The Trials of Empire

Book 3: Empire of the Wolf

by Richard Swan

Genres: Fantasy action & adventure; Dark Fantasy; Epic Fantasy

Synopsis

The Trials of Empire is the epic conclusion to the bestselling Empire of the Wolf series, where Sir Konrad Vonvalt - the most powerful and feared of the Emperor's Justices - must finally face the dark powers that seek to detroy the Empire.

THE TIME OF JUDGEMENT IS AT HAND

The Empire of the Wolf is on its knees, but there's life in the great beast yet.

To save it, Sir Konrad Vonvalt and Helena must look beyond its borders for allies - to the wolfmen of the southern plains, and the pagan clans in the north. But old grievances run deep, and both factions would benefit from the fall of Sova.

Even these allies might not be enough. Their enemy, the zealot Bartholomew Claver, wields infernal powers bestowed on him by a mysterious demonic patron. If Vonvalt and Helena are to stand against him, they will need friends on both sides of the mortal plane - but such allegiances carry a heavy price.

As the battlelines are drawn in both Sova and the afterlife, the final reckoning draws close. Here, at the beating heart of the Empire, the two-headed wolf will be reborn in a blaze of justice . . . or crushed beneath the shadow of tyranny.

Praise for the Empire of the Wolf series

'A stunning piece of modern fantasy writing' RJ Barker

'Utterly compelling, thoroughly engrossing and written with such skilful assurance I could barely put it down' Nicholas Eames

'A fantastic debut' Peter McLean

'Equal parts heroic fantasy and murder mystery . . . Richard Swan's sophisticated take on the fantasy genre will leave readers hungry for more' Sebastien de Castell

'Great characters, compelling and wonderfully written. A brilliant debut and fantastic start to the series' James Islington

'Totally addictive' Novel Notions

'A brilliant book, with intrigue, excellent character arcs, a brutal magic system and a story I just could not put down' Grimdark Magazine

'An absorbing fantasy murder mystery . . . I have been thoroughly hooked by this series and cannot wait for the next helping of political upheaval' Fantasy Book Critic

'Fantasy, mystery, drama, intrigue, action - The Justice of Kings has it all' Bibliosanctum

'One of those utterly compelling and believable books that begs to be read in one sitting. This is going to be one of the standouts of the year' British Fantasy Society

'Swan's debut is a thrilling epic fantasy with a murder mystery and supernatural twist that will delight fans of Sherlock Holmes. It certainly delighted me' Fantasy Hive

'Swan has built a dark and gritty world, filled it with beautifully written characters and lays out a master-crafted story to create an incredible book that you can't put down' FanFiAddict

Release date: February 6, 2024

Publisher: Orbit

Print pages: 496

Sample

“Life has no meaning. Forget the Neman Church: there is no one, or thing, to judge you save those about you and you yourselves. Be defined by your deeds this day. Few of us linger in the halls of human memory for long.”

LORD WOLF OF WARINSTADT, ADDRESSING THE 1ST LEGION ON THE EVE OF THE BATTLE OF RABSBACH

I was dreaming of Muldau when the attack came.

No – dreaming is the wrong word. It was a nightmare. We had all been having nightmares, for days by that point. Sometimes we all shared the same nightmare, and those visions were freighted with portent; other times, they were simply nonsensical horrors. But they were consistent, and consistently frightening. Decades later I pray for a quiet and dreamless night’s sleep. Those prayers are seldom answered.

I had been dreaming about Muldau. I did not care to think of Muldau often. The first seventeen years of my life were largely unhappy ones, characterised by cold and hunger, danger and loneliness. But there were flashes of good, even if I did not appreciate it at the time.

Muldau had its fair share of temples, and those temples had their fair share of charitable ventures. Many were predatory organisations, little better than places through which illegitimate money could be laundered; but there were some, like the Order of the Temple of Saint Grimhilt, which cleaved to their stated purpose.

I was availing myself of their services, as I sometimes did. I took a few turns with a broom around the ambulatory, knocked the dust out of the altar cloths, polished some of the silverware, all in exchange for a hot meal and a cot for the night. In the dream, the matria, a woman whose name has long faded from my memory, took me aside whilst I was eating to teach me the Cardinal Virtues.

