The Merchant Emperor (The Symphony of Ages)

  “Not quite, it doesn’t,” Fhremus said dryly. “You are showing signs of severe trauma, soldier; if I had not known you prior to your enlistment, I might not recognize those signs, but having been your uncle all your life, I do. What happened at the abbey?”

  Kymel said nothing.

  “Tell me,” Fhremus said tersely.

  Kymel inhaled deeply, then exhaled slowly.

  “There was an ancient weapon, a catapult of a sort, from the days before the abbey, when the site was a defensive outpost,” he said, his voice hollow. “When the cohort was finished securing the target, it was discovered that the catapult was still operational, the soldiers used it to take turns disposing of the bodies and the—”

  “Halt,” said Fhremus. His voice was shaking. “Bodies?”

  “Yes, sir,” said Kymel.

  “What bodies?”

  Kymel said nothing.

  “What bodies? Tell me. That’s an order, soldier.”

  Kymel exhaled again.

  “We encountered seventeen women, one of whom was in charge of the abbey, the abbess, I believe, fifty-seven children and eleven infants. By drawing of lots, the soldiers of the cohort—”

  His voice broke. Instinctively Fhremus stood in silence, waiting for Kymel to recover his calm, while he struggled to recover his own. Finally Kymel spoke again.

  “In order of lot, the soldiers selected women to ravage, taking turns with some of the more attractive and younger ones. The children and infants were rounded up and used as catapult fodder; the infants were all shot from it, live, into the sea, in a game of distance and accuracy. Some of the children were used as the women had been, some just put to the sword, or shot from the catapult, live, as well. The bodies of the women were similarly committed to the sea, but not until all of their throats had been cut.” He swallowed, forcing the last words to come out of his throat. “Each soldier took a turn with the abbess, sodomizing—”

  “Stop.” Fhremus was trembling with rage. “Did you take a turn?”

  “No, sir. I was tasked with search and reconnaissance.”

  “For what? What was this object that the emperor was so interested in?”

  Kymel looked away.

  “Speak, soldier. What was so important as to send a cohort to an abbey for it?”

  “It was a cookie, sir.”

  Fhremus’s eyes opened to the size of the full moon. “A—a cookie?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “A cookie?”

  “There were dozens of them, sir, on plates on the table in the main building. I heard one of the other soldiers say that the legends of this place, the Well of the Moon, had said that it was a haven for damaged or poor children where if they could find it they would also find kindness, gentle treatment, toys, cookies, and sweetmeats. I can attest to existence there of the last three; the first two seem likely from what I could reconnoiter as well. Nothing magical, epic, or significant, just—just—”

  “Just what?”

  Kymel swallowed again. “Just humanity, sir.”

  Fhremus’s rage exploded. “I will have Titactyk hanged for this.”

  His nephew blinked. “I don’t think you can, sir, at least not by the code of military justice.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Everything he did was fulfilling a direct command of the emperor,” Kymel said without emotion. “We were told to leave no one alive.”

  “Did—did he know what sort of place it was, that it was an orphanage, a refuge for children?”

  “Most certainly, sir. Titactyk was ordered to dispose of the bodies, but there was no place to bury them, and the wet wind prevented pyres atop the cliffs or on the beach. But even if it hadn’t, the catapult was extremely popular.” He looked at the floor. “I did nothing to stop it, sir. For that, I have dishonored our family and myself.”

  No more than I have, thought Fhremus. Sweet All-God.

  “What will you do now, sir?”

  The supreme commander looked out the window of his office, in what had once been, in the days before the invasion, a dispensary of medicine.

  “Deploy,” he said.

  There was no emotion at all in his voice.

  53

  TRAEG, NORTHWESTERN SEACOAST

  Ashe had reached the high cliffs overlooking the crashing sea when a faint blue light appeared, hovering in the air above the beach below him.

  “Rhapsody?” he called. “Is that you?”

  A blurry image, filmy and almost invisible, returned his gaze.

