Warbound: Book Three of the Grimnoir Chronicles - eARC

by Larry Correia

  “Because you missed this?”

  “Yes. We caught him minutes after he had murdered Whisper’s entire family. She had no one else, so I took her in and raised her as my own.” Jacques wiped his eyes. “I loved her very much.”

  “I didn’t know all that,” Faye said.

  “All you need to know is that it is only because of Whisper you are still alive. You see that, Faye? If you are wrong, if the Power decides that the Spellbound is the next step in its relationship with mankind, then it will be Active against Active, killing and taking, no better than animals. It will reduce us to predator and prey.” Jacques glared out the window at the tainted wasteland. “If you are wrong, then that is our future.”

  Chapter 9

  No one who, like me, conjures up the most evil of those half-tamed demons that inhabit the human breast and seeks to wrestle with them can expect to come through the struggle unscathed.

  —Sigmund Freud,

  From Interview with a Reader:

  An Analysis of a Case of Hysteria, 1905.

  Wannsee, Germany

  The Berlin Wall was much taller than she’d expected. She had heard of the great wall which had been erected around Dead City to keep the zombies inside; everyone with access to a radio had heard stories about it at some point, but maybe it was because she’d spent those years on the Vierras’ dairy farm that she’d always figured it would have been more like the sort of fences they used to keep cows in than an actual giant wall made out of stone. If she’d thought that through, she would’ve realized how naïve she’d been. After all, cows and zombies were very different in temperament.

  “So the man you want me to talk to is inside there?”

  “That is correct, Faye,” Jacques said.

  Was he trying to get her killed on purpose? Faye had dealt with the undead before, so she knew how dangerous they could be. Was Jacques trying to get rid of the Spellbound again? Skip another elder’s vote, send her on a wild-goose chase into one of the most dangerous places in the world, and just let the ravenous zombies get her instead? It made a sick sort of sense. “Are you crazy?”

  Jacques chuckled. “Can anyone who has lived for this long in this field truly be sane? I think not.”

  The train station was on the outskirts of the city which had once been known as Berlin. It, like most of the wall’s surroundings, seemed grey and worn. Faye had always assumed that Heinrich always wore grey simply because he was a Fade and it helped him blend in everywhere. Now she wondered if he always wore grey because that was the only color he had seen growing up. Maybe grey was just his favorite color?

  She hadn’t spoken out loud, but Jacques knew what she was thinking. “The people on the outskirts of Dead City do not use bright colors. Should any of the undead make it over the walls, those who still have eyes are attracted to bright colors, just as those who can still hear are attracted to noise.”

  Now that he mentioned it, Faye realized it was abnormally quiet here. Obviously there had been the noise of the train engine, but after it had rolled out, the city was oddly silent. The porter who had carried their bags had spoken in muted tones. There was no loud announce-ments, no music playing anywhere, no loud conversations from the locals. It was like being in the shadow of the dead sucked all the life right out of a place. The grey stone walls loomed over the town, so she supposed it would be hard for anyone to forget. “That’s too bad.”

  “Most of the undead have gone so mad that they are not capable of rational thought. Should some get out, which I have been told is not too uncommon an occurrence, it is better to let them wander aimlessly for a time rather than to have them hone in immediately on the living. It gives the tower guards more time to spot them.”

  “What about the ones that are still smart?”

  “Thankfully for us and them, there are not so many of those left anymore. If an undead who has retained his reasoning truly feels the need to escape into the world of the living, heaven help us all. Hunting down the occasional wrathful undead who escapes these walls is a specialty of our German Grimnoir brethren.”

  The feeling in the air was not that different from the fields of Second Somme. This was a place where magical energy had torn a hole in the world and left a gaping wound. She had been in Mar Pacifica, and had survived the Peace Ray impact there—a hit which had been a tiny fraction of the size of this one—but when she’d come out of the ground, Mar Pacifica had felt different. Everything had still been smoking and burning. It hadn’t had time to turn grey and dead yet. She hadn’t been back to Mar Pacifica to find out what it looked like now, but in her gut she knew it would be another dead, blighted place forever . . . And it had been so pretty once.

  “I can’t believe we’re going in there.”

  “We? I plan on renting rooms for the night and enjoying a warm meal. In the morning, you are going in there and I will stay in my room and enjoy a good book. If you are not back in twenty-four hours, then I will simply assume you are gone, board another train, and head back to Paris.”

  “That’s awfully yellow of you.”

  “Says the girl who can teleport to the portly old man with bad knees who could not outrun the slowest of shamblers. I was only a Brute of medium talent in my prime. Now, I would be consumed in minutes.”

  She knew he was exaggerating. He’d still managed to climb a cathedral just fine. “Oh, come on, Jacques. Even zombies don’t eat that fast, and there’s plenty of extra helpings on you.”

  He looked offended and tried to suck in his gut.

  If he was going to send her into Dead City to get murdered, she didn’t feel any particular reason to be polite about it. “I’m sick and tired of you not telling me anything and keeping secrets. You need to spit it out right now. Who is it I’m supposed to talk to here and why? It better be a good answer or I’m leaving.”

