by K. J. Coble
She thought of the bag of bones, the frigid, nasty little man. “I may have been his intent,” she replied. “But he made no such request of me.”
“No?” Bazul smiled and looked suddenly very weary, very old. “I’d remind you that—beyond our unique, other connections—you speak to your Emperor.”
“It is the truth, Your Highness,” she replied with anger that surprised her. She remembered herself in a rush and quelled the tone. “Elder Cyrok and I are not precisely allies, for what that’s worth.”
Her father swirled his wine again, sipped again. “It may be worth quite a bit,” he replied softly. Setting the goblet aside, he turned back to the map table, set his palms upon it and leaned over. For a lingering silence, he seemed to stare across the vast distances represented on those parchments.
“The Throne Room is a prison, Adeptus,” he said. “I cannot be a man as others would be. The street urchin in a Scintallard back alley has freedoms I can no longer even imagine.”
Having seen such urchins starving, Lyssa very much doubted that.
“I am trapped,” Bazul went on, bowing his head. “I can play the role Scintallos has gifted me, or I can fail and die in blood and disgrace. I offer you this not as excuse, but as explanation. Do you understand?”
Something inside Lyssa twisted and her voice had a hint of a squeak. “I think so.”
“Trapped!” Bazul spun back to face her with a fist clenched, the violence of his motion stirring maps loose. Eyes shimmered like blue fire. Slowly the blaze abated and he lowered the fist. “But I think you understand something of that, don’t you?”
Anger and a sickened confusion warred within Lyssa. What she understood was this man had cast aside her mother when she became inconvenient, did the same with her. Bazul spoke of traps. He couldn’t possibly imagine the traps she’d eluded, coming up through the ranks of her adopted Order—her only family, sick and twisted. She wasn’t certain what he wanted out of this exchange. Forgiveness? Reckoning for his sins? An ally?
But she realized she didn’t know what she wanted out of it, either. So—
“I know something of traps, yes, Highness.”
“Good,” he said. “Because I will have need of you in the coming weeks, maybe even days, and I wanted the air at least a little clear between us. I need you to understand what this can be, and can’t be.”
Lyssa hid a wince. “Of course, Highness.”
“But I also wanted you to know, Lyssa, that I know what we are. I have always known. And I have watched from afar.”
She nodded, but couldn’t reply, couldn’t meet his gaze.
“Good,” he said again and turned back to his maps. His voice changed. “I think that will be all, for now, Adeptus. Thank you.”
STRAYDEN ACCEPTED THE torch from Durrak and turned hesitantly to the pyre. The lads had built it high and well, some being long-accustomed to the ritual. They’d stacked the dead in tiers, alternating with logs, forming a pyramid of sorts.
That the Xyxians had their own for their departed, he didn’t think upon.
“One day will come the Great Cataclysm,” he said, raising his voice as he raised the torch. “And Gruzh will sound the Horn of Annihilation, calling all His heroes back to His side. I know we’ll see you again, then, brothers.”
The survivors of the Fifth Cohort arrayed in the gloom below the low dune upon which they’d raised the pyre. They held weapons up against their chests in silent salute. Nearby fires, pyres for the other cohorts, already lit, painted grim faces and drooping whiskers yellow. A glimmer of tear might have glinted in an eye or two.
“Until then, we envy you. You will have dwelt in the Ale Hall of Gruzh, while we flounder on in this pointless world. You will have reveled and feasted and learned, at last, the Secrets of Steel. And we will come to you as strangers, bereft and dumb.”
Stars winked from above, a brilliantly clear sky marred only by the smoke still drifting from the camps and the wreck of the battlefield beyond. The triple moons were out, but only slivers, like fingernails chewed off and cast carelessly upon a black canvas. The endless, uncaring sky reminded Strayden of Voth, of its bleak nights and marrow-numbing cold.
He was glad for the dead, who’d never again have to suffer its dreariness. None would ever grow so old as to have their sword arm wither, their reflexes fail, and their minds dull. None would face the disgrace of no longer having the wherewithal to answer the rolls when their name was called. And none would have to return to Voth, impoverished, with only their stories to pay their way, once glorious, now things of pity.
That he might live long enough to face such a fate chilled his thoughts and he thrust them away savagely.
