Empire of Rust

by Chambers, V. J.

  Zachariah caught him by the shoulder. “You’re not telling me everything.”

  Nathaniel looked into his leader’s eye. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Is this about the girl?” said Zachariah. “Because we all agreed that there was no good reason to take women along with us. Too dangerous.”

  “Doesn’t much matter, does it?” said Nathaniel, his jaw twitching. “She’s probably dead.”

  “She’s not dead.”

  “I saw her. I saw her on the other side of those revenants, and you wouldn’t let me go—”

  “You would have gotten killed.” Zachariah squared his shoulders. “Besides, it wasn’t her. She didn’t work for the emperor. There’s no reason she would have been in the mansion.”

  “It was her.” Nathaniel shut his eyes.

  There was a pause. Then Zachariah started, “Nathaniel—”

  “No.” He opened his eyes. “There’s nothing that can be done about it now.” He turned and began to walk again.

  Zachariah came behind him, but in several steps, he caught up.

  The two walked in silence for a while.

  “You know,” said Zachariah in a low voice, “we’re starting a revolution. People are going to die.”

  Nathaniel didn’t reply. It was something they’d always said to each other. Sometimes, late at night, drunk on ale, they’d opine on the sacrifices that had to be made for their noble cause. But it had all seemed so abstract then. It wasn’t until the emperor’s mansion, when the emperor had set those revenants free to go after them, that he’d really witnessed people dying. The spurting blood, the screams, the scent of sweat and fear and death…

  “It’s a necessary evil,” said Zachariah. “You know this.”

  “What if we’re wrong?”

  “What?”

  “What if… What if a revolution is the last thing this empire needs? What if we kill all those people for no reason? What if—”

  “You are having second thoughts.”

  Nathaniel sighed. “I’m just… I want to do the right thing.”

  “I hadn’t realized you were so attached to that girl. You were only with her for a week. You’ve spent more time with girls before. Prettier girls. Girls with bigger tits and smaller—”

  “Stop it,” said Nathaniel. “Not when she’s dead.”

  “She’s not dead.”

  “It’s not about her,” said Nathaniel. “Not all about her, anyway. It’s only that I don’t know if I want to be the cause of people’s deaths. Do you understand? I don’t know if I can handle that.”

  Zachariah took a long, slow breath. “Well, Nathaniel, you’re going to have to figure out how to handle it.”

  They were coming up on the camp.

  Nathaniel sighed. “I’m not sure that I can.”

  “You have to. And don’t say anything to the others, all right? I can’t have them listening to you when you’re all confused like this.”

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Michal banged on the door to her brother Gabriel’s study. He didn’t like it when anyone bothered him there, but she didn’t care. Gabriel had the most extensive library of anyone in the empire. If there was information about necromancers out there, his study would be the place where she’d find it.

  There was no answer, so Michal knocked again.

  Still nothing.

  Fuming, she rattled the door latch. It was locked, of course. It always was, and Gabriel was the only one with a key. He probably wasn’t in there or he’d be at the door now, screaming to be left alone and shouting all kinds of words that the holy men claimed would send you straight to hell.

  Since it was silent inside, he was elsewhere.

  Where could he be? From what she knew of her brother, he was only ever doing two things. One of them was working in his study. The other was drinking and having fun, but it was too early for that.

  She kicked the door in frustration.

  “Michal?”

  She looked up. Gabriel was coming down the hallway.

  “Gabriel!” she said. “I need to use your library.”

  He shrugged. “Well, I guess that would be okay. I was only coming down here to pick something up, and then I really need to be going. If I let you stay in there alone, you promise you won’t mess anything up? You’ll put everything back where you found it, and you’ll treat it all with respect?”

  She glared at him. “What? Do you think I’m twelve years old? Of course I won’t mess up your precious study.”

  He smiled and opened the door. “I just have to ask. You know how important this place is to me.”

