He spotted something gleaming, half buried under the sand, and knelt down. Gently, he worked the holy symbol of Annis free. It was a golden sun and heavy, worth quite a bit. He slipped it into his pocket and stood.
“Who are you?” a voice asked. Petro spun and saw a Knight standing there. He wore different colors than the other knight’s who’d been here this morning. He wasn’t from the Order of Annis. The man stood easy, with his hand resting on the hilt of his sword. His beard was gray and his eyes kind.
“Petro,” Petro said finally. “An orphan.”
He added the last as an afterthought, realizing his father must be dead. He’d been in the crowd, and he was too stupid to get away. The funny thing was, Petro felt worse about the priest dying than his own sire. The priest had been good. A good man battling against evil. Evil like Hank. The priest had forgiven Suzanne, and given her back her life. His father just beat him and treated people cruelly.
“I am Sir Martin ofWestminster. I’m going to ask you a very important question and I need you to be honest with me. Can you do that?”
“Yes,” Petro said.
“What happened here?”
Petro was silent for a few minutes, looking around at the bodies and devastation around him. The Lord of Light had killed people in this town, true: the Duke, his family, and the guard Captain. But he’d forgiven everyone else. And if Petro had ever doubted that there was evil in the world and that the Lord of Light was fighting against it, he didn’t now. Beyond those five corpses, the rest had been caused by this demon Mithras.
Mithras and his servant Hank.
When he finally spoke, his voice was sure. “A priest came here. To save these people. But a demon came here too and killed them all.”
The Knight studied him quietly, and then nodded. “An orphan you say?”
“Yes.”
“Are you alone?”
“I have one other with me,” Petro said.
The knight nodded.
“You shall come with me. It’s important that people hear of this. We must know what has happened so we can prepare.”
Petro didn’t dare to disagree. The knight gathered him and Suzanne up and put them on his spare mount. They rode out of the small town to the northwest. Suzanne was quiet for a few weeks, never leaving Petro’s side, but gradually she opened back up and became the sweet girl he remembered. He swore to her that he would never leave her, that they would look after each other.
When they arrived inWestminsterhe was amazed. It was huge and bustling. The knight took them to several priests and lords where they told their story. Many asked for details. He gave them what he could. Some he made up. After a time the Sir Martin took him as a squire and trained him. He learned about martial prowess and knighthood, training daily with all of the knightly weapons. When he was thirteen he married Suzanne. They were fifteen when he had his first child by her. She flourished in the new surroundings, becoming a great beauty that caused envy in many men and boys alike. But she never wavered in her loyalty to him, nor he to her.
For years he traveled with the Knight Sir Martin, squiring for him as the Knight dealt out justice in the name of the True God. They spent much time at odds with the Knight’s Invictus, sharing a difference of opinion in regards to punishment. The Knight’s Invictus, Petro discovered, believed that evil and corruption could manifest inside anyone, and that no one was inherently evil because of their beliefs.
But he knew the truth. That evil hid behind such gray colored beliefs and preyed upon weak people. He had seen true evil. He knew the power that heretics wielded. The priest’s only mistake, all those years ago, was trying to forgive them. A heretic was a heretic no matter how pretty to look upon or how smoothly they spoke. Petro learned how to kill them all.
He developed his skills to become dangerous, a servant of the Lord ready to mete out justice to those who defied the church and to stand strong beside those who needed his protection.
