by Simon Brown
‘Yes.’
‘The way a child is to its mother.’
‘Is there no one who can help me?’ Lerena keened. ‘Won’t you help me?’
‘No. I’ve already told you that although the creature is made and not imagined it is still a part of us. You used us to fill it up, to change what it was into something you wanted it to be, something belonging to the Sefid.’
‘What are you?’ the empress demanded. ‘I thought you were mine . . .’
‘We are the Sefid, of course, as you already know. But we are also your desire and your end. We are both disease and cure. We are greater than any of your family ever imagined, infinite and eternal, but without form or substance in your world until you Wield us. But now we are anchored here in your world and need you no longer.’
‘Help me!’ Lerena pleaded, and then piteously, ‘I order you to help me!’
‘No.’ Yunara put a finger to her chin and looked away as if deep in thought. ‘Perhaps that ugly little chancellor fellow can help. But I can’t see how. Or maybe your cousin Rodin. But oh no, he is far away. So that’s no use. Or maybe dear Uncle Paimer. No, he is in Beferen.’ She stopped then and her gaze seemed to fall on another place. ‘Perhaps not. Perhaps he is much closer to home than we imagined.’
But Lerena was not listening. She had latched on to the first name Yunara had mentioned. Chancellor Malus Mycom. Of course, he would know what to do. He knew everything about everything.
*
Gos hurried to arrange his infantry, but knew they had to move quietly or else they would alert the Hamilayans that something was on. He kept looking at the eastern sky, waiting for the first tongue of light that would tell him time had run out, then back again to make sure his companies were in position. Velan had organised his local militia north of the enemy camp. Lannel was with the Kydan militia to the west of the camp. And Gos with his regulars was still arriving to the south of the camp. He found the rise he wanted and ordered the companies to hide behind it, then alone went to the top and lay down, waiting for Ames to make his move. There was nothing more he could do now except wait.
*
Mycom lurched awake so violently that Galys, who had been keeping watch, could not help yelping in surprise. Kadburn roused immediately from his sleep and leaped to his feet, his scramasax in hand.
‘What is it?’ Galys demanded. ‘Is it her?’
Mycom nodded. ‘Yes.’ He frowned, puzzled. ‘She is frightened. Something dangerous is in the city and she does not know what to do about it.’
‘That’s us,’ grinned Kadburn.
Mycom dismissed him with a wave. ‘No. Something much worse. She wants me to come. I must go right away.’
Kadburn put the tip of his scramasax under Mycom’s jaw. ‘This is no trap now, is it?’
‘If it was, Royal Guards would already be here. The empress summons me, she doesn’t talk to me. I cannot reply to her because I am not a Kevleren and so cannot use the Sefid. Unfortunately that also means I sometimes misinterpret what she is trying to say. All that I can be sure about is that she wants me to come to the aviary right away, and that she believes she is in terrible danger.’
Kadburn glanced at Galys.
‘We may never get another chance,’ Galys said.
Kadburn nodded, then said to Mycom. ‘As we explained before, you will get us into the aviary. What you do after that is your affair, but do not even think about betraying us.’
‘You will need me after we get into the aviary,’ Mycom said matter-of-factly.
‘Why is that?’ Galys asked sceptically.
‘You will see.’ He put on his boots and his jacket. ‘Shall we go?’
*
It was dark when Paimer and the others arrived at Omeralt’s great wall. There were two guards at the main entrance and they lowered their spears in challenge as soon as the riders were close enough.
‘Stand aside, please,’ Paimer said tiredly.
‘Who are you to order about her majesty’s Royal Guard?’ one of them demanded.
Paimer dismounted and went straight up to them, stopping only when both spear points were pushing against his chest. ‘Who am I? His Grace Duke Paimer Kevleren, Lord Protector of Rivald and uncle to Her Majesty Empress Lerena Kevleren.’ He indicated the dozen riders behind him. ‘And these fine men and women are also Kevlerens. Outside of the empress herself and General Second Prince Rodin Kevleren, to the best of our knowledge we are the last surviving members of our family.’
