by Andy Remic
Bhu Vanesh sighed, and tossed away the head. He pointed at Graal, and grimaced. "I cannot stand traitors," he snapped, and from the shadows eased Lorna, petite and blonde and smiling, and the bulk of Division General Dekull. They lifted Graal with ease. He could not fight. He was slowly dying, with his chest caved in.
"Take him to the Black Tower," snapped Bhu Vanesh, eyes glowing, and he waved his talons to dismiss them and turned his attention back to the two moaning girls who remained. "I am still enjoying breakfast. I will deal with him later."
Graal, his clockwork whining, was dragged from the chamber and out, into the cold stairwell, and up narrow winding steps.
General Graal lay on the floor, panting, pain flooding him like nothing he'd felt in his long, long lifetime. Breathing was hard, with a caved-in chest, and he knew even with accelerated vachine healing powers, this pulping at the talons of Bhu Vanesh would take him months from which to recover. If he could recover. But then, in a few short hours he would be dead. Bhu Vanesh was toying with him.
So, it was all for naught? How many men, down through the ages of history, have taken great risks only to end up, condemned and dying, in a prison cell? He smiled at that, then winced and vomited blood.
Many. Many…
And Graal had exterminated most.
Pain rocked through him in waves, and it was so bad, so painful Graal went beyond pain and into comedy. He laughed, laughed because it hurt so damn fucking much. He lifted his head, looked down at the hole in his chest. He could see his own beating heart merged with clockwork. Cogs spun, and gears stepped, but many were twisted and misaligned. The only time Graal had seen that was in the cankers. That thought made him shiver. Sobered him with a slap.
Better death, than to turn canker.
He had seen what becoming a canker did to a man. After all, it had happened to his brother. The brother Kell had killed. Kell! That old bastard. Graal grimaced. Now there's a fucker who needs his head on a spike! His balls chopped off! His throat opening like a second smile! Far too much testosterone. Far too much of the fucking hero factor, the dirty stinking piece of reprobate horse-shit! Him, and that damn axe… that axe…
"I'm sorry to intrude," said the little boy, "but it would appear somebody left a door open."
Graal groaned, and his eyes moved to the boy. He was five or six years old, skinny and raggedy looking to the extent he would be taken for a vagrant in any of the fine cities of Falanor. Not that many existed, in the old sense of the word city. The boy wore rags, and had no shoes, and he was smiling and his teeth were black, like insect chitin.
"You!" gasped Graal, and struggled to rise, but groaned as pain swamped him and he passed back into a welcome deep honey pool of glorious unconsciousness.
When his eyes fluttered open, Skanda was sitting on the edge of Graal's bed, staring down at him where he lay on the stone flags, still with that disarming smile stuck on his face. "You do look rather ill," said Skanda. "Maybe some medicine is in order?"
"I want nothing from you!" Graal spat, and he would have screamed and attacked, but had not the strength, nor the energy. Instead, he glared with blue albino eyes at the boy.
"I disagree," said Skanda, and he hopped from the bed and Graal cringed, as if expecting some fearful weapon. Instead, Skanda knelt down by Graal and placed his hands on the vachine's belly. Inside him, Graal felt the clockwork slow to a rhythm that was normal, not discordant, not twisted. Pleasure ran through him, tingling every fingertip, and pain fled like rats before a flood.
Graal sighed. Then he blinked, slowly, and allowed himself to breathe.
"Thank… you," he managed, and stared hard at Skanda. "But I haven't forgotten Helltop. I haven't forgotten your part in the deaths of my daughters!"
"Ahh. The delightful Shanna and Tashmaniok. Yes. I am sorry about them. But we need Kell alive. We need the Legend to exist. Or all our plans would be for nothing."
"Our plans?" said Graal.
"The Ankarok," said Skanda, softly, his dark little insect eyes fixed on Graal. "That is why I am here. That is why I need your help."
