Cardinal Spyridon II: Saint's Fall
The Thirteenth Day of the Eleventh Moon, 873 AD.
Aegan Road, Aegan Hills, Western Dathan.
He rode on through the night, tears born of a dozen emotions stinging his eyes though never falling. Tears born of hurt, of anger, of frustration, all were kept inside. He couldn't afford to slow himself with such petty things as his emotions, not right now. Sin was dead, and Spyridon was still in the dark when it came to just how much his friend had worked on these last few years.
A part of him thought it might be the same as those wonderful few months in which he'd been able to reconnect with his friend, but that thought only made him curl up his lip in distaste. Nothing would be the same, and it was stupid of him to think otherwise. It was a childish and immature part of him that had brought that thought to the surface of his mind, and the rest of him understood the consequences of what had happened perfectly well.
Spyridon hadn't ever been one for politics any more than he had to, what with all the deal-making and backstabbing, but he did know that there would be ramifications for what had occurred in the senate building and, in a more broad sense, what had occurred in Aegos as a whole since the Cardinals had met each other once more. Two of their number were dead, and he was now fleeing south-west. The only Cardinal left in the capital with Adikos was Admeta, and she both wanted Adikos dead and for the Most Devout Church to flourish for an eternity. She was dangerous. Spyridon would be surprised if Adikos survived the next few months, for if there was ever a time for Admeta to strike then it would surely be now.
Let them kill each other, Spyridon thought bitterly, it was the two of them who killed Sin, and they deserve to be sent to all those they've killed for what they've done.
There was a brief moment of self-hatred with the thought that he'd been involved in that same system for a few years as well, but he forced such thoughts away; he had his own set of instructions to follow now, with no room for distractions. He was to travel to Athio and meet the late Sin's batman, a man apparently called 'Hawk', and go from there. He didn't know if there were plans in place for this occurrence happening, nor if Hawk had already heard the bad news, but either way it was Sin's insistence that he go to Athio and so to Athio he would go.
The road itself was much the same as Spyridon remembered it being when he's bumped into Sin whilst travelling to Aegos originally, only of course he was now on horseback instead of in a carriage and was speeding away from the city alone instead of heading towards it with his entourage.
He did hope that the friends he'd left behind in his entourage would be safe in Aegos. He hoped they wouldn't be blamed for what he was going to do.
There was one other minor difference between now and his journey heading to Aegos of course; he was heading straight to Athio instead of taking a shortcut to the coast. Whatever differences the trip itself may have held, the road was still straight and true, and was well maintained to boot. He had little trouble making his way to Athio alone, though even just the sight of the walls gave him pause.
When he'd been here before, Athio was a relatively normal city with some minor hints of a tradition steeped in gothic architecture and art. Now it was an edifice of black majesty, all dark spires and dark-grey walls. Gargoyles perched over battlements, and even the cathedral that sat at the city's heart seemed... foreboding. Dangerous, even. There was an air of stillness about the city, one that seemed entirely out of place given just how many thousands of people lived here. If memory served correctly some sixty-thousand people must have lived in Athio, and the city hadn't been hit that badly by the civil war, so what was it that meant it was so empty? Was this the air of fear that Sin had masterfully cultivated about this place, still maintained as though he were here out of a genuine belief that he was a twisted creature of the night?
Whatever it was, Sin had really turned this city into his own.
As he made his way through the gates, stopping only a moment to bless the bowing guards who let him pass, he marvelled at the macabre art that seemed to completely cover the city, with dark scenes from several of the saintly books carved into walls and displayed in dark colours on stained glass. It was... he wouldn't use the term beautiful personally for he found them to be rather unsettling in all honesty, even though he knew that in truth it was beautiful, but if nothing else then it was just... it was so Sin. It was exactly the sort of thing he would devote himself to when given the chance, and when that chance had presented itself he'd done exactly that.
Thinking on Sin still made his chest hurt a little, but there was no escaping the spectre of his friend in his mind, not now, not when the wound was so fresh and certainly not in the city his friend had loved with all his heart for so long. Sin's life was a contradictory patchwork of beliefs and careers, of skills and talents that should never have even intersected, let alone worked so well together, whereas Spyridon was... well, he was just Spyridon.
Sin had been a fearsome soldier and commander. Spyridon filed away paperwork about harvests. Sin galvanised armies to action with his words. Spyridon delivered alms to sick children and prayed for their health. Sin was made to win wars.
Spyridon, decidedly, was not.
Still, he would have to learn. To learn or to rely on other people, anyhow. There was a war coming, and he needed to step up and do what Sin was now unable to do. He knew that he couldn't hold a candle to the martial prowess of his late friend, but as of right now the people of Aegos didn't really have another option, did they? It was him or Admeta, and of the two of them Spyridon wanted to at least stop burning people and hunting them for the crime of worshipping the same deity in different ways.
