Cobweb Empire (18 page)

She had been clenching her skirts so hard,
she could no longer feel her knuckles. Percy let go, then smoothed
her palms against the front of her poor dress, and said: “But I am
Death’s Champion, not the King’s Champion. And there is something I
promised to do. I’ve yet to find the Cobweb Bride. So I may not
stay.”

“And you shall not,” the Infanta said. “No
one will stop you from leaving, for I will insist that you come
with me. And no mere vassal king may stop
me
.”

“Ah, Your Imperial Highness,” Grial said.
“Your confidence is commendable, and in any better days it would be
a thing without dispute. However, my dearie, things are about to
get very difficult indeed, for so many of us—listen!”

Grial raised her finger up, and in that
moment of silence they could hear the bells outside still tolling
in grand harmonies. Only—there was something different now. Their
rhythm and cadence had changed.

“Can you hear that?” Grial spoke again.
“It’s no longer bah-dah-DUM-bah-bah! It is now Bah-DUM! Bah-DUM!
Bah-DUM!”

“Yes,” the black knight said. “The cadence
has switched from funeral to military.”

And Vlau Fiomare nodded grimly. “Yes! How
well I know that sound, from the Styx and Balmue border! Those are
the bells of war!”

I
n the bleak
mid-afternoon sunshine, under a white winter sky streaked with
charcoal and silver, Duke Hoarfrost sat atop his great warhorse
before the walls and closed gates of Letheburg.

Around him was a sea of moving
pole-arms—pikes, peasant billhooks, axe-headed halberds—among them
ragged pennants held aloft, and cavalrymen of Chidair and others,
plus innumerable infantry, men on foot bearing whatever weapons
they could hold in their damaged limbs.

This was not an army of living men but the
dead. . . . For hours they had marched, streaming
along the wide road leading south, in a thick flow of cold broken
bodies—human meat frozen to ice and clad in remnants of armor,
bound with rigor mortis and then beyond it, bound with freezing
temperatures and yet in motion somehow, cumbersome yet relentless.
As they approached the capital city of Lethe, their ranks swelled,
as more and more undead joined them from all across the
countryside, while the living cringed and fled their relentless
approach.

By the time they reached Letheburg, they
were in the thousands. . . .

Hoarfrost had received his marching orders
in the early evening of the previous day. In the twilight, a
messenger of the Domain was delivered the news by carrier bird, and
had come before the Duke, bearing the missive from the Sovereign.
The slip of parchment said simply: “Proceed to Letheburg. Then wait
for me.”

Lady Ignacia Chitain came along with the
messenger to interpret the directive. Slightly shivering despite
being wrapped in her new, warm, fur-lined cape that the Duke had
gifted her from his long-dead wife’s own wardrobe, saying that it
was “far more effective here in the cold north than any flimsy bit
of nonsense from the Silver Court,” she entered his freezing
quarters. Because of the broken expensive glass of the “newfangled
window” through which he had put his fist earlier, the snow was
beginning to pile up on the floor just underneath the opening, and
the evening wind came in gusts. And he did not mind it at all,
preferred it, in fact. The cold, he claimed, kept him from “rotting
sooner” than if it had been spring or warm weather.

The messenger, a nondescript, wiry boy,
delivered the note, then waited, holding a candle, the only
illumination in the dark room.

Hoarfrost unfolded the bit of parchment,
raised it close to his hairy, frightful face, grabbed the candle
from the boy and drew it near. He then barked an exclamation.
Ingacia could not be sure if it was a sound of acquiescence or
protest, but took no chances.

“It is time, Your Grace,” she said
confidently. “Gather your men and proceed. All your future
success—and ours—depends upon your actions now.”

“Harrumph!” But the Duke did not appear
displeased. Instead he turned full-body to face her, towering over
the delicate lady like the side of a mountain.

“By Jove and the Devil, let’s do it!” he
exclaimed, his voice powered by grand bellows.

There was a pause. . . .

His eyes—Lady Ignacia noticed—oh, in those
moments, his eyes started
bulging
with effort, then slowly
rolling in their frozen sockets, as he forcefully regained their
motion for the first time since he’d died.

“It’s time! But first,” Duke Hoarfrost
added, “first, I need to head out to the stables and personally see
to my horse. . . .”

