The other obvious approach was to throw his entire might against Blue herself, hope to score a quick victory there before Beleth moved. But what were the chances of that? He was fairly sure he could overrun the Faeries of the Light eventually. But soon …? Unlikely. And even if it only took him days, there was no guarantee Beleth would not attack at once.
General Procles, the senior field commander, had already emerged to greet him, flanked by three of his aides. Hairstreak waited until he was within earshot, then called out, ‘Send your men away, Graphium – this is private.’ He dismissed his own people with a casual wave.
Procles was a tall, thin man, slightly stooped for a soldier. There was a deferential air about him that belied a steely character beneath.
‘I take it the mission was unsuccessful, Lordship?’ he said promptly.
Hairstreak shrugged. ‘My niece will not give her decision before tomorrow. Perhaps not even then.’
‘Will she stand down her forces in the interim?’
Hairstreak shook his head.
‘Do we know why?’ He was a shrewd General. His question really meant, Is there room for compromise or negotiation?
‘She does not trust us.’ Hairstreak sighed. ‘Perhaps we have given her some cause.’
Typically, Procles let it go. ‘Do you have a contingency plan? In the event of her refusal?’
Hairstreak sighed again, more deeply this time. ‘A desperate one, Graphium. That’s why I sent our people away. I want you to hear what I have in mind and I want your opinion. Then, unless you can convince me there is another, better way, I want you to take immediate action. Immediate,’ he stressed. ‘I cannot say how much time we have, so speed is essential.’
Procles nodded gravely. ‘I understand, Lordship.’
Hairstreak held his eye. ‘This is how I analyse the situation. If we are overthrown by the Faeries of the Light, that will be a tragedy. If we are overthrown by Beleth, that will be the greatest disaster in the history of the Realm. Neither ourselves nor the Lighters would ever recover. Our world would become a slave state with the demons as our masters. Do you concur so far?’
Procles nodded again. ‘Yes. If we are overthrown.’
Hairstreak said, ‘Clearly, we will endeavour to secure ourselves against either eventuality. We may even succeed, but I doubt it. I believe we might defeat Beleth or we might defeat Blue, but we will not defeat both. Anyone who thinks so is a fool.’ He stared at Procles, who shrugged slightly. Hairstreak went on, ‘It is my conclusion that, in such circumstances, we must ensure the defeat of Beleth as our absolute priority. Do you concur?’
‘Of course. This is precisely why you have offered an alliance to the Queen.’
Hairstreak said. ‘She may easily refuse it. Blue is obsessed with fighting us. She does not – will not – see the greater threat. And it may be too late by the time she comes to her senses. Let me speak frankly with you, Procles …’
‘Of course,’ Procles murmured.
‘Our pre-emptive strike has not been as successful as I anticipated. The Faeries of the Light are now counterattacking Yammeth Cretch. Our troops are holding them at the moment, but if Beleth moves, we are lost. Thus –’ he took a deep breath, ‘– it is my conclusion that we must throw every available man into a massive attack on Beleth’s forces in the desert. Not merely the reserve troops here, but our forces presently engaged with the Faeries of the Light.’
‘Even though the Queen has not agreed a ceasefire?’
‘Yes.’
Procles looked stunned. ‘You’re prepared to leave the Cretch and city undefended?’
Hairstreak nodded sourly. ‘Effectively, yes.’ He shrugged. ‘Oh, we can deploy a few militias of men who are too old or too ill to take part in the main offensive. They may delay the Lighters a little, but frankly I am prepared to sacrifice the entire Cretch – should it come to that – for the sake of a quick victory over Beleth.’ He hesitated. ‘But there is one more thing …’
Procles waited.
Hairstreak said, ‘Not all Nighters live within the Cretch. Simultaneous with our attack on Beleth there must be an immediate uprising by every loyal Faerie of the Night throughout the Realm. We can set the Realm alight within hours and with luck this may keep the Lighters occupied just long enough for us to dispatch Beleth. If that happens and if we can close down the portals again and if we don’t lose too many men in the process, we may then turn our attention to the problem of Queen Blue. Possibly we may have enough strength to depose her, if we cannot defeat the Faeries of the Light completely.’ He stared at Procles. ‘I would appreciate your comments.’
