The Long War 02 - The Dark Blood

by A. J. Smith

  ‘Answer me!’ he screamed. ‘Use me for your rituals, consume my flesh, but answer me first.’

  The servitor reared up, its ropey tentacles stretching forward and its amorphous flesh shifting through different shades of black. Eyes and mouths appeared randomly, forming no pattern or recognizable face, but tearing into Nanon as if they were dead friends.

  ‘Calm yourself, knife-ears. I will answer you.’

  Nanon panted. He was still ready to run, but anger overrode fear. His head was heavy and his blood felt hot. Every twitch of movement caused burning as the Jekkan magic flooded through his system.

  ‘You cannot defeat Shub-Nillurath. You can only survive. This is what should occupy your mind. Run, hide, wait out this battle of the Long War and be patient.’ A sibilant hiss came from the Jekkan’s mouth. ‘You may wait here if you wish. Spend the coming centuries in beautiful madness.’

  The magic softened and the servitor retreated, allowing Nanon a moment of clarity. He couldn’t stay much longer.

  ‘Why fight, knife-ears?’

  His anger disappeared. His head cleared and suddenly he felt tired. ‘I don’t know. If I can’t win... I don’t know. Maybe friends... or stubbornness.’

  ‘I suspect you knew the answer,’ replied the Jekkan.

  ‘No,’ he said. ‘I feared, but I didn’t know. That’s why I came here.’

  ‘There are few soldiers of the Long War left. Few old-bloods, few creatures of deep time. No beings stand in the lands of men who can defeat Shub-Nillurath.’ The Jekkan relished the words, smacking its lips contentedly.

  ‘So I’ll make do with what I’ve got,’ replied Nanon. ‘We might surprise you.’

  ‘No!’ said the Jekkan. ‘You will not.’

  He took two steps backwards, towards the cave entrance and the Jekkan barrier. Any longer in the ruin would mean death. Complicated and muddled thoughts filled his head. Pain and madness were an instant away as Nanon threw himself back, through the illusion and on to rain-soaked grass.

  BOOK 2

  THE

  SHAPE TAKER

  THE TALE OF THE ONE GOD

  The Giant sat in his stone hall beyond the world and wore grey.

  The Giant acted with nobility and his followers wore purple, rising above other men to rule.

  The Giant acted with aggression and made war upon his enemies and his followers wore red, standing tall and never questioning their duty.

  The Giant showed compassion and his followers wore white, healing the sick and valuing peace.

  The Giant sought knowledge and his followers wore blue, devoting themselves to learning all they could of the world and beyond.

  The Giant became humble and gave to the needy, and his followers wore brown, accepting that they were unworthy.

  The Giant sought riches and became greedy, and his followers wore gold, taking all that they could.

  At the last, the Giant understood death and his followers wore black.

  But the Giant himself remained grey.

  PROLOGUE

  The girl was born in the Karesian city of Thrakka. Her earliest memories were of high spires, dusty streets and rolling deserts. She remembered anger and hatred, but no love. If the girl had ever known her parents, the memories were lost. The first faces she knew belonged to other street children and criminals, though even they were distant. She recalled no names, just that she was used by unclean men and envied by other girls.

  By her fourteenth year, the girl was hard and uncaring. She knew how to hold a knife and where to stick it. She knew how to lie and to whom. She knew how to steal and, most importantly, how not to get caught. She’d seen boys and girls die on the streets of Thrakka, used up by a world that catered only to the very rich. She lived by her wits and resolved to survive. If Karesia used people until they had no more to give, the girl would be a user and not a victim.

  She avoided the brothels and harems, preferring to keep her own company as she traversed the underworld of Thrakka. She sacrificed the money and protection offered by the criminal classes, but never sacrificed her freedom. If she was to be used up, it would be on her own terms. A bribe here, a seductive smile there. She was clever and knew when to fight, when to run, and when to manipulate. She lived in the bottom level of an abandoned vizier tower, eating only what she could steal and wearing the clothes of those she’d killed.

  Her name was Anasaara Valez and she was destined for more than the streets of Thrakka.

