The zombies were still coming, Kagenohime noted as she ducked behind a pillar. The black ships that had come up the river were mostly out of action - suggesting that the total number of the enemy was at least in someway finite - but she couldn't guess how many zombies had disembarked from the ships or how many more had stolidly walked up the shore from wherever their transports had been sunk. There had been a force of thirty Water Aspected Dragonblooded under the waters. Probably none would be returning.
The Imperial City was burning. It was among the largest cities in all Creation - second only to the distant metropolis of Nexus in population, arguably second to none in wealth. For more than seven centuries the Scarlet Empress had ruled from the Imperial Manse, but now her mighty Dynasty had splintered and one faction had done the unthinkable and made alliance with the Dead.
Kagenohime knew the ways of the Deathlords. Mask of Winters was not accounted the most powerful of them - but he was without a doubt the most most ambitious. The Imperial Manse was the ultimate prize, and neither he nor his puppets could be allowed to enter it. And that had brought Kagenohime to where she was, skulking behind a pillar of the Imperial Palace.
The strike had been sudden and unexpected. One minute she was posing as simply another secretary amongst the small staff of a young Ledaal senator, the next moment every senator from House Mnemon was in motion, turning on those around them, while the gates opened and squads of soldiers burst in, sending volleys of arrows into the sections of the room where the Cathak and Ragara delegations were concentrated.
The technical term was coup. The entire Realm had been like a pool of oil, needing only a spark to start the inferno called a Civil War. Lady Mnemon, ruler of the Great House that bore her name, elder living daughter of the missing Empress had lit the match.
It had come close. The Deliberative had been a deathtrap, chaos ruling as fractious senators fought for their lives. Given the sheer number of Dragonblooded present, the Mnemon should not have stood a chance. But a combination of surprise and of opportunists seeking to seize the moment and settle their own agendas made them the largest and best prepared of the dozen or so factions that were suddenly the fighting for control of the room.
Kagenohime raised her hands and shaped the essence around her. For a moment, nothing happened and then a line of bones erupted from the paved yard in front of her. The bones formed a fence eight yards tall and easily fifty long, shredding dozens of the animated corpses as they ripped though the front ranks of another Zombie rush that had been bypassing the young woman's position and now guardsmen in V'Neef colours ran forward to finish off the fore-runners and hold the fence as a defense line.
"Dragon's blessings!" a sergeant called to her and his men cheered, sending a flush of colour through her cheeks. It was not the sort of reaction that she was accustomed to. She suspected that they would be less grateful if they knew that what she had done was not sorcery, but necromancy - of the same nature as the arts that had raised the zombies to carry out this attack.
In the Deliberative, it had taken no longer than the time for Senator Ledaal Irian to join forces with the handful of V'Neef before Kagenohime had concluded that discretion was not the path of survival. Only Irian, who was her niece, had known her true capability - but a dozen Dragonbloods had risen to guard her with their bodies as she cast a spell, and three Mnemon sorcerers had glared at her in baffled frustration as their efforts to counter the spell accomplished nothing but to waste their scanty essence. The greater secrets of sorcery were rarely known to the Terrestrial Exalted - and even more rarely mastered.
There had been an ornamental pond outside the gate of the Deliberative Chamber and at Kagenohime's command the waters had risen in a torrent that smashed aside a score or more of soldiers, opening a path of retreat. The last thing that Kagenohime had seen before she ran out was the Regent dragged from his seat by a pack of brawling senators and she wouldn't have given a bent obol for his chances of survival.
Free of the confines of the building, the little group had headed immediately for the nearby wing where Irian's apartments held armour and weapons for them. Others followed their path from the building, scattering to seek out their supporters and places of power. In Kagenohime, Irian had a priceless advantage however. Sorcery was demanding, both in discipline and in raw power. An Dragonblood who could wield their charms for hours might barely be able to cast two or three spells if they husbanded their strength. Kagenohime however, was not Exalted by the Elemental Dragons, but by other and darker powers. Nor was she merely a sorceress, albeit of the potent Celestial Circle. She was also a necromancer, and it was within her lore to add to her already deep reserves of Essence by drawing upon deaths within her vicinity.
As might be imagined, the middle of a bloody coup was calculated to not only replenish her strength from their escape, but also to permit her to send several sorcerous messages on behalf of her niece, summoning aid from several quarters. By the time she was done, her anima was a black bonfire visible for miles around - a sure sign to everyone in the city that something was badly amiss. Irian had driven off a few intrusions already, as much by her reputation as by force, for although one relatively minor senator might not be known, Irian was far better known by the name she used in the Threshold. Yumenohime they called her. Princess of Dreams.
From across the courtyard, Kagenohime could see Yumenohime leading a force of Ledaal in a counterattack upon the gates. The girl was also a sorceress and though her cheongsan was a beautiful wrapping upon her normal body, she had specialised in studying the sorceries of bodily alteration. As she led the charge, she was was a brass statue towering over her followers, rending wooden claws replacing her hands. Zombies were hurled aside or rent apart where she walked and fifty grim-faced Ledaal legionaries formed a wedge behind her.
Stepping forth once more, Kagenohime gestured to the sergeant who had blessed her. "When I give you an opening, charge!" she shouted. The man had his soldiers scrambling up the fence even as black light began to crackle around her. With a shout, she sent a ripple of force through the mass of zombies. For a moment nothing seemed to happen... and then, one by one the zombies turned on each other, their crude axes carving their own comrades apart.
