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Cold seeped through the roughspun wool of his vestments as Pavel knelt on the flagstone floors, eyes cast up to the painted frescoes on the walls of the church. Services concluded hours ago, the villagers long since departed to either reflect on their sins or go out to commit more, as was man’s wont. Pavel knew himself to be no saint, and as Christ had said, let he who was without judgment cast the first stone. Still, it was with a heavy heart that he knelt in the chancel before the crudely carved wooden cross standing on the altar – the best a poor village in the Bohemian wilds could afford, or create – to confess in the Lord’s hearing his own sins.
His paternoster laid over his palm, he thumbed the beads as he whispered the prayers in an undertone, almost afraid to disturb the still of the air in the church. Scant warmth was offered by the flickering beeswax candles in their iron holders; the muscles of his legs cramped and ached with the chill of the stone floors beneath him. He should feel at peace, alone in the church, in private communion with his Holy Father, and yet peace eluded him. Instead, he faltered in his recitations, becoming aware of the sibilant slithering of maille behind him. It was such a foreign sound in a church – who would feel the need to walk, armed as if for battle, into the House of the Lord? – that he stumbled to his feet, turning to discover the interloper for himself.
A young man swaggered up the nave. He was dressed in scarlet hose, fine pale buckskin boots, and a white jupon; white as snow, white as an archangel’s wings. He would not, in fact, have looked out of place in one of the frescoes painted on the walls around them; boyishly handsome of face, though with an unsettlingly piercing pale gaze like a predatory animal’s. Pavel found himself retreating toward the altar as the man approached, hands fluttering nervously at his sides. For a wild moment, he debated the cost to his eternal soul of using one of the heavy candle brackets to defend himself, should the need arise; the voluminous fabric of his vestments hid a spare but deceptively strong frame, and he and the unannounced man were of a height. No threat had been voiced, nor indeed any words at all, and yet it hung like incense in the air, a private communion of violence on the cusp of commencement.
‘Father Janek has departed for the evening, I’m afraid.’ His voice, by some miracle, did not tremble, though the shaking of his hands no doubt belied his nerves. ‘If you were requiring absolvement.’
‘A shame,’ the young man shrugged. Even speaking softly, his voice carried. Trained like a soldier’s, or a mummer’s, to be heard by a crowd without strain. ‘I had hoped to make my confession.’
Pavel swallowed. ‘Any man may hear his brother in Christ’s confession, though only a priest may offer absolution for it. If listening is all you require, I can be of service.’
‘I had hoped you might say that.’ The answering smile was as sharp as the edge of a sword, glinting in the low light. Pavel was again put forcibly in mind of a predatory animal; indeed, he felt like Daniel thrust into the lion’s den in the expectation of his being devoured. Perhaps, like Daniel, it was his calling to tame this savage beast in his angel’s garb. He gestured to the carved bench set aside in the south transept, inviting the young man to sit. He did so with the languid grace of a wildcat, spreading his knees wide as if to claim territory, his lion’s smile flashing once more in the corner of Pavel’s eye.
Pavel settled beside him, facing forward across the nave. The fresco on the far wall, colours dulled and powdery with age, showed the Fall of Man; in the foreground, the woman Eve, her pale arm extended toward a bough of the tree around which a serpent – the bright, venomous green of a nettle – coiled itself, an oddly human expression in its narrowed eyes. Pavel kept his own gaze trained on the painting as he swallowed again reflexively, the young man’s cocksure nonchalance chafing.
‘Forgive me, brother, for I have sinned,’ the man murmured, a smile in his voice. Pavel worked hard to maintain a neutral expression as he nodded, sensing the young man’s amusement at his visible discomfort. Anger flared briefly in his stomach, knowing he was being tested, a petulant child toying with some smaller, insignificant creature to see how far it might be pushed before it snapped.
‘I am listening.’
