Empire of Avarice (25 page)

A brazier had been lit at the possession’s destination
and acolytes waited in a half circle for the arrival of the people, so that by
the time Gaurel arrived, the main square was packed and nobody could get
through. Gaurel stood on the newly swept steps that had led to the temple of
the gods, and turned to face the expectant crowd. He raised both hands high and
filled his lungs. “People of Niake, people of the empire! The gods are under
attack from unbelievers as never before. Only here in our lands are the gods
truly worshipped, and it is our sacred task to ensure the gods are remembered
and prayed to forever. We inherited our beliefs from our forebears, those who
built this empire from nothing to rule the known world and to bring everyone
the knowledge of the gods, and we should not turn our backs on their memories. Would
you prefer to fall under the heathen sway of the false gods of the east?”

There was a roar of denial.

“Would you bow down to the false god of the Tybar?”

There was an even bigger roar. Gaurel nodded in
agreement. “Then it is up to us to show them, to show the heretics, the
unbelievers, the godless, the infidels, the shallow, the greedy, the evil
followers of false beliefs, that the gods are still here and that they will
once more be worshipped in Niake without fear!”

The people shouted in delight, and the three animals
were led to the steps. Gaurel produced a large shiny knife and dragged a
confused wool beast towards him. On the ground rested a large bowl and the
animal’s throat was sliced open and as two acolytes held the dying beast, allowing
the beast’s blood to fall into the bowl. Once dead, it was laid on the steps
and its belly sliced open. The entrails were pulled out and passed to Gaurel
who held them up against the grey sky. He examined them closely, then cast them
into the brazier.

“I see a glorious future for the gods!” he declared.

The roar could be heard all over Niake. Sitting behind
his desk, Evas turned and peered out of the window behind him. The square was
directly below and the noise was deafening. Evas turned back and faced the two
men stood on the other side of the desk. “There are no laws against a religious
festival in Niake,” he said to the two men.

One of the men wore a thick black beard and looked as if
he’d spent many years in the sun. His companion was clean shaven, slim and well
dressed. “My friend here objects to the banning of worship of other religions,
governor,” the slim man replied.

“The Empire is only for the gods we believe in and not
for other religions, Habnas.”

Habnas conversed with the bearded man in a language Evas
didn’t understand. The governor tapped the table. “Please, in Kastanian.”

“My friend does not speak Kastanian,” Habnas said.

“Then why does he wish to preach in Niake? It seems
nonsensical asking him to practice his religion here when he cannot speak the
official language. What language does he speak?”

Habnas smiled thinly. “That doesn’t matter, governor. What
does is that you’re denying him a fair opportunity to freely preach in your
city.”

Evas spread his hands. “Unless he can communicate with
the people here, I can’t see any point in him doing so. I’m sorry, but
permission is denied.”

Habnas frowned and shot off a rapid sentence to the
bearded man. The man chattered back, clearly angry. He pointed his finger at
the governor and was beginning to get quite worked up. Evas clicked his fingers
at a guard and indicated the duo. “Escort them out. If they resist, you can use
whatever force necessary to do so.”

The guard nodded and advanced, his hands outspread to
take hold of the two. Habnas pointed at the governor. “You will regret this
action, governor! Changes are coming and sticking to the old ways is foolish! They
are doomed, like this empire!”

As the guard dragged both out, cuffing the bearded man
round the head, Evas remained sitting staring at the door. “Well, well,” he
muttered to himself, “my first Tybar.” He decided to write to Kastan. There was
much to say. He wondered about the new regime and what exactly to communicate. He
guessed who may be behind the unrest in Niake, but his experiences in trying to
keep control had taught him it was best not to do anything unless backed by the
ruling regime. The past three regimes hadn’t been interested in either
listening to his warnings or believing them. All they had wanted to do was to
collect money and do nothing in return. They had wanted to hear professions of
loyalty and praise for who they were and what they were doing. If he had tried
to expose problems the regimes may well have seen him as a nuisance and had him
replaced, so he had judged it prudent to remain silent.

But this new regime seemed different. He was something
of a good judge of people, and his impression of the Koros was that they, at
least, seemed interested in the future of the empire. They had upset plenty of
people but they were upsetting those who had been responsible for much of the
empire’s problems. He just hoped they didn’t go too far and upset too many and
get deposed. Besides, he knew Astiras and had found him to be a determined and
basically honest fellow.

