The Severed City

by Christopher Mitchell

  ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘This may be the first time some of you have seen them. Try not to be too scared of their appearance, they’re about as stupid as dogs. If you keep under tree cover, they’ll find it hard to spot you.’

  ‘Are you doing this for your own glory?’ Kylon asked.

  ‘Not at all,’ he said. ‘It is a risk, I grant you, but one must seize even the tiniest opportunity. If we’re successful, we’ll have won a great advance for the alliance. But don’t worry Kylon,’ he went on, ‘you and blondie will be coming with me into the tunnel. You did a good job watching my back yesterday, you can do the same today.’

  Without another word, Benel began jogging down the slope to the track, and the squad followed.

  ‘He’s crazy,’ Niall muttered as they clambered down the hillside.

  ‘He must have some sort of a plan,’ Kylon said.

  ‘I think he’s just making it up as he goes along,’ the corporal said.

  They reached the track, now shrouded in shadow, and trotted along the ledge, until they saw the top of the fort, a high tower rising above the tiered stacks of walls and battlements.

  Benel halted, crouching by the cliffside to their left.

  ‘Niall,’ he said, ‘here’s where we leave you. Carry on past the fort, there is a path that leads down the other side, through some woods. About halfway down, there is a terrace, where gaien and other livestock are held. It’s the best place for a distraction. Make it loud, make them notice you, and then flee when you’re sure you have their full attention.’

  Niall nodded, his face resigned.

  ‘Creator’s blessings on you corporal,’ Benel said.

  Leah nodded to Keira and Kylon, and the squad moved on down the track.

  Keira watched them until they disappeared into the shadows.

  Benel nodded, and turned off the track, scrambling down the uneven slope, the two Kellach following. They came to a path, and ran down it until the walls of the fort came into view. The stronghold was built on several levels, jutting out from the side of the cliff-face, and there was a sentry tower overlooking the path ahead.

  ‘We’ll wait here,’ Benel said, keeping close to the rockface.

  He passed round his flask of rum, and they sipped while they crouched. The temperature plunged as it got darker, and frost glittered their clothes.

  After an hour, Keira heard the sound of raised voices, and steel striking steel, coming from the other side of the fort. Benel got to his feet, and began sprinting down the path, without looking to see if the Kellach came after him.

  Keira sighed and stood, her legs stiff from the cold. They ran after Benel, right under the sentry post, keeping close to the cliff. They reached a turn, and saw Benel in the distance, still running down the path as it made a steep descent to the valley floor.

  They nearly crashed into Benel as they got to the bottom, the Holdings mage ducking as Keira skidded past him on the ice.

  ‘Did you get seen?’ he said.

  ‘Didn’t hear any alarms,’ Kylon said.

  Benel nodded. ‘We’re close. Look.’ He pointed up the valley, and Keira recognised the ramp that led to the tunnel entrance. She remembered Leon, whipping the gaien on as she had lain hidden in the wagon. Poor bastard.

  ‘There will be lizards guarding the entrance,’ she said.

  ‘Of course,’ Benel replied. ‘We shall just have to kill them.’

  He pulled out a little box from his belt, and opened it.

  ‘What the fuck is that?’ Keira said.

  ‘Keenweed,’ he replied, lighting the small, thin smokestick, keeping the lit end in the shadow of the rocks. ‘I suggest you have some too.’

  Keira took the weedstick, and inhaled. As before, she felt her senses expand, and her tiredness vanish, the false energy of the drugs making her feel like she could run all night.

  She passed it to Kylon, who finished it off.

  Benel stood, and they took off again, until the noise from Niall’s distraction faded into the distance behind them. It was dark, but the Holdings mage ran as if he could see as well as the Kellach. They reached the ramp, and saw the lamp-lit tunnel entrance ahead.

  Keira felt her legs power up the ramp as if she were fresh, and hadn’t been running and climbing since dawn. Then she remembered how Benel had passed out the day before, and knew there would be a price to pay.

  So swift and silent were they, that they were upon the Rahain guards at the tunnel entrance before any had a chance to raise their crossbows.

  Keira slashed out, and cut down two guards. She turned, and saw that Kylon and Benel had between them killed all of the others. Kylon stood with a spear and longsword, Benel with his two short swords, smiling at her.

