As Iron Falls

by Bryce O'Connor

  With a sharp whistle, he took their attention.

  At first the soldiers responded with all the trained discipline of Karesh Syl’s army. When they registered that someone was behind them, the rightmost flank rolled off the shield wall to turn and protect their backs. When the man found himself staring up at Arro, though, he made a choking sound. It must have been enough to shake his comrades from their focus, because they glanced around.

  For just a second, no one moved, like the Dragon was giving the men a chance to at least turn and face him.

  The moment they did, though, he struck.

  The great spear’s point lanced forward, piercing the middle soldier’s wooden shield with so much force it pushed the man back, ripping it from his arm as he fell. In the same move, Arro himself targeted the left-most man, striking his shield with such a massive kick Aleem heard a crunch of cracking timber, and the soldier reeled so far he, too, tripped and landed with a puff of dry dust next to his comrade. Most unfortunately for the third man, this left him completely alone against the Dragon, who didn’t waste any time. Ahna’s tips were still embroiled in the wood of the first soldier’s shield, so Arro fought one-handed, his sword blurring into nothing more than a streak of steel as his opponent tried to keep his guard up.

  As it turned out, all the training the city could offer wasn’t a match for Raz i’Syul Arro.

  In the space of a single engagement, the soldier’s blade was knocked from his grasp, the Dragon’s sword reversing direction after the disarming to knock the man’s shield out of the way. Then, with a quick step forward, the weapon was retracted and thrust forward, taking the man straight through the chest, Arro's sword driven up to the hilt by the force of the strike.

  Without so much as a sound, the man tumbled to the ground, leaving the atherian’s sword a uniform wet red as the body slid from the steel.

  Almost casually, Arro turned to face the remaining two, who were just managing to gather themselves and get to their feet. Twisting his spear’s head into the ground, he put a foot on the ruined shield and wrenched her free of the wood, tossing splinters into the air. This done, he advanced on the pair as they collapsed into a two-layered defensive posture, the soldier with the cracked shield half-crouched in front, the one without standing behind him, sword raised above his head like a scorpion’s tail.

  The Dragon looked about as threatened as he might have been by a pair of wet rags.

  Again, he led the attack, and again he moved so fast it was hard to follow his movements. He was more careful, now, fighting two trained opponents at once, but from the moment steel struck steel it was apparent the soldiers were several classes out of their league. Arro’s arms worked as though guided by two separate minds, his right wielding Ahna to engage the back-most man, the left bringing the sword out and around to parry a slash the front-most tried to make at the atherian’s legs from behind his shield. The exchange lasted a little longer, this time, the pair managing to defend themselves for nearly twenty whole seconds.

  Then Ahna connected with the base of the back soldier’s sword so hard the blade shattered.

  The man screamed, dropping the now-useless hilt and staggering back as he shrieked and clutched at his face. In a flash, Arro retracted Ahna and threw a shoulder into the top of the front man’s shield. The thing gave with a grunt of surprise from its owner, and the atherian used it like a platform, rolling right over the man to land behind him, between the two soldiers. The sword slashed before either could react, cutting the shield-bearer mostly in two from behind.

  Ahna whistled, her twin blades cleaving through the air, and the screaming ended as the last member of the patrol lost his head and the two hands that had been clawing at the steel shards embedded in his cheeks, nose, and eyes.

  Aleem had expected a roar of triumphant cheering as the fight came to an end, but the savannah was as quiet as it might have been had no man ever set foot in the wilds of the plains. With wide eyes, the slave watched the atherian rise and turn. The beast didn’t have a scratch on him, and was breathing as lightly as he might have if he’d just finished a casual morning jaunt. He flicked his blades clean, sheathing the sword over his shoulder with a snap, and turned to face the men standing not twenty feet down the road. With a jolt, Aleem realized that the entire group had abandoned their advance on the soldiers as soon as Arro had made himself known.

  Then the Dragon spoke.

  “Take anything of use,” he told the men firmly, indicating the ravaged forms of the fallen soldiers. “Then bury the bodies, if you can. Deep enough that the dogs can’t get them. We’ll rest here for the time being.”

  Aleem had never seen any lizard-kind give orders, so it was odd—even if said orders came from Raz i’Syul Arro—to witness men hop to and do as he commanded. The slave stared, mouth agape, as the soldiers of his patrol were stripped of their armor and weapons, a few of the group even breaking off toward the still form of the sergeant near the back of the train.

  There was the clop of hooves, and a shadow passed over Aleem, shaking him from his shock. He looked around, stifling a yelp when he found himself nose to nose with the long face of a great black stallion. He began to scramble away, but a low voice called out soothingly.

  “Easy, friend. Easy.”

  Aleem looked around the horse’s snout to see the man who had called himself “Akelo Aseni” dismounting, more dust fluffing up about his booted feet as he dropped to the road. Aseni—if that was his name—gave the horse a friendly pat before speaking to it.

  “Gale, go to your master.”