‘I confess it has been quite a while since I found myself in this position,’ the young man continued, his tone conversational. Pavel gritted his teeth, taking a deep breath through his nose. ‘I may need a refresher. There are seven, are there not?’
‘Seven mortal sins, aye.’
‘And what are they?’
The laughter in his voice, poorly hidden under the falsely pious tone, grated on him more than anything else. Pavel had heard many confessions in his time as an acolyte, from strangers in tavern taprooms to condemned men awaiting earthly and heavenly justice on the gallows. He had narrowly escaped such a fate himself once, only his wits and a desperate man’s willingness to throw another into the maw of the devouring beast standing between him and a shallow grave. He knew, however, that he would spend his whole life and the eternity beyond it in atonement for his callous cowardice.
He shot the man beside him a nervous glance, finding those unsettling pale grey eyes fixed on the sharp curve of his cheek. He quickly turned away, back to the wall. The snake’s triangular head seemed to have shifted, the coils of its body squeezing ever tighter around the limb of the tree.
‘Greed,’ he mumbled, shifting his hands in his lap.
‘Aye.’ A mocking sigh. ‘I suppose that’s one of them.’ The young man stretched his arms over his head until there came a popping sound from his spine, resettling in his seat with a groan of relief. ‘I have a terrible propensity for taking things that don’t belong to me from those who have the misfortune to pass by on the roads. Some men may find their purses somewhat unburdened after such a chance meeting. I simply can’t help myself. Coin makes the world go round, after all. And fortune’s wheel is frequently lubricated on the upward turn by a well-silvered palm.’ The chinking of coins in a leather pouch – heavy and bulging where it rested in the lad’s broad palm as he slowly squeezed and released it – drew Pavel’s attention once more. Extended between them, as a gesture of – what? Goodwill? Or a threat?
‘A rich man passes into the Kingdom of God as easily as a camel through the eye of a needle, brother.’
‘So I hear.’ A sardonic laugh as the purse was deposited with another heavy thunk on the bench between them. Pavel felt its proximity like physical heat, the flames of Hell licking at the side of his tunic. ‘So greed is one. And the others?’
‘Gluttony.’
‘Ah. Guilty again, I fear. The proceeds of greed must go somewhere, and Christ knows there’s fuck all else to spend it on around here than inside a tavern. Although admittedly most proceeds go to the Chief, and his tastes in such things are considerably more refined than my own. Still, he can be very… indulgent… with me, perhaps in the hope of instilling some of that refinement. And it can be very dangerous to say no to him when he’s in one of his generous moods, even if it makes my head swim and gives me the shits in the morning.’
Pavel choked back a startled laugh of his own, feeling the reproachful eyes of heaven on the back of his neck as he tried to hide it with a cough. The young man slid down on the bench, slouching; his long, broad frame loose-limbed, legs thrown wide. Pavel’s eyes shifted traitorously toward those strong thighs in their tight hose, the brilliant red of a battle flag: no quarter to be given. He swallowed against a dry mouth, his voice cracking as he spoke again.
‘A man without self-control is like a city broken into and left without walls.’
The young man cast an amused glance sideways at him, his face breaking into a mocking smile. ‘I hadn’t taken you for a military strategist, brother. Men of God amongst the soldiers of my acquaintance are few and far between, though the Chief knew a few amongst those fighting with him at Nicopolis. Fools all.’
Pavel ignored that last barb. ‘Pride.’
‘Dear me. I’m amassing quite the collection. Mea culpa, brother.’ There was not a trace of remorse, not even ironic, in the young man’s voice, even as he shook his head in mock self-chastisement. ‘I will freely admit to being proud above my station. My station being that of a peasant, though you wouldn’t know it to look at me.’ He gestured to his fine clothes; up close, Pavel could see that his jupon was of heavy cotton, finely woven and in immaculate condition. Indulged, he had said, by the leader of whatever band of brigands he belonged to. Indulged and spoilt. It made Pavel wonder what further sins the fellow would confess to if pushed; the mercenaries Pavel had met rarely seemed to waste their ill-gotten coin on dressing their comrades. It was more likely to be spent on their favourite of the loose women serving their baser needs, by manner of payment.
