Guns of the Temple (The Polaris Chronicles Book 1)

by Choi, Bryan

  Their leutnant seemed like he wanted to object, but caution won over bravado and he held up his fist to signal the men to freeze. Aslatiel nodded his thanks to the officer. Some would have simply ignored his assessment and ordered their troops to press on, and then blamed him anyway when the rest of the squad was inevitably shredded by a well-placed ambush.

  “What do we do now?” the Leutnant asked.

  “There’s an officer in there leading them. Possibly polaris. I’ll talk with him—see if he’ll yield.”

  “I thought your kind were all about killing everything that moved.”

  “We do negotiate occasionally. Under no circumstances should your men enter the room before we give word. Zhukov, Rana,” he said, turning to his group. “You’re taking care of the light if things get loud. Lucatiel, you’re with me.”

  “Yes, dear brother.” She marched up to the door to join him. She slowly worked out the kinks in her neck, and made sure that the straps on her armor were fully tightened.

  Fahnenjunker Mikhail Zhukov, the third member of Alfa, knelt nearby and murmured an incantation. His body started to fade and blend in with rough pattern of the walls, until he was but a subtle distortion against the stones. Fahnenjunker Elsa Rana, fourth and most junior, followed suit and disappeared too. The room grew oppressively silent as the preparations came to an end. Many of the men had still never seen true prana usage up close.

  “Men and women of the Dominion, will you parlay?” Aslatiel shouted at the door.

  “Fill your hands, you Imperial dicksuck!” replied someone from the inside. “Who wants to know?”

  “The leader and second in command of Spettsgruppe Alfa.”

  There was a pause. Finally, the door opened a crack and suspicious eyes glared through the opening. Aslatiel shifted to avoid the muzzle of the firelock that also protruded through the gap.

  “Disarm yourselves and step in. No funny movements or witchery or we splatter you on the walls.”

  Aslatiel nodded and unslung the gear that held his sword and submachine gun before handing them to a janissary nearby. Lucatiel passed her twin jian to another soldier. I see fingerprints on the steel and you’re dead, she signaled with a playful wink. They entered the room.

  A dozen Argead soldiers nervously rose from the safety of their cover and trained muskets on their new prisoners. At the head of the group was a man in his late twenties, clad in polished half-plate and heavily armed. He wore the brass sigil of a knight on a chain across his chest and on his pauldrons were engraved a pair of lions rearing on their hind legs. The knight confidently strode forth with a double-barreled howdah pistol leveled at the pair.

  “I thought you’d be smarter than to actually take me up on the offer,” the knight sneered. His eyes flicked between the two siblings and he licked his lips. “Now I’ve got two captives of some renown. Tell your slave-soldiers to retreat back across the river, or we’ll cut the tendons in your ankles and show her what really happens to little girls who think they can fight alongside men.”

  Lucatiel rolled her eyes.

  Aslatiel wanted to sigh with disappointment. These were not the Temple soldiers he sought, just braggarts.

  “My offer is this, Peer of the Dominion,” he began. “Surrender at once, and you and your men will be allowed to retreat with your weapons and banners intact. Your standing will be preserved in the eyes of your lord. You have my personal assurance of this.”

  The knight laughed, as did his men.

  “You want me to run away like some sort of… eunuch making a back-room deal? You Imperials either have no sense of shame, or the rumors are true and all boys are castrated before they start making seed. Certainly explains all the faggotry in your armies. No, you demonspawn pigs, we men of the Dominion believe in honor and loyalty. Something your kind wouldn’t understand.”

  Aslatiel shrugged. “Would you prefer to die in battle instead? That can be arranged.”

  “After we cut off your feet, we’ll all bugger you as well. Since you have no manhood it doesn’t make us queer.”

  “Dear brother, this is boring. May I kill them now?” Lucatiel drawled, tapping her foot impatiently.

  The knight shook his gun at Aslatiel’s face. “Silence your whore!”

  “You keep shouting at me for some reason,” Aslatiel sighed, wiping spittle off of his jaw. “But it’s her you should be afraid of.”

  The torches blazing against the walls died without leaving embers. Panicked, the Dominion men reacted with a barrage of musket-and crossbow-fire that bathed the room in murky, dull orange and roiling smoke. The room sank into blackness again.

