“That asshole makes my cock shrink,” Rigar muttered.
“That help or hurt the rash situation?” Droll said, smiling.
Rigar scratched at his crotch again. “Nothing helps anything out here.”
“Shit, Rigar. That rash has turned you into a dour bastard. Look on the sunny side of this deal. Osyrus Ward’s conquered the whole fucking world and we’re on his side.”
“Not sure I’d call working for Osyrus Ward a sunny situation. I’ve heard he brings every corpse that comes back from the jungle to the top of that big tower he built. Fucks ’em before filling them with machinery and the like.”
“Osyrus is a twisted bastard, all right. But our commander is a known cannibal, so…”
“Thought those stories about Vergun were just rumors?”
“Naw. Castor all but confirmed it after he got shit-hammered during a dice game. And Castor would know. He’s been Vergun’s second-in-command for more than a year.”
“But isn’t Castor always the one who’s saying there’s gotta be a line somewhere, too? Eating a few people and fucking corpses are two different things.”
Droll shrugged. “There’s creepy shit all over this world. Longer you soldier, the longer you realize that trying to gauge the degrees of who’s worse is a waste of time. Just follow orders, kill what needs killing, and collect your coin if you survive.”
Rigar considered pointing out that Droll’s restrained view on soldiering was a minority outlook in Wormwrot. Most of the men had a murder-and-pillage-first, wait-for-orders-second kind of mentality. But he decided against prolonging the debate. It had been a long night and his bedroll was calling.
“I do like collecting coin,” Rigar muttered.
“And between normal wages and the cat bounties, we are making an awful lot of coin on this war.”
That was a fact. Wormwrot paid well for a mercenary outfit, but Commander Vergun had also issued special bounties on Dainwood Wardens: any man who came back to Floodhaven with one of their Jaguar Masks—and a witness confirming they came by it with violence—was given one-hundred gold on the spot. Rigar had personally been paid six bounties, which was middle-of-the-road compared to others, but the men who pushed hard on the bounties often wound up with their eyeballs decorating mud statues.
“Just hope I get the chance to spend mine,” Rigar added.
He had made private plans with himself to use the coin he earned from the war to start up his own cobblery. Given his success with the waterproofing method, he figured that he could have even more success with proper tools and chemicals. And making shoes was a much better long-term vocation than hunting vicious warriors through the jungle.
“If you’re scared of dying, you can always bribe some official to give you a better posting,” Droll said with a smile. “Buy yourself a nice cushy posting on a cargo skyship.”
Rigar sighed. “Those things crash all the time, too.”
“Dammit, Rigar, I told you to look on the sunny side of things. That’s an order. Read me?”
Rigar sighed. “I read you, Lieutenant.”
“Good. Now, I best get back to patrolling before our gray-skinned overlord comes back and—”
Droll’s head exploded.
Wet chunks of skull and brain sprayed across Rigar’s face. The spatter forced one eye shut.
With the other eye, Rigar saw Droll’s body drop to the ground, neck stump pumping a remarkable amount of blood across the stones.
Rigar turned to the forest to find the source of such awesome destruction.
There was a big man in scaled armor the color of fresh snow charging across the field. He had a full helmet covering his face and was cradling one of the balled-up warden corpses under one arm.
“Contact!” Rigar shouted, raising his crossbow.
Rigar pressed down on the loading mechanism as he aimed, which created a metal rumble inside the weapon and arranged a bolt with full tension in the chamber. In the precious seconds that took, the charging man had crossed half the field.
By Aeternita, he’s fast, Rigar thought, adjusting his aim for the speed.
When he was a boy, he’d hunted jackals with his father in the badlands of Balaria. This asshole was moving about that pace, despite the armor.
Rigar fired. Plugged him directly in the solar plexus. Kill shot. At least, it should have been.
The bolt shattered across his breastplate as if it was made of Pargossian glass.
Rigar squeezed down on the trigger and held it there, showering the man with bolts.
None of them had a visible impact.
