Chapter 7 : Flames of Vengeance, Flames of Hell

The King’s embassy was on the road six days later, accompanied by a small honour-guard of Serapis Guards, along with two-hundred regular troops, all under the command of Captain Serdigal, who had lately been assigned the role of personal military representative to the Thane. It was not a large company, but Serdigal’s men were known far and wide as the best Unver had to offer, and were, like their captain, fiercely loyal to the Thane. In the last few years, Vasper had rarely traveled without them.

The road to the Eastmarches was a treacherous route and the frigid, three-week trek crossed frequently through the territory of a particularly nasty band of toaderoid headhunters, whose coldly animal intelligence kept the collective nerves of the company on a constant knife’s edge.

By the time they had entered the relative safety of the T’kula’s outer territory, Serdigal’s men had fought a series of almost-daily skirmishes against the merciless amphibians. All-told, the company lost thirty soldiers to the toaderoids, mostly those caught in cruel traps, cunningly set by the hunters’ hands. The losses were relatively few, however, due in no small part to the expert training and experience imbued upon the soldiers by their Captain’s masterful leadership.

The King’s company was not the only group moving across the frozen tundra of the Eastmarches; they had arrived with little time to lose. The disparate T’kula clans were already on the move toward S’thaka’s steading, where they would gather in honour of the Chieftain-of-Chieftains. This gathering, as Kaynid explained, was the key to his plan’s success.

“The tribes are traveling to pay tribute to S’thaka, so they will be of a mind to honour him,” said the King, watching as several tribes converged and continued their long march as one great mass. “And we will also have the attention of all the tribal chiefs and elders under one roof, something which has not happened in nearly a hundred years and may not happen again for a hundred more. Not only that, but all the warriors and men of high respect have also come, in fact, the only ones not in attendance are those either too old or sick to travel and mothers with small children.”

“I hope you are right,” said Vasper, “from what I have seen it will not be convincing S’thaka that is the difficult part, but winning over the rest of the men.”

“Not today, Vasper,” Kaynid mused, “today they will be primed to follow. You’ll see.”

Vasper gave no response, but continued to look ahead for any signs that they had been noticed. None were apparent until a few hours later when the company found itself quite suddenly surrounded by a T’kula patrol armed with a crude assortment of spears, staves and clubs, faces and bodies painted in aggressive swirls of blue, white and black.

“S’sisi karn tooda?” shouted a tall, bearded warrior, waving a crude spear above his head. The colourful patterns adorning his body were particularly fierce and, unlike the others, appeared to be permanently tattooed rather than simply painted on.

“S’sisi karn tooda!” the warrior cried again. “Why come you here?” he repeated, this time in broken unverion.

Vasper leaned over to Kaynid. “That will be the leader,” he whispered, “I will deal with him.”

Two-hundred hands went to their swords as Vasper stepped toward the tattooed fighter, almost daring the T’kula warriors to make a hostile move.

“Do not be alarmed!” Kaynid shouted, motioning for the men to stand down. “The T’kula are quite peaceful – there is nothing to fear!”

Vasper waited for the soldiers’ reluctant compliance before answering the warrior’s question. “Sikt k’dlma yadi fahn kekt’tiri’kekt.”

“S’thaka?” asked the warrior, registering surprise at being answered back in his own language.

“F’lgi, S’thaka,” Vasper replied, nodding affirmatively.

The T’kula leader turned to speak with the warriors beside him in a flurried exchange of their native tongue, then back at Vasper. “F’lgi’dara j’dakra.”

Vasper bowed and returned to his place beside Kaynid. “He will lead us to S’thaka.”

Kaynid clapped his hands with glee, “Oh very good, Vasper, masterfully done!” he beamed. “When in Giliathor did you find the time to learn their tongue?”

“One cannot hope to conquer something that he does not understand,” Vasper replied.


Four hours of easy travel – the T’kula did not believe in undue haste – brought the company within viewing distance of the great gathering, already underway. A massive skin tent stretched out across the land, large enough for all the men of the nine tribes to hold council together at once, while a great mass of women and children remained outside, celebrating the coming together of the tribes.

“T’blisi gobaya,” said the patrol leader once they reached the outer entryway into the tent.

Vasper signaled for a halt. “We are to wait here while he announces our arrival.”

The tall warrior returned, accompanied by another, less fearsome T’kula, whose body was clear of warrior’s markings.

“Do’bal siah S’thaka’kekt, tueyba natro t’kektra eil dobi’cil ka!” called the Herald, ushering the Unverians inside.

