Shadow of the Conqueror

by Shad M Brooks

  “There’s a soap boxer around three kilometers that way.”

  “Do you need a rest before we go?”

  “I’ll manage,” Daylen said, and then launched himself into the sky with a power jump.

  Daylen landed in an alleyway about a city block from the Dawnist, Lyrah right behind him.

  “He’s on the corner of the street over,” Daylen said.

  “Lead the way,” Lyrah replied.

  They left the alley and it didn’t take long for them to draw a decent amount of attention.

  “Is it you or me that everyone’s looking at?” Daylen asked.

  “I’d say it’s both. As a knight I always stand out, and then there’s you with your Grand High Master’s Mark. You’re also becoming quite recognizable thanks to the press.”

  “We’re quite the potent combination.”

  Lyrah glanced at him with a slight smile.

  “You’ll have to stay at a distance while I talk to the Dawnist. They’re less likely to trust me if you’re around.”

  “Agreed,” Lyrah said, and walked off.

  Daylen approached the Dawnist who looked to be a factory worker. He was calling out to the passersby—no crowd around this one.

  He stopped mid-speech as he saw Daylen.

  “You!”

  “Yes,” Daylen said, glancing around to make sure no one was listening. Several people were, so he stepped in closer. “I want to join.”

  “You do!”

  “Quiet! But yes. I need to speak with your leader.”

  The skinny man leaned down and whispered, “Go to fourteen over thirty-two in the Brickhollow Tenement community on Nail Street, Maraden District. They’ll definitely let you in.”

  “Thanks,” Daylen said before walking back to meet Lyrah.

  “Fourteen over thirty-two, Brickhollow Tenement on Nail Street in Maraden District,” Daylen said once Lyrah had rejoined him.

  “You don’t really think that’s where the Dawnist leader is?”

  “I don’t know. We’ll have to wait and see.”

  “Even if their leader isn’t there, if you can find something that belongs to him, you’ll be able to track him by enhancing your scent.”

  “Tracking, of course,” Daylen said, feeling stupid. “That makes sense. I mean, hounds can track people through scent. Honestly, I had forgotten about enhancing it ever since I experimented with it falls ago. I just hadn’t needed it since then.”

  “Well with a level-four bond on scent you can do more than track people.”

  “You’re talking about emotion.”

  “Yes.”

  “I find it easy enough to read people’s emotions, so I’ve had little need to smell them out.”

  “Unless people are trying to hide their feelings. I’m only saying this because it might be useful to know the emotions of the Dawnist leader.”

  “That’s good advice,” Daylen said, giving Lyrah a suspicious look.

  “What?”

  “You’re teaching me about our powers. I thought that wasn’t going to happen until I joined the knights.”

  Lyrah’s eyes narrowed. “It’s for the sake of the mission, so take it as a small sample of what the knights can really teach you.”

  “I understand completely. So, while you’re being forthcoming and all, is there anything else that might help me?”

  “One other thing,” she said disdainfully. “If you’re going in to try and get them to inadvertently reveal information, channel all your bonds to your voice. One bond to the voice can increase the volume in which you speak, but you can reduce the volume to a normal level even while channeling. Regardless of the volume, channeling light to one’s voice has a supernatural effect on your words. The more bonds you channel to your voice, the greater influence your words will have on people. It can increase people’s disposition to agree with you, do what you suggest, or help them understand a concept you’re trying to explain.”

  “Wow, that’s amazing.”

  She nodded. “You can stack four bonds to voice, which will be very potent. Just remember that it’s not mind control,” she warned. “If they don’t want to talk about something, like a secret, or if the person is aware of the influence, they can resist no matter how many bonds are used—it’s just harder. But if they’re unaware, and their guard is down, especially if they trust you, with a level-four bond you can get them to reveal nearly anything.”

  “Thanks.”

  “I didn’t do it for you.”

  “Not even just a little bit?”

  Lyrah didn’t answer and walked ahead.

  Daylen caught up. “So, how often have you enhanced your voice around me?”

  “Like it’s had any effect. You’re as stubborn as a mule.”

  “Stubbornness is a factor in how effective it is?”

  “Of course.”

  “So we’re both immune to it then,” Daylen said, smiling.

  Lyrah glared at him. Daylen just smiled back.

  He really was enjoying this.

  Chapter Forty

  The countless discontents throughout my empire saw what I did to those who rebelled, and so they didn’t dare do so openly. Instead they acted with more subtlety. Rayaten Leusa had grown in great influence over the years preceding the Daybreak Massacre, but after that, something changed. So many things in my empire stopped running smoothly, with breaks in supply lines, production problems, and attacks on government buildings and barracks, all being run by a group of underground rebels. I later learned that all these efforts were organized by this one man, Rayaten, who had become wholly consumed by his opposition to me. Despite the bounty I put on his head and the men I sent to hunt him out, I never found him.

  Instead, most of my men came back dead.

  * * *

  They decided to catch a skycoach, which let Daylen’s powers recover somewhat from the excessive use.

