Through Fiery Trials Read online

  The mounted men were professional soldiers, members of the Emperor’s Spears, the elite branch of the Imperial Harchongese Army specifically dedicated to keeping the peace internally. That meant suppressing any serfs’ pretension to be more than two-legged animals producing for their betters, and they’d done that job for years with brutal efficiency. In fact, they’d been kept home from the Mighty Host of God and the Archangels during the Jihad precisely because the Emperor—or, rather, his ministers—had realized how badly they’d need the Spears’ bedrock reliability.

  But they were accustomed to sporadic, spontaneous explosions, the desperate spasms of violence of men and women who’d been driven beyond the limit of what they could endure. Men and women who knew their resistance would be futile, that they and their families would be savagely punished for it, but who simply didn’t care anymore. The Spears knew how to deal ruthlessly with uncoordinated, isolated outbreaks like that.

  They had no clue how to deal with this one … and none of Captain of Horse Nyangzhi’s men lived long enough to learn.

  * * *

  “Didn’t any of these stupid bastards ever even hear about watching your flanks?” Zhouhan Husan growled.

  “Not so’s anyone’d notice,” Tangwyn Syngpu replied, slinging the Saint Kylmahn rifle which had fired the shot to signal the start of the attack as the two of them scrambled down from their perch above the roadway where nine hundred and two of the Emperor’s Spears had just been slaughtered. From the sound of the screams, the remaining forty-three troopers would be a long, agonizing time joining their comrades, and Syngpu grimaced as he listened to the shrieks.

  “Wouldn’t’ve lasted five minutes on the Tarikah Line,” Husan continued. The ex-corporal couldn’t seem to decide whether he was more satisfied, contemptuous, or simply disgusted.

  “Didn’t seem to me they lasted a lot longer here,” ex-Sergeant Syngpu observed. “Still, I’ll give you that they didn’t know their arse from their elbow. Just like the Captain of Foot said they wouldn’t.”

  Husan grunted in acknowledgment as the two noncoms climbed over the retaining wall. Neither of them had been actual serfs—they’d been technically free peasants, not that there was much difference between the two, here in Harchong—and they were more focused on their command responsibilities than most of their followers. On the other hand, those followers were far more disciplined and well-trained than anything the Spears had ever before encountered, thanks in no small part to Husan and Syngpu’s experience in the Mighty Host of God and the Archangels.

  Some of that discipline showed as the six-limbed draft dragons harnessed to the four massive freight wagons stamped and tossed their heads. They were obviously anxious at the smell of blood and the screams of dying men, but the experienced drovers Syngpu had assigned to the wagons had already jogged over to them, begun murmuring to them in calming tones. They quieted quickly, although their eyes continued to roll, and Syngpu nodded in approval and relief. They needed those wagons, and that meant they needed the dragons, at least long enough to reach the crossroads five miles closer to Shang-mi, where the rest of the agricultural wagons and pack-dragons waited.

  “Think we should stop them?” Husan asked as two officers who’d survived the initial massacre were dragged, twisting and fighting desperately, towards a knot of serfs gathered around eight nervous horses.

  One of those officers wore a captain of horse’s insignia, and Syngpu wondered if the column’s commander had been stupid enough to let himself be taken alive.

  “I remember something Allayn—Allayn Tahlbaht—said to me back when the Temple assigned its noncoms to the Host,” Syngpu replied, never taking his pitiless eyes from the frantically struggling officers as they were hurled to the ground and ropes were tied to their wrists and ankles. “He said a really smart officer did two things. He always listened to his sergeants … and he never gave an order he knew wouldn’t be obeyed.” He hawked up a glob of phlegm and spat into the roadside drainage ditch. “’Pears to me this’d be a good time for you and me to pretend we’re officers.”

  “I can live with that,” Husan said grimly. Then he rested one hand on Syngpu’s shoulder and squeezed briefly.

  Husan’s wife and two children had survived after he’d been conscripted for the Mighty Host. Syngpu’s family had been less fortunate. His wife, their son, and his younger daughter had starved to death two winters ago, in the most recent famine to sweep Thomas Province. There was no way to prove they’d have survived the winter which had virtually wiped out their entire village if Syngpu had been there, but the sergeant would never know that. And he did know his seventeen-year-old daughter had lived only because she’d no longer been there. And that was because Earl Crimson Sky’s eye had fallen upon her just after her fifteenth birthday. After he’d finished raping her for a month or two, he’d handed her over to one of his trusted barons, who’d been raping her ever since.