  ‘Fucking show offs,’ she said.

  They entered the tunnel, under a huge arch lined with enormous stones, and smoothed by Rahain magery. It was wide enough for four wagons to fit side by side, and twice as high. To the left of the entrance were storage chambers and a gaien stabling yard.

  Benel hitched a wagon to a pair of gaien, and they loaded it up with tools, pickaxes, shovels, and long metal bars.

  Benel took the reins, and the two Kellach climbed up next to him as he urged the gaien into the tunnel. The lamps were lit for only a hundred yards, and then the tunnel ahead disappeared into darkness.

  Kylon jumped down, unhooked two lamps from the wall, and brought them back to the wagon.

  ‘There’s no one here,’ Keira said, as the wagon lurched down the tunnel.

  ‘Of course not,’ Benel said, ‘there’s no way in from the other side.’

  ‘Then how the fuck are we supposed to unblock the tunnel if they can’t?’

  ‘Have some faith, blondie,’ he said. ‘I’ve studied the detailed plans made for us by a renegade Rahain. There are several weak points as the tunnel reaches the Plateau valley. They’re impossible to detect from the outside, but if we can find one from in here, we may be able to do something.’

  For an hour, they made their way down the silent, dark tunnel, the only light coming from the small lamps hanging from the wagon’s sides. Mile marks had been painted onto the walls, counting down the distance to the Plateau. Five minutes after they had passed the last mile marker, openings began to appear in the sides of the tunnel.

  ‘There’s a little network behind the walls,’ Benel said. ‘Chambers, more tunnels, presumably for storage, and to link the tunnel to the fort on the other side.’

  Out of the gloom ahead emerged a great pile of rubble, towering up and filling the tunnel.

  Benel stopped the wagon.

  ‘The last quarter of a mile,’ he said. ‘Completely blocked. I wonder if it pained the mages, to have to collapse their tunnel so soon after finishing it.’

  ‘Don’t feel sorry for those fuckers,’ Keira said.

  Benel shrugged. ‘I feel there is a bond that connects all mages, even enemy ones. That reminds me, I have a confession to make.’

  He climbed down from the wagon, and stood, his arms by his sides.

  ‘I know who you are,’ he said. ‘I could see it in your eyes the first time I saw you. I looked within you, right into your mind, and I saw fire.’

  ‘What the fuck are you talking about?’

  ‘I should have reported you to the alliance authorities, as was my duty,’ Benel went on. ‘But I didn’t. I am no ordinary battle or line mage, just as you are no ordinary fire mage, Keira ae Caela ae Kell.’

  ‘At least you got my name right,’ she said. She jumped off the wagon, Kylon a pace beside her.

  Benel tensed. ‘You can attack me, or you can listen.’

  ‘Are you looking to make a deal?’ she asked.

  ‘Why else would I have brought you here? I have a plan, and it may require a mage of your talents. If we succeed, I will keep your identity a secret, and I’ll have you and any that survive from your squad attached to me personally, and I’ll protect you from any prying questions.’

  ‘And what do you
get out of it?’

  ‘Kylon was right,’ he said. ‘I’m only a man, and I hunger for the glory that victory will bring. And the money, and the power.’

  Keira glanced at Kylon, who was staring at Benel as if he wanted to rip his throat out with his teeth.

  ‘Well, we’re here now,’ Keira said. ‘May as well give it a go.’

  They unloaded the tools, and carried them through a twisting series of side tunnels, passing chambers and caverns cut into the rock on either side, lying abandoned and half-furnished. They reached a large square room, and halted.

  Benel laughed, a grin splitting his face.

  ‘There it is,’ he pointed at the far wall, ‘our way to glory.’

  A stout wooden door was embedded into the wall at the other end of the room. Keira walked up to it.

  ‘A fucking door,’ she said. ‘So what?’

  ‘It leads outside.’

  ‘What?’ she turned, her mouth open. ‘But how? Why can’t the army just open it from there?’

  ‘The Rahain mages will have covered it with a skin of rock, so that it appears invisible.’

  Benel approached the door, and ran his hand down its wooden beams.

  He turned the handle, but the door wouldn’t move.

