by D. K. Latta
in Issue 156, January 2025
The ruins spread before Tantos like the bleached bones of giants gleaming under the moonlight. His soldiers milled uncertainly about his horse, fidgeting nervously; he could even hear the restless stirring of their unkempt prisoners although they were at the rear of the procession. The company had wandered far from travelled paths this night, he realized. Too far. And now, it seemed, they had stumbled upon a mystery.
Ruefully, he recalled that the day had begun less enigmatically…
Tantos cinched the straps of his breastplate before settling his plumed helm upon his head. Dawn was breeching the horizon as the latest addition to the Amyir Empire’s arsenal moved to the front line: the Land Striders. Men ensconced in human-shaped scaffolds lumbered on great legs of wooden poles, capable of wading through enemy forces, operated by a combination of pulleys and counter-balancing sand bags, the logistics of which he didn’t pretend to understand. They were literal giants lurching across the battlefield. Tantos knew they were terrifying to their enemies – but also clumsy. Propagandistic more than practical.
He allowed his aide to leverage him onto the back of his armoured horse, noting the unseasonal mist undulating toward the hill where his troops were amassed. As if such petty sorcery could thwart the most advanced army in the known world; such dreamers these barbarians, he thought.
Tantos gave a curt nod. In response the man on his right blew a fierce, clear note on his trumpet. Armour clanking, the army advanced.
Stout bow in hand, Lilta darted from tree to tree, frowning at the mist conjured by the shamans. She dropped beside Briar who was ensconced in a shallow ditch near the forest’s edge. He was broad shouldered with a patch over one eye; a souvenir from a past battle. “The mist is too thin; it will burn away as the sun rises.”
“Are you afraid, little one?” he growled, not unkindly, his single eye focused unwaveringly upon the distant enemy.
“This was a poor place to make a stand.”
“If wars were fought according to our wishes…”
“..we’d simply wish not to fight wars,” she finished the homily. Although she suspected it was a sentiment the Amyir would not appreciate. They would wish for greater and greater wars.
Dawn light glinted off polished armour as the Empire’s troops advanced, the towering Land Striders at their forefront.
Lilta stretched her bow string taut, aiming at one of the Land Striders. Gently, as if freeing a butterfly, she released the string. The arrow sang through the air, imbedding in the operator’s chest. The Strider reeled, tilted, and then collided with another, both toppling upon a clutch of infantrymen.
Cheers erupted from the woods at the spectacular first strike.
Tantos observed the Land Striders topple. Yes, he mused ruefully, definitely impractical. Then he heard the cheers from the unseen throats hidden in the forest. He almost felt sorry for the rebels.
Almost.
He watched casually as flaming catapults sundered their sanctuary.
Amyir soldiers poured through the flaming rents in the barricade of trees, nature’s phalanx little use against the machines of civilization. Arrows hailed down, launched from the technologically superior crossbows and the fearsome long bows. The Amyir boasted metal armour; the defenders only cotton hardened in brine. But as Lilta ducked beneath a cleaving swing and drove her sword up into the fleshy gap between armour and armpit, she knew the Amyir were not invulnerable.
Crashing through a lattice of branches she staggered over bloody, mangled figures. Her stomach heaved. She heard shouts and the clang of blades, but the greenery conspired with the mist, reducing all to phantom sounds, like a blind man’s dream.
Bursting through more foliage she collided with an armoured form and they both toppled over. Scrambling and kneeing him, she attempted to leap away – but froze before a bristling hedge of swords. A thunder of hooves caused her to glance over as an Amyir commander rode up.
“Commander Tantos,” saluted one of the soldiers.
Tantos looked vaguely over the scene, then wheeled his horse about. As he rode back into the fray he shouted: “Take her alive…or her head. Whichever she prefers.”
Lilta raised her hands.
Tantos’s horse trotted wearily under the noonday sun, flanks glistening from the morning’s exertions. The rebels had fought well, Tantos would concede that. And many had escaped in the shaman-summoned mist. Still, it was inarguably a victory for the Empire and yet another league laid behind them on their path to unification.
His aide took his reins, saying: “The forest is ours.”
Tantos glanced to where century old trees had been uprooted by catapults and scarlet fires still smouldered. “What’s left of it you mean.”
The aide stared obtusely, uncomprehending the irony his commander perceived. “Do you wish to inspect the prisoners?”
Sighing, Tantos slipped from the saddle and followed his aide.
The prisoners numbered close to fifty men and women, bound hand to hand. A dirty, unruly lot in skins and cotton armour.
