TODAY IS TOO LATE

by Burke Fitzpatrick

  TODAY IS TOO LATE

  Book One of

  The Shedim Rebellion

  Burke Fitzpatrick

  Published by Blade Books LLC

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author's imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2013 by Burke Fitzpatrick

  Cover art by Clint Langely

  Map by Jonathan Roberts

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights.

  Visit BladeBooks.com for more information.

  ISBN-13: 978-0-9910572-0-7

  For my first readers: Dan, Jeremy, and Josh who were brave enough to read the first draft. I pestered them with endless questions, and they helped me write a better story.

  CONTENTS

  Map

  Part One

  Part Two

  Part Three

  Afterword

  PART ONE

  The descent to Hell is easy; the black gate stands open, night and day; but to climb back again, to retrace one’s steps to the upper air, there is the hard task, the toil.

  Virgil

  A BLUE STAR

  I

  Tyrus had stood in the hot sun for hours, watching the axman cut off heads. Executions bled together into a meaningless parade of prisoners, scuffles, and cries for mercy. Guards held them down. The axe fell. Heads rolled. A bloody day filled with scores of killings; Tyrus had lost count of the dead. He struggled to remember their faces and felt ashamed that the dead had become one endless blur in his memory, but bearing witness to so much death left him numb.

  The heat shimmered in the air, an oppressive weight that pulled at his shoulders. Tyrus wore full armor, his field plate dented and well used. The black metal absorbed the sun, cooking him. Streams of sweat poured down his face, gathered in his eyebrows, and threatened to drip into his eyes. The arena did not help because yellow sand and white stone reflected the sun. Most of the seats were vacant, with only a small cluster of nobles to witness the executions, but they lacked the heart to sob or cheer. The heat and grisly spectacle left people dazed.

  Soldiers dragged a gray-haired man from a tunnel. He staggered at the sunlight, kicked his feet, and the soldiers lifted him by his armpits. Tyrus saw another pampered noble with a bulging belly and flabby arms.

  “Please, mercy.” The man sobbed. “I beg of you, mercy.”

  Ignoring his pleas, the soldiers planted him before the axman, and he gawked at the block of wood at his feet. Blood and gore covered the thing. His knees buckled, but the soldiers kept him upright.

  A herald unrolled a scroll. “Lord Arlan Rorkal, you have refused the clemency of our merciful emperor.” The words echoed in the arena. “Do you renounce the Kingdom of Shinar and pledge loyalty to the Supreme Ruler of the Roshan Empire?”

  Lord Rorkal trembled as he blinked away tears. The soldiers tightened their grips.

  “What say you, Lord Rorkal?”

  “I cannot. No. I refuse.”

  A third soldier stepped forward, and they went through the awkward dance of positioning him on the butcher’s block. Two held his arms, pushing his shoulders down while the third secured his feet. The axman raised his blade and looked to the emperor’s seats.

  Tyrus hated this part. He stood beside the emperor, and it fell to him, the Lord Marshal of the Imperial Guard, to signal the kill. He had no power to grant mercy, his authority a poor illusion, but he glanced at the emperor as tradition dictated.

  Emperor Azmon wore white robes, a stark contrast to Tyrus’s black armor. Azmon also appeared far younger than his years: thin build, golden hair, a paradox of soft features and stern resolve. He cradled a sheathed sword, the Dawn Caller, as though it were a scepter, and his posture recalled the statues of the ancient emperors, attentive but relaxed, confident yet observant. White robes represented the laws of the land while Tyrus wore the black steel that enforced them.

  Azmon offered no mercy.

  Tyrus played his part. One of the largest warriors in Rosh, with a scarred face, crooked nose, and black hair, he bullied without trying. The hulking enforcer raised his gauntlet to kill the emperor’s enemies. He dropped his hand. The axe fell, and another head rolled across the arena floor.

  After a morning filled with executions, the audience seemed immune to the sight. No one gasped. Soldiers disposed of the remains on a nearby cart and returned to the tunnel for another prisoner with crass efficiency. On the arena floor, pools of blood pocked the sand. The heat dried the blood into dark stains.

