Skulduggery 10: Building a Criminal Empire

by Logan Jacobs

  I was too high above the ground to look for Tevian, but since I still hadn’t heard the elven horn blast of surrender, and since I still didn’t see any kind of white flag below, I let Azure go wild. The only thing I was careful to avoid was my own troops, but otherwise, I gave Azure free rein over the whole battlefield.

  In just a matter of minutes, the entire field was on fire.

  One unit after another of elven foot soldiers crumbled like burnt leaves under the heat of the dragon’s breath, and row after row of elven cavalry dissolved into ashes every time Azure unleashed another river of fire toward them. Hundreds of elves already laid dead on the field below me in only a few minutes, but when there was still no sign of surrender, I wheeled Azure back around to unleash him again, so then the hundreds of dead were joined by thousands more.

  My troops pressed their advantage below as they flung themselves toward the panicked elves, so as they laid waste to the elves at the top of the hill, Azure destroyed the rest of Tevian’s forces with one breath of fire after another.

  Finally, when the field was so full of burning elves that I could smell their cooked flesh from all the way up on Azure’s back, I heard a single elven horn blow the signal of surrender. I guided my dragon a little closer to the hill below to make sure it wasn’t a trick, and as we dropped closer to the ground, I saw that almost every single elf who had entered the battle that day was now nothing but a corpse.

  Out of a force of close to twenty thousand, only a few hundred elves still remained. As soon as they heard the horn blast, they threw down their weapons, dropped to the ground, and covered their necks to try to guard against the dragon fire, but even though I was skeptical of their surrender at first, I quickly saw that it was Tevian who had sounded the horn.

  The night elf general had lost his horse at some point, so he stood on his feet now in the middle of a row of burned corpses with his arms raised and an elven horn in one hand, and he had the look of a man who had been completely, thoroughly, and undeniably beaten.

  When I saw that all of the remaining elves had obeyed his order to surrender, and when I was sure that my own troops had stopped fighting, I guided Azure down to the ground. His claws churned up the burned earth again as he skidded to a halt, but I was able to pull him to a stop just before we reached the elven general.

  The moment that Azure came to a stop, my fierce dragon reared back, slammed his front claws into the earth again, and then roared loud enough to rattle the shields of every soldier on the field. Tevian staggered backward at the force of my dragon’s roar, but he caught his balance by the time Azure began to stalk a little closer to him.

  I patted my dragon’s back when he was only a few paces away from Tevian, but even though Azure stopped immediately, I saw that he was still close enough that every time he exhaled, his breath made the elven general’s cloak whip about his shoulders like he stood in the middle of a storm. Tevian looked fucking terrified, but he managed to stand his ground, even if he was a little shaky.

  As I slid off Azure’s back and strode toward the night elf, I felt all the remaining soldiers on the field press toward me to see Tevian’s final defeat. The elves pressed in on one side, even though they had to pick their way through the charred corpses of their companions, and on the other side, my own soldiers pushed forward to see the results of their victory.

  By the time I reached Tevian, we were both surrounded by our troops, but the night elf didn’t waste any time. He dropped to his knees, handed me his sword so that the blade faced himself, and bowed his head.

  “Go ahead and kill me,” Tevian said as he bowed his head even lower. “You are the victor, so it is your right.”

  “I’m not going to kill you,” I sighed.

  “Fine, you can torture me and then kill me,” Tevian said. “You have beaten me. You have won everything, so do your worst.”

  “I’m not going to torture you, either,” I said and then reached down to extend my hand to him. “What I’d really like is for you to help me rebuild this world.”

  Tevian stared at my hand like it might be poison.

  “You would trust me to do that?” the night elf asked as he finally looked up at me.

  “Yes,” I said.

  “But…” he cleared his throat. “We are enemies. I’ve tried to kill you, and you’ve tried to kill me. Would you trust me?”

  “I know that you’re a man of your word,” I said as I continued to hold my hand out to him. “So if you say that you’ll help me, then you will. We do not need to be enemies in this world. So, will you help me?”

