by Anthony Ryan
“Good pup,” Oskin said, running a trembling hand over the hound’s head. “Best I ever reared. You’ll take care of her, won’t you, brother?”
“I will,” Sollis said. Feeling Oskin sag further he reached out to grasp both his shoulders, gently easing him onto his back.
“Dying amongst the Lonak,” Oskin murmured with a bitter sigh. “My reward for a lifetime in the Order. Perhaps it’s punishment for hating them so. Hate is not of the Faith after a-”
He jerked in Sollis’s grip, letting out a pained shout that echoed through the keep, drawing Elera to his side. “You old fool,” she said, seeing his bandage. It was soaked through with blood now, torrents of it streaming down his side. “Why didn’t you come to me?”
“Leave it,” Sollis said as she crouched lower to inspect the wound. “Please, sister.”
She drew back, briefly meeting his gaze before looking away. “I have something that will ease his pain,” she said, rising and moving to one of her saddlebags.
“Sollis,” Oskin whispered, beckoning him closer. “The sign… the mark you spoke of…” His voice diminished to a croak as Sollis leaned down to put his ear to his lips. “The stables… third stall from the gate…” He fell silent, his breath playing over Sollis’s cheek. Once, twice, then no more.
“Redflower with powdered green hops,” Elera said, returning with a bottle in hand. “I’ve never met the ache it couldn’t banish…” She stopped upon seeing Sollis removing the medallion of the Blind Warrior from about Oskin’s neck. As Sollis pulled Oskin’s cloak over his face Red Ears’ whines became a plaintive howl that filled the keep, drawing the Lonak closer.
“You burn your dead, do you not?” Fehl-ahkim asked, taking in the sight of Oskin’s lifeless form.
“We can’t spare the fuel,” Sollis said.
“Dawn is fast approaching.” The builder jerked his head at his fellows who duly came forward to gather up Oskin’s body. “A man who fights beside you deserves respect in death. Blue Cloak or no.”
* * *
They piled what wood they could gather in the centre of the courtyard, a few shards from the old ruined gate and the brush wood left over from fashioning the fascines. Oskin’s corpse was set atop it after which the Lonak used their scant supplies of lamp oil to douse the pyre. A warrior had relieved Smentil from his vigil atop the tower and he made his testament whilst Sollis lit the torch.
This man was my brother in the Faith, Smentil signed. And my friend in life. Never did he falter in either regard. He lowered his hands, turning to Sollis with an expectant nod.
Sollis chose to speak in Lonak, feeling the assembled Banished Blades deserved the courtesy for the consideration they had shown. “This man was my brother,” he began. “And he taught me many things. He taught me how to follow a track across bare stone. How to read the song of the wind in the mountains. How to trust the nose of a well-bred hound. But he saved his best lesson for his dying breath: it is no good thing to die in regret, despairing of the hatred you nurtured in life.”
Despite their willingness to respect Merim Her customs Sollis still saw little sign that his words engendered any additional regard amongst the Lonak. Rather, they all continued to exhibit only a stern, grudging respect. Smothering a sigh he touched the torch to the pyre, retreating a few steps as the flames took hold. They quickly enveloped Oskin’s body, drawing another piteous howl from Red Ears. The hound sank to her belly and tried to crawl towards the blaze, stopping as Elera crouched to run soothing hands over her pelt.
“I know you came here to honour the word from the Mountain,” Sollis went on, turning to address the Lonak. “But if the beasts come against us again in the same numbers, this place cannot be held.” He exchanged a brief glance with Elera before continuing. “There is a way out, a tunnel. We can escape.”
The Banished Blades shifted a little at his words, but their expressions grew puzzled rather than hopeful.
“The Mahlessa’s vision is not yet complete,” one said, a stocky woman with a stitched gash on her forehead. “We will not be granted restitution until it is.”
Her words heralded a general murmur of agreement from the others, Sollis seeing a certain scornful disdain on several faces. He had thought that, with their shaman laid low, their commitment to this hopeless enterprise might have waned. However, it was clear they didn’t need Verkehla to sustain their obedience. The Word of the Mountain was not to be questioned.
