Litany of Winter

Green appeared in the nearest cut line beneath Severin’s boots.

It spread outward through the concentric script, one carved band after another, until the dark floor held a faint green pattern from wall to wall. Nobody moved. Severin felt the first pulse through the soles of his boots before the low resonance reached the hall.

Paul was somewhere below them.

The sound deepened until the stone seemed to carry it. Severin looked toward the stair. Neumann stood nearest to it, arms at his sides, watching the green lines.

A cry came up through the stone. Paul.

It lasted only a second. Then something struck hard below, followed by the scrape of metal and the surgeon’s voice, too muffled for Severin to make out the words.

Neumann took one step toward the stair and stopped.

More movement came from the chamber. An assistant spoke sharply. Another voice answered. Severin caught the clatter of a basin and the quick drag of something across stone.

The green script kept glowing while Martin rose from the bench and came to stand beside Severin without looking at him. Across the hall, Anna watched the stair with both hands hanging loose at her sides. Rafael had not moved from his place near the wall.

A moment later, the resonance faded.

One band of script went dark, then the next. Within seconds the floor looked exactly as it had before Paul went below.

Nobody said anything as the surgeon appeared at the top of the stair.

Her sleeves were wet to the forearms. She crossed straight to Neumann and spoke quietly enough that Severin had to strain to hear.

”I’m sorry. Paul Weber is dead.”

Martin swore under his breath and punched the wall once.

Two assistants came up carrying a stretcher between them.

Paul lay beneath a sheet pulled to his collar. His face was uncovered. The hair the assistants had combed back before the ceremony was still neat above his forehead, and his mouth had fallen slightly open. Severin had seen men asleep in Blackhaven lodging houses who looked closer to death.

This was Paul. Yesterday he had counted the sheets in his death packet twice and missed one initial anyway. The assistants carried him across the hall.

Rafael stepped aside to let the stretcher pass. His eyes followed Paul until the inner door opened and the body disappeared through it. The door shut again.

Severin kept looking at the closed door. Paul had been eighteen. At eighteen, Severin had been sleeping wherever Blackhaven left a dry corner and taking whatever work paid before dark. Paul had been a telegraph clerk who understood diagrams faster than most of them and could turn almost any silence into a question.

He had also been frightened enough yesterday to count the same packet twice, but the hall had been easier with him talking in it.

Maeve came up last with the iron box held against her chest. She set it on the small table without opening it.

The surgeon washed her hands in a fresh basin. One assistant gathered the used linen. The other returned downstairs carrying clean cloth and a metal tray, with a clean sheet folded over one arm.

Severin watched the basin water cloud and get carried away. The work was careful, almost ordinary.

Nobody told them to hurry, but the work did not stop.

From his coat, Neumann took a pencil and bent over the list. Beside Paul’s name he wrote for several seconds, then pressed a short mark into the margin. Severin could not read the entry from where he stood and did not need to. When Neumann straightened, his finger moved down one line.

Neumann unfolded the list. ”Rafael Montoro.”

He looked at Neumann, swallowed once, and said nothing.

Neumann kept the paper raised. ”Are you ready?”

Severin watched him turn toward the inner door Paul had gone through. Several seconds passed before Rafael lowered his eyes to the dark script on the floor.

Neumann waited. Rafael had been quick with answers for most of the month, but this time he let the question hang. Severin was glad Neumann did not press him.

Rafael drew a slow breath through his nose. ”Do it.”

”All right.”

The surgeon led him through the inner door, and when it closed, six candidates remained with Severin.

Martin sat again. ”Fuck.”

Severin leaned back against the wall. ”Yeah.”

That was all either of them had, and the hall settled into another wait.

No one tried to fill Paul’s place with conversation. Johann checked his watch again, but his thumb missed the catch the first time. Thomas remained standing near one of the slit windows even though there was nothing outside to see but darkness. Anna sat with Madeleine, their shoulders touching.

The bench where Paul had spent most of the evening was empty. Every time Severin looked toward it, he expected to find the youngest of them leaning forward with another question ready.

Yesterday the records clerk had made sure the Order knew where Paul’s things should go. It had been settled before any of them left Kronvaal. 𝑓𝑟ℯℴ𝓂

Severin kept his eyes on the inner door, with Rafael somewhere beyond it now.

The numbers had been easy enough when Neumann gave them in the healing wing. Approximately one in six survived, though cohorts varied. If the pact failed, that was the end of it. There was nothing the surgeons could do.

Paul had asked whether there was any way to predict it, and there fucking wasn’t.

Nearly an hour passed before the inner door opened again.

The surgeon stepped out and said, ”The candidate is ready. He will walk the hall alone.”

Rafael followed her in the same undyed linen shift Paul had worn, though this one sat differently across his shoulders. His feet were bare, and his dark hair had been combed back from his face.

Just inside the doorway, Rafael stopped where the stretcher had crossed less than an hour earlier.

Rafael looked toward Neumann. Neumann gave him a small nod, and Rafael started walking.

His pace stayed even across the hall. He did not look toward the benches or the people waiting beside them. When he reached the stair, he put one hand briefly on the stone wall before descending.

Maeve took up the iron box and followed him, with the surgeon and both assistants behind her.

The stair emptied, and Severin looked down.

For several breaths, the script remained dark before green entered the first line. Martin got to his feet again.

Green light spread in slow bands, the same as before, and the first pulse came through Severin’s boots. On the second, the resonance filled the hall.

Nothing in it told him whether Rafael was living or dying.

Severin fixed his eyes on the stair as the third pulse steadied.

A shout came from below, sharp enough that Anna flinched beside Madeleine. Rafael’s voice cut off almost immediately.

Severin waited for the sudden rush of feet, but none came.

The resonance held.

Thirty seconds might have passed, perhaps less. Severin had no watch and no desire to borrow Johann’s.

The green lines continued to shine while Neumann stayed at the stair. A few seconds later the resonance weakened, and the outer bands began to darken.

Severin let out the breath he had been holding through his nose.

The last green line faded, and silence returned.

Maeve appeared on the stair empty-handed.

Neumann took a step toward her. ”Well?”

”He survived.”

Nobody reacted at first. Martin sat down hard on the bench while Thomas rubbed both hands over his face. Johann took out his watch, stared at it without checking the time, and put it away again.

Severin looked toward the stair. Rafael was alive, while Paul had died less than two hours earlier.

He remained below with the surgeon for almost another hour. The assistants moved between the chamber and the recovery rooms with clean linen, hot water, covered basins, and bottles from the medical table. Maeve came up once carrying the iron box, set it on the small table, closed it, and returned downstairs.

Nobody in the hall asked what gift Rafael had received, and by then Severin understood they might not know yet.

When footsteps finally sounded on the stair, both assistants emerged carrying a stretcher.

Rafael lay wrapped in blankets with a clean linen dressing over his right eye. His left eye was closed, and his face had gone pale beneath the warm hall lamps, but Severin could see the shallow rise of the blanket over his chest.

His right hand rested outside the covers with a dark mark spread across its back. Martin moved closer before stopping himself as Anna rose from the bench.

The surgeon came up behind the stretcher. ”He’s stable, but he hasn’t woken yet.”

Neumann looked at Rafael’s covered eye. ”Take care of him.”

The assistants carried Rafael toward the inner door leading to the recovery rooms. His marked hand shifted with the stretcher and settled against the blanket again.

Severin watched until the door closed behind Rafael, leaving seven of them in the hall where eight had waited after Paul went below.

Neumann looked at the list in his hand. ”Johann Peters.”