Except she kept forgetting them. She would sit in silence, thinking fruitlessly, whilst I would grow increasingly impatient. I wanted to eat my food in peace. Listening to the woman was bad enough; listening to her sit there and say nothing was even worse.

After a while I began to prompt her, but still she said nothing. My prompting became more insistent; then I began to shout, then scream, and rave at her like an insane person, but I got nothing from the woman except the blankest, most incoherent stare, as though a thick fog had enshrouded her mind.

The woman began to cry as her rational brain dissolved into nothingness, as no single lucid thought could be conjured from it. As I ranted at her to tell me the Virtues, she was consumed by the most profound horror, unable to think of anything, let alone one of the tenets of the Neman Creed. As the essence of her spirit dissipated like steam from boiling water, she looked at me with eyes wide with panic and terror. And then she began to scream, to rail against the injustice of her insanity, her impotence and powerlessness in the face of her abrupt, terminal decline. She screamed like an animal, or a babe, a thing with no sense of self or place in the wider world.

The dream faded after that. I have had it many times since that first time, and it ends in more or less the same place: the matria screaming, me screaming, and then I wake up screaming.

I do not know what the nightmare meant. I still do not know. Decades of reflection have not yielded up any intellectual insight.

But I still think about it. I think about many things from that time.

It was Sir Radomir’s hand that was clamped over my mouth and nose. His glove smelt of old leather and spirits.

“Silence, girl, in the name of Nema,” he whispered. His breath was rank with wine. He had long used it to dull his nightmares, but this fresh crop of arcane visions was too much even for him.

I was quiet. Instinctively, I tried to press myself up to sitting, but Sir Radomir held me down.

“No,” he whispered, shaking his head. He looked about the hall. There was a little moonlight, and I could see the whites of his eyes.

The hall creaked and groaned in the wind.

Through the gloom, I could see the Templar margrave, Severina von Osterlen. She was armoured in mail, and clad in a black and white Templar surcoat. She lay half-propped against the wall next to the hall’s entrance, hand on the hilt of her short sword, her face a grimace of anticipation.

I turned, slowly. On the other side of the hall was Vonvalt, similarly poised. But where von Osterlen looked anxious, Vonvalt looked calm, almost meditative. I wondered what he was thinking.

Sir Radomir slowly moved away from me and back into his corner. I realised then that I had been the only one asleep.

The four of us lay in silence. Outside, the wind moaned through the trees, whistling through the branches and rustling the leaves. The timbers of the hall creaked like those of a ship at sea, like rigging swollen with saltwater. The cold air whispered through the thatch above, dislodging dust and debris.

Something was moving amidst the noise.

My blood sang in my ears as I strained to listen. Whatever it was moved slowly and carefully. That it waited for the wind to pick up, trying to disguise its footsteps against the susurrus of rustling grass, suggested an intelligence that set it apart from, say, a passing doe.

My brow furrowed. My head bent to one side. Now there was a curious… trickling sound, though it had not rained, and there was no water in the hall. I looked around, but could see no leaks, and no one else seemed to have heard it either. It was like a patter, as though wine from an upturned goblet was seeping through the planks of a table and dripping on to the floor.

Ramayah.

The word came from nowhere, unbidden, rising from the depths of my mind.

And then I was distracted once again. Something brushed against the timbers of the far wall where Vonvalt sat, causing him to stir from his contemplation.

My hand went to the pommel of my short sword. The others tightened their grips. I looked between Vonvalt, Sir Radomir, and von Osterlen, but there was nothing to say, nothing to do except continue to pretend to be asleep and so perhaps surprise our attackers in return.

There was a gentle thump against the side of the hall that could not be accounted for by the weather. Three interlopers? Perhaps four? Or merely the advance scouts at the head of an entire army? In the best case, it was a few bandits looking to rob us; in the worst, it was some manifestation from our nightmares. There was no way to know. Charging through the door and out into the darkness was insanity. All we could do was wait and pray.

