Heirs of the Demon King: Uprising (12 page)

‘When last I walked amongst the world of men,’ he said, telling his tale without invitation, ‘honour still meant something. The magi still meant something. Warrior kings made war for land or glory, this is true, but they respected the magic. Now, though, magic is a tool to make life easy, or make rich, or kill others. And you tell me now magi are hunted. It is a world to which me and my... to which I do not belong.’

‘What
are
you, Warin?’ Mathias held out a hand and rested it on Warin’s arm. The stocky man stared at it and snatched his arm free.

‘I am the Shapeshifter.’ He closed up again, his moment of vulnerability vanishing.

‘We need you,’ said Tagan. She had been stirred to curiosity by Warin’s suggestion that she was somehow far stronger in her magic than she even knew, but now was not the time. ‘We were sent to find you and others. The Pirate King. The Wanderer. She Who Sees...’

Warin rose and turned his back on Tagan and Mathias. ‘You will leave when morning comes,’ the Shapeshifter announced. ‘And I will not go with you.’

‘But...’

‘No. I will say no more. I will not leave my forest. It has been too long or it has not yet been long enough.’ He waved a hand dismissively. ‘Whatever it is, the answer is “no.” I have no need to return to the world of men and kings and deceit. No. You leave in the morning.’

‘But...’

Warin glared at the young couple and in a heartbeat, he shifted into the form of the wolfhound. Grauenhund barked in joy, delighted to have her playmate back, and the two of them ran into the forest, swallowed up silently by the all-encompassing darkness.

20 miles off the coast of Dieppe

France

S
UNRISE BROUGHT A
rolling fog that curled around the hulls of more than a hundred ships, each proudly flying the French colours. Scores of hawk-eyed boys, and several magi, stood in the crow’s nests, senses strained for any sign of the English who were said to be approaching the coast. A hastily scrawled missive from a spy in the court of King Richard claimed that the King had returned from a hunting trip stained with blood; the result, he claimed, of a failed assassination plot by French agents. He had been so outraged by the incident that he had immediately ordered the army to begin preparations, and the fleet to a state of battle readiness.

Even sped on its way via arcane means, the report had barely reached the ears of King Henri in time to get the fleet in place and the army on the march.

The sound of churning water disturbed the stillness of the morning. It was joined by the chorus of paddles biting at the sea as several dark smears appeared in the fog. The lookouts called out the alert, and within seconds, hundreds of guns were run out in readiness. Every ship was armed and ready to confront the English intruders: the frigates, galleons and carracks presented the formidable firepower of their broadsides.

Crews tensed as the sounds drew nearer. Along with the familiar sounds were other noises—metallic scrapings that were alien to the seas. A dark pall and the smell of tar and soot washed ahead of the approaching vessels. On the deck of the French flagship, a fat-bellied man-of-war dubbed the
Hirondelle
, the master magus and his coven prepared a spell. He firmly believed that King Richard’s notorious disdain for magic would leave the English vessels defenceless against the arcane, despite his much-lauded science.

At an unspoken command, the magi throughout the fleet acted as one, their magic pooling and dispersing in unison, ripping the fogbank apart. At the same time, every French vessel opened fire, the thunderous roar of the cannon eclipsing the noisy approach of the English. A great wave of powder smoke billowed from the guns and the crews let out a mighty cheer of defiance as their trap was sprung.

The cry swiftly turned to despair as the smoke cleared and the French saw what was bearing down on them.

Two score vessels, their hulls studded with iron and belching black fumes, churned the sea to foam. They were led by a dreadnought whose bladed prow stood half as high again in the water as the
Hirondelle
, its deck pierced by a forest of masts and chimneys. They were followed by an armada of barques and frigates, loaded to capacity with soldiers and horses.

Fire from the French guns met the hulls of the ironclads with a dull
clang
, buckling plates or turning aside with shrieking sparks but failing to inflict any serious damage. A second volley creased the air, the well-drilled crews reloading their weapons with a sudden urgency born of desperation. A few English ships stuttered, chimneys holed or paddles shredded, but the rest came on, as relentless and as apparently undaunted as the sea itself.

The magi stationed on the masts began to cast their spells, hurling fire and arcs of lightning at the approaching vessels. They were answered by marksmen among the English crew, wielding long rifles and crystal lenses. What had begun as righteous defiance quickly became disorganised flight.

