The Complete Twilight Reign Ebook Collection

by Tom Lloyd

  I gave a wordless bellow of triumph. He had to have run himself into a corner, most likely down in a wine cellar. There’d be no exit there and he’d retraced his steps too slowly. I stopped a moment to catch my breath and cock the pistol-bow I somehow had managed to retain. My short-sword I had dropped somewhere so I drew my nightstick instead. It was a poor alternative, but better than a dagger and capable of cracking the thickest of skulls.

  Forgetting to wait for my sergeant I wrenched the door open. No sooner had light crept through the breach than a curved blade lashed out, but I was ready for it and deflected it into the doorframe. With the knife trapped I launched myself forward and put the boot in, in the finest traditions of the Narkang Watch.

  With a strangled squawk the man crumpled over my steel-capped toe and clattered backwards. For good measure I punched him in the side of the head and smashed him back down the short flight of steps again. He hit the dusty floor hard and collapsed in a heap.

  Taking no chances I fired the fresh bolt into his thigh – just in case he thought me stupid enough to have never seen a man play dead before. I was rewarded by a scream of pain and the man scrabbled at the floor, crawling weakly towards the back of the cellar in a pathetic effort to escape. I didn’t follow him yet, the cellar was a small one and contained no hiding places so I was happy to let the sick bastard fear the worst. My fury turned cold and quiet as I sat on the steps, reloading my bow before fetching a lamp from the storeroom. He squirmed face-down on the cellar floor, sobbing and howling in a puddle of what wasn’t just blood. The more he wept the greater my contempt became – he was nothing but a coward who couldn’t stand a tiny measure of the brutality he’d meted out.

  Anticipating this moment all evening, I’d expected better. The measure of a man is how he acts when he’s down and beaten, but this wretch was worse than a cowardly child. As I watched him wriggle through the dirt the disgust welled up inside me so powerfully I raised the bow again; bending to temptation before oaths I had sworn years before returned to haunt me. The lamp illuminated the cellar with a fair glow and my eye was inexorably drawn to the wooden pillars that supported the low roof. In the lamplight, the pillars with their diagonal supports and my black mood, I was reminded of a gallows and that was enough to stay my hand.

  ‘Now hear me you piece of shit,’ I struggled to say, my throat thick with rage until I took a few more breaths. ‘I got eight more bolts here. If you don’t explain a few things right now I’ll get some more practice in – then maybe go fetch one o’ your knives till you start talking.’

  My hand trembled at the horrors the man had inflicted, as well as the cruel disdain of his affected concern. The bile rose in my throat and I tasted blood on my lips as I bit down in an effort to stop myself pulling the trigger. Evil was the only word I could muster and nothing in my years of these streets could compete with the scenes this man had left in his wake. I needed a reason, sane or not, for the indiscriminate violence he had inflicted. My hatred demanded that, demanded I know the full pathetic and contemptible reasons that had led him to do what he’d done. After years of seeing the worst of what folk could do to each other, I still wanted to believe there might be a reason behind all this madness. The alternative frightened me, it still does.

  He said nothing and simply lay in a broken, wretched heap as I moved closer. I felt the revulsion tighten my finger as it did my throat. My vision darkened, my rage becoming a fierce pain behind my eyes and when the moment cleared I saw his body jerk in mortal agony.

  For an instant I was sure I had fired. Then my senses returned and I spun around. The bow was smashed from my hand, bolt unspent but now forgotten. I didn’t even attempt to raise my stick as a gleam appeared at my throat.

  ‘Dear fellow, that expression is most unbecoming.’

  ‘But you— I …’ I stammered, unable to connect my thoughts to words of any form.

  ‘But you thought that was me?’ Nimer cocked his head, sword never leaving my throat. ‘I’m hurt; depravity is not among my “special talents” and if it were, you would have not caught me so easily. That man is a clerk to the City Council, just one of many and unremarkable in almost every way. Oh my friend, hundreds pass that window each day, but you only had a mind for me. Perhaps I should be touched you keep me so close to your thoughts.’

  He wore a wide-brimmed hat that gave his face a sinister shade, but it was nothing compared to the sudden, unnerving smile he gave me. His cold, executioner’s expression blossomed into some mad, cruel humour and my skin chilled at the sight.