The doors to the keep heaved open, and Spyridon allowed himself to let inside. The servant besides him seemed to know exactly where to take him without being told, for without Spyridon even speaking he was being ushered into what could only have been Sin's private chambers where a greying man eyed him up and down with more than a little disdain.
"So, you're Cardinal Spyridon. I was expecting more from you, but then Sin did say you were never one for violence. Are you the one that the saints have graced me with? The one Cardinal who can't fight a war?"
Spyridon turned away a little, face reddening in a mixture of embarrassment and anger. Still, he balled his fists and forced it down. He needed to keep a level head here, not respond to the needling of a man who was quite right in what he was saying, even if he was being rather rude in the way he was saying it.
"I am here to fight for the freedom of the people of Aegos. I am here to fight by your side, even though Sin cannot. I am here to honour the memory of my friend, and to enact his will even though he is gone from this world. I am not here to be insulted by the man who I was told to speak to and to treat as an equal by my friend."
If the flicker of the man's eyebrow was anything to go by then it seemed he at least respected Spyridon a little for standing up for himself. It was a skill he hadn't practiced much in his life, but he'd be lying if he said it didn't feel a little good to do it now.
"That's what I wanted to hear. I don't like you, boy, but I don't have to. You believe in what we're doing, and that's the only thing that matters to me. I don't like you because, though Sin was willing to play daemon's advocate for you, you still killed people for their beliefs. Whether you liked doing it or not, you still did it."
"I know. I want to make up for that now, however I can. If that means playing my own life in harms way then I'll do it."
The man nodded again. He still didn't seem like he was enjoying speaking with Spyridon, and the Cardinal highly doubted that was going to change anytime soon, but when he next spoke he at least seemed to have lost some of the sharpness from his tone.
"Good. I won't bore you with pleasantries and the like, for you and I both have nothing to be pleasant about at the moment. I have lost a dear friend, as have you, but there will be time for mourning later. He would want us to work through our grief by enacting his vengeance from beyond the grave."
"Alright." Spyridon replied with a grave nod. "Where do we start?"
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The conversation had gone on for quite some hours at this point, and it was already growing dark outside. Nonetheless the two of them were still speaking in slightly clipped tones, neither man particularly enjoying the presence of the other but still understanding the need to talk, to remain united despite their differences and make sure that the two of them were on the same page when it came to their position at the moment. The stakes were too high for anything else to be true.
"I need to ask," the older man questioned in a gravelly tone, "what thoughts do you harbour towards Admeta at the moment."
He looked at Hawk, confused.
"What do you mean? Why is that important?"
"Because," came the answer, "I want to know why you've had this sudden change of heart. I need to know why, having just watched a friend of yours die, you wouldn't try and cosy up to your surviving friend. No man can go to war without being willing to kill, and you don't seem like you belong in a war at all. What would you say of her, now?"
He thought back to the last conversation he'd had with Admeta, and whether he was misremembering or not made no difference to him. Anger was clouding his memories, and to him she seemed as unfeeling and unemotional as a fucking tree stump.
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"What can I say of her? What can I say of her!? She's a vile woman, once wonderful, who has allowed hatred and piety to overtake all that once held pride of place in her mind. There is nothing left in her now save a genuine belief in the work of the theocracy and a burning desire to kill Adikos. The hatred and piety she bears has left her mind without room for anything else; she is without kindness, without compassion. She hasn't a spark of empathy nor kindness; she has nothing left except her desire to kill Adikos and to survive. She has nothing except her sheer unwillingness to let go, and to tumble down into the blessed relief of hells below."
He shook his head bitterly and spat to the side. He'd truly thought she was a good person once. Before she'd fallen so far in her quest for power. Before she'd had their mutual best friend of nearly ten years murdered in cold blood for the crime of saving people's lives instead of taking them. He let out a somehow even more bitter scoff as he continued.
"What a fucking monster."
Hawk nodded, the man's eyes giving nothing away as he seemed to use them to bore a hole right into Spyridon's mind.
"And if she was in front of you right now," the servant started, "would you kill her?"
Spyridon thought for a moment, eyes closing, before he nodded with a graveness and a certainty he hadn't felt in years.
"Yes. I would."
Whether that was the answer Hawk had been hoping for or not was irrelevant. It was the truth, plain and simple.
"Well then, maybe I was wrong." The man replied.
Spyridon gave him a questioning look, and in response the man only gave him a rictus of a grin.
"Perhaps you do belong here, belong in a war, after all."
"Good," Spyridon nodded, "I'll need to, won't I? We're going to fight her down and we're going to avenge Sin, even if that means I have to march into Aegos myself."
Hawk raised an eyebrow, setting down his quill for the first time in hours.
