Swords of the Imperium (Dark Fantasy Novel) (The Polaris Chronicles Book 2) (10 page)

Taki exhaled through a grin. “That was too close.”

Mikhail gave a single nod. By now, Taki was used to the man’s reticence. Initially, it had been awkward working with the Imperials instead of his own squad. Elsa seemed to lack inhibition; Mikhail simply didn’t speak until spoken to, and even then only when necessary. There was also a palpable tension between the two that wasn’t animosity but something else Taki couldn’t identify.

A low rumbling in the distance broke into his thoughts. Approaching quickly was the dust cloud of a caravan. He brought out Draco’s spyglass and peered through it. “It’s them. Four light horse in the vanguard. Three wagons and a large carriage trailing. Probably twenty-five or thirty men riding with an unknown number in the wagons. Two kataphracts bringing up the rear.”

Mikhail nodded and started a soft chant to activate his
Phon
. Shortly after, Elsa emerged from her hide and stepped into the middle of the road. She was clad in the robes of a beggar and clasped a small, infant-sized bundle to her chest. Soot and mud applied to her face and hair completed the look of dishevelment and insanity. The vanguard came to a stop and leveled their weapons at her. Its leader held his hand in the air and barked a guttural command that Taki could only assume was an order to halt.

Elsa started gibbering, or at least that’s what it sounded like to Taki. The plan they’d worked out was that she’d get close enough to sniff out the telltale signs of weapons and armor and then signal the rest to act. Her disguise had been chosen after extreme deliberation—someone worth neither consideration nor the expenditure of effort to kill.

The leader scrunched his face and tried to spit on her. Elsa whirled away, laughing and jabbering to herself. Another rider huffed in annoyance and leveled a rifle at Elsa. An ax head had been grafted on near its muzzle. The leader put his hand out.

Not worth a bullet, thank goodness
, Taki thought.

“Get ready,” Mikhail said.

Elsa grasped the end of the cloth wrapping around her bundle and whipped it forward at the men. It unfurled in the air, revealing a brace of flash bombs that hurtled toward the center of the vanguard. Elsa wheeled around, clapped her hands over her ears, and dove away. Before she hit the ground, the world exploded into a storm of light.

“It’s them!” Taki bellowed as he spun out from behind the boulder and fired his flare pistol in the air. A burning arc of bright red lanced up into the sky. Mikhail raced past him, opening fire with a self-loading carbine. Smugglers tumbled like cut wheat before they could raise their muskets. When his magazine was empty, Mikhail drew his longsword, charged forward, and plunged the blade into a spearman’s chest.

Taki raced over to Elsa, blasted the nearest rider at full force with a sutra, and shot another off of his horse. Hoofbeats made him twist to face a rider trying to thresh him with a flail. Before Taki could raise his pistol, a load of shot turned his attacker’s face inside out. He saw Elsa work the lever of her own longarm and blast the remaining horseman in the thigh. The rider screamed and grasped at the bloody stump of his leg before being dragged to death by his panicking mount.

“Thanks,” Taki grunted. He braced his spell arm and sent another blast of concussive wind into a charging smuggler swinging a poleaxe.

Elsa loaded her last shells. “Where’s our backup?”

“I told them to wait for the right moment.”

“This
isn’t
?”

The two backed slowly away. In front of them were at least fifty angry men who advanced with spears and muskets leveled.

“No, this isn’t,” Taki said.

“And
when
will it be just right?”

“Wait for it.”

“Oy, no wonder you’re still a virgin,” Elsa said.

“Look,”
Taki said, “they’re easier for
her
to kill when bunched up.”

Before the report hit their eardrums, a column of five men jerked forward with gore spewing from their chests. The bodies had barely hit the ground when another line toppled and fell, followed by the booming noise of a sniper’s rifle. The mob of smugglers quavered and then broke and ran.

“See? Dassa’s the best godrotting shot in the world,” Taki said. “I’d stake my life on her.”

