by Tyler Krings
“…’re in the fucking ranks!”
With Vernon’s aid, the general is pulled to the line shouting orders.
“Regroup! Sheilds up!” Few men heard him over the screams. Horsemen blindly charged, running down their own spearmen in their attempts to engage the enemy. Vernon stood by the general’s side with sword and shield at the ready.
“Fuck me,” said the captain.
The general pushed his way into the front line, now with their backs to him, “To me! To me!” Half a dozen men turned at the sound of his voice. They recovered their wits when they made his face and flocked to him with their shields up. They surrounded him in a guard stance, most of their armor already stained in blood from their comrades. The enemy danced at the soldier’s feet, blurs of dark cloaks with flashes of steel, moving with speed and precision. They cut limbs and heads while dodging spears and horses, one swordsman fighting among a dozen imperials apiece and besting them easily.
“Move forward! Spears up! Into formation!” the general shouted. They moved slowly towards the worst engagements as arrows pounded their shield wall. A shield-bearer collapsed as he took an arrow through the ankle; with his shield lowered he took another through the eye. The men pushed the dying man’s body to the side and closed the gap. The forest floor was littered with the bodies of their comrades. Dying horses screamed as their legs were cut from beneath them, their riders flung hard into the mud and leaves. Men broke formation and ran back the way the army had come. Directly in front of the general’s formation, a cloaked swordsman beheaded a spearman and turned to their small squad. With no visible armor save the cloak and mask, long single edged sword in his hand, he rushed them.
“Spears forward!” Vernon cried.
Within a pace, the swordsman leapt. He cleared their spears and with one foot, bounced off their shields and landed in the middle of their party less than a meter from the general. Vernon grunted and attacked. As he swung, the swordsman dodged and, in a swift motion, cut the captain from pelvis to chest. The other soldiers turned and stabbed, but the swordsman slid between them, cutting the legs out from one spearman and impaling another. The general used his shield to push through a falling soldier before diving into the cloaked figure. His opponent toppled to the ground, surprised, and dropped his sword a few paces away. The general landed on top of him with his shield between them before the enemy could recover. The cloaked man writhed under the general’s weight until one spearman had the initiative to plunge the tip of his spear past the general’s shoulder into the swordsman’s chest.
The general picked himself up and admired the dead man who had slain his second. “See?” he cried to those around him. “They can die just like us!” He spared the one last glance at Vernon’s body before recovering. “Come on, let’s find another.” He looked around at the bodies before him and pockets of men fleeing. “Shouldn’t be too hard to find.”
Men lay dead or dying along the forest floor. The remnants of the Imperial Army retreated in a haggard line all the way to their supply train on the hill where they had left it. The forest warriors harried them throughout their forced march, killing stragglers and laying waste to failed cavalry charges, peppering arrows against shields and armor. In the absence of other officers, the general assumed full command and brought all remaining infantry to the hilltop to surround the supply lines and reinforce barricades. The drivers of the supply wagons and the last of the camp followers cowered together near the command tents amidst the cries of the dying army.
Their enemy stopped killing them once they reached the clearing. Masked warriors held the tree line, holding their swords by their side, motionless. A numbness took the survivors, many of them resting in relief with their backs to the camp’s fortifications. The lord commander had retreated to his tent and had yet to come out since their return while his personal guard stood idly by, far and away from any fighting.
When the general finally stood alone, having given all the orders he could, he stared at the mound of corpses that increased in size with every passing moment. Weary men in stained armor heaved the bodies of the fallen by their limbs with the grace of a vir At the foot of a mountain of bodies, he began to count, only to let his head fall to his chest when the number became unfathomably high. He suppressed a shiver that had nothing to do with the quiet rain that now gradually soaked his cloak.
“Thoughts, Ivan?”
He turned to find a soldier regarding him. At least, the thing sought to be seen as a soldier. It wore shining and pristine armor, though its limbs were bloodied and disjointed. Its helm bore a full facemask, revealing only bloodshot eyes that held too much pleasure behind their misshapen form.
“Who are you?” the general asked.
“Concerned.” Its voice was deep and melodious, carrying soft authority and hidden joy. The thing looked at the mound of dead and dying and cocked its head in unnatural regard. “So much…murder. By them, of course. You’re not doing nearly enough.”
The general took offence, but something in him told him to tread cautiously. “I’ll ask again—”
“Yes,” it interrupted. “Who am I?” It breathed deeply the sodden air and blew it out with great exaggeration, “I’m a maaaaaannnn with a plan!” Its eyes smiled at the general. “Do you want to hear it?”
“Whatever the fuck you are, I’ve no time for this.” The general turned and began to walk away.
“Whatever I am?” The growl in the creature’s voice gave the general pause. “You’ve no idea.”
There was something in the creature’s voice that made Emersin stop walking. He slowly turned back and regarded the creature. It smiled and laced its fingers together casually, taking a slow step to where the general stood. “Allow me a moment of your time, General,” it began. “I promise not to waste it.”
“You’re him,” the general realized. “The noble from before.”
