The Guns of Empire

by Django Wexler

  Be honest. There had been one night, with Bobby, when they huddled under a single blanket beneath the endless starry sky of the Great Desol. She’d thought—what? Nothing particularly coherent, anyway. And nothing had come of it. When Bobby returned from Khandar, she’d had then-Lieutenant Marsh in tow, and in retrospect Winter had been a little harder on the man than he’d really deserved. But that was all.

  So what am I doing? Cyte was utterly unlike Jane. Dark hair instead of red, lithe and thin against Jane’s ample curves. Calm, collected, and ever so rational against Jane’s fire, the passion and violence that lurked just below the surface all the time. But part of Winter wanted to see if that rationality could be teased apart, if there was something more primal lurking underneath it. I want to see her—

  Damn. Brass Balls of the fucking Beast. I am way too fucking drunk. Winter staggered to her feet just long enough to make it to the bedroll. The world will make more fucking sense in the morning.

  —

  In the morning the world was fuzzy around the edges and the sun was far too bright. Winter crawled out of her tent in search of coffee and found a ranker waiting at attention. She squinted.

  “What is it?”

  “From Captain Forester, sir,” the woman said. “She said that you wanted to be told when the prisoner was awake.”

  “She’s up already?” Hanna had thought the girl might sleep for days. “Damn. I’d better go.” Winter hesitated, smelling the brew over a nearby fire. Hell, what’s the point of being a general if you can’t boss the rankers around? “When that coffee’s done, bring a mug or two along for me, will you?”

  The ranker grinned. “Of course, sir.”

  Winter made her way through the camp to the cutter’s tent they’d cleared out for the mystery girl. Six armed men from Sevran’s Second Regiment guarded it, having replaced the detail that had been there all night. If Winter’s orders had been obeyed, a dozen more were waiting within easy earshot, ready to raise the alarm if the patient tried anything strange. Like cutting men in half with a wave of pure magic, say.

  Bobby waited at the tent flap, holding it open with one hand and saluting with the other. “Morning, sir.”

  “Morning. When did she wake up?”

  “Just a few minutes ago, sir, while I was in here checking on her.” Bobby lowered her voice. “I can feel her, too. I think her demon’s a strong one.”

  Bobby’s situation was unusual, as far as Winter understood it. Feor, who bore the demon, had granted her the use of its power, which meant that she had the ability to sense demons to a certain degree but barely registered as one herself. Even when Winter was standing next to her, Infernivore didn’t so much as twitch. Or so Winter had gathered—Bobby had spent time with Feor learning the basics on the long trip back from Khandar, while Winter had rushed ahead with Janus to get herself involved in the revolution.

  “Let me talk to her alone, so she won’t feel threatened,” Winter said. “But stay just outside. If I need you, I’ll scream.”

  “I’ll be waiting, sir.”

  Winter stepped inside the tent. It was large, for a single patient, with three poles and several unoccupied bedrolls. The girl had been given army-issue trousers and a shirt closer to her size. To Winter’s surprise, she was sitting up, shirt pulled up a few inches to examine the bandages wound around her midsection. She looked up as Winter entered. Hollow cheeks and dark circles under her eyes made her exhaustion clear, though she seemed alert.

  “I made a bet with myself,” the girl said, without preamble. “About where I’d be when I woke up. Assuming I woke up at all.” She looked around the cutter’s tent and hugged her shoulders. “I guess I won.”

  “We’re back at my camp,” Winter said. “This is the Second Division of the Grand Army of Vordan. I’m Winter Ihernglass.”

  “You’re in charge?”

  “Of this division. First Consul Vhalnich is in command of the army. Queen Raesinia is here, too.”

  “Quite the assembly,” the girl said. “I’m Alex. You saved my life, I guess.”

  “I may have,” Winter said. “Our cutter Hanna did most of the saving, though. Are you feeling better?”