"There is nothing I can do for you, boy," snapped Graal. "Nothing I can do for the Ankarok! Nothing I can even do for myself…"
"We are alive," hissed Skanda, "and if you help me, Graal, General Graal, Graal the Dispossessed, Graal the Dying, Graal the Fallen, Graal the Slave, Graal the Whipping Boy of the fucking Vampire Warlords… then I will help you. We will help you."
Graal swallowed, and he looked at the six year-old boy, but it was the eyes, the eyes were old, older than Time it seemed. They were portals, piss-holes straight back to the Chaos Halls.
"What is it you require?" said Graal, voice a little strangled.
"We want our Empire back," said the Ankarok.
"What do you need me to do?"
"We need your blood-oil magick. Ours is trapped. Trapped in the curse that is Old Skulkra. I broke free, broke free and was aided by Kell and Saark. But now, now we are ready to return. General Graal – we will sweep aside these vampires. We will send the Warlords back to the Chaos Halls."
"But we'll have you instead," said Graal.
"You will not be a slave," said Skanda. "I guarantee you that. You will rule by my side. You will be a vassal of the Ankarok. You will be a Prince of the Ankarok!"
"How do I know I can trust you?"
"Because you have little choice. But also, I could leave you to die. There are others, Graal. But I like you." The boy grinned. "I like your tenacity. I like your lack of fear. I like your will to get the job done." His smile dissolved. "I like your ability to kill."
"So we would exchange one evil empire for another?"
"Evil is all about perspective," said Skanda. "But these Vampire Warlords thrive on destruction; and what use is that? If you kill all the slaves, who then will be the slaves? It is a base stupidity. A flaw in their strategy."
"What do you need me to do?"
"Follow me."
"What about the thousands of vampires in the city below?"
"Trust me," said Skanda, smiling with those gloss black teeth. "They will not be a problem for my power."
"I will come with you," said Graal. "But I have one request."
"Ask."
"When we find Kell, the Legend, I want to be the one who places his head on a spike."
"Agreed."
CHAPTER 10
Valleys of the Moon
Kell stared at his daughter, and slowly, without taking his eyes off the tall female vampire, he reached down and hoisted Nienna to her feet.
"Mother!" she gasped.
Sara stared at Kell, glanced at Nienna, sneered, and turned back to Kell. "You are looking old, Bastard Father. Soon, soon you will be dead. Sooner, if I have my way."
Kell glanced at Saark. "Go and get chains. And shackles." He stared hard at Sara. "Better make them strong ones."
Saark nodded, and eased through the fortress gates.
"You're looking well," said Kell, staring up at his vampire daughter. She rolled her neck, as if easing tension, and smoothed her hands down her black dress. Then she looked at the bonds restraining her hands. They were tight, and blood bubbled around the rope and thin wires, which bit into her flesh.
"I am weak. These fools put a pitchfork in my back. Right through me! The bastards. But soon, when I am strong, I will return the favour!" She turned and hissed at the men, who backed hurriedly away from the cart, lifting their weapons in a parody of defence.
Kell realised, then: Sara had been weakened during a fight in which she killed forty men and women. She had been restrained. But soon, soon she would snap the wires like cotton thread. She had let them take her; so she could rest. Recuperate. To sleep the sleep of the vampire – like an injured hound licking its wounds, waiting, waiting…
Suddenly Kell leapt atop the cart so he was inches from Sara, and Ilanna was between them and she hissed when she saw the axe, and scrambled back as far as the bindings would allow.
"You remember my axe?" said Kell, voice deep, eyes fixed on Sara. The second vampire started to rise, but Kell waved Ilanna at her. At it. "Stay down, or I'll cut off your pissing head, I swear! There's no healing a wound like that!" He returned to Sara. "Not even for you, daughter of mine."
"It is a shame it came to this," she said, and licked her lips, showing sharp fangs.
"Indeed," said Kell, gaze locked. "Because now I'm going to have to kill you."
"Please, no," and suddenly she was pleading, voice soft, aggression gone and she dropped to her knees. "I will pray to you, great Kell, Kell the Legend, and I will do your bidding."
