Michael reached for Felix's mask even as Felix's hand closed tight around his throat. "Please...Felix," he choked. "Take...it...off!"
"There is no Felix!" Felix thundered. "My name is Lucifer! I am Quirian's captain!"
Felix's head moved this way and that; he squirmed to avoid Michael being able to grab the mask as hard as he had used to squirm when he was caught in a lie. So Michael, gasping for whatever little taste of breath was left to him, raised his arm over his head and struck down upon the mask instead.
His arms were like hammers. Michael might have been being strangled, he might have been struggling to breathe, but he had been freakish strong before he started training under Gideon and Gideon's methods had only honed him to a peak of physical toughness. Though his fists hurt like no one's business in spite of the seven layers of ox-hide wrapped around them, though his arms shook with every blow, he would keep going. Somehow he doubted that Felix's mask would be so durable.
"Get off! Stop it!" Felix howled as Michael's first rained down. He squeezed and squeezed, but Michael kept going. And the mask began to crack.
Michael snarled with fury as his first descended one final time and the silvery mask shattered with a crack like the breaking of the world. There was a flash of light, a cry of pain and splinters of broken metal fell away to the treasury floor, revealing the face of Simon Feliccius Callistus ban Ezekiel underneath, looking scared half to death by what he saw above him.
"Is your name Felix now?" Michael asked.
"Get off me!" Felix yelled, in his own voice praise be to God, as he threw Michael off him and scrambled to his feet, picking his sword up off the floor. "You always talk down to me! You never talk to me like an equal!"
Michael did not pick up Piety as he stood up. Instead he drew the Eena blade that Fiannuala had given him, the green glimmering in the torchlight. "I'm sorry. I'm not sure I am still young enough to change now, but I apologise."
"Please tell me that isn't the only reason you're still fighting," Amy muttered.
"No it isn't," Felix snapped petulantly. "I just...I...I," he scowled clutching the side of his head with one hand. "I have to do this. I can't just let you do what you want. I don't know what to do, but I have to do something. This is the easiest way!"
"Easy?" Michael said. "Fighting me is...easy?" He felt a little affronted to have it put so baldly.
"Yes, no, I don't know!" Felix shouted. "I don't want to talk to you! I want to let my sword do the talking!"
He leapt at Michael again, but his movements were less certain now, his blows less strong, and Michael swept the sword from his hand and kicked it towards Amy.
"Don't give that back to him, our Amy."
"I won't."
Felix retreated, to where he could bar the ladder up into the loft. "I won't let you through. You'll have to kill me."
Michael shook his head. "Don't be silly, our Felix. Stand aside."
"No!" Felix shouted. "I won't! I'm loyal to my Lord Father!"
Michael advanced upon him, his voice soft and trembling. "Please, Felix, don't make me choose between you and Miranda."
"I'm not asking you to choose," Felix said. "It has to be Miranda. You have to choose her. You have to save her. But you'll have to kill me to do it."
Michael's eyes widened. "Do you want this? Do you want me to kill you?"
"How else can I pay for what I've done?" Felix asked tremulously. "I hear the whispering in my dreams. I can hear the screams of everyone in the city. I have nightmares about your face as I killed you. Please, Michael, I want it to be over."
Michael shook his head. "Felix, no. For God's sake, don't make me do this."
"You have to," Felix yelled. "The Corona Firstborn always protected their families, didn't they? So you have to protect Miranda from everyone, even from me."
Michael closed his eyes, and prayed. When he opened his eyes, he said, "I suppose you're right. I am a Firstborn, and I must do my duty."
"Michael!" Amy squawked in outrage.
"Please, our Amy," Michael said quietly. "This is, as I said, a family matter. Are you ready, Felix?"
Tears welled in Felix's eyes as he nodded. "I'm ready, big brother."
Michael smiled. "Good." He dropped his sword.
Felix's eyes widened. "Wh-"
Michael punched him in the face so hard Felix reeled sideways and dropped to the ground, lying their moaning softly as he clutched at his face.
