by Amy Raby
Kal came up, hooked an arm through the shrouds, and settled next to him. “You can go higher for a better view.”
Janto glanced at the topmast above him and shuddered. Heights didn’t bother him, but up there the motion would be even more exaggerated. “I can see well enough. Ugly night,” he added.
Kal shrugged. “It’s barely blowing. And the rain covers our wake.”
Janto nodded. They’d left the rest of the fleet behind in order to scout the Kjallan harbor. He’d had to shroud the entire ship, something he’d never done before. It wasn’t hard, but there was a dilemma—whether to shroud the part of the hull that lay below the waterline. If he did shroud it, he left a giant ship-shaped gap in the water. If he didn’t shroud it, he left the bottom of the ship visible at the waterline. Either way, an enemy eye could spot the anomaly. Thus they’d chosen to scout at nighttime under cover of darkness. The rain was unplanned, but it helped. He raised the spyglass back to his eye.
“Well?” said Kal. “What’s the word?”
“The attack fleet has left. There are only three ships in the harbor.”
“Good,” said Kal. “No waiting, then. May I?”
Janto handed him the spyglass.
Kal stared through it. “Those are seventy-five-gun ships. They outclass ours. If we double up on them, it’ll be a fair fight, or it would be in open water. It’s going to depend on your taking that battery.” He pointed at the tower at the northwest entrance of the harbor.
“I’ll take it,” said Janto. “You can count on that.”
“I’d like to have the Riorcans with us, for extra firepower in case things go wrong.”
Janto shook his head. “No Riorcans in the initial assault. I don’t trust them to show restraint when fighting Kjallans.”
“Under the circumstances, I’m not sure we can trust our own men to do that.”
“If we cannot, Mosar is doomed.”
Kal pursed his lips. “As you command. No Riorcans.” He climbed down from the masthead. Moments later, signals flashed up in silent communication to the crew. Men raced to their positions, some scrambling past Janto toward the topsails. Sashi leapt back into Janto’s shirt for safety, and the ship began ponderously to turn downwind.
Janto raised the spyglass to his eye and peered closely at the lettering on the stern of each Kjallan ship anchored in the harbor. The Blue Rose, the Reliant, and—gods help him, there it was—the Meritorious. He lowered the spyglass, his stomach tightening with worry. Rhianne had not yet left for Mosar. It was good news, in a way. Her wedding to Augustan might not yet have taken place. But she would be at the palace when his men landed. She would be in the direct path of his invading force, and in the chaos of battle, nobody could control the path of every bullet or the arc of every sword swing.
30
Rain sluiced across the black seawater and spattered into the bottom of the boat as it rowed away from the Sparrowhawk. Despite diligent bailing, water had reached the level of Janto’s ankles and was seeping through his boots. Twenty-four men, handpicked for their skill at gunnery, pulled at the oars with muffled grunts of exertion, forgetting, as did most people inexperienced with shroud magic, that there was no need to be quiet. They pulled into the harbor, veered wide around the Meritorious and the Blue Rose, and headed for land.
Kill, Sashi muttered, his whiskers quivering with anticipation.
Janto’s stomach clenched at the grim reminder. He’d never liked war.
The boat ground to a halt against the gravel shore. Janto jumped out, landing knee deep in seawater, and splashed toward dry land. He wobbled on his legs; the solid ground felt funny after so long at sea. The two brindlecats that partnered his war mages leapt gracefully from the bow. Several of the men grabbed the boat by its tow rope and dragged it ashore.
“Sire, shall we leave someone with the boat?” asked a young man with stubble on his chin.
Janto struggled to remember his name. “Palo, isn’t it?”
The man’s eyes lit. “Yes, sire.”
“We’ll not leave anyone behind, Palo. We’re not going back. We’re here to stay.” Indeed, if they failed here, escape would be impossible.
The men divided themselves into two prearranged squads, each headed by a war mage. Janto gestured toward the steep, craggy shore. “Let’s go.”
There was no path. They had to scramble up the rocks, gear and weapons jangling on their backs and belts. The tower loomed above them, the gleaming barrels of its cannons peeking out from gaps in the walls. Lights glowed within.
