The Immortal Throne (2016)

by Stella Gemmell

  ‘The Vorago is a deep crack in the earth marking the border of Petrus with the tribal lands. It is said to be a thousand spans deep and for centuries was impassable, but then the Petrassi built three great bridges over it. The army will cross those bridges tomorrow. Then they will trounce these barbarians and we will go sailing.’

  Emly lay back in the sunshine, holding his hand to her breast. She closed her eyes, thinking over what he’d said. Then she sat up again, frowning.

  ‘If you wanted to stop the empress using the Gulon Veil, surely it would have made more sense to steal it instead of me?’

  ‘Ah, you’ve seen through my ploy,’ he replied gravely, his eyes darkening. ‘Hand me my jacket.’

  She reached for the jacket, which was lying a few paces away. She hauled it towards her. It was of leather, like his old Wildcat jerkin, but the leather was black and smelled new and only slightly of horses. It was heavily padded across the back and shoulders.

  Evan sat up and took it from her and broke a few of the neat stitches inside the hem. He pulled back a bit of the silken lining to reveal, sewn snugly inside, shimmering, the Gulon Veil.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  DAWN THE NEXT day found the Khan army, twenty thousand strong, plus a battalion of camp-followers and a handful of wounded, lying east of the Vorago. They had marched through the night. The army’s leaders Marcus Rae Khan and, particularly, Hayden Weaver, for whom Petrus was home, had been keen to be in striking distance by morning.

  Hayden, formerly general of the last Petrassi army in the field against the City, now with an ambiguous role as counsel, liaison and ambassador, sat astride his horse and stared hungrily towards the west, where the hills of Petrus were shrouded in morning mist. Their long journey was ended and soon the battles would begin.

  It was his fortieth year of war, forty years of sleeping on camp beds or the good earth, of camp food and soldiers’ jests and griping, years of pain and endurance and, always, the hope that one day he would be free to leave this life and spend the final years he had left in a place of peace with his wife. Anna and their three sons had found sanctuary on the isle of Chalcos, many days’ sail to the west. He had last seen her nine years before, in a hurried meeting before she sailed. The two oldest boys had gone ahead and Anna, babe in arms, had been distracted, worried more for them than for the husband who was about to return to war. He had felt aggrieved at the time, and since then he had felt sorrow for her for he knew she would have later cursed her distraction.

  The land of Petrus had been conquered by the City more than a century before and Hayden and his brother, though born in Petrus, were of mixed parentage and raised in the Mountains of the Moon, in the high fastnesses of once-proud tribes who had now dwindled to a few fleeing folk grubbing a transient living from unforgiving valleys. Then, nearly forty years ago, the City armies had started leaving Petrus, finally quitting for good. But the Petrassi had to fight for their land all over again, were still fighting the waves of invaders who swept down from the colder, grimmer countries of the far north, lured by the promise of green plains and rich river valleys. And one northern tribe in particular had grown in strength and ferocity in the last few years, and it was these savages Hayden had come home, with the help of the City, to confront.

  When they were youngsters, just starting to be moulded into the men they would become, Hayden and his brother Mason had left the mountains and travelled to Odrysia. There they gained an education, courtesy of the enlightened king Matthus. Mason joined the Odrysian military school. He was interested in history but fascinated by warfare and he eventually, inevitably, made his way to the home of warfare, the City, which was in the end his doom. Hayden, the elder, studied architecture and philosophy, mathematics and history, but was slowly, implacably drawn to the military as well.

  Although Hayden had lived most of his seventy-odd years outside his homeland, he had fought for its freedom for the greater part of his life, and now his feelings were a turmoil. This day, if God permitted, he would set foot on Petrassi soil for the first time in decades and his life would be made whole. He tried not to think further forward, of being reunited with his wife and children. This day was enough.

  Atop their warhorses a short way from the Vorago, both he and Marcus Rae Khan were troubled as the mist burned away and the green hills of Petrus came in sight. Not one of the scouts sent out in the past three days had returned and they had heard no word from the Petrassi army, sent on ahead, for more than a fortnight.