"Don't be daft, our Felix, I'm not going to kill you," Michael snapped as he recovered Piety and the Eena blade. "Now stay there and have a think about things, I'm going to go get your sister. When all of this over, you and I are going to talk. Understand?"
Felix gave a soft moan by way of reply, which Michael took to be a yes.
"Look after him until I get back," he said to Amy. "Now, pray to God Miranda will be more amenable to me."
He climbed up the ladder out of the treasury and into the dark, dusty loft that lay beneath the roof of the palace. Once there, it did not take too long to find a hatch leading up onto the roof itself. As Michael pushed the hatch open and climbed onto purple tiles, he heard lightning crackling overhead, thunder rolling, the sky growling with a monstrous anger as fireballs fell down from the dark clouds above in bright flashes to land amongst the streets below. Standing up, Michael could see fires spreading out all over the city, in the Metics' Quarter and the Subura, in the Old City and the New, casting an orange glow upon the clouds above them.
Eternal Pantheia burned in Miranda's fires. This was the heart of the Empire, the seat of princes for near nine hundred years. The city of exiles, the city of Aegea, the mistress of the world. And it was dying before his eyes, as Lover's Rock had died before his eyes when his journey had begun. This was the city that was named eternal, as a statement by its founders that it would never fall, and it never had...until now. His little sister was doing what no king or warlord had achieved, and bringing Panthus' city to its knees.
"God and the Empress alike preserve us," Michael muttered. "And may they both forgive our Miranda."
He spotted his sister soon after, leaning upon her cane with a manic smile upon her face as devastation rained down upon the capital at her command. The firelight glinted off the gold she was adorned with, the wind ruffled the white dress she wore; yet Michael swore that he could see tears in her eyes, and took that for a promising sign.
"Miranda!" he yelled.
Miranda turned in the direction of the shouting. "Who...Michael?"
Michael nodded as the wind whipped his hair across his face. With one hand he tried to push it out of the way. "It is nice to see you again so soon, our Miranda. I wish the weather were better."
Miranda's face became contorted with anger. "You came here to stop me, didn't you? You came to plead for the life of the Empire?"
"I came to recall you to your senses before your mistake becomes too terrible to correct," Michael murmured.
"Mistake?" Miranda roared. "I have made no mistake!"
"I am sorry to hear that," Michael said. "I had hoped that I would find this was all an error on your part."
"The Empire is the only mistake in this world," Miranda said. "A nation that should never have been born, a nation that survives only on blood and conquest, a nation that taints everything it touches, that slaughters everything good and pure and innocent." Miranda sounded like she was about to start sobbing, Michael had to forcibly restrain himself from moving to embrace her. "This whole country is a murderer and a fraud."
"I know not what you have seen in this city, our Miranda," Michael replied. "But it is not the Empire that I have come to know, nor the Empire that I have sworn to defend."
"You mean to convince me of the glorious Empire dreamt of by Aegea I suppose?" Miranda asked acidly. "You're too late, Princess Romana has talked my ears off on that subject and did not move me, I doubt that there is anything new to add. Besides, the dream of Aegea seems to me just as bad as what we have now: what a glorious thing, t
o march out and subjugate all peoples, to burn their cities, slaughter their populations, to bring the survivors under your will."
"To bring justice," Michael said. "To spread civilisation amongst the barbarians, to stop wars and protect folk from the constant dangers of raiding or invasion. To impose the custom of peace. To lift up the humble and wear down the proud with arms."
Miranda laughed. "It has done a marvellous job at that, hasn't it? I have never seen so proud a people in all my life."
"Where have you been looking?" Michael asked. "I have seen pride, true, but I have seem great humility also, in Davidheyr and in-"
"I'm going to free Davidheyr, don't you see?" Miranda said. "Lord Quirian has explained it all. Once this city is burned, and the line of Aegea extinguished, then the Empire will collapse. Everywhere will be free! Every city, every state, they can all do as they like."
