CHAPTER 14
Sirus
“Varestia,” Morradin said, a sneer curling his broad lips as his gaze tracked over the pencil-line Sirus had sketched on the map. The marshal’s thoughts went on to form the old Eutherian term for the region, one born of the many wars the Empire had fought there: the Sewer of Malcontents.
“A formidable target then?” Catheline asked, her red-and-black eyes shifting between Sirus and Morradin. The principal captains of the White’s army were clustered around the navigation table on the bridge of a large freighter recently renamed the Malign Influence, the new flagship of their fleet. Following behind were over sixty ships of varying sizes, together with numerous towed barges laden with Spoiled. In all the army now totalled some sixty thousand formerly human souls but, from the grudging concern leaking from Morradin’s thoughts, it might well prove insufficient for the task ahead.
“The Corvantine Empire was never able to fully control the region,” Sirus said. “Even after it had been officially conquered. Rebellions were frequent and the attrition of Imperial forces constant. When the previous revolution broke out, the Empire was obliged to withdraw its forces to reinforce the northern provinces. Following the revolution repeated attempts to reconquer Varestia met with disaster.” Sirus’s gaze flicked to Morradin. “Including one led by you, I believe, Marshal.”
“Fuck you, boy!” Morradin spat. Sirus didn’t bother to conceal his satisfaction at the marshal’s blossoming rage. “And fuck your mother,” Morradin went on. “I was second in command of that expedition, as you well know. And we’d have won if that fool admiral had listened to me . . .”
Be quiet.
Morradin’s teeth clacked as his mouth slammed shut in response to Catheline’s thought-command. He stood with nostrils flaring and eyes blazing as Catheline turned back to Sirus. “You were saying, General?”
“The Varestians’ success in defeating the Empire was largely due to their command of the sea,” Sirus went on. “And a willingness to put aside long-standing clan rivalries to pursue a common aim. Their society is famed for its supposed brutality but is in fact remarkably stable and cohesive, due in part to a strictly observed code of ethics and the practice of resolving irreconcilable disputes through duels rather than large-scale conflict. The geography of the region also presents numerous challenges. So many islands offer numerous refuges for enemy vessels and many opportunities for ambush. Then there is the question of numbers.” Sirus fell silent, turning to Veilmist in expectation.
“The Ironship records seized at Feros,” the Islander began in her unhesitant, precise Mandinorian, “contain a demographic analysis of the Varestian region. It was compiled five years ago when the Syndicate was considering seeking a formal arrangement with the Varestian Ruling Council regarding trading concessions. It concluded the region is home to approximately thirty million people. This is based on the availability of arable land and consumption of imported food-stuffs, a more reliable method than the Corvantine census, which is notoriously inaccurate. This means that in the event of a large-scale conflict the region could muster close to four million recruits of military age, including both men and women.”
Catheline arched an elegant eyebrow at Veilmist. “Four million? That does seem rather a lot.”
“This is the figure they could amass under ideal conditions,” Veilmist replied. “The true figure, given the challenges of local terrain, factional conflicts and logistical difficulties, will be much lower. Perhaps as low as one million, and even then that would require several months of organisation.”
“Let’s say we give them”—Catheline pursed her lips in consideration—“just one month. How many are we likely to face then?”
“Given the armed citizenry already on hand, local militias and likely rate of recruitment, between two hundred to two hundred and fifty thousand.”
Forest Spear spoke up, which was a rarity in these meetings as he tended to make any contributions mentally. However, since Catheline’s ascension Sirus had noticed an increased tendency amongst the Spoiled to communicate verbally. He assumed she just liked it that way. “We faced more in the islands,” Forest Spear said in his guttural but still-comprehensible Varsal. For some as yet unexplained reason the tribals seemed to prefer the Corvantine common tongue when speaking aloud, not that it mattered. All languages were equally understood in this army. “Warriors born and bred for battle,” Forest Spear added. “And still they fell before us.”
“But they didn’t all possess fire-arms,” Sirus pointed out. “Neither did they possess a large fleet of armed ships crewed by the best sailors in the world.” He turned to Catheline, compelled by her desire for unalloyed truth. “We don’t have the numbers for a successful conquest. Or the ships.”
Morradin gave a pained grunt, drawing Catheline’s gaze. She smiled and unlocked his mouth. “Something to add, Marshal?”