“The great chieftain S’thaka welcomes the chieftains from the West to his gathering, as honoured guests,” Vasper translated, leading the way.

The building, itself, was a work of considerable ingenuity. What appeared, on the outside, to be one massive pavilion was, in fact, a clever arrangement of thousands of smaller tents erected against and on top of one another on a scale that even the royal engineers of Unver could doubtfully accomplish.

Inside, the tent was like a giant amphitheatre whose many tiers were filled with T’kula men, over 100,000 strong. Jutting from the walls of the tent, well above the highest tier, were ten long jetties, arranged in a circle and suspended by ropes from the ceiling. The clan chieftains and their entourages occupied nine of the jetties, leaving one empty. Common warriors and men of little prominence crowded the lower tiers and the rest sat somewhere in between.

In the very middle stood a lone figure atop a platform situated neither in line with the chiefs, nor on the ground with the common-folk, but between them. S’thaka was both a Chieftain-of-Chieftains and a man of the people.

“Why the chieftain from the West comes to this gathering, I do wonder,” said S’thaka, looking down upon the party as they gathered in the entryway. “Not to pay tribute, I think.”

By some unknown power, all who spoke inside the tent could be clearly heard by all the others. There was an air of discipline amongst the gathered, none of whom would speak out of turn, in order that all might have their rightful turn to add his thoughts to the table. There were generally few besides tribe chieftains who did much talking, however.

Vasper felt a distinct crackle of power behind the amplification, and searching for its source, noticed the inmost ring of men on the ground floor kneeling as if in deep concentration or prayer. Their markings identified them as shamans of some considerable power. These slaves know not which master they truly serve – all the better, all the better.

Vasper kneeled, one fist to the floor. “You are correct, Chieftain-of-Chieftains. I come with an offer the likes of which—“

“—I have never before imagined!” S’thaka cut in. “I have heard such promises before. What will you offer me this time – pieces of yellow metal stamped with the faces of men I have never known? Or your shiny stones, whose uses, aside from decoration, are few? Maybe you come with barrels of fiery water that steals men’s souls, though its use I have outlawed among my people. The last time your people came, it was to bring wicked weapons and coverings of bright steel, but why would my people want such things which have only made it easier for your kind to kill each other? I ask again, what do you have that I could possibly want, Chieftain-of-the-West?”

“Forgive me, great S’thaka, if my agents have failed to understand the heart of your people in the past,” Vasper replied, “but what I bring you is beyond mere material things. I offer you the chance to be a nation, as you have desired – to have a country of your own and to lead them as their King.”

S’thaka’s eyes sparkled with excitement, but turned sad and dark a moment later. “Sadly, I cannot discuss such matters with you, Chieftain-of-the-West, as you are not the greatest Chieftain of your people, but only his servant.”

Right then a passage began to open up in the soldiers’ line, accompanied by shouts of “Make way! Make way for the King!”

Kaynid bowed low, as he and Vasper had rehearsed, then stood boldly before S’thaka’s high seat. “Greetings, great Chieftain S’thaka! In the name of the people of Unver and all her gods, I ask only that you hear what my servant, Thane Vasper of Serapis, has to say and treat his word as though they were my own.”

“Receive the full honour of your station, then, King of Unver!” S’thaka called down. “You are named friend of the gathering and given rights to speak as a Chieftain for your tribe! You will be lodged as our Chieftains lodge and will want for nothing while you are among us!"

Kaynid and his advisors were appointed to the vacant Chieftain’s platform and, along with Captain Serdigal and a squad of his elites, were taken up, by way of a man-powered elevator platform, to their seats. Vasper stayed below with the rest of the soldiery on the ground floor, where he began the negotiations in earnest.

Vasper began by laying out the entire offer in great detail while stopping frequently to answer questions from the Chieftains, or from S’thaka himself. Despite Vasper’s skills as an orator, the hours stretched into days and the days into weeks as Vasper talked himself hoarse time and time again. Kaynid was reduced to a largely symbolic role, watching the proceedings in silence except when he was asked to give his blessings to some new proposal or add his thoughts to a debate.

For nearly a month the snow fell outside the meeting tent, doing nothing to cool the flames of discord that burned inside. Up until that point, the weather had gone largely unheeded by the T’kula men, who spent their days at the fire-warmed council and their nights among the snug family tents erected outside. Little thought was given by the T’kula, at all, to worrying about the cold; even the weakest women and children were well-accustomed to living in such conditions.

