by David Oliver
Charles swivelled and I could have sworn that a look of panic crossed his face at the sight of Cassius’s descending blade. Instead of blocking, he dived out of the way and went straight into the tail of Akzan, sending him crunching into the floor in a spray of stone. Akzan rained blows down upon the prone figure, each hit sending him further into the ground.
A flash of black light and suddenly Charles was behind the skyren, his hand extended towards the back of the beast. A glowing foot connected with his torso and Charles shot across the room as though launched from a catapult. My eyes widened in amazement - not even in his current form had Cassius possessed that much power. It was almost like he was bonded with a Great Heart, but not even a Great Heart could provide that much overwhelming strength, not to mention the glowing side effects.
Cassius cut down with his blade, the glowing sword peeling apart metal like a hot knife through butter, leaving a flaming line in its wake. He spun and I realised that Charles had reappeared yet again on the other side of the room. Black lines covered his face and his eyes were of the purest black.
“Enough.” The word resonated and the world disappeared.
Utter darkness consumed the room.
Akzan howled, an agonising scream of terror and pain that rose in pitch with each passing second.
A glowing light slowly penetrated the blackness, each step bringing it closer towards me. For a moment I could have sworn that the figure was that of the Emperor but a second later and Cassius’s face was before me.
“Time to go,” he said calmly, raising a hand and placing it on my shoulder.
My mouth dropped open as golden light enveloped me. “Cassius, you’re-”
Light flooded in and the Emperor stood at our side in his study in the citadel, a sheen of sweat on his face and his hand on Cassius’s shoulder.
“-talking.”
Chapter 35
War
Whilst the fight at the citadel might have been considered a victory for the Emperor in that he still lived, for the members of the Academy it was a terrible tragedy. The provision of the sword and being treated like a confidant by the Emperor himself had made me forget about it for a moment and perhaps I willed myself not to think about it for as long as I could.
But at some point we all have to face the music.
Anatha had been right, the tally of dead and grievously wounded was high. Too high. The Academy chose only the most talented, focused, broken or otherwise special individuals to become Imps and the recruitment process was sporadic and generally slow. Injuries and even deaths whilst training in the Academy were not uncommon - as we knew all too well - but to have so many at once, and of a level of Imp that was starting to resemble an Imperator? That was hard. It was a blow to the management of the Academy in a way that they hadn’t experienced in some time.
What was much, much worse was that each and every Imp who had been in the citadel for that battle knew each one who had died. Considered them acquaintances, comrades or even friends. Needless to say; morale was low.
Funerals are not easy. Mass funerals are simultaneously easier and harder. They give you a sense of closure for the many people who died, a chance to grieve and to come to terms with what happened, but I feel that it numbs you to the grief, like your body can only handle so much pain and so shuts itself down. Damien’s death had been terrible - a grief that we all still carried and would for many years to come - but the deaths of those fellow Imps, I feel like they each impacted us less due to that mass ceremony. Or maybe we were just getting hardened around the edges, becoming the hard diamonds that the Academy was compressing us to be.
Regardless, it was a suitably grand affair. The Emperor attended in person with a contingent of guards who kept a suitably dangerous look upon every attending member of the congregation. A number of Imperators made grand speeches about how they had died in the service of the empire and so had fulfilled their duty. Kane took a different approach.
“No one should die young,” he said softly. “I grieve for Devan, Emur and Hol but they were fully fledged Imperators who had all the training and knew all the risks. Riln, Catalana, Emir, Ascin, Allando, Geland, Feyan and Jorna were Imps. Imps who were involved in a fight that was beyond them,” his eyes glistened as he scanned the audience. “All of you here know that the Academy asks a lot of you and that the things we do whilst training hold inherent risk. The fourth-year exam is the tipping point where we try and balance risk against the learning experience, where sometimes we get it right but sometimes we get it wrong. But those Imps who attempt the exam are prepared for it to be hard, for it to be deadly. Imps do not expect life or death scenarios practically within the walls of the Academy and for that I say that we, the staff at the Academy, have failed you. We need to look after the next generation of Imperators and make sure that they at least have the chance to survive to become the heroes of the empire that they aim to be.”
He took a steadying breath and continued, “Because of this there are some things that you should know. There are forces at work against the Andurran empire. Some of you,” his eyes briefly found mine, “had already encountered these forces. All of you now have. As you saw, this is not a game. The force arrayed against us is insidious and can corrupt those who are unwary. Imperator Erethea was one such individual and has trained many of you. Who amongst us can say that she was acting differently or odd?” He paused and scanned the room, nodding when he saw no-one raise a hand. “Exactly. No-one. And so whilst orders will be given that ask you to keep an eye on your fellow colleagues and to flag any potential changes, I - and I mean that personally - also ask that you trust your friends and colleagues. We work best as teams and without that trust we will be lost. Use your common sense but do not fear your friends. We all need to work together to survive and to win.” With a deep breath he bowed his head to the fallen, nodded to the audience and then stepped back, allowing the thunderous steps of the Emperor to take his place.
“Children,” the Emperor rumbled, “it is a sad day. What Imperator Kane said is correct; we are beset by an enemy that can whisper, plot and turn ourselves against each other. We must refuse this enemy at all costs!” His voice thundered as he said the last, echoes of his bellow rebounding through the Academy grounds.
