Seven Deaths of an Empire

by Matthews, G R

  A runner dodged past the last soldier a few moments later and slid to a stop next to the cart.

  The young soldier dismissed Kyron with a glance and looked up to the man on the cart. “Master Padarn?”

  “Can I help?”

  “Spear Astentius has ordered your presence at the front,” the soldier said.

  Padarn gave the reins to the man sat next to him and smoothed down his short beard. “I will come at once.” Padarn stepped down from the cart and onto the mud churned up by the passing feet of soldiers. “Kyron, bring your bag too. It will do well for you to hear what is going on.”

  “Actually,” the soldier said, casting a sidelong glance at Kyron, “it was your apprentice the Spear wished to see.”

  “My apprentice?” Padarn said, his voice cold and crisp. “Whatever the Spear wishes to say to my apprentice can be said to me. I am his master, and he is my responsibility.”

  “I…I…” The soldier stuttered, halted, nodded. “Of course.”

  “Lead the way,” Padarn said. “Come along, Apprentice, let us see what has halted our progress.”

  Following his master, his boots slipping in the mud and a hand on his bag keeping it steady against his hip, Kyron passed the soldiers and priests who stood guard around the waggon. He felt the eyes of the priests track his every step and looking up for a moment caught the hard, stone gaze of the Curate who had been assigned to watch him. She did not nod or otherwise acknowledge his presence, but every step became a little harder, his feet a little heavier.

  “Do not dawdle, Kyron,” Padarn turned and admonished. “The Spear awaits us.”

  Once past the waggon and out of sight of the priests, his tread became lighter once more. Now he noticed that there were fewer soldiers watching the forest. Instead they moved forward with his small group and filtered into new units which grouped into larger cohorts.

  Ahead, the Spear stood with his staff, their horses tended by grooms, and clerks in attendance carried the tools of their trade, ink pots, stylus, and scrolls. Emlyn, the guide and his tormentor, stood to one side.

  “Spear,” Padarn greeted as he approached. Kyron stopped next to his master and sketched a bow, “you sent for me?”

  “Ah,” Astentius said, “Master Padarn. The intelligence gathered after the last attack seems to be coming true. My scouts report a large force gathered just around the bend in the trail. No doubt there are more in the forests.”

  “And you suspect they are hostile?” Padarn asked.

  “They are armed and spread across the trail, Master Magician. Though I am told the trail widens slightly at that point, it is clearly their intention to block our path.”

  “We should attack,” one of the other officers said.

  “And I am not discounting that course of action, Cohort Borus,” Astentius answered. “However, it is always prudent to gather all the information you can before you commit yourself to a course of action.”

  “And you think I can help?” Padarn said, drawing the conversation back.

  “More precisely,” Astentius said, raising a finger and pointing to Kyron, “I believe he can help.”

  “Me?” Kyron strangled the word as it fell from his mouth.

  “With your permission, Master Padarn,” Astentius continued. “I will send your apprentice along with our guide,” the officer nodded towards Emlyn, “and a group of our soldiers under a flag of truce to determine what the tribespeople wish.”

  “Your death,” Emlyn muttered.

  There was a sharp intake of breath from the clerks and the gathered officers. Astentius however, laughed.

  “Quite likely, young lady,” the Spear said without anger, “and truth be known, I do not blame them. If the Empire was invaded, I too would want to kill those responsible.” He raised his finger again, a tutor making a point, sharing wisdom. “However, our count of their number, even taking into account those in the forest whom we cannot see, suggest they do not pose a significant threat.”

  “Significant?” Padarn interjected before anyone else had a chance to speak. “There is a lot of room in that statement, Spear.”

  “Indeed,” the officer agreed. “We would suffer losses, but I believe, as do my officers,” there was a round of nodding from the soldiers, “that we will win any conflict here and be able to continue our mission without undue delay.”

  “Why my apprentice, Spear?”

  “I cannot risk you,” the officer answered in a matter-of-fact tone. “Your skills and abilities are too useful. I know that your apprentice can truth-tell well enough to be useful.”