  She went in after him, shooting imaginary daggers at the back of his head. He could stand to be a little nicer to her, couldn’t he? Especially when she was going to be sacrificed to some flesh-eating monster as soon as Simon arrived back at the capital.

  Gabriel sauntered across the room. He gestured. “There’s the library. Have at it.”

  She darted forward, her eyes scanning the books on the wall. Gabriel had shelves and shelves of them. All four walls were stacked with books.

  He rummaged around on his desk. “Um, actually, I had a favor to ask you.”

  She turned around. “Favor?”

  “Yeah.” He sorted through some papers and then snatched up a few blank pieces. “It’s about my wife, Leah.”

  What? “Is this really the time, Gabriel?”

  He shrugged. “It’s not much of anything, really. It’s only that I promised her that I’d ask you to invite her to a few of your luncheons.”

  Her jaw dropped. “Luncheons? You’re asking me about luncheons?”

  Gabriel furrowed his brow in confusion. “Is that bad for some reason?”

  “Well, I don’t know if I’ll be around for many more luncheons is all.”

  “Why not?” He wrinkled up his nose.

  She folded her arms over her chest. “You don’t know, do you?”

  “Know what?”

  “I’m the necromancer’s intended.”

  “Oh that?” Gabriel shrugged and fished a pen off his desk. “Yeah, Father told me about that, but there hasn’t been a necromancer in—”

  “Simon raised one out in the northern wilderness, and he’s bringing it to court. He’ll be here any day now.”

  Gabriel’s lips parted. Slowly, he set down his pen and paper. “Simon?”

  She nodded. “Yeah. That jackass is raising necromancers. I told you when he left that he’d be up to no good.”

  Gabriel ran a hand over his face. “Well… Well, fuck, Michal.”

  Tears sprang to her eyes. “I’m an idiot. I’m such an idiot. Father was right when he said that about me. I’m going to end up dead.”

  “It’s not your fault. It’s a lottery.”

  “I, um, sort of fixed it so that I’d get the bean. I didn’t want to get married. You know I don’t think it’s right that men get three wives and women have to share one husband. This was my way out of it. But now…” She bit down hard on her lip.

  He massaged the bridge of his nose. “You couldn’t have known, though. Who would have thought a necromancer…?”

  “I know.”

  He took a deep breath. “Well, you’ll have to get married. Now. That’s the only way out of this. You marry someone and they’ll have to pick another girl.”

  She shook her head. “No. No, I’m not doing that. I won’t share my husband.”

  “Michal, surely sharing is better than dying.”

  “You don’t understand,” she said. “I can’t do that. I won’t. Besides, I doubt Father would agree to a match anyway. He’s angry with me. So angry. He thinks that God has taught me a lesson to avoid pride or something and this is my punishment. I have to accept it.”

  Gabriel groaned. “But that’s ridiculous.”

  She shrugged.

  He shook his head. “No. No, there must be something that we can do.”

  “The best thing for me to do is to rea
d everything I can about necromancers. Maybe I can figure out some way not to trigger his instinct to eat me or something.” She twisted her hands together and turned back to the wall.

  “Maybe as a back-up plan,” he said. “You sit here and read everything you can. I’ll figure out some way out of this. You’re my sister. I can’t let you be killed by a monster.”

  “There’s no way out,” she said.

  “You don’t know that. Let me think about it. Let me help you.”

  She felt like crying again. “Well, I guess you can try.”

  He nodded. “Yes. Let me try. Let me do this. And in the meantime…” He scurried over and took several leather-bound ledgers off one of the shelves. “These are the notes that the holy men made about making necromancers.” He moved down the shelf and slid out a few more. “And these are the records of necromancers made and tested. Some of the early records are hard to read, because they’re water damaged, but you can at least look at the newer stuff.”

  New? It was all over fifty years ago. Still, she took the ledgers. “Thank you, Gabriel.”

  He gave her a hug. “We’re going to fix this. You’ll see.”

