Orcs: Inferno

by Stan Nicholls

  Competition for preferment was much stiffer once she entered the Grand Lodge, and advancement was frustratingly slow. Applying pressure on obstructive officials, swearing oaths she would later break, forming fragile alliances, corrupting the susceptible, bullying the weak and eliminating rivals needed all her guile. It also took time.

  Another two years went by before the Order of the Helix was hers.

  She immediately turned her attention to infiltrating government. As magic and politics intermingled in Peczan, she had already earned a certain notoriety that opened previously slammed doors. By virtue of her position at the pinnacle of Helix, she was automatically granted access to the citadels of the ruling class and the parlours of the influential, despite their thinly-veiled resentment of a female. Once again, she set about climbing.

  A further year of machination and murder passed. She completed it as an upper-ranking official; a position of considerable power, though short of the highest. Any hopes she might have had about reaching the apex of empire were allowed to slip away. It wasn’t that she didn’t have an insatiable appetite for power. It was simply that she had all she needed, and saw no point in wasting more time laying siege to the summit, where she would be too noticeable in any event.

  Jennesta never stopped thinking about orcs. She thought of the Wolverines in terms of revenge. And she thought of the orcs of Acurial as an opportunity.

  It had long been her ambition to command an unparalleled army, and given their inexhaustible passion for warfare, no race was better suited to fill its ranks than the orcs. In this, Jennesta was perpetuating the dream of her mother, the sorceress Vermegram, who long ago mustered the orcs of Maras-Dantia. With such a force, and armed with the instrumentalities, Jennesta saw no limit to conquest. But like Vermegram, the magical means to totally control the race had eluded her. The orcs who served her in Maras-Dantia were kept in line with iron discipline and brutal punishments; the doctrine of fear Jennesta applied to all her underlings. That had proved insufficient, as the actions of the cursed Wolverines attested. The irony was that she had all but perfected a method of control when her father consigned her to this world. A world whose only orcs inhabited a distant land.

  So she was intrigued, during her fourth year, when she started to hear rumours about military action against Acurial. This wasn’t because Acurial posed any kind of threat to the empire or its interests. It was motivated by a desire for expansion, a hunger for natural resources and to bolster Peczan’s influence in the region. But even a dictatorship must occasionally placate the opinion of its subjects, particularly when planning to send their young into combat. The orcs reputed passivity went some way to assure people that an invasion would be a walk-over, but a pretext was needed.

  It was Jennesta’s idea to put out that the orcs had magic at their disposal, destructive enough to menace the empire. Ignorance about far-off Acurial was so prevalent that this story was widely believed. Jennesta earned kudos for the ploy, but her request to accompany the invasion force was ignored. She set about fresh intrigues to get what she wanted.

  The invasion was launched, and succeeded, with minimal Peczan casualties. Which seemed to confirm that Acurial’s orcs were too passive to resist; something Jennesta still found hard to believe. The empire’s bureaucracy ground into action and started to administer what was now a province. Draconian laws were enforced. Helix lodges were established. While all this was going on, Jennesta fought to curb her impatience, never an easy task, and continued her campaign to get to Acurial.

  Half a year into the occupation she gained a concession. On the principle of knowing your enemy, she had argued for being allowed to study the orcs. Her hope was that this would take her to Acurial. It didn’t. But Peczan shipped back a sizeable number of orc captives. They were paraded through the streets of the capital as living tokens of the empire’s triumph, then handed over to Jennesta for what was officially referred to as “appraisal.”

  She was confounded by what she saw. These orcs did indeed seem passive, even submissive. Her instinct was to test their apparent meekness to its breaking point. On her orders they were humiliated, demeaned, beaten, tortured and subjected to arbitrary executions. The majority offered no more resistance than cattle sent for slaughter. But a few, a very few, snapped out of their apathy and tried to fight back with a ferocity she knew of old. This convinced her that the race’s martial tendencies were not so much absent as dormant, and could be reawakened.