  “Feel free; you came to me, remember?” She could have simply Traveled away and never looked back, but she didn’t, and they both knew why. Faye did not want to end up a homicidal madman like the last Spellbound. Faye put her hands on her hips and waited.

  “Very well then. The man you are looking for inside those walls was once a knight of the Grimnoir. His name is Zachary. He assisted me in my original investigation of the Spellbound. If anyone can answer the questions regarding your curse and if you are doomed to follow in the footsteps of Sivaram, it is he.”

  She looked in disbelief at the walls, and then back at Jacques. No livung person would be caught dead in there. “He’s a zombie . . .”

  Jacques nodded. “Sadly, yes. Several years ago we were battling some Soviet agents in Hungary. Zachary was killed while under the effects of a Lazarus’ curse, so he came back from the dead.”

  Faye winced as she remembered poor Delilah. “I’m familiar.”

  “When the pain became too much to bear, and he felt he was becoming a danger to those around him, he banished himself here. Zachary possesses an extremely rare type of magic, one which the forces of evil would go to great lengths to secure for themselves if they realized it truly existed. His Power was one of our best kept secrets, and very few knights knew of him. Zachary came here to live in solitude and secrecy. Since then, he has still offered his knowledge willingly to the society when asked, but no one has spoken to him in quite some time.”

  “How do you know he’s still . . .”—she almost said alive, but that wouldn’t do at all—“around?”

  “I do not know for sure. It has been years since his last contact with the outside world. The last time I tried to speak with him was when the question of your identity was raised. Alas, he did not answer the summons on his ring. I do not know if that was because he was unable, or if he no longer cares enough to bother.”

  Faye sighed. So not only was she going into Dead City, she was going to do it for somebody who might not even be sane enough to answer her questions. It wasn’t like the undead were known for their calm. “So this fella knows more about Sivaram than you do?”

  Jacq
ues shook his head. “I am afraid not. I am the expert on that sad individual.”

  “Then why—”

  “Zachary can see the future.”

  Jacques Montand was true to his word. He would wait the twenty-four hours before leaving Germany, never to look back. It was deeply troubling that he was so willing to abandon the poor girl to such a dark fate, but that was only if he was thinking of her as Faye, the helpful, earnest, courageous young woman, rather than as the Spellbound, a lethal vampiric curse bound in flesh, destined to turn into an engine of homicidal madness, and a prototype of things to come. Then the idea was not so difficult to bear.

  She had gone alone into the city. It would be exceedingly dangerous, but he suspected Faye would come back. She was one of the only Actives in the world capable of traversing Dead City alone and making it back alive. It would surely be lethal for almost anyone else, as had been demonstrated by a more than a few foolish treasure-hunting expeditions into the interior. Faye was different, though. Her combination of natural craftiness, quick thinking, and seemingly limitless Power made her an unstoppable force. She was quite the weapon for good. It was so tempting to believe that she could stay on a righteous path, but Jacques had seen far too much in his long life to hold to such naïve idealism.

  The hotel room was too quiet, but such was the nature of the suburbs of Dead City, a place of perpetual nerves and whispers. The quiet made it too easy to think, and he was not a man at ease, for those who had difficult decisions to make seldom where. He had kept his word and Faye’s continued existence was still a secret to the other elders. His knights had been sworn to secrecy, which had been easy to do since none of them realized just what was at stake. The idea that he was somehow assisting the greatest danger to mankind gnawed at his conscience.

  It would have been so much simpler if she had been a snarling killer instead of a charming young girl.

  Assuming Zachary was still available, he would be able to help give her direction. His Power was unreliable at best, but perhaps their fortunes had shifted, and his visions would show some good possible outcomes for Faye to work toward. Doubtful. Jacques took another shot of bourbon. It was more likely that Zachary’s visions were still the same as they were before. Then, Faye would come to understand just how dangerous she really was. It would either serve to temper her recklessness and prolong the inevitable, or sadly, but perhaps for the best, Faye would simply kill herself and spare them the trouble of having to deal with the Power’s dangerous manipulations for another generation.

  Before he had been lost, when their Soothsayer had foretold the coming of a new Spellbound, all of the potential outcomes had ended in rivers of blood and skies of fire. He had never foretold any otherworldly Enemy or hypothetical Pathfinder, but then again, none of them had known to ask.

  Letting Faye live was an incredible risk. Jacques took the vial from his shirt pocket and studied the unassuming liquid through the clear glass. The girl was trusting. It would be so simple to place a few drops of this into her food or drink. Her death would be swift and nearly painless.

  Why did you have to put me in this predicament, Whisper?

  There was a sudden warmth in his body, and it wasn’t from the alcohol spreading through his bloodstream. His Grimnoir ring was burning with sudden magical energy. Someone was attempting to contact him, and by the amount of Power being channeled, it was someone rather capable, more than likely another of the seven elders. Had they found out? Did they know he was sheltering the Spellbound?

