The answer came on a breath of frozen air: "Human Resources."
"Human Resources?"
Red light gleamed in Mr. Skree's eyes. "Their breeding pits are terrible and magnificent, fiend."
"Okay, but what ensures we get the food from our vassals to feed the breeding pits?" Freetrick said, "And how do we keep the monsters they produce in line?"
"Pallid hands," said Mr. Skree, "their veins pulsing with the black blood of the First God, weave dark spells to---"
"I was being rhetorical. Necromancy. We kill people to fuel the necromancy we need to kill more people."
"Elegant," said Mr. Skree, "and diabolical."
Freetrick groaned. How could he explain an unsustainable feedback loop to someone who brushed his teeth with a cloud of beetles?
"The whole system is on the brink of collapse," said Freetrick. "And then we'll get a peasant rebellion, then a foreign invasion, then my assassination by my family, then assassination by my fiancé and her family." Freetrick let his hand flop back down and grumbled, "Possibly in that order, if Bloodbyrn knows a good re-animator."
Mr. Skree coughed.
"You think I'm mistaken, Mr. Skree?"
"This mumbling collection of pus must abase itself to the Master of Mayhem, for his terrible eyes can see details that other cannot…" the chamberlain temporized.
"The way this nation is being run is wrong." Freetrick looked down at his pessimistic notes. "Hell, Skrean government policy is so terrible it ought to be held up as a model for first year political science students. Watch closely, boys and girls, and learn what not to do."
"Indeed, oh Spelunker in the Depths of Human Anguish," said Mr. Skree. "For such is the function of the Kingdoms of Evil."
Ah yes, the Covenant again. "Gibberish," said Freetrick, "I'm going to striking fix this place. So let's get ready for the Vile Council, shall we?" He glared through his pince-nez at Mr. Skree, who eventually cleared his throat with a sound like an abused wood-rasp.
"A thousand pardons may be written upon a thousand strips of a servant's flesh, the flesh knotted onto a thousand arrows, the arrows set afire, and then shot into the heart of this most ignominious of pulsating pustules, oh Mighty Evil One…"
"Uh huh?" Freetrick rolled his hand, wishing he had a fast-forward button for his chamberlain.
"But the ugly and worm-ridden ears of this servant have heard orders. Orders which can be ignored only at peril of long and agonizing extinction."
"Wait," said Freetrick, "who's giving you orders aside from me? What did they say?"
"'Have me notified the instant my lord awakens,'" Mr. Skree released a sepulchral, desiccated, and now horribly feminine hiss. "And inform him that his efforts to seduce me by avoiding me entirely have, unsurprisingly, failed to work." Freetrick looked down at his desk, edging closer to hyperventilation as Mr. Skree's terrible recitation ground to a halt. "The un-wedding, my lord, shall take place tomorrow."
Ah yes, Freetrick thought. In all his plans to save himself from assassination, starvation, invasion, and mutilation, he had forgotten all of the real and immediate dangers to his life.
"I suggest," ended Bloodbyrn's message, "that my lord memorize his lines for the ritual."
***
Madene fell heavily and clumsily, breaking branches and twigs, crashing through slender aspen branches in a welter of yellow leaves.
Something wooshed past her in a clatter of yellow aspen leaves and displaced air, and then something struck Madene hard in the back. The person under her exhaled and hands fumbled, trying to find purchase on Madene's Warrior Maiden leathers. But she was still moving too fast. Madene slid through her catcher’s arms and landed, bottom-first, on the muddy ground of a creek bank.
“Ouch! Istain!” Madene was furious, not that Istain would try to catch her, of course, but because he was bound to be so smug about it. “Look how the mighty have fallen,” he would say, or “I guess men are good for something in Virgin Soil after all.” The asshole. Madene gritted her teeth and opened her eyes.
“Oh!” Madene had time for nothing but a shocked gasp before Selene—Selene— was gone. The tall girl---who had just turned Madene’s fall from crippling to merely painful---now dusted her hands, crouched, and shot back into the air.
Still sprawled on the ground, Madene had to bend her neck all the way back to follow the flight of the Warrior Maiden. She saw Selene twist and the air flash as she unsheathed her sword. A chattering cry in the trees rose to a furious squeal and died suddenly with the sound of blade chopping meat. A dark, furry body plopped out of the branches above and threw up a cloud of leaves where it landed, only a few feet from the other, identical lump of the first goblin.
