The Last Plutarch

by Tom O'Donnell

  “You probably think that’s clever. Once, I would have trembled before you. But you’re not the demigod I thought you were. You’re not even the lion you think you are. You’re just a sad, spoiled, selfish man-child whose only claim to worth is access to the Fog. You’re not in the Fog anymore, however, and if you don’t help me here, someone is going to begin removing things from your body, and if you still don’t help, I’ll have no use for you, and you’ll be given to the rat-men who live beneath the earth.”

  Gallatius was unfazed.

  “Bold. Self-righteous. But still just a Plebian out of his depth. You think because you were lied to that you have a monopoly on suffering. To live is to suffer. The lies protected you. Now your shield is gone. Were you not clothed and sheltered by the Fog? Lived with your family? Had your friends? Plebians live charmed lives. It’s the cloudborn who bear the burdens of truth. That’s why I like to take one of you now and then and show you how uncaring the world really is. Show you how God doesn’t have Chosen. Show you there is no God who gives a shit. Like your friend Swan. The veil has been lifted from her eyes. Shouldn’t you thank me for showing her the truth?”

  Slowly, Meric stood and turned to leave the steamcar. Azog was waiting just outside. Gallatius must have known he meant to carry out his threat, because he called after Meric at the door, even as he affected resignation, as though he were doing him a favor.

  “You have to task patterns. Run programs. Holes in a net, for instance. You form the outline of one hole, and you wrap the right end to the left to form a loop, and you layer a number into the loop. The number of repetitions. Your implant is built to recognize certain symbols…”

  Meric listened.

  Afterwards, in Ozymand, he experimented with the new information. It was difficult. He tried to remember exactly how the faux water had felt in Issenian’s palace, the glowing patterns of energy that had broiled within. It took him an hour to get the simplest loop to run, but after that his progress was exponential. He transmitted simple programs that made sweeping changes to texture and malleability. He looped experimental patterns that formed twisting tendrils a hundred meters long. He was a child with the clay of creation; each experiment yielded thrilling discoveries. Even so, he returned to Gallatius three times the first day. The second day, creating clothes proved tricky, and he visited four times.

  The Plutarch peppered his instructions with snide comments, which Meric mostly ignored. Back in Ozymand, he lost track of time. The outside world faded. He zoned in until he could barely distinguish the Fog from his body. Later, he was only dimly aware of his exhaustion. Goods mounted in piles. He created a wheeled cart to carry them to the lift.

  The steamcar was filled by the third night, but more goods were needed. Gallatius was removed from the vehicle, and two of the savages led the mammoth away. They returned the next night, the steamcar emptied–somewhere out there, Bloodrats had swarmed out the ground to unload the goods.

  By the seventh night, two more loads had been delivered as payment, and Meric was making a few things for Red Oak. In the end, only two items remained: the atomblades and a statue of the Goddess.

  An atomblade requires a highly precise structure, Trajan had said.

  Meric came to understand just how precise. He tried in vain to refine the shape to the proper level, but his Fog-sense didn’t extend to such a miniscule resolution. The blades he constructed were no sharper than an average knife.

  “Quite right. This will never penetrate fogplate,” Gallatius said when Meric consulted him. Azog was holding the blade out for the Plutarch to examine. Meric almost winced at the words.

  Penetrate fogplate? Blood of Marthuk. I’m making blades to kill my friends.

  Gallatius read his reaction.

  “Oh, yes. Isn’t that what you want, Meric? A blade that can kill Panchaea’s finest soldiers? Men you once stood with? How many will die as a result of your efforts here? Go ahead, ask me again. Ask how to make an atomblade. I promise I’ll tell you.”

  Meric’s eyes went cold. He was a hair’s breadth from strangling the Plutarch. He wanted to watch the smile leave his eyes, feel the man’s throat compress beneath his fingers. He eased the tension out of his hands. He would figure it out on his own. Slowly, he got to his feet.

  “Do you know why you’re going to lose in the end?” the Plutarch asked. “You care too much about rules. Make a blade and all you can think about is who it’s meant for–when all that matters is that it’s not meant for you. If you were going to win, you’d already know that. You wouldn’t even think about it. Winners only care about winning. People like you don’t win. You’re not bred to win. You’re bred to obey. And if you do win, it’ll be because somewhere along the line, you stopped being yourself–and became me.”