  ‘You killed him,’ I managed to gasp. ‘Why? You killed my damned prisoner! Why?’ My anger returned and at last I found some strength again. ‘You executed him before he even stood trial! For all that horror he gets a quick, clean death? He deserved to hear the whole city curse his name before he went to the headsman, the king’s justice—’

  ‘The king’s justice has been done,’ Nimer said sharply, cutting me off, ‘and there will be no word of his identity ever revealed, do I make myself clear?’

  ‘What? How dare you dictate my job to me? The Watch is the king’s justice, not some sanctioned assassin …’

  ‘Oh my dear Captain,’ came his cool, mocking voice. ‘I’m most appreciative of your help in this, and let me assure you your efforts will not go unrewarded,’ he said, holding up a hand to ward off my protestations, ‘but for a man of such insight you are extraordinarily naive.’

  To my look of bewilderment he merely laughed and sat back on the steps, sword resting against the wall within easy reach. He pulled a silver cigar case from an inside pocket and selected one, then offered the case to me. Defeated and baffled, I took one of the slender cigars, all thoughts of violence evaporating from my mind.

  I numbly permitted Nimer to take the lamp and light both cigars from the flame. He puffed ponderously at his, the satisfied air of a man whose onerous task was now complete, while I stared and tried to form coherent thoughts.

  ‘If you want this kept quiet, why are we enjoying a cigar while the crowds assemble?’ I asked, sinking down onto an oak casket. ‘Someone must have heard that woman scream, or she’s gone to fetch help. For that matter, where’s my sergeant?’

  Nimer waved his cigar dismissively, leaning back with the poise of a man utterly at ease. ‘Oh, Coran will keep people away, I left him back there somewhere.’

  ‘Coran? The king’s bodyguard?’

  He smiled as if to a child. Offering the silver case once more, but closed this time, he showed me the engraved emblem and initials. A bee with initials inscribed on the wings. Emin Thonal – King of Narkang.

  My throat closed dry. I stared first at the case, then him, then the corpse – all in a drunken haze as the world lurched treacherously beneath me. Nimer nodded at the look on my face and removed his hat, pulling off the eye patch to reveal a healthy eye as cold and arresting as its twin. He scratched at the thin beard and moustache.

  ‘Strange how a few tweaks to one’s appearance can make all the difference, especially to people who’ve only ever seen you at a distance. I was a little concerned I might be too old to wear a silly little beard like this, but I suppose no one is likely to mock a King’s Man for affectations of youth.’

  ‘This has happened before, hasn’t it?’

  ‘Oh yes. Not so dramatically I’ll grant you, but my city grows so quickly and chaotically it is by far the best place for madmen to hide. People are missed less often and neighbours rarely know whom they live next to. And that is precisely why these murders were not the deed of some public servant but a vampire. One you caught and killed all alone.’

  ‘I, I don’t understand.’

  ‘Very well, I shall explain. I am building a nation and it grows at a rate I can barely control,’ he smiled frostily, ‘despite my special talents. We do not have the luxury of a common heritage, only our own endeavour and unity. We cannot afford to wonder whether a killer walks amongst us, to live in fear of our own kind, not when we have enemies ou
t there who would exploit such a thing. The city is one step from revolt each and every day; this you know only too well. But when plagued by vampires, werewolves, daemons and the like, we know our enemy.

  ‘Such creatures are rare in these parts, most of the time nothing more than a story to keep the little ones in hand. But they are not the only monsters in this Land and it’s those that are indistinguishable from men you meet every day that are truly terrifying. A vampire is a banner to the population, as the Gods or the tribes of man are. You can see my busy bee waving from half the flagpoles in the city, but it is my enemies that fly the most important banner.’

  ‘What madness was this?’

  ‘How to define madness?’ his voice hardened suddenly. ‘The man believed he was possessed by demons, that they drove his actions. His research into demonology was extensive, if pursued with a less-than-scholarly instinct. Perhaps he was correct, perhaps not. Best that point be down-played.’

  ‘And the runes?’

  King Emin hesitated, looking thoughtful for a moment before continuing.

