“What? Pay the Damned for—” First Whisper shrieked, cutting herself off, forcing her features out of the revolted mask they’d become for a split-second.
“Boom. Right in the paradigm,” Alpha voxed. “This’ll cause a ruckus.”
“Good,” I replied. “We could do with a proper uprising before we leave. The only way we’re going to make changes stick around here is with blood, enough to double that river flowing right through the city.” This had been weighing on my mind for some time.
“Thank you, great lady. Shall, ah, shall we pass your words along to those who have expressed concern?” First Manifesto managed.
“OF COURSE.” I waved them out. Then I rose and beckoned my honor guard forward.
“WHAT ARE YOUR THOUGHTS ON THE MATTER?” I translated that into their various languages, after asking in English.
“I think those mule dicks are going to try to fuck you up the ass the first chance they get,” Nezool said. Two of the guards froze in trepidation at his utterance. The last, an ex-navy recruit from Georgia, laughed her butt off.
“WELL THAT’S A GIVEN. SERIOUSLY, THOUGH, YOUR THOUGHTS?”
“I have seen war in Caym before, attacks from below. I do not remember if it was this Lord of Smoke and Sinew, but it takes a lot of time to repel the invaders.” That was one of the older guards, a former monk from the Dark Ages. It hadn’t taken long to learn his dialect of Saxon, so I understood him well enough. The Chorus translated for the benefit of his comrades.
“HM. MONTHS? YEARS? DECADES?”
“My calendar is guesswork. I tracked time by the appetites of my owners. At a guess, no more than a dozen decades, though it could be twice that amount or more.” He sighed. “No sun, no moon, no stars. Troublesome.”
“We are in Hell, Widdig, and you are vexed most by the fact you cannot properly tell time,” Narl snorted. He’d come from roughly the same era as Widdig, but was more about raiding and axes and boats. From what Nezool told me when he recruited them, they’d struck up an unlikely friendship from having common ground, even if it had been on opposite sides of politics and conflict in life.
“At least I am not whining about a lack of alcohol all the time.”
“Like you’d turn down a cask of mead!”
Joanna, the navy woman leaned in, popped her visor up, and showed a dark face about the same shade as Nezool’s. “I think an army that big is gonna take time to get mobilized. These guys, they don’t have the same infrastructure chains that we do, or the urgency. They take everything slow.”
I nodded. “TRUE. WE’LL BE OUT OF HERE BEFORE THEY BRING ANY REAL FORCE TO BEAR. BUT THEY ARE IN THE PATH WE NEED TO GO THROUGH...” I’d offered any Damned who wanted to journey with me a spot on the Strix express. Got fewer volunteers than I’d thought, about the same ratio that recruiting from the spires had achieved. Something about this place killed people’s hope, murdered their motivations.
I seemed to be more resistant, and I didn’t know why. I felt it, but it was distant. Superior self-control, I supposed.
“We’ll have to deal with the Wrathlands army one way or the other, boss.” Alpha shrugged.
“TRUE.” I took a princely three seconds, ran through various plans, and smiled. “VECTOR’S STILL OUT ON HIS ERRAND. EPSILON, DID HE EVER DEVELOP THAT CLOTTING AGENT?”
“Yes. He’s got a prototype. The stuff was simple enough to make.”
I took a few more seconds to call up my CAD modeler, whipped up a diagram, working from my eidetic memory on the geography we’d crossed to get here. “TELL HIM TO DUMP IT HERE.” I voxed the diagram through.
“I will. But why?”
“YOU’LL SEE.” I turned attention back to the honor guard. “AND THAT BIT ABOUT THE PAX INFERNUM?”
The monk nodded. “They did not lie. Of my previous owners, I have heard seven of them discussing plans for betrayal and attack on rival houses. But they have stopped short of all-out destruction several times, because of an ancient treaty among the demons.”
“AMONG THE DEMONS...” I rose and paced, thinking it over. “DOES THE TREATY AFFECT THE FALLEN ANGELS AS WELL?”
