Sodom and Gomorrah

Sodom and Gomorrah

"…Uwek."

The imperial capital was greeting the morning with prim, impeccable order.

That very neatness sickened Lakia.

The capital's main avenue ran straight and broad. White flagstones gleamed with the water sprinkled overnight. Windows of the government offices opened at identical heights. Flags facing the palace fluttered in the same direction.

Merchants unfurled their awnings. Warm scents rose from bakery chimneys. Patrol soldiers marched the streets, matching even the angle of their spears and the spacing of their steps.

Everything was clean.

Like a blade after the blood has been wiped away.

Like a corpse whose stench has been concealed.

An entire legion had vanished in the north, and the empire's sharpest-honed sword had failed to return, yet the city breathed as though nothing at all had happened.

Lakia sat upon Alduin's back and looked down at ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠that city.

The capital spread beneath the clouds was small. The palace was small, the plaza small, the walls small. Carriages moved like toys. People flowed like black dots across white stone.

The thought made her bite ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠her lip.

One must not look at people that way. Just because one gazes down upon a city from above does not shrink the lives inside it. She had to believe that.

Yet from Alduin's back the human capital looked like nothing so much as kindling stacked with meticulous care.

Krrr.

Alduin let out a low rumble.

Lakia laid her hand on the nape of his neck.

"Quiet. We're here to eavesdrop, remember?"

Alduin immediately swallowed the sound. Ordinarily he would have given at least one resentful little growl. He did not today.

Because Lakia's fingertips were cold.

Alduin knew the temperature of that hand. Even when she was afraid, even when she grieved, her fingertips never grew this cold. Only when she was deeply angry. Only when the inside of her heart froze before any words could form. Then her fingertips became like this.

At that moment the clouds above the palace split in a long, clean line.

Wheeeeeee—

A sound like a sword drawn across the sky.

People of the capital lifted their heads one after another.

At first it was a single black speck. The speck became a line, the line a shadow, and the shadow plummeted toward the central plaza of the palace.

Magkin.

The swiftest of Lakia's children. He did not so much fly as simply pass through—before sight, before sound, before thought.

Above the palace plaza Magkin twisted his body. What had been held in his talons dropped.

For an instant it looked like a stone wrapped in cloth.

It was a human head.

Bec Chereson's head fell into the very center of the emperor's plaza.

Thud.

The sound was small. The sound of the Empire's Best Sword striking white flagstone was far quieter than any sword-song he had left in his lifetime.

Yet that small sound froze the capital solid.

The nearest imperial guard recognized it first. He took a few steps forward and stopped. The blood drained from his face.

"Bec…"

That single word fell upon the plaza.

People did not recognize it at first. Or perhaps they refused to. A jaw caked with dried blood. Hair matted with battlefield dirt and ash. Closed eyes. A neck severed with unnatural cleanliness.

It was a face known first by name throughout the empire.

The empire's blade. Master of the Lightless Sword. Shadow of the capital. The man nobles praised upon his return from the field, the name that made soldiers straighten their backs the moment he departed for it.

He now lay upon the plaza without a body.

The screams came late. People grow quiet for a moment when they see something too large. The eyes see, the mind rejects, the eyes confirm what the mind rejected—and only then does the throat tear open.

Magkin did not even glance at the stunned humans. He undid the metal plate bound around his neck and dropped it beside Bec's head. The plate rolled once across the bloodstained flagstone and came to rest.

A short message was engraved upon it.

Lakia knew those words. She had chosen them herself. Cold, hard, blatant threats. Yet she had not believed softer language could stop the empire better than Bec's neck.

So she had sent them. Together with the head. Together with the proof. Together with the last chance.

Lakia waited.

She waited for the empire to stop. For the palace flags to lower. For someone to produce a document of surrender. For a decision to be made before more soldiers died. She wanted to believe they would do at least that much.

What had fallen in the middle of the plaza was not merely a single head. It was the tip of the sharpest sword the empire had ever forged from human flesh. That sword had touched a dragon, touched it and failed to cut, and proved its failure with its own neck.