  Once the coach landed, Daylen looked out his window at Brickhollow. The tenement community was a collection of tall, thin buildings squeezed together that boarded a single short lane in a U-shape. The street was littered with small bits of rubbish, scraps, and debris, with dirty children playing in the lane and the elderly sitting on old chairs out front.

  Clotheslines were strung over the central lane from building to building with linens hanging in the still air.

  “From the look of it I almost understand why the Dawnists want a revolution,” Lyrah said.

  “There were far more slums like this during the Dawn Empire,” Daylen replied. “Enough to fuel a nation’s rebellion.”

  “Just because there’s less poor now doesn’t mean that there should be any poor at all.”

  “Yeah,” Daylen said with a sigh. “You’ll need to wait here.”

  “I know.”

  “See you soon,” Daylen said, and exited the coach.

  The smell in this part of the city was offensive, and Daylen wondered when the last time the council had sent some slaves here to clean the streets.

  He enhanced his perception and quickly noticed many distrustful eyes on him, as well as three dirty young men skulking in the shadows of an alleyway looking as if they were ready to rob him.

  He released his bond and was met by a soft headache in return. “Yep, my head really doesn’t seem to like me bonding light to it.” He channeled to heal himself which, once again, didn’t push the pain away completely.

  Daylen walked into the tenement block and was pleased to see that he wasn’t followed. Making his way through the piles of rubbish he came upon a very aged man sitting on a damaged chair in front of one of the buildings. The image stopped Daylen in his tracks, for looking upon the old man Daylen could only see himself. They must have been close in age. An oddity, for few people lived so long, what with the Fourth Night, Daylen’s rule and the bloody second revolution—a person was very lucky to survive all of that, or unlucky depending on how you looked at it.

  Daylen approached the man who stared at him uninteres
tedly.

  “Excuse me.” Daylen said, “But could I have a moment of your time?”

  The man’s eyes twitched and he seemed to register Daylen for the first time. “What, who’re you?” he said in a slurred voice, most of his teeth missing.

  “I’m no one,” Daylen said. “I was just wondering—did you live through the Fourth Night?”

  The man’s focus switched, gazing into his own memory. “The Fourth Night, terrible it was… I fought them, you know—the monsters, I fought them.”

  “Then you’re a hero.”

  “No, it was those that went into the Underworld, they’re the heroes.”

  “Even Dayless the Conqueror?”

  “He was Daylen Namaran back then, before he became the Great Bastard… A good man, once.”

  It was hard for Daylen to control his emotion at hearing this. The mere fact that this man had lived through so many terrible things made his life worth honoring. Yet here he was, cast off, sitting amongst trash. It was heartbreaking. This man had certainly lived a better life than Daylen—yet who would be remembered?

  “Please tell me your name.”

  “Parpen.”

  “It’s good to meet you, Parpen,” Daylen said, kneeling down and handing the man two crowns.

  “What’s this for?” Parpen said in amazement.

  “For living a good life.”

  Parpen huffed. “I don’t have much to show for it, and I don’t have much life left, either.”

  “Such a long life is a burden few people bear. Have you lived in light?”

  “I tried.”

  Judging by the man’s inner light he had more than tried. Light, he must have been a saint. “Then I can’t see why the Light wouldn’t welcome you into its rest.”

  “I guess I’ll find out soon enough.”

  “I’m glad to have met you, Parpen. I hope you find peace.” And Daylen left the old man on his chair, wishing he had time to befriend him properly.

  It was easy for Daylen to find the thirty-second unit of flats.

  Those three thugs had skulked out of their alleyway and were now hiding around the corner that led into the main central lane of the block.

  Daylen entered the flat, climbed the stairs to the fourteenth apartment, and knocked on the door.

  A tall bulky man answered, and his eyes widened as soon as he saw Daylen.

  The man must have been in his thirties, meaning he would have been ten years old or so when Daylen had been deposed. How could anyone who lived during the Dawn Empire want to bring it back? Just going off statistics, everyone from that time would have had at least had one relative or friend executed, if not more.

  Daylen stacked his bonds to voice before speaking carefully and with control. “I’m the son of Dayless the Conqueror. Let me in.”

  The man was silent for a second before stepping aside.

  Daylen entered to see three other tall men of varying muscle and girth standing near the door, each armed with a rapier.

  Two of the muscled men looked young, but the last looked older than twenty, meaning he too must have lived during Daylen’s rule. Are these people mad?

  The apartment’s walls and roof all had wet rot, the carpet stained and dirty. In the adjoining room several weathered chairs had been arranged in rows. They were being addressed by a woman who had pale blue hair with deeper blue streaks throughout in a short cut.

  The woman paused when Daylen entered, staring at him with pair of sharp and truly stunning eyes. She was wearing a button-up white shirt and black slacks with a rapier at her curved hip.

  She was gorgeous and must have been in her late twenties or early thirties, though still a pup to Daylen’s older eyes.

  “You’ll have to excuse me,” the woman said to the seated group.

  “Jena,” a seated man said, “we’ll need to leave soon.”

  “I know,” she said in a soft, almost timid voice, “but this might be important.” A head shorter than Daylen, she was slight and curvaceous. She approached him with a look of awe. “It’s true—you look exactly like him.”

