The Broken Isles (Legends of the Red Sun 4) (42 page)

‘This is good . . .’ Artemisia said. She whispered to the elders in their exotic language, and eventually they nodded their agreement, and seemed sadly satisfied with the notion.

‘Which is the best route inside?’ Brynd enquired. ‘If possible, we should commit it to memory.’

‘I had previously anticipated,’ Artemisia said, spinning one of the maps towards Brynd with a huge hand, ‘that we would take this road here.’ It was marked red on the
map, a complex, almost spiral circuit that led towards the centre of the structure.

‘How many miles is that – in our equivalent terms?’

‘It is . . .’ Artemisia said, ‘about five miles. It is not, admittedly, the most direct route, but it is one that provides the most secrecy and shelter.’

‘This is a big structure indeed,’ Brynd breathed. ‘But surely if we breach their defences, they’ll be aware of our presence, and there won’t be much shelter at all?
We’ll be hunted.’

‘This may be so. We are calculating they will be distracted sufficiently by events on the ground.’

‘That’s too much of a risk,’ Brynd said. ‘We have the Mourning Wasps. We have speed on our side. Surely there’s a more direct route that doesn’t involve us
dicking around waiting to be killed?’

Artemisia appeared confused by his choice of words before regarding the maps once again. ‘You could be correct in your statement, if I understand it. You wish for us to simply strike
quickly, deploy Frater Mercury and get out?’

‘It makes more sense, don’t you think?’ Brynd asked despairingly. How could such an advanced culture have such weak military ideas?

*

Brynd’s mind was flitting with last-minute logic at such a rate that he didn’t recognize time passing by. The Night Guard soldiers remained at the periphery of his
vision, of his mind, committing the route to memory. He had to take a step back and breathe quietly to himself to regain composure.
Don’t let the pressure get to you, he warned himself.
Think how far you’ve come. To lose control now would be catastrophic
.

The plan was simple. Artemisia’s people would provide cover in the sky while the Night Guard and a few other creatures would bust their way into the enemy complex.

Dragons and garudas would patrol the skies outside the city, acting as decoys, distractions, eliminating whatever enemies came their way. There would, Artemisia explained, be aerial combat, so
the Mourning Wasps would have to travel over great heights to retreat, something he had not yet tried out. Despite the awkward stares of his regiment, he dismissed the point – he had to put
his faith in them. There was no other choice in the matter.

*

Out on the landing platform, Brynd stood gripping one of the ornate rails, looking down on the scene below. The structure was drifting lower, through the cloud base, and towards
their enemy – now he could see the swarms on the island of Folke.

Everything appeared abstract from this height. Breathtaking numbers drifted across the landscape, dark tides changing the face of the island permanently. Further out to sea, the ships still
lined up to pummel the island.

‘Normally I couldn’t wait to get into a scrap,’ Brug muttered, appearing at Brynd’s side. ‘We feel invincible, with our augmentations, don’t we? Almost
immortal, dare I say it. Seeing that down there, I’ve never felt more humbled. It was frustrating in there, too, going over things again and again. Don’t they ever just fancy a good
fight instead of being so aloof?’

Brynd said: ‘I nearly lost it. I didn’t say anything, I didn’t let on – but sometimes I wish there was just one person making the decisions.’

‘You mean like a dictator?’

Brynd laughed. ‘Not exactly what I had in mind, but it would certainly get the job done a lot quicker. I gave them good plans down on Y’iren; I thought it was all decided. Yet, every
time I have a question or we make a refinement, Artemisia consults with the bloody elders. Meanwhile, down there, people are having their heads split open.’

‘At least they’re not our own people dying down there,’ Brug said, ‘not yet anyway.’

‘We’ll eventually need to stop thinking in those terms.’

‘They’re not our responsibility though, are they?’

‘They soon might be. Besides, they’re sacrificing themselves in huge numbers so both our races can survive into the future – I’d much rather chuck some of those scumbags
in Villiren into another dimension to make room for people who are willing to shed their blood in such a way.’

