Wrath of Empire

by Brian McClellan

  Styke leaned on his saddle horn. “You’re joking.” No ships. That would make it damned hard to get to Dynize.

  “Not at all! I’ll tell you, it’s the damnedest thing. We had orders to take the city as quickly as possible, but it was empty.”

  “Do you know why?”

  “I’m not one to question fortune, but …” Willen searched his jacket, produced a tin of tobacco, and tucked a wad into the corner of his mouth before continuing. “We came across half a brigade of Dynize cavalry slaughtered in the Hock—I’m guessing now that it was your doing—and our best guess is that the Dynize holding the city were spooked and decided to flee.”

  Styke bit his tongue, holding back a dozen reasons why the Dynize wouldn’t have fled just because of some dead cuirassiers. He looked up at the nearby curtain wall and the high towers of New Starlight beyond it, then glanced to the eastern horizon. “Perhaps,” he said. “Perhaps not. Maybe they got wind of a field army on the way and decided they couldn’t hold the fortress against it.” It seemed like the only probable reason for abandoning New Starlight. Perhaps Styke was just being paranoid. “Tell me, did the Dynize spike the fortress guns when they left?”

  “I’m not sure,” Willen replied. “I can ask.”

  “Do so. Where is Dvory?”

  “Ah. The general is in the citadel. His personal company is holding it.”

  “Taking the choice beds for himself, I suppose.”

  “A general’s prerogative,” Willen said demurely. “If you’d like, I’ll take you to him.”

  “No need, I …” Styke hesitated, exchanging a glance with Jackal. “Actually, that would be wonderful.”

  “Hold on, I’ll fetch my horse.”

  Within a few minutes, Colonel Willen was riding beside them as they headed toward the fortress. They passed beneath the curtain wall, which was staffed with guards from one of the brigades but not policed. The city-fortress within had been taken over by the army.

  “All the buildings were empty when we arrived,” Colonel Willen explained. “As far as we’ve been able to piece together, the city was abandoned by the garrison the very day that word came that Landfall had been taken. The people fled soon after, leaving it abandoned to be picked up by the Dynize.”

  “That’s a shame,” Styke said, watching a company of soldiers march past in the street.

  Willen spat out a wad of tobacco. “Agreed. New Starlight isn’t protected by sorcery, but the walls are strong and the guns powerful. They could have made a damned good stand against any sized fleet in the area. Pity, I say, but that’s what we’re here to remedy.”

  “What, exactly, are your orders?” Styke glanced sharply at Willen.

  “They were secret until we actually arrived,” Willen said. “But we were to march across the Hammer and take New Starlight as quickly as possible. Now, I believe, we’ll garrison the city and use it as a staging point to cleanse the Hammer.” Willen nodded toward the citadel. “General Dvory is meeting with all the brigadiers and about half the colonels right now. I imagine we’ll have our next set of orders by tomorrow.”

  Styke debated his next options. If there were no ships here, then the citadel was useless to the Mad Lancers. His best bet might be to ride back to Belltower and use the good graces he’d earned with the city to commandeer a small fleet. In which case, he should turn around right now and ride back to camp. He didn’t need Dvory getting overly curious about his goals.

  “Why the urgency?” he asked Willen.

  “Hmm?”

  “You were told to march across the Hammer and take Starlight as quickly as possible. Why? Did you even bring enough artillery to take the citadel?”

  “Only just—about the artillery, that is. We have a battery of twelve-pounders and six batteries of six-pounders. As far as the speed?” Willen shrugged. “The orders came directly from Lindet herself. One does not question Lindet’s orders.”

  They reached the main door of the citadel only to find it closed. Styke rode Amrec right up to the door and gave it a shove. It was locked. He craned his neck, looking up to the murder holes for some sign of a guard detail.

  “I say there!” Willen called, cupping his hands around his mouth. “I say there! Colonel Willen to see General Dvory. Open the doors!”

  They were greeted by silence. Jackal rode back fifty yards, looking toward the top of the walls. “I don’t see anyone,” he shouted.