‘There are a great many ifs in your plan, Lordship.’
‘Do you have a better one?’
Procles shook his head. ‘No, Lordship.’
‘Then set the contingency in place. Our commanders are to act on it as soon as they are able. Preferably tonight.’ Hairstreak turned on his heel and strode back to his flyer. As he climbed aboard, he added half to himself, ‘And pray to Darkness this is the right decision.’
Eighty-nine
Pyrgus stopped, locked by a weird, almost overpowering sensation of unease.
‘What’s the matter?’ Nymph asked at once.
‘Something’s wrong,’ Pyrgus said. By his reckoning they were very close to where they’d left the flyer, so close all he’d been thinking about was getting back. But now …
He looked around. The Trinians, who’d been escorting them cheerfully until now, had disappeared. The desert stretched endlessly behind them, rocky, desolate and bare.
‘Nagel …?’ he called out urgently.
The orange dwarf materialised at once from behind a rock. ‘Eeper dahn!’ he hissed, glaring.
Pyrgus looked at Nymph.
‘He wants you to be quiet,’ she told him.
‘Ask him what’s going on. There’s something wrong.’
Nymph started to speak, but before she could utter a word, Nagel put a finger to his lips, caught her by the hand and led her crouching up a rocky outcrop. Pyrgus stared after them for half a second, then followed.
It was almost a repeat of what had happened when they topped the rise and saw the Hael legions camped in the deep desert. Following on Nagel’s urgent signs, they raised their heads carefully.
A small contingent of men wearing the grey-black uniform of the elite Nighter Scout Regiment was moving grimly across the desert in the direction of Beleth’s waiting legions.
‘God of Light,’ groaned Pyrgus. ‘Those are messengers. Hairstreak’s joining up with Beleth. He has to be. We’ll be facing them both now.’ He looked around for Woodfordi. The palace needed to know about this new development at once.
Nagel said something in a whisper.
‘We must pull back from this position,’ Nymph translated. ‘There may be more following. If we stay here we’ll be discovered.’
The Trinian was already on his way to lower ground. Pyrgus and Nymph scrambled after him. For a frustrating fifty minutes they followed the Trinian tribe, moving silently from cover to cover, until Nagel called a halt in a shallow crater ringed by a sulphurous fumarole fog.
‘He says we’re safe here,’ Nymph explained.
Pyrgus’s nose wrinkled. ‘I can see why.’ To Woodfordi he said, ‘Can you talk to my sister – Queen Blue? Can you talk to her directly?’
Woodfordi shook his head. ‘Doubt it, sir. Her Majesty doesn’t usually have a CC handy. Word is she doesn’t hold with us for some reason, sir.’
‘OK, put me through to Madame Cardui again. She can relay the message.’
‘Yes, sir.’ Woodfordi sank down into his impossible squat and crossed his eyes. After a while he uncrossed them again. ‘Can’t seem to make the connection, sir.’
‘Why not?’ Pyrgus demanded. ‘Doesn’t the Painted Lady have her CC handy?’
‘It’s not that, sir. It’s Orion. He’s not responding.’
‘Who in Hael is Orion?’
Woodf
ordi said soberly, ‘Hardly in Hael, sir. He’s the Communications Angel. So it’s more like “Who in Heaven is Orion”, sir, if you get my meaning. Calls himself Military Guide and Spiritual Gatekeeper, but that’s only because he likes wearing uniform. Most of them go nude up there, on account of the balmy weather.’
Despite the urgency of his situation, Pyrgus frowned and said, ‘I didn’t know we were in touch with Heaven?’
‘Military secret, sir.’ Woodfordi tapped his nose. ‘Need to know sort of thing. Shouldn’t really have told you, but I expect it’s all right, you being royal and all that.’
‘Why can’t you get through?’ Pyrgus asked, getting back reluctantly to the matter in hand.
