The Trials of Empire, page 25
“These people are not driven by logic,” Rainer said. “They believe that what they are doing is the will of Nema.”
“Do not seek to lecture me on such matters!” Vonvalt suddenly thundered, making everybody in the strategium jump. “I have been at the sharp end of this for months, and it is only now – now! – that a third of the city has been given over to traitors and I have had to forcefully remove the Emperor from office, that anybody is listening to me. Can you even begin to imagine my vexation?”
Rainer, a tall, muscular and imposing Legionary, shrank back from this. “Sire, you must understand—”
But Vonvalt held up a hand to silence her. “Not now. When matters are in hand, you and I can speak at length about all manner of things. Now you listen. You all listen to me and you do as I say, is that understood?”
Again, there was muted assent.
“The final thing to do is plan our avenue of attack. So: show me on this map, here, everything you know about their dispositions.”
The planning went on for hours. My body was exhausted, and craved rest, and I contrived to have myself dismissed. I wandered the corridors of the Imperial Palace for half an hour, searching for somewhere to sleep, and eventually found a vast and ostentatious stateroom which was unoccupied. Despite wearing soiled, reeking clothes, I made no effort to undress, but simply flopped down on to the bed and fell into a deep, exhausted slumber.
I did not expect to wake up when it was still dark. I had no way of telling the time, but the palace was still and quiet and the sun had not risen.
Something felt strange about the darkened chamber. I sensed something, a presence, though I could not see anyone in the gloom.
Drip, drip, drip. Something, some liquid, pattered against the floor in the corner. I turned sharply as someone whispered in my ear.
Ramayah.
I whimpered, unprepared for this fresh haunting. My skin erupted in gooseflesh. The darkness of the room seemed to close in and deepen, in the same way it did when Vonvalt conducted a séance. I felt a dull throbbing sound in my ears, and my hand went to my chest where the mark of the Trickster sat etched into my skin like a malignant tattoo.
I became aware of a faint shimmer. Terrified, I tried to scream out, but I was frozen in place. My throat was dry and my jaw worked to try and expel some sound, some animal cry of terror, but I might as well have been wrought from marble.
The shimmering took on an odd colour, like a brass or golden gleam. I had seen the fabric of reality both thinned and breached a number of times over the past months, and each time it had heralded the arrival of some eldritch horror. Had Claver found a way to send a squad of daemonic assassins to kill me, in the same way he had hexed Vonvalt with the Muphraab?
Then, just as my dread reached its zenith, the shimmering golden light took on the aspect of a human figure – several figures – but so faint that the barest movement of my eyes caused them to disappear. They were like wire frames made from the thinnest, finest cloth-of-gold thread, as though someone had taken a human form and removed all of its substance, leaving only the outline of their person constructed entirely from aethereal matter.
I sat, staring, wide-eyed at these apparitions, my sense of fear replaced with one of wonderment. There were ten I counted, arrayed around the bed. The number ten had some special significance in the Neman Church, though I couldn’t think of it at the time; perhaps it was the number of Saint Creus’s apostles or perhaps the number of the Deti – Nema and Savare’s demigod children. I could not look at their faces; something intangible discouraged me from doing so. But they looked for all the world like soldiers armoured in gold.
Like armoured angels. Standing guard. Watching over me.
I have no idea how long I sat there for, trying to make sense of what I was seeing. But, eventually, I was filled with a sense of calm and safety, like being hugged by a mother I could barely remember.
I lay back down, the pain on my chest fading into nothingness, and once more fell asleep.
The following day – though it did not really feel like the following day, for we had been up for most of the night – the Imperial Palace, and especially the Hall of Solitude, was a hive of activity. Many of the maps from the strategium had been brought downstairs into the hall, as well as a number of trestle tables, and I watched as Imperial Guard commanders pointed and gestured at them and discussed matters with subordinates.