The weight of the zombie's master turned upon Kagenohime immediately and sweat ran down her face as she wrestled against the force of his mind. There was no doubt who she faced - a Deathlord, one of the ancient ghosts who had delved into the deepest places of the Underworld and learnt the darkest secrets of necromancy. Blood had been spilling irregularly from her brow all day - channelling such enormous forces of essence was not without cost and now it all but blinded her. She could feel human deaths in front of her as the battle raged, but it was quite beyond her to see the fight as she fell to hands and knees, fighting for each breath.
And then it was over, the Deathlord abandoning the fight as useless. Given time, he could have won back the command of his zombies. But they were killing each off and Yumenohime's soldiers were causing even greater losses. The prize was worthless... and he had discovered something of value anyway.
He knew who the necromancer was that opposed him.
He knew that she was one of the Abyssal Exalted, a renegade from that small number of souls pledged to the Void in return for a stay of the death that they had one day faced.
And Kagenohime knew that he knew her and that his agents would hound her to the ends of Creation.
She was still cackling with hysterical laughter when Yumenohime pulled her to her feet, this part of the battle won.
Mnemon's coup had not won her control of the Imperial Palace. While half her forces had struck at the Deliberative and another legion had fallen upon the offices of the bureaucracy, she had personally led an elite force towards the Imperial Manse - forty Dragonblooded (including a dozen of her handpicked sorcerers) and more than fifty demons and elemental spirits.
The unit had cut through the defenders like a knife, hundreds of the Legion of Silence slaughtered in minutes as they tried to hold a line. Meanwhile, the other factions were being drawn off by news of an unidentified fleet rowing up the estuary towards the port and by the sinister black anima that was a distinctive mark amongst the hundreds of more familiar banners of the Dragonblooded Host. The ports defences should have been a formidable barrier - but they lay open as a result of efforts by small squads of saboteurs.
As the source of that anima, Kagenohime had followed Yumenohime to the gates, opening them to House troops from Ledaal and V'Neef. Lady V'Neef herself was with the soldiers and set up a command post just inside the gates. Almost her first act had been to send the two sorceresses to the Imperial Manse, along with a Wing of heavy infantry and one of her daughters, who had spcialised in the study of the Manse's formidable defenses.
The trail had been bloodily obvious and they made haste, pinning the smaller but far more deadly force up against the entrance. Neither side had held back and the stonework of the broad passage to the gates was soon slick with blood. In the confined space, neither side could fully use their numbers - and mortal soldiers, no matter how elite and well equipped were no match for the supernatural forces being unleashed. Yumenohime was more than a match for the deadly demons but she could not fight them all and the V'Neef savant had all she could do holding the soldiers together.
Kagenohime had been the one to turn the tide. Fuelled by the slaughter of the almost helpless soldiers, she had broken summoning after summoning, banishing Mnemon's three most powerful Demons back to their Malfean lairs. The Dynast was the most powerful summoner among the Realm's sorcerers but the might of full Celestial Sorcery was not hers. Then, escorted only by two conjured shadows that beat away the bound Elementals, the Princess of Shadows had marched into the heart of the Mnemon forces, breaking spell after spell until Mnemon and her followers could cast nothing more. Scorched and battered by fire and stone she had called upon the mightiest of Necromancies and a black veil had sealed off the end of the corridor as she cast Mnemon and her followers into the Mouth of the Void.
When the veil fell, only a wounded Kagenohime stood behind it, though a handful of Mnemon's elite guards had clung to life enough that they rose to try for vengeance. It was Yumenohime - many of her sorcerous protections broken by wild countermagics - who had charged in to save her aunt from dying on vengeful jade blades and the guards found themselves facing the fury of a Fire Aspected sorceress. When the dying was done less than a score of soldiers survived.
It was a long hour that followed, the small group watching over the savant as she pored over the protections. Some of them opened with ease that suggested that the woman had already put thought to them, but others would take longer. Kagenohime was recovered enough to send word to V'Neef of their need for support and a second Wing arrived eventually to bolster the defenses. They also bore word that the rumoured fleet was driving ashore and that zombies and other creatures of the Undead thronged the decks.
Kagenohime could feel the stresses building in Creation as she climbed the stairs inside the Gatehouse. So many deaths in such a short time could conceivably create a Shadowland - a bordermarch leading to the Underworld. If that were the case then when night fell warghosts would swarm through the Shadowland, driving the living before them until they reached its limits. Should those limits reach the Palace then the Manse would be imperiled - and shoudl it's contents fall into the hands of a Deathlord then Creation was quite certainly condemned to oblivion.
"This is a dark day," a woman said as the two Sorceresses entered the uppermost chamber. "I knew that Mnemon was ambitious... but to bargain with the dead? Was she insane?"
Yumenohime sank onto a bench. "I don't think we'll ever know," she said wearily. Her sorcery was still in evidence - the bench bent noticably under her weight - but her shoulders were slumped by fatigue. "She's dead and I'd guess that those closest in her confidence died with her."
"When things calm down, see if you can find her sanctum," Kagenohime said absently, looking out one of the arrow slots at the fighting in the streets. The flood fo zombies had died down but large bands were still moving through the streets, battling small clusters of soldiers and Dragonblooded caught between the small number of strongpoints in the city. "I doubt she'll have left a letter 'in the event of her death or disappearance' - she was her mother's daughter after all - but there may be some clues."
V'Neef nodded. "We'll try - although we're obviously not in any position to do anything at the moment." She glanced at Kagenohime's belt. "A spoil of war?"
The necromancer lifted the still smoking Emerald Thurible by it's chain. "Technically, I suppose it is," she said, and let it swing closer to the Dynast. "But it's not much use to me and Yumenohime chooses not to practise the summoning of Demons..."
