Bloody Rose

by Nicholas Eames

  Brune arrived late. There were dark circles beneath his eyes and a crimson smear across his lips that Tam hoped was cosmetic paint. He wore a loose leather cuirass over soiled, shredded clothes, and was using his twinglaive as a crutch as he hobbled into the armoury.

  Cura raised a bone-pierced eyebrow. “Rough night, Brune?”

  “Brutal,” he growled.

  “Are those even your clothes?”

  “They are now.”

  “Where’s your other boot?” Tam asked.

  Brune resisted the urge to look down, but she saw him wriggle the toes on his bare left foot. “Right where I left it,” he said defensively. “Say, does anyone have—”

  “Here.” Rodrick passed him a wineskin. The shaman guzzled it empty, wiped his mouth with the back of one hand, and looked somewhat refreshed afterward.

  Rose sighed. “What happened, Brune?”

  The shaman rubbed at his face. Something haunted flashed in his eyes, brief as a wisp of cloud skimming past the moon. “I don’t remember.”

  “Was anyone hurt?” asked Freecloud. The druin was studying his moonstone coin and didn’t bother looking up.

  “I … don’t remember,” the vargyr repeated. He seemed on the verge of tears. “I don’t think so.”

  Rose chewed her lip, a gambler deciding whether outrage or empathy was her best bet. “Take it easy out there today,” she told him. “I’m sure the rest of us can pick up the slack. Cloud? Cura?”

  “Of course,” said Freecloud.

  Cura gently nudged the shaman’s ribs. “Same as always, then?”

  Brune dredged up a sheepish smile. “Thanks,” he said, and then muttered, “Sorry,” to no one in particular.

  “Don’t worry about it,” Rose said. “Now let’s kill ’em, thrill ’em, and get the fuck out of here.”

  “You only just arrived,” said a woman descending the armoury steps, “and already you’re plotting your escape!”

  The newcomer was the Hysterium’s wrangler, a severe-looking woman bundled in expensive furs. Her hair was bound in a thick braid down the length of her back. She wore a short sword in a jewelled scabbard on her hip, and the polished steel torcs she wore on each arm were a symbol of pride and wealth among the Kaskar elite.

  Rose’s smile didn’t quite reach her eyes. “Hello, Jeka.”

  “Bloody Rose!” The two women clasped wrists. “I’m relieved you came. I was worried you’d renege on our contract and run off Horde-hunting along with every other merc in the north.”

  “Seen one Horde, you’ve seen ’em all,” quipped Rose. “And Fable never breaks a contract.”

  Jeka dipped her head. “I’m grateful to hear it.”

  Freecloud was peering through the gate that opened onto the arena floor. “Who’s out there now?”

  “Men without helmets,” said the wrangler.

  Cura laughed. “We can see that much. He means what band is it?”

  “Men Without Helmets,” Jeka repeated. “It’s an orc-shit name, I’ll grant you that, but that’s what they call themselves.”

  Tam took a step closer to the arena gate. Beyond, she saw three mercenaries doing battle with a pair of sinu—lithe, foxlike creatures armed with wooden clubs. A fourth merc was down and bleeding, having suffered a painfully ironic head injury. As Tam watched, one of the sinu deflected an attacker’s sword and sunk its jaws into the man’s wrist.

  “They’ll be Men Without Hands if they’re not careful,” mused Freecloud, and Cura snickered appreciatively.

  Jeka swaggered over to peer through the gate as well. “Bloody amateurs,” she swore. Tam assumed she was referring to the mercenaries, since their adversaries were driving them back against the far wall. “Thank the Holy Tetrea I thought to drug those foxes, or I’d have a fucking wipe on my hands.”

  Tam glanced over at the wrangler. “You drugged them?”

  “Of course,” she admitted, with no shame whatsoever. “These brats-without-helmets are barely mercs at all. They’re too green for a real fight, or they’d be headed west along with everyone else.”

  “Not everyone,” Cura muttered.

  “So I mixed a little something into their morning eggs,” said Jeka, “but it looks like I should have doubled the dose. Ah, there we go.”

  One of the sinu stumbled, clutching its head with a padded paw. The nearest mercenary seized his manufactured good fortune and drove the point of his sword into the creature’s gut. It fell with a whimper, which spurred its partner to attack more furiously despite the poison coursing through its veins.

