Landfall

by Victor Serrano

  “We will talk above this gate,” the governor answered from above, his voice curt and suspicious. Vermilies saw that there was a small staircase to the right of the gate and ascended it under the watchful eyes of the castle garrison.

  At the top of the stairs he could see what must have been the garrison commander, a bare-headed man with long, black hair and angry eyes. He carried a bronze helm with a dark green crest in the crook of his arm, and a cloak of dark green hung behind him. Aside from these trappings, he was outfitted like the rest of the guardsmen, with a black lamellar cuirass and armored skirt over a simple white tunic.

  Beside him stood the governor, wearing a stained yet ornately embroidered crimson and cream tunic and a bewildered expression. A few scowling guardsmen stood nearby, and from this new vantage point Vermilies could see the movement of recent Syriot arrivals in the distance. Perhaps there will be an assault after all. But I won’t be alive to see it.

  Vermilies thought back to the briefing he had received before the voyage. The Syriot Empire had learned well from the failures of the Jade Sea campaign, and they had spied on the coastal territories for years before the invasion had begun, infiltrating agents through neutral merchant vessels. Vermilies suspected that a few of his fellow graduates from the Jade Sea Academy would have been among them.

  “I take it you are Governor Tarude and Commander Jenisutane,” Vermilies stated, hoping to surprise them with the information.

  The nobleman in the crimson and cream tunic blinked. “I am Governor Tarude, yes, but the commander is away. Some damnable religious ceremony.”

  The man Vermilies had taken for the garrison commander scowled and broke in.

  “Why are you here? What force are you from?”

  Good questions, but you’re not the one to ask them.

  “Is this how cities are run in the Hangyul clan? Do you have mere soldiers govern your governors?” Vermilies asked, affecting the air of an aggrieved courtier.

  “No… it isn’t.” The governor glared at the soldier. “Emissary, walk with me to the Eastern Keep. Captain, stay at your post.”

  “Yes sir,” the captain replied blankly, turning to look down the boulevard.

  The walk from the South Gate to the keep on the southeastern side of the walls took several minutes, and Vermilies took the opportunity to note his surroundings. There were guards positioned every few feet, but they were thickest along the south wall, which was to be expected. The spies had estimated a peace-time garrison of only 400 men would be present during a sudden attack, and as far as Vermilies could tell the estimate seemed to be accurate. The position would fall, of course, but properly led they could delay the invasion by as much as a week. But the commander is not there… interesting. And presumably he has taken some men along with him.

  Vermilies eyed the governor as they strode along the walls in silence. Governer Tarude wanted to talk alone, and in the Eastern Keep, away from the danger. The guards are ready enough to fight, but the governor seems an altogether different sort. Perhaps this has a chance of succeeding after all.

  In front of the two men, guards were rolling a bronze cannon down the narrow rampart, and the governor led Vermilies into a turret to wait a moment, a squat tower filled with curious archers and capped with a pagoda above. The guards dragged the ancient artillery along on protesting wheels, presumably to mount near the South Gate. When they passed, Vermilies and the governor resumed their silent walk into the Eastern Keep, a large tower layered with ceramic roof tiles and arrow slits. There was a small window and an empty space where the cannon had been a few minutes ago, but now the Keep was cold and empty as a crypt.

  Governor Tarude sank into a bench along the wall. “I would know your terms of surrender.”

  “I represent the Syriot Empire. They have designs on the territory of the Three Clans. They are prepared to offer you continued governorship as a vassal to a new liege.”

  The governor nodded. “Continued governorship. Good. The Syriots, though? From the far west? I have barely even heard of them. But you, you’re a Jade Sea Islander, are you not? Can you tell me of these Syriots?”

  “I hail from the Jade Sea Islands that have been occupied by the Syriot Empire. The Empire expects obedience, but does not interfere in local matters. I myself come from a renowned Jade Sea family and have found profitable service for the Empire. It is not so bad.”

