31 Wrong Side of the Argument

THE IMPERIAL MARSHAL cursed himself for leaving the imperatrix at Wept, but he’d had to make sure the mages reached the docks. He rushed back towards the stairs leading to the tower.

The forces arrayed against them were from both within and without, and though he was in command of the city’s defence, he had done everything possible in that regard. It was up to the mages. His main duty now was to the imperatrix herself. Without a leader, after all, what were they?

Folks rushed past, most of them soldiers, many following orders and heading to their posts as commanders learned where the threat was. Others, he observed with narrowed eyes, looked more likely to be up to something, taking advantage of the chaos. Looting was not above certain people; each legion consisted of up to five thousand men, but there were always a few rogues who hid within the cohorts, a few thieves, and rapists. He’d certainly known several when he’d made his way up through the ranks.

Unfortunately, he had no time to deal with traitors. Likely, they would be dead in under an hour. He knew it was a fatalistic way to think, especially for an imperial marshal, but he was in a mood. In all the chaos, he thought about Morla and their daughter. He hated his wife’s decision, but it had been hers to make. All he could do was hope they came out of it in one piece.

He reached the steps and was about to begin the laborious climb when he realised for the second time what a fool he was. She wasn’t up there. As soon as his back had been turned, she would’ve borrowed a sword and gone charging straight at the enemy. That was Sarscha Todralan.

He scanned about, wondering where she might have gone. She didn’t go back down to the city and the docks, or he would have passed her and the considerable armoured entourage he had saddled her with. Knowing his luck, she would have found a way to drag them, and Morla, into a battle. There were still those nightmares to contend with.

He headed onward ignoring the stairs, as he spotted signs of conflict. He headed down a second pathway, which led from the Tower and into a section of the Pleth Quarter.

As he descended, he could make out a knot of soldiers with shields battling four nightmares near a burning building. There were two mages with them, and Artorius knew Sarscha was in the middle of it. Where else would she be?

Drawing his short sword and a dagger, he joined them and began stabbing at the creatures. Six of the greencloaks he’d left with her were dead, and roughly a dozen carried wounds. He saw no sign of his wife among the slain, but he had no time to search. Fool woman would go and get herself killed just to spite him.

The survivors fought, and in their midst was the imperatrix, also with sword and dagger in hand. It was an old style of fighting without a shield, preferred if the enemy had no bows or spears. These nightmares certainly had no such weapons. Unencumbered by a shield, the imperatrix was able to move and dodge at speed, and though no doubt a little rusty, she still had the skills.

Sarscha tried to fight with the same vicious streak she was famous for, but he was glad to see that his soldiers had obeyed him. They were doing their best to protect her.

It was futile of course. The woman was as notoriously stubborn as she was skilled, and she knew how to organise soldiers in the middle of a fight.

He didn’t know the mages’ names, but they were both female. They were the only reason more soldiers, and Sarscha too, hadn’t died. However, what she was doing here instead of down at the docks, he didn’t understand.

The virals combined their abilities, while one of them was directing the magical attacks. As another greencloak died screaming, her body blackening, while the dead ones had started to twitch, the lead mage managed to strike a blow at one of the nightmares. The creature exploded, pieces of fish, river water and slime flying. Then another burst apart, and then the final two.

Artorius found he was coated in nightmare leftovers, and growled his disgust. He was about to snap something at the imperatrix, when another nightmare which was much larger than the others, appeared from nowhere. It grabbed both mages.

Ripping off their heads, it turned on the soldiers, who had little time to react. Then he saw someone hit Sarscha over the head. She fell, and lay unmoving.

Artorius rushed to her side and then noticed the soldier standing over them both, daggers in her hands.

‘Oh, it’s you,’ Lazar said with a grimace, straightening up. The imperatrix lay unconscious from a blow the captain had delivered from behind.

He noted a darkness to Lazar’s skin, like a creeping infection climbing her neck, visible where she’d ripped open the collar of her uniform.

