‘You sound proud of your city.’
‘Shouldn’t I be?’
‘No, of course. I just didn’t take you for a nationalist.’
‘Astute,’ he agreed. ‘I’m actually not. Though I support the war, I want Argentor to embrace its neighbours more, become part of the whole continent. Putting aside recent battles, we are generally an isolationist city. I would describe myself as a globalist.’
‘What is that?’ It was still politics, but Aurelia felt on steadier ground with Marcus if she stayed away from the court itself. Was he a politician? He gravitated to the subject without her help.
Marcus smiled. He liked to be listened to, liked to teach. If she was being cruel, he liked the sound of his own voice. ‘It means thinking of the whole continent, even the whole world as one. Having one government, with one ruler and feudal leaders under that to govern regions. It would mean an end to nations and city states fighting each other constantly. Maybe when men can think of themselves as citizens of Arceth, instead of Theris or Argentor, there’ll be no need for war. We can raise ourselves above it.’
Aurelia glanced higher and took in the beauty of the surrounding woodlands. She could see up to where she had first viewed the city with Lucinda Marchioli. She made a mental note to seek her out. Of all the court ladies, even Nepheli, Lucinda seemed the one Aurelia could talk to.
‘I didn’t take you for a pacifist,’ she said.
‘I’m not. When war is necessary.’
A thought occurred to her and she looked back over the city. No defensive Medusi sails hung over any part of the city that she could see. Here on the outskirts there were a few lookout towers and fences but nothing that could be described as military.
‘Where are your defences?’
‘Might I say, that’s a strange question for a sailor’s daughter.’ He raised an eyebrow.
‘Tailor,’ she corrected.
‘Whatever.’ Is he tiring of his own game? Certainly, she didn’t think the Marcus persona was very far removed from the real one, whatever that was. The mystery was who he was, not what he was like. ‘More the kind of question a general would ask while visiting a foreign power.’
‘You don’t have to answer.’ She continued with her observation anyway. ‘No walls of any kind. I have seen no shields, no great armoury, no standing garrisons or barracks.’
‘Our army dissolves back into the populace,’ he said. ‘There is no need for the defences you describe. Argentor has never been attacked in all its centuries, and it is very rare to find Medusi in this region at any time of year. The fighting with the Emperor of Theris never got this far. Instead the nobles of Argentor deftly and silently removed his influence over their territory, with little loss of life beyond a few officials. By the time Emperor Tiber knew Argentor was ousting him, Duke Gerodin was establishing a front far to the south, at the first point Tiber still held a reserve army.’
‘You’re awfully well informed for a manservant, Marcus.’ She was careful not to react to his simplistic appraisal of the war, either as Liath, or as herself.
‘Yes, well, work in the palace for long and you learn a fair bit. I hear the nobles talk.’
‘You speak like a noble yourself,’ she said, coaxing.
‘Again, I listen, I learn.’
Behind him, Aurelia caught sight of a spindly-legged creature standing in one of the fields. She gasped. It stood very still, so still in fact that Aurelia had mistaken it for a scarecrow or a tall watch post. When she looked again she found there was one in every field and often more.
‘What is that?’ she said.
Marcus smiled indulgently. ‘This is what a brought you to see.’
‘A scary creature? You clearly have no idea what women like.’
‘Don’t be so quick to judge.’ He began to take off his shoes, and then roll up his trousers. ‘Well? Take off your shoes.’
‘You expect me to go in there?’ She looked at the dirty fecund water, with its tens of thousands of tiny spindly green stalks poking up from the surface.
‘The ground is soft. There’s nothing in there that can hurt you.’
‘What about that thing?’ She gestured at the creature, as Marcus stepped into the muddy pool. The water reached to just under his knees.
Aurelia sighed. She wasn’t about to let him upstage her. She had spent most of her childhood accepting and making challenges, and she did not like to fail. He had sensed it. As Marcus had stepped in, the creature had grown interested and turned to look at them.
