Demonbane (Book 4)

by Ben Cassidy

  Potemkin stared at the mayor in surprise. “I—I’m not sure exactly how the fire started, your honor. But right now we have a larger issue. There’s—”

  The mayor rolled his eyes. “Please, Potemkin, don’t tell me you’re believing these religious nuts now too. I’ve heard a couple of the gendarmes babbling nonsense about a goddess or some such. Obviously a case of nerves, nothing more. Our priority is to contain the fire.”

  Potemkin and Gradine both stared at the mayor.

  “I saw the Seteru myself, your honor,” Potemkin said roughly. “I assure you, this situation is very real.”

  “I see a burning theater and a lot of dead and wounded people out there,” the Lord Mayor shot back. “But I don’t see any pagan gods. Or am I missing something?”

  “Those people weren’t injured in the fire,” Potemkin protested. “It was the goddess herself—”

  Potemkin stabbed a pudgy finger towards the shop’s windows that looked out on the square. “One woman did all that?”

  “She’s not just a woman,” Dutraad said, speaking for the first time. His face was pale in the flickering light of the shop’s fire. “Captain Potemkin is telling you the truth, your honor. You can ask anyone outside. There is a demon loose in Vorten.” He lifted his head. “I formally request permission to begin mobilization of the Orange Regiment, and the other Trained Bands as well.”

  “Have you gone out of your mind, Dutraad?” The Lord Mayor thundered. The bell jingled as the door opened again. “You actually believe this…this nonsense?”

  “It’s not nonsense,” Kendril said from the shop’s entrance. He held the door of the fish shop open. “Take a good look, your honor. You have a war on your hands.”

  The Lord Mayor turned, and growled at the sight of the Ghostwalker. “Not you again. Where’s that old woman, the leader of these so-called Ghostwalkers? What was her name?”

  “Madris,” Potemkin reminded.

  “Madris. Where is she? Dead in that fire you and your fellow rogues started?”

  Kendril crossed over to the table. The door banged shut behind him.

  Two gendarmes standing guard inside the room both tensed. Their hands moved to their weapons.

  “You are in the middle of a war, whether you like it or not,” Kendril snarled. “Every minute you waste here is another minute our enemy gains.”

  “Enemy?” the mayor snorted. “The only enemy of Vorten I’ve seen so far is you and your companions. I’ll not be threatened by—”

  “Captain!” A flustered gendarme crashed in through the door. “There’s—” His spotted the Lord Mayor, and his eyes went wide.

  “Spit it out, man,” Potemkin rumbled. “What’s your news?”

  The gendarme saluted, still breathless. “Begging your pardon, sir, but reports are flooding in from all over.”

  Potemkin lowered his eyebrows. “What reports, gendarme?”

  “The city, sir. It’s in a bloody uproar.” His gaze flashed nervously back and forth between the men in the room. “There’s fighting and looting down in the Residential section, a fire up in the Shackles—”

  “A fire?” The Lord Mayor stared at the man. “Fighting? What on Zanthora are you talking about, gendarme?”

  “Sir,” the man sputtered, his voice shaking with stress and anxiety, “our gendarmes are being shot at in the streets. We have several men dead already.”

  Potemkin glowered, his face dark and somber. “Any word from Jennovan? The East Barracks?”

  The frightened gendarme shook his head.

  The Lord Mayor swung his head around towards the gendarme captain. “This is insanity, Potemkin. Complete and total insanity. I expect you and your men to restore order and get to the bottom of whatever is happening here—”

  “What’s happening,” Kendril growled, “is the Fourth Despair. You have a demon loose in your city, and every secret pagan cult in Vorten is rising up at the same time.”

  Potemkin closed his eyes. “The note, the one we found in the barracks. It’s an uprising.”

  The Lord Mayor pounded a fat hand on the table. “Ashes, none of you are making a lick of sense. There are no pagan cults in this city, much less a demon.”

  Dutraad leaned forward, his hands spread on the table before him. His face was deadly serious. “Your honor, I beg you, mobilize the Trained Bands before it is too late. I’ll get the other officers out of their beds personally. We have to act quickly, or we won’t be able to act at all.”