  On her eighteenth birthday, a procession arrived in the city. She watched its arrival from her isolated domain, hidden behind moveable rocks. The procession had been long-heralded and two hundred wind claws accompanied the visitors. Rich merchant families and viziers watched from balconies and Karesians of every stripe lined the streets to pay their respects to the matron mother of Oron Kaa. The elderly woman was tall and thin, with harsh features and penetrating eyes. She had with her a procession of young girls, acquired from every Karesian city. The girls had been chosen to form the priesthood of Jaa. They would be tested and tortured until only seven remained. Every family in Thrakka hoped that their daughter would be chosen to join the enchantresses and many threw coins and wealth in front of the procession in an effort to gain the mother’s favour.

  They walked slowly around the city. At every intersection, the mother stopped and took a deep breath of the air, as if expecting to find something. Each time she passed Anasaara’s hovel, the procession stopped for several moments. Nearby, merchants aggressively thrust their daughters forward, hoping that the mother would notice them. After the third circuit of Thrakka, the old woman began to smile. It was a toothy grimace, with no humour.

  ‘Come to me, child,’ she said to the air.

  Anasaara felt compelled to obey. She removed the loose rocks that hid her dwelling and approached the procession. Hundreds of eyes watched her and the wind claws parted to allow her to come close to the matron mother.

  ‘Do you know who I am?’ asked the old woman.

  Anasaara said nothing.

  ‘Can you speak?’

  Again, the girl was silent.

  ‘You are wilful, girl. But we will break you of that.’

  Anasaara looked around her. Angry merchants were returning to their homes, disappointed that their daughters had not been chosen. The girl was not surprised. She knew that she had been chosen long before the procession arrived.

  ‘You will come with us to Oron Kaa,’ said the mother. ‘Your life is now mine.’

  * * *

  Everything changed. The girl was pampered and well fed. The journey south was long, but comfortable, and they were transported in litters carried by dozens of muscular slaves. No one spoke about their new life or about the sinister old woman who accompanied them, but each young girl was happy. This changed when they reached Oron Kaa.

  The abbey was of stone, rising from the Sunset Coast to touch the clouds. The shimmering deserts of Far Karesia distorted the building, making it writhe in the stifling air. Then the torture began.

  The girl remembered the pain and she remembered the questions. Each new day brought new pain and new questions. The matron mother didn’t expect answers, but she asked anyway. The girl remained wilful, determined to survive, no matter what. She saw girls skinned alive and thrown into the Scorched Sea to be eaten by sharks. She saw her own skin flayed and healed, flayed and healed. Time and again, she was mutilated and made whole. Each new torture brought more pain and more questions.

  ‘Who are you?’

  ‘What do you fear?’

  ‘What is pain?’

  Her body broke a hundred times, but her mind never did. As time passed, the girl realized that she was not ageing. The wind claws who guarded her grew old and died, but the girls remained eighteen. Time was meaningless. All Anasaara felt was pain until it was the only thing she had left.

  ‘Who are you?’

  ‘I am no one.’

  ‘What do you fear?’

  ‘Nothing but Jaa.’ />
  ‘What is pain?’

  The last question was asked a thousand times, but she didn’t know the answer. Their faces began to change until all the remaining girls looked the same. They were beautiful, with lush figures and enchanting eyes. Even their voices became similar. The matron mother paid special attention to Anasaara, singling her out from the remaining girls and personally administering her torture. She did not age either, remaining a sharp-faced old woman, as the third generation of their guards died of old age.

  She clung to her pain. It became her entire world. Hundreds of years and all she felt was pain, until it no longer hurt.

  ‘Who are you?’

  ‘I am one of the Seven Sisters.’

  ‘What do you fear?’

  ‘Nothing but Jaa.’

  ‘What is pain?’

  She paused, no longer doubting the answer. ‘Pain is my servant. I am its mistress.’

  Her life changed once again. The torture stopped and she was allowed to dress and bathe. She ate food for the first time in centuries and found it gave her no pleasure. She spoke to the other girls and learned their names, but their company was nothing but a distraction. She was their leader and she would remain apart.