She took off her shoes carefully. She was wearing a dress that only fell to her knees and she was the same height as Marcus, so she barely had to hold it up. The cloak was the same, hanging just above the water as she stepped in. The mud and silt erupted around her toes in a cloud, darkening the water still further. ‘Happy now? I’m in the swamp water.’
Marcus strode over to the creature, carefully wading down the lines of plants.
Aurelia followed slowly, allowing herself time to examine the beast before she reached it. Its four legs were like tall stilts with multiple knee joints, the front ones much longer than the back. At first it stood bipedal on the shorter back legs, but as Marcus approached, it lumbered down landing on its two long front stilts with a gentle splash. These forelegs had an extra spike that arced backward from the lowest knee-joint and connected to a large section of each leg with a thin membrane almost like a vestigial wing, though Aurelia doubted it could fly. It had a thick ribbed tail that got fatter before it got thin again. The face, which was stretching the term somewhat, sported a wide mouth like that of a chameleon surrounded by fronds, a large throat, and strange slits which she guessed were eyes. Backward facing antenna waved lazily in the breeze and a distended belly hung below, obscured by folds of blubbery skin like it wore its own version of Aurelia’s wrap.
It wasn’t a scarecrow – it looked like nothing she’d ever seen.
‘This is Peluta,’ said Marcus, as the creature bent its head towards him. He reached out and stroked the fronds around its chin. ‘She’s a Luacha, or more commonly an Ambler.’
‘Is it safe?’ The Luacha was leaning in to Marcus’ hand and had begun to make a keening noise.
Marcus laughed. ‘Yeah its safe. She may look scary but she eats insects and small creatures that would make a meal of the rice plants. Not humans. Come and stroke her.’
Aurelia stepped closer, reaching out her hand. She touched it around the throat, careful to avoid its mouth. Its skin was rubbery and leathery at once. ‘So she eats creatures that would destroy the crops.’
‘Yes, and Luacha help with ploughing. Their front legs dig holes in the mud for the farmers to plant in. We have developed a balanced symbiotic relationship with them. They are semi-intelligent too, though they are slow and deliberate.’
‘Intelligent?’
‘They understand basic commands, they talk to each other.’
‘You sound like an expert.’
He smiled. ‘Maybe. I brought you out here because I wanted to show you something that meant something to me. These creatures live in harmony with us. They are special to me.’
Something real again she hoped. Was it possible they could get past the name issue now? She liked his views on borders and boundaries, and he spoke with genuine affection about the spindly Luacha.
‘Liath,’ he said, before she could ask again. He was suddenly looking at her intently. ‘You must know I desire you?’
Aurelia didn’t know what to say. She had guessed he was interested, but you couldn’t know for sure. Well now she knew, but still she went with the question she had been about to ask, shaking her head.
‘But who are you, really?’
‘Does it matter? I am a simple manservant.’
‘I don’t believe you.’
‘Wait, Liath, don’t destroy this fiction. Don’t you enjoy the opportunity to be someone else, I know I do. You’ll go back to your real life soon enough. Let yourself have this.’
<
br /> Aurelia didn’t respond.
‘Just tell me, do you also like me?’ he asked.
If she was honest with herself, she was starting to like this mystery man, a little danger mixed into her new routine of court appearances and lounging on terraces. He was interesting and knowledgeable, and if they could get past the identity issue, maybe he could even help her with the army, but none of that was what he was asking.
Despite what he said, she got the impression he was hard to read, and found it maddening not to know someone's intentions. But then again, she thought, can you ever truly? Was it not enough to simply be, to like someone and contrive to be in their presence for the day?
As she opened her mouth, not even knowing what she would say, there was a blast of sound from the direction of the nearest watchtower, a crow’s nest on stilts, high above the paddies. It was followed by another on the other side of them, a rough horn blare, and then a third from the city itself.
‘An attack,’ said Marcus.