“Charge!” Lotte hurtled over the ridge nearby, flanked by her companions. She deflected a thrown axe with her shield and took her attacker’s head off in return. Draco whirled around with his fighting iron; the weighted end bashed an enemy’s forearm to shreds and ripped the jaw off of another. Karma deflected a mass of spearheads away with a burst of prana and threw one of his spatha into a smuggler’s neck. With a flick of his wrist, he retrieved the blade via a thin chain attached to the pommel.

“The flanks!” Aslatiel said to Lucatiel and Irulan. The women shouted and threw themselves into the fray. Aslatiel parried a spear thrust with his blade, pirouetted, and slashed his opponent’s throat open. With flick of his wrist, steel opened another smuggler’s chest. “Shpejtspate, stay close,” he said.

Enilna grasped the hilt of her rapier with a sweaty palm and spun to face a charging fighter. He held a spiked cudgel above his head and swung it down at her head. She thrust. The cudgel fell to the ground, and the man’s eyes rolled back in his head. Her rapier was buried in her enemy’s chest, right under his solar plexus. She stared at the sight for a moment before twisting her wrist to wrench the blade free.

Yes, it’s all coming together! We’re going to win this.
An unbidden smile worked its way across Taki’s face as he beheld the slaughter.

“Okay, okay. Sorry I doubted you,” Elsa said. “But seriously, try not to give me a heart attack next time.”

Taki nodded. “Yeah, sorry. No surprises from here on out.”

The last carriage in the caravan shattered into flying wooden chunks. A creature sprang to its feet amid the remains, stomped, and let out a guttural, viscera-twisting roar. Though humanoid in shape, it was three times as tall and twice as wide. Metal slabs bashed together into a rough suit of plate creaked in protest as the creature moved and flexed its joints. Through a gap in its helmet, a pair of cloudy yellow eyes flashed angrily at the fighters below.

“No! What the
hell
is that?” Taki scrambled away from the wreckage with his eyes wide.

Elsa sucked her teeth. “An enslaved monster!” She took aim at it and fired. Her muzzle belched fire and sent a solid lead slug at the juggernaut’s head. It slammed against the helmet and let out an eardrum-piercing clang but did not penetrate.

The beast uncoiled a thick chain looped about its waist and started to swing a large, spiked weight in a circle around its head.

Taki fell to his knees. “We’re fucked,” he gasped. A moment later, he yelped in pain as someone swatted the back of his head.

“Maybe you’ll spread
your
cheeks easy,” Lucatiel said, “but not the women! Irulan, with me!”

She charged the beast with twin jian sparking. It swept its chain in an arc to try to pulp her, and she threw herself into a slide. Spikes passed a mere hairs’ breadth above her face, and she passed between the creature’s legs. She whirled, roared, and swung her blades at the juggernaut’s heel. Metal crunched and crimson sprayed. The beast let out a howl of pain and collapsed to one knee. It grasped blindly at Lucatiel, but she rolled away and slashed its palms to ribbons.

Irulan threw her rope dart and sank the barb deep into the creature’s neck. She sprinted around it in circles, wrapping loops of fine cord around its body and binding its arms. It struggled to free itself, but this only made the strands cut into exposed flesh. Unbalanced, the juggernaut pitched forward and fell prone. From its throat, a soft, mournful groan cut the air.

Lucatiel alighted on its back, raised her twin steel, and drove them into the base of the beast’s skull. The rheumy yellow eyes widened and then closed for good.

“Now you see why they call her the Prince of Maladies,” Karma said to Taki. He offered a hand, but Taki waved him off and came shakily to his feet. “We never stood a chance against her. She once fought a thousand Ursalan knights by her lonesome. Killed a hundred of them and set the rest to panic. One monster is nothing for the likes of her.”

“What
was
that thing?” Taki examined it delicately.

“Bipedal manticore,” Karma said. “Used in battle by the warrior tribes of Hunza before they all got Imperialized.”

