“Riuel,” Marcian said to his second, whose single bladed axe was working from side to side, spraying blood with each strike.
“My lord,” Riuel shouted back. His face was covered in blood such that at times he had to wipe the gloved gauntlets over his eyes to clear them.
“Make sure all commanders understand! We take the assembly!”
“Captains of Galaglea!” Riuel screamed. “Take this damned motherless machine out! Echo my command!”
Riuel lifted himself high in the saddle, raising his bloodied sword as a mark.
“All to the assembly!” Marcian heard other captains echo.
“Every warrior against the machinery!” he heard from deeper in the ranks.
Foot by foot they were closing on the high wooden platform that held the machinery.
Marcian remained on horseback as a mark for the others, slaying from side to side, but his arm was growing rubbery and weak from the constant slaughter. His shoulder was racked in pain from each downswing. He was too old for this now. Perhaps as a young man, when he had found the Tarchon Passage; but now—now he felt old and weary, engaged in utter madness.
A worker threw both hands over his face just as Marcian’s blade sliced through them and cut fingers flinging outward, the blade sinking deep through the eyes in a sideways slash.
The Unchurian’s body didn’t fall; it just slumped back against the terrified wall of angel spawn behind him, one eyeball swinging from its nerve root. Never before had he wanted to weep to heaven to stop this, but he had no choice; he had to press onward.
“Pull them back; throw the bodies from our path!” he cried, infuriated.
Thus far, only the cavalry were pressing against the wall of flesh. Marcian heard footfalls and turned in the saddle to see the legionnaires had finally reached the garrison ground—the first thousand of Quietus’s troops. They were exhausted, breathless from their pressed run up the slopes of Hericlon’s vale, but no sooner did they reach the garrison ground, then mounted captains shouted them on, pointing their swords and directing them toward the platform assembly. Without a moment’s rest, they continued their run. They spread out, forming into cohorts, phalanx formation, as their pike lowered. A wall of spears was now closing on the machinery of Hericlon at full run. The unarmed workers of the angel were thrown into utter, unabated panic, clawing over each other, fighting desperately to find an escape from the wall of heavy, cast-iron tips.
Yet, despite the madness, the gate continued to rise. It had enough clearance that Unchurian warriors, armored firstborn, Nephilim, were able to crawl beneath and run to the assemblage, throwing workers out of their path, leaping onto the platform edge facing the Galagleans until soon it was surrounded by a wall of shields. The shields were oblong, oraculum-plated, and all bore the coiled serpent. But these were the children of the lord of death and the serpents ready to strike, and though their eyes were set in flashing red stone, they were skeletal.
“Clear ground for the pikemen!” Marcian ordered.
The weary, blood-soaked cavalry pulled back from the line, pulling their horses sideways to the gaps between the openings of the phalanxes.
“For the love of Elyon,” Marcian shouted as the sweated, weary legionnaires passed at full run, “take out that motherless damned machine!”
They Galaglean phalanxes struck the flesh and fodder, obliterating them. The pikes were soon embedded so deep into flesh and bone they were abandoned. Bucklers, sword, axe, and war hammers began their work. Hundreds of Galagleans formed in squads of cohorts now closed against the few Unchurian prime that guarded the edge of the assembly platform. With the sheer weight of their charge, using the fallen bodies of workers and a ramp up to the assembly, the Galagleans finally slammed into true Unchurian warriors. The most savage fighting Marcian had ever witnessed in his day took place. The Unchurians actually, for the moment, held back ten times their number, fighting like the demons they were. These were the firstborn, the sons of the angel, many seven centuries old, and they fought like the lords of the dead that they were, killing ten, fifteen for each of them that finally dropped. Yet, as skilled as they were, the numbers against them were overwhelming.