‘What?’
‘An attack on the city.’
Aurelia didn’t panic, did the math quickly. The horn had been very close, so they were near the attack and they were at least a mile, maybe a mile and a half from the safety of the city. What had she just been saying about defences?
‘Soldiers?’
Marcus shook his head, ‘Medusi.’ He looked worried.
‘Overlords,’ Aurelia cursed under her breath.
And then she saw them.
It was like a flashback to the battle that had taken Theris from her, and she recoiled from it. A hundred or so wild Medusi, a small bloom, flowed over the southern lip of the valley above them in a wave and began to flow down like a lazy tide. Lazy but inexorable. And aiming for the city.
Horns were blaring all around now, and the Medusi would have to flow right over them to get to their destination. A hundred blue lights swarming towards her. Aurelia didn’t have her bow and doubted what good it would do; the arrow would just go straight through their gelatinous flesh and come out the other side. Unless you hit the crystal in the centre or did massive damage, Medusi just kept coming. Marcus was also unarmed, in line with his talk of peace. He wasn’t a built fighter anyway, Aurelia doubted he’d spent long on the practice grounds; Marcus had the body and mind of a scholar.
Was this how she was going to die? In the wrong place at the wrong time, stung to death by Medusi, on a hill outside Argentor, her dreams unfulfilled, her ambitions unrealised?
‘Liath,’ she heard faintly. She didn’t react, pinned as she was by the sight of her death moving like a blue fluid down the hill towards her. ‘Aurelia!’ That broke through.
She whirled about. Marcus grabbed her hand. The Luacha had crouched down as close to the ground as it could get, its long first knee joint the highest point, and it’s belly in the water. Marcus pulled her in close to its flanks and covered them with the blubbery skin flaps on the Luacha’s side. The creature added its fore leg membranes, stretching them over its charges like a protective mother.
Within seconds the Medusi were upon them, some stopping and striking the Luacha with their stinging tentacles. They were eerily quiet for the most part, not thundering down the hillside like horse’s hoofs, but moving like air or water. Sometimes one would screech, and the noise pierced Aurelia like metal scraping on ceramic. She caught glimpses through gaps in the Luacha’s membranes, watching as most of the Medusi slid past on either side down the hill from terrace to terrace. They converged on the city.
Marcus yelled over the horns. ‘They will be cut to ribbons in the city. The Primes are well trained.’ The Primes were the Premiers’ private militia.
‘What about us?’ She could still feel the Luacha struck again and again by tentacles and realised only now that she was crouched in dirty water and her clothes were soaked.
‘Peluta and the other Amblers are immune to Medusi stings.’ He touched her rubbery hide. ‘This thick blubber protects them.’
And us, thought Aurelia. She had come once again to the precipice of death and found herself still alive. The first time had been when lightning had struck the airship and palace tower. She had never been so close to Medusi intent on her death before.
Absurdly, she doubted this had been in Marcus’ plan. Near death experiences made for memorable first dates, but not good ones.
Marcus looked at her, hunched under the warm membrane of the Luacha that still protected them. She looked back at him, wondering what he was thinking. Then suddenly he pitched forward and kissed her.
He didn’t break away immediately, but neither did Aurelia. She liked it, she realised, had even been waiting for it, but she had no idea how to process it.
He broke away, saying nothing. Just taking the opportunity.
How dare he kiss an Empress? was her next thought. But she was a tailor’s daughter, and he a manservant in the palace. What could she do?
She turned away and watched between the legs of the Luacha as the Medusi slowly gave up on prey that was so difficult to get at. One by one they floated away towards the city and easier victims. When they were sure there were none left, Marcus slapped Peluta’s flanks and the large creature struggled up onto its stilt legs.
Aurelia stood on the ridge, her clothes soaked, cloak probably ruined, wet and cold. And grateful.
‘Take me home, Marcus.’
