Lord of Order by Brett Riley (the reading list book TXT) 📕

own city, with his best friends leading the charge against his position. Nothing made sense.

His muscles ached. His head pounded. He had never felt so weary.

Gordon, Royster whispered.

Boudreaux regarded the pale, withered envoy. He looked little like the man who had taken the High Temple for his own—seemingly twenty years older and shriveled, like the desiccated body of some long-dead desert animal. Boudreaux looked into the envoy’s pain-reddened eyes. Yes, sir.

How long?

I’d give the first wave another five minutes at most, Boudreaux said. Then he gestured to the Crusaders on the wall. This lot ain’t gonna be no help.

Lord, deliver us from thy enemies, Babb intoned for the hundredth time.

Royster swallowed hard and took a deep breath. He groaned. Make our faithful ready to bask in God’s glory.

Protect us now, Father, Babb cried. We walk in the valley of the shadow.

Royster’s pitiful force stood or crouched at ten-foot intervals—no discipline, no plan, no will. One man alone here, a group of six there. Two women crying on each other’s shoulders even as they sharpened their knives with whetstones they had somehow retained as the city degenerated. Most weapons still lay at the Crusaders’ feet. Melton and Glau looked as if they had already soiled themselves and probably would again. Babb babbled. No cover, no relief. Where was the glory? Where were the faithful? Where was God?

Still, with nothing else to do, Boudreaux moved from group to group, conveying the message to the brave and the weeping alike.

52

Troy, Long, Hobbes, Tetweiller, Ford, and Stransky reined up twenty yards from the wall. Their multitude milled behind and around them. No one fired. The Conspirators picked up and handed out the weapons that the Crusaders had lost or cast away.

On the wall, Gordon Boudreaux stood tall, one hand resting on his untied sidearm. Beside him, Royster swayed like a treetop in the breeze.

Jerold Babb stood near them, trembling. Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall inherit the earth, he shouted, hands spread wide.

Shut up, Boudreaux said.

The minister’s hands dropped. He looked at Boudreaux, then at Troy. This is wrong! cried Babb. Surely you know that in your hearts. Stop this devil’s work. Turn your holy weapons on the enemies of God and reclaim your place in heaven.

There ain’t nothin holy about weapons, Troy said. It took me all my life to learn that, but it finally got through my thick skull.

If that’s so, Boudreaux said, why do you still carry them pistols?

No choice, Troy said. Not as long as other folks with weapons want to kill us. Not until we make a better world than this.

Troy turned to Hobbes and whispered, Nobody shoots Gordy or Royster. Leave five or six others alive. Pass it on.

Hobbes turned to Stransky, who turned to Bushrod—What did you do, she said to her lieutenant, run face-first into a hammer fifteen or twenty times?—and in this manner, the word spread through the ranks. The Crusaders watched the gathered New Orleanians, their expressions dark and full of loathing. A breeze kicked up, bringing with it an incongruous, almost otherworldly amalgamation of scents—the fresh smell of bougainvillea and morning glory, the sharper aromas of coppery blood and gunpowder, and the sickly sweet odor of rotting refuse. A single cloud passed overhead like a great schooner on the blue main. Someone coughed as they all waited for whatever came next.

Then Royster, leaning on Boudreaux, spoke in a thin and failing voice. Greetings, Lord Troy. I would ask how you still live, but I see those traitorous dogs at your heel.

You’re the treacherous one, Ford said. They had tied him to his saddle, and he slumped forward like a drunkard, but his voice was strong. You’re the one thirstin for slaughter and blamin it on God.

Troy held up a hand. Let the man have his say, Santonio. He can’t hurt us now.

Royster grinned, still sharklike. You’ve won nothing. Matthew Rook’s reach exceeds any man’s, and we are but a single finger on his hand.

Troy rode out five feet beyond the others. If God’s on our side, Rook don’t matter. And if He ain’t, your boss is the least of our problems. Either way, you’ll never know.

Well, Royster said, what are you waiting for? Get it over with.

Troy smiled. First, watch this.

Countless Conspirators dropped their weapons and ran for the Crusade’s supplies beyond the wall, while others rode out and yoked their horses to the last section of wall. A few minutes of beasts and humans straining and grunting, and the section fit into place perfectly, as Melton and Glau had intended. Other troops hauled over ladders and thick planks and hammered-flat scraps of metal, and they nailed and screwed the section to those on either side. They filled holes and covered the section in pitch. Carrying what they could and leaving the other tools behind, they climbed the ladders to the top. Crusaders stood aside as they pulled the ladders up and eased them down inside the wall. Then Troy and Stransky’s people descended back into the city, taking all the ladders away except the one nearest Royster and Boudreaux.

The Crusaders watched it all without a word.

When it was done, Royster patted the wall and wheezed.

He’s tryin to laugh, and that’s all he’s got in him.

We’re takin your goddam wall, Tetweiller shouted. And your river mines. We’ll use em to keep trash like you out.

Ernie, please, cried Babb.

Fuck off, Jerold. You ready, Gabe?

Troy pulled his sidearm and shot the Crusader nearest Boudreaux and Royster. The man cried out and tumbled against the outward-facing ramparts. The assembly listened to him die.

For a moment, nothing else happened. The very day seemed to hold its breath.

And then the horde opened fire.

They tore the Crusaders to pieces.

Royster fell to his knees and curled up, covering his head with his hands. Babb dropped, shrieking in fear. Boudreaux stood next to them, thumbs tucked into his belt. Bullets smashed into Crusaders and the iron bulwarks and the wall itself, splintering its wood.