  ‘Unimportant. The reference was an obscure one to a false demon cult that once had great power, but is now extinct. It crops up in several of the more deranged works, but has failed the test of time and research. Again, that is something you will not speak of again.’

  ‘And what if I won’t keep quiet?’

  ‘Then I will have sorely misjudged you. This clerk will be remembered as a spy, from Tor Salan or the Circle City perhaps, it doesn’t matter. His memory will be reviled as you wished, just not quite for the reasons you’ve witnessed. What does matter is that truth is a weapon. Your job is not just to uphold the law, but also to protect this irrational and dangerous population from itself. My people’s own imagination can cause them more hurt than they, or even you, could appreciate. You saw that when the vigilantes started to beat people to death. Folk need few enough reasons to panic and whenever that happens, someone gets hurt.’

  He reached out a hand. ‘So, are you with me?’

  I stared numbly at the offer, knowing I was defeated. And for my sins I took it and all it implied; realising it was the truth I sought, as perverse a reason as that may seem. I had spent my life hunting transgressors, driven to put a name and reason to every crime. To illuminate the darkness for those who needed protection in my own small way.

  Now I saw the truth from a king’s sight – how he protects his realm, how he needs his own truth in the void he inhabits. Cloudy and shifting, there was a light to be found there, but sometimes uncovering it would only ever be a disservice to the people I served.

  That has been my life ever since. Now, as I feel Death’s hounds draw ever closer, I am prepared to kneel at my Last Judgement and hear His words – content in my choice for the sake of others.

  It took a killer called Nimer to show me who I was. Many years later I thanked him for it. He merely smiled in that way of his.

  THE GOD TATTOO

  Daken’s stomach growled, long and angry.

  ‘Piss on this nation o’ cowards,’ he muttered, ‘so fast to surrender there’s no pay for an honest man.’

  ‘Tole you we should’ve joined the other side,’ added his nasal-voiced companion.

  Daken glared at the man trailing him and gave the reins of the horse he was leading an irritated twitch.

  ‘An’ I told you, Yanal, to shut the fuck up about that.’

  The smaller mercenary shrank from the look and pulled his coat tighter around his body. He shivered and greasy trails of unkempt hair fell over his face like a veil. Underneath that was a streak of mud across Yanal’s face, pasting his hair down onto his forehead. He’d tripped a few hours back, trying to keep up with the pace Daken had set, and ended up lying flat on the muddy road.

  That had been Daken’s only laugh of the day, and the past few as well. Yanal was getting worried; he could see a familiar set to the big man’s jaw and knew it boded badly for the next person to piss him off. They’d not been comrades for long, only a few months, but any fool could tell a penniless and hungry white-eye was a dangerous beast.

  Not as tall as many of his kind, Daken had a build to rival a Chetse warrior and the similarity didn’t end there. The white-eye’s arms, as thick as Yanal’s legs, were covered in tattoos – hardly the stylised scars of the Agoste field, where Chetse veterans put recruits through gruelling tests, but displaying a variety of styles. Yanal guessed many were charms and wards Daken had collected over decades of soldiering – making bargains and trading favours with any witch or hedge wizard he met.

  They walked on, Yanal keeping well back so Daken had time to calm. He didn’t have a horse of his own, had sold it weeks ago when it looked like Canar Thrit was going to requisition every horse it could. Bastards hadn’t done it in the end, but the rumour had meant he got sod all for the worm-ridden creature.

  There was a light dusting of snow on the empty fields on one side of the road, nothing much but enough to make Yanal fervently hope they found some decent shelter for the night. The sky was clear and there was precious little breeze; no biting wind thank the gods, but a frost for sure after nightfall. A tangle of hedgerows skirted ash trees and young oaks away to their left, barely enough to keep the worst of the chill wind off but as much as they’d managed the last two nights.

  ‘Sun’s on the way down,’ Daken commented from up ahead. ‘We better start lookin’ for somewhere to sleep.’

  ‘Aye,’ Yanal said miserably, trying not to stare enviously at the white-eye’s thick sheepskin coat. His own was nothing like as warm. ‘Last of our food then.’

