Lukas the Trickster

by Josh Reynolds

  Like the cunning old predators they were, they had waited for the Blood Claws to weaken the beast before striking. As it flopped back, screaming angrily, the jarl hewed away at it with his frost blade. His huscarls kept a respectful distance, intercepting any overeager Blood Claws who might interfere. Lukas snorted. This was to be Grimblood’s kill alone, then. Such was the way of it – wolves gave up their kill to the leader of the pack.

  He heard a shout, and saw Ake barrelling towards the fray. One of the huscarls shoved him back. ‘You have done your share of bloodletting, pup,’ the Wolf Guard said, chuckling. ‘Now let a true warrior make the kill.’

  ‘That’s our kill,’ Ake snarled, bumping chests with the towering huscarl. The older warrior’s battle-plate was heavy with trophies and the marks of war, and he carried a heavy two-handed axe. He shoved Ake back another step and gave a booming laugh.

  ‘Then you should have gone and made it, instead of playing with the beast, pup.’

  Ake lunged towards the Wolf Guard and received a clout on the head. He dropped to the ice, pole-axed. The Wolf Guard rolled him over with a boot and called out to his fellows. ‘They are more fragile than I recall, these pups.’

  ‘That’s because you’ve never known your own strength, Hafrek,’ Lukas said. He stepped over Ake, and Hafrek retreated a step. ‘Even when you were a stupid pup, accidentally crippling thralls while in your cups.’

  ‘Guard your tongue, Trickster,’ Hafrek growled.

  ‘Or what?’ Lukas spread his arms. ‘Come, brother, shall we spar like we used to? Is your memory as dull as your wits, that you don’t remember how badly I beat you then?’

  ‘I am not a pup now,’ Hafrek said warily.

  ‘True enough. That means I don’t have to take it easy on you.’ Lukas took another step towards the huscarl. They stared at one another for long moments, until Hafrek snarled and turned away.

  ‘Begone, Trickster. I have no time to waste on you.’

  Past Hafrek, Grimblood was making his kill. The master-crafted weapon in his hands flickered with an azure radiance that left contrails of cold in its wake with every slash. The kraken, already wounded, was little match for a warrior as old and as skilled as Grimblood.

  His blade bit into the black, blister-like eye. Ichor spurted and the kraken’s cries spiralled up into a wail of agony. The smaller, frond-like tendrils clustered closer to its jaws and head slammed into the Wolf Lord, their barbs gouging his armour.

  Grimblood wrenched his blade loose and drove his free hand into the gaping wound. Lukas knew what he was after. There was only one way to kill a kraken – go for the brain.

  Despite the creature’s thrashing, Grimblood found what he sought, and he wrenched a mass of pulpy ganglia free in a spray of gore. The kraken convulsed, cracking the ice all around it in its death throes, scattering its attackers.

  The jarl stumbled back, still clutching its brains. It twisted towards him, its beak wide, before it at last collapsed like a torn air bladder. For a moment, the only sound was the crackle of settling ice. Then Grimblood threw back his head and howled.

  The call was echoed across the ice as the packs heard and celebrated their jarl’s triumph. Hafrek and the other Wolf Guard moved to congratulate their lord. ‘There will be a saga about this great victory before the cycle has finished,’ Lukas said as he hauled Ake to his feet. ‘I wonder whether he’ll mention us?’

  ‘I wouldn’t wager on it,’ Ake muttered, rubbing his skull.

  ‘I could give you odds, if you like. How’s your head?’

  ‘Hurts.’

  ‘Good. Maybe you’ll remember to wear a helmet next time,’ Lukas rumbled. Despite the mist that still obscured much of the ice, he could see columns of smoke rising towards the cavern roof, and his helmet’s autosenses detected traces of burning kraken flesh. Theirs was the only kill the jarl had seen fit to poach.

  He grinned. ‘Go find the others. Get Dag on his feet.’

  Ake looked at him. ‘Where are you going?’

  ‘To speak with our jarl.’

  Lukas stalked across the ice. It wasn’t anger he felt, but relief. Grimblood had struck first. That meant whatever happened next was on his head. The jarl had kept his distance these past weeks, since their initial confrontation, and Lukas had confined his entertainments to the Blood Claws. An uneasy truce, and an unspoken one, but a truce nonetheless.

