Nular had formed his patrol into a line to block the approach to the house as best they could. The problem was that a dozen soldiers couldn’t form a very long line without standing so far apart as to give up the ability to protect one another’s flanks. He wasn’t about to order that, which meant that a fool hell-bent on getting at the building could dart around the end of the formation.
Sure enough, a wiry, dark-haired youth with a sack clutched under his arm lunged at the gap on the southern end. The warrior last in line pivoted and swung his cudgel but was too slow. The lad sprinted on unbashed.
“Hold your positions!” Nular shouted then raced after the youth himself.
The adolescent was quick, but so was he, and he possessed the advantage of long Mulan legs. He caught up, lifted his baton to bash the lad over the head, then thought how the brutal sight might further enflame the mob. He dropped the cudgel to dangle from the strap around his wrist and grabbed the youth with his empty hands instead.
The boy dropped the bag to wrestle and turned out to have some notion of what he was doing. He tried to jam his knee into Nular’s groin, and the guard twisted and caught the attack on his thigh. Next came grubby fingers gouging for his eyes. He protected them by ducking his head then butted the adolescent in the face. The lad faltered, and Nular threw him down on his back. That seemed to knock the fight out of him.
Clad in rags, the lad was plainly a pauper. The stained sack gave off a fecal stink. Most likely he’d meant to use the contents to deface the Red Wizards’ door.
“Stay down,” Nular panted, “or I swear, next time I’ll use my sword on you.”
The boy glowered but didn’t move.
“What in the name of the Kossuth’s fire is the matter with you?” Nular continued. “Would you throw away your life on an idiot prank? You know the wizards punish disrespect.”
“Szass Tam has to be regent!” the youth replied.
“Why do you care? What difference do you think it will make to the likes of you?”
And as long as Nular was posing questions, how had the boy and his fellows learned the outcome of the zulkirs’ deliberations so quickly? As often as not, lesser folk never even heard the council had met, let alone what it decided.
It was a mystery, but someone shrewder than Nular would have to puzzle it out. His job was simply to keep order in one section of Eltabbar’s labyrinthine streets.
“Get up,” he said, “and pick up your bag of filth. Now go home! If you’re still here in forty breaths, or if I catch you out of doors again tonight, I’ll gut you.” He prodded the youth with the tip of his club to start him moving.
Once he’d herded the lad to the other side of the line, Nular scrutinized all the others like him. Feeding off one another’s outrage, they were growing more agitated by the moment. It was only a matter of time before the stones started flying.
He was no orator, but he had to say something to try and calm them. He was still trying to frame the words in his mind when some of them cried out, and they all flinched back.
He turned to see what had alarmed them. Standing behind the line was a towering four-armed creature with dark scales and gleaming scarlet eyes.
Nular felt a strange blend of fear and relief, the former because every sane person was leery of demons, and the latter because it was plain the conjurors in the house had sent the creature to help him.
He gazed up at its wolfish face. “Do you understand me?” he asked.
The entity chuckled. “Yes.”
“Good. That will make things easier. The sight of you has frightened the mob. We need to keep them intimidated. With luck, scare them into going elsewhere.”
“No, warrior. We need to slaughter them. Don’t worry, fighting in concert, we’ll manage easily.”
Nular frowned. “Maybe we would, but I’m hoping it won’t be necessary.”
“It already is. The rabble’s impudence is an affront to my masters and must be punished accordingly.”
“Do your masters understand that the unrest isn’t just happening here? The ‘rabble’ have taken to the streets across the city. If we kill people, the violence could spread and spread. We could end up with a riot far worse than those we’ve endured already.”
The demon shrugged. “That’s nothing to me. My masters command, and I obey. Are you not obliged to obey Red Wizards, also?”
Nular hesitated. “Yes, but you’re not one. If we’re going to do this, I at least need to hear the order from one of the conjurors.” He started to walk around the creature toward the house.
The spirit shifted so as to remain directly in front of him. “That isn’t necessary,” it said, and its crimson eyes flared brighter.