  “Mobilize your regiment?” Kendril gave Dutraad a look that would have stopped most men in their tracks. “You’d like that, wouldn’t you? You could take your men and join your wife in the Despair.”

  The Lord Mayor gave Dutraad a confused look. “Your wife? What—?”

  Dutraad stepped back, his fists balling angrily at his sides. “Insult me if you want, Ghostwalker, but don’t question my loyalty. I cannot answer for my wife, but I am no servant of Despair, and no pawn of the Seteru. My first duty is to my King, then my nation, and finally my city. I will die for Valmingaard if I have to.” He looked over at Potemkin and the Lord Mayor. “You have my word as a gentleman.”

  Kendril scowled, but said nothing.

  Potemkin looked over at the Lord Mayor. “Please, your honor, the Trained Bands. Just give the word, and—”

  “Don’t be fools,” the mayor rumbled. “Do you know how much trouble that would cause? It’s the middle of the night, for Eru’s sake. We’d have to go door to door, call up men that—” He stopped mid-sentence, noticing the gendarme’s expression. “What’s wrong with you, man? You look like you’ve seen a bloody ghost.”

  “Your honor,” the gendarme stammered, “we got a report from Sergeant Sandstone not ten minutes ago that some of the regiments are already mobilizing sir. In the Central Plaza.”

  The Lord Mayor opened his mouth like a dead fish.

  “Which regiments?” Dutraad asked. His voice was hoarse.

  The gendarme looked back and forth at the faces that stared at him, his voice gone.

  “Which regiments?” Dutraad repeated.

  The gendarme searched in his side satchel with a shaking hand, then removed a crinkled piece of paper. He extended it to Potemkin.

  The captain snatched it away from the gendarme. He quickly scanned the written report. “Sandstone reports most of Blue, several companies of Green and Yellow—” He looked up at Dutraad. “And Orange.”

  The Baron visibly paled. “That’s…impossible,” he choked. “I didn’t…how could they have?”

  “I never gave any orders to mobilize any regiments at all,” the Lord Mayor retorted. “This is all highly irregular. Captain Potemkin, I want you to get over there right now with a squad of gendarmes and order those men to—”

  “You just don’t get it, do you?” Kendril exploded. “Those regiments have already joined the Enemy.”

  “That’s ridiculous!” the Lord Mayor shouted. “Whole regiments involved in pagan worship? You’ve taken leave of your senses, Ghostwalker.”

  Kendril pointed down at the Central Plaza on the map spread out on the table. “You said yourself that the Trained Bands would not mobilize without your word. Well three of them are mobilizing. Who gave the order?”

  The Lord Mayor was silent. His face turned various colors.

  Kendril whirled his gaze around to Dutraad. “Who’s your second?”

  Dutraad thought for a second. “Kane. A merchant who deals in trade goods. I forget what exactly. He has a shop up in the merchant’s district.”

  “Could he have ordered your regiment mobilized without you?”

  Dutraad chewed on his lip thoughtfully. “It’s…possible.”

  “This is not possible,” the Lord Mayor murmured. “Not possible at all. It’s all some kind of mistake. A simple clerical error of some kind. You’ll see. It’s nothing, nothing at all…”

  Kendril ignored the man. He pored over the map of Vorten.

  The blue line of the Inersa river
cut the city neatly in half from north to south. The large open space of the Central Plaza lay in the Merchants Quarter, just to the east of river in the middle of the city. The town hall and the Great Library lay over a bridge just to the west of the Plaza. The area around the Grand Theater, including the small square they were in right now, lay just south of the town hall, at the northern edge of the Vines.

  “They already have the Central Plaza,” Kendril said with a frustrated shake of his head. “How many bridges are there over the river?”

  “Three,” Potemkin answered quickly. “You can see them there. The Wobble in the north, the Central just west of the Plaza, and Hound’s Crossing in the south.”

  “We’re on the west side of the river,” Kendril mused. His eyes flicked up and down the map. “The Central Plaza’s on the east. The first thing we have to do is secure those bridges.”

  “Much of the Inersa is frozen,” said Dutraad.

