Needs of the Empire

by Christopher Mitchell

  He looped the reins over a post.

  ‘Stay here, wee bear,’ he said, as a carriage entered the cavern. He raced forwards, ducking behind the passing carriage as it approached the covered wagon. He rolled as the carriage pulled away, dodging the large wooden wheels. He ducked into the booth, and crouched beneath the covered wagon. He could hear the sounds of chatter coming from above his head, and he scrambled to the back, which had been parked close to the rear wall of the booth. He picked up a stone and lobbed it forwards, striking one of the four gaien harnessed to the front. It bellowed out a cry, and Killop drew his sword and leapt up into the back of the wagon.

  Two Rahain peasants, a woman and a man, stared up at him.

  ‘Where is she?’ Killop said, lowering his sword at them.

  The woman lunged for her crossbow, and Killop drove the sword through her neck. The man jumped back, and Killop went after him. He grabbed him by the throat, squeezed until his neck snapped, then threw him at the man on the driver’s bench, who was turning and reaching for his weapon. Killop lunged forward and pulled the other man in. He put his foot on his back and swung his sword down, severing the man’s head.

  His eyes searched the interior of the wagon. There was no sign of Daphne.

  He heard a thump, and looked down, scanning the floorboards. There was a louder thump, and he jumped down from the wagon. He ripped off the tarpaulin covering the rear, and saw a handle in the centre of a horizontal slat. He sheathed his sword, and wrenched open the slat, exposing a dark hidden space under the wagon’s floorboards. He peered inside, and saw movement.

  ‘Step away from the wagon,’ a voice cried.

  Killop turned. By the rear of the booth a man was pointing a crossbow at his chest. A woman stood next to him. She looked different in peasant clothing, but Killop had no trouble recognising her.

  ‘You killed them all, you filthy savage,’ Douanna said, her eyes glancing over the interior of the blood-splattered wagon. ‘Have you any idea how expensive it will be to replace them?’

  Killop moved his hand away from the hilt of his sword.

  ‘Back away,’ Douanna said, drawing a knife from her robes. ‘Jaioun, shoot him if he moves. I’ll make sure that Miss Holdfast remains safely tucked up.’

  She approached the rear of the wagon, glancing down at the wooden slat that Killop had discarded. She lifted her head, her hand clutching the knife, her eyes level with the dark compartment.

  ‘Excitement’s over, Daphne.’

  She paused, her eyes widening.

  An arm lunged out from the darkness, and fingers gripped Douanna’s neck. Killop froze for a second as Daphne flung herself from the compartment, pulling Douanna down with her.

  Jaioun’s eyes darted towards Douanna and Daphne writhing on the ground, and Killop sprang at him. He ripped the crossbow from the Rahain man’s grasp, and clubbed him with it, striking him on the side of his face and sending him sprawling to the dirt. He crouched down next to him, and broke the man’s neck with his free hand.

  He spun round to see Daphne sitting slumped on the ground next to Douanna’s body. A knife was protruding from the Rahain woman’s chest.

  Killop rushed to Daphne’s side.

  She arched in pain as he embraced her, and he looked down at her right leg. Blood was seeping from a wound above the ankle, and two wooden splints had been tied along her shin.

  ‘Shit.’

  He put his arm around her shoulder, and she squinted up at him. ‘Karalyn?’

  ‘She’s close by.’

  ‘I knew you were coming,’ she said. ‘I could feel her mind searching for me.’

  ‘You all right?’

  ‘I lost my vision,’ she said. ‘That’s how they got me.’

  He glanced over at the body of Douanna.

  ‘It’s coming back,’ she went on. ‘Slowly. But I used up nearly all of it to get free. ’

  ‘You did more than get free,’ he said. ‘You killed her. Douanna’s dead. Your promise to Laodoc has been kept.’

  She nodded. ‘What now?’

  Killop helped Daphne get to her feet, supporting her with his arm. He glanced back down the booth to where Karalyn remained, sitting on the stallion. She let out a yelp of joy as she saw her mother, and Daphne smiled.

  Killop gazed down at her. She was exhausted, and in considerable pain, but the spark in her green eyes drew him in, and he knew he would always love her.

