by Stephen Hunt
‘I have to see my brother, too,’ begged Willow. ‘Let me visit him. I won’t try to escape. Then you can sell me to the usurper or the local prefect or Emperor Jaelis for all I care.’
‘What about a last visit to your favourite horses up in the big house’s stables?’ said Aurora, caustically. ‘We could arrange all the servants and retainers to line up outside and see you off, too.’
‘Duncan’s dying. I may never see him again.’
‘Feeling guilty about the trial-by-combat, now?’ The female brigand shook her head in disbelief. ‘Well, it was a good fight. If your brother dies, then he dies well. I doubt he’d thank you for appearing in his surgical tent for a tearful last farewell.’
‘He needs to know the truth about what happened to our father.’
Aurora snorted. ‘Your version of it, anyway. Thousands of farm boys and factory hands coming back dead from the war, rolling across the border piled like logs in the back of carts for burial. Who speaks for them?’
Willow snapped back. ‘And how many killed by people like you?’
‘I know what I am, my lady. This is your war. I’m just another commoner paid to lug a pike around on your behalf.’
They forced her out of the room. Willow stepped over the body of the landlord on the stairs, careful not to slip on the blood. He’d received his just reward for betraying Willow to Holten and Nocks. Once the group were in the street they headed for the centre of the old town, which surprised Willow. She had expected to be spirited out of Northhaven and bundled into the care of the usurper’s enforcers; safely out of sight of anyone who knew the result of the trial. Disappeared. Instead, they headed for a building she knew well enough from her time working for her father. The Guild of Radiomen’s hold. Like a miniature citadel in the centre of the ancient city. Near the top of the hill with a distinctive antenna rather than a tower and battlements. Willow was surprised to see the hold’s armoured metal door lay open and guarded by more bandit fighters rather than the guild’s men. This isn’t right.
‘Inside, girl,’ said Aurora, shoving Willow into the hold.
They went down a narrow stone corridor, into the public receiving chamber where locals and visiting merchants lined up behind the wooden counter to pay by the word to send messages across the guild relays. To the ends of Pellas itself if you cared to wait millennia for the return message to reach your ancestors. These brigands had cleared out all of Northhaven’s townspeople, though. The guild staff were off in the corner with their hands in the air, while a large middle-aged bandit sat on the counter, swaying his legs, bored. He was glared at by the guild’s elderly hold-master, who was as unhappy as Willow would expect at this invasion of long guild territory. Into ground that should have been treated as an inviolable sanctuary.
‘Here’s the Landor whelp,’ said Aurora to the man on the counter. ‘Her father’s dead, though.’
‘What did I tell you about that? Nobody pays for the return of a corpse.’
‘We didn’t do it,’ said Aurora, indignantly. ‘Probably the wife. She cut out in a hurry.’
‘That’s usually the price of marrying ’em,’ said the man, shaking his head. ‘An early grave.’
‘What do you know about it?’ growled Aurora.
Willow stared at the large bandit in bewilderment, realization dawning. ‘I recognize you! Your face’s been on enough newspaper front-sheets. Black Barnaby.’
‘Famous am I?’ The air pirate carefully rubbed his cheek as though polishing it. His dark bushy beard seemed to move with a life all of its own. ‘The illustrations never do me justice. And I far prefer Bold Barnaby. But the dirty ink scribblers never manage to get the name right, either.’
‘Black is accurate enough,’ said Willow. ‘For a man who sold out his own brother for gold.’
‘Privateers are only ever rewarded in coin,’ laughed Barnaby. ‘Either the ruler’s, or booty grabbed from the citizens they want dead. If I desired glory, cheap medals and the unreliable gratitude of monarchs I’d be wearing one of your stupid starched peacock uniforms. It’s a far better arrangement to position yourself on the winning side and be paid for it.’
Willow gazed at Jacob Carnehan’s brother in disgust. ‘There’s nothing I can call you that’s worse than what you actually are.’
‘There’s a fine line between courage and foolishness, girl . . . people in my trade usually try to build it into a parapet.’ He turned to look the guild official. ‘Why aren’t my people back yet, Master Radioman?’