Nular rocked backward as though something had struck him a blow. He felt bewildered, as if he’d just awakened from a dream so vivid that he couldn’t be certain what was real.
Then he caught his balance, and his confusion passed. Or partly so. “What … what were we saying?” he asked.
“That we’re going to kill the rebels.”
“Yes.” That sounded right, or at least familiar. “Swords!”
A couple of his men—the clever ones, who might rise from the ranks one day—eyed him dubiously, but they were all well trained and exchanged their truncheons for their blades without protest. He did the same.
“Now forward!” Nular shouted. “Keep the line and cut the bastards down.”
The mob might have had the stomach for a fight with a dozen legionnaires, but legionnaires and an ogre-sized demon were a more daunting prospect. They screamed and tried to run, but their numbers were such that they got in each other’s way. The ones closest to their attackers couldn’t evade the soldiers’ swords and the creature’s fangs and talons, and thus they had no choice but to turn again and fight.
It was all right though. The soldiers’ training, armor, and superior weapons aided them, of course, but it was the demon’s ferocity that truly rendered the mob’s numerical advantage inconsequential. Striking quickly as a cat, ripping men to pieces with every blow, the spirit butchered more foes than all its human allies put together, until a rioter charged it from behind and buried an axe in its back. Whereupon the demon screamed, collapsed to its knees, then melted away to nothing at all. Nular could scarcely believe that a creature, which had seemed the very embodiment of inhuman might, could perish so easily, but evidently it was so.
“I killed it!” yelled the axeman, brandishing his gory weapon. “I killed it!” His comrades roared in triumph then hurled themselves at the legionnaires with renewed savagery.
With the fiend gone and rioters circling to get behind their remaining adversaries, the advancing line wasn’t viable anymore.
The legionnaires needed a formation that would enable them to guard each other’s backs.
“Square!” Nular bellowed. “Square!”
But they couldn’t form one. The enemies swarming on them from every side, grabbing and beating at them, made it impossible to maneuver. Pivoting, fighting with his sword in one hand and his cudgel in the other, Nular realized the press had suddenly grown so thick that he couldn’t even see his men anymore, just hear the clangor of their opponents’ blows pounding on their shields.
That clashing noise diminished as, no doubt, the legionnaires fell one by one. Something smashed or cut into Nular’s knee, and he dropped too. His injured leg ablaze with pain, he glimpsed men running toward the conjurors’ chapter house, then a burly laborer lifted a shovel high and plunged the edge down at his throat.
At first, Faurgar Stayanoga thought, it had made sense. They’d take to the streets as the priest in the alehouse had urged, and when the zulkirs saw how many they were, and how displeased, they’d have to rethink their decision.
More than that, it had been fun. Intoxicating. His whole life, Faurgar had walked warily in the presence of Red Wizards, legionnaires, or any Mulan really, but tonight, roaming the streets with hundreds like himself, he hadn’t been afraid of anyone. Th
ey’d all said whatever they wanted as loud as they wanted. Defaced, smashed, and torched whatever they wanted. Broken into shops and taverns and taken whatever they wanted.
But he was scared, because the legions had turned out in force to deal with the disturbance, and he and his friends were trapped, with blood orcs advancing from one side and human warriors from the other. The orcs leered and howled their piercing battle cries. The men strode quietly, with faces like stone, but despite their differing attitudes, both companies looked entirely ready to kill.
Faurgar looked up and down the street and found nowhere to run. Some of his companions pounded on doors, but no one would open to them. Evidently hoping the legionnaires would spare the lives of any who surrendered, others raised their hands or dropped to their knees. The rest, defiant still, brandished the knives and tools that were all they possessed in the way of weapons.
Faurgar simply stood, mouth dry, heart pounding, uncertain of what he ought to do. It didn’t look to him as if the guards intended to spare anyone, and if so, it seemed better to go down fighting. But if he was wrong, if there was even the slightest chance of surviving …
By the Great Flame, how had he come to this? He was the son of respectable parents and a journeyman mason. He didn’t belong in the middle of this nightmare.