"Including make war on one another, sack the citadels of their neighbours, butcher or enslave the peoples whom they call their foes?" Michael asked. "If that is freedom I would call chains preferable. And what if they resist? What if... if the Princess Romana were to escape and raise her standard in some other city, will you destroy that too?"
Miranda hesitated. "Yes! Yes, I would, for the good of Pelarius, for the good of the whole world, the Empire must be destroyed."
"Good for whom? Not for the people who live in peace beneath the Empire's protection."
"Those self-same people are ground to dust beneath the Empire's tyranny," Miranda spat. "The Empire cares nothing for any of them; they will all be killed when the time is right. At least if I kill them their deaths will mean something."
"Yes," Michael agreed. "They will mean that you have become a monster, little sister."
"Monster?" Miranda shrieked. "Prince Antiochus was a monster, Princess Romana will become one if ever she gets her hands on power. Proud Lord Commenae, sly Helen Manzikes, these are the monsters, not me. I'm fighting the monsters for everybody, like Aurelia did before me. I killed Prince Antiochus," Miranda gasped. "I burned him alive and I would do it again if I had to. They are all monsters, and I will kill them all and burn this lair of wolves to ashes so that no new cubs may ever arise to challenge my settlement and the tranquillity of the world. The wolves will never rise again." She laughed. "And what about you, First Sword of the Empire? I suppose you're not allowed to watch while the Empire falls. Will you kill me, if I do not repent?"
"I could never hurt you, our Miranda," Michael said. "No anointing by the Empress could change that. I will not harm you."
"Then go," Miranda snapped. "Go, quickly, before I must kill you too."
"You aren't thinking clearly, our Miranda," Michael said. "If you were yourself you would never do anything like this."
"They killed Portia!" Miranda yelled. "She was my friend. She was kind and romantic, sweet and gentle, she never hurt anyone, she just wanted love and laughter and happiness. And she was my friend, and they murdered her because she stood in their way. That's the kind of people that they are, that's why they have to pay, that's why I have to do this, that's why I can't stop. She was my friend and now she’s dead and it’s all their fault and…" she started to sob. “She was my friend.”
“And three of my friends gave their lives to bring me to this place,” Michael said. “Three friends dead to save the Empire; if Portia had died to destroy it I would say we had an irreconcilable clash of obligations, but I do not think that is the case. What did Portia die for?"
"Nothing," Miranda wailed. "She was killed because she was going to have a baby, and they couldn't allow that. It was so cruel, so pointless."
"Then why make it even crueler by adding more and more pointless deaths on top of hers?" Michael said.
"I am honouring her," Miranda said. "I am building a funeral pyre worthy of an Empress."
"And loading it with human sacrifices," Michael said harshly. "Is that how you will birth a new world into being? Look past the lords and the princes, and see the people of this city, if you know them. Have you been in the slums? Have you visited the hospitals? Have you so much as stopped in Andronicus' Square to watch folk perform for pennies?"
"No," Miranda confessed.
"One of my friends, one of those three who gave her life in battle for the Empire, was named Tullia. She grew up in the Subura, poor and sick, without any food but what she could steal. But she found honour in the service of the Empire, and devoted herself to the protection of her master. She was brave and loyal and honourable, and she died fighting fiercely for everything she held dear. Her sister dwells in this city still, a young girl, frail and weak, yet all the same so kind, so gentle. Does that little girl deserve to die? Is she a monstrous beast bent upon ravaging the world? What of the nurse, the street magician and the acrobat who protect her? I do not think them wild and ravenous wolves, merely poor folk who have room yet in their hearts for charity in spite of all the ills they must contend with. Or what of Elissa, a girl in the Metic's Quarter, who would do more and be more in her life than lie beneath men as her mother did? What is her crime, that she has earned a death sentence? I will not deny that there are men in this city deserving of death, I will not deny that there are those possessed of more vices than they have virtues, but they are outnumbered tenfold at least by those whose hearts are good, whose intent is pure, and who live each day obedient to their gods. Is that so terrible?"