“I didn’t think you could tame something like that,” Taki said. He glanced over the rest of the road and spat grit. Their fight was over. Bodies lay sprawled in the dirt or slumped against wagons. Bloody-faced smugglers writhed, dusty and in agony, and sent up moaning prayers that the gods ignored.

“You
can
; it just takes a lot of time and willingness to get your people eaten,” Karma said. He wiped down his blades with a cloth and sheathed them. “We’re dealing with a ruthless bunch, and wealthy, too.”

“Did we take any alive?” Taki asked, suddenly filled with anxiety. It would all be for naught if they had no one to interrogate.

“We have prisoners!” Lotte shouted from farther away. Taki fell to his knees again, this time in relief.

It was well after sunset by the time the squads entered the gates to Gangtok. The ambush had netted fifteen captives, many of whom were wounded. A combination of pain and resentment made for a slow trudge to the nearest town with a jail and a permanent magistrate’s seat. Much to Taki’s surprise, Aslatiel had warned that it was frowned on to flog prisoners to hasten the march. Thus, what they could have covered in six hours took nearly ten.

“Natalis, you’re first watch,” Lotte said, and handed him the cell keys. Fortunately, the jail was almost empty, and the smugglers could be kept separate from the usual collection of drunks and petty thieves. “The albino from Alfa will relieve you in two bells.”

“Who’s doing the questioning?”

“Mainly that Rana woman, because she knows their tongue. Emreis also volunteered to assist.”

“
Our
Draco?” Taki raised an eyebrow. “I never took him for the type who enjoyed pulling toenails.”

“Neither did I. I’m not sure whether to be pleased or put off. Von Halcon and I will make sure things don’t become too savage. Again, one of their surprising little rules.”

“Captain, can I speak in confidence?”

“Aye, what’s on your mind?”

“It sounds like treason to say this, but I’m not unhappy at being a part of their army. Do you think I’ve gone over too quickly?”

“No, and it’s not treason to say so. You had little choice in this matter, Natalis. For you to feel glad of it is good fortune indeed. Sometimes, I wish I could trust as easily as you seem to.”

“You didn’t have much of a choice, either. I hope we find Mezeta.”

“I have a feeling we’ll be on her trail soon,” Lotte said. “She’s the sort who relishes chaos, while the Imperials want conformity above all else. All we have to do is wait and listen.”

“Captain, what if Sir Aslatiel doesn’t want to act against her? What will you do?”

Lotte laughed. “You don’t know Hecaton like I do. The entire world will want her dead at some point. In the meantime, your job is to survive and learn. Remember what I said to you, and try to gain what enjoyment you can from all of this.”

“I’m relieved, Captain,” Taki said.

Lotte smiled and placed a hand on his shoulder. “You did well today. This is the closest we’ve been yet to finding the rebels.”

“I should’ve anticipated that creature,” Taki protested. “It nearly got us all killed.”

“You can’t anticipate everything that’ll go wrong in battle. The only thing you can do is adapt quickly and marshal your strengths.” She leaned in. “Also, you should learn how to take a compliment more gracefully.”

Taki blushed.

“Make sure you rest after you’re relieved. We’ll have to move quickly once the rebels figure out what happened. Hopefully, they won’t pull up roots and move on.”

She left through another iron door, leaving Taki to his solitude. He breathed to calm himself and opened the door to the cellblock.

The prisoners were housed in a large, communal cell with a latrine in one corner and a few lice-infested straw mats shoved against the walls. Most sat sullenly on the floor or lay on their sides, facing away from the bars. Torchlight on Taki’s end was the only source of illumination. A simple bench and long table, along with a rack of leather-wrapped cudgels, were the only furniture present. Though he expected jeering and cursing, Taki only found silence from the men. He sat on the bench facing the prisoners and already wished for Mikhail to relieve him.

“Young master?”

Taki started at the voice and instinctively reached for his saber.
Silly. No one’s escaped.
He scanned the cell and locked eyes with the man who had spoken. He looked to be either a Chung-Kuo or a Tatar, middle-aged but still fit, with a lean, lined face accented by a short goatee and waist-long hair in a ponytail.