"I have enough nightmares about the one's I've fought," that notable replied tartly. "Summoning more of them would be gilding gold."
"...so you may as well consider it a gift," Kagenohime finished, placing the chains in V'Neef's hands. "An inheritance if you will."
"And of no use to you?" V'Neef observed mildly. "As I recall, this permits the summoning of Second Circle Demons, a rare feat in this fallen age. But you didn't say you spurned summoning..."
"I don't," Kagenohime said. "I am not Exalted by the grace of the Elemental Dragons, but nor is my power that of the Celestials. It is my nature to be able to command the Second Circle of Demons... and other things."
The word 'Anathema' hung between them - centuries ago, V'Neef's ancestors had overthrown the Celestial Exalted and condemned them with that name.
But V'Neef did not speak it. She needed this odd, perhaps corrupt and treacherous, cousin of hers. And she knew better than most that she could not afford the casualties that Kagenohime could inflict if provoked.
"I give you my pledge," Kagenohime offered when the silence grew too long. "I came here as nothing more than Irian's secretary. My loyalty is to her and thusly to House Ledaal and to the Realm. I advocate no other cause."
V'Neef nodded. "I've had replies from some of my allies," she said finally. "The Cynis are mobilising two Legions to our aid, but I doubt that they'll be able to get here in time to do any good. The Cathak are too far away, as are the Ragara and the rest of the Ledaal troops."
"I don't see any means to bring an army here in time to make a difference," Irian admitted. "We'll have to fight with what's on hand."
"Which is two of my legions, one of yours and two from House Nellens," V'Neef said drily. "Against what's left of three Mnemon Legions and Daana'd only knows how many of the undead. We don't even hold the Palace - there's most of a Legion bunched up in the eastern wings and I can't spare the troops to root them out."
The other two components of the conversation looked at each other. "Is that an indirect suggestion?" asked Kagenohime.
"I think a Legion might be more than you can handle," V'Neef snorted, then paused. "Isn't it?"
"In a straight fight," Kagenohime said mildly. "I'd say so. But perhaps we can manage something."
"What do you have in mind?" Yumehime asked as they descended the stairs again. "Talk to them?"
"It's worth a try."
At first the Mnemon troops were resistant to shouted requests for a parley, but after a couple of minutes, Yumenohime sent a runner down to the gates of the Imperial Manse. Fifteen minutes later she rolled what she had sent for along one of the long corridors to where a young soldier looked at it, blanched and went running for his commander. Almost immediately a Dragonlord poked his head into view and called that the Legion's General would speak to Yumenohime in a plaza that both sides held opposite sides of. He also requested and was granted, safety to step out and recover the head of his grandmother, Lady Mnemon, that Yumenohime had used to prove that she was dead.
"This changes nothing," the General insisted. He was alone facing the two women in the plaza. "I have my orders and Lady Mnemon would want me to obey them no matter what."
"Lady Menmon made an alliance with the Dead," Yumenohime shot back. "By the time that the sun sets, there could be a Shadowland miles across right in the heart of the Imperial City. Have you ever seen a Shadowland, General?"
He paled. "This is the Blessed Isle," he protested. "That cannot happen here!"
One does not become commander of a Legion without having some measure of backbone. But the flat stares he received were all too much like those that he could recall being faced with on rare occasions when he had incurred Mnemon's wrath.
"Let me be utterly clear, General. Mnemon has risen in rebellion, murdered the Regent and much of the Deliberative and she assaulted the Imperial City with the active assistance of a large army of the undead. Is there any part of this that does not make her a traitor to the Realm? And I would like to point out that she has failed. So your choice is to follow a dead leader in a failed cause or try to somehow get your men out alive. Frankly, if you stay here then sooner or later enough forces will be brought together to root you out. The only question is if those forces will be living or dead."
After a long moment of deliberation the General bowed his head and removed his empty scabbard from his belt, offering it to Yumenohime. "What do you want us to do, Senator?"
She frowned. "For now, I think we should put you to work. Have your men stand down. If they have food, let them eat and rest. Then we'll probably detach your Dragons and send them to start retaking the city. They'll have to prove their loyalty with blood I suspect."
"We're soldiers," he grunted. "We're used to that."
"Beyond that, I'll take you to Lady V'Neef. She's acting as Regent for now. Probably you and your officers will have to swear allegiance to other Houses, but I don't think House Mnemon has much of a future anyway."
V'Neef was more than happy to see the pair return with the disarmed General in tow. "Mnemon Loken," she observed. "I see that I've underestimated Irian's persuasiveness."
"She's a formidable negotiator," he replied. "I suppose that I won't be claiming that House much longer though."
"Perhaps not," V'neef admitted. "I've had word from the Immaculate Order. The Mouth of Peace is on her way with two hundred monks - I'm not quite sure how she's travelling but she says she should be here within hours, so I presume either sorcery or some artifact I'd likely covet. I think I'd you here when she arrives - I know that I have some questions about what Mnemon was thinking and I imagine that she'll have some herself. Please consider yourself detained until then."
"And my men?"
"I think I can do without a senator for the moment," V'Neef observed, turning to Yumenohime. "But I would seem to have a Legion without a commander. Any volunteers?"
"As long as I can take my secretary," Yumenohime replied drily.
"By all means. I insist in fact. I'm sure that you're a lovely person," she added to Kagenohime. "But right now I want you as far away from me as possible. I rather get the impression that the Immaculate Dragons would return to kill me if you met the Mouth of Peace."