  As her sisters were tattooed, Anasaara learned of the world. She read books, studied maps and gained wisdom about the lands of men and its gods. The barbarian lands of Rowanoco had formed an order of warrior priests, and the ordered lands of the One were policed by armies of clerics. In contrast, Jaa had invested power in only seven of his followers, gifting each with great power and trusting in quality, not quantity.

  When she left Oron Kaa, Anasaara Valez was dead. All that remained was Saara the Mistress of Pain.

  PART 1

  CHAPTER 1

  LADY BRONWYN OF CANARN IN THE CITY OF SOUTH WARDEN

  The realm of Scarlet was full of beautiful green pastures and lush forests. The Moon Wood to the north was a magical place where the local farmers prayed to the spirits of earth and rock with which Rowanoco had blessed them. Brytag’s Roost to the east was a sacred mountain range where the Ice Giant’s raven supposedly perched, watching over the lands of Ranen.

  Bronwyn had heard of both places, having been told stories by her father about the groves and glens where the Order of the Hammer heard the voice of their god, but after being in the Freelands for so long she was beginning to take on some of her brother’s cynicism. Scarlet Company and their captain, Johan Long Shadow, were tough men and women. They were not inhospitable to the outsiders in their midst, but they still saw Bronwyn as a pampered lady of Ro. She had tried to bond with them, telling stories of her youth in Canarn and trying to display her uncommon knowledge of the peoples of Ranen. Very little of it worked, though, and despite her best efforts Bronwyn still spent most of her time with Al-Hasim, the infuriating Karesian scoundrel, and the survivors of Wraith Company.

  They had been in South Warden for several weeks and it was a world away from their previous lodging in the ruins of Ro Hail, or the weeks spent sleeping rough as they fled from the knights of the Red. Bronwyn had been given a room in a tall wooden house overlooking the western stockade. The town, or city as the Ranen liked to call it, was a closely packed circle of wooden halls and cosy homesteads, with a constant smell of smoke and iron from a hundred forges and fireplaces. South Warden was home to a few thousand men, women and children. It was smaller than her home of Ro Canarn, but it easily accommodated the five hundred or so refugees of Wraith Company, and their blue cloaks were now a constant presence alongside the crimson heraldry of South Warden.

  ‘It’s early, Bronwyn, go back to sleep.’ The voice came from the lump lying next to her and she elbowed him for interrupting her thoughts.

  ‘The Ranen always seem to get up with the dawn,’ she replied, pulling the covers tight around her shoulders.

  As Bronwyn looked at Al-Hasim, lying next to her, she wandered what her brother would think if he knew she’d given in to his advances. They had begun comforting each other on the journey east. She had adopted a fatalistic attitude to life of late and she felt that taking a highly inappropriate lover was in keeping with her new world view. Brom would likely not appreciate this, and she worried that he’d skewer the Karesian if he ever found out.

  ‘Stone Dog will come knocking on the door when it’s time to get up,’ mumbled Hasim, his face pressed against the pillow.

  She elbowed him again. ‘Shut up, I’m thinking.’

  ‘About what?’ Hasim murmured, turning over and leaning on his hand. ‘How unbelievably attractive I am?’ He had a predatory glint in his eye.

  Bronwyn didn’t smile or give the Karesian any indication that she was in the mood. She then lunged forward and kissed him roughly, biting his lower lip before pulling away.

  ‘Cheeky bitch,’ he said. Touching a dot of blood from his lip, he pulled her down to his level, lying flat on the simple wooden bed. ‘And it’s still too early to be up.’

  Bronwyn didn’t smile. She dug her nails into his back and pulled him in for another kiss. She was angry and a long way from home, and Al-Hasim knew that his job was to provide a distraction for her. ‘Just shut up,’ she growled, wrapping her legs round him and sliding further down the bed.

  ‘I’m just a piece of meat to you, my lady,’ he said, emphasizing his lyrical Karesian accent and pulling away. ‘Do you think Brom knows what a rampant seductress you’ve become?’

  ‘I don’t think he’d care,’ she lied. ‘He’s got forest-dwellers to deal with.’

  Hasim grinned and moved down to bite Bronwyn’s neck playfully. Then a knock at the door made them both jump.