Kell gave a mocking laugh. "Like you prayed to your god? And look what he did for you, Sara. He cursed you! He made you like this! The gods? Bah! A curse on all their hairy arses! And all for what? The pain you caused Nienna with your hard ways, your religious learning, your pious necessities. Well, now she is my ward." Kell dropped to his own knees, so they were once again facing each other. His words came out in a low growl. "And you will serve. Or you will die."
"I will serve," said Sara, head low. She glanced at Ilanna.
"Look well on the blades," said Kell, and then climbed down from the cart as Saark approached with shackles. "For vampire or no, they will tear out your soul and devour it. This, you know. This, you have seen."
Saark secured the shackles on ankles and feet, and using a small ratchet tool, cranked them tight until Sara gave a howl and glanced at him, sharply, as if imprinting his face in her mind for future reference.
Kell lifted Nienna to her feet. "Come on, girl. This place is too painful for you."
"What will you do to her?"
"I will not kill her, if that's what you think."
"I… I love her, Kell. She is my mother, no matter all her faults. No matter her poisonous gossip, her forcefed opinions, her casual hate. I have to love her. No matter what she's done. That's why she's my mother."
"I know that, love."
"How did she become like this? What happened?"
And as they passed through the gates, into the dark and brooding shadows, Kell whispered, "I don't know, girl. I just don't know."
Kell slept badly. His dreams were dark flashes of black, violet and blood red. In his last dream, he dreamt he awoke and it felt real, felt like it was happening and Sara was there, inches from his throat, and she laughed and hissed and her jaws dropped, fangs puncturing his skin and Kell screamed and thrashed but she pinned him down, her strength incredible and unreal as Kell kicked and kicked and kicked, and felt his lifeblood sucked from him, sucked from his gaping throat. Sara would rise above him, dripping blood and grinning in absolute madness – and Kell sat up with a shout, a snap of jaws, and then glared across at Saark lounging in a chair beside his bed.
"What the fuck are you doing here?"
"Good morning to you, Kell."
"What the fuck is that smell?"
"It's perfume. Hint of Venison."
"Hint of what, lad?"
"Er, venison." Saark suddenly looked a touch uncertain.
"So, you're telling me you're wearing a perfume that stinks like a charging, honking stag?"
"No, no, it's more a suggestion of an aura of power, over which all women will stumble erotically when they enter the room."
Kell stared at him. "Either that, or they're knocked down by the stench and buggered unconscious by a group of rampant drunk nobility! Ha, Saark, it smells like rancid bowels on a ten-week battlefield. So I hope you don't want a good morning kiss, 'cos I fear I've got kitten breath something chronic!"
"Not at all, my sweetness," he said between clenched teeth. "I just dropped by to check up on you. Brought you some coffee, and here," he lifted a plate from the floor. "Compliments of Myrtax."
Kell uncovered a large tin plate filled with bacon, sausage, four eggs and fried mushrooms. Kell gawped. "By all the gods, that's a breakfast fit for a King!"
"Or certainly a fat bastard, more like. But you eat it all up, Kell, get some strength in you, then we need to talk about what's to be done."
Kell lifted mushrooms on his fork, chewed, looked almost euphoric, then snapped, "What's to be done? Eh? What do you mean, laddie?"
"Well, I refer to the next stage of your thrilling plan. I am curious."
Kell stared at his friend, who had taken the entire previous evening, late though it was, to bathe, sprinkle himself with perfume and a light dusting of make-up from Myrtax's wife's quarters. The Chaos Hounds only knew which wardrobe he'd raided – now he wore a pink silk shirt, ruffed with lace at collar and cuffs, and bulbous green silk pantaloons the like of which Kell had never seen. He also wore yellow shoes, polished to a bright vomit shine.
"Listen. I'll have my breakfast," said Kell, uncertainly, still stunned by Saark's garish wardrobe. "You go and gather all the armourers and smithy labourers together. Meet me down the Smith House with them, in about… twenty minutes. That's if they haven't kicked your head in first."
"Meaning?"
"You look like a peacock."
