And then a horn sounded from the cliff’s edge. A moment later, something struck her on the left shoulder.
From behind.
Her mail caught the blow, but the blunt force of it sent her to one knee, pain rippling down her arm. She half-turned and raised her spear just in time to catch a highlander sword on the haft, inches from her face.
A man in the crimson and gold of Castar’s army stood over her, his face chillingly blank. He kicked Zerill in the chest, knocking her onto her back. His blade lashed out again.
A heavy club smashed into the man’s arm, caving through flesh and bone. His fingers spasmed open; his sword flew free, still spinning toward Zerill’s face. With her left hand, she shoved herself to one side to avoid the blade, and with her right she stabbed her spear upward. It bit through hardened leather, sank between the highlander’s ribs and into his chest. He swayed heavily to one side, and dropped to the ground.
Korv stood over her, with Eian Gryston at his side. Gryston offered Zerill his hand; she took it, and climbed to her feet, breathing heavily.
“We may have been too eager to press our advantage,” Gryston shouted over the noise of battle. He gestured across the field. Men in red were scattered all throughout their lines, men they’d passed by as they advanced. Men who were supposed to be unconscious, or dead.
All around her, the Abandoned were forced to turn and defend themselves against attacks from every direction; their forward progress slowed to a near-stop. From the far side of the battle, among Josen’s men, she heard shouts of alarm, and knew that the same thing was happening there.
This wasn’t right. A few might have been stunned by that sudden burst of power and recovered late, but not so many. There was something else at work. Their bodies were intact, but these men were dead, all the same.
“This is deepcraft,” Zerill said to Korv, though she spoke aloud for Gryston’s benefit. “The old man.”
Gryston frowned, and then his eyes widened. “Do you mean to say these men are…”
Korv only nodded, and pointed over Zerill’s shoulder with his club. She looked toward the battlefront.
The Goldstone soldiers were using the distraction to break away, retreating to the cliff’s edge. Amid the debris of the sudden quake, more of the fallen rose to their feet and moved toward the front, taking the place of the living. Some of the deepcraft-risen men were even dragging the wounded and unmoving to safety.
“Lord of Eagles,” Gryston said. “I… I never imagined that the deepcraft was capable of this. Or that Castar was. How could he allow this?”
“It’s a distraction,” said Zerill. “The only thing behind them is the cliff. Why are they retreating there?” She didn’t wait for an answer. “Signal Josen’s men. We keep moving. If these men stand in our way, we walk over them.”
As Gryston sounded his horn, Zerill led her people forward once more. Wherever she saw red and gold, her spear moved, and a body fell. The deepcraft might have had the power to make a stilled heart beat, but she had the power to stop it again, and hers didn’t require any blood or ritual sacrifice. Empty-eyed soldiers resisted the advance, and the Abandoned had to fight for every inch, but still she pushed on, and gained ground. No highlander, dead or alive, was going to stop her. Not here, not today.
Today, Lenoden Castar was going to die.
That thought kept her going, though her limbs ached and her lungs strained and her eyes burned under the unrelenting sun. She was going to see him die. The man who had locked her up and laughed at her and hurt her, who had led so many purges against her people, taken so many lives. The man who had killed her sister. She’d blamed Josen for that for so long, and he was by no means entirely innocent, but she knew now who was truly responsible for Azlin’s death. And he was waiting, right in front of her. All she had to do was get there.
The ground shook under her feet; a harsh grinding scraped across her eardrums, coming from somewhere behind Castar’s retreating forces. From the edge of the cliff.
And then Zerill understood. Why Castar had ordered a retreat to the edge of a sheer drop, what the dead men were meant to distract from.
The old man was carving an escape out of the mountain.
She couldn’t see it, but she knew. It was the only thing that made sense.
“He’s making them a path!” She shouted the words, nearly screamed them; the loudspeech was the only way she knew that could get the attention she needed quickly enough to make a difference. “Gryston! Signal the others! We’re wasting time fighting dead men while Castar escapes! We have to head him off on the road!” She was already pushing her way back through the ranks, toward the broken gate. “Lighteyes! With me!”
