Pauper's Empire

by Levi Jacobs

  If there are, you’re the last person they want in the lead. Remember Newgen?

  Tai stopped in his tracks. He remembered—remembered the field of corpses outside the enclave walls, remembered the razed forest hideout they’d returned to, remembered all the wounded and dead on both sides. Because he’d had the great idea to attack them outright. And to leave Curly and Fisher in the forest camp, as if they’d be safe.

  She was right. Or she knew exactly what to say because she was in his mind. But still. He couldn’t not go. “I—don’t have to lead. I can just fight. I’m good at that. No one has to know I’m there.”

  Naveinya laughed. No one has to know? When they see you flying higher and faster than even the Broken? You cannot hide yourself, Tai. And when they see you they’ll want you to lead. To decide how to fight their desperate battle. What did Marrem say? The people need a strong leader. They think that’s you, the poor fools.

  “Maybe it is. It’s their choice, after all.”

  You know better than that. They think a strong resonance makes a strong leader. They don’t know how weak you are inside.

  Her words cut to something deep inside. Something that had been hurt and afraid for a long time. Since his kids were locked up, at least. Since he got Hake killed, maybe. A basic fear that had gone away, just for a few minutes, floating high above the city pushing an entire army down the river with an unstoppable torrent of uai.

  A fear that came back with a vengeance when the torrent died and he couldn’t do it again.

  But fear was normal. What kind of leader wouldn’t be afraid when their people were in danger? Did that make him weak?

  “No,” Tai said. “Making mistakes is not the same as weakness.”

  It’s what comes from weakness. You are weak, Tai. Why else did all your kids die? Your rebellion fail? Your city end up where it is now, dying at the hands of the Councilate? Because you failed. Because you’re not good enough. And now it looks like you’re not even smart enough to understand that.

  The fear was like a steel hand tightening on his heart. He didn’t want to get anyone else killed. But if Semeca was really there his friends were dying anyway. There was nothing to lose.

  And everything to gain.

  Maybe Arkless will lead them out of it. Or Feynrick. The man has a good head for strategy.

  “But they want me to lead. Arkless, Feynrick, the entire Cult of the Blood. Hell, even Aelya wanted me to lead.”

  Naveinya said something, arguing back, but the realization echoed down in him, down to that basic fear. It didn’t matter what he felt. They wanted him to lead. And what else had Marrem said?

  This isn’t about you. It’s about what the city needs.

  He stood up straight and took his bearings. The city needed him now.

  If there was anyone left.

  57

  Feynrick chewed dreamleaf. It was nasty habit, one he’d had to kick years ago, in the army. Swore he’d never do it again. But there was a time for everything.

  He’d done the math. Counted the pairs of resonators they had on the stairway, the amount they had on reserve, and figured the rate they were dying. They’d been here four hours, and they could last another one before they couldn’t fill all the holes. Maybe two. Then they’d start pulling back down the stairwell, letting the Broken closer and closer in. An hour after that, a hole would open somewhere they wouldn’t be able to fill, and it was an old story from there.

  Thus the dreamleaf. And smiles for the men. Grins for the women. Keep ‘em happy. There was a time for facts and honesty, and a time for ignoring the piss out of them.

  Upstairs, someone shrieked above the rattle of resonance. Yuraload gone bad, most like. Feynrick guffawed and told off a pair of militiamen to go handle it. They’d been giving out enough moss to yuraload the last few hours, but people had been slow to try it at first. He didn’t blame them—all the stories about going stark mad and dying didn’t sell it too well. Now in the last while he’d seen more and more taking their balls. Maybe they’d done the math too.

  Turns out there’s a time for madness as well.

  Not that yuraloading was mad. Those that overcame got a lot stronger, sometimes taking down a few Broken as they peaked, and then they could stay up longer. Got refreshed. Didn’t need yura. That was their main pinch, was keeping their resonators in action. Everyone was getting tired, and when you got tired you made mistakes. Then the mistakes got you dead.

