by Stephen Hunt
‘Save Paetro,’ pleaded Willow. I opened the door, I opened it. There’s nobody but me to blame.
Jacob looked like he wasn’t going to answer. He tugged a belt studded with bullets away from the second corpse and clipped it around his waist instead, but finally he spoke. ‘He’s a Vandian killer whose daughter I shot dead for stepping in front of me.’
‘Then you owe him.’
‘Only the first bullet.’ Jacob passed Willow one of the brace of pistols he had stolen from the dead thugs.
So heavy. She inspected the metal weight uncertainly. ‘What do I do with this?’
‘There are six answers to that question inside there.’
Jacob stalked towards the doorway Paetro had been dragged through. Willow hardly dared follow, but she forced herself to. He’s our beast, my beast. And if she was not his keeper, then nobody was. They passed a series of smaller vat rooms and storage chambers, following the sound of the Vandian’s anguished moans, growing louder and more pained, until they found what they were looking for. Willow wished they hadn’t. An abattoir chamber with a series of slabs large enough to hold cattle, easily large enough to accommodate Paetro’s form staked out naked in a horizontal ‘X’, the slab’s surface crusted with the blood of decades of work. Mrs Sackville hobbled between a stone sink containing the instruments of Thomas Purdell’s trade as well as a tanners’. The turncoat glanced up in surprise at being interrupted, a hooked blade hanging in his hand and a brown leather apron to protect his uniform from the worst of the butchery.
‘If you had worn that uniform for real, you’d know a soldier expects a little blood,’ said Jacob.
Purdell lifted the blade up high in the air carefully, moving it to the side of the slab. ‘That’s hardly fair, is it, a gun against a feather dissection blade?’
‘That’s why I’m going to shoot your over-the-hill tutor first, to give you a chance to go for that pistol tucked in your army holster.’
Purdell snorted. ‘You never did possess any flair, you dolt.’
Willow had to give Mrs Sackville her due, she ducked fairly spryly when her life was on the line, but Jacob’s pistol tracked her dipping form viper-fast, the barrel jouncing with a single shot. Sackville screamed as the bullet’s impact twisted her wizened old body and sent it spinning to the floor. Purdell’s revolver was in his hands and coming up towards Jacob as the first of the pastor’s volley caught the traitor in the chest. Maybe if Purdell’s hands hadn’t been slick with Paetro’s blood, he might have drawn faster. Jacob strode towards the traitor, shot after shot, fanning the pistol and emptying his chamber into the treacherous guild courier, Purdell stumbling back, striking the wall before slipping down the back of the abattoir, sliding on a trail of red strokes, painting the bricks behind him.
An unholy scream of rage tore out of Sackville’s wounded throat as she picked herself up and came charging towards the pastor waving a meat cleaver sharp enough to sever a cow’s heavy head. The pastor turned and fired, but the pistol chamber clicked uselessly. Empty. Willow winced as the blade came arcing down towards Jacob Carnehan’s skull until Mrs Sackville went dancing sideways under a volley of fire, her old body fountaining with entry wounds before she tipped over one of the spare slabs. There she lay, a slight trembling and a moan before all life was extinguished. Willow stared down in shock at the pistol in her hand, its barrel warm and a tail of gun smoke stinging her eyes.
‘That’s your answer,’ growled Jacob, looking sadly at Willow. ‘And it’ll go hard on you.’
There was another groan. Thomas Purdell tried to get to his feet, but he failed and collapsed. ‘No … style, no … sophistication,’ Purdell hissed from the floor, the words bubbling from his lips. A hand reached towards Mrs Sackville, but if his teacher had a human soul, it had already departed. ‘I should … have gone … first.’
‘Nobody ever dragged a mace to a duel,’ said Jacob.
‘Mace? You’re … little different … to me,’ spluttered Purdell from the floor. ‘You need … this as much as I do.’
‘There’s one fundamental difference,’ said Jacob, reloading the pistol’s chamber with a single shell before lowering the gun towards the prone traitor. ‘And it’s the only one that ever counted.’
Willow jumped despite herself as the weapon’s barrel bucked with the explosion. He didn’t murder Purdell. I did. Just as surely as I sent that wizened old demon back down to hell.
