Empire of War - An Epic Fantasy (The Empire of War Trilogy Book 1) Read online

  EMPIRE OF WAR

  An Epic Fantasy

  VICTOR METHOS

  WAR OF BLOSSOMS

  The warrior spun and his blade cut through muscle and bone as the man screamed from underneath his armor. The warrior pulled the blade from the man’s torso and thrust it through him again, into his heart. Blood spattered over his face; he could taste its metallic tang like warm steel.

  Evening was falling and the dark made the corpses on the ground appear sinister. They blanketed the battlefield like wet sacks. The ground was spongy with the blood spilt that day.

  The warrior’s queen was defeated and lying wounded behind him. The conquering king, the queen’s former husband, was on the way with more men. They would take her as a trophy, perhaps rape her first through the night. With him they would do what they had done with the other generals of the queen: they would skin him alive and let him die of exposure tied to a tree.

  But now his mind was focused elsewhere, on the lone opponent standing among the corpses, a Royal Guard of the king, a giant of a man with a broadsword as thick as a tree trunk. The warrior lowered his faceguard as the guard did the same.

  Silently, they walked among the dead toward a clearing of the bodies. There, they stood and watched each other a moment. The guard looked toward the queen. That was his prize. Only the warrior stood in his way.

  The guard shouted like a man possessed and lifted the broadsword over his head as he ran. At the last moment he brought the sword down and swung with his hips. The warrior ducked low and came up with his blade and the guard kicked his arm, knocking the blade away.

  The warrior rolled backward and then twisted just as the broadsword came down and bit into the ground. He grabbed his blade and thrust at the guard’s leg and then came up into his ribs as the guard clutched the blade with gauntlets made of steel mesh.

  The warrior spun from the ground with a kick that impacted against the guard’s jaw and flung his head backward as the warrior kicked into his knee, practically toppling him.

  As he lifted the blade for the killing blow, the guard pulled a knife from his waist and thrust up into the warrior’s stomach. The warrior missed his target and the sword embedded into the guard’s mask, striking one of his eyes. The man’s screaming filled the air.

  The warrior fell away as the guard did the same. They lay still and the warrior could hear only his own breathing. He looked down and blood was beginning to flow from the wound in his stomach. He pressed his hand to the injury and rose with a groan. The guard was still on his back and had just pulled out the blade embedded into his mask. The warrior rose, hardly able to stand, and stumbled back to his fallen queen. He fell to his knees beside her.

  “I have failed you, My Queen.”

  She was staring at the sky with a fish’s glazed eyes, her blood leaking from the hole in her chest into the dry earth. She looked over and noticed the wound on the warrior. Raising her trembling hand, she touched it, and then placed her palm over it.

  The warrior felt a blinding pain and heat that burned him so intensely he smelled smoke. He tried to pull away but found he couldn’t move.

  As suddenly as it had started, the heat faded. He looked down and the wound was only a scar.

  “My Queen,” he said, his voice cracking with emotion, “heal yourself.”

  “No, I cannot. They have pierced the heart which cannot be healed. I will die soon, my protector.”

  “I’m … so sorry I failed you.”

  “It is my time, my brave one. Leave me here and save yourself. Have children and live your life.”

  “No. It can’t end like this. Not like this.” He paused. “I know a place that has power beyond that known to men. I have been there.”

  “What such place?” she said, gasping lightly for breath.

  “I will take you. And you will be immortal.”

  SLESH OF ULRIK

  I felt the warm spatter of blood on my face like rain as his head split in two. I held my axe still a moment as his eyes went up to stare at the blade, the final image he saw before his soul left him. I pulled the axe out with bits of skull and a final torrent of blood.

  The man’s partner rushed at me from behind. I swung around and caught him in the neck as another man threw a net around me. He darted at me with small blades in each hand, quick and silent. I spun out of the way as the blades passed; I grabbed his wrists and twisted them over each other. I kneed him in the groin and then kicked into his leg, the bone splintering as he fell to the side, screaming. He would be the one.

  I lifted the net and retrieved the two small blades the man had dropped.

  The forest was echoing with the sounds of animals and the sunlight was bright. I didn’t like the light, the sun always hurt my eyes. I ignored it as I sat down in front of the man.

  “You picked a poor target,” I said.

  “Fuck you and your whore of a mother.”

  I slit his belly open, his guts falling out over his fingertips. He didn’t die. He wouldn’t die just yet.

  “Did someone send you?” I asked.

  He was crying now. They always cried. “Let me live and I’ll tell you.”

  “I’ve already killed you. The question is whether it will be a slow death or quick one.”

  He began begging and pleading, talking about wives and children that he didn’t have. It made me laugh and my laughter confused him.

  “Who sent you?”

  “No one, no one sent us,” he said, trying to hold his guts in place, the blood running over his fingers and staining his clothes.

  “You’re just bandits preying on the helpless that come by?”

  “Yes, just bandits.”

  “I don’t believe you.” I reached down and grabbed his guts and twisted.

  He screamed. “Canserius!” he shouted. “Canserius hired us.”

