Fearsome Journeys (The New Solaris Book of Fantasy)

by Jonathan Strahan

  Whatever it was, it was sufficient. In clear view of every Iron Ring soldier on the field, the greatest feat of ferro-thaumaturgical engineering in the history of the world charged toward its feeble-looking rival, only to stumble and plunge in a deadly arc, smashing its armored cupola like a crustacean dropped from the sky by a hungry sea-bird. A shroud of dust and smoke settled around it, and none of its occupants were left in any shape to ever crawl out of it.

  Millowend, Rumstandel and I fell to our knees in the cabin of our hoax machine, gasping as though we’d been fished from the water ten seconds shy of drowning. Everything felt loose and light and wrong, so much flesh had literally cooked away from the three of us. It was a strange and selfish scene for many moments, as we had no idea whether to celebrate a close-run tactical triumph, or the simple fact of our continued existence. We shamelessly did both, until the noise of battle outside reminded us that the day’s work was only begun. Sore and giddy, we let Rumstandel conjure a variation of his kites to lower us safely to the ground, where we joined the mess already in progress.

  It was no easy fight. The Iron Ringers were appalled by the loss of their war machine, and they had deployed poorly, expecting to scourge an already-depleted camp in the wake of their invincible iron talisman. They were also massed in the open, facing troops in breastworks. Still, they were hard fighters and well-led, and so many Elarans were second-line militia or already exhausted by the long labors of the night.

  I’ll leave it to other historians to weigh the causes and the cruxes of true victory in the Battle of Lake Corlan. We were in it everywhere, rattling about the field via horses and sorcery and very tired feet, for many Iron Ring magicians remained alive and dangerous. In the shadow of our abandoned joke of an effigy engine, we fought for our pay and our oath, and as the sun finally turned red behind its veils of powder smoke, we and ten thousand Elarans watched in exhausted exaltation as the Iron Ring army finally broke like a wave on our shores, a wave that parted and sank and ran into the darkness.

  After six months of raids and minor successes and placeholder, proxy victories, six months of stalemate capped by the terror of a brand-new way of warfare, the Elarans had flung an army twice the size of their own back in confusion and defeat at last.

  It was not the end of their war, and the butcher’s bill would be terrible. But it was something. It meant hope, and frankly, when someone hires the Red Hats, that’s precisely what we’re expected to provide.

  In the aftermath of the battle I worked some sorcery for the hospital details, then stumbled, spell-drunk and battered, to the edge of the gaping pit now serving as a tomb for the mighty war machine and its occupants.

  I have to admit I waxed pitifully philosophical as I studied the wreck. It wouldn’t be an easy thing to duplicate, but it could be done, with enough wizards and enough skilled engineers, and small mountains of steel and gold. Would the Iron Ring try again? Would other nations attempt to build such devices of their own? Was that the future of sorcerers like myself, to become power sources for hulking metal beasts, to drain our lives into their engines?

  I, Watchdog, a lump of coal, a fagot for the flames.

  I shook my head then and I shake my head now. War is my trade, but it makes me so damned tired sometimes. I don’t have any answers. I keep my oath, I keep my book, I take my pay and I guard my friends from harm. I suppose we are all lumps of coal destined for one furnace or another.

  I found the rest of the company in various states of total collapse near the trampled, smoldering remains of General Vorstal’s command pavilion. Our options had been limited when we’d selected a place to build our machine, and unfortunately the trap path had been drawn across all the Elaran high command’s nice things.

  Caladesh was unconscious with a shattered wagon wheel for a pillow. Tariel had actually fallen sleep sitting up, arms wrapped around her musket. My mother was sipping coffee and staring at Rumstandel, who was snoring like some sort of cave-beast while miniature coronas of foul weather sparked around his beard. In lieu of a pillow, Rumstandel had enlisted one of his familiars, a tubby little bat-demon that stood silently, holding Rumstandel’s bald head off the ground like an athlete heaving a weight over its shoulders.

  “He looks so peaceful, doesn’t he?” whispered Millowend. She muttered and gestured, and a bright new red hat appeared out of thin air, gently lowering itself onto Rumstandel’s brow. He continued snoring.

  “There,” she said, with no little satisfaction. “Be sure to record that in your chronicles, will you, Watchdog?”