“My brother died in your defence,” Sollis said, suddenly angered by their subservience to a woman they had never seen. A woman he had sometimes suspected might be some mythical creation of their shamans, an immortal illusion designed to keep them cowering to their non-existent gods. “If you all die here his sacrifice means nothing.”
“It means a man who was our enemy helped us regain our honour,” Fehl-ahkim replied. “It means that our clans will speak our names once more and our stories will be shared at the fire without reproach or shame.” He extended a hand to the barrier he had built, gesturing to what lay beyond. “The thing that commands these beasts is not yet slain. Flee like a worthless dog if you must, blue cloak. We are the Varnish Dervakhim, soon to be redeemed in the eyes of the Gods. We stay here.”
Sollis searched his mind for some argument to sway them, but knew it to be in vain. Which left him a choice: stay and die, after having been forced to watch the woman fulfil her dire promises, or find the tunnel and leave with Smentil and Elera… and the children.
“No,” Fehl-ahkim stated with emphatic resolve when Sollis raised the question. “They stay with us. The creature comes for them. They stay.”
“They are innocents!” Sollis exploded, advancing on the builder, his hand going to his sword. “They do not deserve to be doomed by your Mahlessa’s bloody game.”
Smentil came to his side whilst Red Ears turned from Oskin’s pyre to join them in facing the Banished Blades, a low growl rising in her throat. Fehl-ahkim crossed his arms, whilst the Lonak at his back tensed in anticipation of combat.
“They are innocents, yes,” the builder said. “But they are Lonakhim and have learned from birth to honour the word of the Mountain. If you fight us you will die and they will stay.”
Sollis’s hand tensed on his sword hilt. He had no doubt the Lonak was right. There were too many for him, his brother and a grieving hound to defeat. Even so, he found his anger building. Rage was a rare emotion for him. The frequent irritations of life in the Order and the excitements of combat were one thing, but rage was another. It was something he thought he had surrendered to the masters’ canes in the Order House. Now he found it sparked anew. It was the children, he knew that. Their plight stirred long buried memories of hunger and cold suffered in a dozen ruined hovels, of his mother dragging him away from one burning village after another as they fled the king’s wars. Then came the day she took him to the Sixth Order mission house in a border village he still couldn’t name. She held him by the shoulders, speaking in clipped, uncoloured tones that didn’t reflect the rare tears shining in her eyes. I can’t feed you anymore. I spoke to the brothers. They’ll take care of you now.
He met Fehl-ahkim’s eyes and drew his sword, the scrape of the blade leaving the scabbard swallowed by a pain filled scream from above. Sollis’s gaze snapped to the top of the tower, finding it wreathed in some kind of dark cloud. The Lonak sentry who had taken Smentil’s place writhed within it, lashing out with his war club as his screams bespoke terrible torment.
Not a cloud, Sollis realised, looking closer. Birds.
The birds, crows, falcons and hawks moving with an unnatural unity of purpose, whirled around the struggling warrior in an ever denser spiral until he was lost from view. They continued to mob him until he tumbled over the edge of the tower, crashing to the courtyard in a bloody spectacle of flensed skin and shattered bone. Above, the birds wheeled away from the tower before sweeping down onto the battlements below, a dark stream of flashing talons and stabbing beaks lacerating the sentries
on the walls.
Sollis started for the nearest steps, intending to retrieve his bow and use what arrows remained to stem the onslaught, but skidded to a halt at the sound of something very large impacting on Fehl-Ahkim’s barrier. The stone and iron construct shuddered, metal bolts squealing as they were worked loose from the walls.
“Get the children!” Sollis said, taking Elera’s arm and shoving her at Smentil. “Find the tunnel.”
She began to ask something but her words died as Smentil dragged her towards the keep. Sollis took a firm, two-handed grip on his sword and strode to a point some twenty paces from the gate, watching the barrier shudder again as whatever sought entry pounded at it once more.
“He found more bears,” Fehl-Ahkim observed, coming to his side, war club in one hand a knife in the other. The other Banished Blades fanned out on either side, some using their flat-bows to cast arrows at the birds still assailing their comrades on the walls, most readying their weapons as they stared at the gate in tense expectation.
