Imperius Ch. 03

The "they" Saphir referred to turned out to be the entire Imperial battalion.

He led her through more corridors—and Lilah realized as they went that the sky-ship seemed designed to be deliberately confusing, and not just ineptly conceived, as she had first thought.

It was not a comforting realization. There were only two purposes she could think of for such an endeavor, to confuse an intrusion, or an escape. She wasn't sure which scenario was more frightening to imagine, but neither frightened her so much as considering that the ship had been actually built with such likelihoods in mind.

What had she gotten herself into?

A ramp descended before them, slowly, and as she stepped out in view of the encampment, she felt a hundred eyes on her.

The Praetor, Lilah thought—wryly and without surprise—was the sort of man to throw a new swimmer into deep water before they knew what to make of it.

What did surprise her was seeing the same bone-deep weariness in the eyes of the Imperial soldiers that she knew so well among the soldiers of the Illythian regiment. These troops had initially been promised a brief campaign in Illythiel, where the technology was decades behind their own.

More importantly, the Imperius had believed that Illythiel was too fixated on honor and chivalry to be particularly adept at tactics. They were wrong.

Illythiel had proved to be more cunning and inventive than they had ever anticipated. The war had barely begun when they had crafted mechanical men, goliaths towering over the battlefield, that crashed into the enemy ranks and smashed the smaller Imperial sky-ships to bits. They had introduced other innovations as well, devices that drew the Illythian mists to their forces and shrouded both their approach and retreat in mystery and confusion.

Most of those they passed stared, some lascivious, some hostile, and almost all of them exhausted.

She was nearly relieved when Daegon lifted a tent flap open, guiding her through.

Lilah stepped inside and found herself facing the sudden attention of a bevy of imperial officials.

Deep water, indeed.

There were more than a dozen people in the tent, each clad in the armored regalia of the Imperial military, and divided into four distinct groups. At the forefront of each entourage stood a Praetor, each of them marked by a crimson cloak. Each blazed a force of personality, the precise and stern charisma of military command.

Of course, there was Magnus. He stood in the far corner, arms crossed, his figure drawing her gaze with his primal magnetism. His eyes moved over her, languid and smoldering, sending warm, unwanted ripples of embarrassment and desire through her.

She hated him so.

"I know you think it's a mistake—," the one nearest to her was saying when she had entered the tent, and went silent, turning at her entrance. Only slightly less tall than the giant Daegon at her side, he had deep, dark eyes and skin like dark umber, contrasted elegantly by white armor. Of all of them, and all the other Imperials she had met, he alone wore something so pale, accented by gauntlets and greaves the color of polished gold. His face was a harmony of angles and curves, the hard square of his jaw giving way to the sculpted roundness of his lips and cheekbones.

He looked grand and almost knightly in an ostentatious sort of way, and as afraid as Lilah was of her breach of decorum, she realized that she was not quite afraid of him.

The same could not be said for the others.

There was a man with hair colored to emulate burnished gold, and flashing emerald eyes. He wore a brooch on his red Praetor's cloak that depicted a rearing, golden lion on a black backdrop. His gaze was haughty but acute as he looked at her, his arms crossed over his chest.

On another side stood a woman of statuesque proportions, aloof and regal. Lilah had never seen a colder beauty. If she had been asked to conjure a vision of winter embodied, this woman was what Lilah would imagine. Her skin was polished alabaster, pale to the point of translucence. Her hair was raven, so dark it hinted at blue, and gleamed like obsidian. Her eyes were a pale silver gray, opaque and emotionless.

Lilah was awestruck, lost in her icy glamour.

When she did tear her gaze away, it was only for it to fall on the most alarming thing she'd ever seen outside of a battlefield. Lilah gasped and stepped back, and unthinking, grasped for a handhold.

A panther.

There was a panther in the tent.

It sat placidly beside the winter goddess. Its fur was the essence of midnight, sleek and gleaming, and so black that Lilah first mistook it for a trick of the darkness. Its amber eyes shifting to jade in one flicker of light and then back again in the next. It exuded silent power, a quiet inner ferocity that, for Lilah, conjured ancestral memories of jungle shadows and sounds in the dark.

The woman, her expression as empty as glass, rested her hand on the panther's head. The motion stirred Lilah from her shock and she found herself gripping—of all things—Daegon's massive wrist. The giant was looking back down at her, something unreadable glinting in his eyes. She had a sneaking suspicion that it was amusement.