That was the previous evening. Since then,
the Duke had ordered the Chidair undead to get ready to advance
within the hour, regardless of time of day or night, and so they
gathered by midnight, just as light snow started to fall, then
spent the night on the march.

But first, as promised, Hoarfrost had gone
to the stables where he took out his dagger and killed his great
loyal warhorse—with a swift, neat stroke to the neck and a minimum
of flesh damage. Supposedly, the beast was already very close to
expiring as it was, from all the endless patrolling without rest or
respite, for days on end, and living on inadequate, rationed grain.
While the horse stood patiently dying, being slowly emptied of its
lifeblood, the Duke patted it along the flanks, crooned in its
ears, and swore to the frightened groomsmen who stood witness, with
torches, that he was doing his old friend a kindness. Now the
stallion would be able to “march to war properly, and match his
master in every tireless stride.”

Lady Ignacia, having attached herself to
this entire endeavor, was given use of a small Chidair
“carriage”—indeed, a glorified covered wagon cart—and thus rode
with the army, all through the night, dozing fitfully and afraid to
miss a moment of import.

They had been on the move all night and all
through this morning. The southern road emptied of all other
traffic as rumors of their approach spread swiftly ahead like
freezing vanguard gusts of wind. At the great walls of the capital
city—which they approached and then surrounded not long after
noon—the main gates and each of the lesser entry gates around the
perimeter were drawn shut and every portcullis raised. Meanwhile,
at least fifty feet above, on the battlements, bowmen and arquebus
marksmen were positioned at each snow-capped crenel and merlon, and
their various firearm muzzles and projectiles bristled from each
embrasure slit in the parapet wall.

Duke Hoarfrost was pointed out the enemy
archers and marksmen by one of his men-at-arms, and his mechanical
voice bellowed in raucous disdain. “What do they think they can
do
to us with those puny shafts? Make pincushions out of
dead men? Hah-hah-hah!” And he brandished his huge gauntleted fist
and taunted the marksmen and archers of Letheburg. “Come, boys! Let
us have some of your pellets or your arrows, arse-headed fools!
Right here! Put one right here, directly in my stilled heart! Let
your best shot make me a pincushion for your granny! Don’t worry,
I’ll be over your walls soon enough, and you’ll have your arrows
and your balls back!”

Lady Ignacia, having availed herself now of
a horse, and fully aware that this was the second stage of the
endeavor, approached the Blue Duke’s position, unceremoniously
scattering his dead men-at-arms out of her way with the end of a
mid-length lightweight pike that she’d borrowed from some poor
infantry fellow. The thing was still infernally heavy, and she had
to hold it with both hands, but it served its purpose to clear her
way.

“Your Grace!” she cried. “We have arrived at
Letheburg, precisely as Her Brilliance the Sovereign has
instructed. But now, we must make no hasty action—we must
wait.”

“Ah, it’s you, my pretty bird!” Hoarfrost
turned his barrel body slightly in her direction. “Waiting is not a
thing a man does willingly—not even a dead one, with all the time
on his hands. Nor is it a prudent thing under the circumstances.
Look, the place is ripe for the picking! We go in, and we take it
all! All of it is ours!”

“Your Grace, there is wisdom in waiting,
especially since you are not yet informed of the whole plan of the
campaign. As soon as Her Brilliance arrives, you will be informed
as to its entirety. But for now, as a man of your word, I would
remind you to heed your promise.”

“Aye, I shall wait, little bird. But only
for a short while. Tell your Sovereign I am not a patient man. I
give her—what? A day? Two? No more. Then, I go forth and take
Letheburg for myself.”

L
istening to the
non-stop tolling of the bells for over an hour, Percy grew
uncomfortably aware of a new sense of which she yet had no clear
grasp or explanation. It was a strange flimsy tug, a pull at her
innards, coupled with a crawling sensation, as though she was being
watched
.

Who or what was watching her?

They were all still gathered in the same
fine parlor with the chartreuse brocade decorations. Eventually an
exquisite tea service was delivered, with fine baked goods, and a
servant stayed to pour the rich amber tea into fragile bone china
cups. This was no ordinary tea, but a royal blend prepared for
Court. Percy watched the perfectly brewed treasure-drink cascade in
swirling ribbons of liquid into each cup, wafting forth a complex
aroma of the highest premium tea leaves from the Orient.