‘Think it might be this place, sir,’ said Woodfordi earnestly. ‘Reception wasn’t great earlier, to tell you the truth. Lot of volcanic activity round here. Ground stresses always influence the energy flow, throw up trapped lightning fields. Affects the network. Sort of like transportation portals in reverse. I’ll keep trying if you like, sir, but my guess is it won’t improve until we get out of the deep desert.’
But suddenly Pyrgus wasn’t listening. He had the look of somebody struck by a sudden idea.
‘What?’ Nymph asked.
‘Portals!’ Pyrgus said. He looked around urgently. ‘Nagel, you called the demons Fluid Dark. Does that mean you’ve seen them in the desert before?’ That’s what it had to mean. Nobody had names for things they’d never seen before.
Nagel nodded. ‘Yar,’ he said.
‘Where do they come from?’ Pyrgus asked. He had the air of somebody pushing down a rising excitement.
Nagel pointed. ‘Ohr ere way yorboat hores alk sides tha ate if.’
Pyrgus’s ears must have been starting to attune because it almost made sense to him. But he turned to Nymph all the same.
‘Over there, the direction he’s pointing, about an hour’s walk away. Apparently it’s beside something they call the Great Cliff.’ She stared intently at Pyrgus. ‘What is it?’
‘Look,’ said Pyrgus excitedly. ‘There’s an army of demons in the desert: we saw that. But we never thought to ask how they got here. Well, did we?’
‘No …’ Nymph said uncertainly.
He gripped her shoulder. ‘It has to be portals. There’s no other way you could transport so many troops in so short a time. Well, you could ship them in, but not without being noticed. So it’s portals. But it can’t be the regular portals – we’d have known if they got them open again – right?’
‘Right …’ Nymph confirmed, even more uncertainly.
‘So Beleth must have set up new ones!’ Pyrgus exclaimed. ‘I know what Nagel means by the Great Cliff. It’s a geological feature in the deep desert, about as inaccessible and far away from anywhere as you’re likely to get. Perfect for Beleth’s portals and perfect for his demon troops – they like volcanic conditions. But don’t you see, Nymph …?’
‘See what, Pyrgus?’ Nymph asked him patiently.
Pyrgus was actually grinning. ‘We can’t do anything about the troops Beleth already has here. But if we sabotage the portals, we can stop him sending any more! No reinforcements. No fresh supplies. It could mean the difference between victory and defeat.’
Nymph looked interested at once. ‘Do you know how to get to this Great Cliff?’
Pyrgus shook his head. ‘No, but Nagel does – he knows this desert inside out. And his people might be able to help. Violet Trinians are warriors. They could support us if the portals are guarded. And Green Trinians are great with technical stuff – Innatus made that little clack, remember – they could help with the sabotage. This is an incredible opportunity, Nymph. All of us together could make such a difference. And if we move fast, we could do the job before nightfall.’ He turned to Nagel. ‘Will you do that, Nagel?’ he asked urgently. ‘Will you help us?’
‘Oh yar,’ Nagel said.
Ninety
Pyrgus was getting a bit tired of approaching places crawling on his face, but he had to admit it was better than being spotted by demons. He raised his head cautiously.
The Great Cliff towered above him like the central spine of the wasteland, a sheer sandstone massif that climbed so high it created its own mini-climate, whipping up dust and sand from the desert floor in confined swirls that looked like whirling djinn.
He turned his head slightly and his jaw dropped. Set at intervals no more than a yard or two apart were the portals he was expecting. But there were more of them than he could have imagined in a nightmare. There were portals by the score, by the hundred, by the thousand and more. They stretched like sentries along the base of the cliff as far as the eye could see. There was no way so many portals could have been constructed in the time since the standard portals had closed down. Beleth must have been secretly building these gateways for years.
There were no visible guards. But perhaps Beleth felt none were needed. Destroying so many portals would need an army of men and even then would certainly take days, maybe weeks. Besides, his secret had been safe for so long he probably thought the work would never be discovered. No one ventured this far into the deep desert: even the Trinian nomads avoided it as much as possible. It was the perfect base for a demon invasion.
