Under the Crimson Sun (the abyssal plague)

by Keith R. A. DeCandido

  But he really wanted to be a soldier.

  Like everyone in Urik, Sasker was tested by the templars as a child, and his aptitude was for soldiering.

  So he volunteered for the Imperial Guard.

  At first, everything was fine. He went through the training, just like everyone else. In fact, he excelled at it, which was more than he could say for his bunkmate, Torvald.

  Torvald didn’t like to do all the work. He didn’t put a full effort into his training, always lagging behind everyone else-or taking shortcuts that required less effort.

  What amazed Sasker was that the drill sergeant didn’t seem to notice when Torvald slacked off. That wouldn’t have bothered Sasker so much, except the sergeant noticed it for everyone else. Even the ones who weren’t actually slacking off. One time, Sasker had been the first one to finish doing pull-ups, and the sergeant yelled at him for making the others look bad-then he yelled at Jonas, who was the last one done.

  But Torvald, who only did half the required pull-ups, got off with nothing. Again.

  Eventually, Sasker grew tired of it and complained to the sergeant.

  Actually, he did more than complain. Sasker carried on for five minutes, enumerating everything that was wrong with Torvald and why he’d make a terrible soldier and why was the sergeant, whaddayacall, letting him off so easily?

  The next morning, a lieutenant came into the barracks with two soldiers and told him to pack his things. He was kicked out of the Guard.

  On the way out of the barracks, the lieutenant said, “And don’t expect much by way of job prospects after this, Sasker. At least, not as long as Lord Torvald’s alive.”

  Sasker winced as they literally pushed him out the door. Torvald was the son of a sirdar.

  Somebody could have told him.

  The lieutenant had been right about the lack of job prospects. He spent his days failing to find work and his nights drinking in taverns and running up bar tabs he couldn’t afford to pay. It took a great deal to get him drunk, as Sasker had always had a high tolerance for that kind of thing, so he drank a lot.

  Finally, someone at one of the taverns-the third he’d been frequenting since being kicked out of the Guard, after the first two refused him service until he paid his rather large bill-mentioned that the Pit of Black Death was looking for guards.

  Sasker had always loved going to the Pit as a kid, though he generally preferred the early fights, because he could get closer to the action. He hadn’t been there in a while. First he had training to deal with, and since being kicked out, he couldn’t afford it, since the arena insisted on coin up front to pay for your seat.

  But his training as a soldier proved a good fit for the job of keeping an eye on the slaves between fights as a guard, plus he’d get to see the fights for free!

  That last part turned out not to be true very often, as most of the guards were kept down in the dungeon area to make sure that the slaves who weren’t fighting didn’t take advantage of the chaos of the fights to try to escape. So Sasker spent a great deal of time patrolling the dungeons and escorting the fighters to the holding areas, but not actually watching the fights.

  The job got really boring really fast.

  It didn’t help that he didn’t get along with the other guards, because one of them was Jonas. Being last to do pull-ups was far from Jonas’s only sin as a trainee, and he was drummed out of training, but for whatever reason, Jonas decided that it was entirely Sasker’s fault. Where Sasker had taken a few months to find the job, Jonas had landed at the Pit almost immediately after being kicked out of the Guard, so he already was friends with the other guards. The moment Sasker showed up, though, Jonas poisoned the others against him, making him a pariah.

  But at least they paid him. He’d settled all three bar tabs, and even started to save up his coins. He wasn’t sure what he was saving for, but it was something his mother always told him to do when he worked, so he did it.

  Maybe someday he’d be able to get a better job somewhere.

  “Greetings, fellow guard!” came a jolly voice from behind him as he was doing his rounds down the corridor.

  Turning, Sasker saw a thri-kreen. While she wasn’t wearing a guard’s uniform-thri-kreens didn’t wear much by way of clothing-she did have a patch attached to her thorax that matched the one on Sasker’s own tunic, and those of all the others.

  “I am Chrids’thrar. I just started working today. A pleasure to meet you.”

  “Uh, whaddayacall-thanks. I’m Sasker.”