  Willen scowled at the door as if he might open it by annoyance alone. “Everyone must be at the general’s meeting.”

  “Strange,” Styke muttered, feeling his uneasiness deepen.

  They waited for a sign of life from within the citadel for nearly fifteen minutes until Willen finally shook his head. “I’ll send men around to the other gates to find a way in,” he assured him. “Dvory’s damned bodyguard are too good to open the door, and they’ll hear it from me. Can I escort you back to your men?”

  “We’re camped down the coast,” Styke said. “To the east. I can find my own way back.”

  “Of course.”

  Styke raised one finger, turning Amrec this way and that as he examined the city-fortress. “How many scouts do you have out right now?”

  “You’d have to ask a dragoon company.”

  “Do you have any dragoons attached to your brigade?”

  “We do. My sister is their commanding officer.”

  “Do me a favor. Get them out into the countryside. The Dynize might have sailed away, but they might also be lurking out there somewhere.”

  Willen sucked on his teeth, obviously reluctant. “General Dvory gave the men an informal leave while we wait for our new orders. My sister won’t be eager to send her boys out too early.” He paused, looking up at the citadel. “I’ll convince her,” he added.

  “Good.”

  Styke nodded good-bye and turned Amrec back toward the mainland. They were out of earshot when Jackal said in a low voice, “You told him we were camped to the east. You don’t trust him?”

  “I don’t want Dvory to know where we are,” Styke replied.

  Ibana met them about a mile outside the curtain wall. “I was just about to come looking for you. Is everything all right?”

  “I’m not sure,” Styke said with the shake of his head. “I want you and Gustar to send out our best scouts. Scour the area.”

  “What are we looking for?”

  “Dynize.”

  “A lot? A few?”

  Styke glanced back toward the citadel one more time. He thought he spotted someone in a yellow jacket on the walls of the citadel, but by the time he found his looking glass the person had disappeared. “I don’t know. Look for anything suspicious. No fires tonight. Tell the men to be ready to fight or flee at a moment’s notice.”

  CHAPTER 60

  Vlora sat on horseback, watching as rows of Riflejacks marched past her along the winding, treacherous foothills of the Ironhook Mountains. Less than fifty hours had passed since Flerring had cracked the godstone, and even with a swift departure from Yellow Creek they were only thirty miles or so east of the town. Supply wagons—and the big oxcart carrying the capstone—slowed them down, as did the rough terrain itself. Their only saving grace was that the men themselves were relatively fresh from days loitering outside of Yellow Creek.

  But an army could only move as quickly as its slowest piece, and in this case it was the capstone. Sixteen extra oxen and a whole company of soldiers and engineers stood by to push or pull the wagon through mud or up steep embankments, to repair broken wheels or switch out tired animals. They worked with efficiency found nowhere else in the world, and yet it still wasn’t enough.

  “Where’s Colonel Olem?” Vlora asked one of her aides, eyeing a particularly steep part of the road up ahead. The capstone would be along soon, and the engineers would have to deal with that hill, slowing down the whole army even further.

  “I think he’s coming up just behind us, ma’am,” the aide answered.

  Vlora acknow
ledged her response with a nod and headed back down the column, where she found Olem conferring with several of their engineers, walking beside them as he led his horse. She caught his eye and he broke away, mounting up and coming over to join her.

  “We just had word from our scouts,” he reported before she could speak. “The Dynize are coming up on us quickly—there’s a full brigade just a couple hours behind us.”

  Vlora swore. “How the pit did they catch up so quickly? Didn’t they at least head to Yellow Creek?”

  “They didn’t.” Olem unfolded a hand-drawn map of the region and held it where Vlora could see. “As far as we can tell, they changed directions at this road here, heading to cut us off. Either they had better scouts than we expected or their Privileged were able to sense the capstone moving east and they made some quick assumptions.”

  Vlora tried to look on the bright side. “They’ve taken the bait.”

  “That they have. By the time they catch us, Burt will have the rest of the godstone up in the Ironhook passes. No chance of the Dynize following them up there.”