  “Master,” Kyron complained.

  “And your soldiers will keep him safe?” Padarn asked, ignoring the pleading in Kyron’s voice.

  “Of course,” the Spear nodded. “It is my intention to bring every one of them back safely with information we can use. The risk is, I believe, minimal. Is that not true, guide?”

  Emlyn huffed. “A flag of truce has as much meaning for us as it does for you, probably more so. You people of the Empire are honest only when it suits you. The rest of the time the lies which reside in your heart are spoken without a care.”

  “Excellent,” Astentius replied, and Kyron realised that the Spear had got used to dealing with Emlyn and refusing to rise to the bait she placed in the trap. “That should ease your concerns, Master Padarn. Your apprentice will be safe under the flag of truce. Our guide says so, and she does not lie.”

  Kyron caught the sour expression which twisted Emlyn’s face for a moment. She caught his look and the expression changed into a sardonic smile.

  “Then I have nothing to fear,” Padarn replied, looking to the guide. “I would appreciate his safe return, Emlyn, and your own.”

  She nodded, a quick gesture. “Let’s get this over with.”

  “Borus,” Astentius ordered. “Gather your soldiers. No more than four, and the flag. We shall await your report.”

  “Yes, Spear,” Borus answered. He waved to the four soldiers at the rear of the group. One of the men raised a pilum to which they had attached a white square of cloth.

  “Will your people recognise the flag?” Kyron asked as he fell into step with Emlyn.

  “More than yours,” was her answer. She sighed, an exhalation full of sadness and regret. “We use the white flag because it is easier to see amongst the trees. Your people took it from us.”

  “We did?” Kyron was surprised.

  “She is right, lad,” Borus said. The soldiers closed in around them as they made their way down the track. “Centuries ago, before we came to the continent, we raised our shields above our head in surrender or to parlay a truce.”

  “It looks too much like a formation,” Emlyn said, “a trick to protect you from arrows.”

  “So we learned,” Borus agreed. “The flag is used even in the far east, in the Han lands. Though there it means something else.”

  “You’ve been to the Han lands?” Kyron’s surprise kept on growing. “I didn’t know anyone had really been there.”

  “A few merchants,” Borus said, “over the centuries. The odd delegation from the southern continent, but we don’t have much contact, so I understand. They prefer it that way. And to answer, no, I haven’t. Doesn’t mean I can’t learn though.”

  “Well, no, I didn’t mean…” Kyron said, giving up as the Cohort grinned at him.

  “Don’t take everything to heart, Apprentice. I’m a soldier and that means knowing your enemies. Even if conflict is unlikely, it is good to know something about people from different places,” Borus said. “I find it interesting, the different ways in which people live, but I’d appreciate it if you didn’t go spreading that around.”

  “There is nothing wrong with learning,” Kyron said, his turn to be supportive and forgiving.

  “Not at the top of the army, but a Cohort fights with his men, and soldiers prefer the simple life of orders, direction, and certainty.”

  “Then how do they rise through the ranks to b
ecome leaders?” Kyron said. “I mean, if they don’t learn all they need.”

  “Aye, well,” Borus grunted, “that’s half the problem. Anyway, in the Han Lands, white symbolises death. So, the flag is really a flag of death. If we go to war, it says, you will die and so will we.”

  “Isn’t that what ours means?” Kyron looked at the square of cloth which hung limp from the spear.

  “More or less,” Borus acknowledged, “but ours is more about purity of purpose, innocence and truth.”

  Emlyn snorted. When all turned in her direction, she changed the snort into a cough, covering her mouth with her hand.

  “Cohort,” one of the soldiers said as they rounded the bend and pointed down the track.

  The Spear had been correct; the track widened enough at this place for four waggons to travel side by side without difficulty. If the area had not been filled with warriors of the tribes daubed in woad of blue, oval shields on their arms and a forest of spear points rising above their heads, Kyron would have described it as a clearing.