‘Pride goes before destruction, brother, and a haughty spirit before a fall.’
‘Is that so?’ The young man snorted, stretching again, showing off the long, well-muscled lines of his body through the heavy jupon. He reached up to unlace the collar fastenings, allowing it to fall open to the centre of his chest; a thin white linen shirt was the only barrier between it and the ruddy skin beneath. Pavel’s eyes followed the open line of that shirt far lower than they ought, and he blushed to see himself caught doing so when he remembered himself and returned his gaze to the opposite wall of the transept.
‘I make that three of seven. I’d hate to leave some unaccounted for and my education incomplete, brother. Please, continue.’
‘Envy.’
The change overcame him all at once: huge, scarred hands by the young man’s hips clenching briefly into fists, his lip curling. His eyes were sharp as blades on Pavel’s all of a sudden, speech hoarse and choked.
‘There are some amongst the men who think to possess something that should by rights be mine. One in particular. He seeks to – to enjoy this possession, to flaunt it before my eyes, to torture me. He is like a pissing dog, marking what territory he considers his own–’ The man’s voice was a growl less human than animal. He spat the words out like a handful of teeth loosened by a blow, grey eyes flashing like steel in the low light. ‘He does not deserve it. He does nothing to earn such favour, and yet–’
He let out a snarling, furious noise, his balled fists slamming against the wood of the bench, making Pavel flinch.
‘A tranquil heart gives life to the flesh, but envy makes the bones rot.’ His voice was strangled, hardly his own. He felt the heat of that fury at his side like the blaze of a furnace, the fifth sin forced out of him as he fought the urge to shuffle away for some reprieve from it. The blond snorted dismissively, spitting on the floor. Pavel felt another flare of irritation, glowering at the small puddle of saliva on the flagstones, the disrespect making his own anger rise.
‘Wrath.’
‘The list only grows, brother. I am consumed.’ The man leant forward, his eyes flashing. ‘Those who wrong me, I make suffer. Slowly, agonisingly, in most cases. I take great pleasure in it. I killed a brother in arms, a man who has fought at my side in many a battle and guarded my back as faithfully as a dog, who cheated me in a game of dice. I have tortured many men past the point of endurance for information, for revenge… for sport, sometimes. When I was a child, men came to my village and razed it to the ground in fire and fury. I have never forgotten it, and will never forgive them their part in it either.’ His teeth were bared in a snarl. The mask of civility, so carefully held up, had begun to slip, his handsome face twisted into an expression of such fury it made Pavel’s bowels quiver to see it. Still, he found himself filled at the same time with pity. To lose home, family and future to the realities of war was, in these uncertain times, sadly not unusual. But well he knew the lasting scars it left, the river of grief coursing under the skin ready to flood to the surface at the merest scratch.
He reached out a hand, hesitant, to rest it on the young man’s thigh. Those fierce pale eyes snapped to meet his, the muscle tensing like an iron bar beneath his palm, visibly fighting the instinct to remove it by force. Pavel was not for a second labouring under the misapprehension that such action on the young man’s part would not end with broken bones; he was nonetheless grateful that the fellow took the attempt at comfort as it had been intended.
‘Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of God, for it is written: ‘Vengeance is mine, I will repay, sayeth the Lord.”
The other man’s eyes narrowed, his mind clearly at war with itself on his face, the battle playing out in the array of emotions quickly flitting over his handsome features. Eventually he settled on a smirk, clearly habitual, though his brow was still knitted and eyes simmering with anger.
‘What’s the last?’ he asked, his own large hand – broad, wide-knuckled, with its strangely neatly manicured nails – thrown over the back of the bench, close to the back of Pavel’s head; he could feel the warmth of it against the nape of his neck, despite the lack of physical contact.
