The Misrule Boxset - The Complete Series (Novels & Short Stories): The Misrule

By Andy Graham

Power and vengeance, love and betrayal, and a fight for redemption.

A three-generation tale of one family's struggle with their greatest enemy - themselves.

A Father's Choice

When confronted by a government's dark secret, will Rick Franklin risk everything for what he knows to be right or hide behind a lie?

A Brother's Secret

A young soldier's quest to find the truth about the brother he never knew he had exposes the ugly underbelly of the country he serves and a family history that shocks him to the core.

A Mother's Unreason

In the midst of a society sliding into chaos, a mother desperately tries to stop her two surviving children from murdering each other.

A Lover's Redemption

As one man's burning desire for his brother's death pushes him to the brink of madness, a lover seeks redemption for mistakes that stretch back a lifetime.

Who would you sacrifice for your beliefs? Yourself, your family, or your nation?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Andy Graham
• Release date: Jun 7, 2019
• ISBN: 9781393915942

Book preview

The Misrule

THE MISRULE

THE COMPLETE COLLECTION

ANDY GRAHAM

CONTENTS

A FATHER’S CHOICE

Stay up to date

1. A Coin

2. Trust Me

3. Surprise

4. Aerfen's Debt

5. Tea

6. Sun-Fans & Pencils

7. Return to Tear

8. Stay Gone

9. Pig-Headed

10. Change

11. The Unsung

12. Paper Galleries & Perspective

13. Bucket Towns

14. Red Lipstick

15. Rumours & Dreams

16. No Ifs, Ands or Buts

17. The Great Trade Conflict

18. A Trick

19. Who Watches the Watchers?

20. Roundabout

21. Donarth

22. Rigour Mortis

23. Revolutions & Martyrs

24. A Handshake

25. Three Words

26. Wedding Burns

27. The Gunpowder Tower

28. Rose Franklin's Monster

29. Epilogue

A map (of sorts)

The cast of A Father’s Choice

Copyright & Disclaimer

A BROTHER’S SECRET

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1. Ray Franklin's Monster

2. Hallowtide

3. The Ward

4. An Incentive

5. Left

6. The Kickshaw

7. Playground Economics

8. Tattoos

9. X517

10. White Plague

11. The Bits in the Middle

12. Captain Electric

13. Vulnerable Old People

14. Cats, Dogs & Buckets

15. Naive & Bitter

16. Everyone Should Lift

17. The Sit-in

18. Back Doors & Buckles

19. Head. Heart. Hand.

20. The Pregnancy Directive

21. The Angel City

22. A Fisher Gull & Four Horsemen

23. The Dawn Rock

24. The Disease Dog

25. Enough

26. The Northbridge

27. An Annoying Buzz

28. Greenfields

29. The Spokesperson

30. The Angel Nation

31. An Ambulance

32. A Farewell

33. Substation Two

34. Donarth Taille

35. Gwenium

36. A Subterranean Sun

37. Noise, Noise, Noise

38. A Coin

39. Good News for Some

40. The Watchfires

41. A Cowboy Hat & a Code

42. Left or Right

43. Ancestors

44. An Old Friend & a Dumb Waiter

45. Reza

46. Phoebus Donohue & Coincidence

47. Stella

48. An Unexpected Visitor

49. A Wooden Chair

50. The Wind at a Window

51. You Are a Hypocrite

52. You Know Me?

53. A Folly Tree & a Field-Marshal

54. Genes & Diseases

55. A Question

56. Finding Rhys

57. The Dead Could Wait

58. Epilogue

A Map (of sorts)

The cast of A Brother’s Secret

Copyright and Disclaimer

A MOTHER’S UNREASON

Stay up to date

1. Bait

2. Just Doing My Job

3. The Weeping Wood

4. Plans & Problems

5. Under the Donian Mountains

6. Smack Time (One)

7. Lesau & Melesau

8. Leadership

9. The Solution

10. The Hunt

11. The Church Above the Ward

12. More than Ugly

13. Trucks & Cages

14. Alcazar

15. A Little Girl’s Mother

16. The Morgen Towers

17. Jann Rainehoff

18. Maudlin. Definitely Maudlin

19. Return to Tear

20. The Map Room & the Husband

21. A Plastic Tube

22. The Other Twin

23. Bricks, Puppies & a Fisher Gull

24. AWT in EBT

25. Flinty-eyed Fury

26. An Opening Gambit

27. Loaded Dice

28. The Musical Graveyard

29. Smack Time (Two)

30. It’s for You

31. Frames

32. It’s All About Stories

33. Outside the Bridged Quarter

34. An Old Promise

35. Inside the Bridged Quarter

36. A Twist

37. The Hanging Urn Gardens

38. The Old Cells

39. Smack Time (Three)

40. They Shoot Dogs Here

41. The First Deceiver

42. Matricide

43. Captain Brennan’s Sister

44. An Old Man’s Eyes

45. More Than Pregnancy

46. Purple Eyes

47. Payback

48. Nervous & Suspicious

49. Three Reasons

50. The Stone Bridge

The cast of A Mother’s Unreason

Copyright & Disclaimer

A LOVER’S REDEMPTION

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1. Lesau Rising

2. Remembering Rose

3. Remembering The Past

4. Remembering Lena

5. Remembering The Way

6. Remembering The Future

7. Remember A Lover

8. Remembering Rick Franklin

9. War

10. White Coat. White Noise

11. A Twin Arrives

12. Corporal Orr's Obedience

13. The Sub-Metro

14. The Antidote

15. The Musical Labyrinth

16. Remembering Bethina

17. The Morgen Towers

18. Brooke

19. Fight For The Towers

20. Regroup. Return. Rebel

21. A Meeting. A Refusal

22. VIPER

23. Cobwebs

24. Manoeuvring

25. The Angel City

26. A Change of Plan

27. Corporal Orr's Disobedience

28. Transit

29. Remembering The Arch Trees

30. Corporal Orr's Legend

31. The Best & Worst Of Friends

32. It Begins

33. Higher Ground

34. Tradition

35. Brothers & Bullies

36. The Monster Under The Mountain

37. The Battle For The Angel City

38. It Ends

39. Lenka

40. Epilogue

The cast of A Lover’s Redemption

Copyright & Disclaimer

THE MORGEN TOWERS

Stay up to date

The Morgen Towers

Trustless

Henn's (Pen is) Pink

Hell Sky

Switch

Shark Teeth

Sticks & Stones & Scalpels

Droidal

Lynn's Projects

Copyright and Disclaimer

A FATHER’S CHOICE

THE MISRULE: BOOK ONE

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1

A COIN

In the old fairy tale, the traveller carried his fire in his leather rucksack. It was always lit, always warm. Wherever the man stopped for the night, he would pull out the fire, unfold it and lay it on the ground. He would reverse the process the next morning and continue his journey, a crimson glint seeping through the stitching on his bag. Aerfen’s father had told her the tale and that’s what she saw now.