He recognized one-eyed Briar, a respected warrior among the rebels. A good catch. The young woman beside him Tantos remembered seeing captured. “I’ve heard of the warrior-girl, Lilta,” he drawled as she glared defiantly. He cupped her chin, tilting her head, revealing the slightly tapered ears. “A girl with a bit of elven blood in her.” He made a show of wiping his fingers disdainfully on his cape. “I thought you’d be prettier,” he said. But in truth he knew: clean her up, comb her hair, and she’d be a head turner at the imperial court.
Lilta spat at him.
He laughed. “And more lady like.” Stepping back so that he could see – and be seen – more clearly, Tantos proclaimed loudly: “You are all prisoners of the Empire. If you recant and cooperate in helping us track down your brethren, many will be allowed to return to their homes.”
“While the rest are piked!” shouted Lilta for her brethren to hear.
“Rebellion will not be tolerated,” Tantos said. “Why do you resist? We offer law, order, opportunity.”
“Your order is a mask hiding a tyrant’s face.”
Tantos frowned. “We are the future. Your magics are sand castles to the tide of civilization.”
Lilta spat again. “You sheath yourself in armour and can’t feel the breeze, you build engines of war that level a forest.”
Tantos started, his earlier words on seeing the smoking woods returning to him. He pulled his cape around himself. “Gather the more valuable prisoners,” he told his aide. “I’ll lead a small troop escorting them to safer regions for proper interrogation – before their friends regroup and counter attack.” Irritably, he strode away.
Tantos rode at the head of twenty soldiers while tethered in a line behind came eight prisoners. Lilta and Briar among them, both esteemed among the rebels. They struck out cross country, eschewing the more travelled routes likely to be watched by spies.
But as late afternoon settled Tantos grew increasingly uncertain of their location. Still, he was confident that once they met up with the river Aessoeur it should prove easy to get their bearings. He gestured his aide over. “What do you know of these lands?”
“We are at the fringes of the Empire and it has been spottily mapped, sir. Still, we should meet the Aessoeur eventually and then we’ll know where we are.”
Tantos glared. “Do you intimate that I don’t know where we are?”
Muttering hasty denials, the man backed sheepishly away.
Yet as the trees grew more tangled about them, Tantos rather wished he had kept to the common paths after all.
Ruins gleamed like bones in the moonlit.
Vines crawled across old stones like the fingers of blind lepers looting a nobleman’s corpse. That imagery came to Tantos as he stood up in his stirrups. There was majesty to the buildings that time and erosion had not fully despoiled. And though ruins now, he thought he recognized the architectural style. He settled upon his saddle. “Bring the girl – Lilta.” On hearing the scuffling of feet as the girl was dragged unwillingly forward, he said, “Do you know what that is?”
Lilta stopped. Having been in the back of the procession this was the first she saw of the ancient city. “I played in places like that as a girl.”
“I’m sure you did,” he said drily. “What you observe is a city of the Ghanarii – an empire that ruled centuries ago.” He shot her a glance. “I suppose barbarians know little of actual history.”
Lilta glared at him, then shrugged, as if slightly embarrassed.
“They were masters of the technologies. They built the first aqueducts. The first chariots. It is said that they constructed limbs for wounded soldiers – not just peg legs and hooks, but moveable thanks to pulleys. They mapped the rotation of the stars. We Amyir have modelled ourselves greatly after the Ghanarii.”
“And their cities are ruins.” Lilta laughed. “You give me hope.”
“You see their end and think you can defeat the Amyir. I see a physical legacy that has survived beyond even death. Someday your children’s children will remember these times and they will thank the Amyir for forging their world in the furnace of civilization. We’ll spend the night here.”
Lilta started. “Ruins are sanctuaries for ghosts. We should sleep in the woods.”
Tantos chuckled. “You play among ruins in daylight and run from them in the night? And you wonder why we’ll triumph? Besides – I don’t recall you having any say in the matter.” Twitching his reins, he started forward.
Though he was weary and feeling the settling chill of night, the ruins were a stimulant. As the soldiers and their captives filed under the crumbling main arch, picking their way through weed-splintered flagstones, Tantos felt a part of history. Men passed to dust. Their works endured. That was something the girl could not appreciate.
As the procession entered the main square, buildings rising around them like canyon walls, Tantos thought he heard something scramble over loose stones. He reined in his horse and looked about, eyes narrowed. A trickle of pebbles rattled down the face of one building. He pulled his sword and held it aloft, instantly alerting his men. “We’re not alone! Sound the alarum!”