“A ruse,” it replied, “and hardly relevant. These...forest dwellers, they don’t fight fair. I would like to suggest that you don’t either.”
The general barely heard him. “Who are you?”
It chuckled. “You’re asking the wrong questions. You should be asking, ‘what can I offer?’”
The general approached the Anarsin’s tent in the middle of the struggling camp. Despite the protests of the lord commander’s guard, the general barged through the flaps. The little man sat atop his chair, his armor strewn about on the floor, with a goblet of wine in one hand and his head in the other.
“What the hell are you doing?” Emersin asked.
The younger man raised his head. “Don’t you dare speak to me that way. Leave me and I won’t have you arrested.”
Without pause, the general charged him and knocked the goblet from his hand. He grabbed Anarsin by the scruff of his cloak and smacked him across the jaw with a gauntleted hand. He heard the tent flap open as guards came in with swords drawn.
The general pulled the knife from his belt. “Back the fuck off or I’ll slit his goddamn throat!”
They kept their distance but did not sheathe their weapons.
“Ivan! Release me!” the noble cried. Fear choked his voice, and the general ignored the order. He spun the Anarsin around and wrapped his fingers around his neck.
“I told you what would happen, Ustin! I told you and you didn’t listen. And now you sit here, drinking wine while men continue to die!”
“What do you want me to do!? What, General!?” The lord commander ripped himself from the general’s grasp, “In case you hadn’t noticed, fucking hill people just raped three fucking battalions of the Imperial army! There are barely half the men we had and we’re fucking surrounded!”
“I’m not asking you to march us to our goddamn deaths; I’m asking you to get off your pompous ass and think!” The general put a hand through his cropped hair.
Anarsin stared at the general for a long moment before slowing returning to his chair. “It was that thing,” he said. “He told me...he told me ‘glor
y awaited,’ and so many other things. I...believed him.”
Emersin knew exactly who the lord commander was speaking of.
“Yes,” the general replied. “I’ve met...it. It doesn’t matter. We’ve a war to win, and men to get home.”
Anarsin shook his head. “The battle is lost, General.”
Anger filled the general’s belly. “Aye, the battle. But not the war.”
“What are you talking about? We cannot fight them the way we are.”
“No. On that we agree. Our…friend…may have given us a way to turn the tide.”
In the cover of night, they loaded every piece of explosive they had into carts. Soldiers piled their dead into large heaps and covered them in oil, using all their remaining supply and emptying every lamp. A line of soldiers, under the guidance of a creature pretending to be a noble with a strange smile, red eyes, and disjointed armor, took only their shields and spears down a circuitous route through the darkness behind the village to prevent any chance of escaping what was to come. Soldiers maneuvered trebuchets into the center of camp and away from the trees to avoid detection. When the general gave the order, the dead were coated in oil set aflame. Soldiers pushed carts down the hill, and they careened into the forest, exploding into a century’s worth of dead leaves, old roots, and dense forest. The artillery fired long into the night, casting fiery wretches, the flaming bodies of imperial dead, far into the trees. By midnight, all the world burned.
Two figures stood on a distant hill watching the drifting smoke blot the stars of the night sky, the smell of the blood magic still heavy in the air. One of them, wearing shackles, fell to his knees as the other droned on.
“Such a thing. Creation. Destruction. One cannot happen without the other. Even the Void was nothing before it was something…or was it the other way around? I get so confused. Here we are, or rather, here I am creating something new. All thanks to the destruction of something old—your people. I hope you don’t mind my taking pride in what I do. In fact, when you think about it, the Creator and I are in the same line of work. Two sides of the same coin, I think.”
The Lord of War shuddered a breath, the shackles on his wrist jingling as tears stained his face. “Spare me.”
“Oh, oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t realize…were you partial to your little flock?” the Lord of Murder replied.
War did not respond.
“Well,” said the creature in disjointed armor with a smile, “if it makes you feel better, a mighty welcoming party has been arranged. Not so bad, considering your crimes.”
“You think very highly of yourself, little god.”
Murder considered. “I do. It is my sin.”
2
The Fall
Twenty Years Later
The old man and the boy watched quietly as flame streaked across the sky. The boy took it to be a falling star at first, but its fall was too slow, too direct, and it burned far too bright. Their horses stared as silently as they did, only occasionally flicking their ears in annoyance at its brightness.
The boy was only a boy by the old man’s standards. The beard on his cheeks and chin was only the barest shade compared to the old man’s. By Imperial standards, the youth would have already been married and been found a farm to work or been conscripted into the military, but such was not the boy’s fate.
“It looked like a person,” said the boy.
The old man mumbled agreement.
“People don’t fall from the sky.”
Again, the old man nodded. The boy adjusted himself in the saddle. He was not afraid, but he was smart. Logic dictated that they turn from here; bright lights in the sky brought attention, and attention was never something they sought. Smoothly, he took the bow from his back and placed one end in a stirrup to string it. To anyone looking, the pair were hunters, bows on their backs and strings of game across their saddles, but to any with a sharp eye and a pinch of wit, these travelers were something to be avoided.