The man in front of her picked up the flickers of light one by one. Colours skittered across the walls of the canvas shelter. He kissed each spark and packed the balls of fire into the bag of powder. Under the scars and burns, the fingers he had left moved with the precision of a watchmaker. Aerfen had been brought up by those hands. They’d fed her, taught her to tie her laces, to write. They’d comforted and disciplined her. They’d taught her what soap was for. Her father loved her. She had learnt so much from him. Why didn’t she have any patience for him?

She had snapped again this morning, impatient with his inability to grasp all the wireless technology sweeping the nation, frustrated because he couldn’t remember his passwords. His response? To kiss her forehead. She had felt ashamed and said, I’m scared.

So am I, her father had replied. That makes what we fight for even more important.

These things you make. What they do to people. It didn’t seem real before.

Neither did life before I met your mother. He had pulled her close, held her tight enough for her to feel the thud of his heart. No one will think any worse of you if you change your mind about tonight, Aerfen.

The tent walls cracked in a gust of wind. Aerfen’s fear spiked. She hadn’t changed her mind. She had made the journey with her father and the rest of the rebels. Just as she had promised herself she would. Carefully, her father reached for another steel ball. His fingers patted it into the grey powder, like the young saplings he planted in the Weeping Woods.

Aerfen closed her eyes. Remembered.

On the morning of her seventh nameday, she had woken to find the hands that seemed so much a part of her childhood had a finger missing. Her leathery-headed father, who had labelled each of the lines on his face after one of her misdemeanours, brushed off the questions. He had sat her on his lap and brushed her hair, humming to her until she’d fallen asleep on his shoulder.

It happened again when she was a teenager. This time she had been awake when he turned up missing a thumb. She had pestered him until he told her the truth.

Then the hands that had taught her how to live and survive taught her different things. Things she hadn’t thought one person could do to another. The things she had only heard in whispers were now words in her bathroom, being washed down the plug hole with the swirling red water.

She blinked, the cold air stinging her eyes. She wasn’t at home. Not a child. She was in a tent in the Weeping Woods. Aerfen reached into her fatigues. The metal disc was still there. She wanted to be sure. The torchlight flickered. Her fingers clamped around the token in her pocket. With glacial stillness, her father picked up a nail. It was long and rusty. He whispered something to it and pushed it into the powder with the pad of his remaining thumb.

The tent walls flapped around her. Aerfen was vaguely aware of the speech rising and falling between the tree trunks outside, of words that whipped the wind into a frenzy and scared the bright eyes of the forest predators away. For all that they were metres away and joined by the same cause, the other people could have been on a different world.

Her father had been excused from the gathering. She had slunk away, picking her way through the starlight that frosted the ground. She had heard variations of the speech many times. The first time had been while she had been dressing the stump of her father’s thumb over their chipped sink.

The words in the night reminded the listeners of the bastards who had taken everything from them: the soldiers that had ransacked homes, blitz mined the valleys and stolen their gods; the men who had demolished temples and built their own on top, reclaiming land like one dog marks its territory over another’s. They had tried to beat the language out of the young. Aerfen was one of those children; the scars on her back still smarted when she thought of it.

It was a peculiarly inventive way of eradicating language and culture. Any child caught speaking their mother tongue had a hanky tied around their neck. The knotted hanky was passed to the next child heard using the language. The child wearing it at the end of the day got strapped.

The day after Deian, her father, had given her the speech she could now hear through the canvas, Aerfen had fastened one of her mother’s old hankies around her neck. It had still smelt of her perfume, roses. Aerfen had slept in it and gone to school wearing the hanky the next morning. She had refused to take it off, even when the teacher’s cane snapped on her back. The next day three of her friends had done the same. Within a week, the entire class was wearing them. A month later, the school.

As terrified as she was, this was her cause now. Her inheritance. Not being considered old enough to be legally classified as a woman hadn’t stopped the enemy from abusing her like one. The men from Ailan had bloodied her, taken what should have been hers to give. Now it was her turn. She was going to take their crusade back to them.

Six months ago, she had followed her father to her first meeting. There had been a brief flash of anger, then he had hugged her. The tears rolling down his face had been both sad and proud. That evening, the order had come from the faceless leader of the Council to attack the castle on the border. Aerfen had wanted to be part of it.

She had begged her father while they sat on the edge of the bath. He had finished cleaning his teeth, spat the froth down the plug hole which had taken away so much filth and pain from their family, and taken her face in his hands.

There had been no tears, no attempt to talk her out of it. He had cleaned her up the day after the soldiers had defiled her. He had buried her mother. He knew why she wanted to go. Her father had just said, It’s easier to hate someone else than it is to love yourself. Whatever happens in Castle Brecan, don’t forget that. Don’t gloat. Don’t talk to anyone. Don’t even enjoy it, just get it done.

Now she was here. Waiting. Fear and sweat creeping down her spine.

Aerfen’s thumb rubbed over the rough metal edge in her pocket. Despite his warning to her, her father was whispering the hate into each piece of metal he packed into the gunpowder.

The last ball bearing flashed its oily message around the tent. He sat back on his haunches. Have you got it?

Aerfen rooted in her pocket. Yes. Here.

She held out the coin. A Mennai crown, the old type that the villages still used. It was warm in her hand. Slippery. When their leader had sent it through the clandestine channels, Aerfen wanted the honour of looking after it. She had spent weeks guessing at its symbolism. Was it a vindictive tax payment, blood money or something else? In the end she had settled on something much simpler.

For luck? she asked.

Her father smiled, gun-grey eyes twinkling under milk-white hair. Squeezing her hand as he took the coin from her, he slid it between a cluster of nails. For luck.

2

TRUST ME

Rick Franklin watched his twin moon shadows coalesce. The rifle slung low over his shoulder blurred, then shifted into focus. He murmured a hurried wish, tapped his forehead, his heart and his right hand with his left. The tradition was supposed to be performed naked but he wasn’t sure Lieutenant Chel would approve.

