4 - Ash and Coals

  A mask.

  That’s all Savidor’s men found after four days of scouring the crater, digging through corpses, and slipping through earth so soaked with blood it oozed underfoot. A single bone mask - fractured, splintered, the black lacquered surface warped from the heat. No body, not even bones. Just ash and coals.

  It might as well have been nothing.

  Wallace leaned across the desk and picked up the mask. His fingers caught on the uneven edges as they curled around it. The bone beneath his fingers splintered further as his grip tightened.

  “You’re certain?” he asked.

  He glanced up at the knight who stood at attention before him, hands clasped behind his back. Wallace didn’t remember his name. The knight nodded firmly.

  “Yes, m’lord,” the knight said. “That was all we found at the site. We were able to recover arms and most of our dead before the agreed-upon deadline, but-”

  “Did you look over the entire area?” Wallace interrupted, voice sharp.

  The knight paused and glanced up.

  “...yes, m’lord,” he said hesitantly. “Thoroughly. We even reassigned men from the clean up to-”

  “Did you search the crater itself? Find any other signs?”

  The knight’s jaw tightened. Wallace ignored it.

  “We did not find any other signs, m’lord,” the knight said through clenched teeth.

  Wallace frowned, eyes narrowing.

  “How thoroughly did you and the others search?” he asked.

  For a moment, only silence met the question. The knight’s jaw worked as he struggled to reply.

  “Sir,” he said finally. “We checked the area thoroughly. I retrieved that mask myself. Because of our mission, we were unable to recover some of our own casualties.”

  “Your casualties mean little when it comes to the weapon,” Wallace snapped. “Do you truly not understand what it means to have lost this asset? Or are your men so confident that this loss has not shaken them?”

  The knight fell silent, not meeting Wallace’s gaze. Wallace straightened and waved a dismissive hand.

  “Leave me,” he said.

  The knight came to attention, bowed stiffly, and left. His armor clanked as he strode from the room. The door closed a little too firmly. Wallace ignored it.

  “Imbecile,” he muttered.

  Dead soldiers were not his concern. A body would rot beneath the sun just as easily as it would rot beneath the earth. He sat and leaned back in his chair, rubbing his temple.

  It wasn’t unexpected - far from it. The negotiations had gone too smoothly, the disagreements superficial. They knew it. They all knew it. And now, no body. He thought back to the conversation between himself and the high commander.

  “He was strong,” Voss had said. “But he fell to Adern, just like any other.”

  “And the body?”

  “Burned up.”

  Burned up indeed.

  “So, I was right,” a smooth voice said.

  Wallace glanced up as a figure peeled itself from the shadows, shimmers of magic falling to reveal gold and red threads of mage’s robes. Master Varos’ nose wrinkled as he dusted his shoulder off.

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  “Fordan’s Hill is certainly…quaint,” the mage sniffed.

  He sat across from Wallace, who frowned.

  “What are you doing here? I thought you were holed up in a mountain somewhere,” he said.

  Varos grinned. “Happy to hear you missed me.”

  Wallace only scowled. The mage made him feel uncomfortable in many ways. He wasn’t quite sure how to describe it. Slimy perhaps. Or off-putting.

  “My project can be put on hold, especially since it seems I need to retrieve our only surviving subject.”

  “Don’t get ahead of yourself,” Wallace said. “We don’t know for certain that it’s alive.”

  Varos smiled.

  “It’s alive. I’m certain. I made it myself. I should know its limits and capabilities,” he said.

  Wallace’s frown deepened, tone rising as he snapped, “Or perhaps, mage, you know that the Savidorian court will be breathing down your neck should it truly be dead. You made too many promises, Varos. And now, your weapon is gone.”

  Varos waved his hand dismissively.

  “His majesty expects results. He doesn’t care how it gets done. He understands the nature of risk, provided, of course, that the outcome still favors him.”

  Wallace’s expression darkened as he stood abruptly and paced over to the window. His gaze narrowed at the outside world - unfamiliar stone and streets. Fordan’s Hill once belonged to Adern. Now it belonged to Savidor. But it wasn’t home. And that seemed to frustrate him even further.

  “You assured us of a decisive end,” Wallace said, frustration rising with his tone. “You assured us this weapon would see the end of it. For three years, this war has raged, and Adern is still not under our control. Two years longer than we anticipated.”

  “I warned you they were slippery folk,” Varos muttered, sinking further in his chair.

  “Master Varos!”

  “I delivered what was promised!” Varos shouted, sitting up straighter. “My creation did exactly as it was made to do - routed enemies, cleared battlefields, savaged Adern. It is not my fault you didn’t know how to control it properly. Nor that you lost it.”

  Wallace clicked his tongue and turned back to the window.

  “We didn’t lose it,” he snapped. “It fell in battle.”

  “All the worse. If you had used it like I suggested-”

  “I will not, nor will I ever approve of setting a monster like that upon a population of civilians. Savidor does not have to stoop so low as to use underhanded tactics like that.”

  Varos grunted and sat back.

  “At some point, you will have to come to terms with acceptable risks,” he muttered under his breath.

  Wallace looked at him. For all the world, he didn’t understand why his majesty had even sought out this mage. From the first meeting, Varos made Wallace’s skin crawl. It could be that he worked in monstercraft, could be that Wallace had witnessed his experiments in person once or twice. But no, it was more than that. Something about his eyes when he talked about things like “acceptable sacrifices.” Empty.

  After a moment, Varos cleared his throat and looked up again.

  “It’s still alive,” he said.

  “You don’t know that.”

  “But I do.”

  Wallace’s eye twitched as he stared at that childish grin. Sometimes, it felt like dealing with a child. He closed his eyes and reminded himself quietly that this madman had still been the one to earn them the successes that they’d had in this war.

  “How?” he asked, turning to face the mage.

  Varos grinned. “There’s no corpse.”

  “We established that,” Wallace said. “It burned up.”

  “But a corpse burned up, even with mage’s fire, will leave some traces - bone or teeth.”

  “How do you - no, never mind, I would rather not know,” Wallace said, holding up a hand. “Adern probably took the body. Hauled it back to Bastion’s Reach as a prize.”

  “If they had, do you truly think they would have hidden it?” Varos tilted his head, a smile twitching at his lips. “You forget, I know these people. They wouldn’t have passed up an opportunity to reassure their people that the big bad monster killing their fathers and brothers was dead.”

  Wallace hesitated. It made sense. Too much sense. He shook his head.

  “Dammit,” he hissed, walking back to the desk. “It’s alive.”

  There was no other possible explanation. Varos grinned. Wallace wanted to slap it, but he clenched his fist instead.

  “How the hell do you explain that, then? Your unstoppable creature. How did they stop it?”

  “Desperation births miracles,” Varos said. “After all, it was desperation that approved my work for you.

  “We were not desperate,” Wallace snapped. “We were looking to mitigate the damage to our army. We are still looking for that.”

  He chewed his lip and leaned against the desk, mind whirling.

  “His majesty is concerned that this ceasefire will make us look weaker but I think we can use this to our advantage, especially if you’re right and that damn weapon is alive,” he said.

  “They won’t stay cowed for that long, especially since it seems Adern’s High Commander Voss is determined to sell the lie that the monster’s dead,” Varos warned.

  “But that’s the point. They’re hiding it. If it were me, I would be looking for answers on how this thing works, how to counter it if another should come about, or how to reproduce it,” Wallace muttered. “And if they’re keeping it…”

  “We can find it,” Varos finished, grinning.