The Broken (The Lost Words: Volume 2) (78 page)

“Look around,” he told the adviser. The old man had hooded himself again, a stranger. Sergei swept his hand past the miserable sentries, down the long lines of shacks and animal pens and fire pits, smoldering with the last evening coals. “Until recently, this was open land. Now, it’s a city, built by your Athesians, prisoners and free folk alike. At dawn and dusk, they pray alongside my soldiers. For them, life has meaning once again. I can guarantee them a future that Amalia cannot. It’s only sensible for you to accept that and do what’s best for your nation. You know that. A figurehead makes no difference. But I know you will serve me just as dutifully and honestly as you served all your other masters.”

Sergei bent down and scooped a handful of snow, crushing it into a snowball. He tossed it far and watched it lob against the silver sky that glimmered with frost.

“And there’s my son Vlad.”

“Your son is alive and well. He’s treated with courtesy,” Theodore said.

“Thank you,” Sergei muttered. He wasn’t quite sure what to say next.

“He will not be harmed unless you attack the city,” the adviser warned in that slow tone.

Sergei bunched his fists as melted ice bit his fingers. The warm pain felt good. “My son’s fate won’t change anything. Roalas will fall. Whether thousands of its citizens perish in the taking, well, that’s entirely up to you.”

Theodore pulled his cowl deeper. “I can talk to—”

Sergei turned toward him suddenly. “I have no intention of killing the innocent people of Roalas. But if I must, I will kill every woman and child to free him. Do you understand? Do you?”

The old man’s eyes were invisible inside the hood, but the king could feel them, watching, judging. “I do understand, Your Highness.”

Sergei was angry. He felt weak for threatening him and for revealing that he feared for his son’s life. But he didn’t know of any other way to win this battle and save his son. Sometimes he envied Sasha’s cruel and simplistic way of thinking. But then, she had never held a child of her own, never seen them grow and make their first baby steps, mutter their first syllables or discover the wonders of mud and sand and nettles and scabbed knees.

If what his informants whispered were true, then Commander Gerald was inclined to compromise. And that’s what Sergei feared the most. Should the man convince his empress to let go of her hostages, Eracia and Caytor might suddenly become sympathetic toward their cousin. The Caytoreans sure bore him no love, after having delivered the Oth Danesh to rape and pillage across their country. The Eracian monarch was a weakling, but he was not going to let anyone up him when it came to deterrence. He would ally with whoever gave him the most advantage in this game of power.

Sergei’s hopes of a sure victory were fading, like color off the snow-blasted trees. In three months, his conscripts would be free to head back home. Unless he could provide them with new lands, new homes, they would leave. He would remain stranded with his disgruntled dukes and counts and the evergrowing debt he owed the Borei. Roalas had to fall so he could earn precious time to continue this campaign. Once the city was his, the rest of the realm would quickly succumb. Roalas would be his salvation or his bane.

And the price was the life of his son, it seemed. A royal price.

The king hoped Theodore would take his message back to the city and discuss it with the army echelon. He never expected Amalia to negotiate, but the rest might be sane enough to put aside their personal greed and think of the greater good. He was willing to sacrifice Vlad if need be; he did not expect any less of them. He hoped they could understand his determination and appreciate it.

Roalas was a black shadow ahead, dotted with lamps and fires that flickered like false stars. All around it, old rubble lay in soft, icy heaps. But a large swath of the Inferno had been cleared, leading toward the city gates. With arrows and blocks of stone and caltrops raining all around them, his engineers worked day and night to clear the destruction and allow for the passage of a large assault wedge.

The ground was strewn with ox carcasses, left there to freeze. In the first days, the muck had claimed more lives than the missiles fired from the curtain wall. Unable to pull away, his troops would kill stranded beasts and retreat. Now that the earth was frozen hard, carts could roll and the animals could pull on chains and haul broken spans of stone and wood. Yuri knew the price of failure.

In the east, the news was less satisfactory. Duke Kiril reported a series of quick skirmishes with the pirates and easy success in battle. But his former allies turned enemies would not fight him. Instead, they fled the wrath of the Parusite cavalry and just retreated deeper into Caytor. The High Council cared little for his noble effort; they simply counted the damage caused by the hordes of wild men running through their land, killing, stealing, and burning.

The year was about to turn. Sergei looked back and saw the months blur before his eyes, a jumbled memory of stalemates and indecision. He knew this protracted misery could not last. But the greatness he hoped for was elusive and slippery. No matter how he rolled the dice in his head, he came up short. Perhaps that was the due of true conquerors. They didn’t fight for glory or satisfaction. Whatever it was that motivated them wasn’t written in history books.

“Thank you for your time, sir,” Sergei said at last. He waved at the nearby guard.

Theodore extended his hand, a surprising gesture. “You are a good man, Your Highness.”

Sergei clasped it. “Think of the good of the people.”

“I always do,” the man said. They said nothing else after that.

Minutes later, four soldiers came and led the adviser away. The old man was not a traitor, the king knew, and he was glad for it. Theodore might open the city gates, but he would do it for the love of people and not because he wanted to betray Amalia. Otherwise, he would be dead now. Sergei had no sympathy for traitors.