Then came a very different sort of night: colder by far than anything in recent memory, with wind enough to break branches from trees and a heavy blanket of falling snow that hid from view anything further away than an outstretched hand. ‘Unnatural’ some called it; even the most revered shamans were unable to detect its warning or discern its cause.

The coming of morning dispelled the wind and snow but brought with it a dense curtain of fog that settled over the area like an impenetrable shroud, blocking all view of the landscape beyond its reach. There were rumours in camp about strange noises from beyond the fog, like heavy footsteps, and the sounds of tinkering. To make matters worse, the previous night’s patrols had not returned and were widely presumed to have been trapped in the storm and overcome.

In council, the T’kula were on edge, squabbling and bickering with each other in an uncharacteristic fashion, even more so than with the Unverians. All pretense of reasonable deliberation had been given up for lost by the time Serdigal returned to the meeting tent, having been sent out on apparent patrol, flanked by a small squad of elites.

“I respectfully request a short break to confer with my Captain,” said Vasper to the gathering.

“Agreed,” said S’thaka from his podium, and called for refreshment to be brought.

King Kaynid watched as Vasper and Serdigal disappeared into the tent’s long entryway, wondering what could be important enough to interrupt the council, and feeling somewhat annoyed at having been left out of it. Perhaps they forgot to send someone for me, I’d better go down and see what is going on. After gulping down a goblet or two of dewberry juice, his new favourite beverage, he snuck onto the elevator with the servants heading down to the bottom.

Vasper and Serdigal stood a short distance away with their backs turned to facilitate privacy. Kaynid moved toward them quietly, curious for a hint of their discussion, both men gesturing emphatically as they spoke. Serdigal shook his head, then stopped and looked gravely at the floor.

“…Do as I command of you, Captain,” Vasper was saying, “and be concerned only with reaping your reward. I will worry about deciding who is innocent and who is guilty.”

Hmph, some sort of troop discipline issues, Kaynid thought, no wonder they didn’t call for me. He turned to leave and then stopped as the conversation took an interesting turn.

“As you command, my Thane,” Serdigal was nodding. “All has been made ready, and is at your command.”

“Excellent work, Captain, this charade has gone on long enough. I am filled with a sudden optimism about this afternoon’s negotiations, as though I stood on the precipice of an unexpected breakthrough.” Vasper’s eyes twinkled, darkly.

Serdigal bowed, turning to leave. “I must go tend to the placement of—“

The conversation quickly halted and Kaynid was startled to find himself looking into Vasper’s narrowed eyes. He tried to think of something to say in defense of his eavesdropping, but before he could form the words, Vasper flung out a hand towards him and mouthed words he could not hear.

With no particular explanation, Kaynid felt firmly compelled to immediately return to his seat. Without thinking about the actions involved, he found he had walked back to the elevator and was already halfway to the top, feeling rather nebulous as to why he had wanted to go down to the floor to begin with. By the time he sat back in his comfortable seat he could only muster up the vaguest recollection of having left at all. A fresh goblet of dewberry juice dispelled what little memory remained.

When council reconvened a change had come over Vasper. Authority, which had been absent through all the previous weeks, flowed through his words. Questions and objections were met and dismantled like so much intellectual fodder, his answers driven home on a spearpoint. So great was Vasper’s power that all negotiations were finished that afternoon, and every T’kula, to a man, shouted approval for the agreement with their whole hearts.

“At last! At last!” cried S’thaka, “We will be a nation – a people worthy to have a country of our own!” The T’kula cheered wildly, making such a noise that the Unverians feared that the tent might collapse on top of them.

“People of T’kula, a new age is upon us!” proclaimed the proud Chieftain-of-Chieftains, now a mighty King. “This council is closed, now let us light the great flare and give back the setting sun to the sky in thanks to the guiding spirits!”

S’thaka clapped and a number of servants holding great polished mirrors entered, forming a ring around the centre of the tent. Once the mirror-holders were in place, another group grasped long ropes that hung from the middle of the ceiling. With a concerted pull, an eye began to open in the ceiling, slowly growing in size to allow the light in from the sky above. Though the land was still beset with an oppressive pall of fog, the setting sun shone down brightly into the tent, its light caught up by the ring of mirrors, re-focused and reflected back up through the aperture like a great column of yellow light reaching into the heavens. The flare was accompanied by a deep rumbling hum that emanated from the T’kula, caught up in rapt praise to their gods.