Kagenohime smiled. "Unlikely... but there's no need to take the chance," she agreed.
"So there it is," V'Neef said brightly. "Your soldiers are in safe hands, Loken."
"Who is she?" Loken asked, watching as the pair left the room.
"She singlehandedly defeated my sister and half-a-dozen other sorcerers in a duel," V'Neef replied. "I'm just a little afraid to even ask."
It didn't take long for the two sorceresses to return to the Mnemon troops, although Kagenohime muttered that with all the back and forthing, she could do with an easier way to get around the Palace grounds. What did take time was getting several thousand soldiers organised to march. In the end, they simply had all the Dragonlords assemble their men on different courtyards and lawns before sending one Dragon at a time marching towards the gates of the palace. The long line of soldiers was more than a mile long, Yumenohime still speaking to the last Dragonlord as Kagenohime led the first units out through the gates and into the city.
Fortunately, the legionaries were trained for this sort of house to house fighting and Kagenohime, who had never claimed to be a general, did not need to do more than point out an objective and the soldiers marched off in disciplined groups, dragonblooded officers preparing charms. "Do you think we should go with some of them?" Kagenohime asked casually as Yumenohime approached with the last unit - what was left of almost five hundred heavy infantry and perhaps half that many slingers.
"I don't think waving them off was quite what Lady V'Neef had in mind," Yumehime replied with equal lack of concern. "I'm sure we can just tag along here," she said waving casually at the Dragonord who visibly winced. Obviously a pair of young and pretty women, neither wearing armour and only one of them armed, was not what she would prefer to be escorting on a battlefield. The fact that they were acting like the flightiest of Cynis society hostesses on a shopping trip only added to the injury to his pride.
"Well then, I think it would be nice to take a little walk towards the docks," Kagehime replied lightly. "Shall we go?" Her anima had died down and now the only sign of her nature was the blood trickling from her caste mark.
The two set off and the Dragonlord hastened to get her troops to follow, sending files fowards to flank the two women that she was horribly aware had been placed in command of her - a perfect cap to a day that had killed quite a number of her relatives and seemed likely to spell the doom of her house.
They had gone no more than a few streets before they came across another band of zombies. The vanguard, obedient to their training, quickly formed up across the street and braced to receive the charge of the undead monstrosities. It was hard to tell how many there were - the smoke from the dozens of fire shrouded the city and the notoriously random street plan made it almost impossible to see more than a few score yards in any direction.
There was a flare of essence and Yumenohime hurled a fireball down the road. Three zombies burst into flames and the light illuminated something further down the street - something larger and more menacing than the Dragonlord wanted to deal with. "Was that a Warstrider?" she snapped urgently.
"No - I've heard of this," Kagenohime observed reassuringly. "It's a framework covered in zombies. No real armour but it can hit just about as hard."
"Well now I feel much better!" the officer snapped. "Slingers! Put a volley into that thing the minute you see it again. We're in a city - there's no chance you'll run out of ammunition here." The soldiers spread out, unlimbering staff slings that would hurl fist-sized stones at lethal velocities.
"I should mention," Yumenohime advised. "that I don't think I'll be casting any more spells just yet."
"Oh, you're so lazy," Kagehime chided her. "Do you think you can at least light your anima?"
They grinned at each other and then Yumehime vaulted the line, fires blazing around her as she landed on the cobbles and charged recklessly into the middle of the zombies.
"You might want to sound the charge," Kagenohime advised the white-tabarded Dragonlord, who cursed and hefted her direlance before taking her place in the front rank. The sorceress stood and watched with only half her attention as she shaped a familiar spell.
The line of soldiers slammed into the disorganised mass of the zombies, who had been distracted by the fiery warrior in their midst, driving them back and leaving a trail of chopped apart bodies behind them as they advanced. The street wasn't wide enough for even a tenth of the Dragon to participate, but they spread out along side streets to extend the unit's flanks and check the buildings for lurking menaces.
For a moment all went well, none of the soldiers hurt enough to back out the line and then the lumbering mass appeared again, dozens of zombies pushing and pulling like muscles on the metal framework they held. A volley of slingstones broke bones and a few dropped away, but the leviathan came on and one great foot crashed into the line of legionaries, sending four men flying backwards.
It was the moment that Kagenohime had been waiting for. Her most useful spell was providing her with more Essence than she could have hoped for on most days and she conjured another, stepping foward as the zombie mass took another step through the legionaries. "Fall back twenty paces!" she screamed and hurled the sickly green glow in her hands at the zombies.
The armoured legionaries obeyed automatically, the Dragonlord turning to curse the Shadow Princess for her command. Then she saw the white-clad woman running for her life and followed suit. Behind her the towering mass of metal bones and zombie muscles reeled and then came apart with a horrid sound as the dead flesh rotted away from the zombies.
"Yosh!" the legionaires screamed and without prompting they charged back into the fray.
That had been an hour ago and the deaths kept coming, each a shrieking mote of essence that sought out the dark visaged Kagenohime. She suspected that she was drawing the bulk of the invaders towards herself - at least she hoped so for if the dead were as thick on the ground everywhere as they were around her then the battle was lost already.
"So, you're the one that has dared to challenge my master," said a silky voice and Kagenohime hurled herself aside as black arrows knifed one by one into the cobbles, sending shards of stone flying as they chased her across the street. "Pitiful."
