The Crimson War: A Space Opera: Book Three of The Shadow Order

by Michael Robertson

  “It’s true.” Seb nodded and sighed. “The great Seb, the fierce warrior, has been worn out by three very brave children.”

  All three of them seemed to grow another few inches before they walked back to their mother and sat around her on the cold and hard ground.

  A look over at the door and the pallet covering it and Seb sighed. “So I need to go somewhere.”

  Even Bruke, who had seemed completely occupied with his cooking, turned to look at Seb.

  “You what?” Janina asked.

  “I need to go somewhere before we move forward with our plan to fight the Countess. I need a day, maybe two, to sort a few things out.”

  “What?” Bruke asked, leaving his pot bubbling on the stove. “What do you need to sort out?”

  “Things.”

  “And what about us?” The children nodded at Bruke’s words. “What do we do while you’re gone?”

  “Start some rumours.”

  Such a thick frown on his face it looked painful, Bruke said, “What are you talking about?”

  As he edged closer to the door, Seb said, “Tell the neighbours something big’s coming. They already know something’s up. I can’t believe me arriving in this place dressed the way I am hasn’t spread like wildfire.”

  As much as Bruke looked like he wanted to contend what Seb said, he shrugged.

  “They need to know the Countess’ days are numbered. They need to know a revolution’s coming.”

  “And what if it gets back to her?” Janina asked.

  “Good.”

  The children pulled back at Seb’s words.

  “Let it get back to her. She won’t be able to do anything about it now. It’s worth the risk to get everyone in the slums on side. If we can get everyone up for it, it won’t matter what the Countess knows. They won’t be able to stop us.”

  None of the others replied.

  “So talk to the neighbours and let them talk to their neighbours. Talk and talk. Just don’t tell them it’s me yet. Let them speculate, although they probably won’t need to think on it for long to work it out. I promise you, I’ll be a day or two at the most.”

  The same confused frown sat on Janina’s and the children’s faces. Little Jince cried at the news.

  “Okay?” Seb said to Bruke.

  Bruke finally said, “Okay.”

  And with that, Seb moved over to the door of the hut, picked up his backpack, and slipped out into the cold, dark, and misty slum.

  Chapter Eighteen

  The elevated city’s shadow stretched out over the slum, turning it even darker. The closer Seb walked towards it, the deeper the pitch until he could barely see his feet. The temperature also seemed to drop, lifting gooseflesh along his arms and the back of his neck. His heart heavy, his legs leaden, he looked up at the top of the enormous protrusion. Maybe this would be a mistake, but he had to know.

  When he reached the base of the elevated city, Seb looked all the way up it again and his head spun. Although a vile community of greedy beings, it would be a million times better up there. Anything would be better than where he planned to go next. A look into the dark crevice leading to the sewers and his heart galloped.

  A deep inhale to settle his nerves and Seb pulled the reek of the sewers into his lungs. He slipped his backpack from his shoulders and removed his torch from it. His hand shook as he fumbled to turn it on. The bright beam lit up the dark wall and the crevice, but did little to penetrate the void beyond.

  One final deep breath and Seb looked over both shoulders. When there didn’t seem to be anyone else near, he entered the dark cave in front of him.

  Not that Seb had forgotten his experience of walking through the place only a few days previously, but he reeled at becoming reacquainted with the reality of it. The dark walls and floor glistened as if the rocks sweated with a fever. Humidity hung heavy in the bitter air; the dampness clung to his skin, worked into his bones, and made his joints ache almost instantly.

  When Seb pointed his torch up at the ceiling, he saw the white and bobbled coating on the rock. It ran so dense he couldn’t see the dark stone beneath them. “Mushrooms,” he muttered. “Mushrooms everywhere.”

  A river of shit ran through the middle of the sewer. A brown, churning mess of frothy water. Its current pushed stronger than many rivers Seb had seen before. Hopefully he wouldn’t have to swim in it again. An elevated path ran down either side of it. For no other reason than he currently stood closer to that side, Seb picked the right of the two walkways. Neither looked appealing.