  “Are you in charge?”

  Jena’s demeanor changed and she smiled, looking suddenly confident. “That depends,” she said playfully.

  “On what?”

  “What you want. Last I heard, you weren’t exactly sympathetic to our cause.”

  Daylen stacked all his bonds to his scent and wasn’t prepared for how hard the putrid smells of this place would hit him. It nearly caused him to lose his composure, but he quickly focused his scent to smell for emotion and targeted the sense to the young woman.

  This Jena was radiating a smell of…well, the only way Daylen could describe it was sex. His mind processes that smell into an understanding. She was attracted to him. Powerfully attracted to him, if this smell was anything to go off. There was also a prickly smell that Daylen instinctively knew as caution. Daylen switched his bonds back to his voice.

  “I want to know why you revere my father.”

  “Simple,” Jena said. “He was a great man. Do you know that he was a bona fide war hero before he even became Emperor?”

  “Trust me, you don’t know more about Dayless the Conqueror than me.”

  Jena shook her head, smirking. “No. You grew up in an orphanage and only lived with the Conqueror for a few years before he died. I’ve spent my whole life studying your father. I understand who he really was.”

  Daylen gritted his teeth. This idiot girl knew nothing. What would she say if she knew that the real Dayless the Conqueror was actually standing right before her?

  “Didn’t you read the letter he left? It’s been reprinted in the papers. Dayless hated himself for all that he had done.”

  “If he really did write that letter, which I’m not convinced is true, he must have lost his way and forgot the vision he had for a unified and just world.”

  Daylen pushed down his growing rage and did his best to not choke on his own words. This girl was attracted to him after all, so he would certainly catch more flies with honey, as the saying went.

  “You might be right,” Daylen said, looking Jena in the eyes. “Father was very reluctant to speak of his past. He was a different man toward the end, and I want to know who he was. I think you’re the one who can teach me on this…as well as many other things.”

  Jena smiled, her sharp eyes twinkling. “Then you’ve come to the right place.” She nodded to the muscle surrounding them. They relaxed. “You can call me Jena. Come.”

  That was easy, Daylen thought. I’ll have to remember to enhance my voice more often.

  Jena led Daylen to a study with several portraits of himself hanging on the walls. “We’ve saved as many of these as we can,” Jena said. “The Senate opted to keep a few for history’s sake, but only ones that vilify the great man. None truly capture his strength, though your appearance has served to show the younger generation what the Conqueror truly looked like.” She looked at a portrait and spoke softly. “He was probably the most handsome man who ever lived, not the scowling villain the Senate wishes to instill on our minds.”

  Jena turned back to Daylen. “And you look exactly like him…” She suddenly became shy and brushed her hair behind her ear. She walked to sit behind her desk. “What would you like to know?” she asked, waving a hand to the seat on the other side of the desk.

  Daylen sat and asked, “You’re old enough to have lived during the Conqueror’s rule, seen what it was like; how could you have any positive feelings toward a man that oppressed you?”

  Jena leaned forward, resting her chin on laced fingers. “Just the thing every woman wants to hear: how old they are.”

  Daylen choked back a snort. “Oh, trust me, girl, you’re practically a baby on the larger scale.”

  Her mouth pressed together at that. Probably not the best response to a woman trying to flirt with him. “My question?”

  “It’s a matter of perspective,” Jena said, leaning back. “They say the Conqueror st
arved his people, but the truth is that no one died of famine. He made sure everyone had enough, reserving the larger portion for his armies and storehouses, all to protect his people from invasion and the next Night.”

  “I doubt you would be saying that if he had executed anyone close to you.”

  “My parents,” she replied flatly.

  “What?” Daylen asked, shocked.

  “My parents were executed by the Conqueror.”

  Daylen’s mouth fell open and he couldn’t think of anything to say.

  “I was heartbroken, of course,” Jena continued. “I was just a child, after all. But once I grew up, I wanted to know why they had been executed. In fact, that was the reason I started to search out the truth about your father. It turned out my parents were part of the rebellion and had tried to sabotage one of the Empire’s battleships.” Her mouth turned down in displeasure. “If they had succeeded, the entire crew of the ship would have been killed. Innocent soldiers only doing their part to protect their nation and families. It was a hard thing to realize, that my parents were murderers, and the truth is that they deserved to be executed,” she finished tightly.

  Daylen was lost for words. He had never expected to find a family member of one of his victims to be happy with what he had done.

  Looking at Jena, this soft-spoken and slight-statured girl, Daylen now saw a cold hardness behind those discerning eyes.

  Jena smiled at him. “You see, the real question isn’t how we Dawnists can love your father, but why everyone else hates him so much.” She started to speak matter-of-factly. “Dayless the Conqueror sought to make all men equal. His wars were fought to protect his people, his laws were fair and his punishments just. Do you know it was really the Guilds that promoted and funded the majority of the resistance against him? Think about that. They were hoarding most of the wealth in the nation from the majority of its citizens, and when the Conqueror sought to regulate their practices and redistribute their stolen wealth to those who rightly deserved it, they betrayed him for their own ends.”