Confused signs flickered throughout the Abandoned, but she was Grandmother now; what kinmates heard her words moved to obey, breaking away from the fight. She emerged from the press of bodies, sprinted across open fields toward the road down the mountain with hundreds of Lighteyes behind her. At her back, Gryston’s horn sounded, sharing her warning with Josen’s men. And with every step, she felt the slight tremor of the old man’s deepcraft, reshaping the mountain at his will.
She passed through the remains of the wall and onto the road, and there it was: a new path along the cliff’s edge that met the old at a switchback hundreds of feet below, just above the narrow pass that led to the ruins of the lower walls. Castar’s forces had already started down—she would have to move quickly to catch them.
The weight of Zerill’s armor was slowing her, so without stopping she pulled the chain shirt over her head and the Storm Knight tabard with it, and threw both aside, leaving only the hide shirt she’d worn beneath. She paused only briefly to cut the straps on her chainmail leggings with her knife—there was no time to fumble with buckles—and then she was moving again. Fire burned in her lungs and in her legs; she’d already climbed a mountain and fought the largest battle of her life in the course of a single night. But she couldn’t rest yet. Instead, she pushed harder, forced her exhausted body to do what she needed it to do.
Castar couldn’t be allowed to escape. Not after everything he’d done. Not after everything she’d done, to come this far.
Even with the back-and-forth switchbacks, the road was steep, but Zerill raced heedlessly down, barely slowing to round the sharpest bends. Castar’s men had a head start, but she was gaining ground, and although she had pulled slightly of ahead her kinmates, they were very close behind. If there was one thing the Abandoned had ever been better at than any highlander, it was running—their survival depended on it.
The Lighteyes drew ahead of Castar’s men as they neared the place where the roads joined. They were close enough now that Zerill could hear the highlanders breathing, hundreds of men panting together as they ran.
She rounded the last switchback, pouring all of her will into moving her legs just a little bit faster. She was nearly there. We’re going to make it. We can still block their way.
Looking across the divide, she saw a dark-skinned man with a trimmed black beard leading the highlanders. For a moment, Lenoden Castar’s eyes met hers.
Beside him, a hooded man pointed one finger in her direction.
The road crumbled beneath Zerill’s feet.
It gave way all at once, without warning. One moment she was on solid ground, the next she was sliding down a sharp incline atop an avalanche of loose earth and rubble. Below her, the first rocks reached the end of the short slope and launched into the open air, plummeting toward the mist below.
She groped blindly for a handhold, anything that might arrest her fall. Her fingers fumbled against broken stone, and found no purchase. She was aware, vaguely, of others falling beside her, but there was nothing she could do to save them. There was nothing she could do to save herself.
A hand locked around her wrist.
As debris cascaded down the mountain below, she looked up to see a silver-haired man laying flat on his belly over the sharp drop where the road now ended, gripping her a
rm tight in one hand. For a short, wild moment she thought it was Verik, but no; his shoulders were too broad, and there were no familiar lines of laughter at the corners of his mouth. Grimacing silently under the strain of her weight, Korv heaved her up over the edge.
As she got to her feet, she saw others doing the same; a few had been saved like she had, by the quick action of those nearby. Not everyone had been so lucky. Far below, more than a dozen Lighteye warriors fell through endless sky under the harsh light of the highlanders’ sun. Their stolen Storm Knight tabards made dwindling spots of lighter grey against the dark of the mist. It would be a long while before they hit the ground. Ancestors, receive them kindly. No one should have to live that long in their death.
Trembling, Zerill raised her eyes, already knowing what she would see. On the far side of a chasm some fifteen yards across, the old man’s road was still intact, and highlanders moved along it in a rush, fleeing for the cover of the mist. There was no way to cross that gap in time, and even if it had been possible, too many were already safe between the steep walls of the lower pass, well beyond reach.