  This was victory.

  Tyrus had seen it many times, and the smell never changed. Outside the arena, fires burned. They had sacked the city of Shinar three days ago and now purged its nobles. A new order would be established, lands divided, and the few Shinari nobles who pledged loyalty would become little more than slaves. Tyrus had led the Roshan army across two continents, humbled dozens of cities, and part of him hoped the campaign neared its end. Constant expansion left him weary.

  The executions continued. A dozen men and women died refusing to serve Emperor Azmon while Tyrus craved a moment in the shade, a glass of wine, a respite from the heat and his wretched armor. A dark thought made him scowl: watching people die was worse than killing them yourself.

  A change fell over the arena. The audience stirred, and their murmurs echoed off stone when a dozen soldiers emerged from the tunnel, escorting the last prisoner, the Warrior King of Shinar, Lael the Dauntless. He had a soldier’s cropped hair and scars, well muscled but almost naked. Chains bound his wrists and ankles. The guards carried him by his armpits, and his feet dragged a long line in the sand. Even in disgrace, King Lael glared murder at the emperor.

  The axman left the arena. Guards carried the butcher’s block away. King Lael was brought to the same place, and the dozen guards fanned out around him.

  A herald said, “King Lael Baladan, you have refused the clemency of our merciful emperor.”

  “I am no slave.”

  Lael’s voice carried across the arena, forceful, bearing the weight of the crown. He commanded respect despite his chains. The Shinari in the stands, those who had accepted clemency, shuffled. Tyrus pitied them. They did not understand the cost of their betrayal.

  The herald pulled open a scroll. “Then let it be known, in the year 643 of our savior, Jethlah the Prophet, that the Prince of the Dawn, Emperor Azmon Pathros, Supreme Ruler of the Roshan Empire and Conqueror of the Five Nations, has sentenced King Lael Baladan of Shinar to death by combat. What say you?”

  Lael clenched his jaw.

  Death by combat was a new protocol, and the herald turned to them with a confused look. Tyrus glanced at Azmon. The emperor waved a hand to continue.

  The herald called, “Unchain the prisoner.”

  Six guards hurried to free Lael’s hands and feet. They backed away faster because Lael was an Etched Man. Beneath the grime, he had Runes of Dusk and Dawn carved into his flesh. During the Second War of Creation, before the Age of Chaos, sorcerers had discovered a way to etch spells into a man’s flesh, and the runes empowered Lael, making him a force on the battlefield. He fought like six men.

  Tyrus studied Lael’s runes with a practiced eye. The ancient words were a mix of dashes and triangles—a language only sorcerers and priests spoke—but Tyrus knew enough to recognize the runes for boar, bear, and eagle, amo
ng others. Metallic inks were part of their magic. In Rosh, the engravers used dark-green inks, but Lael’s runes were golden and shimmered in the sunlight. Tyrus had never seen that before and wondered if the gold made them stronger.

  The audience whispered awe and appreciation. Lael had forty-four runes, a torso that read like a scroll of sorcery. An ordinary person might survive one or two—most elite warriors had at least five—but the pain of an etching often stopped one’s heart. Lael’s collection impressed Tyrus, but he had far more runes. If Shinar had fielded a larger army, with more etched champions, the city might have held. Songs would have been written about the great king and the handful of heroes who fought off impossible odds. Instead, the Roshan Empire consumed another kingdom.

  The herald’s voice echoed across the arena. “Arm the prisoner.”

  One of the guards tossed his long sword to Lael’s feet. The rest backed away, wary.

  Lael hesitated, studying the stands, before picking up the blade. “Who will be first?” He glanced over his shoulder at his keepers. “Shall we fight again, Tyrus, the Dauntless versus the Damned?”

  Tyrus shook his head once.

  Lael looked puzzled.