Just before the assembly was finally and blessedly overtaken, Marcian saw a rider on a massive horse lower himself enough to squeeze between the bottom teeth. He was unlike any warrior Marcian had seen. He was far from human. His skeleton was on the outside, bloodred, hardened and polished like the finest wood. It formed red armor that sheathed his entire body. His eyes blazed like coals burning from the hardened helm that was both armor and his literal face. Horns like a bull’s curled from his temples. Tips of leathered wings arched above his shoulders between slits in his bloodred cloak. He lifted a war hammer and began to slay, working his way into the Galagleans about him, killing everything in sight. In his other hand, his buckler was no less a weapon, edged so effectively it beheaded those that closed on his left with wide, swift strokes that cut through to the chine. Marcian watched, chilled, as if there had not been enough madness, as if the day had not yet had its share of insanity. In mere moments this creature had slaughtered a dozen men. But he was not moving for the machinery; he did not seem to even care of it. His objective was somewhere else, and briefly Marcian wondered what it could be.
The Galaglean legionnaires finally overwhelmed the platform. The last of the Nephilim standing surrounded the winch operators and continued on fighting in a desperate, furious struggle as the operators continued working the winches, the gate continuing, beyond all reason and sanity, to rise. Finally, a muscled axeman turned his attention to the great center gear mechanism and began hacking at its teeth, blow after blow, like a tree cutter working the forest until finally it snapped, triggering a chain reaction. The wooden teeth sheared away with a rickety sound, flinging bits of wood and debris into the air. The chain jerked some of the Unchurians hauling it upward, flinging them as the weight of the portcullis fell. Those warriors that had been squeezing beneath it were crushed into the ground, vanishing beneath the thick, heavy oraculum as its teeth sunk back into their holes.
The last of the Unchurian guardians fell, and the winch operators were hacked to pieces in furious vengeance. Marcian stared at the massive, unbelievable mounds of bodies and flesh, blood, and bone surrounding the platform on all sides as the assembly tore itself to pieces, breaking apart. Marcian closed his eyes, weary from the sight, and realized he was past his time for this. Had he not witnessed in his day enough death that now he should see such a circus of carnage that it defied imagination? His sword arm felt numbed, so worn out from killing that he just let it drop from his fingers, not caring if he ever found it again. Living through the gathering wars alone had taken his soul. Losing all he had and loved had left him for all the years of his life saddened and broken. But now this. Even more death, more slaughter, this time a carnival of it, a tavern joke, the slaying of the unarmed like the killing of so many children weeping as they were decimated by the sword and axe.
He lowered his head, weary, wondering, briefly, of the god he had prayed to all his life, seeking to answer the sorrows of his hearts. But what god was this? How was it that Elyon allowed such a travesty of all that was true and good to take place? How could He simply turn His face from such madness? Marcian felt so weary his soul was no more than dust waiting to be blown in the wind.
Satrina had kept with the Galagleans, to the rear. She continued searching, but hope had almost faded. How could Rhywder have ever survived this? There was no chance. Her heart failed her and tears fell freely across her cheeks as she stood weary and confused, warriors rushing past her for the gate, at times knocking her from their path. She looked up to see a rider on a massive horse hewing his way through the Galagleans as though they were no more than children. He was mercilessly slaughtering them—a single rider and no Galaglean could even reach past his buckler and hammer. Blood sprayed as Galagleans fell and a rider pressed through them, his path littered by their blue cloaks soaked i
n their own blood.
She knew of these. Her father had told her of them. They were Nephilim, high-blood firstborn who had slain their own bodies to craft new ones grown from pods that spawned a certain wood able to form arms and legs and sheath them all in exoskeletons hard as steel. Just the sight of him chilled her through to her bone. What looked to be his helm, with red iron horns, was, in fact, his face. He was driving forward, searching, but for what? The machinery had been destroyed, all hope of lifting the gate was ended, yet this one continued slaying with purpose. She noticed within his skeletal helm, the faint flow of his eyes as they continued to seek.
He was passing right by her, close enough to shear her neck open with the buckler, and Satrina did not even step back. She had lost all hope. If Rhywder was dead, what use was there? The creature almost seemed to hear her thought. It paused and the head slowly turned to her, almost a mechanical movement, and the faint glow of the eyes bore into hers. She felt him stab through her mind, a probe; it struck with blinding pain as he searched her memories. He slew a warrior coming at his side, knocking Satrina out of the way to have his throat opened. The Unchurian crushed another, beheaded a huge axeman with the edge of his buckler, kicked in the chest of a legionnaire who charged him from the side.