  And then he left, off to try and work his magic. But Gabriel was wrong. He wasn’t going to be able to make this better. He was the kind of person who simply wanted everyone to be happy. He’d do whatever he could to make that happen. But he had difficulty accepting when there was no way for happiness to exist.

  Still, it made him feel good to try, so she wasn’t going to stop him.

  Now that he’d left the study, she was all alone. She spread out the ledgers and began to go through them. She started with the notes the holy men had made when creating necromancers. The paper was old and fragile, and she had to be quite careful as she turned the pages.

  Much of it wasn’t helpful to her. There were lists and lists of ingredients and techniques, explanations on when to administer the concoctions to the necromancers, and other explanations on how to do it differently if the candidate had already been bitten by a revenant.

  She went past that business and found a personal account by one of the holy men on the necromancer that he had created.

  He seems almost inhuman, and I am nearly frightened by him. He still speaks to me, but he is different than he was before. Somehow, he is distant. When he does speak, there is something in his expression that alarms me. It is as if he is holding back some deep desire, some great hunger. Sometimes, when he moves, I am quite convinced that he will leap upon me and tear my flesh from the bone.

  Though it is said that the making of necromancers is knowledge given to us by the Lord so that we may survive, I confess that when I look into his eyes, I see nothing heavenly. It is like looking directly into the smoldering infernal fires.

  Michal shut the book after reading that. It was the last thing that she needed to hear. She wanted to think that the necromancer would be completely tame and safe. If she could make herself believe that, then maybe she wouldn’t be so frightened.

  Of course, she knew that it wasn’t true. Necromancers were very unstable and unpredictable. As she paged through the ledgers of records, she was astonished at how low the rate of success was for most of the necromancers. She estimated that nearly half of all men who were put through the change actually managed to pass the test. The ledger reported it so matter-of-factly.

  Attempt #20 Unsuccessful. Candidate has ripped out girl’s throat and eaten most of the livestock as well, it would say, as if it were reporting on the weather.

  Only when she got to the end of the records, after Judah the Equalizer had decided to change it so only noblewomen could be sacrificed to the necromancer did the reports seem a bit more gracious. Now it would lament the loss of the girl, making notations such as, God rest her soul and convey her sweet self to heaven.

  Michal didn’t intend to go to heaven. She intended to stay right here on earth.

  But she couldn’t see how she was going to stop herself from dying. The necromancers didn’t seem to be reasonable. Though they still had their human capacities to think, they were also controlled by some dark animalistic instinct.

  She imagined a necromancer before her. He had long tangled dark hair and he was naked except for a filthy cloth between his legs. He bared his teeth at her.

  She closed her eyes and shook her head, trying to rid herself of the image. But he only seemed to solidify behind her eyelids.

  Now, she could hear his whisper, which sounded like the hiss of serpents or the dry scratch of dead leaves in the wind. Come to me, wife. And we two will become one flesh. When I consume you, we will be one.

  She shuddered.

  You are mine, Michal, continued her imagined monster. To have and to hold. To love and to cherish. To eat your body. To drink your blood. And when I do it, I will remember you. My wife.

  “Stop,” she said aloud.

  She’d fight him off it it came to it. There had to be a way to kill them, didn’t there?

  She went scrambling back through the ledgers, looking for reports on executing the necromancers who failed the tests. How was it done?

  But the ledgers didn’t say.

  The necromancers had to be similar to the revenants. It was a variation on the same virus that made them. So, she assumed that she had to destroy the brain. If she had a knife or a sword. Even a hammer.

  No. A knife. She could hide a knife better inside her wedding dress.

  She wasn’t a victim. She was Michal, daughter of the emperor, and she wasn’t going to die.

  * * *

  Gabriel threw open the door to Ezekiel’s room in the inn. “Listen,” he said, “I wanted to help you out, but something’s come up with my sister—”

  “Did I say you could enter my room?” Ezekiel was glowering at him.

  “Oh, come on,” said Gabriel. “Can’t we just drop this act where you’re angry with me every time you see me? We both know you aren’t.”