  The land around them sharpened into focus and the two leaders kicked their mounts forward. Orders were shouted and the great mass of men and women moved into a walk. Horses snorted and shook their reins; soldiers shouted greetings and oaths at each other; and far behind them they heard the complaints of livestock as they were cajoled and prodded into movement. And above all was the familiar sound of more than forty thousand boots on the march.

  Between the army and the Vorago was a gently sloping plain but the leaders set a measured pace. They had ensured that those at the rear, the baggage train and the camp-followers, had caught up before nightfall and been enveloped in the main body of armed men and women. They wanted the crossing to be performed as quickly as possible for there were, almost certainly, enemies waiting on the other side of the bridges, enemies who had had plenty of time to prepare.

  The three bridges – called in the City tongue Power, Passion and Greatness – were each wide enough to take six men walking abreast. They had been constructed five hundred years before at the behest of the Petrassi god to demonstrate the nation’s willingness to seek alliances and friendships in the wider world. They were built first of timber, then of iron and stone, and were a symbol of the determination of the nation, despite all indications to the contrary, that men could move forward together for their mutual progress. They were also, of course, easily defended if it came to it.

  Despite himself, Hayden urged his horse Rosteval forward, his eyes straining for a sight of the chasm and the fabled bridges. He had never seen them before. Rosteval clopped up a small eminence on the shallow plain and his rider leaned forward. He blinked and peered. His eyes were getting very poor and he fumbled his spectacles out of a pocket.

  Then he slumped in his saddle, shocked by what he saw and crushed by a cold wave of sorrow and disappointment.

  The bridges were gone.

  He heard Marcus curse and there was a wave of oaths and despairing groans as the news spread swiftly. They had thought themselves close to their target. What now? Marcus Rae Khan heeled his horse forward and Hayden followed more slowly. They rode up to the edge of the Vorago and looked down. The tattered ends of a bridge clung to the sides of the vertiginous abyss. Pieces of tortured iron stuck out of the remaining stone piers, broken stone littered the ledges and steep rocky slopes all the way down, down to a thread of river far below. For a moment Hayden thought he saw people down there, but he blinked and realized they were just the black motes that floated in his eyes in sunlight.

  The gorge stretched directly north to south across their path. He gazed longingly across the void. The central bridge’s site had clearly been chosen because the abyss narrowed there. Hayden visualized a rope hurled over first, then a rope bridge strung across, then, in time, a bridge of wood, and finally one of stone. The Petrassi side was a mere stone’s throw away, but it might as well have been ten leagues. Even a good horse on its best day could not leap the gap.

  ‘What has done this?’ Marcus growled.

  ‘Black powder,’ Hayden replied quietly.

  Marcus looked at him, his face red with frustration and anger. ‘No wonder Marcellus was long determined to outlaw it. It is a terrible weapon.’

  It is, Hayden thought, a worm of fear moving in his belly. He looked to his right. ‘We will have to march north, go round.’

  ‘A good ten days’ march,’ Marcus sighed. He started giving orders to his commanders.

  Hayden felt angered, frustrated in his ambition, yet something de
eper bothered him about this move by the enemy. He was expecting a fight – that was what he was there for. Everything he had heard of the invaders who had flooded Petrus from the north indicated they were uncivilized, followers of some pagan faith who fought without battle tactics or strategy. But the demolition of the bridges was sophisticated work, beyond the knowledge of wild-eyed barbarians. Was it reckless destruction, a brutish attempt to keep the City army from the land of Petrus? Or something more calculated, a show of might, a demonstration of intent? He wondered what mind was behind this stratagem. And what had become of the Petrassi army sent ahead of them? Did they too stand here looking at destroyed bridges? If so, what had become of them?

  He stood in the stirrups and looked to his right, along this side of the gorge. The soft plain they stood on ended abruptly a hundred paces north and for as far as he could see beyond the land was rock-strewn and tumbled, like a ruined city, barren of trees or undergrowth. The early-morning sun cast multiple deep pockets of shadow – in which an enemy could hide. Dread coiled in his belly.

