Konrad Curze the Night Haunter by Guy Haley

Author:Guy Haley
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
ISBN: 9781789994452
Published: 2019-05-14T15:23:07+00:00

TEN

CARRION WORLD

‘Men like Gendor Skraivok were the first hints of the wickedness that would befall my Legion,’ said Curze to his corpse statue. ‘Selfish, interested only in power. There were many like him. In my impatience to see your vision fulfilled, I marginalised them rather than purging them, relying on the most faithful, men like Sevatar. Sevatar understood, he saw the need for fear to bring order to the galaxy. My other captains were allowed to wage war as they liked so long as they achieved my objectives. I did not pay their misdeeds enough attention. By the time I noticed the rot, it had run its roots deep into the heart of many companies.’ His face wrinkled in disdain. ‘I was better alone. You made me a general, yet did not give me the capacity to act like one. So many errors, father.’

He flipped through his book, smiling at certain passages, scowling at others. ‘Such a thing it is, to write a book. I am tempted now to scratch whole sections out and begin them again, but then, that would result in a different book. What has been set down must be preserved. It can only be changed so much, until it is a new thing altogether, and the truth of its original nature lost.’ He closed the book and stalked around the chamber, passing around the back of his mock-father, stepping over the savaged body of the unfortunate slave. He straightened, adopting the air of a man dictating a letter, or a scholam master lecturing his students. ‘I was never true to myself, always trying to do what you expected of me, for little thanks. When I came here again, to this place, I realised that I had to stop trying. I had to embrace my fate. I am a monster, father, and should be punished for it. That is what I am, and that is where my destiny leads.’ He smiled sadly. ‘Why fight it?’

Flashes of things yet to be forced themselves into Elver’s nightmares.

Giants clad in armour the colour of midnight storms crowded him, each so huge he felt small as a rat. Dust raced through a chill atmosphere, stinging his skin, scratching his eyes.

Konrad Curze looked at him for one last time, and Elver saw he did not care at all what happened to him.

Dozens of pairs of slanted ruby eyes shone their malevolence upon Elver.

‘My lord!’ he cried.

An armoured hand reached for him.

Gentle trilling woke Elver from his troubled sleep, not that he experienced any other kind. He rolled over, his single eye bleary, the numbers on the chronograph swimming in his vision.

In primitive digital sticks of green, the chronograph displayed the time and the subjective date. Neither of these measures were as important as the third set of data, a countdown ticking towards zero.

He stared at it, not believing that after so long it was nearing the end.

‘It’s time,’ he said.

He rubbed his left hand over his face. It’d taken him a long time to get used to doing that with his left rather than his right.

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