  ‘I was thinking,’ he said. ‘The Severed Clan won’t need a chief when they get to Domm, and Bridget will do a fine job leading them there.’

  Her eyes widened.

  ‘If you want,’ he said, ‘we could go to Hold Fast, and see your folks.’

  She threw her right arm around his neck and drew him close.

  ‘You sure?’

  ‘Aye,’ he said. ‘It’s time I saw the Holdings.’

  Chapter 37

  Out of Luck

  P lateau City, The Plateau – 21 st Day, Second Third Winter 506

  Shella awoke and opened her eyes. The light was dim, but she could make out a long jagged crack running across the ceiling a few feet above where she was lying.

  She took a breath. She felt fine. No, better than fine. She felt alive. She reached for her powers and found them, her reserves full and ready.

  Where was she?

  She turned her head and saw Kalayne reclining in an armchair, snoring. A lamp on a table next to him was providing the small room’s only illumination. Thymo sat on another chair, playing with some toy figures of warriors.

  He looked up, and smiled.

  ‘Auntie,’ he cried, and ran into her arms.

  She laughed as the boy embraced her.

  ‘You’re fine?’ she said.

  ‘Me?’ he said. ‘I’m okay.’

  ‘Ah, you’re awake,’ Kalayne said, grimacing and rubbing his neck. ‘All better now?’

  ‘I feel great,’ she said. ‘What happened? How did I get out? ’

  ‘How do you think?’ he said, frowning. ‘I got you.’

  ‘You got me?’ she said. ‘You mean you walked into the institute, amid fire and destruction, and carried me out?’

  ‘Something like that. I won’t bore you with the details, though suffice it to say it involved a great deal of sneaking around. I also read your memories. They were quite interesting.’

  Shella shook her head. ‘It was terrifying. The Emperor…’

  ‘Is no longer the Emperor.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Everyone believes that the Creator bestowed great power upon the Emperor, but I saw what occurred, through your memories, and understood, even if you didn’t.’

  ‘Understood what?’

  ‘The Creator himself now resides within the body that once belonged to Emperor Guilliam.’

  She frowned.

  ‘It wasn’t meant to happen,’ the old man went on. ‘The Creator miscalculated. He hadn’t taken into account the fact that I’d sabotaged Benel’s mind, and it tripped him up.’

  Kalayne smirked.

  ‘Benel’s dead,’ she said.

  Kalayne shrugged. ‘That was going to happen, with or without me. The night you were arrested I had only a moment, so as well as wiping Benel’s memories of me, I placed a few obstacles in his mind.’

  Shella bowed her head.

  ‘Your survival,’ the old man went on, ‘was also my doing. That block I placed in your head, although it couldn’t prevent the Creator from entering your mind, it shielded you enough to keep you alive.’

  He grinned at her, his eyes bulging.

  Shella said nothing.

  ‘Thank you might be the appropriate response, one would have thought,’ Kalayne said.

  ‘I’m glad you saved her, grandpa,’ Thymo said. ‘I missed her.’

  ‘At least someone’s grateful,’ Kalayne said .

  ‘You risked your life to rescue me,’ she said. ‘I am grateful. I’m just trying to come to terms with everything. For a start, what
happened to the fire mage?’

  Kalayne frowned for a moment. ‘The Creator stopped her heart, and killed every Sanang warrior in her army.’

  ‘Fuck,’ Shella said, shaking her head. ‘Where are we?’

  ‘In a cellar under the Kellach quarter.’

  ‘We’re still in the city?’

  ‘Of course,’ he said. ‘I’m not a mule. I wasn’t going to carry you across the Plateau. I have made arrangements for a wagon, and now that you’re awake, we should be able to leave in the morning.’

  ‘Which morning? How long was I asleep?’

  ‘Well, let’s see,’ he said. ‘I found you a couple of hours before dawn, and it’s now the evening of that day. Sixteen hours maybe?’

  She nodded. ‘Okay. Next, why do I feel great? I should be exhausted, ill, whatever.’

  ‘I hired a Sanang hedgewitch to heal you.’

  ‘What?’

  Kalayne shook his head. ‘I don’t intend to repeat myself.’

  ‘You found a Sanang mage? Here?’

