You Die When You Die

by Angus Watson

He told them everything.

  “Deep-throat a goat,” said Sassa when he’d finished.

  Chapter 13

  Persuasion

  There was a flash from Chippaminka’s alchemical bowl. The girl warlock fell back and cracked her head on the great gold statue of Innowak.

  “See to her,” Ayanna told her fan men. “No, just one of you. The rest of you keep fanning.” The baby was due any moment and it was hot.

  “What did you see?” she asked the girl when she was back on the cushioned seat.

  “I saw bad news, Empress, but also an opportunity.”

  “I am far too pregnant for cryptic fooling. Out with it.”

  “The bad news is that Yoki Choppa has turned against you and tricked the Owsla into following him. He is taking them into Badlander territory. He intends to unite with the Badlanders to attack Calnia.”

  “Never!”

  “That is what the bowl tells me.”

  “What is the opportunity?” Pain lanced through the empress’s stomach. “Massage your salve into my stomach as you tell me.”

  Chippaminka picked up the bowl of the unguent that now sat permanently next to the empress’s day and night beds. She warmed it in the rays from the great sun crystal, scooped out a handful, straddled Ayanna’s legs and lifted her dress. The lithe, near-naked girl looked very slight next to the empress’s preposterously massive belly.

  “The opportunity is to bring a halt to the strange and worsening weather. It is being caused by the dark magic of the Badlanders,” she said, her wonderfully cool hands gliding up the centre of the empress’s stomach, outwards across her ribs and down her flanks. “The alchemy tells me that you should gather the army, cross the Water Mother, march to the Badlands themselves and destroy the Badlanders.”

  “Calnians do not cross the Water Mother.”

  “In that case you cannot do it. I am merely telling you what the alchemy tells me.” The girl’s hands circled her stomach again, then again, each time widening her reach.

  The empress sighed and closed her eyes.

  EPILOGUE

  HERE COME THE BADLANDERS

  The Badlander scout Nya Muka sat astride his moose and watched the strange procession. He was two miles away, in a copse of trees on a slight rise in the broad plain. His red-tailed hawk-powered vision allowed him to see the strange travellers as if they were twenty paces away.

  “This is a new lot,” he said to his companion an Empty Child sitting silently on his or her bighorn sheep.

  The child’s large, bald head tilted too far to the side then too far upwards. White iris- and pupil-free eyes looked up blindly. Nya Muka told the boy-girl creature about the pale-skinned people and the warrior women. The latter lot were Calnians and the first lot demons, by his reckoning.

  The way the two groups were spaced reminded him of when he’d been perhaps eight years old, and his clan and another clan who disliked each other had travelled together. They’d walked across the Ocean of Grass close enough to benefit from each other’s numbers if they were attacked, but not so close that anyone might be forced to have anything as unpleasant as a conversation with any of the other clan.

  Twenty miles to the west, Tansy Burna watched as the Plains Strider prepared for the return to the Badlands. Riding her dagger-tooth cat across the Ocean of Grass was around a thousand times more exhilarating than travelling on the huge land craft alongside the Badlanders’ captives, but the size of the Plains Strider and the staggering amount of magic needed to make it work were awesome.

  The millions-strong flock of crowd pigeons took to the sky, each attached by a strand of spider’s silk to the superstructure of the Plains Strider. With a dreadful creak, the nose of the vast vehicle lifted like an island leaving the land, shedding grass and earth like spring rain. The hundreds of buffalo tethered to its trailing edge strained and hefted the tail off the ground. At its prow were the six bald-headed Empty Children who commanded the animals and so controlled the Strider, all rigid with concentration. Aboard the land ship Badlanders milled about, checking bonds and cages. The captives roared and shrieked and shouted. As well they might. Tansy Burna did not envy the fate that awaited them back at the Badlands.

  Flanking riders on dagger-tooth cats and moose took their positions alongside. Behind the Plains Strider, more Empty Children manoeuvred the herd of buffalo which carried fodder, catch nets, folded cages and all their other gear. There were too many folded, unused cages. It had not been an unsuccessful hunt—they had plenty of interesting takes, including their first ever Squatch—but it had not been one of the greats.

