Exiled: Clan of the Claw, Book One

by S. M. Stirling, Harry Turtledove, Jody Lynn Nye, John Ringo; Michael Z. Williamson

  Sherril passed over the dagger and signed to all the warriors to do the same. His innocent expression put Scaro on alert. He had to give credit to the wily elder. They wanted to get into the stronghold.

  Surrounded by an endless field of ugly slate-colored faces, Scaro marched his warriors toward the keep. Above his head, he saw the flash of metal. More Liskash guards awaited them on the first level. His keen sight picked up not only spears, swords and blades, but chains. Lord Tae intended to bind them before he had them dragged into his sight.

  “Clawmaster…?”

  “Drillmaster, I see,” Emoro said mildly. “Don’t let it happen.”

  “Yes, sir,” Scaro said.

  “Climb,” the brass-hat said, as they reached the wall. Scaro put a foot on the rung. “The females first!”

  “Sorry, I don’t understand your accent,” Scaro said. He swung up, signing to his men to follow him.

  When they had all reached the first walkway, lizard guards reached out to seize him.

  “Lord Tae wants only the females,” their commander said to the brass-hat. “Chain them and kill the rest.”

  Scaro waited just long enough for one of the lumbering fools to come toward him with the chain in its hands. He stepped forward, grabbed the hanging links, and elbowed the guard in the face.

  Momentarily stunned, it let go of the hank of chain and clapped its hands to its face. Scaro came around with a roundhouse kick and knocked the guard off the wall. It wailed as it fell. The guards took so long to react that he had time to whip another with the armful of chain. It dropped its pike. Neer seized it and stuck it between the guard’s feet. It, too, screamed in its death fall.

  “Go, Dancers,” Scaro gritted, swinging the chain back and forth in a deadly figure-eight. He backed up toward them, keeping the dinos at bay. The enemy tried to pass, but he smacked down one after another. Blood lust rose in him as white bones pierced through gray skin and green blood spattered the walls.

  “We can’t get to the ladders!” Ysella cried.

  “Put your foot in my hand, child,” Emoro said. He boosted her upward. She scrambled over the edge of the next level and disappeared. Gilas followed her, finding clawholds invisible to the naked eye. Cleotra shinned up as easily as if it was a level floor. Scaro admired her. He hoped he would get to tell her one day. “Stay alive if you can, Drillmaster. I’d hate to lose you.”

  Easier said than done, Scaro mused. But the others had gone, climbing the walls like spiders. It didn’t matter now what happened to him. He hissed at the onslaught of Liskash guards.

  “Get me if you can, worms!”

  * * *

  Ysella sprang to her feet on the stone walkway and spat out a mouthful of dust. Gilas pulled her up by the elbow.

  “Are you all right, my lady?” he asked.

  “I’m fine,” she said. She wanted to glance over the edge, but the roiling masses of Liskash at the base of the building terrified her. She felt the pounding in her head. Lord Tae was calling them. She would not submit! “Will he die?”

  Gilas twisted his mouth and his ears lowered. “I don’t know, but he’s good, Dancer. I have to protect you.”

  “Run, Ysella,” Cleotra said. Her eyes glowed with anger, Ysella hoped not at her. “We must reach the throne room.” She sped fleetly toward the next ladder. Two guards panted in her wake. Ysella and Gilas ran to catch up with them.

  Their goal was all the way at the corner of the building. Ysella concentrated on reaching it, and not hearing the screams and the clashing of metal. Scaro must live!

  A cry came, not from the walkway, but from behind her. Ysella spun. Gilas lay at her feet. Looming down on her was a gigantic Liskash with a metal helmet and a tunic covered with plates. More of his kind were coming up behind him.

  He reached for her. Ysella cowered.

  “Cleotra!” she cried.

  Her mentor was almost to the ladder.

  “You are a Dancer, Ysella!” she shrieked. “Act like one! You have the skills! I must reach Lord Tae!”

  With that, she leaped for the ladder and swarmed up it. Petru and Sherril stayed close behind her. A claw of warriors went with them.

  Emoro ran back with the rest of the Mrem. He wielded a bronze-hafted spear. “Behind me, Priestess!”

  “No,” Ysella cried. “Cleotra is right! I can do it!”