  The crowd hadn’t seemed to notice the sinu’s sudden lethargy. They’ve come to see bands triumph and monsters get killed, Tam reasoned. They wanted blood, and now they’ve got it.

  “Do you do this often?” she asked. “Drug the monsters?”

  The wrangler shrugged. “With the new blood, yes. Although sedatives aren’t always the best option. I might break a kobold’s arm, or dump a bucket of sand down a slag drake’s throat. With some of them—the smarter ones—you can pretty much call the shots if you’ve got their offspring on hand. They’ll do just about anything to save them, even if it means throwing themselves on a sword-point. It’s dreadfully convenient.”

  It’s dreadfully something, Tam thought, disgusted.

  Jeka went on. “Some bands—Fable, for instance—won’t allow it. They think it’s cheating. I think it’s good for business.”

  As if to accentuate her point, the crowd began celebrating a heroic victory beyond the gate. The bloody corpses of the sinu were dragged away, while the mercs still standing basked in the adulation like beggars tossed a handful of courtmark coins. They didn’t seem overly concerned that two of their fellows were down and bleeding.

  “Give us a moment to clean up the mess,” said Jeka. At a gesture from the wrangler, the gate clacked slowly open.

  In the meantime, Rose had drifted to one corner of the armoury and was holding a satchel Tam recognized from the Ravine. She plucked a brittle black leaf from inside it, then stole a furtive glance at Freecloud—as if the druin might disprove of what she was doing—before pressing the leaf to her tongue and letting it dissolve.

  Uncle Bran had once suggested that Tam’s father try using Lion’s Leaf to bolster his courage. This was shortly after Lily’s death, when her uncle still nursed the hope that Ironclad would go on as they always had. As if they possibly could. There were side effects (addiction not least among them), but Bran had been certain that, with proper medication, Tuck could return to fighting form once again.

  Assuming she’d identified the black leaves correctly, Tam couldn’t imagine what use someone like Rose could have for Lion’s Leaf. Here was a woman who’d faced down the Heartwyld Horde, whose exploits were praised by every bard in Grandual. Even her refusal to face the Brumal Horde seemed courageous to Tam. Rose had chosen to honour her contracts instead of running off to gorge herself on the soon-to-be carcass of Brontide’s army.

  Jeka strode back into the armoury. “You’re on,” she yelled, pitching her voice to be heard above the arena crowd, who were chanting Fable’s name. The sound of stomping feet echoed from the circling tiers, a hammering heartbeat of leather and steel. Dust shook loose from the armoury roof, glinting like sparks in the slanting light.

  Rose, her gaze wiped of everything but constrained fury, stepped into the circle of her bandmates. “Death or glory,” she said.

  “Death or glory,” they echoed.

  “But preferably glory,” said Freecloud.

  Rose nodded, and led them out.

  “Is that …?” Tam trailed off as she studied the creature against which Fable was pitted.

  “A raga,” said Roderick. “And yes,” he added, before the bard could think to ask, “I chose it because I fucking hate ragas, and I’m really looking forward to watching this one die.”

  “It’s not just any raga,” Jeka was pleased to point out. “Temoi here was a pride lord. The Scourge of Heatherfell. He led a war
party against North Court last summer. His warriors were slaughtered, but Temoi was taken prisoner, destined to die in one arena or another. I paid a small fortune to make sure it was mine.”

  The raga was enormous, heavily muscled, armoured in scraps of sun-bleached bone. His head was framed by a mane of coarse black fur, and there was a festering scar bisecting his broad, leonine snout. Claws that could have crushed Tam to pulp gripped a pair of flat-topped iron swords as long as the bard was tall.

  All this she discerned while the beast was charging Rose. His huge swords came slashing before him, and Tam briefly imagined watching her idol’s torso go jetting skyward on a surge of blood. But Rose was already down, tumbling between his legs, deft despite her half-plate armour.

  Freecloud flowed into the space behind Temoi’s swords. Madrigal came singing from its scabbard, carving up through the raga’s chest. Temoi’s bone armour shattered like dishware. His flesh curled away from the blade’s edge to reveal the blood-slick grin of ribs beneath.