‘Finish me,’ moaned Paetro from the tanner’s slab. ‘For the love of the ancestors …’
Jacob brought his pistol around and rested its barrel against the soldier’s forehead. It was hard to believe that Paetro could be harmed any more than he’d already been hurt, a web of crimson lines bleeding across his face which were so fine they might have been pencilled on.
‘No, please,’ begged Willow, stepping forward between the pastor and the slab. ‘I promised Paetro I would save his daughter.’
‘Then I’ve made a liar of you twice.’
‘Please. I came to Midsburg to save you, Father!’ Willow thought briefly about turning the gun in her hand on the pastor, ordering him to stop. But she knew Jacob Carnehan would turn and gun her down before she could summon the speed or will to squeeze the trigger. Like Quicksilver. Some storms you couldn’t stand in front of – you just had to wait for them to pass. Willow felt like a coward, standing there paralysed with a fear far more raw and primeval than when Purdell had held her prisoner. Willow watched the pastor struggle with himself, his finger white and tight around the trigger, stealing herself for another sudden explosion. But the shot never came. She allowed her breath to escape in a deep rush.
‘Hadra-Hareer is due north of here,’ said Jacob, uncocking the hammer and lowering the pistol at last. ‘It’s a bleak, rocky place, the capital of Rodal. But men like you and I can always find a way to make such places bleaker, can’t we?’
‘Why won’t you finish me? You want to watch me bleed out slow, you bastard?’
Jacob leant over and unstrapped Paetro’s legs before releasing his arms. ‘Your wounds are bad, but hate can goad a man into surviving almost anything. And if that’s not enough, I figure the duty you owe Lady Cassandra should be good for the difference.’ He pushed the radio into Paetro’s blood-covered fingers. ‘Tell your legionaries to come for you.’
‘You can’t save me. Not you. Not you. Damn you!’
‘Damn me?’ Jacob laughed. ‘That ship’s already sailed. Tell your mistress not to bother using her carriers to transport prisoners to Vandia. You’re going to need every last vessel … every soldier and gun and murdering imperial noble you shipped here, as well as all those turncoat southerners your blood money’s paid for.’ Jacob bent down beside the weeping soldier, whispering so low Willow could barely hear the rest of the exchange. ‘Remember your duty to your house. And the look of surprise on your girl Hesia’s face when I drew on her. I’ll never be far from you.’ He turned to Willow. ‘You’re my conscience, now. You and Carter. There’s nothing left in me but you.’
I don’t want that. But she had it. She had opened the door to the cage. Willow bent down and helped Paetro sit up, picking up his clothes piled on the floor and passing them to the Vandian. ‘If you care anything for Duncan, tell him not to follow me. Give that message to my father, too.’
‘You’re a fool if you go with the priest, lass,’ moaned Paetro, glaring in revulsion at the pastor. ‘Death follows him like a shadow.’
‘I know.’ My shadow too, now. Stretching long across all of Weyland.
There was a rattle from the roof above, shaking from a nearby explosion. ‘That was one of ours,’ said Paetro, glaring at the pastor. ‘We’re going to win here, Weylander.’
‘Break the city, crush parliament’s army, smash the rebellion,’ said Jacob. ‘Yes, that was inevitable. Even without the Imperium’s might, Bad Marcus would have starved and shelled Midsburg into submission within a few months.’
‘We’ve won,’ snarled Paetro.
What does he mean? ‘I don’t understand?’ said Willow.
‘All we need to do to win here is survive,’ said Jacob, prodding the traitor’s corpse with his boot. ‘And we have.’
‘I’ll chase you to the ends of the world,’ snarled Paetro.
‘With your empire’s might, you probably could, if you set your mind to it,’ smiled Jacob. ‘But you won’t have to. This is my war now. You’re not facing Prince Owen and his po-faced general staff’s noblemen anymore. This defeat will end their control over the army. Don’t you see? I couldn’t seize command of the northern army in a coup. How could I do that? Who in our undefeated army would ever follow a bandit chieftain and murderer? But if I find the army lying beaten, lost in the gutter like a dropped dagger and bend down to pick it up …? The fall of Midsburg isn’t your victory. It’s mine. I should thank you, Vandian. I should kiss your emperor’s arse, because you’ve done everything I needed you to.’