Pyrgus allowed his eyes to travel desolately along the line of portals. ‘So much for sabotage!’ he muttered between clenched teeth. Even if they managed to close down one or two, thousands would remain. The effect on Beleth’s war effort would be a gnat’s bite.
‘Wouldn’t be so sure,’ remarked Nymphalis, stretched out on the ground beside him. She turned to Woodfordi, who was lying beside her. ‘What do you think?’
‘Distance apart you mean, Miss?’ Woodfordi asked.
Nymph nodded silently.
‘Tricky to say from here,’ Woodfordi frowned. ‘But they could have been set too close together …’
‘What are you talking about?’ Pyrgus asked.
‘Chain reaction,’ Nymph told him. ‘Portal technology is inherently unstable. Basically you’re creating a hole in reality, so it has to be. Inside any given portal the instability is under control, but it’s still there. You see what that means?’
‘No,’ Pyrgus admitted. He hated it when Nymph lectured him.
‘If we were to sabotage one portal – blow it up, that is – we would trigger the portal’s own instability,’ Nymph said. ‘So our sabotage explosion causes the portal itself to explode; and that’s a much larger explosion. But if there’s another portal nearby, another portal that’s close enough, the explosion in the first portal will cause that one to explode as well.’ She glanced towards the row of portals underneath the cliff. ‘If those are close enough together, we only have to blow one up for the whole lot to go off like firecrackers, one after the other.’
Pyrgus was staring at her in astonishment. ‘How do you know all this technical stuff?’ he asked. ‘Forest Faeries don’t even use portals.’
Nymph just smiled at him.
Pyrgus said, ‘Pity we don’t have anything to blow up the first portal.’ When he’d suggested sabotage he’d been thinking of blocking them up with rocks, an old guerrilla trick that would have left transported demons locked inside the stones.
‘Think we might have, sir,’ Woodfordi said. He rummaged in his kit and brought out a length of painted willow about nine inches long.
‘What’s that?’ Pyrgus asked.
‘Exploding wand, sir. You snap it in half to distress the spell coating, then leave the pieces beside the thing you want to blow up. You’ve got eight seconds to get out of range.’
‘I thought CCs were non-combatants,’ Pyrgus said.
Woodfordi smiled. ‘Still issue you with the kit and give you the basic training,’ he said. ‘Just in case.’
Nymph, who was looking at Woodfordi, said, ‘What’s the problem?’
Pyrgus glanced at her in surprise. ‘Why should there be a problem?’
Woodfordi said, ‘Thing is, Miss, eight seconds is plent
y of time to get out of range of the wand explosion. But if the wand triggers the portal, that’s a much bigger explosion. Much bigger …’
‘So whoever blows up the first portal might not get away in time? Might be caught by the larger explosion?’
‘Might be killed, Miss, yes,’ Woodfordi nodded soberly.
‘I’ll do it,’ Pyrgus told them promptly.
‘No you won’t,’ said Nymph at once.
‘I’m the soldier,’ Woodfordi said. ‘Has to be my job.’
‘You’re our Communications Channel,’ Pyrgus told him fiercely. ‘We need you to get word back to the palace.’
‘Can’t get word back from here,’ Woodfordi pointed out. ‘Orion isn’t answering.’
‘That’s only because we’re in the deep desert. We can use you later.’
‘I’ll do it,’ Nymph said. ‘I can run faster than either of you.’
‘No you can’t!’ Pyrgus bristled.
‘Oh yes I can,’ Nymph told him confidently. ‘Besides, I know what a portal explosion is like and I think I can be out of range within eight seconds.’
‘How do you know what a portal explosion is like?’
Annoyingly, Nymph only smiled at him again.
The argument went on until Nagel crept up beside them and suggested, ‘Ace or aht.’
Pyrgus blinked. ‘Race for it?’ He’d understood Nagel this time and it sounded like a good idea. He didn’t think he’d have any problem beating a girl and Woodfordi had only little short legs.
‘From here to that rock,’ Nagel said, pointing. ‘I’ll count you down from three.’
Ruler of the Realm Page 25