Perhaps the old man naively believed that the young girl would still live when Sergei declared Athesia a new duchy of his kingdom. But it could not be. Amalia and her close circle of friends and officers had to die. Honor, as much as necessity, demanded it. After eighteen years, he would bring closure to the old wound Adam the Godless had reaped against his nation and family.

Theodore would know what he must do when the moment came. If he chose to. It was now in the hands of the gods. There was nothing else he could do.

Sergei headed back into his hut. It felt small and cold and spartan, just like his soul.

CHAPTER 49

“I
want to know everything,” James said as he entered the cabin.

Nigella didn’t seem surprised at his sudden appearance. She stood near the stove, cooking. “Do you?” she asked carefully.

He removed his gloves and threw them on the table. “Yes, I do.”

“Mind your manners. Those are wet. Get them off.” She stirred the contents of her pot.

Like a berated child, he picked up his gloves and beat the ice off against his trouser leg. Then, he carefully placed them on top of the small hearth in the corner of the room.

“Better,” Nigella said.

James sat in a chair and watched her work. The small house felt oddly intimate. After having masturbated in one of its corners for a while now, the sense of belonging had seeped into his skin. He felt relaxed in Nigella’s home, even though he knew it was an alien place, in spirit and purpose.

The cat came over to sniff him.

Winter snows had put an end to his military excursions for now. He had done all he could to prepare for war. There was only one piece missing, the certainty of his cause. Relying on visions to blaze the path through his future was a dangerous game. It was like being fed; after a while, you forgot what hunger was, and you never hunted as keenly as before.

Her advice shadowed him like a silent bodyguard, protecting him, guiding him, lending a sharp killing edge to his sword, an edge that guile and money and fake smiles could never give. His life was wrapped in magic, with glimpses of the future borrowed in blood and seed.

But there was always something missing.

He had disposed of a dozen enemies, only to have dozens more appear, new faces, new names, fresh ambitions. After a while, he had learned it was better to have old foes with known intentions than young upstarts dying to prove themselves. He had promised the world twice over. He had threatened until his throat turned raw. He had bedded so many women the act of pleasure felt like a boring duty. There was perfume clinging to his skin and crusted flakes of blood under his nails. Xavier was working a net of spies so thick a fly couldn’t slip through. His sycophants and fans numbered in their thousands. And his armies were as ready for war as they would ever be. And still, he was edgy, uncertain, reluctant.

Rob was the friend he had never had, a brother almost. They had become inseparable, in secrets, in deeds, in their plans. But even though he trusted the man with his own life, a streak of bone-deep paranoia burrowed through his bones, like some maggot.

So, he visited Nigella almost daily now, gasping and huffing in a chair as she patiently waited for the cup of his hot semen, and she swilled it and rolled her eyes and told him truths and riddles. But the world was glazed over, a pane of grease and filth clouding it. He could guess shapes, but he couldn’t tell for sure. It maddened him.

His every sense screamed at him not to give in. But he had to. And it wasn’t that difficult. The bucktoothed woman was there. He could smell her, the ripe smell of womanhood and life’s hardship, her plain lines strangely attractive.

He realized she was watching him intently. “Let us eat first,” she said simply.

James swallowed down hot gulps of thick broth mechanically as he considered the next hour of his life. The cat tried to push its tiny nose into his bowl, but he flicked its ear, and it retreated. It would change everything. He almost feared the foretelling, but he knew he must have it. When Nigella pushed her plate away, he almost jumped.

Without a word, she reached for her cat, picked it up, opened the door, and gently tossed it out. Then, back in the warmth of her small, humble home, she started shedding her clothes, layers of wool and leather. Soon, she stood in front of the fire, shivering, goose bumps covering her pale skin. James felt his heart hammer as he took his clothes off. This felt nothing like any of his political rituals back at the mansion. This was no silly game.

Nigella lay on her bed. “Come here,” she called.

Giddy with excitement, he rested on top of her, the tips of her nipples brushing against his chest. He wondered what she was thinking. How many men had she lain with in her life? How many times it was for business and how many times it was for love? How was she different from a common whore?

Doubts and questions fled him as he entered her. At first, he didn’t move. She nodded. He made his first thrust slowly. She gasped. Three minutes later, he spent his seed with a savage growl on his lips. Nigella’s head slumped against the hard mattress.

Panting, James watched her. Her face was ruddy, her skin dewed with sweat. She shone bronze in the dim light of the cabin fire. An artery in her neck pulsated rapidly, beating against the skin. Her eyes were wide open, but they only showed the white.

“Nigella?” he whispered.

Her eyes rolled back to normal. Her vision focused. “I saw,” she said.

James swallowed. “What?”

She put a hand on his nape, pulled him close, and spoke in his ear.

Three days later, James stood in the same big hall they had celebrated the Autumn Festival in. The audience was much sparser, but still large and colorful. All slightly tired and drunk, they waited for the day to end and a new year to start.

The future emperor of Athesia had won himself a moment of respite and stood all alone, sipping wine, thinking. The flood of people moving before his eyes floated in a rapid stream, those who called themselves his partners, those who styled themselves his friends, followers, maybe even enemies, definitely those. He had labored for the last six months trying to carve his survival in a bedrock of lies and plots. And now that he had, he felt naked, exposed, exhausted. Nigella’s words boomed in his head, echoing the sound of his heart.