The Broken Isles (Legends of the Red Sun 4) (38 page)

Malum placed his hands in his pockets and waited just a little longer before beginning. ‘Thanks for coming,’ he started. ‘It’s much appreciated. Feels good, doesn’t
it? All of us together like this. You know, humans and rumel, folk from all across Villiren. That’s us. That’s community. That’s what this city’s built on, right?’

A few cheers scattered about the club.

‘Good,’ Malum continued. He walked slowly across the stage as he spoke. ‘My lads have good evidence, you see, that all of this is under threat. You heard about the monster in
the iren, yeah? The child killer?’

A murmur of agreement from the audience.

‘You ain’t seen anything yet. There are worse creatures to the south. We’ve seen them.’ He gestured to his accomplices on stage. ‘Me and the lads, we’ve seen
just what lies on the edge of the city. You want to know what we saw?’

Malum marched across to the other side of the stage. ‘Oh, we saw some of the sickest shit. Creatures with more arms than you’ve had hot dinners.’ He pointed to a heavyset man
in the audience, and got a few laughs.

That seemed important, to show his charisma
, Fulcrom thought.
He’s looking to win them over all right, but for what? Why does he need their support?

‘Creatures with rows of vicious teeth, creatures with the blood of our children on their hands. That’s right, we’ve seen them taking people off the streets. Kids, animals, you
name it.’

‘That’s not actually true, is it?’ Lan whispered to Fulcrom.

‘No. But he’s very convincing, isn’t he?’

‘So, the commander who fancies himself as a bit of a ruler over you and me – someone who doesn’t know how tough things are for honest people in this city – seems to think
it would be a good idea if we lived side by side with these things. He’s spending all his time meeting with them, preparing the way for millions of those aliens to come to our islands. He
wants them to work with us – can you imagine that? There’s hardly enough fucking jobs as it is – he wants to hand over what’s left to a bunch of evil monsters?’

‘He’s stirring up a little racial hatred,’ Fulcrom whispered. ‘You see it all the time from various businessmen trying to keep the masses angry and accept low wages, but
what’s this guy trying to achieve?’

‘Maybe he wants to lead them?’

Fulcrom’s attention skipped back to Malum, who was continuing his monologue of hatred.

‘I’d like to invite anyone who supports them aliens south of the city to stand up here on this stage and tell me why,’ Malum demanded. He now stood centre stage once again.
There was nothing but silence to his question.

A voice eventually hollered from the audience: ‘OK, you got us on your side, pal. What can we do about it?’

‘I’m glad you asked that,’ Malum replied. ‘In terms of your safety, I’m already on it – not the military, you should note, but a lot of genuine people who I
know well. We’ve got civilian patrols organized keeping watch on the fringes of the Wasteland . . .’

As Malum spoke, Fulcrom caught some movement to one side. It looked like a scuffle, and two men were pulling a third out towards the exit. ‘Wait here,’ he whispered to Lan, before
pushing his way through the attentive crowd towards the doorway. He poked his head around the corner and glanced through to the dimly lit corridor beyond. There, two thugs were laying into another
man, striking firm blows to his stomach and face. They pushed him up against the wall and spat in his face.

Fulcrom could overhear a few words. ‘. . . You breathe a word to anyone and we’ll kill you.’

The victim, a male in his late thirties, with a torn shirt, brown breeches and heavy boots, spluttered his response. ‘Didn’t . . . didn’t mean to disagree with the man. Just
seemed a bit over the . . . over the top.’

‘You said you were heading to the Citadel,’ one of the attackers snarled.

‘Was jokin’. Empty threat. Nothing more.’

A third man came to enquire what was going on and the thugs dumped their victim on the floorboards before speaking to the newcomer, a broad-faced, red-headed man who looked as though he’d
been in a few fights in his life.

‘Citadel you say.’ The red-headed man scratched his chin. ‘Malum wouldn’t like that. Better get rid of him. Keep it clean.’ And with that he began to walk away.

The thugs nodded, pulled out a blade, hauled the victim up off the floor and, with his eyes wide and his hands up in protest, they slit his throat. It happened so quickly. Blood pooled across
the wooden floor.

‘Aw, for fucksake,’ the red-headed man called back. ‘I said keep it clean.’

