by Will Panzo
“He used to take seizures on occasion,” the general continued. “Occupational hazard amongst our people, as you well know. When he came to, he liked to walk. Sometimes just a lap or two around the fort, or down to the docks and then back up to the gates in Hightown if he was in the city.”
“Alone?”
“Always alone.”
“I’ve felt that way sometimes,” the figure in white said.
“Once he wandered out into the jungle and didn’t come back. He was missing a full day. We found him in the ruins of a small village. Something like ten or twelve huts. He had burned it to ash, the villagers all killed.” Quintus paused. “He had decapitated the dead. A handful of people, some children. And when we came upon him, he was sitting in the dirt, making spears sharpened on both ends.”
“To post the heads around the village.”
Quintus nodded, his eyes cast to the side. “When I asked him why he had done it, he said he knew why he would succeed where the other legion commanders had failed. He knew the secret to ruling the savages.”
“And what was that?”
“They prefer their leaders mad.” Quintus rubbed his hands as though washing them. “They’re like the Antiochi in that way.”
“What’s the point of that story?”
“The point is,” the general said, “do you think you’re the scariest man that ever asked me to step outside?”
The figure in white did not respond.
“Come in here, dressed that way.” The general began pacing. “Talking of your work. You got a job to do? You got work still unfinished? Then do it. Be about your business.”
“We can discuss this outside.”
“Is that how you pictured this? You and I both with our gauntlets. Right here in the fort. Maybe even a ring, some circle dug into the ground. I bow to you. You bow to me. We salt the ring. A hard fight but fair, and the best man is the one left standing. Is that how you thought this would go?”
The figure in white stood silent.
“Wake up,” Quintus shouted. “This isn’t some goddamned fairy tale. In the real world, when you come to kill a man, sometimes he’s getting blown by a maid. And you have to look at him naked, realize he’s an old man. And sometimes he refuses to fight you.”
“I have—”
“What do you do then? Do you still try to kill him? Or do you jaw at him for hours, try to get him to put clothes on and step outside. And to what end anyway? To preserve your honor? Because you don’t want to kill someone unarmed, as though you haven’t done that before?”
No one spoke, and the sound of the fire was loud.
“Did I do something to you?” Quintus asked.
“You don’t know?”
“A man of my age and my inclinations, the list of people who want you dead gets so long, there’s no use keeping a list.”
The figure in white crossed the room to the chair where he had found the general. He slid the gauntlets across the floor with his foot. By the fire he could see the diviner’s set Quintus had played at the beginning of the night still ranged along the ground.
“Pick them up,” the figure in white said. “And defend yourself with them.”
“Or what?”
“Or I will kill you where you stand.”
“I don’t think you will.” Quintus leaned back. His head passed into shadow. “These are treacherous moral waters you find yourself in, boy. Especially a man who lives by the code you do. No guides out here. You’re all alone. Except for me.” Quintus’s teeth shone in the firelight.
“I don’t need advice from you.”
“Yes, you do. Out where we play, you and I, there’s no one around for miles. You’re scrambling right now. But let me make this easy for you. Lift your hand and burn me to ash. Do it right now, as I am. Or would you prefer to have this conversation when Galerius and the legion return?”
“The legion won’t be coming back.”
Quintus stiffened. “What does that mean?”
“Piso killed Galerius.”
“And about the legion?”
“Galerius marched the legion through a spellcaster cross fire in the Market. The part left standing is trapped in Lowtown, under siege by Piso’s men.”
“No,” Quintus whispered. “No, you lie, boy.”
“Not to you.”
Quintus moved to the desk. He opened a drawer and fished out the box of brown powder. He was mumbling to himself.
“That’s something Vorenicus would never have done,” the figure in white said, “getting your army killed off for you.”
“Vorenicus is dead,” Quintus roared. He hurled the box of powder, and it shattered against the wall.
“Just you and me left now. All alone.”
Quintus’s eyes dipped to where his gauntlets lay on the floor.
“Go on. Pick them up.”
“Who am I to you?” the general asked.