‘Lust.’
A wolf’s smile. ‘Aren’t all men tormented with the fires of Hell below their belt?’ He shifted on the bench, sitting upright once more as one hand trailed over his thigh to cup his cock through the linen braies. A gold ring, set with a cabochon of onyx, on his smallest finger caught the shallow candlelight, a flash of light dancing on the whitewashed church wall. He drew the full, rosy lower lip between his white, white teeth, allowing it to slip back with a soft hum as he squeezed and massaged himself, those unsettling pale eyes fixed in a challenge on Pavel’s own. The situation was rapidly slipping away from him, unravelling like a skein of wool; heat surged in Pavel’s belly, ire and desire one and the same. He was being mocked, and worse, the other man was drawing a terrible, unnatural pleasure from pricking at him thus. He should stand, refuse to hear more; let this man and his infuriating base insinuations languish in their earthly squalor here on the bench. He soiled himself and his soul just by exposing himself to them, and yet, was it not his duty to take on this cross to bear, as Christ had for the good of all mankind?
‘Each one is tempted when he is drawn away by his own desires and enticed. Then, when desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, brings forth death.’ Pavel’s remonstrations landed on deliberately deaf ears; the young man simply smiled wider, stroking himself through his braies.
‘Temptation is by definition difficult to resist, is it not? And I am but a mortal man,’ he sighed, his voice softening on a delicate huff of breath as his eyelids fluttered, fair eyelashes shading those arresting eyes. Pavel coughed uncomfortably into his hand, the urge to get up and run away – to escape this mortifyingly charged situation – stronger than ever, and yet his body frozen to the bench, his gaze glued to the steady motion of the stranger’s hand over his groin. ‘You seem plenty tempted yourself, priest.’
‘I am bound by vows of chastity.’ Pavel’s rebuttal was weak even to his own ears. The young man ignored him, reaching out for the paternoster sliding rapidly out of Pavel’s hands toward the floor.
‘Chastity amongst priests is almost as rare as godliness amongst soldiers in my experience,’ the young man retorted, sliding fluidly off the bench to stand in front of Pavel. He cupped Pavel’s chin in one broad hand, forcing his gaze up and off the frescoed serpent’s glimmering coils toward his own face. He stood, the light of the candle brackets behind him illuminating the coarse blond curls of his head in a smoke-hazed halo, the vision of a sainted martyr, and Pavel could almost hear the cracking of stone floors opening, the crackle of flames licking at his ankles.
The young man guided him forward, up onto the apse. There, there were no painted serpents to affix him with baleful gazes; instead, it was a host of painted archangels, the eyes of the Saviour himself on his crucifix, staring down at him from the walls. Pavel closed his eyes, shame burning in his chest at the same time as the flames of lust – the last and most vicious of sins – were fanned ever higher in his belly. The young man’s strong grip on his wrists making him shiver as he pinned them behind Pavel’s back and forced him to his knees on the stone platform. The young man bent down, his mouth scant inches from Pavel’s ear, to whisper mockingly to him.
‘Aren’t you the good Christian?’ he murmured, tongue flickering against the rim of Pavel’s ear, laughter in his voice as it forced a weak whimper out of Pavel’s mouth. ‘On your knees before the Lord. So devoted. So pious.’
‘You blaspheme,’ Pavel gasped, shuddering. ‘God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he reap.’
‘Oh, I certainly hope so,’ the man smirked. Pavel felt the coarse beads of his paternoster being wound around his wrists, fastening them behind his back. It was deft work, neatly done, by someone well-versed in the art of tying restraints. He struggled fruitlessly for a moment, cheeks burning, until the heavy palm landed on his shoulder once more. ‘You’ll find this goes easier for you, brother, if you don’t resist. Resistance gets my blood up in ways you’ll find far less enjoyable.’
