The Grim Company (54 page)

There was a moment of deathly silence – and then Salazar raised one wasted hand. ‘So. You wish to be a hero? Let us see if you have what it takes.’

Cole gasped as Magebane began to throb in his palm. Almost instantly it was boiling hot, burning through his glove to sear the flesh beneath.

He was across to the Magelord in an instant.

Gasping from the pain, still clutching Garrett’s pocket watch in his other hand, he plunged the glowing dagger through those scarlet robes and deep into the withered body underneath.

Salazar’s arm wavered and then flopped down to dangle by his side. Magebane’s hilt cooled almost instantly as the Magelord’s magic sputtered and died. The killer of gods, the most powerful man in the north, began to sag.

Cole held him up, staring into the wizard’s eyes. He was shocked to find that he weighed less than a child. ‘Why?’ he asked quietly. ‘You had the power to change the world for the better. Why didn’t you?’

The Tyrant of Dorminia sighed softly. Cole had expected Salazar to die screaming and cursing his name, but the Magelord appeared peaceful. Almost content. His voice was a bubbling whisper.

‘Things… rarely go as we hope they might. I once thought to save humanity from the gods…’ He coughed suddenly, blood bubbling around his mouth to stain his beard and moustache the same colour as his robes. ‘I did not realize humanity needed the gods more than they needed us. I was blinded by hatred.’

‘And Shadowport? Was hate the reason you murdered an entire city?’

‘“
Hate
”…’ the dying Magelord repeated, his voice now so weak Cole could barely hear it. ‘That was not hate. That was… compassion.’

Compassion?
That made no sense. ‘What do you mean?’ he was about to ask, but Salazar’s breathing had stopped. There was no sound but the whistling of the wind and the
tick tock tick tock
of the timepiece in his hand.

The Magelord shuddered once. His fading gaze settled on the pocket watch. ‘
Time… to die
…’ he whispered.

His eyes closed one final time.

Cole slid Magebane free of Salazar’s body. He was about to lower the corpse to the ground when suddenly it began to glow. He jerked backwards as it floated up and drifted out of the side of the tower, rising higher and higher, above even the Obelisk itself.

Without warning, blinding rays of golden light burst from the dead Magelord’s eyes and mouth. Cole shielded his own eyes as the incandescent rays shot upwards – a stream of divine energy fleeing its host to return to the heavens whence it was stolen.

The spectacle continued for two or three minutes before the light died. Salazar jerked once when the last golden motes had finally faded. Then the Tyrant of Dorminia began to fall, tumbling end over end.

The body struck the courtyard hundreds of feet below and burst apart.

The Wolf

 

 

 

Sasha gasped and reached down to her side, probing at the four-inch sliver of wood stuck there. Her fingers came away bloody. A grunt ahead snapped her attention back to the fighting raging ahead of her, and before she knew it a Watchman was grappling her to the ground, his hands closing around her throat. She grabbed hold of his fingers, tried to prise them away. He was too strong. She scratched at him, attempted to bite his face, but he laughed at her clumsy efforts and squeezed harder.

She could see her short sword lying on the trampled turf. She stretched for it, every muscle in her arm straining, but it was just out of reach. She tried to scream, but the crushing hands around her throat turned her cry into a pathetic squeak.

She stared up at the leering face above her. The man’s rancid breath filled her nostrils. Her vision began to blur. Her assailant’s cruel eyes seemed to fill her world, sweat glistening off a nose cratered with blackheads. ‘Die, bitch,’ he panted.

Her right hand closed around the shield fragment protruding from her waist. With a wild effort, she wrenched it free. The pain was excruciating, but she had no time to indulge it; her strength was almost spent. Slowly, almost dreamily, as if she were detached from everything going on around her, she raised her arm from the ground and drove the makeshift dagger through her would-be killer’s eye.

