Kestrel had no trouble anticipating the next statement.
Those who would seek to destroy humankind must be destroyed first!" the Priest said fiercely. "There can be no sin in this; it is not murder, for they have no souls! It is self-defense and no more; ridding humanity of their cursed presence is no worse than ridding the city of rats! And who is it that has these unnatural magics, that you have been warned against? More often than not, it is these unhuman monsters!"
This time it was Robin who pulled him away, but he was not reluctant to leave; he had certainly heard enough to nauseate him. "God is l-love, l-love is b-blind, I am b-b-blind, therefore I am G-G-God," Kestrel muttered under his breath; something that had become a very unfunny joke. Horrid how the rules of logic could be twisted to make the illogical, irrational, and idiotic sound reasonable....
Robin shushed him, and they crossed over to the other side of the street to return to their inn. The last light of the sun died away overhead; the little canyons between the buildings were already full of shadows, and lamplighters made their way along the street, pausing at each of the street corners. There were not too many people out at this point; those that were did not seem to be in any great hurry to get anywhere. Kestrel noted with thankfulness that the preachers had taken the coming of nightfall as a signal to leave their posts and find some other venue for their speeches. He'd had a bellyful of them, and he was not in the mood for any more.
But he was to get one more dose of Holy Word before they reached the relative safety of their room.
The last preacher of the night was hard to classify; he had the collection plate and the common clothing of an ordinary street preacher, but the trained voice and command of rhetoric of a full Priest. They could not get by, for his listeners had temporarily blocked the street, so they had no choice but to listen for a moment.
And for a moment, it seemed as if his message was no more insidious than any of the other lunatics out here this afternoon. "_ idle time, time that is not spent in work or in contemplation, is time spent in evilness," he was saying. Kestrel could not see his face in the shadows; he kept his voice deliberately soft, so that anyone really listening had to lean forward to hear his words. The combination of the darkness, the soft words, the persuasive voice, worked in a hypnotic fashion before a listener was really aware of it.
Unless you were a musician, and had used similar tricks yourself, to create a mood of quiet persuasion in the middle of a crowded tavern.
"Because of this, anything done purely for pleasure or for simple enjoyment is also evil because these are things done in idleness. The only fit occupation for a true man is work; either the work of his hands and mind, or the work of God and the Church. Those temptations of hollow pleasure must be eliminated, and those who will not give them up must be taught the error of their ways. Gently, if possible, but if not"_he concluded, darkly_"then by whatever means necessary."
At that point the blockage cleared, and Robin and Kestrel hurried on, quickly, until they were well out of range of sight and sound of the final preacher.
"Now I'm glad we were warned," Robin sighed. "If we had come into town the way we usually enter a city_"
"P-playing and s-singing 'The S-saucy P-p-priest'?" Kestrel finished. "I th-think our w-welcome m-might have b-been w-warmer th-than w-we'd l-like."
"That, at least." Robin held his arm, tightly, as much for comfort as for appearances, as they entered the inn courtyard. It opened up like a haven of sanity after the speeches of the past hour. As they opened the door to the common room, one of the serving girls spotted them and hurried over to them.
"Would you like your baths now?" she asked. "The water is hot and ready, and no one has bespoken the room until later."
"Please," Robin said, and lowered her voice a little. "We were just taking a walk outside, and we couldn't help wondering_is every night like tonight? I've never seen so many preachers in one place before. Is there something special about tonight, or this street?"
The girl sighed, and rolled her eyes a little. "Nothing special about tonight, but they do seem to pick this street t' be doing their ranting. P'rhaps it's 'cause most visitors lodge here, or p'rhaps its 'cause the Cathedral's so near. There's laws, thank heavens; they can't be preachin' long after dark, to disturb folks' rest, or we'd not get any. No offense _" she added hastily.
Kestrel managed a wan chuckle. "N-none t-taken," he said. "We're here t-to p-peddle our c-crafts, and if it's G-god-Stars th-these p-people w-want, th-that's what th-they'll g-get!"
The girl smiled warmly. "I shouldn't've said what I did, but I didn't think you was lunatic religious," she replied. "F'r one thing, they don't bathe near often enough!" And she wrinkled her nose. "Be glad it's 'bout winter! I tell you, some 'f them 'd choke a goat in hot weather!"
Robin shrugged. "We're traders," she said. "We were warned what had happened, and we changed our trade goods for something that would sell under the circumstances. Perhaps it may sound cynical, but if they'd all gone mad for_for some actor who fancied feather masks, for some reason, we'd be peddling those instead of God-Stars."
"But actors don't get y' pilloried_or worse," the girl muttered, then shook herself. "Well, sir an' lady, take y'rselves upstairs, whilst I call th' upstairs wench, an' by the time y' reach the bathing room, the baths'll be ready."
She was as good as her word. The bathing room had two tubs, side by side, and both were full and steaming, as promised, by the time they arrived at the bathroom door. They sank into the hot water with gratitude.
Jonny simply let his mind empty; he did not want to think about what he had just heard. He wanted to relax, just for a moment, and pretend that none of this was happening.
Church bells woke them; not uncommon in a large city, but they seemed unusually loud until Kestrel remembered the Cathedral was not far away. And they were very loud. He hadn't heard bells like this since_since_
Since I was a child, and living in the Guild Hall with my Master. The Cathedral was across the street, and every morning the first bells would wake us, no matter how tired we were, or how late we had been up the night before.