"When you care enough to send the best, Child of Silence," Kagenohime replied, recognising the brand of Midnight upon her hunter's brow. Weren't the Gods supposed to be on her side? Where was Yumenohime? Or was this just going to be an exercise in economy for some stringpulling heavenly bureaucrat, eliminating one slave of the Neverborn and weakening another, no matter which won when they were pitted against each other.
The Imperial City was burning. It was among the largest cities in all Creation - second only to the distant metropolis of Nexus in population, arguably second to none in wealth. For more than seven centuries the Scarlet Empress had ruled from the Imperial Manse, but now her mighty Dynasty had splintered and one faction had done the unthinkable and made alliance with the Dead.
Kagenohime knew the ways of the Deathlords. Mask of Winters was not accounted the most powerful of them - but he was without a doubt the most most ambitious. The Imperial Manse was the ultimate prize, and neither he nor his puppets could be allowed to enter it. And that had brought Kagenohime to where she was, skulking behind a pillar of the Imperial Palace.
The strike had been sudden and unexpected. One minute she was posing as simply another secretary amongst the small staff of a young Ledaal senator, the next moment every senator from House Mnemon was in motion, turning on those around them, while the gates opened and squads of soldiers burst in, sending volleys of arrows into the sections of the room where the Cathak and Ragara delegations were concentrated.
The technical term was coup. The entire Realm had been like a pool of oil, needing only a spark to start the inferno called a Civil War. Lady Mnemon, ruler of the Great House that bore her name, elder living daughter of the missing Empress had lit the match.
It had come close. The Deliberative had been a deathtrap, chaos ruling as fractious senators fought for their lives. Given the sheer number of Dragonblooded present, the Mnemon should not have stood a chance. But a combination of surprise and of opportunists seeking to seize the moment and settle their own agendas made them the largest and best prepared of the dozen or so factions that were suddenly the fighting for control of the room.
Kagenohime raised her hands and shaped the essence around her. For a moment, nothing happened and then a line of bones erupted from the paved yard in front of her. The bones formed a fence eight yards tall and easily fifty long, shredding dozens of the animated corpses as they ripped though the front ranks of another Zombie rush that had been bypassing the young woman's position and now guardsmen in V'Neef colours ran forward to finish off the fore-runners and hold the fence as a defense line.
"Dragon's blessings!" a sergeant called to her and his men cheered, sending a flush of colour through her cheeks. It was not the sort of reaction that she was accustomed to. She suspected that they would be less grateful if they knew that what she had done was not sorcery, but necromancy - of the same nature as the arts that had raised the zombies to carry out this attack.
In the Deliberative, it had taken no longer than the time for Senator Ledaal Irian to join forces with the handful of V'Neef before Kagenohime had concluded that discretion was not the path of survival. Only Irian, who was her niece, had known her true capability - but a dozen Dragonbloods had risen to guard her with their bodies as she cast a spell, and three Mnemon sorcerers had glared at her in baffled frustration as their efforts to counter the spell accomplished nothing but to waste their scanty essence. The greater secrets of sorcery were rarely known to the Terrestrial Exalted - and even more rarely mastered.
There had been an ornamental pond outside the gate of the Deliberative Chamber and at Kagenohime's command the waters had risen in a torrent that smashed aside a score or more of soldiers, opening a path of retreat. The last thing that Kagenohime had seen before she ran out was the Regent dragged from his seat by a pack of brawling senators and she wouldn't have given a bent obol for his chances of survival.
Free of the confines of the building, the little group had headed immediately for the nearby wing where Irian's apartments held armour and weapons for them. Others followed their path from the building, scattering to seek out their supporters and places of power. In Kagenohime, Irian had a priceless advantage however. Sorcery was demanding, both in discipline and in raw power. An Dragonblood who could wield their charms for hours might barely be able to cast two or three spells if they husbanded their strength. Kagenohime however, was not Exalted by the Elemental Dragons, but by other and darker powers. Nor was she merely a sorceress, albeit of the potent Celestial Circle. She was also a necromancer, and it was within her lore to add to her already deep reserves of Essence by drawing upon deaths within her vicinity.
As might be imagined, the middle of a bloody coup was calculated to not only replenish her strength from their escape, but also to permit her to send several sorcerous messages on behalf of her niece, summoning aid from several quarters. By the time she was done, her anima was a black bonfire visible for miles around - a sure sign to everyone in the city that something was badly amiss. Irian had driven off a few intrusions already, as much by her reputation as by force, for although one relatively minor senator might not be known, Irian was far better known by the name she used in the Threshold. Yumenohime they called her. Princess of Dreams.
From across the courtyard, Kagenohime could see Yumenohime leading a force of Ledaal in a counterattack upon the gates. The girl was also a sorceress and though her cheongsan was a beautiful wrapping upon her normal body, she had specialised in studying the sorceries of bodily alteration. As she led the charge, she was was a brass statue towering over her followers, rending wooden claws replacing her hands. Zombies were hurled aside or rent apart where she walked and fifty grim-faced Ledaal legionaries formed a wedge behind her.
Stepping forth once more, Kagenohime gestured to the sergeant who had blessed her. "When I give you an opening, charge!" she shouted. The man had his soldiers scrambling up the fence even as black light began to crackle around her. With a shout, she sent a ripple of force through the mass of zombies. For a moment nothing seemed to happen... and then, one by one the zombies turned on each other, their crude axes carving their own comrades apart.
The weight of the zombie's master turned upon Kagenohime immediately and sweat ran down her face as she wrestled against the force of his mind. There was no doubt who she faced - a Deathlord, one of the ancient ghosts who had delved into the deepest places of the Underworld and learnt the darkest secrets of necromancy. Blood had been spilling irregularly from her brow all day - channelling such enormous forces of essence was not without cost and now it all but blinded her. She could feel human deaths in front of her as the battle raged, but it was quite beyond her to see the fight as she fell to hands and knees, fighting for each breath.
