The Great Bear: The Adarna chronicles - Book 3 (13 page)

‘Martius…’ Conlan had heard the men of the legion that had been erased by the Emperor whisper around their campfires at night. ‘He could lead us.’

Conlan’s head drooped to his chest as sleep welcomed him into its dark embrace. A loud crack from the fire snapped him awake and after that he could not settle again. Too many thoughts whirled through his mind, too many worries.
 

Sleepily, he stood. He decided to walk to clear his head. So much had happened in such a short time. He found himself longing to have a moment to himself, some space to think. It had been so easy only a few short weeks ago, when he was just one of the lads; an officer, yes, but not so distant that he could not enjoy the camaraderie, share in jokes and tell stories in the bar.
 

There had been no need to worry back them, life was simple. Martius’s mules they called themselves, marching, fighting and protecting wherever ordered to, no questions asked.
 

It was easy to take orders, but
so
much more difficult to give them. Conlan did not feel he was better than his peers. Jonas was one of the best swordsmen in the legion, a controlled and calculating killer. Dylon had been the strongest by a fair distance, a true giant of a man, rivalled in Conlan’s mind only by the Wicklander, Wulf. But Dylon was gone and Wulf had been defeated with ease by Optuss.

Conlan wandered through scattered large boulders – some reaching as high as his waist – that stood all around the camp.
 

This region, just north of Sothlind, was peppered for many miles around with these great granite blocks. No one knew where they came from. Giants, some legends said, had thrown them down from the Indomius Mountains. Or perhaps they were the remnants of some great explosion in the distant past.
 

Gradually, Conlan climbed up a shallow incline away from the camp. He passed a silent sentry, standing rigid in the dark. The sentry recognised Conlan as he drew near and nodded recognition, immediately unconcerned.
 

Conlan knew that the legion father did as he would.
He
did as he would. There was no one in the camp that would think to stop him if he just carried on walking, looking for a future far away where there were no concerns, no wars, no invasions… just peace and security.
 

Walking away would be easy, but he could not leave the Phoenix Third. They were his now, he would not abandon them, even if they
were
heading to their deaths – marching to fight an enemy the Empire thought defeated.
 

As he reached the top of the slope, he pulled his cloak around his shoulders and raised the hood. He peered west; a glorious crimson sunset lit the sky from horizon to horizon.
 

Tomorrow they would enter Sothlind Valley and move onto a campaign footing. There would be no more open camps, no more lonely sentries in the dark. Tomorrow night, and every night henceforth, the legion would fortify. Trenches would be dug; earthen ramparts raised and stakes set. They would be prepared for attack at any time.
 

Campaign marches were hard on the men. They needed to be tough to march twenty miles in full kit and then spend the final three hours of each day digging in.
 

Conlan looked back at the camp in the distance. Fires and torches gleamed. Hundreds of tents illuminated from within by oil lamps. They looked like glimmering jewels at this distance. He marvelled at the bizarre beauty of the scene, the sheer incongruity of beauty reflected from a walking machine of death.
 

He moved to an up-thrust rock and sat upon it. The stone still radiated heat from the day and it offered surprising comfort because of it, the warmth a welcome balm for his hips, which ached from weeks in the saddle.

He let his thoughts drift and his eyelids began to droop once more. This time the walk had done its job. His mind was clear and he hungrily embraced the void, willing himself to relax, welcoming the darkness.

Abruptly he regained consciousness. He was not sure what woke him. One moment he was nestled in the delicious warmth of a dreamless sleep and the next he was staring into the dying rays of the rapidly disappearing sun.
 

He thought he imagined it at first. A silhouette swaying against the ruby light in the haze of the evening, but as it approached it resolved into a figure; a woman, he was sure, and a confident one at that to judge from the sensuous sway of her hips as she drew ever closer.
 

Conlan stood, confused by the image before him.
What woman would be out in the wild at this time?
There were scattered crofts and hamlets but there were also wolves and worse in this land. A woman without protection could find herself an easy target.
 