She let go of his wrist. Somewhere in the tent, someone chuckled.

Saphir, on her other side, guided her to a point beside Magnus, just a fraction behind him. She felt curious eyes on her and kept her gaze lowered, trying very hard not to think about feline shadows leaping from the darkness.

She lowered her head, and she did not have to feign that demure impulse now. Her cheeks felt as hot as they had when she had noticed Daegon in the shadows. The giant stood near her shoulder, and she was strangely grateful for his company. As frightening as he was on his own, he was like a blockade against the Praetors' attention. It didn't eradicate it, but she felt small enough in his shadow that her sense of it was diminished.

All around her, she could feel the energy of the space, tense, curious, and wondering.

It made her want to bolt.

Magnus cleared his throat, "You were saying, Ajax?" he asked courteously.

There was a pause. "Yes," the other man responded, straightening. "I was saying," he said, with the tone of one trying to reclaim a train of thought. He placed his hands on the war table in the center of the tent. A holographic map floated in the air before him. "My men need a respite, Magnus."

"Don't we all?" The blonde man put in, with the tone of mingled boredom and amusement so instinctive to aristocrats. "Back in the capitol they romanticize this Island, for its fixation on courtesy and valor and its lush scenery." He nonchalantly rested his hip against the edge of the war table. Lilah kept her eyes averted, but she could feel his eyes sweep over her as he spoke, curious and arrogant. "We expected a temperate climate and a swift victory. What we found was this dreary, cloud drenched abyss. Temperate only by virtue that the damp can do little more harm than seep into our bones and rust our weaponry."

He straightened and began to circle the war table."After three years of this exhaustive campaign, Who amongst us couldn't do with a little distraction?"

He neared Lilah, then, and she tensed at the unexpected attention. Lilah had believed they were moving on from her arrival, but as he came to a stop before her, she could feel his eyes fixed on her face. He was taller than she had expected. At first sight, he had seemed one of the less obtrusive figures in the tent. Not so at this distance. "Speaking of which," he said, "Who is this pretty little thing you're parading in front of us, Magnus?" he asked, a sardonic edge in his tone. "You don't look much like a soldier," he added, addressing Lilah.

She glanced at Magnus, uncertain what to do. He simply nodded, his expression vaguely amused by the turn in the conversation.

"I'm a medic, my liege," she replied, lowering her head in deference.

"The one who captured you," Cato said with certainty. He spoke to Magnus, though his focus stayed on Lilah, and his mind worked behind his arrogant gaze.

"Just so," Magnus said, bowing his head in acknowledgement.

Lilah was taken aback to hear the event phrased in such terms. While it was true her commanders had approved of her actions—eventually—after learning who it was she had brought back to camp that day, Lilah herself had only seen a dying man. Someone she could help.

Cato chuckled. "In the end they would have been better off if she had not done so—how many Illythian soldiers did you claim you killed during your escape, Magnus?" He asked.

Though there was no emphasis on the word "claimed," the tension in the tent deepened at the implication.

"Seven," Magnus said, with an easy amiability, "I will not pretend, however, I found the task an easy one."

"Remarkable," said Cato, in a tone too careless to do the word credit. "Tell me." His eyes narrowed on Lilah, gleaming with naked cunning. "Do you regret saving him?"

Lilah's skin felt cold. She hesitated, hoping someone would say something to interrupt, to free her from the spotlight. No one did.

Saphir's cautioning echoed in her thoughts. Defiance might be satisfying in the moment, but it accomplished little.

"I could never regret saving a life," she said, her lips numb as she maintained a calm she didn't feel.

"Ah, the ideal Illythian military hero," Cato said, speaking to the small crowd, amusement gleaming in his eyes, "A pacifist."

There was some appreciate snickering from his own entourage behind him, but it was restrained. Lilah shifted uncomfortably but said nothing, resolving to keep her eyes lowered.

Thus she felt, more than saw, Cato's hand reach out as though to brush at lock of her hair or to touch her arm. Daegon caught him by the wrist with a crisp, snapping sound before Lilah even noticed the giant's hand move. Cato didn't flinch, but met the larger man's unreadable expression. Then his gaze moved, swung to lock with Magnus', who observed the scene with a mildly entertained equanimity.