Then the nightmare was upon them, the last of the soldiers flung aside like a discarded ragdoll. Artorius lunged for it with his blade, but it was batted aside. It grabbed him, about to rip him apart, and on instinct he grabbed hold of it in turn, his fingers gripping its neck.

It shrieked a horrible noise and this time, the imperial marshal knew why; his hand had blackened, just like Lazar’s neck, and where he touched the nightmare, it bled an oily black smoke.

Tightening his hold, ignoring the pain of the wounds inflicted on him, he crushed its neck with his infected hand, and the nightmare burst asunder. It felt good to destroy the thing, although he knew his newfound ability was killing him.

He fell to his knees surrounded by gunk. There was a scuffle and a cry. He looked up to find Lazar holding Morla with a dagger to her throat. The fool woman had tried to save him of course. The infected captain had finished off the other survivors while he’d battled the nightmare.

Lazar cut Moral’s throat from ear to ear in a long bloody gash, before letting her body fall. His wife kicked several times as she bled out, before going still.

He should have cried out in horror, raged or something, but all he did was sit there on the ground, staring.

She came at him with her daggers, and he had no time to think. He scrambled to his feet and dodged her first attempt, but it still caught him, scoring a burning gash in his neck. She came at him again, stabbing high and low, aiming for the joins in his armour, trying to catch him off guard.

Whether he knew what he was doing, or if it was instinct, he didn’t know, but he let a low blow strike home. She had dropped to one knee and driven the dagger into his gut, slicing up beneath his armour.

His blackened fingers found her throat, just as they had with the nightmare. ‘I am so sorry,’ he whispered to her, as he felt the second dagger enter his belly, though the words weren’t for the captain. His gaze drifted towards the body of his wife. ‘I am sorry, my love.’

Now both of his hands were on Lazar’s neck, the infected one burning into her flesh as she shrieked. It wasn’t Lazar anymore, of course. He had interrupted her attempt to kill the imperatrix. Maybe something of the captain had still survived, holding back from completing the deed for she had only knocked Sarscha out. It was also likely that the captain had led Sarscha down to this area of the city into an ambush.

Lazar’s wild eyes, filled with inky blackness gazed hatefully up at him as he crushed her windpipe. He did it with his own hand, but then it wasn’t his hand anymore either. It belonged to Tartaros now. They all did. The world was ending, and it didn’t much matter anymore.

Her body dropped lifeless, and he knew it would not be long before it rose again with the others. Morla’s too. Some of them were shifting about on the ground, trying to rise already.

Dagger hilts still protruding from his abdomen, he stumbled towards the burning wreckage of the building, and managed to grab a brand, scorching his good hand in the process. He knew his time was up. One last duty remained him.

Without ceremony, he set fire to the clothing of each of the corpses, those moving and those not, leaving his wife and Lazar’s until last.

Then he collapsed, legs unwilling to cooperate. He tried to set the flame to his own clothing, but he had dropped the brand and couldn’t reach it. Strength was leaving him, and horror was taking its place. He didn’t want to become one of those things.

Then a face hovered into view. He blinked away tears, surprised to find he was crying. He realised it was Sarscha. Blood masked one side of her face, but she leaned over him, checking on his wounds.

‘Don’t ... don’t bother,’ he managed, throat dry. He knew the infection was spreading uncontrollably, and soon, if she didn’t act, he would rise from the dead like the others.

‘Don’t be a fool,’ she snapped, trying to staunch the bleeding with some rags. She could not have failed to notice the burning bodies. She grimaced. ‘I failed you, Art,’ she whispered. ‘I am sorry.’

He knew she meant his wife. He managed to grab her hand, though it took a lot of strength to do so. ‘Look at me,’ he hissed.

She did, and her eyes were filled with a sadness he had never seen in her before. It didn’t suit her. An imperatrix needed to be above simple emotions, but then Sarscha Todralan had never been just an imperatrix. She had been and would be for a long time yet, he knew, a military leader.

‘You know what ... to do,’ he said, but the last couple of words came out garbled as he began to choke on his own blood.