  The stallion huffed in Aleem’s face, like it didn’t like to be told what to do, then shook its great head and tromped off. The slave watched it go with his mouth hanging open, following the animal until it stopped, amazingly, to nudge at Raz i’Syul Arro’s arm by the cart.

  Seeing this, Aleem found his voice for the first time.

  “Who… Who are you?” he asked with difficulty. It had been a long time since he’d posed a question to anyone who wasn’t a slave like him.

  Aseni chuckled in response. His bow was back over his shoulder, but he reached up with gloved hands to pull the spiked helm from his head. He was old, as Aleem had suspected, his hair the same mix of black and silver as his beard. The old bruise darkened his right eye in a fading shadow, but his expression was clear, like a man with a purpose.

  “My name is Akelo Aseni,” he insisted. “As to who we are—” he turned his head to nod down the road toward the rest of the group, now paired off to haul the limp forms of the dead soldiers into the grasses of the plains “—that’s more complicated.”

  At first, Aleem had no words for that. He simply watched the bodies being carried off, one after the other, until nothing was left of the patrol he’d been tasked with caring for but a pile of armor and weapons and a few rust-colored stains soaking into the dirt of the road.

  “Are you going to kill me?” he asked finally, not looking away from the spots where the men had died.

  He wasn’t sure why he asked the question. In truth, he had come to the conclusion a long time ago that perhaps dying was the best thing he might be able to manage. His placement in the kitchens had been easy enough, sure, but there were no guarantees in a slave’s life, no promises that things would always—or ever, for that matter—be safe or fair. Not fifteen minutes ago, in fact, hadn't he been worried about being sold off as just another body for the pirates of the coast to grind to nothing in the belly of some ship?

  Now, though, faced with death, Aleem found himself wondering if life was truly something to be given up so easily.

  So when the Percian standing over him answered, he felt that spark of hope, kindled into existence at the sight of Raz i’Syul Arro, shiver and grow.

  “No, friend,” Aseni said. “We aren’t going to kill you. On the contrary. We are here to make sure you learn again exactly what it means to live.”

  CHAPTER 36

  “Of all the titles Raz i’Syul Arro gathered
in his time on this earth, none ever resounded as far or wide as the one given to him by the wild tribes of the Northern reaches. As ‘the Dragon’, Arro became more than a simple name to be feared and respected. After the fall of Karesh Nan, ‘the Dragon’ rose as a symbol of the revolution, a figure to which all those who thought themselves helpless could flock to and learn that, together, they were anything but…”

  —The Atherian, by Jûn fi’Surr

  Raz gave his men till noon to rest. They hadn't been marching all that long—maybe three or four hours since the Sun had first begun to rise over the savannah—but the encounter with the patrol seemed like a good opportunity to grant them all a reprieve from the tedium of the journey they’d been on for a little over a week now, ever since leaving the groves of the eastern coast. Most of the men who hadn't gone off to bury the dead in the prairie lounged about the caravan, sitting against the cart wheels or lazing to nap with arms over their eyes along the cooler edges of the road. Raz didn’t bother them. He himself had been walking along at the head of the train, unwilling to ride if the others couldn't, and he didn’t hate the idea of halting for a while. They were in no rush. So far their cover had held, and no witnesses had been allowed to escape from the now two patrols they’d run into.

  More importantly, it gave them a chance to take stock of the loot they’d been left with from the encounter.

  “Five full suits of armor.” Cyper looked pleased, counting off the folded piles of leather and chain on the back of the cart. “A little bloody here and there, but nothing we can’t wash out at the next watering hole.” He gave Erom, standing next to him, an exasperated look. “Must you always cut their throats?”

  The borderer, in turn, glowered and crossed his thick arms defensively.

  “Arro says ta’ end it quick, I end it quick,” he drawled, jerking a thumb at Raz, who stood between them. “Ain’t a faster way ta’ kill a man.”

  “Because you insist on using those damn things,” Cyper pressed with exasperation, waving at the hilts sticking out behind each of Erom’s hips. “If you’d let us teach you how to handle a sword, then—”

  “Cyper, leave him be,” Raz cut in, lifting a pair of gold-and-white leather greaves from the piles, its right leg stained coppery red. “If Erom wants to stick to knives, it’s his decision. Sun knows he’s got a knack for them.”

  “I can do something about the stains,” Syrah offered helpfully from beside him, speaking from behind her veil to nip off any argument the West Isler might have made as Erom grinned triumphantly at him. “It’s more a pity that we lost the horse. It would have done us good to have another mount.”

  “Aye,” Kalin, one of the group’s three kuja, said with a pained expression from where he sat on the edge of the cart above them, lifting a boot for emphasis. “If Karesh Syl doesn’t end us, all this walking might still.”

  Syrah looked at his feet with what Raz assumed was concern, given that her face was hidden.

  “Well small wonder, with footwear like that,” she said worriedly. “They’re too big. Here.” She reached to pluck a pair of boots from the new piles Cyper had collected

  “These will do better. Then give yours to Harnen. He’s been complaining about his as well. And we can—”

  Raz smiled, leaving Syrah to her work swapping and switching out the men’s attire as best she could. She still didn’t like being left alone without him, but over the last two weeks the Priestess had grown to trust these men, these former slaves they’d freed. She’d found it easier to be around them particularly after donning her white robes, gloves, and veil as the Sun became crueler inland, like the hiding of her face and covering of her hands shielded her from their touch. More importantly, though, she knew the men respected her. Respected her, in fact—Raz suspected—practically as much as they respected him.