Evas had done the expected when Astiras had seized power
and sent a letter congratulating him and professing his loyalty, but he got the
impression such fawning sycophantic messages hadn’t been appreciated. Thereafter
he’d sent just blunt reports without flowery greetings. He believed the Koros
wanted the important details rather than being flattered and so forth. What he
got from Kastan were brief and concise messages telling him to do this and do
that. They wanted updates and situation reports on the conditions in Niake, and
to his surprise, had even sent money to help with the road repairs in the
province. The last three regimes had never done that; they’d taken money and
then expected the provinces to pay for their upkeep on top of that, which went
some way to explain why things had become run down of late.

Evas dipped his quill in the ink pot before him and
poised the tip over the sheet of paper in front of him. What should he say? He
decided to be honest and blunt. The Koros wanted facts, not lies. They wanted
an honest appraisal, not words of praise and gushing loyalty. If it displeased
them, what he was going to say, it was only an appraisal of what really was
going on.

To be honest, he sympathised with Gaurel. The city
wanted the temples rebuilt and wanted to worship the gods. In these difficult
times it was more important than ever for the people to cling to their beliefs.
That had been the problem with the merchants, counsels and lawyers who had
ruled Kastania over the past few years. They had just not understood anything
other than making large amounts of money for themselves. They had bled the
treasury, and provinces, dry and abandoned their people and their gods, all for
personal wealth and material gain. But now they had a soldier in charge and he
was shaking things up, and woe betide anyone who got in his way. He fought with
the iron fist and the sword, rather than the deceit and regulations his
predecessors had.

Perhaps it was time to come down off the fence?

 The snow blanketed the whole countryside. It was
bitterly cold and Astiras remembered all too well just how bad it could get in
Bragal in the winter. The blizzard had come and gone, and in its place was a
fantastic panorama of sculpture, created by nature. The tents and wagons had
half their sides covered in drifts and men were out trampling down the snow in
the camp, their breath clouding around their heads as they tried to get warm.

“I’d forgotten how cold it could get here,” Teduskis
commented, beating his hands together, his nose red. “Gods, how I hate the
winter!”

“I hadn’t,” Astiras replied, grimacing as his fingers
sent shafts of pain up his arms, protesting at being used. The emperor was
flexing his gauntlets, testing the leather and steel out.

The chargers were hunched miserably in a group, their
blankets hanging limply down off their backs. They had been tethered in the lee
of a grove of trees and had escaped the worst of the blizzard, but even so they
presented a sorry sight. The bodyguard were busy tending them, breaking the ice
in the water buckets and thrashing out the hay from the supply wagon.

Fires were centres of life. Men gathered round and eagerly
awaited the brewing of klee, or just hot water, and strips of dried meat were
sizzling over the fires. Breakfast in Bragal was usually meat – the cold
demanded lots of fuel for the body and meat gave this.

The scouts were in and their reports presented to
Astiras. Military campaigns in winter were normally frowned on, and memories of
army revolts in the past when they had been asked to remain in the field were
always in mind when planning one. Astiras had no worries on that score from
these men; one third were mercenaries who had taken gold, another third
professionals with previous experience under Astiras in Bragal. The remainder
were the new recruits, men who were untried and unknown. If trouble was to come
it would be from these men. Currently they were too miserable and lost in their
own troubles to look outwards.

“How far is the village, sire?” Teduskis asked, looking
at a dazzling white slope half a league distant.

“On the other side of that,” Astiras nodded at the
slope. “They won’t be expecting us.”

Teduskis chuckled. “All the better.”

They packed up camp and set off, the spearmen ploughing
through the drifts, upwards towards the hill. The route was planned so that
they used the downwind side of the hill to climb, where the drift was not so deep.
The cavalry came next followed by the mercenaries and finally the imperial
archers. The scouting had been done and they knew what lay ahead. The two spear
companies kept on switching every quarter league so as not to exhaust them; and
the four lines of men interchanged more frequently than that within each
company. The snow became shallower so that it was only ankle deep on the higher
slopes and they made better progress, leaving the wagons in the valley. Their
drovers would have to clear the road to the village, something that would take
all day.

At the top of the hill the Bragalese village came into
view, a neat collection of wooden huts and shacks with fenced compounds for
beasts, huddled in between three hills and astride a brook that was clearly frozen.
Smoke spiralled out from chimneys and people were moving about, black objects
amongst the white and brown.