  Syngpu hadn’t learned about that—or about the rest of his family—for over five months after his wife’s death. After all, who cared about letters to a peasant shepherd who’d been forbidden ever to return home, anyway? When he did learn, it had taken him another three and a half months to travel the fifteen hundred miles home on foot, evading the patrolling Spears charged with keeping desperate men like him from doing exactly that.

  By the time he got there, his daughter had endured her second forced abortion. After all, what Harchongese noble needed a bastard half-peasant child to complicate the succession? Or a pregnancy to get in the way of his pleasure?

  She was determined to keep her third child, though, whoever its father was, and neither Baron White Tree nor the Pasqualate monk who’d aborted Pauyin Syngpu’s first two children would be around to prevent it.

  Her father had seen to that.

  Zhouhan Husan had known Syngpu for almost eight years now. The big sergeant was as tough as they came and only a fool tried to settle things with him physically, yet if there was a vicious bone in his body, Husan had never seen it. But he understood exactly why Tangwyn Syngpu felt no desire to intervene as the other ends of those ropes were tied to the saddle horns of the captured horses. For that matter, neither did Husan. It was one of the Spears’ favorite “lessons” for serfs who got out of line, after all. If ripping parents’ bodies apart in front of their children to encourage those children’s better behavior was good enough for them, then he could indeed live with it when their turn came around.

  Whips cracked, horses snorted, reared, and lunged forward, and the spread-eagled men shrieked as they were literally pulled—slowly and terribly—limb-from-limb while their cheering executioners jeered at their agony.

  “Going to be ugly,” he said quietly to Syngpu as the two of them climbed up into one of the freight wagons, and both men knew he was talking about far more than just this bloody day.

  “Lot of that going around,” Syngpu replied as he used a bayonet to pry the top off of one of the hundreds of long, heavy crates stacked in the thirty-ton wagon. The smell of lubricating grease rose to meet him and he smiled grimly.

  “A lot of that going around,” he repeated, gazing down into the crate, “and these beauties are about to make sure there’s a lot more of it.”

  .II.

  Imperial Palace, City of Shang-mi, Tiegelkamp Province, North Harchong.

  “It’s all that bastard Rainbow Waters’ fault!”

  Lord of Foot Runzheng Zhou, Baron of Star Rising, suppressed a stillborn sigh before it ever touched his expression. He paused long enough to be sure it was staying suppressed, then glanced up from his conversation with Baron Blue River. Controlling reactions like that was second nature to anyone who wanted to survive long at the imperial court. It was a bit harder than usual this time, though.

  “We should have called the fucking traitor home and made an example out of him and his entire family!” Earl White Fountain continued with a snarl. “And he should’ve told Maigwair to take a flying fuck!”

  White Fou
ntain’s earldom lay in southeastern Tiegelkamp, and he’d been raging against Rainbow Waters for almost three years now, ever since three of his manors had been gutted by a serf insurrection. That particular outburst had been purely local and the Spears had suppressed it quickly, with all their customary, brutal finesse, but one of White Fountain’s cousins and his wife had been caught by the serfs before the Spears could intervene. The cousin had at least died relatively quickly; his wife had been less fortunate as the serfs vented their hatred for all the generations of their wives and daughters who’d been casually raped by their betters.

  Star Rising understood White Fountain’s rage. He simply had zero sympathy for the man. He did feel a certain degree of compassion for White Fountain’s cousin-in-law, but it was precisely White Fountain’s sort of idiocy that had guaranteed the sporadic outbursts which had speckled the map of North Harchong ever since. There were times—a lot of them, and they’d been growing steadily more frequent since well before the Jihad—when Star Rising felt nothing but despair as he contemplated his fellow aristocrats’ attitudes.

  “He wouldn’t have come,” someone else pointed out to White Fountain. “Whatever else he may be, he wasn’t that stupid! He knew damned well what would’ve happened to him.”