The orcs reached the first kneeling man. Steel flashed, blood spurted, and the penitent collapsed to flop and twitch like a fish out of water. Soldiers trampled him as they continued to advance.
All right, thought Faurgar, now we know for certain that they mean to kill us all. So fight! But he didn’t know if he could. Tears were blurring his vision, and even if they hadn’t been, the urge to cringe was so strong that he could hardly bear even to look at the warriors. How, then, could he possibly strike a blow?
As if too full of bloodlust to permit their human comrades an equal share in the killing, the orcs abruptly screamed and charged. One ran straight at Faurgar.
Fight! he told himself, but when he tried to raise his trowel, his hand shook so badly that he dropped it. Knowing it was craven and useless, but powerless to control himself, he crouched and shielded his torso and face with his arms.
And as if the Storm Lord were responding to the spectacle of his wretchedness, the night burned white. Prodigious booms shook the earth, and torrents of frigid rain hammered down, ringing on the legionnaires’ armor and drumming on everything else.
The legionnaires faltered in shock. Barely audible over the thunder and the downpour, the commander of the orcs bellowed at his troops. Faurgar couldn’t speak their language, but he had a fair idea of what the gray-skinned creature was saying: It’s only rain! Go on and kill the rabble as I ordered you to!
The orcs moved to obey, then a flare of lightning struck a peaked rooftop on the right-hand side of the street. The flash was blinding, the crash loud enough to jab pain into Faurgar’s ears, and everyone froze once more.
One of the human soldiers shouted and pointed. Blinking, Faurgar reflexively glanced to see what had caught the legionnaire’s attention. He expected to observe that the thunderbolt had set the shingled roof on fire, but it wasn’t so. Rather, a tall, thin man in a red robe stood in the middle of the charred and blackened place where the lightning had struck, as if he’d ridden the bolt down from the sky.
“That’s Szass Tam!” someone exclaimed, and certainly the guards were coming to attention and saluting. Faurgar and his fellows knelt.
The lich’s dark gaze raked over them all, warrior and cornered troublemaker alike. “This won’t do,” he said. He seemed to speak without raising his voice, yet despite the din of the storm, Faurgar could hear him clearly from yards away.
“Unlike some,” Szass Tam continued, “I’m not eager to see Thayan soldiers slaughtering Thayan citizens, not as long as there’s any hope of avoiding it. Accordingly, you legionnaires will give these people one last chance to disperse and retire to their homes in peace.”
“Yes, Your Omnipotence!” the commander of the human guards shouted.
“And you citizens,” the necromancer said, “will do precisely that. I understand that you’ve behaved as you have out of concern for the realm, and to that degree, your patriotism does you credit, but you can’t accomplish anything by damaging your own city and compelling the guards to take harsh action against you. I promise a better outlet for your energies in the days to come.
“Now go,” he concluded, and a heartbeat later, inexplicably, he was gone. Faurgar had been looking straight at him, yet had a muddled sense that he hadn’t actually seen the wizard vanish.
The human officer barked orders. His company divided in the middle, clearing a corridor for Faurgar and his companions to scurry along. The orcs scowled but offered no protest. Szass Tam was their zulkir too.
Their zulkir, and the greatest person in the world. Thanks to him, Faurgar was going to live.
Malark stood at the casement watching the lightning dance above the city. The peaceful city. Even those folk who hadn’t had the opportunity to hear Szass Tam speak had discovered that cold, blinding, stinging rain washed the fun out of looting, vandalism, and assault, or in the case of the legionnaires, it dissolved their zeal to chase those guilty of such offenses.
The door clicked open behind him, and he smelled the perfume Dmitra was wearing tonight. He turned and knelt.
“Rise,” she said, crossing his darkened, austerely furnished room, a silver goblet in her hand. “I’ve received a message from Szass Tam. He’s retiring to his estate in High Thay for the time being. I can contact him there, but the implication is that I should refrain except in case of an emergency.”