The master magus looked on in despair as his brothers and sisters died, plucked from their perches by unseen snipers. The captain of the
Hirondelle
was bellowing orders as he tried to bring the great ship about, but it was already too late. For something so massive, the English flagship moved with horrifying speed. The mage closed his eyes and whispered a quiet message to the air, infusing it with a little power. The words flew away faster than thought; they would reach the ears of one of the magi assembling with the army. It would be enough to warn them of what was coming.

He opened his eyes in time to see the iron prow of the
Indomitable
towering over him, blotting out the sun. Then it drove into the side of the
Hirondelle
and broke her open. Screams, and the sound of shattering wood, consumed his world.

‘I
NTO THEM
!’ W
EAVER
roared.

The Lord Inquisitor sat astride his war horse, taking in the growing scene of carnage spreading along the beach. A line of shields and spears bristled halfway up the sand and was steadily pushing the French line back. Hundreds of arrows rained from the high ground on to the landing boats, but the wood and leather roofs of the boats kept the majority of the men safe until they were able to join their comrades.

Pockets of resistance formed around the French magi, who blasted holes in the ranks with elemental fury, crushed flesh and armour with fists of invisible force or turned the ground to sucking mud with their powers. The English outnumbered the French, but still landing as they were, they were unable to bring their greater numbers to bear.

Weaver frowned behind his mask as a broken warrior sailed through the air and plunged into the sea. Ahead of him a mage had emerged from the ranks and was laying into the English soldiery with a staff. The force of the weapon’s impacts was huge, the magically enhanced staff smashing shields to splinters and pulping men with each blow. The Inquisitor drew one of his pistols, sighted and fired in one fluid motion. The newly developed crystalline shot flashed through the air, leaving a greenish trail, and struck the mage in the side of the head, blowing half his skull away. The alchemical bullets were just one of many new weapons that had been bestowed upon the Lord Inquisitor before his departure from England. It had transpired that Isaac Bonnington was not, in fact, the useless creature many had taken him for.

The King had impressed upon him the importance of his mission. Paris must be broken before winter arrived, and Weaver had no intention of disappointing his King. He turned in the saddle as another wave of boats crunched onto the beach, this one carrying more of the esoteric weapons birthed by English science. Several units of archers and fire-lancers took up position behind hastily erected mantlets and began returning fire up the beach. The long rifles were many times more potent than the bows, but were slow to reload, so their wielders had been instructed to look for magi or nobles among the army.

A dragon’s-breath team struggled up the sand, two men bearing heavy barrels of alchemically treated pitch following another pair who handled a pump and nozzle. Upon reaching the line of shields, the first man uncovered a tiny gas light whilst the second began working the pump. A jet of black spewed forth and emerald fire raged into the enemy ranks. Men and horses shrieked and died, the flesh melting from their bones, and a pair of magi were immolated where they stood.

The French line wavered in the face of this new assault, their morale beginning to buckle. Then a huge figure descended onto the beach and the defenders gave a cry of elation. Weaver narrowed his eyes in distaste as the creature stomped its way across the sand. It could only be a mage, quite possibly the master magus of the army, but its form was entirely concealed within a hulking body of stone.

The Lord Inquisitor watched as arrows and shot clattered harmlessly from its craggy hide. It pushed through the alchemical fire, streams of burning liquid cascading in its wake, and slammed into the English ranks. Men were scattered like toys before the giant, their mangled bodies crushed into the beach, flipped into the air or broken with contemptuous ease. It stomped on the dragon’s-breath team with a crunch of breaking bones and wood, and the barrels of pitch exploded, belching a mushroom of green-tinted smoke into the air.

‘My lord, we cannot fight the likes of that.’ The armoured Duke of Suffolk looked aghast at the monster. ‘We must retreat, and bombard the coast with the ships’ guns.’

There was an uneasy murmur among the assembled lords behind the Inquisitor. Weaver turned slowly to regard the Duke. ‘There will be no retreat,’ he growled, voice echoing in his mask. ‘Any man who voices otherwise, be he lord or serf, will answer to me for treason.’

The Duke of Suffolk visibly shrank in the saddle and a number of nobles very obviously distanced themselves from him.

‘Bring up the repeater,’ Weaver ordered a runner and the boy hastened to obey.

Less than a minute later, a carriage pulled by two straining horses splashed onto the beach from the Inquisitor’s own boat. They turned in a half-circle to present the rear of the wagon to the enemy and then the canvas covering the vehicle was pulled back. Thirty miniature cannon, bound together with copper and iron, sat bolted to the floor of the carriage, attended by a pair of soot-smeared gunners. At Weaver’s direction, they took hold of a number of crank handles protruding from the rear of the weapon and began to turn, heavily muscled arms pumping in unison.