  “You really mean it, don’t you?” Tevian asked as his eyes grew large.

  “I do,” I said. “I want this kingdom to be peaceful and prosperous, and I’d like your help to make sure that happens.”

  “You’re a better man than I thought you were, Wa--” the elven general stopped himself before he finished my name. “If this is the kind of world that you want to make, then… then you deserve to be king. This realm needs someone like you to rule over it.”

  “So what do you think?” I asked again.

  “I apologize for my actions,” the elven general said, and then he grasped my hand and let me pull him to his feet. “I agree to your terms… my king.”

  As both sides of soldiers looked on, the night elf shook my hand, dropped it, and then bowed low to me.

  “I am yours to command,” Tevian said.

  “Then hear this!” I called as I turned to the rest of the battlefield. “From this day forward, we are not enemies! From this day forward, we are all equals. We will learn to live in peace with each other, so that every man, woman, and child can prosper and enjoy the fruits of our kingdom!”

  My soldiers cheered and stomped their feet, and even a few of the elves clapped their hands as they looked around at the new world that they had suddenly joined. As the crowd continued to cheer, Tevian finally straightened himself up from his deep bow, while Golierian and Clodia came over to join him.

  “You’ll see that it’s not so bad under the new human king,” Clodia teased the other night elf. “In fact, it’s actually pretty much like paradise. A chaotic paradise.”

  “But don’t worry, there will still be plenty of rules for you to follow,” Golierian laughed.

  I turned from the elves to look over at my friends, since they had all managed to find each other in the crowd again. Ava and Penny stood arm-in-arm with each other, while Skam supported an exhausted Selius beside him. Osman’s cheeks were stained with tears of joy, and beside him, Melia tried to hand the djinn a cloth to wipe at his eyes with, while Dar tried to patch up a small cut on the halfling woman’s arm. And even though I couldn’t see them, I knew that from somewhere inside the walls of the Blood City, Cimarra, Twila, and Ashlin must sense our victory, too.

  We had won the battle.

  We had won the war.

  Now, it was finally time to build my kingdom.

  Epilogue

  “Stand still, man!” I laughed.

  Dar tried to stop squirming in front of the mirror, but he couldn’t seem to help himself, so I grabbed his shirt and forced him to stay still until I had adjusted his collar. When it finally laid where it was supposed to, I released him and stood back to examine my work.

  “There you go,” I said. “That wasn’t so bad, was it?”

  “No,” Dar sighed as he smoothed down the wrinkles in his shirt. “I’m just… ah, shit. It’s nothing. I’m fine.”

  I grinned at my halfling friend as he studied himself in the mirror, and even though he still seemed like a bundle of nerves, Dar looked quite pleased with all his new finery, from his waistcoat to his trousers and all the way down to the gold pocket watch that he pulled out to check the time.

  “You have the rings?” Dar asked as he slipped the watch back into his waistcoat.

  “Of course, I have the rings,” I said and rolled my eyes. “What kind of best man would I be if I didn’t have the fucking rings?”

  �
��You’re my best man and my officiant,” Dar corrected me. “As long as Melia still decides to show up, anyway.”

  “Relax,” I said and clapped him on the shoulder. “It’s been two years, so if Melia had wanted to run off, she would have done it a long fucking time ago.”

  “That’s very encouraging,” Dar muttered.

  A gentle knock sounded on the door right before Cimarra opened it and stepped through. The raven-haired dancer looked like a dream with the garland of pink and white flowers in her dark hair, and she smiled when she saw that Dar couldn’t stop fidgeting in all his finery.

  “We’re all ready for you,” Cimarra said. “Dar, you haven’t gotten cold feet, have you?”

  “No, this waistcoat is just itchy as shit,” Dar huffed.

  “I doubt that,” I snickered. “It’s made of the finest material in the whole kingdom, so I think it actually might just be your nerves.”

  “Well, today is kind of a big deal,” Dar said. “After all, it is my wedding day.”

