Infernal Machines
Page 34
Where the rift had been, there was still something. A line, churning in the air, like some volcanic seam releasing gas. But it was small now, the size of a vaettir. What poured off it was minuscule compared to what had been before.
‘There’s no way to totally seal it,’ Sapientia said. ‘It is but scar tissue the universe will not let heal.’
‘Truly?’ Lina said.
‘I don’t know,’ Sapientia said, giving a rueful smile. ‘Maybe.’
Livia and Fisk walked arm and arm, faces empty. It would take them a long while to come to grips with what had happened here. But, I think, in that moment when Carnelia wrested Fisk’s fate from him to herself, they apprehended the nature of her greatness, which had been, up until then, so easy to miss. She cloaked herself in frivolity, to hide her true nature.
We spent weeks giving Principia and her people all the steel and metal we could spare from the Typhon. Our main concern on returning to it was seeing if it would still run. But Sapientia’s prediction held true – daemons bound here remained bound here, even after the rift was closed. We had devalued silver and increased the value of daemonbound in one fell swoop.
Livia and Fisk closeted themselves with Fiscelion. Tenebrae wept openly at the news of Carnelia’s demise.
Sapientia, Lina, and I spent our time drinking rum and homebrew wine.
‘What became of Carnelia, do you think?’ Lina asked. ‘You know, when she went over to the other side.’
Sapientia leaned back against the gun shroud – after reclaiming the greasy canvas we had used to make the tent – and looked up at the sky. Now the rift was gone, Terra Umbra was no more. The clouds had dissipated and land that had been in darkness for thousands of years suddenly saw the light of day.
She drank deep from her cup and then gestured me to pour some more. I tilted up the pitcher and gave her good measure.
‘I don’t know,’ Sapientia said. ‘But we know what happens on this end, when daemons come through. A massive release of energy.’
‘Are you saying she would be a daemon there?’ Lina asked.
‘Maybe. It’s possible, when she came into that world, whatever it was, she would expand into a titanic fireball.’ She drank some more. ‘She’d become a great explosion.’
‘She was a great explosion on this side,’ I said.
We bid farewell to Principia, who seemed bemused at the idea of goodbyes.
‘I look forward to your return,’ she said.
‘It is likely we will never journey back here. Our world is out there,’ Livia said. Her sombreness had faded. As had Fisk’s. And they had begun the truly hard work of raising a son.
‘You will return, eventually.’ We did not argue.
Gynth came to me. ‘You will never return, will you?’
‘No, hoss,’ I said, looking up at the big bastard. ‘I don’t think we will.’
‘I would have you stay,’ he said. ‘Gynth.’
‘Pard,’ I said, ‘you’ve got a good deal here. This is where you belong. Spending your days chasing those scaled sons-a-bitches and doing exactly what vaettir are supposed to do.’
‘Yes, I know,’ he said. ‘But I will miss you all the same.’
‘And I you, hoss,’ I said. ‘Come.’
I motioned and he fell to his knees and for the first and last time in this life, I gave a vaettir a hug.
Tamberlaine was dead, killed in a daemonic attack on his new Gallish capital. Another city killer. And Rume was destroyed for eternity, nothing left except slag and stone.
But Novorum was being rebuilt. Marcellus had rallied the remains of the legions there and, in some pitched battles, had turned the tide. Mediera held the Hardscrabble but were being pressed hard by guerilla dvergar forces. And vaettir.
Engineers and the military were stunned. No more Hellfire. Munitions became precious, those that were left.
The legions had retreated through time three hundred years to gladius, pilum, and shield. And no one fought better than Rumans with these.
We were greeted, at the harbour, by Senator Gaius Cornelius Ursus. Flanked by praetorians in gleaming phalerae and lictors hefting fasces, he stomped to the end of the pier where the Typhon was moored, his silver bear’s leg clearly visible. Along with its flask.
‘You’re back!’ he cried. ‘I never thought you’d come back!’ The smell of whiskey pouring off him was quite strong.
‘Tata, we thought you were dead!’ Livia said.
‘Dead?’ Cornelius said. ‘Preposterous. After your escape, I fled to the country, because crucifixion doesn’t sit well with my complexion. Then everything went up in fucking literal flames. There wasn’t a senator left alive, practically. So, when I went back to Tamberlaine, hat in hand, he reappointed me governor here.’ He sniffed. ‘There was a lack of qualified men.’
Cornelius looked around. His gaze fell upon Lupina, who held Fiscelion.
‘There he is!’ Cornelius crowed. ‘There he is!’ He came forward, his hands making grabbing motions.
Lupina turned the child over to Cornelius, reluctantly. He lifted him up on high.
‘Where is Carnelia?’ Cornelius asked, absent-mindedly. ‘Isn’t it just like her to be late greeting her father?’
‘Tata, I have something to tell you,’ Livia said, eyes welling.
‘Me first. I have some good news and bad news,’ he said. ‘The bad news is that I was not able to get Tamberlaine to rescind his order of divorce for you and my legate, Fisk. Sadly, you two are no longer man and wife.’
Fisk and Livia said nothing.
Cornelius went on: ‘Nor could I get him to rescind his adoption of you. He was distracted, maybe, with all the death and destruction.’ He sighed. ‘You are no longer Cornelians.’
‘All right, Father,’ Livia said. ‘Is there any good news?’
‘Somewhat,’ he said. And then a grin spread across his face. ‘It seems that Tamberlaine’s heir Marcus perished with him in Gall.’ He turned the infant Fiscelion this way and that, looking into the child’s beaming face.
‘So,’ Cornelius said, his expression exultant, ‘may I introduce you to Fiscelion Hieronymous Iulii Tamberlaine the Second, Emperor of Rume.’
After a moment of enduring our stunned silence, Cornelius harrumphed.
‘Where is Carnelia?’ he said, craning his neck and looking over the Typhon’s deck. ‘Is she hiding?’
THE END
Also by John Hornor Jacobs from Gollancz:
The Incorruptibles
Foreign Devils
A Gollancz eBook
First published in Great Britain in 2017 by Gollancz
an imprint of The Orion Publishing Group Ltd
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This eBook first published in 2017 by Gollancz.
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Copyright © John Hornor Jacobs 2017
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