The dead had not fled. They still occupied their positions. Their blackened cadavers were charcoal. Only their teeth were white. The tribesfolk feared this place, but not us. We were Ghulam. The children of the chattel-camps.
The ferrosteel wrecks were our kitchens. We slept in the lee of blackened cabins. Lay on the racks of unexploded ordnance. We shared our lives with the dead.
The Blood Pact paused and waited for me to approach. The mukaali snorted in the morning cool. I could smell them from where I stood. I didn’t move, but instead waited for him to approach me.
His honour guard dismounted and I noted that they marched in step, like trained dogs. I made a face.
‘Old enemies,’ he explained, ‘now brothers-in-arms.’
It took me a moment to understand. ‘They were the enemy?’
He nodded. ‘Their commander was disgraced. They rebelled. They fight well.’ I gave him a look. ‘Though not as well as the Sanguinary tribes,’ he said.
I watched them more closely now. I felt contempt for them, still marching in step. They had much yet to learn.
‘So you want me to fight?’
‘I do.’
‘And you have a gift?’
The etogaur’s face was hidden behind his mask, but I could see him smile.
He clapped his hands. An albino mukaali was brought forward. Lashed to its back was an iron cage, and trapped inside, shouting the name of the Emperor, was a thing I had not seen for many years: an Imperial preacher.
I feasted the Blood Pact etogaur with great honour and we swapped stories of battles and places we had fought in, as old warriors do, and found that we had served in many of the same actions.
All this time the priest raged and shouted. I knew many of his prayers. They were ones I had spoken myself with my mother, or Fjara. Hearing them took me back a long time to my days in the chattel-camps.
Those years felt an age behind me. I remembered my mother and felt a wave of melancholy. If only she could have seen how I had grown, tall, powerful and strong.
The preacher fought, of course. It took six of us to drag him into Yaguden’s yurt and pin him down and tie him, spreadeagled on tenter pegs.
I slept that night in the back of a Chimera, the flip-down seats my bed, and as I looked up through the open hatches I saw the great darkness, speared by the light of warships hanging in orbit.
Over the priest’s prayers, the only sound in the desert was of Yaguden sharpening his knife. He always worked the knife one way up the gritstone in long, scraping movements, thumb and finger on the top side of the blade, pushing it over the stone. I could picture him in my mind’s eye, sitting cross-legged in the middle of his yurt, bending forward into each long stroke, checking the silver smile along the edge of his blade. Human-augury was a bloody business, but this time he was trying something more ambitious.
At last the scraping came to an end and Yaguden’s hide drum began to beat. We could feel the air go cold about us.
The monotonous rhythm went on for hours. The drum quickened in its beat, like a startled heartbeat. Like the spreadeagled man, I thought, starting to know true fear.
The screams went on through the night. They were muffled at first, as if the man was holding back the pain. And then they burst out in unabashed agony and the priest spewed forth a litany of hatred and curses. We were foul dogs. The Emperor was the supreme being. The only hope for us was to repent and lay down our lives in the service of the enemy. I had heard many of his curses before. They were the kind of things Fjara used to say of the gangers when we sat at night and supped. I would sit quietly and the old preacher would mutter, spitting indigestible lumps out into the dust.
I was asleep when the final scream tore through the night. It was a cry of defeat and victory. But there was something more: a sound both of death and of birth.
Something cold fell onto my face. I sat up. Inside the wrecked tank, snow was falling. I grabbed my war-blade. The thread diamond pattern on the exit ramp glittered with an unseasonal frost.
Light was coming from Yaguden’s yurt. I paused outside. Through the felt I could hear voices speaking. I passed through the flap, and the sight that greeted me inside the tent took my breath away.
Yaguden sat cross-legged. He beckoned me forward. The captive had been subjected to a thousand cuts. His body was scaled like a fish, each scale a wound cut into his flesh. His hands were stumps; his lips and nose had been sliced away, his eyes forced out; and his neck had been slashed open, right down to the bone. The severed ends of arteries were visible, the purple windpipe.