  Gallatius’s smile was full of teeth.

  As much as he didn’t want to admit it, the words touched a fear in Meric’s heart. The Plutarchs would shield themselves with their faithful pawns. Plebian deaths would outnumber Plutarch casualties in any battle. Savage deaths would be higher still. If Panchaea could ever be taken, it would cost its rulers least of the three–even if it cost them everything. Meric now knew the power of the Fog. How much would he be willing to sacrifice to keep that power? How much of himself–and how much of others?

  He made the atomblades regardless–through angry, stubborn determination, without Gallatius’s help. The key was to apply a program along the blade’s edge, causing the Fog to mold itself into recursively thinner layers. His first few dozen attempts failed. The layers came out too thin or too thick or ran through one another, creating brittle double-edges. He honed the speed and feel of the program until it came together just right. The resulting blade was sharpened to a near-molecular level.

  Then all that remained was the statue of the Goddess.

  Meric puzzled over this last. It was less practical than the others, with no definitive shape. Fortunately, sculpting in the Fog was as easy as applying the thought. He wreathed the Goddess in vines. Her feet were the roots of trees. Her wild hair was as yellow as the sun. He lost himself in the work. He had no idea how long it took. A mild delirium set in. When it was done, he was proud of the effort.

  It was the last item. He would have to leave the Fog again. Go back to that other life. Be a captive and not a demigod. But there was no helping it. When he couldn’t delay any longer, he sighed and accompanied his guards back to the lift, lessening himself, diminishing, feeling the Fog fade into the distance.

  Aboveground, there was a surprising amount of sunlight left … until Meric realized the sun was in the wrong place. He’d worked straight through the night. The savages were eating breakfast. They examined the new wares. Picking up an atomblade, Azog looked at him with a hint of a smile. Meric felt unexpected pride at his tacit approval–and then shame, because this was, after all, the same man who’d killed Horus. What would his old friends think of him now? Would they think he’d betrayed them? How very far he was from his old self, his old life.

  Nog picked up the statue. His squirrel materialized and ran down his arm to sniff it.

  “This was supposed to be a statue of the Goddess, not Meliai,” he said.

  Meric’s lips froze in the act of forming words. He’d tried to make something beautiful, natural, wild, and sacred. He’d ended up with Meliai. Nog chuckled.

  “Passing effort though. What’s this? And this? These weren’t on the list,” Nog said, holding an ornately formed pipe in one hand and a necklace in the other. Dangling from the necklace were elongated pyramidal diamonds.

  “The pipes are for you and Azog. The necklaces are for Hestia and Meliai–if she’ll take it. I doubt she will, from me. Maybe you can deliver it. I have some others in there. If you don’t want them, trade them for yams or wine or whatever you’ll need for the winter.”

  Nog studied him. He tucked the pipe away into his leather pouch. Later, on the journey back, Meric looked among the goods on the steamcar. Azog and most of the others
had taken their gifts. A few, like Hestia, had refused, perhaps suspicious of Meric’s intent or the hidden evils of his sorcery. At least they didn’t feed him whitecrowns again.

  *

  On the trip back, Meliai dominated Meric’s thoughts. That had been more or less true since the day he’d met her, but he’d repressed the topic as often as not. Now his need for her was irrepressible, magnified by the knowledge that she would never be his; that Trajan’s death had made anything more impossible. When he slept, he dreamt of her–only to wake in an agony of bitter longing. His desire was a fever that wouldn’t break; one he wouldn’t have parted with even if he could, though it pained him utterly.

  Swan wasn’t excluded from his thoughts. Meric loved her, but more in the way that he loved Dominus or Reed. He couldn’t engage her with the ease he once had. Their experiences had opened a chasm between them, and now their attitudes diverged as well. Swan had suffered terribly, but she hadn’t caused others to suffer. She was free to break with the past. Meric, on the other hand, felt like a great dark hand pressed upon his every waking moment, smothering him with guilt and self-loathing.

