by David Hair
Ramon inhaled. It all sounded so reasonable, in Calan Dubrayle’s matter-of-fact yet caring tones. Yet it also made him angry. Elites must be sustained, must they? The alternatives are unthinkable, are they? He wanted to lash out, but he had to admit to being captivated by hearing this giant of the empire – his natural father – speak. It was like being permitted to interview a deity. He wished Vann Mercer, Alaron’s father, who’d been responsible for shaping his political beliefs to a large extent, was here to help him frame the questions he wanted to ask. But he was alone, and Dubrayle wanted answers too, and soon.
Dubrayle’s voice became warmer.
*
‘So what happened next?’ Seth Korion asked, leaning forward as Ramon paused and took a swallow of brackish, lukewarm water from his bottle. ‘What did he say?’
They were watching their men tramp down a dusty road towards a flat horizon. The sun was its usual oppressive presence, but the rankers were singing, and so too the Khotri women riding with the baggage train: two songs merging into one.
Ramon laughed. ‘He said that if I surrendered myself and all the gold I have to him, he’d pardon me, acknowledge me publically and give me a position as a Junior Legate in the Imperial Treasury.’
‘Holy Kore! What did you say?’
‘I told him to go and rukk himself with a sharp stick.’
Seth’s jaw dropped. ‘Seriously?’
‘Well, no, actually. I told him I needed to think about it – if I can string him along, it might buy us some time. I told him that I’ve no longer got the gold, and said that it’s been dumped in a series of marked sites on the Tigrates River, and that no one person, not even me, is aware of all the sites. I thought that way he might hold off trying to just snatch me from the column.’
‘Do you think that will work?’
‘Not for long. But he says your own loving ex-Papa has despatched men to intercept us, and the Imperial Volsai and the Church are converging on us too. He also said that Saint Lucia is terrified that whoever succeeds in snatching the gold will seize the throne, so she’s trying to create alliances in each camp. This could buy us time.’
‘To do what?’
‘To come up with a better plan.’ He winced. ‘Sorry, I’m running out of ideas.’
They fell silent for a minute, then Seth said, ‘So he would actually acknowledge you? And take you under his wing?’ He was still in agony over being rejected by his own father.
‘Dubrayle doesn’t want me,’ Ramon said. ‘He wants to preserve the wealth of “his people” – the Elites. He’d be more than happy to have me executed as a traitor, provided he gets the gold first.’
Seth listened gloomily. ‘Look at us: both illegitimate sons of powerful men who’d happily see us dead. And we even went through the Arcanum together. Incredible.’
‘There aren’t that many Arcanums,’ Ramon replied. ‘Don’t invent coincidences, General Korion.’
‘Fetallink,’ Seth corrected.
‘No, you’re a Korion – sorry, but you really are. So, anyway, Dubrayle tried to scare me with all his “world will collapse unless we let rich pricks rule for the rest of eternity” shit. It just left me twice as determined to get our rankers home with gold in their pockets. Dubrayle can go to Hel.’
Seth listened, then solemnly shook his hand. ‘So then. We’ve got the whole of the empire lining up to annihilate us. What are we going to do?’
‘Honestly? I don’t know.’
‘Come on, you’ve always got a plan,’ Seth teased, his voice light and his eyes fearful.
‘Not this time. We need a miracle.’
‘I thought you didn’t believe in those?’
‘I don’t. But I’m thinking I better get praying.’
He didn’t actually get around to praying; instead Ramon worried at his problems as the column wound west of Medishar, buying what food they could from a destitute rural populace. He insisted on paying – the Crusade had done enough damage here, and the exorbitant prices were easily affordable to him – and before long Dhassan merchants began to come to them, lining the roads to sell, knowing they’d get more than from the locals, not caring that their own people might starve. If he’d had a choice, he’d rather have hung them for profiteering. Instead, he made them rich.