  That blow should have killed him, Tam knew—and so did the bowl of spectators, since they groaned in dismay. The people of Woodford had been anticipating this fight for months, after all. They wanted Fable to win, but they wanted a good story as well—something they could use to impress their grandchildren someday without having to embellish too much.

  Fortunately for them, Temoi wasn’t so easily killed. The pride lord remained on his feet, fangs bared, arms flexing as his swords came scissoring back at Freecloud.

  The druin stepped clear of the blades, then danced back as the raga slashed again. Tam marvelled at Freecloud’s casual grace. Every move he made seemed part of some indiscernible stratagem, the way a Tetrea master reacted with cold calculation to an opponent’s clumsy advance.

  Brune, bless his heart, made an effort to join the fight. He staggered forward on one bare foot, but then stopped suddenly and clamped a hand over his mouth to avoid spilling his guts on the arena floor. A pair of Cura’s knives blurred past him. One clanged harmlessly off the raga’s bone plate, but the other buried itself between two of Temoi’s exposed ribs. The beast howled in anguish, and might have rushed the Inkwitch had Rose’s swords not come bursting through his chest.

  The raga slumped to his knees, still clutching his heavy iron swords. He bared his teeth again, but if he’d meant to roar defiance he failed miserably, since only a wheezing rattle escaped.

  Rose left Thistle and Thorn buried in the monster’s back. She turned away from his corpse, arms outstretched, face raised to the sky like a prisoner released to a rainstorm. Freecloud sheathed his keening sword and started back toward the armoury gate. He passed Cura on the way as she stepped forward to retrieve her knives. Brune slumped visibly, gripping Ktulu with both hands and doing his best to appear as if he might not topple at any moment.

  “Such a pity.” Jeka’s disappointment was readily apparent. “Fable usually puts on a better show.”

  Roderick said nothing, only eyed the dead raga with grim satisfaction.

  What would she have them do? Tam wondered. Torture the thing? Make a spectacle of its suffering? Mercenaries killed monsters because monsters killed people, not so that wranglers could recoup the money they’d spent taking them captive. At least that’s what Tam had believed until today.

  She watched Cura spend a moment appraising the raga’s ruined chest, then plant one foot on Temoi’s thigh and grip her knife’s pommel with both hands.

  And besides, Tam thought, fighting isn’t a game, and killing monsters—whether you do so in a cave or on an arena floor—isn’t something to be taken lightly. The bard knew this better than most; she’d lost her mother to a monster, after all. A moment is all it takes. A heartbeat, and the world as you know it—

  She saw the raga raise its head, saw the white fires burning where its eyes should have been.

  “Cura!” Tam screamed through the gate.

  The Inkwitch spared a glance behind her, then dropped like a stone as one of Temoi’s grey swords swooped overhead. The raga’s swing arced in a circle, and Rose turned just in time to raise an arm before the blade struck. Sparks flared as the cold iron edge met Rose’s raised gauntlet, driving her arm against her breastplate. There was a dry snap as the bone broke, a wet pop as her arm wrenched loose from its socket, and a gasp of horror from the Hysterium crowd as Fable’s frontwoman went skidding backward, slamming hard against the opposite gate.

  Tam rushed to a rack on the armoury wall and lifted a broadsword clear, immediately wishing she’d chosen something practical—something she could swing more than once before her strength gave out—but there was no time to be picky. “Open the gate,” she said to Jeka.

  “What?” The wrangler scoffed. “Are you mad?”

  “I said open the goddamn gate.”

  Jeka laid a hand on the jewelled pommel of her own weapon. “Try me, girl. I was a merc for seven years before I built this place. You ever hear of Rockjaw the goblin king?”

  “I … uh … no?”

  “That’s because I split that prick’s head open when he was still just a prince. Now drop that sword or I’ll show you how I did it.”

  “Hey.” Roderick took Tam by the arm. “You’re the bard, remember? You can’t just jump in and fight whenever you feel like it.”

  “But—”

  “They can handle it, kid.” The satyr sounded more sure than he looked. “Trust me.”

  Tam shrugged out of his grip. She discarded the sword and closed her fingers around the iron bars, wishing she hadn’t left her bow on the Rebel’s Redoubt. “I thought that thing was dead,” she grated.

