Scions of the Emperor Read online

The rest backed away, shooting wildly over my shoulder.

  'In the name of the consuls,' I cried, 'submit!'

  They froze, confused, thinking I was offering them a chance to surrender.

  I nodded, acknowledging their obedience, then removed their confused expressions with a barrage of shots. I felt no pity as they thudded to the floor, their faces smouldering and their limbs convulsing. They had turned on the senate. They had betrayed Macragge. There could be no greater justification for summary execution.

  'Gallan?' I cried, looking back.

  He walked towards me, gripping the bicep of his gun arm. 'I'm fine,' he said, nodding to the next room.

  When we approached my father's chambers, the fighting was starting to die down. My men were reporting only minimal resistance now. Gallan and I had dealt with the ringleaders. My father's stateroom was palatial - a work of art rendered in ivory and gold - but the luxurious rugs were all soaked with blood and littered with dead guards, several of whom I had known my whole life. I recited Tarasha's litanies again.

  There was an eerie quiet as we reached my father's private chambers. There were dozens more corpses and a fire spreading quickly over a tapestry that covered one wall.

  Gallan rushed to the tapestry and tore it down, cursing as he stamped out the flames and surrounded himself with embers. 'Priceless,' he snarled. 'And ruined by barbarians who wouldn't even be able to read it.'

  I loved Gallan but he was as strange as all of Macragge's nobles. He had just passed all those dead men, but it took a ruined tapestry to make him angry.

  I noticed an odd aroma on the air, bitter and chemical. It seemed worryingly familiar and I scoured my memory, trying to recall when I had smelt it before.

  Then I saw movement on the floor near Gallan, near the burning tapestry.

  'Watch out!' I snapped.

  He backed away and we both raised our guns.

  I gasped as I saw a man, crumpled on the floor like a piece of broken furniture.

  'Father!' I howled, shaking my head. 'No!'

  We rushed towards him, but he held up a warning hand and we stopped a few feet away, both whispering curses. His ornamental cuirass was punched full of holes and his robes were drenched in blood. His leg was bent underneath him at a sickening angle and his skin was scorched and blistered. Worst of all, though, was the dark line at his throat. It looked like a second mouth, wide and leering, dribbling crimson threads. He gasped, trying to breathe, colour draining from his face.

  I dropped to my knees, reaching out to him. Again, he waved me away, desperate warning in his eyes. He tried to speak but only managed a hideous bubbling.

  For all my strange gifts I could do nothing as he slipped away, choking on his own blood, gripping his throat and trying to sit up. I tore some of my cloak to wrap it around his neck but he pointed a pistol at my face, fury in his eyes.

  'Who did this?' I gasped, but he did not seem to register my words.

  When I stopped trying to touch him the anger left his eyes and he tried to reach for something on the floor.

  I grabbed it. It was a coin. It must have fallen from his robes when he fell. I tried to give it to him but he shook his head, indicating that I should close my fist around it.

  I gasped as I understood what he was doing. He was reminding me of that day in the mountains. The day when he handed me a coin and promised I would never be alone.

  'No!' I howled, but he was still pointing his gun at me, refusing to let me approach.

  Gallan put a hand on my shoulder but I shrugged him off, gripping the coin so hard it buckled.

  For nearly a minute, my father lay there, gun pointed at my head, warning me not to touch him. Then his stare hardened, focusing on somewhere only the dead could see.

  As he fell back, so did I, collapsing against the wall, snarling like an animal. Gallan hauled at my shoulders, shouting something, until I realised I had fallen into the shreds of burning tapestry.

  I stood and stared at Konor's corpse. I was electrified by rage, every inch of me taut. I dared not move for fear of the violence that might spill from me. My father had not left me, he had been taken.

  'Roboute,' said Gallan, speaking in quiet, careful tones. 'We should go.'

  'Go?' I glared at him. Even as a teenager I was a giant. I loomed over the consul. 'My father lies murdered and you would have me go? You would have me leave him like this?'

  'Think, Roboute. The city is tearing itself apart. Would Konor want you to watch over his corpse while his life's work is being ruined? Think of your duty - your duty to Macragge.'