  Once he’d gone just a few metres into the sewers, the rushing sound of shit water surrounded him. Despite being so close to the slum, he’d left that world behind now. He’d entered a different dimension. He’d committed to see this through.

  The sound of the water called through the expansive network of tunnels ahead. That, Seb could cope with, but then he heard something else and paused. An extra disturbance maybe. A splash of something breaking the surface. It sounded huge, like a tentacle or a gigantic domed head. But maybe not. He could be imagining it. After what he’d seen the last time he’d been in the sewers, it would be perfectly rational to be a bit paranoid.

  A few metres farther and Seb could already taste the stale air on the back of his tongue. Each breath felt like it dragged a disease into his body. Almost as if spores floated in the air and every inhale pulled more of the infection into his lungs. He shone his light on the mushrooms above him, expecting to see motes floating around them. He didn’t see any, but no doubt they tainted the already rancid environment with their poison.

  Another splash broke the water behind him and Seb spun around, shining his torch into complete darkness. Had he been brave or stupid to come into the sewers? Either way, he had questions that needed answers and it seemed like the best place to start.

  The labyrinthine maze of walkways bisected every few metres. Every turn Seb took relied on intuition. It must have taken Phulp years to learn the mazy paths through the dank tunnels. But if he had plans to leave like Janina said, then maybe he needed to know how to access the elevated city. There wouldn’t be any other way off the dreary planet.

  A loud splash came through the tunnels again. Distant, but loud—definitely larger than the other creatures they’d encountered.

  A second later, another, even louder splash came at Seb. More than one of them together. Because of the interconnected maze of walkways, the sound hit him from several angles. Impossible to pinpoint. Impossible to run away from.

  Seb shone his torch down on the water below. Maybe the disturbance affected its flow, but maybe not. Hard to tell as he stared at the churning and twisting river. The torchlight shook at the end of his outstretched arm. He couldn’t do much about it now anyway. Another sweep of his torch revealed nothing more.

  “Come on, Seb,” he said to himself, and after rolling his shoulders and raising his chin, he delved deeper into the sewer.

  Chapter Nineteen

  It felt like hours had passed, but then five minutes in the dark and dank space felt like hours. The smell seemed to get worse the longer Seb spent down there and the splash of breaking water came at him sporadically. Because he found no landmarks to gauge his progress by, for all he knew he could have been walking in circles for the entire time he’d been down there.

  Another loud splash called at Seb from the distance and, like he’d done every time before, he froze. He would have looked in the direction of the noise if he could pinpoint it. Instead, it came at him as a wash of sound from multiple tunnels. Because he couldn’t locate it, he couldn’t run away from it.

  Seb continued and turned down the next tunnel he came to. He had no good reason for his navigational decisions other than he felt the urge to make them.

  It had already been a long day, and as Seb’s strength slipped away from him, so did his will to keep going. He’d killed some Crimson soldiers, watched a fight in the pit, had a run-in with a minotaur, and now this. The permanent darkness
of Solsans made it almost impossible to gauge how much time had passed. Maybe he should have slept. Maybe he’d been awake for a couple of days already. It certainly felt that way. But where would he rest now? Not exactly the best place to catch forty winks.

  So when Seb came to a crack in the wall to his right, he stopped and shone his torch through. There seemed to be some sort of cave beyond. It would have to do; at least the gap certainly looked too small for a tentacle to fit through.

  Another splash ran through the complex maze of tunnels. Louder than any of the other splashes, it sounded as if a whale had leapt from the water. Seb looked around, his heavy heartbeat rocking him where he stood. If he passed up this opportunity to rest, who knew when he’d get another chance, and if he passed up this opportunity to hide, maybe he wouldn’t ever get out of the sewers.

  A second splash rushed through the dark maze. Seb hadn’t heard two so close together before. Then another splash.