  A small lie, as his family name had won no particular renown before the Syriots had arrived. They really had been the making of him though. Enbo Vermilies no longer carried any mixed feelings about the Syriot Empire. Attendance to the finest schools, for service as a translator? It was better than anything the Jade Sea tribesmen could have offered. They still resisted the Empire to protect their own way of life, not to benefit the masses.

  And why should I fight to preserve the old ways? The future belongs to those who adapt.

  The governor must have seen the truth in Vermilies’s words, or at least in his presence at the head of a Syriot invasion force.

  “I see. Yes, we get many traders from the Jade Sea Islands. The Empire has been very effective at combating piracy, I am given to understand.”

  “The Empire is very effective at all forms of combat, Governor, and very supportive of trade. Am I to understand that you are surrendering to the Empire? If I relay your words now, you will retain your fiefs and personal treasury but will be expected to open your castle to garrison Imperial forces. You will also need to ensure your men stand down and be an example to any further resistance in Tamani.”

  Governor Tarude thought quietly for several moments. “Tell me more of this Empire,” he said, rubbing his hands together. They’re trembling. Good.

  Vermilies sighed. “What is there to say? They come from a continent many leagues distant, beyond the reaches of your own trading vessels. Their ships are massive towers decked with rows of sails, and even then it takes months to cross the vast ocean.”

  “Months?” The governor kept rubbing his hands now, faster and faster. “Gods. On a ship?”

  “Their technology is much farther advanced than anything you’ve seen. They have cannons that could level this entire castle. They have balloons that can float from above and travel for many miles.”

  “Balloons… so that’s what I saw.”

  “Their Emperor is scholarly and wise, a sage man of much learning and experience.” An old man, on the verge of death. Something in his expression must have shown.

  “An elderly man? He has sons?”

  “They… perished. Various illnesses.”

  “Perished.”

  “He has a daughter.”

  The governor snorted, but he still seemed concerned with something else. His hands were still now. “I surrender to the empire,” Governor Tarude said, his voice soft.

  “Good,” replied Vermilies, trying to hide his excitement. So I won’t be executed in a fit of misguided patriotism. Wonderful.

  “Then let us proceed to the South Gate. Have your men stand down and open the gate. I will inform the Imperial forces.”

  Chapter Fourteen

  Crossing the Pass

  The prince nudged his musket up a hair, resting it gently on the stone. The trackless wastes went east for countless distances; a harsh land where he had won the bulk of his reputation. To the west the ground edged upward, up to foothills and scrub forest, and soared higher as it rose into the mountains that separated the Veldtlands from Kintari territory, and the rest of the Three Clans beyond. Yet the Prince was still in the wastes, on the very edge of the Veldtlands, scouting ahead of his Elephant Corps. And he had found his prey.

  The musket kicked back as it fired, blowing smoke in the air that concealed the Prince’s vision. He waved away the smoke in some indignation.

  “I think you got one, sir,” the mahout said after a moment. The others had remained on Ranvir, the great beast snuffling at the ground with his trunk and standing still in placid silence. He had long ago gotten used to the
explosion of the Prince’s musket. Prince Sharnipur squinted as the smoke cleared. He saw several gazelles bounding away across the distance, the antelopes ever present throughout the wastes but very difficult to bring down with anything besides a musket. A musket like the one he had, forged all the way in the distant lands of the east and the length of a spear. It had cost quite a lot, yet it served its purpose.

  “Did I really?” Prince Sharnipur asked as he lowered his musket.

  “Climb aboard, sir. We’ll go check.”

  At the mahout’s gentle urging Ranvir began ambling forward. Unlike the clumsy handling of most elephants, with their whips and goads, Prince Sharnipur’s Elephant Corps was held together by a deal brokered with the Matriarch of the Wastes. Every year the terms were renegotiated when the roaming herds of elephants would reunite at their oasis. The prince would take spice, enter the Reverie, and commune with the Matriarch. Prince Sharnipur offered protection for the young from Wasteland rovers and captors, with medical care from his mahouts and bushels of tamarinds to sweeten the deal, and the elephant goddess would offer the strongest and most restless of her herds for his army.