  “Oh, yes,” Chrids’thrar said, making those weird noises that thri-kreens always made. “I’ve heard about you.”

  Sasker rolled his eyes. “Talked to Jonas already, huh?”

  “Yes, but I found him to be a fool, so I’m sure he was lying.”

  “Wow.” Sasker was impressed. He didn’t usually get the benefit of the doubt like that.

  “I hear there’s a new mul in the arena,” the thri-kreen said enthusiastically.

  “Yeah, he’s, whaddayacall, in the next cubicle.”

  They approached the cubicle in question, and Sasker looked inside.

  The new mul was a surly sort. Sasker had heard about the bitch who owned him, who apparently was Gan’s original owner. “We got this guy and lost, whaddayacall, Gan. He was an okay guy, Gan. Liked him better than this jerk.”

  The mul just glowered at Sasker, which was what he always did.

  Thankfully, the mul didn’t talk. Gan talked a lot, but it was okay when he did it, because he was intelligent. Sasker had known a few muls in his day, and they were all idiots.

  “Hey, after the fights tonight, come join me for a drink,” the thri-kreen said.

  “We’re not allowed to drink on duty,” Sasker said dolefully. It was yet another thing he hated about the job.

  “That’s why after the fights.”

  “We’re still on duty.”

  “Yes, but all the other guards do it.”

  Sasker sighed. For the past three months his job after the fights was guard duty on the mul-prior to that, it was on Mandred, and prior to that, it was on Gorbin. He’d heard that, since he got that task, the other guards had little gatherings after the fights to eat or drink, even though they too were technically on duty. Of course, he hadn’t been invited to them. “Then I definitely shouldn’t go. I’m, whaddayacall, not welcome.”

  The thri-kreen made more of those noises. “Don’t be silly. This is special wine from Yaramuke. Very rare.”

  That got Sasker’s attention. He’d heard stories about the wine that they made in Yaramuke before it was destroyed, and he had been simply dying to try it.

  Still, he didn’t think it would be a good idea if the others would be there. “Sorry, I gotta keep an eye on this jerk.” He indicated the mul with his thumb.

  “Oh, come now. It’s a special occasion. My first day. The mul will keep.”

  Again, Sasker sighed. “I’ll, whaddayacall, think about it, okay?” He had no intention of going, but at least by saying that, he’d placate the thri-kreen, who seemed like a nice sort.

  Besides, he’d heard that thri-kreens were good in a fight. There hadn’t been a riot in a while, but you never knew, especially given how crazy things had been since Gorbin finally got himself killed.

  The rest of the day passed in relative calm, and then Tirana posted the duty roster for the evening. Sure enough, he had guard duty on the mul after the fights ended. Everyone else had roving duty, except for Chrids’thrar, who was guarding the other main-stage fighters.

  Except she wouldn’t be-she’d be sharing drinks with the others while Sasker actually did his job.

  He was tempted to talk to Tirana about what was going on, but his experiences with the Imperial Guard taught him the value of telling tales to your supervisor. He kept his mouth shut and did his job without causing problems.

  Besides, it was Tirana’s job to keep track of the guards. That was the task her father had given her in the arena, so let her figure it
out. It wasn’t Sasker’s problem.

  The fights that night went as expected. He may have been a surly bastard, but the mul was a good fighter. His arms were scarred from previous brands that arenas had put on him and then removed. Calbit would be coming in the next day with the branding iron, at which point the mul-and two other slaves who’d come in yesterday-would get the Pit’s brand on their biceps.

  Along with the mercenaries that Calbit and Jago had hired after Gan and Mandred had arrived-whom Sasker hated, as they were even stupider than the mul, though he had to admit that they were handy-Sasker escorted the mul back to his cubicle.

  “You should go drinking with your friends,” the mul said as Sasker pushed him into the cubicle.

  Scowling, Sasker said, “You shouldn’t, whaddayacall, listen in on other people’s conversations.”

  Then the mul did something Sasker hadn’t seen him do in the two days he’d been there-he smiled.

