Wrath of Empire

Chapter 32

Before heading down the main avenue of Bellport, Styke approached Ka-poel and let her horse nuzzle his hand. “Why are you following me?” he asked. “Don’t you have sorcery to do somewhere?”

She rolled her eyes and went through a series of hand motions.

“She says that she’s following you because you’re her protector,” Celine said, joining them with Amrec in tow.

Styke eyed Celine. “You picked that shit right up, didn’t you?”

She learns very quickly, Celine translated for Ka-poel.

“What do you mean I’m your protector? The whole of the Mad Lancers is your bodyguard. You’re safer out there.”

Ka-poel pursed her lips and signed. It took several repetitions before Celine was able to translate a coherent sentence: A bone-eye needs a protector. I am not incapable of defending myself, but I am far more dangerous if I don’t have to worry about physical danger.

“So go back with the lancers,” Styke said, getting frustrated.

I haven’t anointed the lancers. I have anointed you. Besides, Taniel has trusted you with me. Neither of us wants to betray that trust.

Styke noted the fond way she smiled when she signed Taniel’s name. He spat in the dust. “What the pit do you mean by ‘anointing’? Have you done any of that blood magic shit on me?” He thought of that moment in the town outside of Landfall just before the invasion.

Ka-poel regarded him coolly, but did not answer. This was not, Styke decided, the place to press the point. He didn’t want to take her to task in public, and he definitely didn’t want his men to witness him being stonewalled by a hundred-pound Palo woman. Besides, if she had put some kind of her magic on him, he would have smelled it. Wouldn’t he have?

“We’ll talk about this again. I have a man to kill. Are you two coming?” He climbed into Amrec’s saddle and lifted Celine up after him.

“Are you going to let me watch you kill him?” Celine asked as they began to ride.

Styke sucked on his teeth. He shouldn’t. He should turn around and leave Celine with Ibana. Better yet, he should hand her over to Ka-poel and tell them both to get lost. But he had the feeling that wouldn’t actually work. Besides, he also had the feeling that he shouldn’t tell a child about his plans to kill a man in the first place but that ship had sailed. “Just stay out of the way when the fighting starts.”

Styke followed a stranger’s directions across the city, eventually reaching a warehouse on the main thoroughfare just outside the old city walls on the north end of town. The warehouse’s main door had been replaced by a colonnaded facade in imitation of the boxing arenas in Landfall, above which was an enormous banner bearing a likeness of Valyaine’s upper body, fists held forward for a fight. The building had not been damaged by the shelling, the streets outside crowded with wounded and displaced citizens.

Styke left Celine with Amrec and entered through the front door. He was surprised to find that it wasn’t just the facade that had been remodeled: The entire inside of the building had been turned into a clean, well-lit arena, including boxes, bleachers, and snack stands. It could easily fit five thousand people, and from the busts and posters around the building, Styke gathered that there were shows every night. Valyaine himself, one of the posters proclaimed, was a feature every weekend.

The arena wasn’t empty; it had been converted into a hospital for the victims of the shelling. Quiet moans filled the hall, coming from the countless wounded laid out on every surface. Surgeons and nurses rushed around, and Styke even spotted a woman in Privileged’s gloves attending to the worst of the battered, filling the room with the brimstone smell of her sorcery. He breathed it in, enjoying the biting scent.

Styke almost backed out. He didn’t need to fight in a hospital. But Valyaine was here somewhere. Styke could feel his blood begin to rise in anticipation of violence, and he caught the arm of a passing nurse. “I’m looking for Valyaine Soris,” he said.

The woman looked him up and down, her eyes widening at his size. “I don’t know where he is,” she said. “But I’m in a hurry. I last saw him a few hours ago.” She rushed off before he could question her further, leaving him empty-handed.

He plucked at his big lancers’ ring, running his thumb over the skull relief and looking around the hall. Maybe, he thought, it would be best to come kill Valyaine on his way back through Bellport.

“Styke?”

Styke turned around to find Valyaine standing in the doorway, a load of fresh linen in his arms and a surprised look on his face. The surprise disappeared quickly, leaving behind something akin to resignation.