Everywhere they went they saw the suffering the invasion had caused, and it affected the rankers especially, despite all they’d seen and been through, not to mention their own predicament. The best and worst of their natures came out: some of the men were foolishly generous to the locals; others were cruel and bullying – and sometimes it was the same man, just on a different day, when stress made him snap.
The time passed in a haze, the road like a burning dream.
On the last day of Aprafor, under the Darkmoon, they reached a place marked on the maps as ‘Bassaz Junction’. They’d approached from the east; there was wilderness to the south and the city of Bassaz itself was fifteen miles further westward. But the northern route was the great road of the Dhassan kings, and it went all the way to Hebusalim.
Ramon was riding next to the Souldrinker Delta, who was quietly lugubrious company, and not unpleasant if you could ignore what he was. They crested a rise and found themselves overlooking a low valley. Coll and his fellow scouts were waiting for them, because the Lost Legions could go no further: above the crossroads, blocking the northern route, was another army, some fifteen thousand men or more, according to Coll’s estimates. ‘They’re First Army, sir, with plenty of Inquisition and Kirkegarde – all cavalry, mounted on those damned khurnes.’
Ramon’s spine stiffened at the thought of a whole lot more Siburniuses and Nytrasias and their ilk. He glanced at Delta. His kind too, perhaps?
‘What else, Coll?’ he asked, because the scout was almost bursting to go on.
‘They’ve got hordes of war-hounds – I barely got out. And I saw venators . . . and worse.’ Coll’s voice dropped to a whisper. ‘I was there in Pallas when Lucia Sacrecour got ’erself Sainted, sir. These two giant flyin’ reptiles flew over the plaza, breathin’ fire – Drakken, sir, jus’ like the legends, come to life.’
Drakken? Oh . . . that’s just rukking wonderful . . .
32
Limits of Power
The Elder Gods of Gatioch
Great Masters, I swear that this was the only way of inculcating these heathens with the Word of Ahm! They just could not conceive of the Prophet as being divine, yet not one of their pantheon. So yes, I allowed them to think that we regarded Aluq-Ahmed as a child of Markud, the king of their gods! Yes, this was a heresy! But it has brought them to the Faith! I beg you for clemency!
GODSPEAKER GULBRACH, AMTEH MISSIONARY TO GATIOCH, AT HIS TRIAL FOR HERESY, Y132 (A586)
Valley of Tombs, Gatioch, on the continent of Antiopia
Thani (Aprafor) 930
22nd month (of 24) of the Moontide
The thrum of the Keshi windship was clear, even in the after-deck cabin, which told Alaron they were still making good speed. He, Ramita and Corinea were crammed together, poring over the map on the table dominating the tiny cabin. Coloured stones etched with runes covered the parchment.
They were somewhere over Gatioch, flying under a burning sun.
Corinea had been scrying the route ahead so that they could narrow down where to find Malevorn and Huriya; it gave them something to do as they flew northeast, aided by the spring winds rolling across Ahmedhassa from the western seas. Free of the mountains, they’d come up against strong wards whenever they tried to scry Malevorn, Huriya or Nasatya directly. But Corinea was focusing on something else right now, what she referred to as a ‘snail’s trail’ of gnostic echoes that apparently bore ‘his taint’. Alaron wasn’t sure if the ‘his’ referred to Malevorn any more.
‘This is the position of the Crusade now,’ Corinea said, indicating the map. ‘Kaltus Korion’s forces are arrayed north to south, facing Rashid from atop the Ebensar Heights, east of Galataz. They’re only two months from Pontus if they march quickly. I presume they’ll stay in Ebensar until the beginning of Maicin.’
‘That’s only a few weeks away,’ Alaron mused.
‘Indeed.’ Corinea pointed to a number of markers in southern Dhassa. ‘Here we have the southern Keshi army, led by the sultan himself. He seems to be moving into Dhassa, trailing a number of smaller Rondian forces: the former garrisons of the southern cities.’ She tapped the marker for the sultan. ‘The Keshi armies are huge.’
