Jason Lewis - Phoenix Rising

“What has happened to me?” she muttered to herself, a habit she was becoming acquainted with as the years passed and one that Martius found particularly amusing.

She stood, moved to her bed and perched on its edge. The book she had been reading lay on the sheets. She picked it up now and absently thumbed through to the page she had marked by folding the corner. Books and learning had increasingly become her escape over the years. To a certain extent, it had always been so. Now, even as her ageing eyes began to betray her, she found she was rarely without one.

It was a good book, Ellasand judged. A short treatise on the role of ballistic weapons in the modern legionary army by Martius’s brilliant young nephew, Metrotis. He made a good argument for the mechanical monstrosities being the future of modern warfare and showed, through the use of diagrams and pictures in his own clear and artistic hand, how these could be built to be more effective.

She read for some time, fascinated by the young scientist’s understanding of engineering. Metrotis seemed such a gentle soul and she wondered if he really comprehended the destructive horror of the machines he had developed. Finally, as the candles in the room began to burn low, Ellasand sighed, put the tome down and returned her gaze to the mirror.

The sound of song drifted up from below. Glacis, the cook, was singing as she often did in the evening. Tonight she chose an ancient hymn, ‘the choice of Terran’. Her rich, melodic tones penetrated the creeping dusk, keeping the night at bay, it seemed, for a moment longer.

Martius loved her, of that Ellasand was sure, but she wondered how long that love would last when her beauty faded as Glacis’s song soon would.

They had met late in life. She a wealthy merchant’s daughter whose father would not allow her to marry for fear of a huge dowry; he a hero of the Empire, freshly returned from the Xandarian hedge wars — which were really just a series of squabbles between the free states — and veteran of the pacification of the hill tribes. At thirty-five years of age, he had been in his prime, and as the oldest son of one of the ancient noble houses of the Empire, he could have had any woman he wished. Instead, after one chance meeting at the theatre, Martius had chased her with the single-minded abandon of a teenager. Finally, her father — realising that, as his daughter’s suitor was staggeringly wealthy he need not fear for his savings — had agreed wholeheartedly to the alliance.

“Will you still love me when I am a grey?” she said to her reflection, but the beautiful hawk-eyed woman looking back at her gave no reply. Increasingly, Martius would stay up late, working on his ‘plans’ and meeting with his staff and aides even more than was usual… even for a workaholic like him.

“A wind of change is rising in the Empire,” he had told her as they lay in each other’s arms just two nights before. “There will come a time when all men will be judged on their merits alone and will be able to reach their true potential. What if the legions were just the start, Ella? What if the men speak to their families, their friends, planting seeds of change…? What if the message spreads like forest fire in summer?”

“You must be careful.” she had replied, her heart thumping in her chest. “You cannot be associated with the republican movement; it is too dangerous — even for you.”

He had just smiled his confident little smile. “They know I am not part of it, my love. You must not worry. I believe in freedom and free thought, but I love the Empire, and the Emperor.”

“You loved the old emperor,” She had replied in a tone she immediately regretted. “Do not be fooled; his son is not cast from the same mould.”

Arguing voices and loud footsteps from the veranda dragged Ellasand from her reverie.

“I am telling you it was a valid move!” said a young and vibrant male voice, already deepened by the change.

“Uncle Metrotis says that he couldn’t find a reference to it anywhere and he looked in Goodlan’s almanac!” said another, very similar voice, just as vibrant but a touch slower, deeper and less clipped.

“I would listen to him, Accipiter,” said a female, her tone clean and crisp. “Don’t forget what Mama says about Uncle Metrotis: he’s probably a genius; and either way he’s definitely smarter than you are.”

Ellasand smiled thoughtfully as her children entered the room — without knocking as usual — through the ironbound door that led onto the upper veranda.

Ursus did not look at all happy. She thought it likely he had lost a game of steal the king, which was always deeply frustrating to him. She often wondered what it must be like for her twins, almost identical in every way physically, but so clearly different in so many others. They were equally matched in most things, but Accipiter, who constantly reminded Ursus that he was the elder by ‘at least two minutes’, did seem to have gained the upper hand recently when playing their favourite board game.

“Mama,” said Elissa, at eighteen a woman grown and three years the boys’ senior, “will you please sort these two out? It’s getting dark outside, and do you know what the little clowns were proposing to do?”

“Ah, shut up, Lissa!” snapped Accipiter.

“They,” Elissa raised her left hand and pointed at the pair, finger dancing from one to the other, “were proposing to have a duel with real swords , in the dark .”

Ellasand glowered her disapproval at the boys. “I certainly hope that isn’t true, you two.”

“We were just joking around, Mama,” Ursus said sullenly, elbowing his brother gently in the ribs. “We wouldn’t really have had a duel.”

“If that’s the case, do you mind me asking you both why you are wearing your swords?” Ellasand flicked a finger towards the sword belts they both wore.

The boys exchanged a look and then turned back to their mother, identical expressions of regret — that Ellasand had little doubt were contrived — on their handsome young faces.

“Forgot we had them on,” they replied in perfect synchrony.

Ellasand sighed. They are still so young, still as they were when they were children in so many ways . “You will report to Darcus at once and have him return your swords to the armoury. I will not have you carrying dangerous weapons around the house unsupervised.”

“Sorry Mama,” said Accipiter. “But we were just with Darcus, and Andiss, and Dexus at sword practice.” He smiled winningly. “We just forgot to hand them back… honest.”

Ellasand frowned. “I don’t want to hear any more. I will be speaking to Darcus about this in the morning and we will know the truth of it. Just do as you are told.” She waved a hand dismissively. “Go on now.”

The boys exchanged dejected looks and turned towards the door. A dark shadow flitted across them.

Ellasand looked up; she expected it was Martius, or perhaps Darcus looking for the boys. Come to chastise them, perhaps.

The man in the doorway was a stranger. And he held a drawn sword.

Elissa let out a piercing scream.

Martius sat at the desk in his study reviewing troop manifests. It was a thankless task, but a necessity. He paused to rest his eyes and looked out through the open window in front of him. The garden was in its full glory on both sides, the prize going to Ellasand’s ornamental beds, where her roses were stealing the limelight once again.

At the opposite end of the enclosed courtyard stood the kitchen. Outside its door, the cook, Glacis, sat on the steps, taking her turn at the butter churn as she chatted to the freed slave, Sissa. Glacis began to sing as she often would, in the evening as the sun began to set, her voice high pitched and melodic. She recited an ancient hymn to Terran, high god above them all.