His scream was hideous. The pressure around her windpipe evaporated as her attacker flung his hands up to his face and reeled away from her. She choked in air, rolled over and pushed herself to her feet. Her legs almost gave away beneath her and she stumbled, but she did not fall. With deliberate care she picked her sword up off the ground.

Blood ran down her leg. She ignored it. The Watchman was still howling, his fingers plucking ineffectually at the wooden fragment extruding from his burst eyeball. She limped over to him, raised the sword, and thrust the blade straight through his face.

Sasha stood there for a time, staring at the dead man, then turned and retched. All around her the fighting continued. Thelassa’s mercenary army and the city’s defenders were locked in a vicious struggle. She wiped her mouth, retrieved her sword and limped over to the nearest pocket of fighting. A Sumnian almost fell into her, a pike quivering from his belly, and she pushed him away. The arrival of Salazar’s Augmentors had swung the battle and now they were being pushed back away from the gates.

The blond-haired warrior in the golden armour strode the field like death itself, his sword slaying at will. He was relentless, surgical in the way he stabbed, chopped and thrust his way through the dark-skinned Sumnians. He left a trail of corpses in his wake.

Elsewhere other Augmentors had brought their magic to bear to devastating effect. Nearer to the wall, the warrior in the bronze hauberk scattered enemies like leaves with his terrible hammer. The weapon had annihilated half a dozen mercenaries in a single swing and caused the explosion of splintering wood that had knocked her to the ground and pierced her side.

The pain was growing worse. Her neck throbbed. Through the haze of agony she wondered how the assault on the east side of the city was progressing. In response to the advance of the White Lady’s pale servants, the Watch had seemingly thrown the bulk of the city’s militia against the western gate. If General Zolta didn’t attack soon and draw some of the defenders away, two of the three companies that made up the White Lady’s army could soon be routed.

An explosion suddenly rocked the ground ahead of her. The stench of burning flesh would have made her puke if there had been anything left in her stomach.

She stared through the smoke. A group of Sumnians were engaged in a desperate struggle to fight their way past a similar number of Watchmen. Behind the red-cloaked soldiers lurked an Augmentor. In one hand the man carried a wicked-looking flail, but it was his other hand, the hand he was raising above his head, that caused her heart to skip a beat. There was an ominous glow around the glove covering his fist.

As Sasha watched, the Augmentor hurled a sphere of glowing energy straight at the mercenaries. It struck the earth and exploded, sending white-hot fire blossoming outwards. Once her eyes had cleared, she saw that half the Sumnians had been reduced to smoking corpses. The others immediately fell back, screaming in agony and nursing terrible burns.

She searched around the battlefield. She had discarded her own crossbow a while back. But there, ten feet to her left, she found what she was looking for.

Half staggering, she reached the fallen Watchman and prised the weapon from his dead hands. As luck would have it, it was already loaded. She edged forwards, trying to get close enough for a clear shot. She took another couple of steps and a gap opened up. She raised the crossbow.

At the last moment, one of the Watchmen noticed her. He yelled and pointed. The Augmentor turned and raised his gloved hand.

She pulled the trigger.

This time the explosion knocked her off her feet. There was a deafening roaring in her ears. She tasted blood in her mouth and realized her nose was bleeding. Something smelled of burning. It was her hair. She reached up to touch it. A clump came away in her hand, blackened and singed. But she was still alive.

The Augmentor and those surrounding him were not so fortunate. Struck by her quarrel, the man had misdirected his fireball and launched it at the ground just in front of him. Chunks of flesh and scraps of red cloth sizzled and steamed where the Watchmen had been standing. Nothing remained of the Augmentor but a pair of smoking boots and a puddle some six feet wide.

Sasha stared numbly at the carnage. Then she released her grip on the crossbow and rolled over onto her back to stare up at the clouds overhead. She could hear the sounds of fighting nearby, but she was past caring.

Let them come. She was done.

No one would care if she lived or died. No one apart from Cole and possibly Garrett. And if they knew the truth, they wouldn’t want anything to do with her either. She was a hateful, drug-addled piece of shit. She had deceived Garrett, tricking him into spending more and more of his own coin on narcotics which she had kept to fund her habit. And then she had attached herself to Vicard and used him, too.

