Seven Deaths of an Empire

by Matthews, G R

  “That doesn’t seem like a safe thing to do?” she quizzed. “What if someone finds it? It might be full of secrets.”

  “I don’t know,” Kyron said, pausing in his steps towards the stairs which led up from the cellar. “I didn’t think of that.” He shook his head. “It doesn’t matter. We find it and then we can decide what to do.”

  “So where is it?”

  “I don’t know,” he admitted, nearing the top of the stairs. “His study, his room, somewhere in the house. He didn’t have it on him when he went to the church and hasn’t been anywhere since.”

  “His office in the palace?”

  “I already checked, on the way out the prison,” he answered. “It was quiet in the palace. I think everyone was celebrating.”

  He pushed open the cellar door and stepped into his childhood home. The kitchen was unchanged. A long wooden counter running down one wall, some amphorae stacked in the corner and near the stove were cupboards and shelves.

  A cook and cleaner had been employed in the house when he had left for the Gymnasium. Kyron realised he had no idea if they had stayed with his grandfather and were still living in the house.

  “We… um… may not be alone in the house,” he whispered.

  Emlyn nodded, slipping her knife free and holding it ready.

  “No,” he hissed. “They’ll be asleep and wouldn’t harm me. We just have to be quiet.”

  “The way we smell would wake the dead,” she said with a grimace and, he noticed, did not sheathe her knife. “Which way?”

  “His office is on this floor,” he whispered. “This way.”

  He led her to the door and out into the home’s atrium. It was square with a tessellated floor in a simple design and the painted ceiling looked down upon them from above the second floor. In the southern Empire this room would, he knew from his classes, have an opening in the ceiling and a small, decorative pool in the centre of the room. It was too cold and too wet for such luxury here.

  The front door was directly ahead and beyond that the guard. To the left were the stairs leading upwards and, he knew though could not see, a door leading into the large dining room. On the right were three doors.

  One of the rooms had, from his memory, belonged to the cook, Decima, and her husband, Gressius. An ex-soldier, the man hadn’t spoken much, but walked with a pronounced limp without complaint.

  Next to that was the small house temple. A richly decorated room with a fire bowl which was kept burning day and night, the smoke exiting through a small chimney. Grandfather was a devout follower of the Flame and tried without much success to impress the same upon Kyron.

  The last room, the one closest to the door was the old man’s office. Apart from the walled garden out back, it was where he had spent much of his time when Kyron was growing.

  Upstairs was given over to bedrooms and guest rooms. Some of his belongings would still be there, Kyron knew, but facing those memories would be too much for tonight’s work. Another day, he promised.

  “Here,” he whispered, pushing open the office door and lifting his free hand to maximise the illumination. As Emlyn crept in beside him, he closed the door. “We’re looking for a book, about so big with dark leather bindings. I don’t recall it having any writing on it, but it looks old, battered and well used.”

  “His desk?” she suggested, pointing.

  Kyron walked over, keeping clear of the slim tables upon which vases and statues rested, moving around the large chairs which, during the day, would be in full view of the sunlight streaming through the windows.

  “It’s here,” he said, holding up the book, its leather straps keeping it shut.

  “Well,” Emlyn said, “that was easy.”

  There was a crash from the atrium, the sound of a door opening and metal striking the tiled floor.

  Kyron stared at Emlyn who returned the shocked gaze. She moved first, turning back towards the door.

  “We need to go,” she said, her voice gone from a whisper to a warning, and the knife coming up before her.

  “Don’t hurt anyone,” Kyron said, racing forward, drawing the motes from the room and building them into a spell.

  “No promises,” she replied as she pulled the door open and stepped into the ruddy light of an oil lamp.

  “Guard!” the man shouted, as Emlyn came into view. “Guard!”

  Kyron piled out of the room, book tucked under his arm and his spell of light still glowing in other hand. At the front door, there was a rattling sound as the soldier outside tried to respond to the man’s shout.