All of the messages that Vonvalt had decreed be dispatched had been sent. Posses of Guardsmen and watchmen were trawling the city for fighting men and women. Guardsmen piled up equipment in various parts of the Hall of Solitude – swords, shields, armour, victuals and medical supplies – wine, vinegar, bandages. There was an air of excitement and anticipation, and it was not just about the impending conflict; people were waiting to see if anyone would accept Vonvalt’s offer of a pardon.
I asked a succession of people if they knew where Vonvalt was, and I was directed to the front of the Imperial Palace. It was just as busy out here as it had been in the Hall of Solitude. This space had become an impromptu staging area, where already I could see decent numbers of citizen soldiers being outfitted with armour.
Vonvalt was on the Creus Road, looking west towards the temple of Nema and, in the hazy distance, the Creus Gate. He himself was armoured, too, wearing the obsidian black plate of the Imperial Guard. But instead of a purple cloak, a cloak of rich cream was fastened to his breastplate by a pair of golden wolf-headed brooches. I had never seen him look so powerful, so imperious. He looked more like the Emperor than the Emperor himself.
Next to him was a fully armoured Kimathi; and next to him was a large, black hound.
A Sovan war shepherd.
“Helena,” Vonvalt said as he saw me approach.
“Heinrich!” I shouted.
Heinrich turned to me and immediately started barking and wagging his tail madly. I collided with him and he knocked me bodily to the floor, licking my face and whimpering like a pup.
I grabbed his head. “Where the hell have you been? How did you get all the way back to Sova?”
Vonvalt, who was watching this reunion with a rare smile, helped me up. “After he fled Keraq he must have made his way back to the capital. It is not unheard of. Sovan war shepherds have preternaturally good senses.”
“What secrets are locked in your head, eh?” I asked the hound, rubbing his massive cheeks and ears. It was like playing with the head of a bear. “Oh my heart!” I had never expected to see Heinrich again, and I spent a long time ruffling his fur and scratching his ears.
“Has any news come back? About the pardon?” I asked, standing. Heinrich licked my hand and I idly stroked him.
Vonvalt shook his head. “No, not yet.”
Sova was once again quiet. Some merchants were on the road, but most were put off by the sight of their countrymen hanging from gibbets, or lying by the sides of the road as blackened corpses.
“I was just telling Kimathi about our actions in the south, and the visitation,” Vonvalt said.
Kimathi nodded. “Unsettling,” he said in Saxan. It was strange to hear after weeks of Kasari and Kasarsprek, but it made sense that Kimathi would speak the language of the Sovans better than any of his brethren. After all, he had spent most of his life here. It had been easy to think of Kimathi as a piece of ostentation, an imposing, silent, statuesque guardian, little better than an automaton. What a failing that was: to overlook the lives of others, to appreciate they were – are – as intricate and tangled as our own.
“I need to speak to you about something,” I said quietly to Vonvalt.
He turned to me, though his attention remained on the Creus Road. “What?”
“Last night, something happened.”
“Oh?”
“I had this sense of a… presence in my bedchamber. Something evil.”
Vonvalt nodded. “Yes,” he said. “Unsurprising in the circumstances.”
I paused, indignant. “I was terrified.”
“I can well imagine,” he murmured, and then, when he heard my snort of incredulity, turned to me. “I am sorry to hear it, Helena. Truly. Did you get a sense of the entity? Its name, or nature?”
“No,” I said, annoyed. “But ’tis all academic. Something drove it off. I’m certain of it.”
“Probably Resi, or Lady Frost,” Vonvalt said, turning back to the Creus Road and peering through the morning haze. “Come on,” he muttered to himself.
I nearly punched him on the shoulder. “I don’t think it was either. It was like… beings made of light. Golden light.”
“Hm. If it happens again, try to make contact with them.”
“Try to—!” I began, but Kimathi shifted his halberd from one hand to the other, and grunted, and Vonvalt turned to follow the line of the wolfman’s gaze. Coming down the Creus Road were perhaps fifty Imperial Guardsmen. In the centre of them was a man whom I thought I recognised.
