Rebellion of the Black Militia Read online

  Contents

  Copyright

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Where to get more

  About

  Rebellion of the Black Militia

  Author: Richard Nell

  Email: [email protected]

  Website:http://www.richardnell.com

  All material contained within copyright Richard Nell, 2017. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means without prior written permission from the author.

  The following is a book of fiction. Names, characters, places, and events are either the product of the author’s imagination, or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events, is purely coincidental. Probably.

  Chapter 1

  “On the 21st day of May, in the three-hundred forty-second year of God-King Marsun’s rule, I, Johann Planck, Apprentice-Scribe of the fifth mark, have been sent to stop a demon.”

  Johann stared in amazement at the fresh ink now staining his notebook. He did his best to ignore the servants gathering and stuffing his personal affects into bags, and stripping his bed sheets.

  I’m not bloody dead yet, he thought bitterly, then wiped sweaty hands on his robes, and forced his attention.

  “That I have been sent on such a difficult task in my relative youth, and with so little oversight,” here he paused, and swallowed, flexing his trembling hand slightly, “surely implies a great confidence and faith in my abilities, and in my education…”

  His old, oak door creaked open with a jerk, and a balding pate poked inside.

  “That’s enough scribbling, Mr. Planck. The armorer is here. You’ll attend him, and then leave at once. Is that understood?”

  The bald pate belonged to a Mr. Ainsley—the head servant of the Apprentice wing. He was generally polite, but still intimidating, and his mere presence had inspired childish terror in Johann for over a decade.

  “Yes, Mr. Ainsley. Of course.”

  Johann clenched his teeth and set down his quill. His heart raced at the very notion of needing an ‘armorer’.

  Metal clacked loudly against wood to announce Johann’s visitor, and the ‘armorer’ entered with a huge canvas bag slung over his shoulder. He was unshaven and thick, with the blue cloth pants and shirt of a kingsman. His uniform was entirely wrinkled from neck to ankle, and also stained with soot.

  “Hullo, then. Needing a blaster, yer lordship?”

  Mr. Ainsley scoffed, and Johann blushed. He had risen to greet the man properly, but now stopped his bow mid-drop.

  “I am not a lord, sir. And, very sorry, but, a what?”

  “A gun, sir.”

  Johann’s desk shook as the man dropped his heavy bag. A few papers scattered to the floor, but Johann resisted the urge to give chase.

  “Or maybe a pistol, like?” The armorer rooted through his inventory. “There’s some pin-shooters, er, crossbows, rather, if ye’d prefer. Unless ye’ll be wantin’ a sword?”

  Again Mr. Ainsley made a sort of snort, lowering his face to hide his expression. Johann balled a fist.

  “Both, I think, thank you.” He swallowed back his fear. “The pistol, and the arquebus, I mean.”

  Expressionless, the royal armorer nodded. He stuffed a pistol and two small satchels wrapped in rags into Johann’s already stuffed bag. Then, with a loud thud, he placed a long musket across the desk.

  “This here’s a three an’ a half foot wheel-lock,” he said, “plus some powder and round shot fer both. An’ not ta worry, sir, triggers have guards.”

  Johann nodded as if he understood and was pleased. He waited and hoped for further explanation, or perhaps a lesson on how the weapons actually worked. The armorer stared at him.

  “Yes, well, thank you kindly. That will be all.”

  “Sir.”

  The big man turned and heaved his heavy sack again to his shoulder, brushing past Mr. Ainsley without a word.

  The old butler rolled his eyes, as if to say, ‘Oh dear, the lower classes,’ and Johann smiled politely. He’d never liked Vendian hierarchy, but thought it best to seize on a rare moment of solidarity.

  “I shall be out directly, Mr. Ainsley. Thank you.”

  The old tyrant frowned but made his exit, and Johann stooped and collected the papers before returning to his desk.