The noise, even above the clamour of battle, was tremendous.

Not all of the shots struck the stone-clad mage; several smashed through the line, killing French and English alike, while a few more failed to fire altogether, the imperfect mechanisms missing their triggers. The rest hammered the giant to its knees, chewing fist-size chunks from its hide and filling the air with the stink of sulphur and rock dust. Then one of the ballistae struck something at the core of the creature that was soft and yielding.

A mist of gore exploded from the rear of the giant and with slow, majestic grace the creature toppled backward to shatter into rubble on the beach, revealing the broken remains of a grey-robed magus. The shot had cored the man, blasting a huge hole in his torso and hollowing him out. The French broke and began streaming back up the beach toward the doomed village of Dieppe.

‘Advance,’ Weaver ordered. ‘No prisoners. Burn the town to its foundations.’

The invasion of France had begun.

Bavaria

Germany

D
AWN
,
WHEN IT
finally broke, was cool and damp and although wellrested, Mathias woke with an ache in the small of his back and a throbbing in his head, just behind the eyes. He sat up and rubbed vigorously at his face to divest himself of sleep.

The Shapeshifter was once more seated by the fire, his broad shoulders hunched over as he stirred water in a pot. He raised his head briefly as he heard Mathias moving about and grunted by way of greeting. Tagan was already awake, sitting by the fire with him. She looked as though she had not slept anywhere near as well as he had, and she gave him a wan smile as she saw him. The blanket was wrapped around her shoulders like a cloak.

Mathias stretched out his aching muscles and stepped out to join the two of them at the fire. He touched his hand to Tagan’s shoulder gently and she nodded in response.

‘I will take you both back to the circle after you have eaten,’ said Warin, clearly not prepared to waste any time—or allow Mathias another opportunity to attempt to reason with him. ‘I will send you back to your land. Warin the Red will have no part in this.’

‘Warin...’ Mathias began, but Warin raised a meaty palm. ‘We will not discuss it further.’

‘But...’

‘Ah!’

‘I just...’

The Shapeshifter unleashed a string of Germanic words that Mathias

didn’t understand, but which he was pretty certain was something less than complimentary. A few moments of silence passed and Mathias’s shoulders slumped in defeat. Breakfast, it turned out, was a thin broth that tasted faintly of last night’s rabbits. It was hardly filling and probably not all that nutritious, but it was hot and turned away some of the damp that these woods seemed to bring to both body and spirit.

The three of them ate in silence, the she-wolfhound lying with her great head across Warin’s lap, soulful eyes gazing up at him. He stroked her silky ears tenderly and looked faintly annoyed when she trotted over to do the same to Mathias. The younger man smiled down at the animal and carefully stroked her head.

‘She trusts you.’ The red-headed man observed this in a flat, toneless voice and Mathias grasped on the final chance to find some common ground.

‘I love animals,’ he said. ‘I always have done. You said yesterday that there is much about my magic that I do not understand. I would dearly love to learn more.’ Warin’s eyes narrowed as though he suspected another lobbying attempt to get him to travel. When it didn’t come, he visibly relaxed.

‘You are old to start learning properly,’ he said. ‘But not so old that you cannot learn a few important things. Perhaps when you return to England...’

‘Wales.’

‘Perhaps when you return to your home...’ He glared at Mathias and the young Welshman fell silent. Tagan giggled quietly beside him. ‘You can get your father—Ardwyad?—to show you the true power that you have locked up here.’ He reached over to put his big hand flat on Mathias’s chest. ‘So much to unlock. He has shirked his responsibilities, yes?’

‘His name is Wyn, not Ardwyad,’ Tagan said, and Warin’s eyes turned to her.

He grunted. ‘Wyn, eh? Not what I expected.’

‘Why would you expect somebody to have a particular name?’ Tagan asked.

‘Because that is what he is. To you, anyway. I would usually know him as Adelmo. The men of the north know him as Asmund; those of the south, Alexander. It is who he is. You call me the Shapeshifter, because that is what I am. The Pirate King is just that. The Wanderer...’ A faint hint of reverence came into Warin’s voice. ‘The Wanderer, he is never where you left him.’