Janto struggled up the final slope. As they reached the tower wall, one of the brindlecats growled a warning. Moments later, two men in the orange of Kjallan soldiers appeared around the corner.
Janto drew one of the three pistols he’d stuck in his belt and gestured to the war mage San-Kullen. “On three,” he said, and counted. He and San-Kullen fired simultaneously, dropping both Kjallans. Sashi chittered in triumph. Janto extended his shroud over the dying men to muffle any sound.
It was possible the tower had been alerted, but not likely. The shroud muffled the sounds of the pistol shots, but not the initial cries of the men. It was a tricky business, knowing just when to extend his shroud to include the enemies. Too early, and the enemies would see him. Too late, and their cries would be heard. He examined the enemy soldiers to make sure they were dead, then shoved the spent pistol back in his belt and drew another. “Come on.”
They jogged around the tower to the front gate. Two more guards stood there. Janto’s men shot them and entered the tower.
Inside was a large spiral staircase. Sashi leapt off Janto’s shoulder and raced into the hallway beyond. First door on the left, sleeping quarters, he rattled off. A dozen men in their beds. Second door, five men playing dice. First door on the right, kitchen, two occupants.
They killed the sleeping men first. To avoid discovery, Janto extended his shroud over the enemies before his men slit their throats. Then they moved on to the men who weren’t sleeping. The Kjallans stared in shock, uncomprehending, as their companions fell, blood gushing from the gunshot wounds in their chests, and then took bullets themselves. They turned to answer the cries of fellow soldiers, only to receive sword slashes to their throats. It was butchery, ugly and without honor. It had to be done.
Janto was in the kitchen, where a cooking fire burned and a haunch of venison hung from the ceiling, when the upper levels began to rouse. Heavy boots thumped on stone overhead.
“You and you,” he said, selecting men, “go back and guard the front gate. Kill anyone who tries to escape.”
Five coming down the stairs, warned Sashi.
Janto barked a warning, and the remaining soldiers closed around him, shielding him so he could maintain his shroud through the chaos of battle. When the Kjallan squad reached the door, the Mosari met them with a hail of bullets. Men screamed. Bodies dropped to the floor. Smoke filled the room, obscuring the doorway. Janto and his men held their pistols at the ready. Another gunshot rang out, and one of Janto’s men screamed.
Janto found the faint outline of a man in the smoke and fired. The man dodged the bullet—he seemed to have moved a moment before Janto pulled the trigger.
“War mage,” Janto guessed. “San-Kullen! Tas-Droger!”
The two Mosari war mages launched themselves at the Kjallan in the doorway, swords drawn, their brindlecats snarling and bounding ahead of them. The Kjallan ducked out of the room. San-Kullen and Tas-Droger followed. Steel clashed, accompanied by the terrifying growl of the brindlecats.
“To the stairway,” Janto ordered the rest of his men. “We’ll work our way up. You,” he said, selecting a soldier at random, “help the injured man.” He glanced back at Lago, one of Kal’s time-honored veterans, who sat in a pool of blood, clutching his leg.
In the stairwell, one of the brindlecats stood possessively over a body. San-Kullen presented Janto with a topaz mounted on a chain, the riftstone of a war mage.
“Your
victory, your token,” said Janto. “Keep it.”
They worked their way up to the second level of the tower, with Sashi scouting ahead and calling back to Janto with the numbers and positions of their enemies. The ferret’s joy and bloodlust spilled over the link, but Janto resisted the vicarious thrill. He was no ferret who killed to survive; he was human, and these were fellow humans he was slaughtering. Rhianne’s countrymen. No doubt they had families and friends who would miss them.
There were only a few Kjallans on the second level. His men dispatched them and headed back up the stairs, which ended at an open trapdoor. Rain had fallen through, leaving the stone wet and slick. Kjallan soldiers clustered around the opening, staring down and pointing their pistols at what must have looked to them like an empty stairway, though it was filled with Janto’s invisible war band.
Janto scooped up Sashi and stuffed him in his shirt. No need for scouting. “Fire,” he said softly.