“The southern coastal ports of the Empire,” he said, stubby finger jabbing at a series of successive points on the map. “Each one separated by at least fifty miles, unable to come to the other’s aid should they be attacked.”
“Population?” Catheline asked, turning to Veilmist.
“Five million all told,” she said after a pause of only a few seconds. “But dispersed. Melkorin, the most westerly port has a population of only eighty-five thousand. Even allowing for the vagaries of the Corvantine census, it would seem a manageable objective. I estimate the recruitment yield to be close to twenty thousand Spoiled, allowing for a three to four percent casualty rate amongst our own forces.”
“And when we’re done there,” Catheline said, a note of approval in her voice as she traced her crimson finger-nail along the coast, “we’ll have yet more fruit to pluck. Excellent reasoning, my dear. You are as clever as you are beautiful.”
Sirus managed to summon enough fear to mask his disgust at the warm gratification these words provoked in Veilmist’s mind. Even the Spoiled, it seemed, were not immune to the flattery of a beautiful madwoman.
“Any additional concerns, General?” she asked, her gaze swivelling to Sirus as she sensed his fear.
He shook his head. “Only an observation that battle is always uncertain,” he said.
She laughed, moving closer to pat his arm, her hand lingering to caress taut muscle beneath his sleeve. “But that’s what makes it so stimulating.”
Catheline stepped back, closing her eyes momentarily as she communed with the White, which had chosen to perch itself on the wide aft deck of the Malign Influence, along with its clutch of juveniles. After a moment she opened her eyes and favoured them all with one of her brightest smiles. “Consent is given. Please plot a course to Melkorin.”
“Are you angry with me?” Catheline asked as they dined together. The Malign Influence lay at anchor a mile south of Melkorin and Sirus could see the flames rising above the harbour wall. “For keeping you from all the fun,” she added, sipping her wine.
They had dined on sea-trout, expertly poached by a former head chef from one of Morsvale’s more exclusive restaurants. Upon finding the fellow amongst the ranks of Spoiled Catheline had immediately appointed him as her personal cook and dined every day on lavish meals of the highest quality. She always ate dinner on the observation deck to the rear of the bridge, seated at a table complete with an ornate silver candelabra, plates of antique Dalcian porcelain and silver cutlery.
It was a week since the conference, sufficient time to plan their attack and complete the approach. At Catheline’s instruction the entire affair had been left in Morradin’s hands. Sirus found his own role restricted to overseeing the running of the fleet. He suspected she either wanted to stoke the rivalry between them or obtain an unvarnished example of the marshal’s abilities. Perhaps both.
Morradin’s plan had been characteristically straightforward, though he borrowed some of the more subtle elements from Sirus’s attack on Feros. A small flotilla of ships, disguised as refugee vessels with besmirched hulls and unkempt works, approached the port in late evening, their signal pennants displaying a request for safe harbour. The Melkorin authorities, however, had staunchly refused to raise the door in their wall, gathering their garrison and militia in and around the docks. Sirus felt his sympathy for these people erode slightly when gun-batteries on the wall began casting shells at the supposed refugees.
Yes, Catheline agreed, sensing his disdain. Yet more souls deserving of their fate. But then, they all are.
Whilst the attention of the Melkorin defenders remained fixed on the ships outside their wall, the White’s host of Reds swept over the coast to the east. They flew north for several miles before turning west as the sun began to fade, swooping low to deposit Spoiled and Greens on the port’s outlying suburbs. Meanwhile, Morradin led the bulk of the fleet to land the main force of Spoiled infantry on a broad stretch of beach three miles to the west. Within hours the entire port was in chaos and the Corvantine troops and militia were unable to mount an organised defence. Resistance was still fierce, however, especially amongst the militia who were defending their homes and families. A few companies barricaded themselves into the more substantial buildings in the commercial district, holding out against repeated assaults until Morradin lost patience and asked for assistance from the Reds. Any action undertaken by the drakes that lay outside the original plan had to be approved by Catheline, their lives being regarded as so much more precious than the Spoiled.
Are you sure, Marshal? Catheline asked. Seems a trifle excessive to me. Can’t you just wait for them to run out of ammunition?
They’re blocking the main thoroughfare into the residential neighbourhoods, Morradin replied. My scouts report a large number of people fleeing to the hill-country to the north. The longer this lot holds out the smaller our yield of recruits.