  He bit off another plug of dreamleaf. Sent a few more militiamen to where brawlers were trying to push through the library doors. Grinned at Ella as she ran by, ragged but still pretty for all that.

  He paused, waiting for Gleesfen to comment, but Gleesfen was gone, shucked in his overcoming at the gates. He missed the old lecher, even if he hadn’t really been one of the genitors after all. He’d made the days a little lighter, and saints knew they could all use a little lightening.

  In the center of the courtyard Marrem was firing off orders and overseeing a small team of assistants seeing to the wounded. He spat green and sighed. There was a time for everything.

  “Madam,” he said, laying a hand on her shoulder. “A word?”

  “No time,” she started to bark, then caught sight of his eyes. A grin couldn’t hide everything, apparently. She followed him off a ways.

  “We’re going to die,” she said without preamble. “I know that. It gives them something to do. A little hope doesn’t hurt anything.”

  “Couldn’t agree with you more,” he said, nodding to one militiamen carrying another. “But it’s time to start thinking longer term.”

  “What longer term?” she snapped. “Hands? Fingers? Is this where you try to kiss me?”

  He just stared at her for a moment, then roared laughter. “Kiss you? Genitors praise woman! Kiss you? Easier to try kissing a swamp dragon!”

  Her back went stiff. “I’m not so old as all that. I’ve had lovers in my day.”

  “I don’t doubt you have!” he said, still chuckling. “And genitors-praise if we make it through this I’ll take you out on the town, woman. But meantime, no. This is about saving what we can.”

  Her expression never changed. “I don’t see how we could. We’re surrounded and outnumbered. You don’t need a military background to see there’s no saving this.”

  “Perhaps you need one, to see it. Don’t underestimate your brothers in arms.”

  “What, then? Out with it. Unless that dreamleaf’s got you loopy already.”

  “Way I see it, whoever’s running these things, she can barely make ‘em fight. I doubt she’ll muster ‘em room to room once the rest of us are done to check for stragglers. So we hide who we can in the empty rooms, have em play dead, hope the Broken just piss off once they’ve done their killing.”

  Her expression softened. “And who do you mean to save?”

  “Women and children, mothers, that’s up to you woman.” He never let the grin leave his face. “Send em up with your runners. Just a few at a time, mind, so the enemy doesn’t get an eye on it. Hide em under the beds, blankets, get em bloody and pretend they’re dead, whatever they can do. Tell em to wait a full day and night, at least. Two if they can. Glass don’t burn, so they should be safe.”

  “And what do the rest of us do?”

  “We make a good show of it. Spit in the demon’s teeth and all that. But don’t go talking about us. Those that live, they’re going to need someone to show em around. Heal what wounds they got, find a safe place for the winter.”

  Her face hardened. “I won’t leave my patients.”

  “Will ye leave your daughters then? I know you have a few of em.”

  The woman’s mouth puckered like she was chewing lemons. She swallowed. “Fine. I’ll see to it.”

  “There’s a girl.” He clapped her on the shoulder and she turned to go. “Don’t forget about my kiss once this is all over, eh?”

  She glanced back, eyeing him up and down. “You get us out of this, I’ll giv
e you more than a kiss.”

  The grin was easier to keep on for a bit after that. He told off more soldiers, chewed more dreamleaf, and grinned at the healer’s assistants going up in twos and threes to the lower bedchambers, and not coming back. Good. That was good. If somebody lived, then it wouldn’t be a total defeat.

  A boom sounded above them. Not the crash of a wafter smashing into a wall or the thud of a jumper hitting the floor, but a boom, like siege balls hitting a Seinjial castle in the Forger’s Uprising.

  Feynrick looked up with the militiaman currently giving him reports. Plaster showered down from a section of the spiral ceiling two thirds of the way up, cracks appearing. What could have caused that?

  Even stranger, the Broken wafters up there had stopped dive-bombing the floor, trying to get through the harmony. Instead they were all clustered along one section of the thick support columns that ran from floor to ceiling, pushing from one side as if they were meant to topple the column.