  “I am to be sent East to the province of Humberland, where reports indicate a class five creature has possibly been loosed and is now causing local destruction in the towns and countryside. My orders are to mark my skin with its name, then kill and trap it within my flesh, until I have returned to the Scribery for safekeeping.”

  The door creaked open again.

  “Sir?”

  “For God’s sake, a moment of peace!”

  Johann spun and saw the lowered head and dejected eyes of a new, teenage servant.

  “I…I’m sorry, sir. There’s…a hunter, that is, I mean, a Knight of the Crown in the hall, sir. He’s asking for you. Right now, he said.”

  Johann breathed and let the anger fade, knowing it was really all anxiety, and in any case not the boy’s fault.

  “Tell him to wait, please. I’ll be along shortly.”

  “I…yes, sir, but surely, if you were to tell him yourself, sir, it would be better…?”

  Johann took another long, calming breath. He turned and stared at the few brief words of his journal entry.

  I should have made a will, he thought, reading them again, now grimacing at the idea of a task undone. But what the hell do I have to give. And who would I give it to anyway?

  Decision made, he stood and waved away the boy. He inspected and took the time to fix the crude, inefficient packing done by the servants, then with a final, longing glance around his quiet home for the past ten years, he heaved the heavy bag onto his back, and tied the leather straps. With a deep breath, he seized the gun.

  * * *

  Johann rounded the corner with sweaty hands and a careful introduction prepared. He had never actually met a knight, and now that the moment loomed he worked hard to control his breathing.

  The instant he spotted a man in traveling clothes leaned against the barren stone wall, he lowered his head in respect.

  “Good afternoon, sir. I am Johann Planck, Scribe of the Fifth, and I must say I’m very pleased to…”

  “You use that thing?”

  Johann blinked and gaped as his plan fell apart.

  “The gun. Have you fired one?”

  Johann looked up from the floor. He had anticipated a square-jawed noble, groomed and resplendent, bursting with chivalrous vigor. Instead he encountered a dirty, disheveled young man with one milky eye, who to Johann looked more common bandit than knight. With some embarrassment, he decided it was the knight’s squire.

  “Of course I have. Wheel-lock. Three and a half foot. Guarded trigger.”

  The squire’s eyes assessed, and narrowed. Then they roamed Johann’s limbs, seeming to focus on his hands.

  While he waited Johann eased his weight from foot to foot, most uncomfortable in the silence of being so obviously inspected—especially by a soiled, low-born squire, little older than he.

  Though the years have been harder on him, by the looks of it. But such is the way of common laborers.

  “Who are you, sir? And where is your master?”

  The squire grinned with dry lips, showing darkly stained yellow teeth.

  “Call me Lam. My ‘master’ is waiting.”

/>   With that he turned and strode down the hall towards the wing’s exit, and Johann followed, practicing his introduction again in his mind.

  He’d lost some nervousness, at least, and silently thanked the squire for that. Despite living in the God-king’s protection now for more than half his life, Johann had rarely left the Scribery. Like most of his colleagues he spent his time in drawing rooms and libraries, learning symbols and languages, studying demonology, alchemy, and natural philosophy, while honing his mind and spirit to withstand evil. He had read many stories of Knights of the Realm, mostly fables and legends, always exulting in the great heroes protecting men from monsters. The warriors described were always regal, glorious and powerful. His hands twitched in nervous excitement.

  “Do you know the name of your master’s mark, Mr. Lam? The demon’s name?”

  ‘Mr. Lam’ ignored him, keeping on in a strange gait, as if his joints ached and the movement caused him pain. When at last he reached the long, curved stairs of the Apprentice Wing, he sighed and stopped, removing paper and tobacco from his pocket.

  “Don’t know no names,” he said, stuffing and sealing the paper expertly before lighting it with a match. Johann cleared his throat.

  “I’m sorry, but smoking is not permitted in these halls, sir.”

  Lam made no indication of having heard. He glanced over the rail, then down the long, winding staircase.

