The House of Sacrifice. Anna Smith Spark

said. The red dragon almost spoke it. The words there in the stink of its breath. I want to die: kill me, he almost said.

      Or kill the soldiers. My soldiers. Come down in fire, burn my army to dust. We spread out across the world in blood and fire, we have destroyed half the world but the world is endless, the road goes on and always there is another conquest waiting on the horizon. All I need to do now is speak one word to make it stop.

      Dragons are not gods, he thought then. Not wonders. There was nothing in the world that they could give him. Huge things, huge as dreams; he stood between them tiny and vulnerable. He could crush them.

      ‘Kel temen ysare genherhr kel Ansikanderakil?’ the red dragon asked again.

      ‘Ekliket ysarken temeset emnek tythet. Ekliket ysarken temeset amrakyr tythet. Ekliket ysarken temeset kykgethet,’ Marith said in reply.

      What is it that you want, my king?

      I want you to bring death. I want you to bring fire. I want you to kill.

      Always the same words. The same commands given. Kill! Kill! Kill! On and on forever. On and on until the world ends. So close to asking. But I don’t ask. Why do we waste our breath saying it?

      If my army was destroyed, he thought, I would cease to be king. What would I be, if I were not a king?

      ‘You are tools,’ Marith shouted at the dragons. ‘Nothing more. Things I send out to kill.’

      The dragons nodded their heads in obedience. The green dragon might smile, even. Scars on it deep in its body, wounded, its body moved with the awkwardness of something in pain. The red dragon thrashed its tail. Hating him. Tired. Old. Just wanting to sleep.

      The green dragon said, as it always did, ‘Amrakane neke yenkanen ka sekeken.’ Amrath also did not know why. ‘Serelamyrnen teime immikyr. Ayn kel genher kel serelanei temen?’ We are your tools. And what are you?

      They leapt into the air together. Red and black, green and silver, so huge he was left blinded. The snow where they had crouched was melted. He watched them spiralling up and outwards. Off to the south, towards the Forest of Calchas, the Sea of Tears, the Forest of Khotan. Tiny jets of flame on the horizon. Or perhaps he was imagining them. But when he closed his eyes he saw it burning. The trees burning. The sea rising up in steam.

      Go back four years. Marith sits in his new-built fortress of Ethalden, new-crowned King of the White Isles and Ith and the Wastes and Illyr. He has taken his father’s kingdom. Yes, well, any number of sons have done that. He has taken the neighbouring kingdom. That’s not exactly novel behaviour from a new ambitious young king with his people to impress. He has taken the kingdom of his holy ancestors, he is a king returned in glory, he has restored a blighted land to greatness, he has been revenged on the evil-doers who ill-treated him. That’s absolutely right and proper. Expected by everyone. And then …

      ‘Gods, this is glorious,’ Osen Fiolt says one night in the new-built fortress of Ethalden, as they sit together in a feasting hall with walls and floor and ceiling of solid gold. ‘Goodbye sleeping in a stinking tent in the pissing rain. Hello sitting by the fire with our feet up. We’re richer than gods and worshipped like gods and we’ve still got our whole lives ahead of us to do absolutely nothing but enjoy ourselves in.

      ‘Look at my hands,’ Osen says, stretching out his right hand. ‘Look, the calluses are finally going down. I might grow a beard, you know? Befitting my noble status as First Lord of Illyr. Or get my wife pregnant. You’re going to have a child, Marith, you should maybe grow a beard as well. Dress like a respectable family man, stop wearing all black. Kings wear long robes, have well-combed beards, feast and wench rather than drink and mope. Those pretentious boys quoting godsawful poetry and weeping over life’s burden … and now we’ve got wives and children and kingdoms to rule. Gods, who’d have thought?

      ‘I will do nothing,’ Osen says, ‘but sit by the fire and drink the finest wines and eat the choicest meats and fuck my wife and my servants. Raise a horde of spoilt brat children. Never pick up a sword again.’

      ‘It feels strange walking,’ Marith says, ‘without a sword at my hip. Unbalanced.’

      ‘Lighter,’ Osen says. ‘Much lighter. The joys of not wearing armour! A real spring in my step.’

      ‘That too.’

      They both go to bed early, dozy with warmth. It’s very restful, doing nothing. It’s amazing how tiring paperwork and bureaucracy and helping your wife choose baby things can be. He goes to bed early, wakes late in a warm room in a bed of gold and ivory and red velvet, soft as thistledown after campaign beds. His bedchamber looks very much like the one he slept in at Malth Salene. He is not sure whether Thalia realizes this. Unlike at Malth Salene, the morning sun shines in on his face. He tries to put this thing he feels into words; even to himself he cannot say what it is.

      Two days later he is reviewing the Army of Amrath. Dismissing most of it. Illyr is taken. The Wastes are taken. Ith is taken. The White Isles were and are his own. He is king. War is done. All is at peace.

      ‘You have to disband some of them,’ Lord Nymen the Fishmonger says to him. ‘They are driving the people of Ethalden mad with their brawling, the women fear to walk the streets after dark because of them, innkeeps and merchants shut up shop at a soldier’s approach. As they say: a friendly army without a purpose is more dangerous than an enemy army at the gates. Also, more seriously, My Lord King – do you know how much this army costs?’

      ‘I have the wealth of three kingdoms at my feet.’

      There is a short pause. ‘You had the wealth of three kingdoms at your feet, My Lord King,’ Aris Nymen says.

      A thousand times a thousand soldiers. And horses. And armour. And equipment. And engineers and doctors and weaponsmiths and farriers and grooms and camp servants and carters and …

      ‘Yes, yes, I suppose. I see. Yes.’

      ‘The cost of Queen Thalia’s temple, My Lord King … It being made of solid gold … Amrath’s tomb … The work on the harbour is proving more expensive than we thought …’

      ‘Hang the man who thought up the original cost then. No. No. I’m joking. You’re right.’ I am King of Illyr and Ith and the Wastes and the White Isles. I am invincible, invulnerable, soon I will have a strong son to follow me. What am I afraid of, that I need an army of a thousand times a thousand men? He rubs his eyes. For the first time since he took Illyr, he does not sleep well. He stands in the great courtyard in Ethalden, raised up before his army on a dais of sweetwood hung with silver cloth. They cheer him. They hold out their hands to him. Their faces shine with love.

      ‘Amrath! Amrath! Amrath! King Marith!’

      He smiles, basking in it. They shine so brightly, his soldiers, so strong, so proud. He begins to speak.

      Stirring. Faces grow pale. Eyes stare up at him in astonishment.

      The war is over. They have won eternal glory, until the drowning of the world the poets will sing of them. They can go home now in triumph to their friends and families, tell them of their prowess, show them the riches they have won. If they do not want to go home they can have land in Illyr, slaves to work it, a life of leisure, farming: the soil in Illyr now is rich and good. That is what all men want, isn’t it? A house, a garden in which children are playing, fruit trees, clear sweet water, fresh meat, fresh bread. Long days of peace stretch before them. They are heroes from the poems, every one of them. They will look back on what they have done with pride all their lives.

      Muttering. Whispering. He can see tears on some of their faces, at the thought of this time ending. Feels tears himself, to dismiss them. They who have made him all he is. He hears his voice unwinding out of his mouth.

      Their voices come back mournful as seabirds: ‘But … But … My Lord King …’ ‘You can’t … you cannot abandon us, Lord King …’ ‘We fought for you. We shed our own blood for you. You can’t abandon us. Please, Lord King, do not abandon us