Cameron Johnston - The Traitor God

The Magash Mora was dead.

Now you can rest in peace, my old friend.

It was a small but comforting mercy.

I lay gasping for breath, drained of all strength, a gentle breeze cooling my sweat-slick skin. The crystal was hot in my hand, pulsing with life, its alien whispers stroking my mind as it fed on my magic. The traitor magus, his pet god, and that other thing flailed away in the back of my mind, crude but strong, their grip on the Magash Mora’s core slipping with each second it spent in my hands.

The mountainous corpse of the Magash Mora twitched and jerked, jets of blood still spurting but weakening. To our relief it showed no signs of reviving.

Eva lay unmoving, and with my magic leeched away I couldn’t be sure if she was still amongst the living or if her agony had ended with her mission. I was too exhausted to feel more than a numb sense of loss. Numbness was the mind’s way of coping, and that scab would fall off soon enough. Her bravery didn’t merit this kind of fate, but then neither had the countless thousands of other lives devoured today – I swallowed and avoided thinking about that.

Martain and Breda picked their way through rubble towards us, stained and sore and looking every bit as awful as I felt. They stopped a safe distance away, swords sheathed at their hips. “How is she?” Martain said.

Eva was encased in a warped shell of steel so I put my ear to her mouth listening for any sign of breath, but the breeze made that useless. I shrugged. “There’s nothing we can do anyway,” I said. “Even if she is still alive, I doubt there is a healer who would even try.” Under the armour her skin was crispy as crackling and most of her exposed flesh was seared to the bone.

Breda sobbed, more from shock and relief than for Eva. “How could she walk like that, never mind fight?”

I shook my head. “She is possessed of a rare iron will. As if a shitty daemon and a traitorous pyromancer could ever stop Evangeline of House Avernus from carrying out her mission.”

“She will be remembered,” Martain said.

“You had better,” I said, grimacing as I hauled myself to my feet. “You two will likely be the only ones to tell of what she did here.”

“What do you mean?” Martain said, eyeing the crystal in my hands. “Is that what I think it is?”

“Yes, this is where it all began. They fed it mageblood to create the Magash Mora.” I winced as I took a tentative step on my weakened leg, pain spiking. I set the crystal down – just for a moment – to let my magic wash away what tiredness it could. My stomach rumbled as wounds burned and itched from quickened healing. My hands shook with fear and shock and starvation.

“That sounds more like a job for a sanctor,” Martain said.

“You would take it to the Arcanum,” I said. “I mean to destroy it.”

After a moment’s hesitation, he nodded. “Perhaps that would be for the best.”

Breda slammed into Martain, knocking him aside. Flame engulfed her as Martain landed awkwardly. She shrieked and fell, kicking and screaming and sizzling.

“Drat. Missed,” Harailt said, appearing through a bank of smoke.

A dozen huge Skallgrim warriors in blackened mail and blood-soaked furs marched beside him, led by the Gifted wolf-ship captain. Harailt’s eyes glossed over Eva’s burnt figure, not even acknowledging his vile handiwork on somebody that had called him friend.

Martain surged to his feet and drew his sword. “Breda!” But she was already a smoking corpse. “You murdering scum. I’m going to cut your rancid head off!”

“Ah, ah, ah,” Harailt said, waving a finger. “No, you won’t.”

I sought out his mind but it rebuffed my exhausted fumblings.

He chuckled. “I must admit that it was gratifying to skin your fat friend after his arson destroyed my stock of mageblood. The timing was perfectly terrible you know. The Magash Mora was supposed to have emerged in all her mature glory, fully capable of scaling the cliffs of the Old Town. The Skallgrim fleet sent by my allies was meant to arrive in time to help me rebuild and consolidate my control, not to waste manpower in pointless battle.” He sighed, then smiled. “Ah well, these things happen. One must be adaptable.”

“And what did you plan to do with the Magash Mora once you’d won?” I asked. “Did you think such ravenous hunger would just go away?” I itched to smash his face repeatedly into a wall until it was paste.

He shrugged. “I would unleash it upon my enemies, you stupid tyrant. One land at a time until all bowed to the new Arcanum and its new archmagus.”

“And you call him a tyrant,” Martain said. “You are offal, filth that deserves to be scraped off the boots of decent folk.”

Harailt twitched, expression flickering through horror and fear, then anger before settling back on a mocking grin. He ignored Martain’s jibe to focus on me. “It amused me to make your friend Charra’s daughter dirty herself cleaning up my loose ends, but can you imagine my joy when I found out that you were still alive? That I get to dispose of you is a lovely gift indeed. There is no place for base-born vermin like you in the true Arcanum.”

“What about your loyalty to Setharis?” I said. “What kind of monster would willingly bring this horror down on us? Look at what you did. Look, you sick fucker! The city is burning.”

“I…” A shadow of confusion passed through his eyes. He shook his head and his gaze swiftly hardened. “Setharis is riddled with rot and its leaders are corrupt and impotent. I know you see this. To heal the Setharii empire I must cut off the head of this sickly serpent, and if a few lives need be sacrificed then so be it. I will rebuild anew, lacking the weakness and cowardice of past leadership. I will lead the new Arcanum to a golden age beyond even the wildest dreams of ancient Escharr.”

“Oh, will you now?” I said, picking up the crystal core and backing away. “What about–”

The Skallgrim captain cut off my attempt to stall for more time, speaking in coarse Setharii. “Just kill them already.”

Harailt waved acceptance and their men charged. “Kill the fools. Bring me his head and that crystal.” He grinned, enjoying this deadly game.

I took one look at the advancing warriors and did what I do best – ran away. Harailt shrieked for them to give chase as I dodged his premature spurt of flame and legged it down the ruins of an alley. Axes thunked into the wall behind me. I hoped Martain had enough sense to run instead of making a futile last stand over the corpses of our companions. Honour was an admirable thing but I much preferred living; I’d been running from death for ten long years and I’d be damned if I allowed an odious little shite like Harailt the satisfaction of finally offing me. One way or another, I’d end him.

When I was young I’d made sport of losing people in the narrow lanes of the Warrens, getting away from bigger boys and brutal gangs with my hide intact. The trick was to get far enough ahead and make so many turns and twists that they had to pause at each intersection just to discover which way you’d gone, allowing me to gain a little more lead each time. But my natural strength was nearing its end and all that steel and leather the Skallgrim wore didn’t slow them down. They were hard on my heels and gaining.

I scrambled over a pile of rubble and headed left, then took a sharp right down a narrow passage choked with refuse. If it was a tight fit for a skinny bastard like me then those hulking armoured lads would have trouble following. The sound of steel scraping along stone and guttural curses gifted me a fleeting pleasure.

I burst from the passage into a wider street, wheezing for breath, legs threatening to cramp. A few blank-faced Docklanders scraping through the ruins of their collapsed homes looked up and scarpered at the sight of me. A blood-stained madman holding a huge glowing crystal encrusted with weird runes wasn’t somebody you wanted to be around. I shifted the murmuring crystal core to my other arm and scrambled down a side-street as shouts in the guttural Skallgrim tongue roared from behind.