by Tom Lloyd
Come evening, Safir’s prayers were only fitfully answered. The wind had continued all through the day so there was no thick cover of cloud come nightfall. The upside was it gave them a better view of the city that defended the approach. They arrived comfortably after dusk – only the good roads and lack of patrols allowing them to travel so late.
Seiteil turned out to be nestled between two hills at the edge of a great plain, the high pass somewhere beyond. Lynx knew it was close, the Sons had extensive maps of this region, but there was only a barest outline at night.
The city itself was a strange sight – old and elegant with massive stone buildings. Several palace-like structures accompanied a huge temple, but no city wall at all. While it guarded the approach to the holy valley, overlooking the road that wound up past it towards the Seit pass, it seemed incapable of defending itself. More to the point, it didn’t look like they were even going to try.
‘Never needed walls,’ Anatin commented as they kept to the cover of the treeline. ‘Almost a boast in these parts. Still, anyone seen a city so quiet?’
He received only grunts in reply. The city was small, an administrative heart and temple complex that had sprawled into something greater, but they still had a good view of the whole place. There were lights and trails of smoke on the air, but very few. Either they were hiding and it was a ruse, or even Seiteil had been largely abandoned.
‘No army’s ever been mad enough to come here since the fall of the old kingdom I’d imagine. Given what’s behind them, who wouldn’t make for safety?’
In the darkness and at such a distance, Lynx could only imagine it, but the Sons had provided a detailed description of the pass defences. Two great towers with a long wall between and siege weapons running the entire length. No doubt it had taken hundreds of stone mages to create it, given they backed onto statues of the Order’s founding figures two hundred feet high. A man and a woman, both armed and armoured, stared imperiously down at the plain below, while the towers were still broad enough for the largest war engines.
‘More likely they’ve gone elsewhere,’ Anatin said. ‘Bastard Charnelers ain’t exactly known for their human kindness. Don’t they have rules about people entering the valley?’
‘If the Lord-Exalted’s at the front of the column, they’ll open the way.’
‘And shut it again as soon as the prick’s inside.’
Anatin’s comment drew a grudging nod from Toil, but there was little evidence of soldiers or civil watchmen anywhere.
‘Kas, you and Brel head down there, see what you can see.’
The company scouts slipped away without a word. The Cards settled down for a long wait, setting a makeshift camp in the dark with little prospect of decent food. Each minute dragged on like an hour. A scattering of rain came and went, while the only wildlife they saw were elementals – shadowshards making their ineffable progress across the fields and orchards, the bright burst of a firedrake high in the sky.
When they finally returned, Kas confirmed their suspicions. There seemed to be no sentries at the city and almost no activity on the outskirts. Even splitting up, she and Brel had been unable to find any signs of hidden troops. Seiteil was a hollow city. Those remaining residents cowered in its inner parts, hoping to weather the storm. Not one uniform or weapon was visible. It was either an incredibly orchestrated ruse performed on a night when they would have known the enemy couldn’t be within striking distance, or things were just as they appeared.
Toil and Anatin discussed it at length while the Cards shivered around them. Finally, the order was given.
‘Marked Cards, let’s move out,’ Toil said.
‘Out?’ Safir asked. ‘Where?’
‘We skirt the city, come around on the western side and ascend through the scrub on that flank.’
‘Totally bloody exposed all the way.’
She nodded. ‘But they don’t have eyes like us. It’s a damp and dark night. In these coats a small group will be invisible from up on those towers. It’s the only flaw there is because it’s not much of one most of the time, unless a small group can sneak mage-spheres all the way up that hill.’
‘What do we do once we’re there?’ Safir pressed. ‘We’ve got, what? Half a dozen grenades? Nothing that can breach those walls. You planning on just leaving a rude message then slipping away again?’
‘Then we see what there is to see. Work out how best to employ our two mages.’
‘Oh great. Perfect. Just so long as you’ve got it all worked out.’
‘Have a little faith, my friend,’ Toil said with a half-seen smile.
‘Yeah, I’m noted for the strength of my faith,’ Safir spat, but hefted his gun all the same.