  Placing the lethal toxin back in his pocket, Jacques went to his luggage and removed a small pocket mirror, which he had already engraved and bound with spells for just such an occasion. He set it on the bed and willed his own magic to connect. It only took a second for the Power to activate and for the communication spell to take hold. The mirror began to glow as it lifted from the covers to hover at eye height. It seemed to spin about as others joined the conversation. He recognized many of his longtime compatriots from around the world and various other prominent knights, some of whom appeared to have just been woken from sleep. A few of the faces seemed to be blurred and dark, much as his would appear to the others, a magical protection to conceal the identity of the elders. So this was not an interrogation, but rather an emergency conference. He breathed a sigh of relief.

  And then the spell settled on the man who had called so many from across the entirety of the Earth. It was not one of the seven elders looking back at him, but rather it was the hard, square-jawed face of Heavy Jake Sullivan, who, despite his relative inexperience, displayed a subtle mastery of magic which already rivaled or surpassed many of the elders. Sullivan was a dangerous, dedicated, and passionate individual, and his adamant insistence on the existence of the Chairman’s mythological Enemy had caused many of their best young knights to join his futile quest.

  “Evening,” Sullivan said. There was a chorus of responses, some more positive than others. Regardless of Sullivan’s effectiveness against Imperium forces, he was a controversial figure at best.

  “Hello, Mr. Sullivan. Have you found your white whale yet?” Jacques asked.

  “Read that book. Don’t want to ruin it for you, but the whale turned out to be real. I’ll keep this brief as possible. We raided the Imperium monitoring station at the North Pole.”

  “You did what?” someone blurted. They’d known Sullivan was chasing his unicorns, but apparently not everyone had realized just how far he was willing to go in order to catch them. Of course, Jacques had already thought this through, so he wasn’t surprised in the least. Sullivan’s decisions were proving no more shocking than those of the man who had recruited him. Black Jack Pershing would have approved of such decisive actions. “The Imperium will retaliate against us all!”

  “I’m talking to dozens of people all around the world, so I don’t have the Power or the inclination to debate this again. We took a few casualties, but we learned that the Enemy is already here. It’s all over the Imperium, hiding at every one of their schools. The invasion has started.”

  There were some angry cries from the disbelievers, but Jacques cut them off. “The schools are beyond our reach. What do you intend to do now, then?”

  “We think the imposter Chairman is somehow in on this. Toru figured out who he is. I’ll have your knights send you the details. In the meantime, I plan on taking out the Chairman, in public, so that the Iron Guard will know they’ve been compromised. Once they realize that, they’ll have no choice but to clean out the infestation for us.”

  “Another attempt on the Chairman? Every such action has always caused a terrible response,” one of the elders shouted. “Permission denied!”

  “Good thing I wasn’t asking for any.” The Heavy was not so easily riled. “We’re already on our way. The Pathfinder’s got a head start, so we need to act fast. Exposing the fake Chairman is our only fast option.”

  Jacques nodded. It wasn’t like they had not already tried to assassinate the Chairman many times before. The most recent attempt had been a disastrous plot, which had rocked the elders’ council, murdered Pershing, cost Harkeness his life, and sent Rawls into banishment. “It will be a shame to throw away the lives of forty knights.”

  “And a far bigger shame to have the Power flee and all of us be eaten by this Enemy,” said another elder.

  “Assuming it is even real!” declared the American elder. He was the newest member of their leadership, and it had been a difficult decision for the others to choose between this man or John Moses Browning. Both had been capable candidates, but it had been felt that Browning had been getting up in years, which seemed an ironic reasoning for a position called elder. “You want to risk the lives of our men, my men, all on the word of an Iron Guard? Absurd.”

  “Button it,” Sullivan ordered, which was a rather surprising breach of etiquette, but Sullivan was, after all, an American too, and they tended toward direct speech. “We’re making the attempt whether you like it or not. Anybody on this airshi
p who doesn’t want a piece, I’ll let them off before we hit Japan. But one way or the other, we’re going in. So the society can either help, or it can get out of my way.”

  There was a long silence as the most powerful and influential Actives in the world weighed the consequences. Their stated purpose was to protect Actives from the world, and to protect the world from Actives, and it had been clear for generations that the Imperium was the greatest threat to human liberty in history. Attempting to assassinate the Chairman was practically a tradition at this point. “It isn’t like the Nipponese can possibly come to dislike us more,” said a British elder with a laugh. “I say good hunting, Mr. Sullivan.”

  One of the more cautious elders interjected, “Are we willing to lose so many valuable knights over this?”

  Fool. They are going regardless of our opinions. They were young, idealistic knights, eager to strike a blow against tyranny. The elders were old, looking at the big picture yet unable to grasp the passion which inflamed their soldiers. Whether Sullivan realized it or not, he had inspired many. They would follow him, and this task would be seen through to completion, regardless of the outcome. Personally, Jacques thought the entire concept of the Enemy sounded implausible, and, in fact, he had doubts that Okubo Tokugawa had ever been killed to begin with. The Chairman had easily destroyed all of the knights who had come against him before, so why would this time be any different?

  Yet, he could still feel the weight of the poison in his breast pocket, and the thought occurred to him that this suicide mission offered other opportunities. If it could not be stopped, then it should at least be utilized in the most effective manner.