He finally turned from Satrina’s eyes and the probing stopped, leaving her head throbbing as if he had just worked his fingers through her brain. But he had found what he wanted, and he turned with renewed purpose. She followed his gaze. There were tall pikes near the wall of the gate. She noticed bodies hanging from them upside down, tied to the tip of the pikes. She realized these were many of the boys who had been defending the gate. Their hands and feet were bound and carefully selected cuts in their necks were letting blood steadily drip into casks below.
Rhywder had spoken of this, how there were blood drinkers who collected human blood like fermenting fine wine, how it was something of an art with them, how they needed to collect the blood slowly, mixing it properly with the seasonings in the casks. A good brew took time, Rhywder had told her. And she remembered something else, the blood drinkers needed to collect the blood at just the right moment, while their victims were still alive!
The minion killed a Galaglean who leapt for him like it was an annoyance and turned his heavily armored horse toward the pikes, picking up his pace, continuing to slay, but now driving in a line for the pike and hanging boys.
Satrina then gasped. One was not a boy. One was Rhywder! The monster had sensed Rhywder’s lifeblood through her eyes, and now he moved with a single purpose. The Galagleans would eventually bring him down; as omnipotent as he seemed, there were simply too many warriors filling the passage for him to survive much longer, but that mattered little to him. He had only one objective: the creature was going to kill Rhywder—Rhywder the Lochlain, the Walker of the Lake, the valiant one—and Satrina had virtually pointed him out for the beast.
Rhywder was hanging upside down from a briarwood post, his feet and hands lashed tightly. Cuts in his neck let his blood drip in steady splats into a keg below him, letting it mix and brew with the seasonings.
Satrina scrambled to her feet, lifting Rhywder’s short sword.
“Someone help me!” she screamed. She ran and leapt for the minion’s horse, but he anticipated, turned in the saddle, and his boot slammed into Satrina’s chest. She was thrown high, the wind knocked from her, and when she hit the bloodied ground, the sky and commotion about her for a moment went gray.
The Galagleans not only had heard Satrina’s cries; they had already lost hosts of their own to this single rider. Scores of Galagleans swarmed him. A lance pierced through the minion’s underarm—a place where the bone-armor did not cover—but the dark rider ripped it away, even tearing the sinew that held one wing. The wing hung askew. He reared the huge horse, slew a Galaglean axeman in his way, crushed the head of another, but one arm wasn’t working well so he cast the buckler aside, and used only the hammer, swiftly from one side to the other. He pushed his horse onward. Not much farther to Rhywder.
“Nooo!” Satrina screamed, scrambling to her feet. “Stop him! Stop him!”
Two more leapt at him from either side. The first he killed with a crushing blow of the axe. With his boot, he kicked the chin of the second so hard the neck snapped.
Satrina ran for him, clutching Rhywder’s short sword tight in one fist. She was coming from behind this time and perhaps his senses were not as keen. She was, after all, merely a woman and there were armored warriors coming at him from all sides.
He killed yet another Galaglean, then cast aside his war hammer. From a back scabbard, he lifted a heavy iron crossbow. This was for Rhywder. As only Satrina knew, Rhywder was his single target. One bolt was all he needed, and he had used the hammer to clear ground for him, giving him time, and he lifted the crossbow, already loaded with a heavy bolt that would rip any man in half. The only thing he ignored was Satrina, leaping onto the back of his horse. He leveled off the crossbow, using his arm to steady the aim, lowering the oraculum tip on Rhywder’s midsection, even ignoring a lance that buried deep between a break in the armor near his ribs with a heavy thud.
Satrina was no warrior. She had never fought in a battle in her life. But none of that even crossed her mind. The huge horse was big enough that she could crouch behind the upturned back brace of the minion’s saddle, and with all her strength, she plunged Rhywder’s sword into the only opening she could find, a break in the plated armor beneath the back of the head, just below the skull. It allowed him to look up or down, and it also allowed Satrina to plunge Rhywder’s short sword deep, angled upward. She screamed with the effort, throwing all her weight into it, feeling it drive past the spine, feeling it pierce something round and almost soft until she was able to drive it in all the way. Only the crossbars of the hilt stopped Rhywder’s sword from vanishing into the brain of the creature.