Widdig crossed himself. Two seconds later, Narl followed suit. “I do not know, Lady Dire. They do not speak of the Fallen Angels often. When they do, it is with fear.”
“Demons dread where angels tread. Fallen or no they’re fearsome foes,” Alpha said. “There ya go. Free poem. Worth what you paid for it.”
I’d learned much in the three weeks since I’d seized Caym, but there was still a lot about Hell that remained a mystery. I needed more data before I could formulate a plan that had a shot at getting us through.
Joanna spoke while I mused. “That bit about Damned selling their flesh really shook them. I don’t know how well it’s gonna go down with the local Damned too, Doctor.”
“NO? THEY DON’T WANT FREE WILL?”
“Free will we have,” Nezool said. “But our bodies are different now. Every time we feel pain, it is as if it is the first time we have ever felt pain.”
“He is not wrong. Nor is it merely the pain of the body that is new. My mind should have broken many times over from the tortures I endured,” Widdig confirmed. “But ever and again, I returned from the depths of madness, recovering as my flesh does from mortification.”
I’d wondered about that. Given the stress this place put upon its victims, there should have been a lot more madness around. I’d seen a few down here, but now I wondered if they were the ones who’d started life out that way.
“WHAT OF HUNGER? AND THIRST?”
Joanna grimaced. “It’s complicated. We feel hungry all the time, but eating anything never fills us up. We feel thirsty all the time, and when we get some actual water that helps for a while.”
“Lasts longer than eating,” Narl said. “But water’s rare. Not wasted on Damned like us.”
I hadn’t paid much attention, earlier. Nobody had ever complained, and back at the quarry my original bunch of Damned had tucked into the burren steaks with satisfaction. They’d enjoyed the water, too, but they hadn’t seemed to need it, or cared much until it showed up.
I wondered how much of that had been stoicism, and how much had been fear that we’d punish them or take away luxuries after we had what we needed from them. I resolved to ask my Romans when I had a second.
Though I had a second now, didn’t I?
“THANK YOU. YOU’VE GIVEN DIRE MUCH TO CONSIDER. ONE LAST QUESTION; HAVE ANY OF YOU SEEN CASSIAN OR JUNO?”
“They are at their game,” Nezool said, his voice dropping down to a whisper. “Lucky Romans!”
“I’m due for my second session in the next shift.” Joanna smiled, and the other guards sighed longingly, looking at her with raw envy.
“WAIT. WHAT?”
“Monsters and Mangonels,” Widdig offered up. “The game of stories.”
“With dice!” Jarl grinned. “My kind of stories.”
“OH-KAY.” I looked to my Chorus. They put on innocent poses, though the effect was somewhat ruined as I heard Alpha snickering over the vox channel. “WHERE ARE THEY HAVING THEIR GAME?”
“I’ll show you,” Alpha said. “You’re gonna love this.”
I bit my tongue and followed my minion. He led me down the stairs, into an actual fucking dungeon. The cells were empty of occupants but filled with bones. “TELL DIRE WE LET THE PRISONERS FREE.”
“The few Damned that were down here, yeah. We got First Manifesto to tell us the crimes of the demons. Some got freed. The rest, eh... well, you don’t wanna know their crimes.”
I nodded, then glanced to the side as a demonic functionary bowed and scurried past, on his way to another errand. Many ears here, so I switched to vox instead. “So First Manifesto kept track of the crimes?”
“He kept all of Illwrack’s records, pretty much. He also handled a lot of the bureaucracy and the city’s works. Dude’s fussy.”
“Fussy?” Not an adjective I’d expected to hear apply to a demo
n.
“He’s a perfectionist or got some hyper-OCD, or some degree of both. I got the feeling that the only reason he’s unhappy about the current situation is that it’s highly irregular for a mortal to do anything like conquer a city, much less fail to die when a greater demon looks at them.”
“Well, he’ll have to get used to that.”
“Will he?” Alpha glanced over his shoulder at me.
“Will he what?”
“I mean, we’re moving on eventually, right? Anything we change here, anything we do, there’s no way to make it stick once we’re gone.”