  I am here.

  The voice was foreign, almost alien, bearing none of the warmth that he knew as well as he knew his own name, the beating of his own heart. I have returned from the journey I told you about the last time we spoke. All was done in accordance to plan. In addition, Anwyn is dead; history will record me as her executioner, as her killer.

  There was no sadness in her words, just simple statement of fact blended with the whine of the sea wind. Ashe swallowed hard.

  “Being victorious in battle with a wyrm, or any other opponent, does not make a killer of the winner, Rhapsody.”

  She did not die in battle, though one did take place between us eleven days before. I followed her into the broken ruins of Kurimah Milani, where she was hiding, injured and compromised, and put her to the sword, ignored her pleas for her life. I do not regret it; I am merely telling you the truth. I took her life and burned her body; there is no possibility she will return.

  Ashe’s brow furrowed, but otherwise his expression did not change.

  “Good,” he said. “Tell me of your journey.”

  The look in Rhapsody’s eyes grew colder. All is in place, as I told you. If something should happen to me, you will know what to do. I do not judge it wise to say more in the open air.

  The Lord Cymrian nodded, quietly dismayed to have no specific report of Meridion, a reassurance that had sustained him ever since he had sent his wife and son away to the Bolglands with Achmed. He rubbed his hands briskly over his arms, as if to ward off the chill of the wind, or perhaps in her voice.

  “Where are you going now, Rhapsody?”

  The howl of the sea wind almost blotted out the sound of her answer.

  Wherever the Lord Marshal deploys me. I leave on the morrow to meet up with him and your namesake.

  “Please, please be careful, my love,” Ashe said fervently. “I don’t like the look in your eyes.”

  The image of Rhapsody seemed to inhale, then let her breath out steadily. She said nothing.

  The gusts off the waves below picked up, whipping the Lord Cymrian’s cape about him.

  “Rhapsody,” he said, his voice serious and grave, “listen to me. You and I have both made bitter sacrifices to fulfill our responsibilities as Lord and Lady Cymrian, but those duties are not what need to guide us now. If you and I feel the weight of every person who depends on our actions, we will surely buckle under the guardianship of an entire continent. So, having put safeguards in place, we are both wading forward, you into the fray, I into the sea—but what needs to anchor us both is our vow of love to each other. I know what you have given up to protect—”

  He stopped at the furious gleam in her eyes, then dropped his gaze.

  “If anything were to happen to you, it would have been better to throw myself from this cliff into the sea right now. I cannot go on until I have your assurance that you will fight with everything you have to come back to me, to us.” He raised his eyes and looked at her image again.

  The woman who returned his gaze was all but unrecognizable.

  Within him, he felt the rise of the dragon as it began to panic.

  I will do the best I can, she said. Perhaps you can take comfort in knowing that, because I am numb, I am logical, and focused. The lack of pain should serve to keep me sensible.

  Ashe exhaled, tears filling his eyes.

  “I love you,” he said as the blue light faded and the image disappeared into the wind. “Gods, I love you.
”

  There was no reply.

  HIGHMEADOW

  The Lord Cymrian had left without warning, telling no one but his namesake.

  Not even his chamberlain.

  So when Gerald Owen heard the voice in the dark of foredawn, he had no idea that its instructions would come to naught.

  The voice had been nattering subsonically for some time, whispering outlandish instructions and wheedling charmingly. Owen was beginning to think he was ill from worry or succumbing to the frailty of old age, when the order that appeared in his mind sounded.

  He stopped in his tracks in the buttery where he had been preparing Ashe’s morning tea and the whey cereal that was one of the few things the Lord Cymrian would eat in these days of terrible news. He cocked his head to one side, hearing the directions, but for the first time since the whispering had begun some weeks ago, he did not shake it off.

  And instead went back to the pantry, looking for a stronger blend of tea to hide the taste of the datura he also took from the cleaning cabinet to enhance it with.