  “Still a little light-headed,” Alex said. “And there’s a chunk missing from my side. But better than I have for days, which tells you something.”

  Winter sat down, cross-legged, beside the bedroll. “I don’t even know where to start. Who are you? Everyone I’ve met who is . . . like us, you understand?” She glanced around at the tent walls, which were not far away and not terribly thick. “They all worked for the Church.” Winter lowered her voice. “The Penitent Damned. I assume you’re not one of them, because you’re not trying to kill me.”

  “I’m not,” Alex said. “Of course, that’s exactly what I would say if I were one of them, to gain your trust. Right?” She raised an eyebrow and shrugged. “I saw the guards. You’re not stupid. I don’t blame you. But I’m not with the Church. They’d like to have me locked up, in fact. For a long time I thought I was the only one, until I ran into the Penitent Damned.”

  Winter winced. “They caught you?”

  “You might say that,” Alex said. There was pain in her voice, and Winter let it lie for now. Time for that later.

  “Hanna tells me you’re lucky to be alive.”

  “I had a run-in with a Murnskai patrol on the way here.” Alex shifted, wincing. “Remind me to thank her.”

  “You said you were looking for us. For Janus.”

  Alex nodded.

  “Why?”

  “Because the priests are telling everyone he’s sworn to destroy the Church.” She shrugged. “And I won’t pretend that the chance to get back at them doesn’t come into it, either. I owe them quite a bit of that.”

  There was a long pause. Alex cocked her head.

  “You don’t trust me,” she said.

  “Would you, in my situation?” Winter said.

  “I suppose not.” She spread her hands. “All I can give you is my word.”

  “So when Janus asks me what you’re doing here, what should I tell him?”

  “Tell him I want to help.” She raised a hand, then winced. “A demonstration may have to wait until I’ve had a little more rest. But trust me when I say I can be useful. And all I want in return is the chance to take Elysium down.”

  “That’s all?” Winter said, with a slight smile.

  “Well, a cushy government job with a nice salary wouldn’t go amiss, either. But mostly revenge.”

  There was something disarming about her honesty. Winter smiled back and got to her feet. “All right. For now concentrate on getting well. I hope you won’t be offended if I keep some guards around. We can discuss where you go next when you’re healed.”

  “Do what you need to.” Alex lay back carefully and put her head on her pillow.

  “Bobby—Captain Forester—and my staff officer Captain Cytomandiclea know about . . . all of this, but none of the others do. I’d appreciate it if you kept it that way.”

  “Of course. I don’t know about you, but I’ve spent my whole life hiding what I am.” Alex smiled weakly. “Honestly, talking about it to anyone feels strange. Like taking off my clothes in public.”

  “Let’s try to avoid that,” Winter said. “I’ll let you know when I’ve spoken to Janus. He may want to meet you.”

  Alex waved a hand regally. “I’ll try to make time in my schedule.”

  —

  “Interesting,” Janus said. “You’re certain she carries a demon?”

  “It’s not something you can fake,” Winter said. “Not up close, anyway. Infernivore . . . reacts.”

  “But she didn’t say what sort of power it grants her?”

  “She was remarkably closemouthed. But Corporal Forester agrees that it’s a powerful one.”

  “D
o you think she’s telling the truth?” Janus tapped his grease pencil thoughtfully on the big map at the center of the command tent. “About hiding from the Church?”

  “It seems . . . plausible,” Winter said. “I can understand how a demon-host could hear the rumors and think of taking shelter with us. But there’s more she’s not telling us.”

  “Being on the run does inculcate the habit of secrecy,” Janus said. “All right. Keep her with us for now, with all appropriate precautions. See what else you can get out of her.”

  “You don’t want to see her yourself, sir?” Winter said.

  “Best not,” Janus said. “We can’t rule out the possibility that she’s a Penitent. At this point I imagine the Pontifex of the Black is getting desperate, and he would certainly try to kill me if he could. A suicidal attack might have the best chance of success.”