"Yes. Well. 'Tis hardly a fair division of work, I feel," said Saark, pouting. "And I did bring you breakfast."
"Eh? Well, I tell you what, next time I'm up to my neck in gore from the killing, I'll make sure you get your fair share of the fight as well. Agreed, Saark?"
"Point taken. Twenty minutes, you say?"
"Good man! Go knock 'em out."
And for the first time in what felt like years, Kell focused on one thing and one thing only. Gorging himself on a fine fried breakfast. He tried hard to shut out the shouts, laughter and whistles as Saark moved gaily through the old prison grounds, but could not help himself. Kell grinned like a lunatic.
The armourers were a bunch of huge, heavily muscled men – numbering perhaps forty in total, with one single exception. A small, weedy looking man standing almost swallowed by the wall of blackened, bulging flesh. They wore the universal uniform of smithies the world over: colourless leather pants, heavy work boots, and most went bare-chested, a few with leather aprons. The small man was the only one smiling.
"Look at him," nodded Saark, and nudged Kell in the ribs with his elbow. "Stands out like a flower on a bucket of turds."
"I'd keep your voice down if I was you," said Kell. "Smithies are not known for their fine tempers and happy chatter. You liken them to horse-shit, next minute you'll be trampled in it, mate."
"Point taken. Point taken."
"Right, lads," said Kell, standing with huge hands on hips. "You all know what's happening here, so I reckon I'll cut to the shit. We'll be going into battle. All the men here will be fighting men, and they'll need weapons, light armour, and shields."
"Won't we move faster without armour and shields?"
"Ha. Maybe. But we certainly won't live as long against… them. Now, I know you have great stores of iron and steel here in the mines. Have you any gold?"
The small man lifted his hand. "I believe there are several bags of coin in Governor Myrtax's underground vault. He kept a certain mint for King Leanoric. We found some large lodes down in the mines, you see. Way deep down, in the dark, where fear of collapse is greatest."
"Good. Good." Kell scratched his chin. "We'll need that to pay the lads. But with regards warfare, this is what I need. Short stabbing swords for close combat. Maybe only," he parted his hands, "this long. I want round shields with rimmed edges, so they can be hooked together, locked together to repel a charge. I need long heavy spears, maybe twice as heavy as you'd normally make, and arrows – I want iron shafts with slim heads."
"They'll be heavy for the archers to fire," said a big man, with thunderous brows, shoulders like an ox, and a certain distinct look of eagles about him.
"Yes," nodded Kell, "but they'll also have a lot more impact. And believe me, we'll need that for these vampire bastards. They'll take some killing, if they're anything like their dirty, blood-sucking vachine brethren."
"Steady on, Kell," said Saark, sounding a little injured.
"Just telling it how it is."
"The men who came in last night," said the large smith. "They said three vampires wiped out near forty of their friends. They managed to kill one, and after a long struggle they captured the other two. That means these creatures are pretty brutal, if you ask me."
Kell nodded. "They're brutal, I reckon. But they also prey on naivety. If we know what we're fighting, and we know how to kill 'em, and we have some protection – I reckon we can take the fight to them. Another thing we need," he looked around to check he wasn't overheard, "we need steel collars."
"Like a dog collar?"
"Aye. Only these stop the bastards getting their fangs in your throat. You understand?"
"How thick do you want them?"
"About half a thumb-length."
"They'll be uncomfortable. Chafing, like."
"Not as uncomfortable as having your throat torn out and strewn across Valantrium Moor."
"I take your point. Although I'm not sure the men will wear them."
"They will. And those that won't, when they see a friend spewing blood they'll soon change their minds."
"What's the best way to kill these vampires?" asked the small man.
Kell jabbed his thumb towards Saark. "Lads. This is Saark. He's an, er, an expert on the vachine, and indeed, that makes him more of an expert on the Vampire Warlords than any of us could ever be. Any more questions about killin' 'em, ask Saark here. I know he looks like an accident in a tart's parlour, but he knows his stuff. I'm off, I need to speak to my daughter."