“You don’t know?”
“No. And that upsets you for some reason.”
“I’ll be outside.”
The figure in white stepped over the broken door and out into the small clearing beside the general’s quarters. The sun was beginning to rise, the sky still black, but with a strip of warm gold visible very low on the horizon. He did not wait long.
The general emerged from his quarters without his gauntlets. He was still naked and did not acknowledge the figure in white but instead moved past him, moving toward the northern gate.
“Where are you going?”
“To the jungle,” the general shouted over his shoulder. “To die in peace.”
The figure in white lifted his hand and aimed. A dark cloud formed overhead, and a smell like sulfur descended. The fireball shot from the sky with a great gust of wind and struck the statue.
He closed his eyes against the shower of dust, and when he opened them again, he saw the statue broken to the knees. Chunks of stone lay smoking at the base, and small fires had sprung up on the grass.
The general stopped. He turned and looked to the ruined statue. He crossed to the edge of the blast and continued on, walking barefoot through the rubble. He kneeled, pressing his hand to the base, then withdrawing it from the hot stone with a yelp of pain. He sank into himself, and his shoulders began to shake. He covered his face.
In the distance, a mastiff barked.
The figure in white looked away, not wanting to see Quintus that way, and the rock struck him on the side of his head. He reeled and nearly fell. He touched his hand to the spot above his right eye, and when he pulled it away, his gauntlet was streaked with blood.
He heard another rock sail by his ear. He looked and saw Quintus on his knees, arm cocked and with both hands full of stones. His face was red, eyes wet.
A rock struck his mouth. Blood spurted from his lip. He felt something solid on his tongue and spat a black tooth. Then he was running.
He tackled the general, and they fell together awkwardly. He landed on top, the general beneath him wiry and tough to pin. He felt as though he were wrestling a cat, as in control and as dignified.
“All those years spent on the Isle of Twelve, is this how you thought it would end?” Quintus stabbed a finger up into the cut above his eye.
The figure in white slammed his knee into the general’s ribs, and the general exhaled sharply. He mounted the general’s waist and gripped his throat with both hands. He squeezed, digging his thumbs into the soft flesh on the underside of the general’s jaw.
Quintus’s face was a violent red-purple. A blue vein throbbed in the middle of his forehead. He grabbed at the gauntleted hands throttling him, his fingers spread across the rainbow of jewels.
“I—I know,” Quintus gasped, his eyes beginning to close.
The figure in white eased his grip. He could feel Quintus’s throat spa
sm as it gulped for air.
“I know who you are now,” the general whispered.
“Say it.”
“You are—”
“Say it,” the figure in white shouted.
“You are Death, my deliverer.”
He squeezed tighter.
Quintus smiled faintly. “And Death, my avenger.”
He felt a thrumming in his chest. And then he felt nothing.
• • •
The figure in white lay trembling in the grass, the sound of his breathing ragged. The explosion had bowled him over backward and he was looking up at a dawning sky now. His eyes hurt when he blinked, a pain like ground glass sprinkled into the folds of his eyelids. He was numb through the rest of his body though, and he thought his back broken. Soon the numbness faded to a feeling of pinpricks and then to sharp cold pain.
He sat up. The general’s quarters were afire. Wisps of small flame had sprung up in the field, and a thin haze hung overhead. His tunic was shredded, soaked through with blood, his own and Quintus’s. Ribbons of burned skin dangled from his arms. He stood and walked to the general, each step shambling and painful.
The corpse lay with its hands on its chest, like a body composed for a viewing. Both hands were burned to the bone and the bones blackened, the fingers so near to dust that a stiff wind could have scattered them.
He nudged the corpse in the ribs with his foot. He felt something give.
He had pictured this moment many times before, but now he was here, and he was not sure what he should do next. He felt that maybe he should say something, but what was the point in that? There was no one to hear it, and he did not know what to say besides.
He stood staring for a little while longer, then he turned from that sight and headed toward the southern gate.