  “Gressius,” Kyron whispered, dropping the spell he had been about to throw at the man, “it’s me, Kyron.”

  The old soldier lowered his gladius and cast a sidelong look at Emlyn who still held her knife ready. “Kyron, you stink. What are you doing skulking around? It’s your house as much as his.”

  “Not at the moment,” Kyron corrected, stepping forward to clasp arms with his grandfather’s loyal cleaner and handyman who wrinkled his face at the smell. The old soldier’s eyes were bright despite his age and the scar which ran down his face. “I would say it is good to see you, but you know what is happening.”

  “Aye, I do,” the old man said. “It isn’t right, but I won’t be abandoning my post.”

  “Are you all right in there?” the soldier outside called. “Let me in.”

  “I’m fine,” Gressius called back. “Stop your shouting. You’ll wake the whole street.”

  “He didn’t do it,” Kyron said. “What everyone is saying. What the Emperor said. He didn’t do it.”

  “I know that,” Gressius answered. “Isn’t him at all.”

  “Let me in.” The door rattled once more. “By order of the Emperor.”

  “I just tripped over something,” Gressius called back. “Everything is fine.”

  “Open this door!” the guard screamed through the thick wood.

  “You have to go,” Gressius told Kyron, “and take your young friend with her sharp knife with you. Can’t do much about the stink, but I’ll think of something.”

  “They can’t know I was here,” Kyron said, shifting the book under his arm. He saw Gressius take a quick glance towards it. “It is to help him.”

  “You sure he wants your help, young Kyron?”

  “Maybe not, but like you I am not abandoning him,” he said, squaring his shoulders and standing up.

  “Good for you,” Gressius nodded. “Get out through the trapdoor. I’ll hold up our loud friend for a moment.”

  “Open this door or I’ll start chopping it down,” the guard shouted.

  “Thank you, I…”

  “Get going,” Gressius took hold of Kyron’s arm gave it a squeeze and then pushed him towards the kitchen door. The old man raised his voice and limped towards the door. “One moment. I fell over. Let me get something on and the key.”

  “Open this door,” the soldier called once more.

  “I’m coming,” Gressius shouted back, “dropped the chamber pot. Give me a moment to clean it up. Wouldn’t want to spoil your boots.”

  Kyron and Emlyn left the two soldiers arguing and slipped down the stairs into the cellar. Dropping into the darkness, Kyron passed the journal over and lifted the trapdoor back into place, locking it with the key.

  “Now you’d better hope the street cover is still open,” Emlyn said.

  “I hope Gressius doesn’t get hurt,” Kyron said as they hurried down the dark sewer, his dim light leading the way.

  “He’s known pain before, by the way he walks and stands, but he looks like he knows its tricks,” Emlyn said as she followed along.

  It took an hour of negotiating the sewers and streets before they stumbled, worn out and stinking back into Padarn’s rooms. The magician at the gate had covered his mouth and nose with the sleeve of his robe but asked no questions.

  “Wash,” Emlyn said, pointing to the bowl of water, and speaking over her shoulder as she moved to the other room. “A
nd get changed. Throw those clothes away, that stink will never come out.”

  He sniffed the air and proceeded to strip off, casting glances at the closed door. Kyron raced to get clean and dragged on a new set of clothes whilst still damp.

  “Well,” Emlyn said as she came back in and stirred the fire back to life, “let’s see what you got.”

  Kyron cleared a space on the desk and drew an oil lamp closer. With shaking fingers, he undid the bindings and opened the book, turning the pages and scanning the neat lines within. “I can’t read it.”

  “Why not?” Emlyn said coming closer.

  “It is some sort of code or cypher,” Kyron snorted in disgust, stepping back and away. All that effort, for nothing. The last chance to find the information he needed to save the old man. The stubborn old man who had raised him, argued with him, driven him to slamming doors and raised voices, and to the Gymnasium, to magic and a future.