Serdigal called down from the high platform, ordering the troops to back away into the entryway, and S’thaka bowed appreciatively at the display of apparent reverence and respect. Serdigal did not return the gesture.

The eye began to close, signaling the ritual’s end. S’thaka clapped once more, this time out of joy and exultation. “Join me, brother!” he called to Vasper, who he had come to think of as his compatriot over the past long weeks. “It is good for the builders of the pact to celebrate together!”

Vasper stepped toward the army at his back, face twisted into a contemptuous snarl. “I will celebrate when you and all your pestilent people’s bones have been burned to ashes and spread across the East Marches!” he growled.

Deep confusion coloured the Chieftain’s face, wiping away his jubilant smile. The celebratory sounds of the other tribesmen said that no one had heard the Thane’s damning words but S’thaka, and almost he tried to convince himself that he had somehow imagined it. Out of the corner of his eye he noticed the menacing stances of the Unverian soldiers – not reverent, but ready.

“Shields!” yelled Serdigal from above. To the General’s side, Kind Kaynid seemed entirely bewildered by the order. The Unverian troops spun to face the entry-flap behind them, dropping to their knees as shields were raised above their heads. The sound of celebration stilled as the councilmen began to notice the peculiar goings-on, and an ominous sound rose up in its place, like a great insect swarm, flying on wings of wood and steel.

The arrows struck, ten-thousand razor-sharp teeth, piercing the tent-skin in a single instant, and every one alight with flame. S’thaka was among the first to die, falling from his pedestal with a burning shaft in his heart. Others followed, and those who did not die pierced by an arrow’s point were devoured by the licking tongues of flame kindled in the projectiles’ wake. Those who survived to flee toward the exit found themselves facing an untouched line of Unverian troops, whose swords eagerly finished what the flaming darts had begun.

Another volley came, and another after that, and another, each bringing death and fire the likes of which had never been known among the peaceful T’kula. Screams of confused terror echoed throughout the burning tent as men breathed their last or witnessed the last breaths of their fathers, brothers, uncles and friends.

Crouched atop the last remaining high platform, Kaynid grasped onto the hem of Serdigal’s cloak as arrows rained destruction upon those he had come to appease. “How could you do this?” he wept. “I did not command this! I did not want this!”

“It was the only way, my King,” Serdigal replied, “it had to be done for you and for Unver. Vasper made the difficult choice, knowing you could not.”

“Vasper!” Kaynid cried, “He is behind this! Where is Thane Vasper?”

“Here, Kaynid,” said an icy voice from behind.

The King spun around, and there was Vasper standing on the platform, seemingly oblivious to the flames licking at the walls all around him. He held a jewel-hilted dagger in his hand.

“Curse you and all of your descendants to the halls of Ferius!” Kaynid screamed, “You will bring the wrath of the gods down upon all our heads!”

Vasper sneered. “You are sorely mistaken, my King; it is the gods who have directed my hands.”

More flaming projectiles fell, igniting a section of the jetty and illuminating Kaynid’s advisors – all dead – with the light of their destructive power. Kaynid cowered amidst the flames, hanging onto one of Serdigal’s black steel greaves like a shield. “I will pardon your part in this, Captain, if you bring me Vasper’s head! He is a traitor and a criminal and I order his execution!”

“Execution!” Vasper hissed, raising the knife, “Was it an execution when you ordered my mother to kill her husband?” He took a step toward the King, “Or was it simply murder?” Another step. “What was it when you told her to kill her son?” Kaynid gave a surprised gasp.

“Yes, dear friend, in her bid to have her final suffering ended, my mother told me everything. It has not been easy to be patient all this time, but well worth the wait. I am looking forward to watching you burn.”

Serdigal stepped between them, torn between his two masters. “This was not what we discussed, Thane! I am yours to command, but… I am a Captain of his majesty’s Royal Army... I can’t just stand here and watch you kill the King!”

“Then do not watch,” Vasper commanded, his eyes never leaving the King. “Surely my General has troops to command, yes?” Serdigal’s eyes widened at the sudden promotion, glancing back and forth between Thane and King in momentary hesitation before submitting to the fate he knew he must choose.

“Soldiers – steady the line! Prepare to fall back!” the newly raised General bawled, striding toward the elevator and out of sight.

Kaynid keened as his only protection left his side, scurrying backwards, over corpses, toward the platform’s end. Flames roared across the entirety of the lower levels, fueled by the bodies of the dead. None had escaped; all were dead or dying.