“Soris,” Styke said, nodding slowly. He examined Valyaine in a heartbeat, taking in all the changes. Valyaine wasn’t a tall man, easily a foot and a half shorter than Styke, but he’d always been well muscled. In the last ten years he’d grown positively enormous, with arms bigger around than Styke’s and a chest that looked like it could catch a cannonball without splitting. He had a square jaw and short, jet-black hair, and he wore a businessman’s suit and trousers. “This your place?” Styke asked, gesturing behind him.

“It is.” Valyaine passed by Styke warily, handing the linens off to a nurse. He looked Styke up and down like a butcher prepping a piece of a meat, his eyes lingering on Styke’s knife. “Heard you were still alive. Heard you saved Landfall.”

“Something like that,” Styke replied. He began to move slowly, keeping Valyaine in his field of vision, and they began to circle each other in the vestibule of the arena. “I heard you did a favor for Fidelis Jes a decade ago to buy you this.” He gestured around the arena.

Valyaine took off his jacket and lay it on a nearby bench, never once taking his eyes off Styke. “Me? I got paid, sure. But I built all this myself.”

“How much did he pay you?”

“Fifty thousand.”

Styke scoffed. “Agoston got two million.”

“I also asked for a favor from Fidelis Jes. I never cashed it in. Didn’t see the need. I’m not the greedy shit Agoston is.”

“Was,” Styke corrected.

“Right. You do him with that big knife of yours?”

“I did.” Styke tapped the underside of his jaw. “Put it through the soft spot here.”

“You came across central Fatrasta. I imagine Tenny is dead, too?”

“Very,” Styke lied.

Valyaine sighed. He didn’t seem frightened or even all that put out. Just tired. “Dvory?”

“He’s next.”

“He’s got a field army at his back, so best of luck with that.” Valyaine’s eyes fell to Styke’s knife. “You gonna take it personally when I fight back?”

Styke almost laughed. That indignant anger now churned in his belly, but more than that, he felt alive, as alive as when he unleashed Amrec to a full gallop toward an enemy flank. “Traitor or not, I wouldn’t begrudge a man a good fight.”

“You wait here while I go get myself a knife?”

Styke snorted. Despite Valyaine’s resignation, there was a light in his eyes. He, too, was looking forward to this. Styke made two fists. He didn’t want this to go down like it did with Agoston. He wanted this to last. “We’ll do this your way.”

“Suit yourself.” Valyaine rolled up the sleeves of his white dress shirt and flexed his fingers. They continued to circle.

“I always liked you, Valyaine.”

“Yeah? Well, I always thought you were a wanker.” Valyaine darted forward faster than Styke expected, his arms coming up in a boxer’s stance and his right fist lashing out and connecting with Styke’s chin in a powerful jab that snapped Styke’s head back and brought tears to his eyes. Styke stumbled, raising his arms in defense, taking two more jabs to the ribs before he could fend off the attack.

Valyaine retreated, bouncing on the balls of his feet, fists held high. Styke copied the stance, remembering his days fighting in the barracks, well before the Mad Lancers. He swung at Valyaine’s head, but the punch was too slow. Valyaine ducked beneath it, hammering his left side with a flurry of blows, causing Styke to double over – only to take a knee to his forehead.

Styke fell back against the wall. His eyes were blurry, blood leaking from his nose and mouth and streaming from Valyaine’s knuckles.

“What are you doing, Ben?” Valyaine asked, dancing in front of Styke, feinting left and right. “Is this part of some path of vengeance? Is this some kind of redemption? Get out that big knife and end this thing. It’ll go faster.” He darted back in, pounding on the arm Styke raised in defense and then leaping back from Styke’s counterjab.

He continued to talk. “Do you think you’re some kind of hero? Rumor has it you’ve threatened to crucify any soldiers you find stealing from Fatrastans. Is that true?”

It wasn’t, but Styke didn’t see the need to correct him. It sounded like something he’d do.

When he didn’t answer, Valyaine barked a laugh. “That’s some hypocritical shit there, Ben.”

“We never stole from the people we protected,” Styke snapped. He pushed himself off the wall and brought his arms in. He closed the distance between them, attacking Valyaine with short jabs that the boxer simply slapped aside. Only one managed to land, hitting Valyaine in the cheek and sending him reeling.

Valyaine recovered and spat blood at Styke. “We stole from everyone,” he growled. “You’ve got rose-colored spectacles, you big dumb asshole. If we needed something, we’d just accuse someone of being a royalist and take it from them. Maybe there was a veneer of honor to it, but never more than skin-deep.”