By that time, Wister and Grotto had climbed up to the little stone wall, leveled their own repeating crossbows, and started releasing. They exploded around the charging man in a cloud of chaff. He reared back and threw the balled-up warden. Caught Wister in the chest and whipped him backward. He landed somewhere behind Rigar with a wet smack.
The white-armored man leapt over the wall and grabbed Grotto by the head.
“Morning,” he growled.
Then squeezed.
More blood splashed into Rigar’s eyes, blinding him and putting him on his ass. There were shouts from below. Then sounds of tearing flesh and joints. When Rigar managed to blink his eyes back into a semblance of vision, the white-armored man was looming over a fallen Wormwrot, beating him to death with his own arms.
Rigar stepped forward, planning to try a close-range crossbow bolt to the base of his neck, which looked like a potential weak spot. But the armored man saw him just as he was raising his crossbow. He swatted Rigar away with one of the arms.
Rigar was airborne for a few seconds, then he crashed through a wooden wall. Scraped the shit out of his face on something rough and sharp.
He tried to breathe. Couldn’t. Tried to stand up. Couldn’t. For the third time in as many minutes, he was blinded. All kinds of sharp, scratchy shit in his eyes. His boots were gone, and it took Rigar a second to realize that the white-armored man had hit him so hard that he’d been separated from his footwear.
He blinked until he could make out the blurry outlines of his surroundings. He’d been thrown into an old gardening shed. A bunch of rusted hoes were in one corner.
Still gasping for air, Rigar crawled through the hay, reaching the door and poking his head through.
The whole unit was rushing across the yard, blades drawn. Shouting.
The man in white armor jumped into the muddy fray. He’d dropped the arms and was swinging his fists left and right. He took no discernible damage from the swords and spears clattering against him, but dealt out killing blows each time his fist connected with a man, often jamming his whole arm straight through their armored bodies, then scooping out a bunch of organs as he pulled it back through.
He fought like an acolyte, which made Rigar wonder where Acolyte 408 was.
Less than a minute later, the man in white armor had slaughtered the whole platoon except for Westley, who had the new kind of dragon-bone shield Osyrus Ward had designed. The man in white armor beat him back against the wall of the holdfast with a series of brutal punches and shoves and charges that dented the shields, but didn’t break them.
Before he could finish Westley off, Acolyte 408 came around the corner at a full run. Dragon-bone barbs popped out of his arm as he ran, turning the limb into the equivalent of a morning star. He slammed his arm into the man in white armor, which sent him flying into the outer wall about thirty strides away, where he shattered two granite blocks and settled into a heap. Alive, but not in a rush to get up.
The acolyte crossed the yard. Stopped a few strides away.
“Master Ward said that we might encounter one of his older models in the field,” he hissed. “Such a primitive application.”
“Did its job, though.”
“Please. A relic like you could never defeat me.”
“Wasn’t trying to. Just wanted to clear the field and soak up the balance of your attention. Wouldn’t want none of it wandering t
o the top o’ that holdfast.”
The acolyte cocked his head. Looked to the holdfast.
Rigar looked up, too. Squinted. There was another man up there. He wasn’t wearing armor or a shirt or boots, but he was holding a long, queer-looking spear. His dark hair was whipping around in the strong wind.
The man jumped off the holdfast. Collided with Acolyte 408 and jammed the spear straight into his right eye, pinning him to the ground. Acolyte 408 tried to grab the spear shaft, but the man gave his weapon a hard twist.
Acolyte 408 went still.
The spearman was tall. Lean. His black hair was shorter than most Almirans kept it, but unruly and wild all the same. He also had a blue bar on each cheek and about sixty dragon tattoos running down his left arm.
The Flawless Bershad. Had to be.
For unclear reasons, Westley decided this was a good time to charge forward with a war howl and raised sword and braced shield.
Bershad whipped his spear around, shearing the shield apart and slicing Westley’s throat open—his larynx flew into the mud like a chucked stone. Westley fell over, clutching his throat.
Bershad turned back to acolyte 408. Peered into the wound in his eye like a man studying an animal burrow.