  “Elvorix,” Borus said to one of the soldiers, “start getting a count. Everyone else, take care what you say and guard your reactions. Let’s see if we can get through this without a battle.”

  “Not likely,” Emlyn muttered, and Kyron saw the grimace cross Borus’s face.

  “Even so,” Borus said. The officer squared his shoulders, took a deep breath and marched forward. “Lift the flag high.”

  No one spoke as the small group advanced. Kyron could not help but look at the tribes arrayed against them. Each man and woman was dressed in woollen trousers and a tunic dyed into a cross-hatched pattern. However, it was the woad with which they decorated their faces and shields that drew his eyes. Splashes of blue and green across faces, more in their hair to raise it into spikes which looked sharper than the spears and swords they carried.

  From the mass of warriors, insults were hurled. Though the language was one he spoke very little, the anger in the voices gave meaning enough. The Empire were not welcome and death was the only escape. He was certain, because Empire soldiers had hurled insults in the last battle, that there were also promises of much more gruesome fates.

  Kyron felt trembles begin in his fingers, spread to his legs, pull at his bottom lip, and salt tears threatened to spill from his eyes. The urge to run into to forest and piss was strong, a burning sensation in his bladder. Looking right, he saw the soldiers march in step, their faces fixed and unmoving, bravery and courage earned in a thousand battles blazing from their eyes.

  He blinked and saw the truth. They were scared too, they just hid it better. His fear gave way to shame. He would not, could not embarrass himself, his master, Borus, the Spear, or the Empire. He was a Magician of the Gymnasium, an apprentice to be sure, but he had passed the tests and not been found wanting. He would not be found wanting here.

  Kyron echoed Borus’s earlier gesture, took a deep breath and set his shoulders.

  A shout went up from the tribes and silence descended on the forest. In the front line, a spear was raised with its own flag of truce hanging from it. Four warriors detached themselves and marched forward. Unlike the regimented, rhythmic march of the Empire soldiers, the tribes came forward with an unhurried swagger.

  “Be ready to truth-tell them, magician,” Borus said from the side of his mouth. “Guide, you translate if needed. Remember your worth.”

  The last statement made little sense and Kyron was unsure if it had been directed at him, Emlyn, or the soldiers.

  The delegation from the tribes stopped twenty paces from the Empire and planted the spear in the ground.

  “Right,” Borus muttered, “let’s get this done.”

  XXIII

  The General

  Nine years ago:

  “I am not ashamed of where I come from, boy,” he said, shaking his head. “I came from the streets, raised by a good man and woman of the Empire. They gave me the best start in life they could, and I joined the army. It made me who I am. There’s a few of us who came from nothing and reached for the heights.”

  “But…” the boy said, his words faltering.

  “It isn’t where someone comes from, lad. It is what they do that judges their worth. Service and duty, learned that from my parents and army both.”

  The Empress waited at the door to the bedchamber. There were two guards with her and though both had faces locked into a professional expression, Bordan saw the pain in their eyes.

  “Your Highness,” Bordan began without knowing the words which would follow.

  She turned and he saw tears tracing down her cheeks. Her eyes were hollow voids of loss, her hands shook, and her skin was pale.

  “The surgeon says there is nothing that can be done,” she said, her words calm and clear, at odds with her expression.

  “Godewyn?” Bordan raised a questioning eyebrow.

  “Perhaps if we see the Prince?” the priest offered, but Bordan heard the answer in the pause before his old friend spoke.

  “In there,” the Empress pointed at the door. “I can’t… I can’t…”

  “Wait here and see to the Empress,” Bordan ordered the two soldiers. They nodded, unsure of their role but grateful to be given some orders. He understood their position. In truth, there was nothing they could do, but he hoped their stoic presence would comfort the Empress.

  To lose a child was a pain no one understood, not until they suffered the same wound. The emptiness, the sense of failure never left you. Every day there was a hole in your life which nothing could fill, not drink, women, or even, he confessed in the privacy of his own thoughts, work.