The whole hall had grown silent, and Styke could feel the eyes of the doctors and nurses and wounded upon them as they continued to circle. He thought about his vengeance, and realized that to all these people he was just a big dumb soldier attacking their benefactor.

The vengeance was only in his head. But then again, that’s all that ever mattered.

Valyaine came at him again, smashing fists against Styke’s arms, jabbing his ribs. Styke swung hard and low, ignoring a blow to his face in order to land his own. He felt something crack beneath his knuckles, and Valyaine suddenly retreated again, holding his side.

Valyaine grinned. “Pit, I forgot how strong you are.” He spat out more blood. “You know, Ben, it’s been so long I forget what it was that Fidelis Jes said that made me decide to betray you. He prodded at all of us, you know – for over a year. He even tried to get to Ibana. Didn’t anyone warn you?” He shook his head. “Nah, of course not. You don’t warn Ben Styke. That’s like warning a hurricane. What good would it do?”

Styke wished Valyaine would shut up and focus on the fight. This wasn’t how it was supposed to go. This wasn’t meant to be fun – not for him, and definitely not for Valyaine. This was just a man taking care of business. He swung with his left fist, letting Valyaine duck under it, following up with his right and grabbing Valyaine by the neck, lifting him and slamming him against the wall. Styke felt a kick against his knee and suddenly lost his balance. He gasped in pain as he fell, then felt Valyaine’s fist slam into the side of his temple with the force of a warhorse kick.

Styke staggered to the side, seeing double, and turned back toward Valyaine.

“I’ve killed people with that punch,” Valyaine stated with an almost maniacal laugh. “I never liked you, Ben, but I damn well respect you. You’re a bloody mule. I love that. I love that you never go down. You know what? I remember what Jes said now – why I agreed to help him. Because he told me what it would be like having a monster like you roaming the countryside after the end of the war.”

“That’s it?” Styke demanded, trying to blink his vision back to normal. “That’s all it took you to betray me? Some hypothetical image?”

“Hypothetical? Pit, Ben! What kind of shit did you smoke in the labor camps? I was there. I saw the terror that was the Mad Lancers. We were a goddamned force of nature. Cutting off the head was the only way to stop us.” Valyaine shook his head. “I wish it didn’t come to that. I wish we’d all just gone home, but instead we had to leave with the worst kinds of scars.” He tapped the side of his head. “Agoston spent all his money to climb into the bottom of a bottle for the last decade. Tenny Wiles got himself a wife and buried his head between her legs. Worst of all, Dvory got put in charge of a whole field army as his reward from Jes. Between you and me, he never did care. I may dislike you, but Dvory … he hates you.”

Styke’s vision finally began to clear. “And you?”

“Me? It bothered me for a year or two. Then I forgot about it. Got a career. Made money. Started to help people in the community. I sate my bloodlust in the ring and I’ve only killed a few men doing it. Sometimes I go on a mala binge. Helps me forget about the things we did in the name of freedom.”

Styke could see Valyaine settle his weight on his back foot, coiling like a snake ready to spring. He fell back a half step and when Valyaine leapt forward, he was ready. He caught the wrist of Valyaine’s right arm and jerked him past, grabbing his neck and using Valyaine’s own momentum to lift him clear off the ground. He spun, flinging Valyaine with all his strength through the arena doors.

The doors burst open, one of them snapping off the hinges as Valyaine stumbled through them and into the street, reeling until he finally collapsed in the mud.

Styke followed him out, removing his knife from his belt. To his surprise, Valyaine wasn’t even unconscious. He lay in a puddle with about as much grace as a man could, looking back up at Styke through hazy eyes and laughing quietly to himself.

“What’s so funny?” Styke asked.

“You,” Valyaine said. “I always told Dvory that you would never die. He insisted you were already gone, that Jes had put you in front of a firing squad and a doctor pronounced you dead.”

“And that’s funny?”

“It’s always funny when Dvory’s wrong.” Valyaine coughed and, slipping and sliding in the mud, slowly regained his feet. He eyed Styke’s knife. “What’s really funny is that you don’t even know what you actually are. You always demand the closest loyalty from your own men, but you never give your own.”

“I’ve always protected Fatrasta,” Styke protested. He wondered why he bothered – he needed to step over and finish this with a swing of his knife.