  A second later, the rushing sound of a waterfall reached him. It sounded like a large domed head rising from the river of shit. A look at the water and he saw more than its raging current. For the first time since he’d been down there, something disrupted the flow of it.

  A rush of adrenaline added rocket fuel to Seb’s actions. He wriggled free of his backpack and dropped it on the ground. A shake ran through his clumsy hands as he unzipped it and slipped his torch inside. He dragged the bag next to the gap and went in first, turning sideways so he could fit through the narrow space.

  Tighter than he’d initially anticipated, Seb pushed into the crack and got stuck. His chest and shoulder blades pressed into the rough rock.

  The rush of the water came closer, followed by another splash as if the thing had leapt as it raced towards him. It sounded like more than one.

  A long exhale to force the air from his body and Seb pushed farther into the gap. The jagged walls bit through his flimsy flight suit. He managed to move a few inches, but still didn’t get all the way through.

  “Come on,” he muttered to himself through clenched teeth and he wriggled, each movement ripping at his chest and shoulder blades.

  Thankfully the walls were wet. The lubrication allowed him to steal an extra inch, and then another. He gritted his teeth against the raking pain and pushed on, the sound of the oncoming beasts spurring him forward.

  Blind without his torch, Seb listened to the monsters getting closer. They sounded nearby. Where he’d heard the splashes coming at him from multiple tunnels, they now came from just one. They were closing in.

  Panic rose up in Seb and threatened to choke him. He gasped as he pushed on, the tight pinch crushing his lungs.

  When he got just metres from the cave on the other side, the water from the river kicked up and splashed against Seb’s hand and the side of his face. A tsunami heading his way, he shouted, “Come on!” at himself.

  A scream met Seb’s call. Deep and loud as if driven from a gargantuan diaphragm. It shook the walls, vibrating through the rock holding Seb and rattling his vision.

  Seb ground his jaw and yelled as he pushed harder than ever. It crushed his body, but he still couldn’t get through.

  Then silence.

  Fire tore through Seb’s chest and back as the rough wall held him in a vice-like grip.

  The water whooshed next to him as the sound of something broke through the surface and rose up.

  Even in the near complete darkness, Seb saw the onyx dome of the creature’s head. Its shining black eyes, each as large as a tractor tyre.

  It raised one of its huge tentacles and screamed again. The rush of its breath blew Seb’s hair back and nearly suffocated him with the metallic reek of spilled blood.

  But the booming call also shook the walls. It ran enough of a vibration through them to free Seb up and help him slip through into the dark cave beyond.

  Seb fell to the ground the second he broke free, a deep sting in his kneecaps from where he crashed down. He then reached back through the gap for his bag.

  At full stretch, Seb pressed his face against the cold and damp rock, the jagged surface cutting into his cheek like it had done his chest and shoulder blades. Because he had to reach through at full stretch, he turned his face away, blind to the location of his bag.

  The hot breath of the creature pressed against his hand as he patted the moist ground, desperately searching for one of the straps.

  Another rush of water on the other side of the wall. It sounded like the large beast lifting a tentacle from the river.

  Seb felt the bag’s strap with his fingertips, flicked it in towards him, and yanked it through a second before the loud whack of a tentacle slammed down where his hand had been. The blow seemed to shake the entire planet.

  The beast screamed again as Seb pulled back into the cave and remained on the ground, cuddling his bag to his throbbing chest. His hands shook as he undid the zip and removed the torch. It took him a second to get a strong enough grip on the light to flick it on.

  When he saw the cave beyond, Seb froze. “What the …?” he said, blinking against the change in light as he took the place in. Suddenly, the other side of the wall seemed much more appealing.

  Chapter Twenty

  Seb remained sitting on the ground, his back pressed against the wall next to the crack he’d just slipped through. Repeated whacks from the monster beat against the other side of the wall. A rhythmic and heavy boom, the sound made his ears ring and shook through his body. Although, at present, it seemed like the best place to be. As long as it avoided him going any farther into the cave.