‘You have hundreds of messages to transmit,’ spluttered the official. ‘It takes time to contact that many stations.’
Barnaby jerked a thumb towards the doors behind the counter. ‘Off you go, my sweet. Make sure this cunning fox isn’t playing us false. Take him with you. If he doesn’t hurry his apprentices to a decent pace, put a round in his head and promote the next piece of guild braid to hold-master.’
‘We are neutral in Weyland’s civil war!’ blustered the old man.
Black Barnaby patted one of the many guns tucked behind his leather belt. ‘Nothing more neutral than the bullet from a charged pistol, Master Radioman. Every corpse equal.’
Aurora left with the man and was away for five minutes before she re-appeared from deeper inside the hold. The hold-master looked as pale as a ghost. ‘It’s done. All our messages are sent.’
‘Excellent.’ He raised a hand lazily to his men. ‘Have our bucks put a torch to every battery room.’
‘You can’t do that!’ protested the hold-master.
‘People keep on saying that to me,’ said Black Barnaby. He accepted a rifle from one of his bandits, and then drove the butt into the master’s gut, doubling him up, before he lashed down with the weapon a second time. There was a terrible crack and the man fell still to the stone floor. ‘But I’m in the I can business. Always have been. I can do whatever I like because I’m Black Barnaby. The scourge of the Lanca.’
The staff in the corner cowered. Bandits prodded them with rifles, obviously eager to act as a firing squad if ordered.
‘This is one of the long guilds,’ cried Willow, horrified. ‘They’re neutral in all of this.’ We need them. The nation needs them. ‘Why would you—?’
‘Why? Because I bloody well can. Because my dealings here are concluded and I don’t need anyone else using Northhaven’s radio hold to report on your vanishing, girl. Now still your wagging tongue.’
Willow ignored him. They need me alive and unhurt. At least until they hand me over. ‘Long guilds are an essential part of civilization.’
‘Civilization? Pah, nothing but mob rule with taxes. Keep your civilization to yourself.’
Terrified shouts echoed from inside the hold, the stench of volatile chemicals burning as torches were set to the chamber-sized batteries which powered their powerful radio relays.
A brigand with the rest of the gang came strutting into the chamber. ‘Finished.’
‘The locals won’t be happy,’ observed Aurora.
‘Have we swapped trades, Daughter?’ said Barnaby. ‘Are we in the happiness business now?’
Daughter? So that’s where the Weylander portion of this hellcat comes from. Willow saw the resemblance on second glance.
‘Swivel me, you seem happy enough,’ said Aurora.
Barnaby turned to Willow. ‘She tells me I can’t and far too frequently. But that’s what you get for indulging your wretched offspring.’ He pulled a pocket-watch out of his crimson jacket, checking the time. ‘Off we hop. Can’t be late.’
‘The rumours in town are true then?’ said Willow. ‘Bad Marcus is coming through the prefecture on a progress to lord it over his conquered territories.’
‘So it seems. What’s the point of stealing a gold coin if you don’t get to roll the beauty between your fingers and savour its feel.’ He jumped off the counter, landing on the floor. Pulling out a pistol, he pointed it at the radiomen he had taken prisoner. ‘Off with your uniforms. Down to your woollens, my b
eauties.’ They complied, terrified. And once the prisoners shed their garments, the bandits chased them into the corridor, hooting with laughter. Aurora removed her whip and sent a crack or two in their direction to scatter the guild workers.
Nobody takes a naked halfwit seriously.
‘This is the style,’ roared Barnaby, watching the half-naked guild staff rush out into the open. He strutted after them, the air pirates sweeping Willow into his train. ‘A little mayhem to liven the blood and brighten the day.’
A low distant droning filled the sky. Willow stared up, finding the sun. The clouds to the north vibrated with the unfamiliar sound as big rolling white clouds above the high mountains disgorged a locust storm of warplanes. An undisciplined mass which seemed to appear without end to their numbers. Not Weyland’s new skyguard or the time-tested Rodalian flying wings. Certainly not the mosquito-like helos or strange rocket-driven squadrons of the Vandians. These were hulking, primitive craft of wood and fabric, engines that seemed too big for their bodies; no two alike, as though the artisans responsible had lacked blueprints to base their craft on and hammered away on brute instinct alone.