• • •
The sun was risen when he reached the city. There were no guards posted at the shattered gates, and huge fires still burned in the heart of Hightown. The streets were mostly empty. When he did pass people, they gave him a wide berth.
He made his way through the Market slowly. Cutpurses were moving about the bodies. Most anything of obvious value had been taken, but there were still gold teeth to be plucked and other small trinkets the night looters had missed in the dark. He caught sight of these people staring, watching him as vultures atop carrion might watch some wounded beast.
He collapsed against the base of the statue. He kissed the warm stone there, its surface stained with blood that had been wet only hours before. He closed his eyes and listened to the quiet of the Market. He fell asleep, and he did not dream.
He woke to find Sulla standing over him. She was nudging his foot with her own and staring down at him, horrified. She had two daggers tucked into her belt. Her hands were bloodied, and he wondered if this was his blood.
“I thought it was you,” she said. “Are you all right?”
“No,” he said.
“How long have you been here?”
“I was going to ask you the same.”
She looked around the square, glancing with furtive eyes.
“We’ve got to get you to a healer,” she said.
“Find the Yoruban.”
“Who the hell is the Yoruban?”
“In the east end. Charnel Row. He’ll come.”
“All right, then. It might take time. Everyone is scattered and hiding. I’m going to leave and come right back. Okay?”
“Okay.”
“Okay,” she said. “Give me your gauntlets.”
“Why?”
“Because if you fall asleep again, someone is going to take them.”
He tried to pull his left gauntlet off, but he was too weak. He held his hands up to her, and she slid off each gauntlet and cradled them.
“Why the hell are you dressed like this?” she asked.
“I am Death,” he said.
“What?”
“Death the deliverer. Death the avenger.”
“Don’t talk like that.”
He closed his eyes.
“Cassius?” she asked.
He shook his head.
She touched his face gently, her fingertips smeared with white paste and blood. He opened his eyes, and she looked at him, her gaze soft. She stared for a time. She smiled sadly.
“I’m sorry,” she said.
“I left you no choice.”
“I didn’t want them to hurt you or Lucian. I didn’t want anyone to get hurt.”
“You did the right thing.”
“And what happens now?”
He did not respond.
“I’ll find you a healer,” she said. “I’ll find the Yoruban.”
“Sulla.”
“Yes?”
“We’re free now, you and I and all the others,” he said. “The guilt. The pain. It’s all been made right now. It’s all finished.”
“Finished because of you?”
“Yes.”
“And was it worth it?”
He took a slow breath and opened his mouth to speak when a man with a club stepped from around the side of the statue and turned to face the prone figure, his back to Sulla. At this distance, she could see now that he was no man but a boy and big for his age, thick, and with a head covered in black stubble.
He lifted the club high. “For Junius,” he said. The boy swung the club, but before his strike hit, a spray of blood splashed Sulla’s face.
She shouted, wiped at her eyes. When her vision cleared, she saw the boy with the club slumped forward, a ragged wound in his back. A tall man stood astride the boy, his long red hair bound with gold rings and a jeweled kopis gripped tight in his massive, bloody hands.
The red-haired man shook the blood from his blade and sheathed it. He stepped forward and gathered the figure in white into his arms, hefted him over one large shoulder.
Sulla made to shout, and the red-haired man turned to face her. She stared into his eyes, and a queer sensation overcame her. She felt dizzy, unsteady on her feet.
The red-haired man smiled, his teeth glinting gold. “This man has a debt to me,” he said, as though an explanation were needed, as though law or custom applied here.
Sulla tried to speak but found herself voiceless. The red-haired man lifted the gauntlets out of her arms, one and then the other. He stared at her, as though waiting for some final protest, but she did not move. Nor did she say anything, so stunned was she.
The red-haired man turned calmly and walked off, gauntlets in one hand, the figure in white over his shoulder. He approached a wall of flame and, without slowing, stepped into it. Then he was gone, swallowed by smoke and fire.
After working in publishing and as an editor for Marvel Comics, Will Panzo found his true calling as a physician assistant for an emergency department. The Burning Isle is his first novel. He lives and works in New York City.
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