Phantom: Chainfire Trilogy Part 2

"In the end, the only people of Galea left alive were the boys and the women who didn't die during the brutal rapes and then as whores for the soldiers. In the end, the older boys were participating in the rapes as part of their initiation and as rewards for their enthusiasm during their assignments, including the executions.

"Many of the women, of course, managed to kill themselves. Every morning, on the cobblestone streets at the foot of the taller buildings, were found the broken bodies of women who, seeing no future but degrading abuse, had managed to throw themselves out of windows or off roofs. I don't know how many times I would happen on a woman off in some dark corner, her wrists slashed by her own hand, her lifeblood having drained away along with any hope. I couldn't say that I blamed them for their choice."

Richard stood with his hands clasped behind his back, staring into the still waters of the fountain, as Jebra went on in endless detail of the events following the great victory by the brave men of the Imperial Order. The senselessness of it was almost too monumental to comprehend, much less endure.

The slashes of sunlight coming in through the skylights above slowly crept across the marble bench around the pool, across the expanse of floor, up and across the granite steps. The bloodred stone of the columns glowed as the sunlight ceaselessly, incrementally, advanced up their length while Jebra chronicled everything she knew of what had happened while she had been a captive of the Order.

Shota stood unmoving nearly the entire time, usually with her arms folded, her fair features fixed in a vaguely grim cast, watching Jebra tell her story, or watching Richard listen to it, as if making sure that his attention didn't wander.

"Galea had reserves of food aplenty for their citizens," Jebra said, "but not for anything like the numbers of invaders now occupying the city, who themselves did not have plentiful supplies with them. The troops stripped every storehouse of food. They emptied every larder, every warehouse. Every animal for miles around, including the great many sheep that were raised for wool and the milk cows, were butchered for food. Rather than keep the chickens for a steady supply of eggs, they, too, were killed and eaten.

"As the food ran low the officers sent off messengers with ever more urgent requests for resupply. For months the supplies did not come — no doubt in good part because winter had set in and slowed them."

Jebra hesitated, and then swallowed, before going on. "I remember the day — it was during a heavy snowstorm — when we were ordered to cook some fresh meat the Imperial Order soldiers delivered to the kitchens. It was freshly killed, headless, gutted human carcasses."

Richard abruptly turned to stare at Jebra. She gazed up at him as if from a place of insanity, as if in fear that she would be condemned for what she knew was beyond the pale. Her blue eyes brimmed with tears of supplication for forgiveness, as if she feared he would strike her dead for what she was about to confess.

"Have you ever had to butcher a human body for cooking? We had to. We roasted the meat, or stripped it from the bones to make stews. We dried rack upon rack upon rack of the meat for the regular soldiers. If the soldiers were hungry and there was nothing to feed them, bodies would be delivered to the kitchens. We went to extraordinary lengths to stretch what supplies of food we had. We made soups and stews with weeds, if we could find them beneath the snow. But there was just not enough food to feed all the men.

"I witnessed many things that will give me nightmares the rest of my life. Seeing those remorseless soldiers standing in the open doorway, the snow blowing in behind them, as they dumped those bodies on the floor of the kitchen will be one of the things that forever haunts me."

Richard nodded and whispered, "I understand."

"And then, early this past spring, the supply wagons finally began arriving. They brought great quantities of foodstuffs for the soldiers. I knew, despite the seemingly endless wagons full of supplies, that it would not last a long time.

"Beside the supplies, there were also reinforcements to replace the men who had been killed in the battle to crush Galea. The numbers of Order troops occupying Ebinissia were already overwhelming; the extra soldiers seemed to add to my numb sense of hopelessness.

"I overheard newly arrived officers reporting that more supplies would be coming, along with yet more men. As they streamed in from the south, many were sent on missions to secure other areas of the Midlands. There were other cities to be taken, other places to be captured, other pockets of resistance to be crushed, other people to be enslaved.