The Burning Isle

by Will Panzo

  “His capture means the rebellion is over.”

  “Not his capture, his death.”

  “Forgive me, Master. I misspoke.”

  “You made a good point, boy,” Master Gallard said. “Although I’m certain you didn’t mean to. This isn’t the first time Governor Tulloch has captured Centurion Balthus. Two years ago, he arrested the man for trying to foment rebellion. He made Balthus pay a fine and released him after a few months spent in the copper mines, thinking some hard work had taught the man his lesson.

  “When his old soldiers saw the way Balthus had been treated, they rallied to his cause by the hundreds. If the governor could treat a loyal servant of Antioch such as Balthus so cruelly, what would he do to a common man, they wondered. Later, about six months into the fighting, Tulloch routed Balthus at Shatterspear Pass. Most of the rebels managed to retreat, but Tulloch captured Balthus and his honor guard. He crucified the men, leaving them to die in the harsh winter cold, but Balthus didn’t die. No one knows how he survived. There are rumors, of course, but only the good commander here knows for certain. So when you say that Balthus’s capture signals the end of the rebellion, you again have made the mistake Tulloch made.”

  “I see,” Numerius said.

  “Do you?” The light of the flames seemed to twist around Master Gallard, reaching for him but unable to touch him, a familiar sight from the hundreds of duels Numerius had witnessed on the Isle. In this new light, the trappings of the man’s outfit disappeared, and he no longer resembled a common mercenary, willing to kill for drink and plunder, but instead became a Master spellcaster again.

  “I believe so.”

  “Do you think this war mattered?” Master Gallard asked.

  Numerius was silent.

  “To Governor Tulloch and Centurion Balthus, I’m certain it did,” Master Gallard continued. “But as a study of war, nothing of consequence transpired here. Two armies fought. Sometimes well, often poorly, and in the end, the force that was better equipped, better positioned, and considerably larger won. In a few years’ time, everyone will have forgotten there even was a war. Everyone but you, boy.”

  Master Gallard sprang forward. He grabbed Numerius by the back of his neck and squatted, pulling the boy with him, until both were inches from the face of the dying centurion.

  “This is the face of a man who can’t be reasoned with,” Master Gallard said. “A man who can’t be stopped, short of death. Tulloch twice let him live, and instead of walking away with his life, this man returned stronger and more determined. This is why you must never wound an enemy. You must destroy them completely. Remember this.”

  Numerius looked over the centurion. He would not live to see the light of morning, Numerius was sure of that. Even a man as dull as the governor was not likely to make the same mistake three times. The lesson Master Gallard wished him to learn was plain to see, writ on the broken body of the man. But Numerius thought he saw something else as well.

  The centurion had fought bravely and as best he could, leaving pieces of himself on every battlefield of the war, yet still he soldiered on. Looking down on him, Numerius thought that sometimes, the ruin of a thing was remarkable in itself.

  14

  It was dark inside the looted storefront. Cassius sat in the front room and peered between the slats of a boarded-up window, surveying the Market by the light of the fires consuming it. Behind him, Vorenicus lay unconscious on the floor, amidst bolts of shredded silk and broken wine bottles, overturned pots of spices whose heady fragrances hung thick in the cramped room. From time to time, Vorenicus stirred. His eyes fluttered. He groaned. When he spoke, he called for his mother or uttered words too soft for Cassius to hear. And once, while Cassius was kneeling over him, Vorenicus opened his eyes and stared up at Cassius and reached.

  “Father,” he called. “Father.” Then he shut his eyes again.

  The hearing in Cassius’s left ear was still impaired and half his face numb. When he felt the familiar queer sensation work across his scalp, he walked to the back room and lay on the floor and waited for the fit to overtake him.

  In the other place, he heard the low voice calling to him again, calling him by his true name. It was a man’s voice, speaking in a strange language but one he understood.

  “Let me die,” he told the voice.

  He could feel the presence of the voice near him. It was like the sensation of being watched.

  “You don’t want to die,” the voice said.

  In the dark, he could feel his body but not its place in the world or its relation to other objects, yet it seemed the voice was calling from behind him and drawing closer.

  “I failed her again. All the years, all that I thought I had become. It wasn’t enough.”

  “You are confused.” The voice was strong. It shook his bones.

  “No.”

  “What happened to her happened long ago.”

  “It happened again today,” Cassius said.

  “Today was different.”

  “I wanted to be her hero.”

  “You will be. You are something great and terrible now.”

  He felt a tremor pass through him. He heard his own groan, distant and strained.

  “You thought you were dead, and you should be dead,” the voice said. “There are hundreds of dead outside. But you live. What does that mean?”

  “It means that it is not my time.”

  “A lesson you learned years ago.”

  “Yes.”

  “But sometimes a reminder is in order.”

  “Yes.”

  “You know what must be done when you wake,” the voice said. “You have come too far to abandon this road. The time spent training, the sacrifices, the struggle, what was it for if not to bring you to this very moment?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “You do know. You know what I am going to say before I say it. But still you want me to say it, and so I will. You die when you flee your true path. Until then, there is nothing in this mortal world to stop you.”