Other Night Guard soldiers approached and most of them remained in companionable silence. There seemed to be nothing left to say any more. Everything had been decided. All that was left was to
find Frater Mercury. They milled about for a few minutes, agitated, anxious, eager to get into battle.

Brynd headed back into the wooden cages to tend to the Mourning Wasps. They had been fed some liquid prepared by Jeza, though he was not sure what it was exactly. It seemed to satisfy their
appetites. He felt a strange affinity to them; and though he might have been convincing himself of the fact, he felt they responded to him positively as time went on. He took the unusual step of
placing his hand affectionately on one of their skulls; it was smooth to the touch, and through it he could feel the minute vibrations from their powerful wing muscles.

It seemed inherently obvious to Brynd why he was drawn to creatures that were so different. No, not different –
unique.
He could never escape the company of others, but he felt
consistently isolated. Facing battles never bothered him for this very reason, and at the back of his mind was the niggling sensation that if he did die in battle, it would be no bad thing. Even
before the arrival of other cultures, his faith in Bohr had been long eroded, so there was solace to be found in the fact that he might die and nothing would happen. Nothing, other than the fact
that his corpse would burn, his ashes would be scattered, and the very fabric of his body go back to the earth. There was something comforting about that fact, especially when confronted with such
uniqueness as the Mourning Wasps.

The Boreal Archipelago was full of weird wonders. It was about to receive even more.

There was a hubbub outside the cage so Brynd left the wasps, strode down the platform onto the landing bay. Artemisia was approaching, with Frater Mercury, half his face glistening, his
expression as always hidden and out of reach. He was wearing a rich blue cloak and tunic with a fine gold stitching of bold shapes; around all of this were strapped thick metal objects.

‘Are those relics?’ Brynd asked Artemisia.

‘I still do not know what you mean by relics,’ she replied. ‘They are devices that Frater Mercury will use to terminate his life.’

‘And the lives of those around him, presumably,’ Brynd replied.

‘As confirmed earlier, yes.’

‘Is he still comfortable with killing himself for the greater good?’ Brynd asked.

I am
, came the thunderous reply in Brynd’s mind. Frater Mercury seemed furious with those two words, a gesture that hinted at far greater powers – and dangerous powers,
too.

‘My apologies,’ Brynd replied, to strange looks from his comrades, who must not have heard the comment. ‘Your suicide is a noble one, a gesture that will last for generations
to come.’

I want it over now. No more. I have seen all I need to see. I am more than ever disappointed in the results of the experiment.

Brynd felt as though he’d let the man down, though it seemed irrational to think so.

They all prepared for the mission. Brynd guided down the Mourning Wasps one by one, until they lined up in a neat row. For creatures who could manoeuvre so well in the air, they seemed to cope
awkwardly walking down the platform, their movements stuttering and clumsy. They were to be deployed into smaller cages, on the backs of smaller, more agile dragons – lithe, green creatures
that appeared more like lizards – so that the intention of a smaller force heading into the sky-city would be disguised as best as possible. Their stance was crouched and alert, their wings
massive and venous. As the last few Mourning Wasps were taken to their new transport, Frater Mercury moved towards one of them, his hands aloft. Brynd ordered to halt the movement of the wasps.
Three of them stood there as Frater Mercury walked around them.

Brynd tried to sense whether or not Frater Mercury wished to communicate with those around him, but whatever went on in the man’s head now remained private. He seemed to recognize the
Mourning Wasps. He touched their skulls with great respect and for the first time Brynd saw him appear like an ordinary human. His profound presence fell away: instead this could have been a man
greeting his own dog at the end of a hard day’s graft. Even Artemisia seemed surprised at Frater Mercury’s gestures.

He gradually turned his attention away from them.

It will be
, Frater Mercury said to Brynd,
a great honour to travel with these creatures. Where were they found?

‘I believe they were excavated and brought to life on an island further up the Archipelago.’

For a moment Brynd felt as if Frater Mercury was not going to continue with his suicide mission; he felt his heart thumping in his chest as he waited for further communication.

I remember these the first time around, many ages ago
, Frater Mercury said.