  “We’ll keep an eye on her, sir.” Winter hesitated. “She seems to understand quite a bit about demons. Is that something she could have learned from the Priests of the Black?”

  “Doubtful. They’re not exactly free with their knowledge.” Janus flicked his pencil north across the map, to the mountains and forests of northern Murnsk. “Perhaps she’s been in contact with someone else.”

  “Who else is there?”

  “There are . . . others. Survivors.” Janus shrugged. “The Church has done its best to eradicate all the knowledge and traditions of the pre-Karisai age, but there are remnants if you know where to look. The old tribes had their mystic traditions, as did the Mithradacii Tyrants. The greatest height of knowledge came after they were torn down, in the era of the so-called Demon King and his colleagues. Even the early Church, in its pre-Elysian days . . .” He shook his head. “In any event, pockets of the old world remain here and there. Before my assignment to Khandar, when I had only just convinced myself sorcery was real, I did a great deal of research. Church suppression was much more thorough in the south, among the more civilized peoples, than here in the north. I spent some time poking around the lost corners of Murnsk. It’s possible Alex found one of them, too.”

  It was the first Winter had heard of such a thing. Janus himself, she reflected, wasn’t good about sharing his knowledge either.

  “In any case, I think you made the right decision to bring her in. She could be a useful asset, if we can convince her to open up.”

  Winter relaxed a little. “Thank you, sir.”

  “And your operation against the partisans was well conducted. I understand our casualties were light?”

  “Yes, sir,” Winter said, trying not to picture the doomed boy flailing at the dead Girls’ Own soldier with his knife. “I must say I’m concerned at the Murnskai’s fanaticism. This could become a very ugly campaign.”

  “I agree,” Janus said. “All the more reason to make it a quick one.”

  His gaze shifted south again on the map. The Pilgrim’s Road was drawn in red, running northeast from Vantzolk, crossing one river line after another at tiny towns whose names Winter could barely read. A mass of markings in red grease pencil clustered around the river Syzria, with cryptic markings and dates merging into a complex mess.

  “Make sure your soldiers are ready for some harder marching, Division-General,” Janus said, as though reading Winter’s thoughts. “It won’t be long now.”

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  RAESINIA

  The mood of the camp had gotten darker over the past few days.

  Raesinia rode near the head of the column, with only a few attendants. She’d returned most of the Girls’ Own guards to their regiment now that the fighting had begun, though Barely and Joanna had volunteered to continue as her personal escorts. Most of the Grenadier Guard had been left behind, too, at Raesinia’s insistence. They weren’t field soldiers, and their elaborate kit took up wagon space that could be used for supplies. With Janus constantly suggesting she’d be safer behind the lines, Raesinia was determined not to give him any reason to think she was hindering the march.

  At first the quick retreat of the Borelgai and the slow pace gave the whole affair the air of a triumphal procession. They passed through towns and villages, watched from the sides of the road by awed Murnskai peasants. They didn’t look very different from Vordanai peasants, in truth, though the women universally wore ankle-length skirts and drab colors. Even the meanest settlement had its Sworn Church, wooden spire topped with a double circle, a constant, slightly alien reminder that they were far from home.

  Still, enemies or not, the people were happy to sell what they had to the foreigners at what were no doubt ludicrously inflated prices. To the great consternation of her servants, Raesinia insisted on sampling local fare—coarse black breads, roasted potatoes and turnips, and a seemingly endless variety of ways to rearrange the parts of a pig. There was very little wine, but quite a few local drinks made from fermented potatoes, beets, or grains. She purchased a sampling of these to serve at her dinners with Marcus, though she had to admit that since her demon made her unable to get drunk, she didn’t get much out of them.