  She looked across at Rappa Hoga. The expedition leader’s strong face shone with its usual calm confidence, but could she see a hint of disappointment in his brown eyes and the slight downturn of his kissable lips?

  She was startled by the drum of hooves. It was Chapa Wangwa, galloping up on his moose, his permanent, skull-like grin ablaze with cruel excitement. Tansy Burna shivered.

  “Rappa Hoga!” he cried. “The Empty Children have found new quarry. Eleven pale-skinned and yellow-haired demons travelling with five female warriors and a man.”

  “Are the warriors Calnians?”

  “The scout thinks so.”

  “Which scout?”

  “Nya Muka.”

  Rappa Hoga nodded, his face giving nothing away. “There is more to the message.” It was a statement, not a question.

  “You are wise, O great leader.” Was that sarcasm in Chapa Wangwa’s voice? “The Child said that there is much magic in both the people and the demons, that they are more powerful than they look.”

  The leader’s dagger-tooth cat roared. His eyes drilled into Chapa Wangwa’s. The latter’s cruel smile morphed into a grin of terror. There was a long and deliciously awkward silence, during which Tansy Burna fantasised about Rappa Hoga wrestling his horrible underling to the ground and pounding him into a dead mess.

  “I shall lead the catch squad myself,” said Rappa Hoga eventually. “Have all the dagger-tooth riders prepare, plus a hundred moose-mounted warriors with clubbed arrows, holding poles and catch nets.”

  Chapa Wangwa was surprised, and it looked for a moment as if he was going to protest that so many should be taken to catch so few, but instead he nodded.

  “Tansy Burna, prepare your riders and tell the other cat captains,” Rappa Hoga added.

  Tansy nodded and squeezed her thighs on the great cat’s flanks. She smiled as she bounded towards the squads of cat riders. Who were these people that Rappa Hoga was sending an army powerful enough to take a city?

  She could not wait to capture them and find out.

  The story continues in …

  THE LAND YOU NEVER LEAVE

  Book Two of the West of West series

  Coming in FEBRUARY 2018

  History

  This book is a fantasy fiction novel, but it’s inspired by Vikings in North America a thousand years ago.

  Vikings

  Vikings were in North America around a thousand years ago. Hard, provable history will tell you they got as far as Newfoundland. However, it’s important to remember that history knows very little about the past. Whole empires have been and gone and done many things without leaving a trace of themselves. There’s no physical evidence of Caesar’s huge invasions of Britain in 55 and 54 B.C., for example (see Age of Iron). If a couple of people hadn’t written about those invasions, we wouldn’t know they’d happened (and, more importantly, there would have been no Age of Iron). Imagine what other huge things must have taken place about which we know absolutely nothing.

  So, given that the Vikings were gung-ho adventurers with “you die when you die” at the forefront of their philosophy, I am certain that they didn’t sit around in Newfoundland. They went further into America.

  It is perfectly feasible that the great sailors and mad adventurers sailed and rowed up the St. Lawrence River, around the Great Lakes and down Lake Michigan to a spot about fifty miles north of modern-d
ay Chicago (which they may or may not have named Hardwork). They would have had to portage around Niagara Falls on the way, but a little waterfall wouldn’t have held back people like the Vikings for long. Once they’d established a base on the banks of Lake Michigan, it’s possible that a group of them headed off, across the continent.

  It’s less likely perhaps that they met sabre-tooth tigers and were chased by magic-powered super-warriors, but, as I mentioned, this is fantasy fiction.

  I’ve tried to be accurate with Viking technology and culture. Christian Vikings, for example, did bury their dead with a holy water tube poking down, Freydis’s suggestion that Jarl Brodir tried and failed to encourage a bear to have anal sex with him would have been a normal Viking insult, and their tribal gatherings really were called Things.

  Native Americans

  For all their coverage, we actually know very little about the Vikings. We don’t know how they worshipped the Norse gods, for example.