The sword at the boy’s side matched that of the old man: long, thin, and single edged. Its hilt hid beneath his parka, within easy reach. None save perhaps the old man could match the boy’s proficiency in its use. Both the boy and the man held the posture of soldiers, but their movements lacked rigidity, spoke of grace, and their eyes burned with experience gained in times of war and the times in between.
“Are we going to investigate?” the boy asked.
“Yes,” the old man answered.
The boy finished stringing his bow and nocked an arrow. The old man led their horses gingerly along the rolling hills that bordered the forested plain at a light canter. Bright fires sparked distant lights on an otherwise darkened landscape. The moon was only half full but provided more than enough light for their horses. From the rolling hills they entered into the forest. The crunching of leaves and foliage under hoof were the only sounds in the still air. There was no breeze, nor signs of life. They passed the darkened shadows of the trees as they rode with haste until they came upon a corpse of burning trees. They covered ground quickly but approached the flames with caution. The fires were clustered in a small area of the forest, though no flame ran rampant, and most of the charred trees and brush had already burnt out.
After passing the first few desolated trees, the old man dismounted. He flung the reins across the saddle’s pommel and strode away without ceremony. The boy followed suit, trusting the horses more than he trusted most humans. The unblemished trees sported high branches and darkening leaves of the approaching season. The floor beneath them was made nearly entirely of moss and fallen leaves. They crept along ashen forest in silence, keeping watchful eyes until they reached the source of the fires, little more than a hundred yards from where they had left the horses.
The crater was perhaps twenty yards wide and only a few deep. What was left of the trees around it bent away, as if afraid to come any nearer. The charred remains of the forest floor smoldered, and the ground of the crater itself cracked like thin ice. In its center, the body of a naked human—by the frame the boy thought it a woman—could be seen through the grey twisting curtains. The old man looked to the boy, who nodded. The boy placed his back to the crater and watched the silent forest for any movement.
The old man descended, carefully testing the cracked ground with calculated steps. The woman in the center did not move, and it seemed she was barely breathing. She was covered in ash and soot, and all hair had been burned from her body. There were no burns on her skin, yet she was marked. Curving designs flowed upward from the back of her hands to her shoulders and across her back. They were neither tattoos nor scars, and no artist on this world could have created something so beautiful. None save the gods themselves would have recognized them for what they were.
The old man glanced back at the boy, the back of his grey parka barely visible against the smoky background. The boy was right, though he had not spoken of his misgivings. Logically, they should leave and mind their own business, but that was not what they had been bidden to do. The old man stared at the woman; even charred and ashen, she was beautiful beyond any woman he had seen on this world, but he was not fool enough to call this woman a human.
For some there might have been a choice, but for the old man, and, he hoped, the boy, there was none. The old man took off his parka and threw it over the woman before he heaved her over his shoulder and carried her to where they had left the horses.
They wrapped her in the canvas they used for a tent and laid her across the back of the boy’s horse. At this time of night, the Imperial Road was empty except for them, for even bandits found it hard to stay active on a highway so far from the heart of the Empire. Lights ahead warned them of the guards at the crossroads, though at this hour, as they eagerly awaited shift change, they were likely less awake than they would admit to any officer. The old man and the boy approached, making their presence known and appearing to be in no hurry.
“Out at bit late, even for you, Noah,” said the sergeant as they approache
d. Torch fire kept the darkness at bay but played shadows across the old man’s face.
“Aye. Out hunting,” he replied.
“You two usually come back a bit quicker than that. A younger man would have sent a patrol out after you.”
The old man nodded. “Aye, the boy had a bit from my flask the night before. Couldn’t shoot shit. I made him stay out until he got it right.”
The sergeant laughed. A younger soldier, around the same age as the boy, approached. “I’ll believe that when I see it. Come by the Rooster sometime, Jon. I’ll get ya right pissed, and then we can finally have a fair archery contest.”
“I can shoot straighter than you right pissed than you could standing a foot from the mark,” the boy replied.
The soldier and the sergeant laughed. “Oy, I’d put money on that.” The soldier eyed the parcel behind the boy. “Bag yourself a doe there, Jon?”
“Mind your fucking business, Rueben,” said the boy.
They laughed again and the sergeant waved them on.
The road home was long and winding. Rough hills and shattered peaks mired the distance, and fields of barley and hay lay in the valleys. Their home was half a day’s ride from the town proper, and the people of Errol’s Fortune rarely paid them a visit. They knew most villagers only in passing, through the market in times of harvest and what few social festivities the locals insisted on upholding. Their farm sat on the edge of a forest thicket, not far off the River Midas. A barn, an outhouse, and a small work-shelter guarded three corners of the acreage; a stone well rested closer to the river. The field had grown nearly to the point of turning, another sign that harvest was near. The house itself boasted two stories, a chimney, and a deep porch. It was as much a product of the forest as the men themselves, having been built by the old man and the boy on a plot of land bought and paid for more than a decade prior.