Bec had tried to end the war even as he died. That if he could not reach it, neither could the imperial army. That upon seeing his defeat the rest should turn back.

But the palace did not collapse. It did not weep. It did not stop.

It moved swiftly—like someone who sees a bloodstained floor and first reaches for a rag.

The plaza was sealed. Citizens were shoved back. The metal plate was recovered. Witnesses were separated. Bec's head was placed upon a silver platter covered with black cloth. They carried it into the palace.

Lakia borrowed Alduin's eyes. Distant windows drew near. She saw the helmets of guards racing through corridors, the long table of the conference chamber, the red pins stuck into the map.

There the black cloth was lifted. Bec Chereson's closed eyes met the air of the conference room.

The emperor gazed long at that head. It was a worn face—not one that had long observed human lives, but one upon which time spent measuring human lives as numbers had accumulated. He took in the dried blood, the dirt, the clean cut surface.

Then he spoke for the first time.

"How many saw it in the plaza."

Lakia read the shape of his lips. For a moment she did not understand. His first words were not about Bec. Not about death. Not about dragons. About numbers.

The chancellor answered with a bloodless face.

"We are confirming the exact count, but it exceeds several hundred."

"Narrow the range."

"Yes."

"Stop the rumors before they spread."

"Yes, Your Majesty."

"Isolate the witnesses."

Before Bec's head, the first thing the empire reached for was not grief but control.

The emperor asked again.

"Is it truly him."

A mage stepped forward. With a trembling hand he touched the air before Bec's forehead. Blue light swept across eyelids, jawline, hair. Everyone in the chamber watched those fingertips.

At last the mage spoke.

"It is him."

The air grew heavy.

"The residual mana matches that of his living self."

The minister of military affairs slammed the table.

"Impossible."

The word was closer to prayer than judgment.

"I cannot accept a report that Bec Chereson was defeated by a dragon."

The chancellor said quietly,

"The head is here."

"There is no process."

The minister's fingers tapped the map.

"It could have been a surprise attack."

Lakia slowly blinked.

Surprise attack.

Bec had come alone. He had walked from the front. He had asked to face the strongest dragon. He had neither fled nor hidden. He had asked that his defeat be delivered to the empire.

Yet the first word the empire spoke was "surprise attack." They were not looking at reality; they were carving reality into a shape they could endure.

The emperor lifted the metal plate. His gaze traveled along the sentences. His pupils paused briefly on the final line. Then he asked as if nothing were amiss.

"How many dragons were there."

The chancellor answered,

"It is not specified."

The minister of military affairs cut in.

"Northern reports state there were multiple individuals."

"The main force of the actual engagement."

"Estimated as one black dragon."

The emperor repeated softly,

"One."

The air in the chamber changed. Fear did not vanish, but calculation rose atop the fear.

If only one. If only one, a path still remained. Raise a barrier to cover the sky, draw every mana stone in the capital, mount ballistae on the palace roofs, place mana cannons at the four corners of the plaza, gather the legions.

If only one.

The empire began to breathe again—before Bec's head.

An elder slowly rose.

"Surrender is out of the question."

His voice trembled, yet his eyes shone strangely.

"They have thrown the enemy commander's head into the heart of the capital."

"It is a barbaric threat."

"If we withdraw here, the empire's prestige will never recover."

"We cannot allow Sir Bec's death to be in vain."

"We must issue a total mobilization order."

"Kill the dragon and the tables will turn."

"We need only catch that one black dragon."

Lakia forgot to breathe.

We cannot allow Bec's death to be in ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠vain.

That sentence was the most terrible of all.

What Bec had wanted was not more death. Because he could not reach it, neither could the empire—he had offered even his neck to deliver that truth. Yet these people were using his death as kindling for another war. They did not listen to the will of the dead. They tore out only his name and pasted it upon their own sentences.

From one side of the chamber a cautious voice emerged.

"It may be faster to target that woman rather than the dragon."