  The prince patted Ranvir’s flank and craned his neck to the side to look back east. They had been out scouting ahead of the main column, Prince Sharnipur always willing to take the same duty as any other. Unlike those in the old country they had left behind royal rank meant little in his mercenary outfit. Former nobles served alongside the commoners of the old country and those they had picked up over years of fighting in the Veldtlands.

  He thought that he might have seen an upraised dust trail but it easily could have been an illusion. The main column was still some ways away and moved at the pace of its slowest members, the baby elephants sheltered within the inner periphery and those still wounded from the latest fighting in the North. One man had been gored by a mammoth during the fighting in the frozen tundra and yet somehow still clung to life. The prince found himself wondering idly if he had died by now. It would probably be a mercy to kill the man but under the care of the former royal physician of Guthara he could still pull through.

  “There it is, sir!” Sanjay said from his perch, leaning forward. He still held his lance, though it seemed almost pointless in this barren and open land. “A fine shot.”

  The prince leaned his turbaned head over and found that he had indeed felled one of the gazelles.

  “You’re going to have to make room in the howdah,” Sanjay jeered at the gunner. Judging from Sanjay’s aggrieved squeal Anander had made some rude gesture at him.

  The prince ignored it all. Sometimes they just acted like boys. Prince Sharnipur himself was closing in on forty, though a life of hard riding and simple living kept him trim and lean, unlike his peers in the Old Kingdom. Former peers. I was exiled from them long ago. These are my peers now, these bright and young men who have guarded my elephant for years. The prince smiled to himself as he patted the massive side of Ranvir.

  Sanjay and Anander had been with him since the exodus years before, and earned their place on his personal elephant through feats of bravery during the journey outward, and fighting all through the wastes afterward. Even so, they were still in their early twenties and sometimes acted even younger. Still, they are the best with a lance and ballista in the whole of the Elephant Corps, and that is no mean feat.

  The prince shifted his gaze to the mahout. Even in the respected position of rider of Prince Sharnipur’s personal war elephant the mahout always had the look of a dignified but impoverished guru. His turban was simple and stained, and the sinewy old man wore an unremarkable and faded robe. I should see to that, my old friend. You deserve so much more. Still, I know you wouldn’t accept anything like that. Too frivolous, you would say.

  The mahout was somewhere in his fifties and had known Ranvir since the elephant had been born. The great war elephant would only accept these two riders, and though Prince Sharnipur could ride the beast alone he hadn’t the heart to assign the mahout to another. You love Ranvir, more than you’ve loved any other, I think. You had a wife, if I recall, before we were forced to flee during the coup. Yet I have never heard you speak of her.

  The mahout’s expert handling of his elephant let Prince Sharnipur keep to the larger picture, as any commander should. The mahout led Ranvir into battle and the prince led the Elephant Corps. It was an arrangement that worked well, as dozens of fallen foes would attest to had they still been among the living. As if sensing his thoughts, the mahout turned to look at the Prince, his face lined and wrinkled but his eyes as alert as ever.

  “Shall we wait for the rest of the Company, my prince?”

  “No, there’s no time. We’ll press on over the pass. The others know to follow. We’ll eat well tonight, I think, and the rest will keep until they rejoin us.”

  “Perhaps. It will be cooler in the mountains, at least.”

  It wasn’t much for the Elephant Corps, the gazelle meat like a drop of water falling into a leaky bucket. They needed a new contract, and fast, and so the Prince was at the very vanguard of the Elephant Corps. If he could find a disgruntled but wealthy nobleman in the Three Clans, Prince Sharnipur could begin to turn their fortunes around. Or, at the very least, keep his men and beasts fed.

  It took some doing to load the gazelle into the howdah, even with Ranvir laying down agreeably. The prince himself stripped off his tunic and, bare-chested, helped his three companions wedge the gazelle into the howdah. It would make the ballista all but inoperable, but Prince Sharnipur didn’t expect much trouble ahead. Though they had some rations strapped to the great elephant, Ranvir was a war elephant of the highest quality, not some cargo hauler. They would just have to make do.

