‘You’re choking him,’ the boy’s brother protested. The lad had turned red. His mother moaned pitifully.
Before Barandas could order his deputy to release the boy, the older brother grabbed Thurbal’s arms from behind. He tried to pull the Augmentor away from his sibling — but quick as a flash Thurbal threw his elbow back to drive deep into the young man’s stomach, causing him to release his grip and double over in agony.
‘Enough,’ Barandas ordered, but the grey warrior ignored his command, stepping forwards to bring the pommel of his scimitar crunching down into the lad’s skull once, twice, and then a third time, each blow connecting with a sickening crunch. The quarryman flopped down onto the ground.
‘Enough,’ Barandas barked again, and this time his own sword was in his hand. ‘Lower your weapon. Disobey me again, Thurbal, and I’ll kill you.’
His deputy sneered back at him and waved his scimitar in the air. The pommel was covered in blood. ‘That’s right, defend these cowards,’ he spat. ‘All your softly-softly bullshit will count for fuck all when the Sumnians arrive. You know what they do to their enemies? Let me tell you-’
He didn’t get the chance. With a flick of his wrist, Barandas disarmed his subordinate and sent his scimitar spinning out of his hands to land a dozen feet away. Thurbal’s mouth dropped open in shock.
‘I told you to lower your weapon,’ said Barandas. Despite his anger he couldn’t help but feel a sense of relief. Thurbal had needed a dressing down, but his disarming of the man could very well have backfired and left him holding one half of a severed sword. That wouldn’t have done much to establish his authority over his rebellious colleague.
‘You can retrieve your scimitar when I say so.’ Barandas looked down at the fallen quarryman. Blood leaked from the top of his head and pooled on the ground next to him.
It was then that his mother started to scream.
‘Someone fetch a physician,’ he said loudly to the slack-faced onlookers. He turned to the woman and her younger son, who looked as if he was about to piss himself. ‘I am sorry for what occurred here. Come and find me when you know if he is… likely to pull through. I would see you recompensed in some way.’
He left the sobbing woman and the small crowd that had gathered behind. Reprehensible though Thurbal’s actions were, the incident had been coming ever since Barandas and his two deputies arrived in Malbrec. The town had seemingly forgotten that it was a vassal of Dorminia; forgotten that it was Salazar who kept them safe and allowed them to sleep soundly in their beds. Now that war with Thelassa loomed, the town needed reminding where its loyalties lay.
Salazar had recently returned to the city after a two-week absence. The Magelord had not yet deigned to speak of where he had been. Halendorf’s condition had worsened, and the pressures of organizing Dorminia’s army had taken their toll on Barandas. Grand Magistrate Timerus was sufficiently recovered from his own ordeal and was already in the process of recommending new magistrates to replace those murdered in the assassination attempt. The upper echelons of Dorminia’s government would soon be crawling with men loyal to the hawk-nosed Grand Magistrate — or at least, even more loyal than the previous ones had been. Timerus was a schemer without peer, a man whose cunning had secured him a position second only to Salazar himself.
Barandas sighed. Timerus could play his games. He had more important matters to focus on. The drafting of soldiers from Dorminia’s poorer districts was under way and had gone surprisingly well, but three of Dorminia’s larger vassal towns had provided such a meagre yield of men that the Supreme Augmentor had decided to oversee the recruitment at Malbrec personally.
He sweated in his golden armour as he strode towards the east of town, where the gigantic quarry that was the basis of Malbrec’s industry yawned like a festering wound in the land. Red-cloaked soldiers saluted as he passed them, shielding their eyes from the afternoon sun.
Eventually he found the man he was looking for. Garmond was difficult to miss, even while he was sitting down. He was clad in his enchanted plate armour from head to toe, making no concessions to the early summer afternoon heat. The only part of his raiment he had removed were the gauntlets, which lay on the table next to him.
The huge Augmentor had a sheet of parchment before him and was in the process of scribbling something down. The quill looked faintly ridiculous in his ham-sized fist. At first Barandas had been vaguely surprised that the man even knew how to write. Garmond’s brutish countenance and infamous temper made it easy to overlook the fact he was a son of one of Dorminia’s most renowned families.
Garmond stopped writing as Barandas approached. ‘Commandant,’ he said. The monstrous helm he wore caused his voice to echo ominously so that not only did he look demonic, he also sounded the part.
Barandas nodded in greeting. ‘How many?’ he asked. He wasn’t particularly keen to hear the answer.
‘Eighty-five. They came forward quickly enough once I started knocking heads together.’
Barandas raised an eyebrow. That was more than he had expected from the small part of town Garmond had been assigned. Malbrec was home to just short of four thousand, the largest of the settlements that fell within Dorminia’s territory, but so far only a few hundred men had been drafted.
‘Is anyone still giving us trouble?’
Garmond turned his helmed head and nodded at the hill a few hundred yards to the south. A cluster of walled estates perched on top of the hill, fronted by pretty orchards and gardens.
Barandas sighed. Always the privileged. Too rich, too important to send their sons to war.
‘I’ll speak with them,’ he said. Dorminia’s nobles were still resisting his efforts at securing their participation in the city’s defence. He had no option but to raise that particular annoyance with Timerus, who would probably wave him away with some weak excuse. Still, there was no reason the wealthy merchants and landowners of Malbrec should dodge the draft.
He strode up the gently sloping path that meandered up the hill. The walk was a pleasant one. From this vantage point Barandas could see Crimson Watchmen going from door to door and enlisting suitable candidates. Those drafted would have a day to gather a few essential belongings and bid their farewells before they departed to the training camp just outside Dorminia’s eastern wall.
Wiping sweat from his brow, he approached the first of the estates, a small manor house set behind a row of cherry trees preparing to bloom. He stopped suddenly.
He remembered trees very similar to these, on a day that had, at first, been equally glorious.
The afternoon was thick with the smells of summer. The odours that always accompanied hot days in Dorminia were there, so ubiquitous that one hardly noticed them. But nothing could overpower the rich scents of blossom, the crisp aroma of fresh grass and the sweet tang of the rose-coloured cider that was so popular during the Festival of the Red Sun — the one day of the year when Lord Salazar presented himself before his people.
Barandas recalled the pride he had felt marching alongside his comrades at the front of the procession. He had been a member of the Crimson Watch then, barely a year into his service with the army. The parade had taken them down from the Obelisk to the lush, leafy boughs of Verdisa Park, which occupied a wide space near the south-east corner of the Noble Quarter. They had proceeded to the centre of the park. There Salazar would stand silent vigil before the great oak.
The Eternal Tree, it had been called. No one knew what significance it held to their Magelord, but the tree itself was a thing of beauty, its golden leaves untouched by the turning of the seasons. The Eternal Tree had occupied the centre of the park for as long as any in the city could recall.