in front of him before gently raising the pendant to his face and pressing it against his lips, suppressing a shudder as the cold metal made contact with his skin. It was a beautiful pendant of solid silver, more entrancing than any other he had seen; eight times did the rope coil about a spear, the shaft of which passed through the noose and ended with the spearhead peeking through the top alongside a length of straight rope. The Ichorian Cult did not have a large body of worship in Dathan, that much was true, for it was a cult centred around a Klironomean king, and Sin was no Klironomean, visibly confusing one or two of the people in front of him. Despite how strange it may have seemed for one such as himself to worship a long-dead foreign king however, he felt it more strange that people seemed to forget that yes, whilst Harald the Second had been a King of the Klironomeans, the kingdom he ruled had once encompassed the hills of Aegos as well. The ancestors who had reigned before the boy-king had all been renowned strategists and conquerors, after all. Sin was almost certain that he had some remnant blood from the soldiers of their armies running through his veins.

"So... you're a Harald worshipper?"

Sin smirked, pressing a finger to his lips.

"Hush now, little sheep. It would not do to spread such rumours. I am the Cardinal of the Sleeping City, after all. Such rumours could be particularly dangerous to spread, would you not agree?"

The young man, barely out of childhood, retreated a few steps as Sin came closer, nodding fearfully. A man to the side snarled at him in response. A very bold one indeed, to try and appear threatening to one so steeped in rumour as Sin was.

"And the fact that you're a member of one of the minor cults is supposed to make us forget the people you've killed? The members of your brother-faiths that have disappeared because of you?"

Sin smiled wider, a ravenous thing barely held at bay by his conscious mind. You could kill all of them, that voice in his head beckoned him in a saccharine tone. It wouldn't take long. It's what they expect of you as well. But no. He was better than that. He was no longer Adikos' rabid dog like he had been in the civil war, beating back the armies of General Thrax. He had far more important work to do now.

"Killed? I've never killed anyone, save on the battlefield. Disappeared? Now that's a different story. It is true, a great many heretics have disappeared under my auspices. You will as well by the end of the night."

A few of them looked at him with confusion, a few still with fear. None spoke. Sin rolled his eyes and continued talking.

"There's a village due west of Athio, and a carriage that will take you there near a postern gate. Come with me to the vestry and put on the scarlet robes. If you look like monks of the Most Devout, keep your heads down, your mouths shut, and walk in two parallel lines like monks of the church do, then no-one should question me escorting you there. None of the guards with to be around me when the hour of the raven draws near."

A trembling voice spoke up, whispering out a question.

"Are you sure we can make such a journey?"

Sin cackled, finding the question genuinely funny. These people were terrified of him, and yet as of right now they could only trust him or die.

"Little lamb, I've made this journey nearly every night for the last sixteen moons. Not once have any of the guards done any more than query my identity, and those that did immediately shit themselves and backtrack once they realise who they're speaking to. None of them will give you any trouble. The driver is a good man, so treat him well. He'll take you to your destination, but what you do from their is your own choice. There are small communities that will accept you on the Isles of Aercad just across the water, or you could pay for passage upriver until you reach the city of Methoy and the lands of Imperator Thrax. I don't really care. Either way, you'll be alive and safe. That's as much as I can offer. Now get yourselves dressed in your garments. We'll be leaving in less than an hour."

He sighed and moved to lounge on one of the pews as the six people moved to follow his instructions. Saints, he was bored. Hopefully he would remain bored for the rest of the night, after all, the only excitement he got nowadays was when something went wrong. He just needed to wait until things started to collapse, and then he could turn tail and revolt against his erstwhile master. He just needed to wait a little longer.

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"You all remember what I told you? Keep yourselves quiet and your movements steady. This'll all be over soon. Let's go."

Without waiting for an answer he turned and strode out of the cathedral doors, the six little lambs now in the scarlet robes of the Monastic Order of Saint Khidon, and began the walk to the western gate of the city. There was little to encounter on the way save the occasional patrol of a pair of guards, and none of them were all that keen on getting in his way. Good. He may spend his nights saving whoever he could, but his men didn't know that. All they knew was that he would send out members of a monastic order nearly every night from the western gate, and that if they wanted to keep their livelihoods they weren't to bother him. Very few had challenged that ruling so far, and Sin allowed his eyes to follow a pair of guards ahead. The six little lambs were nervous, Sin could feel their anxieties radiating off of them like smoke from a fire, but they maintained their positions at a gesture as he flicked one of his wrists behind his back. He was more than a little satisfied when not only did the sheep stay close, but one of the guards pulled on the sleeve of the other, who shot a fearful glance towards him. The two guards moved swiftly out of the way of their little party, saluting with pale faces and trembling hands as he nodded at them. Oh, it was good to play the villain sometimes.

"Who goes there!"

The voice rang out from the gatehouse, young and inexperienced.

"What do we do?" One of the lambs behind him whispered. "Have we been found out?"

Sin rolled his eyes and turned to them, motioning for them to be quiet and keep following in rank. The six were all varying degrees of apprehensive, but he didn't blame them for that. Instead of answering the guard he simply continued walking towards the gatehouse, retinue in tow.

"I said who goes there! Identify yourself!"

The young guard raised his spear, and Sin just smiled a predatory smile at him. The guard kicked the sleeping figure opposite, an older and more experienced guard by the looks of him. The man groggily came to and looked around at what was going on.