  She began to weave back and forth before the enormous Liskash. It watched her in fascination as she bounded in past his guard. The ritual of the Destruction of the Great Mountain would serve here. Ysella felt deep inside herself for the connection to the infinite. The power of Aedonniss was with her, as were her distant sisters. She felt the power growing inside her.

  Emoro charged past her and struck the Liskash with the polearm. The point caught between the plates on the creature’s chest. It grabbed for the shaft and twisted. Emoro staggered within a hand of falling over the side. His warriors swarmed over the huge guards. They screamed out war cries that stirred Ysella’s blood. She Danced faster.

  The guards began to look confused. The throbbing in her head subsided. Lord Tae’s presence was driven not only away from her, but from the Liskash as well!

  “That’s it, girl,” Emoro said, encouragingly. He took swift advantage of the first guard’s wavering, and plunged the spear into its open mouth. Green blood spurted out. It splashed on Ysella. She gasped, looking down at the green liquid running through her fur. It was hot.

  The shock made her lose her place in the dance. The constricted feeling came back in force. Lord Tae wanted her to surrender, to kneel on the ground. She felt her knees go weak. The hot sun beat down on her head, making it ache more. She trembled with fear. Emoro glanced away from the guard he had just smashed in the teeth.

  “Help us, Priestess!” he shouted. “Do it for the sake of that boy, if nothing else! He worships your very feet! If you don’t Dance us out of here, I can’t see how we can retrieve him and heal his wounds.”

  “Gilas?” she asked, shakily. “Not Scaro?”

  “Yes, Gilas! He’s a good youngster. I want him to grow up and be a mighty warrior. Help us! Help him.”

  Ysella put her soul into her Dance, more deeply than she had ever done in her life. Gilas was in love with her. She should not have ignored that. When a heart was given, it was a precious gift!

  She flung herself at the enemy. Energy poured through her from the heavens and the earth. She was the volcano, she was the tree, she was the lightning! She Danced under the noses of guards, leading the warriors behind her. They took advantage of the spell she created, breaking Lord Tae’s hold on his slaves’ minds.

  Then she made the mistake of looking back, just as Emoro speared one of the guards in the eye. The bursting of the black orb into dark green goo made her stomach heave. Her rhythm faltered. She hummed to herself to get it back, and found she was chirping instead. She should be angry. They had been tricked into the city to become slaves! She didn’t want to die here.

  Ysella began the Dance again, but her momentum was broken. The guards’ eyes lost their haze, and they pressed forward, stepping over the bodies of their own dead.

  “Retreat!” Emoro shouted, yanking his spear out of a guard’s belly. “Come on, girl, you’ve done well.”

  Priestess, she wanted to say. But she hardly felt she deserved the accolade. The warriors closed around her and hurried her toward the next ladder. The lizards feinted toward them. Ysella tried to restore her link to the other Dancers. They saw the same sun she did. They were together in mind and intention. She twirled, trying to gain power.

  “Dancer!” Emoro shouted, moving to shield her, but it was in vain. A wall of armored Liskash overwhelmed them. Ysella was knocked off her feet by a heavy weight striking her in the back. Her head hit the stone. Color exploded in her vision, followed by blackness.

  * * *

  “This way, to the north side,” Sherril said, pointing over the lead warrior’s shoulder as they came off the ladder. He heard the war cr
ies behind him but did not look back. “We’ll come down right over the throne room.”

  “Yes, sir,” the warrior said. He and the two claws who had sheared off from Emoro’s contingent to escort Cleotra had one Liskash weapon apiece in their grip. Not enough, Sherril feared. Their greatest defenses were the Dancer’s protection against the Liskash noble—and his own brain. He had memorized all the ins and outs of the keep when he had been there. He had flattered Lord Tae mightily to get a tour of the building and its environs, and carefully memorized all that he could about it. The noble knew where they were, but not necessarily where they were going or how they would get there. It was a game of The King Dies, with both sides truly fighting for their lives. Sherril intended to win.

  The long stone walkway on the north was deserted except for a frightened female Liskash who leaped back into her doorway as the Mrem raced by.

  “Curse it,” Sherril said. “Tae will see through her eyes. We will be interrupted.”

  “I will get you through, sir,” the lead warrior of the first claw promised him. He was a big, rangy male with black and gray stripes and a jagged scar where his left ear ought to be.

