Deathstalker 02 - Deathstalker Rebellion

be anyone who challenged his or the Church's authority. He didn't hesitate to accuse anyone who stood against the Church's rising influence or who got in the way of his own personal ascent, even if they were friends or Family or previous allies. And as he rose through the ranks with unprecedented speed, people hurried to copy his zeal, if they knew what was good for them.
    As a result, a useful way of dealing with one's enemies was to accuse them of heresy. No proof was needed; often the accusation was enough. There were tribunals, where the accused could present their defense, but they cost money.
    Justice has never come cheap. Things got so bad some people tried to take out
    insurance against being accused, to cover possible legal fees, only to discover the premiums were more expensive than the fees. That was when the courtiers first realized no one was safe anymore. The Empress wasn't slow to pick up on this and found the practice particularly useful for helping her keep her Court in order. If anyone started making trouble or getting above themselves, the word would go out and the unfortunate victim would be awakened in the early hours by the sound of holy boots kicking his door down. Soon anyone who even annoyed Lionstone had better have very strong ties with the Church, or a lot of money to hire lawyers. If you could find a lawyer brave enough to take on the Church these days.
    The courtiers played the same dangerous game, denouncing each other every day for political, Family, or personal reasons, but they were taken less seriously.
    The truth quickly vanished in a morass of claims and counterclaims, until even the Church grew sick of it. So they just recorded everything, to be kept for future ammunition, as necessary.
    Valentine Wolfe had been denounced so many times for all kinds of heresy that the Church lost count, including some that had previously been thought to be only theoretically possible, but the charges never stuck. No one doubted that he was an utter degenerate, with a drug habit strong enough to have killed half a dozen normal men, but as head of the Empire's first Family, incredibly rich and powerful, with the Empress's ear and support, he was for all practical purposes completely untouchable. Some wits made remarks about barge poles, but never when Valentine was around. Kassar still hadn't given up on him, but for the time being they settled for conspicuously ignoring each other. The courtiers watched avidly. Everyone knew the situation couldn't go on forever. It was just a question of which one made a misstep first; and then there'd be blood and hair
    on the walls.
    People had been laying bets for months.
    Valentine Wolfe stood a little alone in the heart of the crowd, as he always did. He was the head of the first Family on Golgotha, his every word a command for thousands of people, but he had no friends, or anyone who could say they were close to him. Valentine didn't give a damn. He never had. He'd always found himself infinitely better company than any of those who surrounded him. And given his continuing experimentation with every drug under the sun, and a few that grew only in darkness, his inner world was more than enough to occupy him in his quiet moments.
    Valentine was tall and slender and darkly delicate, like a fairy-tale demon prince, only more unreal. His face was long and thin and dyed a perfect white.
    Heavy mascara surrounded his overbright eyes, and a thickly painted crimson smile gave his face its only expression. Jet-black hair fell to his shoulders in thick curls and ringlets that had never known a comb. He wore dark clothes with the occasional splash of color, red for preference, and ignored the passing dictates of fashion with supreme indifference. In his time, he'd used every drug known to man and kept his private staff of chemists busy coming up with new ones. It was truly said he'd never met a chemical he didn't like. Anyone else who tried to ingest the quantity and variety of drugs Valentine had would undoubtably have been poisoned a dozen times over, his brains helplessly scrambled; but by some dark alchemical miracle. Valentine thrived and prospered.
    And if he saw the rest of the world rather differently than most people and had the occasional animated discussion with people who weren't there, still, it didn't seem to be slowing him down any. He remained sharp, ambitious, and
    extremely dangerous.
    But even he knew he couldn't go on forever as he was, without