His trumpeter raised his instrument to his lips – then fell back, gurgling, an arrow in his throat. Suddenly figures leapt from the roofs, others burst from the black maws of ancient doorways.
Tantos expected raggedy barbarian rebels. Instead, the hooded figures were garbed in elaborate robes embroidered with unfamiliar patterns. The swords they brandished were curving and well-honed, unlike the crude short swords of Lilta’s people. They uttered no battle cries, no rallying shouts.
Momentarily he wondered if they had discovered a new people to be assimilated by the Empire. But he had no more time for musings as the battle was joined.
Bound, the rebels were in no position to participate in the conflict. Lilta had briefly felt elation as the ambushers erupted forth from the shadows. But like Tantos, she failed to recognize their raiment and suspected they were as much a danger as the Amyir.
One of the figures charged at her and she drove her heel into his diaphragm. The man fell, sword clattering across the stones. Lilta pounced on the weapon…
Tantos’s horse kicked at a purple-robed giant, gold tassels upon his shoulders. The giant dodged but Tantos brought his sword down upon his shoulder. It bit sickeningly deep, only the weight of the falling man himself wrenching the blade free. Wheeling his horse about, Tantos screamed, “Archers!”
Stirred from their confusion by his voice, the half dozen crossbowmen dropped to their knees and fired. There was music in the unison of the multiple twangs, poetry in the shafts hissing through the air with a single tongue. Attackers fell like scythed wheat.
“Hold!” roared a voice.
A figure loomed upon the roof of one building, easily mistaken for a statue save for when he moved. He carried no weapon, instead clutching an ivory-coloured staff. With this he gestured. “Cease thy strife! Canst thou not recognize brothers when thine eyes gaze upon them?”
Tantos frowned. With everyone milling about chaotically it was unclear to whom the staff-wielder was referring. Suddenly Lilta ran forward. “Help us! These men are invaders—!”
“Silence!” sneered Tantos, wheeling his horse about and raising his sword threateningly.
“Halt!” roared the man on the roof. “Thou clearly be men of Empire. Therefore thou art heartily welcomed!”
Tantos grinned even as Lilta’s face fell, robed men closing about her and her rebels. It was their use of crossbows that must have decided the matter, he realized. “I am Tantos, Commander of the 5th Legion of the glorious Amyir Empire.”
“I be Darnil, governor of Carmash – distant-most outpost of the Ghanarii Empire!”
Tantos’s jaw dropped.
The rebels were herded through winding passages by the robed strangers till they arrived at old dungeons. The doors creaked mournfully on rusty hinges, thick dust stirred by the movement of bodies. Did that indicate a benevolent culture with little use for dungeons? Or a ruthless one that disposed of its enemies so swiftly they had little need of incarceration? More likely, she thought, it was merely a sign the robed men encountered few strangers.
The door clanged shut at her back, followed by the rasp of a bar being slid into place.
After a moment she peered through the tiny window, but the hall was already deserted. Confident they would not be interrupted for a time she settled cross legged upon the cold floor.
“What are you about, little one?” Briar asked.
She laid pouches of powders before her that the cynical Amyir had not bothered to confiscate from her belt. Various appropriate incantations flittered across her thoughts. “I may have a spell or two that can get us out of here, provided we are undisturbed…”
Governor Darnil emerged upon the square beneath the moon bearing his staff of office. Tantos squinted but could not discern features in the darkness of the man’s cowl. He glanced around at all the hooded men, unconsciously pulling his cape about him. He did not like dealing with faceless men.
What he said was, “I regret our people met in such a disastrous misunderstanding.” The dead were being carted away by other robed men, in silence, and with all the grace as if they were sacks of potatoes.
“‘Tis a trifling thing.”
If it were his men, he would be more bitter, he thought. Then remembering one of his own was among the fallen he looked about quickly for his slain trumpeter, but the body had already been removed. He wasn’t sure he liked that. But he was a diplomat as well as a soldier, so he kept his peace. “You say you are Ghanarii?”
“Verily,” said Darnil. “Come, permit us to provide victuals.”
As Darnil led the way, Tantos’s aide sidled up to him. “The Ghanarii Empire collapsed centuries ago,” the aide whispered.
“An empire is not a body, where when the head dies, limbs must wither. Perhaps an off shoot remains. You yourself said we had not fully mapped this territory. Or perhaps these people occupied these ruins and adopted the name for themselves.” Yet why did they speak in such an archaic manner, he wondered? Another possibility was that these truly were the descendants of a final garrison of the Ghanarii.
But they would have to be mad not to realize their empire had collapsed long ago.
