The Heavenly Host

“Hmm, very nice stores. Popular among greater demons and a few archdemons,” Boggy said. “Never been, myself. Haven’t got that kind of money.”

“What does your friend do?” Antefalken asked.

“Sam just said he worked in the Courts,” Tom replied.

“Sam?” Tizzy perked up.

“Yes, his name is Sam. He works in the Courts and has a getaway cave not too far from here,” Tom confirmed.

“Human-shaped demon you said?” Tizzy asked. Tom nodded. “Red hair, beard, drinks carbonated beverages?”

“Yes.” Tom said, frowning. “I take it you know him?”

“Tizzy seems to know everyone,” Estrebrius commented.

“I know him. Haven’t seen him in a while; he must spend a lot of time in that cave. Don’t trust him,” Tizzy said.

“Why don’t you trust him?” Antefalken asked.

“I did not say I don’t trust him, although I don’t. I said, do not trust him, meaning Tom should not trust him,” Tizzy said.

“Why?” Tom shook his head. “You’ve been getting rather paranoid recently. You’ve been rude to my friend Reggie, and now you don’t like Sam.”

“I didn’t say I did not like Sam,” Tizzy said. “As his type goes, he’s quite pleasant and can sometimes be fun to be around.”

Boggy was now staring at Tizzy and shaking his head. “So you don’t trust him, and you don’t think Tom should trust him, but he’s fun to be around?”

“Yep.” Tizzy nodded and stuck his pipe back in his mouth.

Boggy shrugged and shook his head, looking back to Tom.

∼

Hilda was enjoying herself. One did not get to do much hands-on work as a saint. Pretty much by definition, you just sat there on a pedestal. This was like her mortal days, going from patient to patient, examining them and treating them. The nice part was that she had a lot more healing power as a saint than as a human.

Initial triage had been done, and many of the worst issues dealt with, but there was only so much healing to go around, at least when it came to thaumaturgy. It was relatively inefficient healing to begin with, and being mortal, the wizards had limited mana reserves and needed to sleep. Neither were a problem for a saint.

Of course, technically, one was really supposed to focus on healing the faithful and there were not a lot of those here, but they had been working in concert with the Rod to drive the demons out, so they were allies. There was no proscription against helping non-believers; it was really more of a prioritization sort of thing. If there were more believers here, she obviously would prioritize them.

Anyway, it was mainly broken bones from falling masonry, a few concussions, and some cuts and bruises. A lot of trauma, understandably. A lot of her focus today had been on the servants and apprentices that had been bowled over by fleeing demons and their paths of destruction. Like clerics, the thaumaturgists had their priorities: the city elite, meaning other wizards and their families; plus, of course, the very seriously wounded. Therefore, she was doing a lot of work with the lower classes, which suited her fine. As a saint and a former Sister of Tiernon, caring for the disadvantaged was a critical component to her ministry.

She and Danyel had come by after breakfast and gone to the reception desk and advised them of her skills and willingness to help; they had been quickly led to the main infirmary and from there assigned a young page with a list of people to visit. Currently she was in a courtyard area tending to staff who generally lived in the city proper and came for help. They had had some people from the city itself, who had been wounded by fleeing demons, held in laboratories outside the palace as well.

Technically, she supposed, as a healer, she should have been doing this yesterday, but as a spy, she had had other priorities. Hilda shook her head. The higher one rose in the ranks, the more priorities one had to manage. Danyel, who had been holding a man’s foot as she healed his broken thigh, suddenly stared over her shoulder and made a coughing noise before quickly looking down, as if hiding his face. What was his problem?

“Arch-Diocate, Vicar General, here you see a courtyard where we have healers tending to the wounded from all over the city,” a voice behind her said. She did not recognize the voice, but the titles were rather obvious. She quickly tried to adjust her healing to be more precise and focused. She had been a bit lazy and had allowed for some aura leakage. She could not let them see her doing a healing ritual. Even as she finished healing the leg, she felt the presence of a group of people behind her.

Hilda finished as quickly as was prudent and then stood and turned to face the group of people behind her. Sure enough, there was a high-ranking wizard in his mid-thirties along with someone dressed as an arch-diocate and another as a vicar general of the Rod, along with a few other Rod members. Hilda clamped down on her aura, gave a low-wattage smile and curtsied. “Holy Sirrahs,” she addressed the two senior members, “Rod members, my pleasure. I am Hilda the Healer.”