‘Now,’ said Kyne. ‘Let’s see what he has to say for himself.’
Kyne picked up the collar, a simple loop of metal with a hinge and a clasp, and held it open as he approached the circle. The Imperator snapped his teeth, struggling against the manacles. Unmasked, trapped, he’d lost some of his dark grandeur. Kyne waited for the right moment, then with one assured movement he darted forward and snapped the collar shut around the Imperator’s scrawny throat.
The Imperator immediately went rigid. Kyne stepped back and crossed his arms over his armoured chest. His eyes glowed piercingly beneath his hood.
‘The Awakeners intend to launch an attack on the Coalition in the near future,’ he said. ‘You will tell me when and where. You will tell me the size and nature of their forces. You will tell me everything you know about it.’
The Imperator opened his mouth, gaped soundlessly, and shut it again.
‘You will speak,’ Kyne said, and suddenly the gloom felt heavier, and Kyne seemed to grow, to become menacing and dreadful. Crake almost spoke himself, such was the force of the command. He felt a powerful need to do as he was told.
His voice, Crake thought, as the words skittered away into silence and the harmonic echoes died. He’s thralled the mouthpiece of his mask. Samandra was right: he’s crawling with daemons!
The Imperator trembled with the effort of resistance. ‘Speak!’ Kyne said again.
The Imperator shuddered. A line of red trickled from the corner of his mouth, shocking against the dead white skin of his face.
‘Speak!’ Kyne commanded.
The Imperator began to twitch and spasm. His mouth moved without sound. Drops of blood ran from his rotted nose.
‘What’s happening to it?’ Plome cried.
‘It’s the same thing that happened to Condred,’ said Crake. He should have anticipated this. ‘The daemon’s trying to destroy its host.’
‘Speak!’ thundered Kyne, and he loomed so large in Crake’s mind that Crake took a step back in fear.
‘Thessssk. .’ The words wheezed out of the Imperator like a slow breath through a harmonica, dragged from his lungs. ‘Attack Thesssk. . whole. . fleet. .’
Thesk, the capital. They were planning an attack on the capital, the seat of the Archduke’s power.
‘When?’ demanded Kyne.
The Imperator coughed up a gout of dark blood. It spattered Kyne’s chest and masked face, and drooled down the Imperator’s chin. Kyne didn’t flinch. The Imperator was wavering on his feet, but the power of the collar and the summoning circle kept him upright.
‘When?’ Kyne said again.
‘Tomorrow. .’ the Imperator said. ‘TomoooooaaaccCKKK. .’
The Imperator’s final word dried up into a rattling choke. Another flood of red spilled over his lips, his eyes rolled back, and he fell to his knees and tipped sideways, out of the circle, knocking aside rods and spheres as he fell. An unearthly screech sounded in their heads as his body passed through the protective flux, the last howl of the daemon as it was torn apart by the sonics. Then the Imperator hit the floor, lifeless and still.
Crake stared at the corpse, his chest heaving from the tension of the last few moments. Plome had his hand over his mouth. Kyne turned his head slowly towards them, green eyes like lamps in the dark. Outside, the sound of rifles cut through the silence.
Tomorrow. The Awakeners were going to attack the capital with all their strength, carrying an Azryx device capable of destroying the entire Coalition fleet. And they only had until tomorrow to stop it.
Thirty-Three
Silo backed off through the ruined room, Malvery at his side, both with shotguns held ready. All around them was the sound of movement: feet scraped, glass tinkled. An Awakener in a thick brown coat came lumbering through a doorway, carrying a rifle. Malvery fired, and he spun away in a cloud of blood and fabric.
Debris crunched underfoot, threatening to turn their ankles as they retreated. A section of the ceiling had caved in and boards hung down. To their left were jagged window frames that had once held glass. They were on the ground floor, and all Silo could see through the windows was the slope leading up to the meadows. That, and the man climbing in.
The Awakener was caught halfway in and halfway out. He’d got himself snagged on something and was frantically trying to pull his arm free. He looked up as Silo turned the barrel of his weapon on him, and Silo saw that he had wild black hair, and young terrified eyes. Then hair and eyes alike disappeared in the roar of Silo’s shotgun.
‘Swarmin’ all over us down here!’ Malvery said, still backing away.
Silo went to the doorway at the other side of the room and looked through. At the end of a short passageway, a door to the courtyard stood open, snow piling up against it. Malvery was right. They would have to abandon the buildings on the south side of the hamlet, facing the meadows where the lander had come down. Jez and Pelaru were nowhere to be found, Ashua had abandoned her post, and he’d sent Harkins to watch the trees to the north. They probably couldn’t have held the south side anyway, not against this number.
‘Awakeners keen on havin’ us dead, that’s for damn sure,’ he said.
‘Must’ve really got ’em worried,’ Malvery replied, with a grim smile.
‘Come on. Back to the others. We gonna hold that house, at least.’
They stopped for a moment in the doorway to the courtyard, to check that the coast was clear. The hamlet had been reduced to a warzone. The buildings were bullet-gnawed, roofs slumped and windows smashed. Snow had invaded them eagerly, and now gathered in cheerless living rooms and garages. The fountain in the centre of the courtyard had collapsed amid a tangle of metal that seeped black smoke: the remains of the gunship Grudge had taken down.
The wind picked up again, blowing a stinging flurry. Silo narrowed his eyes and ran for it. It was as good a time as any.
Somewhere to their left, past the burning wreckage of the gunship, was the bridge, the chasm, and the mansion beyond. All of that was lost to sight in the blizzard. To their right was a gap between the buildings where the road led away to the landing pad. The Awakeners had taken the pad and were pushing down the road, but they hadn’t dared to enter the courtyard while the defenders held both sides of the hamlet.
Silo could hear the dull roar of engines nearby, an insidious reminder that another gunship still lurked out there. Grudge had made the pilot wary, and his autocannon was another reason the foot soldiers wouldn’t enter the courtyard. He was hidden on the first floor of one of the buildings on the north side, covering the area from an elevated position. Silo approved of his tactics. The threat he posed kept the enemy off their backs more effectively than a dozen shotguns.
Somebody fired at them from the direction of the road, but the bullets were past and gone before they heard the shots, and they ignored them. They ran through the doorway of a stout stone house which had weathered the assault better than its neighbours. Inside was a short gloomy corridor with a doorway off to the left and narrow stairs heading up.
Malvery ran on while Silo paused and looked back, searching for signs of the gunship. Over the buildings on the south side of the courtyard, black smoke was billowing. The generator’s fuel tanks had gone up. Something to do with Jez? Perhaps. He hoped she was keeping them busy out there.