The armored man removed his helmet, revealing a long shock of greasy red hair.
“Clean?” he asked.
“Clean enough,” Bershad said. He looked around at the yard of corpses. “Whole thing went pretty smooth, all things considered.”
“Speak for yourself.” The red-haired man got up with a groan. Gave his body a gentle once-over. “Bastard broke a few o’ my scales. Cracked a rib, maybe. And I don’t repair the bastards all quick like you.”
Bershad shrugged. “You’re the one who wanted to go in strong.”
“Yeah.” The redhead smiled. Looked around. “Last time you had all the fun by yourself.”
“I wouldn’t call this fun, Simeon.”
“That’s ’cause you’re a morose bastard. You gotta see the joy in this. The beauty.”
Simeon went over to Westley and tore his head off.
“Again with that shit?” Bershad asked.
“Simple but effective war tactic.” Simeon moved to the next corpse. Pulled his head off, too. “The next Balarian patrol that comes through is gonna find all the bodies but no heads, and they’re gonna be wondering where they went. And when they don’t find ’em, they’re gonna keep wondering. ‘What happened to all those fucking heads?’ they’ll ask. Are the Jaguars eating them? Casting spells? Making bone fences? Who’s to say.”
He tore another man’s head off.
“And when the next battle comes, we’ll have the edge. ’Cause we know what happened to the heads, and they don’t.”
“Do you know how insane that sounds?”
“You lowlanders just don’t understand this type of war. Outnumbered like this—with limited territory and resources—killing the enemy ain’t enough.” He tapped his temple, leaving a bloody mark. “You gotta make war on their minds, too. On their dreams.”
“And tearing the heads off dead men will accomplish that?”
“Exactly. Doubt’s what kills a man, Silas! Doubt, and poor physical conditioning.”
“No. Sharp objects kill people. Doubt just bothers them when they’re trying to sleep at night.”
“Easier to kill a man who’s sleep deprived, too.”
Bershad shrugged. Then he shoved acolyte 408 onto his stomach, drew a meat cleaver from his belt, and started hacking into his spine. Not too hard—more like a butcher making careful quarters of a quality carcass he could sell for a premium.
“You give me shit for taking heads, but you’re the one mutilating all the grayskin creatures.”
“This serves a purpose. Those heads are just extra weight, and I’m not helping you carry them back.”
“Fine. I can always use the exercise. Because poor—”
“Physical conditioning kills men. Yeah. Got it.”
Simeon tore another man’s head off. Then stood up and took a long, deep breath.
“Smell that? Ghalamarian blood. I can always tell the difference. Smells kinda musty. Like bad wheat.”
Bershad sniffed the air.
“I smell it.” Another sniff. “Some of it hasn’t gone cold quite yet.”
Simeon smiled. “Interesting.”
Bershad turned and looked directly at Rigar—wild, green eyes narrowing. “I’ll get him.”
Before Rigar could even think about running away, Bershad had crossed the yard and yanked him out of the shed by his wrists, pulling so hard it felt like they’d come out of the sockets. He hauled him through the mud and left him in a heap. Glared down at him.
“Name.”
“R-Rigar. Private Rigar.”
“Where are you from?” Simeon asked.
“Pargos,” he said quickly.
Rigar was really from Cornish—one of the Ghalamarian cities that bordered the Skojit territory of the Razorback Mountains. But that seemed like an unwise origin to share.
“That right?” Simeon asked. “’Cause Rigar doesn’t sound particularly Pargossian. Their names always have a shitload of Ls in them. Calluckstan. Ackllemel. Mollevan. Like that.”
“Uh, I guess I’m an exception?”
Simeon gave him a long look, then crouched down. Up close, Rigar could see that his white armor was made from dragon scales that were battered with nicks and scars and dents. Beneath the scales, there were scores of small moving parts that fit to his muscular body like a snake’s skin.
“What do you think, Silas?”
“Pargossians all smell like those jasmine spices they trade,” Bershad said. “He smells like wheat and fear.”