  ‘Wake up, ladies,’ shouted Micah Stone Dog from outside their chamber. ‘That Brown cleric from Canarn wants a word.’

  Bronwyn didn’t let go of Hasim for a moment, letting her thighs grip him tightly before slapping him hard in the face and smiling. ‘Calm down, Karesian, we have things to do,’ she said in a low whimper, pressing her body against his.

  Another knock on the door. ‘Get up. You can fuck later. There are a lot of hours in the day, I hear.’ Stone Dog’s sarcasm and dry humour were in full flow in the mornings. ‘Try not to prove everyone right by being a Karesian and a Ro.’

  Any kind of sexual mood disappeared instantly. Bronwyn yawned extravagantly and Hasim sat up and rubbed the tiredness from his eyes. The sun was starting to intrude through the shuttered windows and the air was rapidly warming up as they rose swiftly from their bed.

  ‘Who do you think they hate more, the Karesian or the Ro?’ Bronwyn asked, pulling on her simple homespun dress.

  ‘I’m not a noble, sweetness,’ responded Hasim. ‘I’m just exotic. You’re a stuck-up Ro.’

  ‘Apparently so,’ she said drily, not finding the situation particularly funny.

  Stone Dog wearily knocked on the door again. ‘There’s an assembly first thing and Brother Lanry wants to make sure you don’t fuck up if you’re asked to speak.’

  Bronwyn and Hasim exchanged a concerned look. They’d been told to expect this, but it was still scary news. Captain Horrock of Wraith Company had petitioned to rouse the Free Companies and declare war on the invader knights of the Red. Johan Long Shadow agreed, but the proper way of doing things in Ranen was to allow all sides a chance to speak.

  There were dissenting voices, though Horrock was convinced that seeing an army of knights appear over the horizon would silence them. Bronwyn had counselled that William of Verellian, the captive knight of the Red, should be released with peace terms, but most of the Ranen had laughed. It was only the esteem she had gained from Wraith Company that meant her voice had been listened to at all.

  * * *

  The Ranen assembly of South Warden was a circular stone building in the centre of the town. Bronwyn had seen it every day since they had arrived, but she had not been permitted to enter until now. The assembly was treated with great reverence by all of the Ranen. Even the refugees from Wraith Company knew the significance of Rowano
co’s Stone and of the decisions that were made in the assembly. Any Ranen man of good standing was allowed to sit in the cold stone auditorium, and each held a small axe with which he could cast his vote. Father Magnus used to joke that the politics of Ranen were more violent than the wars of Ro and that a decision would never be respected unless at least one man died during their deliberations.

  To Bronwyn it was an inconceivable way to run a country. Even Al-Hasim found the Ranen assembly intimidating and, as they walked up the rough dirt track that served as a road, he looked even more nervous than Bronwyn. Stone Dog was apathetic as always, as he walked casually beside them using his vicious-looking locaber axe as a walking stick.

  South Warden was built on a natural hill and the central palisade vaguely resembled a wooden fort, with the Ranen assembly the only stone building within the central ring. The family of Long Shadow had purposely built the town to be defensible and every point of the compass had multiple gates and stockades, most of which were not currently manned. Bronwyn was no military tactician, but even she could see that, if Scarlet Company chose to make it so, South Warden would become a nightmare for an invading army.

  Brother Lanry was waiting for them outside the inner fortifications, several streets away from the assembly. He had been sent north by Bromvy to tell them of Magnus’s death and of the retaking of the city from the Red knights. She liked the old cleric and, aside from Al-Hasim, he was the friendliest face in South Warden.

  ‘A bright and crisp Ranen morning if ever I saw one,’ he said cheerfully, as the Ro noblewoman, the Ranen warrior and the Karesian scoundrel approached. ‘Horrock said it would rain this morning... good to know he’s a better warrior than soothsayer.’

  ‘Not by much,’ muttered Stone Dog without cracking a smile. ‘But I suppose he is old, and his knees are giving up.’

  Lanry chuckled guiltily. ‘Well, that aside, young Micah, I believe this day bodes well for the cause.’