“Who goes there?” He intended to shout but it emerged as a hoarse whisper, his voice betraying him as his conscious mind registered where he had seen the silhouette before. Fear gripped him and, without thinking, he drew his sword and took a step back, almost tripping over the rock that had been his bed.
 

“Who are you? Identify yourself!” But he knew, and the knowledge paralysed him, locked his body in place, rendered him helpless to act as the woman inexorably drew closer.
 

She was no more than a stone’s throw away now. Her face took on a lustrous glow, somehow highlighted and defined against the fading light of the sunset.

Conlan gasped. Her hair was red, not the orange red of so many from the north, but a dark, burnished and unnatural tone, just as he remembered it. The red of blood and death; the crimson glory of battle. She wore the same armour he had seen her in at Sothlind. It was clean now, no longer covered in gore and dust, no longer a record of the pain she could cause, the mayhem she could wreak. A hawk emblazoned in simple black on the fitted breastplate appeared to strike down at some unknown foe.

“Your sword will do you no good,” she purred, slowing her advance. “You know it to be true. Sheathe it now, for I mean you no harm.”

Conlan swallowed hard, his mouth uncomfortably dry. He sheathed his sword slowly, deliberately. The rasp of metal on metal jangled through his nerves.

She moved then, with breathtaking speed and grace.
 

In a split second she loomed over Conlan, her sword held to his throat.
 

He stood stock still, not daring to move.

She stared at him, unblinking, over the keen edge of her white pommelled blade. He did not fight. He gazed back, mesmerised, into her eyes. They were the colour of emerald, lucent in the night.

“Why did you trust me?” she asked.
 

Her sweet, perfumed breath sent Conlan’s head into a spin. The world tilted at a bizarre angle, the ground shifting under his feet.
 

“You know not what I want,” she said. “You know I
could
just kill you.” She peered into his eyes, applied gentle pressure with her blade.
 

Conlan imagined warm blood trickling down his neck, then fought to regain his composure.
 

Fight,
said a voice in the depths of his consciousness.
Flee
.
 

His body ignored all pleas, heedless to his needs. “Why haven’t you killed me already, then?” he growled through gritted teeth.

One corner of her mouth turned up, exposing perfect ivory teeth. Like the enigmatic Optuss, she bore no blemish, as if freshly made, not having suffered the trials and hardships of mortal life. “You believe I will not? What should I care of you, mortal?” Her eyes glimmered dangerously. “Know you not who I am?”

Conlan returned her smile. He fought for confidence.
She could kill you but she hasn’t. She wants something.
She was so beautiful though, he feared he could not resist, feared he would tell her what she wanted and die for it. “You are a killer. I know that.”

Her smile widened further, gaining a subtle and terrifying intensity. “You plead ignorance but you
know
, little man.” She reasserted her dominance with further pressure on her blade.

Conlan pulled his head back as the sword stung him.

In that moment he felt his turbulent spirit rise. It was the force that had begun to change him after Sothlind, somehow it removed his fear of rebellion, allowed him to challenge, lent him strength. He still cared if he died – he did not want to – but he could not stop himself from baiting her. “Tell me then, tell me who you are… or kill me if you like.”

Her nostrils flared, bathing him afresh in cloying fragrance. His head spun, he fought to regain his balance.
 

“So you will play ignorant?” She tilted her head back and laughed gently, it was a haunting, beautiful sound. “Ignorance must come easily for those such as you. I have been known by many names, mortal. Your people call me
Syke.
” She placed her left hand on his shoulder and pushed him down with shocking and brutal strength. “You should kneel before your goddess, little man.”

Conlan fought hard, but he gasped at the pain in his shoulder. The sheer pressure threatened to fracture bone. With a long sigh he let his legs buckle, there seemed no point fighting anymore, he had no choice but defeat. Her power was irresistible, indomitable. What purpose could resistance serve? She could have his soul if she wished, and he would be hers, gladly.
 