High above him, partially hidden by grey clouds, the constellations glittered. The Jester teased the Dancer while the Little Cleaver watched. Dotted amongst them were an increasing number of winking red dots. There was a scuff of boots to his left.

Do you think anyone ever got what they wished for? the other soldier asked.

I doubt we could find out, Rick replied. This double lunar eclipse is pretty rare.

Stann reached up a hand to grasp at the moonlight. Shadows danced on the stone behind him. When I was a kid I told my mum that one day I’d be rich enough to buy her one of the moons. Just one, I wanted to leave the other for everyone else.

Generous of you.

Deluded too, even for a kid. There’s no way you get rich wearing this uniform. He plucked at the triangular badge on his sleeve.

The wind swept past them. It tugged at Rick’s trousers, moulding the dark cloth to his legs. Stann gazed upwards. I still think there must be a better way of tapping the moons than this mining mission. Surely there’s a way of harnessing all the light up there? All those winds shifting the clouds around? We’d need a way of getting the power to these computers of ours to gorge on, though. You know, like an aqueduct for electricity.

Nice idea, Stann. Maybe you can apply for Sci-Corps, the staff are short a few scars. You’ll bring the average up nicely.

Back home they’re saying this lunar mining mission of yours is gonna turn the moons against us. They reckon for every chunk of rock we take, the moons are going to take a wish and twist it inside out. That people like you, the sparkies that worked on the project, are going to pay first and worst.

It’s not my mission, Rick replied. And you Axeford folk were always a little too poetic.

Stann’s head whipped round, a finger jabbing towards Rick. And you people from Tear always thought too much of yourselves. You’re no cleverer than all those bloody pigs you have there.

The moons slid across the sky. The crisp outline of his shadow lost its definition. C’mon, Rick said and pulled out a screwdriver. Let’s get moving. I don’t want to get shot for the sake of an old tradition.

Stann spat between the battlements. The spittle arced through the air and was swallowed by the creeping mist below. Lieutenant Chel wouldn’t shoot you for staring at the moons. He’d probably knock you around a bit but a few bruises make a man look good.

I’m not talking about him. Rick nodded towards the forest. The Weeping Woods were restless tonight. The branches twitched in the wind, moonlight shimmering on the leaves.

The Mennai? Stann laughed. Don’t have the balls. Not even these death-before-dishonour separatists we’re watching. I’d bet my left hand on that. I heard they’re using girls to do their dirty work now ‘cos their brothers and fathers are too scared. My mother has more testosterone than any man in this wretched country.

Does that explain the moustache?

Stann grabbed a fistful of Rick’s lapels and yanked him close. He stank of sweat and grease and violence. What did you say?

"Your moustache, Stann, Rick said, struggling to keep a straight face. You were unusually advanced in that regard. You know, nature and nurture, feeding the seed."

You’re trying to be clever again, aren’t you, Franklin? Good job we go way back. I’d have given anyone else a little character around their eyes for that. He shoved Rick backwards and held up his left hand. Smells of respect. That’s what Dads used to say. He held up the right. Smells of disrespect.

Something cracked in the forest below. A handful of birds spilled out of the trees and disappeared into the night. The two men hunkered down. One lean, one muscular. One blonde, one dark. One angry to the other’s calm. They had been grudgingly inseparable since before either had teeth. Even now, in the military, they had ended up in the same unit.

What’s your infra-red camera say? Stann whispered, peering round the crenellations.

It’s not working, none of the cameras on this wall are. That’s why we’re here, remember?

Not that one, genius, your mobile one.

Rick held it over the edge of the ancient stone. Moss tickled the burn scars on his wrist. Nothing there. Nothing human anyway. Maybe it’s the moons, come to take some pre-emptive revenge. Rick chuckled. A thin sound that felt too loud when Stann didn’t join in. Healthy disrespect, he thought. That’s the way to deal with your fears. Never laugh at them; never let them laugh at you.

Still not funny, Stann said. He tapped the small camera mounted on the wall. They may not be working but they’d be a great place to hide something. Squirrel it away for a later date.

Where?

The cameras, fool. It’s the last place you’d look for something. Who watches the watcher, right?

Full of ideas tonight, aren’t you, Sub-Corporal Taille?

Stann grunted as the lens hissed as it refocused on something in the woods. He stared down his rifle sight. Sure you wired them things up OK?

Trust me, Rick said. The smell of damp stone and decay was rank in his nostrils. This whole place just felt wrong to him. A bird hooted at the base of the hill, even that noise sounded off. The fault must be somewhere else. I’m sure I know where it is. I just can’t place it.

‘Trust me’, he says. If only. Stann vaulted onto the wall and stared out over the forest canopy that stretched below the hill. Come and get me! His shouts faded into the leafy night. I’d rather die of bullets than bickering.

Get down, you idiot. If Chel catches you, he’ll give you a makeover not even your dog could love.

I’m bored. Stann dropped to the ground, grabbed a handful of gravel and threw it off the walkway. A soldier scurrying across the courtyard swore up at him. Stann hurled curses at the retreating figure. I haven’t even had a decent fist fight since getting to this pile of rubble, given someone the old Stann Taille one-two, the stumble-and-feint routine.

That’s beyond old. No one falls for that unless it’s a no-budget film company.

This sucks, Stann said. The food sucks. Lieutenant Chel sucks and all this waiting around for something to happen sucks.

We’re outside. It’s better than being cooped up in the barracks back in the capital. Something’s up, sure as eggs came before chickens. The riots and those walls they’re building there are just the start of it.

Private Lee said the new walls around the capital are to keep us villagers out. He said they’re gonna put border controls in, that we’ll have to patrol them. Stann bowed his head. His blonde hair looked green in the moon light. Not sure how I feel about that.

Orders are orders, Stann.

I didn’t sign up to fight my people. They’re not my enemy. And when did the army tame you? I’ve barely seen you for a year, you get dumped into this unit out of the blue and you’re all obedient now?

I don’t know why I’m here, either. I was told it was important, that’s all. My leave got cut short because of this posting. I missed my Rose’s fifth nameday.

There’ll be plenty more for you to go to. Stann peeled some moss off the stone and flicked it at Rick. And don’t think that means I’m gonna forgive your dig at my mother. Some things are just not said. Wives, mothers, girlfriends and daughters are off limits.

Stepmothers, mothers-in-law? Grandmothers? Your enemy’s mother? asked Rick. My great-aunt Eleanor is someone’s daughter and she’s a fearsome woman when she gets riled.