‘Oh.’
‘And your spears are pointed right at my heart.’
Paimer had never before seen two guards snap to attention with such speed. He remounted and guided his horse under the wall, thanking the guards for their courtesy as he passed them.
After hurrying so desperately to reach the city, the party now slowed down. The need to go on was only slightly stronger than the fear that was building up inside them. Only Bayer seemed immune to it, and showed no trepidation at all, not that he let that stop him from asking ‘Why?’ every few hundred yards.
For Paimer it was like fighting through air that was slowly solidifying around him. Even his horse seemed to feel the effect and he had to continuously tap its flanks to keep it moving. They made their way past what used to be the quarter of the city reserved for the wealthiest citizens who were not Kevlerens. Grand houses loomed over them like giant skulls, threatening because they were empty. Further on they came to the industrial sector, where warehouses and light industry were once located to help support the upkeep of the royal household and all its affiliates. And then, finally, they were there.
More guards moved forward to challenge them, and this time Paimer let Beremore handle the courtesies while he looked over the palace precinct. It was the pens his gaze settled on at first. It was too dark to see the individual faces of all those kept prisoner, but Paimer was sure that if he could he would see the end of his own great line, overwhelmed by the centuries of suffering it had brought.
Then, slowly, as if motivated by a mind not his own, his eyes turned upwards until he saw the dome of Yunara’s great aviary. In the dim light cast by a crescent moon he saw things move under the glass, massive shapes that swirled like clouds in the sky.
‘We can go in,’ Beremore said. ‘The guards will not stop us going to the aviary.’
‘I should hope not,’ Atemann said grumpily.
‘I wish they would,’ Paimer said, but quietly so no one else would hear.
*
Salo Mikhel did not want to wait any longer. The secretaries working in the alcazar claimed they could do no more to help. If she wanted to see him, the empress would let them know. Feeling restless and frustrated, he climbed to the highest tower in the alcazar and looked out over Omeralt. The dome was higher still, and blocked his view northwest towards the Vardars, but everywhere else the sight was magnificent, even if most of the city lay in darkness. Thin moonlight made the land silvery as it stretched east towards the sea, and closer made Omeralt look almost like a natural part of the mountainside it was constructed from. In fact, Omeralt looked almost organic, as if it was a slumbering animal waiting to be roused. The far corner of the city even looked vaguely like a head, and that red spot could almost be its eye.
The two red spots.
Mikhel held his breath. The two spots joined, spread. Fire flickered into the air. Someone was setting fire to houses down there, someone fighting for their lives who accidentally, desperately, had nothing left to defend themselves with except fire.
He felt apart all of a sudden, as if he was watching a play. This could not be happening to him. This could not be happening to Omeralt.
*
Ames saw the sky change colour. He pretended to check the girth straps one more time, then calmly lifted himself into the saddle. His dragoons did the same. He drew his sabre and again his dragoons did the same.
‘Diamond,’ he said stiffly, feeling the cold morning affect his voice.
The troop neatl
y, professionally, formed into a diamond formation with Ames at its chief point.
‘You all know what to do,’ he said loudly enough for them to hear in the still air. ‘Whatever happens, we must destroy their water casks.’
He tapped his horse into a walk, counted fifty beats so the whole diamond had time to be at the same pace. Then he raised his sabre so the hilt was next to his cheek. Every rider moved to the trot. Another fifty beats and he fully extended his arm. The troop shifted to the canter. Now Ames could clearly see the enemy camp looming out of the ground, with sentries every twenty paces, just as instructed in every textbook.
Wait, he told himself, don’t let the troop go too soon or the horses will be blown and none of us will escape. He concentrated on keeping his back straight, his boots flat in the stirrup. There, one of the sentries was shouting, he was sure. Now he was raising his firegon.