‘But what
are
you?’ Mathias was feeling bold enough to ask this question again. He still had no idea what Wyn expected of him, or what it had to do with the revelations about the demon. It had seemed to him last night, whilst Warin had been demonstrating his considerable skills, that the Shapeshifter’s magic was far,
far
beyond anything he had ever seen in his entire life. ‘Please, Warin. If you will not come with us, at least do us the honour of explaining what this is all about.’

‘It is not my place. Ardwyad...’

‘Enough!’

Mathias had had enough of ignorance and evasive answers. All his life, he had been a quiet young man, placid and good-natured. He had never raised his voice to anybody other than Wyn, and the old man had taught him to respect his elders in return. The simple community in which he had grown to manhood had taught him kindness and compassion. The old man and the village were probably both now gone, and the stress of the last day and Warin’s truculence finally overcame him in an explosive outburst.

‘All my life,’ he said, forcing the words around his sudden anger, ‘all my life I have been given half-truths and lies. My mother never told me the truth about my father’s death. I had to learn that after
she
died. My adoptive father tells me a tale about a
demon
that he believed was hunting him. I am sent, by magic I never knew existed, to a country to which I have never been, to meet a man who will not be reasoned with and who
continues
to talk to me as if I were a child. Enough! I want answers, and you, Warin the Red’—Mathias levelled an accusing finger at the stocky man—‘you are going to start
providing
them.’

Tagan stared aghast at the unexpected outburst and Mathias flushed with indignation. There would be a time, much later, that he would come to regret his demand.

Warin tipped his head to one side and then he nodded curtly before he began to speak, his voice low and passionate. His manner held Mathias and Tagan in thrall from the moment he began. Outlandish as the tale proved, it was spoken with such conviction that there was little room to doubt that he, at least, believed every word he was saying.

‘Demons are real,’ he began. ‘Not in the way that the Church would have you believe, or not entirely. They dwell in a land much like our own. It has forests’—Warin gestured expansively to the surrounding woodland—‘it has seas, plains, many things you would understand. It also has many things you would not. It is like a shadow of our world. It is the same shape but is very different, yes?’ The two young people nodded. Warin stoked the fire and continued.

‘That place has many names: Elysium, Samsara, and Niflheim. Some magi have named it the Aetherworld. It is from there that all magic flows, and it is often closer to us than we think.’

‘You mean... the stone circles?’ Tagan interrupted. Warin nodded.

‘Yes, that is where the veil between the world of men and the Aetherworld is at its weakest. You have heard not to go into a circle at twilight? That is when the worlds are in close. It is where old tales about mushroom rings comes from. Bad things will snatch you away, or carry off your children. The demons, though, they cannot cross over. They are things of magic. Without magic, they are like fish, plucked from the river.’

‘But Wyn showed me a vision of a demon. Stalking the battlefield at Bosworth. Killing magi.’

Warin shook his head. ‘What you saw was nothing more than a shade. They can be given power in our world for a short time, with blood, or gold, or dreams. A sacrifice of some kind. It differs for each. But they cannot remain for long.’

Warin’s hand stroked the back of the dog’s ears and she whimpered softly, lying down at the Shapeshifter’s feet and gazing up at him with adoring eyes. His tone became deeply sorrowful. ‘But always they are trying to find a way, trying to get into our world, to take what is ours and make it theirs.’

Mathias became aware that Tagan’s fingers had closed around his and he squeezed her hand in return. Warin stared up at the leaden skies, where clouds gathered, heavy with the promise of rain.

‘Sometimes the Church says that a man is possessed, or that a witch has a demon in her, but that is wrong. They say it because it gives them power, not because it is true. A demon cannot wear the flesh of a man. A summoned shade may have the face of an angel, but you can feel its evil, feel its wrongness. You cannot invite that into you. To do so, even for a little while, brings madness. It rots the mind and body, the soul.’

‘So, if they can’t stay here, even through possession, what is it that they want with us?’ Mathias asked. He had only experienced the presence of Melusine through Wyn’s illusion, and couldn’t imagine what the appalling reality of it might feel like.

‘Purchase. Permanence. They need to forge their pure vessel.’ Mathias suddenly remembered Wyn mentioning something about a vessel as he had prepared for the ritual on the hill. ‘They whisper in the ears of men who lust for power, conquest and war. Men who might forge a dynasty. There have been others before Richard— Caligula, Xerxes, Genghis Khan, Vlad Draculesti—but always people have risen to stop them. Their bloodlines have died or been too weak.’

‘But not this time,’ Mathias said in alarm. ‘Wyn said that he had hoped that the vessel would not be born during my life. What does that mean?’