  The reader will note that I have been pleased to comply.

  AMETHYST, SHADOW, AND LIGHT

  SALADIN AHMED

  “I JUST THINK it’s a bad idea,” Zok Ironeyes said as he sat down to a hilltop meal of oatcakes and pigeon eggs with Hai Hai. Below them, across a vast expanse of the greygrass that gave Greygrass Barrows its name, stood the small manor house under discussion. Zok popped a pickled egg into his mouth and turned his gaze from the bright green house to his partner’s beady black eyes.

  Hai Hai waved a dismissive white paw. Her long, pink-tipped ears drooped slightly, as they did when she was annoyed. “‘A bad idea.’ That’s what you always say. That’s what you said about the Mad Monk’s Meadery.”

  Zok chewed and swallowed. “And we were nearly killed by the shade of a baby-eating cleric there.”

  “You were happy enough with the spoils, though —that case of rubywine and the two whores with the rhyming names.” The rabbitwoman smiled wickedly and took a bite of her oatcake.

  Zok also smiled in spite of himself. “Anyway, abandoned house, unattended loot that somehow hasn’t been claimed yet—this all sounds too good. A beautiful beer-bottle with poison inside.” But even as he said it, he was plotting out their approach in his mind.

  The greygrass was tall enough that even Zok could approach unseen. The sweet-smelling blades swayed in the breeze, enough so that the duo’s movement might be masked. It was either a perfect score or a trap.

  Zok knew how that usually ended. Still, the Thousand Gods damn him, he’d never been able to resist a ripe peach dangling from a low branch.

  He ate his last pigeon egg. Perhaps Hai Hai’s mewling stooge had told the truth. Perhaps the place had been left unattended all season. The Legion kept a relative peace on the roads, even this far out, but bandits were hardly unheard of. Not to mention wolves and grasscats. The owners would have to be away to have left the ground uncleared so close to the front door.

  Unless they had... other ways of keeping watch.

  Zok took a long pull from his wineskin and turned it all over in his mind again. But there was little point. Either they went in, as quiet as they could, or they didn’t. “This source of yours... you trust him?”

  Hai Hai drained her own wineskin, and a thin red rivulet trickled down her chin, staining her white fur. “Foxshit and fire, Zok, no, I don’t trust him! It’s a fucking gamble, same as anything we do in this road-life of ours. How many Thousand-Gods-damned fool errands have I followed you on? Hunting that toad-headed demon you’re always going on about? Peace and honor to your dead wife, man, but—”

  Zok nearly growled at the blithe mention of Fraja’s name. Out of habit, his fingers went into his purse and touched the earring that was his only memento of his wife.

  Hai Hai saw the fire in his eyes. “I’m sorry, Zok. I know she was a fine woman, but she was nothing to me. I’ve helped you try to avenge her because you’re my partner. That means something. So if I say ‘here’s a score,’ you should...”

  As Hai Hai spoke, Zok stood and strapped his bespelled broadsword Menace to his hip. By the time she finished her little speech, he was already moving quietly down the hill toward the manor house.

  ZOK KNEELED AT the edge of the greygrass with Hai Hai, only thirty yards from the house.

  The two-storey house was made of green-glazed brick, and had a flat, crenelated roof. Stables, a small barn, and a shed stood off to the side. Not
a sound came from any of the buildings. No light from lamps, no smoke from fires. No animals about, either, other than the odd sparrow or squirrel.

  The front door of the green house was a slab of etchwood covered in images of animals. Zok knew right away that it was genuine, and his pulse raced at the size and complexity of the nature-wrought scenes. Etchwood was prized for the naturally occurring images it held, but usually one found a single flower or a sun. A slab this size, with this many little pictures... Zok smiled, despite his unease. One part of the story was true, at least—there was great wealth here.

  Beside him, Hai Hai sniffed once, and her ears stiffened. She gave him the someone’s here hand gesture. Zok’s muscles tensed. He looked before him, behind him. Nothing.

  Something struck him hard from above. The quiet afternoon exploded with shouts.

  A man had dropped onto him from the rooftop. Even as he crumpled to the ground, Zok shoved his attacker away. The man—no more than a blur of colorful robes to Zok’s eyes—was on top of him again in an instant. Where is Hai Hai? Zok couldn’t see his partner. Worse, he couldn’t reach his sword.