There were more noises now at the door, some scraping sounds, like claws against wood, and snorting like the snuffling of a boar. For a hopeful second, I thought that that was precisely what it was, and our fear and paranoia had finally overtaken us. I turned to look at Vonvalt, preparing to flash a wry grin, a rolling of the eyes and perhaps a knowing wink. In turn, he would smile, release the handle of his sword, and gesture for me to return to sleep.

He did one of those things, which was to release the handle of his sword. But then he brought out his Oleni medallion, which had been in his pocket, and placed it around his neck.

My heart leapt with great violence. “No,” I breathed.

“What? What is it?” Sir Radomir demanded in a whisper.

I looked at the door. The clawing, pawing was more insistent now.

I looked back to Vonvalt. He met my eye, gently shook his head. His face was grim set.

“What?!” Sir Radomir hissed.

“I think we might be about to die,” was all I could say.

Then the doors smashed open.

The following morning was a crisp one. The sky above was clear blue and still, the air fresh and cold. Our breath streamed away from our mouths in great clouds of vapour, and we pulled our cloaks about us.

We emerged from the hall, exhausted, shaken, but physically unharmed. Outside, there was no sign of any interlopers; no footsteps in the dew-laden grass, no broken stalks of wildflowers, no disturbed barrels or crates. The hall was unmarked, save for the marks we had left.

The village was a typical one for this part of Haunersheim. I do not remember its name, only that it was about twenty miles north of Hofingen, the last major settlement before one was faced with the vast, desolate emptiness that the Northmark was infamous for. In the distance to the east, the mountains of Hasse were reduced to the foothills of Leindau, though still high enough to be dusted with snow. To the west lay the beginnings of a network of huge ancient forests which stretched to the North Sea and the Tollish coast.

In front of us was a cluster of perhaps fifty houses, with thatched roofs so steep and tall that they were more roof than house. Of the villagers, there was no sign.

“Sir Radomir,” Vonvalt said.

“Aye?”

“Fetch the baron, would you.”

“Aye.”

Vonvalt, von Osterlen and I stood waiting as Sir Radomir walked to one of the larger houses about a quarter of a mile away and disappeared inside. A moment later he returned, this time with a handful of men, foremost of whom was an old lord who reminded me of Sir Otmar from Rill – stooped, ailing, and who had probably been the lord of this place since his twenties and outlasted several generations of his peers.

Eventually, the old baron reached us, flanked by his retainers.

“Our problem is solved?” he asked.

Vonvalt was quiet for a moment. “I believe so,” he said.

The baron grunted. “Will you take some victuals before you leave?”

“Aye,” Vonvalt said. “That and the information you offered me.”

The old baron winked at me, though I was in too sour a mood to give him the smile he expected. He did not seem bothered. “Come. Let us eat, and I will tell you what I know.”

The retainers set out a trestle in the hall, and fetched some bread to break our fast. They also brought a flagon of wine, which we divided eagerly between the four of us. The baron took none.

“So, Sir Dovydas,” the baron said, addressing Vonvalt. “You have some idea of what manner of beast has been terrorising my people?”

Vonvalt nodded slowly. “I believe a rare type of wild cat – rare here, in the Hauner Vale. They are much more common over the Kova, in the northern parts of the Confederation.”

“A large wild cat?” the baron asked. A note of scepticism freighted his voice.

“Aye,” Vonvalt said mildly. “A Gevennan swordfang. They are difficult to spot thanks to the colouring, and they hunt exclusively at night. We all of us saw it.”

“Yes, we heard the noise,” the baron said. He looked pointedly at the smashed bar which had hitherto provided a lock for the great hall.

Vonvalt inclined his head. “It is a fearsome beast, to be sure. But I have two pieces of good news. The first is that there will only be one, given they are solitary creatures. The second is that we are likely to have frightened it off forever.”

“Why do you say that? How can you be sure?”

“My experience of the creatures is that they attack opportunistically, preying on the vulnerable. They will quickly abandon a hunting ground if they are challenged. It is likely you will never see it again.”

