Page 16 of The Infernal Battalion

And he saved my life. It had taken her some time to realize that. Bobby had flown her away from Elysium and the Beast, but she’d been left alone in the mountains, no food or water, one arm broken. The Ghost had found her and led her back here. At the time, she’d been too wrapped in grief to do more than put one foot in front of the other, but her stint in the potato fields had cleared her head. If he hadn’t found me, I’d have frozen or starved. She wasn’t entirely sure whether she was grateful.

“Thank you for coming,” the Eldest said. “Antov, tea for Winter, please.”

A young boy, sitting so still near the entrance that Winter had barely noticed him, sprang to life and scurried away. Winter took her place on the cushion equidistant from the two men. The Ghost inclined his masked head, firelight gleaming off brushed steel.

“You’re back,” Winter said. The Ghost had left again as soon as she’d been safely delivered to the Mountain. “Did you find anything?”

“A great deal,” the Ghost said, in his Khandarai-​accented Vordanai. “None of it good.”

“Elysium?” the Eldest said.

“Nearly abandoned. The Beast is on the move.”

Winter shuddered. She and her friends had broken into the stronghold of the Church, expecting to face the Priests of the Black, only to find that their thirteen-​hundred-​year watch had finally ended. The Beast, brought into the body of Winter’s old lover Jane, had slipped its bonds. It spread from mind to mind, converting all of Elysium into its thralls.

“Where?” Winter said. Her throat was dry, and when Antov returned she gladly accepted the steaming mug of tea.

“Hard to say. It does not keep its bodies together. As we feared, it has learned. It will not allow itself to be wiped out again.”

The Eldest gave a little sigh. Not much of a reaction, Winter thought, to the news that the world is doomed.

“There’s more,” the Ghost went on. “Janus bet Vhalnich has crowned himself Emperor of Vordan and Murnsk and declared the queen deposed.”

“What?” Winter said, her numb detachment suddenly broken. There was a crash, and it took her a moment to realize she’d jumped to her feet, her forgotten mug of tea now smashed in a puddle on the rock.

The Eldest sipped from his own tea. “Another mug, I think, Antov. With perhaps a dash of something stronger.”

“You can’t be serious,” Winter said to the Ghost.

“I have not seen Vhalnich myself, but the news is everywhere. If it is a lie, it is an exceedingly widespread and consistent one.”

“But...” Winter paused, trying to get her racing heart under control. Emperor? She sat down, legs crossed underneath her. Her mind felt rusty from disuse. “That doesn’t make any sense. If Janus wanted the throne of Vordan, he could have taken it after Maurisk’s coup. I’m certain that Elysium was his real objective.” She shook her head. “And anyway, how can he be Emperor of Murnsk? They’ve already got one.”

“There are rumors that he is dead,” the Ghost said. “Others say he has fled to the east. Either way, Vhalnich has the support of Cesha Dzurk, who claims to be heir to the Murnskai throne.”

“It’s still insane,” Winter said. “The people of Murnsk will never accept a foreigner on the throne—I know that better than anyone.” That was a scene from one of her recurring nightmares, the desperate Murnskai peasants-​turned-​partisans hurling themselves onto the bayonets of the Girls’ Own, slaughtering their own children to keep them out of the hands of the invaders. “Janus isn’t that stupid.”

“It does seem out of character,” the Eldest said mildly. “Though I have never met the man.”

Antov returned with another mug. Winter drank deep, and tasted the faint bite of liquor under the astringent tea.

“I agree,” the Ghost said. “The explanation seems obvious.”

“You think he’s been taken,” the Eldest said.

The Ghost nodded.

“Taken?” For a moment Winter’s brain refused to process that. “Taken by the Beast?”

“The Beast is not a mindless plague,” the Ghost said. “It is intelligent, and it has had thirteen hundred years to learn the ways of men. Its knowledge grows with each mind it conquers. It must know that having Janus as a figurehead will help it immeasurably.”

“Why would it need him?” Winter said. “I thought it was just converting everyone in its path.”

“We believe its power is not sufficient for that,” the Eldest said. “Not yet. We have studies from Karis’ time, and extrapolations based on other demons. Our guess is that there is an upper limit on the number of individuals the Beast can convert in a day, probably fewer than a thousand to begin with. It also cannot spread itself an unlimited distance, though it can certainly cover hundreds of miles.”

“Which is fortunate,” the Ghost said. “If the Beast could truly double in size every day, the world would be submerged by now.”

“But the more it grows, the more power it gains. And the more power it gains, the faster it can grow.” The Eldest shook his head. “We do not have much time.”