‘Sorry, JC. You want us to sort it?’

‘Yeah, we’ve got a reputation. People respect us. Get a mop and a bucket and sort it out, and get rid of that fucking body.’

Fulcrom quickly pulled back into the room and, his heart beating rapidly, he pushed his way through to Lan’s side. Malum was still talking, and there was now the acrid stench of arum weed
to add to the sweaty musk.

‘What was it?’ she asked, and he told her.

‘If I’d have intervened they would have taken me too.’

‘Shit.’

‘Exactly. I’d like to see what the commander has to say about this.’

‘They’re not messing around, are they?’ Lan whispered.

‘No, this is serious,’ Fulcrom replied. He eyed Malum, who was at the far side of the stage, continuing his diatribe.

‘Tell you what I’m going to do,’ Malum called out across the crowd. ‘I’m gonna repeat this little speech of mine on another night or two. Or three. Fetch your
friends and family – and if they can’t make it, tell them all will be fine. I’m here. I’ll not let this city become some kind of military dictatorship or alien
ghetto.’

The raucous cheer was louder than ever. People banged tankards on tables and stamped their feet on the floorboards.

After this settled, a few people began to ask what he’d do next?

‘All in good time, my friends. All in good time. I’m getting some of the old underground networks to unite. We’re starting to form a new network with some of the tavern owners
and shopkeepers around the city – all nothing to do with the alien-lovin’ soldiers. We’ve got plenty of money on our side. We’ve got all we need to take our city back and
protect it from aliens. Expect more news very soon.’

With that, he turned and walked off stage, leaving the crowd demanding more.

‘That guy knows how to play to an audience,’ Lan commented.

‘It all explains why he created that scene in the iren, anyway,’ Fulcrom replied. ‘We need to report back to the commander right away.’

The military were packing up for the final time. People were bustling through the corridors on each level, carrying supplies, blankets, armour, swords, food – everything
that said something big was about to happen. Fulcrom found Brynd surrounded by clerks and piles of paper.

‘You look busy,’ Fulcrom commented.

Brynd didn’t reply for a moment, simply staring at the papers before him on the table. ‘It’s war this time, investigator. This is it. This is the big campaign.’

‘Will you be gone from the city for long?’

‘I’ve no idea. It could be over pretty quickly. It could be a more sustained campaign but I bloody well hope it isn’t.’

‘Where’s the conflict?’ Fulcrom enquired.

‘It’s looking like the coast of Folke, if the surveillance is correct. There’s another coastal invasion being planned. If Folke falls, so does the rest of the
Archipelago.’

‘I hope it goes as well as these things can do,’ Fulcrom replied.

‘Thanks, but I take it you didn’t come here to discuss that.’

‘No, I’ve found out who acquired the corpse of the monster in the iren, and why.’

‘That was quick.’ Brynd gestured to the chair opposite.

Fulcrom sat down to reveal his findings, from his dealings with the youths at Factory 54 to the meeting in the Partisans’ Club. ‘Those kids were probably quite innocent in all of
this I believe. The girl – Jeza – felt pressured by Malum. She probably regrets ever having met him.’

Brynd had kept calm while Fulcrom related the information, but as soon as he recalled the threats that Malum had made to him months ago, his temper began to show.

‘You know who Malum is, I’m guessing,’ Fulcrom ventured.

‘I certainly do.’ Brynd sat back in his chair, made a steeple of his hands and contemplated his fury. ‘He was a vicious gang leader and used to be a powerful man – for
his position. He tried a few tricks on us. If I’m honest, I hoped he’d died in the war, but I knew there were still a few issues with the gangs in some districts. It’s the gangs
who rule the streets in this city, investigator – or so they’d like to think.’

‘What do you think of the meeting at the club?’

‘I’ve not got time to deal with it so I’m going to entrust this to you – but be careful. The man was once capable of great evil. Because of that, I’ll release what
few guards we have left at the Citadel to be at your disposal, but tread carefully. I’ll see if we can spare fifty newly enlisted soldiers and have them patrol the streets, but that really is
a maximum.’

‘Of course,’ Fulcrom said. ‘How many soldiers from the city are going with you?’

‘Nearly all of them – it has to be that way. We really do need
every
fighting man and woman for the battle.’