  The emperor had planned a special event, calling it an object lesson in humility. The sound of steel locks, unbolting, awoke the arena. On both sides of Lael, heavy oak doors creaked open. In the gloom of the tunnels, red eyes glowed. Large animals snorted and scratched at the ground.

  Two bone beasts emerged, ducking low to clear the eight-foot doors. Their bodies were a mixture of bleached bones and black leathery skin that creaked when they moved. Skeletal hands, larger than a shield, ended in long white talons. An assortment of horns and bone plates covered their heads and shoulders while rows of fangs filled their jaws. Red flames burned in empty eye sockets. The decaying monsters snorted and grunted and drooled.

  Lael backed away, openmouthed. He gathered himself and tested the blade. The steel wobbled. He knelt and smashed the blade into the sand. A metallic ring echoed off the arena walls. He wiped away sand and raised the blade with both hands. The lines of muscle in his stomach and torso deepened. He struck again. The blade snapped. Steel shards splintered into the sand.

  The audience whispered, and Tyrus squinted. What was Lael doing?

  Lael smiled at a shard and tested its weight. Tyrus’s eyes widened. He stepped in front of the emperor as Lael flung the metal. Blurring through the air, the shard pierced Tyrus’s open gauntlet, lodging deeply in his hand. He worked it free and snarled as the blade slid between the bones of his palm. Blood oozed from his armor.

  “Inventive,” Azmon said. “He reminds me of you, Tyrus. Let me have it.”

  Tyrus handed him the bloody metal. Azmon juggled it once, and Tyrus felt a chill as the color left the emperor’s eyes. He had the dead look of sorcery: white on white eyes with black pupils like pinpoints. The sword point lifted off Azmon’s hand and rotated in the air before it shot toward the arena in a blink. King Lael staggered. Blood poured from one hand.

  “An eye for an eye.” Azmon gestured for a cloth and wiped his hands. “Enough delays. Let us see the Warrior King fight the beasts.”

  One monster roared, the other flexed its claws, and Lael looked defeated for the first time. In full armor, an Etched Man could kill a beast. A man like Lael might win against two, but not naked.

  The beasts charged faster than their size suggested. Massive claws raked the ground. Lael jumped clear and hung in the air before snagging one of their shoulders. Roaring, the thing swung and tried to maul him with its fangs. Lael scrambled onto its back and attacked with his broken sword, hacking and stabbing the beast’s neck a dozen times. The monster staggered.

  Lael did not see the second beast move into position. Two sets of claws flayed beast and man alike. The first beast moaned in pain and pitched forward, its face kicking up sand. Lael screamed. He had lost an arm, and his back was shredded.

  Etched Men died hard.

  Most of the audience gasped. Tyrus clenched his teeth, intimately aware of how Lael felt. He was maimed and broken, but his runes repaired the damage, kept him conscious, gave him strength to fight when he had nothing to fight with. A normal man would black out before the wretched end, but not Lael. His good arm struggled to pull himself away while the beast that struck him stalked nearby, playing with him. That was new behavior.

  “You see it, don’t you?” Azmon asked. “The intelligence to flank, the desire to hunt? These are two of my newer constructs.”

  “I see, Your Excellency.”

  “So formal. Have I offended you?”

  “I never liked these monsters.”

  “They are ugly but effective,” Azmon said. “It is an important statement, something these Shinari nobles need to understand. The world has changed. Their precious heroes, these Etched Men, are a thing of the past.”

  Tyrus turned to Azmon. He had far more runes than King Lael.

  “I don’t mean you,” Azmon said. “I will always have a need for men like you. A hundred champions like you, and I wouldn’t need any beasts.”

  The monster played with Lael, stabbing and tossing him, smiling at his shrieks of pain like a cat with a mouse. The beast enjoyed itself, as if it had a personality—and that bothered Tyrus more than the brutality.

  He removed his gauntlet and flexed his hand. His runes repaired the flesh. Already the gash had sealed. A pink line hid behind smeared blood, and a burning sensation radiated from the meat in his palm to his fingertips. The healing hurt worse than the wound, but after years of service, he had developed a tolerance for pain.