And then it was over, the Deathlord abandoning the fight as useless. Given time, he could have won back the command of his zombies. But they were killing each off and Yumenohime's soldiers were causing even greater losses. The prize was worthless... and he had discovered something of value anyway.
He knew who the necromancer was that opposed him.
He knew that she was one of the Abyssal Exalted, a renegade from that small number of souls pledged to the Void in return for a stay of the death that they had one day faced.
And Kagenohime knew that he knew her and that his agents would hound her to the ends of Creation.
She was still cackling with hysterical laughter when Yumenohime pulled her to her feet, this part of the battle won.
Mnemon's coup had not won her control of the Imperial Palace. While half her forces had struck at the Deliberative and another legion had fallen upon the offices of the bureaucracy, she had personally led an elite force towards the Imperial Manse - forty Dragonblooded (including a dozen of her handpicked sorcerers) and more than fifty demons and elemental spirits.
The unit had cut through the defenders like a knife, hundreds of the Legion of Silence slaughtered in minutes as they tried to hold a line. Meanwhile, the other factions were being drawn off by news of an unidentified fleet rowing up the estuary towards the port and by the sinister black anima that was a distinctive mark amongst the hundreds of more familiar banners of the Dragonblooded Host. The ports defences should have been a formidable barrier - but they lay open as a result of efforts by small squads of saboteurs.
As the source of that anima, Kagenohime had followed Yumenohime to the gates, opening them to House troops from Ledaal and V'Neef. Lady V'Neef herself was with the soldiers and set up a command post just inside the gates. Almost her first act had been to send the two sorceresses to the Imperial Manse, along with a Wing of heavy infantry and one of her daughters, who had spcialised in the study of the Manse's formidable defenses.
The trail had been bloodily obvious and they made haste, pinning the smaller but far more deadly force up against the entrance. Neither side had held back and the stonework of the broad passage to the gates was soon slick with blood. In the confined space, neither side could fully use their numbers - and mortal soldiers, no matter how elite and well equipped were no match for the supernatural forces being unleashed. Yumenohime was more than a match for the deadly demons but she could not fight them all and the V'Neef savant had all she could do holding the soldiers together.
Kagenohime had been the one to turn the tide. Fuelled by the slaughter of the almost helpless soldiers, she had broken summoning after summoning, banishing Mnemon's three most powerful Demons back to their Malfean lairs. The Dynast was the most powerful summoner among the Realm's sorcerers but the might of full Celestial Sorcery was not hers. Then, escorted only by two conjured shadows that beat away the bound Elementals, the Princess of Shadows had marched into the heart of the Mnemon forces, breaking spell after spell until Mnemon and her followers could cast nothing more. Scorched and battered by fire and stone she had called upon the mightiest of Necromancies and a black veil had sealed off the end of the corridor as she cast Mnemon and her followers into the Mouth of the Void.
When the veil fell, only a wounded Kagenohime stood behind it, though a handful of Mnemon's elite guards had clung to life enough that they rose to try for vengeance. It was Yumenohime - many of her sorcerous protections broken by wild countermagics - who had charged in to save her aunt from dying on vengeful jade blades and the guards found themselves facing the fury of a Fire Aspected sorceress. When the dying was done less than a score of soldiers survived.
It was a long hour that followed, the small group watching over the savant as she pored over the protections. Some of them opened with ease that suggested that the woman had already put thought to them, but others would take longer. Kagenohime was recovered enough to send word to V'Neef of their need for support and a second Wing arrived eventually to bolster the defenses. They also bore word that the rumoured fleet was driving ashore and that zombies and other creatures of the Undead thronged the decks.
Kagenohime could feel the stresses building in Creation as she climbed the stairs inside the Gatehouse. So many deaths in such a short time could conceivably create a Shadowland - a bordermarch leading to the Underworld. If that were the case then when night fell warghosts would swarm through the Shadowland, driving the living before them until they reached its limits. Should those limits reach the Palace then the Manse would be imperiled - and shoudl it's contents fall into the hands of a Deathlord then Creation was quite certainly condemned to oblivion.
"This is a dark day," a woman said as the two Sorceresses entered the uppermost chamber. "I knew that Mnemon was ambitious... but to bargain with the dead? Was she insane?"
Yumenohime sank onto a bench. "I don't think we'll ever know," she said wearily. Her sorcery was still in evidence - the bench bent noticably under her weight - but her shoulders were slumped by fatigue. "She's dead and I'd guess that those closest in her confidence died with her."
"When things calm down, see if you can find her sanctum," Kagenohime said absently, looking out one of the arrow slots at the fighting in the streets. The flood fo zombies had died down but large bands were still moving through the streets, battling small clusters of soldiers and Dragonblooded caught between the small number of strongpoints in the city. "I doubt she'll have left a letter 'in the event of her death or disappearance' - she was her mother's daughter after all - but there may be some clues."
V'Neef nodded. "We'll try - although we're obviously not in any position to do anything at the moment." She glanced at Kagenohime's belt. "A spoil of war?"
The necromancer lifted the still smoking Emerald Thurible by it's chain. "Technically, I suppose it is," she said, and let it swing closer to the Dynast. "But it's not much use to me and Yumenohime chooses not to practise the summoning of Demons..."
"I have enough nightmares about the one's I've fought," that notable replied tartly. "Summoning more of them would be gilding gold."
