Authors: John Hornor Jacobs
6 Ides, Quintilius, 2638 ex Ruma Immortalis
The citizens of New Damnation feared fire.
It was a city that grew around the fifth’s garrison in a mad jumble of wooden buildings; engineer college and munitions, a river harbour and port, slaver’s wharf and auctions, millers and dyers, crossroad colleges, bathhouses, barbers, artisans, boatwrights and fishermen, printmakers and engravers, whorehouses and saloons, and one great aqueduct lancing down like an arrow from the springs in the foothills of the Whites. New Damnation’s air was filled with the noise and spice of industry: the bustle of tradesmen and the dusky slave-teams chanting work hollers as they pulled sledges through packed-dirt streets, the constant banging of hammers on wood as carpenters built arrogant houses for merchant kings, equites rising, the steaming tenements and insulae near the river teeming with street vendors, the scents of their foreign foods and fragrant worship of obscure gods filling the air, the stink of sewage spilling into the Big Rill along with the chaff of millers and the dross of the smelting forges, the drunken laughter of theatre-goers and the chants and incense of the pious visiting the temples to Ia and the older gods.
Of course, it wasn’t named New Damnation to begin with. Its original name was Novo Dacia – founded by Hellenes – but that was a century ago, before the Ruman occupation and then outright ownership of the territories. A wooden town, built from gambel and pine timbers harvested from the skirts of the White Mountains. A tinderbox.
One poorly drawn ward, one ill-guarded lantern and New Damnation would live up to its name, blossoming into inferno.
We crossed the Big Rill upstream at the Miller’s Crook ferry and reached the town on 6 Ides, and the whole place was in a tizzy. Vigiles patrolled the streets, wary and watchful – never straying too far from fountains or water wagons. The lanes were full of pistoleros loitering on the planks in front of stores, shops, and the larger homes while the legionaries kept to the campus martius and, mostly, inside its walls.
I picked up a copy of the
Cornicen
as we rode into town from a newsie-lad for a copper denarius. The headline read
Harbour Town On War Footing – All Able Bodied Men Needed.
When I showed it to Fisk he shrugged, as if he expected it.
We made our way through the streets, avoiding the homeless wanton-boys, the slave workers bearing palanquins over the muddy streets, past the shit-slicks and refuse piles near insulae, up the hill to the better appointed neighbourhoods with paved streets lined with white, soft, quarried stone until we came to the campus martius plateau, and showed our papers to the legionnaires posted at the gates. The dead
vaettir
on the back of Fisk’s horse drew attention, causing a small commotion, and we led a processional to the stables, where my partner tasked the saucer-eyed stable boys to guard the body until he could figure out some way to dispense with it.
What was once a camp of the Ruman army on the march had, over time, become a permanent encampment. Timber walls were replaced with stone, tents with housing and barracks. The command tent was now a three-storied office complex, adorned with
daemon-light
fixtures allowing worklight at all times. Yet all of the buildings were still plain, devoid of all but the barest adornments. Simple functional buildings crafted of stone harvested from the Whites and brought here on the backs of countless slaves – most of those
dvergar
, but also Numidian, Aegyptian, and wherever else they came from. But above the command centre a great flag pole stood flying the emblems of V Occidentalia. There was a fifth back in Latinum, but the emperor Ingenuus saw fit to reset the legion counter, as it were, with the discovery of the Imperial Protectorate and the Hardscrabble Territories. The fact that this fifth was the second fifth caused some consternation when officers who had served with the Latinum V Prima were assigned. The Prima galled them, over here.
But it didn’t keep them from being proud. The brag-rags whipped in the fresh wind coming down from the Whites and showed holly and silver, cannon and ships, and a curious flame emblem I could only take to mean Hellfire.
We stabled our mounts and made our way to the command.
If there’s one thing that Rumans love above all else, it’s bureaucracy. It was hard to tell the difference between secretaries and slaves here – everyone ran about clutching papers and wax styluses. But Fisk fixed the pilum-bearing eagle pin to his shirt – showing his rank as legate – and snagged a page by the elbow.
‘Take me to Marcellus,’ he said.
The boy – no more than sixteen – looked frightened. ‘Can’t, sir. He’s in Harbour Town. Some of his legates have remained here, and so has the camp prefect.’
‘Take me to the prefect, then.’