Satisfied with his handiwork at Pavel’s back, he walked around to stand in front of him, leaning back against the altar casually. His hands were busy with the fastenings of his jupon, the lacings falling open to reveal the fine linen shirt beneath, ruddy skin flushed in the deep V of the neckline. Worse still, the material was bunched at the waist, where a rapidly thickening cock was rising beneath his braies, close enough to Pavel’s face that every shaking exhale produced a visible twitch. Pavel swallowed, panic rising in him, as the young man gripped a handful of hair and dragged his head closer still, rutting his hips against Pavel’s cheek with a groan that echoed in the still air of the church.
‘I see you’re starting to grasp the situation,’ he murmured, and Pavel closed his eyes in silent prayer for mercy, for this insolent, malevolent boy to be struck down where he stood. He prayed to Christ and all His archangels for reprieve, but what came out of his mouth instead was:
‘Please–’
‘Please what, brother?’ The young man smirked. He flexed his hand in Pavel’s hair, the ring on his smallest finger snagging on one of the strands and producing a tiny, electric pain like that of a stinging insect. “Ask, and ye shall receive.’ Is that not what the good Lord says?’
Pavel tried to wrench his head away from the tight grip on his hair. The other man’s free hand shot out to grasp his chin, squeezing painfully until the bones of his jaw creaked and ached. Those pale grey eyes glittered cruelly as he arched his hips, rubbing the tented linen of his groin against Pavel’s chin, the rise and fall of his chest steady and relaxed in contrast to the acolyte’s panicked heaving.
‘I’ve not got all night, brother. My patience wears thin. What is it you want?’
To be left in peace, Pavel almost sobbed. He pressed his lips tightly together, shaking his head as much as was possible with the man’s fingers still knotted in his hair. The fingers gripping his jaw squeezed again, forcing his mouth to open.
‘Ah. You do still have a tongue in there. Must I loosen it for you?’ The hand in his hair moved again, this time to the man’s belt, where a dagger – the hilt carved into the unmistakable form of a phallus and stones, from smooth, polished walnut – rested against his hip. The man’s fingers brushed lovingly the rounded head, the threat of it being withdrawn from the scarlet leather sheath hanging in the air; Pavel let out a strangled ‘No, please–’, and the man smiled.
‘Very good.’
Pavel blinked, and the lacings of the man’s braies fell open, his cock slipping free of its confines to rest, heavy and flushed and – terrifyingly, for the size it had already reached – only half-hard against Pavel’s bottom lip. The young man let out another soft noise, considering, as his fist closed around it, stroking slowly. A bead of fluid welled at the tip, and a soft sob, half despair and half terrible desire, escaped from Pavel’s lips as if in answer. The blond sighed, pumping his fist a few more times, grey eyes locked onto Pavel’s as they followed the movements, hypnotised.
‘I see what you want, brother. How fortunate you are, that I am such a generous soul; I shall give it to you, if you will only ask.’
‘My vows–’
‘Your vows, your vows. Fuck your vows. You’re as greedy, as lustful, as wroth – I see it in your eyes, brother, no matter how you try to hide it – as the rest of us poor souls.’
‘You must be the Devil himself,’ Pavel gasped helplessly, as the young man’s hand thrust into his hair once more, dragging his head forward until the leaking head of the blond’s cock skidded over his desperate mouth, ‘to attempt to – to debase me thus – to tempt me into such unnatural–’
‘I am doing nothing to you,’ the young man snarled, with that sudden fierce fury that had frightened Pavel before, ‘that you are not on your knees all but begging me for. Such ‘unnature’ is in you already, brother. You and I are alike in our debasement, I can promise you that. The only difference is that I admit it – embrace it, even. The Devil himself could not hurt me, as I am without fear of damnation.’