  He longed, if not for Meliai, then for the Fog again–for the escape, the creative powers, the expanded senses. He wanted to turn around and return to Ozymand. Or he wanted to speed ahead to look for Meliai in Red Oak. He wanted to be anywhere but where he was, in the steamcar with that smirking bastard of a Plutarch. Perhaps he’d ask Diodorus (who he still couldn’t think of as his father) about Trajan’s so-called plan when he got back … but what if there was no plan? He wasn’t ready to crush that last flake of hope. He wondered if–

  The steamcar jerked to a halt as a savage tugged the mammoth’s guide-reins.

  Meric sat up. Gallatius’s eyebrows climbed. Hestia and Nog were in the steamcar too. Hearing shouts, Nog ran outside. Without waiting for permission from Hestia, Meric followed. Wispy black clouds wafted high above the trees. They were near the base of the mountain which supported Red Oak Grove. A campfire smell permeated the area. Ahead lay a shallow stream. Stumbling toward them, tripping in the water, was Diodorus. A Bloodrat ran beside him, pulling him up as he fell–the same pale-eyed, baby-faced tribesman who’d met Meliai in the graveyard. Behind the pair, pursuing them through the trees on the lower slope of the mountain, were twenty Plebian legionnaires.

  CHAPTER 20

  Meric’s escort numbered nine–an auspicious number among the People. Eight ran at the pentacrus headed their way. The ninth, Hestia, exited the steamcar with her blade drawn, grabbed Meric by the collar, and threw him back against the vehicle.

  “Inside,” she snarled. Her eyes were dangerous, volatile.

  “Give me a weapon. Let me help,” Meric said, holding up his bound wrists.

  “One word…” Hestia breathed.

  Would she really cut him down? Probably. Meric stepped up into the steamcar. Hestia slammed the door. It was foolish–the enemy would kill him too if they could–but Hestia didn’t trust him. He couldn’t blame her. Meric peered out the front half-wall, but the mammoth blocked his view. Shouts, clashes, and howls of pain filtered through. He paced the chamber.

  “This doesn’t seem to be part of the plan,” Gallatius commented. Meric ignored him.

  Nine against twenty. It wasn’t enough. The tribesmen were fierce fighters, and his escorts were well-armed, but they didn’t drill as a unit. Against a larger, more disciplined formation, what chance did they have? He had to do something–but what? The Plebians would’ve already been told he was a doppelganger or an evil sorcerer. They wouldn’t listen to a word he said. It was as if the truth was a virus, and the Plutarchs had inoculated their troops.

  The door banged open. A helmeted soldier was looking up at him, atomblade and shield in hand. The man tensed in recognition–then leapt onto the first step and thrust at Meric. Meric sprang to one side, dove forward, and tackled him through the door. The man flung his arms out. His blade sliced through the wall of the steamcar as they fell. They hit the grass hard. Meric’s momentum saw him summersaulting over the man’s helmet. Both men scrambled back to their feet. Meric capered backwards as the atomblade almost cut him in half. The return swing made an upward arc. He half-dove, half-fell beneath it. The man was fast…

  And then he wasn’t.

  The soldier’s third swing was drunken, half-hearted. His hand went to his throat. He took a wobbly sidestep. He collapsed in the grass, convulsing. Meric stared, dumbfounded.

  The tooth.

  His false tooth must’ve been crushed in the fall. Mouthguards were attached inside every helmet to prevent such a thing, but either the legionnaire’s hadn’t been in or it had popped free when they’d hit the ground. A fatal mistake.

  Meric split his wrist-rope along the legionnaire’s blade and pulled the weapon from the dead man’s grasp. He looked around. Something was different. The main battle was twenty to thirty meters away. Two men were on the ground by Azog, who pressed another with the whirlwind of his hammer. Nog and Hestia fought nearby. More than one savage was down…yet there more combatants now. Far more.

  Bloodrats.

  Everywhere he looked, men in hooded fur cloaks pressed the Panchaeans. They fought with long, curving blades strapped to their forearms–the same type of weapon Meric had made in Ozymand. No, better than those he’d made. Some were penetrating Fog-armor. Somehow, they had atomic edges. A blowgun was tucked into each Bloodrat’s belt, holding darts dipped in knockout-poison, but they were useless against fogplate.

