A Secret Man of Blood

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Squad laughs, though Anya is sceptical. "How is that a moral tale?"

"Ten years later the boy died of syphilis," Sig explains, as though the answer is obvious.

A smile creeps across Anya's face, though she shakes her head. "Fine: what's the moral of the story?"

"...Wolves?" Sig hesitantly suggests.

"Just saying 'wolves' isn't a moral!"

"...Big wolves?"

Indigo, who's holding a paper, reads the headline. "Trouble for surrounded Samarian Army in Tyria," he says, referencing their current situation, as Night Elf forces press in on them from the north and south. "Oh," he exclaims excitedly. "And they're releasing a new commemorative stamp celebrating the resistance of Tyria. That's exciting news for stamp collectors."

"Everything is exciting news for a stamp collector," Squad quips.

Sig and Squad fist bump. "Take that, stamp collectors!" Sig agrees.

Anya looks down and contemplates their fate, her tone cauterising the subject. "If we're trapped, that'll be the end of a free Tyria. The rest of the Samarian forces won't be able to reach here in time."

*

Black, starless cloth covers the windows of the row house, colours blinking on its surface from the flashing magic of the sign outside. Lu writes something and reads it aloud, her voice rising and falling like the shadows of an open fire. Mazer watches, caught up in a rapture of listening at the strange words, so alien to his nature and culture.

"A man looks at his son and thinks,
'I don't have the strength to carry
The weight of a tombstone.'
But, like a sword stabbed into a desert
The thought has no import
To the raging voice of life
That demands the last resort."

Lu pauses as if measuring the passing of time, then speaks again:

"The boy watches with sad, delicate patience
As the man runs and takes what isn't his
The street becomes a single fury fused
They grab and tug at him with the ecstasy and anger of the sea
Then beat him until he's bruised
Bludgeoned most of all by the look of gets from his son
Who runs to his side and looks up
At the man he has become
As if reading from the book of his own future
With a piercing, heart-wrenching dread."

"Is that something you've made up?" Mazer questions, though he suspects the answer.

A slow shake of Lu's head. "They're...emotions I've experienced, since inheriting the Mandate of Heaven from the Emperor." Her voice is soft, disintegrating – tears forming in her eyes, though refusing to fall. "I think they're people who have died fighting the Scrovengi invaders since I've been away. Somehow their souls, their memories, can still reach me." She relapses into silence.

Mazer's head feels strangely light, borne by thoughts like flights of birds, and he thinks about how his people invaded the Jade Empire, conquered Lu's home and killed many people. He's allowed himself to escape from war for too long. Wrestling with speechless stillness, he looks up and sees Lu's distress; without thought, he crosses over and comforts her, hugging the girl like a daughter.

A jolt of awareness causes him to turn. "Not now," he growls, drawing his sword and crossing to the door with fury in his eyes. "Stay down," he tells Lu, kicking the door off its hinges and knocking aside two waiting assassins.

Striding purposefully towards a group of fighters, Mazer picks up speed as they raise their crossbows and spins through the air, dodging projectiles with balletic grace, one bolt passing inches from his face. He spins like a steel-edged spinning top, cutting through the first rank in a hail of blood, his eyes burning like black coals.