Straits of Hell by Taylor Anderson Page A

as that. “And the creatures that slew the Celestial Mother
are
our enemy; mortal to our very race!” Esshk paused and gazed at Ign’s warriors. “And as for my ‘army that cannot fight,’ few of its members were at the CelestialCity—and only those that were there allowed the fight to continue long enough for the bloodline to escape!”
    â€œThe Celestial City is the greatest, best defended city in all the Empire,” Ragak scoffed. “Any fool should have had no difficulty holding it, and protecting the bloodline there!”
    Esshk looked strangely at Ragak. “
Any
fool?” he asked mildly.
    â€œOf course! And retaking it as well—with fewer warriors than lost it, I am sure, against the contemptible prey animals that infest it now!”
    â€œCould
you
retake the Celestial City?” Esshk pressed, his tone thick with sarcastic admiration, and Ragak suddenly caught himself as thousands of slit-pupiled eyes turned to him. “I was not formed as a general,” he demurred, suddenly cautious.
    â€œBut I was, and clearly failed to a treasonous degree in your vastly more sagacious estimation. You said ‘any fool,’ and you are not a fool—so a Hij who is not a fool should find the task almost effortless . . . should he not?”
    Only then, glancing down at the sea of faces, both Hij and Uul, did Ragak realize he was caught. He’d known Esshk since they were hatchlings and had long envied his influence at court, but having known him so well—he thought—and technically outranking him as a regent, he’d never fully credited how cunning Esshk had become, or the accounts of his greatest strategies: goading his prey into lunging to its own destruction.
    Esshk looked back at the crowd that Ragak had been so foolish to invite to this confrontation. Its presence probably made no difference, but it did make things simpler. “I have been named Champion of the Empire by the Celestial Mother Becoming,” he stated. “As such, I now commission Regent Consort Ragak, as general.” He looked back at Ragak. “You will take your army, untainted by the ‘unnatural’ trainings I have devised, and liberate the Celestial City at once!” He cocked his head. “Should you succeed, I will happily relinquish my duties as First General and Regent Champion to you, and destroy myself however you see fit.” His crest rose. “If, however, you should fail, I will not punish your courage. You will remain a general under my command, and all your armies shall belong to me.”
    He turned back to the crowd. “In the meantime, while General Ragak prosecutes his mission, we will continue the utter and completemobilization I deem required to defeat our existential foe. I will lend General Ragak what support I may, from the air at least, and release what transports he requires to move his army. But the rest of us will build the greatest swarm that ever was, and finish this threat forever!” He paused and bowed to Ragak. “Unless our newest general does it for us.”
    Ign bowed to Esshk in admiration, as underofficers shouted his warriors back into ranks—which further exemplified the differences between them and Ragak’s warriors, who had begun drifting away as a mob. Ragak himself had quickly vanished.
    â€œHow much will you give him?” asked General Ign with a hint of concern. “Our greatest shortage at present is in transports, as you know. Can we spare any for Ragak?”
    â€œWe shall give him what I said,” Esshk replied grandly. “He will have as many of the old transports as he needs—to carry himself and his army of mindless Uul to their doom.” He was a complete convert to Kurokawa’s principles, which had created the new army, and he had little desire to employ simple massed mobs of warriors again. He’d tried that before. Suddenly, he actually caught