  Zok wrestled with his attacker. The man smelled of cloves, and his mustache was long and braided. An Eastlander? What in the Three Hells is he doing here, besides trying to kill me? Somewhere behind him he heard a woman shouting and Hai Hai cursing.

  Menace’s hilt dug into his ribs.Zok tried to gouge the man’s eyes, tried to get space for a good head-butt. But despite being much smaller, the Eastlander was nearly as strong as Zok. Few enough men could say that.

  Zok felt the battle-madness rise in him. Enough of this. He twisted and bit the Eastlander, tasting blood.

  It worked. The man screamed and looked at Zok as if he had just become a giant viper. Zok seized on the Eastlander’s surprise. He managed to flip the man onto his back, then sat astride him, pinning his wrists. A dozen yards away, Hai Hai was facing off against a small, dark-haired woman also wearing vibrant robes. The rabbitwoman had lost one of her sabers. The Eastlander woman wasn’t armed, but a strange glow surrounded her hands, and they danced like weapons.

  Zok looked back to his attacker. Now that he’d been pinned, the man didn’t struggle. He just lay there, staring at Zok as if at a mad dog.

  Only then did Zok notice the man’s necklace. Around his neck was an incredibly thin band of what looked like... amethyst. The stone of the Empire.

  Zok could still hear Hai Hai and the Eastlander woman, but he could no longer see them.

  Do they work for the Amethyst Empress? Why in the Three Hells would Easterners be working for the Empire? Who are these people? They were good, whoever they were. That rooftop blow would have knocked most men cold.

  But Zok was not most men.

  “Stand down, woman, or I’ll kill your friend here!” he shouted. It was a bluff—as soon as Zok released the man’s hands he’d have a fighting opponent again—but it was worth a try.

  “Zok, don’t—” Hai Hai’s shout came from somewhere behind him before it was cut short. Zok turned, trying to keep hold of his captive. He saw Hai Hai sprawled at the robed woman’s feet.

  Then the Eastlander twisted away hard, breaking free of Zok’s grip. Something—some sort of pink light—blazed forth from the man’s hand, catching Zok full in the face. It burned his eyes, and he had trouble breathing. In an instant, he felt the magical light clouding his mind as well.

  “Bind them,” he heard the Eastlander say from far away. Only then did he realize he was lying on the ground. It was all Zok could do to keep his eyes open. After another moment, he couldn’t even do that.

  ZOK AWOKE IN chains. It had happened to him enough times that he did not panic. He was indoors, in a drafty building with a high ceiling. It was dark—the dark just before sunrise, his body told him, which meant he’d been out for hours—and his nose picked up the faded scents of horse and riding-beast nearby. He guessed he was in the stables of the house he’d just tried to rob.

  He tested his bonds once, twice, thrice. But it was no use—whoever had chained him had known just how strong he was.

  Just as his eyes were adjusting to the dark, a weasel of a man entered the stables. He carried a torch in one hand, and what looked like a jewellery box in the other.

  “Who do you work for? Those Easterners?” Zok asked, his voice cracking. “And where is my partner? Best tell me now, little man. You know these chains won’t hold me long. And as soon as I’m free, I’ll snap that skinny neck of yours with my bare hands.”

  The little man didn’t respond. He set the torch into a sconce and opened the small box.

  Displayed within was a ring—impossibly delicate, and made of amethyst. It glittered with more than mere torchlight. Sorcery.

  The man stepped close enough that Zok could smell his breath. Close enough that even a chained man could give him a good headbutt.

  Zok lunged as best he could.

  There was a pleasing crunch as Zok’s skull connected with nose-bone. The man let out a howl and a sob as he snapped back, his ruined nose bleeding badly. He dropped the jewellery box, clutched his face, and ran screaming from the room.

  An hour passed as Zok watched the torch burn.

  Just as the chains were really beginning to hurt, another man entered the stables. He was bigger than the last, with cold eyes. He held a broken broomstick in his right hand. Without saying a word, he walked over and shoved it hard into Zok’s guts. Then he jammed it into Zok’s balls. It hurt. Bad.