The baron appeared to accept this fabrication with relief. “Well! Here’s to that!” He raised his goblet. “I am indebted to you, Sir Dovydas!”

Vonvalt smiled thinly, lifting his goblet the barest amount. “I should be grateful, now, sir, if you would share with me the information you have.”

The baron nodded. “Aye, you have earned it,” he said. He turned to his right, and called out to the door, “Anthelm! The information!”

Vonvalt frowned as the door to the hall was opened once more. Only this time, a group of five strong-looking men, variously armed with melee weapons, entered.

“What the fuck is this?” Sir Radomir demanded, pressing himself to his feet. Von Osterlen and I did the same, each of us drawing our swords.

Vonvalt remained sitting. He gestured to the newcomers. “You could not have used these men to tackle the swordfang?” he asked wearily.

“Only there was no swordfang, was there? Justice Sir Konrad Vonvalt?”

Now Vonvalt did look up sharply. He stared at the old baron. “So. You know who I am.”

The baron laughed. “Thought I was just some provincial idiot, hey?” He grinned. “I never forget a face, Sir Konrad.” He stabbed a thumb into his chest. “I was in Sova for your investiture. Aye, we were both younger men then, eh?”

Vonvalt could not contain his surprise. “That was over twenty years ago.”

The man tapped the side of his skull. “And yet I remember it as though it were yesterday.”

Vonvalt’s expression turned sour. “And so what? Your plan is to kill me, is it?”

“You are in disgrace, Sir Konrad. You think the news from Sova has not reached us out here in the Northmark? Every lord in the land is looking for you. There is a healthy bounty on your head. Enough to keep this village in victuals and trade for years to come. That will be my legacy; no man will say that I did not provide, nor that I was not faithful to the Autun.”

There was a lengthy silence. “I had hoped there would be no bloodshed here,” Vonvalt said quietly.

The baron laughed again. “There will not be any. I have just told you, you will be taken captive and returned to the capital.”

“I did not mean our blood.”

The baron snorted, making a show of looking at us. “A sot, a woman, and a stripling maid. Your reputation as a hero of the Reichskrieg may precede you, Sir Konrad, but even you cannot take on five men. And certainly not with this shabby collection of persons. Drop your weapons – and the pretence that you are anything other than condemned.”

“You miserable old cunt,” Sir Radomir said, spitting a gob of phlegm on the floor. When he spoke, he did so with a weary, disappointed anger. “What a waste of time, and lives. Must we really kill all of you now?”

“We are going to have to,” von Osterlen said, displeased. She nodded to the baron. “He knows who Sir Konrad is.”

For the first time the baron’s composure fractured. “Enough of this! Drop your weapons, or I shall be forced to have you drop them. And you would do well to remember—” he added, pointing at me, Sir Radomir, and von Osterlen “—that it is only Sir Konrad I am interested in capturing.”

“Are you ready?” Vonvalt asked us over his shoulder, ignoring the baron. “When I do it, you must move quickly.”

We each nodded, spacing ourselves out and bringing our swords into a classic Sovan guard.

“What in the name of Nema are you talking about?” the baron demanded, anger and confusion in his voice. “Blood of gods, Anthelm! Get them!”

“Drop your weapons!” Vonvalt thundered in the Emperor’s Voice.

The five men immediately divested themselves of their weapons, as though their arms were strung to a common puppeteer. They watched in horror as they did so, mouths agape, eyes wide, staggering as though drunk. Clubs, hatchets, a crude morningstar, clattered to the boards.

It was over quickly. I had barely moved by the time Sir Radomir and von Osterlen had killed two men apiece, stabbing ruthlessly, repeatedly, hacking as though cutting through a thicket. For my own part, I stabbed my opponent in the forearm, where he’d had the presence of mind to try and block my sword, and then again directly in the eye as he recoiled. I had not meant to stab him in the face particularly – rather the more vulnerable neck; but my short sword slid smoothly into his brain, the blade’s razor edge unhindered by the bone of his eye socket, and he collapsed dead so suddenly that my weapon was nearly pulled from my hand.

