The Broken Isles (Legends of the Red Sun 4) (5 page)

‘What form will our returns take?’

‘New estates,’ Brynd replied. ‘New markets to control, new constructions to build across the Empire, and new statutes that need to be written. This will be a long-term plan,
but in the first instance I will see land taken from the Empire, and handed over.’

‘I imagine these new statutes will be complex, eh?’ someone asked.

Probably a lawyer.

‘Because we’ll be sharing our world with aliens,’ a merchant blurted out. ‘Ain’t that so, commander? There’ll be foreigners here, sharing our towns.
There’ll be monsters walking up and down our roads and people’ll be expected to just get on with it. Ghettos will form, mark my word. Things won’t be the same.’

‘It’s the people who leave who create the ghettos,’ Brynd said. In another time, in another setting, Brynd would have had that man roughed up for his tone. Instead he simply
continued, ‘Though much of what you describe may well be an inevitable consequence of them helping us, but don’t forget they will be bringing with them their own industries, their own
wealth . . .’

‘They should be segregated – given their own land well away from the rest of us.’

‘Aye,’ another said. ‘I ain’t living with things like that walking the streets.’

‘Please,’ Brynd said, ‘if we’re lucky enough to be alive in the future, and to have a society, then we can discuss such matters; though I ask you to concentrate on
what’s happening right now, in the immediate future.’

Once they had accepted that statement, the questions followed from those around the table for another hour at least. Each of them demanded to know some fine detail relevant to only them,
creating a disparate set of conversations. There were questions concerning payments, land divisions, how much ore would be needed and by when, and whether common land would be privatized – a
firm no from Brynd. What surprised him the most was that few of the questions concerned Artemisia or indeed the inevitable war and races that would be crossing into their own world.

‘I’m in,’ said a balding, fat man in the corner smoking arum weed, wearing purple robes that almost matched the colour of his cheeks. It was Coumby, someone who once owned many
of the buildings in Villiren, before they were destroyed. ‘I got dealings in ores, and smiths, and the fishing industry.’ He paused to take another drag. ‘I’ve heard enough
talk to last the day. I think I could be of use to you, commander.’

‘Good,’ Brynd replied loudly, optimistically. ‘Thank you, sir. So who else can we add to the list?’

‘Fuck else is there to do in this city?’ the thin-faced lawyer chimed in eventually. ‘I’m intrigued at the prospects of designing laws from scratch.’

‘One thing,’ Coumby muttered, then inhaled again. His face was becoming obscured by smoke. ‘This young lady here,’ he nodded his head towards Rika. ‘She’s in
charge, you say? You’re the one doing an awful lot of talkin’, is all I can see . . . What’s her role?’

Brynd looked towards her. Rika had been impassive for much of the last hour. She had let him do the talking and the work, but now she stood up, and he stepped aside to wait for her to speak.

‘He is,’ Rika began, ‘working on my behalf, because of my family’s lineage, and because of the underhand methods that Emperor Urtica used to dethrone me. I have some
connection with the populace. My father’s reign was relatively popular – we expanded the Empire and provided stability. I seek nothing more than continuing stability.’

‘Indeed,’ Brynd said, ‘something as stable as a Jamur ruler would be preferable. It would make any transition much easier to withstand. It would help morale, give people
something to cling on to.’

‘What’s that to us?’ Coumby asked, and there were gasps then. ‘What’d you do if we all sat here, lass, as we are, and did nothing to help you?’

Even Brynd raised an eyebrow, anxious to see how she would take such talk.

Rika smirked, then laughed. ‘You would probably all die, and I would do nothing to stop that from happening.’

‘Tough talk for just a pretty thing,’ another merchant said. Coumby laughed into his own smoke.

‘What is your name?’ Rika asked.

‘Broun, Hant Broun,’ the red-bearded rake of a man replied.

Rika looked to Artemisia and all she did was nod: the massive warrior stepped towards the merchant, hauled him spluttering from his seat and thrust him against the wall. He skidded smoothly up
the obsidian surface as Brug leaned casually out of the way. With one arm thrust against his throat, Artemisia reached over her shoulder with her free hand and drew a sword out with a slick zing,
and held the point to Broun’s throat. Not one person tried to rescue Broun, whose legs kicked back against the wall to support his weight.