Paetro groaned in pain.
‘And you’ll never have to look far for me, Vandian. I’ll be your shadow. I’ll be your night and your day. And if you ever get lost, just follow the sound of the screaming. That’s where I’ll be.’
SEVENTEEN
THE FALL OF MIDSBURG
Duncan surveyed the landscape from one of the Vandian tanks, standing on the relative safety of its iron ramparts, fifteen feet above the ground. This particular machine of war was named The Wolf of Soarspur by its crew, after some distant province of the imperium. It sported one large turret at the front, two smaller turrets at the rear and a series of heavy guns mounted on the ramparts that ran above its armoured skirt for the accompanying company of legionaries. These gun mounts were clearly designed to take down attacking skyguards, but with Midsburg’s air cover shattered or fled, the tank crew had to be content to pick off defenders along the curtain wall. Snarling white fangs were painted on its forward turret, grill-meshed lanterns on its flanks remade as two evil red eyes. At the very front of the vehicle a wickedly-spiked steel roller rotated between two metal arms, felling trees inside the orchards as if that was its purpose. Apple and pear trees crunched before them in splintered streams of timber, bloody red streaks twisting on the drum speaking for the few Weylanders who had survived the empire’s ‘treacle’ and been foolhardy enough to charge the Wolf. Barns and farm buildings exploded in clouds of brick, timber, masonry and tiles, singled out as though the tank drivers in the glacis-plate-mounted cockpit were seeking out fresh challenges for their amusement. Duncan’s unsolicited bodyguard, Nocks, leant lackadaisically on one of the mounted guns as though the farmers’ fields they tore up were his. He had made no comment beyond a little half-amused grunt when they’d crossed the smoking blackened hell where the northern cavalry charge had ended. As if to say here’s something new and the rebels should have expected nothing less. Duncan had smelt nothing like it before. Churning through bones, hot mud, ashes and the leftover tar of a charnel pit. A stench he’d carry to his grave. Death as a sweet, sickly aroma; treacle indeed.
They picked up speed. The entire Twelfth Armoured Legion driving forward like a steel javelin hurled towards the city’s eastern flank. There was little opposition worthy of the name left outside, only fountains of cold soil erupting occasionally where Midsburg’s wall-mounted cannons spoke. The Wolf rumbled forward with its main turret rotated towards the city. The entire tank rocked with each shell launched, a flower of flame and smoke from the big gun and then a shattering explosion and blast of masonry answering from along the curtain wall. Fire rippled the length of the armoured column, ear-splitting big guns detonating, rolling thunder as the war machines tossed their lightning towards Midsburg.
It’d be less noisy inside the tank. Except Nocks and the legionaries seemed to think nothing of riding outside and risking a shell or a sniper’s shot from the city. Hell if I’ll have them think me a coward. A line of horses came galloping up alongside their tank tracks, more than fifty steeds seemingly oblivious to the line of loud rotating track-drive wheels powering the treads. These were Weylanders, bluecoated cavalrymen with a thin yellow stripe down their trousers and a long rifle tucked into each leather saddle. The officer at the front of the riders lifted up his cap as he pulled to the side, and Duncan stifled a groan as he saw it was his brother-in-law’s face.
‘Those kettles are fine for Vandian steel-backs to rattle around in,’ called up Wallingbeck, slowing and allowing his riders to pass him by. ‘But you need to be seen up high on a fine stallion for the common herd to know you’re a man of quality. These horses hail from m’own stables, cornfed and groomed by the stable-hands at Belinus Hall.’
I’m sure the snipers up on the wall will be only too glad to see you coming. ‘You’re riding with the Twelfth Legion all the way to the wall?’ shouted Duncan.
‘General Colbert doesn’t want all the glory of the fall of Midsburg going to the king’s allies,’ said Wallingbeck. ‘Did you see the assembly’s army ride out? Have you ever seen anything so magnificent? I won’t have it said that any Riverlarn man was less brave than the pretender’s dirty rebels.’
Magnificently stupid, perhaps. ‘I don’t think you will hear any slights cast by the northern cavalry.’ And you had your chance to hear first-hand, as you rode over their baked bones on the way to the city.
‘Damned fine day for riding,’ said Wallingbeck. ‘Have to give the court a good show.’ He nodded and spurred the horse on fast, re-joining the company.