Chapter 29
The group of Cards moved as fast as their slowest member allowed. Of the twelve, Atieno was both the oldest and least mobile, given his tempest magic had caused some bones in his foot to turn to stone. It was a common side effect of his magic and one that had been alleviated in part at Jarrazir, but it was still a problem.
The countryside was almost entirely empty. Most of the local farmers had escaped with the herds, but not all, and Kas insisted on stealth as they travelled. Sitain did what she could for Atieno, her night magic able to relieve some of the pain he felt. All the same it was more than three hours before they reached the foot of the slope they needed to ascend.
In the limited cover they found under a stunted pine tree, the group took ten minutes to eat and drink before their ascent. Atieno wasn’t the only one to be feeling the effects of recent days and months. As Lynx looked round at his companions his mage-touched eyesight could pick out the sharper lines of their faces still. They were growing gaunt, easy days and indulgent nights long behind them now.
He resisted the urge to pat his own belly, now less ample than it had been in a few years. Months of limited rations and marching will do this to a man, he reflected with a small smile. The humour didn’t last. Before long he remembered an incident of a few days past. Nothing dramatic, but it had stuck with him all the same.
They’d stopped at a small lake to fill their waterskins and Lynx had caught a glimpse of his reflection in the water. It wasn’t exactly a young face that had looked back at him. The decade since the end of the Hanese conquest hadn’t been kind. All the same it was his younger self there. A leaner figure than the man he’d become, one who believed utterly in the rightness of his mission.
Have I slipped back into the man I was?
He shook his head. Those years hadn’t been kind, but nor had they been ignored. Lynx wasn’t the easily fooled youth he’d once been. He wasn’t blindly following an empty cause now. Whether or not Toil had the same force of personality as the Shonrin, So Han’s deposed warleader, he believed because of all that had happened in his life, not despite it.
The image lingered in his mind though. The thin face and hard eyes of a man on campaign. And now he was creeping through the darkness to strike where the enemy least expected.
Mebbe you can’t ever escape your past, who you are. Or mebbe I was just too scared to properly try.
As they prepared to set off, Toil warned them to keep silent from there on. Lynx took one last look at the faces around him. Toil herself, so strong and assured, Safir and Layir, composed and graceful in their every action. Kas and Aben, naturally at ease and welcome in almost any company, while Estal put him in mind of some ancient goddess, one face warrior, the other mystic.
Granted, Deern was still just a self-serving arsehole, but overall this was company to be proud of. Anatin had assembled more of a jigsaw puzzle than a neat deck of cards, but with all these awkward shapes around him, Lynx found a fit that suited his own.
The climb up the slope would have been difficult during the day. In the wake of rainfall and at night, Lynx could see how the defenders might be complacent – if indeed they were. There were no lights to see above them. No sign whether Knights-Charnel dragoons were waiting there to rain fire on intruders o
r had decided to turn in for an early night. Without their mage-blessed eyes it would have been near impossible. Certainly, more than one of them would have tumbled backwards. As it was, they made slow but steady progress. A laboured walk where they used mage-guns as walking sticks, rather than blind peril.
It took a good few hours more to reach the top. Atieno and Sitain both needed regular assistance and they were near exhaustion by the time they reached the base of the western tower. There they rested on a narrow shelf of ground with their backs against the smooth mage-cast rock. Too tired to think let alone talk, Lynx drank a little water and tried to ignore the cold in his bones.
Once he’d failed to do that he turned his attention to where they were sitting, hoping that the awe and absurdity of camping at the base of his enemy’s fortress would distract him. It didn’t, but the sight of that sloped stone stretching far above his head did spark a jolt of fear. Up close the walls were intimidatingly big – unassailable and housing some of the most terrible weapons known to man.
Toil worked her way over to him and wedged herself between Lynx and Atieno, whom he’d been helping for the last stretch.
‘We don’t have many grenades,’ she said, softer than the passing breeze. ‘What could you do to this rock?’
Atieno scowled and placed his hand on the rock. For a worried moment Lynx thought he was going to draw on his magic but the mage simply ran his hand over the surface and shook his head.
