Beggar's Rebellion: An Epic Fantasy Saga (Empire of Resonance Book 1)

by L. W. Jacobs

  “Good.” Another roar echoed in the chamber. “Gods, what is that?”

  “It’s Hernst,” Karhail said. “It was his turn to load.”

  “Right after a battle?”

  “He’ll come out of it,” a recent Yersh recruit was saying, sounding near tears. “I know he’ll come out of it. He just needs time.” As Tai recalled, they’d enlisted together and looked to be street brothers, sharing a bed as well as friendship.

  “And he’s yelling like Matle did?”

  Karhail nodded. “We may have to put him down.”

  “Prophetsmeck,” Tai cursed. “Did he choose to do it?”

  “It was his time to load,” Karhail answered, stony-faced. The Yershman moaned.

  “Is he safe?”

  Karhail nodded, and Tai took the passage down to the chamber where Weiland and Karhail had overcome their revenants, now the unofficial yuraloading chamber for recruits in the caves. Hernst was there, bound to the rock pillar, muscles straining against the ropes, air crackling with brawler buzz. His arms were rubbed raw from struggle against his bonds, blood seeping into the jute fiber. “Prophets,” Tai breathed. He’d been avoiding the yuraload area of the hideout but heard plenty of cries like these.

  Weiland was there with Berlaw and some others. The timeslip nodded. “Don’t know if this one will make it.”

  “How long has he been like this?”

  “Almost since the start.”

  Hernst roared, air crackling again, shoving against his bonds. The veins were rigid on his neck and head. He let out a string of words, half-intelligible, like the ancient Yersh of Eschatolist ministers.

  “Did you give him dreamleaf?”

  Weiland huffed a laugh. “Tried. Didn’t make much difference.”

  Lumo appeared behind them, the giant Minchu pulling on his pipe. “This is not good.” His green eyes looked sad.

  Tai nodded. “Have you ever seen anything like this before?”

  Lumo paused. “Not in my place. But I have been watching those in the hideout. When they begin to yell like this…” He shook his head.

  “What happens? Any idea why it only hits some people?”

  “No. It is like his revenants are battling each other. Or his revenant’s revenant.”

  “Revenants have revenants?”

  “We are not sure. Some shamans believe yes.”

  Tai nodded, lapsing into the mute worry of the rest of the crowd. Karhail came after a time, sword strapped to his back.

  “Did Theron and Ilrick return?” someone called.

  “Not yet,” the bulky swordsman said.

  The mood darkened further, punctuated with Hernst’s cries. Lumo pulled at his pipe, Beal cracked his fingers in turn, and Hernst’s lover wept quietly against one wall.

  “The others will be fine,” Lumo said, breaking the silence. “They are probably just being careful.”

  “They would have been fine,” Beal said, “if we hadn’t decided to escape by running into armed men.”

  Tai met his eye, recognizing Beal’s grudge. It seemed petty now.

  Hernst screamed. Something about a bloodied lance?

  “It was the only way,” Weiland said, slouched against the wall. “The wafters would have shot us down no matter which way we ran.”

  “So, he should have airlifted us out.”

  “It was the only way,” Karhail barked. “Even if we lost a few, better that than all of us.”

  “And now we lose another,” Eyna said, brushing peppered red hair from her face.

  This brought to mind the bodies Tai had seen in the courtyard, Karhail taking the limb from an unarmed Coldferth woman. “How many did we kill in there?” he asked.

  Beal snorted. “All of them.”

  “I mean workers, not fighters.”

  Karhail eyed him. “They were Coldferth men. They deserved to die.”

  “They were workers, not fighters,” Tai said, watching Hernst. Blood was running freely from one bicep now. “We agreed not to do that.”

  “They were in the way.”

  Hernst roared, drool coming from his mouth.

  “They were trying to escape.” Tai turned on the bulky Seinjialese, rage rising in his belly. “How are they going to rally to us if we keep killing their friends?” Eyna and some of the others nodded at this.

  “They were in the way,” Karhail growled. “There will be some innocents lost.” Beal joined Karhail’s glare.