As the men tramped downhill through the deepening snow,
shouts of alarm went up from the villagers. The sight of seven hundred men
coming towards them sent the villagers into panic. They only numbered some
sixty.

As the soldiers reached the boundary of the village, a
delegation came out anxiously, their faces reflecting the alarm they felt. The
spearmen stood at the ready, points wickedly aimed at the five man delegation.

Astiras remained in his saddle and looked down at the
wretched people. “Hear me and know that you are under the rule of Kastania and
shall be forever. You are to pay a tithe to me, and to obey the laws of the
empire. Failure to do so will result in severe penalties.”

“Lord, we are a poor people,” the village leader
protested, “and cannot afford a tax. We only wish to be left alone in peace.”

“Is that the peace that includes slaughtering my
people?” Astiras asked icily. “I know you all too well. This village provided
men who two summers ago took part in the butchering of Kastanian villagers two
valleys to the west.”

“Lord, this is not true! We only wish for peace!”

“Now listen to me and listen good. Your revolt is at an
end. You will pay taxes and stop your life of theft and banditry. If you are
unable to do so then pack up your belongings and leave the empire, or I shall
burn you and your homes to the ground. I am Astiras Landwaster. Remember my
name and fear me!”

The villagers paled. They knew the name all too well. Astiras
had become a name to fear in Bragal, until he had been recalled when on the
point of bringing the Bragal revolt to its knees. “Lord, we did not know it was
you!”

“Then know this also; I am now Emperor of Kastania, and
I will not rest until Bragal accepts my rule. If Bragal resists, I shall
destroy every last one of you.”

“Lord, we shall do as you command,” and the five knelt
in the snow and bowed their heads. The other villagers watching did likewise,
and Astiras ranged his eyes over them all, looking for any sign of dissent or
refusal. There didn’t seem to be any. He gestured and the villagers stood up.

“My army will remain here for the winter. You shall
provide for my men. Our camp will be here. Go spread the word to the
surrounding villages – we are to be obeyed or I shall burn every settlement to
the ground. All shall perish. I trust you understand.”

“Lord, we understand,” the village leader replied, and
backed away, bowing extravagantly.

Teduskis came alongside. “That was easy, sire.”

“Too easy,” Astiras muttered. “They’ll try to kill us
all before long.”

“Then sire, why did you ask them to tell the other
villages in the area?”

Astiras smiled hungrily. “So they could group together
and try to take us on in one go. Giving them one huge whack should bring them
to heel – and eliminate their fighting men in one fell swoop. Set the camp up
at the base of the hill and surround it with a ditch and stakes. We don’t want
to make it too easy for them, do we?”

Teduskis sniggered. “It shall be done, sire.”

Word went out to the surrounding villages that the
Kastanian army was back and was encamped in the valley of three hills, and so
men from leagues around began converging, trampling through the snow, hatred in
their hearts, weapons at the ready, all prepared to kill and kill and kill.

Astiras wasn’t going to allow himself to be caught
napping; he was too experienced at this type of warfare. He sent out foraging
groups of ten, all armed to the teeth with orders to see what raw materials
they could find but also to spy on the countryside. The moment they saw anyone,
they were to return as fast as they could and not get involved in any skirmish.

The spear militiamen were used to build the camp. They
were not expected to be able to scout and to know how to deal with the problems
of finding their way back to camp in the snow. Nor were they expected to tackle
the Bragalese should they fall upon them outside the camp. No, the militiamen
had their role to play but it would be strictly in camp and under orders. Instead,
those that went out were the mercenaries, men of the mountains and of Bragal,
who knew how to track, scout and stay hidden, even in snow.

The villagers next to the camp stayed away. They were
intimidated by the numbers and stayed indoors as much as they could. But their
men folk began collecting every weapon they had, ready for the attack. When it
came, there would be no mercy shown, no quarter. They would drive the hated
Kastanians out and inflict such a defeat on them that they would never return.

Astiras put together all the reports from his scouts and
sketched them roughly on a sheet of parchment, showing it to Teduskis and his
company captains. “We appear to be facing around two hundred villagers who are gathering
at three locations close by. The first,” he pointed at a black blob he’d drawn,
“here where the brook curves round the hill beyond the village here. The second
is over the ridge to our right, and the last behind us. We have nobody out
there now that the wagons are in safely, so we have no worries that if anyone
appears they may be hostile. Anyone who approaches the camp is to be regarded
as an enemy, and on my command are to be cut down.”