  The Panchaeans were attempting to fall back into a defensive formation. During the offensive, they’d spread out in twos and threes. Now the fighting was too hectic to regroup. They were being overwhelmed. One was closer than the others. A Bloodrat had just slumped to the ground at the end of his blade. The legionnaire looked up to see Meric standing by the steamcar. He wore the matte gray fogplate of a common soldier … which meant he’d answered a Calling, run the Noose, taken meals in the barracks with his fellows. Maybe even rejoiced at Meric’s Triumph.

  “There’s no need to die here,” Meric said, feeling a touch of déjà vu.

  The Plebian ran at him. Their blades came together. It was easier than he might’ve thought. Like another training exercise. He could focus on his technique, letting his body move instead of his mind. He’d killed men before. Savages. But only when he hadn’t known any better; when they’d been less than human, and his rationalizations had been as layered as an onion. This was different. Here was an enemy who only did his duty, who put his faith in the Plutarchs, who believed he was doing the right thing. An enemy who was, for all intents and purposes, exactly what Meric had been.

  An enemy, a friend, a neighbor.

  Meric hadn’t practiced in weeks. It didn’t matter. There was a reason he’d nearly made First Bladesman. His body did its job. His muscles executed their programs. When the movements were done, the atomblade went in beneath the legionnaire’s left arm. The man went rigid, gripping Meric’s arms, slumping against him.

  The battle was at an end. There were no Plebians left standing–except Meric and Diodorus. Four of Meric’s nine escorts were dead, as were several Bloodrats. Others were wounded. Azog, Nog, and Hestia lived, though the giant would have more scars, and a gash had been opened across Nog’s forehead.

  Hestia strode toward Meric, dark eyes hateful.

  “Drop it,” she said.

  Meric shrugged and tossed the atomblade in the grass. He bent to the dead Plebians and removed their helmets. The poison-swallower was blotchy and purple, his face swollen, dried foam around his mouth. The other was no older than Meric himself, pale and empty-eyed.

  More men who’ve died for the Plutarchs. Men I’ve killed for the Plutarchs.

  A wail from Azog drew his attention. The giant had gone to one knee, head bowed. Meric had never seen him so. Nog laid a hand on his shoulder. The others were similarly dejected. Hestia joined them. At first, Meric thought it was grief for those who’d died. But it was someth
ing more. Something bigger.

  “…the outer huts first. They were in the village almost before the smoke hit the sky. We had no warning,” Diodorus said.

  The savages were in a semicircle around him–around my father. Meric still couldn’t reconcile the label with reality. Suddenly he connected Diodorus’s words with the campfire smell. And the smoke, high and widespread, hours or days old, drifting above the mountain.

  “What are you saying?” Meric asked, coming closer.

  “Red Oak is lost. Burnt. Those that weren’t killed were driven out,” Diodorus said.

  “How many dead?” Hestia demanded.

  “I don’t know. Two hundred? Maybe more.”

  Hestia swayed on her feet.

  “Blood of the Holy Goddess…”

  “Two hundred…” Nog whispered. Mobius had burrowed out of his pack and climbed onto a shoulder to investigate, but Nog took no notice.

  Meric tried to imagine the news coming out of Panchaea. The city’s population was much higher, much denser, but even then everyone was connected. With that many dead, you were bound to lose an acquaintance, a friend, a relative. In a little village like Red Oak, the scale of the loss was unthinkable. The homes were gone as well. The tree-houses. The bridges. The huts and the fields. Up in smoke.

  “Where’s Meliai?” Meric asked, afraid to learn the answer.

  “Don’t know. She wasn’t in Red Oak when the attack began,” Diodorus said, shaking his head.

  “Malthenian?” Azog asked, head still bowed.

  “He lives. Thanks to Rune and his friends here.”

  Diodorus clapped a hand on the shoulder of the pale-eyed Bloodrat. Rune’s gaze went to Meric. There was something unreadable there. Azog dragged himself to his feet and withdrew a stalk of demongrass. His face became a mask. The demongrass could only mean one thing: he expected to fight again.

  “How could there be no warning?” Nog asked. “Scouts ring the mountain. Hermits, outcasts, small families–they’re spread through the forest. We have people watching Panchaea.”