“Wheat. Ghalamarians and their fucking wheat.” Simeon stood up. “Welp, it’s settled. Gonna use Rigar’s skull as my new piss pot.”
He raised his bloody fist. Rigar dug around in his pockets for his shell, but his fingers were jelly.
“Wait.” Bershad stopped him. “Might be he does smell like jasmine after all. Yeah. I’m getting some whiffs of it—just traces on his breath, though. Could be my imagination.”
“Quite the conundrum,” Simeon said. “What’ll sway the balance, you think?”
“Oh, I’d say the value of the words his breath can form will have a direct impact.”
“I can be valuable!” Rigar said quickly, trying to think. “We’re under contract with Osyrus Ward. Wormwrot is supposed to find and map every dragon warren in the Dainwood. There’s something inside of them that the Madman wants. We find the warrens, and the acolytes come take it out.”
“I already know that,” Bershad said. “Gonna have to do better.”
Rigar tried to think of something else, but his mind was blank with fear.
“How long have you been soldiering for Wormwrot?” Bershad pressed.
“A month,” Rigar lied, figuring they’d have less sympathy for a veteran.
“Before that?”
“I was a hired blade for merchant galleys in and out of Taggarstan.”
“Why the change of vocation?”
Rigar shrugged. “Commander Vergun was hiring up pretty much any man who knew his way around a sword. And he pays better than anyone. Ten gold pieces a week.” Rigar swallowed. “We get an extra hundred for each Jaguar we kill.”
“Bounties, is it?”
Rigar nodded.
Bershad’s face darkened. “Where is Vallen Vergun?”
Rigar hesitated. “He moves around. Same as you. I … I don’t know where he is.”
“Ghalamarians are known for their lack of specific knowledge.” Simeon growled. He raised his blood-soaked fist again.
“Wait! Just wait!”
Simeon’s fist stayed where it was, poised over Rigar’s face and dripping blood onto his forehead. Rigar tried to think of something useful they wouldn’t already know.
“We use a secret code to rank the warrens. There’s a rating system based on t
he amount of vines and overgrowth coming out the entrance.” Rigar drew a series of symbols in the dirt beside him. “This is for a small one. This is medium. And these are for the largest. My crew’s never found a big one, but I heard from another private that Commander Vergun joins the escort crew personally to harvest them. Doesn’t want anything going wrong.”
Bershad squatted. Studied the symbols.
Simeon scratched his head, which led to a streak of brain and blood through his hair. “So, this one a Ghalamarian or not?”
Bershad looked back at Rigar. Scanned his wounds. “You’re bleeding pretty bad, and you got a lot of jungle between here and home. If you brave the wilds, chances are you’ll wind up taking an ugly and painful trip down the river. You want it done clean, instead?”
He lifted his spear a little. Not in a threatening way, just to make it clear what was on offer.
Rigar looked at the spear point, then the clean hole in Acolyte 408’s head. Then he looked at the torn and shredded corpses that Simeon had created. Between the two, a clean death seemed preferable, but their next skyship extraction point was only ten leagues away. He could make it.
“I’ll take my chances with the jungle, if you’re offering the option.”
Bershad nodded. “I think this one’s Pargossian after all. They’re known for being stubborn bastards.”
Simeon sighed. “Your merciful nature is the most irritating thing about you, Silas.”
“Nobody’s ever told me that before,” said Bershad. “You sure you aren’t just a murderous bastard?”
“Might be a factor as well.” Simeon spat. Gave Rigar a long, hard look. Then he pointed east. “Go.”
Rigar crab-walked backward—hoping to get some space in case it was a trick—then got to his feet and started a stumbling walk. His ribs were screaming and his face was bleeding and he didn’t have any boots, but he didn’t care. He could make it.
“And Rigar?” Bershad called.
He turned around, sinking his shoulders and preparing for a spear to be hucked through his heart. But Bershad was still squatting on the ground—his blue tattoos a stark contrast against his skin in the morning light. He pointed up with one finger.
“Keep an eye on the skies. The dragons rule this jungle.”
Fury of a Demon Page 2