‘Charge!’ Ames screamed at the top of his voice and lowered his sabre, keeping his arm straight. The cry was taken up by every trooper, and the horses almost without urging leaped to the gallop, their backs stretching, the sound of their hooves on the ground a rolling thunder. Ames saw flashes and little puffs of smoke from the enemy camp, saw thousands of infantry frantically trying to rouse themselves from sleep, scrabble for firegons and bayonets, saw officers gaping at the oncoming dragoons while trying to buckle on swords and shake off dreams of loved ones and home and a safe, warm bed.
And they were between the closest squares. Firegons cracked, iron balls whizzed by their ears, found riders and horses, but all too late. The dragoons crashed into the thin line of men linking the two squares, rode over them, through them, and were in the middle of the whole enemy camp.
*
Galys told her heart to stop beating so quickly but it paid her no attention at all. They were in the courtyard of Yunara’s alcazar. Guards eyed them lazily, saw the chancellor and looked away. Mycom walked a lot more slowly than Galys would have liked, but knew that hurrying him would just lead to mistakes being made, and she and Kadburn had come too far to risk that.
Then they were inside the alcazar itself and found themselves in a warren of corridors and connecting rooms. Slowly the quality of the panelling and furniture improved from rustic to expensive, and they emerged in the skyway connecting the alcazar with the dome. Both Galys and Kadburn stopped in their tracks. Mycom kept walking on until Kadburn reached out and took the chancellor by the collar. ‘Slow down,’ Kadburn grumbled. ‘We’ve never been here before.’
‘I forgot,’ Mycom said dryly.
‘There’s a fire over there,’ Galys said, pointing over to the poor quarter.
‘It seems to be spreading,’ Kadburn said. ‘Is the fire service still operating?’ he asked Mycom.
‘Within the precinct.’
‘Poor bastards. Can no one help them?’
‘They can help themselves.’
‘I should cut your throat,’ Kadburn said.
Mycom looked at the wire door at the end of the skyway, at the fire blooming in the poor quarter, at Kadburn Axkevleren and said, ‘You would be doing me a favour.’
Taken aback, Kadburn still managed to say, ‘You weren’t so keen on being hurt back in your office.’
‘That was there,’ the chancellor said flatly. He glanced again at the wire door leading into the aviary. ‘We must go on. The empress is expecting me. But I should warn you.’
‘About what?’ Galys asked.
‘Do not expect it to be the same under the dome as it is here outside of it.’
‘What are you talking about?’
‘We are about to enter Lerena’s realm. It is her own world, and apart from ours.’
‘Just go in,’ Kadburn ordered impatiently. ‘We’ll follow.’
*
A face appeared near his stirrup and Ames slashed at it. He felt the blade connect and had to jerk it free. He tried to reach the nearest wagon, but all around him was a jumble of horses and men engaged in a confusing melee. ‘The water casks!’ he shouted. ‘Destroy the water casks!’
Someone shouted gleefully in Kydan, and he could not help laughing when he heard it. The sound seemed slightly hysterical in his own ears and he tried to stop it, but it was no good.
A space appeared before him and he kicked his mount through it. There, a wagon with two large barrels tied down on it. He slashed at the plug of the closest barrel with his sabre, had the satisfaction of seeing water pour out of the hole. A Hamilayan soldier jumped onto the wagon armed only with a bayonet and Ames cut at his legs. The soldier screamed and fell off under the hooves of Ames’s horse. He stretched out with his sword to hack at the plug on the next barrel, but another trooper beat him to it.
He searched for the next wagon, but all were either overturned or had dragoons swarming around them. He heard their victory whoops as all of the casks were destroyed. Firegon balls started flicking past him. The enemy was getting desperate, and it was time to leave. He hoped the Hamilayans thought the dragoons were going to go out the way they came in.
‘Now!’ he shouted in Kydan. ‘Now ride, dragoons! Ride south!’