Sir Radomir pushed past me and cut the man’s throat as well, then wiped his sword on the man’s clothes. It was butchery. Vast quantities of blood flooded the floor, leaking from gaping wounds like red wine from a spilt bottle. Someone was screaming, long and loud, over and over again with every breath, and it took me a moment to realise it was the baron.

Vonvalt had not moved from the trestle. He continued to not move, nor speak, until the baron had stopped his lunatic screaming. I wondered whether one of the slain men was his son.

“You asked me a moment ago whether I thought you were some provincial idiot,” Vonvalt said. “The answer is yes, I did. Nothing you have done here has disabused me of that notion.”

“How could you – what have you done? How could you? What have you done?!” the baron shrieked stupidly.

Now Vonvalt drew his own short sword, with great purpose, and laid it on the table in front of him.

“The information. The matters we discussed yesterday. I would now like the answers. You know I am capable of drawing them out of you whether you want me to or not, so spare me the time and the energy.”

Vonvalt sat patiently for a long time until the baron calmed himself enough to speak sensibly. “Why should I tell you anything?” he asked eventually. “You are going to kill me whatever I do.”

“I am. You have committed the crime of incitement to murder. The penalty for that crime is death.”

“You do not have the authority to execute me. You are not a Justice any more. There are no Justices any more.”

“I have not been formally divested of my power.”

“You are a traitor!” the baron spluttered.

“Accused of treason,” Vonvalt said, as though these petty corrections would change the man’s mind. “You are wasting my time. Must I use my Voice on you? I assure you it is an unpleasant experience.”

The baron looked utterly wretched. “You want to know about ‘pagan armies’?” he said with sudden venom. “Draedists and northmen bandits marauding about the woods? And all led by a warrior witch? Aye? That is what you wish to know about?”

“You told me that you had heard about such matters. That you had knowledge on the subject.”

“Aye, I have heard about it. Everything I have just told you is what I have heard.”

“I am looking to discover the precise nature and location of this warband.”

“I have no idea where it is. I have no idea if it even exists! It all sounds like complete nonsense to me.”

Vonvalt frowned. “You told me—”

The baron gestured violently through the open hall door. “I told you because I wanted whatever it was that was terrorising the village to be killed, and I knew if anybody had the means to do it, it was you, Justice. A skilled swordsman with magickal powers – even if you are a traitor to the Crown – it was too good an opportunity to pass up.” He cast an eye over the corpses on the floor, his expression somewhere between forlorn and venomous. “Now I see it was little more than a cursed coincidence.”

Vonvalt sat back. I could tell he was struggling to contain his anger. “You have no information. You merely dangled a lure. To use me.”

The baron shrugged. Behind me, I heard both Sir Radomir and von Osterlen let out angry, exasperated noises.

Vonvalt stood. He picked up his sword. “If I were you, sir, I should not wear my loyalties to the Autun so visibly on my sleeve. Not any more.”

“I took the Highmark. I’ve no love for the Two-Headed Wolf,” the baron sneered. “But I know the value of money. I would have turned you in for the bounty and nothing more.”

“It is just as well. With Seaguard ungarrisoned, I expect it will be to this ‘warrior witch’ that you will shortly owe your allegiance. And certainly there are few enough men to be drawn from Hofingen to protect you.”

The baron shook his head in confusion. “Seaguard is not ungarrisoned.”

Vonvalt gripped the handle of his sword, ready to slay the man. “It is. Not that it matters. Do you have any more to say? Every word you spill to assist me is another few moments of life.”

The baron shook his head, but it was in confusion, not defiance. “Seaguard is not ungarrisoned. The Sixteenth Legion is there. Prince Gordan himself led them in.”

Vonvalt paused. “The Sixteenth Legion, and Prince Gordan with it, was slain to a man but a few weeks ago.”

The baron shook his head again, more vigorously this time. “I know not what to tell you. But the Legion has not been slain. They have taken up residence in the fortress.”