  The sounds of panting behind them caused the warriors to spin in place.

  “As you were!” Emoro growled, racing towards them. The Mrem were streaked with blood, both red and green. One male was limping on a badly wounded foot. Others bore bleeding gashes. Emoro himself had a cut on his upper arm that missed his shoulder joint. Cleotra’s eyes widened with dismay.

  “Where is Ysella?”

  “Down,” Emoro said, his voice tight with pain. “I set her in an empty chamber and closed the door. With luck no one will notice her until this is over. If any of us live.”

  “One of us must,” Sherril said, with determination, pointing to the ladder. It had been painted to blend in with the wall, but it cast a shadow he could see. “There’s our way up. Lord Tae hasn’t ordered his soldiers to draw the ladders up. He could trap us, but he hasn’t.”

  He pushed past the warriors to be the first on the rungs. Behind him, Emoro let out an exclamation of irritation. Sherril turned to glare, then realized another shadow was looming over him. An enormous Liskash guard with a metal helmet peered over the edge of the level at him. Many more figures were behind him.

  “Greetings,” Sherril said, as if he was glad to see them. “Lord Tae called for us. We were frightened by the battle at the front, so we came this way. Will you take us to his presence?”

  He hadn’t believed it when it worked the first time, nor could he believe that it worked again. Lord Tae was much too confident in his powers. The big-jawed lizard seemed to chew over this information for a while, then stood back.

  “All right. Come ahead.” He beckoned Sherril up.

  The counselor ascended, and straightened out his coat with dignity. The others scrambled upward. Sherril noted with dismay that there was only a single eight of warriors left behind Clawmaster Emoro. The Liskash took the hard-won weapons away from the Mrem.

  “Escort us. We must abase ourselves in his presence.” That ought to please the wretched worm’s ego, Sherril thought.

  Each of the Mrem was flanked by two Liskash guards. Sherril regarded the creatures marching beside him as nonentities, of no importance except as messengers to Lord Tae.

  With spears pointed at their backs, the Mrem ascended to the top of the building and made their way along the hammered-metal of the walkway. It was slippery in the dew of dawn. Sherril looked down. He was not afraid of heights, but a misstep would be fatal. Below, in the courtyard, a square formation of guards waited. They all wore the same metal helmets and leather tunics, but Sherril saw that some were the elite guards that had flanked them the night before, and some were Mrem.

  Automatically, he turned to the right, making for the ladder on the inside of the west wall. The officer halted the line and put a hand into Sherril’s chest.

  “Do you truly wish to serve the god Lord Tae Shanissi?” he asked.

  “Of course,” Sherril said, opening his eyes wide with feigned sincerity. “That is my dearest wish.”

  The guard grinned. “Then it is the god’s wish that you fling yourself off the building and sacrifice himself in his honor.”

  Sherril sighed. “Oh, very well,” he said. “But I prefer that the god himself watch me perform my sacrifice.”

  The guard pointed down. Sherril followed his finger to a shining figure seated on a raised, royal blue dais, surrounded by dull-colored guards.

  “Lord Tae is there. Now, jump!”

  Sherril moved to the edge, and the guards stayed with him.

  “What are you doing?” Cleotra demanded.

  “Sacrificing to Lord Tae, of course,” Sherril said. He spread out his arms. Then he dropped onto his back and braced himself. With his long, strong feet, he kicked both guards under their tails. They bellowed surprise as they plummeted to the first walkway below. The first struck the edge with the back of his head and went limp. The second clawed at the edge, then fell helplessly down, bounced, and down again. Sherril grinned.

  “Is that enough of a sacrifice?” he called down to Lord Tae.

  The commander bellowed and charged at him. Sherril dodged out of his way, avoiding the point of the spear. Emoro signed to his warriors to defend. Petru took Cleotra’s arm and towed her toward the ladder.

  Sherril dodged and dodged again. The walkway was a Mrem-height wide, but that wasn’t much room. The lizards had the advantage of numbers. They charged at him. He took to his heels and ran, his slower foes in pursuit.

  In the courtyard, Lord Tae shrieked his displeasure. Guards made for the ladders on all sides and began the long climb up to intercept them.