The cry was picked up and riders slapped their horses back into a gallop, riding for the angle opposite the one they had entered. Ames wheeled around twice, making sure none of his troopers left alive had been abandoned, then urged his own horse into a gallop. He leaped over an infantryman who was on his knees trying to protect himself with his firegon, realised too late the firegon had a bayonet fixed to it. His horse screamed, bucked, reared then fell. Ames tried to remove his boots from the stirrups but was too slow. His head hit the ground first, then the horse fell on his leg and he cried out in pain. A black sea rose all around him, and he did not see nor feel the bayonet that ended his life.
*
‘Release them,’ Paimer ordered.
‘Sir?’ The guard looked at him with disbelief.
‘You heard me. Open the pens. Release all the prisoners.’
The guard forced a laugh, as though the duke was telling a joke. ‘They’re not prisoners, your Grace, they’re Axkevleren.’
Paimer felt blood rush to his face. ‘These are not Axkevleren!’ he shouted, and the guard recoiled. ‘They are farmers and carpenters and grocers and fathers and mothers and children from all over the empire, but they are not Axkevleren. They are innocents! Open the pens now!’
‘But your Grace, what will the empress say?’
‘I will deal with the empress!’ Paimer roared. ‘Open the pens now!’
The guard could argue no further. He hurried to unlock the nearest gate, then moved on to the next and the one after that.
The people inside did not move.
‘You are free,’ Paimer said. ‘Go. Find your way home. I don’t care how. But leave this city now before it is too late.’
They huddled together in the middle of the pen.
‘Don’t you understand?’ he said, his voice almost pleading.
Atemann touched his shoulder. ‘Paimer. We have to go. The time is here. We have to get to the aviary.’
‘But these people –’
‘Can look after themselves now. Our duty is elsewhere.’
Paimer let himself be led away. They strode past the old palace and up the slope to Yunara’s alcazar. An officer was walking swiftly the other way, looking both angry and afraid at the same time, carrying two lit lanterns in both hands. ‘Leave this city,’ he growled at them. ‘Leave the city before it is too late.’
‘Why?’ asked Bayer, but the officer had already passed them.
The Kevlerens watched him in surprise until he was out of sight.
‘How did he know?’ Atemann asked.
Paimer shook his head and resumed the climb to the alcazar.
*
As soon as the dragoons were past his line, Gos ordered his companies to stand and fire. The volleys banged out over the enemy camp and Hamilayans who had been cheering what they thought was the rout of the enemy horse scrambled for cover.
Then he heard Lannel Thorey’s militia companies fire their volleys, and the Hamilayan camp lost all cohesion. Soldiers fled north to get away from the lethal hail of bullets that smashed into them.
Velan waited until the last moment and then ordered his own men to stand and fire. Balls cut swathes through the enemy. Hamilayan officers desperately tried to steady their men, but all the soldiers wanted to do was get away from the redjackets. They moved east almost as a single mass, trampling any unlucky enough to trip or stumble.
Gos watched in elated amazement. He did not think a Hamilayan army could crumble so quickly. Now was the time, he told himself. Now he could press them all the way into The Wash. He ordered his companies to wheel left so their lines ran parallel with the river. Lannel saw what he was trying to do and ordered his companies forward to join the regulars, making a single continuous line running parallel with the river. Then they advanced.
*
The creature reached the dome. It put a hand on its surface and it shone under the creature’s almost translucent skin. It needed to get in, but it could see no door, no tunnel, no way in at all. There was a big building on the opposite side that might have an entrance, but there would be people there and that might be dangerous. Especially now it was so close to reaching whatever had been driving it since . . .
It struggled to remember, past the killings and the family it had made and the land it had traversed. Into the dark sea, the cold biting sea, deep deep and away from the sun. That was its oldest dream, but now it sensed there was something beyond that.
It shook its head in frustration. What came before that did not matter. It was in the sea when it had woken, and it was from that time that it had been seeking this place.
‘Oy, what do you think you’re doing?’
The creature saw two guards emerge from the darkness.
‘Get away from the dome! That’s the empress’s special home, that is!’
They came closer, carrying spears. They were no threat.