“What if they are women – or children?” one of the
militia captains, Sepan, pointed out.

“Kill them.” Astiras was curt and in no doubt.

“But, sire, children?”

“Kill them, Sepan. Bragal children are just as adept at
slitting throats as their fathers are. And the women, too. I’ve lost count of
the men I’ve lost to Bragal women, thinking they were being hospitable. A drink
offered is followed by a knife to the guts or heart. A kiss is followed by a
stab, or in the middle of making love the poor victim is strangled, stabbed,
garrotted or disembowelled.”

Sepan looked aghast. Teduskis agreed with the Emperor. “I
lost two men to children the first year we faced the uprising; they were
playing a game of tag and ran round the legs of my two men, who laughed at
their game. Next moment both men had been stabbed through the groins because
the bastards had been hiding daggers in their jackets. Both men took three days
to die.”

“But – but..”

“Sepan, if you’re incapable of following my orders I’ll
have you replaced and you can take your position in the lines of the men,”
Astiras said. “Let me make things completely clear to you all. This is a war to
the death. Bragal thinks it has a chance of independence. If we look weak they
will take full advantage. But I learned that they respect strength, and I had
half of Bragal under my heel when my predecessor lost his nerve – and his head
– and pulled us out. I have no intention now of coming here just to lose.”

The officers nodded. They knew what they must do.

The evening came and torches were lit at the perimeter
of the camp, and guards patrolled inside the line of the ditch and stakes,
watching the darkness. The wagons had been arranged in a large circle inside
the perimeter, and inside these stood the tents. All the snow had either been
trampled down into flat ice or shovelled out to form a perimeter inside the
ditch. Some men were detailed to look after the chargers and they stood in the
centre of the camp. In strategic locations braziers flickered, giving light and
heat to the men nearby, and also to provide the secret weapon to the imperial
force that Astiras had up his sleeve.

The emperor and Teduskis stood at the corner of one
wagon, looking into the darkness beyond the line of torches flickering in the
wind. The village lights had all been extinguished a short while back. “It
won’t be long now,” Teduskis said softly. “Just like old days, sire, isn’t it?”

Astiras clapped his right hand man on the shoulder. “The
men know what to do; I’m just concerned at the militia companies. This is not
their sort of thing.”

“They’ll be fine as long as they stay where they are,
sire.”

Beyond the limit of the light, dark shapes were slowly
closing in on the camp. Each of them was armed with a sword or bladed weapon,
and many had bows across their backs, brought out of habit. But this night
archery would not be used; they wanted to close in and surprise their enemy. A
volley of arrows would alert the Kastanians and the one chance the Bragalese
had was to overwhelm them in one sudden rush and kill them before they knew
what was happening. It had worked on other enemy forces in the past, but they
had never faced Astiras Landwaster. There was nobody to tell them how he
fought; all who had fought him were dead.

Astiras passed another order around softly, and lengths
of fencing the height of a tall man were raised up and held in place by ropes,
the men holding them up remaining still, waiting for the order to release them.
These lengths of fencing were in between the gaps left by the wagons, so that
there now stood a solid wall of wood twenty paces inside the perimeter. The
guards left outside this nervously paced back and forth, maintaining an air of
normalcy, straining their ears and eyes for any sound or sight of an approach.

Gradually, the sounds came. Soft crunching of footsteps
in the snow, whispers of noise above the softly blowing icy wind. The guards
withdrew slowly, passing through quickly opened gaps that closed again the
moment they had done so.

Astiras nodded to Teduskis who slipped away to command
the rear of the camp. His other captains looked to the emperor, waiting for his
signal. The emperor looked through a gap in the fencing, peering at the edge of
camp, and slowly but surely dark figures came into view, all holding weapons in
their hands. Astrias smiled and pulled back from the fence. He nodded once to
the captain of the imperial archers who signalled to his men. As one, they
dipped their strung arrows into small buckets of a dark, thick liquid at their
feet, then stuck the wet ends in one of the braziers close by. Flames sprung up
from each and Astiras plunged down his arm. “Now!”

The fences were dropped and the gathering Bragalese were
astonished to see gaps suddenly appear, all brimmed with archers aiming arrows
burning with flames at them. Even as they registered the fact, the arrows were
streaking through the night air to strike into soft targets.