  The effort required not to hit Gallan was so great that I could not speak for a moment. But then, as the crackle of las-fire echoed in the distance, I saw the truth of what he was saying. I thought of the coin in my fist, crumpled but unbroken, and nodded.

  'The Senatorum.'

  He nodded. 'The legislature will have assembled. We must tell them what has been done here. The mob have just robbed themselves of their greatest champion.' He shook his head, looking at Konor's body. 'But they have also risked the stability of the entire planet. There are too many factions vying for power. If there's a consular election now there will be mayhem.' He looked at the bodies scattered around the room. 'This is a dangerous moment.'

  I trapped my grief in a corner of my mind and tried to think. 'Macragge has lost one of its consuls today,' I said, holding Gallan's gaze. 'I won't let it lose another.'

  I ordered some of my men to guard my father's corpse and, with the rest of them following in my wake, I marched back out into the city, my pulse hammering in my ears and my father's face staring at me from every corner.

  As we crossed the city, crowds spilled from every temple and hab-block. I ignored the rioters but not the chainmail-armoured soldiers. Those men saw a fraction of the rage I was holding back. I tried to kill them with the dispassion I was trained to show, but something in me had cracked. I could not stop at simply shooting them. I am ashamed to recall how I vented my rage, smashing walls with their corpses, pummelling skulls with my fists, hurling living men onto fires.

  By the time we reached the lawns around the Senatorum, Gallan was shaking his head, angered by the messages that were crackling in his vox-bead.

  He caught me looking his way and grimaced. 'They want me to stand as sole consul until this is over - until we have restored order.'

  'Sole consul?' I raised an eyebrow. 'A bold idea.'

  'It goes against every statute.'

  'Well something has to be done if we're going to ride this out. And fast.' I gave him a pointed look and strode on.

  There was fighting all around the Senatorum gates. I was about to lead an attack when Gallan held me back.

  'We need to reach the Hall of Concord quickly. We have to speak to the assembly before they make any decisions.' He waved me around the building to the entrances reserved for servitors and serfs.

  I hesitated, glaring at the rabble by the gates. They were hurling bricks and trying to set light to the banners. They looked drunk, or deranged. Again, I found it hard to think that I was even the same species as such moronic creatures. How could they turn on the state that had given them so much?

  'Don't let anger muddy your thinking,' said Gallan. 'We could be stuck here for an hour.'

  'You're right,' I replied. 'I need to get you to that assembly before it's too late.' I ordered my men into battle but then left them to it. We rushed through the darkness to the rear of the building.

  The doors were open and, as soon as we entered the lofty halls of the Senatorum, I heard things I knew Gallan would not - as well as the crowds thronging through the streets outside, I could hear the lords gathering in the Hall of Concord. An emergency council had been called. Hundreds of Macragge's patricians had made it through the riots, determined to make their voices heard. Even from here, I could hear how craven some of them were. There was excitement in their voices where there should only have been rage. They saw opportunity in the bloodshed.

>   For several minutes, Gallan had been whispering furiously into his vox, talking to whoever was feeding him information from the hall but as we neared the centre of the building he broke off from his conversation and looked at me 'I want you with me on the podium. It's what your father would have wished.'

  I nodded, barely registering his words, still thinking of what I had lost that day.

  'But you can't appear before them like that,' he said.

  I frowned, confused, then realised he was talking about my battle-gear. I had not changed since returning to the city. I was still clad in chainmail and plate and it was filthy, covered in blood and ash.

  He shook his head with a faint smile. 'If you enter the Hall of Concord looking that brutal there will be a riot in there too.' He grabbed my hand. 'We need to be the voice of reason, Roboute. There has been enough savagery today.'

  I nodded. All my life I had struggled not to bring shame on my father's name. Somehow, in the wake of his death, that seemed even more important. I started to unfasten the wargear.

  'Here,' said Gallan, far better acquainted with the building than I was, nodding to a door. 'Let the serfs dress you.'

  As I headed for the door, Gallan hesitated.