Lakia's eyes stopped.

"The woman in the black robe."

"If there is a controller of the dragons, we must eliminate the controller."

"There is also the method of using Haireden prisoners as bait."

"If we gather the kingdom natives currently in the capital and stand them upon the walls, that ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠woman may hesitate."

"Children and the elderly could prove effective."

Lakia's fingers dug into Alduin's scales.

Prisoners. Children. Elderly. Upon the walls. Bait. Shields.

Those words drove themselves one by one into her core.

The empire was still calculating. Where to stand living people for maximum utility. How to stop fleeing people most efficiently. How to forge fear into a tool.

Only then did Lakia understand.

Bec had been an exception. An exception that had made her believe people still existed inside the empire. A man who had thrown his own life to sever the war. A general who had sought to save the remaining soldiers with his own defeat.

The empire he had tried to protect was designing a greater execution ground before his head.

Something cold spread from deep within Lakia's chest. Too quiet to call anger. Too sharp to call sorrow. Too deep to call disappointment.

The name of that emotion was disgust.

The emperor raised his hand. The chamber fell silent. His lips moved.

"There will be no surrender."

Lakia read the words with perfect clarity.

There will be no surrender.

The emperor continued.

"I proclaim a capital defense order."

The minister of military affairs bowed his head.

"I shall gather the entire army to the capital."

"Confiscate every mana stone."

"Yes."

"Clear the outer districts."

The chancellor lifted his eyes.

"There are many residents in the outer areas."

The emperor did not hesitate even for a breath.

"Use them as the defense line."

Lakia's world stopped for an instant.

Defense line.

Words spoken of people. Words spoken of his own subjects.

Stand them outside the city and the path is blocked. If they flee, chaos is sown. If they die, time is bought. If they live, they become shields. That is a defense line.

The emperor said it as casually as moving wooden boxes. As casually as stacking dry kindling.

Lakia parted her lips. No sound emerged.

Alduin trembled low in his body.

Krrr.

The rumble was a question. It was waiting.

Lakia looked down.

White stone paths. Ranked flags. Citizens shoved back from the plaza. Bec's head, covered in black cloth, carried into the conference chamber. The emperor who had declared there would be no surrender. The people who would be used as a defense line. Ministers placing hands upon the map. And above it all the imperial eagle still fluttering with arrogant pride.

The capital no longer looked like a city. It looked like a giant weapon—a machine that burned people as fuel, turned its gears with people's blood, and vented people's screams as exhaust.

Rather… ah.

Lakia smiled, very small, at the fact that she had thought such a thought. The smile vanished at once.

"I'm having thoughts like that too."

Her voice was smaller than the wind.

"I hate it."

Alduin did not answer. He waited for her next words.

Lakia waited as well.

One last time.

Hoping that someone inside the chamber might stand. Might shout, Are you mad? Might demand whether they intended to continue even with Bec Chereson's head lying there. Might ask whether calling people a defense line was something a human being should say. Let's stop. Let's surrender. Let's save those who can still be saved.

Someone. Even one person.

But the people who rose did not speak of surrender. They placed hands upon the map. They pointed to barrier positions. They chose sites for mana cannons. They marked the zones into which the outer residents would be driven.

The empire's center was still alive. And while alive it intended to kill still more people.

The light in Lakia's red eyes slowly cooled. She stroked the nape of Alduin's neck. Hot heat stirred beneath the black scales. Alduin held his breath.

Lakia opened her mouth.

"…Al."

The name was low. Soft. And therefore more terrifying.

Alduin's golden eyes narrowed.

Krr.

Lakia looked at the empire. Looked at the palace. Looked at the conference chamber. Looked at the people who still struggled not to surrender even before Bec's head. Looked at the people who would be discarded under the name of defense line.

She closed her eyes.

Kanefisara's voice rose in her memory.

The world does not ask your permission before becoming cruel, Lakia.

Then I shall become cruel first. That way I lose nothing.

Lakia whispered.

"…Burn it all."