The Fall of Neskaya

by Marion Zimmer Bradley

  I should have him hamstrung so that he can never stand before his betters again, Damian thought, and then gave the order to hang him and any sons. The price of resistance must be seen by all to be too high.

  Vair blustered and made threats as they dragged him out. Damian, eyeing the crowd which gathered at the gates, hoped word would spread quickly. It would make his job that much easier.

  By the time the Ambervale forces marched out of Vairhaven, the kyorebni had picked the lordling’s corpse almost clean. So too were the fields and most of the surrounding orchards. When a party of farmers had approached to complain, saying they had done nothing to deserve such treatment, Damian snorted and ordered the right hand of their headman cut off. Then he conscripted all the men between the ages of fifteen and fifty to the ranks of his foot soldiers.

  “It is the way of war,” he said to Belisar once they were on the trail.

  For the next tenday, no one could doubt Damian’s victory as one petty lordship after the other surrendered bloodlessly to his forces. Yet, too frequently, the lord turned out to be some aged grandfather, half blind and palsied, and once, a woman. Pock-faced, simpering, and none too clean in her personal habits, she offered to share Damian’s bed as a conquest of war. He declined. Conscripts were few and either too old or too crippled to be of any use. No decent horses could be found.

  Scouts brought news to Damian’s army as it made its way toward the Venza Hills which rose like the backbone of an ancient monster along the eastern horizon. Rumors of Queen Taniquel’s return reached them daily. Some said she had a thousand men, ten thousand; others that the very beasts of the field bowed down before her; still others that Aldones himself had come down and blessed her cause.

  “And where is the tyrant

  Who fights with treachery and lies?

  Darkness falls, honor dies

  At his foul approach.

  But up from the ashes

  A bird of unquenchable fire,

  She comes to us, she comes to us,

  Blessed by Aldones’ everlasting light . . .

  Lift up your head, O Acosta,

  Bound in sorrows and blood—

  The new day is coming!

  Lift up your voice, O Acosta,

  Lift it up in every land.

  Huzzah! Huzzah!

  Weep with joyful heart!

  Lift up your arms, O Acosta!

  Every man’s hand

  A blow for freedom!”

  Damian rained curses upon Taniquel Hastur-Acosta and also on himself, for not pursuing her or finding some way of forcing the Comyn Council to turn her over when he had her within sight. But upon reflection, he realized that the result would have been the same. Hastur would have found some other excuse to get involved, once his own interests were threatened. Sooner or later, they must meet on the battlefield. This time, it would be on his own terms.

  News came also of armed bands making their way through the Hellers foothills. One of the men Damian had left behind at Vairhaven clattered into camp on an old farm horse, his head shaved bald and painted blue. His hands had been lashed to the saddle and a note pinned to his tunic,

  So shall we deal with all tyrants!

  It was signed, “The Free Men of Acosta.”

  When the note was brought before the war tent, Belisar roared out that such rebellion must be put down immediately, but Damian managed to calm him down.

  “They pose no real threat to us. They do these things only to slow our progress. If we take the time to deal with them, we give Hastur that same time to advance even further, to meet us closer to our own territory instead of his own. Our advantage lies in our speed, our ability to choose our own battlefield. Meanwhile, I will have General Vyandal double the scouting patrols and night watch. We may have a few skirmishes here and there, but we will not be delayed.”

  The next day, the vanguard of his army approached the Greenstone River, a minor tributary of the Valeron. Trees clustered along the banks on either side, narrow ribbons of green. To avoid a long detour to the treacherous fords downstream, General Vyandal had suggested the easier route over the stone bridge, even though to cross it, the men could march only four abreast on foot or two on horse. This would leave them strung out and vulnerable. Moreover, the brushy trees gave excellent cover for an ambush.

  Damian ordered a slow, careful reconnaissance. He sent mounted scouts up and down the river, but they saw no sign of any body of rebels. When they approached the bridge, however, they gave a warning.