“We do not mourn you brothers,” he went on, forcing a tremor from his voice. “We do not. We will look for you, again, when the Last Call is sounded. Until then...” He held the torch up high. “Blood for Gruzh!”
The Vothans raised their weapons. “Skulls for Gruzh!”
Strayden thrust the torch in amongst the kindling and stepped back as well-oiled logs burst into fire. He and Durrak backed away as the flames and heat built. It didn’t do to stand too close when the bodies lit—the smell could sicken, and sometimes the stiffs moved in the blaze, a bad omen best not seen. Witch women back in Voth went wild to such things, spun up villages with their talk of visions and demands for more sacrifice.
By Gruzh’s Sweaty Ball Sack, Strayden did not miss the place! But damned if he wasn’t thinking on it a lot, of late. Mood darkening, he stared downhill into the waited ranks of the Fifth. Eyes regarded him expectantly. Aelren was smiling.
“All right,” he growled. “Someone get a cask open!”
The Cohort roared in appreciation and broke up, flowing down from the dune to the spread of their tents. They’d camped on the far side of the Scintallan perimeter, closest to the direction an enemy might come—though none feared that after the day’s butchery. In truth, the revels were well under way, camp followers waiting with wine or ale, salted pork from the Scintallan quartermaster, army biscuits, and a scattering of victuals seized from the Xyxians.
On the way into camp, many paused to cackle darkly and jeer at the new decoration to its unofficial entryway: a post dug into the dirt, adorned with a head. By the time Strayden, gloomily bringing up the rear, got near it, it’d already seen its share of punishment. Spittle from passersby still dribbled off mauled features. The less imaginative had adorned it with scraps of garbage. And enterprising crows had had their way, of course.
Still, Strayden thought, pausing before the grisly trophy, you could still tell what a handsome devil the Son of Arr had been—even with the gouge left by Durrak’s axe.
“I say, good day, sir,” Aelren drawled as he passed.
Durrak chortled softly but didn’t add on, paused to eye Strayden. “Something troubles you, Captain?”
“Brave bastard,” Strayden mused. “We would’ve welcomed his type amongst the Guard, were the Fates so inclined.”
“The Fates trip a man up, aye,” the Nuburran-turned-Vothan said, “but a man choses action or not.” He regarded the head of Xyxian who, truth be told, he shared more in appearance with than with the heroes among whom he’d taken his place. “The man matters, Captain; not the whims of Fate.”
Strayden didn’t dare answer that. Durrak had come to Vothan ways and religion from outside—and allowed the odd eccentricity, he supposed. But Strayden wasn’t so sure he was so loved by the Gods that he could test Their Patience.
“How do you think we’ll end, my friend?” he asked. “Scorched and scattered as ashes like a hero, or left to feed crows like this sad git, here?”
“I’m only allowed two choices?”
“I’m serious.”
“And I don’t care. Gruzh’s Stinking Hangover, Captain!” Durrak growled. “Let’s get you a drink before that mood of yours darkens the whole Cohort’s morale!”
Grudgingly, Strayden followed the giant the rest of the way down into cam
p.
A number of the old hands had taken places near the front of Strayden’s tent, slumping on blankets in the dust or plopping down on sawed-off logs not yet put to use. Aelren was prodding the campfire embers back to life. With a last, worried glance at Strayden, Durrak left for the line already forming where the wine barrels had been arrayed, scooping up trenchers he clenched in either fist.
Strayden settled onto a stool he’d stolen from some lesser Sctinallan noble’s pack train, not long after the Scintallan fleet had made its beachhead on the Xyxian coast. No one had come looking for it. Or perhaps, no one had dared bring it up. It wasn’t particularly comfortable, especially as the soreness of the day’s trials wormed into joints and sinews. Strayen would have thrown it back in its owner’s face.
A figure flitted by the firelight at the edge of the group of long-timers and Strayden noticed the bandage about the lad’s forearm. “Horsa, you skinned-rabbit! Hold on! Get over, here, lad, and let me see that!”