The tension simmered in the air around them, thick with dark energy.

Cato's hand was still very near Lilah's shoulder, held in the Daegon's grip. It was a long, measuring, quiet moment.

"Then again," said Cato, his eyes settling hard on her again. "It is a little amusing, no? Your own compatriots looked to you for hope on the battlefield, and you salvaged an instrument of their defeat."

His eyes flickered over her again, lazily considering. "Perhaps, after all, you shouldn't be one of their heroes. Perhaps you should be one of ours."

To Lilah, it seemed as though there was no blood left in her face. Her skin felt cold and unpleasantly charged, as though static energy danced against the surface. The words burrowed into her heart like a parasite.

"Better her," said Magnus, drawing every eye in the tent, "than someone who's spent more time in pleasure houses than he has in battlefield."

His undercurrent had changed. The electrified energy beneath his surface had rises, no longer amused. Indeed, Lilah realized, it had turned scathing. Angry.

That was when the tent curtain parted, bathing them all in pale daylight, and the Legate's procession entered.

Daegon released Cato's wrist.

There were half a dozen of them, trailing in the wake of the Legate's stride. Two bodyguards in red armor, and helmets that covered their faces. Three slaves, marked by their wrist cuffs and downcast expressions.

Three men, walking close at the Legate's shoulders, Lilah would later learn were all Consulars of comparable standing. One of them was familiar. Vero, the very man who had toured Magnus through the slave ranks only a day before, and delivered her to the Praetor. He was a slight man, not thin, but of a modest height and delicately featured. To Lilah's eyes, the just-so sculpting of his short beard seemed ludicrously elaborate. He wore vivid, jewel like green.

Beside him was a man with a grey, monk-like robe and features Lilah would have found reassuring in any other setting. Despite being among their number, this man stood apart in an understated sort of way. He wore no adornment beyond the scarlet silk lining visible just beneath his stolid grey clothing. His features were rounded and quietly pleasant, all except for his eyes, which angled elegantly at the corners. Lilah would have guessed his origin as a southern islander, though she had never seen one before.

The third was a roundish man with a nervous undercurrent to his movements, wearing cloth of gold that did no favors for his sallow complexion. He was as pale as the Winter Goddess Praetor, but where she was all alabaster perfection, his milky pallor seemed somehow moist, unpleasantly reminiscent of spoilt milk. He had darting, opportunistic eyes. Here was a man, Lilah would have wagered, who would sell his own mother green glass and call it emeralds.

The Legatus himself put any of their attempts of ostentatiousness to shame.

"Magnus!" he enthused upon entry, his arms spread in greeting. His expression was indulgent, even fatherly. His chest was squarish, without being overly-broad, clothed in the deep purple of the Imperial house. Lustrous ornamentation of silver and gold, gracefully entwined, gleamed from his fingers and chest. His beard was neatly trimmed and as dark as his eyes, which were fixed on Magnus. Indeed, he spared no one else so much as a glance.

He clasped Magnus by the arms, with the manner of a doting uncle. Cato had stepped back from Lilah and the other Praetor had moved to the side, looking on awkwardly.

"Legatus," Magnus responded, inclining his head.

"And who is this vision?" The Legatus asked, turning to her unexpectedly. Until that moment, Lilah wouldn't have believed he had even seen her. He took her hand with another indulgent smile. Daegon didn't snatch at his wrist.

Lilah felt the familiar flush rise to her cheeks, and with it the renewed realization that she was surrounding by many of the most powerful people in the Imperius. Even in Illythiel, many of their names and reputations were known. Hesiod himself was the Imperator's own brother, and possibly the most influential Legate in the assembly.

"This is Lilah, your eminence," Magnus replied.

"Oh, but she's trembling!" said Hesiod, "my dear, are you well?"

Lilah felt a small sound escape her, a burble of laughter, half panicked and half despairing. She wondered if she were having some kind of out of body experience. No one seemed alarmed by the outburst. Most in the tent gazed at her as if she were an exotic bird adjusting to cage life.

The frantic laughter threatened to rise up again. In many ways, that was what she amounted to for them. This time, she squelched the sound. "No, my liege," she managed, "I'm..."

I'm a nurse, and a military lieutenant in the service of my home, and I'm wearing metal lingerie and I can't stop thinking about my enemy and slave master's knowing, ruthless eyes all over my body. And I think I might have helped you conquer my own country.