  “That’s Councilate logic. They kill whoever’s in the way—kids on the street, miners in the caves—or lock them up in a prison camp. My whole people are just things in the way of the Councilate’s business interests.”

  “That’s the world we’re trying to get rid of.”

  “By being just like it? By killing regular people and forcing our recruits to load like this? We’re better than that. Or we need to be.” Eyna and Lumo nodded, others in the room looking torn.

  “Don’t push me on this one, Tai,” Karhail growled. “You try to save everyone, you end up saving no one. Better Coldferth workers than us.”

  “There has to be a better way.”

  “Yeah, well, you find it, you let me know.”

  A black mood descended on Tai. “I spoke to the High Arbiter today.”

  “What?”

  “He was with my contact, in Newgen.” Tai looked at Hernst, a strange feeling of carelessness replacing his anger. “That’s why I was late. The army’s coming.”

  “The army?” Others perked up at this.

  “The Councilate army. They’re already on the Ein.”

  “Rumors.” Beal said. “Exactly the kind of stuff the Councilate wants us to believe, so we stop attacking.”

  “How do you know that?” Karhail demanded.

  “My contact said she’d heard it from the Arbiter himself, and a House official.”

  “And you trust her?” This was Beal.

  “She’s the one who taught us yuraloading and tipped us off about the Coldferth bluffmanse.”

  Karhail grimaced, working his jaw. “This isn’t the first we’ve heard of it. We need to step up our attacks.”

  “Towards what?”

  “Same goals, faster timeline. We need to force the Houses out before the army gets here. Burn all the manses, sink all the ships, clean every one of these mines out. Make it too expensive for them to stay, too dangerous for any fighters to take their pay.”

  Eyna shifted, fingers busy tying knots in her hair. “It’s a good plan, but do we have the manpower for it?”

  “It’s coming,” Karhail said. “The forest is already full to bursting, and today’s strike is going to double that. We gutted Coldferth today. The people have been dying for some way to fight, and they have it now. By the time the army gets here, we’ll have a city to stand against them.” He was shouting at the end, trying to be heard over Hernst.

  Tai rolled his shoulders. “We have to do something about him.”

  Karhail grimaced. “Beal. My sword.”

  The fish-eyed wafter handed Karhail his sword. A moan came from Hernst’s lover. Tai reached out. “Karhail, we—”

  The brawler was too fast. He spun in a crackle of uai, striking out for Hernst’s chest. The Yati man’s howls changed to gurgles and he went limp in his bonds, blood soaking the ropes around his heart.

  “Prophet’s peace,” someone whispered.

  “He was going to die anyway,” Karhail said, turning. “This way is better.”

  Hernst began jerking, his heels drumming the rock. Karhail moved forward, methodically untying the ropes. The lover wailed, head in his hands.

  “We have to stop this,” Tai said. “People should have a choice whether to load.”

  “This is our edge,” Karhail snapped, unwinding the bloody rope. “This is how we’re winning the war.”

  “Maybe there is a better way,” Lumo said. “Some way to make it easier. Or to predict who will be taken by their revenants.”

  “Good,” Karhail jerk
ed the last of the bloody ropes off. “Work on that, Lumo. Until then, we continue. Berlaw, help me with the body.”

  Voices sounded in the passage. Pendra appeared a moment later, leading Theron. A cry went up. “Theron!”

  Karhail stood from his work, clapped the other Seinjialese on the shoulders. “Well fought, man. And you escaped all right?”

  Theron nodded, taking in the scene. “Aye. It was touch-and-go for a while, but I made it. Gods. What happens here?”

  “Hernst,” Tai said. “We yuraloaded him, and he died.” He didn’t have the words to honeycoat it.

  “Prophet take him up,” Theron said, crossing wrists in the Seinjialese fashion.

  “Is Ilrick with you?” Weiland asked.

  Theron dropped his eyes. “He went down under some fighters. We couldn’t get to him.”

  The lightness Theron had brought left. Karhail cracked his knuckles. “He was a clever man. Is a clever man. He’ll show up. Till then, Berlaw and I will take care of Hernst. The rest of you get some sleep. We strike again tomorrow.”