He yanked on Pavel’s hair at the same time as arching his hips, the sudden movement startling Pavel’s mouth open. Both groaned, the young man in pleasure and Pavel in despair, as the stranger’s cock slid over Pavel’s tongue, trailing salt and musk. Admitting defeat, Pavel closed his mouth around the slick head, suckling at it obediently. Hating them both for it; the young man for knowing he wanted to be used thus, and himself for taking this twisted, sinful pleasure in it. The rough wool of his tunic offered little cushioning on the uneven flagstones beneath him, his knees aching where their ragged edges pressed on his bones, shoulders screaming where his arms were restrained behind his back.
‘Do they train you,’ the young man panted, as he rocked his hips again, pressing his cock deeper into Pavel’s throat until he gagged around him, ‘in sucking cock, at the seminary? You and all those other acolytes, buggering each other senseless in the cloisters? Or am I just fortunate to have found one with such–’ He moaned, hand flexing in Pavel’s tousled hair, watching his cheek bulge as the rolling of his hips pressed the head of his cock deeper, ‘–such a natural predilection for it?’
Pavel choked again, the rough wooden beads and hemp rope of his paternoster rubbing the skin of his wrists raw as he yanked and tugged to escape his bindings. The young man laughed breathlessly to see him struggle, gripping the stone edge of the altar with his free hand for balance as he thrust harder, forcing Pavel to swallow him down, tears blurring his vision and welling along the line of his lashes.
‘I should commend you, brother,’ he gritted out, his ruddy face growing redder still as a heated flush climbed from the open V of his shirt towards his hairline. ‘It’s few and far between, man or maid, who take me so well without spewing all over themselves, or worse, me. Many a pair of boots I’ve had ruined. Of course,’ he continued, the strain in his voice belying its conversational tone, ‘the blood afterwards, when I satiate my anger at the spoiling of my clothes, doesn’t help.’
Pavel wanted to weep. He only grew more sure that the man above him, using him like a common whore, was more Devil than human the more filth came pouring from that angelic-looking mouth of his. Surely this was the Devil’s worst trick, to have his servants on earth look so lovely. The man withdrew at last, a string of saliva stretching between the glistening head of his prick and Pavel’s swollen mouth before it broke. Pavel felt his stomach roil with nausea and shame, closing his eyes.
The stranger patted his cheek roughly, smirking down at him.
‘Not bad, priest. But we’re not finished yet.’ He stepped around to Pavel’s back once more, dragging him up by the wrists to stand and bend over the altar. Pavel squeaked in protest, realising that this was going to go further even than a cock in his mouth, and struggled against the young man’s powerful grip. The blond leant over him, one hand bracing his weight against the altar and the other pushing Pavel’s tunic up to his waist, exposing his pale legs and worn linen braies. ‘What did I tell you about attempting to resist?’
‘You can’t–’
‘I can, and I will,’ the young man whispered into his ear, licking the rim again as he ground his cock against Pavel’s arse. Pavel could feel the thick, hot shape of him finding the crease, slotting against him like an arrow into its quiver; he moaned, hot tears stinging his eyes as they finally spilled free. The blond groaned, rutting against him again as his hand wrenched Pavel’s braies down to his knees, exposing shivering, milk-white flesh. ‘That’s it. Deny it all you like, brother, your body says different. Your arse is as hungry as your mouth ever was.’
Pavel sobbed into the ragged altar cloth as the young man spat on his fingers, not bothering with more than a perfunctory couple of thrusts to stretch him before he felt the hot, slick head of his cock against his rim. He took a deep breath in, gritting his teeth to stifle his cry as the blond pressed in, his size – alarming in Pavel’s mouth, terrifying in his arse – feeling as though he were being split in half. He fought to relax, every muscle tensed and screaming as he braced against the agony of being penetrated so roughly. The man behind him panted and groaned into his ear, the strain in his voice as he rasped, ‘Fucking hell, priest, you’re tight–’ betraying the fact that he also was in pain.