  Sherril raced to find a way down that was not filling up with angry Liskash. For once, he had not completely thought out his exit strategy. That is not like me, he chided himself. But at least I buy time for the Dancer. Emoro had her fully surrounded, on the opposite side of the building, heading for the way down. Lord Tae danced and shook his fists in anger. Sherril felt the pressure of his mind, pulling at his muscles to make him slow down. He felt as if he was crawling through mud.

  The noise was deafening. Sherril had to concentrate to think. If Cleotra could break his hold over those Mrem below, they would have allies. Perhaps enough to overwhelm the Liskash noble. If not, enough to get the Lailah to the gates of the city would do. They had to survive. He had to survive. He looked for a hiding place. Yes, there was a door standing ajar just past the corner ahead. He threw himself down the ladder, raced in, slammed the door closed, and flung himself against it. The room was full of rolled tapestries and wooden chests stacked to the ceiling. They were too tightly packed for him to hide among.

  BAM! The door jerked against his back. BAM! Sherril dug in his heels on the stone floor. BAM!

  He was flung forward against the chests, striking his jaw. Sherril lay dazed for a moment, thinking how much his mouth hurt. The door opened and Liskash poured into the room.

  Sherril had not always been a pampered counselor to the clan leader. Once he had been the second-youngest kit in a large family. As the Liskash made for him, he sprang up and bared his claws and teeth. He threw himself on the nearest lizard and bit into his neck. He spat out bitter-tasting blood and kicked the still-flailing body away. His claws lashed out at the next guard. The Liskash screamed as his eyes were gouged out. Sherril wasted no more time on him, but flung himself down and kicked upward with his powerful legs. He raked bellies and buttholes with his toe-claws, driving the wounded out of the room.

  But there were always more Liskash. Sherril fought as hard as he could, but he began to tire. The walls of the small room seemed to loom up and strike him on the shoulders, the back, the head. Hands grabbed him and pummeled him. He was a mass of bruises, but he could not stop fighting.

  He spun and leaped for another Liskash that tried to get behind him, biting his throat and tearing it like one of his feral ancestors.

&
nbsp; Suddenly, he felt his head jerked backwards. He found himself looking into the eyes of the commander who had ordered him to jump. He knew Lord Tae was looking out of the creature’s eyes.

  “How do you like this sacrifice, slave?” the guard captain asked. He raised his fist, and brought it smashing into Sherril’s temple. The counselor collapsed, disappointed in himself.

  * * *

  Emoro watched the guards pouring upward, but they were pursuing Sherril. Good. Lord Tae was ruled by his ego. Sherril had insulted him, so he must be punished first.

  “I hope that leaves us enough time to get down,” he said.

  “That way, Clawmaster,” said his lead warrior, Nemru Ssar. He pointed to a ladder that had just been vacated by a contingent, all of which was intent on pursuing Sherril. The counselor led the Liskash down the west wall and down a level on the south. Eights of lizards scrabbled at the door behind which he had barricaded himself.

  The mental pressure he had been feeling since they came over the wall eased ever so slightly. Lord Tae had fixed his attention on Sherril. That meant Emoro had a brief gap of time in which he must try and get the Dancer as close to the evil bastard as he could.

  “Four of you ahead,” Emoro said. “Lady, Petru, you stay close to them. The other four, follow. I’ll be at the back. Nemru, I’ll trust you to find us a way down.”

  “Yes, sir,” Nemru said. He set off running. At the ladder, he stopped to let two warriors proceed the Dancer downward. Petru slid along the rails like a kitten and thumped onto the floor. Nemru went afterwards, with his remaining warrior. Emoro kept one eye on them and the next on the Liskash noble. Petru kept throwing him anxious looks. There was no time to respond. All Emoro’s thoughts must be on helping the Dancer to her goal. She kept her arms and body moving in the rhythm that brought the gods’ protection. As long as she was alive, they had a chance.

  Two more levels to the courtyard. The next ladder was to the east. The levels got progressively larger as they descended, so it was a longer and hence riskier run. Emoro watched out for the guards.

  Nemru bore grimly down toward a set of steps propped in the southeast corner. It was leagues from where they wanted to be. Emoro almost ordered him to turn back. What they were doing was in full view of Lord Tae. There were no secrets now. It would be a full battle.