The boy led us through a warren of offices and hallways, neatly lit by
daemonlight
fixtures, until we came to a large room centred around a three-dimensional map of the Imperial Protectorate and Hardscrabble Territories. Many officers and messengers spoke quickly and quietly, prim and officious and efficient. The air smelled of tallow and blood and ink and on a far wall there were six or seven tremendously large slaves – each wearing a torc around his neck – attending Quotidians that hissed and scratched their messages on parchment and were then snatched up by waiting legates.
‘I’ll be damned,’ I said, looking at the slave-manned Quotidians. ‘That’s a blood-thirsty bit of work, there, Fisk.’
He squinted, eyeing the slaves. ‘Those hosses seem like they got enough, though, don’t they?’
There was one officer who simply sat at the map, holding a parchment and smoking.
‘That’ll be our man,’ Fisk said to me and then approached the map, the orders Cornelius provided us in-hand.
The camp prefect was a thick, burly fellow with a distracted air. He stared at the parchment he held as if he wanted to strangle it. Or the person who wrote it.
‘Pardon me, sir,’ Fisk said, slowly. ‘We come under orders from Governor Cornelius.’
The camp prefect glanced at us, jarred out of his brooding, and looked surprised to see us there.
‘And?’
‘We’re looking for a man. Beleth. Cornelius’ fugitive engineer.’
‘I have heard of him. There are wanted posters.’ He turned and bellowed, ‘Gellus! Where’s that munitions report?’
A thin, nervous looking man piped up: ‘Coming, Mr Maelli! It will be ready in moments.’
Maelli frowned. ‘From Harbour Town as well?’
‘Yes, sir.’
He nodded brusquely, and then waved Gellus away.
‘A reward?’ Fisk asked.
‘I believe there is,’ the man replied, his thick shoulders set in sort of a defiant shelf of muscle. It’d be easy to imagine that he was half-bear. His corded arms were covered in dark fur and he had a bristling, angry beard. ‘Not much for a man of your rank, but it would be a nice bonus, if you bring him in.’
‘No matter. If you know of him already, is there any intelligence on the man’s whereabouts?’ Fisk asked.
Just like that, the prefect’s interest in us evaporated and he turned back to his parchment and resumed reading. ‘Have a slave take you to Andrae. He’s the spymaster.’
Fisk made a curt bow and touched his heart in salute.
A slave led us downward, into the guts of the building, revealing that there were at least as many levels below ground as there were above. The corridors became closer and more cramped and the
daemonlight
fixtures more sparsely positioned – which was odd because down here was where they were needed most. But the slave led us to a small conference room with a large table covered in stacks of parchment.
Sitting at the desk was a long, lean man with hawkish eyebrows and a narrow, patrician nose. He had the full, lush lips of someone familiar with pleasures of the flesh, yet tinged toward cruelty, and his eyes possessed a keen intelligence. More Quotidians sat in neat rows behind him. There was a bottle of wine and a plate with a rime of blood on it perched precariously on a stack of ledgers and papers, a fork and knife at crazy angles. Judging by the Quotidians and lack of slaves, he’d have to eat quite a bit of meat just to have the blood for correspondence. Behind him, a mirror-backed
daemonlight
fixture cast a bright, yet wavering, luminescence about the room, almost like sunlight reflected through water. There were regular tallow candles strewn about the place as well, giving the conference room an air of ceremony and mysticism. I imagined he might want it that way.
‘Yes?’ he said as we entered.
‘You Andrae? Intelligence?’ Fisk asked.
A smile hinted at appearing on his lips, little amused flickers at the corners of his mouth. But it was only hints and flickers. The smile never touched his eyes.
‘I hope so.’ He gaze rested on me for a moment and then back to Fisk, taking in his riding leathers, the six-guns, and the insignia of rank pinned on his shirt. ‘Ah. You must be …’
Andrae shuffled through papers until he brought up one and squinted at it, his thick lips pursed in concentration. ‘Legate Fiscelion and companion—’ He paused for a moment. ‘Shoestring? ‘No other known name’, it says here. Hmm.’
‘Yep,’ I said, giving a small nod of my head. ‘That’s me.’ Strangely, I felt a small relief that this man didn’t know my name just by looking at me. Fisk didn’t seem to mind.
‘I’ve been tasked to find Cornelius’ engineer. I was told you might have some intelligence on his whereabouts.’
Andrae considered Fisk very carefully. The man’s whole aspect was desultory. The slant of his shoulders. The sensuous pursing of his lips. The derisive amusement flitting about his features. In some ways, he reminded me of the stretchers – infinitely bored and desperately craving entertainment.