‘Ah – please – Christ, it hurts,’ Pavel whimpered, as the young man finally bottomed out, his hips flush against Pavel’s and his cock feeling as if it was lodged somewhere around the apple of Pavel’s throat. The blond huffed a breathless, mirthless laugh in his ear as he dragged back an inch or so before shoving back in on another groan. Pavel squirmed under him, canting his hips, anything to get away from the burning in his core. The young man kept it up, hard, short thrusts that punched breathless wheezes out of Pavel’s lungs until he at last relaxed, giving up the fight.
The crack of a hand meeting firm flesh as the stranger slapped him on the haunch. ‘Good lad.’ His voice was strangled and hoarse as the punishing rhythm of his thrusts shifted, short bucking movements lengthening out into powerful drives of his hips. Every thrust slammed Pavel’s hipbones against the edge of the altar table, bruising his fair skin, making him cry out. His arms were beginning to go numb, his wrists chafed raw by the paternoster. There was a puddle, wet and viscous, under his head where tears and snot had comingled, sticking his cheek to the surface of the altar. Still, the shift of the stranger’s hips as he drove into him again nailed the spot inside him that sent sparks shooting up his spine, his prick leaking copiously over the bunched fabric of his tunic as he moaned and arched his back.
‘Sakra,’ the blond ground out, his movements starting to lose their rhythm, growing sloppy and disjointed as he barrelled toward his climax. Pavel whined and pushed his hips back against him, trying to guide him to that spot again; the young man shuddered, pummelling him with a few more haphazard thrusts before shuddering and collapsing, still twitching, against his back, grinding into him as he spilled deep inside. When he at last withdrew, with a wet noise that sounded all the more obscene for the silence of the church broken only by their harsh breathing, Pavel felt the viscous wetness dripping out of him and felt sick.
A sharp pain at his wrist and the flow of more liquid warmth, the smell of iron, marked his release. The severed strings of his paternoster clattered to the flagstones, the beads scattering. Blood dripped over his hands where the dagger had caught his skin as the young man sliced him free. Craning his neck to look over his shoulder, he saw the man lick – lick! – the blade clean, lapping at it with a pink tongue like a cat’s, before sliding it carefully back into its sheath.
‘You may add sloth to my list of confessions,’ the young man murmured for a parting shot, his smirk audible, as Pavel wiped the tears from his face, feeling the man’s semen trickling down his thigh. ‘I did nothing at all to bring you off during our meeting. I didn’t think it necessary. And judging by the mess you made of the floors,’ He gestured at the incriminating splatter of white where Pavel had been bent over, traces of it soaking into the front and hem of his tunic, ‘I was correct.’
Something snapped in that moment. Pavel snatched up the wooden candlestick, taking a calculated swing at the young man’s head. The blond batted the improvised weapon aside with his sword – drawn when, and from where, Pavel didn’t know; he had not seen it on the fellow’s belt when he had entered – and smiled viciously as the steel cleaved through the wood with a splintering crack like thunder. The point of the sword rested, pricking deep enough to draw a thin trail of blood, in the hollow between Pavel’s collarbones. His chest heaved, ears ringing with fury.
‘A solid attempt,’ the young man said, his head cocking to one side curiously. ‘A well-aimed blow. Should’ve taken my head off my shoulders, had it been steel. And had I not been expecting it.’ He grinned. ‘Still. I expect you’d be decent in a fight, even rarer amongst priests of my acquaintance.’
He sheathed his sword.
‘You may keep the purse. If you ever want to earn one like it – fuller, even, if you play your cards right – and you don’t mind taking a few more swings at those who deserve it, with real steel this time… Come to me.’
‘And who the fuck are you, exactly?’ Pavel asked, the splintered wooden candlestick still gripped tightly in his right hand.
‘We’ve a camp in Vranik, at the top of the hill. There’s a die in the coin purse – show it at the gate, they’ll let you through.’ The man turned on his heel, already retreating out of the church. ‘Report to me when you arrive. Report to Erik.’