“What if they’re ghosts? Like the girl said?”
Tantos looked at the dilapidated city, pondering the weird way the silent men were hidden in their robes. “Do ghosts fall to arrows?” He turned irritably upon his man. “Are we superstitious barbarians?”
His aide paled, suitably chastised, and stepped back. But as they were led into the building, Tantos wished his words had reassured himself.
Tantos shivered as he recognized the torch-lit eating hall from other Ghanarii ruins he had come across – three long stone tables set at angles to each other, forming a triangle; the walls dressed with embossed sheets of copper, displaying scenes of Ghanarii military victories. Never before had he seen such a hall alive and occupied. It was like he had stepped into history. He might almost believe the rebels had enchanted them if Lilta and her group hadn’t been as surprised by all this as he was.
His men clustered at one table, taking comfort in unity, their hosts finding seats at the other tables. Food was brought. The meat was gamey, the vegetables lacking crispness, but it was mostly edible.
Tantos suppressed his unease. This was a tremendous opportunity he knew. A chance to make contact with, perhaps form an alliance with, a fragment of the very model upon which the Amyir based so many of their ideals.
“It was our understanding the Ghanarii Empire had…” He hesitated, choosing the most diplomatic way of broaching the topic. “That is, um, is the empire…strong in these parts?”
The governor said, “I…I am unsure. It has been some time since we have benefitted from communiques from Zajarii.”
The capital of the Ghanarii Empire! This then was no second empire but it truly was a forgotten remnant of the true culture. “Then I bring you melancholy news: Zajarii fell, long ago.” The robed figures stirred, murmuring amongst themselves. “But I represent the Amyir Empire,” he added hastily, “the true child of Ghanarii. We eagerly welcome you and yours into our…” His words drifted off.
A tall figure had entered and taken his place at one of the tables. Tantos recognized the golden tassels at the man’s shoulders. Dimly, he was aware Darnil was speaking.
“..verily, such news be calamitous. Though long have I pondered why it be that no longer do I enjoy the privilege of receiving missives from the emperor—”
“You?” said Tantos, hollowly. “The empire fell generations ago.” Tantos rose. “And I demand you explain that man.” He gestured shakily at the newcomer. “I struck him down grievously not an hour ago!”
“Verily, but we are hardy, we men of Empire.” Darnil snapped his fingers and the bigger man rose again from his seat and casually opened up the breast of his robe.
Revealed were scraps of flesh – old, putrid. But mainly it was a breast of iron, as though shards of breastplates had been forged clumsily together; through gaps revealing the chest cavity he could see large gears grind about each other like the innards of a clock.
Tantos’s tongue felt sandy in his mouth. He clutched the table and looked about at the other Ghanarii – all robed, their faces hooded, concealing their true forms. He recalled the stories of how the Ghanarii had progressed beyond hooks and pegs to replace damaged limbs. But this?
This was unbelievable.
He remembered Darnil’s claim to having received missives from his emperor. “You…have kept yourselves alive? All this time? With gears and iron and…” He could not finish the thought.
“We have transcended fragile humanity, for the glory of the Empire. As wilt thou and thine.”
Tantos stared, the words only slowly percolating through his mind. “Whu-what?”
A man stepped up behind Darnil – and Tantos recognized him as his own trumpeter, slain less than an hour ago. His neck and upper chest gleamed with polished metal. “The spark of life did persist in yonder man of thine,” said Darnil. “We stoked it again into the flame of life.”
The trumpeter’s eyes were dull and glassy, his lips hanging slightly apart, like an imbecile. Tantos started to back away, clumsily falling over his stool. He scrambled up, his frightened men clustering about him. Their swords hissed free of their scabbards. “You’re…you’re insane. He’s not… None of you are human anymore!”
The robed figures began circling the tables. “We have divested ourselves of the frailties of flesh – we grow no more sick, nor sick of heart,” said Darnil. “Ne’er more to know pain, or fear, or sadness. Thou wilt see when you have joined us—”
“To the demons with that!” roared Tantos, hacking at the nearest Ghanarii, half cutting his head from his shoulders. As the man fell, Tantos could swear he heard the ticking of a clock.
The Ghanarii surged forward.
“They can be killed!” shouted Tantos, encouraging his men as they retreated into the passage leading from the chamber. “Or at least incapacitated! We saw that in the square!”
The curved swords of the Ghanarii flashed in the torch light, met by the sparking blades of the Amyir. Tantos saw one of his men cut down in a flash of silver, his bloody body disappearing into the swirl of robes. He shuddered, pondering the man’s ultimate fate.