"...so you may as well consider it a gift," Kagenohime finished, placing the chains in V'Neef's hands. "An inheritance if you will."
"And of no use to you?" V'Neef observed mildly. "As I recall, this permits the summoning of Second Circle Demons, a rare feat in this fallen age. But you didn't say you spurned summoning..."
"I don't," Kagenohime said. "I am not Exalted by the grace of the Elemental Dragons, but nor is my power that of the Celestials. It is my nature to be able to command the Second Circle of Demons... and other things."
The word 'Anathema' hung between them - centuries ago, V'Neef's ancestors had overthrown the Celestial Exalted and condemned them with that name.
But V'Neef did not speak it. She needed this odd, perhaps corrupt and treacherous, cousin of hers. And she knew better than most that she could not afford the casualties that Kagenohime could inflict if provoked.
"I give you my pledge," Kagenohime offered when the silence grew too long. "I came here as nothing more than Irian's secretary. My loyalty is to her and thusly to House Ledaal and to the Realm. I advocate no other cause."
V'Neef nodded. "I've had replies from some of my allies," she said finally. "The Cynis are mobilising two Legions to our aid, but I doubt that they'll be able to get here in time to do any good. The Cathak are too far away, as are the Ragara and the rest of the Ledaal troops."
"I don't see any means to bring an army here in time to make a difference," Irian admitted. "We'll have to fight with what's on hand."
"Which is two of my legions, one of yours and two from House Nellens," V'Neef said drily. "Against what's left of three Mnemon Legions and Daana'd only knows how many of the undead. We don't even hold the Palace - there's most of a Legion bunched up in the eastern wings and I can't spare the troops to root them out."
The other two components of the conversation looked at each other. "Is that an indirect suggestion?" asked Kagenohime.
"I think a Legion might be more than you can handle," V'Neef snorted, then paused. "Isn't it?"
"In a straight fight," Kagenohime said mildly. "I'd say so. But perhaps we can manage something."
"What do you have in mind?" Yumehime asked as they descended the stairs again. "Talk to them?"
"It's worth a try."
At first the Mnemon troops were resistant to shouted requests for a parley, but after a couple of minutes, Yumenohime sent a runner down to the gates of the Imperial Manse. Fifteen minutes later she rolled what she had sent for along one of the long corridors to where a young soldier looked at it, blanched and went running for his commander. Almost immediately a Dragonlord poked his head into view and called that the Legion's General would speak to Yumenohime in a plaza that both sides held opposite sides of. He also requested and was granted, safety to step out and recover the head of his grandmother, Lady Mnemon, that Yumenohime had used to prove that she was dead.
"This changes nothing," the General insisted. He was alone facing the two women in the plaza. "I have my orders and Lady Mnemon would want me to obey them no matter what."
"Lady Menmon made an alliance with the Dead," Yumenohime shot back. "By the time that the sun sets, there could be a Shadowland miles across right in the heart of the Imperial City. Have you ever seen a Shadowland, General?"
He paled. "This is the Blessed Isle," he protested. "That cannot happen here!"
One does not become commander of a Legion without having some measure of backbone. But the flat stares he received were all too much like those that he could recall being faced with on rare occasions when he had incurred Mnemon's wrath.
"Let me be utterly clear, General. Mnemon has risen in rebellion, murdered the Regent and much of the Deliberative and she assaulted the Imperial City with the active assistance of a large army of the undead. Is there any part of this that does not make her a traitor to the Realm? And I would like to point out that she has failed. So your choice is to follow a dead leader in a failed cause or try to somehow get your men out alive. Frankly, if you stay here then sooner or later enough forces will be brought together to root you out. The only question is if those forces will be living or dead."
After a long moment of deliberation the General bowed his head and removed his empty scabbard from his belt, offering it to Yumenohime. "What do you want us to do, Senator?"
She frowned. "For now, I think we should put you to work. Have your men stand down. If they have food, let them eat and rest. Then we'll probably detach your Dragons and send them to start retaking the city. They'll have to prove their loyalty with blood I suspect."
"We're soldiers," he grunted. "We're used to that."
"Beyond that, I'll take you to Lady V'Neef. She's acting as Regent for now. Probably you and your officers will have to swear allegiance to other Houses, but I don't think House Mnemon has much of a future anyway."
V'Neef was more than happy to see the pair return with the disarmed General in tow. "Mnemon Loken," she observed. "I see that I've underestimated Irian's persuasiveness."
"She's a formidable negotiator," he replied. "I suppose that I won't be claiming that House much longer though."
"Perhaps not," V'neef admitted. "I've had word from the Immaculate Order. The Mouth of Peace is on her way with two hundred monks - I'm not quite sure how she's travelling but she says she should be here within hours, so I presume either sorcery or some artifact I'd likely covet. I think I'd you here when she arrives - I know that I have some questions about what Mnemon was thinking and I imagine that she'll have some herself. Please consider yourself detained until then."
"And my men?"
"I think I can do without a senator for the moment," V'Neef observed, turning to Yumenohime. "But I would seem to have a Legion without a commander. Any volunteers?"
"As long as I can take my secretary," Yumenohime replied drily.
"By all means. I insist in fact. I'm sure that you're a lovely person," she added to Kagenohime. "But right now I want you as far away from me as possible. I rather get the impression that the Immaculate Dragons would return to kill me if you met the Mouth of Peace."
Kagenohime smiled. "Unlikely... but there's no need to take the chance," she agreed.
"So there it is," V'Neef said brightly. "Your soldiers are in safe hands, Loken."