The youth paused as dark chuckles passed around Strayden’s ring of comrades. But, to his credit, he held up his chin as he stepped into the fire light. Muscular in a ropey way, like a lot of the rag-clad urchins the Vothans had whelped without knowing and left scattered through the streets of Scintallard, he’d probably only reached maturity this past fall—might be sixteen. Blonde whiskers barely burred his chin and scars on bony cheeks were the product of malnutrition instead of battle. If the Guard hadn’t been desperate to fill its rolls before shipping out, the kid likely would’ve been laughed out of the ranks.
Still, he hadn’t run when a lot of older, bigger men had cringed to the rear.
“Let me see,” Strayden asked again.
Horsa held out the bandaged forearm, his left. “Went straight through, the surgeon said. Caught between the two bones. He broke it off” the kid didn’t quite suppress a shiver “and pulled the rest out with tongs.”
Strayden grabbed him by the wounded arm with a slap, fingers curling with deliberate force around the bandage. Horsa grimaced and buckled a little at one knee, but only bared his teeth, didn’t cry out. Tougher than he looks. Strayden gave a little twist, not enough to really hurt, just to see what he was made of. A couple of the others smiled and elbowed one another. Aelren watched with grim amusement; Strayden had put him through similar.
“What else did that fop surgeon say?” Strayden asked. “That’s your shield arm, kid. You going to be able to buckle one on again tomorrow?”
Horsa trembled a little in Strayden’s grip and sweat sprouted across his brow, but his lips peeled fully back, formed a defiant smile. “Captain, I’ll be able to buckle one on tonight!”
Strayden held on a moment longer, grinned back, and released the kid with a slap to the cheek. “By Gruzh’s Greasy Taint, you’ll do!” He stamped his foot into the dust at his side. “Join us, Horsa. Tonight, the eve of your first blooding, you dine with the worst reprobates in the Fifth!” He glared at the others. “Well, someone find the kid a blanket or something!”
Laughter went around the circle again and someone hurled a twist of rug that looked like it’d been pilfered from a pleasure den. Horsa accepted it and sat down among Strayden’s crew with just a hint of hesitation.
“The first one always seems the worst,” Strayden said, clapping the kid on the shoulder. “Gruzh’s First Kiss. We’ve all been there!” He pointed to the opposite side of the campfire. “Ivar, what was your first?”
The man had stringy, brown hair that had thinned away from a bald, scarred pate. Ugly as a curse, it looked like scar tissue held him together more than skin. “Axe in the back,” he replied and pointed over his shoulder. “Ship-fighting. We were seizing a Scintallan cog south of the Rocks of Phyrr. One of the defenders didn’t think I should take the rudder.”
“You were raiding the Emperor’s shipping?” Horsa asked in shock.
“I was young,” the old reaver said with a sinister, gap-toothed smile. “And there are a lot of ways to make a living.”
A growl of agreement went around the circle, notably from the oldest hands. In the early days, when Bazul’s predecessors first formed the Guard, most of the men filling in its ranks had actually been Vothan sea raiders. Promise of steady pay and plunder had brought more, like Strayden, young fools who sailed—and robbed—their way south to Scintallard to join. Only in the last few years, as the Guard ebbed in numbers and favor in court, had other nationalities began filling it in, along with a generation of half-Vothans, like Horsa, born in the great city.
“Vidar!” Strayden called to another comrade. “What was your First Kiss?”
The man was a mountain of meat, more fat than muscle, anymore, but massive enough that it didn’t matter. Gray streaked his matted black bear. It’d crept into a lot of the whiskers around the fire, truth be told.
“Ah, it was fighting the Ybbasids,” Vidar said with a smile that was almost a grimace and scratched at his inner thigh. “I took an arrow in the left testicle.”
A half-groan, half-chuckle went through the crowd.
“Fought all day like that!” he added.
“And it didn’t stop him from leaving bastards all over town, the last ten years, did it?” Strayden said to a full bout of laughter. He turned his attention on Aelren. “And you, lad, you’ve seen a nasty lot with us and you’re closer to Horsa than you are to these old crones. What was yours?”
The younger Vothan smiled uncomfortably and reached for his sword pommel, touched it in a motion Strayden knew was superstition—a silent plea to Gruzh for his favor. “I...can’t say that I’ve had one, Captain.”
“What?”