Don’t complicate the theory. I break things, you fix things. Let me have my turn at the clever stuff for a change.

They lapsed into an uncomfortable silence. The wind whipped the clouds into a frenzy. The same wind hissed through the leaves of the forest surrounding the castle. It swept across the top of the wall, buffeting Rick. Cold air swirled up his sleeves and dragged shivers down his spine.

Stann stamped his feet. This wind sucks, too. It makes me nervous. Not knowing why it makes me nervous makes me more nervous.

My wife’s people have a fairy tale, Rick said. They believe the wind is a collection of all the bad things that have ever been said. The stronger the wind, the more hate is being spoken. It’s the world’s way of cleansing itself or warning us.

Yeah, well, your wife’s a bit odd round the edges.

Rick ran a thumb across the shiny skin circling his wrists. The scars prickled, like a thousand tiny scabs were being pulled off. Off limits, remember? Thryn made her choice. Let it go, Stann.

The squawk of birds filtered through the leaves below. The thick forest was threatening to drown the ancient castle the soldiers had taken over a few weeks back. Fallen clouds seeped through the trees; slow, grey flames that licked at the base of the walls. Stann prodded Rick. "How did you keep your wife out of the immigration camps? You’ve always been cagey about that."

The scars around Rick’s wrists hurt now, a dull pain, a good pain, a pain with a purpose. It wasn’t very scientific but it made sense. An ex of mine returned a favour. I threw in some extra wiring for a new camera system of hers and she pressed the right buttons.

Beth?

Rick nodded.

Always the same story. Bribes, barter and blackmail, the oldest currencies in the world. Guaranteed they’ll outlive this new swipe-card currency the government is planning. Well, let’s hope for Thryn’s sake you love her more than you did Beth. He clutched his hands to his chest and sighed like a bad actor. You were smitten by Beth so much you were married to Thryn and expecting a baby within a year of Beth dumping you. The words dissolved into a deep chuckle. Private Lee called it ‘jilting the jerk’ before he got sent home.

Beth didn’t jilt me. We were only engaged.

Lee said you run like your knees are allergic to your feet, too. Stann’s barrel chest juddered as he cackled. "Now, get a move on, sir, shift’s almost up," Stann said.

Rick squatted to double-check the cables on another camera. I don’t get it. This camera’s fine, too. He pushed himself to his feet. Let’s do one more round.

Time’s up. I’m hungry. It’s slop o’clock, Stann replied. Let’s go.

He loped towards the wooden door of a watchtower, rifle slung over his shoulder. Rick followed. He’d missed something. He knew he had. He just couldn’t remember what or where.

Finish this shift, eat and then start by checking the monitor room again, he thought. It’ll be a simple solution. Most answers are.

Stann slipped through the door. He slammed it shut and forced the squealing bolt home. Rick hammered on the wood, calling for Stann to open up.

High above them, hanging proud amongst the constellations, the two moons were now clear of each other. Lesau and Melesau, fated to chase the same golden-skinned woman for eternity. The moonlight glinted off the cracked tiles on the turret roof of the watchtower Stann had just locked from the inside. It danced off the leaves of the oak, birch and wolfbark trees and filtered down to the forest floor, where animals scurried away from the rustle of dark leather boots.

3

SURPRISE

Rick collapsed into the beaten-up armchair. It was more springs than stuffing but after a day in ill-fitting boots, it felt as welcoming as a hot bath.

Between backpacks and rolled up mattresses, an assortment of foldaway green canvas chairs dotted the room. Everything was immaculate. Sleeping bags were stowed and eating utensils sparkled as best as dull steel could. The castle had been picked clean of as much grime as the off-duty squaddies could manage. Eight hours’ sleep. Eight hours’ patrol. The same again for food and chores. It never felt like an even split.

The armchair Rick was sitting in was a puzzle. It wasn’t what you’d expect to find in an ancient, though well-preserved, castle. The chair was on the scrawny side but otherwise dry and smell-free, as long as you didn’t breathe in too hard. The soldiers had appropriated it and named it the Throne. There were days when they squabbled over it like over-sized two-year-olds.

The rest of Castle Brecan had been filled with scraps of cloth, mould and the random detritus of forgotten inhabitants. There were other things in the corridors that the soldiers ignored. Lost things, whispers, memories and glimpses of movement that were never anything more than they should be. Then Stann had found a family of coffins in a hidden crypt. They had led to a series of predictable jokes about creatures of the night, and a dare. Private Lee had lost the dare.

The jokes stopped the morning after Lee had spent eight hours trying to sleep in a coffin. He was sent back to Effrea-Tye, the capital city of Ailan, for a psych assessment. His wide-eyed drooling hadn’t been a problem, nor the gibbering, but Lieutenant Chel had drawn the line when the snaggletoothed private had professed an allergy to sunlight. It had thrown the squad off for days and brought Chel’s muscular brand of discipline thudding home.

Lieutenant Chel had shouted himself hoarse at the soldiers’ indiscipline, their games and lapses in concentration. He had been right. It made a mockery of the military for the soldiers to lose it because one of their colleagues was a few bullets short of a bandolier. Chel’s predictable digs about sexuality and parenthood had been laughed off. But when the lieutenant had resorted to cliches and stereotypes about the Bucket Towns, it hadn’t gone down well.

A soldier burst into the room, displaying the tobacco he’d just won off Lacky, a new sub-lieutenant. The gloating soldier stashed his winnings, high-fived his colleagues and gave his grinning audience a card-by-card account of how he had beaten Lacky. His pleasure in beating a city-born officer was palpable. And that, Rick reflected, was one of the main issues with the military.

Chel, Lacky and the rest of the officer class were drawn from the cities. The front-line soldiers hailed from the towns and villages, sometimes referred to as the Free Towns. The city-born called the latter the Bucket Towns, after a few practices that still lived on in more isolated areas. Private Lee had been that rare thing, a city-born soldier who had ended up on the front line. The rumour was that Lee’s posting was a punishment. His parents had made a public stand over the government reneging on a pre-election promise not to raise taxes. The promise had been dismissed as ‘campaign rhetoric’ and their only child, Lee, had been posted to the disputed border between Mennai and Ailan.

Lee, as belligerent as a cockerel in the neighbour’s yard, had jumped at the coffin dare, unaware Stann had set him up. The private had been desperate to prove to the other soldiers that the government’s new laws banning myths and legends were justified. Like many city folk, Lee believed the Free Towns’ traditions were as substantial and welcome as a freezing fog.