Madene’s eyes tracked the creature, then widened as its limbs fell open against the ground and its shape became clear. Even with its dark fur and its pointed ears and bushy tail, the body on the ground was undeniably, disturbingly human. The hands and face were leathery and black, but perfectly formed, like the hands and face of a baby…
Selene’s feet splashed into the mud behind her. “Did it poke you?”
Madene looked around Warrior Maiden rising from her landing crouch, sliding her grass-slender blade back into its scabbard, her face tight.
“What?” Madene tried not to tremble as she pulled herself upright.
“On mbibrí tú? Did it poke you? Understand me?” Selene knelt by Madene, ignoring the two corpses on the ground. She took a hold of Madene’s arms and brought them up to examine her hands and wrists. “DeDébhegh pómaigi mé, how do you say it, on ndemeobhói was carrying a— diglann a—that is a…a poke, a prick, from a wood urchin.”
“On ndemeobhói,” said Madene, stunned. “The…the goblin?”
“Déa!” Selene gave a short, emphatic nod as she bent Madene’s arms. Tá on iélse iádúil…poison, do you understand me? Did it poke you?” Her fingers dug into Madene’s flesh.
“Nuh—no,” said Madene. Sweet words, had it? Madene looked toward where the first goblin lay on the muddy ground. One of its little hands still clutched something like a red and yellow knitting needle. “I mean. I don’t think so.”
“Are you feeling strange anywhere? Tá teubhsite tú?…gan teubhsiú—that is, like you can’t feel.”
“Numb?” said Madene. Selene’s worry was contagious. Oh Truth, was she? “I don’t know.”
Selene grimaced. “Take off your clothes.”
“What?”
“Your silleac,” said Selene as she seized the bandolier around Madene’s torso. “Take it off!”
Madene didn’t argue. Her fingers fumbled at the tight little clasps down the front of her silleac, the tight, buckskin, vest-like upper garment of the Warrior Maidens. Selene’s own garb was the same, vest above and short buckskin pants below, for mobility. Only Selene wore a sword at her hip and gold dueling rings in her hair. The steel-chromium torque of the initiate to the Warrior Maiden mysteries flashed as she bent closer to Madene.
Madene was relieved to see no little holes in the shift she wore below the silleac. So was Selene, evidently, for she did not remove the shift, but instead probed her fingers into the flesh up Madene’s arms, over her shoulders and collar.
“Can you feel this?” She asked, “does my finger feel strange?”
Madene winced, “I don’t think so.”
“Ndhobhró,” Selene straightened, “okay.”
“Okay.” Madene closed her eyes and breathed out in a long sigh.
“So Istain, is she prettier than me?”
Madene’s eyes snapped open.
“What? Ha. Selene, I am not falling for that one.”
And she was spinning around, glaring, eyes flashing silver at Istain who had—of course—been watching the whole stinking escapade.
“No really.” Selene’s voice had lost all of its urgency. She tossed her short hair at Istain and stuck out a hip. “I’m wanting your honest opinion, boh-ya. You said you like small women.”
“I believe I
said that while I was holding you, my dear.” Istain was leaning against the slim trunk of an aspen, bending it horribly, with that smug smile he always wore when someone humiliated herself, the one that meant he was about to say something sarcastic. Madene opened her mouth to scream at him—she had no idea what—when Selene reached out and twisted her around so the taller girl’s hip pressed into her waist.
“But Madene is smaller than me. And, see, her breasts are a little bigger than mine.”
“Maybe I’m an ass-man,” Istain grinned.
Madene made an inarticulate noise of horror and clasped her arms over her chest, suddenly horribly conscious of how easy it was to see through her undershirt.
“Don’t worry, Madene,” Istain said, “you’re quite nice. I wonder what would that Kendrick say if he saw you in those pants. Huh?”
“You…BASTARD!” Madene shrieked. She kicked out, and an incoherent blast of Maidencraft sent her shooting up at an angle to crash into an aspen. She fell heavily to the ground—for the second time in this horrible day.
“Woah, hey, calm down Madene.”