He shrugged. Certainly, no scar marred his smooth cheeks. He’d grown in his blonde mustache, let it go long and drooping. But he was still pretty with the fullness of his youth, so attractive he’d amassed a stable of female admirers back in Scintallard and attracted a barrage of good-natured insults as a result.
“After all we’ve been through together?” Strayden pressed. “Not a scratch?”
“Nothing more than a bruise or an abrasion.” He shrugged again, clearly vexed. It was an odd sort of shame. No one would doubt his courage.
“Well, hells!” Strayden proclaimed and stood, put a hand on the knife at his belt. “I’ll cut you myself, just to end the streak!”
The Vothans jeered, a few even egging him on.
“What about you?” A voice spoke from the edge of the fire light.
A lithe shadow materialized into woman form as it stepped into the circle. Black leathers stitched tight at the curves accentuated a short, athletic build. A short sword gleamed against one hip, jeweled handle flashing as brightly as glowering green eyes. She came to stand in their midst, arms akimbo and an insolent smirk on her lips.
“Asyra!” Strayden exclaimed. In truth, he was surprised—hadn’t had any clue the burglar had joined the trip. “The gods favor me, this night!” He folded his arms and glowered at her. “You’ve finally decided to stop fighting it and share my bedroll with me!”
The Vothans guffawed and even she snorted.
“I think I’ve had enough disappointment for one day.”
The Vothans roared in delight.
“Horsa,” Strayden said, gesturing to the Ybbasid, “this is the lady Asyra, who—I assume—has joined this quest to avoid larger complications back in Scintallard?”
She nodded to the youth but showed Strayden an unreadable smile. “Meager pickings in the city,” she said. “Better prospects following along with this ill-considered picnic the Emperor has thrown together.”
“Indeed,” Strayden replied, deciding not to press now. Rumors had circulated that she’d fallen in with a new crew, but she seemed to be on her own, here. He hadn’t seen her in months, since they took ship across the Mid Sea.
“You never answered the question,” another voice boomed. Durrak had returned and, rather than bring the trenchers he’d had, he’d hefted an entire wine barrel on his shoulder. This he set down to cheers fr
om the others and left the work of tapping it to another while he rested a hand on it and grinned at Strayden. “Well, Captain?”
“Knife in the gut,” Strayden replied. He turned to Horsa, pointed low. “I was lucky. Barely missed anything important.”
“You left out the part where you got it in a brothel,” Durrak added.
Strayden felt his face redden as the others jeered, and scowled at the Nuburran. “She was crazier than one of these desert dogs, lied and said I didn’t pay her!”
“Almost died,” Durrak chortled, folding his arms and nodding at Horsa. “He was weeks in his cot, suffering the gut rot.”
“Well, your first and ugliest wound was being born, you bastard!”
Durrak joined the laughter coming from all around. Cups of wine were circulating now. The huge Nuburran took two and brought one over to Asyra. “I see we’ve attracted more refined company.”
“Any port in a storm, as the saying goes,” she replied and accepted the drink.
“And thank you for bringing one for your Captain!” Strayden growled at Durrak. He turned. “Horsa, you’re going to wear out your welcome real fast if there isn’t a drink in my hand soon!”
The kid leapt from the rug like something had bitten him and scrambled over to the barrel. With half-pitying chuckles, the others let him to the front of the line at the tap.
Strayden regarded the Ybbasid beauty with no small amount of unease as the others stepped away a little, left the pair of them to speak. The sneak-thief didn’t just show up without reason. He knew. “Not that it isn’t lovely to see you, but a battlefield is a dangerous place to be working an angle, isn’t it?”
“There’s never any of the small talk with you Vothans,” she replied with a smile and sipped at the wine.
“Not out of the sack, no.”
She rolled her eyes at him. “Really, your charms haven’t improved.” She sniffed once. “Neither has your grooming. And don’t you think Hilde might object to your philandering?”
Strayden didn’t quite hide a grimace. Hilde was owner and proprietress of the Gruzh’s Pleasure, the Fifth Cohort’s favorite watering-hole in Scintallard. The curvy and contentious woman was also, of late, his on-again-off-again bedmate. It didn’t help that her blue-eyed waif sons looked an awful lot like Strayden.