Thieves World 7 – The Dead of Winter by Asprin, Robert

“I have only myself and you- remember that.”

He pulled the curtain shut. The two acolytes who had been arranging Aldwist’s

corpse on a simple pallet moved aside to let the Hierarch speak the necessary

rites of passage. A war-priest, Molin had sanctified the deaths of so many

unrecognizable chunks of mortal flesh that nothing could bring a tremor to his

voice or gestures. He had come to believe himself truly immune to death’s

outrages, but the imploded face of the gentle old priest brought twisting pangs

of despair to his gut.

“We do not have enough bitterwood for the pyre. Rashan took what we had with

him,” Isambard, the elder of the two acolytes, informed him.

Molin pressed his fingertips between his eyes, the traditional priestly gesture

of respect for the departed and one which, coincidentally, dammed his tears.

Rashan: that conniving, provincial priest whose sole purpose in life, even

before Vashanka’s death, had been to thwart every reform Molin instituted. A

cloud of rage worthy of Vashanka swirled up invisibly around Molin Torchholder.

He wanted to confront Rashan, the so-called Eye of Savankala, shove every

splintered log of bitter-wood down the whey-faced priest’s gullet and use that

nonentity to light Aldwist’s pyre. He wanted to take his ceremonial dagger and

thrust it so deep in Gyskouras’s chest that it would pop out the other side. He

wanted to take Isambard’s tear-stained face between his hands….

Molin looked at Isambard again, little more than a child himself and unable to

hide his grief. He swallowed his rage along with his tears and rested comforting