‘Now, there’s a thing you don’t often see,’ grinned Black Barnaby, slapping the legs of his trousers. ‘I should be more careful what I wish for. Enough mayhem for the whole bloody week.’
FOURTEEN
THE STEALER’S TALE
Duncan wasn’t sure how long he had been drifting in and out of consciousness. One time he woke to find Paetro arguing with the legion surgeons – threatening might be a better word. He just caught the words poison and antidote being tossed around before blackness claimed him again. Staying awake was arduous. Duncan’s blood boiled, his skin itched, the flesh where the sabre had gone straight through felt as though a butcher had carved it away and seeded the rump left behind with fire ants.
He came to again, more suddenly than he was used to. The lantern light hanging from the tent’s frame stung Duncan’s eyes. There was a doctor with a syringe standing by his cot. And from the red spot on Duncan’s arm, he had been injected with something. I can’t feel my wounds. And the terrible itching had subsided, too.
‘How long?’ asked Paetro.
‘Half an hour of lucidity at most,’ said the doctor. He scowled at Duncan, as though this was a patient who had put him to far too much trouble already. Waiting for me to die.
‘How bad is it?’ coughed Duncan.
‘You need to go to the knuckle, lad,’ said Paetro, avoiding answering the question. ‘Fight! It’s as if you’ve lost the will to live.’
Fight? Duncan felt weak and light enough to float out of the cot. ‘You have to rescue Cassandra for me. Bring her back to Weyland.’
‘That’s not the empire’s way.’
‘Damn the Imperium and the celestial caste code,’ groaned Duncan. ‘Rescue her from those Nijumeti savages and bring her back. My father can look after her at Hawkland Park. Tell him it’s a debt of honour. Tell him it was my last wish.’
‘Not your last one.’
‘I’m tired,’ wheezed Duncan. He realized that Paetro was just trying to rile him. Anything to make him stay conscious. ‘I just want to sleep.’
‘It’s no sleep a soldier welcomes.’
‘Why not? I’ve been exiled from Vandia. My own brother-in-law tried to kill me. Was that Willow who shouted a warning to me?’
‘Aye,’ said Paetro. ‘Your father’s wife arrived to visit you yesterday. She reckons Willow did a deal with the viscount to kill you during the duel. Willow must have had a last minute change of heart.’
‘Or she wanted to give me the motivation to gut him properly. The trial-by-combat went in Willow’s favour, didn’t it?’
‘She’s free, all right. I ordered the sentries to turn her away from here.’
‘It doesn’t matter,’ said Duncan. None of it does. Let Willow run away with Carter. She can dance naked for the rebel troops for all that I care. I never realized before. All you have to do to free yourself from the cares of the world is to die.
‘It matters to me,’ growled the sturdy soldier.
There was a disturbance at the hospital tent’s entrance. Sentries pushed out of the way. The hurried protests of doctors.
‘Get out!’ barked Apolleon, striding inside. The surgeons and orderlies needed no further urging to be free of the ominous head of the hoodsmen. They fled like scared rabbits.
‘I stay,’ demanded Paetro, holding his ground by Duncan’s cot.
‘Have a good look at your friend,’ said Apolleon. ‘Does Duncan of Weyland appear as though he will live to you, Paetro Barca?’
‘He needs an imperial surgeon,’ said Paetro. ‘He needs a real hospital back in Vandia. Not cheap battlefield sawbones willing to hack limbs off in return for the legion’s paltry pay.’
‘Duncan would not survive the acceleration of any ship capable of carrying him back to the empire in time,’ said Apolleon. ‘Mine own among them.’
‘You’re not a surgeon,’ accused Paetro.
‘Oh, I have cut into plenty of men in my time,’ smiled the head of the secret police, coldly. ‘You will leave, Paetro Barca. Or I shall. And if I depart, your friend will not survive the night. Duncan of Weyland will slowly choke to death and drown on his own blood. I am his very last chance.’
‘Go,’ whispered Duncan to Paetro. Let me die now, the damn pain. The laudanum he had been injected with was fast wearing off.