Fulcrom nodded and rose. ‘I’ll do my best, commander.’

‘I want to repeat: be cautious,’ Brynd replied. ‘Malum isn’t your typical criminal.’

The rumel smiled. ‘I’ve dealt with more than a few unusual criminals in my time, commander.’

*

‘Hey, Malum,’ the kid said, stirring Malum from his slumber.

Malum recalled his surroundings: he was sitting in a plush chair in an empty underground tavern. Everyone had gone home. The party had ended. It was just him and the embers of the fire, and the
empty lager bottle that lay by his feet. He breathed deeply, trying to clear his head.

‘What is it?’ Malum tried to locate the kid’s voice, and his blurry vision eventually located the doorway, in which a blond kid was standing.

‘JC told me to tell you that the army’s leaving.’

‘What? Say that again,’ Malum demanded. His head didn’t pound these days, but the kid’s voice was dulled slightly.

‘The army is vacating the city.’

‘Why?’

‘They’re going to war, JC says.’

It took Malum a while to process this.

‘Tell JC to get the Bloods together, in here, tonight. What time is it anyway?’

‘Mid-afternoon,’ the kid said.

‘Fucksake,’ Malum muttered. ‘All right, let JC know that. Get them all here real quick. Tell them to sober up, too.’

*

Later, the tavern was rammed with his core gang members, a good few hundred of them. These were the remnants of the war – not that many, but enough to get the word about.
They were his brethren, the people he could trust. They would do anything, kill anyone, if he asked it of them.

Malum stood on the bar and regarded them all. Like he had done on stage, he waved for silence and it duly came. ‘It’s come to my attention that the military is leaving the city. I
thought there’d be a thousand or so soldiers in the city – turns out there are less than a hundred left. I’m sending out scouts to confirm this, but this new situation changes my
plan somewhat.’

‘We sending out raids on the aliens now then?’

‘No,’ Malum said, ‘not immediately. We’ve always sought for this to be a free city from the Empire. Only when it’s free of military and Imperial rule will we get to
do what
we
want. We get control then, and we can only do that if the people want the same thing. We’d hoped to start doing this across the city after the war, but it didn’t
really happen like that, did it? No, because the military got there before we did. Effectively, there’s one place we need to occupy to make Villiren what we want.’

There was a stony silence in the tavern. No one knew what to say.

‘The Citadel,’ he concluded. ‘With all the soldiers heading to war, this leaves the Citadel
unguarded
.’

‘It won’t be completely unguarded though, will it?’ someone called.

‘Probably not, no. There are most likely going to be a few units on the streets too. But we’re never going to get a better chance to take the place, are we?’

‘What, we just
take
it?’

‘We just take it. Like a repossession, break things down from within. Without the same level of defence, it’ll be like walking in. Any soldiers on the streets, we’ll slaughter
– we’ll overwhelm them. It won’t be that easy, obviously, but if we’re ever going to do it, now’s the time. Once we’re in the Citadel we can loot the place and
burn what we can’t take.’

‘But that Jamur lass is still going to be there, isn’t she?’

‘Probably, unless she’s going with the military,’ Malum said. ‘If she is, we could keep them hostage, or hang their body parts on the outer limits of the city –
like the old days. Either way, they’re not going to provide much of a challenge against a few thousand of us.’

‘Where are we going to get a few thousand from?’ came another voice. ‘There’s barely a thousand of the Bloods left.’

‘We put the word out. We make offers of sharing the spoils of the Citadel with the people – whoever would like to help us. They’ll accept that. Tell everyone that the aliens
will soon be coming. We unite what’s left of the gangs under one common aim: to reclaim Villiren while the commander’s at war, to take the city for our own, to stop aliens coming in.
Who knows, the commander might die while he’s at it, meaning there’ll be nothing to trouble us afterwards. And when the military does decide to come back – depleted after the
fighting – there’ll be nothing here for them. The people are already on our side.’

‘We doing this for the people or for us?’

‘For
us
, of course. We need the people to be on our side so we can take what we want. But everyone wins, think about it. This is the chance to make the city ours. To free it from
the Empire, let people do what they want, make their own rules. Meanwhile we can live like kings and make sure there’s no aliens at the same time.’