  Damian spurred his horse to the front, followed closely by Vyandal and his personal guard. The Ambervale soldiers halted an arrow’s flight away from the bridge. On the far side, a party of men raised their bows and shouted for them to halt. Some of them stood on the stone railings. They wore woodsmen’s clothing in shades of brown and green, difficult to see in the dappled shade. An arrow quivered in the matted grasses in front of the hooves of the foremost horseman. He was still struggling for control of his white-eyed, snorting mount.

  “That was a warning!” One of the ruffians, a man with a full black beard, called out. “Come no closer! Go back to where you belong!”

  The man atop the left side railing drew his bow and sighted along the arrow. He was more boy than man with his slender build and cropped russet hair, but Damian had no doubt that his was the arrow and that he had placed it exactly where he meant to.

  “What do they think they’re doing?” he asked aloud, caught between irritation and bemusement. “Trying to become the stuff of legends?”

  “Dead legends, sire,” said Vyandal. “But not stupid ones. We can charge them over the bridge, but not fast enough to prevent them from shooting down the first rows of horses and creating a nice hurdle for the rest of us to cross.”

  For a flicker, Damian wished he had not sent Rumail on his mission. It would be satisfying, and so much simpler, to boil the brains of these miscreants in their skulls or turn their arrows into venomous snakes.

  “We’ll have to make a wall of shields,” Vyandal said.

  Damian nodded assent. It would be slower, and there would undoubtedly be a mess of hand-to-hand fighting at the end of it. As the first ranks of foot soldiers inched across the bridge with their shields forming a barrier, the archers let loose a half-hearted volley and retreated beyond the trees, where their own horses were picketed.

  Once a foothold was established on the far bank to cover the slow passage of the army, Vyandal called forth a unit of his own archers. In the field beyond the river, the bandits circled, aiming when they could and occasionally hitting a target. One of them, the red-haired youth, was wounded in the thigh, but not badly enough to take him from the fight. They began taunting Deslucido’s men, hooting at them and daring them to follow. Once a horseman rushed them for a few paces before a rain of arrows sent his mount rearing in panic. Whenever the Ambervale bowmen would move into position, they would retreat to a safe distance and continue their obscene calls.

  “They’re making fools of us!” Belisar cried. “Get rid of them!”

  Damian, who had been watching the action, shook his head. The archers were an annoyance, true. Their major power was to sting, not to harm. It would be easy to send out enough men to chase them away or run them down. But that would take time, and their harm was their ability to slow him down. Some of these ruffians might even have been the ones who retook Verdanta. Yes, that would make sense—small bands of men, preferably the pick of the seasoned veterans, making their way through the Hellers foothills and into Acosta.

  They hoped to pin me down before I could mobilize another attack, but I stole the march on them, Damian thought. Like a spear, like an arrow, I will outrun them.

  The crossing took hours, for the rest of the day. The archers melted away with the gathering shadows of night-fall.

  Damian pushed his forces across the remaining stretch of Acosta fields and into the Venza Hills. As they came into the funnel pass, the heavens seemed to gather themselves for the battle. Cl
ouds swept white and gleaming, the sky a sheet of polished silver. Radiance saturated the air. No breeze stirred, but the army made its own storm. Damian poised on its crest, glorying in the sense of vast, unstoppable power. He had not only men and swords, but the rightness of the day, that vision which made victory inevitable. Darkover must be united and these petty bickering squabbles put to an end.

  A mote of blackness broke the brilliant sky, no—two. Squinting, Damian made them out to be birds. Large hawks, he thought, or scavenger kyorebni, scenting the battle to come. They descended, hovered, then dropped even farther so that he could make out their pinions outstretched to catch the air currents. For a long moment, they hardly seemed to move. He held his breath, remembering his own boyhood dreams of flying. Then one plunged to begin a sweeping arc over the army.

  The bird’s smooth flight broke, as if it staggered. Wings folded, it plummeted to earth. Damian wheeled his horse in the direction of its fall.