Vonvalt considered this for a moment. He lowered his sword, and I thought he was going to spare the old man; but then he battered him repeatedly with the Emperor’s Voice, over and over again, questioning him about the rumours of the pagan warrior queen, the nature of the entity attacking the village, on what news had reached the village from Sova about Vonvalt and Prince Gordan, and many other things besides.

The baron may have been a deceitful man, but he had been telling us the truth – at least as regarded his lack of knowledge. He knew nothing beyond the same rumours that we had heard. But he remained adamant that Prince Gordan and the 16th Legion had not been killed.

In the end, the questioning, rather than the sword, was the death of him. His throat worked in silent excruciation, his eyes rolled back into his head, and he slumped forward, his heart stopped.

Vonvalt wiped the perspiration from his forehead with a gloved hand. He regarded the baron for a moment, then slid his sword back into its scabbard, and stood.

“Come,” he said, and, stepping over the corpses of the slain men, he walked out of the hall.

We followed. I paused only briefly, to look at the small rune of banishment he had carved into the door frame.

“Quite the tally you have now,” Sir Radomir said to me.

We had recovered our horses and were heading north on an old path nearly overgrown by briar. Vonvalt had not spoken since the baron had died.

“What do you mean?” I asked irritably. I was exhausted, and cold, and still frightened from the events of the night before.

“Of men you have slain,” Sir Radomir said. He took a long drink from his skin, which he had refilled with wine from the baron’s stores.

“What an odd thing to say,” von Osterlen said from behind us. “Do you keep score?”

Sir Radomir shrugged. “I mean only that Helena has cleaved to her high-minded ideals in the past. She is quick to judge those who perform the act of killing.”

“Enough,” Vonvalt called out from the front of our caravan like a weary schoolmaster.

“I can speak for myself,” I said.

“Aye,” Sir Radomir said, as Vonvalt merely shrugged. “That you can.”

“There was nothing unlawful in what we did. They would have taken us captive.”

“Ah!” Sir Radomir said, pointing a finger at my face. “But they were acting within the confines of the law. There is a lawful bounty on Sir Konrad’s head, issued by the Emperor.”

“It was self-defence,” von Osterlen said, her voice level.

“Was it? Or was it the butchery of a group of lads seeking to enforce the common law? Certainly that is no longer our purpose.”

I felt a surge of anger wash through me. I threw my hands up in the air. “What are you doing? What is the point of this? So, what? We should have allowed ourselves to be captured, arrested and taken to Sova, there to be publicly executed whilst Claver launches his attack? Blood of gods, keep your thoughts to yourself if their only purpose is antagonism. Nema knows our lives are difficult enough.”

Sir Radomir was quiet for a moment; then he smiled, a lopsided, disingenuous grin. “Just wanted to get my sword red on some legal debate. I thought you all enjoyed it.”

“Enough, Sir Radomir,” Vonvalt said again, wearily.

We rode in silence for a little longer. I found my thoughts turning to Bressinger, as they often did in those days. With Vonvalt and von Osterlen taciturn, and Sir Radomir being a quarrelsome prick, I missed his easy manner more than ever. True, the man had been surly and withdrawn, though his moods were often a foil to those around him. When Vonvalt was quiet, Bressinger would sing; when Vonvalt was dour, Bressinger was garrulous. Had he been with us now, he would have been trying to make multilingual puns – his favourite pastime – or playing word games with Sir Radomir, or trying to provoke von Osterlen to smile. He would have done it, too. Bressinger could be – had been – irrepressible.

I smiled at my favourite memories of him, biting my tongue so as not to weep. I missed him so very dearly.

Perhaps half of an hour passed before any of us said anything. My thoughts had drifted back to the night before, and the hall we had slept in. Slowly, a question formed on my lips, but for a long time I was too disquieted to voice it. “Will they come back?” I asked eventually. I felt Sir Radomir and von Osterlen stiffen up. “Those… creatures? From last night?” I tried not to think of them. They were horrors, like those Sir Radomir and I had seen in Keraq.

Horrors that appeared to be following us.

“Demons, more like,” Sir Radomir muttered.

“Aye,” von Osterlen agreed quietly.