  Feynrick’s grin slipped. Another boom sounded, and more plaster rained down, cracks spiderwebbing down the spiral walkway.

  He ran to the central doors, where an exhausted pair of resonators held a melancholy harmony. Militiamen jumped up at his approach, at first saluting, then looking confused as he went to open the doors.

  “Sir,” one said in halting Yersh. “You can’t—”

  “Step aside, boy,” Feynrick muttered, grin truly gone now. He thought he knew, but he needed to see it. Needed to witness with his own eyes.

  They stood back and he opened a door, heat and ash and smoke hitting him in the burning red darkness. Brawlers howled a few paces off, still throwing themselves at the harmony, still failing, but he didn’t care about them. He looked up.

  It was too big to see at first, then he picked it out against the blacker sky. Picked her out, the Councilate woman Ella had described, long dress streaming behind her as she flew above the Tower. There was a massive boulder in her hands, dwarfing her figure, smooth and tan like the kind that littered the bluffs along the river valley. Other Broken flew underneath it, helping her push, and Feynrick winced as she got above the Tower and let go. It hit with another ground-shaking boom, then tumbled down the conical face, smashing tiers as it went.

  The game had changed, and none of their tactics mattered anymore. The enemy wasn’t trying to invade the Tower.

  They were trying to destroy it.

  58

  I thought for a moment I could see Teyena’s eyes in his, but it was only a trick of the light. And what would I say, if I could meet those eyes again? I am sorry? Words do not suffice.

  --Aymila Reglif, private journals

  Tai flew over the forest, trees a blur in the fading light. Naveinya still argued in his mind, but it wasn’t important. This wasn’t about what he wanted, or even what he feared.

  It was about doing what was best for his friends. Leading because they wanted him to.

  He had sort of expected Naveinya to go, after he realized that. Hoped for another flood of uai, like when he overcame the Hake-revenant, something that would give him the strength to defeat Semeca. It hadn’t happened. Maybe it would never happen—she and Nauro certainly didn’t think so.

  It didn’t matter. Naveinya didn’t control him. He would do what he could.

  The best thing you can do is land now and let your friends take care of themselves. You’ll only make things worse.

  “It’s not mine to choose,” he said to the whistling sky. “They want this, not me. It’s probably better that I don’t want it. Nauro, Semeca, all those self-absorbed rich people at the meeting in Gendrys, they all want it, want to be in control. And look at the mess they’re making. Maybe the best reason to be a leader is that you don’t want it.”

  Your friends wouldn’t want you either, if they knew how broken you are.

  “No. Aelya knows. Feynrick knows. Hell they all know, they were all there for the rebellion, they know what happened to my gang. They want me anyway.”

  But you keep failing. You have to admit that.

  He rolled his shoulders. How far out from the city was he? “That just means I’ve tried. That I know the costs now. I didn’t want to lead before because I was afraid of those costs. Afraid my decisions would get someone else killed. But I guess that’s part of the reason I am cut out for it. Because I know what failure means.”

  Cold solace that will be when you get the rest of your friends killed.

  “Ancestors send I’m there to die with them. It’s worth it. We all agreed it was worth it when we stayed, even after things got hard. Maybe we’re all being leaders that way. Standing in the front. Accepting the costs. Hoping the rest of the world will follow our example, but doing it anyway.”

  I’m not leaving, if that’s why you’re saying all this. You won’t get rid of me that easily.

  “Fine. Maybe you’re one of the costs too. A constant reminder of my doubts. Here to keep me honest. Good. I’m glad you’re here.”

  She had no response to that. A glow appeared on the horizon, red like the sun’s last light, but north instead of west. The sinking feeling in Tai’s stomach only increased as he sped closer, over the old forest hideout, over the mine complexes, over the trampled fields of melon, now littered with bodies.

  That was Ayugen. The city was burning.