“Remember your duty and remember your training and we will remove this foe from our midst, from our Empire and then from our world. We will not cease and we will not falter. You are Imperators, the hidden blades of the Empire, you will stand tall and protect all of us from enemies without...and from within. So yes, this is a sad day, but it is also a day to remember, a day of celebration, for We pushed back the Enemy, We defeated His minions and We. Are. Unbroken.” Cheers resounded as his statement thundered through the air, his voice like a physical force.
Raising his hands for quiet he waited for calm before speaking again. “What happened should not have happened. This you and I know. Changes will have to be made, some you will see, others you will not. Further details will follow. But before we send these brave fallen to their final resting place I ask of you now; will you fall into the dark?”
“No!” shouted the crowd.
“Will you bow before the corrupt?”
“No!”
“Will you allow the Empire to fall?”
“No!” the crowd screamed, myself among them.
The Emperor grinned wolfishly; his gaze almost predatory. “Then my friends, it is time to embrace change. For the Academy…
...The Academy is going to war.”
Epilogue
Present day
I looked into Cassius’s eyes, hoping to see the clever and witty eyes of my friend looking back at me. My heart sank. They were there but there was none of the intelligence that I had just seen. His eyes were unfocused as though he was daydreaming.
I turned my gaze upon the Emperor. “What just happened?” I asked, my tone cold.
“Success happened,” the Emperor rumbled tiredly. “If not the total victory that
I had wanted. But a successful field test certainly.”
“A field test?” I murmured. “Of what?”
Deep down I already knew the answer.
The Emperor brightened. “Of Cassius of course! You just witnessed the first successful attempt of a human able to wield the power of a full-fledged seraphim.”
“Those things you did to him,” I replied, my gorge rising. “It wasn’t just to make him stronger; it was to make him more like you, wasn’t it?”
“Precisely,” he replied, eyes twinkling. “Other test subjects have failed somewhat...shall we say, explosively, in the past. I needed to reinforce Cassius in order for his body and mind to be able to wield my power. Sadly the restructuring of his brain had some unintended side effects but overall I would say it was a resounding success.”
I shifted and suddenly Asp was at the Emperor’s throat. “You’re a monster. You trained me to kill monsters.”
The man didn’t even twitch, his smile completely unfazed. “Now Calidan, we’ve been down this road before. You know full well how this goes. Even if you did manage to mortally wound me, you know exactly what will happen. I’ll be back on my feet in moments and somewhere down below something very dear to you will not be.”
He held my gaze and I knew that he would happily let me cut his throat just to teach me a lesson. Slowly I backed away and sheathed Asp. “You’re as bad as Charles,” I snarled. “Just using us for your own fun and games.”
The Emperor let out a full-throated laugh, his body shaking with humour. “You act surprised. You are beneath him. You are beneath me. The surviving seraphim, Charles excluded, led humanity out of the darkness. You are only here because of us. This empire, the empire before that and the one before that, all of it is because of us. I can end it on a whim.”
“If you’re so powerful then why did you even need Cassius?” I asked, unable to keep the almost whine out of my voice.
The Emperor shook his head. “Taking on a seraphim on his home turf is a dangerous business. I needed to surprise him, to change the game if you will. Now I can use Cassius as an extension of my own self with very little risk to me, when the need is there of course.”
I held out a hand to Cassius and turned my back on the Emperor. “So you’re a coward. I see.” The smile didn’t even waver on his face. “I’m going to fix what you’ve done to Cassius,” I promised him over my shoulder as I began to walk away. “I’m going to save Seya. And I’m going to end you for what you’ve done. End you all.”
His laughter followed me down the hall of his citadel, reverberating the walls with its mirth. “Honestly my boy, I wish you the best of luck. It would be the most interesting surprise. Take care of Cassius for me on your travels; I’ll be watching.”
✽✽✽
Charles swept up the ashes of Akzan. Her levels of seraph had been far too low after her prolonged stay in his facility to remotely have been able to face his wrath. He lost himself in the simple action; his body content to move whilst his mind worked on overdrive.
The Emperor had adapted, using his own tactics against him and he had nearly been caught napping. His mouth twisted in a dark smile. Surprises were so hard to come by at this stage of his life, he had nearly forgotten how much fun they could be.
Time to change the game again.
Author’s Note
Well…this was a long time in coming! For anyone who has been waiting with bated breath for the next adventure of Calidan and Seya, I apologise. To paraphrase Jeff Goldblum in Jurassic Park, ‘Life, uh, got in the way.’
Even with life getting in the way, progress on the third book is well underway and I’ve also written a much longer fantasy novel called Draconis which will also be released this year, so hopefully that is something for you to look forward to.
Thank you so much for reading this book (and presumably the one before it…I can’t imagine anyone making heads or tails of what is going on if they jumped in at this point), your support means a huge amount to me.
If you can spare a moment to leave a rating or, even better a review, you will make my day. They are the lifeblood of indie authors and without ratings these books tend to disappear into the murky waters of Amazon algorithms and so, in this instance, every little truly does help!
Until next time.