"A little lightheaded," she said.

"Tea," said the Imperial Legatus, patting her hand comfortingly. "That will improve matters. Jadir, would you please...?"

The attendant who had intrigued her, with the rounded features and olive gold skin, bowed in acknowledgement and gave her a considering look. Like the Legatus, there was a broadness to him, sturdy yet unobtrusive. Lilah found herself liking his solemn, pensive eyes and serene expression. It occurred to her, as she watched him turn and give a command to the solitary slave behind him, that her choosing favorites among her captors was only complicating her, previously simple, conception of goodness and wickedness. Was that how it would be in the Imperius, measuring the world in terms of which masters were cruel and which less so? How must it be for those who had known nothing outside of such a life? If someone was a slave for as long as they could remember, how would they see someone like her, chafing and straining against her bonds?

That is assuming, she realized as she watched the slave leave the tent, the slave spared her any thought at all.

"Well," said the Legatus, patting her hand once more and moving away from her, "Whilst we wait on the tea, let us discuss tonight's festivities. I understand," he added with a flicker of humor in his eyes as he turned his gaze on Magnus, "That there is some objection."

Magnus spread his hands. "I am concerned, my liege. If we give the soldiers a sense of victory now, we risk depleting their resolve before the final throes of the war. They are already counting the spoils in their hearts, and most of them will still not see home for a year or more."

His glance flicked toward Cato. "This hubris could be our undoing."

Caro bristled, "My esteemed colleague," he said slowly, in order to lace each word with a measure of disdain, "would have it that our soldiers will fall apart and forget their duty at their first taste of pleasure."

Hesiod put his hands up, forestalling further argument. His expression was thoughtful, and he milked the moment. He's a showman, Lilah realized, doing nothing without a reason.

Which meant his attentiveness was as much a part of his show as anything else he did.

"Magnus, I hear my younger brother's wisdom in your words," Hesiod said, nodding at the younger man with that same avuncular affection. "Do not mistake me, I value it."

Hesiod moved to the war table, and like Cato had, sat his hip against it. Behind him, the tent parted again as the slave returned with a delicate painted tea set and a stand. Hesiod did not observe the activity, as others in the tent did, but picked up a model of a sky-ship and studied it. "I wonder," he said, "Are we not balancing wisdom against wisdom in this matter? If we do not offer our soldiers some semblance of reward in their endeavor, do we not risk incurring rebellion...In their hearts, if nothing else?"

The Legatus looked toward the Winter Goddess Praetor, "What say you, niece? I understand you have kept your peace on the matter."

"I would that your will be done, Uncle," she said, regarding him in turn. Her voice was cool and measured, suffusing imperious pride with deference.

He shook his head a fraction, looking away. "That's helpful, Ariadne. Thank you," he replied dryly. Lilah understood the silent amusement that shifted through the small crowd. The female Praetor—Ariadne—seemed to make up in silent respect what she lacked in outspoken popularity.

Hesiod paused, considering. "Jadir, how many desertions have we seen since the beginning of this war?

"Scarcely two hundred, my liege," murmured Jadir, pouring tea into dainty cups that the slave held on a tray. The wide sleeves of his robe functioned to protect his hands from the heat of the teapot. His voice was steady and slightly accented. "That we know of."

The slave, clad in white linen, distributed the cups amongst the officials. Cato and Ariadne declined. Jadir brought Lilah a cup himself, and she accepted it, feeling unwontedly timid as she did.

Hesiod sipped his own comfortably before speaking again. "A tolerable number, perhaps, in balance," he said. "You all know I do not pretend at possessing any military brilliance. I leave that to my younger brother—and somewhat to my elder." He set his cup on the war table, and Lilah almost felt a flicker of amusement when she saw a few of the officials follow the motion with pained expressions.

"I will leave the war tactics in your capable hands. What I can offer you is this: I have seen the state of this encampment. These soldiers need a reprieve, or we will—sooner or later—face malcontent on a scale we have not before seen. We will proceed as planned."

~ * ~

He devoured her with a kiss the moment they were alone. He had let the curtain of his private war tent fall behind him and dismissed his lieutenants, then pulled her close, the heat of his desire searing through her startled tension until she warmed in response, turning soft and pliant in his arms.