  We know far less about pre-Columbian Americans.

  The first important notion to grasp is that we’re not talking about one group of people here, in exactly the same way that when we talk about Vikings we’re not talking about ancient Egyptians. America, south and north, is a vast place, and it was populated by myriad diverse tribes.

  (Similarly today, to think that two people are from the same culture because they’re both Native American is like expecting someone from Glasgow to drink retsina, eat moussaka and play the bouzouki on the slopes of Mount Olympus.)

  The second generally held misconception is that pre-Columbian Americans were stone-age savages. Technically, yes, their tools were predominately stone. But, for example, a thousand years ago the city of Cahokia, near modern-day St. Louis, was the same size as London (25,000 people). But, while London was a sprawling mess, Cahokia was a fully planned city, with broad boulevards, towering gold-topped pyramids and burial pits, some of which contained only the bodies of young women. Cahokia, of course, is Calnia in this book.

  Over on the other side of the Rockies at Mesa Verde (we’ll get there in book three), there are thousand-year-old stone towns built into the cliff sides (which you can visit today, and should if you’re even slightly interested in that sort of thing).

  Both Cahokia and Mesa Verde were abandoned about seven hundred years ago, well before the European invasion. Nobody knows why. People will generally suggest climate change, war or a combination of the two. But the Cahokians and Mesa Verdians might just as well have built a space rocket and headed off to populate another planet. We really don’t know. It’s mysteries like that one that make me write speculative fantasy historical fiction.

  So, I’ve tried to be a realistic with the pre-Columbian structures and technology, but I’ve completely invented the tribes and their characteristics, based very loosely on the history books.

  Flora, fauna and landscape

  Bull sharks still swim up the Mississippi, at least as far as Illinois. The Rock River is a tributary of the Mississippi, so, believe it or not, it really is possible that a tribe fed people to sharks on the Rock River a thousand years ago.

  I’ve tried to be accurate with the animals, landscapes and flora, with the exception of kraklaws, dagger-tooth cats and Erik the Angry’s bear. These animals, more commonly known as giant sloths, sabre-tooth tigers and short-faced bears, officially died out about ten thousand years before the events in this book, but I’ve reincarnated them and enlarged the sabre-tooth tigers. The other two really were that big.

  Acknowledgements

  Massive and unrelenting thanks to my wife Nicola, without whom nothing would be possible.

  Thanks to my sons Charlie and Ottar for the entertainment and the sleep deprivation which contributed so much to this book. (In case you’re wondering, I named Ottar the Moaner in the book before our own Otty was born. I mentioned the name to my wife and she liked it (not the “the Moaner” bit)).

  Thanks to Joyce Boxall and Danielle Evans for looking after Charlie and Ottar so that I could get some work done during the day.

  Thanks to all at Orbit and Writers House for their ceaseless devotion and vehement striving, particularly my editor Jenni Hill and my agent Angharad Kowal.

  Thanks to Dr. Mike Voorhies, University of Nebraska-Lincoln Emeritus Professor in Earth and Atmospheric Sciences and Robert E. Warren, PhD, Curator of Anthropology at Illinois State Museum for their help in working out what North America looked like a thousand years ago.

  Thanks to beta readers Tim Watson and Amy Dean, both of whom have greatly improved this book.

  Thanks to the states of Illinois, Iowa, Nebraska, South Dakota, Colorado, Utah and Nevada for your hospitality and jaw-droppingly beautiful landscapes. Particular thanks to the Nebraska state trooper who let me off with a warning for speeding, the doctor in Sioux Falls, SD, who pointed out that the tick I was worried about on what we’ll call my lower back was in fact a mole that I’d scratched, and the farmers from California who rescued me when I got my car stuck on a rock.

  Thanks to everyone who read Age of Iron and posted a favourable review. Thanks to everyone who emailed or Tweeted or Facebooked or whatevered me directly to say they liked it. Writing is a weird profession, in which you sit alone at home while everyone else in the world, it seems, goes out and has a jolly old time together. An email from someone saying that they liked a book I wrote is a massive boost at the beginning of the solitary writing day.