  “Shoulda sent a bloody servant.” He put his lips to the paper and drew a deep puff of smoke, his eyes again sweeping Johann’s body. “Woulda thought you’d be leaner doing these every day.”

  Johann waved smoke from the air.

  “The Scribery has kitchens and everything else the students and teachers require. My life is here. I rarely take them.

  “Don’t have everything.” The squire grinned, eyes glittering with something entirely unwholesome. Then with another sigh, and after loudly popping his neck and wide, lean shoulders, he slunk down the steps as he smoked, cursing with every platform reached.

  The Scribery was simply called ‘the Tower’ by the scribes, because that’s what it was. It was only one of such structures built on the edges of Newstone castle, but since it was the only such structure that mattered to the scribes, ‘the tower’ seemed sufficient. ‘The’ tower also had the distinction of being the biggest, and therefore tallest of the castle’s spires. Descending it took Johann and his new friend several minutes.

  They emerged at the bottom red and sweating—or at least Johann did. His heavy bag and arquebus had become instantly unfamiliar and unwelcome weight, digging their straps and wooden points painfully into his skin.

  Halfway down he’d considered asking Lam to take one, but the disgruntled squire’s curses and attempts to keep his legs straight seemed burden enough. The tall, pock-marked soldier flexed his hands occasionally as well, as if the knuckles hurt him.

  “Are you…alright?” Johann panted at the bottom, leaning forward with his hand on a wall.

  “I’m bloody fine.”

  Johann glanced at the man’s knuckles. Lam clenched his fists and pulled them away.

  “You’re a bit young…for inflammation, I mean, of the joints. Do you know this word? ‘Inflammation’? It means swelling. Have you seen a physician? I’m sure your master could inquire…”

  “I know what it bloody means. There’s nothing they can do.”

  Lam’s tone seemed to add ‘and leave me the hell alone,’ which Johann decided to oblige.

  He also noticed, now that he was watching him, that the young squire wasn’t even breathing hard. In fact his pain seemed the only indication at all that he’d just suffered a long, laborious descent, whereas Johann felt distinctly as if he might at any moment gasp his last, wheezing breath.

  The squire continued to notice Johann’s inspection. With a sound like a rutting pig, he snorted up a wad of yellow phlegm, and promptly spat it on the clean, stone tile of the tower entrance.

  “This way.”

  Lam shouldered past the few servants clustered at the tower doors, drawing looks and mutters as Johann smiled in embarrassed apology.

  Together they crossed the beautiful white-stone courtyard of the Scribery’s North face. Midweek merchants plied their trade from behind the appointed barriers, and the busy Newstone city life bustled beyond.

  Johann tried and failed to remember the last time he’d left the tower. It has not been this month, he thought, but perhaps last. Sometimes he went with some of the scribes his age to taverns, though he drank sparingly. And sometimes, to his enduring shame, he frequented the closest bawdy house.

  “Keep up, for God’s sake.”

  Johann blinked and tried to follow the lanky squire through the crowd. Lam was tall, and therefore at least easy to spot, but he also moved quickly and found gaps through the peasants with ease, while Johann bumped and blundered constant apologies in his wake. It soon also occurred to him that if he lost sight of the man, he had no idea where they were going.

  After near half an hour of barely keeping up, he became concerned that if the journey was much further he would have to shame himself by calling for a rest. Mercifully, the squire at last ascended a final hill, and took them entirely from the throng.

  Newstone had been built on a series of such hills all the way to the Eastern sea. Over the centuries it expanded into surrounding forest and countryside, until its borders stretched as large as some small nations. But the tower wasn’t far from the Northern border of the city, and apparently they had reached the edge.

  They entered a stablegrounds attached to what Johann assumed was an inn. Most of the populace couldn’t read, and so establishments like these simply placed signs with pictures of what they were. This one had a rooster crowing atop a mound of…maybe cheese.

  A stableboy spotted them and leapt off his barrel as if his mother called him for supper.