  “Trust me.”

  Once the door was locked, the mercenaries all went off-they didn’t say, but Sasker bet that Chrids’thrar had invited them to drink with her too-and he was alone with the mul.

  About an hour passed, and Sasker noticed that it was unusually quiet. He hadn’t noticed at first, since the time after the fights usually had a sharp reduction in noise level with the crowds having gone home. But that night was far quieter than usual. The only sound he heard was the mul snoring-he’d nodded off half an hour earlier.

  “Greetings, my friend.”

  Turning, Sasker saw Chrids’thrar coming down the corridor holding a flask.

  “You didn’t come to drink with us.”

  “Yeah, I told you it’d, whaddayacall, be a bad idea.”

  “That’s too bad.” The thri-kreen was offering the flask with one of her pincers. “This is really, really good wine.”

  Sasker glanced inside the mul’s cubicle. He was still snoring.

  “What the hell.” He took the proffered drink and gulped it down.

  It was sweet and caustic, which wasn’t at all what he was expecting. The liquid also burned in his throat, but it wasn’t the good burning that he got from the liquors in the taverns.

  Then the room started turning all kinds of interesting colors. Particularly the ceiling …

  It was only when he noticed that the ceiling was bright pink that he realized that he was on the floor. He couldn’t feel his legs. The burning sensation in his mouth and throat had become an embracing numbness.

  “Shouldn’t he be asleep?” the mul asked, which confused Sasker, as the mul should have been asleep.

  Clumsily reaching for his bone knife, he saw the thri-kreen standing in front of the open cubicle door, the mul standing next to her.

  “I don’t get it,” the thri-kreen was saying-except she sounded different, much quieter-“the feresh should have taken him out in an instant like it did the other guards.”

  Sasker tried to make his mind focus. Obviously the thri-kreen wasn’t who she said she was, which was kind of annoying, and she had drugged his wine. Sasker was so grateful that he had a high tolerance.

  He almost lost his grip on the bone knife. Concentrating, he held onto it.

  If only someone was close enough for him to stab. Unfortunately, the thri-kreen and the mul were moving away from him.

  “What the frip is going on?”

  That was Tirana.

  “Something’s happened to the guards, and-Why is the mul out of his cubicle?”

  The mul said, “Gan told us what you did to him and Rol to lure them here. That means I don’t need to be nice.”

  Sasker struggled to his feet even as Tirana screamed. He heard the sound of bones breaking, and then the screams stopped. Sasker couldn’t see what was happening, as he was staring at the floor after having managed to get to his knees.

  He gathered every inch, every muscle, fighting through the fatigue that was covering him like a blanket, and struggled to his feet.

  Once he did so, he found himself face-to-face with the mul. Beyond him was the thri-kreen, and beyond her the broken body of Tirana, her head at an impossible angle.

  “I told you to drink with your friends,” the mul said. His breath was awful.

  “Wouldn’t have helped,” the thri-kreen said.

  Needing all his energy to raise his arm, he did so without speaking.

  Before he could strike, the mul grabbed his hand and directed it right down into his chest.

  The wine from Yaramuke-or whatever it was-had numbed him to the point that it didn’t actually hurt. But he could see his blood dripping from his chest onto the stone floor.

  Sasker’s final thoughts before the darkness claimed him were that he really, really hated his job.

  Fal Jago always went back to his office after the fights were over and had a drink. By the time the last fight was done, he was exhausted and wired at the same time. Being out on the stage, hearing the roar of the crowd as he riled them up, preparing them for the fight, was at once thrilling and tiring.

  Since Calbit didn’t do anything during the fights, Jago was more than happy to leave the supervision of the guards and the closing down of the arena to him.

  One could argue that Calbit didn’t do much of anything beyond recruiting, but that wasn’t fair. After all, if it wasn’t for Calbit, Jago wouldn’t even have known that the Pit was available for sale. And Calbit was expert at finding prospects for the arena.

  But it had been Jago who provided the capital to allow them to purchase the arena from the crown. Jago rather wished Calbit remembered that more often.