“Bah,” Valyaine spat. “A concept. You’ve never been loyal to a person. You’ve never listened to a set of orders without thinking about how you were going to disobey them. You’ve never been Commander Ben Styke, the officer that everyone else can depend on. You’ve just been that force of nature. They pointed you at the people they wanted dead and hoped you didn’t come around and get them all killed.” Valyaine looked at the knife in Ben’s hand and raised his fists. “Let’s finish it, big man.”

Styke stared at Valyaine. He stared hard, letting the words rattle around inside his mind. He needed to kill Valyaine, to finish this whole thing off. He stepped forward, setting his foot for good purchase in the mud and took a swing.

Even as he went through the motion, he knew it was half-hearted. Valyaine knew it too. He stepped into the swing, catching Styke’s weak wrist with a quick jab that made his hand go numb. His knife fell from his hands. Valyaine’s next punch came all the way across the boxer’s body and slammed into Styke’s chest with immense power. Styke stumbled back, slipped in the mud, and fell.

He struggled to breathe, looking up at Valyaine. Slowly, Valyaine lowered his fists. He took one step to the side, picking Styke’s knife out of the mud, then tossing it to him hilt-first. “I never wanted you dead, Ben. I just wanted things to end. You think about that real hard. Go slaughter Dynize until you swim in blood. If you still want more, you can come back here and gut me. I’ll even open my shirt for you.”

Valyaine turned around and walked back into the arena.

Styke struggled to his feet. He’d killed men before for walking away during a fight. He watched until Valyaine had disappeared, then limped across the street to where Ka-poel and Celine waited with Amrec. Passersby stared. He ignored them.

Celine had a strange look on her face, Ka-poel a scowl. Styke took the reins from Celine and realized that she’d probably never heard anyone talk like that to him – like an equal who was sick of his shit. She asked in a quiet voice, “Why didn’t you kill him?”

It was an echo of the question she’d asked when he failed to kill Tenny Wiles. Styke sighed, knowing he was never going to hear the end of this from Ibana. Because he beat me fair and square almost came to his lips, but instead he said, “Because he wasn’t wrong,” and limped down the street with Amrec in tow.

Everything hurt – he hadn’t been beaten that hard since the labor camp, and it wasn’t a good kind of memory. He felt around with his tongue, making sure he had all his teeth, and gingerly touched his face. Broken nose. Split lips. Maybe a cracked rib. He still had a hard time breathing. He’d need a big supply of horngum before he left town.

They’d gone a few blocks when Styke suddenly spotted something out of the corner of his eye. He handed the reins to Celine, who still sat alone on Amrec’s saddle, and limped down the street toward an old man he’d spotted leading a horse.

“You there,” he said, tapping the man on the shoulder.

“Eh?” The old man turned, looked up at Styke, and did a double take. “What do you want?”

Styke did a quick circuit of the horse, looking at teeth, eyes, hooves, and legs while the man looked on, bewildered. “It looks like a midget Rosvelean draft horse,” Styke said.

“Not bred that way. She’s just a runt. Can I help you with something?”

“How does she do with noise?”

“What’s this about?” the man demanded.

“Noise?” Styke said. “How does she do with it? Quick movements, large crowds, all that?”

“She does great,” the man retorted. “She’s a damned miniature warhorse, just too small for a soldier. What the pit do you want?”

Styke ignored the man’s frustration. “Name me a price and I’ll buy her right now.”

The man looked around suspiciously before eyeing Styke for a long moment. “A thousand krana.”

It was three hundred more than the horse was worth. “Done,” Styke replied. “You bring her and any kit you have for her out to the Mad Lancer camp by nightfall. Tell Ibana ja Fles that Ben Styke bought a horse for the girl, and she’ll pay you.”

“I … I …”

Styke left the man standing there stuttering and returned to Ka-poel and Celine. Ka-poel had a small smile on her face, and Styke avoided looking her in the eye.

“Who was that?” Celine asked.

“Just some man,” Styke replied.

“What did you want with him?”

Styke took Amrec’s reins, patting Celine gently on the arm. “I wanted to buy his horse. She’s yours. Should be there by the time we go to bed tonight.”

The look of joy on Celine’s face made him forget all about his broken nose, Valyaine, and the entire damned war. Unable to stop grinning, Styke led them back to the Mad Lancer camp.