Rick shifted in the armchair. A spring was digging into his arse. Now matter where he moved, the spring seemed to follow him, adding to the unsettled feeling he’d had of late. Part of the problem was that he was finding this constant competition between cities and towns wearing, more so as his daughter got older. It didn’t make sense anymore. Weren’t they supposed to be on the same side? But if life-long friends like he and Stann had argued over everything under the moons, from toys and milk as kids to women and spirits as adults, what chance did anyone else have?

On cue, the door squeaked on its hinges. It cut through Ray’s daydreaming and Stann strutted in. Guess what?

Sub-lieutenant Lacky’s promised never to play cards again? Ray replied as cold air swirled around his ankles.

Yes, but wrong answer.

Lieutenant Chel’s been promoted and we’re rid of him?

I wish, but nope.

Lee’s back?

Stann snorted. Not a chance.

You had a wash?

Fuck you.

I give up.

Sub-Colonel Chester’s been at it again.

Rick groaned. What’s she done now?

C’mon, Rick. Be fair. Chester’s not all bad.

What then? Rick wriggled in the seat. The damn spring had a mind of its own. Maybe he should have a word with someone in Sci-Corps about weaponising the Throne. Death by armchair. Didn’t have a great sound to it.

The barracks are buzzing with rumours Chester’s about to be promoted again, Stann said. And she’s planning a new off-the-books arm of the military.

Promoted? She’s not much older than us.

So? Age doesn’t guarantee wisdom, my old man was proof of that. Chester’s proved herself already. Splitting the working day into three equal parts was a good idea. We actually get some rest now. He frowned. Well, some of us. Last I heard, Lee’s still refusing to sleep. Word is he’s going to be sent to some kind of camp. Apparently, they were interested in him as he’s a leftie.

Sub-Colonel Chester’s new change? Rick asked. He screwed an eye shut and wiggled his toes. The spring was now digging into a buttock and his foot was going numb.

Gyms for each regiment with new equipment. Not these antique banana barbells we’ve been using. They’re more use as macho fishing rods than anything else. Stann held both hands up high, fists clenched. When we get home tomorrow, I will be even more invincibler than I am now!

Invincible, not invincibler.

Nope. Invincibler. It’s even more than invincible. Stann was grinning from temple to top hat.

Rick couldn’t help but smile back. It doesn’t work like that. It makes as much sense as saying you’ll give something 110 percent.

Don’t be getting clever on me again, now.

If you’re invincible that’s already kind of finite. I don’t think⁠—

Franklin! a voice bellowed from the corridor.

A series of hurried curses snapped round the room. Squaddies jumped up and gave each other a quick buddy check, straightening collars and doing up buttons.

Stann’s smile vanished to be replaced by the look of looming violence he wore so well. If you’ve done anything that gets us all stuck here any longer than we need to be, you’ll be sleeping in those coffins of Lee’s. I’ll nail the lid down ’til those ‘pretty brown eyes’ your wife loves so much go mouldy.

Chel wouldn’t keep us here. Rick hurried over to his bedroll.

Damn right he would. He’s a vindictive little sod, the bald ones always are.

Maybe you should introduce him to your mother. Her testosterone could sort him out. Rick winked at his friend just before the wooden door slammed open and most senior officer currently in Castle Brecan (to everyone’s dismay but his) marched in.

Chel had the dubious epithet of being both the youngest person to make lieutenant in the army and now the oldest person to still hold that rank. He was steeped in old-school, patriarchal values that would use the carrot to beat you with once the stick had broken.

Corporal Richard Franklin, Chel said in a voice like a dry shave.

Frederick Franklin, sir. Not Richard. He was my late uncle. Rick stared at a point just over Chel’s shoulder.

If I say your name’s Richard, then your name’s Richard. The lieutenant’s face gleamed as if it had been polished with sweat. He looked at the bedding next to Rick’s feet. This your bedding, Richard?

My name is Frederick, sir.

Still pushing it, Franklin. Haven’t you learnt yet? Or maybe you want some of what Lee got? I hear he’s going to get some special treatment now. Shall I put in a word for you, too?

Stann shook his head a fraction. The other soldiers stood parade-ground still.

It’s my bedding, sir.

Chel walked up the length of the mat and kicked Rick’s cooking cans over. It’s dirty. Got footprints on it. Seems bruises aren’t good teachers. Maybe I should try my belt. He stuck his thumbs behind the large brass buckle. It was perfectly aligned with the buttons of his shirt. Don’t worry, Richard, that’s against regs for some reason, another change that has got Sub-Colonel Chester written all over it. He splayed two fingers into a V shape and pressed them into his throat. That and the parade pins. I got taught my lessons with a switch, he said to the silent soldiers. You whelps have it easy. There wouldn’t be all this trouble back in the capital if we were allowed proper discipline.

Rick clasped his hands tighter behind his back. The burn scars on each wrist were taut and sweaty. He was here for Thryn and Rose. Every day he put in was another day of credit for his wife and daughter. I’ll clean it up, he said.

Chel cupped a hand to his ear.

"I’ll clean it up, sir."

The lieutenant smiled. Of course you will, Franklin. But first, remind me. Why are you here?

We’re here monitoring separatist activity in Mennai, sir.

A rustling noise in the corridor stopped as quickly as it started. Rick swallowed. Damn Private Lee and those ghost stories.

"Yes. But why are you here, Franklin? Why were you dumped into my unit?"

Sci-Corps. Tech support, sir.

Ah yes, of course. You’re the computer genius who’s supposed to make sure this new gear’s working.

Sir?

You’re the camera geek, Franklin. Highly recommended, too. Worked on the lunar mining mission, various jobs for the big dogs in the capital, blah blah blah. He put one immaculate fingernail on Rick’s shirt and walked his fingers up to the collar as Stann’s eyes cut to the corridor. Chel wiggled a plug out of his pocket. A number was written on its back.

Plug seven, Rick said, the itching feeling that he had missed something felt like a bat to the back of the head right now. That’s the socket to the monitor bank for the north wall of the castle, sir.

Oh, plug seven, said Chel. For the north wall, you say? You mean the wall facing Mennai, our enemy? The wall you and Sub-Corporal Taille were just checking?