  Tyrus remembered fighting King Lael only a few days ago. For the first time in over six centuries, the famous walls of Shinar had been breached, and the Jewel of the West lay vulnerable to assault. Tyrus led the Roshan charge while Lael and the Soul of Shinar, a host of holy knights, defended the piles of rubble. Beasts pushed the knights back into the streets of Shinar, and the two armies clashed in a confused mob of shields, swords and banners.

  As the fighting spread throughout the city, Tyrus and Lael faced off like a song of old, the champions of each army in the place of honor at the vanguard. Etched Men were meant to fight one another. In the songs, runes marked heroes for death and glory. Long ago, the histories claimed, a duel between two champions could win a war. An old custom, but the practice prevented normal men from needless butchery.

  The press of bodies fell away, revealing a path from Tyrus to Lael. Lesser men did not want to fight either of them, and Tyrus sensed this dread in the thousands of eyes watching him advance on the king. This was the moment, the meeting of great names. The battle inhaled with anticipation as the two men circled.

  King Lael wore heavy plate armor and a great helm, silver metal that gleamed in the morning light, and he carried a massive double-headed axe that a normal man would lack the strength to weild. Tyrus used an oversized two-handed sword, a slashing weapon with spikes along the blade for deflecting swords and cleaving armor. They circled, black armor versus silver, weighing their first strikes.

  Tyrus hoped Lael was the stronger warrior. He wanted to be the underdog again, to rely on his wits and skills to survive because his runes gave him unnatural powers. Fights felt one sided, as though he slaughtered children, and he was sick of being Tyrus the Damned. Just once, he wished, let the other man stand a little taller, hit a little harder. The danger might make him feel human.

  Lael slashed down like he was cutting wood, his full weight behind the attack, but Tyrus blocked. His blade struck the axe shaft, and Lael tried to rake it away, using the blade to hook and drag. Tyrus countered, pulling the axe forward, and saw Lael’s eyes behind his visor. A moment of panic—the king was surprised. Tyrus forced the axe blade away and down, feeling Lael resisting, but the king lacked the strength to fight back.

  Tyrus had hoped for a stronger opponent. He shouldered Lael backward and responded with his own overhand attack. Lael blocked b
ut almost had his axe torn away. He stumbled. Tyrus raised his sword, advancing.

  Their duel felt like hours of work. Tyrus could have killed him but chose to wear him down, to take him prisoner. He beat him into submission and dragged him out of Shinar. Azmon’s students, the bone lords, had said capturing the famed hero was impossible, but Tyrus proved them wrong. He had delivered Lael as a gift to the emperor, a feat no bone beast could match.

  As Tyrus watched the atrocity in the arena, Lael screaming while the beast mauled him, he wished he had killed the man. A king deserved better. What had the Roshan Empire become, to feed a great hero to a pair of monsters? He turned away.

  Azmon asked, “You do not like the spectacle?”

  “He was a worthy opponent.”

  “No. He was a poor imitation of you. I had hoped he might see reason and we could avoid this mess.”

  “Not him. He would never join us.”

  “Such a waste. There are so few who can endure the etchings anymore. I might have taken his runes further.”

  Tyrus thought of his own runes. Was he less human than Lael? Had Azmon taken his runes too far? He flexed his hand. His grip was strong again, as if he had never been hurt. Even among Etched Men, Tyrus healed fast.

  Azmon called off the beast. Lael twitched on the ground. The axman claimed his head, and soldiers tossed the body with the others. Long before that, the audience had stopped watching, pretending to cough or wipe at their eyes. Dozens of bone lords wore black robes and averted their gaze, but Tyrus wanted to force them to watch. He had fought beside their beasts and knew their brutality. The lords replaced a tradition of heroes with monsters. This was the new empire. No more honor or service or dignity, only claws and fangs.

  Above the arena a star burst, a bluish light bright enough to compete with the midday sun. The beast in the arena, covered with blood, gazed at the heavens, and the bone lords gasped.