“Istain Scander,” Madene snarled at him, “oh God of Words help me, you turn around right now!”
Istain obediently turned to face the trees while Madene yanked her silleac off the ground and buttoned it over her chest. “What did you think you were doing?” She shouted. All of the terror and confusion that had filled her when the goblin attacked had been burned into rage. “Making jokes and…and making fun of me! I could have died.”
Selene snorted and Madene turned to her in a sudden, terrible assumption. “Or could I? Oh Truth!” She felt like crying. “Are wood urchins even poisonous?”
Selene frowned, “Of course, Sestregh Madene. They wouldn’t be of the Shadow if they weren’t. If you touch one your hand will go numb. You’ll fall over in a minute, but it might be an hour before your heart stops. And,” she continued while Madene tried to work up a response, “I thought it poked you, true. What kind of Sestrea are you thinking I am?”
“Oh,” said Madene. “Well, did you have to take off my silleac?”
“Of course,” said Selene, “If not, my boy could not compare us. Then he might to think he made the wrong choice. It is important.”
Madene gritted her teeth.
“Madene,” called Istain. “We’re sorry, okay? Can I turn around now?”
“No!” said Madene, but of course he did anyway.
“So,” he said, “what’s up?”
Madene gave that the glare it deserved, but Istain only raised an eyebrow. “Okay, cool it, Madene,” he drawled. “I mean, jokes aside, you nearly got yourself killed.”
Madene’s rage boiled over. Maidencraft propelled her across the ground faster than Istain could blink, and then she was standing in front of him, her nose nearly pressed against his solar plexus. “Shut up, Istain.” There, at least she had wiped the smugness of the boy’s face.
“Now.” Madene floated upward until her eyes were level with Istain’s. How long she had been wanting to do that! “I want you to tell me what the heck you think you’re doing here.”
Istain, his face a bare inch from hers, raised an eyebrow, “Killing goblins.” He nodded toward the furry heap on the ground. “I should think that was obvious. And also saving your life. I think you ought to thank Selene for that.”
Madene stepped back onto the ground, disgusted. Selene was not what she had expected of a warrior maiden. Almost as surprising as the fact she even had a taste for men was how truly terrible that taste was. The border guard had attached herself to Istain on their first day in Virgin Soil, and she'd been all over the obnoxious boy ever since. And the way they kissed. In public! But Selene was a warrior maiden, and she had just saved Madene's life. “Thank you, Selene,” she said.
“You’re welcome,” Selene nodded, “and I’m sorry I joked with you, Sestregh. I did not know you would not…like the joke.”
“I could’ve warned you,” muttered Istain from behind her.
“But,” said Selene, “I think we have all learned something, right?” She turned and, hips swinging, sauntered over to the dead goblins on the ground. When she bent to pick them up, Madene was sure Istain got another dose of ass. Stinking wonderful.
“Why were you killing goblins?” Madene asked again.
“Because I saw them.” Selene slung the furry carcasses over her shoulder
Madene decided not to ask if monster-hunting was more important than orders from the High Maiden.
She had suspected at the time that High Maiden Kadene had sent Selene on urchin-killing duty as a punishment. Certainly the girl was doing her best to merit the discipline, in Madene’s opinion. “The High Maiden sent me.”
“Of course,” said Selene, “what was her message?”
“We are to seek her audience immediately,” Madene gave both of them a level look, “you and me, and Istain.”
“Istain?” said Selene, at the same time Istain said “me?” in exactly the same tone complete surprise.
“Why the stricken hell would she want to see me?” Istain continued, blasphemously, “last time I checked, I was a guy, and as far as I can tell, the High Maiden doesn’t see much use in anything with its testicles on the outside.”
Madene wasn’t surprised at the boy’s irreverence, but she wasn’t going to let him sully the name of High Maiden Kadene, stink it! She turned a threatening glance his way. “Keep a civil tongue, Istain.”
“Don’t get attacked by goblins, Madene,” he smirked.
I could rip the head from your body Madene wanted to shout, but controlled herself. Physical threats would only make Istain even more sarcastic. At least while Selene was around to make sure those threats never became reality. A quick fantasy involving an unprotected Istain, a tall tree, and the Maidencraft played itself out for Madene’s enjoyment.