  “I don’t know if you’re particularly stupid or just have selective hearing,” said Ezekiel. “I don’t know how to make it clearer to you. I don’t want to see you. I don’t want to be around you. I want nothing to do with you.”

  Gabriel cast his gaze up at the ceiling. “I don’t have time for this, Ezekiel.”

  “Don’t take the time. Just leave. Go away. It will be much better if I don’t see you again.”

  “No, that’s the thing, it won’t.” Gabriel sat down on Ezekiel’s bed. “You’re trying to stay away from me because you think what we do together is a sin—”

  “It is a sin.”

  “And you think that your desires are evil desires, but they aren’t evil, Ezekiel, and I can’t let you keep thinking such destructive thoughts about yourself. So, regardless of what you think of me, I have to help you. You are so unhappy—”

  “My sister is dead. Of course I’m unhappy.”

  “Speaking of sisters,” said Gabriel, “mine is in trouble. I promised her that I’d do what I could. So, even though we haven’t gotten to the bottom of what happened with Honor, I’ve got to take a brief detour. I just came to tell you that I wouldn’t be available for a while.”

  “I don’t care if you are. You’ve been no help whatsoever. Your wife knew nothing helpful, and I’m at a dead end looking for answers. I’ll figure it out without you.”

  Gabriel cocked his head, surveying the other man. He sounded so sure of himself that Gabriel almost believed him. Maybe it wasn’t about sin after all. Maybe Ezekiel truly didn’t like him, wasn’t attracted to him, and wanted away from him. Maybe the sin bit was his way of trying to be polite.

  On the other hand, there was nothing polite about Ezekiel.

  But Gabriel had to be sure. He got up off the bed and approached Ezekiel. “I’m sorry that I won’t be able to help today.”

  “I told you, it’s better if you don’t.” Ezekiel backed away. “And what are you doing? Keep your distance.”

  Gabriel held up a finger, still moving forward.
“I just need to try something.”

  Ezekiel collided with the table next to the window, toppling the candle. He made an irritated noise and fumbled to pick it back up and set it to rights.

  Gabriel moved close.

  Ezekiel turned back to him. Their bodies were practically touching. “What are you doing?” Ezekiel’s voice came out breathless.

  “Like I said, I want to try something,” said Gabriel, turning his head, bringing his face closer to Ezekiel’s.

  “Damn you,” whispered Ezekiel. And then he seized the other man, cupping the back of his skull with one hand and bringing his mouth down on Gabriel’s.

  Gabriel opened his lips to the other man’s tongue, and it was bursting sweetness, soft yet insistent as it probed him. He clutched Ezekiel’s shoulders. He shouldn’t have worried. Ezekiel was definitely attracted to him.

  Abruptly, Ezekiel shoved Gabriel away. He turned to the window, sinking his hands into his hair. When he spoke, he was agonized. “Why won’t you stay away from me?”

  Gabriel looked down at the floor. He didn’t wish to cause the other man pain. It shouldn’t be pain, of course, but he wasn’t sure how to convince Ezekiel of that. “I… I’m not sure if I can. I think about you—”

  “Stop.” Ezekiel pounded the window frame. “Stop thinking about me. Stop coming to see me.”

  “Listen, you’re torturing yourself. There’s no reason that we can’t be together and enjoy it. We’re doing nothing wrong.”

  Ezekiel turned on his heel. He put his finger in Gabriel’s face. “I’m going to get to the bottom of all of this so that I can leave. I’m going to the emperor right now. I’ll force him to tell me what happened that night. And then I’ll be free.”

  “Wait,” said Gabriel. “I told you. I have things I have to do for my sister, Michal. If you could just give me a day—”

  “I never want to see you again.” Ezekiel swept across the room and threw open the door. He turned back to Gabriel. “Don’t come back here.” Ezekiel left the room.

  The door slammed.

  Gabriel dragged a hand over his face.