‘Remind me about this one?’ Alaron asked, pointing to a marker in the south of Kesh. They were Rondian, apparently marching from Medishar to Bassaz in good order. He’d been rather optimistically scrying for Ramon – more in hope than expectation – but if he was out there, he was warded too. He could have tried calling for him, but that was noisy and might have alerted unfriendly minds to their presence.
‘A small Rondian force,’ Corinea replied. She indicated another marker. ‘They appear to be linking up with this force that’s come south, very swiftly, from the First Army.’ This was well out of their way – Corinea’s ‘snail’s trail’ began in Gatioch, far to the east.
‘What about Huriya?’ asked Ramita, who cared little of the Crusade’s progress. ‘What about my son?’
She knew the answer; they all did: Huriya was nowhere to be found, and nor was Nasatya. ‘They’re just warding too strongly for us to find them,’ Corinea said soothingly, though the growing fear that the boy was dead gnawed at them all.
Ramita wasn’t mollified. ‘So: we know where all manner of people are: just not those we actually want to find.’ She brushed Alaron’s hand away irritably. She had a temper she seldom showed, but when she did, the world knew it.
Corinea smoothed back her long silver hair. ‘I shall attempt another divination,’ she said, as if only she could perform the really useful tasks. ‘I’ll need this cabin, of course.’
‘Of course,’ Ramita yawned wearily. ‘I need fresh air.’
‘There’s plenty of it out here,’ Alaron quipped as they left the sorceress and went out into the biting wind. The deck was exposed to all the elements and any of the Merozain Brothers who weren’t actively working on trimming the sails were cowering in the shade. By now the young men were fed up with the miracle of flight. They’d crossed the great gulf of the Rakasarphal nonstop, then carried on flying through the daylight hours, keeping high up to minimise detection, only landing at dusk to sleep. The lack of success in finding their quarry was getting to them all.
Alaron and Ramita had barely settled into their customary nook on the fore-deck to doze the afternoon away when Gateem shouted excitedly, ‘Look, look—!’
As everyone stood to see, Alaron exclaimed, ‘Holy Kore! What an incredible place!’
They were flying into a valley that ran from east to west, where giant statues fifty feet tall or more of enthroned animal-headed men facing the dawn had been carved in weathered stone. There was a mass of stone and marble buildings, rows and rows of them, a great city, filled with palaces and monuments, broad streets and narrow alleys. But they were all utterly lifeless: more than five miles of empty stone, filling up with sand.
‘It looks abandoned,’ Ramita said.
‘It’s a city of the dead,’ Gateem called from the rigging above. ‘The Gatti used to build them for their kings. But when Gatioch declined, such places were abandoned. It was long ago, before the Prophet came.’
‘Master Puravai isn’t here to mark your work now,’ Yash called, laughing. ‘We learn the histories in our training,’ he added to Alaron. ‘Gatioch was a great empire, before Kesh conquered all.’
‘Look!’ Gateem shouted, pointing away to their right. ‘There!’
Alaron followed his finger and saw a plaza on the south side of the valley where the tombs were blackened and broken, and in the midst was the blasted carcase of a large creature, slowly being pulled apart by a huge swarm of vultures and carrion crows. There was another one, a little further onwards, already reduced to bones and dried skin, and what looked like armoured human remains.
Holy Hel, what happened here?
After circling cautiously to ensure they were alone, they put down in the next plaza. Only the birds shrieked in fury at their passing. They left half the Brothers with the windships and then together went to investigate the fallen, using Animagery to drive the shrieking mass of birds away. What was revealed was the eerie sight of two dead venators. They spent an hour trying to piece together what had happened, using Clairvoyancy and other gnostic methods, which revealed traces of gnosis-use, powerful blasts of energy that had wrecked the tombs here. They also revealed that many of the bodies had distorted skeletons, warped by the gnosis, but still the details remained sketchy.
‘They were Shapechangers, most of the dead,’ Corinea said after examining them. She was holding one of their skulls, sniffing it occasionally. She pointed to the armoured corpses, and added, ‘These were Inquisitors.’