  Another loud scream from the creature behind him and Seb heard a glacial crack pop through the rock when it whacked it again. The entire wall would come down at some point. Were it not for the dog-leg in the crevice he’d slipped through, then he might have been able to send a few blaster shots back at the monster to scare it off, but from his current position, he couldn’t get a clear line of sight on it. Sooner or later, he’d have to delve deeper into the strange little space he found himself in, regardless of what he’d seen when he shone the torch down there.

  Another blow against the wall shook through Seb’s body and wobbled his torch’s beam.

  He’d have to do it eventually, so Seb moved away from the vibrating wall and got to his feet. His legs shook to step towards what looked like a ritual sacrifice, but the creature seemed to be dead. Surely it couldn’t harm him any more than the thing behind him. As if to remind him of its power, the monster in the river whacked the wall again, sending a stinging shower of small rocks from the ceiling down on top of his head.

  A few steps closer and Seb cast his torch over the dead animal. A circle of burned-out candles framed the scene. In the middle of them lay a creature of some sort, pinned to the hard ground. About the same size as a small dog, each of its four limbs and head had been tacked down. Its stomach had been cut open and its entrails dragged out of it. They seemed to have been consciously arranged, delicately placed as if the exact layout mattered.

  A strange buzz ran through Seb’s hands, much like the one he’d felt when leaning over Phulp’s corpse. For some bizarre reason, he had a mind to reach down and touch it. Then he caught the sharp reek of its rotten intestines. It reminded him of the time he’d opened the fridge in one of his kitchen jobs on Danu to find a tray of rotten schtoo livers. A shake of his head and he pulled back from the pinned corpse.

  Now considerably closer than before, Seb saw markings around the creature. They’d been carved into the ground as small trenches, all about an inch deep. The grooves glistened from where the animal’s blood had run through them recently. But how recently?

  Seb had seen the large circle of candles around the sacrifice from a distance. They’d been allowed to burn down and sat as no more than piles of molten wax. But now he’d stepped closer, he saw the huge carved ring that framed everything. The candles, the creature, and the patterns were all within the ring.

  The sacrifice lay in the centre of a five-
pointed star. The five tips of the shape met the outer ring framing everything. Each of the creature’s pinned limbs followed one of the points. The head pointed up, its legs running along with the other four. Pitchforks had been carved into the spaces between the star and the circle. Winged creatures were also emblazoned on the rock, crude in their depiction, but clearly something demonic.

  The large ring framing everything took up most of the width of the floor in the narrow cave. Seb had to press his back against the wall to pass it so he didn’t step in it. The tentacled beast continued to thrash against the other side as if it could beat it down, and the vibrations ran through his stinging shoulder blades when he rubbed them along the wall.

  Once he’d passed the strange ritual, Seb shone his torch up ahead into the narrow space. It seemed clear. Hopefully he wouldn’t come across anything else. Or at least anything worse than what he’d already dealt with. But where were the creatures who did this? The thought of it snapped a chill through him.

  When he’d moved far enough away from both the strange ritual and the gap in the wall, Seb found a dark corner and sat down.

  Regardless of the horrible surroundings—the beast sloshing in the river outside the cave as it lay in wait for him, and the dead carcass spread out on the floor as if it had been used in a ritual to drag up the denizens of hell—Seb’s eyes grew heavy. He’d been awake for far too long already. Several laboured blinks and his eyelids closed a little more each time.

  Just before he drifted off, Seb pulled his bag around, slipped his torch in and pulled his blaster out. He then re-shouldered his bag. If anyone wanted it, they’d have to wake him up to get it.

  Seb leaned against the hard, damp, and cold wall, held the blaster in his lap, and closed his eyes as sleep dragged him under.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  A sharp pain clamped onto Seb’s ankles, forcing him awake. He opened his eyes and looked up, but he couldn’t see much. Still groggy from sleep and with the surroundings too dark to make anything out, he didn’t have a clue what had a hold of him.