‘Maybe I could degrade enough to create an opening, but the rock must be yards deep even if it isn’t protected against magic. Grenades aren’t enough.’
Toil nodded. ‘Thought as much.’ She patted the mage on the shoulder. ‘You rest. I’m going further down. I’ll send for you, okay?’
Atieno nodded as Toil headed along the tower base. Lynx watched as she moved to the rough sheet of rock that underpinned the blockish building beside the tower base. Toil paused to listen for sounds above, but it seemed she could hear nothing. The wind was in their faces, coming down from the north-east, so it should bring them some sounds of the garrison. Looking up, there were no visible lights – no movement or anything else.
Slowly, Toil made her way until she reached the earthworks – a hundred-yard stretch of bare slope topped by a wall the height of a man. It was the weakest part of the line, but any sentry would be mere yards away. There she stopped, pressed flat against the cold earth, and listened again. After that she headed on, slithering along the base of the earthworks. Before long she was swallowed by the darkness and Lynx was left just guessing.
Somewhere over that way was a road. The Sons said it was protected by a stone gatehouse the size of a small castle, armed to slaughter anyone who made it past the longer-ranged weapons of the towers. Toil was out of sight for ten minutes or more, long enough that Lynx started to worry she’d been taken. When she returned it was to pull Sitain and Kas out from the group. Those three repeated her journey with the sharp-shooting Suth bringing up the rear.
When something finally happened, Lynx flinched so hard he almost lost his footing and went tumbling down the hillside. His hand and cheek began to glow so he doubled over to hide any light from above. The rush of magic flowing through his body remained strange, for all that he’d felt it more than a dozen times. This time, though, the surge was strong – artlessly yanked to the fore by Sitain’s imperfect skills. Tattoos tingling, bones aching, Lynx could only close his eyes and focus on the great wash of power running through him.
Away in the distance he sensed a pulse of magic puncture the night – blackness upon blackness. The power bled away, leaving only a prickle in his fingertips and a hollow sensation of fatigue. Lynx opened his eyes and saw the others, except Atieno, wincing or gasping for breath. The old tempest mage sat more upright, eyes wide and darkly gleaming at the power in his bones.
Lynx heaved himself up and moved down the line, mage-gun at the ready. He nudged every Card he passed with the hard butt of his gun, knowing that they would need to be ready to move. There were more than a few scowls by the time he’d finished, but the faces were alert and they filed after him. Reaching the lower wall, he paused and soon caught sight of Toil coming the other way. She signalled for them to attack using the clipped gestures of So Han’s army, to Lynx’s intense surprise.
‘Ain’t that sweet?’ Deern breathed into Lynx’s ear. ‘She’s learned your language.’
‘When the fuck did that happen?’ he whispered.
‘Who cares – what’d she say?’
‘Silent attack, move through the town … well, tower, I guess she means.’
‘Limited vocabulary, your lot,’ Deern muttered. He broke his gun open and withdrew the icer from the breach. ‘Silent attack – right then. Sitain specials it is.’
Deern looked behind him and waved a new mage-cartridge at those behind him. They couldn’t see much, Lynx guessed, but Deern put his fingers to his lips to make it clear and the rest reloaded. Lynx was last to do so, still reeling from seeing signals he’d not used in years. Eventually his fingers found the black-painted clay with an S scratched into the surface.
‘If we all die, it’s your fault,’ Deern added as Lynx slotted the cartridge home.
‘Always an upside,’ Lynx muttered as he crept forward.
The earthwork slope was steeper, but short. Under the cover of darkness, Lynx was able to kick shallow footholds around clumps of grass and ascend to the wall atop. Once there, he set his back against the stone and interlocked his fingers. Deern put a steadying hand on Lynx’s shoulder and allowed himself to be boosted up and over. Without waiting to hear the result, Layir stepped up to do the same and went over.