  It was, Vlora had to admit, a terribly satisfying thing to know that she’d outmaneuvered Ka-Sedial once more. It took an enormous amount of anxiety off her chest. However, she didn’t need to remind herself that the Dynize could still slaughter her and all of her men. Saving the world from a Dynize god had been her first priority. Now she needed to get her people back to Adro in one piece, and Olem had not said “if” they catch us, but rather implied “when.” “Do we have any chance of outrunning them?” she asked quietly.

  Olem looked toward the engineers, his expression souring. “I think we can stay ahead of them if we keep moving, it’s just that …”

  “Don’t lie to me,” Vlora told him.

  Olem glanced away, grimacing. “Dragging this capstone with us, we have no chance of staying ahead of the Dynize. As long as we’re in the foothills, we can block the roads and keep them from flanking us, but as soon as we break out onto the plains, we’ll be surrounded by five brigades of infantry.”

  Vlora tried to keep from spiraling into a well of despair. “I’ve gotten us all killed, haven’t I?”

  “I’m sure you’ll think of something,” Olem said confidently.

  “That kind of pressure isn’t exactly helpful.”

  “Hasn’t stopped you before.”

  She wanted to slap that reassuring grin off his face. “If we live through this, my love, please make me retire.”

  “I’ll do my best.”

  Vlora turned to watch as the cart with the capstone was manuevered up the steep hill on the road ahead of them, and was pleasantly surprised when none of the ropes snapped or the oxen stumbled. It was up and over the hill in just a few minutes, leaving her in a slightly more optimistic mood. She wondered what Tamas would have done in this situation, and realized she’d been with him in a tangle not so dissimilar during the Adran-Kez War. Had the odds been better, or worse? She couldn’t quite remember.

  “How hard will it be for the Dynize to get around us?”

  “While we’re on these foothill roads?” Olem asked. “Fairly difficult.”

  “Good. Tell the engineers I want them to keep that wagon going as quickly as possible, no matter what the rest of the army does.”

  “You intend to stop and fight?” Olem asked with surprise.

  “ ‘Stop’ is a poor word for what I plan. We’re going to bloody their noses a little, and see what kind of sorcerous support they have. Fetch me Taniel, Norrine, and Davd.”

  Vlora listened to the screaming of horses as she lined up her next shot.

  Finding a proper line of sight in these foothills was next to impossible. It took climbing a tree on the next ridge over just to be able to witness the ambush the Riflejack rear had arranged for the Dynize vanguard. The ambush itself was in full swing—six hundred of her riflemen firing staggered volleys into a column of dragoons. The column went back down the valley for as far as Vlora could see, and had clearly not expected to run into the Riflejacks so quickly. Once the firing had begun, they had milled for almost a minute, the front line pushed ahead by the advancing column behind them, before charging up the hill toward her Riflejacks.

  The dragoons died by the score in that charge, but Vlora forced herself to ignore them and kept her eyes on the column behind the battle. Her senses ablaze with a powder trance, she watched as word of the ambush was passed back beyond the curve of the next hill. She kept her gaze there, watching, waiting for the logical Dynize response.

  It came within about two minutes. A Dynize Privileged, white gloves already on, appeared from down the column, his bodyguard shoving their way through the dragoons as he attempted to make his way forward to deal with the ambush. A Privileged of reasonable power could do enough damage to her rear guard to allow his dragoons to advance. If he had a lot of power, he might be able to brush them aside single-handedly.

  Vlora had no interest in finding out. She braced the barrel of her rifle on the branch in front of her as she focused on the Privileged. She opened her third eye, letting out a small gasp as the world turned into a black-and-white landscape with a few pastel brushes of sorcery dabbed across it. The Privileged glowed brightly in the Else, forcing Vlora to blink at the radiance. It took a few moments to notice that the Privileged had not come unprepared for this eventuality—that there was a half dome of hardened air just a few inches in front of him. It would be very difficult to punch through, and impossible to shoot around for all but the most skilled of powder mages.

  The Dynize, it seemed, had learned from the battles they’d fought against powder mages.