Lenoden Castar was gone.
Josen
Leaning against Shona, Josen limped on his newly stitched and bandaged leg across a field devastated by monsters and soldiers and deepcraft. Between those three, more than half of the farmland here on the lowest and largest of the farming flats had been torn and trampled and broken, rendered useless in less than a day. The bodies strewn across the plateau were far from the only lives the battle had claimed—hundreds more were already marked for death by slow starvation. They just didn’t know it yet.
Eroh walked at Josen’s right hand, and just behind, Azra helped keep Verik upright. Morne and a dedicated guard of knights and adjutants kept a perimeter all around, to ensure Josen’s safety.
The king’s safety.
The bulk of his army was ahead, cleaning up the last of the men Castar had left to guard his retreat, but Shona had kept Josen behind the lines where his wounds could be tended. There had been little for him to do but watch uselessly as Morne directed the battle through Cer Hughan’s horn. Not that he wanted to fight, or would have done much good if he had—he just would have liked to have served some purpose. Zerill was probably one of the first into the battle, while I hid here at the back doing nothing.
Now, it was all but over. Castar had escaped, and his rear guard wouldn’t last very long. All that remained was to cross the broken fields to where the swamplings waited, and see if he could stop his men from trying to kill them. Or them from trying to kill his men. It could go either way, really.
“God Above, why won’t they just die?” Shona was looking ahead to the few places where men were still fighting. Her lips were pursed and her brow knit, something between a thoughtful look and a scowl.
“He does seem to inspire loyalty, our dear Lenoden,” Josen said. “It must be the beard.”
“You know it’s more than that,” said Shona. “Cer Falyn, can you signal the men? I want someone kept alive, a prisoner. I want to see for myself.”
Morne nodded. “Cer Hughan, signal the third company. They’re nearest.”
Cer Hughan licked his lips—cracked and dry from hours of sending Morne’s signals—and sounded his horn. A moment later, another signal answered. “They’ve heard,” he said.
The fight didn’t drag on for very much longer; the last of Castar’s men fell even as Josen and the others drew near. Knights and army men parted to let them pass, saluting Morne and bowing before their king, touching fingers to foreheads when they saw Eroh’s eyes.
At the front, a small group of army men were waiting with the prisoner, a man in the crimson and gold of Goldstone. A barrel-chested soldier with a scar across his lip kicked out the prisoner’s knees. “Kneel to the king, traitor.”
Josen hardly spared the kneeling man a look. From here, there was nothing between him and the swamplings. There was no ignoring them, an army of thousands approaching across the open field. The sun shone bright off white skin and lightly colored hair—all whites and silvers and pale yellows—but their eyes, if anything, looked blacker here than they ever had beneath the mist. He searched for Zerill’s face, but they were too far away; he couldn’t find her. Wind of Grace, let her be alive.
Eroh touched his arm. “Don’t worry. She’s there. I know she is.”
Josen looked into the boy’s golden eyes, and didn’t know what to say. Does he have some Windwalker power to read minds, or is it just obvious what I’m thinking?
He didn’t have long to wonder about it. He was still leaning against Shona, and she hadn’t forgotten the prisoner. When she started in that direction, he had little choice but to go along. As they drew near she released Josen to step closer; in the absence of her support, Josen winced and put his weight on his good leg, swaying more than he liked.
Now that he was looking, he saw little remarkable about this soldier—clean-shaven, black-haired, older than Josen but not by a great many years. But the man’s stillness was strange by itself. He didn’t struggle against the rough treatment of his captors, and when he looked up, there was no expression on his face.
Shona bent low to peer at the man. “Why didn’t you throw down your swords?”
“We fight for Duke Castar,” the man answered. There was no passion in it; he didn’t sound very much like a man willing to fight to the death for his cause.
“Duke Castar is gone,” said Shona. “There was no need for so many to die.”