  Jago missed Storvis, but the mul who’d replaced him was doing very well. He suspected that their profits would be tremendous before too long.

  He had no idea what it was that Mandred was turning into, but he was more than happy to have it out of his arena.

  Reaching down, he yanked open the lowest of the drawers of the desk he and Calbit shared in the office, then removed its sole item: a bottle of wine from one of Urik’s finest vineyards. Jago had come to an arrangement with the vintner; he provided Jago with the finest bottles from his stock, and Jago gave him free seats in the arena.

  He hadn’t actually shared the details of the arrangement with Calbit. What his partner didn’t know wouldn’t hurt him, and besides, then Jago would just have to share the wine.

  As he poured it into a goblet, he shuddered at that notion. Twirling it around in the goblet, he imagined Calbit slugging it down like the uncouth sand rat he truly was.

  Calbit hadn’t been able to find anyone to properly train fighters since Sorvag’s death. Sorvag’s boys would always give the people a good show, but once Gorbin killed him, that was the end of it. Gorbin’s skills not withstanding, Jago thought the lack of good training was the real reason the fights had become so poor.

  The ease with which Mandred took Gorbin down bore that out. Mandred and Storvis had training. The only other people who did so well in the arena were ex-military.

  It was becoming increasingly obvious that the partnership was not working. Calbit’s contributions were less and less valuable-and took him farther and farther away from the arena for longer and longer periods of time.

  Jago had been saving since he and Calbit bought the place from the crown. He hadn’t been able to save as much the past couple of years, but he had enough coin stashed away that he could sell his share of the arena to Calbit and finally retire.

  With the new mul in place and the fights becoming unpredictable, it was a good time. Jago wouldn’t need to sell the fights anymore-worst-case, Calbit could hire a professional barker.

  Or maybe Calbit would try it himself. That would be a laugh. The least charismatic person in all of Athas trying to announce the bouts. Jago would probably come back to the arena to see that.

  Though that was unlikely. Urik was a city of magnificent architecture and glorious spires that clawed for the skies like the lions that provided the motif for so much of it.

  And Jago spent
all his days and nights in a tapped-out obsidian mine. Never feeling the red sun on his face, instead all his hours were spent surrounded by stygian darkness barely illuminated by inadequate torches.

  He’d had enough. A few more fights, once the profits were guaranteed to be back on track, and Jago would sell to Calbit. He’d buy a castle with lots of windows so he could see the sun for as long as it was up.

  It would be glorious.

  “Where the frip is everyone?”

  Jago sighed at the sound of his partner’s voice. Usually Calbit was supervising the guards at this point, leaving Jago in peace.

  Calbit stormed in. “What the frip is going on?”

  “What are you blathering about, Calbit?”

  “I can’t find a single one of the guards.” He frowned at Jago. “What are you drinking?”

  Setting the goblet down quickly, Jago said, “Nothing. What happened to the guards?”

  “I haven’t the first fripping clue. I can’t find Tirana or any of the mercenaries, either, and-”

  Calbit cut himself off at the sound of someone walking down the hall. Jago peered past his partner to see the new thri-kreen guard, whose name he couldn’t remember, skittering down the hall.

  “You’re both here,” the thri-kreen said. “Good. I need to show you something.”

  Moving toward the thri-kreen, Calbit snarled. “What is going on? Where is everyone?”

  The thri-kreen chittered in her native tongue for a bit. Jago’s Chachik was a bit rusty, but it was something about being unable to believe what she was hearing.

  Jago certainly felt that way a lot when Calbit spoke.

  “It’s really difficult to explain,” she finally said in Common. “If you’d just come with me, it’ll all make sense.”

  Shooting Jago a look, Calbit asked, “Can you believe this idiocy?”

  Somehow, Jago managed to restrain himself from saying what he wanted to say.

  “Look,” the thri-kreen said, “if you just come this way …”

  Calbit turned on the thri-kreen. “I will not ‘come this way’. I am the owner of this arena.”