Chel teased open the plug. Like a cheap illusionist playing to a crowd of bored drunks, he snapped it shut again. The lieutenant separated the two halves with a flourish. Now, you’re the expert, not me, but shouldn’t this wire connect to that terminal there? Chel pointed.

One of the wires was hanging off its terminal by a thread of copper. The rest of the frayed metal was splayed out in a ragged fan. Rick screwed his feet into the ground, fighting the sinking feeling.

The nagging memory he’d been looking for came crashing back. With the unit’s captain recalled to the capital, Chel had ordered the soldiers on a twenty-four hour endurance march, daring them to report him for breaking the new eight-hour shift system. He’d wanted ‘to keep them sharp, while blunt with fatigue’. The lieutenant had tagged an emergency shift on the end of the march, claiming it didn’t count as part of their eight hours’ work, that they had hours to make up because of the march. It had been the day after Lee had been sent home. Everyone had been jumping at nothing. As sweat prickled through his skin, Rick remembered seeing the worn cable but the problem failing to register.

You don’t feel your clothes once you’re wearing them, he’d been told by one of his instructors. Your job as an electrician is to make sure you always see and feel everything you do, even something as simple as screwing in a light bulb. This way you’re less likely to make mistakes.

The images danced around Chel’s leering face: Rick missing the connection, walking out of the monitor room and the film playing in his head cutting back to the plug. The scene could have been lifted from the dodgy movies he and Thryn laughed at so much. Only right now, he didn’t want to laugh. He couldn’t. He felt as if someone had filled his mouth with sand. He fought down the urge to swallow. He wasn’t going to let Chel see his victory, no matter how bad the mistake.

The lieutenant cupped his own face in his hands and made an O-shape with his lips. Stann, fidgeting on the spot, glanced at the door. His voice rapped off the walls. Sir, permission to speak, sir?

Chel wagged his finger at Stann. Not now, Sub-Corporal, I’m just getting to the good bit.

Sir, the corridor, I heard⁠—

Chel formed his other hand into the shape of a gun and fired an imaginary bullet at Stann. One more word, Taille, and everyone here gets rat-rations for the week.

Stann saluted, his face grim. Chel held the plug up in front of Rick, opening and closing it in time to his words. Maybe that’s why the monitors for the north wall are blank again today. The click-clack of the plastic echoed around the room. You wanted to check the wall, Franklin, ‘cos you said you’d checked the monitor room.

Sir—

I’m guessing the cameras were fine, Franklin, Chel cut in, grimacing. You people from the Bucket Towns are all the same.

Free Towns, sir.

The Buckets, Chel shouted. His nose was a whisker away from Rick’s. The thin arteries in his eyeballs throbbed under the glistening white sheen. You do not answer back to a senior officer! If boot camp didn’t get the message through to you, I will, by any means necessary. I’ll make you cut enough switches from that stinking forest outside for every soldier in this unit to beat you with. And you have my word that they will beat you until their hands are bleeding. Do you understand me?

Yes, sir.

I don’t think you do, Franklin. Chel was apoplectic, slimy balls of saliva gathering at the corners of his mouth. Maybe you left your brains in the same pail you bucket heads used to shit and wash in? You folk from these ‘Free Towns’ are as dull as the animals you live with. Chel’s nostrils flared as he stamped a foot on the ground. There was a barely audible whinny from someone in the room.

The lieutenant spun to glare at the line of immobile soldiers, each and every one of them expressionless. I’ve always wondered, Richard, Chel said to the room as a whole, do you all share beds with the animals, too? It’d explain a lot about you peasants: your looks, brains, the smell of your women.

Stann’s face darkened. The air in the room seemed to get colder, harder to breath. Chel pivoted back and stabbed his finger into Rick’s chest. Just you wait until the captain returns and I inform him about this farce. I understand there are some new disciplinary procedures being rolled out.

Still not gonna get promoted, someone muttered.

A muscle in Chel’s jaw twitched. He dropped the plug and kicked it behind the armchair. Corporal Franklin, you will grovel your way into the corner and pick that thing up. Then you will fix what you broke.

Rick wrestled to keep his face impassive. Never mind Chel’s bile. This was a rookie mistake. He hadn’t done anything this sloppy since he was a kid. If he couldn’t focus here, how could he focus in combat? Making this sin, and it was a sin for a military electrician, on Chel’s watch just made it that much more bitter.

The lieutenant launched a string of expletives at the other soldiers as he headed for the exit. Rick ducked behind the armchair, scrabbling on the floor for the pieces of the plug.

A blast of cold air chilled the sweat on the back of his neck. The door screeched open and Chel lurched to a halt.

A black-clad figure, covered in twigs and leaves, stood in the corridor. Gun-grey eyes stared out from a mess of leathery wrinkles. The old man tossed a leather bag at Chel. Surprise, he slurred in a thick Mennai accent.

Chel caught the bag, his eyes wide. Stann yelled. Launched himself at Chel. The room turned white. Then the gunfire started.

4

AERFEN'S DEBT

The shockwave slammed the armchair into Rick, cracking his skull against the wall. He was covered by the thick fabric. It smelt of mould and pinned him to the damp stone. As the reverberations from the explosion died down, the firing started. Then the screams. Voices. Shouting. Swearing. Pleading. Rick pushed and pulled, twisting under the chair as the carnage unfolded without him. Each time he moved, the throbbing in his head peaked and a wave of nausea ripped through him. The armchair seemed to be full of lead. He had to get out. Help his colleagues. The chair shuddered as something thudded into it. Rick thudded back against the wall. Winded and dazed. His vision cleared and, through the gap between the fabric and the stone, saw a hand dangling inches from his face. A streak of crimson trailed across the wrist, onto a finger. It formed a bead on the end of a nail. The hand twitched and the blood splashed onto the floor, congealing in the dust. To Rick’s horror, he realised more blood was seeping through fabric of the soldiers’ Throne, sticky and red and warm.

Help me, he yelled. His voice was lost amongst many. Get me out.

A door rattled open and the crash of booted feet shook the room. Reinforcements! an Ailan voice cried, relieved and desperate.

The shooting stopped. Too many people! Rick realised. Not enough space for guns. And in the time it took for him to draw in a breath of stinking air, to hope it was over, the air was filled with the hiss of steel, stabbing and gutting. Knives. The Mennai had brought their knives. That chilled Rick more than the guns. More even than the bomb. Now the room was thick with the tortured screams of a different kind. An evil kind. Screams born in a slashing red hell.

