Raef woke reeking, hungry for real food, but no longer exhausted. His mind had cleared.
Hanel didn’t answer when Raef called for him. The air of the cave tasted stale, but Raef didn’t want to risk whatever lived in the passages. He called for the black hand and nearly wept when it answered. He could control it, could summon it, at least in darkness. If the hand worked like the knife, then he would lose it again in daylight.
He swallowed all the algae his stomach would take, and found the hole Hanel used for a latrine, holding his breath until he was clear of it.
After, he returned to the books.
He scanned tablets and pages, setting things in order as he went. He worked until his eyes hurt, rested, and rose to read some more.
He lost all sense of time, but a history of the gods, of their war with the demons, told from the side of the vanquished and translated by the Inquisitors, emerged. Raef’s head spun with the implications and revelations.
“Where are you?” Hanel asked, surprising Raef from the foot of the ladder.
Book in hand, Raef froze. He relied on Hanel’s blindness to protect him if the old priest turned violent.
“Where. Are. You?” Hanel punctuated each word as if stabbing the air with spittle.
“Here,” Raef said, setting the book back into its niche. “I was reading.”
“What?” Hanel lifted his lantern.
“Reading, Father Hanel. I told you I could.”
“Did you find it?” he asked, his rage forgotten. “Did you find the thing I had to unsee?”
“I think so.” Raef joined him on the ground. “These texts, the people who wrote them, they didn’t consider the demons evil or even monstrous. They thought them gods.”
“So they were. The higher demons at least.” Hanel fluttered a hand, showing a hint of the jovial scholar Raef remembered. “The lower ones are less, somewhere between the gods and men.”
“So it’s true?” Raef asked.
“Yes.” Hanel deflated, became suddenly small and tired. “Banished by their children, our gods invaded this world. They warred with the gods here, and branded them demons to win the people’s faith.”
“I can guess who came up with that strategy,” Raef said, remembering how thoroughly the Inquisitors had whispered lies and truth to turn the people against Phoebe.
“How did you find this?”
“Logrum. We were paired on pilgrimage. We went to Teshur, to study the fire temples beneath the desert. They believed we’d be good for each other, that my mirth would temper his seriousness. The steles there—the carvings we found told us the story.”
“And you told Father Polus.”
“Yes. The Inquisitors already knew of course. They don’t forget. Then Polus started making the children. I told Logrum what Polus did, how to stop him so he’d spare them. They were innocent. You were innocent.”
“But he betrayed you,” Raef whispered. “He blinded you and threw you down here.”
“Yes. I dedicated my life to teaching, to ensuring the gods’ truth. What I found, that the gods are no better, no worse than the demons. I could not bear it. I could not. It is a mortal wound when your faith breaks, my boy.”
Hanel sobbed, though no tears filled his dead eyes.
“What do you mean, that the gods are no worse than the demons?”
“The Knights of Hyperion made the hounds, bred them to fight the demons, bred them from the demons here.” Hanel caught himself on a shelf, as if speaking it wounded him. “Their excuse for killing her was for doing what the knights and Inquisitors had done in Hyperion’s name.”
Raef’s vision narrowed to a tunnel. The rank hypocrisy of it lit a cold fire inside him. The ink, the marks, thrummed beneath his skin. There was some rage left in him after all.
“Why then?” Raef growled. “Why did they really kill her?”
“Because the Hierarch told them to. He said it was necessary, that he heard a prophecy from an Oracle. They killed us, their brothers and sisters. They killed our Lady and all of her children. I told them how, and it was hypocrisy. All of it.”
Hanel’s face went slack as if he’d spent his lucidity. It drained away, leaving the defeated old man who’d saved Raef from the acid.
Raef struggled to tamp down the cold fire, the rage, even though he didn’t want to. It eased the blacker maw in his heart.
He took in the jumbled library, the shelves and stacks that held everything he’d ever want to know.
“You have to go,” Hanel said. “I thought it would be different, but I’m not sane. You have to get out before I hurt you. You have to tell someone the secret.”
“I will, Father. I’ll tell everyone. I promise.”
“Good,” Hanel said, sounding small. “That’s good.”
“Can you tell me anything that would help me reach the surface?” Raef asked. “Anything about the way out?”
“You can’t reach the surface,” Hanel said. “The only gate is drowned in acid.”
“So you said,” Raef reminded him gently.
“I wish you could stay and read for me. Maybe you could find it, the thing I need to know. Maybe I could understand again.”
His words dampened the fire inside him. Hanel had already forgotten. Perhaps that was a mercy.
“Me too, Father.”
“I can’t take you. I don’t know the way out.”
“It’s all right.” Raef bent to take in the old man’s face, to remember it. “You stay with the books. Keep them safe for me.”
“Maybe you could come back. Maybe I’ll be better. Maybe then you could read to me.”
“I’d like that.”
“Take my lamp.” Hanel offered it like a delicate, precious thing.
“It’s all right, Father. I have my mother’s eyes. I can see in the dark.”