"Well, at least you've come around quite soundly. Lets make one thing clear though: you're going to be the frontman for this rebellion. You, de-jure, are to be our leader. You will not be making any decisions. I will. De-facto, I will be in charge. I've got the experience and connections that you lack, not to mention the fact that I know exactly who we'll be fighting and where we can expect help to come from. I applaud your change of heart, but you lack the training to lead men into war."
Spyridon nodded slowly. It felt a little humiliating, but it was the truth.
"Alright. Anything else?"
"There are a fair few things, yes, but first of all I'm going to ask you to make a decision. I just told you that you wouldn't be making any decisions, I know, but this is the one time you get to choose something. It's extremely important, but you need to choose it now."
He nodded at the man, hoping to convey that he was ready to make whatever choice he needed to step into the shoes that Sin had left for him to fill.
"Alright," the older man began, "do we bow our heads before Admeta now, assuming she's already supplanted Adikos of course, and wait for a few more years to gather outside support, or do we make a bid for freedom now whilst Aegos is still in chaos."
"Now." Spyridon replied immediately, almost without thinking. "Sin waited long enough and died before seeing his wishes fulfilled. I'm not going to wait around and suffer the same end without closure. We strike now, we fight, and whether we succeed or we die we will at least know that we tried to do what we could to right the wrongs of the past few years. We will at least die contented in the knowledge that we did our best and have done right by the holy books if we fall. That's got to be worth it."
Hawk nodded slowly, seemingly unsure what to make of him. He still seemed to find Spyridon's mere presence distasteful, but at the very least he now seemed more tolerant of the idea of working alongside the Cardinal. Maybe. Just a little bit.
"If that's the case we need to send the ravens afly to those few ears sympathetic to our cause. Without allies we will fall."
Spyridon scoffed.
"We control half of the men in the Aegan hills, including a few men Sin was able to befriend in Aegos himself. We can fight alone."
Hawk shook his head.
"You don't know how war works, boy. Spirit alone can't carry us through, nor can we win a rebellion on our own. We're outnumbered and the defences of Aegos are strong. We won't win. I'm aware to these new friends of which you speak, for Sin wrote to me often whilst in Aegos, but they won't be enough. Even if we defeat the council in Aegos, we'll just be attacked by the Imperator. We can't win alone."
"Well, what if we just... swear fealty to Imperator Avitus Thrax? If we bow to the Imperator there's a chance we could be accepted into his empire with only limited bloodshed and growing pains, so to speak. We wouldn't need to fight him, and his strength would be joined to ours against the theocracy. Would that work?"
Hawk shook his head, a bitter smile on his face.
"Of course not. If it weren't for Cardinal Adikos usurping the senate and declaring himself Archcardinal first then General Thrax would have done the same and called himself the Imperator anyway. The republic was always going to fall at some point this century; it had grown too decadent, too complacent. What it needed was a crisis to shake it from its lethargy, and whilst what has happened is far and beyond what anyone expected it will, at the very least, mean that the re-established republic will lack the decadence of its late predecessor. That's something that we can cling to in these dark times."
"Are you certain?"
Hawk scoffed.
"Boy, I've been working on this with Sin far longer than you've even known about our little operation, so trust me when I say Imperator Avitus Thrax will see us hang just as readily as the Archcardinal. He's just another despot."
The man might have been old, but there was no hitch to his gait, no stammer in his speech. Were it not for the greyness of his hair or the wrinkles about his forehead he would have seemed no older than Spyridon himself.
Sin's old servant moved to look out the window to the west, a pensive look on his face, and Spyridon's face twisted in a sort of confused frustration as the man's words sunk in.
"So who? Who can we turn to in these most dark of days? The Khyprians? The Confederation of Falcons? Imperatrix Cleodoro would smile as we burned, and the council in Kannagrios would spend half a decade deliberating over whether we speak the truth to them, then another five years on whether we deserve their help. If we don't reach out to the Imperator then we're doomed; no one else cares about our corner of the world."
After a few minutes of silence, broken only by the crashing of the waves against the Rocks of Aercad in the distance, Hawk spoke with a smile dancing about his features.
"I can think of someone, but they're too far from this place to make a difference yet. In a few years perhaps, but I do agree with you that we need to act now. What we're going to do is launch our rebellion and hope from support from our neighbours. We'll aim to keep ourselves and our lands safe instead of marching on Aegos, for it's defences are too great for us to take with enough speed to keep the Imperator out of the way. We need to see to our own defences first and foremost."
Spyridon nodded, conceding that the man probably knew far more than he did about this sort of thing.
"I can send a missive to Captain Dessano to the Aegan Watch if that's useful to you? In the chaos that's gripping Aegos at the moment I doubt people would hardly even notice if the two-thousand men of the watch made for Athio. It would give us a good core to form an army around, wouldn't it?"