And here we were, mice for the cat to play with.
‘Is that so? Please, have a seat. Wine?’ He gestured with one long, pale hand at the bottle on the table.
‘No, thank you,’ Fisk responded. ‘Just any information you might have on our man would be helpful.’
Andrae looked slightly miffed at that. He wanted to play – banter, maybe. Gossip. Might be we should introduce him to Carnelia.
‘Let me look in my files.’ He rang a bell, and from the other door a young man, his secretary, scrambled in, dressed plainly in a white tunic with a torc around his neck. Looking at his hands and wrists, it was quite easy to see the scar tissue there and recent wounds. Fuel for the Quotidians. ‘Go fetch the file on Mr Beleth—’ He stopped, turned to Fisk. ‘Full name?’
‘Linneus Gauis Beleth.’
‘Right,’ Andrae said and waved his hands at the secretary. ‘Go.’ He picked up the bottle and poured himself a glass. ‘It will be a while. Our files are … extensive, to say the least. Please join me.’
‘Water would be nice,’ Fisk said, dusting his britches and taking a seat on the opposite side of the table. Andrae focused on Fisk. He ignored Fisk’s request of water and poured a small earthen cup – a settler’s cup – of wine and then one for himself. Fisk ignored the cup, hooked his thumbs into his gunbelt and put a boot on the table, tilting his chair back on its hind legs.
Andrae now paid me not the least bit of attention.
Dvergar
, of course. Hardly worth noticing. That can be a blessing, at times. The man made my skin crawl.
‘Nasty business with the Diegal girl,’ Andrae said. ‘Nasty business.’
Fisk remained silent. His stillness was a warning to me, if not Andrae.
Andrae went on: ‘You were tasked with recovering her from the indigenes, were you not?’ He waved his hand negligently at me.
‘That’s right.’
The spymaster tsked, and shook his head. The sound was loud in the quiet of the room. Fisk did not respond.
‘It’s interesting that Tamberlaine would saddle you with this task, then, in light of your previous failure.’
To someone who didn’t know him, Fisk would’ve seemed as still as a statue. But I know him. The muscles in his cheek tightened and shifted.
‘There was nothing we could do about that,’ I said. ‘It was the stretchers. You ever seen one? We got one on Fisk’s black in the stables.’
Andrae blinked, slowly. A bit of artifice, that, the slow closing of his eyes before turning to look at me. Only his head moved, pivoting on his long – almost gimballed – neck. ‘No. I hear they’re quite vigorous in their carnal appetites.’ The way he said carnal made me uneasy. ‘I’m sure you did all you could.’
We all remained quiet for a bit, Andrae sitting there, sipping the wine from his cup, Fisk meeting his gaze placidly.
‘I understand you wedded the Cornelius girl.’ Andrae tilted his head back and looked at the ceiling, as if trying to remember. ‘Livia?’
Fisk nodded. I don’t know if the other man realized how treacherous the ground he trod upon was.
‘Fascinating,’ Andrae said. ‘It’s hard to believe that a proconsul – the governor of this region, in fact – would allow his daughter to wed such a man as yourself, Mr Fiscelion. If you’ll pardon my saying so.’
‘Seem to me that you’re free to say whatever you like, mister,’ Fisk replied. ‘You seem to know quite a bit about me. So much that it doesn’t seem like I need to do much talking at all.’
‘Quite,’ the spymaster replied. ‘Those are nice guns, I see.’ Andrae cocked his head. ‘Might I see one?’
‘Sure,’ Fisk said, whipping it out so fast that it was as if he went from one state to the other simply by thinking. A blur. Fisk popped open the cylinder and emptied the Hellfire Imp rounds into his palm. He then presented the six-gun to Andrae grip first.
The man took it, holding it lightly in both hands. ‘Hmmm. Judging by the wear, this has seen some action,’ Andrae said. ‘And here, “Labor Ysmay”.’ He ran a finger along the underside of the barrel. ‘I’m aware of this engineer. From Harbour Town. Not an adept, but a reliable and expensive provider of munitions.’ He offered the gun back to Fisk, who took it, thumbed back in the rounds, and replaced it in his holster. ‘How ever do you afford such weapons on a scout’s salary?’
Fisk tapped the legate’s emblem on his chest with a finger.
‘Ah, yes. You have risen quite far, quite fast, as well,’ Andrae said. ‘That seems a bit odd to me, though. Why should Cornelius allow you to wed his daughter and raise you – the son of an exiled traitor – so high?’