  The caves were a somber bustle, people bandaging minor wounds, arranging bedrolls, and taking draughts of dreamleaf. Their numbers were large enough now that they spilled over into adjacent chambers, mixing with the recruits who had stayed down here, a separate cell making their own attacks. Tai found a pallet in the chamber he’d shared with Aelya, but knew he would find no rest there, not this agitated. He turned for the stairs.

  “Tai.” Lumo lay atop a pile of furs, pipe drifting scented smoke. “Where are you going now? It is sleeping time.”

  “Out,” Tai said. “I need some fresh air.”

  The Minchu gazed after him, saying nothing.

  It was full dark when he got out, nodding to the guard as he passed. The star was down, no more than a blue glow on the western horizon, and the moon hung mottled in the eastern sky, green continents and blue oceans. Tai took a farmer’s path by its wan light, headed away from town. He felt stirred up and confused, like a night river rushing over rocks.

  Ilrick was gone. Part of Tai wanted to agree with Beal, that yes, the plan to blend had been stupid, yes, they were going to lose people, yes, they should have come up with something else.

  That’s what war is, Tai. You lose people.

  Tai shook his head. Was it the only way? Or was it the Councilate’s way? Ella’s words haunted him—but what else could they do? Sit by and let the Councilate lock them all up? Erase them, as she put it?

  His confusion was answer enough. Karhail’s way wasn’t right, and Ella’s way didn’t exist.

  Tai kicked at a dried beet, discard of last year’s harvest. They were so focused on winning, they didn’t have time to do it better. But they had to—there had to be another way.

  Getting out. That’s the better way.

  “What?” Hake hadn’t talked much since the prison escape, but he’d never said anything like this.

  This rebellion is not for you—you’ve known that from the start. Concern radiated from him instead of the usual guilt. Karhail won’t change his ways, but you can. You can save our kids from what’s coming. Leave before it gets worse.

  “And abandon my friends? Like I left you on the field?”

  That was different.

  Tai waited for more, for a reason, for some sarcastic jibe, but nothing came. He narrowed his eyes. “Who are you?”

  What do you mean? I’m that best friend you left on the field to die.

  “No,” Tai said, shaking his head. “No, the friend I left back there would never tell me to abandon friends in danger. Or to abandon his own sister, like you did before I got her out. How did I not see it then?”

  See what? Tai I’m just looking out for you.

  “Elkmeck. You’re a revenant.” Tears sprung to his eyes as it all came together. “Lumo said there were two levels to the power, two revenants to get through, but I didn’t want to believe it. I thought you were my friend. But you’re not, are you? You’re just”—he waved his hands, anger and sadness mixing in his chest—“some thing, a guide or ancestor or revenant or whatever. But you’re not guiding me. Not like Hake would.”

  I am Hake, Tai, the voice said, sounding so much like Hake. Like a desperate Hake. Your friend.

  “No. No, you’re not.” The words felt final, somehow. The one certain thing in an uncertain world.

  Tai waited, looking around. It felt like something should happen, like Hake should go away or transform. Isn’t that what Ella said happened to her? What all the yuraloaders said?

  Nothing changed.

  Tai? The voice tried, tentative. Not even trying to sound like Hake now. Hake, his friend, who’d been dead six years.

  “Get scattered,” Tai growled, grief overcoming his anger and confusion. Grief and loneliness. Hake was gone. Had been an illusion the whole time. This was all on him now. Like it had been from the start.

  28

  Hard to remember, even! What our fair city was before the gift of yura. What is a minstrel band without a mosstongue to sweeten the tune? A match of strength without brawlers to lift the stones? A stars reading without a mindseye to divine your thoughts? Or a ginseng binge without a wafting fistfight at night’s end? No, friends, Worldsmouth will never be the same.

  —Artimus Kellandrials, Collected Broadsheets, Yielmoon 98

  Ella reported for work the next day as usual, though the upper floors of the Tower were a mess. Sablo’s chambers were packed, a steady stream of House bureaucrats and disgruntled citizens seeking him. The air smelled of ash, and the hillside was a smoking ruin out Sablo’s wide amber window, charred wood walls showing between the relatively untouched buildings of Newgen itself.