He tried to cry out but his voice was stolen by a tendril of liquid shadow that wrapped around his throat and choked his breath away. More shadows came, covering him in their foul darkness, suspending him over the hellish inferno below. Vasper stood before him, on the edge of the jetty, the naked blade ready in his hand. Darkness clung to the Thane’s body like a cloak that no power of flame could expel.

“Soon you will enter the eternal flames of hell,” whispered Vasper, “but the flames of my vengeance shall have you first.”

A single stroke sealed Kaynid’s fate, the dagger moving swiftly from ear to ear. A look of disbelief replaced the fear on the King’s face as his own blood drowned the life from his body. The shadows pulled away and Kaynid fell, his gurgling screams consumed by the roaring of flames that never went out.

Many outside were dead already, struck down by stray arrows, or overcome while attempting to help those trapped inside, by the time Serdigal led his troops out of the meeting tent. Most had moved away from the sky-high flames and were huddled together in a great, disorganized mass of panic and shock. Almost as many women remained outside as men had died inside, and most of these had at least one child with them, every face streaked with tears.

The masses watched the Unverians emerge from the burning wreck of a council tent, now the massive funeral pyre of husbands and fathers, grief turning to a rage hotter than any fire. No longer a despondent mass of helpless victims, a horde of furious T’kula, many times larger than any army their enemy had seen before, faced down Serdigal’s tiny contingent. Fighters they were not, but the press came on, curses on their lips, their lack of ability more than made up for by the sheer force of numbers alone.

“Loose!” cried Serdigal, his voice echoing through the oncoming rush and beyond. A symphony of bowstrings twanged in answer, and a near-solid mass of darkwood shafts pierced the foggy walls, showering the vengeful mob with barbed-steel heads. Women and children fell by the thousands, and the T’kula charge broke as people scattered every which way to avoid the next barrage, and the next.

Fog roiled behind the Unverian line, growing denser and darker, as if on the cusp of a mighty storm. The cloud burst, and rank upon rank of grim fighting men, all in Serapis black and silver, marched through the protective veil to join with Serdigal’s company.

“You took your time coming,” the General remarked, taking over command of the army from a graying Undercaptain named Melchym.

“Three and a half weeks to move fifty-thousand foot and half-again as many archers, without being heard or seen, is damned respectable in my books,” the Undercaptain retorted. “Especially in this freeze, I might add! Mind you, I’m mighty thankful for this weather; we’d have been hard up to get in close enough to do any damage without it! Thank Tergo, I guess.”

“You can thank the Thane for your cover, when he arrives.”

Melchym looked fairly taken aback. “Then it’s true, what they say…” He shook his head.


The surviving T’kula, still an impressive score, regrouped for another attempt at a charge, but found themselves pinned down by a hail of arrows, laid down by the unseen bowmen in the fog. Their anger spent, the women lacked the spirit to face so many skilled soldiers, and they put up their hands in surrender, hoping that their children might be spared the Thane’s retribution.

No longer needed, the misty covering around the battlefield melted away, and the sun shone down upon twenty-five thousand bowmen with arrows nocked and at the ready.

“Finish them, General,” came a slithery voice, approaching.

Serdigal looked around, startled at Vasper’s appearance. “My Thane, they have surrendered.”

“Excellent, that should make them easy to dispatch,” Vasper replied.

Serdigal looked puzzled. “Dispatch, my lord?”

“Hear me well, General,” Vasper’s eyes blazed sinisterly, “I will not share Serapis with these base creatures, nor will I countenance their continued existence as rebels and witnesses. Now, you will order my army to deal with this rabble, as I have prescribed, or somebody more compliant, perhaps Melchym here, shall take your place.”

Serdigal met the Undercaptain’s eyes with a scowl and moved to the front of the line.

“Company… attack!”

The battle – or massacre, as it could more properly be called – raged for many long hours; there were many to kill. But, by the time the crimson harvest moon had chased the waning sun from the sky, the land had been desecrated, perhaps forever, by innocent blood. Women and children lay dead, almost an entire race laid to waste by blade and bow; not a single man, woman or child was left upon the field, nor in the charred remains of the gathering tent.

Vasper stood at the head of his army, its General by his side, and smiled. “Prepare the men to move out, and leave the crows to their meal. They will be well fed by the time we leave the Eastmarches, I think,” said the Thane, and then added “Let my enemies burn.”

* * *

“Vengeance,” said Vasper as he returned to the present, a triumphant smile on his lips. “Let them all burn.”