  “Cease fire, you cockgobblers! You’ll hit me!”

  The men started to cough and gag from the fumes.

  “Did we get him?” whispered a shaky voice.

  “Shut up! They’re still here!” hissed another.

  “Light the torches…”

  Rapid-fire thunder from dual pistols interrupted the last command while white novae flitted around a woman in the center of the room. In the last visions of dying Argead soldiers, Lucatiel moved with stuttering grace, with not a single wasted movement as she sent hollowpoint rounds into their bodies. As abruptly as it had begun the firing stopped, and the room was again plunged into acrid silence.

  “Approach,” Aslatiel said, smiling grimly in the darkness.

  The janissaries rushed into the room with torches while Lucatiel slowly released herself from her end-stance. Her foot eased off Aslatiel’s shoulder, allowing him to rise from kneeling. All of the Dominion men-at-arms had fallen, slumped in the indignity of death with perfect clover-leaf groups of bullet holes in their foreheads. The knight was bent backwards over a barrel, still clutching his expensive pistol as a death reflex.

  “That’s our Leutnant,” said Elsa with an appreciative whistle as she emerged into visibility under an extinguished torch.

  “Did I do well, Aslatych?” asked Lucatiel to her brother as she changed magazines and holstered her guns. Though tiny compared to the dead knight’s hand-cannon, her pair of ancient pistols marked “26 Austria” were far better tools of destruction, and entirely worthy of her power.

  Aslatiel scanned the interior more closely. It was a powder repository where the frigates’ spare shells and bombs were stored. Naked explosives stacked on wooden shelving gleamed with cosmoline in the light of the Imperial torches.

  “Yes… But I fucked up,” he muttered, a sick feeling mounting in his gut. Using that tactic had been a mistake. One misplaced shot or ricochet and she might have blown the lower levels up. It would have meant an abrupt end to everyone’s life, and most of all, failure in the eyes of his master. Ba’gshnar was right. Lucatiel could take care of herself, but he still had much to learn. A solid punch to his arm shook him out of his dreadful reverie.

  “Aslatych, just how bad of a shot do you think I am?” Lucatiel said, crossing her arms in frustration. “I’m not going to get blown up by some stupid warhead. If I did, who would protect you then?”

  Aslatiel had to smile, despite himself. He was foolish to have doubted her in the first place, and they were most definitely alive. Gently, he took her hand and touched his lips to it with as much chivalry as he could muster.

  “Luca, my dear, you are the only woman I would fear to face in combat. If you weren’t my sister I’d want you as my wife.”

  She beamed in pleasure before suddenly drawing him in and wrapping her arms around his waist with a grunt of effort. The bear hug was capable of crushing an enemy’s spine, and Aslatiel struggled to breathe. He was embarrassed, but at the same time, flooded with an unreasonable sense of fulfillment.

  “I’ll hold you to that,” she said, looking intently into his eyes.

  Taki panted as he reached the wooden doors to the winch house. Everything else could fall or burn but this one place. Below, the keep’s innards were protected by two kilotons of solid steel gate that would never fall to even the most determined ram. If he protected it w
ell, the Imperials would have to turn back. He didn’t care that the squad wasn’t there to back him up. With the exception of the captain, the others had shown their true nature as conniving layabouts. He angrily pushed against the doors, and they grudgingly swung open with much creaking and flying dust.

  To his surprise, there were no soldiers tugging at the wheel, and no barrage of lead screaming his way. Merely a single woman wielding two straight swords, a demure smile, luxuriously straight midnight hair, and the sapphire eyes of a murderess. She gave Taki a coquettish wink and tilted her head from side to side. Though she was comelier than any other woman he’d seen in his life, the sight of her made his blood run cold for some reason.

  “I-identify yourself!” Taki leveled his saber at her.

  “You can call me Lucatiel,” she said with a playful curtsey.

  “I am Taki Na—”

  She raised a hand to cut him off. “No need, dear boy. It’s really not important.”

  Taki glared. “So be it, Imperial. Will you surrender or will I be forced to dispatch you?”

  Lucatiel let out a chuckle. “Why don’t you be good and sit in a corner until your fellows arrive?”