"Who is she?" Loken asked, watching as the pair left the room.
"She singlehandedly defeated my sister and half-a-dozen other sorcerers in a duel," V'Neef replied. "I'm just a little afraid to even ask."
It didn't take long for the two sorceresses to return to the Mnemon troops, although Kagenohime muttered that with all the back and forthing, she could do with an easier way to get around the Palace grounds. What did take time was getting several thousand soldiers organised to march. In the end, they simply had all the Dragonlords assemble their men on different courtyards and lawns before sending one Dragon at a time marching towards the gates of the palace. The long line of soldiers was more than a mile long, Yumenohime still speaking to the last Dragonlord as Kagenohime led the first units out through the gates and into the city.
Fortunately, the legionaries were trained for this sort of house to house fighting and Kagenohime, who had never claimed to be a general, did not need to do more than point out an objective and the soldiers marched off in disciplined groups, dragonblooded officers preparing charms. "Do you think we should go with some of them?" Kagenohime asked casually as Yumenohime approached with the last unit - what was left of almost five hundred heavy infantry and perhaps half that many slingers.
"I don't think waving them off was quite what Lady V'Neef had in mind," Yumehime replied with equal lack of concern. "I'm sure we can just tag along here," she said waving casually at the Dragonord who visibly winced. Obviously a pair of young and pretty women, neither wearing armour and only one of them armed, was not what she would prefer to be escorting on a battlefield. The fact that they were acting like the flightiest of Cynis society hostesses on a shopping trip only added to the injury to his pride.
"Well then, I think it would be nice to take a little walk towards the docks," Kagehime replied lightly. "Shall we go?" Her anima had died down and now the only sign of her nature was the blood trickling from her caste mark.
The two set off and the Dragonlord hastened to get her troops to follow, sending files fowards to flank the two women that she was horribly aware had been placed in command of her - a perfect cap to a day that had killed quite a number of her relatives and seemed likely to spell the doom of her house.
They had gone no more than a few streets before they came across another band of zombies. The vanguard, obedient to their training, quickly formed up across the street and braced to receive the charge of the undead monstrosities. It was hard to tell how many there were - the smoke from the dozens of fire shrouded the city and the notoriously random street plan made it almost impossible to see more than a few score yards in any direction.
There was a flare of essence and Yumenohime hurled a fireball down the road. Three zombies burst into flames and the light illuminated something further down the street - something larger and more menacing than the Dragonlord wanted to deal with. "Was that a Warstrider?" she snapped urgently.
"No - I've heard of this," Kagenohime observed reassuringly. "It's a framework covered in zombies. No real armour but it can hit just about as hard."
"Well now I feel much better!" the officer snapped. "Slingers! Put a volley into that thing the minute you see it again. We're in a city - there's no chance you'll run out of ammunition here." The soldiers spread out, unlimbering staff slings that would hurl fist-sized stones at lethal velocities.
"I should mention," Yumenohime advised. "that I don't think I'll be casting any more spells just yet."
"Oh, you're so lazy," Kagehime chided her. "Do you think you can at least light your anima?"
They grinned at each other and then Yumehime vaulted the line, fires blazing around her as she landed on the cobbles and charged recklessly into the middle of the zombies.
"You might want to sound the charge," Kagenohime advised the white-tabarded Dragonlord, who cursed and hefted her direlance before taking her place in the front rank. The sorceress stood and watched with only half her attention as she shaped a familiar spell.
The line of soldiers slammed into the disorganised mass of the zombies, who had been distracted by the fiery warrior in their midst, driving them back and leaving a trail of chopped apart bodies behind them as they advanced. The street wasn't wide enough for even a tenth of the Dragon to participate, but they spread out along side streets to extend the unit's flanks and check the buildings for lurking menaces.
For a moment all went well, none of the soldiers hurt enough to back out the line and then the lumbering mass appeared again, dozens of zombies pushing and pulling like muscles on the metal framework they held. A volley of slingstones broke bones and a few dropped away, but the leviathan came on and one great foot crashed into the line of legionaries, sending four men flying backwards.
It was the moment that Kagenohime had been waiting for. Her most useful spell was providing her with more Essence than she could have hoped for on most days and she conjured another, stepping foward as the zombie mass took another step through the legionaries. "Fall back twenty paces!" she screamed and hurled the sickly green glow in her hands at the zombies.
The armoured legionaries obeyed automatically, the Dragonlord turning to curse the Shadow Princess for her command. Then she saw the white-clad woman running for her life and followed suit. Behind her the towering mass of metal bones and zombie muscles reeled and then came apart with a horrid sound as the dead flesh rotted away from the zombies.
"Yosh!" the legionaires screamed and without prompting they charged back into the fray.
That had been an hour ago and the deaths kept coming, each a shrieking mote of essence that sought out the dark visaged Kagenohime. She suspected that she was drawing the bulk of the invaders towards herself - at least she hoped so for if the dead were as thick on the ground everywhere as they were around her then the battle was lost already.
"So, you're the one that has dared to challenge my master," said a silky voice and Kagenohime hurled herself aside as black arrows knifed one by one into the cobbles, sending shards of stone flying as they chased her across the street. "Pitiful."
"When you care enough to send the best, Child of Silence," Kagenohime replied, recognising the brand of Midnight upon her hunter's brow. Weren't the Gods supposed to be on her side? Where was Yumenohime? Or was this just going to be an exercise in economy for some stringpulling heavenly bureaucrat, eliminating one slave of the Neverborn and weakening another, no matter which won when they were pitted against each other.