  ‘The Kellach have been hiding him for some time. His services don’t come cheap, let me tell you.’

  ‘How did you afford it?’

  ‘I sold some of the valuables I took from the embassy the night you were arrested. As well as the hedgewitch, your jewellery paid for the wagon, a pair of horses, and supplies for our journey.’

  ‘Oh yeah? Where are we going?’

  ‘Kellach Brigdomin.’

  ‘Not on your fucking life.’

  ‘It’s safe there,’ he said. ‘We can regroup. Others are making their way to the haven at Domm, I have seen it. We shall need to meet with them, as I have a plan for how we can defeat the Creator.’

  There was a knock on the door.

  ‘That’ll be Chief Duncan,’ said Kalayne. ‘He mentioned he might pop over to see you. Remember, he thinks that Guilliam has been given powers. Let’s keep it that way, there’s no point trying to explain the truth to him. Oh, and he knows nothing about the hedgewitch, so don’t mention it.’

  The door opened, and a tall, broad Kellach man entered, bowing his head due to the low ceiling. He took a seat at her bedside and frowned at her.

  Shella smirked. ‘You have the biggest beard I’ve ever seen.’

  ‘I am Chief Duncan,’ he said, his eyes flickering contempt. ‘I rule the Kellach Brigdomin, and this quarter of the city. Were it not for the many favours that Kalayne has performed for our folk, I would not have allowed you to be hidden on our property, but even so, your time here is limited.’

  ‘Don’t you worry, Duncan,’ Kalayne said, slapping the huge man on the back, ‘we’ll be off in the morning. The wagon’s all been sorted.’

  ‘Are you also leaving the city?’ Duncan asked.

  ‘Aye.’

  ‘You should stay. A new dawn is rising over the empire. Now is the time to be living here, in the capital. That bitch Keira may have burned half of it, but we can rebuild it bigger and better. A new reign of peace has come. No army will ever dare attack this city again. The Creator has blessed the Emperor with the power he needs to protect us.’

  ‘And that’s just lovely,’ Kalayne said, ‘but unfortunately I have business elsewhere that forces me to leave for a while. But have no doubt, I’ll be back.’

  ‘Will you be escorting her out?’

  ‘Oh aye,’ Kalayne said. ‘I’ll be with her for a good portion of the way. I’ll make sure she leaves.’

  ‘Good.’

  He stood, flinching as he banged his head on the ceiling.

  ‘Farewell,’ he muttered, and left the room.

  Shella sighed. ‘What a fuckwad. How did he ever become chief?’

  ‘He’s a good man,’ Kalayne shrugged. ‘Has the best interests of the folk here at heart. He’s just always felt grateful to the Holdings for taking them in when they were refugees. He’s loyal. And stubborn. He committed himself to the alliance and the empire, and he’ll be with them to the end.’

  He leaned over and picked up a bottle from the floor.

  ‘One other thing in his favour,’ he said. ‘He controls many of the illicit stills in the Kellach quarter, and let me tell you, this stuff’s not too shabby.’

  He opened the bottle.

  ‘Tonight we might as well get pissed,’ he said, ‘for tomorrow we begin a long, and no doubt extremely tedious journey to the far end of the world.’

  ‘Sounds delightful,’ Shella said, picking up her mug. ‘We might have to put Thymo to bed first.’

  ‘And then we’ll be alone,’ he leered. ‘Still feeling grateful?’

  ‘Dream on, grandpa.’

  ‘That’s not a wagon,’ Shella said, pointing. ‘It’s barely a cart, at best.’ She turned to Kalayne, his face in the shadow of a hood as Thymo trotted behind. ‘Is it supposed to get us all the way to Kellach Brigdomin?’

  ‘Your jewellery didn’t fetch at much as you might have hoped. If I were you, I’d put in a complaint to the Rakanese government for giving you such cheap tat to wear.’

  They reached the small wooden wagon. Two Kellach porters were loading trunks and boxes onto it while another held the reins of the horses harnessed to the front. The sky in the east was growing brighter, and a chill breeze swept through the tavern courtyard. Shella pulled her hooded cloak around her as they waited.