  “How can you know that?”

  “Because it was true for me.” The voice seemed to waver.

  “Who are you?”

  “You know the answer.” The voice was far away now, fading.

  “Attus?”

  • • •

  His chin was wet with spit when he woke. His head ached, as did his jaw. The ringing in his ears was low, and beneath it, he heard whispers. He saw the world through unfocused eyes, a soup of browns and grays. When his vision cleared, the world took on a pointed sharpness, as though his eyes had carried defects before but were now set right.

  He found Vorenicus lying in stupor, as he had left him. He stood staring for a time, struggling to envision the way forward from here. That was the lesson he had learned on the Isle of Twelve, the importance of position and of projection. To anticipate the moves of an enemy, you had first to assess his position, assess it honestly, then judge the best action available to him.

  Who were his enemies now? Cinna and Piso both, after today.

  And how would each man react? There would follow a period of confusion as the bosses gathered information about the fight. Each would blame the other. Both would know Cassius was at fault, but they would not yet understand why. It was this small uncertainty that would allow him to stay a step ahead of both bosses.

  But where was he to go? There was no place in the city to hide. Every stranger would want him dead. He could disappear into the jungle, maybe meet with one of the lost Khimir tribes. But they were just as liable to kill him as an interloping Antiochi than welcome him as an ally.

  He looked again to Vorenicus. The way through was clear.

  • • •

  He left the looted storefront and found the square limned by starlight and fire. He walked with one arm hooked under Vorenicus�
��s shoulder, the legionnaire sagging heavily against him and his feet dragging in the lane.

  The fight in the center of the Market had ended with neither side a clear winner. After the skirmish, fires had burned uncontested for hours, and whole sections of the square were now ash.

  Cassius set his burned cloak on Vorenicus, to cover the legion uniform, and moved slowly, dragging Vorenicus with each step.

  Near the council hall, he spotted the young priest of the Vinalia order who had presided over the funeral rites of Piso’s nephew. His rose-colored robes were bloodstained, as was his face. He moved from corpse to corpse and at each body he bent and said a prayer.

  Cassius cut west toward the alleys leading from the Market. Outside a dilapidated storefront, a man stood loading bodies into a mule-drawn wagon. He was an old man and big, with a high forehead and thin gray hair. A dozen bodies lay at his feet, the ground beneath them foul with piss and blood, mounds of feces. As Cassius watched, the man lifted the body of a woman by the armpits and laid it over the lip of the wagon, bent forward, then hoisted the body up into the wagon.

  “Evening,” Cassius called.

  The man turned to face Cassius. His face was pockmarked and one eye milky with a cataract. The front of his tunic was stained, and he kept one hand behind his back.

  “Something I can do for you?” the old man asked.

  “You moving these bodies?”

  “Any of these your kin?”

  “No.”

  “Then what business is it of yours?”

  “Can I ride with you a bit?” Cassius asked. “My friend and I are hurt. I don’t know how far we’ll make it on foot. I’d be willing to pay.”

  The man looked to his cart. He looked down to the pile of bodies.

  “How much?” he asked.

  “Half a silver.”

  “That’ll do the job.” The man hooked a thumb at Vorenicus. “Is he dead?”

  “I don’t believe so.”

  “Good for him. Now help me with these here, and we’ll get moving twice as fast.”

  “I think I may have broken my hand.” Cassius lifted his hand, showed it as proof of its own dysfunction. He was aware of the pain, the constant droning ache that wracked his body, but it seemed detached from him. Or maybe the pain was with him, and it was his body that seemed detached.

  “How’s the other hand doing?” the old man asked.

  “Fine, I guess.”

  “Then give me one hand’s worth of help.” The old man turned and Cassius saw a cleaver tucked into his belt, at the small of his back. “Your friend there can ride in the back. It smells like hell itself, but I don’t imagine he’ll care.”

  “Would you think it strange if I asked to ride with him?”

  “I might.”

  “Would you object?”

  “I wouldn’t. Where you headed anyway?”

  “Hightown.”

  • • •

  The mule rode slowly, and twice the wheels of the wagon stuck in loose mud.

  In the back of the wagon, surrounded by the dead, Cassius wondered if he was not dead himself, and this entire scene some cruel trick to cross him into the afterlife while he yet thought himself alive. When the wagon stopped a third time, Cassius heard the old man climb down off his perch and the sackcloth covering drew back.

  “This is it,” the old man said.

  The streets were deserted and unlit. Cassius climbed out of the wagon, and the old man helped lower Vorenicus onto his shoulder. Cassius paid the man and thanked him, and the man acknowledged neither. He climbed back onto his cart and cursed his mule and whipped the animal once, and the mule started forward at a lazy trot, the wagon rocking side to side as it rolled, like a dog drying itself.

  The door in the stables was unlocked, and Cassius entered the bar silently. He placed Vorenicus on the pantry floor and walked out into the dim front room. He found a lit candle at the bar. He walked upstairs and checked first the guest room and found it empty, then checked Lucian’s room, where Lucian was snoring in bed.

  He called out, and Lucian sprang up shouting, eyes wide, hands clenched into fists.