  Ranald Vyandal stood holding the bird, a huge ugly thing with mottled naked skin over its head and neck. An arrow jutted from its breast. It must have died instantly.

  “It’s a sentry-bird.” Vyandal’s voice came thick and dark. He looked up, to the now-empty sky. “The Hasturs know where we are. They cannot be more than a day or two away.”

  Belisar’s horse, catching his surge of excitement, danced beneath him. “Then we will meet them all the sooner!”

  “We go no farther today.” Damian reined in his prancing mount, yanking the horse’s head up and back. “We make camp here. It is time for the second part of our plan.”

  That dusk, Damian sat in conference with Ranald Vyandal and his senior lieutenants. Camp chairs were drawn up in his tent and guards posted to prevent any eavesdropping. Belisar sat in one corner, face unreadable in the shadows.

  “We had hoped for a larger army at this point,” Ranald said.

  Damian propped his elbow on one arm of his chair, leaning his chin on his cupped hand, eyes absently following the pattern of the travel-stained Ardcarran carpet. “Our numbers will be enough. We will attack from a quarter Hastur is not expecting.” He had kept his true plans secret until now, even from his general. He could not chance any word of it leaking to the Hasturs or even his own men. The time had come to let his officers know what a glorious victory awaited them.

  “Sire?” Ranald Vyandal blinked.

  “I bet it has something to do with Uncle Rumail,” said Belisar.

  “Indeed, before we left Acosta, I dispatched Dom Rumail for Tramontana Tower with a picked escort, a sort of enforcement team, if you will. Just to make sure there is no problem of obedience to our will. And our will is that he be placed as Keeper there, with absolute authority to issue orders in my name.”

  Vyandal, however, went pale. “Majesty, you do not mean to bring the Towers into this war?” In his eyes, Damian read the barely-healed memories of his last battle with laran weapons.

  “I do not mean to use bonewater dust,” Damian reassured him. “But a far more powerful strategy. Before, we could only use those armaments which the Towers could physically produce. Yes, I plan to bring Tramontana into this conflict, but in a very different way. A way that will blind the Hasturs’ advantage and turn the battle with far fewer of our own men lost.”

  He watched the shifting expressions on their faces as he outlined the plan, astonishment and consternation giving way to devotion. These men would follow him anywhere, die at his slightest word, for he had handed them a victory such as the world had never known.

  What he proposed had been done before, but on a very limited basis, only by small laran circles who traveled with their armies. Their powers were limited by their numbers and distance from their targets. Rumail’s genius showed how the strength of an entire, fully functional Tower circle could be brought into battle, no matter how far away. For in the Overworld, that vast mental plane, the power of the mind reigned supreme. It was from that bizarre and terrible place Deslucido would launch his true assault.

  “As soon as we are in position, it will not matter what the Hasturs know or how many more men they have. They will fall like ripened wheat beneath our scythe. Nothing they do can stop us now.”

  35

  Rafael Hastur’s army made its way along the circuitous route from the Drycreek area to the Venza Hills and the border with Acosta. It moved slowly as supply lines were reestablished and the sick men tended to. About halfway there, Taniquel joined him with her heavily-armed escort. This was no longer a simple border dispute, she pointed out in her missive, informing him that she was coming. The goal was now the liberation of Acosta and she, as its Queen Regent, had every right to be in the forefront.

  When she went to greet her uncle the morning after her arrival in camp, she found him scowling as he sat in his favorite camp chair. In front of him, two men knelt while a handful of others, subordinates by their bowed heads and awkward hands, stood a respectful distance away. Their scabbards hung empty from their belts.

  As Taniquel approached, Rafael looked up, his expression lightening. The kneeling men turned, and she recognized the elder of them. Esteban—Esteban of Greenhills.

  A little shock went through her. It had been Esteban who led the expedition to Thendara to plead for relief against Damian’s rule. He and the other Acosta lords had been so desperate, they determined to pledge themselves to a foreign king rather than continue to see their land pillaged by Deslucido’s tyranny. But Rafael had refused to hear them, and in his place, they had found her.