  “Fuck yeah, it is,” I said with a grin.

  “And Melia?” Dar glanced at Cimarra. “Is she… you know… is she here?”

  “She hasn’t suddenly changed her mind and fled the Capital, if that’s what you want to know,” Cimarra laughed. “Melia is here, and she’s waiting just outside the temple chapel.”

  “Shit,” Dar whispered. “I guess it’s really happening, then.”

  “It’s about time you settled down,” I said. “Maybe you’ll have a couple kids of your own before too long, and then my children will finally have some cousins.”

  “It’s not exactly like our children are lonely,” Cimarra said with a smirk. “You have… shit, sometimes I still lose count. There’s our son, Ava’s daughter, Twila’s son, Clodia’s set of twins, Ashlin’s son, and Penny’s twin daughters, so that’s…”

  “Eight,” I said with a grin. “And Clodia’s got another one on the way.”

  “Or another two,” Cimarra said. “I have this feeling that Clodia might like chaos so much that her body will refuse to have anything but twins.”

  “That would certainly make sense,” I laughed. “But only time will tell. Her set of twins have definitely kept her out of trouble so far.”

  “She always did say that her greatest fear in life was that she would get bored again,” the raven-haired dancer laughed.

  “Yeah, so it’s a good thing that I figured out the perfect solution,” I said. “After all, kids are the ultimate chaos, so the best way to keep her from being bored was to just make sure she was always pregnant.”

  “Who would have thought that the guildmaster would take so well to motherhood?” Dar laughed.

  “I think you’ve stalled for long enough, Dar,” Cimarra said with a wink to me. “Let’s go get you married.”

  “We’ll be there shortly,” I told the beautiful dancer. “We’re right behind you.”

  After Cimarra smiled and closed the door behind her, I turned back toward Dar. He didn’t look like he was going to vomit or pass out or anything like that, but he still looked like something was on his mind, and it wasn’t just whether or not he would stumble over his vows.

  “What’s on your mind, my friend?” I asked.

  “Do you think I’ll be…” Dar hesitated. “Do you think I’ll be a good husband to her?”

  “What are you talking about?” I demanded. “Of course, you will.”

  “She’s just so perfect,” Dar said. “Melia is so much more than I ever dreamed of, and I just… I just don’t want to fuck it up.”

  “Trust me,” I said. “You won’t.”

  “That’s easy for you to say,” Dar said as he adjusted his collar again. “You somehow manage to keep all six of your women blissfully happy, on top of the fact that you keep this whole damn kingdom happy, but that’s just because you’re the fucking champ, Wade. You always have been.”

  “Well, I sure as shit couldn’t run the kingdom so well without my best friend by my side,” I said. “But if I can keep all my women happy, I think you’ll be able to handle Melia.”

  “Fair enough,” Dar said with a smirk. “Well, my king, are you ready to officiate your first official wedding ceremony?”

  “I can’t believe that I’ve been king for two years, but somehow this is still my first wedding,” I laughed. “Well, other than all of my own weddings, anyway.”

  “Then let’s go get me hitched,” my halfling friend said.

  I smiled, adjusted my crown, and then led the way down the temple corridor toward the main chapel. As I strode down the hallway, I couldn’t believe that this temple had ever belonged to the elven priesthood. All signs of the priestesses and their sacrifices had long since been scrubbed away, so now the temple in the Capital shone exactly like it had always been intended to, and that was as one hell of a human architectural achievement.

  It was my favorite building in the Capital, other than my own palace, of course, but I had built that right in the center of the halfling district instead of close to the temple. After all, I wanted to be able to walk over to Osman’s bakery whenever I wanted a hot cup of coffee, and every now and then, I liked to pick some merchant’s pocket in the district when he tried to charge an unfair price.

  I might be the king now, but old habits still died hard.