  And now it was broken.

  Grimblood turned as Lukas thrust aside two of his huscarls. They snarled at the disrespect, but stayed their blows at Grimblood’s curt gesture. ‘What is it, Trickster?’

  ‘You’re welcome, Grimblood.’

  ‘For what?’

  ‘The kraken we bloodied for you.’ Lukas held up his hands as Grimblood growled. ‘No, no, think nothing of it, my jarl. It was our honour to hold the poor beast down while you so courageously seized the glory full in your jaws.’

  ‘Careful, Jackalwolf. I can stomach only so much of your foolishness.’

  Lukas glared at him. ‘It was their kill, Grimblood. They earned it.’ He leaned close. He could feel the anger radiating from the other warrior. It beat at his senses like a wave. ‘We must prove our worth. We must earn our sagas, and howl them into the teeth of the void. That is what we are taught. You steal the beginning of their saga from them with this act.’

  ‘If you were anyone else, I might be shamed by that,’ Grimblood said after a moment. ‘But I know you, Strifeson. And I know that you don’t give a damn about such things. I took the kill, for it is my right to do so. They should be honoured, for their names will be a part of my saga.’

  ‘They will be delighted to hear that.’

  Grimblood shook his head. ‘Sometimes I wonder why they bothered to scrape you off the ice, brother. What did old Ulrik see in you that day?’

  ‘I often ask myself that same question,’ Lukas said. ‘This mountain is full of ghosts who want to make us something we are not. To bend us into shape, fit for sagas and the songs of skjalds. I, for one, prefer to tell my own saga. Not be a part of someone else’s.’

  ‘You talk about sagas as if you are free of them. But what are you, save the thing they have made you?’ Grimblood snorted and poked a finger into Lukas’ chest. Lukas frowned. ‘The Jackalwolf. Do you know why we call you that?’

  ‘Because you’re jealous of my looks?’

  Grimblood glowered at him. ‘No. Because you remind us of bad days and black deeds. You do not listen, you do not heed your betters. You snap at them instead. The way we once did, before Russ took us in hand.’ His voice rose, and Lukas cursed inwardly as he noticed the grey shapes gathering in the mist to listen. He had made a mistake. Grimblood had wanted a confrontation – had baited him into it with a stolen kill.

  ‘Our name was a joke, Trickster. The Rout – it is a joke. An insult. A term for a pack of jackals, or the pariah dogs that haunted the dry seas of Terra. We were beasts in those days, and named for beasts. That was the beginning of our story. The names we bear are sagas in and of themselves, links in a chain stretching back unto the opening of the Wolf’s Eye.’ Grimblood frowned and clenched his fist. He was making a show of it, impressing their brothers with a display of strength and control. ‘We are stories, Jackalwolf. We are sagas unwritten, and it is our duty to play the parts the Allfather intends for us.’ Grimblood fixed him with a steady gaze. ‘Even you have your part to play.’

  ‘Aye, and I know it well. Without me, you would sink into melancholy and spend your days reciting sad sagas of glories past. I give you something to look forward to.’

  ‘Your eventual death, you mean?’

  Lukas laughed. ‘Why not? I’m not planning on dying, but it gives you something to growl over. Like a wolf with a bone.’ He thumbed his nose and stepped back, out of reach. ‘I am what I choose to be, Grimblood. And nothing more.’

  ‘And that is wh
ere you are wrong, Jackalwolf. You are what I say you are, while you are a part of my pack.’ Grimblood drove his sword point-first into the ice.

  Lukas glanced at the sword, and then at Grimblood. ‘It’s going to be a long Helwinter for both of us, I fear,’ he said, baring his teeth in a wide, slow smile. He heard the huscarls growl at the implied threat, but Grimblood might as well have been carved from stone.

  ‘Go back to your pack, Blood Claw.’

  Lukas bowed mockingly, then turned and trotted away.

  ‘Ake was right, then?’ Kadir asked bitterly as Lukas rejoined them. Halvar was supporting Dag, who was cradling his head.

  ‘Right about what, pup?’

  ‘That the jarl has claimed our kill for his own.’

  Lukas nodded. ‘As he has just reminded me, that is his right as jarl.’

  ‘The glory was ours. It isn’t fair,’ Ake said.

