Stephen Hunt - Jack Cloudie

His empty pistol discarded, the commodore held his position in the retreating line alongside Westwick, his sword hacking and thrusting as the number of claw-guards pushing them back swelled, both Jackelians made mere components in the living war machines savaging each other. Every metre they lost littered with dead. Every minute they gained for the main attack purchased with their blood and bodies; every second closer to their ranks being thinned to a complete rout.

No place for a man — no place for Jared Black’s unlucky bones.

‘Go back, Omar,’ called Salwa from the line of claw-guards blocking his passage down the tower steps. ‘You do not have to die here tonight for the sake of someone else’s palace intrigue.’

‘It is not a palace intrigue I die for,’ said Omar. ‘It is the Caliph Eternal and my guardsman’s oath. I already gave you my answer back on the walls of the palace fortress.’

‘You thought you were giving your answer to Salwa,’ called the new grand marshal of the guardsmen. ‘Not to Shadisa.’

‘No! I was right. Salwa did kill Shadisa, for I see nothing of her in you ,’ shouted Omar.

‘Then you have been blinded by your stupid male pride,’ retorted Salwa, ‘for we are exactly the same. You never knew me at all, did you? Only the idea of a golden-haired girl you filled with all your hopes back in Haffa.’

And how I wish to the hundred faces of god that idea was still alive, somewhere.

‘Order your soldiers aside,’ demanded the caliph, stepping forward. ‘You have fallen under the glamour of the grand vizier, I can see that. Stand down your force here and I will see that you are pardoned for your treason. There are womb mages inside the city who can undo the evil changes that have been worked upon you.’

‘The changes that really count, little enculi,’ spat Salwa, ‘aren’t the ones your sorcerers can undo at your whim. You and your ossified regime have held back progress for so long that you have forgotten how to bend with the winds of change. And if you can’t bend, you must be made to snap.’

Omar rested his hand on the pommel of his sheathed sword. ‘I only hear the propaganda of the Sect of Razat. None of your own words.’

Salwa slipped the scimitar out of his belt and raised it ready to commence the attack as the leather-uniformed ranks of his claw-guards jostled each other, preparing to spring up the stairs and begin the slaughter. ‘Then you may hear mine now.’

There was a splintering sound behind Omar as the snarling beyrogs’ massive crossbows were cranked back and projectiles pushed into position, ready to release the first of their heavy three-fletched bolts.

The caliph spoke softly to Omar. ‘Let the beyrogs go in first. I heard your voice when you spoke of this Shadisa back in our cell; I would not order you to do this, guardsman.’

‘You do not have to, your majesty,’ said Omar, drawing his scimitar. ‘This is my fate and this is my choice.’

The caliph smiled sadly. ‘So be it, then. They are coming up the stairs while we are going down, with only enough space for one of us to pass. That’s a story as old as time. Let us settle it now …’

There was a moment’s silence, the claw-guards’ quivering talons left shaking in the air, the wordless growling beyrogs holding their oversized scimitars out high as though they were totems to the storm shifting above them. Both sides’ roars rose up almost simultaneously and the two ranks surged towards each other, Omar and Salwa’s swords clashing in the centre of the melee as they ran to do murder. It begins.

Biologicks from both sides crashed into their enemies in multiple waves of animal frenzy, the claw-guards’ charge fleet and furious, the beyrogs meeting them with the weight of moving mountains, beating aside sabre-fingered strikes with four-foot tall scimitars as bestial yells were hurled between the hacking, thrusting, howling forces. Dead soldiers spilled over the sides of the twisting staircase, living ones too, still locked in fierce combat. Lightning flashes illuminated the hellish scene while the heavens split and roared, two armies from a nightmare spiralling towards each other far above the black spires of the Forbidden City.

Lost in the sodden stench of the animal rage all around him, the world reduced down to his own private combat, Omar struggled against Salwa, his fingers locked around the wrist of his opponent’s sword arm, as Salwa’s were locked around his, the two of them desperately shifting and struggling for advantage.

‘Is this,’ Salwa panted through gritted teeth, ‘what you want?’

‘No,’ said Omar, his arm burning as held back the blade inching towards his nose. ‘But it is what we have.’

Salwa grinned through a snarl. ‘Yes.’ Their swords danced, and Omar turned one of Salwa’s thrusts a little too clumsily, the point cutting his left cheek and drawing a bitingly painful thin rivulet of blood there.

‘A duelling scar for you,’ said Salwa. ‘But there’ll be none left among your old guardsmen friends to appreciate it.’

Try for my heart next time. You’ve already filleted it.

They both fell back as a beyrog collapsed into their space, three claw-guards slashing at the giant’s yellow breastplate, taking out slices of metal armour with each swing. Free of Salwa’s grasp, Omar warily circled the new commander of the guardsman, both their scimitars held high in the classic duellist’s pose.

‘I am stronger than you, Omar. Faster.’

‘The grand vizier’s sorcerers refashioned your muscles well,’ spat Omar, not taking his eyes off the gently swaying blade. ‘And your soul too. It used to be as clear as a lake. Now it is a dirty puddle.’

‘The Sect of Razat freed me!’

‘I felt your soul!’ shouted Omar, turning aside Salwa’s blade as it came out in an exploratory tap. ‘You don’t even know what they’ve done to you.’

Again Salwa’s steel sprang out, far faster and more decisive this time. ‘I could say the same about you, Omar. Spouting dull platitudes about the honour of the Caliph Eternal. Is this what the guardsmen have done to you ? Made you care about a dying age? Made you pick the wrong side of history when all you used to care about was a life of ease and your belly?’

Omar feinted right and cut left, but Salwa was too quick, blocking his thrust. ‘The guardsmen are right.’

‘This makes right,’ yelled Salwa, pushing forward with a quick sequence of thrusts so rapid that Omar had to give ground up the steps as he parried. ‘Victory and nothing else. You’ve picked a bad time to learn to care about something at last, Omar Barir.’

Omar nearly stumbled back over one of the dead claw-guards. ‘I used to care about you.’

‘Another lost cause. What a pity you didn’t join us when I offered you the chance. The future could have been ours.’

No future I want.

‘I am going to gut your sect’s future,’ snarled Omar. ‘And when I’m done with them, I’m going to hunt down Immed Zahharl and feed him my sword inch by inch for what he’s done to you and everyone I ever cared about.’

‘Through me first,’ said Salwa, meeting Omar’s blade with a chime of metal. ‘I’m the future! These beautiful claw-guards are our new guardsmen. More loyal and reliable than you and your men ever were.’

Omar fell back again. Perhaps this twisted shadow of the woman he had loved was correct. We’re too alike, too evenly matched. Salwa met every blow Omar gave out, turned every thrust, reversed every parry. Salwa was even wearing the same uniform as the claw-guards; monsters following their new grand marshal, in crude, bestial mockery of the brave men that Omar had served alongside. Omar’s jacket was soaked with rain, sweat and the blood of the dying biologicks still impaling and battering each other around him. His muscles and tendons seemed made of living fire as he tried to summon up enough strength to beat his way through Salwa’s guard. Is this the fight you wanted, fate? Is this what you have spared me for? I must kill the sole piece of Shadisa that hasn’t already been murdered by the grand vizier.