Gavin Smith - The Age of Scorpio

They sank into the planet itself. Spiralling slowly around massive roots that dug into crust and then mantle. Finally they flew through a network of airlock-like heavily armoured doors that shut behind them one after another.

The luxury G-car landed in a huge open space. There were other more utilitarian and military vehicles present. The structure might have been the first construction that Zabilla had ever seen that was not made of wood. She had to search her neunonics to find references to nano-bonded reinforced concrete.

Still without saying anything, the avatar, now looking as ostentatious and out of place as Zabilla felt, led her through a heavily defended series of chambers to a very secure laboratory, which, unlike her own laboratory, seemed to be all substance and no style.

Lying on a metal table in the centre of the lab, surrounded by very visible sensors of every conceivable type and a ring of automated weapon systems, was a strange, roughly coffin-shaped cocoon structure made of a white substance that Zabilla did not recognise.

‘Congratulations. You have got the job,’ the avatar said.

‘Why are they here?’ It was unusual for Bress to hear nervousness in Ettin’s voice.’

At Crom Dhubh’s behest. They harvested the crystal,’ Bress said emotionlessly.

‘But then why does the dragon remain?’

‘It feeds from her while poisoning her like a parasite. It wants to ride her corruption when it comes. Besides, it is a little added security.’

‘These primitives are no threat to us.’

‘Some of these primitives have the blood of the gods in them.’

Ettin stared at Bress for a moment, trying to fathom him. ‘Watered down,’ the two-headed creature said, turning away.

‘Not all.’

‘Your woman. The one you spared.’

‘She is not my woman, but she is coming south with two others.’

‘As I said, primitives.’

‘They are from the Eggshell.’

Ettin turned to Bress again. ‘That is a myth.’

Bress could not be bothered to respond. If it was a myth then where had the warrior and the swollen-headed demon come from? He looked at what they had grown. It towered high above the ships and the wading giants. He tried to ignore the smell, the screams. They were allowed to scream now as they were feeding her. He thought of the dragon burrowing into her flesh like a venomous tick and he tried to ignore the feeling that he had just betrayed his entire species.

Dead men writhed on the ground before the fire. They looked like worms, grubs, their movements a mockery of dance. The dead men averted their eyes and cowered as a figure formed in the fire. Formed of flickering black flame, the figure was warped, twisted and difficult to see, as if parts of its shape made no sense. The horses whickered, whinnied and stamped nervously where they had been tethered. It was not the sight and smells of the corpse-studded ground that made them nervous.

Those prostrate on the ground felt the power of this mere shadow of their charnel god. The Dark Man in the flames, Crom Dhubh, the man the witch folk fire-danced with, was just a more powerful messenger of oblivion than they themselves.

‘Carrion warriors, continue to drive the weak before you, take your fill of their flesh and drive the rest to the sacrifice.’

Cadwr was nervous, but the young warrior knew he had led his small part of the warband well. They had ranged along the south-western banks of the river of the Grey Father. They killed those they caught, let the rest flee to be herded to the south by the larger bands led by Ysgawyn. They burned the land and slaughtered the cattle. There would be famine when winter came. Only the dead gods would feast, as would their servants, those who ate the flesh of heroes blessed by the gods themselves.

‘What would you have us do?’

The warped, living black flame turned to look at the young warrior covered in lime and blood.

‘When you meet Ysgawyn, go to the Crown. Slay this Rin; he is old and weak like the blood of the god within him. Bring the rest of his people to my servant, the tall man. I will send beasts from the Otherworld to aid you.’

Britha stood in the darkness just beyond the light of the fire and the circle of lime- and gore-crusted warriors. She knew that simply by being still they would not see her for looking. It was movement that gave away the hidden.

The figure in the fire was making her sick. She could feel it in the air somehow. She felt the violation of the natural order of things, a connection between the living fire and wherever this dark figure actually stood. The Cirig knew that you never looked too hard into a fire as you risked attracting the attention of callous gods who lived in burning places.

As sick as it made her, she felt its call. Was this shadow Bress’s master? she wondered. The figure spoke to the same parts of her that the dreams of Bress did. The dreams were more frequent and intense now. But perhaps it was just the thought of battle that was making her wet.

They were in the northern lands of the Atrebates, the tribe whose king they sought. What the black curraghs had left, the Corpse People had despoiled. Tangwen said that the Corpse People had been one of the many tribes that made up the Durotriges, a confederation of peoples from the far west. They had been expelled from the confederation for their dark practices. They lived on the plain where many of the other tribes placed their dead in barrows or left them for the crows to carry to the Otherworld. The plain bordered Annwn, the land of the dead, and the Corpse People were thought to have strayed too close to that border.

They had been travelling for ten days now. The last Britha had seen of the People of the Snake had been the little girl holding one of Fachtna’s arm torcs. The Will of Dagon had carried them west up the river until Hanno had finally refused to take them further despite there being plenty of loot for the Carthaginians from deserted and destroyed villages. Tangwen had led them on foot from there. The young hunter and warrior had taken them deeper into the ruined landscape. They had gone west first, skirting areas that had been raided, trying to avoid bands of warriors from further north seeking to protect their lands. Then they headed south. Britha did not trust the land here – its flatness seemed unnatural – but she had to admit that before its despoliation it must have been very rich.

‘What have you brought for me?’ the warped figure in the living flame asked. Its inhuman voice made Britha’s skin crawl. Bress must be his slave. This monster must have forced him to drink from the chalice she had seen. She had to push down these thoughts, focus, forget about Bress. All that mattered was her tribe. Regardless of this thing’s hold on Bress and her attraction to him. Bress still had to die.

The boy they brought forward was too terrified to cry. Pale and naked, there were cuts on his head and face where hair and eyebrows had been shaved off. The smile on the face of the warrior who’d asked about Rhi Rin told Britha that he took pleasure from this. She’d seen the look before on the face of blood-drunk warriors and black-robed sacrificers who relished what should have been no more than their duty. The boy shook like a leaf. They were not a strong people , Britha thought.

They made the boy kneel before the fire. Cadwr crawled behind him, averting his eyes. He put the stone blade into the small of the captive’s back. He would destroy the bone there so the boy could not move and then feed him to the fire so the Dark Man could drink the weakling’s suffering. The smiling lime-covered warrior wanted the smell of blood boiling in blackening skin so that Crom Dhubh would know his devotion. He was looking forward to the ragged feel of the rough stone blade tearing through soft skin and hard bone. He savoured the boy’s fear as stone touched flesh.