  She told her superiors about it. She demonstrated it to them by having selected subjects goaded to fury. The fact that at least some orcs were capable of defiance was no surprise to them. The situation in Acurial was becoming troublesome. There had been organised attacks on the occupying forces, and they were escalating. Jennesta persuaded them of the need to send an emissary to shake things up in the province. Her Helix reputation, and not least her ruthlessness, landed her the role.

  But shortly before she was due to leave, she saw her father.

  From time to time, Jennesta would walk the streets incognito, usually at night. She did it partly to gain a sense of the city’s mood, but mostly to hunt for victims when she felt in need of sustenance. She went out alone, certain that her powers could better anything the city might threaten, though there were those who would have assassinated her given the chance.

  She found herself in one of the more sordid quarters, as she often did. Such places tended to have an abundance of people who wouldn’t be missed. There had been the usual minor inconvenience of men trying to approach or harass her. Most turned away when they saw her look. The persistent were given a taste of the Craft, leaving them stung or injured or worse. Jennesta remained unperturbed.

  Weaving through a street that seemed to house nothing but taverns and bordellos, something caught her eye. A man was walking some distance ahead. Like her, he was hooded, and he had his back to her. But she thought she recognised his frame and gait, although there was sign of a slight limp. Certain she must be mistaken about who it might be, nevertheless her curiosity was stirred, and on impulse she followed him. He was doing his best to keep to the shadows. She did likewise.

  After trailing him for some time through bustling streets they came to a quieter but no less run-down district. At one point the man slowed and looked back. Luckily for her, Jennesta was able to take refuge in the gloom of a cloister. Hidden by a crumbling column, she got a fleeting glimpse of his face. It was thinner than when she last saw him, and he looked drawn. But there was no mistake.

  Very little shocked Jennesta. This was a rare and notable exception. But surprise was soon replaced by cold fury.

  It seemed her father hadn’t seen her, and continued his journey. She followed, doubly careful not to be spotted. He led her deeper into the low neighbourhood. Others lurked in the shadows here, but father and daughter both radiated something the night dwellers found unsettling, and they went unmolested. The streets became lanes and the lanes narrowed to twisting alleys. At last they arrived at a blacksmith’s shop with adjoining stables, so ramshackle they were presumably abandoned. Her father paused at a side door and again looked back. Jennesta was well hidden. Satisfied, he pushed the door just far enough to slip in, then quietly closed it behind himself.

  She lingered where she was for a moment. There was no question that she would act. Her dilemma was how. Remembering the last encounter with her father, she considered summoning Helix and military reinforcements. But there was a good chance he wouldn’t still be here when they turned up. More importantly, he looked far less robust than he used to, and perhaps not so much of a challenge. Although she didn’t know who else might be in there with him, of course. In the end her rage at his presence, and a hunger for vengeance, overrode any other considerations. She made for the door.

  It wasn’t locked, and opened at her touch. Inside was a short wooden passageway leading to another door that stood slightly ajar. She approached it stealthily. Peering through the crack, she saw a barn-sized interior lined on t
wo sides with stalls for the horses, all derelict now. Ahead of her were stacks of powder-dry bales of hay. She crept to them and hid there.

  There was a murmur of voices. The interior was ill-lit, but she could make out two figures. One was her father. The other was a much younger man, no more than a youth, with a striking mop of red hair and a freckled face. Like Serapheim, he carried no obvious weapon. The pair were conversing earnestly. Serapheim dug into a pocket, took out an amulet on a chain and handed it to the youth. The young man stared at it for a moment, then put the chain around his neck and tucked the amulet into his shirt. They carried on talking, and Jennesta, keeping low, moved forward in an effort to hear.

  Serapheim held up a hand to halt whatever the youth was saying, then turned in her direction. “You can come out,” he said, his voice clear and steady.