“Do you think he knows you warned the other zulkirs of his intentions?”
“By the Black Hand, I hope not. I also hope it was the right thing to do. My instincts told me it was, and they’ve rarely played me false, but still …” She shook her head.
“If I may say so, Tharchion, you look tired. If you don’t feel ready to sleep, shall we sit and watch the storm together?”
“Why not?” He moved a pair of chairs up to the window and she sank down into one of them. “Do you have anything to drink, or must I call for a servant?”
“No wine.” Now that she’d come closer, he knew what she’d been drinking. He could smell it on her breath despite the overlay of perfume. “But some of that Hillsfar brandy you like.”
“That will do.”
As he passed behind her to fetch clean cups and the decanter, he automatically thought of how to kill her where she sat. One sudden blow or stranglehold, and no magic would save her, but he didn’t actually feel the urge to strike. Aside from the inconvenience to himself, obliged to give up a congenial position and flee Thay just when life here was becoming truly interesting, there wouldn’t be anything profoundly appropriate or exceptionally beautiful about the death. Dmitra was his benefactor, perhaps even in a certain sense his friend, and she deserved better.
She sipped brandy and gazed out at the tempest. “You have to give Szass Tam credit,” she said after a time. “First he incites what could have been the worst riot in the history of Eltabbar. He even tricks the mob into believing Nevron and the conjurors sent demons to kill them. Then he ends the crisis in the gentlest way possible, making himself a hero to every person who feared for his life and chattels, every rioter who escaped punishment, and any legionnaire who was squeamish about killing other Thayans.”
Malark smiled. “While simultaneously demonstrating just how powerful he is. I assume it’s difficult to spark a storm in a clear sky.”
“Yes, though we Thayans have been the masters of our weather for a long while. I’m actually more impressed by the way he appeared in dozens of places around the city all at the same moment. Obviously, people were actually seeing projected images, yet by all accounts, the phantasms didn’t behave identically. They oriented on the folk they were addressing, and if anyone dared to speak to them in turn, they deviated from the standard declaration to answer back.
I’m a Red Wizard of Illusion, and I have no idea how one would go about managing that.” She laughed. “And this is the creature I opted to betray.”
“But with considerable circumspection, so instead of fretting over what can’t be undone, perhaps it would be more productive to contemplate what’s just occurred. What game is Szass Tam playing now?”
“I don’t know, but you’re right, he is still playing. Otherwise, what’s the point of the riot?”
“He must realize now that the other zulkirs will never proclaim him regent no matter how much he makes lesser folk adore him.”
A gust of wind rattled the casement in its frame.
“I wonder,” Dmitra said. “Suppose he murders another zulkir or two. Suppose he tempts one or more of those who remain with the office of vice-regent, subordinate to himself but superior to all others. Sounds better than death, doesn’t it?”
It didn’t to Malark, but he didn’t bother saying so. “Now that I think about it, the various orders must be full of Red Wizards who’d love to move up to be zulkir, even if the rank was no longer a position of ultimate authority. It’s easy to imagine one or more of them collaborating with Szass Tam. They work together to assassinate Nevron, Samas Kul, or whomever, get the traitor elected to replace him, and afterward the fellow acts as the lich’s dutiful supporter.”
Dmitra nodded. “It could happen just that way, but not easily, not when Szass Tam needs a majority on the council, and not with all the other zulkirs now striving assiduously to keep themselves safe. I actually think the game has entered a new phase.”
“Which is?”
“I wish I knew.” She laughed. “I must seem like a pathetic coward. It’s one zulkir against six, who now enjoy my support, yet I’m frightened of the outcome. I have an ugly feeling none of us has ever truly taken Szass Tam’s measure, whereas he knows our every strength and weakness. I can likewise imagine our very abundance of archmages proving a hindrance. The lich is a single genius with a coherent strategy maneuvering against a band of keen but lesser minds bickering and working at cross purposes.”
Unclean: The Haunted Lands Page 25