‘I’m damned if his ugly mug is the last thing you will see,’ said Paetro.
‘Go,’ said Duncan.
The soldier snarled but reluctantly walked away.
‘Do not return until I call you,’ warned Apolleon.
Duncan tried to say goodbye, but his words twisted into a rasping croak.
‘I was at the trial-by-combat,’ said Apolleon, watching the stout soldier exit the ranks of blood-soaked cots and surgical equipment. ‘Your brother-in-law meant to kill you. You should have been skewered through the heart.’
‘Well, I’m certainly dying now,’ Duncan managed to cough.
‘Yes, I am rather afraid you are. Your opponent’s sabre was oiled with a salve made from Bloodbane petals. Somewhat unscrupulous. The poison has reached your heart. I can hear the organ failing you like a stuttering engine.’
‘Are you a doctor – or a priest now?’ Duncan coughed up blood. ‘Is this my final confession?’
‘People often whisper the truth as they die,’ said Apolleon, ‘using their last few breaths. It’s a curious thing. As though losing his life makes a man honest.’
‘I don’t want to die.’
‘That much I believe.’ Apolleon took a towel from the cot next door and secured it tightly around Duncan’s head, covering his eyes.
Duncan struggled vainly to remove the flannel, but the nobleman was too strong for him. ‘I need to see.’
‘Is that all the thanks I get? Keeping you from dying from shock.’
Duncan managed to dislodge the barest corner of towel. He was rewarded with a shocking sight. Apolleon’s arm had changed into something like a sharp steel lance, barbed and headed with multiple blades and evil-looking instruments. Duncan tried to scream, but a warm hand closed over his mouth, and the warmth became a gag moulding itself over his face. Then hissing. Burning heat worse than acid, and beneath the appalling agony, Duncan felt something cold injected into his chest, worms of ice wriggling inside his body, fighting their way under his skin. He shook and fought wildly, but the weight grew heavy inside him. I’m lead now. Made of lead. And then he fell unconscious again. For seconds or minutes. Possibly hours. When he came to the tent was still empty save for Apolleon. The head of Vandia’s secret police sat on the cot opposite, reading a small leatherbound book. Seeing Duncan awake he dropped the tome into a pocket of his large greatcoat.
Duncan was surprised to find he could sit up now. There was no more blood to be coughed out from his lungs. His skin was covered in a strange black dust, as though he had
been bathed in ash or sweated out the contents of a cold fireplace. What is this filth? He rubbed the dust off his arms. I’m healed? I should be dead, but I’m alive? Duncan wanted to feel elation, but seeing the sly creature opposite he was gripped by a strangely nauseous feeling of foreboding. ‘Why?’ murmured Duncan.
‘Why? Because you still have a part to play in my schemes,’ said Apolleon.
‘How can you possibly know?’
‘It is not just the gasks who are able to peer down the possible futures,’ said the head of the secret police. ‘A few of my people possess that talent. You are important to Princess Helrena and she is important to us.’
‘Who are your people?’ asked Duncan. ‘What are you?’
‘We have so many names.’
‘If you trust me enough to keep me alive, then at least trust me with the truth.’
‘In Weyland you call us the stealers.’
Duncan moaned, his worst fears confirmed. Demons. I have traded my soul to cheat death. ‘Begone. I want no part of you. Not your stealer’s cursed healing or your stealer’s schemes. I agreed no pact with you. You forced me into this.’
‘Ah, there we are,’ laughed Apolleon. ‘How successful the enemy’s calumnies prove. Libel one side as devils and the other automatically becomes angels, the ethreaal. In truth, neither side conforms to your barbarous superstitions.’
‘Your lies steal the souls from people. Even the face you wear is stolen. I glimpsed your real form when the assassins attacked the Castle of Snakes. When they tried to kidnap Lady Cassandra. You looked like a giant spider.’
‘A form I adopted to save you from the attack,’ reminded Apolleon. He tapped his jacket. ‘When you attain a certain level of sophistication, flesh becomes akin to clothes. Your people wear armour to go into battle, gloves to remove thorns from the fields, furs to hold winter at bay. My people alter their bodies to obtain much the same ends.’