  ‘No, it isn’t. It merely is, or is not.’ Lukas turned and studied Grimblood. Already a plan was beginning to form. ‘Still, you are right. Grimblood oversteps himself. Occasionally even Wolf Lords need to be reminded that they are part of the pack – not above it.’

  ‘Chieftain,’ Einar said.

  Dag nodded. ‘Einar is right. He is jarl. He is above us.’

  ‘No,’ Lukas said mildly. ‘He is in front of us. A good leader is always in front. But never above.’ He laughed.

  ‘Which is why he will never see it coming.’

  Chapter Five

  BAITING THE HOOK

  641.M41

  Sliscus ran across the sheet metal rooftops, his steps as light as the oily rain that fell across the city. He drew his sword as he went. The blade was a work of art, as singular in the universe as its wielder. He had made sure of it. It had been crafted especially for this day, and he’d had the swordsmith executed to ensure there would never be another like it.

  Unfortunately, his prey wasn’t where he had hoped to find them. He pursued them now down through the tiers of the gravity-defying arcology, from gilded palaces to these dank slums.

  The dark, faceted armour he wore caught and reflected the lights of the cityscape like black glass. A luxurious cloak of dark fur rippled in his wake, the individual hairs stiffening and twisting in strange patterns. Sliscus had adorned himself in a panoply of blades and curves so that his merest twitch might catch and scatter the light. He wore no helmet, preferring to taste the carnage unfiltered by autosenses.

  He wasn’t the only corsair on the rooftops. His warriors were scattered across the slums, hunting for prey and plunder. Raiders swooped low over the plazas and avenues, and the night was alive with the music of slaughter. Sliscus slowed, taking it all in.

  The Autocracy of Pok spread out around him like a scum of grey slime on stagnant water. The world was a gas giant, but the mon-keigh had colonised it readily enough despite the lack of anything resembling solid ground. The city was a floating conglomeration of a dozen crude arcologies, bound to one another by massive tensile causeways. Great engines fuelled by the chemicals pulled from the atmosphere kept the Autocracy aloft. All very primitive, but efficient in its way.

  It was almost a shame to destroy it, but there were some insults that simply could not be borne by any right-thinking corsair. A world like this could not be allowed to get above itself. There was a very strict hierarchy to the galaxy, and Sliscus was its faithful servant. In this instance, at least.

  Far above him, something exploded. Reavers and hellions tumbled through the virulent gases of the atmosphere like brightly coloured birds of prey. They spun about the upper tiers and towers of the city, preventing any escape from the docking platforms that extended outwards from the high places like dull halos. Sliscus allowed himself a paternal smile at their antics.

  He attracted all the wrong sorts to his banner. Rebels and spire-gangers, cutthroats and criminals. Renegades, even among the hedonistic kabals of the Eternal City. They made poor soldiers, but fine pirates. Some would eventually make their way back to Commorragh, wiser and bearing the scars of their experiences. Others would die. But while they served him, he made good use of them.

  A chunk of burning debris slammed down nearby, and he quickly sprang to the left. He caught sight of his quarry and slid down the incline of the roof. Just before he hit the edge, he leapt upwards, arcing out over the street. He tore his splinter pistol from its holster as he landed and fired without looking. His prey died all the same, and he shuddered in pleasure as the echoes of their agonies washed over him.

  They were mon-keigh, so the repast was less satisfying than it otherwise might have been. They died too quickly, and their agonies were but crude emulations of those of higher species. They lacked the sensory capacity of an antedil or the pain receptors of a sza. Nonetheless, they served their purpose.

  He felt the pull of She Who Thirsts dwindle and fade for another moment. He straightened and laid the flat of his sword across his shoulder. ‘Well, what have we here?’ His voice carried easily along the avenue, despite the cacophony of battle. ‘Is that you, Gymesh? Fancy meeting you here, old friend.’

  Gymesh, High Autocrat and Lord of Pok, sat hunched in a gilded sedan chair supported by four spindly automatons. That such ephemeral-seeming machines could support his great bulk spoke to the hardiness of their construction. Behind the chair, a loose maniple of machine-warriors spread out to protect Gymesh’s courtiers. Or perhaps to use them as cover, it wasn’t clear which.