  Datura was an herbal element, deadly poisonous to the cockroaches in the nests that the Lady Cymrian had painted with it when back in the drafty keep of Haguefort.

  And to anyone who might ingest it.

  He had almost forgotten what he had done until the young duke of Navarne came down to breakfast.

  And sat in the Lord Cymrian’s place at the table.

  Gerald Owen had reentered the room just in time to see Gwydion Navarne lift Ashe’s teacup to his lips.

  His ragged gasp caused the young man to freeze, his hand with the cup in the air in front of him.

  “Er—young master Navarne,” he said, trembling. “What are you doing?”

  Gwydion summoned a halfhearted smile.

  “Ashe is gone, Gerald,” he said. “He has invested me with his Right of Command; I am leaving immediately to meet up with Anborn and Rhapsody two days hence in the farming encampment south of Bethany. I thought I might keep his tea from being wasted before I left.”

  The elderly chamberlain’s eyes welled up at the sight of the young man he had loved as a son for all Gwydion’s life.

  A love stronger than any demonic command could ever be.

  “No, sir, I’m afraid you are mistaken. Even if you are the acting Lord Cymrian now.” Gently he took the teacup from the young duke. “You see, that’s my tea.”

  The tears in his eyes spilled over as he raised the cup to his lips.

  And drank.

  Then he bowed, excusing himself, and hurried back to his chambers behind the buttery to bed before the datura took him, so as to appear to die in his sleep.

  His last act of guardianship to the family Navarne.

  54

  KREVENSFIELD PLAIN, SOUTH OF BETHANY, NORTH OF SEPULVARTA

  A sennight after he had numbly buried his family’s beloved caretaker and left for Bethany, Gwydion Navarne stood atop the viewing tower at the highest elevation of the east-west midpoint of the Krevensfield Plain, spyglass to his eye, watching the armies of Sorbold advance. Down from the piedmont that led to the steppes to the south, long dark lines of soldiers, ten divisions mounted, another twenty on foot, and, most terrible of all, fifty or more wagons with the long boxed frames indicating the transport of iacxsis were approaching the armed farming settlement, defended only by the eight thousand or so soldiers that the Lord Marshal had deployed there.

  Another forty thousand were coming, by his own command, but all intelligence predicted a three-day wait until their arrival.

  By which time, the garrison was likely to be nothing but ashes.

  Gwydion swallowed hard. He, like Anborn, had expected Sorbold to attack the less central, more vulnerable settlements first; their bad guess looked to be a costly one. Though Sorbold could have committed more soldiers, it was clear that the supreme commander had been confident enough to attack with the forces that had been quartered in Sepulvarta, leaving the walled city all but undefended.

  In his youth, Gwydion had not enjoyed the games of three-in-hand or fiddlesticks, betting games of bluffing and intentional deception, for just this very reason. He, like his father, was by nature a straight arrow, a man with little taste for risk taking. His lack of a sense of this kind of adventure was something the Lord Marshal had bemoaned humorously when training him in field strategy, but even the great Cymrian hero had to concede that risk did not always pay off.

  Anborn had taken the young duke spying in southern Sorbold and the Nonaligned States with him, and he had watched the Lord Marshal offer halfhearted crossbow support while his godfather sliced through a cohort of twenty-seven Sorbold soldiers that had made its way inside the gate of Haguefort disguised in the colors of Ashe’s own regiment. Ashe and Anborn had seemed almost bored as they dispatched the intruders; it was a fascinating if unrealistic view of military maneuvers, leaving Gwydion both comforted by the level of skill of those leading the armies and navies of the Alliance, while making him worry that he would underestimate what battle really required when he himself was drawn into it.

  Ashe had known of his fears, and had brought him along when repelling raids in southern Navarne, allowing him to put the skills that Anborn had been imparting to him to the test. The result was that he now had a healthy respect for his own limitations.