‘Um, Lady Rika . . .’ Brynd hissed. ‘Call her off – we
need
these people on our side.’

‘We need no one,’ she whispered bitterly. ‘They should
fear
us.’

‘These men would rebuild our world for us!’ Brynd snapped.

Rika said nothing but stared angrily at the table. Brynd called for Artemisia to release her grip, and the warrior woman simply removed her hand and let Broun crumble to the floor before she
walked back to Rika’s side under the gaze of everyone in the room.

Great, just great
, Brynd thought.

‘This,’ Rika said, ‘this is an example of what will happen to us all. See the might we are dealing with? This is someone who is
on our side
, who wishes to make a
peaceful union with our nations. You can either work on your own, as you have always done, or for once you can put aside your own little empires and join together.’

‘You mean,’ Coumby said, ‘unite to protect yours.’

Rika turned and glared at him, before nodding. ‘If that is what you wish to call it,’ she said, ‘but what other option have you to hand? None, I can tell you that much. Either
you unite for just a short period, with great rewards at the end of it for those of you who do, or all you’ve ever worked for will be destroyed anyway. We will have creatures much
stranger-looking than Artemisia here coming into our world and destroying everything you have ever achieved, not to mention your friends and your family.’ As the room fell silent, Rika moved
towards her chair and sat down. ‘Everything will be wiped out. Now, we need supplies, we need a building programme, we need jobs and most of all an army kitted out to defend our shores. Put
simply, we need your money.’

Brynd watched these impassive faces show sudden concern. At one end of the room, Broun was now on his feet, dusting himself down before he snuck out quietly, without his dignity. Someone nearby
chuckled.

‘I’m in,’ Coumby declared, ‘should the offer suit me. We can help each other. To our mutual benefit.’

Following Coumby’s lead, a few other merchants threw in their hand, obviously wanting a slice of whatever was on offer.

‘See, commander?’ Rika whispered. ‘A stern word and a little force is sometimes required. They need fear in them.’

‘Of course,’ Brynd replied. ‘Well put, Lady Rika.’

A river of refugees, forty thousand long, stretched across the bleak landscape of Jokull, while in the distance in the direction of the ruins of Villjamur, a sky-city hovered,
a black smear against the sleet-filled sky. There was a strange ambience to the scene, one of a people resigned to their fate, yet possessing an urgency to move nonetheless. It was as if they had
accepted they would die, but didn’t want to – not just yet.

Fulcrom, one-time investigator of the Villjamur Inquisition, now resigned but somehow with more authority than he’d ever wanted, turned his horse around to face the other horizon –
in the direction of their travel. There were a few hills with patches of forest to navigate through, but other than that there was merely the endless tundra stretching into the distance. In front
of him, a flock of geese arced a slow circle then – for a brief, dreadful moment he thought they were something else coming down to the ground.

In the periphery of his vision, a black-clad girl with a dark fringe bounded towards him.

‘You miss me?’ Lan asked.

Fulcrom broke into a reluctant smile. ‘Did it all go OK?’

‘Sure, not as much trouble this morning as last night. There are no serious threats at all.’ Her slender face was caked in mud, her hair dishevelled. Lan’s black outfit, once
the hallmark of a Knight of Villjamur, was now a meaningless costume, though her deeds were still the same: pulling people out of harm’s way. There was still plenty of work for her.

‘Hmm,’ Fulcrom muttered.

‘What?’

‘I don’t like it when there are no threats. That usually means something’s about to happen.’

‘Ever the optimist, aren’t you?’

‘I’m merely being rational. It’s not right when there are no signs of life up there,’ Fulcrom said, indicating the sky-city. ‘Whenever there’s been a calm
before, a blistering attack follows. Why should
now
be any different?’

‘Well, in quiet periods we can get people moving quicker than before,’ Lan suggested. ‘We can get further along. That’s something, surely?’

‘I know,’ Fulcrom sighed. ‘I just wish we had more of these vehicles. We just seem to be bringing more communities on board every hour. I didn’t even realize Jokull was
this populated until now. Anyway, where’s Tane?’