I grinned, but no one could see my face. “Already thought of that. You’re gonna get a kick out of her solution.”
“Yeah, if you want the Damned in this city to stay un-tortured then it had better be a really good one, boss. I mean you’re awesome and all, but this is Hell. There’s like an anti-momentum here, from what Khalid tells me. Really, really hard to make any improvements that stick.”
“We lose nothing by trying. This isn’t Mariposa. The enemies are legion and horrible, and Dire’s free to employ whatever tricks and tactics she desires to ensure her will be done.” Though I kept my tone under control, I could feel heat burn its way through my chest.
Hell... offended me. It was broken.
And I could fix it, given a big enough lever and just the right place to apply pressure.
“If you say so, boss. Oh, hey, we’re here!”
I stared up at double-brass doors sized for a troupe of elephants. Elephants that were standing on each other’s backs. The doors dripped with frescoes and murals of demonic slaughter.
“Swanky,” I voxed.
“You ain’t seen nothing yet.” Alpha put an arm on each door and pushed.
The cavern he revealed could easily hold the entirety of the tower within it. Around the edges of the room the walls had been carved into support pillars and ringed benches.
And about every bench was filled with Damned and demons, looking into the center, a sandy pit that looked all the world like an arena; probably because it was. The grilled gates surrounding the room, opening up into the main floor, could serve few other purposes that made sense.
In the center of the arena sat an altar. Old, blood-stained, lined with manacles, it loomed. How many had died on it? Hard to tell.
Especially with the hex-map covering it.
Delta, my two Romans, Thirteenth Chain, and The Cat sat around the altar. The Cat’s servant stood next to him, rolling his dice whenever his turn came up. Chalices full of unknown liquid sat next to the players.
Delta spoke. “The door slides open without sound.” In the crowd, translators listened to her English words and spoke them in dozens of tongues.
“Superior stealth,” the Grimalkin said smugly in that voice I heard with my mind. “Did you expect anything less from Hoomin the Thief?”
Half the crowd ringing the arena cheered.
But Delta wasn’t done. “Unfortunately, the poison dart trap that fires when you open the door isn’t so quiet. Gimme a reflex save.”
The cheers turned to gasps, and now the crowd was literally leaning forward in their seats, on edge and waiting to see if The Cat’s character lived or died.
“I block the darts with my shield!” Cassius called.
The arena went silent.
“Huh. Well, you are next to him.” Delta tapped a finger on the map. “Okay, I’ll let you give him a bonus to his save, but if he fails, you’ll be hit too.”
“An adequate risk. Brutus the Fourth is strong against poisons. Hoomin is weak to those.”
The Cat’s tail lashed. “You’re trying to save me now? Why? What’s your angle?”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Juno snorted. “There are at least six other doors we have not opened. If there are more traps we need Hoomin alive to survive this labyrinth.”
“Oh, hey boss!” Delta waved. As she did, every eye in the arena snapped to me. And all of the seated spectators rose.
“YOU ARE DOING VERY WELL. CARRY ON.” I threw out my arm, and they sat back down. But they were still staring at me, so I withdrew, waving at Alpha to shut the doors behind me.
“Delta?” I voxed. “What the heck is happening, here?” She could vox me and talk at the same time, I figured.
“Monsters and Mangonels. Did you not see the Mountain Brew? Well, as close as we could get it, anyway. Ray whipped it up. It’s about as bad for you as the actual stuff, but demons and Damned can drink it and it’s got something like a sugar buzz.”
“For an audience?” I knew the game, of course. I’d read the books a few years back, when I was bored once. Hadn’t seen the appeal.
“I blame it on the internet. It’s not down here, so things are really, really fucking boring. Something like this is new and original and doesn’t take much to get going.”
“There are guys back Earthside who play this in prison,” Alpha said. “Dice carved out of soap, I shit you not. Same principle, when you think about it.”
“Huh.” I frowned. “Vector’s out on a mission, so I’m not surprised he wasn’t there, but I thought Beta was playing with you as well?”