His vision blurred, the void beckoned to him. Nevertheless, again, a part of his subconscious – his immortal soul perhaps – rejected submission, would not be subsumed.
 

“What do you want from me?” he rasped, his breathing ragged.
Why do you taunt me?
She had haunted his dreams and his life.

She tilted her head to one side, seemed to concentrate on him for the first time. Abruptly she released her grip and withdrew her blade from his throat. She must have sheathed the weapon, but Conlan did not notice.

Spots flashed before his eyes. He fought to remain conscious, to regain his lucidity.
 

“What do you want from me?” he repeated. He gazed up at her glorious, luminous, face, framed in blood red tresses that billowed gently in the evening breeze.

“You must give us the vessel,” she said. Her tone was almost gentle. Her hand caressed his head. “We know that you have it. Where is the vessel, Conlan?”

She knows my name
. The mist in his mind made thought difficult.
How could she know my name
? “Vessel, what’s a vessel?” He focused on her eyes, honed in on their eldritch brilliance. “You are no goddess,” he protested. It felt good to resist. It felt right. He would die with his pride intact. “There are no gods. You’re just stories made up to explain the world. To give us hope of an afterlife. You are a dream…” he denied her.
I haven’t woken. I’m still asleep.
It had to be true. “You’re not real.”

Again she laughed with girlish abandon, her flawless features glistening in the reflected glow of the setting sun.

I’m nothing to her
. It had to be a dream. She could not be real.
I’m dust in the tempest blown before her majesty.
 

“I am real, mortal man, of that you can be sure. You must relinquish the vessel to us. It must not fall into
their
hands.” Her tone almost beseeched him. “They are coming, be sure of that, and your greatest armies will be as wheat to their scythes. You cannot win.” She leaned down, bringing her face before his once more. “Where is the vessel?”
 

Conlan’s mind spun as he inhaled her cloying essence.
What’s the vessel?
He thought he knew but then it slipped away, tauntingly close yet unobtainable. The void called him. He could resist no longer, his limbs leaden and numb. The spark of his resistance extinguished, he sank deeper into the cushioned embrace of the beckoning darkness, fell into the void.
Is this death?
he wondered, before the end.

THE LEGION PASSED INTO Selesia without mishap. The men were understandably silent and pensive as they marched across the battlefield of Sothlind.
 

Martius allowed two hours of rest at the site of the battle, which was still scarred and rutted, the weeds and grass not yet reclaiming what had been lost.

Martius had ordered a clean-up after the battle. It was the only way to be sure that disease would not take hold and spread to the local shepherds and smallholders when they eventually returned to their lands. The Southern Imperial Way ran straight down the valley here. It had been obscured during the battle by dust and chaos but it stood out now, a great wide sliver of gravel that ran down the valley where a river could have flowed. The gravel indicated their distance from the core of the Empire, where roads were paved in blocks of stone.

On either side of the road, set back about fifty yards, stood two large mounds. The western mound was the lesser, containing as it did the dead of the Empire, the men buried with full military honours.
 

It is no dishonour to be buried beside your brothers.
A pang of guilt struck Martius. So many had not been buried or honoured by their families, wherever they might be in the vast Empire that Xandar had created.
 

A simple wooden pole – the whole trunk of a tree – had been sunk into the earth at the top of the mound. The mound itself was covered with new cut sods of turf from the valley. On Martius’s own orders, masons and architects from Adarna would soon arrive to begin the solemn task of raising a permanent memorial to the heroes of Sothlind.

A small group of mourners stood around the mound, no doubt those whose sons had come from nearby cities and towns. Martius had found he could not meet the eyes of those the legion had passed on the road, some travelling towards the memorial, others grieving as they began their journeys home. He felt the weight of his responsibility weigh heavily on his shoulders.
 

What could you have done differently?
He knew he would always be haunted by the possibility that at least some could have been saved.
They remain your responsibility in death just as in life.