  He staggered to a chair and slumped down. Already the tears, a mix of frustration, anger, and grief, were welling in his eyes and flooding down his cheeks. He balled a fist and slammed it down upon the arm rest. He raised it again and this time brought it down upon his own leg, the pain a punishment, acknowledgment of failure, of self-disgust. Leaning forward he put his head in both hands, covering his mouth and screamed into them.

  For a time, he cried. Each hot tear was a regret for an opportunity missed, a chance lost, a moment ignored. They carried with them his sense of loss and emptiness as they dripped to the floor forming a small, lonely puddle of grief upon the cold stone.

  Slowly, the sound of pages turning infiltrated upon his thoughts. He looked up to see Emlyn hunched over the book. Wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, he mumbled, “What are you doing?”

  “Reading,” she said without turning.

  “The code?” He stood, incredulous and shocked.

  “It isn’t code.” She turned to him with a cautious smile. “It is written in Old Galix.”

  “In what?”

  “The old language of the tribes,” she said. “Quite a few in the northern areas, like mine, still write in it. Usually in formal declarations, and your grandfather cannot spell worth a damn, but it does make sense.”

  “Did he say who he thinks ordered the assassinations?”

  “He does,” she said, her smile fading. “You’re not going to like it.”

  “Who?” The hole in the pit of his stomach gaped wider as the thought that his grandfather had confessed his guilt to those private pages.

  “Aelia,” Emlyn said.

  “The Emperor?” Kyron said, leaping from the chair and snatching the book from her hands. “We have to find Master Vedrix.”

  “He is at the palace tonight,” Emlyn said. “They told us that this afternoon.”

  “I have to see him.” Kyron turned to the door.

  “They won’t let you in,” Emlyn called. “Not dressed like that and not stinking like you do. Also, it is late and Vedrix will be asleep. I know it is hard, but it will be best to see him in the morning.”

  “The morning,” Kyron almost shouted. “My grandfather will be executed in the morning.”

  “You have time, Kyron,” Emlyn said, stepping across the room and gripping him by the arms. “You have time. Let’s wash, get some sleep and be ready for the morning. We’ll leave as soon as the sun rises.”

  She was correct, he knew. It was too late, the palace would be sealed until morning and there would be more guards on the streets. It would do no good to get caught, to have the book, the evidence taken from him before he could speak to Master Vedrix.

  Her being right did not make him feel any better.

  LIX

  The General

  Three years ago:

  The last sight of the lad in the Master’s study almost broke him, but he smiled and gave the boy a wave. It was returned with hesitance and the door closed.

  “He will be fine, General,” the magician who escorted him to the door said. “He is not the first, nor last to come through those doors and start a new chapter of their lives.”

  “He is a good lad, but not always the most,” he paused, “sensible.”

  The magician laughed. “I think that describes most boys of his age. I will look out for him. Please, do not worry.”

  “Thank you,” he began and realised he did not know the other man’s name.

  “Padarn, General,” the magician said. “Master Padarn.”

  The soldiers who arrived to escort him to the hill of execution did not speak. Communication between the condemned and their guards was forbidden, and he had trained his soldiers to follow orders above all else. However, the lack of chains restraining him and the manner in which each looked at him said more than simple words would convey.

  Give us the order, they said. We will follow.

  He shook his head and held out his hands for the chains. The soldier, uniform spotless, freshly shaved, and unsmiling, clasped them about Bordan’s wrists with a sigh.

  Still without a word they turned and marched from the cell. He fell into step, two soldiers ahead and two behind. Through the door and up the stairs, only the sound of their boots on the stone steps and the whisper of their breath for company.

  At the top, the door stood open, and a line of soldiers guarded the passage they trooped down. He felt every gaze fall upon his shoulders with the heavy weight of expectation. Bordan, once General of the Empire, kept his gaze down, focused upon his feet and the path they followed.