  ‘Should’ve learned to use that bloody sling better then,’ Daken replied sourly. He looked back. ‘And don’t you start looking at my horse that way.’

  ‘I weren’t,’ Yanal said sulkily, ‘you made it clear enough last night.’

  ‘Good …’ Daken took a breath as though to continue but stopped dead, jerking on his horse’s reins to bring it up. ‘Well, looks like it’s your lucky night, I won’t have to eat you either.’

  Yanal flinched at the thought as Daken pointed ahead, down the road. He was as savage a fighter as any man Yanal had ever met and it was hard to put much beyond the axe-wielding madman.

  ‘What is it?’ he asked hoarsely.

  ‘Someone up ahead.’

  Daken was perfectly still now, weight on the balls of his feet like a hound poised to spring. Yanal moved up beside him and looked to where the white-eye pointed. He couldn’t make out much, just a dark shape that had to be another traveller two hundred yards down the road.

  ‘They seen us?’

  Daken shook his head. ‘Don’t look like it.’

  Without taking his eyes off the other traveller he reached for the axe he’d stowed on the saddle. Plundered from a recently deceased cavalryman who’d been cheating at cards, it was a long-handled affair with a crescent blade on one side and a small clenched-fist hammer on the reverse. Daken tossed Yanal the reins and slipped off the road.

  ‘Ride up and keep ’im talking – I’ll circle around and catch up when he’s not looking.’

  Yanal nodded, eyes flitting to his spear and short sword, also bound to the saddle. ‘Bastard better have some food.’

  ‘Won’t help him either way,’ Daken said softly, the dangerous edge restored to his voice. He slipped off into the undergrowth and quickly the sound of his footsteps faded to nothing.

  ‘Aye, true enough,’ Yanal said and hauled himself awkwardly into the saddle.

  A lone traveller was just asking for trouble and they could meet a lot worse than Daken. A white-eye only enjoyed killing in battle when he was worked into a frenzy; out here it’d be clean and swift. He nudged the horse into a brisk walk and started to catch the figure ahead.

  Daken heard hooves on the dirt road and cursed mentally, there were no voices accompanying them despite the order he’d given Yanal. He’d wanted their victim to be chatting away, not listening for danger. Now that wasn’t happening Daken cou
ldn’t tell what was going on. This would be a short-lived robbery if their victim was walking with a cocked crossbow, but he was fast running out of options.

  He glanced behind him. The ground was pretty open, a few bushes to hide behind but none as thick as the ancient hawthorn he was presently behind. Once they passed that he’d have precious little cover if he was going to hide.

  Fuck it, he thought and tightened his grip on his axe.

  The hooves came closer, so close they had to be just a yard or two behind the hedge. With a snarl he pushed himself up off the ground and sprinted around the hedge towards the two figures on the road. Their horses shied and turned, forcing both travellers to grab their reigns and lose a precious second as Daken closed. Yanal was on the near side but dropped a pace back as Daken came. His companion was a tall man in a long patchwork cloak, each coloured patch edged in metal and set with what looked like glinting glass charms.

  Suddenly the image changed and Yanal became the further man, then the air seemed to waver before Daken’s eyes and the two figures winked out of existence, swapping places once, then twice. Daken staggered, confused by the strange happenings, and looked from one figure to the next. Just as he focused on one they swapped again and he saw it was an illusion, each one backed by a black silhouette in the instant the images swapped. He kept going for the right-hand figure, now the man in the cloak, and the man reached an open hand towards him.

  Daken charged.

  A searing flash of light whipped across his eyes and the charms of protection glowed warm on his skin – then he reached the man and punched the top edge of his axe into his ribs. The man folded inwards under the blow, legs collapsing as one final burst of magic sparkled the air and dissipated. The air went still again, the gloom of evening returning as Daken blinked down at the figure doubled-over at his feet. He scowled; it was Yanal.

  Bugger.

  He turned, bringing the axe up and around as he moved. The tall man stepped back with unnatural speed and the weapon caught nothing, but before Daken could close the gap an explosion of white light burst before his eyes. Desperately shielding his face, Daken fell back and ended up crouched on the road; axe abandoned and hands over his eyes as knives of pain scraped his skull.