Brynd stared at the two halves of his face, waiting. He had a thousand questions he wanted to ask them. How this figure could have lived so long was beyond Brynd’s comprehension –
but then there were a lot of things he did not understand.

Artemisia stepped between them. ‘We must go now. The weather is in our favour.’

So it must be
, Frater Mercury said, much less intense than ever before.

*

There was a dripping sound coming from somewhere. Wherever he was, the place was utterly dark. The ground was moving softly . . . no, not the ground. They were somewhere else
entirely. A boat, on water, drifting . . . Fulcrom sat up and felt a stiffness in his chest, but that soon faded. He then felt nothing at all.

Lan was beside him. Sweet Lan, lying there peacefully. Fulcrom tried to remain as logical as possible, and examined her: there was a hole in her uniform where the sword had penetrated, but other
than that she looked exactly as he remembered. Well, not
exactly
– her skin was far paler than before, almost giving off a glow in this darkness. He checked his own body, and he, too,
had a sword wound in his chest, right above his heart. He checked optimistically for any sign of his tail, which had been cut off by Urtica’s men in Villjamur, but it was not there.

Bugger
.

All around them was water, but the boat – a small vessel – was drifting in one direction, that much he could be sure of. Lan stirred and a few moments later she rose up to see what
Fulcrom was describing. He explained to her what happened with Malum.

‘I can just about remember, though it’s a bit hazy. I wasn’t unconscious, but I was really, really dazed at the time.’

‘He kept good to his word.’

‘What?’

‘Malum. Once I clicked he was going to kill us, I had no choice but to persuade him to kill us in an appropriate manner and not burn our bodies.’

‘We’re dead then?’ Lan asked.

‘Or undead. I’m not so sure how to label the dead, now we’re one of them.’

‘Why did you do that? Didn’t you want our souls to go on to other realms?’

‘It would’ve meant we would be apart. I didn’t want that. It was – if you could believe it – a selfish gesture of love. I just wanted to be with you. Is that so
bad?’

‘No, not at all,’ Lan replied. ‘Eternity together is certainly more meaningful than flowers.’ At least her sense of humour had followed her down here . . . ‘So
Malum hasn’t burned us, and our physical bodies are probably somewhere in the harbour in Villiren?’

‘Something like that. I can’t be sure, though.’

They both moved in close together, and regarded the distance where lights were flickering along a shoreline. There were spires there, glistening, and as they approached they could see people on
the shoreline, one or two of them waving. The boat, through no control of Fulcrom, turned in the waters and began drifting in that direction. The water was black, the sky a phenomenally dark grey.
There were no stars to be found, and clearly no sun, but it looked very much
unlike
the city of the dead under Villjamur. Just how many of these cities of the dead existed, Fulcrom had no
idea. All he felt now was a continuation of that release from when he was killed, and an overwhelming sense of calm.

‘So where next, then?’ Lan asked.

‘Who knows? Wherever this boat takes us, I guess,’ Fulcrom replied. ‘Somewhere deep under Villiren. It doesn’t matter – we can probably handle anything
now.’

*

In the cages, Brynd remained tense as the dragons lurched through the air. This transportation was far more erratic than the previous methods, but it seemed a trivial thing to
be concerned about.

He held his helmet in his hands and examined the visor, staring at his own pale reflection. For a moment he felt the usual images of his past flicker into his mind, but then he began to empty
his emotions once again. Dwelling on such things would mean his concentration would slip and he’d end up getting killed. His own Mourning Wasp – one of two in this cage – seemed
to have been befriended by Frater Mercury, who slumped alongside it in the darkness of the cage, apparently communicating with it. Artemisia was attending to her own creature, a much smaller, red
dragon barely any bigger than the Mourning Wasps.

Brynd felt remarkably isolated in the cage. He turned to Sergeant Tiendi, and even she seemed to be struggling in the violent flight of these dragons.

‘Is this what you hoped for, when you joined us?’ Brynd asked. She had only just become a Night Guard before the war in Villiren.

‘No, sir. It’s far better than that. We get to fly these wasps into an almost certain death situation.’

Brynd grunted a laugh.