  Vlora shifted her attention to the woman sitting in the saddle just behind and to the right of the Privileged. She also glowed in the Else, and Vlora had seen enough bone-eyes by now to know them by their aura. The Privileged was focused on the battle ahead, no doubt trusting his shield of air, while the bone-eye seemed focused inward. Vlora had no doubt she was spurring on her soldiers, giving them the courage to charge uphill against her Riflejacks.

  It was, so far, not working. Several hundred dragoons already littered the road, further slowing their compatriots. Vlora’s Riflejacks worked with mechanical precision, firing staggered volleys into whatever came next. It was utter suicide on the part of the dragoons—unless, of course, they were simply buying time for their Privileged to reach the front and lend them a hand.

  Vlora readjusted her grip, took a long, steady breath, and breathed out as she squeezed the trigger. As the bullet flew from the barrel of her rifle, she burned powder charges in her kit, adding extra strength to the shot so that it would soar straight and true across nearly a thousand yards of open terrain. As it approached the enemy, she nudged the bullet down and to the right. The bullet skimmed the outer layer of the Privileged’s shield of hardened air and slammed into the bone-eye sitting next to him, snapping her head back and sending her tumbling from the saddle.

  The Privileged whirled, watching his companion fall, right as a bullet tore through the base of his spine from the opposite direction. Another bullet killed the captain of the Privileged’s guard, while two more bullets downed nearby officers.

  Vlora allowed herself a victorious smile, glancing across the valley to where Taniel hid on the hillside opposite her. Somewhere to his left were Davd and Norrine, but Vlora didn’t take the time to pinpoint them before turning her gaze back to the battle.

  The Dynize faltered, the courage their bone-eye supplied suddenly gone. Some tried to flee back down the column, though there was no space for them to go, while others abandoned their horses and took cover in streambeds and ditches. Vlora found Olem standing with her rear guard, keeping them in check so that they held their ground. More than a few of them would want to press an attack, but Vlora had no interest in taking a single step back toward Yellow Creek.

  The trap had drawn out the brigade’s Privileged and bone-eye, and Vlora pulled a mirror out of her pocket, flashing it toward Olem. He nodded t
oward her, giving an order to pull back. Let the Dynize stumble over their dead and wonder when the next ambush would come. In the meantime, the Riflejacks would march double time to catch up with the capstone and continue their sprint toward the coast.

  Vlora was just about to climb down from her perch when her preternatural senses picked up something she did not expect—not up here. It was the sound of hooves on gravel, as well as the jingle of cavalry kit. It was, alarmingly, coming from behind her.

  She swung her rifle around and over a branch, shifting her position so that she could face toward the crest of the ridge behind her. To her surprise, she saw well over a hundred Dynize cavalry in their shining breastplates mount the ridge and fall into line. She swore to herself angrily, wondering what damned goat track they had found to be able to flank the Riflejack position. The dragoons hadn’t just been buying time for their Privileged—they’d been buying time for their cuirassiers as well.

  The charge was not an ideal one—through a screen of trees that hid the cuirassiers from the Riflejacks, across a tiny streambed, and then over a rocky field. Not ideal, but certainly possible, and with success it might be able to shatter her rear guard.

  The cuirassiers finished falling into line, and their officer raised his sword.

  “Piss and shit,” Vlora growled. She dropped her rifle to the ground, hoping it wasn’t damaged in the fall, and awkwardly pulled her pistol. Just as the officer lowered his sword, she pulled the trigger, floating a bullet fifty yards and, with an extra flare of powder, put a neat hole through his breastplate.

  None of his cuirassiers seemed to notice him fall as they plunged over the lip of the ridge, charging through the screen of trees without a word, while the attention of the Riflejacks was split between shooting dragoon stragglers and preparing to pull back.

  Vlora shouted for Olem across the valley, but the noise was lost among the screams of men and horses down on the road. She swore again, reaching out with her senses, and set off the powder carried by the six closest cuirassiers. The kickback of the sorcery almost knocked her off her branch, but the blast had the intended effect—causing the cuirassiers to falter, and Olem and the rear guard to look toward their left.