‘I’ve no idea,’ she said. ‘He was with me when I ran from the confrontation last night, but I’m much quicker than him over any distance. I just assumed he’d
make it back OK.’

Fulcrom nodded and regarded the scene. As if becoming sucked into a moving tide, people were being dragged into the ongoing mass of humans and rumels. A few thousand had become tens of thousands
– twenty, then nearer thirty, as the villages and hamlets emptied themselves of people desperate to avoid the devastation heading their way.

At first Fulcrom was in shocked awe of the tide of new refugees. Then he realized that their presence here was, ultimately, a good thing. It meant that their civilization might survive a little
longer.

‘What’s next?’ Lan asked, jumping effortlessly up onto Fulcrom’s horse behind him. She moved one arm around his chest and squeezed him closer. It made him feel normal
again – albeit for a brief moment – though Lan hadn’t quite been normal since they’d left the remains of Villjamur. She’d been thriving out here; her confidence had
reached new heights, the people had seemingly forgotten or ignored the recent revelations about her past.

‘Just keep going, I guess,’ he replied.

‘We’re nearly at the coast though. Then what? Will the sky-city follow us? Do we go across the water?’

Fulcrom held up his hands. ‘I’m hoping Frater Mercury will sort something out.’

‘That’s a bit like praying for divine intervention,’ Lan commented. ‘I didn’t have you down as a particularly religious man.’

‘That was before we had someone who’s practically a god by our side,’ he replied.

‘Speaking of which, what’s he been up to?’ Lan asked.

‘Oh who the hell knows? I tell him what I need, he delivers it if he feels inclined, though sometimes I’m not sure he even hears me. So, essentially, that’s why I have some
hope that we’ll be fine when we hit the water.’

‘So you
can
be an optimist,’ she joked and kissed the back of his neck.

*

There were twenty-two earth carriages now, twenty-two behemoths constructed by Frater Mercury from the very fabric of the land. They had risen up from the ground with mud
dripping off like water, and wheels had been created from debris and somehow bound to these enormous clumps of land.

These rolling banks of earth were enough to carry hundreds of people, and many of them sat clinging near the edges nervously. Each was pulled by a horse taller than a church spire.

*

Fulcrom, with Lan behind him, rode forwards alongside the lead vehicle. It was cold, it was
always
cold, but they had to keep moving. The sound of the vast rotating wheels was monotonous.

‘He seems to have settled into our world quite nicely,’ Lan observed. She indicated Frater Mercury, who stood on top of one of the towering horses.

Frater Mercury: a being summoned through to this world by a priest who was no longer in it. He was a head taller than Fulcrom, and his face was split down the centre: one side was bone, the
other metal, and where they met seemed to be a perfectly natural design. His two human eyes, set amidst that alien facial architecture, were disarming for their familiarity. He wore a deep-blue
cloak that seemed to hold other hues within it, and beneath that was a body-tight dark outfit, one befitting a soldier, and one which Fulcrom half suspected was Frater Mercury’s body
itself.

‘For a god, he certainly doesn’t act like one. If indeed he is a god.’

‘I’m not actually sure what he’s meant to be,’ Lan said. ‘I’m glad he’s here though.’

Fulcrom was also grateful to have the enigmatic Frater Mercury travelling with them. Not only had he created these rolling earth vehicles, but when there had been assaults from the sky-city,
Frater Mercury had turned to engage in combat – something remarkably impressive for such a frail-looking old man.

*

Stopping was a slow and laborious affair and, even though they had been on the run for several days now, the process had become an art.

Fulcrom took out a red rag that he had wrapped around a stick to form a banner. After indicating to the soldiers accompanying the lead land-vehicle to halt, Fulcrom turned his horse and rode
backwards along the line, at speed. With the wind ruffling his wax cape, and Lan holding on tightly behind him, Fulcrom steered past the streams of muddied, cold and confused citizens of the
Empire. He waved the red banner and called out to the soldiers, who he had requested to station themselves along the line on horseback, to act as guides and moral support.

As Fulcrom passed the crowds, he could see people collectively grabbing the reins of the gargantuan horse that towed their land-vehicle. Eventually, the thunderous strides ceased and the
vehicles rolled to a stop. Everyone on board them looked dazed, as if they had just woken from slumber.