Again, “We fight for Duke Castar.” That was all; not even a flicker of emotion in those empty eyes.
“Just like Benedern.” Shona straightened, turned to Verik. “It’s as you said.”
Verik only nodded.
Shona looked down at the prisoner once more, for a long moment, and then said, “That’s enough.”
“But… you’ve hardly asked him anything.” The scarred man who had forced the prisoner to kneel looked to Josen. “Your Majesty?”
Josen inclined his head. “End it quickly. No suffering.” If he’s still even capable of suffering.
The scarred soldier drew a long knife, knelt, and placed it against the prisoner’s armpit near the heart. Josen looked away.
The prisoner died without a sound.
Shona returned to Josen’s side, and took his weight again. “Deeplings and deepcraft and dead men,” she said, soft enough that only he could hear. “I don’t know what kind of enemy we’re fighting anymore. I don’t even understand how we won. Where did that… that quake, or whatever it was, come from?”
“I don’t know,” Josen said, although he had one idea, one he wasn’t ready to tell her just yet. “But maybe they do.” He inclined his head toward the swamplings.
They were only a few hundred yards away now, and drawing nearer. Behind Josen, his own men were beginning to shift and mutter nervously, putting hands to swords. Josen couldn’t blame them. They were under a thousand strong; the swamplings had to have three times that, and even one above the mist was more than any man in the Peaks had ever seen. And they were too quiet. That many men and women moving together should have been as loud as rolling thunder, but Josen could barely hear the sound of their footsteps even at this distance.
The swamplings were less than a hundred yards away before they broke their silence. A series of horn blasts sounded from somewhere near their front lines.
“The lord general’s cipher again, Your Majesty,” said Cer Hughan. “He’s calling for parley.”
Josen could feel the tension in the men behind him; more than one half-drawn blade glinted in the sun. It wouldn’t take very much to break this uneasy alliance, now that their common enemy was gone.
“Return the signal,” he said. “We accept.”
Shona chose the party for him—it would be her, Josen, Morne, Eroh, Azra, and Verik. Bringing the swamplings, she explained, would show good faith. Very quickly, Cer Falyn arranged a suitable escort of a dozen trustworthy knights. And then they
were crossing the blood-stained field toward a sea of pale white faces.
The swampling party started forth at nearly the same time, with an escort of their own. Their number was very near that of the guard Morne had selected, the customary size for a parley by the customs of the Peaks. Eian must be advising them.
And though they were still far away, he could see a dark brown face among the white now—a face that could only be Eian’s. His heart beat a little bit faster, and he picked up his pace, forcing Shona to move faster at his side. He had to get closer. There was one more face he hoped to see, and from this distance, he couldn’t yet tell the swamplings apart.
“I know you trust her, Josen,” Shona said as they closed the distance. “I want to trust her too. But you understand how careful we need to be, don’t you? We still don’t know for certain why they’re here.”
“I understand. But she won’t—”
“Zerill!” Before anyone could stop him, Eroh pushed past Josen, sprinting across the last two dozen yards toward the swamplings. Overhead, the sound of an eagle’s cry pierced the sky, and Goldeyes dove to meet his master.
Eroh threw his arms around the woman at the head of the swampling party. At nearly the same moment, she raised her arm, and the little eagle came to rest there, golden feathers shining in the morning sunlight.
And it was her. Josen knew her face now, though he’d rarely seen it in the light: the high cheekbones and wide forehead, the pale yellow-white hair. And despite his injuries, despite the devastation across the fields and the cost of this victory in lives, he couldn’t help but grin. She’s here. She’s alive, and she’s here.
One of the warriors beside Zerill, a white-haired woman with a long braid, had raised her spear at Eroh’s approach. Zerill signed something to calm her, and gently removed the boy’s arms from around her waist. She took his hand to lead him on, and Goldeyes hopped from her wrist to his shoulder.
The Swampling King (The Windwalker Legacy Book 1) Page 91