  That real-life training was the only combat experience he had ever had, with the exception of the battle with the Fallen at the Moot during the Cymrian Council four years before, where every civilian, even the lame and children, had joined in the fray, using every possible weapon of any sort they could find, including horse whips and shovels.

  The battle that had taken his father’s life as he had held the gate, rescuing much of the population as it fled the Moot.

  Gwydion looked down at his own hands. They were trembling.

  For all that Ashe had invested his own Right of Command in his namesake, Gwydion Navarne was deeply aware that he, a human man with distant Cymrian ancestory, did not have the lineage of extreme longevity or dragon blood that both Ashe and Anborn did, nor did he have their physical training and the experience of, in Ashe’s case, more than a hundred years, in Anborn’s, more than a thousand, of soldiering and surviving battle.

  He did not fear for his own life.

  He feared that losing it easily would leave the Alliance, and therefore the Known World, in danger of destruction.

  Gwydion prayed that he would be killed, rather than captured.

  He looked down to his left, where Rhapsody stood, her emerald eyes gazing south as he had been.

  “Do you think our ballistae will hold—I mean, will they be effective against the iacxsis?”

  She did not take her eyes off the approaching army.

  “I hope so,” she said. “We will have a rough time of it. Don’t take your eyes off the sky.”

  There was no confidence or reassurance in her voice, just a cold, emotionless assessment. It brought no comfort to the sick twisting in the depths of Gwydion’s viscera, but he reminded himself that this was how Rhapsody was now. The warm-hearted woman who had chosen him as her first adopted grandson had been replaced by a warrior he did not recognize. But the loss of the almost parental love and reassurance she had given him over the last few years serving with Ashe as his and Melisande’s guardians was well worth the cost if the steadiness was effective on the battlefield.

  “How much longer do you suppose it will be?”

  She did not answer immediately, her eyes fixed on the approaching army.

  “It will take at least an hour before the calvary gets within missile range,” she said. “No more than two, though; they didn’t bring siege weapons, so they’re traveling quickly. They are confident, apparently. It’s time to get to down to the field.”

  Gwydion exhaled, looking for one last long moment at the approaching lines blackening the rolling hills of the Plain beyond the walls of the armed settlement. Then turned to embrace Rhapsody one last time before they went into battl
e.

  She was already heading down the ladder.

  * * *

  The Lord Marshal was riding the line along the southern quarters of the garrison on horseback when Gwydion and Rhapsody arrived at the front.

  The Lady Cymrian dismounted from her own steed and tossed the reins to a corporal from the livery as Anborn slowed his black warhorse and pulled up beside her.

  “The archers are in place, the defense of the wall is forming. How many troops do you want back here in the midfort for yourself, m’lady?”

  “None, thank you. For what I plan they would just be in the way. If a iacxsis is targeted at me, I don’t want anyone else to suffer for it—or to prevent me from responding appropriately.” She turned to Gwydion, who had dismounted as well. “The only support I will need is yours.”

  Gwydion nodded nervously. He had been briefed by the Lady Cymrian the night before when she arrived on her plan to work side by side with him, using their special weapons and abilities, saving any direct combat as a second line of defense. Gwydion suspected that if their swords were needed in hand-to-hand combat, the outcome would be foreordained anyway.

  He was having a hard time remembering that the woman who was calmly discussing last-minute strategy with the Lord Marshal was the same woman he had known and loved for a third of his life. He barely recognized her, the golden locks she was famous for shorn to the base of her neck, her legendary beauty replaced by a sharpness that he found disturbing. He closed his eyes and willed himself to concentrate on the battle coming quickly, relentlessly toward them.

  “Fair enough,” said Anborn. “Good luck, both of you. We will focus on the conventional forces—the archers will hold the wall as long as they can. If we are overrun, use whatever power is at your command, m’lady. Do not spare any of your comrades—any of us. The enemy needs to die first; if you have to take some of us with them, then that is as it should be.”

  “Indeed,” Rhapsody agreed. “Good luck to you as well.”