Deus Necros

“The hell is going on outside?” Ludwig said as he sipped from a copper cup. The mead was sweet and did not seem to have much alcohol in it, a honeyed thing that coated his tongue and left only a soft warmth behind. He kept his face aimed at the window next to him, the side of his mask catching the faint reflection of lanterns across the inner court. The glass was the old kind that wavered and swam when he shifted his head, so the city beyond looked as if it were painted on water.

It was night time and they were asked to remain where they were, in wait for his majesty to wake up. The order had been delivered with courtesy and with a firmness that expected obedience. However, the wait took too long as it was well into the night. The palace changed its breath after sunset, voices softened along the corridors, the soft percussion of sandals on carpet became the rule, and torches along the outer walkways stretched shadows like dark tapestries between the pillars.

Fireworks or what looked like organized signals blew up systematically through the city, one flare rising after the last had begun to fall, as if an invisible hand moved stone pieces along a board. They seemed to be sequential, as if following something or someone. Each flower of light printed itself against the underside of a low cloud, then bled out into ember dust before the night took it. The sounds reached him after the color had faded, deep and short, the kind of report that carried along rooftops and across washed stone.

Soon, Ludwig noticed several figures flying rapidly across rooftops and heading toward the firework location. At first they passed through peripheral hints, a dark movement that refused the moon, then he caught the clean line of a body cutting a roof’s edge and landing light as a cat. Cloaks closed around them as if the night itself had decided to keep their heat for later.

Ludwig placed the cup back on the small table and kept a watch on the far away streets of the capital. The table was low and carved with a pattern of dunes and crescent shapes, every groove rubbed smooth by hands that had rested there before his. The room held the stillness particular to expensive rooms, that careful hush bought by heavy curtains and thick doors and servants trained to pass like breath.

Not long after, his door opened up. The guard captain, dressed in armor still, only this time it was no longer bent and misshapen from all the brutalizing he received at the hands of the Faceless apostle, stepped inside. The dents had been hammered out and re-riveted, the lines re-oiled until the leather straps lay flat, and he even had his hair combed and face cleaned up.

“Sir… there’s a problem.”

“I guess the fireworks is related to that reason.”

“Pretty much so…”

“So, what’s going on?” Ludwig asked. He did not step away from the window, but his body turned to give the man more than an ear. The mead had warmed the blood without dulling the edge of his attention.

“Well, I think the royal guards are chasing after you…”

“Huh?”

“I mean, the fake you, the one claiming to be Ludwig,” this part was said in a hushed tone, afraid that others might hear it. The fear was not only for eavesdroppers behind doors. In palaces, walls carry news with a speed that makes feet needless.

“Hmm,” Ludwig thought for a second and then stood up. The chair’s legs whispered against the carpet, a quiet protest. “I should head there then.”

“I don’t think it’ll be a good idea, what if you get confused with the preparator?” The captain’s eyes flicked to the mask, then to the window, then back, measuring how quickly panic can be born when a rumor and a face meet in a narrow street.

“That’s more reason for me to go there, someone is dragging my name across the mud, I’m already considered a traitor back at the empire, and now I’ll be a mass murderer here? I can’t just sit here and wait.” The words came out even, without heat, but the thought behind them tightened his jaw. There are lies that can be burned away with an act, and lies that grow teeth if you let them live till morning.

“But the chancellor’s orders are for you to remain seated until his majesty wakes up…” the guard captain said. He did not like to press, yet he pressed because the order wore a crown’s weight. His hands opened once, empty, then closed again against his thighs, leather glove squeaking softly.

Ludwig sighed. The breath left him as if he had set down a pack for a moment, and would pick it up again shortly. “Be honest, do you think anyone here can stop me if I wanted to leave?”

“I’m not trying to undermine your ability or belittle it… but yes, there are several who can.” The captain did not blink when he said it, and there was no pride in his voice, only an inventory of the palace that he loved. Somewhere above them a bell struck twice, slow and careful, like a servant knocking before entering a darkened room.

Ludwig smiled, a small thing that touched his mouth and not his eyes. He had not truly shown all of his cards back at the cave, and he was not willing to do so here. At least with the information that this man told him right now, he believed that there were several people capable of stopping the Ludwig from the cave, but little that the guard knew that once Ludwig killed the Faceless, he was already far beyond what he was.

“Sure thing then, I’ll remain awake, waiting for this to resolve itself. Would be nice to have a look at the person who’s impersonating me once he is captured.” He spoke as one agrees to sit while the bowstring dries. The window carried another pulse of red more fireworks shot up indicating a new path to follow.

“I’ll inform you of such when it happens then. Just please, don’t leave this place…”

“Fine, fine,” Ludwig said. He lifted the cup again and did not drink, letting the sweet smell keep his mouth from turning sour.

The guard soon locked the door and left. The sound of the key turning was polite and final, like a cough before a sentence. The carpet swallowed the last of his steps, and the corridor’s quiet returned to its old level.

“Are you going to truly just sit here?” the Knight King spoke. Since several days, he had yet to say a single word. And only spoke now. The voice did not come from air or from the boards, it came from that particular place in the head where old debts keep a chair ready.

“Kinda, I was thinking of doing something however…” Ludwig let the mask angle from the window at last, and the room set itself back into solid lines.

“What is it?”

“Well, I’ve felt it back at the cave… I need powerful allies with me when I go to fight.” He did not dress the admission with excuses. He had seen how quickly a field can turn when a single thing enters it that should have been on your side already.

“Was it when the faceless was destroying your summoned undead.”

“For someone who’s acting like a necromancer, I really suck at it,” Ludwig said. The truth sounded less bitter when spoken aloud, but it was still the truth. The spell work had answered, the dead had risen, and then they had died badly, without purpose, like tools used by a hand that had not yet learned the weight of iron.

“That is a fact, you have powerful physical abilities and decent magical ones, but your summoning of the dead is very premature.” The spirit of the Knight King spoke. There was no mockery in him. There was a plainness that men use when they have held a shield before their chest long enough to know what can pass through it.

“So I was thinking… I already obtained the Advanced Necrotic Rituals from beating the Wrathful Death. It’s time to bring you back big guy…” Ludwig smiled. For some reason, it felt a bit too sinister.