The service was still underway. Valeria stood at the entrance to the main nave, watching the rows of kneeling women for a moment. The same hum of prayers. The same trembling shadows on the stone walls. The same smoking candle three rows from the right—wick too thick, wax cheap.
She found an empty spot in the ninth row and knelt, the stone cold beneath her knees. She rested her forehead against her interlaced hands. The drone of prayers filled her ears, alongside the scent of myrrh, burnt sage, and damp stone. Valeria closed her eyes and began to whisper the words with everyone else—the same words, the same rhythm, without pause, without stopping.
The words were good; she had known them for sixteen years. They entered the rhythm of her breathing like something natural, like a heartbeat. She prayed for forty minutes. When the service ended, she rose with the others, brushed off her knees, and straightened her headscarf. She left through the side exit with the crowd.
Outside, it was cold. The sky was gray, and the pavement was wet from the night's rain. The stench of exhaust fumes, roasted chestnuts from a stall, and fresh manure from the street hung in the air. The city lived at its own pace. Valeria headed toward her quarters; she still had two reports to write before noon.
Valeria's quarters consisted of a single room on Filtrant Street—a name she hadn't chosen, nor had any previous executioner; it was simply the name of the street. The room was small, clean, and practical. A bed against the wall, a desk by the window, and a wardrobe for equipment. There were no decorations on the wall except for a single symbol of Erynis—a hollow eye, without a pupil—nailed into the plaster.
Valeria sat at the desk and took a report form from the drawer. A mental report was one thing, but people deserved something more to be left behind. The paper was thick, gray, and printed with vertical columns: date, time of summons, time of order execution, state of the target before annihilation, means applied, result. She wrote precisely, in small letters, without mental shortcuts.
In the column for mental state of the target before annihilation, she paused for a moment. She wrote: Conscious. Communicative. No aggression.. She did not write: He said he had prayed for eight years and received no answer.. That was not relevant to the report. She folded the paper and slipped it into a sealed envelope.
She stood up, took off her coat, and hung it on a peg. She removed her shoes. Sitting on the bed, she began to check her copper fasteners—her evening routine, each one individually. The third fastener was loose. She took small pliers and tightened it.
It hurts—each of these veins hurts separately..
Valeria set the pliers aside. She took a shoe in her other hand and began checking the sole.
For eight years, Erynis did not answer me once..
The sole was good, with no cracks. Valeria set the shoe down and took the second one. Thorne sometimes answered in the middle of the night—a voice in her head, warm and dry, when Valeria lay in the dark after more difficult operations, counting the cracks in the ceiling plaster. Sleep. You did what was necessary.. She always fell asleep.
She checked the sole of the second shoe; it was fine. She placed the shoes side by side on the floor, heels together. She extinguished the lamp. In the darkness of the room, it was quiet. Through the window, she heard the distant rattle of a cart on the cobbles, a dog barking two blocks away, and the muffled voice of someone upstairs. Valeria lay on her back with her arms at her sides. The ceiling was invisible in the dark. She counted the cracks she could not see.
The morning brought the report, then an equipment review. Afterward, an hour of training with the Severer in a narrow cellar beneath the cathedral—just the blade, no partner, strings hung at various heights. Each had to be cut with a single movement, and none of the six could sway after the cut. Valeria cut all six.
Then, silence. No summons. Thorne remained silent all morning—which was normal; he didn't have to speak every day, as he had other matters. Silence meant nothing. Valeria returned to her quarters and ate lunch at her desk—a piece of dark bread, cheese, and cold water from a metal cup. She ate efficiently and wiped the crumbs from the tabletop afterward.
In the evening, a summons arrived. Not from Thorne. A paper one, brought by a Messenger in a sealed envelope with the red seal of the hierarchy. Higher than Thorne's seal—much higher. Valeria opened the envelope with a paper knife.
Executioner Valeria. Tomorrow at dawn. Hall of the Three Thrones. Presence mandatory..
The Hall of the Three Thrones. Valeria read the message twice. In seven years of service, she had never been summoned there. No one summoned executioners to the Hall of the Three Thrones unless there was a very good reason. She folded the note and slipped it back into the envelope.
A very good reason—or a very bad one.