The servant attempted to present the first
cup to Her Imperial Highness, but Vlau Fiomarre stepped forward and
intercepted it with a gesture of one hand.

“I thank you, but I am not thirsty,” the
Infanta added politely.

“Everyone else, eat and drink up!” Grial
wiped her hands with determined enthusiasm against the front of her
dress, finding no apron and apparently not caring in the least. “Be
sure to have plenty, because you never know when the next
opportunity to gobble will come along!”

And saying that, Grial winked at Percy.

Moments later the doors to the chamber
opened unexpectedly, and two Chamberlains stepped forward to
announce the King.

Roland Osenni did not look much different
from earlier that morning, except his countenance was now settled
into a blank tired mask, and he had put on an over-jacket of
complete black without any decoration, to indicate extreme
mourning, and a black unpowdered wig to cover his short graying
hair in proper courtly fashion. He was followed by a minor retinue
of courtiers, advisors, and royal bodyguards—who all crowded into
the room a few discreet steps behind him.

Beltain and the others, except for the
Infanta, rose from their seats, clattering teacups against serving
tables, and bowed or curtsied before the new King.

“Lord Beltain,” he said, addressing the
black knight with no preamble. “Are you aware that your
insubordinate Duke father has camped outside the city gates,
together with an army of dead men? Apparently he has gathered
hundreds upon hundreds of rabble from all around my Kingdom, not
only Chidair. This is an outrage! And even more so, it is
insupportable that it has happened on the day of Her Majesty’s
passing!”

“What? My father has gone mad! I know he has
been obsessed with the hunt for the Cobweb Bride, but I know of no
reason for him to rise up against his liege directly!”

“Well, whatever it is that has incited him
to rebellion,” said the King, “matters little. What matters is the
consequence. Because now we are in a siege, in the middle of a
rather brutal winter, with no preparation and no means of proper
engagement, and only a meager selection of troops and militia
stationed inside these walls of the city. Lord knows what prompts
you northern brutes to fight during the cold months unlike other
civilized men! Furthermore, even if we
had
a full, properly
outfitted military force here in Letheburg, there is no conceivable
method at our garrison’s disposal to fight or even resist the dead
in such numbers!”

“There is Goraque,” Beltain began. “I bear
witness to the fact that after the battle of Lake Merlait, the Red
Duke had forged a truce with Chidair. But this is no longer a
territorial dispute, Chidair against Goraque—this is war amongst
the living and the dead, and the truce is justly nullified. As the
dead continue to desert from all sides and flock to my mad father’s
banner, I venture that the living, such as myself, will do a
similar thing and pledge themselves to the nearest living
commander, such as the Red Duke. Even now, Goraque might be counted
on to rally troops still loyal to Your Majesty and to the Liguon
Emperor, and come to the defense of Letheburg.”

“Goraque is an option, but not a long-term
solution,” mused the King of Lethe. “What I require now is the
Emperor’s significant forces at my back, and something even more
effective against the dead—indeed, by all that I hear and have
observed for myself, something that’s indeed
proven
to be
effective.” He turned around and pointed at Percy with one finger.
“You!”

Percy, discreetly finishing up chewing a
piece of flaky tart pastry, started to choke.

“Tell me honestly, girl,” King Roland spoke,
perusing Percy closely as she turned red, coughing and swallowing
to clear her throat and dearly wishing she could take a gulp of
tea. “How many dead men are you able to put to rest at once? How
close do you need to be? Can you do a long-range propelling
strike—”

“Your Majesty,” said Beltain. “As the girl
herself had said to me just the other day, she is not a musket. Nor
is she an artillery cannon.”

Roland Osenni raised one brow, but was not
in the least bit amused. “My question is serious,” he pronounced.
“This girl, this so-called ‘Death’s Champion,’ as I am told she is
called in the countryside—she just might be our only means of
loading the odds in our favor. We cannot carry on a normal war
against men who cannot be killed—especially considering that as our
own living soldier ranks dwindle, they will cross sides to increase
the enemy forces the moment they are ‘slain’ in battle.”