Gunshots roared. The Kjallans returned fire, and the top of the stairs erupted into a chaos of screams and shooting and smoke. Someone slumped against Janto. Janto moved away, and the dead man, one of his own, rolled partway down the stairs. When the pistols were spent, Janto’s men drew swords. They hoisted themselves up through the trapdoor. Janto followed, his hands slipping on rainwater and gore.
On top of the tower, his men butchered the last of the Kjallans. Tas’s brindlecat ripped out a Kjallan’s throat. Nearby, two of Janto’s men flung a wounded enemy over the side of the tower. Janto wrapped an invisibility shroud around the man to silence his screams.
It was finished. His men stood quietly, panting with exertion. The air smelled of sweat, excrement, and blood. A few men were missing. Still, his band of two dozen had killed more than a hundred Kjallans.
Tas-Droger saluted him. “Tower’s secure, sire.”
Janto nodded. “Good work. Reload your weapons and catch your breath. Then we’ll put these cannons to work.”
After a short rest, they cleared the bodies away from the cannons. Janto set two lookouts, one on top of the tower and one at ground level, and sent men to fetch the wounded Lago.
Four of his men had been killed in the final action. That left him with seventeen to man the guns. The tower had ten thirty-two-pounder cannons, better than anything the ships in the harbor possessed. He had enough men to operate two of them.
“Double-shot them,” he ordered, as they sponged the bores. The men loaded the guns with powder, shot, and wad, and ran them out, ready to fire. “Aim at the Meritorious. Her mainmast.” He gave them a moment to aim, and extended his shroud over the cannons to muffle the noise. “Fire!”
The guns roared, plunging back against their harnesses. The smoky tang of gunfire filled the air.
“Reload,” ordered Janto, rushing to the stone parapets to assess the damage. He could not tell where the balls had struck, but the mainmast still stood. Something had been noticed, however, because men began to swarm up on deck, milling about, confused.
The guns were ready. “Fire,” he ordered. This time, the mainmast shuddered at the impact. Then, very slowly, it began to fall. “Next shot, below the waterline. We’ll sink her if we can. Make Kal’s job easier.”
The Blue Rose and the Reliant were waking up. After sending several more shots into the Meritorious, Janto had his men aim at the Reliant. Sailors swarmed into the tops of all three ships, unfurling the sails. It seemed they had decided not to fire back at the tower. Their guns could do little damage against thick stone walls. They meant to sail out of the harbor to safety.
The Blue Rose, the least damaged of the three, got under way first. Janto smiled grimly. It would not get far.
His eyes went to Kal’s fleet at the mouth of the harbor. The ships slipped silently over the water with all lights doused, nearly invisible to anyone who did not know where to look. The Blue Rose spotted the attacking fleet too late, wheeling to fire. Kal’s lead ships got their broadsides off first. Another circled around to the Blue Rose’s stern. Two more moved to engage the Reliant.
“Concentrate fire on the Meritorious,” Janto ordered. The ship was crippled, down at the stern and listing to port. Its sailors could not get the vessel moving.
In less than an hour, it was over. The Meritorious was sinking. Its surviving sailors clung to lifeboats or leapt off the ship and swam for shore. Kal’s fire mages had set the Blue Rose and the Reliant ablaze. The ships were terrible pyres, the flames climbing up the masts to leap for the heavens. Black smoke spilled off them in great clouds.
Beyond a doubt, they know we’re here. Janto’s eyes went to the Imperial Palace at the top of the hill. Rhianne was there somewhere. Might she be looking down at the harbor even now?
A flash of color caught his eye. The tower beside the palace had sent up the fireworks of a signaling pyrotechnic. Soon he saw answering signals from the tower at the far end of the harbor, and from others more distant, on the horizon. It would not be long before they were relayed all the way across the continent.
Send word, thought Janto with satisfaction. Bring reinforcements. A good first step is to recall your fleet from Sarpol.
He turned his attention back to the harbor, where his boats loaded with ground troops pulled for shore. Hold on, Rhianne. I’m coming for you.
31
In the city of Riat, Janto and his army met almost no resistance. The streets were deserted. Most of the streetlamps were extinguished, forcing them to light their way with blue magelight, which reflected off the tall, rickety buildings and cast strange shadows on the ground. Janto felt as if he’d stepped into the spirit world.