“I think this might be something else,” Sollis replied, seeing how the stone in the centre of the barrier had begun to bulge under the repeated battering. He was surprised to find his rage had gone now, replaced by the familiar mix of anticipation and certainty that always seemed to grip him in the moments prior to combat.
“I don’t know if it’s of any concern to you,” he told Fehl-Ahkim. “But I’m glad I didn’t have to kill you.”
The builder bared his teeth as he barked out a laugh and began to reply, his words forever lost as the barrier shattered and a monster charged into the Reach.
10
The barrier shattered in an explosion of stone and twisted iron, Sollis and the Lonak ducking the boulders that flew across the courtyard. The four-legged beast that charged through the gate stood at least six feet tall at the shoulder, its massive, hump-backed body covered in a thick shag of black-brown fur. Its broad, bovine features were framed by a massive pair of horns, curving out into dagger like points from a dense mass of bone in the centre of its forehead.
“Muskoxen!” Sollis heard one of the Lonak snarl, the stocky woman with the spear. She darted forward, nimbly diving and rolling under one of its horns to drive her spear into the beast’s flank in what was evidently a long practiced move. The muskoxen bellowed in range and whirled, the Lonak woman leaving her spear embedded in its flesh as she dodged back, fractionally too slow to avoid the horn point that took her in the chest.
The other spear-bearing Lonak surged forward as the muskoxen flung the woman’s body aside. It went into a frenzy of flashing hooves and scything horns, cutting down another two Lonak despite the poisoned spear blades they repeatedly jabbed into its flesh. Sollis sprinted forward and leaned back into a crouch, sliding along the mossy surface of the courtyard to slip under the muskoxen’s belly. The star-silver edge of his sword sliced deep, unleashing a torrent of guts and blood before Sollis slid clear. He came to his feet, watching the animal let out another bellow, pain erupting from its mouth in a gout of steam as it sank to its knees. The Banished Blades fell on it, spears stabbing in a frenzy.
A fresh scream dragged Sollis’s gaze to the now open gate in time to see a Lonak brought down by a trio of apes, claws and teeth biting deep whilst a tide of wolves, cats and apes rushed into the Reach. With a shout the Banished Blades charged to meet them and for a time the courtyard became a chaos of tooth, claw, knife and spear.
Sollis ducked the slashing arm of an ape then hacked it off at the elbow, the animal falling dead a second later as the Black Eye took hold. Whirling he saw a snow-dagger coming for him, long body stretching and contracting like a spring as it closed the distance, mouth gaping. A loud, snarling growl came from Sollis’s left and a brown blur caught the edge of his vision as Red Ears sprinted to intercept the cat. The hound’s jaws clamped tight onto the cat’s neck before they enveloped each other in a savage thrashing, tumbling away into the confusion of the courtyard.
Sollis fought down the pang of guilt as he stopped himself running in pursuit. Despite his promise to Oskin, a swift glance around the courtyard was enough to convince him there was no hope of victory now. The last of the warriors on the wall lay twitching as a crow pecked at his eyes with methodical, precise jabs of its beak. The Banished Blades still battled on in the courtyard but it seemed to Sollis that one died with every passing heartbeat. He saw Fehl-Ahkim bring down a wolf with a blow from his war club before a snow-dagger leapt on his back, its elongated fangs sinking deep into the builder’s neck. Still he tried to fight on, flailing about with his club even as blood fountained from the twin wounds. Sollis lost sight of him as a quartet of wolves closed in, masking him in a mass of red and white fur.
Tearing his gaze away he ran for the stables, hacking a hawk out of the air as it swooped low to stab its talons at his eyes. He found Smentil with bow in hand, crouched behind the bulky corpse of Vensar. The stallion had plainly been set upon by multiple beasts at once, his spine clawed and bitten through in several places and his ribs showing white amidst the mass of gore that had been his chest. Sollis took a morsel of comfort from the sight of an ape lying with its skull crushed under one of Vensar’s hooves.