  The palace and parade grounds were silent, lined with more soldiers, survivors of the honour guard and those who fought in the Battle of the Bridge, whose eyes followed his every step to the gates.

  Overhead the summer’s day had dawned, cloud covered and grey. Rain would fall. Its scent was upon the air, and those little gusts of wind which chilled his face.

  He stopped at the gates, looked up at the sky, and took a deep breath. With deliberate care and speed, Bordan let his eyes go to every man and woman who stood upon the walls and filled the parade ground.

  His army. His troops. Trained and deployed to keep the Empire safe. Feared by the Empire’s enemies and loved by its people. His children almost as much as his son had been. Every single one raised under his watchful gaze and each with some imprint of his personality. His proudest achievement.

  Bordan raised his bound hands and tapped his chest. In a great wave every soldier returned the gesture. The condemned may not speak, but often words are the lesser aspect of language.

  Keeping his shoulders straight and head high, he crossed the threshold of the palace and stepped out onto the wide avenue. Here the crowds had gathered to see the traitor conveyed to the hill. The same barriers which had been used to keep the people back on the day of coronation were in place, but no one cheered this time.

  He turned with his escort and joined the larger group of soldiers who would take him to the hill.

  As they marched, the whispers began. The populace had come to see a traitor executed and their view was blocked by the soldiers. Whispers became calls which grew into shouts and rage.

  “Traitor,” came the call.

  “Murderer,” another.

  “Assassin,” a third shouted.

  “Bastard.”

  He felt each shout batter at his ears, but he had faced armies. In the years of service, he had stood on the front lines and lifted a sword for the Empire’s sake. In battles past, he had seen friends cut down, had cut down enemies.

  Blood, intestines, kidneys, the clear liquid which was housed only in the skull, the wrinkled grey of brain, the purple hue of a stilled heart, the bright red of severed muscle and the clean white of freshly exposed bone.

  There was nothing he had not seen in battle or the lull after. A man crying over a lost friend. A soldier vomiting and shaking in released fear. The stink of shit and piss. Copper tang of blood on his tongue. A dying soldier whimpering for help.

  Soldiers, survivors of a battle, given over to
their base emotions and the need for revenge. The slaughter of enemies. The painless application of the poppy or the slither of a sharp knife across a throat.

  The shouts of the crowd were nothing to those. Irritating and undeserved, but not as sharp as a sword nor as dangerous as an axe surrounded as he was by soldiers who had stood with him, or at his order, in battles of their own.

  Here was his land, his domain, his safety and comfort. However short it would be, this march to his last battle would not be one of shame.

  In his mouth, Vedrix’s pill was as hard and cold as a pebble fresh from the beach. A passing memory of a small boy, sad, sullen, broken, lifting a smooth stone and throwing it with every ounce of anger and injustice into the crashing waves.

  They marched through the city, down roads he had walked for decades, past shops he had bought food from, inns and taverns he had drunk in as soldier. The city had grown over the decades and improved. Markets had taken over squares and the people enjoyed the wealth which the Empire brought to their door. All protected by him, by his army, by his soldiers.

  Now they wanted his blood, to see him die upon the cross. He should be angry with them. The thought rose in his mind like the relic of a ship exposed by the tide. He should condemn them much as they did him.

  But he could not. All he could do was wish to spare them the pain of the coming years. Aelia as Emperor, even with the tempering experience of Godewyn, Vedrix, Maxentius, and the other council members, was a disaster in waiting. Soldiers who had seen battle and whose minds had snapped, or who had been overwhelmed by fear, by the horror, were given doses of poppy to keep them calm and sent back to rest. Some never recovered, but few ever held a sword in anger again.

  There was no one to give Aelia the calm clarity of the dreamer’s potion. Her mind would crack further under the pressure of grief and the amulet. Those who served her would ever remember this day, and know that they could be next. Some, he knew, would see this as a just punishment, but many others who knew of his lifetime of service would know this for what it was, and they would be afraid.