There were no gunshots so Lynx counted that as a good thing as he sent Safir on his way. The rest went in quick succession with Aben coming last. He scrambled up with Lynx’s shoulders groaning at the big man’s weight, but Lynx was glad of Aben’s size when it came to needing someone to haul him up. In moments they were crouched on a deserted walkway. Nearby was the foot of a curved stair that led up to the higher station. Behind that was the tower itself, both still looking dark.
They ascended the stair, Deern in the lead and Lynx behind him. The higher platform was also deserted. The Cards exchanged puzzled looks then moved on. Ballistae and mangonels stood overlooking the valley below while three larger trebuchets loomed behind them.
They reached the door without incident. Deern discovered it wasn’t locked, despite the lack of guards. He eased it open and entered. The room was bare aside from a stairway and a cart, while at the back stood what seemed like a large cupboard in a chimney. Lynx had seen such things many times before, used for ferrying mage-spheres up from the secure magazines. A quick check showed no life in the other lower rooms so they started to ascend. Finally, somewhere above them, Lynx heard a noise and he almost gasped with relief. Just the clump of feet and murmur of voices – nothing alarming and a relief for those fearing surprises.
They worked their way up several levels, finding more empty rooms on each until they neared the top. There Lynx made out voices more clearly. They didn’t sound alarmed so Lynx kept on moving until he felt Safir’s hand on his shoulder. The Knight of Snow clearly had decided it was time for seniority and moved ahead, directing Layir to watch the stair to the upper platform.
He arranged the Cards at the door and made sure Atieno was well clear. Indicating that he’d shoot first, then Lynx, Safir knelt and shoved it open. A wash of warm air, thick with the smell of sweat and food, met them. The startled faces of three Knights-Charnel, cheeks flushed with drink, looked up. Safir fired, the new cartridge emitting a bare hand-clap of sound as a grey coil flashed forward to strike the middle Charneler.
A small cloud of smoke seemed to burst around her, insubstantial and feeble-seeming. She had just enough time to look startled before she folded up and collapsed like a dead thing. The man beside her followed an instant later. The third Charneler, a pale young man with a patchy first attempt at a beard on his cheeks, yelp
ed and threw up his hands, eyes half-closed as he anticipated being shot.
Lynx stepped forward but didn’t shoot, seeing the soldier was unarmed. Instead, he scanned the room, a sparse bunkroom with an iron stove in the centre and a long table to one side. There were more bottles than anything else, the room slovenly as though they’d almost been confined here. He advanced, checking the corners before turning his attention to the terrified Charneler.
‘Where’s the rest?’ Safir demanded in Parthish. ‘The other soldiers?’
‘Soldiers? Gone!’
‘What do you mean? Gone where?’
The terrified soldier gulped air as he spoke, each word fired out breathlessly. ‘Away. With Lord-Exalted.’
‘Which direction?’
‘In – into valley! Town soldiers too, through the gate.’
‘From the towns – the garrisons? They’re inside the valley? How many?’
‘Don’t know. Ah, ten – ten hundred? More?’
Safir glanced at the rest. ‘Garrisons from the towns? Explains why we saw no opposition, or civilians. The soldiers left and everyone else just ran. Whatever was eating their cattle would be back soon enough and they must’ve had word of the Sons too.’
‘Did you even know we were coming?’ Deern demanded. When the youth just looked blank Deern repeated the question in his own language and the soldier shook his head, wide-eyed.
‘No word. No news.’
Deern fired more words at him then relayed his response. Several weeks back the Lord-Exalted had recalled every garrison from the towns and cities within fifty miles. With them had gone the senior priests, leaving only their subordinates to tend to the population. Whatever news they’d got from inside the valley, it sounded like the temples themselves were under threat or some sort of disaster had taken place, the youth didn’t know.
What was more certain was what the remaining handful had seen on the slopes, what had indeed slaughtered cattle and prompted the mad flight. Without soldiers to protect them the population were just another food source to the dark, swift creatures that were likely maspids, and various winged predators too. For the last week, however, they’d seen nothing – the Charnelers didn’t know if that was good or bad news. These ones had been drinking their terror away, too frightened to patrol at night given that monsters had been seen inside the valley too.