  When Dar and I entered the main chapel, I couldn’t help but let my gaze wander up to the ceiling. No matter how many times I came here, it was always such a beautiful sight that I had to look up. The clear glass roof of the chapel extended high into the air above us, where it ended somewhere in a perfect triangle point that pierced the low clouds on a rainy day.

  But today, there was no rain. Instead, the only shadow that fell over the sunny chamber was of my blue dragon as he wheeled and dived overhead, just because he could. I certainly didn’t blame him. Even in the two years that I had been king, I still sometimes found myself wondering if we all really were that free.

  Of course, usually whenever all this seemed too good to be true, a handful of my kids would run into the room and throw themselves on top of me, and that always served as a reminder of just how real our new lives were.

  I led Dar up to the platform at the head of the temple chapel, and I noticed that my halfling friend carefully climbed the stairs at twice his usual pace. He must have been worried that he was going to trip over his big halfling feet in front of everyone, and I just smiled at the thought.

  Dar didn’t have anything to worry about. The entire chapel was filled with our friends, and as we both turned around to face the main chapel doors and the crowd of people right in front of us, I still couldn’t quite believe my good fortune.

  Well, it wasn’t exactly fortune.

  Sure, the Rainbow Keys had been on my side, and so had the Ancients, but our victory hadn’t just fallen into our laps. We had worked like hell to win this kingdom for me, and as soon as I had become the official ruler over all ten cities and over all the rest of the realm, the real work had finally started.

  It had taken weeks to clean up all the elven bodies that we had left behind us all across the realm, and it had taken a few more weeks to hold funeral services for all the soldiers that we had lost ourselves. Then there had been the matter of cleaning up the cities, plus we had also needed to find new housing for all the elven prisoners. We had to make sure that they would abide by the laws of the new kingdom before we released them, but once Tevian or Golierian or Clodia had a conversation with each of them, they all got on board surprisingly quickly.

  It helped that we didn’t give them an alternative.

  It had been a hell of a lot of work, but as I looked out at all my friends now, I knew that it had all been more than worth it. Everything really was a goddamn paradise now, but we had fucking earned every piece of it.

  Cimarra had already taken her place in the front row with all my other women, and she bounced our son on her knee to keep him content during the ceremony. The beautiful dancer winked when she saw me l
ook at her, and I wondered if she could read my mind about how much I wanted to put another baby in her.

  Clodia sat beside Cimarra, but she had charge of both her own twins and Penny’s twin daughters, since the redheaded pixie had to serve as Melia’s bridesmaid today. The night elf seemed anything but overwhelmed, and instead, she seemed to enjoy every moment of motherhood, even when she had to hand back one of the twins to Golierian or Skam in the pew behind her to hold for a minute.

  Ashlin and Twila sat on Cimarra’s other side, and I was impressed that they had somehow managed to keep each of their sons still on the seat between them. Of course, half a second later, I noticed that Twila’s son held up a lizard triumphantly, but Twila instantly snatched it from him and let it scurry free before he tried to throw it onto some poor unsuspecting wedding guest.

  Ava sat on the very end of the row with our daughter in her arms. When I caught her eye, the blonde assassin looked up at me, and I was pretty sure that her blue eyes were filled with tears. She tried to wipe her eyes and then glanced away, but I froze everyone else in the chapel except for the two of us and our daughter, so when it fell quiet, Ava looked back up at me.

  “I love you, too,” I said with a wink.

  Ava just bit her lip, and then I let the chamber return to normal, so no one even realized that they had been frozen. I knew exactly how Ava felt, just like I knew that I could guess what she was thinking.

  It wasn’t just that we finally had our kingdom.

  It was that now, we finally had our family.

  When the main chapel doors opened a minute later and the musicians began to play, I gave Dar a reassuring nod, just before Melia appeared at the end of the aisle. She smiled as soon as she saw Dar, and the moment the halfling woman smiled, my friend seemed to instantly relax. As Melia began to stride down the aisle toward the main platform, I looked behind her to see Penny, and I felt my heart pound inside my chest like it was the first time I had ever seen the beautiful redhead all over again.