Inside the walls!
Inside the wall?
Inside was chaos, and license. Everywhere the three looked, the minions and the hanger-ons of the See of Iniquity were indulging in every vice known to humanity, and a few unique to Unholy Toledo. There was shouting, and killing, and revelry enough for twice the number of people cavorting in the space between the walls and the Fane, and even this late at night the bonfires were lit, making the scene flicker in a grotesque alternation between greasy shadows, and the pitiless firelight of Hell.
It was well-known that to carry a weapon openly without leave in the Whore’s Fane was to volunteer to be thrown from its highest spire. But on this night nobody challenged them, or even seemed to notice. “Where are the guards?” Nat muttered. “Not that I miss them.”
“The smart ones fled, and the unlucky ones were caught and slain for treason,” shrugged the Monsignor. “The very unlucky ones will be flogged towards the foe when the Babylon Gate is breached. But they will not be at their posts, which is all either of you should care about. Follow me, and stay close! Even now, my presence will keep the prying eyes of this rabble safely averted.”