When she was calm enough to speak again, she said, “The High Maiden has summoned all of us.”
“And the Tenured Captain-Assistant? What does he say about it?”
“I don’t know, Istain!” Madene threw up her arms in exasperation, “what does Tenured Captain-Assistant Clanat have to do with anything?”
“Well, he’s the boss of me,” said Istain, “not your High Maiden. I’m not a Virgin Soil subject.”
Neither am I, Madene wanted to say, but I’m not being an asshole about it. “Just come on, will you?”
Istain and Selene shared a look. Madene didn't like that at all.
***
Observant people would say that the Skull Throne of Skrea was more a pyramid than a chair. More observant people would say it was less a pyramid than an enormous pile of human skulls, glued together, with a depression in the middle for what Mr. Skree described as the Looming Buttocks of the Light-Queller.
The throne dwarfed its occupant, who wriggled against the cranial domes of his slaughtered enemies, fiddling with his towering crown, trying to find a position that didn't hurt like hell.
"Is his seat of government all I promised my lord it would be, or is it not?" DeMacabre sat in a smaller, less boney, and probably a far more comfortable chair down and to the right, his head around the level of Freetrick's armrests. "How does my lord find the Skull Throne, and the power invested in its calciferous hollows?"
Easy. I just look at the top of this monster-filled arena and there it is. Freetrick grimaced, "Too many skulls."
"Aha," said Bloodbyrn. "A quip. How inappropriate." There were only two seats on this wedge of the arena, so Freetrick's fiancée sat on the armrest of Freetrick's throne. Her seat had to be even more uncomfortable than his, and yet Bloodbyrn seemed entirely at ease perched at Freetrick's left hand.
"My lord and his joking," DeMacabre was wearing a new hat, Freetrick saw, which, though not as tall as Freetrick's own crown, still had to be strapped on. "Hih-lar-ious, my lord," he said, "but lah, what heady pleasure it must be to sit astride the Skull Throne," DeMacabre winked at his daughter, and his voice dropped,
"towering over all, watching—no, lord—glaring balefully, my lord," he was standing now, eyes nearly level with Freetrick's, "upon the arrayed ranks of the greatest and most depraved of your servants and slaves," his arms lifted as he turned, arachnid hands splayed as if to embrace his nation's government, "the Council of Villainy!"
The Audience Pit stretched below him, a bowl-shaped depression the size of a Rationalist amphitheatre, its walls formed by a ranks of terraces. And on the seats…
A week of exposure had taught him to identify the black-and-silver-clad Skrean Dark Ignobles and Dark Princes who ruled the Kingdoms of Evil. The seats they occupied lay under pulsing shadows. Directly across from Freetrick sat the subject nations, the Dark Lords and ladies of the bloody swamps of Sangboire and the grim Murder-woods of St'tdrakh.
DeMacabre made a lacy flourish with one hand. "See! The ruler of every despotate, duchy, barony, and county of the Kingdoms of Evil, their retainers, slaves, catamites, parasites and others. All came to swear fealty to the new Ultimate Fiend, and so they have remained. Not," DeMacabre laughed, "that they would expect personal audiences with the Master of the Maelstrom, in all his dark and unholy glory. They may dream of such things, my lord, but not even in their worst nightmares would such a horrible honor, or, if my lord would permit, an honorable horror, be visited upon the heads of men such as these."
Freetrick kept his expression blank. So that was why all of his official business in the last week had been conducted through DeMacabre and his legion of minions. He didn't need a nearly completed political science degree to tell him that that was a bad idea. "I expect to be introduced to all of the members of my government, DeMacabre."
"Of course, my lord." DeMacabre's grin would have put a barracuda off its breakfast. Lace splayed across his hand as he indicated the roaring nobles arrayed below them. "In time, my lord, in time. I expect my lord shall make the intimate acquaintance of many dark aristocrats. Yes, most intimate indeed."
"So this monster thing," he paused as a rattling scream drowned out his voice, "is some sort of opening ceremony?"
"Oh, no, fiend," DeMacabre said, "this is but an appetizer. Wait for just a moment, then the Council of Villainy will become so much more interesting."
The Kingdoms of Evil Page 22