There was no doubt. The priest was dead. But despite all this, the blinded skull turned towards me.
Yaguden gestured me to come closer. ‘The compact has been made,’ he whispered. ‘It might rebel, but it cannot deny us now.’ He signalled that I should introduce myself.
‘I am Briar Etogaur. Scourge of the Arch-heretics. To what do I speak?’
There was a pause. The lipless mouth worked soundlessly. The spirit was struggling against the pact that it had made.
It was Yaguden who spoke this time. His voice was severe. ‘You are bound to speak truth!’
There was a moment of stillness, as if it was trying to remember. It struggled against the bounds that held it. ‘…Pern.’
Yaguden leant forward. ‘You were a holy man.’
The thing paused. Its voice was like the rasp of a knife. ‘Confessor.’
Yaguden was proud of the thing he had created. His face softened as I gave him a questioning look and he nodded and spoke to the thing before us.
‘Tell us your name.’
The thing writhed like a man held over hot flames. There was a long pause as it tried to remember. ‘Confessor Akind Pern.’
The name meant nothing to me. Yaguden leant forward and whispered words that I did not know. There was a tearing sound as its wounds pulled.
‘Who did you serve?’ he prompted.
‘I served the God-Emperor!’ the thing spat.
‘Who did you serve?’
The corpse lifted off the floor in its fury. But it was bound with unholy compacts and it gritted the words out. The words were indistinct.
I caught Yaguden’s eye. There was something he knew that I did not. And he could not wait for me to find out.
He repeated, more slowly, ‘Tell me the man’s name.’
The undead thing had no need of breath, but there was a hiss as it sucked air in between the bloodied teeth and hissed the name at last.
‘Forges.’
‘Who is Forges?’ I said.
‘Lord Militant Forges,’ it answered.
‘Impossible,’ I stated to Yaguden. ‘It’s lying to us.’
‘I was chaplain to Forgessss,’ the dead thing said. ‘And Forges was shamed.’ You could hear the anger in the dead thing’s voice. The hurt, the pain.
This was the weakness that Yaguden had exploited. I guessed then that the troops with the etogaur were Forges’ own… And this was their confessor.
A nasty little tale was laid out before me.
‘Who shamed Forges?’ Yaguden demanded.
The word came immediately from the dead thing’s lips with all the force of vomit. An utterance full of bile and hatred. Even I felt a chill descend down my spine.
‘Vichressss,’ it breathed.
‘Yes,’ I smiled, despite myself. ‘Lord Militant Vichres.’
VI
Sabre Bridge was a little-used crossing at the southern end of the tarpits that cut out the wider loop skirting the loading bays of Harshen Quay. It was not so much a bridge as a collection of causeways that connected the scattered islands in the tarpits, and made them into a coherent route. We had guarded it a year earlier, so we knew it well.
Winter had come early and icy gales were blowing sideways as my captains joined me in Yaguden’s tent. The confessor’s cadaver was rotting. It filled the tent with its stink as I laid out my plans.
‘It would be impossible,’ Todai
Sirdar said. He had a forked tongue, but he spoke right.
‘You are right, Todai. The Ghulam would never make it. But perhaps a small band could.’
‘They will see you,’ Todai said, meaning the enemy’s air force.
‘Not if we go on foot.’
‘You would walk in this?’ he said, referring to the cold. He laughed, but I was not joking.
We were Ghulam. What pain did we fear?
All my captains turned and stared as the confessor’s lipless mouth spoke. ‘You must take me with you!’
And so, next morning, we set off. The cadaver, limp with decay, was folded up, so it would fit inside my backpack. The stench was terrible.
I picked each of the hundred and eight who were to accompany me. It was a holy number among the Ghulam. I left Murrai in command of the Warp Vultures. I did not tell him what he should or should not do. If I did not come back then I would be dead, and long beyond caring. That was what I thought, at least.
