Lilith woke suddenly to the sounds of horns and the deafening flapping of countless wings and banners mingled with shouted orders. She reached the window just in time to see Sargatanas and his lords pass beneath at the head of a large contingent of Foot Guard. They continued down the Rule and then took a turn marching out of sight toward, she guessed, the Fifth Gate. She looked up and saw the gathering formations of flying demons begin to stream in the same direction, following their lord's command like migratory Abyssals answering the imperative of instinct. She watched this gathering of forces for some time, until something made her peer out farther into the darkness beyond the walls. There she could just discern a gathering clot of infinitely tiny figures that she knew must be another army, and she realized that this must be the Soul-General Hannibal's army. Seeing them forming up, she was suddenly overcome with emotion; she realized that this was the army she had always en-visioned, the army she had begun with her little statues, the army for which Ardat Lili had been flayed. But notwithstanding that bitter memory, Lilith recognized that she, with Sargatanas, had given the souls something they could never have had in Hell otherwise, something she valued beyond almost everything—a semblance of free will. It was the beginning of their Infernal emancipation, and no matter whether they won or lost their battles, they were now more than they could ever have been without her efforts.
THE WASTES
The march lasted two full days, during which Hannibal had watched his army carefully, measuring their spirits as they trekked through the umbral landscape. Yen Wang and his Behemoths had been left behind; Sargatanas deemed them too precious to use in this encounter. Well into the second day, winged scouts brought word that a suitable location for their camp had been found, the shallow valley between two long ridges that smoldered with perpetual flames known as the Flaming Cut. When Sargatanas and his staff arrived at the scouts' favored location the demon lord appeared satisfied that the lay of the surrounding terrain favored him.
In his Life Hannibal had seen many eves of battle but only one eve of war. That war had lasted sixteen long years. Here, in Hell, it was no different; this eve of war was as pregnant with possibility, both fearful and glorious, as that one had been in his Life. He knew that conflicts had raged for eons, since Hell had been colonized, tearing away at the uneasy borders of every established feudal kingdom. But while those borders had constantly shifted no demon had ever gained anything that might threaten the hegemony; war, true war that feeds hungrily upon entire kingdoms, had not been permitted. But, Hannibal reflected, all that was about to change.
'Mago,' he said, approaching his brother, who was seated, quietly sharpening his blade. 'Gather the generals. There is something I must tell them.'
Mago hesitated but, seeing that Hannibal would not offer any explanation, set about his task. The Soul-General waited, impatiently. Sargatanas' plan came at a price, and Hannibal was almost as reluctant to relay its details as he was to disobey his new lord.
One by one the souls appeared and stood before Hannibal, anxiously awaiting word of what their roles would be in the coming battle. When he was satisfied that all were present, Hannibal cleared his dry throat.
'Generals, I will be brief. What I am about to ask of you on behalf of Lord Sargatanas will shock you and truly put to the test our mettle as leaders. Our role ... that of the souls ... will be essential to the outcome of this battle, but it will be seen by our soldiers as nothing short of treachery on the part of our demon allies. I ask you to listen and then go back to your officers and units and make them understand the gravity of the situation. I ask you to trust me as I trust Sargatanas. I believe in him and this plan for battle.'
Hannibal looked as his handpicked generals and remembered other reluctant generals and other difficult times and knew then that he could be convincing, that he could lay out his lord's plan effectively. It was Hannibal's talent to be able to persuade those around him to die for him.
Chapter Twenty-Two
DIS
The two hundred Knights stood around him drenched in the steaming blood of sinners. Behind them, hung by their heels on sturdy racks, gagged and flailing, were hundreds of skinned souls, unwilling participants in a pre-battle tradition that went back to Dis' distant origins. Fresh skin cloaks hung about the warriors' shoulders still rippling and twitching, parted from the souls only moments earlier. A number of orbs lay in a cluster to one side awaiting dissolution. Dripping in glistening rivulets from scarlet-hued breastplates, cloaks, and weapons alike, red-black blood pooled slowly at their heavily shod feet, leaving the assembled Knights deeply stained. Adramalik, leaning on a long, barbed pike, noted with pride the perfectly aligned star-shaped pattern of their parade formation, the precise angles of unsheathed swords, and the fierce, toothy grins that each of his proteges bore. It had been a long period of relative inactivity for them, a period filled with restless activity, of controlled violence and uncontrolled perversion. But even knowing this, it was apparent to the Chancellor General, reviewing them in tight-lipped silence, that their loyalty and discipline were total, that they had not lost anything of their edge.
A soul was brought forth, dragged by two large Knights-in-training to the center of the formation before Adramalik. Selected for the unusual barbarity of his life, he was a large individual, in Hell a chief mason perhaps, with oversized hands and a sloping, furrowed head. He was trussed in deep-cutting, crisscrossing ceremonial cords of gold, and from each intersection depended an amulet, an inscribed, fly-shaped talisman that the Knighthood had been awarded for every hard-fought victory. As they dragged the soul the golden flies jingled against the wires, an odd, light sound that was disharmonious with the muffled, throaty moaning that issued from his gagged mouth.
Adramalik lowered the barbed shaft until it was chest high, pointing it at the kneeling soul. Seeing this, the Knights began, in low whispers, to intone their credo, a series of short obeisances first to Lucifer the Lost and then to Beelzebub. Each Knight in turn stepped forward and with his drawn sword, and with only one thrust, pierced the soul in a different space between the golden cords. The chanting grew louder with each recapitulation, and when it was nearly shouted the Knights-in-training grasped the soul under his arms, raising him above their heads and then dropping him with gurgling screams upon the upraised pike. There, vertically impaled, he slumped, and all eyes watched what was left of his blood flow down the pike's shaft until it reached Adramalik's hands.
Silence descended like a hammer.
Capping the pike with Beelzebub's crest—a great, golden fly—Adramalik raised the newly created standard high overhead, and the Knights responded by breaking formation, each moving to his steed at the head of a full mounted battalion that stretched out and down the broad, torch-lit Avenue of War. Barracks along its length were still emptying their legions onto the avenue behind the cavalry. Fiery unit sigils stood out in the haze of ash, dwindling as they progressed down the avenue to pinpoints of light in the far distance, lights that reminded the Chancellor General of the specks upon an Abyssal serpent's back.
A sound of cries and crunching caused him to turn in time to see Moloch looming huge upon his soul-steed, trampling a few luckless demon foot soldiers underfoot as he took the forward position. His wheeling mount was an immense Melding—a many-legged, headless steed fashioned of souls com-pressed into a form from which sprouted a dozen weapon-wielding arms. With a snarl and an annoyed flick of one of his Hooks, Moloch set the army in motion. It was a small gesture, Adramalik noted, but a gesture heavy with significance. War was at hand, a war that Adramalik was certain would have but a single outcome. And when it was over, tired as he was of the ceaseless politics, he thought that he might take up residence far from Dis, perhaps somewhere in the newly conquered territory where he could indulge himself away from the ever-watchful eyes of Beelzebub's court. It was a fantasy that caught Adramalik off guard, one that he had never considered before but which brought him some