  ‘Marcus,’ he barked urgently, ‘look to the north!’

  As they watched a dark shape appeared on the horizon, a wide blur which darkened and coalesced. The enemy had been waiting for them! Marcus bellowed to his commanders. More shapes started rising from the cluttered landscape, closer, much closer. A dull clattering started, the sound of swords battering on shields. The Khan army’s captains were racing the length of the lines, shouting orders. Men and women swiftly moved into battle formations to confront the foe on their flank, clapping helms on heads and strapping on breastplates as they deployed. Cavalry units galloped towards each end of the new front line. Marcus’ bodyguard, fifty veteran warriors, moved in front of the two leaders and unsheathed their swords.

  ‘We can’t attack,’ rumbled Marcus with something like disappointment, ‘not on that terrain. Or use the cavalry.’ He turned to Hayden. ‘We’ll wait for them to come to us. Good enough. Who are they, d’you think?’

  ‘The enemy we’re here to fight,’ Hayden said, and shrugged. ‘But we weren’t expecting to confront them on this side.’

  The enemy line came on slowly, hampered by the landscape they’d been hiding in. Hayden could see they were dressed in a motley of furs and hides, leather and metal, and bearing swords and knives, clubs and axes. He raised his eyes, peering through his spectacles. On the horizon more enemy units were gathering. There must, he thought, be a hidden valley.

  All his fears had gone now. The past year of inaction, of endless politicking and diplomacy, all drifted away. Familiar routines re-established themselves. Hayden put his eyeglasses away in their box. He muttered a prayer to his god and tightened the straps of his light armour. He rinsed his mouth with water and spat it on the ground. One of his bodyguards fitted Rosteval’s thick leather chest-guard and the horse snorted. Hayden patted him on the neck. The old boy knew what was coming.

  Crashing their weapons against their shields, the first few enemy fighters came clear of the rocky ground and started to run in an undisciplined charge. Some City soldiers bellowed their battle chants, but they were ordered to stay quiet. So in stony silence the first line of the City waited, shoulder to shoulder, shields up, swords ready. They knew what they were doing. They didn’t have to concern themselves with who they were fighting. After weeks of marching their blood was up for the first time and they were eager for enemy heads.

  The first enemy warrior crashed into the line. He was tall and fair, his face and bare arms heavily tattooed. He was armed only with a studded club. As he raised it to strike his enemy two swords drove into his chest and he was dead before he hit the ground.

  A league to the southwest, the Pigstickers were back from the action and they had leisure to prepare. Emly watched them putting on armour and helms, buckling straps and tying ties. She felt helpless. A small part of her wished she could stay and fight with her friends. But Evan had told her to take the horses and go, to follow the wives and whores who were streaming away eastward under orders to put as much distance as possible between themselves and the enemy. And part of her was desperate to flee the slaughter to come.

  Evan rolled out his chain mail vest and dragged it on. Em sprang forward and buckled it closed on each side, then stepped back as he knelt to tie his greaves. He reached into a pack and took out three more knives and slid them into their places on his buckler. He was not looking at her.

  ‘Got enough blades there?’ Benet asked him jovially, but Evan made no reply. He had no time for fighting beside a soldier who was half-blind, although he wouldn’t say so to Stern, whom he respected.

  ‘He thinks he’s a one-man army,’ Benet added to the company in general, and Evan nodded abruptly. He had no tolerance for warriors who chatted before battle either, though he understood why they did.

  Emly watched Quora, who was punching the padding in her helm into shape, cursing to herself, and she wished she’d had the time to ask the warrior to teach her to fight. She admired Quora. She wasn’t tiny, like Em, but she was smaller than all the men yet they treated her as an equal. Quora had no time for Benet either.

  The front line was getting closer, and Em tried to shut her ears to the sounds of men and women screaming and groaning and the clash and crash of swords and shields.

  Evan stopped what he was doing and turned his pale, cold gaze on her. He said nothing but she knew he was telling her to go. He and Stalker had elected to stand with the infantry and it was her task to remove the horses to safety. ‘If they stay here they’ll end up in the battle. Do you want that?’ he’d asked when she’d argued.