  ‘They must have jammed it closed,’ he said.

  ‘How thick is the skin of rock?’ Keira asked.

  ‘Only a few inches,’ he said. ‘You up for it?’

  ‘How will we explain the flames to the army?’

  ‘We’ll tell them we got lucky, and found a load of lamp oil, and made an explosion.’

  She smiled. ‘Aye, let’s do it.’

  Kylon scowled but said nothing.

  ‘We’ll need fuel,’ Keira said.

  Benel nodded. ‘We passed a tonne of wood in the chambers on the way here, let’s gather it up.’

  They smoked another stick of keenweed, and got to work, building a bonfire of tables, chairs and anything else wooden they could find, using the pickaxes to break it up.

  Keira positioned herself between the stack of wood and the far wall.

  ‘Bring me a lamp.’

  Benel passed her the one he had been carrying.

  ‘Now stand the fuck back.’

  Keira closed her eyes, feeling the rush of keenweed surge through her.

  She pulled the glass top from the lamp and tossed it aside, gazing at the small yellow flame. She weighed the lamp in her hand to judge the amount of oil it had left, then raised the fingers of her right hand. A tiny spiral of fire rose up from the wick, and she shot it into the pile of wood. A table leg caught fire. Keira swept her hand up in a slow motion, and within seconds the rest of the bonfire was blazing.

  She staggered, having never felt so connected to the power within her. Her head swam with fire, her hand seemed to be physically linked to the flames. She stared at the bonfire. It appeared alive, and ready to obey her will. It loved her, and would do anything she commanded.

  She lowered her hand, and willed the flames to move, and they jumped at her thought, roiling into a tight ball of blinding heat and light up by the ceiling, which scorched and blackened.

  She glanced at the door, and the ball of flame raced to obey.

  It crashed into the wall, sending a shockwave through the room that threw Keira to the ground. The flames surged, eating into the wood of the doors in seconds, then tearing through the thin shell of rock, sending fiery fragments hurtling out into the dark night sky. Then it was over, the bonfire’s fuel exhausted, and where the door had been, now stood a gaping hole into the darkness. A cold wind blew into the chamber, clearing the smoke and acrid fumes.

  Keira stood, and walked to the hole in the wall, feeling none of the nausea she usually felt after such an intense surge of power.

  She heard Kylon and Benel join her, and they gazed down onto the Plateau, where the great army of the alliance were camped out under the shadow of the mountain. To their right, fifty yards away, was the ramp leading to the blocked-up entrance. There was movement in the camp below, where troopers on guard duty were staring up the slope at them.

  Keira smirked. ‘Did I pass the audition?’

  Chapter 23

  Mistress of the House

  Plateau City, The Plateau – 19th Day, First Third Winter 505

  The western sky glowed in deep reds and oranges, spilling its light onto the still waters of the Inner Sea, which reflected back the glory of the sunset. Wrapped up warm on the townhouse balcony, Daphne sat back and relaxed.

  ‘Okay, I admit it,’ said Shella. ‘It’s beautiful. Can we go back inside now? I’m freezing.’

  ‘You think this is cold?’ Bedig said. ‘Back in Brig…’

  ‘Oh for fucksake, Bedig, you great oaf,’ Shella sighed. ‘We know. Your winters are so cold and dark you all hibernate like bears in your mountain caves.’

  ‘We didn’t live in caves.’

  ‘Sanang or Kellach, it’s hard to tell who wins the competition for being the most barbaric race,’ Shella said. ‘Daphne, what do you think?’

  Daphne smiled, resting her hand on the enormous bulge her bump had become.

  ‘Let’s see,’ Shella went on, counting on her fingers. ‘Neither can read or write, neither lives in anything bigger than a few shacks lumped together, both eat mud…’

  ‘We don’t massacre civilians,’ Bedig said.

  ‘Really?’ Shella said. ‘Not once in the entire war with the Rahain? The Kellach behaved like paragons of virtue throughout?’

  Bedig reddened.

  ‘Ah,’ Shella said, glancing at Daphne. ‘He knows something.’

  ‘There was one time,’ he said. ‘I wasn’t there mind. It involved Killop and Keira.’

  Shella cackled. ‘This gets better.’

  Daphne turned. ‘What exactly involved Killop?’