Glad to see that your wife and child’s well-being inside Midsburg is still gnawing away at you. Well, it seemed Willow had developed a knack for survival. Her marriage spoke volumes for that. It was his friend Paetro that Duncan was worried about. Things must be dire inside Midsburg for the old soldier to break off contact, failing to report in. You survived the legions, Paetro. You survived everything that Helrena’s enemies threw at the house over the years. Surely you can survive a backwater like Weyland, too?
‘There goes a future field marshal,’ said Nocks, dryly. The scar-faced sergeant watched the viscount gallop towards the head of the column of cavalry.
Duncan turned his attention to his father’s servant. ‘Lady Landor told me that you served on the Eastern Frontier?’
‘Did she now? True enough,’ grunted the sergeant. ‘We taught all the bandits and bushwhackers out Ivah and Kish way that they’d be better off hunting for pickings on the opposite of the border, leaving the kingdom well alone.’
‘And how did you do that?’
Nock’s eyes glinted malevolently. ‘Oh, we had our little ways.’
I’m sure you did. ‘I’m not interested in scalping rebel prisoners, Nocks. Willow may or may not have her liberty inside the city; but my sister isn’t the reason we’re heading to Midsburg. Only Princess Helrena’s daughter matters. Lady Cassandra’s our duty.’
‘Don’t worry, boy,’ said the sergeant. ‘Old Nocks knows what to do. The daughter of a princess trumps the daughter of a northcountry nobleman, even if the northern wench is willowy Willow.’
‘She’s the wife of that future field marshal, Nocks. Lady Wallingbeck. You’d do well to keep that in mind.’
‘Oh, I’m just a simple man with simple tastes,’ said the servant, the scar on his face glowing crimson as his face scrunched up in a wicked grin. ‘Yes, Nocks knows his place. Lugging a bucket around Hawkland Park in Landor livery or dressed in the royal blues of an artillery sergeant … I’m a humble soul.’
‘It may be that it’ll take hanging a few northern officers and rebel assemblymen from the lampposts to free Lady Cassandra.’
Nocks grinned even wider at that. ‘Won’t be much different from hanging farmers caught harbouring outlaws. Ain’t a lesson that ever needs repeating, in my experience.’
Duncan nodded, glad that the stout leering servant might have his uses after all. Let Nocks do the deed, he looks like he mig
ht even enjoy it. I thought I was coming home to help temper the imperium’s vengeance. Instead, I’m crunching over the bones of Weylanders to save Cassandra. Well, the rebels’ back-stabbing stupidity sowed this harvest, now they’ll have to reap it. I did my best for my old country. Everywhere Duncan turned he saw foolish choices. The northern prefectures and national assembly choosing to rebel against the king. His sister choosing a dolt like Viscount Wallingbeck for her husband. His father choosing a woman young enough to be his daughter as a wife and then wilfully ignoring poor Leyla to manage the house’s affairs. And now those errors were leaking into Vandia with Helrena trying to convert an untrustworthy foe like Prince Gyal into an ally through marriage. Why does the weight of making things right always fall on my shoulders?
‘I like the way these Vandians make war, that I do,’ said Nocks. ‘Wagons like land-based ironclads to keep a man safe inside. Skyguards able to hover as still as a hawk and turn battlefields black with dragon-fire. I can see this alliance going a long way. Maybe they’ll start recruiting for legionaries inside the kingdom, too?’
‘We’ll be gone,’ said Duncan. ‘The imperium will extract their price, free Lady Cassandra, and Weyland will just be one of a thousand distant lands desperately clamouring for the empire’s bounty.’
‘You sound like one of those steel-backs, right enough, strutting through the streets and throwing your gold about,’ said Nocks. ‘Weyland’s muddled along just fine for thousands of years with only the ocean for company. I reckon King Marcus will muddle on a while longer after you’ve gone back to Vandia.’
It’ll go to hell without me … and the nation’s welcome to it. I’ll have enough on my plate trying to keep Prince Gyal from poisoning Cassandra and Helrena.
A steel hatch opened in the rear turret closest to Duncan and he saw it was the legionary from the vehicle’s communications room: A Sig in the military jargon of the legion. ‘Any answer?’