  Sablo had left her the previous night, a soldier escorting her back to the Tower while the Arbiter stayed to deal with the aftermath. Ella had watched from her window as more bluffmanses went up, water first refilling the artificial lake of Newgen proper before spilling onto the burning bluffs. Refugees had streamed into the Tower, some seeking shelter or medical attention, others just feeling unsafe, fearing further attacks.

  The strike was all the talk today—how many had died, why Coldferth was targeted, whether it had been economically motivated, and the apparent supernatural resonances of the fighters. One woman claimed to have seen men descending from the sky, others brawlers who tore through stone like cake. Ella couldn’t help grinning at this, at her discovery fueling the rebellion, even as her stomach turned at talk of the innocent dead and the total body count.

  This is war, sis. It’s what you wanted, right?

  She sighed, putting down her pen. It would have been impossible to concentrate in the crowded office even if she didn’t have so much to think over. It’s not what I wanted, she thought back. But maybe…

  Maybe what you wanted is impossible?

  She sighed. Maybe it was—maybe the notion that they could overthrow the Councilate without hurting anyone was just naive. Maybe the thought that she could come up with something better, if the revolution worked, was just pride.

  “Having trouble working in here?”

  Sablo’s voice startled her, and she looked up to find him at her desk, eyes sallow from lack of sleep. “I’m—afraid I am. The noise.”

  “Come on,” he said, jerking his head toward a far door. “I can at least do something about that.”

  Ella gathered her things. “Thank you.”

  He led her to a smaller chamber with a red-tinted wall looking over Newgen and the forests to the west. She was surprised to see a bed there, and a clothes wardrobe. These must be his bedchambers—not normally appropriate for a man to show an unchaperoned woman.

  Noticing her gaze, he said, “I hope you’ll forgive the informality—I thought this would be a quieter place to work.”

  “No, thank you,” she said, spotting a desk in the corner. “This will do wonderfully. I expect you’ll be occupied most of the day.”

  “At least,” he sighed, then sank into a chair. “I may be getti
ng too old for this.”

  “Senior statesmen are like salt marsh sage,” she quoted. “Assuming quality, their smoke only improves with age.”

  Sablo gave something like a laugh, and she realized he might not have recognized the quote. “That’s LeTwi.”

  “Ah.” Sablo smiled. “Now there is some scholarship we can discuss.”

  “You’ve read him?”

  “Read him?” Sablo gestured to a far wall, with a glassed-in cabinet of books. “Half of those are LeTwi, including his lesser-known lectures at the theatres.”

  “Prophets,” she breathed, noticing the cabinet for the first time. It had to contain fifty books or more. “Can I…take a look?”

  He gave a weary nod. “Be my guest. I need a moment to, ah, improve my vintage, anyway.”

  The cabinet was a treasury of LeTwi—classics like Yersh Scripture and Its Discontents and Meditations on Nothingness, along with collections of theatre lectures she’d never seen, and related books by other authors like Stamayns and Pelenstel. Others were unlabeled, either on spine or cover. Curious, Ella flipped one of these open.

  —may be that revenants can respond to calls of the uninitiated. Fragments from Teynsley, in his last address to the Society before overthrowing Arnsgel, indicate he had found a new source of power—

  Cocking her head, she flipped back to the first page. A single symbol was printed there, a circle pierced by nine spears. Nine spears—where had she seen that before?

  “Don’t read that one!” Sablo barked, starting up and striding across the room.

  Ella started, closing it convulsively. “I’m sorry, I—”

  He grabbed it from her, then re-shelved it and locked the case. “Excuse me,” he said after a moment. “I—had forgotten some of these were personal.”

  All his warmth was gone. “Oh. Sorry. I’ll—look at the rest another time.”

  “Yes. I think that would be best.”

  Ella stood. “Maybe I should work in the main room.”

  “No, no,” he said, warm tone returning. “You really are welcome to work in here. I’m just—I guess I’m not used to guests.”