She held his hand tight, looking down on him, and he thought, as he felt his life ebbing away, that this was not such a bad death. To die fighting for his city, for the imperium, to fall defending his imperatrix. Well, it was more than he had any right to ask for.

Maybe Morla had been right after all.

‡

Sarscha watched the life leave him, as the infection spread across his face, soiling his handsome features.

‘No, no,’ she mumbled, fighting back a lump in her throat, but she couldn’t hold back the tears. ‘You stupid fool!’ She didn’t know whether she meant him or herself. Perhaps both.

She had followed Lazar, who had told her there was a greater threat to the northwest. She had spotted two mages hurrying in the other direction and had grabbed them, sending a messenger for more. In the end, they’d found nightmares and there had been no time for anything but trying to survive.

It was her fault for not noticing Lazar’s change, for not seeing the trap for what it was. Her fault that her most loyal subject, her friend, lay dead in front of her. I’ve lost my edge, she thought. Becoming imperatrix had changed her. The imperial marshal she had been once would never have let this happen.

When his corpse began twitching, she knew what came next. He had asked her to take care of it, and she would not deny his final request.

A burning brand lay close by, and she guessed he had taken care of the others. In the distance there was the sound of battle, of cries and screams, of raised voices and the clash of arms. Wind fresh off the Adalcis coast whipped the flames to a frenzy as her city, her imperium, burned.

She touched the flame to Art’s cloak and watched it consume him, stepping back from the heat.

Then she turned away and didn’t look back.

The dead were free.

It was the living she had to worry about.

‡

Vilt saw Wallow emerge from the medicary and felt a surge of hope. The other mages stood on the Gulley walls, as Wallow climbed the steps to the battlements.

The Titans, molten wings burning the very air, had broken through a section of the Gulley. Chimera of various types, all in the shapes of wargs, slinkts, wolves or other predators, along with winged harpies, were savaging the defenders atop the battlements. Several forts were overrun. Imperial artillery, enhanced by viralic magic, hurtled into the titans with spectacular results. Several of the monstrosities were destroyed. However, those floating spectres she’d heard were called wights, soon overcame them. The catapults and ballistae fell silent. The ranks of ethereal angels were the only brightness on that dark battlefield and they swept forwards to meet their dead kin.

Vilt screamed at Wallow, pointing at the breach, but the viral seemed to be in a daze. She didn’t look well, for one of the undead, and Vilt’s instincts honed by years of military service, told her to run. Instead, she stood there and stared as the viral woman transformed.

She’d known about Threadfin Todder and his ability to change into a hideous creature, which folk had come to call a dragon. Whatever a dragon was. They all knew of his ability, though no one talked about it.

Seeing Wallow’s body enlarge, bones snapping and muscles regrowing as her skin changed colour and texture with a tail sprouting from her rear, Vilt should have felt elated. A dragon on their side might turn the tide, but her instincts still told her to flee. She ignored them. Wallow was her friend. Right?

The remnants of a shattered phalanx turned and pointed their weapons at Wallow or what used to be her. The dragon turned its head, regarding them with one massive dull grey eye. Then it lunged, wings fanning as its jaws tore them to pieces.

With a lurch of horror in her stomach, Vilt fighting the urge to be sick, she saw other virals beyond the wall on both sides transform, and she knew they also weren’t on the right side of the argument. Something had gone horribly wrong.

Grudge, the fool, who had been leading the defence of another section of wall, was running towards her along the battlements, several soldiers with spears in tow. The dragon, who had once been Wallow, spotted them.

Vilt cried out in fear and desperation, but it was too late. The dragon’s tail hammered into the battlements right where Grudge had been.

A shower of stone, masonry, and dust, and they were gone.

Another of the viral dragons leapt onto the wall, its talons clutching two merlons as its gazed down at her, casting a vast shadow with its wings.

With a cry, Vilt shot an arrow at its face, but it pinged off the beast’s armour. She had no idea which one of the virals it had been, and it didn’t matter.

The dragon’s head lowered, and its jaws shut with a snap.