Occasionally they saw signs of life: a pair of eyes squinting through a cracked shutter, the patter of fleeing footsteps. At one house, a small boy watched them from the porch, idly sucking a finger, until a woman flew out the door, grabbed him, and disappeared inside.
Janto looked up at the palace on the hill, where the Kjallan troops had to be mustering. He couldn’t see them yet.
A musket cracked behind him, and a man beside him screamed. Janto whirled, along with half the marching column. One of his soldiers was down. Men clustered around the injured man, while others pointed at a pile of wine casks in an alleyway. Between the casks, metal glinted. Several of Janto’s soldiers fired, and the hidden man appeared, falling to the ground from behind the casks. Silence fell as they awaited more shots, but none came.
Janto shrouded two men and ordered them to retrieve the enemy. They did so, confiscating the man’s musket. He was wounded but alive. The Mosari soldier he’d shot was in similar condition. Janto ordered his Healers to help them both. These Kjallan civilians posed no serious threat beyond the odd potshot, and they were Rhianne’s people. She would not want them harmed.
Neither civilian resistance nor the enemy troops that awaited him concerned Janto; he had them outnumbered and expected a decisive victory. He had all of Kal’s men plus a large Sardossian army, while Florian had only a few centuries of soldiers stationed near the palace, plus the contingent Augustan had brought with him from Mosar. Together, the Kjallan forces amounted to less than a battalion. The greatest danger to his operation was not the opposition, but temptation. There was not a Mosari man among them who hadn’t lost something to the Kjallans—his parents, his family, his home. Now each soldier looked out at the Kjallan capital city, licking his lips and savoring the taste of vengeance. Each of these houses in Riat hid valuables they could steal, Kjallans they could rape or murder. Only discipline and Janto’s authority could prevent them from doing so.
A few days ago, as they’d sailed toward Kjall, Janto had visited each ship in the fleet and spoken to the men. “This is not a mission of war,” he’d said. “It is a mission of peace.” Kjall was large and powerful, he warned them; it would rebound quickly from the damage they inflicted. If Mosar could not establish a lasting peace following this attack, Kjall’s retaliation would destroy what was left of them. “Every Kjallan civilian you murder could bring about the murde
rs of a hundred Mosari. Every Kjallan woman you rape could lead to the degradation of your wives, your sisters, and your daughters. Cruelty and brutality have no place here. Only restraint can win this war.”
The men had avoided his eyes and shuffled their feet. Janto knew what they were thinking. How could peace be established with the Kjallans, who’d razed Mosar’s cities, beheaded her leaders, and enslaved her children? How could such a nation understand any language but cruelty and brutality?
Janto knew it was possible. He’d met one Kjallan, so far, who spoke the language of peace, and he had hopes for her cousin as well. If he’d found two, there had to be more.
He looked over the column of troops, satisfied so far at how they were bearing up. He’d set a good example with his merciful treatment of the man who’d taken a potshot at them. He hoped his men had noticed it.
San-Kullen galloped up on a fine chestnut horse, entering the dome-shaped shroud Janto had placed over half his army. It was a rough shroud, poor in quality and with many defects, but at this distance it should serve. He didn’t want Florian to realize how big the invading army was, lest he and Lucien perceive the danger, slip away from the palace, and escape.
San-Kullen leapt off the horse. “For you, sire,” he said proudly. “The best we’ve found. My men are tacking up a couple more, but I thought I’d bring you this one directly.”
Janto took the reins and hoisted himself into the saddle. “Thank you.” The horse danced and tossed its head, rolling its eyes at San-Kullen’s brindlecat. “He’s not gun-shy, I hope. He? She?”
“It’s a gelding, and no, we tested him. Fired in front of his face, and he flung up his head, but that’s all. He’s levelheaded,” said San-Kullen. “Most of the animals we can’t use at all. They’re afraid of the cats, or gunfire, or both.”
“Find us some more,” said Janto. “Twenty at least. Sensible animals, but they don’t have to be perfect. We won’t be using them for combat.”