  “Then it should damned well happen to him where he is!” White Fountain snapped. “Are you telling me we don’t have any assassins who could get to him even in Saint Cahnyr?”

  I’m pretty sure that’s been tried, Star Rising thought caustically. Bit hard to get an assassin through to a man who’s got several hundred fanatically devoted veterans watching his back, though. And more power to him!

  “I understand why you’re upset, My Lord,” a third courtier said. Star Rising couldn’t remember his name, but the fellow was attached to Grand Duke North Wind Blowing’s staff somehow. “And I deeply sympathize with your losses. But the Empire is huge, and there have always been some … unfortunate incidences of insurrection, even without any outside incendiaries. That’s simply a fact of life, and it’s one we’ve all learned to deal with. I agree it’s past time something was done about Rainbow Waters, but it’s not as if these scattered incidents pose any significant threat.”

  Several other voices muttered in agreement. There was, Star Rising noted, a certain lack of confidence in them.

  “Well, I don’t like what just happened to Captain of Horse Nyangzhi,” someone else muttered. “That was less than fifty miles from the capital, for Chihiro’s sake!”

  “I know it was,” North Wind Blowing’s man said, and Star Rising frowned as he tried again to remember the idiot’s name. “But the city guard has the situation well in hand here in Shang-mi; there haven’t been any additional incidents in over a five-day; and if the rabble haven’t taken to their heels and found deep, dark holes to hide in by the time Earl Winter Glory’s column gets here next five-day, they’ll learn a lesson they won’t have time to forget!”

  The mutter of agreement was louder and more fervent than before, and Star Rising shook his head ever so slightly.

  “Do you think White Fountain has a point?” Blue River asked him very, very quietly, and Star Rising arched a thoughtful eyebrow.

  His family had known the other man’s for a long time and the two of them had always maintained a reasonably friendly relationship. That didn’t mean as much as it might once have, though, and he rather regretted the headshake which had probably prompted Blue River’s question.

  “About Rainbow Waters?” he asked after a moment.

  “White Fountain’s had a bug up his arse about Rainbow Waters for years now,” Blue River snorted. “I’m pretty sure he thinks Rainbow Waters is the reason Hsing-wu’s Passage freezes every winter!” Star Rising’s eyes widened ever so slightly at the searing contempt in the other baron’s quiet voice. “No, what I’m worried about is whether or not he’s right to be as scared shitless as he is about the other shoe.”

  Now that’s an interesting insight, Star Rising thought. And here I thought I was the only fellow at court smart enough to figure out just how scared White Fountain really is.

  “I don’t know,” he said out loud, equally quietly but rather more frankly than he’d intended. “I’m pretty sure Rainbow Waters isn’t directly involved in any of this, though.”

  Blue River cocked his head with an air of polite skepticism, and Star Rising shrugged.

  “Oh, he’s got plenty of reason to be pissed off with North Wind Blowing and the rest of His Majesty’s ministers. That’s certainly true! But I’ve met the man. I think he’s probably more sympathetic to the serfs than anybody here in Shang-mi. For that matter, after his time commanding the Mighty Host, I’m pretty sure he’s a lot more sympathetic to them than he ever was before he left the Empire himself. But however true that might be, he knows as well as anyone—probably better, considering what he saw in the Temple Lands after the Sword of Schueler—just how ugly any general insurrection could get.” Star Rising shook his head. “There’s no way he’d knowingly contribute to something like that.”

  “All right,” Blue River said after a moment. “I see your point. But the fact that White Fountain couldn’t find his arse with both hands when it comes to figuring out who’s behind it doesn’t really address my original question. Do you think we all ought to be scared shitless?”

  Star Rising looked at him levelly, considering very carefully. Then he shrugged mentally. He and Blue River had known one another a long time, so he nodded towards one of the many discreet alcoves which were always in quiet demand at any gathering at court.

  The two of them stepped into it and Star Rising stood where he could keep an eye out for any curious ears that might wander into proximity.

  “I don’t know how scared we ought to be,” he said then, softly, behind the cover of his fluted wineglass, “but we damned well ought to be more scared than North Wind Blowing or any of His Majesty’s councilors are willing to admit.”

  “That’s what I was afraid of,” Blue River said equally quietly, “but I don’t have any military background. How bad is it?”