‘So the Inquisitors were victorious?’ Ramita asked.
‘I doubt it. Inquisitors don’t leave their bodies unburied. It’s part of their oath, to respect their fallen.’
‘The bodies are weeks old, and there are fresher ones in the pits on the south side. Hundreds and hundreds of them,’ Yash commented. He was holding Tegeda’s hand, publically testing the limits. Alaron didn’t care: they’d not put anything about chastity, or even not marrying, into their fledgling order’s vows.
Then Aprek came running from a tomb shouting for Alaron and Ramita: he’d found the body of a small black-haired female, chained in manacles to the wall of a cell. When Ramita saw it she almost fainted.
‘It’s Huriya!’ She sank to her knees in a torrent of tears.
*
Ramita let the ashes pour through her hands and merge with the sands. They said in Baranasi that every speck of sand marked a death, one grain for every person deceased since time began.
Goodbye, Huriya. Namaste and farewell. I thought of you as my sister, as my heart’s companion, but you were someone else entirely. I’ll not waste my life trying to understand; I’ve got more pressing things to do. But I’ll never forget you. Perhaps in the end you saw the Light, and that’s why they left you chained in the dark? I will pray that’s the way it was. May all the gods forgive you.
She couldn’t think of anything else to say so she stood up, dusted her hands on her kameez and turned away. The wind whispered wordlessly through the dunes and blew the ash away.
The cell next door to where Huriya had been found had contained a couple of discarded toys, just crude wooden figures, but they had filled her with hope. Huriya was dead, but perhaps Nasatya was still alive.
‘I am ready,’ she said quietly to Alaron. ‘Let us go and find my son.’
They joined Corinea on the south side of the Valley of Tombs. She’d pulled a skull from a fresh grave and given it to Alaron to anchor the scrying-spells he was using to find Malevorn, even though it certainly wasn’t his skull. It wasn’t even human. But it must have had something to do with the Inquisitor, because it was definitely helping. Alaron had been able to penetrate Malevorn’s shields enough to sense direction – somewhere northwest; meaning Malevorn was alive. That thought energised them all.
The
old sorceress looked up as they approached. ‘Have you finished your mourning?’ she asked Ramita in a careless voice.
Ramita flinched. ‘Huriya has been cremated and her ashes spread to the winds. She was my blood-sister, and once I loved her. Perhaps you remember such feelings?’
Corinea’s grey eyes flashed. ‘I’ve lost everyone,’ she said in a hollow voice. She flung the skull against the wall in a sudden fit of violence – then abruptly she was calmness itself again. ‘I have what we need here. I have powdered the skull of the dead shapechanger found near the cell where your Huriya was found: there is a gnostic trace burned into its very bones that links to the the very taint I’ve been tracing. The next time this Malevorn expends a significant amount of gnosis, I’ll know precisely where he is.’
Zhassi Valley, on the continent of Antiopia
Thani (Aprafor) 930
22nd month (of 24) of the Moontide
Malevorn Andevarion knelt on his right knee, bending over the hilt of his sword. He’d used Earth- and Fire-gnosis to reshape the blade from the heathen curved blade to a good straight Rondian sword. The cross-piece, forming the Sacred Dagger of the Kore, provided him a focus for his worship.
Growing up as a mage was a strangely ironic position in Yuros society. All magi were descendants of the Blessed of Kore, with magical powers and sacred status – and yet the very learning of the gnosis gave insights that the common people never saw. Like stagehands in a theatre, magi saw the ropes and mirrors behind every performance; they more than anyone knew that they and their fellows were far from divine. Malevorn had despised his closest friends at the Arcanum, and had to admit that even he had sinned at times.
But now he’d been chosen by Corineus Himself, and that demanded higher standards: I will institute a new Inquisition, one that is more deeply rooted upon the ideals of the Kore, he decided. I will return us to the fundamentals of Faith.