She remembered raiding the physician’s home in Farrowgate. She was a common thief as well as a manipulative, deceitful little fuck-up.

Warm blood still trickled down her leg. Just as it had all those years ago. The gang should have killed her as they had killed her father and sister. It would have been better for everyone.

There was movement ahead of her, the sound of a booted foot scuffing against the dirt. Hardly caring, she twisted her neck to see who approached. It was Jerek.

The Highlander was covered in small cuts, his hide shirt torn in multiple places. Red smears and ash covered his bald head. The axes he held at his sides dripped with the blood of countless enemies.

And his eyes were staring in her direction, burning with a hatred that promised brutal death.

The blackness inside her head receded, replaced by sudden terror. She scrabbled to her feet as the grim warrior stalked towards her. He was on her before she could think to run, his axes raised, preparing to end her miserable life. She stared dully at the strapping around his shoulder. The strapping that covered the wound she had accidentally given him. What was it Brodar Kayne had said?
The Wolf doesn’t forget a debt
.

‘Wait, you know I didn’t mean—’

An axe came down.

And Jerek pushed her gently away from him with his forearm. He didn’t take his eyes off whatever it was he was staring at. ‘Get out of here,’ he growled.

Sasha turned.

The hulking figure seemed to blot out the sun. It was a giant, a towering monstrosity of black metal wearing the face of a demon. ‘I’m Garmond the Black,’ he rumbled. ‘She’s mine. Once I’m done with you.’

Jerek’s face twitched. ‘Reckon so? I’ve killed bigger men than you.’ He leaned over and spat. ‘Ain’t never seen a bigger cunt, though.’

Garmond brought his gauntleted fists together with a thud, sending splatters of gore flying in all directions. ‘You’re dead.’

‘Get out of here,’ Jerek rasped again, and this time Sasha heeded his words. She ran, half stumbling, until she had put a good distance between her and the two men. Then, unable to stop herself, she turned and watched.

The combatants circled one another warily. Jerek, himself a big man, looked shockingly small opposite the Augmentor.

The Highlander feinted and then sprinted forwards, his axes whirring. He hit the giant on the thigh, the shoulder, and then across the chest. The sounds of steel clashing against steel rang out across the battlefield – but when the Wolf ceased his flurry, Garmond’s armour displayed not a single dent.

The Augmentor lunged at the smaller man, but Jerek was already out of range. The Highlander spat and then began stalking a circle around the behemoth, keeping him at a distance.

Garmond turned on the spot, maintaining the angle between them. Suddenly Jerek dropped his shoulder and dashed at the Augmentor. He was halfway to him when he hurled one of his axes at the giant’s head. It whirled through the air, end over end, clashing into the demon helm with a gigantic clang and jerking Garmond’s head back. At the same time Jerek launched himself at the Augmentor’s armoured legs, tackling him shoulder-first with the full force of his body weight. The massive warrior stumbled and then toppled backwards, crashing to the ground.

The Wolf was back on his feet in the blink of an eye. He grabbed Garmond’s head and tugged, his jaw clenching from the effort of trying to prise the great helm lose. Eventually it came free. The Highlander tossed it away and raised his remaining axe. With a grunt, he brought it whistling down.

The axe bounced off Garmond’s vambraced forearm. The massive Augmentor threw his other arm back, elbowing Jerek in the stomach. He doubled up for an instant, just long enough for Garmond to get hold of him and lift him bodily off the ground. He plucked the Highlander’s axe from his hand and tossed it aside, and then brought him down over his knee, once, twice, each impact striking with a sickening thud. Finally, Garmond lifted Jerek high above his head. Sasha was shocked to see the man beneath the helmet was fairly young, utterly unremarkable in appearance. With a snarl, the Augmentor hurled Jerek to the ground. He landed hard and lay still.