  Being with the army felt liberating and frustrating in equal measure. She was away from the court, with its fawning sycophants and endless ceremony, not to mention the ceaseless debates with the Deputies-General over minor points of constitutional protocol. Marcus had relaxed, at least a little, and settled into his role as the queen’s military tutor. Now all the talk of divisions and battalions, squadrons and batteries, lines and flanks and deployment no longer seemed quite so incomprehensible to her. Soldiers, she’d decided privately, were a bit like doctors, giving complex names to straightforward things to keep outsiders from understanding what the hell they were talking about.

  Spending time with Marcus, though, reminded her of everything she’d given up. The time before the revolution seemed, in retrospect, unbearably naive, but she couldn’t help longing for the nights of lounging around the Blue Mask with Ben, Cora, and the others, arguing over some of the same points the Deputies-General now investigated at such length. The brief taste of freedom she’d gotten later at Marcus’ side, going incognito to investigate the attempt on her life, had only left her increasingly unsatisfied when she’d returned to the palace. Now, though she had escaped from Ohnlei, it felt as though some part of it had followed her here. Being constantly surrounded by soldiers meant keeping up her official mask at all times, and Marcus, though a bit friendlier, was still always scrupulously correct in his manner.

  Worst of all was that she didn’t have anything to do. She was determined to stay close to Janus, so as to be on the spot when the war reached its decisive point. But she didn’t have any responsibilities in the army, not even the ceremonial sort that she’d grudgingly gotten used to at Ohnlei. Sothe had originally wanted to arrange reviews and parades, but Raesinia had forbidden it—again, she refused to give Janus any way to say she was interfering in military matters.

  After the partisan attacks had begun, there was no more talk of reviews or parades, and the friendly markets with Murnskai peasants disappeared. The army huddled in on itself, sleeping fitfully behind trigger-happy sentries, like a beast suddenly aware there were predators out in the darkness. Two days out from Vantzolk, the Girls’ Own was sent to clean out a nest of the irregular fighters, and the stories that filtered back were horrific.

  “Is it true?” Raesinia asked Marcus that night at dinner. “About the children?”

  “What?” Marcus looked up from his glass, which contained some dubious-looking red liquor probably derived from beets. “What children?”

  “When the Girls’ Own tracked down the partisans, the whole band attacked and was shot down, the boys and girls and women along with the men. And then when they found their camp, the elders had—”

  “Oh.” Marcus shook his head. “Yes, that’s about the shape of it, as far as I know.”

  “Balls of the Beast,” Raesinia swore. She did that more frequently th
an she really ought to, just to see the look of shocked surprise that crossed Marcus’ face every time. “The Priests of the Black, do you think?”

  “Janus believes so,” Marcus said, looking uncomfortable. “He told me the pontifex won’t hesitate to hurt the locals, because he knows they’ll blame everything on us in the end.”

  “Is he right?”

  “I expect he is.” Marcus tipped back the drink and winced. “My experience in Khandar taught me it’s easy to get people to think badly of foreigners.”

  “So what do we do about it?”

  “What can we do? Push on to Elysium and put an end to this.”

  Raesinia hesitated. The hell of it was, the barbarism of the Church actually made Janus’ position look more reasonable. If Sworn Priests are telling villagers to slaughter babies like hogs, maybe we ought to root them all out. But however awful the Elysian Church could be, and however passionate his rhetoric, she didn’t believe for a moment that Janus himself cared. What will he do when he has Elysium? He’d crossed half the world to secure the Thousand Names, and now the greatest treasure trove of magical knowledge ever assembled was nearly within his reach. What is he planning to do with it? Become the next Demon King?

  The subject of the atrocities clearly made Marcus uncomfortable, though, so Raesinia let it drop. While the servants brought in another local delicacy—toasted black bread with a spread that was almost pure pork lard—he patted his coat pocket and pulled out a few sheets of folded paper.

  “We’ve had word from Vordan,” he said, once they were alone again. “Via the flik-flik.” That was the innovation Janus had copied from the Desoltai, the chain of lanterns that could pass information across hundreds of miles in a single night.