Lost Covenant: A Widdershins Adventure Read Online Free PDF Page A

nation and hers.”
    Widdershins didn't so much scoff as snort. “Galice and Rannanti have been rivals for—”
    “Yes, thank you, I did study history in the monastery.”
    “I didn't study history anywhere, and I still know that! Going to take a bit more than a Church appointment to fix that, yes?”
    It might have been her own mind, might have been Olgun, might have been a cooperative effort between them, but once again she found herself leaping ahead, realizing precisely where Maurice was leading.
    “And you all just learned that the hard way, didn't you?”
    Her host muttered something toward the table (which, despite being nearer than Widdershins, probably couldn't make it out, either).
    “Figs and finches, Maurice! Did nobody at the basilica have the brains to realize this might make a few Galicians just a wee bit irritable? Pretty sure a lot of older folks still remember losing parents and grandparents—”
    “I'm not one of the high officials, Widdershins. I don't know what they thought or didn't think! My guess is that they expected problems, but not to this extent.”
    “And the city guard? Lourveaux does have a city guard, yes?”
    “Church soldiers. The, uh, the secular government is really just more of a recordkeeping bureaucracy than…Um…” He looked briefly like a turtle, trying to retract into its shell from Widdershins's level stare. (Olgun presented her with an alternate image to the turtle, accompanied by what could only be called a dirty-minded chortle of the soul, but she quickly shoved the image aside before she burst into laughter, blushed red as raspberry jam, or both.)
    “So just to be clear,” Shins said, drumming the fingers of one hand on the table and of the other on her teacup, “the Church appointed a new archbishop from Galice's oldest rival, took no steps to handle any resulting social unrest, and now has riots on its hands in the city that is only the seat of power for the entire Hallowed Pact. Have I left anything out?”
    “They're not riots, not yet. Just a lot of protesting and vandalism, mostly.” Again, he seemed suddenly to want to shrink away from her expression. “No, I…think you've got the gist of it.”
    “Are you sure? None of the bishops decided to poke a few sleeping bears? Throw darts at a grimoire and read random passages?”
    “I believe that's on next year's agenda.”
    The wisecrack, unexpected as it was, silenced her for a moment—which, a gleefully snickering Olgun assured her, was almost certainly the monk's whole point.
    “She wants your help , Widdershins. At least if she decides you can be trusted.”
    “She?” Shins shook her head, trying to throw off a sudden daze or perhaps dislodge an insect buzzing in her hair. “She who? Wants what? Who what?”
    “Her Eminence. We're fairly sure there's someone orchestratingat least some of the unrest, and they're far too adept at ferreting out anyone we send to find them. The archbishop was hoping that you might—”
    Widdershins shoved herself back from the table and stood, knocking the chair over behind her; spun on her heel and all but dashed for the exit. This time, the monk's pleas for her to wait didn't even slow her as she hauled open the door and threw herself into the blustery winter winds.

Lourveaux really was very much like Davillon, except for the ways in which it wasn't.
    Here, in the poorer neighborhoods and back alleys, as distant from the beating heart of the Church of the Hallowed Pact as one could be and still stand within the city proper, things looked almost familiar. Streets caked with dirty-gray snow, passersby in threadbare coats and worn shoes; the same scent of cheap woods and even less pleasant fuels, smoldering away in a desperate defensive line against winter's advance; the same sorts of buildings, blocky and bordering on decrepit without ever quite threatening to just give up the ghost and collapse like a bad soufflé.
    Even here were differences, however. The roads