The crossbow’s bolt soared upward, blind. The Unchurian arched his back, roaring, furious. He twisted roughly, throwing Satrina from the back of the horse as he reached, clutching for the hilt of Rhywder’s sword. But Satrina had buried it deeply, and even as his armored fingers searched desperately, they were beginning to falter.
Lying on her back, to the side of his horse, she briefly saw the look on his face as he struggled to dislodge Rhywder’s sword, a look of utter astonishment, a look of complete disbelief. And in the last moment, before he dropped over the flanks, his eyes even connected with hers, swearing at her, damning her as he fell.
Satrina had to dive to the side, crawl under his horse, then run for Rhywder. Behind her, the Galagleans overwhelmed the struggling Nephilim, falling on him and hacking into him with savage revenge. He had left a trail of their best from the gate to where he had fallen, a litter of blue cloaks and fallen shields. She saw an arm torn free and flung into the air, the same arm that had wielded the war hammer that had caved in so many Galaglean heads.
When she reached Rhywder’s side, she first grabbed a fallen dagger, then leapt to catch the post and quickly scaled it. She cut the cords that bound his feet, pulled him to the side where they would miss the cask of his blood still brewing with its strange smell of seasonings, and fell with him, rolling on the rock ground of Hericlon. She propped herself against Hericlon’s wall and cut away the rest of the bindings, freeing his hands. She then cut through the hem of her skirt and tore away binding to wrap about the lances in his neck, putting pressure against them to stop the bleeding. Sitting beside him, she held him tight, his head lying on her shoulder. He was still alive, breathing, even stirring. She curled her hand about his and held it in her lap.
There were others being cut down, as well—five or six of the boys who had been selected for blood draining, as well. Apparently, the blood drinkers were picky, it looked as though they had selected the best fit, the most muscular and handsome of the boys, and were slowly draining them of living blood. The blood drinkers would have had no reason to suspect the gate was that same day going to b
e swarmed by Galagleans.
Rhywder slowly came to. He shook his head, ran his fingers through his hair, and looked about, disoriented. He then leaned back and turned to find Satrina sitting beside him. He believed it was a dream, none of it could have been reality, but a strange blood-soaked, chaotic dream in which he and Satrina were sitting against the rock of Hericlon’s gate. He then noticed the tall pike and remembered being hoisted up, tied to it; how the priest, the blood drinker, had so carefully cut the right lashes in his neck to drip his blood out at the proper rate. There was simply no explanation from that moment to this, sitting here held by Satrina. She smiled, seeing he was conscious. He had to blink and look again, making sure it was real. “Satrina?”
“I brought them,” she said, “just as you ordered. I brought the Galagleans.” She was bloodied all over, but not blood of her own. He could see no injuries, and it was truly her, it was Satrina, violet eyes quick and alive, the Cupid’s bow lips, the button nose, and her expression was as if not that much had happened, as if everything were fine, just fine.
He coughed, still difficult to breathe. “How?”
“I told their fat king with his chariot and horses to come save you. I was not going to let you die, Rhywder. I will not let you die. At all. Ever. Do you hear me? Not here, not anywhere. You are staying with me now. You are mine, so get used to it.”
He nodded, still troubled by disbelief.
“Promise me! Say you will stay alive from now on!”
“I … I promise, Satrina,” he said weakly. “You have my word.” He stared at the keg that contained much of his blood, realizing his head was light as a bubble.
Rhywder looked up to find a tall, bloodied Galaglean, helmet still on. He bore wounds and had obviously seen bitter fighting.
“This man helped me,” Satrina said. “But I do not know his name.”
“I am Marcian.” He held out Rhywder’s short sword, cleaned of blood. “Your sword, my lady.”
Angelslayer: The Winnowing War Page 41