“Peace, Helena, We can discuss it later,” Vonvalt murmured. He shouted to Serjeant Rainer, who turned and collared a dozen Guardsmen and city watchmen. Together they formed up around Vonvalt and Kimathi. There was something non-threatening about the approaching company, though, and I did not get the sense that they were about to attack.
“That’s Tymoteusz,” Vonvalt said, squinting. I followed the line of his gaze, and saw that it was indeed Senator Jansen in the centre of the mass. “Steady everyone, he is a friend. I think,” he added in a mutter.
They closed the gap and fanned out. Jansen wore an apologetic smile.
“Sir Konrad,” he said.
“Senator,” Vonvalt replied.
Jansen spread his hands. “I am afraid these are all you are going to get.”
Vonvalt frowned. “What do you mean?”
“Your message – a stroke of genius, I had had the same idea – unfortunately was intercepted, its bearer killed. I have brought this delegation with me ostensibly to issue various threats, and so on, but in reality we are here to join you. My time as puppet master of the Savarans is at an end. There will be a reckoning this afternoon.”
“Then we must strike this morning,” Vonvalt said simply.
Jansen nodded. “I agree. I recommend that you move on the barracks first. The bulk of their force remains at the Temple of Savare, but there is a sizeable contingent of men guarding the College, too. There is something afoot there; you and I must discuss that in private. But not now. Now is the time for action. Where is the Emperor?”
“I have detained the Emperor,” Vonvalt said. “I am acting as regent, for the time being.”
Jansen’s eyes widened. I realised that the man had probably envisaged such a position for himself.
“I see,” Jansen said. He thought for a moment, completely wrong-footed. “W-who is, uh, commanding your forces here? Aside from yourself, of course.”
“Serjeant Rainer,” Vonvalt said, gesturing to the woman.
Jansen seemed to finally regain himself. “Serjeant; my Guardsmen here are at your disposal. They will fight for the Emp— for Sir Konrad,” Jansen briefly corrected himself, though it did not feel like an accidental slip of the tongue, “of that, have no fear. Do with them whatever you think prudent.”
The influx of fifty Guardsmen – a tenth of our enemy’s number, but better than nothing at all – were led away to join their loyalist brethren. In spite of Vonvalt’s entreaties for cool heads and pragmatism, the loyalists were clearly unhappy; and after a minute or so of heated argument, the former traitors were sequestered at the far end of the staging area, shamefaced and uncomfortable. I eyed them warily. I could not shake the fear that this was something orchestrated by Jansen, a scheme to seed fifty saboteurs in our ranks.
Jansen stepped closer. When he spoke it was in a low voice.
“Hello, Helena. I am glad to see you both alive and well.”
I forced a smile. “I am sorry I hit you,” I lied, but Jansen waved me off.
“In truth, Helena, I deserved it. Indeed, I deserve much worse. I have done a number of despicable things to save my own skin. I have a well-deserved reputation as a manipulator, and, quite frankly, I am something of a coward in my advancing years. I will do a great many things to avoid being killed.”
It struck me as the first honest thing the man had said in a long time.
“Desperate times call for desperate deeds,” Vonvalt said. “I think we are all going to have to get our hands dirty in order to save the Empire – or rather, the parts of it that can be saved.”
“What do you mean?” Jansen asked.
Vonvalt explained to him the bargain he had struck with Lady Frost, renouncing the Empire’s claims to great swathes of Haunersheim, Jägeland and Tolsburg.
“Good gods, you truly have taken on the mantle of regent. I hope the price you are paying for this peace is not too high.”
Vonvalt shrugged. “What are a few lines on the map compared to the lives and livelihoods of tens of thousands?”
“I can think of plenty who would disagree.”
“And are you one of them?” Vonvalt asked sharply.
Jansen held up his hands in a placatory gesture. “No. All this…” he gestured expansively around him “… is bad for business. War profits none save the devil.”
I could not help but look at Jansen in light of what Danai had said about him, and his friend Sir Anzo. The senator had always been a pleasant, gregarious, charming man; now I saw him in a different light. He seemed oily, sleazy, desperate. I believed him entirely when he said that he would do anything to survive. I hoped that Vonvalt didn’t trust him – though he seemed quite eager for this marriage of convenience to proceed.