  ‘At the battle of Marchside,’ he said, ‘Killop led a company round the back of the Rahain, and slaughtered the campfolk there, to distract the army, so Keira could torch the lizard’s catapults.’

  ‘So it was during a battle?’ Daphne said.

  ‘Aye,’ Bedig said. ‘They way I heard it told, the Rahain catapults were pinning our army down, and Killop took command of a company, and went off on his own initiative. We sang songs about it. Guess we weren’t too bothered about the fact they were civilians back then.’

  ‘I’ve murdered people,’ Daphne said, wishing she had a cigarette, ‘and not just in war. I’ll not condemn Killop for doing what he felt he had to.’

  ‘I suppose none of us are innocent,’ Shella said. ‘I killed more than my share during the Migration. I stopped counting when I reached a hundred.’

  ‘What’s wrong with us?’ Bedig said. ‘There are only five races in this world. Can we not just live in peace with each other?’

  The light faded, as the sun dipped below the horizon.

  ‘Bedig,’ Daphne said, ‘could you help me up, please?’

  He came round to her right side, and held her arm as she grunted and stood. She had needed to remove the moulded armour from her left arm, as it was as bloated as the rest of her, and no longer fit. Her limb felt vulnerable again, and she tried to keep it close to her side.

  Shella shook her head as she got to her feet.

  ‘Praise the gods you’re due soon,’ she said. ‘It’s not possible that you could get any bigger.’

  ‘Thanks Shella,’ she replied, ‘that’s just what I needed to hear.’

  ‘You’re not that big, miss,’ Bedig said, as he helped her walk back into the house. ‘I’ve seen pregnant Brig women who looked like they’d eaten a house.’

  Daphne felt the baby move within her, squirming and kicking. Not long to go.

  A servant was coming up the stairs as they crossed the landing.

  ‘Mistress,’ he said, ‘there are troopers at the door.’

  ‘Really?’ Daphne frowned. ‘What do they want?’

  ‘They’re escorting someone who wishes to see you.’
<
br />   Daphne turned her head, and saw a long comfortable couch by the wall.

  ‘Can you bring them up here, please?’

  ‘Yes, mistress,’ the servant said, then turned and hurried back down the stairs.

  Daphne noticed Bedig and Shella share a glance as she sat on the couch.

  She heard the sound of footsteps in the hall below, then saw the shining armour and helmets of the cavalry come up the stairs. At their head was a tall officer, and behind, two troopers held the chains of another man, dressed in prison clothes and keeping his head bowed.

  ‘Baoryn,’ cried Bedig.

  The Rahain lifted his head, and nodded in recognition.

  The officer stopped in front of Daphne.

  ‘I am Captain Suthers, of the Plateau City Port Authority,’ she said. ‘We’re here to let you know that we are releasing this prisoner, and putting him on a boat in the morning back to Rainsby. He asked to see you before he departs, and we knew it was unlikely you’d be able to travel to the harbour cells in your condition.’

  ‘Very considerate Captain, thank you.’

  ‘No problem, ma’am.’

  Suthers gestured to the other troopers, who led Baoryn to the top of the stairs.

  ‘Daphne,’ the Rahain said, his eyes glimmering yellow in the lamplight.

  ‘Baoryn.’

  ‘Thank you for getting me released.’

  ‘I’m only sorry it took so long. The authorities had trouble believing that a Rahain arriving in the middle of the siege wasn’t a spy. Where will you go?’

  ‘Look for Kylon,’ he said. ‘Daphne, Killop thinks…’

  ‘I know,’ she said. ‘Leah told me.’

  He bowed his head.

  ‘Sorry.’

  ‘It’s all right,’ she said. ‘I know Kylon thought he was doing the right thing.’

  ‘You will be together again,’ the Rahain said. ‘You and Killop. Kalayne knows it. He has seen it.’

  She smiled. ‘More Kellach prophecies?’

  ‘I too doubted them at first,’ Baoryn said. He motioned to the guards. ‘I am ready. Daphne, farewell.’

  ‘Goodbye Baoryn,’ she said.

  Bedig stepped forward and embraced the Rahain, lifting him off his feet. ‘Pass on my love to the others when you find them.’