The Hidden City

Knights were born and raised in Hell. A fair number of the debaters are currently taking the matter up with God in person.’
    ‘I gather that religious disputes among the Peloi are quite spirited.’
    ‘Oh, yes,’ Daiya agreed. ‘The message from Archimandrite Morsel helped to quiet things, though. Peloi religious thought isn’t really all that profound, your Reverence. We trust God and leave the theology to the churchmen. If the Archimandrite approves, that’s good enough for us. If he’s wrong, he’s the one who’ll burn in Hell for it.’
    ‘How far is it from here to Cynestra?’ Bergsten asked him.
    ‘About a hundred and seventy-five leagues, your Reverence.’
    ‘Three weeks,’ Bergsten muttered sourly. ‘Well, there’s not much we can do about that, I suppose. We’ll start out first thing in the morning. Tell your men to get some sleep, friend Daiya. It’s probably going to be in short supply for the next month or so.’
    ‘Bergsten.’ The voice crooning his name was light and musical. The Thalesian Patriarch sat up quickly, reaching for his axe.
    ‘Oh, don’t do that, Bergsten. I’m not going to hurt you.’
    ‘Who’s there?’ he demanded, fumbling for his candle and his flint and steel.’
    ‘Here.’ A small hand emerged from the darkness with a tongue of flame dancing on its palm.
    Bergsten blinked. His midnight visitor was a little girl—Styric, he guessed. She was a beautiful child with long hair and large eyes as dark as night. Bergsten’s hands started to tremble.
    ‘You’re Aphrael, aren’t you?’ he choked.
    ‘Good observation, your Grace. Sparhawk wants to see you.’
    He drew back from this personage that standard Church doctrine told him did not—could not—exist.
    ‘You’re being silly, your Grace,’ she told him. ‘You know that I wouldn’t even be talking to you if I didn’t have permission from your God, don’t you? I can’t even come near you without permission.’
    ‘Well, theoretically,’ he reluctantly conceded. ‘You could be a demon, though, and the rules don’t apply to them.’
    ‘Do I look like a demon?’
    ‘Appearance and reality are two different things,’ he insisted.
    Afrael looked into his eyes and pronounced the true name of the Elene god, one of the most closely-kept secrets of the Church. ‘A demon couldn’t say that name, could it, your Grace?’
    ‘Well, I suppose not.’
    ‘We’ll get along well, Bergsten,’ she smiled, kissing him lightly on the cheek. ‘Ortzel would have argued that point for weeks. Leave your axe here, please. Steel makes my flesh crawl.’
    ‘Where are we going?’
    ‘To meet with Sparhawk. I already told you that.’
    ‘Is it far?’
    ‘Not really.’ She smiled, opening the tent flap.
    It was still night in Pela, but it was broad daylight beyond the tent flap—a strange sort of daylight. A pristine white beach stretched down to a sapphire sea all under a rainbow-colored sky, and a small green eyot surmounted by a gleaming alabaster temple rose from that incredibly blue sea about a half-mile from the beach.
    ‘What place is this!’ Bergsten asked, poking his head out of the tent and looking around in amazement.
    ‘I suppose you could call it Heaven, your Grace,’ the Child Goddess replied, blowing out the flame dancing on her palm. ‘It’s mine, anyway. There are others, but this one’s mine.’
    ‘Where is it?’
    ‘Everywhere and anywhere. All the Heavens are everyplace all at once. So are all the Hells, of course—but that’s another story. Shall we go?’

Chapter 21
    Cordz of Nelan was the perfect man. That realization had not come easily to the devout Edomishman. It had only been after extended soul-searching and a meticulous examination of the sacred texts of his faith that he had arrived at the inescapable conclusion.
    He was perfect. He obeyed all of God’s commandments, he did what he was supposed to do, and he did not do the things that were forbidden. Isn’t that what perfection is all about?
    It was a comfort to be perfect, but Cordz was not one to rest on his laurels. Now that he had achieved perfection in the eyes of God, it was time to turn his attention to the faults of his neighbors. Sinners, however, seldom sin openly, so Cordz was forced to resort to subterfuge. He peeked through windows at night, he eavesdropped on private conversations, and, when his sinful neighbors cleverly concealed their wrongdoing from him, he imagined the sins they might be