  “Lucian, it’s all right. It’s Cassius.”

  Lucian punched the wall. “Goddamn it, boy. You’re going to give me a heart attack. Like a thief in the damn night you come to me.”

  Lucian wiped his eyes. He took up one of the wine bottles from his nightstand and found it empty. He rose from bed, naked in the soft light of the candle, and walked to the corner and stood urinating into a chamber pot. Cassius turned to leave.

  “Where are you going?” Lucian asked. “I need that light to piss by.”

  “Ever the gracious host.”

  “Maybe I’d have more time for niceties if you gave fair warning once in a while. Instead of dropping in on me whenever the hell it suits your purpose.”

  Lucian gathered a large tunic from a stool near the window. He shook the tunic and donned it, then wiped his hands on its sides. He crossed the room and stopped before Cassius.

  “You don’t look much the way I remember,” he said.

  “You doubt it’s the real me?” Cassius asked.

  “The real you?” Lucian stared down into Cassius’s face. “What could I use for comparison?”

  Lucian exited the room, his feet heavy on the wooden floorboards. He descended the steps to the bar, and Cassius followed.

  “You looking for a place to stay?”

  “That and one other thing,” Cassius said. “I’ve got someone with me.”

  Lucian stopped. “Someone with you? Why would you bring someone to my bar?”

  “I had nowhere else to go.”

  “Do you realize the position you’re putting me in?”

  “Relax.” Cassius had meant to sound calm, but the fear in him, the pain and rage and maddening uncertainty, twisted the word. He paused, composed himself. “I’ve got everything under control.”

  “Just like always, huh? Where is this stowaway?”

  “In the pantry.”

  Lucian walked behind the bar. He entered the pantry and squinted into the gloom. He motioned for Cassius and Cassius came close and, in the dim light of the candle, Lucian saw General Quintus’s wounded son lying on his floor.

  “Damn, boy,” he said. “I knew you’d make a dead man of me yet.”

  • • •

  The bean soup was cold, and the feeling of a full stomach discomforted Cassius. The wine was light, and he finished off a single mug to Lucian’s three.

  “You want more?” Lucian asked.

  “I’m not very hungry,” Cassius said.

  “How’s that hand?”

  “I think it’s broken.”

  “Let me see.”

  Cassius lifted his hand and Lucian accepted it with both of his own, as one might accept a large plate. He stared at it for a time, turned it over, inspected the palm. It was swollen and stiff, marred with nicks and cuts. Black grime was worked deep into the creases, and the fingernails were chipped and broken, with congealed blood in the cuticles.

  Lucian nodded, as though confirming a suspicion. He released the hand.

  “Is it broken?” Cassius asked.

  “How should I know?” Lucian poured the last of the wine into his mug and lifted the mug and tapped it against Cassius’s.

  “What are we toasting?”

  “To not trusting first impressions.” Lucian drained the mug.

  “When do you think Sulla will show?”

  “I don’t know. She was here for most of the day, waiting for you. But then she left after sundown.”

  “Will she be back before dawn?”

  “Either before dawn or after dawn, I should think. Or maybe never. She was talking of booking you passage on a ship off the island. Maybe she did the smart th
ing and kept the ticket for herself.”

  “I need you to send for a healer,” Cassius said. “He’s a Yoruban. He has a shop in the east end.”

  “What’s his name?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “You don’t know his name?”

  “He didn’t give it to me. I didn’t ask.” Cassius sighed. “Look, just—he’s a Yoruban spellcaster living in the east end. How many people fit that damn description?”

  “Okay,” Lucian said. “Relax. If he’s still alive, I’ll find him.”

  “Thank you.” Cassius stared into the hearth. No fire burned there, for fear that smoke might attract attention.

  “You still thinking about that?” Lucian asked after a while.

  “About what?”

  “About leaving.”

  “No.”

  “I guess business picked back up this morning.”

  “It has a way of doing that sometimes.”

  “Do you need me to tell you that I’m nervous about this arrangement?”

  “I’ve got it under control.” Cassius clenched and unclenched his injured hand.

  “Housing you is one thing,” Lucian said. “That’s a risk I took with my eyes open. Or about as open as they could be, dealing with a bastard like you. But this is something else.”

  “I’ve never done you any harm.”

  “Dragging Quintus’s near-dead son into my bar is harm on a scale you can’t imagine.”

  “Maybe you should see how this shakes out before you lose all faith in me.”

  “In you?” Lucian wiped wine from his lips. “Cassius the master plotter?”

  “Have I wronged you so far?”

  “A month ago, I was a bartender in a provincial town. I made an honest living, and no one bothered me. Now half my city is on fire with war. Look at the trouble you’ve caused here.”

  “The trouble I’ve caused?” Cassius’s face was weary, his eyes heavy-lidded.

  “Who if not you?”

  “A month ago, you were a retired mercenary from a failed rebellion. You lived in a refuge for debtors and criminals and exiles. Ruled by a bastard general with a bastard army. And governed by two crime bosses. All three with the blood of thousands on their hands. And yet you think I caused this trouble?”