  “You ready to wear the ring now? You get one chance before I fuck you with this.” He could have been talking about the weather.

  Zok’s eyes still burned with tears of pain. “You win, tough man. Just get me some water, eh?”

  The man said not a word. He picked up the jewellery box and drew the amethyst ring from it. Then he took hold of Zok’s left hand and placed the ring on his little finger.

  As soon as he did so, the ring shimmered and disappeared, though Zok could still feel the cool stone against his skin. There was a flash of light, and suddenly Zok felt something cool and smooth around his neck.

  A ring of amethyst, Zok guessed. Just like those the Eastlanders had worn.

  The man with the broomstick left. What is going on here? Zok tested his chains again, but of course he was still held fast.

  A moment later, Zok heard the slapping feet and wet huffing sounds of a riding beast outside. The stable door opened again, and someone lit torches, but when Zok’s eyes adjusted to the darkness, it was a man, not a beast that he saw entering.

  He was a head shorter than Zok, and thin, but he carried himself with the confidence of a big man. And no wonder, given the shining tabard he wore over his armor.

  Ah, shit in my stew! Not a Fatherpriest. Zok didn’t mind the road-priests who, nominally at least, followed every one of the Thousand Gods. But he had never met a man who wore the shining tabard who wasn’t a pompous sack of scum. And they had the power of the Empress behind them, which made them dangerous scum. A man with a sword at his hip followed the priest in, then closed the door and stood silently beside it.

  The Fatherpriest studied Zok again for a long moment, as if he were considering buying a horse. Let him come check my teeth, then, and I’ll bite off his fucking fingers.

  But he stayed a good ten feet back from Zok. “My son. You are called Zok Ironeyes, yes?” he said at last. “I am Father Gabrien, servant of the Fathergod. I have...”

  Zok hawked up what wretchedness he could from the back of his throat and spit it at the man, besmirching his pristine tabard and cutting off his speech. “What have you done with my partner?” Zok shouted. “She had better be alive, shit-for-breath!”

  Zok had hoped to goad the man close enough to bite him. But the priest showed no rage. He smiled mirthlessly, ignoring Zok’s question.

  Gabrien ignored the question. “I am about to unchain you, my son. Do not think to attack me. For at my command, that necklace you wear—my little gift to you—will return t
o the size of a finger-ring. Depending on which command word I use, it can either behead you as it does so, or reappear on your hand as a harmless but valuable piece of jewellery. Do you understand?”

  Zok nodded once. Gabrien’s men opened the locks on his chains. Zok suppressed his rage as best he could, keeping his hands from their throats. The Fatherpriest wouldn’t have had the nerve to unchain Zok unless he were telling the truth about the amethyst necklace.

  “Tell me what you know of the Shadow Weavers, Zok Ironeyes.”

  The Shadow Weavers? What is this madman about? Zok wondered. He spoke slowly. “The demon-men of the Old Far North, or so the stories go. Ages ago, led by the Dark King, The Man-Shadow, they swept over all of the lands of the Empire That Was. Shadow, shadow, black as night / Grew until it murdered light.” Zok spoke the words of the boyhood rhyme without quite meaning to. “Why are you asking me about children’s tales? And WHERE IS MY PARTNER?”

  “The children’s tales tell more truth than you know, my son. Three thousand years ago, the Shadow Weavers—the spawn of man and demon—poured forth from the Plain of Ice and Iron. Northlands, Southlands, Eastlands, Westlands—everywhere they butchered men like animals and ate their souls. Entire kingdoms were slaughtered. Mankind was very nearly destroyed.

  “Only the Twelve Clans survived, led by Virgin Queen Glora, whom the Fathergod, in His wisdom, chose as a messenger and a vessel. It was she who finally destroyed the Dark King in single combat, she who sent the Shadow Weavers scurrying back to their holes of cold and metal, but in the battle she was gravely wounded.

  “When she died, the Fathergod brought her to His side, to sit at His right hand and bask in the glow of His love, away from the painful world of men.”

  Zok yawned, perhaps more loudly than was strictly necessary. He had not been to a Church of the Fathergod in decades, but he remembered the stories well enough. They were no less dull to him now than they’d been as a child, but Gabrien surely had some point to all this blathering.