  “Welcome back, sir. I kept’m right shiny and fed. He had his own booth, and I kept it clean, just as you asked.”

  Lam grunted, inspecting a huge, grey stallion that stood ramrod straight in its stall.

  Johann knew little of horses, but decided surely by the beast’s stature, grooming and size—this was a warhorse. A knight’s horse. He let the heavy satchel on his back drop to the dirt, careful first to spot for feces.

  “Your lord is here, then? Shall I meet him inside?”

  “No. We leave directly.”

  Lam clicked his tongue and the already saddled warhorse walked to him. “Yours.” He pointed, and Johann looked to find a vastly smaller, browner and longer-hair breed, surely more donkey than horse.

  “I fed and washed ‘em too, mister. Saddles on proper.”

  The boy beamed and held out his hand, and Johann stared for a moment before understanding. He reached for his pocket.

  “Bah.” The squire cuffed the boy’s head as he walked past. “He’s been paid.”

  Johann cleared his throat and fumbled to tie his bag and gun to the horse’s saddle. With a steadying breath he put a foot squarely in the small stirrup, planted his weight, and tried to swing up.

  The horse snorted and pulled away, and Johann sunk immediately back to the ground.

  “Please, no rush.”

  Lam had apparently already mounted. He removed an apple from his saddlebag, and crunched loudly as he stared.

  Johann’s face burned. He had only once ridden a horse, and then only briefly as a boy. This memory was not a soothing one, so he did his best to banish it as he grasped the hard leather pommel again, lodging his left foot firmly on the stirrup.

  “Don’t you bloody move,” he whispered, then with a burst of effort, half-leapt and half-lifted his right leg high and over, firmly planting himself in the saddle. He glared in triumph at his ‘guide’.

  Lam coughed, then hawked a yellow glob of spittle on the grass.

  * * *

  They were half a day’s ride from Newstone in the hot afternoon sun before Johann’s courage built enough to voice his susp
icion.

  “Your master. He’s not coming, is he.”

  Lam took a long swig from his water flask—or at least Johann assumed it was water—and sniffed.

  “He is not.”

  Johann clenched his jaw, and held back the curse. He already found himself shifting in the saddle to avoid now-tender patches of skin. His back hurt, his thighs hurt, and the spring wind somehow made his eyes and nose runny while at the same time dry. He took a breath to control his tone.

  “Please explain.”

  For a time it seemed the man was content to entirely ignore him, but at last Lam’s eyebrows quirked. He cleared his throat.

  “My master doesn’t trouble himself with little devil-shites pestering villagers. It’ll be me who kills your monster, scribe. Unless you’d like to use that pea-shooter.”

  Johann looked again at the odd, lowborn rogue. He would have laughed, if he wasn’t terrified.

  “Little devil shite? Are you mad, sir? Or just a fool? We track Sazeal. A light and shadow demon of the fifth rank.”

  He waited for the appropriate fear, but Lam only sniffed.

  “A spawn of hell itself,” Johann gestured towards the earth in emphasis. “A creature all but invisible in darkness.”

  “Suppose we’ll hunt him in the day, then.”

  “In the…sir, this is a creature so strong, it can kill men with a single blow.”

  “So can a bear.”

  Johann clenched his jaw again and glared. After a few moments he began to notice the slightly upturned corners of the other man’s mouth, and the crinkles around his eyes.

  “You’re mocking me.”

  Lam finally grinned, or so it seemed, then he raised a hand and picked his teeth with a dirty fingernail.

  Johann spurred his horse and followed the road slightly ahead, not really knowing where they were traveling. When he felt calm enough he returned to find the squire puffing happily on a cigar and humming to himself.

  “What is your master’s name, sir? Which knight do you serve?”

  Rather than speak, Lam lifted a long pole on the opposite side of his horse. He slid off the covering tarp, pulling back the cloth to reveal a polished, silver spear.