Ushoran strode through their ranks, a demigod clad in gilded armour and bearing a handsome face. On his head, he wore the iron crown, and shadows seemed to sweep in his wake like the wings of some mighty bird of prey. But there was another face beneath his, another figure occupying his space, just out of sync with him, but yet connected — a massive shape, twisted and dark and mighty in that darkness, but unseen by any save he, W’soran knew. Ghostly brass claws held tight to Ushoran’s broad shoulders, guiding him towards his throne as musicians played a triumphal march and his people cheered.
W’soran could see the tightness of Ushoran’s muscles, the resistance in every movement. The ghostly claws tightened, slicing into him, and Ushoran’s lips peeled back from his fangs in a grimace that his court likely took for a smile. The crown pulsed and burned to W’soran’s eyes, like a gangrenous wound wrought in iron. Strands of hateful magic stretched from it and spread down into Ushoran, digging into his vitals like a torturer’s hooks.
Ushoran took his throne, and Abhorash moved out from the crowd to stand at the foot of the dais that supported his throne. From Abhorash’s face, W’soran knew that he knew and that he saw what W’soran saw. And yet he stayed. What madness compelled him, W’soran wondered? Was he too under the power of the crown, even as Neferata had been, or was it something else?
Before he had more than a moment to contemplate those questions, he saw Ushoran, slumped on his throne, turn slightly, as if looking in his direction. Then, with sickening certainty, W’soran knew that he was. Pain rippled through him, a dull, pounding ricochet of agony, searing him. Again, he felt Khalida’s arrow at the Gates of the Dawn, and the wet tearing of Neferata’s improvised stake as it punched through his sternum. His claws dug into his skull as he quivered in agony.
Looming above Ushoran, skull wreathed in balefire, something looked at him and then Ushoran asked, WHAT ARE YOU? WHAT IS W’SORAN OF LAHMIA? Ushoran’s eyes blazed as the words thundered in W’soran’s head, spiralling into agonising incandescence. And Ushoran twitched upon his throne, as if trying to pry himself free of what held him. His eyes met W’soran’s and there was a terrible plea in them. The Lord of Masks was caught in a trap that not even his cunning could set him free of.
Then, all at once, the vision was done, and there was nothing in his head save the sound of the night wind howling through the crags and the dull warble of Melkhior’s voice as he reached out a claw. ‘Master, are you unwell?’
W’soran spun about, and he slapped Melkhior off his feet, nearly knocking him from the ledge. One hand clutching his aching head, W’soran snarled, ‘Never touch me!’
Then, without a backwards glance, he left the winds and his cringing apprentice behind as he strode back into the mountain, shaking and shivering with rage and fear.
There was murder to be planned and a war to be won. And perhaps, just perhaps, an old — what? — friend, that was as good a word as any, to be saved — saved from himself, from the ghosts of the past, from his unearned throne.
But most importantly of all, there was an empire to be had.
‘What is W’soran of Lahmia, old friend?’ W’soran asked himself as he swept his cloak about himself. ‘Why, he is your master. He is the Master of Death, and he will break you on the altar of your own hubris!’
Chapter Six
The City of Bel Aliad
(Year -1152 Imperial Calendar)
‘Nightfall crept into our souls and changed us all,’ Abhorash said softly, sitting slumped in his chair, clad in armour that was unadorned but well-kept. He was dressed as a kontoi, one of Bel Aliad’s noble horsemen. The night-wind coiled softly through the open windows of his chambers. He had been awarded a small palace, near the centre of the City of Spices, for his efforts in helping the Arabyans make it their own.
He raised his hawk-like features and his lip twitched, revealing a length of fang. ‘Some more than others,’ he added. His hand found the pommel of the long blade that leaned against his chair, still sheathed, but no less intimidating for all that. He smiled coldly and said, ‘and some of us not at all, eh, W’soran? Except for that eye, I mean.’
W’soran stiffened and made to retort, even as his hand flashed to his unseeing eye. The arrow that had pierced it at the Battle of the Gates of the Dawn was long gone but the damage was done. His eye had yet to properly heal, instead remaining a milky, sightless orb. Ushoran held up a hand. ‘Be quiet, old monster. If you insult him, we will achieve nothing,’ he hissed.
‘You will achieve nothing regardless, Ushoran.’ Abhorash pushed himself to his feet, his armour creaking. ‘I have left mercy long behind me, and am in no mood to take part in your damned fate, whatever it might be. Go back to your fell master and leave me be.’
‘But surely it won’t hurt to hear us out, eh? Otherwise you’d have set those ravening devils of yours on us,’ Ushoran said, indicating the silent, unmoving shapes of Abhorash’s Hand — the four men who’d stood by him since Lahmia’s fall. W’soran knew them by name, if not by appearance. Walak of the palace guard and his cousin Lutr, of the harbour guard, were both Harkoni hillmen rather than true Lahmians, and had been given position in the military by Abhorash in better times. Mangari of the Southlands, a savage-turned-soldier, and Varis of Rasetra, a cunning duellist and former mercenary. Each was almost as formidable as their master and their eyes glowed red through the chainmail masks they wore beneath their ornate, high-peaked Arabyan helms.
W’soran seethed at the touch of those gazes. He longed to burn the impertinence from them. But Ushoran had convinced him to approach Abhorash peacefully, in contrast to his aggressive pursuit of Ankhat and, later, Neferata. In the months since his capture, the Lord of Masks had swiftly — indeed, more swiftly than W’soran had anticipated — regained his faculties. Even as W’soran had hunted for Ankhat, Ushoran had begun his hunt for the others, infiltrating the cities of the coasts of Araby and Nehekhara, his guise switching and changing month to month as he moved once more among mankind.
Nagash had already enacted the initial stages of his great plan. Soon, there would be no time to search for the wayward members of the Lahmian Court and bring them to heel at Nagash’s behest, and once again W’soran would be the fool. He imagined Arkhan’s look of arrogant triumph — no mean feat, given the liche’s lack of a face — and ground his fangs in annoyance.
He had already lost Neferata to a moment of foolish indiscretion. He had thought to overawe her with his power, and had attacked her where she laired in the desert, surrounded by an army of ragged tribesmen. He traced the barely-healed scars that covered his throat. Neferata had resisted more strongly than he’d anticipated, and her handmaidens were as deadly as he remembered. They’d almost killed him. Only Ushoran’s intervention had allowed them to escape.
Now, she was in the wind, and Ushoran had convinced him to cease hunting her and to instead set a trap. W’soran grunted and the moment of reverie passed. Ushoran and Abhorash were still speaking. ‘And you are sure she is coming here?’ Abhorash said. He crossed his arms over his chest and glared at them.
‘There is nowhere else,’ Ushoran said. ‘She is not a creature of the deserts and the discomforts of the wilds. She wants a city to rule, with civilised folk, not barbarians. Bel Aliad is the closest, and the tribes will be inclined to attack anyway given their history. The question is, what are you going to do about it?’