the guiding instinct within.
‘This is home,’ he whispered. ‘This is us.’
When the pattern within the pattern was done, Crys stepped back. The middle of the stone glowed, the carvings bright as starlight in winter. The air hummed. Ash had already knelt and bowed his head and Crys opened his mouth to tell him to get up, silly bollocks, and stop embarrassing them both. The Fox God stopped the words.
‘Two-Eyed Man,’ Cutta shouted. ‘Our legends tell of you. The teachings of our old priests talk of your appearance and how you will lead us.’
‘To death and beyond,’ Crys muttered, though none heard him. ‘I do not lead you,’ he shouted back. ‘I do not seek to take command, but the Gods of Light need you. I need you. If Rilpor falls, the Mireces will come for you next. Your faith and your way of life will be forbidden. Krike will drown in its people’s blood unless we stop them in Rilpor. Unless you help me stop them.’
The war leader walked forward into the empty space between them. The stone at Crys’s back was still humming, as though a million sleeping bees fanned their wings as they dreamt inside it. ‘Is this magic? Blood magic?’ she asked quietly, loosening the knife on her belt.
‘This is me,’ the Fox God said and she took a step back, awe and fear chasing across her features. ‘This is the fate of Gilgoras and the part you may play in it.’
‘May?’
The Fox God spread His hands. ‘I do not command.’
‘You killed the Dark Lady?’ she asked. A tiny frog was tattooed in front of her left ear.
‘I drank Her and destroyed Her,’ the Fox God replied. ‘But She seeks a way back and Her followers aid Her. If they succeed all will turn to Blood and madness. While I can stop the Dark Lady again, I cannot stop Her forces alone.’
‘You are not alone, Two-Eyed Man,’ Cutta Frog-dream said, and knelt at his feet. ‘Green Ridge is with you and together we will convince all Krike, including the Warlord.’
That was easier than expected, Foxy.
There was a rustle of amusement from within. Don’t get used to it.
Seventh moon, first year of the reign of King Corvus
Throne room, the palace, Rilporin, Wheat Lands
‘The thing about control that you Rilporians have never quite understood is that if you don’t believe in it, neither will those you rule.’
Corvus examined the nobleman kneeling on the marble before his improvised throne, the original now a charred heap of wood and gold leaf. ‘Take us, for example, and them.’ He pointed at the fresh corpses. ‘I have control over you, because I have proved beyond doubt that if you disobey me you will die. As such, our relationship is established and both of us can be content within it – me as owner, you as slave. Oh, don’t look so horrified. You’re alive, aren’t you, still in possession of your limbs, your tongue, your eyes and your cock? So you have to serve me instead of others serving you. You’ll get used to it. And when you place your feet upon the Dark Path, you’ll be freed and can buy slaves of your own. The sooner you understand that, the sooner we can all get along.’
Lord Silais shifted, clearly unused to the discomfort of kneeling on cold stone.
This is the breed of man who ruled this country? Corvus allowed a sneer to twist his mouth. No wonder Rivil was weak.
‘Your Majesty, I am a child of Light. I will never walk the Dark Path – but that does not mean I cannot be of assistance to you. Advise you,’ he added quickly. ‘There are many things you will encounter as you consolidate your rule. Rebellions, laws, heirs to the throne who may seek to seduce loyalty away from you.’
Corvus looked at Valan, his second in command, and rolled his eyes. ‘I know about Tresh in his little castle in Listre,’ he said. ‘You’re beginning to bore me, Slave Silais.’ He grinned as the man twitched again – it really was too much fun.
The former noble met his gaze with an expression of earnest surprise. ‘Oh no, Your Majesty, there are many more heirs than just Tresh. They’re like rats, Sire – kill one and another rears its head. It’s a shame so much of the palace burnt, really. All the records of the full line of the Evendoom dynasty were in the royal library.’
Corvus’s humour vanished. ‘Let me guess – you know who these heirs are and you’re bartering your freedom in return for the knowledge?’
Silais’s smile was silky-smooth. ‘It appears we can assist each other, does it not?’ he asked, straightening a little, feeling he was on firmer ground.
‘It does,’ Corvus said and jerked his head. Valan stepped down from the dais and held out his hand to help the lord up. Silais nodded his thanks and was on his feet before he realised Valan had ducked behind him, snaking his arm around beneath his chin and grasping his ear firmly. Valan tucked his elbow and pulled Silais’s head into his chest, stretched his ear out further, and sawed it off with his knife.
Silais was screaming like a bloody woman by the time it was done, legs treadling and hands slapping uselessly at Valan’s constricting arm. Corvus wandered down from his throne and bent to look into his face, still tucked lovingly against Valan’s chest.
‘Control,’ he whispered into the bloody hole where his ear used to be. ‘I have it, and you don’t. And you’re going to tell me the names and locations of Rastoth’s heirs, aren’t you, my lord Earless? Or Valan here will show you just what an artist he can be with that knife.’
Silais tried to nod, snot bubbling from his nose. ‘Y-yes, Your Majesty. Anything. I’ll tell you anything.’
Corvus patted his head. ‘Not anything,’ he clarified, straightening up with a wink at Valan. ‘Everything.’
The problem, of course, despite his fine words to the contrary, was that Corvus didn’t have control. Or not as much as he’d have liked, anyway.
Oh, Rilporin was mostly peaceful as the slaves adjusted to their new way of life and any uprisings were put down with the usual brutal efficiency, but the rest of the country was kindling awaiting a flame. And Mace fucking Koridam, General of the West Rank, was running around out there somewhere striking sparks.
Best guesses put him in Listre, but in the chaotic aftermath of the fall of Rilporin and the days afterwards with Mireces and East Rankers struggling to come to terms with the loss of the Dark Lady, the man could have marched past the city with drum, flute and flag and no one would have noticed.
Corvus had never had this much territory to control before and his influence – or lack of it – had never extended so far from his power base, and he’d never had to function with his heart torn from his chest.
The Dark Lady’s absence was madness clawing at the edges of his mind, questioning his every decision, whispering at him to lie down and die. Every night, when he pulled a blanket around him, the temptation was there, at the tip of his dagger. Every morning, the grief mocked his cowardice. Corvus survived by packing the hurt down inside himself to fester, like an abscess beneath a tooth, buried and stinking.
It was different for the common Mireces and East Rankers – all they had to do was follow the orders given them by their leaders. For Corvus, his surviving war chiefs, Lanta and General Skerris, it was like trying to stand against an avalanche to make sure others survived. And what should have united them was driving them apart.
Two weeks after Rilporin’s conquest, Skerris and the East had left the capital, flooding west and north to occupy the major towns along the Gil and the Tears to take control of supplies, stores, wealth and crops. It made military and economic sense, and it left Corvus with an altogether unfamiliar sense