  Please do write a review anywhere online if you enjoyed You Die When You Die. If you didn’t like it, well done for reading this far, and please don’t fuss too much about that review.

  extras

  meet the author

  ANGUS WATSON is an author living in London. Before becoming a novelist, he was a freelance features writer, chiefly for British national newspapers. Features included looking for Bigfoot in the USA for the Telegraph, diving on the scuppered World War One German fleet at Scapa Flow for the Financial Times and swimming with sea lions in the Galapagos Islands for the Times.

  Angus’s first historical fantasy trilogy is Age of Iron, an epic romantic adventure set at the end of Briton’s Iron Age. He came up with the idea for West of West while driving and hiking though North America’s magnificent countryside and wondering what it was like before the Europeans got there.

  Angus is married to Nicola. They have two young sons, Charlie and Otty, and two cats, Jasmine and Napa.

  You can find him on Twitter at @GusWatson or find his website at: www.guswatson.com.

  Find out more about Angus Watson and other Orbit authors by registering for the free monthly newsletter at www.orbitbooks.net.

  if you enjoyed

  YOU DIE WHEN YOU DIE

  look out for

  THE FIFTH WARD: FIRST WATCH

  by

  Dale Lucas

  Humans, orcs, mages, elves, and dwarves all jostle for success and survival in the cramped quarters of Yenara, while understaffed watchwardens struggle to keep its citizens in line.

  Enter Rem: new to Yenara and hungover in the city dungeons with no money for bail. When offered a position with the watch to compensate for his crimes, Rem jumps at the chance.

  His new partner is less eager. Torval, a dwarf who’s handy with a maul and known for hitting first and asking questions later, is highly unimpressed with the untrained and weaponless Rem.

  But when Torval’s former partner goes missing, the two must consort with the usual suspects—drug-dealing orcs, mind-controlling elves, uncooperative mages, and humans being typical humans—to uncover the truth and catch a murderer loose in their fair city.

  Rem awoke in a dungeon with a thunderous headache. He knew it was a dungeon because he lay on a thin bed of straw, and because there were iron bars between where he lay and a larger chamber outside. The light was spotty, some of it from torches in sconces outside his cell, some from a few tiny windows high on the stone walls admitting small streams of wan sunlight. Moving nearer the bars, he noted that his cell was one o
f several, each roomy enough to hold multiple prisoners.

  A large pile of straw on the far side of his cell coughed, shifted, then started to snore. Clearly, Rem was not alone.

  And just how did I end up here? he wondered. I seem to recall a winning streak at Roll-the-Bones.

  He could not remember clearly. But if the lumpy soreness of his face and body were any indication, his dice game had gone awry. If only he could clear his pounding head, or slake his thirst. His tongue and throat felt like sharkskin.

  Desperate for a drink, Rem crawled to a nearby bucket, hoping for a little brackish water. To his dismay, he found that it was the piss jar, not a water bucket, and not well rinsed at that. The sight and smell made Rem recoil with a gag. He went sprawling back onto the hay. A few feet away, his cellmate muttered something in the tongue of the Kosterfolk, then resumed snoring.

  Somewhere across the chamber, a multitumbler lock clanked and clacked. Rusty hinges squealed as a great door lumbered open. From the other cells Rem heard prisoners roused from their sleep, shuffling forward hurriedly to thrust their arms out through the cage bars. If Rem didn’t misjudge, there were only about four or five other prisoners in all the dungeon cells. A select company, to be sure. Perhaps it was a slow day for the Yenaran city watch?

  Four men marched into the dungeon. Well, three marched; the fourth seemed a little more reticent, being dragged by two others behind their leader, a thickset man with black hair, sullen eyes, and a drooping mustache.

  “Prefect, sir,” Rem heard from an adjacent cell, “there’s been a terrible mistake …”

  From across the chamber: “Prefect, sir, someone must have spiked my ale, because the last thing I remember, I was enjoying an evening out with some mates …”