The second time Leximus followed Williams, he noticed the pattern.
The Justicar's days were the same, measured, unchanging. He arrived at the tribunal at eight in the morning, walked the same path from the merchant district, passed the same shops, the same lampposts, the same iron gates. He did not deviate. He did not hurry. He simply moved, step by step, as if following a route that had been laid out for him long ago.
Leximus had watched him for three days now. Each day, the same sequence. Tribunal until noon. A brief recess—Williams sitting alone in a chamber off the main hall, not eating, not drinking, just sitting. Then more proceedings until four. Then the walk back through the merchant district, the alley, the iron door, the hours of stillness. Then emergence, unchanged, and the walk to wherever he slept.
Leximus didn't know where that was. Williams always disappeared into the fog before Leximus could follow him all the way.
On the fourth day, Leximus noticed something else.
Williams didn't blink.
Not once. Not during the trial, when the witnesses testified and the gallery murmured and the gas lamps hissed overhead. Not during the walk, when the fog swirled around him and the wind tugged at his coat. Not during the hours he spent behind the iron door.
His eyes were open, always open, the same hollow grey staring out at a world that didn't seem to touch him.
Leximus had seen that before. In the mirror. In his own reflection, when the cold inside him was at its strongest, when the Void was closest to the surface. The stillness. The emptiness. The sense of something looking out from behind his eyes that wasn't quite human.
Is that what you are? Leximus thought. Something that was once human and isn't anymore?
The cold inside him didn't answer.
On the fifth day, Leximus tried to get closer.
The tribunal was crowded—a minor case, a dispute between merchants, nothing that would attract the attention of the Crown. The gallery was full of clerks and clerks' assistants, people who had come to watch the proceedings because there was nothing better to do. Leximus blended in, his face just another face in the crowd.
Williams sat on the bench, his black frock coat buttoned, his cravat pinned, his top hat set aside on a small table beside him. The two lesser judges sat on either side, their white hair gleaming under the gaslights. They looked old, tired, human. Williams looked like a photograph—still, flat, unchanged by the passage of time.
Leximus watched him for the entire proceeding. Two hours. Williams didn't move. Didn't shift in his seat. Didn't scratch an itch or adjust his collar or clear his throat. He simply sat, his hands folded on the bench before him, his eyes fixed on the witness stand.
The witness was a woman—a shopkeeper whose goods had been stolen. She was nervous, her voice trembling, her hands clutching the rail of the stand. Williams asked her questions in a flat, affectless voice. She answered. He asked again. She answered again. The rhythm was mechanical, like a machine following a program.
Leximus felt the cold inside him stir.
He's not human, he thought. He's something else. Something pretending.
After the proceeding, Leximus followed Williams to the chamber off the main hall.
He didn't go inside—that would be too dangerous. But he stood in the corridor, his back against the wall, his eyes on the door. The gas lamps hissed. The shadows stretched. Minutes passed. Then an hour. Then two.
The door didn't open.
Leximus pressed his ear against the wood. Silence. No footsteps. No breathing. No sound at all. Just the stillness of a room that might as well have been empty.
He stepped back.
What do you do in there? he thought. Do you sleep? Do you eat? Do you do anything at all?
The cold inside him didn't answer.
At four o'clock, the door opened.
Williams emerged, unchanged. His frock coat was still buttoned. His cravat was still pinned. His face was still empty. He walked down the corridor, through the bronze doors, down the worn steps, and into the street.
Leximus followed.
The walk was the same as always. Through the merchant district, past the grand houses and the iron gates, past the shops with their awnings pulled down. The fog was thick, the gaslights struggling. Williams moved through it like a ghost, his footsteps silent on the cobbles.
He turned into the alley.
Leximus followed at a distance, staying in the shadows, his footsteps silent. The alley was narrow, the walls close. The single gas lamp at the far end burned low, its flame blue.
Williams stopped before the iron door. He reached into his coat and pulled out the brass key. He inserted it into the lock, turned it, and pushed the door open.
He didn't look back.
The door closed behind him.
Leximus walked to the door and pressed his palm against the iron. The cold was still there. The wards were still there, the same that didn't belong to the Church.
He tried to un-write the lock again.
Nothing happened.
The cold inside him pulsed—not in frustration, but in recognition. The wards were not just old. They were alive. They had been placed here by someone who understood the Void, who knew how to guard against it.
Who are you, Joel Williams? Leximus thought. What did the King appoint?
The door didn't answer.
He waited in the courtyard for four hours.
The fog thickened. The gas lamp burned low. The cold inside him was steady, patient. He didn't move. Didn't shift his weight. Didn't make a sound. He simply waited, watching the door, listening for any sign of movement from within.
There was none.
At nine o'clock, the door opened.
Williams emerged.
He looked the same as he had when he entered. Frock coat buttoned. Cravat pinned. Top hat set at the same precise angle. His face was unchanged. His eyes were empty. There was no sign that he had eaten, or slept, or done anything that a normal person might do in four hours.
He locked the door behind him, slipped the key into his coat, and walked back through the alley without looking left or right.
Leximus followed him to the edge of the merchant district.
Williams walked on, disappearing into the fog.
The Ministry was quiet when Leximus returned.
The basement was empty, the gas lamps turned low. He sat at his cubicle, pulled out his notebook, and added to his notes.
Williams does not blink. Spends hours behind a warded door. Emerges unchanged. The wards are old—older than the Church. They are designed to keep out the Void.
He stared at the last sentence.
Designed to keep out the Void.
That meant whoever had placed the wards knew about the Void. Knew what it could do. Knew how to protect against it.
Who are you, Joel Williams? Leximus thought again.
The cold inside him didn't answer.
He left the Ministry at midnight.
The streets were empty, the fog thick. The gaslights flickered as he passed, their flames shrinking to blue pinpoints before flaring back to life. The cold inside him was a second heartbeat, steady and patient.
He thought of Williams's empty face. His empty file. His empty eyes.
He thought of the door that wouldn't open. The wards that kept him out.
And the closer I get, the more I realize I don't understand any of it.