  'I will be quick,' I said. 'Go.'

  He stared at me, pain in his eyes, then nodded and hurried off.

  The room was lined with the woollen togas and mantles worn by the patricians of the legislative assembly. I began shedding my armour as I approached them, the metal clanging across the cold, tiled floor.

  I was half undressed when a serf rushed into the room and bowed, closing the door behind him. 'My lord,' he murmured, rushing to help me unfasten the armour.

  'That one,' I snapped, waving at the most understated garment I could spot - a simple blue and white toga without quite so much of the gold embroidery that covered the others.

  He hesitated, then seemed to think better of whatever he was going to say and crossed the room to fetch the toga.

  As I dressed l noticed something odd. I could smell the same chemical aroma I had smelled in my father's stateroom. The same, unspoken warning tugged at my thoughts, willing me to make a connection. This time I pursued the thought to its source and an image flooded my mind. The campaign in Illyria had been brutal but satisfying. For every savage we killed, there were ten who listened to sense and dropped their guns. For the first time in my life, I had seen how diplomacy could outstrip force. But the leader of the revolt, a wiry runt called Zullis, had not been willing to bend the knee. He fought like a rat in a snare, lashing out with the same curved blade I had seen his assassins use. It was covered in neurotoxins, he had said, laughing as he hurled it at my face. I had given Zullis a decisive lesson in manners, but the smell of the poison had stayed with me.

  The serf came at me with a grin, his long, curved blade flashing in the half-light.

  I dodged his lunge and grabbed his wrist twisting his arm slowly back until the bone cracked and he howled in rage and shock.

  'You killed my father,' I said. 'You poisoned him. That's why he warned me away.' My rage had passed beyond the animal fury I felt earlier. It was ice in my veins. I felt less human than ever before. I felt like a weapon.

  'Yes!' gasped the assassin, his eyes rolling wildly as he tried to wrench his arm free. He snorted and giggled and I recognised the signs of combat-stimms.

  'Why?'

  'Money!' he giggled, grinding his teeth, leaning closer. Breath exploded from my lungs as he kicked me, hard, in the stomach.

  I cursed my stupidity as I staggered across the room. He was distracting me. And I was far slower than I should have been.

  I had not slept for the duration of the Illyrian campaign and then I had returned home to find the riots. Perhaps there was a limit to even my stamina?

  He came at me again, wielding the knife in his other hand, but this time I was ready. I sidestepped the blow and landed a brutal punch on the side of his head.

  He went down hard, making a wet choking sound.

  'Who paid you?' I cried, grabbing him by the neck.

  The chemical smell grew stronger and he slumped in my grip, foam forming at his lips.

  I dropped him to the floor and watched his death throes, feeling no pleasure in his pain. Foam bubbled from his mouth and the smell intensified further. He had bitten a capsule. Probably the same toxin that was on the blade.

  I rushed to the door. As I did so, I saw something lying next to my armour - the coin my father had bade me take as he died. I snatched it up and then, as I ran out into the corridor,

  I halted, noticing something odd about it. I stared at it and, under the harsh light of a glowglobe, I saw the truth. 'No,' I gasped, bending the coin back into shape and looking at it again, not wanting to believe. Then I ran on.

  When I entered the Hall of Concord, Gallan was already on the podium, trying to quell the noise. Macragge's aristocrats had turned on each other with almost as much violence as the mobs outside.

  I had emerged at the back of the podium and Gallan continued shouting as I approached him from behind.

  'And I don't just mean Konor, I mean his son too!' he cried, hammering his fist on a lectern. 'They brought this ruin on our heads. They risked everything we hold dear! I watched Konor leading the rabble into Consul House. If it wasn't for the bravery of my men, he would have burned the whole building down. He murdered dozens of loyal soldiers before we could stop him.'

  The crowd fell quiet, shocked, whispering to each other.

  'And as for his son, that arrogant interloper Roboute. What more could we have done to welcome him into our homes? And this is how he repays us! I saw him, not ten minutes ago, in this very building, trying to fight his way to this chamber with the very traitors he claimed to have been fighting in Illyria. What was he really doing out there? Plotting to overthrow us! We stopped him, but it was a close thing. I had to kill him myself.'