  Jennesta cursed herself for thinking he wouldn’t detect her presence. She stepped out of hiding. The youth looked shaken. Her father displayed no such reaction. He seemed calm as she walked towards them, though she judged his appearance as weaker than when they last met.

  “You look a mess,” she told him.

  “You haven’t changed,” her father replied.

  “Thank you,” she gave back wryly.

  “It wasn’t a compliment.”

  “I thought you were dead.”

  “Don’t you mean hoped?” He didn’t wait for a response. “Luck and the Craft got me out of the palace. Just.”

  “And not without cost, by the looks of you.” He said nothing and she added, “So how do you come to be here? Or need I ask?”

  “I thought the… task was done in Ilex. It was only later that I realised you hadn’t perished, or had at least arrived somewhere you could do no harm. And when I saw what you were up to in this world…”

  She wanted to say You can do that? but bit it back. “You can’t be that far-looking if you weren’t aware of me tracking you tonight.”

  “I let myself be preoccupied. Humans do that. We’re not perfect.”

  “That wins a prize for understatement. I assume your arrival at this particular time has some significance?”

  “I’ve been here a while. I’ve watched you. I know you’re intending to go to Acurial.”

  “Ah. Your beloved orcs. So that’s why you came here.”

  “We owe them, Jennesta. For what we’ve done to them. What Vermegram tried to do.”

  “My mother was a visionary!” she snapped. “I’ll never understand why she got entangled with a weakling like you.”

  “Perhaps I was weak in turning a blind eye to her… misguided notions. But I believe she came to see the error of her ways.”

  “There was no error in her ambition,” Jennesta replied icily. “It was right, and she almost achieved it.”

  “I can’t allow you to carry on what she started.”

  “And how do you think you’ll stop me? By repeating what you did to me in Maras-Dantia? You failed.” She rapped her chest with a fist. “I’m here, in front of you. You’ll fail again.”

  “I’ll have allies.”

  “Not in this world. None in the empire and certainly none in—” She checked herself as a thought struck.

  His thin smile seemed to confirm her suspicion. “Not all orcs are like those in Acurial. As you well know.”

  No, she thought, not in this world. She turned her attention to the youth, as much to give herself thinking time as anything. He looked awed. “And is this one of your… allies?” she asked, contemptuously.

  “Parnol’s an apprentice; a very promising one.” He laid a hand on the boy’s arm and fixed Jennesta with an even gaze. “And he’s under my protection.”

  She didn’t think her father would have made that point if this Parnol was capable of defending himself magically at any high level. So he had to have another function. She was beginning to guess what that was. “Careful, Father,” she said. “You don’t have Sanara here to help you.” She flicked a glance at the youth. “And he doesn’t look comparable.” Parnol shifted uncomfortably.

  “I’m warning you, Jennesta,” Serapheim bristled.

  “Do it now.”

  “What?”

  “If you’re so confident you can defeat me, why bother with plots and schemes? We can settle this now. Right here.”

  “It doesn’t have to be this way,” he reasoned. “Reflect on the course you’re taking.”

  “Oh, save your breath, old man,” she retorted disgustedly.

  “If you can see the light,” he persisted, “as your mother did—”

  “To hell with this.” She swiftly brought up her hand and lobbed a fistful of flame at him.

  For all his age and brittleness, Serapheim was faster. A swathe of energy instantly appeared, embracing him and his apprentice. When Jennesta’s searing volley struck, it dissipated harmlessly. She summoned a defensive shield of her own and continued her fiery assault. At first, her father didn’t respond, until, under the increasing salvo, he retaliated. Blast and counter blast illuminated the cavernous barn.

  It was all too reminiscent of their duel in Ilex, but Jennesta was determined on a different outcome. She invested all her concentration and considerable skills in overcoming her father’s defences. Yet despite her resolve, and Serapheim’s apparently diminished state, she couldn’t break through.