‘It means that after generations, one has finally come who can endure true possession. One who can host a demon without withering and decay. One who will wield magic like a god and force the nations of men to their knees, driven by a master of power beyond reckoning.’

‘Melusine,’ Mathias breathed. Warin nodded slowly.

‘Richard wages war on magic because through his family, she has led him to do so. Magic is the only thing that can threaten her. It is the defence of the world of men against the Aetherworld. And when the time comes, she will use her power to tear down the veil. The demons will spill through and enslave humanity to their will.’

There was a long pause, and Mathias stared in open horror at Warin.

‘And you will stand by and just let this happen? Wyn sent us here because he believed you would help us!’

Warin could not meet Mathias’s eye. He stared down at the ground, running his hand through the hound’s fur. ‘The earth will endure. Evil comes and goes, but the earth will endure. It always does.’

‘But
we
will not. You are happy to hide in your forest and let people suffer and die as long as your precious earth survives, is that right?’ The young man’s voice was thick with indignation.

Warin surged to his feet, his face a dark, furious mask. ‘And you would be a hero, is that right, boy? Men are weak! They bicker and fight and serve only their own greed. You might have been shown Richard’s corruption at Bosworth Field, but did
Wyn
also tell you that Tudor bargained with the demon as well?’ There was thick, heavy sarcasm around the name that Mathias’s adoptive father had used. The Shapeshifter turned from the pair, shoulders heaving. His voice, when he spoke, was composed once again. ‘Kings. Princes. Nobles. Even if this time is different, it will only happen again. There will always be another.’

Tagan got to her feet and hesitantly went to Warin’s side. She put a hand on his shoulder. ‘Please,’ she said quietly. ‘At least come with us for a while, tell us what we must do, where we must go. At least for a while.’

For a long time she thought the Shapeshifter would not answer, but then he sighed and turned to look at her. ‘Very well,’ he said with evident reluctance. ‘We will go back to the circle and I will send you back to your land.’ Her face dropped, but then he continued. ‘But I will come with you back to England to speak with Adelmo. I will see this King Richard for myself.’

‘His name is Wyn,’ Mathias said, though the relief in his voice was obvious.

‘Of course it is,’ Warin replied sombrely.

The road to Paris

France

T
HE ARMY MOVED
quickly, considering its size. A huge plume of soot and dust trailed in its wake and mingled with the rising pillars of smoke to the northwest. Dieppe burned. Nothing had been spared. Those few able to escape the destruction fled before the English and a bow wave of terror now spread south ahead of the advance.

Weaver rode at the head of the army. Sir Thomas Thirwell, King Richard’s personal banner bearer, rode at his side, proudly flying the royal colours. A number of the nobility had protested his brazen approach, fearing that he would present an easy target for enemy magi should they come upon them on the road. The Inquisitor had silenced them with a word. He would not be cowed. The idea that magi might actively seek him out was an irony he found grimly amusing.

They passed farms and hamlets, all of which bore signs of hurried evacuation. The signs of open magic use were everywhere. Fields tended by animated tools, rain artificially brought to crops, animals corralled by fences of air. At one point they came upon a line of windmills that turned enthusiastically despite the feeble breeze of the day. All were put to the torch in turn, to expunge the stain of the arcane.

The Lord Inquisitor stopped to observe a plough as it turned the earth of an empty field, but waved the army to continue on. There were no oxen in the traces, no man to steer it. The tool simply worked up and down in neat lines of its own accord, following the arcane instruction of the magic that animated it.

‘An honest man does honest work,’ Weaver growled. ‘Shall I send for some serfs to pull the thing apart, my lord?’ Sir Thomas said. Weaver thought he detected a trace of scorn in the man’s voice, but dismissed it as irrelevant. There were many among the court who did not fully grasp how insidious magic could be.

‘No. Inform one of the dragon’s-breath crews to melt it down as they pass. That should be thorough enough.’ One of the quickfooted messengers sprinted off toward the rear of the column without needing further instruction.

‘We cannot scour every magical blasphemy from the land, my lord,’ Thirwell said. ‘The King expects Paris to fall before...’

‘I know what the King expects,’ Weaver snapped. Sir Thomas was a bear of a man, like his father and grandfather before him. He was made larger still by the bulk of his armour, and sat astride his horse with the confident ease of a warrior. Yet he seemed to shrink before the Lord Inquisitor. ‘And he should not concern himself. We will tear down the walls of Paris before...’ Then he stopped, midsentence.