  Beside her, the wrangler was trying—and failing—to hide her growing smile. “I think it still is,” she said.

  Chapter Eleven

  The Greater of Two Evils

  Cura said something to Freecloud that Tam couldn’t make out above the anxious babble sloshing around the arena bowl. The druin nodded and began skirting the wall slowly, so as not to draw Temoi’s attention.

  Assuming, of course, that the creature squaring off against Brune and Cura was still Temoi.

  Tam had her doubts. She recalled what Brune had said last night about white-fire eyes. Had a sorcerer brought the raga back from the dead? Could it have been Jeka? No, Tam decided. Despite the wrangler’s smug glee at the prospect of getting more than she bargained for, the woman was very obviously as suprised as anyone that the pride lord was back on his feet.

  Was the person responsible hidden among the arena spectators, then? And what, if anything, did this have to do with the woman who’d come begging for Fable’s aid last night? You’ve got a necro in the neighbourhood, Brune had told her.

  Whoever this necromancer is, Tam thought, they just knocked on the wrong fucking door.

  Brune, who sobered considerably in a matter of instants, hefted Ktulu and threw a searching glance at Cura. The Inkwitch gestured encouragingly toward the hulking raga, as if to say, Be my guest. The absurdity of their exchange drew a bout of nervous laughter from the tiers above.

  The shaman spat a mouthful of phlegm onto the arena floor, rolled his neck from side to side, and charged. The thing that had been Temoi thrust one of its swords directly at him, and though the tip was blunted, Tam had no doubt the pride lord’s strength could punch it right through Brune and out the other side.

  The shaman, however, had something less suicidal in mind. He used one of Ktulu’s long blades to knock the raga’s weapon aside and lunged after it, so that Temoi’s other sword chopped down behind him. This left the shaman in the enviable position of being inside his enemy’s reach with a razor-sharp twinglaive in hand, so he did what anyone (provided they were skilled enough to wield a twinglaive without gutting themselves) would do in that case.

  He cut the bastard in half.

  Or he tried to, anyway. The raga turned just as Brune attacked, so the bulk of his arm bore the brunt of the blade’s edge. Temoi’s severed limb, and the sword it held, dropped like a dead branch at hi
s feet.

  But Ktulu didn’t stop there. It was halfway through the pride lord’s torso before it got snagged on something—probably his spine. The shaman tried to tug his weapon free, but abandoned it as the raga, undeterred by the fact that Brune had chopped him mostly in half, raised his other sword.

  “KURAGEN!” Cura’s voice cut through the arena’s clamour like the scrape of a sword drawn in a chapel hall.

  A creature surged off her thigh, tendrils of ink coalescing into something twice the size of the undead raga. Its torso was distinctly feminine beneath a sculpted chiton breastplate, and she (assuming Kuragen was a she) clasped a two-pronged spear in one webbed hand. Her head was encased by a pearlescent white helm that concealed the upper half of her face. It reminded Tam of the seashells her mother had brought back from a tour of the Silk Coast. Hair like tangled weeds emerged from beneath Kuragen’s helm, and gills ribbed her long neck, gasping clouds into the cold air. Instead of legs, she possessed a dozen writhing tentacles, each as thick around as Tam herself. Two of them lashed out to coil around the raga’s raised arm.

  Next to Tam, Roderick withdrew a silver flask from inside his pants. He took a swig and closed his eyes as a shudder ran through him. “I hate this one,” he muttered. “She gives me the creeps.”

  For a moment the two monsters—Jeka’s unholy abomination and Cura’s undersea horror—strained against one another, until the thing the Inkwitch had summoned snapped another of its coiling limbs around the raga’s arm and hauled him off balance. Brune barely managed to tear his weapon free before the raga went down.

  Tam felt the gate bars quiver in her hands as Temoi hit the arena floor. He dropped his remaining sword and scrabbled for purchase as Kuragen began dragging him across the ground. A fourth tentacle snagged the raga’s leg, hastening his doom. Cura was kneeling now, breathing in gasps and trembling visibly with the effort of sustaining her inked monstrosity.

  Freecloud had reached Rose’s side. She roused at his touch, thrashing madly, but he pinned her down until she went still beneath him. Brune drifted toward the couple, weapon ready, in case Temoi managed to get free and go after them.