  It had been Syrah’s plan, after all, that had borne fruit as they’d been struggling to figure out how to begin their journey west.

  It was a simple thing, the morning after they’d beached the boat, to pry one of the cages from the wreckage of the Moalas after the tide had cooled the iron and receded. What wood had been left for the metal to cling to was burned and brittle, so Raz tasked Hur with breaking it free. The mute man had taken to his task with fervor, he and his axe making short work of the residual hull. After that, they’d hauled the thing out of the wet sand, rolled it up the beach, and let it dry in the Sun. Finally, they’d wrapped all their provisions and equipment together in the sail canvas, plopped the whole bundle into the cage, and tied the bars to Gale and Nymara’s saddles.

  By the evening, the group had been nothing more than a streak in the sand, surrounded by footprints for the tide to wipe away, leaving behind the ghostly remnants of the burned ship.

  The village Akelo had spoken of, it turned out, was several days' march to the north. They traveled mostly at night, surviving on coconuts, roots, and the provisions that Garht Argoan had spared them, taking to the shade of the groves when the Sun was highest during the day. When they finally reached the village, Akelo and Odene, one of the other Percian, took Gale and Nymara into town, the pockets of their stolen pants heavy with most of the gold and silver from the Moalas’ treasure. They’d returned several hours later with exactly what Syrah had asked for: a cart and a draft animal, the oafish ox the men had taken to calling “Omara,” though they never explained the joke. Another day or so hidden in the groves a mile down the coast from the village, and they’d managed to get the cage up onto the cart and bolted securely into the wood with iron nails they’d salvaged from the ruined Moalas several days before. This done, they’d packed the rest of the bed-space with their gear and food, then covered the entire thing with the sailcloth.

  When they’d left the beach for good, it was in a wide arc around the village through the palms, as Akelo had suggested, and within a few hours they’d found the road that had led them west, away from the coast, and deeper into the vibrant lands of Perce.

  They made the marshes just after nightfall, so Raz hadn't gotten to take in the wonder of the wetlands till the following morning. This worked out for the better, though, because it offered yet another opportunity for Syrah to prove herself to the men when the unforeseen difficulties of mosquitoes descended on them in swarms as they left the palm trees behind. The men had to endure about ten minutes of cursing and slapping their necks and arms before the Priestess got a simple ward of protection up around them, disintegrating the insects within with a dozen zapping flashes like firecrackers. After that, they’d spent the evening in relative peace, all of them eventually tuning out the frequent pop as another mosquito drifted foolishly within the border of the magical barrier.

  For the next few days, Raz had been allowed to enjoy the scenery of the marshes with little distraction, taking in the saltwater bogs and cattails and sharp-billed birds that strutted through the reeds on legs so tall they reminded him of stilt-dancers in the streets of Miropa. Every now and then he would make out the sound of approaching groups from ahead or behind them, and before long a rapid system was developed wherein Raz would whistle quietly to get Akelo’s attention, handing Gale off to him before hiding in the sweltering darkness of the iron confines beneath the canvas until the danger passed. Not once had he emerged to find out the men had been given anything other than a curious glance or a raised hand in greeting, and Akelo kept assuring him they were unlikely to come across soldiers along the trade roads. Some of the smaller kuja tribes, unable to make ends meet for their families, had been known to set up ambushes for travelers, but the Tash had never before cared to do anything about it. Sure enough, for the two days it took them to cross the marshes, nothing more exciting happened than Marsus Byrn losing a shirt—and almost a hand—to a crocodile while washing his clothes in the waters one morning.

  Then they’d reached the savannah, and it wasn’t more than a day before things got more complicated.

  Initially, the wild plains of Perce sang with a hearty vigor that reminde
d Raz, in a way, of the depths of the Arocklen Woods in summer. Life was tangible here, thriving in a way it never could among the blistering sands of the Cienbal and Southern fringe cities. Though at first glance the place seemed half-barren—particularly in comparison to the Woods—it didn’t take long for Raz to understand the hidden depths of the grasslands, to see the intricate sentience of the place. Every few hours Raz would have to ask Akelo or one of the other Percian what some animal or another was, or be brought back to earth by Syrah calling his name after his mind drifted off in the soothing sway of the fields. Trees were sparse, with only a few distinct species, but they stood like landmarks in the flatness of the world, a gathering place of shade for land-bound animals and birds alike. The consistency of the marshes was replaced by scattered watering holes as they pressed inland, and at one point Raz and Syrah had allowed the convoy to go on without them for a minute or two, sharing a private joke as they gaped in fascination at a herd of black-and-white striped horse-like creatures Odene had told him were called “zebras.”

  Then, on the eve of their second day crossing the savannah, they’d encountered the first patrol.