"No, but," Miranda shook her head wildly. "They are complicit in the Empire's crimes; their peace is bought with the deaths of others."
"Deaths long past, most of them, and irreversible in any case, even for you," Michael said. "And even if that were a cause for guilt, what should they do? Sell all their belongings, leave their homes and dwell in the dust under the open sky so that nothing tainted with conquest or crime may pollute their flesh? That is absurdity, and all those people you claim to be freeing suffer that same guilt, being born under the same flag of the same Empire.
"Nobody deserves this, our Miranda," Michael said. "But most of all you do not deserve to do this to yourself. From one who knows: if you do this, it will stay with you forever. Please, I beg you not to hurt yourself that way. Please stop this."
"Why should I, I'm not hurting anyone who matters." Miranda snapped.
"Yes, you are," Michael said quietly.
Miranda froze. Her eyes went wide. She spoke more slowly now, more hesitantly. "Even if everything you say is true, so long as this city survives...so long as the Empire survives, it will continue to spread pain throughout the world."
"No, it will not Miranda, I will not allow it," Michael said. "I give you my word, as I gave Gideon my word, that I will see the Empire made great and good again. Whatever I have to do I shall, I swear it to Turo."
Miranda was crying now. "I can't stop. I've gone too far. After what I've done...they'll kill me."
"No, they won't," Michael said. "I shall not allow that, either. First Sword or no I'll fight all the legions to keep you safe, Miranda. I...I know that I haven’t always been a very good brother. In fact I have more often been terrible than not, but trust me now, please. Trust me when I say that what you are doing is wrong. Trust me when I say that you have to stop. And trust me when I say that I will keep you safe and shelter you from any consequence."
Miranda turned away from him, looking out across the burning city. Michael could still hear the anguish in her voice. "Aurelia was given these powers to defend humanity from the Eldest One. Why was I given them, if not for this?"
"The Empire has no need to be scourged with magic, it needs to be pulled up by the bootstraps and recalled to dignity and honour," Michael said. "Miranda, I shall not pretend I know why you have this magic, but I do know that you're destiny - and you do have a destiny, and a great one, I know that for a certainty for all that the destiny itself is yet uncertain - is not to wage magical war upon the Empire. Perhaps the Eldest One will escape his prison once again, perhaps the sky will be torn in two and some greater evil still will des
cend from out of the void intent on devouring the whole world, perhaps the dragons will return full of fury and a thirst for blood. There will come a time to unleash all your magic, but that time has not yet come."
For a moment, Miranda was silent. "Those people you talked about, you didn't make them up, did you?"
Michael could not restrain a chuckle. "No. One of them, Vergillia, came with me and is waiting downstairs. You can meet them all, if you come with me."
Miranda did not move. "Portia thought of me as a sister."
"Then live for her, and let all of the fine qualities she embodied show forth in your actions, as I try to be guided each day by the unflinching steadfastness of Filia Tullia, the reckless daring of Princess Fiannuala, the selfless devotion of Gideon, my father," Michael said. "If you live for her, then you may meet again in the next world and there you may share the years that were denied to you in this. But if you will kill for her, then you will be forever sundered when the Maelstrom or the Black Abyss await you."
For a moment Miranda stood still as stone, tall and proud. Then with a loud sob she slumped forward. "I'm sorry, Portia. Gods, I'm so sorry."
Michael caught her before she could fall. "I have you, little sister. You are safe now, I promise."
"I want to go home," Miranda wailed.
Michael looked down. "I doubt that is possible, our Miranda, for any of us. Though there are times when I wish it was. But I have no doubt that you will find a new home, a new place, with Filia Octavia, who loves you well."
Spirit of the Sword: Faith and Virtue (The First Sword Chronicles Book 2) Page 52