He groaned as a blade gashed his arm, but plunged his sword into the dark mouth of a hood. There was a sickening crunch, but whether bone, or iron, he could not be sure. Wrenching his blade free, he parried another strike and kicked out at the attacker. In the passageway it was hard for the robed men to come at them in numbers. Tantos was able to shift his men about, allowing a few soldiers to rest at the back before surging forward and relieving the men at the front. In this way, each man could briefly recoup his strength. It was a simple tactic, but one that seemed not to occur to the Ghanarii who kept the same attackers at the vanguard until they fell beneath Amyir blades.
Moonlight splashed suddenly over them and the stones beneath Tantos’s feet became weedy. He gratefully inhaled the fresh breeze of the open square. Yet as they retreated into the open, he knew the Ghanarii could overwhelm them with their greater numbers.
Suddenly footsteps rattled in his ears. He whirled, fearing ambush. But he stopped on seeing the rebel girl, Lilta, and her group, apparently having escaped captivity and armed with Ghanarii swords that must’ve been left upon the ground from the previous battle.
If nothing else, the rebels were resourceful, he mused.
Lilta looked from Tantos to the dark aperture from where the sounds of clashing swords emanated. A snide smile turned her lips. “Negotiations going poorly?”
“A truce!” panted Tantos. “An alliance against a greater foe.”
Lilta looked from him to the entrance.
“Only together can we survive!”
She pursed her lips. Then she nodded curtly. “There’s something uncanny about these Ghanarii.”
Tantos laughed almost hysterically. “You don’t know the half of it, girl!”
His men fell back into the square and robed figures poured like a torrent from the tunnel. At a gesture from his uplifted sword, crossbows twanged and the first line of robed men tumbled to the flagstones. “Retreat!” he screamed.
Amyir and rebel alike retreated, side by side, hacking at the silent men pursuing them. Tantos found his horse and mounted, the beast’s slashing hooves enhancing their arsenal. They fought a rear-guard action to the city limits, paying for each yard in a currency of blood and a flurry of blades.
“What do they want?” demanded Lilta, panting. “We’ve nothing of value.”
Tantos snorted. “They act in our best interests. They think we want to become like them!” His horse kicked, caving in a skull of one robed man too slow to get out of its way. “Beware the fanatic, girl!”
Then they were beyond the city limits and racing into the woods.
The pursuit continued for a while, but grew rapidly less enthusiastic. Eventually, rebel and Amyir alike found themselves running through the night with only memories at their heels.
Lilta and Briar and their fellows collapsed to their knees, panting, nursing nicks and other wounds. Wiping sweat from her eyes, she looked up – the tip of a sword pointed at her. Beyond it was Tantos’s aide. Other Amyir encircled them, swords drawn.
“We are allies,” she gasped.
“Against a common foe,” he said, “who has now retreated. We resume our former roles.”
Glaring, Lilta looked over at Tantos astride his horse, his eyes opaque, his brow knitted. He said nothing.
Lilta awoke with a hand over her mouth. She struggled but a hiss stilled her. She saw a finger pressed to lips, cautioning silence. Sleep slipping from her eyes, she recognized Tantos leaning over her. He relaxed his grip.
“What do you want, curse you?” she whispered.
He displayed a knife, startling her. But she was even more surprised as he commenced sawing her bonds. “The sentry’s asleep – unsurprising given the day we’ve had. He’s not due to be relieved for another hour. You have that long to get away.”
“What’s your game? A hunt?”
“If you’re far enough away before your absence is detected, I can justifiably tell my men we are too exhausted to pursue you and you can slink back to your comrades.”
Briar and the others had roused by this point and stared unbelieving as Tantos severed their bonds as well. Lilta rubbed her wrists absently for a moment, staring at the Amyir. “Why?”
“I believe in the Empire. I believe we are the flame that will burn away the darkness of barbarism.” He hesitated, sheathing his knife. “But I’ve glimpsed something this night – a path yet untrod, perhaps. A future to which our catapults and self-righteousness may one day lure us. And I think, perhaps, a healthy opposition might not be a bad thing. A tempering influence, if you will.” He saluted ironically. “When next we meet, it will doubtless be on the battlefield.”
Turning, he crept back toward his own tent.
Lilta did not quite understand what Tantos had meant, but she did not care. She and her companions slipped away quietly into the night.
© January 2025, D. K. Latta
D. K. Latta is a Canadian writer of Speculative Fiction with a few score stories published over the years, including on previously in Swords & Sorcery Magazine.
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