  “Why?”

  “He said he wanted you dead. Paid us each five sesters to do it.”

  I stood up. “Wasn’t worth it.” I placed a blade on each side of his throat and slid them across. He groaned like cattle and fell back, his life pouring into the soft dirt and over the leaves.

  Canserius of Laban. I knew him well. He had beaten a woman once that I was close to and I had paid him a visit and given it to him. Perhaps I went a bit too far, but I was like that sometimes. I couldn’t control myself and that dark feeling would rise in me and take over. But I did stop with him. He was alive after all, even if he was missing his face and arms.

  I picked up my axe after taking the money each of the men had on them and continued walking through the forest. I would have to stop at Laban to visit young Canserius. If he thought I caused him pain before, I’d have something really special for him now.

  But first I would go to Emma.

  Emma who always greeted me with a kiss and a warm meal. She loved me, I think, though I could never repay her love. I didn’t even know what that was. But she loved me. Me, who was reviled by all, even the gods. And a god was probably the only thing I had not killed yet. But Emma didn’t care.

  I would visit her first, and then find Canserius.

  2

  I continued on the road a long while, listening to the sounds of the forest around me. Some people were scared of it, as it held all manner of beasts, but not me. I preferred the beasts. Beasts were simple. They either wanted to kill you or be left alone, and you always knew which.

  My axe was heavy. It was not my preferred weapon. I liked swords. But it was the only weapon I had at the moment. I heard horses up ahead and saw men in a great caravan speeding toward me.
They held the royal banner. The family Kandarian, the rulers of the Empire of Oryt. I cared nothing for them but I cared nothing for any of the rulers I had seen. One was interchangeable with another as far as I could tell.

  I stood to the side to let them pass. It would have been fun to stand my ground and watch his guards decide whether to kill me or laugh, but I didn’t. They were the Royal Guard, the best trained fighters in all the Empire, the ones taken from their parents at five and tortured to make them immune to pain. The ones that would die happily for the emperor.

  Emperor. Hgg. Funny saying that. We’ve had nothing but kings for so long it was a surprise when he changed his title to emperor. More fitting, he said, for his station. But I think king left a bad taste in the people’s mouths after he murdered his own queen on the battlefield in the War of Blossoms.

  The caravan sped by and I saw the carriage with gold trim holding some member of the emperor’s family, maybe even the emperor himself. I waited until they were past, the royal guards staring down at me from their massive steeds with their shining armor. There would be no fight today, but one day. It was inevitable. I was too curious to see what they could do with a lifetime of training.

  The first village I came upon was Trefect. Small and tucked away in the woods, it was surrounded by sheep and cattle and horses. You could walk right into it and the first thing you would see is a carving of a large mug of ale over the alehouse. I walked in. It smelled of all alehouses, like vomit and food cooking.

  It was dark with no windows, the way I liked. I sat at a table and a wench came over and brought a dark ale.

  “I’m hungry too,” I said.

  “We got roasted swine and chicken.”

  “Chicken. Swine is too smart. It’s like eating a person.”

  She shrugged and walked away to the cook and shouted at him.

  I stared at the patrons. A ragged lot. Most of the men were out breaking their backs working fields from sun up to sun down for a bowl of soup and hopefully one for their families. It seemed a losing proposition. Much better to be in the pub drinking the days away, or doing what I did: stealing for a living.

  I finished my ale and shouted at the wench for another. I saw that they had stacks of ferris root, a fine root that you smoke. It has a calming effect and was the only thing I found that helped that dark feeling I get. I asked for a stick and she lit it for me and I smoked. Some people laugh hysterically while smoking but it never does that to me. It just makes me not want to bash everyone’s skulls into the ground.

  By the time night fell I was on my tenth ale and spending all the money I’d taken from those men, buying ale and ferris roots for everyone who came in. I didn’t want to be liked. I just thought it amusing that Canserius’ money got spent on the peasants he so hated.

  Fights broke out around me later in the night as everyone grew drunk. Two men were battling next to me but I just focused on my root. One hit the other hard in the jaw and he flew over me and I ducked to let him pass. Another fight happened because one man flirted with the wife of another. Then they stood about like idiots, hitting each other in the face when there were perfectly good knives and hot pans laying about.

  Eventually, they stopped hitting and I could see the wife deciding who had won. She would probably go home with whoever came out on top, but it was too hard to tell. So she went home with her husband. Stick with the devil you know, I suppose.

  By midnight I had drank twenty ales and was so drunk I could barely see. Just enough that I might actually be able to get to sleep. I hadn’t slept for three days and the only way it ever came about was getting this drunk and forcing my body to give up. Otherwise I’d be up all night with the dark feeling. Guaranteed, I’d have nightmares, but they didn’t bother me. It wasn’t much different from what I saw every day.

  I stumbled up to the front and asked for a room, or asked for something, it was difficult to tell exactly what was coming out of my mouth. But the wench understood me. She took one sesters and stole another one but I didn’t care. She led me up some wooden stairs to a room and opened the door. I collapsed on the bed.