  Taki flared his nostrils and tightened his hold on his weapon. No matter how comely this Lucatiel was, she’d have to die for such an insult. He let out a battle-cry and lunged at her with his blade raised high to cleave her neck. She raised one of her swords to counter, but her movement seemed too slow to counter his. He could almost taste her blood.

  His vision flashed white and he instinctively pulled back before he’d have completed the downstroke. Everything he saw was doubled and spun around crazily. His ears rang with painful tinnitus and his sword-arm spasmed involuntarily. His yatagan had been reduced to a jagged stump and its fragments littered the ground before him. Something salty dripped into his mouth. He put a hand to his face, only to feel a deep cut on his cheek. He pulled the hand away and gazed at the blood with a mix of surprise and horror.

  Lucatiel yawned. “Brother, kill him please. I don’t want his stink on my blades.”

  Taki cast aside the useless weapon remnants and pointed an open palm at her. Even if the woman was a supreme fencer, no blade would protect her from a proper frying. His channeling ability had always been his strength, and the reason for his success in the academy. Now, the Imperial would pay, and painfully. He’d just opened the last gates when something hard crashed into the back of his neck. As if a torch had been snuffed, he lost feeling to his body and collapsed in a heap.

  “No need. This one’s just a novice. I want to know where his commander is.”

  Taki stared up at the ceiling, spread-eagled on his back and unable to do more than twitch. A new arrival stood over him wearing the same sigil Lucatiel had: a maroon cherry blossom motif over a white griffin. The mark of Sevastopol. Spetsnaz, Taki realized. I have to stop them. He strained and tried with all his might to get to his feet, or at least roll onto his side, but all for naught. Below his neck, everything felt blanketed by stifling fog. He’d heard of this happening before—a fall from great height or a careless blow to the back making a man a cripple—but only as a parable against recklessness during training. Realization hit him along with a wave of cold sweat.

  “Imperial,” Taki groaned. “Have you made me an invalid?”

  The man looked down at him and sighed. “Most likely.”

  Taki swallowed back tears. “Then I beg you to kill me.”

  “And I beg you forgive my sister’s rudeness. She sometimes lacks in the social graces. Pray tell me your name.”

  “Taki Natalis, a corporal.”

  “I am Aslatiel von Halcon, and I will honor your request. May you achieve enlightenment in your next life.”

  Aslatiel drew a curved sword and held it firmly for a downward thrust into Taki’s chest. Taki trembled and tried to peer at his executioner, but the effort was too exhausting. Taki closed his eyes. He always knew he’d die in battle, but what irked him was that it had been so soon after graduating, and under such unheroic circumstances.

  The brick wall of the gatehouse exploded as Lotte crashed through it and knocked Aslatiel aside like a ragdoll. She let out a triumphant roar and promptly turned to face Lucatiel with her weapons drawn. Draco barreled in after her and threw Taki over his shoulders. Hadassah squirted by and promptly tried to bayonet Aslatiel while he rolled away.

  Two more figures, also wearing spetsnaz insignia, melted out of the darkened corners of the gatehouse to attack with thrown darts and flashing knives. Lucatiel became an inhumanly fast maelstrom of blades focused on Lotte. Sparks flew as the greatshield’s engraved sun was obliterated by deep gouges and the zweihander’s keen edge turned to fractured teeth. A spear-tip snuck under Draco’s armor and he dropped Taki to the ground.

  Taki groaned, vomited, and to his own surprise, shakily pulled himself to his knees. His lower half no longer felt leaden and insensate. His legs burned and now he could tell that he’d pissed himself. The sensation was mortifying, but more importantly he could feel again, and most importantly, move again. Slowly, painfully, he pulled himself to his feet. His sword was broken, his Bastard missing, and he was in no shape to channel sutras. To his great shame, there was nothing he could do to help.

  “Who dares wake me from my slumber? I’ll devour you all!” Hecaton cackled as she emerged through the hole in the wall. She sent an arc of blinding, violet current upward and instantly blew the gatehouse roof to smithereens. The Imperials quickly hopped back and pulled out their guns while the Tirefires did the same. For what seemed like an eternity, silence reigned save for the pattering of raindrops. Hecaton licked her lips.

  “We meet again.”

  The Unified Imperial was grammatically perfect, but accented with something eastern and more remote than the diphthongs of the Chung Kuo. When Hecaton saw who had spoken, her expression soured and she turned pale, if only for a moment. Chronicler carried no visible weapons, not even the usual dagger or officer’s pistol. His bare hands were sufficient to murder each and every single person in the gatehouse, the castle, and the town.