  Godewyn nodded to him and they pushed open the thick wooden door. The scent of death was something every soldier knew. It was impossible to avoid and, once smelled, unforgettable.

  The large bed, furs and blankets rucked up near the bottom of mattress, was the focus of Bordan’s gaze. Upon it, the body of the Prince lay in peace. From a step inside the door he could see no wounds, no blood, and no evidence of a fight. Yet a young man, who had decades of privileged and comfortable life ahead of him, was dead.

  To the side stood the court surgeon and his apprentice. The old man, wisps of grey hair about his temple, and his old-fashioned toga of white cloth wrapped tight about him, looked up as the door swung closed.

  “General, High Priest,” he greeted them in a sombre voice. The young man next to him did not speak but bobbed his head in acknowledgment of the newcomers.

  “He is dead?” Bordan asked, but his mind was cataloguing all those who already knew of the death, thinking of strategies to contain the news until he was ready to act.

  “Yes, General,” the surgeon replied.

  Godewyn stepped across the rugs and approached the bed, tilting his head as he did so. Bordan waited a moment for the High Priest to speak, but he remained silent.

  “How did he die?” Bordan said, his eyes scanning the room. The window was closed and there would have been guards outside the door. Perhaps the Prince had not been alone. A courtesan, a paid companion for the evening, could have shared his bed. She, or he, would have information and was the chief suspect.

  “I do not know,” the surgeon admitted. “I can find no wounds on the body and no evidence of poison.”

  “Young men don’t just die,” Bordan said, finally moving forward towards the bed. “Alhard was young, fit and strong.”

  “Sometimes, sadly, General, they do,” the surgeon said.

  “Not a Prince,” Bordan stated, ending the argument. “If there are no wounds, then it must have been a poison or an illness.”

  “I saw him this morning,” the surgeon said, and his apprentice nodded in confirmation. “He was hale and not complaining of any illness. Bad food can kill, but it is rarely this sudden.”

  “So, poison?”

  “If there is poison, I cannot find it,” the surgeon said.

  “There must be something,” Bordan snapped. “He cannot have just died. Not like th
is. Do you know what is at stake? The whole Empire hangs on a knife edge, surgeon. If the succession does not go ahead, we’ll face a civil war which could tear the Empire apart.”

  “I know that, but it does not change the facts,” the surgeon snapped back, before taking a breath. “My apologies, General. I am as frustrated as you. I have looked after the Prince since his birth. It is like losing a son.”

  Bordan flinched and the temptation to correct the old man, to explain to him just how much this was not like losing one of your own flesh, was a rush of warm blood to his head. He took his own breath, letting the fresh air cool his hot blood. “It is I who should apologise. Is there anything more you can tell us?”

  “Not here,” the surgeon said. “There are some things I can test for, in my laboratory. There will be an investigation?”

  “Of that you can be sure,” Bordan answered. “However, that’s not what you mean?”

  “General,” the surgeon spared a quick glance at his apprentice, “the outside of a body can tell us many things about life and last moments. However, a man’s insides can often tell us more about the cause of death.”

  “You want to cut him open?” Bordan’s voice rose in pitch, incredulous.

  “Absolutely not,” Godewyn said, speaking for the first time. “Such is forbidden.”

  “Of course, High Priest,” the surgeon said. “However, I would be remiss if I did not make the suggestion.”

  Godewyn grunted and moved to the other side of the bed. Bordan noted he had not touched the body of Prince Alhard, but also that he had not stopped looking at it.

  “What have you seen?” Bordan asked him.

  “I’m not sure,” Godewyn answered and a frown creased his brown. “However, there is…”

  His next words were cut off as Princess Aelia crashed into the room. Bordan caught her by the shoulders as she tried to rush to her brother’s side. The General grunted with the effort. Despite her smaller frame, there was a wiry strength to the Princess and Bordan was not a young man anymore. A moment later, Godewyn, bigger than both of them, took hold of the Princess’s arm.