  Then she noticed her father produce an object from the folds of his cloak. Or rather, a cluster of objects, interlocked. In a heartbeat she realised it was a set of instrumentalities. Her eyes widened at the sight. She burned with frustration at having what she most desired so near yet beyond her reach.

  Her aggravation heightened when she saw that her father was manipulating the artefacts. He had them directed at Parnol, who was doing little beyond looking terrified. Jennesta guessed what was about to happen, and nothing in her magical armoury seemed able to pierce Serapheim’s barrier and prevent it.

  In a rush she realised the flaw in her father’s strategy. The barricade of energy he conjured was focused solely on repelling magic, which left another possibility. But Serapheim was slotting the last instrumentality into place, and she had just seconds to do something about it. More in desperation than in hope, she acted.

  The sunburst spell she unleashed was simple. It was merely the generation of an eruption of light, but blindingly intense. When she opened her eyes she saw that it had left Serapheim and Parnol in disarray, and both had instinctively turned their backs on her. But her father was still fumbling with the instrumentalities. Gathering up her gown, Jennesta plucked out the dagger she kept strapped to her thigh. She drew back her arm and flung the blade with all the strength she could muster.

  In that speck of time, two things happened simultaneously. Serapheim activated the instrumentalities, and his apprentice, still dazzled, lurched into the dagger’s path. Unimpeded by the shield, it struck the youth square between his shoulder-blades. Serapheim cried out. Parnol staggered from the blow, then whipped away by the power of the instrumentalities, he vanished.

  Shocked by what had happened, his concentration broken, Serapheim lost his hold on the protective shield. As it dissolved, Jennesta began to conjure a further, lethal strike. Her father hastily adjusted the instrumentalities, and with a last look mixing sorrow and anger, he disappeared too.

  She stood alone. There was disappointment at not having eliminated her father, and particularly at letting the instrumentalities elude her. But she judged it at least a partial victory.

  The sulphurous tang of magic hung in the air. It mingled with the smell of burning timber, stray bolts from their battle having started several fires in the building.

  She left it to burn.

  Jennesta set out for Acurial not long after, and many were glad to see her go.

  She had no way of foreseeing what would unfold there. No hint that she would triumph in her quest for the instrumentalities, yet see her other plans ruined, thanks to the intervention of the detestable Wolverines.

  Nor could sh
e imagine that she would eventually find herself on a corpse-littered beach on a world of islands, poised between the prospect of victory and having everything turn to ashes.

  1

  There was chaos.

  All across the island, battles were raging between Jennesta’s loyalists and the Gateway Corps. Most of the dwarfs who inhabited the isle, and who had survived the initial clash, had fled to their boltholes or the upper slopes of the sacred volcanoes. Seashore and jungle resonated with the flare of magic and the ringing of blades.

  The Wolverines were gathered in the strip of pebbly land between beach and tree-line, sheltering behind an outcrop of rock. They were still reeling at what Stryke and Coilla had told them.

  Two of the band’s best scouts, Hystykk and Zoda, had been dispatched to discover Jennesta’s whereabouts. They returned crestfallen.

  “She’s not where you last saw her, Captain,” Zoda confirmed. “There were too many of her troopers about for us to look much further afield.”

  “So where the fuck is she?” Haskeer said.

  Coilla shrugged. “Could be anywhere by now.”

  “This island’s not so big,” Stryke told them. “We can find her.” As the effect Jennesta’s spell had on him wore off, it was being replaced by pure anger.

  “Where’s she likely to have gone?” Pepperdyne asked.

  Haskeer gave the human a venomous look. “If we knew that, pink face, we wouldn’t be flapping our gums here.”

  “I mean, figure it out. It wasn’t as though she was actually winning the battle, was it? It was a draw at best. And it looks to me like that elf’s group holds the beach. So she’d maybe think twice before going for her fleet.”

  “Makes sense,” Coilla said.

  “Trust you to back him,” Haskeer muttered.

  Coilla shot him a dagger look but kept quiet.