  “But not solid,” Kendril added. “The bridges are the only true safe crossing points, especially for large numbers of men. They’re also natural chokepoints.” He looked up at Potemkin and Dutraad. “We have to get the remaining regiments called up.”

  “If the men in the Central Plaza really have turned against us,” Potemkin warned, “then there’s no place for the remaining bands to form up.”

  “The city is in chaos,” Kendril fired back. “We don’t have time to form the Trained Bands up into neat little lines, even if we could. We need to get the sergeants and lieutenants to gather the men in whatever units we can, wherever we can, and form some kind of a resistance.” He glanced at Potemkin. “We have your gendarmes, at least. They will have to be the core of Vorten’s defense until we can get the militia called up.”

  “Whichever of my gendarmes are still loyal to us,” Potemkin said severely. “Or who haven’t abandoned their posts.”

  “Madness,” the Lord Mayor muttered. His face was pale, his eyes glazed. “Total madness. This isn’t possible, it isn’t…isn’t right…” He stood, his legs wobbly and his face green. He bent over as if he was going to be sick, retched, then hurried out the door of the shop.

  Dutraad closed his fist on the map. “I am assuming command of Vorten’s defense for the time being, Captain Potemkin.” He glanced over at the door to the shop. “At least until his honor has…composed himself.”

  Potemkin saluted. “Aye, sir.”

  Kendril straightened up, his face shadowed by doubt.

  “Call up the Trained Bands,” Dutraad continued. “All of them. Your men are to go house to house if necessary, do you understand? Start here in the western side of the city. I want the Central Bridge secured immediately, as well as the town hall and the west gate.”

  “When they come at us,” Potemkin said grimly, “you know they’ll be coming over that bridge first.”

  Dutraad looked down at the map. “I know. That’s why I need your gendarmes to hold it.” He looked back up at Potemkin. “At least until I can get you reinforcements. We can’t lose that bridge, Captain, no matter the cost.”

  The gendarme captain nodded. “Aye, sir.” He slapped his hat back on his head and exited the shop.

  Dutraad turned his gaze on Kendril. “I know you don’t trust me, Ghostwalker.”

  The corner of Kendril’s mouth twitched. “Now what gave you that idea, Baron? Maybe it’s the fact that your wife and half of the members of your household were behind the greatest pagan uprising in the last thousand years?”

  “Where are your friends?” Dutraad asked quietly. “The other Ghostwalkers?”

  Kendril glanced at the door to the shop. “Around. Madris is still missing in all the chaos out there. She may be dead, I don’t know. As for the others…” He sighed. “Well, probably trying to figure out what to do next.”

  Dutraad gave a curt nod. “I know you won’t take orders from me, Ghostwalker, and I can’t say I blame you. But for my part, I’m giving you and the other Ghostwalkers authority to do whatever you think is necessary to find Mi—” he paused, his voice choking on the word. “The Seteru. Find her and…destroy her. Do you understand?”

  Kendril gave the baron a long, hard stare, then slowly nodded. “I understand.”

  Dutraad looked down at the map. His face was lined with fatigue. “Lieutenant Gradine?”

  The gendarme saluted. “Yes, sir.”

  “You and your men are to follow this Ghostwalker’s orders, and those of any other of the Ghostwalkers, as if they were my own. Is that understood?”

  Gradine gave Kendril an uncertain glance, but saluted. “Yes, sir.”

  Kendril stuck out his lip. “This still doesn’t mean I trust you, Dutraad.”

  “You don’t have to,” Dutraad said briskly. “But if we’re going to save this city, we have to work together whether we like it or not. Find this Seteru and stop her however you can.”

  Kendril opened his mouth to reply when the door behind him clanged open.

  A gendarme stood in the entrance, his carbine slung over his shoulder. “My lord,” he said, addressing Dutraad, “Captain Potemkin’s complements, and he wants you to know that we have new reports of fighting in the north, up in the Shackles.”

  Dutraad swore. “Any sign of the Seteru?”

  “Not yet sir.”

  “Any movement on the Central Bridge?” Dutraad pressed.

  The gendarme shook his head. “Not yet, sir. The Captain’s ordered two squads to secure it from this side, sir.”

  Kendril made a face. “Two squads of gendarmes can’t hold off thee regiments of militia for long.”