Hawk nodded, not quite dismissively but certainly with his mind elsewhere.
"Indeed it would. The actual armies of Aegos will be split, and we'll have somewhere around four-in-ten men on our side. There are five-hundred men in the Athian Watch, and if memory serves correctly there are around three-hundred in the watch of Chytos. Assuming we're able to sway a few hundred knights to our side then that means we'll have around seven-thousand men total to launch our rebellion."
"Will that be enough?"
Hawk shook his head. The man seemed grim, grimmer than usual anyway, and seemed to be actively pushing down his distaste of Spyridon. He didn't blame the older man, of course. He'd been working with Sin behind the scenes for years, and now it was Spyridon with which he would be forced to make things work. Spyridon would be pretty pissed if the situation was reversed as well, but he supposed that a crisis made for strange bedfellows. Still, despite the fact that both men would much rather have had Sin at their side, that was impossible now. Sin was dead, and the two of them would need to pick up the pieces and dust themselves off as best they could.
War waited for no man, after all.
"No. Using the same logic we've just used, the theocracy itself will still hold somewhere around eight-thousand men in its armies. That isn't a big difference in and of itself, but they hold the more advantageous position as well as the ability to conscript people into civilian phalanxes from a much larger population than we can. If the war drags on long enough for civilians to be conscripted then we've got very little chance of winning."
"What about the Imperator? If he invades Aegos as well then the theocracy's attention will be split, which is a good thing for us, surely?"
"That's true," Hawk replied, "but whoever wins between the two of them will come after us next, and neither of them will be willing to broker a deal with us. All we can do at the moment is hope and pray that someone from beyond Aegos will swoop in and save us. Given that Dathan is the backwater of the continent, I fear there are few who would wish to involve themselves in our affairs and risk becoming entangled with the tinderbox that has been building these last few decades."
"About that," Spyridon asked, "what if our rebellion and the Imperator's intervention grows further? What if others begin taking sides that aren't our own?"
Hawk shrugged, seeming completely untroubled.
"Then we fall sooner. That's it."
"So we're doomed no matter what then?"
"Unless we can hold out for a few years?" The old man sardonically smiled. "Yes, we're doomed. But like you said, at least we can die doing the right thing."
Well, he thought to himself, his internal tone laced with sarcasm, isn't that a comforting thought.
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He didn't sleep that night. There was too much to think about, so much planning to go through in his mind. This had been what Sin was good at, not Spyridon. Spyridon was given over to bureaucratic paperwork, to ensuring the smooth daily running of his piece of the theocracy. The first steps of whatever plans Sin and Hawk had once made were now in motion, and Spyridon would be stuck playing catch-up for the foreseeable future. It was a daunting task, and one which he genuinely wasn't sure he'd be able to complete. None could tell him what the future would yet hold with any degree of certainty, not anymore, and it honestly scared him a little.
And yet it was not for those reasons that he could not sleep. No. It was his fears nor his memories that kept him awake, nor even his rapidly cascading thoughts. The thing that kept him awake was... well, it was a book. He had seen a book on the table, dog-eared and worn. It had clearly been well read and much leafed through, and his curiosity was beginning to get the better of him. Not curiosity as to what the book was, for the cover made it abundantly clear. No, Spyridon was curious about the contents.
And this was one of the many books he'd been told to never be curious about.
On the small oaken table in front of him, a small oaken table in Sin's private quarters, which Spyridon honestly felt bad to even be stood in considering the circumstances, was a well-loved copy of the Book of Saint Khidon. The principle guide to all things Khidonean, and the starting point for many a believer in the words of the Arch-Heretic. He really shouldn't, but... well, a read through just to understand it a little more couldn't hurt, could it? That was one of the things Sin had offered him, that he had offered in turn, the chance to discuss and learn about this sort of thing without having to actually convert. If nothing else it would surely take his mind off of things at the moment.
Spyridon sighed deeply. He'd never bothered learning about the Khidonean Heresy, nor any of the heresies really, but Sin had revealed shortly before his death that he'd been a Khidonean. If they'd captivated the ever erratic and moving mind of his friend then there must have been something to their words, surely? Besides, it wasn't like he was going to be able to sleep tonight anyway.
He found suddenly that he could not bring himself to pick up the book, to open the pages, to read what was written, his learned fear of such occult doctrines having a hold on him even now. He kicked himself mentally. Sin had died without fear to see that the flame of freedom might be relit, and here Spyridon was afraid to read a book. Slowly, almost gingerly, he moved across the room. He sat down at the table and picked up the book. With the sense that he was fighting his own unconscious mind, he opened the pages. Finally, with an almost monumental effort, he forced himself to read the words of the Arch-Heretic, Saint Khidon.
"Rejoice," he began, reading the book aloud as though in a daze, "for death walks amongst us."