  “You know,” she said, “for another sesters I can keep you warm tonight.”

  I threw her a sesters. “Keep it and leave me be.”

  She left and shut the door behind her. I didn’t feel that dark feeling anymore. I felt nothing. I blacked out lying on a rough bed of hay and cloth.

  3

  I awoke sometime in midday. My head was pounding and I sat up and checked my pockets. The last of my sesters was gone. As was my axe.

  I stretched my neck from side-to-side. My body didn’t fit my person sometimes. I wasn’t massive like some men, wasn’t intimidating. Except for my face and eyes. That’s what I’d been told anyway, that my eyes had darkness to them. I don’t know if that was true or not but it felt about right.

  I lumbered down the stairs and sat at a table. “Ale,” I said. The wench brought it over. I grabbed her wrist. “I don’t care about the money, but I need my axe. Who took it?”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said, pulling away.

  I stood up. There were only a few other people here and the cook. He glanced at me and then away. “I’ll start with the first house,” I said. “I’ll kill everyone inside. Then I’ll go to the second house and the third … until I find my axe.”

  This wasn’t exactly true. I never had and never could hurt a woman. I don’t know why. Maybe because I was raised by a mother who protected me from a monster of a father. Maybe because I felt sorry for them. Maybe because I still needed to believe that a part of me was human. I don’t know why. But they didn’t know that.

  The cook swallowed.

  The wench saw his fear and said, “He’s not going to do it.”

  I grabbed one of the drunks next to me. Just a poor bastard who happened to be in the wrong place. I rammed his head through the wall and then spun and flung him across the room into another poor bastard who was asleep at his table. The wood from the table crashed loudly and splinters flew everywhere. I grabbed a chair and flung it into another chair, shattering them both like glass.

  “All right!” the cook yelled. “I have your axe right here. I was just keeping it for you is all.”

  I walked over and took my axe. I held the blade just away from his face and I could see the fear in his eyes that comes when a man isn’t sure if he’s about to die or not. I smiled and walked out.

  The wench yelled out, “You can’t treat people like this, you know. People always get what’s comin’ to ’em.”

  I shat in some trees and used leaves to wipe before leaving the town. I could hear a stream up the road. I went to it and let the cold water run over my hands and splashed it on my face to wake me up.

  The road was hot under my feet as the sun beat down. I needed a horse and hoped some bandits or assassins who had been paid in horses rather than money would try to get the better of me. But no such luck. I just had to walk and walk until my feet ached.

  I rested on the side of the road under the shade of a tree. I’d seen plenty of people on the roads but this one man who came along interested me. He was a slavemaster, driving new acquisitions in front of him, about twenty men and five women, two young girls, bound about the neck and hands. He had several other men with him with whips in their hands.

  One of the young girls fell and a male slave helped her up. One of the masters jumped on him, whipping him furiously, splitting his skin; blood rained out of him. The slave’s action was innocent, but he hadn’t been told to do it. They were only to do what they’re told.

  The other slaves stood by. It was a show for them. One of the women was crying quietly: probably the man’s wife.

  The slavemaster whipped the male until he couldn’t move. He lay on the ground, twitching, unconscious. Then the master turned to the young girl who had fallen. He spun her around and pulled down the rags she was wearing as a shirt. He smiled as he ran his hand over the whip, sliding the
blood off to ensure that it wasn’t slick when it tore her flesh.

  He leaned back with the whip, a grin on his face.

  My axe embedded in his face like teeth in soft cake. His legs still moved and he pranced around a bit like a chicken and it made me laugh. The other four pulled out their swords. I walked toward the young girl. She was crying and I pulled up her shirt to cover her. A little doll was by her feet, no more than rags, like her clothing. I lifted it and bent down. “She looks like she’s not very frightened of anything,” I said.

  “She’s not,” the girl said, tears streaming down her cheeks.

  “That’s the way to be. Don’t be scared of anything and nothing can hurt you.”

  I handed the doll back to her. Another slavemaster on a horse rode up to me. He pulled out a scrap of parchment with writing on it.

  “This is a lawful order from the emperor’s clerk himself granting ownership of these slaves to me. You have interfered with a lawful imperial order and in the process killed one of my men. By law, I have the right to take you or a member of your family in his place.”

  I stared at the horse. “That is a mighty fine horse. Strong and well fed.”

  He looked at my face and I saw the fear in his eyes. The dark feeling got a hold of me and I couldn’t help but laugh.

  4

  I saved the slavemaster for last. He was lying on the ground with his legs cut off and he was screaming. Three other corpses lay at my feet. The fourth was trying to run. He was out there in the forest and I was going to give him a good head start. I felt like a hunt today.

  I looked to the slaves. “Under imperial law, you’re slaves. You need to leave the Empire.”

  “And go where?” one woman said.

  “You can go north to the forests or east to the sea or west to Axeria and buy your passage to some other land.” I saw the girl looking at me. “You should take her now,” I said pointing to the doll, “so she doesn’t get nightmares from what I’m going to do.”