He had to get out! With a shove of his legs that left bile in his mouth, he toppled the corpse-covered Throne and crawled into a room that was utterly quiet.

Rick had no idea how long he had been trapped, wrestling with the weight of the chair and the spinning in his head. A minute? Ten? Less? But the scene that greeted him made him want to crawl back and put out his own eyes. The bomb had killed or crippled most of the soldiers in the guardroom. Bullets had done the rest. As for the reinforcements? Ailan soldiers, who, minutes ago, had been cooking, scrubbing, darning socks and cleaning weapons? They lay dead and dying. One clutched at the glistening purple coils spilling from her stomach, whimpering. Another was praying for the first time in his life. There were no nice deaths in battle. Heroism was a matter of perspective but these soldiers had died horribly. The armchair that had saved his life hadn’t fared much better. It was dripping red. All thrones come from blood, most return there. The soldiers’ Throne had been no different. A thought hit him, staggering him as another wave of dizziness washed over him.

Stann! Where’s Stann? Rick raced to the tangle of bodies on the floor. He peeled back one, then another. Another. None of them were the friend he sought. Rick was filled with conflicting emotions of relief, grief for the fallen and guilt for his relief. He tugged back another body, a Mennai trooper, and found Chel. What was left of him.

Rick’s knees hit the floor and he emptied his guts. The explosion had torn Chel in two. Maybe Rick should fear bombs more than knives after all. The lieutenant’s torso was in the centre of a fan-shaped pattern of soot and debris. The bomber hadn’t been any luckier. He must have stumbled as he tried to get away, the nails and ball bearings ripping him to shreds. The old man’s head lay in a corner. One gun-grey eye stared at nothing; a bent coin rested on the other eyelid.

Squatting back on his haunches, Rick wiped the strings of spittle from his mouth. There was still no sign of Stann. The corridors, he must be taking the fight to the Mennai. That’s what Stann would do.

The door slammed open. Rick grabbed the nearest weapon, a Mennai knife, and clutched it in front of his chest. The knife was a vile thing with a serrated, triangular blade. The jagged puncture wounds these things left wouldn’t close up and bled freely. It made him feel filthy just holding it. An Ailan soldier stumbled into the guardroom, covered head to toe with slime and gore.

Help me, please. Sub-lieutenant Lacky collapsed as Rick leapt for him, his own head spinning treacherously.

Too many, Lacky said. Our patrols. Gone. Killed. One thumb drew a red line across his neck. Or pushed. Off the walls.

Rick had a sickening image of Ailan soldiers falling from the walkways onto the cobblestones below the walls, like black-clad hail, crimson gashes across their throats. Lacky opened his mouth to speak but the cherry-red bubbles frothing on his lips were noiseless. His hand went limp.

No. No! Don’t you fucking dare die on me. Rick threw the Mennai blade away and drew his own knife. He sliced off a piece of a dead woman’s shirt, opening a fresh wound in her arm in the process, and applied a hasty tourniquet just as Lacky slipped into unconsciousness.

Got to get out of here. Get help. Rick lay the man down, grabbed a rifle, radio and helmet and sprinted for the back door, the closer one. It was blocked by corpses on the other side. The main exit? Too risky? He poked his head out. Clear. He cross-stepped down the corridor. He had no idea if he was quiet or not, his ears were full of a hissing noise from the explosion. At the end of the corridor was a T-junction.

Rick huddled into a shallow alcove just shy of the corner. Black stains gleamed on the floor. Ten metres of corridor separated him from freedom and help. Ten metres of stone and twisting smoke. Question was: what else did that ten metres hold? He balanced the helmet on the rifle muzzle and poked it round the edge of the wall. A shot thundered through the castle and the helmet clattered to the ground.

A Mennai fucking terrorist, he muttered. That’s what else is in the corridor. Now what do I do?

He glanced back at the guard room. Low moans drifted through the splintered door, mixing with the smoke and dust that choked the air, and an idea popped into his head.

The smell of burnt hair was thick on Rick’s tongue. He was losing his grip on his burden. It wasn’t heavy. Just unwieldy. Slick with blood. He hugged it tighter, fighting not to drop it. There was a blur of movement. A soldier, dazed from the bomb, stumbled past him into the T-junction.

No! Rick yelled.

Machine gun fire skewered the soldier. She gyrated as the bullets rattled her body and sent her spinning down the corridor.

Fuck it. He hadn’t thought there were any more people alive in the guardroom. Rick hoped his lame plan would help him get round the same fate as this poor woman. The ceiling shuddered. A burst of tiny stones pattered into his hair as the echo of another grenade faded down the next corridor.

Rick wrestled his burden closer. Bits of flesh flaked off it, onto his hands. He gagged and forced down the acid in the back of his throat. Now, he whispered. Just do it now, before you drop him. Or puke again. On three.

He eased himself forwards. Chel’s head, a dead weight on his neck, lolled back. His sightless eyes stared up at Rick. Even now, what was left of the lieutenant’s face seemed to smirk back, his sunken knuckles promising more character-enhancing beatings. No matter how much of a bastard he’d been to his subordinates, he hadn’t deserved this.

Forearms cramping as he held on to the back of the lieutenant’s shirt, Rick leaned Chel’s torso past the corner. A shot cracked the air. The dead man’s head exploded in a red cloud. Rick dropped Chel, spinning the lieutenant’s remains across the floor and flattened himself into the guard’s post.

The slow crunch of approaching feet got louder. It was working. The hells only knew how, but it was. Rick held his breath, gripped the handle of his belt knife. Except for the fuller, it was smooth and unadorned. As civilised as one of these things could be. A gaunt Mennai soldier stepped round the corner, his rifle poised. He saw Chel’s legless torso and paused. Rick slipped out of the alcove, wrapped his hand around the man’s mouth and slid the knife between his ribs. There was no scream, just a gurgling sigh as the man crumpled. Rick lowered the soldier to the ground and slit his throat. The man twitched once and lay still, blood pooling under his neck.

Get it over with. Keep it clean. Dignified. Part of him wanted to believe it was better to die on one of these blades than the ones the Mennai used but he doubted the dead man would agree. Rick bent over the corpse to close his eyes. He would have done the same to Chel, if all of the lieutenant’s face was in one place.

Rick huddled in the shadows and tried the radio he’d salvaged. Nothing. I guess whoever built this castle wasn’t thinking of reception when they made these walls this bloody thick. He kicked the stones behind him. He had to get onto the battlements, out of this charnel house into fresh air. He wasn’t sure how many from Ailan were still alive.