"We've got company, Korax!"

The older of the two guards, Korax apparently, took one look at his partner's raised spear and another at Sin, and immediately blanched. His mouth opened and closed in horror a few times before he eventually tugged none-too-harshly on the arms of his compatriot, hissing a thousand curses under his breath at the younger man.

"That's the Cardinal you bloody fool! Put that fucking stick down before you get us both killed!"

The young man whipped his neck around to look at the other guard, fear plastered on his face, before turning back to the small group at the sound of the clack, clack, clack, as Sin's cane tapped against the cobbles.

"Father, Cardinal, I mean, I apologise, I did not realise-"

He raised his hand at the man's ramblings not at all caring for his excuses or reasons. At the moment he just needed the young fool out of the way.

"Peace, my child. You were merely overzealous in attempting to perform your job. Very lucky for you that your friend here was able to warn you of your mistake, was it not?"

The young man nodded fervently, looking moments away from grovelling in the dirt.

"Yes, Cardinal. I am sorry."

Sin nodded.

"Good. You are dismissed for the night, both of you. See yourself to your barracks and pray that you may not make similar lapses in judgement in the future. Dismissed."

The two guards left, pale-faced, and Sin ushered the others through the gate where a carriage was waiting. As the little sheep entered the carriage the young man turned to him and gave him a shy smile.

"Thank you, Father."

He smiled at them, nodding once.

"Off with you, little sheep. This nightmare will be over soon, and the diaspora will then return. Of that you have my word and my assurances. Now go, and be far from here as the sun begins to rise. Saints bless your journey."

"Yours as well, my Cardinal."

And with that the little carriage trundled along the road, its six occupants headed west, west towards safety and refuge.

Sin watched the carriage roll out of view, then sighed to himself. It was time to return to his keep. He'd dallied too long here already, and having his people see him in the light would only serve to harm the image he'd cultivated around himself. Besides, he was an ungodly level of tired. It was time to walk home and try to snag a few hours of rest before the new day began.

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He stalked back to his chambers with pride and purpose, a smirk on his face. Servants shied away from his eyes as he walked past, and a serving-girl gasped as he looked at her, clutching the empty round tray she'd been carrying to her chest as though it could be used as a shield. Once he eventually reached his private chambers and the door had slammed shut behind him, he slumped. Saints, he was tired. So fucking tired. The sun was just beginning to rise on the horizon, and if he was lucky he might be able to snag a few hours of rest before the work of the day had to begin. The inside of his room was just as gothic as the city outside, queer statuettes and pagan symbols appropriated as iconography by the church plastering the walls and ceiling. He moved to kneel for a moment before a statue of Agia Harald, muttering a prayer that he might be blessed with fortitude and endurance, a prayer that he might find the strength to continue leading his dual life and saving his people for just one more day. It was a prayer he knew by rote at this point; he'd called upon the reincarnation of the First Saint for the same thing every night for the last sixteen moons. What more could he do than what he already was doing? He didn't know, and his lord had not revealed anything else to him, so he simply carried on doing what he had been doing, night in and night out. So long as he could save just one more person, this would all be worth it. After he'd saved that one, he'd try for just one more again. The same after that, and after that, and again and again and again. So long as he could protect those under his purview, he would be content. True rest could wait until this whole damnable theocracy had collapsed.

Sin was a member of the church, yes, and had been for most of his life, but that did not mean he was supportive of how his superior had overthrown the republic, not anymore. He had not worked his way through the baffling ranks of the church's hierarchy to burn and kill. He'd entered the church so that he might learn to live with the voices that commanded him to commit heinous acts, to silence them, and to help others afflicted with the same disease of the mind. He had not entered the church to kill these people. He hated it. He hated what the church had become in this part of the world, and he hated the amount of work he had to do to pretend he was helping prop it up. Saints, what work!

At just the thought of the paperwork and administrative duties that would soon form stacks upon his desk he wanted to bury his head into a pillow and scream, but he didn't. He was Cardinal Sin, and Cardinal Sin did not scream. Cardinal Sin worked as was expected of him, and rested when he could. As such he removed his outfit, changed into a far more comfortable set of smallclothes, and lay down on his bed.

The weight of the world sometimes felt like it was resting upon his shoulders, the fact that he had to appear as a monster to the world so that his colleagues did not suspect his true faith whilst also trying to get as many religious non-conformists out of the beauteous edifice that Athio had become was a drain on his stamina, his energy, and by all the hells he was tired of it all. He may have been a despot to the outside world, a butcher to the rest of Aegos, and a creature of darkness to those who he reigned over, but right now, lying in bed with his bloodshot eyes screwed shut, he felt like a child waiting for someone to come and help him out of the mess he was in. These people were relying on him. So many people's lives hung by a thread, and Sin was under no illusions that his actions were reliant on the shakiest of foundations, the most unreliable and volatile conditions. All it would take was one of his colleagues to ignore the rumours that surrounded him, the fear that he inspired, and look closely at happenings in Athio, and he'd be done. It would all be finished. It was a miracle no-one had begun asking questions already. There were so many people relying on him for this, so many lives to preserve, but he was one man. He couldn't save everyone, but he could save some. That had to be worth something. It wasn't enough, it would never be enough, but it was something.

That night he dreamed of a dim flame, and a candle burning at both ends.