Vonvalt turned briefly. His face looked tired and grey. “No. Not there, anyway.” I thought of the rune he had carved into the door frame, and the way the creatures had shrieked as they encountered it – as though they had suddenly been hosed with boiling pitch. “But… there is something at work in the Northmark. I can feel it. The fabric between worlds is thin—and thinning. And for as long as it is, I fear we shall see more of those… ‘creatures’.”

“Never mind that,” Sir Radomir said, eager to talk about something else. “What about this talk of the Sixteenth Legion? Every person from here to Sova agrees it was destroyed. How is it they have taken up residence in Seaguard?”

“I assure you, Sir Radomir,” Vonvalt said, turning away. “I intend to find out.”

We rode on a little further until the countryside began to open up again. After a while the briar receded, as did the farmland that it hemmed, and we approached a vast expanse of marsh. The clouds had drawn in, and the countryside looked bleak and grey in the late morning light.

Before we left the outermost environs of the village, we came across a sorry sight half lost in a gorse thicket. It was an old shrine to Nema, but the altar was askew, the deer’s skull had fallen to the floor, and little more than a rime of melted wax marked the stones. From the look of the overgrowth which had wrapped itself around the altar’s base, it had clearly been neglected for a long time.

“We should have the villagers repair it,” von Osterlen said.

Vonvalt glanced at the shrine. “Why the hell should I care?” he muttered, and urged his horse on into that desolate, unforgiving country.

“The healthiest thing for any human mind is a willingness to change it.”

FROM CHUN PARSIFAL’S TREATISE, PENITENT EMPIRE

It would be the last time I travelled to Seaguard.

It was a place that had only ever been a symbol of fear, of corruption and treachery, of violence and death. Once the seat of Margrave Waldemar Westenholtz, now months hanged, it had passed into the hands of a caretaker master in anticipation of the arrival of Prince Gordan Kzosic, the Emperor’s third son, and the 16th Legion.

We had run into Prince Gordan briefly on the Baden High-Way, on our way to Sova, and he had struck me as a pleasant man who did not care much for the vicissitudes of Imperial politics. The prince had been tasked with taking up the margraveship of Seaguard ahead of the summer fighting season, a time when the North Sea was calm enough to allow for raids from the northern kingdoms.

Since then, rumours abounded of the destruction of both the prince and the 16th. We had first been told of this by Senator Tymoteusz Jansen, in secret in the Hauner fortress town of Osterlen; but we had heard it spoken of in almost every place we had been since.

The Legions had a certain aura of mystique about them. This had of course been eagerly cultivated and propagated by the Sovans, but quite needlessly. The evidence of their effectiveness as a fighting force was everywhere. Certainly in my life I had never known a Sovan Legion to be bested. And prior to the ill-advised invasion of Kòvosk, and the ascension of blackpowder as a weapon of insurgency and sabotage across the Confederation, one would struggle to find a record of a Legion suffering any meaningful defeat in the preceding half-century.

There were many reasons for this, which I do not need to go into in this account. Training, equipment, strategy and tactics, zealotry, and a lack of coordination and cohesion amongst their many enemies, all played their parts. At that time, therefore, it was unthinkable that a Legion could be defeated, let alone beaten so thoroughly that not a single man had survived. But, as with many things in the Sovan Empire, the supremacy of the Legions was on the wane. Blackpowder and its use was becoming the predominant force on the battlefield, and the Sovans, unlike their enemies, were slow to adopt it – wedded as they were to the short sword and the outmoded heavy cavalry charge.

To hear, then, that not only had the 16th Legion not been destroyed, but that Prince Gordan had in fact arrived safe and unharmed at Seaguard as planned, aroused within us a curious mixture of emotions. It fit with our own view of the natural order of things that the Legions were invincible, and was therefore a strange comfort; and, to the extent that the preservation of the Empire, or at least the lawful peace which it had brought about, remained our goal, the news was a boon.

But at the same time, there was something… odd about it. It was widely accepted – by many people who were not naturally credulous – that it had been destroyed. This apparent reversal, therefore, did not feel