  When the porters had finished, Kalayne opened a purse of coins and gave them a couple each. They passed the reins to Kalayne and went back into the tavern.

  Kalayne gestured to Thymo, and the boy climbed up onto the cart, and sat down on the narrow driver’s bench. The old Kell got up next to him.

  ‘Am I in the back?’ Shella said.

  ‘For now,’ Kalayne said. ‘Let’s get you out of the city first, before you make yourself too obvious.’

  Shella frowned, but stepped up onto the rear of the cart. She squeezed between the crates and boxes, and settled down.

  Kalayne leaned back. ‘Put this blanket over you, and stay quiet.’

  He snapped the reins, and the two horses moved off towards the courtyard entrance, where it opened onto a street. Shella watched from under the blanket as they pulled out onto the cobbles of the narrow road, the tall wooden tenements of the Kellach Brigdomin quarter to either side. The streets were quiet, with just a few Kellach going to work, as well as several homeless Holdings folk sleeping in doorways.

  She noticed more of them as they approached the edge of the quarter, lying out in the open air, or clustered round burning braziers. Ahead of them loomed the old Emergency Wall, built in a few frantic days when Agang Garo’s army had threatened the city, in what seemed a lifetime before. A great opening had been knocked through, and the gates were being hauled open as the sun rose.

  Kalayne led the cart to the end of a small queue of wagons waiting to get through. A large group of Kellach labourers on foot had also gathered, ready for a day’s work in the New Town.

  When the gates opened a squad of imperial soldiers strode under the archway and began to wave the traffic through. There were paying no attention to the wagons or the labourers, gathering round a fire to warm their hands.

  Kalayne clicked his tongue, and the horses began to walk, following the wagon ahead of them. Shella kept her head down as they went under the arch and entered the New Town, where the city’s biggest market was located.

  She gasped. The market had gone, replaced by mounds of piled-up wreckage, charred and burnt. Dozens of labourers were cleaning the huge, open square, sweeping up the ashes and clearing the roads. The houses and shops bordering the square were burnt-out shells, their roofs gone and their walls blackened.

  Kalayne flicked the reins, and the horses turned the cart onto a road leading through the merchants’ quarter. Many of the fine, stately mansions were in ruins. Whole streets had been gutted, while just a few yards away, others had escaped the devastation. She remembered back to the night under the institute, and the rumbling explosions she had heard. Now she saw the damage they had caused.


  Bodies were being pulled from the rubble, and heaped onto the backs of open-topped wagons. Imperial soldiers stood around, guarding the properties of the wealthy.

  They turned a corner, and Shella saw a huge breach in the city walls. It was over twenty yards wide, and giant fragments of rubble were scattered across the street. There, the bodies that were being slung onto wagons were not Holdings, but Sanang warriors from the fire mage’s great horde. Their corpses were burnt and blackened, and littered the street. A way through had been cleared, and Kalayne led the cart between the mounds of scorched bodies, grime-covered labourers, and the dozen wagons that were half-piled with dead.

  The horses shied away from the stench, but Kalayne spoke soft words to them and they passed through, then went up a side street towards the eastern gates.

  In the distance, the ruins of the cathedral came into view. Its bulk had been pierced in several places, and its high spires had toppled. The roof had collapsed, and smoke was lingering up from the gutted interior. To the left, the palace was in a similar condition. Its great silver dome had gone, replaced with jagged and scorched stonework.

  As they approached the gates, Shella sunk down lower into the cart and covered her head with the blanket. She felt the horses come to a halt as a Holdings voice rang out. There was the muffled sound of a conversation, and they moved off again.

  Shella sighed with relief as the cart picked up speed.

  After a few minutes, she felt a hand shake her.

  ‘You can come out now,’ Kalayne said .

  She lifted the blanket and gazed back down the road they were trotting along. Between the cart and the city walls lay a carpet of dead Sanang, covering every inch of ground. She gagged as she realised that each body was missing its head. Above, birds were circling, and in the distance a few pyres were sending thick black smoke into the sky.

  ‘The Creator did this?’

  ‘Aye,’ Kalayne said.

  She bowed her head. ‘The bastard used my power to do it. The power he ripped out of me. Do you know if Keira came close to stopping him?’