  “It’s not like I’ve got decades of ‘military experience’ of my own,” Star Rising snorted, lifting his left arm slightly. It ended just above the elbow. “I lost this and got invalided home less than six months after Rainbow Waters took over the Mighty Host.” His lips twitched in a humorless smile. “Probably the best thing that ever happened to me, even if I didn’t think so at the time! But I’ll tell you this, the Spears don’t have a clue how war’s changed. And they aren’t remotely as well equipped as they ought to be.”

  Blue River was an experienced courtier. His expression never changed, but his eyes were dark and worried, and Star Rising shrugged.

  “Every rifle we managed to build during the Jihad—muzzleloaders and Saint Kylmahns alike—went to the Mighty Host. I think His Majesty’s councilors managed to overlook that minor point when they convinced him to issue the decree against the Mighty Host’s return.”

  Blue River nodded. Both of them knew precisely why North Wind Blowing, Waisu VI’s first councilor, had issued that decree over the Emperor’s signature, but Star Rising wondered if Blue River fully appreciated just how stupidly shortsighted it had been. From the look in his eyes, he probably did.

  “Practically none of them, especially the Saint Kylmahns, were issued to the Spears or the other Army units retained at home,” Star Rising continued. “And, to be honest, Duke Silver Meadow’s acquisition programs since the Jihad have met with only … limited success.”

  This time Blue River’s mouth twisted in bitter understanding, and Star Rising nodded ever so slightly. Mangchywan Zhyung, Duke Silver Meadow, Waisu VI’s Minister of the Exchequer, was ostensibly in charge of the Empire’s spending. In fact, Zyingfu Ywahn, who could claim only the modest title of First Permanent Underclerk, not only supervised the Empire’s spending but formulated the policy for it. He was new in his job—he’d replaced Yang Zhyanchi in late 899 when Zhyanchi was fired as his
nominal superiors’ scapegoat for the ruinous state of the imperial treasury—but he’d been making up for lost time. His rapaciousness was almost as great as that of the aristocracy to which he would never be admitted, and vast sums which should have gone to reequipping the Harchongese Army had gone into his own pockets—and those of his aristocratic patrons—over the last four years.

  “I have to say, that’s what worries me the most,” Star Rising said, although that wasn’t strictly speaking true. What worried him the most was the reason the Army was likely to need all those weapons it didn’t have. “And it’s what makes these latest rumors especially … bothersome.”

  “What?” Blue River’s eyes narrowed. “Why?”

  Star Rising’s eyebrows rose, then he took another precautionary glance out of the alcove. From his fellow baron’s expression, he truly hadn’t heard.

  “I don’t know if this is accurate,” he said softly, “but if it is, I’m pretty damn sure that ‘spontaneous attack’ on Captain of Horse Nyangzhi’s column was anything but spontaneous.”

  Blue River swallowed visibly. The capital had buzzed with rumors about the extermination of Nyangzhi’s entire force—almost a thousand of the Emperor’s Spears slaughtered to the man—for the last seven days, and the whispers about what had happened to Nyangzhi and his senior officers had been especially disquieting. But that obviously wasn’t what Star Rising was talking about.

  “From everything I’ve been able to turn up, the serfs had plenty of reason to want Nyangzhi dead,” Star Rising continued, “but what he was doing when they caught up with him—according to my sources—was escorting a convoy to the capital from the Jai-hu manufactory. A convoy of rifles.”

  Blue River’s jaw tightened. The city of Jai-hu, on the western flank of the Chiang-wu Mountains, was home to one of the relative handful of foundries which had been established in North Harchong during the Jihad. North Harchong’s rivers and rugged terrain had never lent themselves to the sorts of canals which served most of Howard and both Havens. That was why the vast bulk of the Jihad’s foundries and manufactories had been built in South Harchong, where the huge amounts of coke and iron ore they required could be freighted in by water and the weapons they produced could be freighted back out again. The transportation argument had been irrefutable, at least until the Imperial Charisian Navy cut all shipping routes across the Gulf of Dohlar, and even the imperial bureaucracy had had no choice but to bend to then-Treasurer Rhobair Duchairn and Captain General Maigwair’s insistence that the foundries be built where they would be most efficient.