“At least he went down fighting,” he muttered, hurdling the body and crouching at Smentil’s side. “The tunnel?”
His brother jerked his head to the rear then abruptly tensed and loosed an arrow. Sollis glanced back to see a charging lynx fall dead a few yards away. Proceeding into the part demolished stable, he found Elera crouched at the base of the wall, the two children and their grandfather huddled nearby. Verkehla sat slumped and grey-faced to Elera’s left, Sollis seeing with surprise that her eyes were open.
“She stuffed something foul smelling up my nose,” the shaman said with a grin that was more of a grimace. She flailed a hand at him. “Help me up. We need to find…”
“We’re leaving,” Sollis broke in. “The Reach is about to fall.”
He moved to Elera’s side, seeing her using a long bladed knife to scrape away the mortar surrounding a stone marked with the Far Western symbol for tunnel. Most of the mortar was already gone and Elera grunted as she worked her fingers into the gaps, vainly trying to work the stone loose.
“Won’t come out,” she panted. For the first time Sollis saw fear in the gaze she turned on him, though he doubted it was for her own safety. He bent lower, trying to prise the stone free but finding it stuck fast. Hearing another twang from Smentil’s bowstring he tried again, grunting with the effort and cursing when the stone failed to budge.
“Could try pushing instead of pulling,” Verkehla suggested in an oddly conversational tone. Her voice had the dull, distant quality of one about to lose purchase on the world.
Sollis paused then pushed a hand against the stone. At first nothing happened but then he felt it give a fraction and pushed harder. The stone slid into the wall for several inches before coming to a halt. Sollis renewed his efforts, Elera joining her weight to the labour until whatever obstructed the stone’s path was either crushed or pushed aside and it slid free of their hands. Sollis heard it tumble into some empty space beyond the wall, leaving a gap no more than a foot wide.
“Not much of a tunnel, brother,” Elera observed then shrank back as the lower half of the wall collapsed. The passage beyond was cramped, perhaps four feet tall, but wide enough to allow entry.
“Brother!” Sollis called to Smentil. He cast about, finding an extinguished torch that must have fallen from the parapet above, and quickly struck a flint. “Lead them on,” he said, handing the lighted torch to Smentil. His brother hesitated, doubt creasing his brow until Sollis gave him a reassuring nod. “I’ll be along,” he said, hoisting Verkehla over his shoulder.
Smentil crouched and started into the tunnel, Elera pushing the children ahead of her as she followed close behind. Sollis nodded to Khela-hahk who took a brief look into the gloomy passage before spitting and shaking his head.
“Would you rob me of the ch
ance for a good death, Blue Cloak?” he said. Hefting his war club, he turned towards the courtyard then paused and tugged the aged war banner from his belt. “Here,” he said, tossing it to Sollis. “If the banner never falls then neither do the Stone Crushers.”
The skitter of multiple claws drew his gaze back to the courtyard and he flicked an impatient hand at Sollis. “Go!”
* * *
Sollis had to cradle Verkehla in his arms as he shuffled along the passage, his head making frequent, painful contact with the rough hewn roof. He kept his gaze fixed on the partly obscured glow of Smentil’s torch, ignoring the soft but insistent protestations of the woman he carried.
“No,” she groaned. “This is not her vision…”
Behind them the sound of the old man’s final battle echoed along the tunnel. The tumult continued for far longer that Sollis expected, making him wonder if the boasts of the Shatterer of Skulls hadn’t been exaggerated after all. By the time the sounds of combat came to an abrupt end Sollis could see the glimmer of morning light ahead.
The tunnel opened out onto a narrow ledge barely two yards wide. It snaked along the face of a tall granite cliff rising to at least a hundred feet above. A brief glance over the edge of the cliff revealed a sheer drop into the misted depths of a canyon far below. He could see no hope of climbing either up or down, leaving them no choice but to proceed along the ledge. Smentil led the way with Elera following, the boy and girl held tight against her side. Sollis was grateful at least that dawn had finally broken, bathing the cliff face in sunlight that was for once unobscured by cloud. Navigating this route in the dark would have been impossible.