  He was ready to fight. He had a sword in one hand, a shield strapped to his arm and a second sword at his side. On the Day of Summoning she’d been there to witness him fighting with two swords in the Hall of Emperors, and suddenly her blood ran cold and she was desperate to get away from there, from what was coming.

  She said nothing, just nodded gravely, then walked back to where the horses were hobbled. She unroped them and tied her packs on Patience. She looked back at Evan and saw he had put the black and silver jacket back on; it had his medical kit, such as it was, in the pockets. She thought of the Gulon Veil stitched snugly into the back. She climbed up on Blackbird, holding Patience’s lead, and turned to say goodbye.

  But she saw he had forgotten her already. He was talking to Stern, his head down, a look of fierce concentration on his face. She turned her horse’s head and headed east.

  The sun was moving down the sky and the shadows were long once more, as they had been at the start of the day, the start of the battle.

  Stern lay in the dirt and waited for death. In the loud heartbeats before the blade would slice his spine he realized he had been outfought, out-thought. His opponent had feinted to the right and Stern, tired and blood-weary, had followed the sword and not seen the punch coming. It had knocked him sideways, dazed, leaving his back an open target.

  But the blade-thrust did not come and Stern, reprieved, rolled over and scrambled up. His opponent lay dying, split open from guts to throat. Stalker was standing over him. The big man grinned and said, ‘You’re welcome,’ then launched back into the battle.

  Stern spat out two teeth and looked around. There was a lull in the fighting, but a brief one. The enemy strategy was clear as day. The City forces were being driven back towards the chasm of the Vorago on the west and the sea-cliffs to the south. The enemy army was advancing from north and east, leaving just a narrow corridor along the high southern cliffs for the defenders to flee in the direction of the City. The more they were pushed back towards the cliff-edge, the more tempting that escape route would become. So far Stern had seen no one run. No one wanted to be the first to bolt. But it was obvious now that the enemy – whoever they were – outnumbered them at least two to one. These were odds Stern had taken before and won, but he feared the enemy had strategies left to play.

  He watched as Broglanh cut down an enemy soldier, lancing him in the throat
, then the warrior cast a murderous glance back at Stern who awoke from his reverie and stepped up beside him.

  ‘We’re outnumbered,’ he said.

  ‘We’re always outnumbered,’ Broglanh grunted as another tattooed fighter ran at him. He ducked at the last moment and drove his sword into the man’s belly. ‘City warriors fight best when they’re outnumbered,’ he said, dragging the blade out.

  Stern grinned. It was something he’d heard all his soldier’s life.

  ‘Look to your brother,’ Broglanh warned, dodging a blow from a cudgel and felling the man bearing it.

  Stern looked to the left and saw Benet fighting in a little island of his own. He was a menace to his own comrades for he was flailing and hacking at anyone who came close. Stern moved up near him, beyond his range, and despatched an injured man, then shouted, ‘Brother!’

  Benet’s head swung round towards him and at that moment a man came from his left, a long spear at waist level.

  ‘Down!’ Stern yelled and, though Benet hadn’t seen the threat, he dropped like a stone and rolled under the spearman’s feet. The man, at full pelt, stumbled and fell and Stern moved in and sliced the back of his neck under the helm, cutting through bone and gristle. He bent and tore off the bright crimson sash the man wore and tied it round his left bicep.

  ‘I’ll stand to your right,’ he told Benet. ‘Watch for me. Try not to kill me.’

  Benet nodded, his eyes wide and full of fear.

  The City warriors who’d been fighting in front of them were the Hogfodders, doughty warriors all. They had slowly been forced back by the enemy. The last few were holding their own but their comrades from other companies on either side were giving way step by step and soon the Hogfodders would be surrounded. There seemed to be no one left to give them orders so Stern bellowed for them to retreat ten paces and the veterans complied. They withdrew to line up with Stern and his warriors and for a moment there was a pause. Stern wiped the blood and sweat from his eyes.