The short afternoon was already darkening. The promethium tanks at Harshen were still burning and the choking plume of black smoke crept towards us. Ash was falling like snow. I caught one of the flakes on my tongue. It tasted of promethium.
The day had a melancholy air to it, despite everything. I was tense. I had waited years for this moment and did not know what lay beyond it. When I had Vichres’ head, what would I do next? Was there any purpose? If there was, how would I know it?
And how would the Mansa reward me?
We wore camo cloaks over our mail and armour, but we were barely an hour from the camp when the storm came howling down from the upper hives. The wind was as cold as knives. It was so fierce it froze our eyelids open. When we stopped after five hours, I could barely speak; my sharpened teeth were rattling against each other.
I stood in the middle of my Ghulam and all I could hear was the chatter of teeth, the involuntary shiver of frozen bodies, the fierce look of those who were not going to make it through the night.
What passed between us that night was unspoken. We were slaves. Our lives had been forfeit for years. Everything we had achieved in life was a demonstration of our spirit. I could not articulate, so I said everything in the look I gave each one of them.
We pushed on, wrapped in our cloaks. Each time one of us gave up, I gave them the blessing of release. Their blood was a brief warmth, but I found it quickly froze, if you did not wipe it off.
Only ninety-five of us reached the tarpits. They stretched out as far as we could see, a black lake of frozen tar, shimmering in the predawn light. We camped out for the rest of the daylight, making ourselves hidden, as we waited for the night to fall again.
It was here we saw our first armoured patrol. It was a Chimera in the colours of the enemy, trundling out, alone, into the wastes. The troops within did not try to remain hidden. They were soft. They were arrogant. They came from the rich and powerful Imperium, and they thought that they could bring their luxuriant and corrupt ways to the harsh rimward worlds.
Todai’s lips had cracked into bloody scabs. ‘They think they are secure,’ he commented.
I nodded. ‘They did not grow up in the chattel-camps.’
There were eighty-seven of us who huddled down till the enemy had passed by. Only seventy-three of us rose again to start our trek to the bridge. The cold had turned the pitch almost solid. We lost five more in that crossing. As night fell we could not go on, and camped on islands. We ate frozen food, thawed our canteens for a few drops of water.
Fifty-four of us rose next morning for the last trek. We were three hours into it when, at last, we caught sight of Sabre Bridge.
It was like a mirage rising out of the frozen black landscape. The gnarled buttresses were worn by acid rain. The gothic supports were pockmarked with strafing fire. Bomb damage had been repaired with girders and iron plates. Enginseers from both sides had done their best to keep the artery open.
‘So,’ Todai said as we dragged ourselves up onto the rocky shores of the island.
I nodded. We were here. But there was no sign of Vichres.
‘How long?’ Todai demanded.
‘Three days,’ a voice from my backpack stated.
Todai’s eyes met mine. Neither of us spoke. Three days would kill us all.
Less than fifty of us had reached this place. We hunkered down and waited, blue with cold. We spent the night shivering as violently as the possessed. We had already lost more than half our number. We were dying too quickly. On the day that the enemy was expected I had all my troopers make themselves ready, but our bodies were so cold that every movement was an agony.
‘When will he come?’ Todai asked me.
I opened the backpack, where the cadaver was bundled up. But the thing was cold. It was frozen solid. It did not answer my questions. It did not move.
I put on a brave face to my Ghulam.
‘What need we of unholy beasts? We are Ghulam! We are warriors enough!’
It took me nearly an hour to fit the powercell into my rifle. Then we waited as the day wore on, and the storm deepened.
I dreamed myself a child again. It was dark. My mother was carrying me on her back as she picked peels and scraps from the midden heaps. A voice shouted. A lumen pointed our way, and she fell over as she fled into the shadows.
Something nudged me. It was a Ghulam named Qoyar, sliding sideways into me.
I let him fall. He was dead.
But then I saw a distant light. We were lying at the bottom of the bank with the road above us. Along the road a convoy was coming. I could see the searchlights panning for the road.