  The handful of warrior-drones were not like the household guards he had just dispatched. These were a stunted, blood-simple warrior-caste, their meat minds scooped out and replaced with glorified targeting computers. Their souls flickered but dimly within the cybernetic husks they had made of themselves. Gymesh had risen to his current exalted state on the back of such pathetic creatures, but their lack of initiative ill served him now.

  The courtiers were a motley lot clad in soot-stained finery, and some clutched weapons that were more akin to props than implements of death. The last vestiges of the old mercantile houses were retained to add a sheen of respectability to Gymesh’s governance. Birds of paradise in gilded cages. Sliscus could understand why Gymesh was dragging them along – their contacts and resources were worth a bit of trouble, especially if Gymesh had an eye to rebuilding elsewhere. He had an almost Commorrite cunning, did the Lord of Pok.

  ‘Ah, ah, ah. Trying to escape. What sort of tyrant are you?’ Sliscus strode forward. ‘We could have had this moment among the burning ruins of your palace, Gymesh. Instead, we must dirty ourselves in a rancid alley like common cutthroats.’ He extended his sword. ‘I am quite put out, you know. I had this sword made especially for this occasion. I had it all planned – a thing of sublime artistry. And you had to go and ruin it.’

  ‘We had an arrangement,’ Gymesh said. His voice shuddered through the damp air like a skirl of feedback. ‘We paid for your protection.’

  ‘Yes, but you were very rude about it. And I was getting bored, watching your fat little gas-scows trundle back and forth through the system so arrogantly.’

  ‘You could have taken one. I would not have protested. Gas-crews are cheap.’

  ‘But if I had, we might not be having this moment here. A pleasure denied is a pleasure redoubled, as the great sage Um’shallyah penned in his treatise The Principles of Pain. A delightful work, if academic.’ Sliscus smiled.

  ‘I have not read it.’

  ‘I doubt you would understand it if you had. Now, alas, you will never have the chance.’ Sliscus took a quick step towards his prey, and the cybernetic guards stiffened slightly. He fancied that he could feel their targeting sensors sliding over him, and he shivered in anticipation. The facets of his armour were angled just so, to make target locks all but impossible. To them, he might as well have been a mass of confusing signals.

  ‘I might, if you were of a mind,’ Gymesh said. Sliscus felt a gru
dging admiration for the creature. Panic normally set in at this point. But Gymesh radiated nothing but resignation and irritation. Perhaps he had foreseen this. He would have been a fool if he hadn’t.

  ‘What are you offering?’

  ‘This world. Its bounty. Take it as a gift. I will leave it to you.’

  Sliscus shook his head. ‘You offer what I already have.’

  Gymesh sighed. He shifted in his chair and glanced at his courtiers. ‘But you do not have these. Highborn flesh fetches high prices in the slave markets.’ Shouts and screams of protest arose at this, but at a gesture from Gymesh his cybernetic warriors beat down the loudest of them. Sliscus smiled thinly as he realised why the warriors had deployed as they had. Gymesh, cunning old rogue that he was, had foreseen this. But such foresight would avail him little today.

  ‘No, I’m afraid that won’t salve my pride,’ Sliscus said. He extended his sword. ‘It is time for a parting of the ways, Gymesh. We have had a good run, you and I, but new stars beckon and I have more interesting souls to reap. So draw your blade, meat, and let us commence closing negotiations.’

  ‘I see you will not be reasonable.’ Gymesh flung back the edges of his ornate robe. He had spared no expense in modifying his pathetic flesh. Cybernetic augmentation wasn’t unknown among the higher echelons of the Eternal City, but it was considered somewhat gauche to make it obvious. Gymesh, on the other hand, had obviously wanted to see what he was paying for.

  Beneath his robes, he was a nightmare of primitive modifications. His jointed legs seeped steam from pneumatic vents, and the pistons of his claws dripped sparks as he flexed his hands. The armoured plates fused to his corpulent frame dripped a tarry substance that might have been blood or oil or both. The rain made curious trails through it.

  The High Autocrat heaved himself up out of his sedan chair with a bone-rattling groan. Pumps wheezed as chemical hoses flushed darkly. Prosthetic eyes whirred, focusing on Sliscus. ‘That it has come to this is a disappointment, Traevelliath. Our arrangement was most efficient.’