  “Major! Let’s wreck this sonofabitch!” Draco growled. He gripped his pistol assuredly and tensed on the trigger.

  “No!” It was the first time Hecaton had raised her voice at them in a long while. “All of you retreat. The fortress is lost.” Draco opened his mouth to object, but was silenced by the look on her face. “Do what I say or you will definitely die.”

  As Hecaton’s charges started to slink back, the von Halcons attempted to step forward only to be halted by a casual wave of Chronicler’s hand. He spoke, now in a foreign tongue that only the spettsgruppe had heard him speak before: “It has been far too long since we parted ways. But I was not mistaken to come all this way to find you. For that I am relieved, Sirin. Now, come with me, away from this place. We have much explaining owed to the other Powers.”

  Hecaton squinted, let out a resigned chuckle, and replied in the same tongue. “You always were a dumbass.”

  She joined her hands with a complex interlock of the fingers in front of her. Before Chronicler could react, the gatehouse was choked with billowing, blinding smoke.

  A torrential ejaculation of lead shattered the wooden walls, dead bodies, and stone blocks facing Alfa Gruppe as they simultaneously magdumped into the space Hecaton and her cohort had occupied a half second before. Chronicler grimaced, drew in a breath, and violently exhaled. The smoke parted instantly and fled as if moving of its own accord.

  “Bitches and whores!” Lucatiel bellowed. Sullenly, she ejected the empty magazines from her pistols and shoved them into pouches.

  “There there, my dear. You are a more respectable young lady than that,” Chronicler admonished, switching back to Unified Imperial. “Spettsgruppe Alfa, you have done well. I will inform the padishah of your prowess and see that you are rewarded justly. That being said, you should open the gate to allow our commandos to penetrate the inner fortress.”

  Fr
ustration leaving her face, Lucatiel nodded to Mikhail and they set to work turning a large wooden wheel on a pintle. Elsa joined in, speeding the process. The gatehouse rumbled, and triumphant roars erupted from below as the gate lifted and janissaries flooded the courtyard. Unlike other men-at-arms serving the Imperium, they were forbidden to sack the town or take liberties with the inhabitants, as they received a regular salary. Pacifying the surroundings would be easier once the Argead citizenry realized they had no reason to fear for their lives.

  “Ba’gshnar,” Aslatiel said, kneeling contritely. He swallowed back a wave of nausea provoked not by his brush with death, but by the fact that he’d almost died to some damnable old hag. “Once again, you lay bare my unworthiness. You have my limitless gratitude for saving my soldiers.”

  “Rise, Aslatiel,” Chronicler said. “You have incurred no disgrace. The woman you faced is unlike any other in the world, and even a match for me. She and I are bound by an unfortunate string of fate.”

  “Who is she?”

  Chronicler smiled wistfully. “I once thought her beautiful. But now that she is wizened and hateful, she is even more enticing.”

  A non-answer. Aslatiel bowed again to his master. The Alfa knew better than to ask more, though he craved to do so. Chronicler rarely changed his mind, especially when he chose to guard the details of his past. Trying to probe would only lead to blood and loss.

  5

  By the time of his capture, ulcers raked Taki’s feet from constant rubbing against the insides of his boots and his heels wept where blisters had burst along the way. After a hasty descent down the walls of the keep, he and the rest of Tirefire the Lesser had sprinted, jogged, and then trudged for the rest of the night until light from burning towers no longer punctured the horizon. Every breath felt like a lungful of searing volcanic ash, and Taki wanted most of all to die, vomit, and rest, in that order.

  He spent a good portion of his attention furtively looking around for any sign of a mount or wagon. Anything would suffice to rest his burning calves and soothe his chafing thighs, but the roadway was barren. He recalled a tale of some king who had offered to trade his domain for a horse under similar circumstances. At the time, he had thought the man foolish, but now the logic was flawlessly clear. Especially since the mere act of placing one foot in front of the other was becoming progressively difficult by the step. Draco slogged on ahead, arguing with Hadassah over something that involved tossing her rifle back and forth between them. Their words were gibberish. Taki felt himself falter and he sank to his knees.