  I swore to them I would return and free Acosta. That was the day my life truly ceased to be mine.

  Joy blazed across the old man’s face. “My Queen! We have found you at last! We all heard the rumors, but dared not hope at first. Then came word that you yourself had taken to the field.” He bowed his head, eyes gleaming, and reached for the hem of her gown. “Lead us! We are yours!”

  Taniquel gently pulled her skirts away. “Please, good sir. Get up. This groveling is not seemly before the Hastur lord.” She turned to her uncle, eyes questioning.

  “It seems,” Rafael said in a dry voice, “that your reputation has outsped you. These men have been searching for you. They wish to enlist in your cause.”

  Taniquel had no armies of her own, let alone any grasp of how to command one effectively. But how could she say so to these men who looked to her with eyes brimming with hope?

  She was Queen Regent of Acosta, mother of the one true heir, and she had been Queen in her own right before that, Taniquel reminded herself. She was kin to Kings and gods. The blood of Hastur, Son of Aldones, flowed in her veins.

  She drew herself up, head high, shoulders squared. “How many men do you bring me?”

  Esteban named a number, men from his own province and more from his neighbors. Some, she guessed, had been fugitives under Deslucido. All would be sorely missed come harvest time. She had half a mind to send them all back where they would do the most good. But she could not throw away the gift of such loyalty or expose them to Deslucido’s retaliation.

  Taniquel inclined her head toward where Rafael lounged in his chair like a throne, amusement playing across his eyes. “There sits my uncle, who is my champion in this war. In this campaign, I am guided by him. Are you willing to place yourselves under his orders, to march with his own soldiers against the tyrant of Ambervale?”

  Esteban glanced from her to Rafael. Emotion twisted his features, though he held himself proudly. “Your Majesty, vai domna, we are yours to command.”

  “And you, Uncle,” Taniquel said, raising her voice. “Will you accept the loan of these fighting men, to lead and care for as your own, for the duration of this campaign and without any commitment of future fealty?”

  He nodded almost invisibly and she felt the flush of his approval. “I will, my niece.”

  “Then,” she turned back to Esteban and the others, “I command you to go with King Rafael’s officers and do as they bid you. I commend you for your service.” With her ey
es, she dismissed them.

  In a few minutes, the tent was cleared, the Acosta men directed to their new units. After that, there was no discussion of her going back.

  As the army got underway again, Taniquel found herself subject to restrictions. It was one thing to travel alone or in command of a small armed party, and quite another to be in the midst of such a large body of soldiers. She knew nothing of the routines and discipline of a traveling army, and she did not want to take men away from their necessary duties to dance attendance on her. Since there was little for her to do except sit quietly while generals discussed things, she spent most of her days with the laran workers.

  Trailed by two bodyguards, Taniquel and Graciela followed Edric, who was mounted, a short distance from the main army encampment, watching him fly the sentry-birds from a little grassy knoll. The two women chatted comfortably as they stretched their legs in the morning sunshine, each happy to have found a friend. Caitlin had returned to Thendara to oversee the care of those sickened by the bonewater dust. Her place had been taken by two men from Hali whom Taniquel did not know.

  Graciela’s initial shyness was wearing off, revealing a surprisingly self-confident young woman. She was the fourth out of seven daughters of an impoverished but noble family, and her family had been only too happy to send her off for Tower training at the slightest hint of talent.

  “I had thought I might become a Priestess of Avarra,” she’d confided to Taniquel, “but I would miss the fellowship of men. This is much better.”

  For the last hour, Edric had described the location and arrangement of Deslucido’s forces with a detail that she could not have imagined. Had anyone cared to enquire, even the number of latrine ditches and cooking pots could be known. Rafael’s aide, a huge blond man whose skin had sunburned badly and was now peeling away over new pink skin, had taken notes and consulted his maps, then ridden back to deliver the news.