I had a sudden fear that all my Ghulam were dead about me. Arban was on the other side. I pushed him but he did not move. I pushed Dorben. And Tabun. And Nutuk. But they were all dead. Only Todai showed any sign of life. I crawled towards him, using my elbows.
‘Todai!’ I hissed, though the truth was my mouth could not articulate.
He was lying face down, his face resting in the crook of his elbow. His face was black. His eyes had frozen solid. They were white with ice. I understood that he was dying. The sound that came out of him was not a human sound. It was an animal noise. It was pitiful. A begging sound.
‘Todai!’ I begged, but it was beyond him.
The light of the lead truck fell across me as the tank swung onto the island where we were hidden. I could hear the low rumble of their engines. I could feel the weight of their tracks through the frozen ground. As the convoy rumbled towards us I knew that we had failed. I was alone and there was no way we could kill Vichres, if indeed he was here. If I could, I would have wept.
‘Free me!’ a voice behind me hissed.
I tried, but my hands were too cold; I could not even push the straps from my shoulders.
‘Free me!’ the voice came again. ‘He comes!’
I put my fingers in my mouth to warm them as the line of armour rolled steadily towards us. My chattering teeth drew blood. I could taste it, though my fingers were beyond feeling. I might have been chewing off my own fingers. At last, I felt pain and life return as the cold blue headlights panned across the landscape and I had just enough feeling in my bloodied hands to slowly dragged my war-blade out of its sheath.
I used my other hand to clamp my fingers around the hilt, held Todai’s mouth against my chest and drove the knife into his gut. My arm went up to my elbow before it found his heart. I left my arm inside him and felt the heat in his body thaw my arm.
To have feeling return was all pain. But pain is not always bad. Sometimes it is the only sign of life left that you have.
Without the warmth in my hand I could never have done it.
I dragged the pack off my shoulders. It landed with a dull thud. From the sound I knew that the corpse inside was frozen solid. I tried to open the thongs that held it. My hands were stupid and clumsy with cold. I pulled at the straps but I could not open it.
The pack started to move.
I thought it a dream at first. But it ro
cked violently, and then the pack tore open, and a hand grasped the edges of the tear, and pulled it wide enough for the thing inside to clamber out. It let out a shriek that cut through the cold like a hot blade.
‘Vichress!’ it howled.
A sound of pain and fury that left me in its wake.
VII
I had not seen the Mansa for over fifteen years. As I stood in the antechamber I was conscious of my mutilated state and set my plumed helmet straight with the stump of my left hand, made myself ready. Young Ghulam stood guard at his gates, their blades sharp, their eyes hard as glassy stone.
Once I had been fit and hale, like them. Now I felt the gulf between us. They looked at my ruined body with a mix of curiosity and contempt. But they were still young and naïve. They imagined there was no foe they could not overcome with courage and strength. I knew better. Cociaminus had cured me of my arrogance. My body had been through war and ice and fire, and each had taken a heavy toll of flesh.
But as for my missing hand, I had cut that off myself at Sabre Bridge, when the enemy fled with Vichres’ body, and I was unable to fulfil my geas. I had thrown my weapons away, and stumbled back alone through the front lines, and let myself be taken as a slave.
I had suffered most in those latter years. It had taken many years to come to terms with my failure. But you light the fuse, and the fyceline will blow. I should have trusted to my luck. If one is destined to be rich, even lead turns to gold.
At last my name was called and I stepped inside his chamber. I saw, to my terror, that the Mansa had not changed. His fangs still protruded from his snout. His bald and ugly head stared down at me. His slit eyes glowed yellow. It was all I could do to force each leg to swing and take me forward.
At last I stood before him.
‘Briar!’ he snorted. ‘I heard many years ago that you were dead.’
I fell to my knees and touched my head to the floor in total obeisance. ‘Not yet, lord. I made a promise to you…’
He saw the skulls that hung from my belt. I took one and presented it to him, between hand and stump.
The Mansa’s hand was enormous. The object nestled in it like a pebble in the hand of a child. ‘This is him?’
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