  “I’ll get them reinforcements,” Dutraad promised. “But first we have to get those cursed bands called up, at least whomever is still loyal.”

  “Oh, and Captain Potemkin told me to tell you, sir,” the gendarme continued, looking straight at Kendril. “Your friend, the old woman. She’s been found.”

  Bronwyn struggled to keep her arms and legs from visibly shaking.

  “It has been long since I have walked in the flesh.” Indigoru’s words echoed in Bronwyn’s ears. A strange whisper, terrible yet beautiful at the same time. “It is long since I have looked at this world through mortal eyes.”

  Bronwyn lowered her head. “Yes, my goddess.”

  The Central Plaza stretched out in front of them, stark and cold in the glimmering light of the glow-globes. A fire blazed in a bookstore at the northeastern edge. Broken glass covered the edge of the plaza, where store windows had been broken and the contents pillaged.

  The cathedral had not gone untouched either. The large stain glass windows on its front had been shattered by halberd and musket shot, the beautiful stonework over the doors cracked and defaced. The bodies of five priests of Eru swung from ropes attached to the gargoyles over the temple doors.

  The plaza itself was filled with the shouting of men, the clattering of hooves as troopers rode by, and the clank of weapons being made ready.

  “My army,” Indigoru hissed. “Vagabonds and derelicts. There was time when I was feared in Zanthora, when men trembled at the mere mention of my name.”

  “Yes, my goddess,” Bronwyn repeated. It seemed the best thing to say. She risked raising her head a little, and stole a glance out at the plaza.

  There were a surprising number of men here, more than Bronwyn had expected. She had known there were many underground cults here in Vorten, all united in their worship of the various pagan gods, but she had not realized there were this many. She was no expert on things military, but the rag-tag militia and gendarmes assembled here had to number in the hundreds, perhaps even thousands.

  It seemed enough, especially if they moved quickly. They could take Vorten, hold it against any counter-attack.

  A rider came up to Indigoru, flanked by two other horsemen. They all wore breastplates, buff coats, and the open lobster tail pot-helms popular with the cavalry.

  The lead rider saluted Indigoru. “Colonel Hamlin, at your service, my lady.”

  Indigoru
gleamed brighter, her golden essence hurting the eyes of everyone around.

  The horses capered back, whinnying nervously.

  Hamlin put a hand over his face, protecting his eyes from the glare.

  “You will address me as a goddess,” Indigoru whispered. Her voice was harsh and terrible. “Bow to me.”

  Hamlin squinted around the edge of his hand. “But…I’m mounted, my—”

  Indigoru lifted one hand.

  Hamlin was torn off his horse with terrific force and tossed backwards through the air. His body slammed hard into the dry fountain, then flopped lifelessly to the ground.

  The crowded plaza became suddenly silent.

  The other two riders stared, dumbfounded.

  “Bow to me,” Indigoru repeated.

  The two men practically leapt off their mounts and prostrated themselves on the snow-covered cobblestones. Their horses stamped and snorted.

  “The men…are ready to march,” stammered one, his voice quaking with fear. “We can cross the bridge, just west of here.”

  Indigoru looked over their heads, as if she was unwilling to acknowledge their existence. “We are not marching to the bridge,” she breathed. She cocked her head to one side. “Come forward, Dannon.”

  A man in a simple baker’s outfit stepped forward, seemingly without fear, and knelt before the floating goddess. “Your command, my life.”

  Bronwyn looked over at him. She had seen this Dannon before. He was the leader of a cult in the Merchant’s Quarter, a sect devoted to Chalranu, if she remembered correctly.

  The faintest shadow of a smile crossed the Seteru’s face. “You have found worth in the eyes of the Seteru, mortal.”

  Dannon bowed even lower.

  Indigoru looked out over the open space. “You will be my high priest here. You will prepare the sacrifice and the door.”

  “Your will, goddess.”

  Bronwyn could not avoid a stab of jealousy. Why had the goddess not given her this great honor? And what did she mean? What sacrifice?

  Indigoru turned her head back to Bronwyn.

  The witch lowered her gaze, feeling guilt surge through her as if she had spoken her doubts aloud.