  As I stepped closer to Gallan, light washed over me and the crowd gasped, staring at me in confusion as Gallan described my death.

  'I'm not ashamed of what I did!' cried Gallan, misunderstanding their shocked expressions, still unaware of my presence.

  'He was a traitor to Macragge and I was not prepared to let him step foot in this hall. I ended his treachery in the only sure way I could.'

  I finally spoke up. 'I was with my father when he died.'

  My words rang out into a shocked silence.

  Gallan paled as he turned to face me.

  'And I asked him who was responsible,' I continued, placing the assassin's poison blade to Gallan's throat. 'He could not speak, but he gave me the name of his murderer all the same.'

  Gallan looked panicked and confused as I took out the coin and held it in front of his face.

  'Very rare I imagine,' I said, turning it around in my fingers. 'Mistakenly minted. Rather than showing both consuls, the same face appears on both sides. Your face, Gallan.'

  Gallan laughed. 'You're alive! This is wonderful. I heard you were killed.'

  I glared at him. 'I heard you. I heard everything you just said.'

  His smile froze and for a moment he seemed at a loss. Then anger flashed in his eyes.

  'What right do you have to come in here making threats? You do not belong here, boy, you never did. Where did you even come from? Do you even know who your real father is? You're lucky I didn't kill you when…'

  Gallan's words trailed off as a hum of angry voices swelled through the hall. Some of the patricians began jeering and swearing. For a moment I thought it was directed at me but then I realised their outrage was for Gallan. Of course. Whatever their politics the nobles of Macragge agreed on one thing — to lie in the Hall of Concord was beneath contempt. And my presence had shown them what a fraud the consul was.

  I pounced on their moment of doubt, speaking to the room with the calm, magisterial tones I had perfected speaking to the Illyrian rebels.

  'My father never lied to you. Whatever is happening today is nothin
g to do with him or his reforms. Nothing meant more to him than this senate. And he grasped truths lost on men like Gallan. A tyrant's power is brittle and short-lived. It dies with him. But a state that frees its people grows more powerful every year. Each new generation has more to fight for than the last. More reason to serve. We can arm Macragge with the loyalty and faith of our subjects. We can make it invincible.'

  Gallan's face was purple with rage. 'Idiots! Yes, I killed Konor. And who do you think I did it for? Who do you think will pay for the freedom Konor promised? Whose lands do the mob want to seize? Yours! It's your power they want. Your money. What do you think you would be if Konor's reforms were passed?' He was almost screaming. 'You would be nothing! No better than the common herd! Centuries of tradition, torn down by one ill-conceived act of charity!'

  I prepared to end his words, tightening my grip on the knife, recalling the pain in my father's eyes as he died.

  Then I realised the senate had fallen quiet, watching me closely, fascinated by the lurid scene that was unfolding on the podium. In their expressions I saw the future. If I killed Gallan I would prove him right. I would be the savage rebel he claimed I was. Any other truths would be overlooked in the resultant clamour. There would be a frenzy of recriminations and plots. They would turn on each other. While the city died, its leaders would bicker, letting Macragge burn while they tried to raise one hereditary claimant over another.

  I thought of the savages in Illyria, dropping their guns for a place in the dream I described to them.

  I lowered the blade.

  Gallan looked at me in shock as I stepped away from him.

  'It is not the job of a single man to pass judgement,' I said, looking out across the crowd. 'It is the job of the senate. Macragge is greater than any of us. Gallan killed my father, but I would rather see him go free than tear this council apart. If you would have this man as your consul then so be it. But you heard him lie to you. He has admitted it without shame. And you must choose your course of action quickly.'

  Gallan's eyes gleamed. He struggled not to laugh, so sure that no one would listen to me over him.

  'Traitor!' cried a voice from the back of the hall. I looked through the ranks of patricians and saw that one of them was pointing a trembling finger at me. No, not at me - at Gallan.