“Come, then. We have a city to retake. And that is just the beginning of it.” He sighed. “After that we have Claver to worry about.”
XVIII
The Battle of the Barracks
“I would choose to fight almost anywhere in the world over the breathless confines of a city.”
MARGRAVE VALERIJA JONAITIS
Vonvalt tried to prevent me from joining the mission.
“You are too important,” he said to me as we walked back to the Imperial Palace.
“At this point it doesn’t seem like it even matters whether I live or die. Nema, the afterlife is like Sova on market day.”
“The market runs every day in Sova,” Vonvalt said, in a flash of pedantry which made me curiously nostalgic for the man he’d once been. “Notwithstanding,” he continued as we turned a corner. Vonvalt walked very quickly, and I had to half-jog to keep up. “You cannot join.”
“I can and will,” I said firmly.
He stopped and looked at me. “I will not have you throw your life away on some skirmish.”
“My life is not yours to do anything with, throw away or otherwise,” I snapped, suddenly hot with anger. Heinrich whined next to me.
Vonvalt gritted his teeth. “Nema’s blood, do what you will,” he muttered, turning away from me to join a gaggle of soldiers in the square. “And for Nema’s sake, someone fetch Sir Radomir!”
I got myself kitted out by the Imperial Guard. The armour was much lighter than I had expected it to be; the cuirass could only have been twenty pounds. It was also surprisingly comfortable. Given that as many women as men joined the Imperial Guard, they had armour for my frame, though I certainly didn’t have the muscular bulk to fill it. It was a little loose, even with the straps tightened as far as they would go, but of course I preferred it to nothing.
“Do you know what you are doing?” the Guardswoman who was armouring me asked. She did not ask it in a condescending way, it was a simple enquiry. She was more interested in Heinrich next to me, and she kept pausing to scratch him under the chin.
“I was at the Agilmar Gate,” I said. “In the van,” I added.
The woman looked at me quizzically. “You are a Templar?”
“Oh, no,” I said. “It’s… a long story.”
Once I was armed and armoured, I reported to Serjeant Rainer, who was assembling the host of Guardsmen, watchmen and volunteer companies in the impromptu staging area to the south of the Imperial Palace. The palace itself was now closed and locked down like a fortress; neither Vonvalt nor Rainer wanted to waste any more people than they had to on guarding the place.
We must have numbered a thousand, all in. When we were all formed up, swords and shields ready, we began to advance down the Saint Slavka the Martyr High-Way. The seasoned Imperial Guard were able to move in lockstep, as was I, for marching is not difficult if you have half a brain; but plenty behind struggled with it. Still, we made very good progress down the road.
I was not as nervous as I should have been. Being in and amongst the armoured Legionaries was an entirely different experience to my brief and inauspicious stint as a Daughter of Nema. A good four ranks were interposed between me and the vanguard, which suited me just fine. In fact, I began to wonder why I had been so insistent on joining the melee in the first place. Certainly agency was a part of it – I had been whisked along by Vonvalt and events for so long, it felt good to be exercising some control – but I was also infused with a curious fear of missing out. Of missing the action. Irrespective of the risk of injury and death, I could not bear the thought of listening to Vonvalt and Sir Radomir and the other commanders trading war stories in taverns for years to come.
I just hoped we would all live long enough to be trading war stories in taverns for years to come.
We came out of the shadow of the Imperial Courts of Justice, past the City Watch House, and reached the Miran Bridge. Here we encountered the first traitor checkpoint, and I watched as, after a desultory exchange of missiles, they fled, shouting and screaming that the attack was upon them.
This brief action seemed to infuse the company with purpose. The pace quickened. We cut rapidly east down the Petran High-Way, but although there was a great temptation to start running, the formation held. I could see now why the volunteer companies had been kept in the rear; as the least disciplined, they were the most likely to try and charge forward, especially at the earliest signs of success.