“Right, well, there’s too much demand,” Delta explained. “He picked up the notion after a few games, and he’s running his own for another batch of folks. Mostly Damned, though we’ve got a couple of the foundry demons playing. They have more spare time now that the lodestone’s gone, and we’re using the Last Janissary’s iron transmutation process.”
That explained the whole second-shift comment, from upstairs. Well, if it kept people busy, that was fine. “Where is Khalid, anyway?”
“I think he’s with the kids,” Alpha answered. “Down at the new hospice—”
“Wait. What?” I hadn’t heard that right.
“The new hospice, it’s where he’s been tending to the Damned—”
“Get back to the part about kids.”
“Oh.” Alpha said.
“Shit,” Delta commented. “Nobody told you, did they?”
“Evidently. Not.” I felt my temper bubbling, somewhere around my stomach. “Why are there kids here?”
“I don’t exactly know,” Alpha said. “Janissary’s tending to them, along with the folks we cut out of the stairs and floors.”
I felt my lips flatten together. He hadn’t said a word to me. After all we’d been through, he didn’t trust me with something like this?
“Going to have a talk with that one. Mind matters until she returns.”
“Okay boss, but I’m pretty sure he had his reasons...”
“Then he can say them to Dire’s face.” I scowled. “Metaphorically speaking.” I flew up the passageway, taking the time to test out the gravitics, making sure they meshed with the armor repairs and modifications. It seemed to be operating within tolerances.
I flew up from the staircase, into the back of the tower’s entrance hall, and straight into a hail of arrows that tore through the new armor patches like hot knives through cloth.
CHAPTER 8: DELAYED REACTIONS
“When initiating plots of intrigue, bear in mind they shall nearly always turn to blood. This is acceptable and encouraged, for it gives those who are only interested in fighting something to do should their more clever compatriots fail.”
--Excerpt from the second book of the Chronicles of the Shared Lie; The Monster Master’s Methods
Layered defenses had saved me many times in the past, and they saved me now. I dove for cover back underground, yellow-grade damage warnings screaming in my ear. Thanks to my fast-processing mind, my power allowed me to examine and comprehend the icons in the space of microseconds.
The arrows had shorn through the outer armor, but the impact gel had slowed and stopped them. The shafts were throwing off unidentified energy signatures... likely magical. I’d expected to run into sorcerous weaponry and effects down here at some point. I’d also expected the city I had conquered to rise up against me at some point. I hadn’t
expected either of these events to hit so soon, or together for that matter.
A second more and I was back in the hallway below.
“We’ve got a coup,” I voxed, across all channels.
“God dammit! I just got the PC’s to a fight!” Delta groused.
“Bringing the cameras up... wow, how’d I miss that?” Alpha spoke up. “The guards outside the tower are dead, spiked in place to either side of the gate. The doors are barred, and there’s about twenty skulky looking bastards filling the first and second floors of the tower.”
“That’s it?” I felt vaguely insulted, magical arrows or no.”Keep running the game Delta, we’ll get this.”
Then I heard it, a groaning that tore through the air, a shuddering howl that filled the corridor, and the city beyond.
“And now we’ve got explosives going off around the Hate Spires. Looks like they’re trying to drop them into the Royal Tower. Figure a minute to impact.”
“Oh. Cute.” I grinned. Adrenaline rose in me, and I felt almost like my old self once more. It had been easy so far. Almost too easy. “Yeah, keep playing, Delta. Everyone else in the city, rendezvous at the hospice.”
“Yeah, about that. Twenty assassins? Waiting for you to pop your head up again?” Alpha asked.
“Oh. Right.” I launched a concussive missile up through the hole, let the blast wave rip through the chamber, then came up with particle blasters blazing. Three seconds later there were nothing but twitching forms on the floor, and I’d burst through the shut and barred door like a bullet through a pinata.
Outside, dust filled the air. I filtered it, glanced around. As I did so, four metal forms whirred past me, legs pumping as they raced into the cloud and down through the rubble-choked streets. My Chorus, obeying the order I’d given.
DIRE : HELL (The Dire Saga Book 6) Page 11