When they arrived back in the city, she found the slippery blue jelly of Medusi carcasses littered the streets, but it wasn’t alone. There were human victims too. She saw a child crying near the body of what she guessed was a parent. What a waste. A simple Medusi shield system would have solved this. And if this was what a hundred could do, imagine a thousand, or an army with strategy and intent, and a sorceress at their back.
Chrysaora was angry with her, protesting that she had been out searching the city, during a Medusi attack no less. Terietta read her rights again. But when Aurelia turned to tell them she had been fine, she had been protected by this manservant, Marcus, he was nowhere to be found.
Chapter Fourteen
Anthrom
Noctiluca had awarded him the run of the palace on the condition that he came to her when summoned, and Anthrom intended to make full use of his freedom. He could still access all his myriad spying tunnels and haunts except Aurelia’s panic room; for now High Cleric Harling and the other Clerics seemed oblivious to the fact there might have been more. Noctiluca could obliterate minds, but she couldn’t read them. His secret was safe.
And he intended to listen for hers.
The hollow walls had been created by the architect of this second version of the palace, Emperor Tarien, who had lived almost four hundred years ago, just after the fire that had destroyed the previous palace and given him his throne. They had been added to by like-minded descendants ever since, on down the Nectris line to Anthrom himself. If I’m ever in charge of this castle I will probably put some in myself, he thought. There were three openings to the throne room into which Anthrom could squeeze, and from which he could listen to, and in one case even watch, what transpired in Noctiluca’s court.
Over the next week or so he witnessed much.
The rebel whose head had been imploded was not the last; there was a steady stream of them over the coming days, most leaving defiant but dead, and some thralled and cowed.
Noctiluca regularly spoke to the High Cleric about her plans, stirring diatribes about subjugating the rest of the continent, and because of the large area of influence of her powers, Anthrom was able to hear them also. She intended to invade Argentor with an army of thralls and Medusi under her command.
Even when it was just the two of them, they never dropped the rhetoric of thralling being the true form of human and Medusi life on Arceth, a return to a master race, when the two species had been connected. Anthrom didn’t believe any of it but he was fascinated to see that Harling lapped it up like a cat with a saucer of milk. The Cleric was being held back from his final destiny, but Anthrom co
uldn’t guess why.
Noctiluca also had plans for Theris; she spoke of remaking it, and her ideas were horrific; great Medusi nests filled with nightmare-inducing forms the Clerics were creating, farms churning out indestructible thralled soldiers, a punishment that involved a type of Medusi he’d never even heard of that sounded like it meant being swallowed alive. Somewhere deep inside, Anthrom hoped she never got the chance to realise her plans, but he suspected she would. His resistance would just get him killed. He’d learnt the lesson of the rebels down to his bones.
Being in such close proximity to her did have its downsides; Anthrom regularly emerged from the alcoves with blood streaming from his nose and sometimes his ears.
But it was a small price for the knowledge he now had. Her power was no joke; he’d seen it demonstrated, he’d felt it in his mind, and the possibility that she might succeed in thralling the world made him giddy. Here was someone with power, real power, who made Stauros and even Anthrom’s father look like pretenders. It was disgusting Medusi power, but no one could deny it was real.
Now he had to find a way to make it work for him.
When Harling was not around making her orders a reality in the city, Noctiluca acted very differently. She disliked being interrupted when she was with her Cepheans, a group of thralled children who she cared for and mothered, but not like any normal human; this was a creature’s nest, where the children basked in the love of their goddess, caressed by the tentacles of the great Medusi above. When she relinquished control while in the nest, she no longer swam in Anthrom’s thoughts. Instead, she communicated only with her Cepheans in a language only they understood. He heard snatches of it. The strange beatific smiles on their angelic faces were disconcerting, like they were drugged. What did she do, he wondered, tell them bedtime stories? Or was it more sinister? Was she preparing them to rule the world with her?
Embrace of the Medusi (The Overlords Trilogy Book 2) Page 21