This had been enough for Catheline to unleash the Reds, Katarias leading several dozen out of the night sky to blast the buildings with flame from top to bottom. This attack succeeded in eliminating resistance but also birthed a conflagration that soon spread to much of the port’s western districts.
What a marvellous strategist you are, Marshal, Catheline observed. I ask for recruits and you give me charred corpses.
Morradin’s response consisted of a sullen, reluctant pulse of apology which provoked a surprising laugh from Catheline. “What a simply dreadful man,” she commented to Sirus. “But useful. Not as useful as you, dear General, but still worth keeping around. Don’t you think?” Sirus sensed a genuine enquiry in her tone, eyebrows raised above her wine-glass as she added, “I’ll kill him if you like.”
He felt Morradin tense, the Spoiled of his personal guard immediately turning towards the marshal with levelled rifles. Sirus let the fear seep into his mind, masking his thoughts. Morradin was useful to the White, it was true. He was also supremely arrogant and self-interested to the point of mania, not to mention an Imperial butcher with the blood of thousands on his hands. But, more than that, he hated his enslavement just as much as Sirus did, and such hatred might suit his own ends in time.
“In land warfare he has no equal,” Sirus said, reaching for his own wine-glass. He shrugged as he took a small sip. The wine was an expensive Mandinorian white of impressive vintage, part of the copious stocks looted from the Ironship stores in Feros. Sirus doubted even his father could have afforded a single bottle of the stuff. He had found since his conversion that his senses had been enhanced, including his taste-buds, and he savoured the tingle the wine left on his tongue. Notes of apple with a hint of lemon, matured in oak for at least eighteen years. He shared the taste with Morradin, feeling the marshal’s hatred swell along with his terror.
“However,” Sirus went on, lowering his glass, “his instinctive aggression can cause problems, as you’ve seen. Perhaps punishment would be preferable to execution. But, of course, I leave the matter in your hands.”
“Do you seek to teach me restraint?” Catheline’s lips pursed in mock offence. “I should hope not, sir. I was never one for moderation. But you speak sense. Punishment it is.”
Sirus flinched as she blinked and sent a pulse of pure agony into Morradin’s brain. The marshal stiffened and collapsed, writhing on the cobbled street as the port burned around him. Catheline held out her glass to the Spoiled waiter near by, who dutifully filled it. She had drained the glass by the time the pain faded from Morradin’s mind.
I trust such lessons will not be necessary in future, she told him, all humour gone and her thoughts chilly with sincerity. Now be about your business. Twenty thousand recruits is what I was promised, and what I expect.
Sirus felt the marshal’s thought-command spread to the rest of the army, carrying strict injunctions against any unnecessary killing. Apart from the children, of course, he added. They’re of no use.
“Ah,” Catheline said, brightening as a second waiter approached bearing a tray. “Dessert!”
“This is the point in the evening when most men would try to fuck me.”
She had him stroll with her after dinner. Sirus had been required to dress for the occasion and wore the uniform of an Ironship Protectorate colonel of infantry, complete with several medals won by its former owner. Catheline was attired in an elegant gown of black silk embroidered with flames of red, the product of a skilled dress-maker captured and converted in Feros. She also wore a shawl about her shoulders, fine lace threaded with jewels that glittered as they caught the flickering flames from Melkorin. Sirus supposed that, but for their deformities and the dying city across the water, an ignorant observer might have thought them the image of a romantic young couple.
“Oh, I beg your pardon,” she added, sensing his surprise at the coarseness of her language. “Seduce me.”
Sirus found himself at a complete loss for words. He had experienced a great deal in a short space of time, but some things were still far beyond his abilities.
“Despite my reputation I was quite choosy, you know,” Catheline went on. “Married men were always my preference, especially if their wives were one of those managerial bitches who loved to sneer at me so. I always found sex and revenge a potent mix.”
They came to the prow of the ship where she paused, rearranging her shawl to reveal her shoulders. Sirus found himself momentarily distracted by the way the light of the burning city played over her flesh, smooth, unscaled and wonderfully human.
“Why thank you, sir,” Catheline said, sensing his involuntary lust. “I was beginning to think such things beneath you.”