Rick peered into the smoke. Silence. Now. He had to move now. One of the lieutenant’s fingers crunched under Rick’s boot. He shifted his weight, lifting his foot out of the sticky mess congealing around the lieutenant.

A snap sent shudders through the corridor. Something slammed into his shoulder. Spun him round. Shards of stone bit into his flesh. Rick collapsed face first onto the dead man, his cheek pressing into the still-warm slime on Chel’s. His revulsion was lost in a pain that tore through him. His shoulder? His arm? Neck? He wasn’t sure which bit but fuck did it hurt. He pushed. His hands slipped off Chel’s corpse and Rick collapsed as feet thumped towards him. Someone rolled him over and Rick found himself facing a pair of black leather boots that had mud clinging to their soles and smoke twisting through the laces.

His breath came in short gasps. Each one tugged lines of fire into his shoulder. He hadn’t realised until now how much this place stank of blood, urine and shit: the true stench of war. Through the spreading pain, a thought hit him: Maybe Stann was right. Maybe I shouldn’t have taken that job working on the lunar mining project. Blinking the sweat out of his eyes, Rick stared down the muzzle of an old Mennai rifle.

No pretty speeches for you, Ailan child, a woman’s voice slurred. I’m not supposed to waste time gloating, no matter how much I want to savour this. But you owe me. All you Ailan men owe me.

Above blood-spattered fatigues, her eyes were autumn brown. The same as Thryn’s. The same as Rose’s. Rick had insisted on the name: Rose. He’d joked it was the only decision about his daughter he’d been allowed to make. Like Rose, this woman’s face was smooth and unblemished, curly dark hair pulled back tight around her head. Unlike Rose, she looked haunted, older than she had any right to be.

Are you scared? she asked.

No. No, I’m not. The words wouldn’t come. They were there. Somewhere in his head. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t say them.

You are scared, aren’t you? She nudged him with her boot. It was too small for a soldier’s boot. Scared to die.

To die? No. He wasn’t sure what he felt. A searing pain bordering on numbness. Fear he wouldn’t see his Rose laugh again, that he’d never hold his wife. But scared to die? Even now with the black hole of the woman’s rifle barrel pressing into his nose. No. He wasn’t. He was scared of what death left in its wake.

Her finger tightened on the trigger. This is for what you did to me, to my mother and my people. And the Mennai People’s Council wish you well in the afterlife. The woman’s face twisted into a grin, white teeth bright against the blood and camouflage paint. Oh, I forgot, she whispered. You’re not allowed to believe in things like that anymore.

What are you talking about? He must have said it aloud because she answered.

Your government is going to take your gods from you. I heard it a few days ago. They’re going to take from you what they’ve already taken from us: hope. She stroked his face with the muzzle of her rifle. So, there is no afterlife for you. I guess this really is the end. As your brother soldiers said to me: ‘my dear, you are about to get well and truly f⁠—’

She shuddered. Once, twice, three times.

Her finger convulsed on the trigger. A single bullet grazed Rick’s ear, spilling heat down his neck. The Mennai woman stared at the red streams from her abdomen. She dabbed at them, at the blood dripping off her hands. And as her eyes rolled backwards in her skull, their autumn brown changed to winter white. She collapsed onto the man Rick had stabbed, her face softening into that of a little girl asleep.

Big problem with war films, a voice said from the corridor leading to the guard room. Gives people a sense for melodrama. Doesn’t belong in real war. Do the job, don’t talk about doing the job. Someone should have told her.

Relief flooded through Rick as Stann dragged himself to the junction.

Stann! I knew you’d be OK.

Stann dragged himself over to the fallen woman. He pulled his bayonet free from his weapon. Wait, what are you doing. Stann? No! And slammed it through each of her eyes. Her back arched, mouth splitting wide. And with a slow sigh, she sagged back down to the floor. Her fingers went limp on a rifle that looked to be older than her. Stann grabbed his bayonet with both hands. The metal squeaked as he wrenched it free from the socket.

Rick’s tongue felt like a rasp. You’re alive then.

Speak louder, Franklin. My eardrums are shot. Fucking bomb blew them to shit.

You’re alive? Rick shouted.

Near deaf. He spat on the floor. Not a coward, though.

What?

First you hid. Then you ran. Told myself I’d cover you. I’m not gonna let no one down.

Hiding? Running away? Wait. What?

Wasn’t sure I was going to make the shot, mind. My aim’s a little off. Stann held up his left hand. Three fingers were missing, the stumps crudely bandaged with torn-off cloth.

Rick stared, slack jawed. His protests were forgotten as his mind raced through the consequences of what Stann’s ruined hand meant.

Patched myself up, Stann said. He was staring at his hand as if incapable of understanding what he was seeing. Hurt like fuck but it’s amazing what a man can do when high on adrenaline or not running away or cowering under a chair.

Your aim’s as good as it always was, Rick managed to say.

I was aiming for her head.

I didn’t run, Stann. Or hide.

Yes you did. Saw you. Guess you’re not going to have any problems beating me in any footraces from now on, either.

What are you— The question died in Rick’s mouth as he saw the trail of blood smeared down the corridor, Stann’s mangled leg. Oh no . . .

Feels like I can even wiggle my toes, Stann said. Fucking odd that when I’ve got no foot. Guess I may not be hitting Chester’s new gym tomorrow after all.

You’ll be fine. Rick kept his voice upbeat. From somewhere he found the strength to check his friend’s bandages. We just need to get you out of here.

‘You’ll be fine, Stann,’ the other man mimicked in falsetto tones. That’s just what you said about those cameras and computers. ‘They’re fine.’ I was there on the battlements. And after you checked the plugs in the monitor room. I watched you filling in the report while we waited to go check out the rumours about Lee.

It was a mistake. I was tired.

You’re a soldier. You’re supposed to be tired. And I thought the great Frederick Franklin never made mistakes? You always get the girl, get the promotion, always got the right gig going on. His voice was rising, spittle dripping down his chin.

You’re in shock, Stann. You’ve lost a lot of blood. You’re high on pain and adrenaline.

Blood, yes. Memory, no. Stann’s lips curled back to reveal red teeth. This is your fault, Franklin, all of it: the bomb, Chel, my leg and hand. You did this. I saw you hiding under that armchair.

Rick checked the bullets in his revolver and shoved it back in his holster. Slinging Stann’s rifle over his shoulder, he stooped down