  “There’s a path up ahead, my prince,” Anander said. He had sharp eyes and the best vantage point, even crammed together with the gazelle carcass. “Just follow that game trail. It widens up in the foothills.”

  With the prince’s assent the mahout guided Ranvir on. It was another hour of relative silence before they had climbed the last foothill and could now see the saddle along the mountain range that marked the border of Kintari territory. We’ll cross the pass before we take a break and camp in the foothills on the other side. We should be able to make it there by sunset.

  “There’s dust, sir,” came Anander’s voice, the ballista gunner perched behind Prince Sharnipur. “The Elephant Corps is following along.”

  “Good,” Prince Sharnipur said with a grunt.

  The great beast labored onward without complaint, even as the rocky trail grew treacherous and the air grew thin. The prince squirmed in his tunic, feeling the coldness of the air. Their clothing was light and well suited to life in the arid Veldtlands, where most of their skirmishers had been recruited. Still, the Three Clans are supposed to be very warm. Warm and humid.

  The prince’s thoughts wandered. It had been desperation that sent them to look for work in the land of the Three Clans, desperation and the knowledge that his force was not yet strong enough to win back the throne that was his by rights. The Elephant Corps had grown year by year though, from victory to victory, bolstered by the alliance he had struck with the Matriarch.

  Some day I will lead us back home. And finally face my treacherous brother.

  Rocks skittered down the scree, interrupting the prince’s thoughts. He frowned. That was more than would be normal. Prince Sharnipur squinted up and thought he could make out figures silhouetted against the setting sun. They looked some strange mix of ape and goat, with curled horns and a bulky frame that looked man-shape if not for the huge size. There were four or so, just barely visible, and they watched for several seconds before moving away and disappearing behind the ridge.

  Anander swore. “Mountain apes.”

  Dhamdalek shook his head. “No, no. Those are the fabled Kintari Rock Men.”

  “No no no,” Sanjay cut in. “Those are trolls.”

  Prince Sharnipur frowned up at where the distant shapes had been outlined against the s
un. “Are they not ogres?”

  A silence settled.

  “They’re ogres if you want them to be, sir.”

  The prince scoffed. “Whatever they are, let’s do our best to avoid them. We shall stick to human clients.”

  Ogres along the mountains. So the tales really are true. The beasts had scurried off long before the war elephant had reached the summit. The prince grinned as Ranvir lurched over the pass and now began the slow descent westward toward the setting sun. I wonder what other strange things we will find in the land of the Three Clans?

  Chapter Fifteen

  The Surrender of Tamani

  The clatter of spears hitting the ground was as sweet a sound as any Vermilies had ever heard in his two and a half decades. Around him the grim-faced archers of the Tamani Castle Guard were unstrapping their quivers and unstringing their bows. The Eastern Keep was filling up with discarded weapons and bitter words, though Vermilies found them less than convincing. Even a fool could see the overpowering might of the Syriot Empire.

  “Stack them over there,” Governor Tarude said, his stinging voice provoking muted glares from the despondent garrison as they unstrapped their weapons. “Neatly, now, neatly!”

  “You cannot be serious.”

  Vermilies turned toward the voice. The guard captain, his simple cuirass edged with gold markings, stared at the governor in open hostility, any pretense at respect discarded.

  “Stand down, Captain,” Governor Tarude replied. “We are clearly outmatched. It’s for your own good, you know, and that of your family. My responsibility, after all, is to the safety of Tamani and the Syriot emissary has assured me that we will be safe under their rule.” He turned to look at Vermilies. “Right? Tell them.”

  “That is correct,” Vermilies declared as a dozen sullen faces turned to look at him. “The Syriot Empire promises that the citizens of Tamani will not be harmed. After the cessation of hostilities all residents of Tamani will retain their property rights, and business will be conducted in the usual manner under the protection of the Syriot Empire. These are the terms, guaranteed upon Syriot honor.”