She turned back to the city as a large explosion blossomed above the wall. From the scale of the blast Sirus assumed the fire had reached the garrison’s arsenal. “I had them burn Feros before we left,” Catheline continued, the explosion fading into a cascade of debris. “He hates cities, you see? The very notion of human civilisation is offensive to him. I expect this is a sight to which we’ll become quite accustomed before we’re done.”
“What happens then?” Sirus asked. He was aware this might be dangerous, the Spoiled did not question their great White god after all. But he coloured his mind with what he hoped was a sufficient level of simple curiosity to conceal any sense of concern for the fate of the human world.
“The world will be his, and we will be his grateful servants,” Catheline replied, apparently failing to detect any artifice. “For He has blessed us, has He not? The ability to seamlessly share thoughts and experience. Think of a whole world where lies have been banished, where every mind is united in a common purpose. This will be the last war in human history. I have a yen to be a mother when this is all over. My child will be heir to a new world of eternal peace.” She glanced over her perfect shoulder at him. “You fathered a child, did you not?”
Katrya’s face when he shot her . . . Can we not love too? He drowned the memories in a deluge of fear and grief, but not before Catheline sensed his guilt.
“We can’t keep them all alive, General,” she said, a frown of sincere sympathy creasing her brow. “More’s the pity. I’m sorry for your woman, and the child, but soldiers die in war. Come the morning we’ll have thousands of freshly converted young women in our ranks. Choose one, if you wish.”
“No thank you.”
Catheline’s sympathy turned to amusement and she moved to him, reaching out to take his hand, perfect unblemished fingers tracing over the callused, scaled flesh. “Still carrying a torch for your fallen lover?” she asked. “Or do I flatter myself that you worry over making me jealous?”
Nothing, he thought, his mind sliding over hers like a hand pushing at smooth, cold glass. No clue as to her true intentions. What she really is.
“What I am?” she asked with a laugh provoking the shocked realisation that he had failed to shield his thoughts. “Oh, don’t fret,” she added, squeezing his hand as the fear flooded in. “It’s refreshing to find a genuinely curious mind amongst this lot.” She moved closer, her perfume rendered near intoxicating by his enhanced senses. “I am the final word in his blessing of this world,” she murmured, lips close to his. “He needed me, you see? Not all of me, since He got a good deal from the other bitch before she died. But, great as his mind is, it lacks . . .”
She let out an involuntary shout, her breath hot on Sirus’s face as she convulsed and collapsed at his feet. Sirus started to crouch at her side but froze as another far more powerful will invaded his mind. A low, rattling growl came from above and Sirus looked up to find the White’s huge head poised above them, thin tendrils of smoke leaking from both nostrils. Its gaze flicked over Sirus before locking onto Catheline. She let out a strangled scream, jerking on the deck as spittle drooled from her lips.
Punishment, Sirus thought.
A series of thuds drew his gaze to the surrounding deck and he saw the juvenile Whites had come to watch the spectacle, wings flapping in excitement, tails and necks coiling as they hissed and squawked. Sirus found he had no need to draw on his reserves of fear to mask his thoughts, the fist of terror that gripped him now was completely authentic, though he did find room amongst it all for a singular insight. Your god does not love you back, he decided as Catheline’s choking shudders subsided into a gibbering tremble.
The White’s growl trailed off and it grunted out a gust of smoke before launching itself into the air, the wind generated by its wings strong enough to force Sirus to his knees. He watched it ascend into the night air, ivory scales painted pink by the light of the burning city. It levelled out and angled its massive body towards Melkorin, its juvenile brood clustering around it, screaming in excited hunger. It had been the same after Feros. After the fall came the feast, and there were many children in this city.
He lowered his gaze to Catheline, seeing that her tremors had stopped and she now lay in an exhausted stupor. He also saw that she had contrived to besmirch her silk gown with a copious amount of urine. He wondered if the White would care if he killed her now.
Sirus crouched and gathered Catheline into his arms, lifting her easily. He stood watching the White dive down into the burning city, its dreadful brood following close behind, before lowering his gaze to the dark waters below. Throw the mad bitch over the side. The world will thank you for it.
Catheline let out a soft, fearful whimper, her fluttering eyelids telling of a mind beset by nightmares. She shifted in his arms, moving her head closer to his chest in an instinctive quest for comfort. Sirus turned and carried her towards the nearest hatch, making for her cabin and sending a command to the crew to bring her some clean clothes.