  59

  Another boom sounded above and Ella ducked, covering her head as plaster and wood and whole sections of flooring tumbled past the walkway to crash below. The Tower groaned, and she locked eyes with the frightened pair of Achuri holding resonance in front of her, waiting for the whole thing to collapse. She had come up here to convince them to stay, to hold the harmony, that it was the only thing keeping them alive.

  Turns out it wasn’t enough.

  “We will stay,” the older woman said. “If it is to die fighting here, or die waiting there, we will stay here.”

  Tears started in Ella’s eyes, but there was no time for that. She nodded, thanked them, and moved to the next pair, another shower of plaster raining down. Feynrick had told them about the dropping boulders with a smile on his face, but they all knew what it meant: they couldn’t stay here, and there was nowhere to go.

  She got back down to the floor to find Feynrick still in discussion with the other circle members, everyone clustered at the edges of the courtyard where the Tower’s overhanging walkways offered some protection. The center was a heap of fallen building materials, glass and fine carpets and teakwood mixed together with mortar and stone and broken lengths of wood.

  Thrusting from this was a thick length of stone, the first section of support column the wafters had broken free. The rest of that column was doing nothing to hold the massive Tower up now. There were thirteen other columns--how many more before the weight was too much? How long before that boulder Semeca was dropping smashed all the way through and brought the Tower with it?

  “—make a charge. It’s the only way.” Feynrick grinned as he said it, but his eyes were sad. “We lead them off, die bloody and valiant and all that, and you slip out the back.”

  “The town is burning,” Marrem said. “You can’t even stand near the windows, the heat is so bad. We wouldn’t make it.”

  “Better an uncertain death than a certain one,” Feynrick said, hand kneading a plug of dreamleaf.

  “I’m with Marrem on this one,” Arkless said, the normally collected merchant looking pale. “Perhaps we can all pack into one of the side rooms, away from where the bulk of the Tower will fall. Try to ride it out.”

  “You got no dogs to ride,” Feynrick said. “We’ve done everything we can, and there’s still too many of them.”

  “No,” Gil said, hand clutching his scarlet necklace. “Lord Tai will come. We just have to keep faith.”

  “Keeping faith is fine,” Arkless start, then another boom cut him off.

  They all flinched as the debris tumbled down. Someone started sobbing toward the outside of their circle.

  “Thi
s is insane,” someone whispered behind her.

  “Whatever we do,” Marrem said, practical as ever, “we need to do it now. This tower won’t hold.”

  “So we all run together,” Aelya said. “Strike the harmony, fight em off, try to get back to the caves maybe.”

  “The heat,” Marrem said, just as Feynrick shook his head. “We’d be cut down.”

  Ella found herself strangely detached from it. Resigned. What would happen would happen, regardless of any last desperate meetings they held.

  She’d been this way for a while now, she realized. Fighting and pushing more out of denial than any hope it would change things. There was no solution to this. They were going to die. The only question now was how.

  She would let them make the big decisions. She was tired of making those. The Achuri couple was right—she would rather die fighting than waiting. Stand with those on the walkway until there was no one left.

  Peace came with the decision. She knew what to do. Ella made her way up the spiral staircase, carpet bloodied and silted with white plaster now, stopping to speak to each pair in turn, not offering false hope but just standing with them for a while, adding her resonance to theirs. It came down to this, anyway. People. Just people, helping each other, standing with each other in times of need. Sharing their strange and brief time on this planet before moving on.

  How ironic that the one to end her time would be someone she’d known from her other life. That they were allies in the Councilate—only it seemed like maybe there was more to the Councilate than she knew. Did other councilors know Semeca could do the things she could? Did they all know?

  Another question she wouldn’t answer. Ella wandered into one of the empty rooms, this one still intact. Silk cushions lay atop a fluffy featherdown mattress, a fine layer of dust over everything. Almost like the life she had left behind, her single room with its plush featherdown mattress. She walked to the window and wiped the dust from it. The pane was blue, casting the raging fires outside in a violet light. She was on the right side of the Tower to see Semeca, white gown streaming around her, lifting the giant boulder for another attack on the Tower.