Academ's Fury ca-2

by Jim Butcher

  Somewhere above them, iron screamed protest again, and a hollow, thumping boom swept down the staircase. A few seconds later there was the clash of steel on steel, which faded as they went on down away from where the wounded captain fought to hold the Canim at bay.

  For the first time since he had escaped the warehouse, Tavi had a spare moment for thought. Dragging Max around was a familiar task, and while not exactly easy, it did not require his attention, either. He started piecing together the things he had seen, trying to get an idea of what might happen next.

  And suddenly he couldn't breathe. It wasn't an issue of labor or lack of air. He simply could not seem to get enough air into his lungs, and his heart was pounding with such terror that he could not distinguish individual beats.

  They were trapped.

  Though the Royal Guard was no doubt trying to fight their way down to the First Lord, some of the Canim had to have been holding them off. The wolf-warriors were deadly in such closed spaces, where there was less room to avoid them or circle to their flanks, and where their superior reach and height made them more than a match for all but the most seasoned legionare. Without a doubt, the Knights of the Royal Guard would use furycrafting against them, but they would be sharply limited in what they could do for the same reasons Tavi had explained to Kitai. Not only that, but it was entirely possible that most of the Knights had not yet arrived at the top of the stairway. The attack had come in the darkest hours of the night, when most were abed, and it would take long moments for them to awaken, arm, and rush to the fight.

  They were moments the First Lord simply did not have. Eventually, the Guard would overcome the Canim, of course. But the Canim only needed to hold them off for a few moments more, and in a mortal struggle those moments seemed like hours. They would simply throw themselves at Miles, exchanging themselves for blows that would merely cripple the captain. They had numbers enough to do it and still leave more to finish Miles off and tear apart those behind him.

  There was no way out of the deep chamber but for the stairs. There was nowhere to run. The Canim were still coming, and Sir Miles had not managed to kill the queen. Miles, the only one of them who could hope to stand up to the Canim for long, was already wounded, bleeding, and half-blind. The smallest of mistakes or misjudgments could cost him his life, and while Tavi was confident Miles could have handled it at any other time, with his injuries it would only be a matter of minutes before he was too slow or too hampered by his damaged vision to fight perfectly.

  When Miles fell, the Canim would kill the Maestro. They would kill Tavi and Kitai. They would kill Max, of course. And, unless they were extremely stupid, they would kill Gaius, as well, despite Max's willing sacrifice as the First Lord's decoy.

  Gaius was still unconscious. Max was incoherent. The Maestro was an excellent teacher of the fighting arts, but he was an old man, and no soldier. Kitai had seemed to handle herself in a fight at least as well as Tavi, but she was simply not a match for one of the Canim, much less a dozen of them. Tavi himself, while a trained fighter, could hardly hope to face one of the Canim with any significant chance of victory. The disparity in size, reach, experience, power, and training was simply too great.

  If the First Lord died, it would provoke a civil war-a civil war the Canim would gleefully use to their advantage. Gaius's death could quite possibly prove to be the event that signaled the end of the Aleran people.

  More thoughts bounced and spun through his head, and he gritted his teeth, trying to clear his mind and focus. The best he could do was to isolate two concrete thoughts.

  Gaius had to be saved regardless of the cost.

  Tavi did not want to die, nor see his friends and allies harmed.

  There was only one person trapped in the First Lord's defense who could make a difference.

  They reached the bottom of the stairs, and Tavi settled Max down as gently as he could beside the cabinet. The larger boy, though he looked identical to the First Lord, slumped down at once, sinking into immobility and unconsciousness again. A heavy snore rattled from between his lips. Tavi laid his hand on his friend's shoulder for a moment, then rose as Kitai and Fade emerged from the meditation chamber and shut the door behind them. They started for the base of the stairs, but Tavi stepped into Fade's way, his teeth clenched, and glared at him from a handbreadth away.

  "Fade," Tavi said, his voice hard. "Why didn't you fight?"

  The slave eyed him, then looked away, shaking his head. "Couldn't."

  "Why not?" Tavi demanded. "We needed you. Max could have been killed."

  "I couldn't," Fade said. His eyes shifted warily, and Tavi saw real fear in them. "Miles was fighting that thing, that vord. It was too fast. If I'd drawn steel, he would have recognized me immediately." Fade took a slow breath. "The distraction would have killed him. It still might."

  "He's hurt," Tavi said. "And we have no idea how long he can fend them off."

  Fade nodded, his expression bleak, full of old pain. "I… Tavi, I don't know if I can. I don't know if I could bear it if…" He shook his head and said, "I thought I could, but being back here… So much will change, and I don't want that."

  "Dying is a change," Kitai put in. "You don't want that, either."

  Fade shrank a little.

  Tavi made a gesture to Kitai to let him do the talking. "Fade, the First Lord needs you."

  "That arrogant, pompous, egotistical old bastard," Fade spat, his voice suddenly filled with an alien, entirely vicious hatred, "can go to the bloody crows."

  Tavi's fist caught the ragged slave on the tip of his chin and knocked Fade onto his rear on the smooth stone floor. Fade lifted his hand to his face, his expression one of pure shock and surprise.

  "Since you don't seem to be thinking well," Tavi said, his voice cold, "let me help you. Your feelings toward Gaius are irrelevant. He is the rightful First Lord of Alera. If he dies here tonight, it will cast our entire people into a civil war that will be a signal to our enemies to attack us. The vord pose a threat that could be worse than the Canim, Marat, and Icemen combined if it is left to fester, and we need a strong and unified central command to make sure it doesn't happen."

  Fade stared up at Tavi, his expression still stunned.

  "Do you understand what is happening here? Millions of lives depend on the outcome of this hour, and there is no time to be distracted by personal grudges. To save the Realm, we must save Gaius." Tavi leaned down, seized the hilt of Fade's worn old sword, and drew it from its scabbard. Then he knelt on one knee and stared into Fade's eyes while he reversed his grip on the blade and offered the hilt to the slave over one arm.

  "Which means," Tavi said quietly, "that the Realm needs Araris Valerian."

  Fade's eyes brimmed with tears, and Tavi could almost feel the terrible old pain that brought them, the fear that filled the scarred slave's haunted eyes. He lifted his hand and touched his fingers to the coward's brand on his maimed cheek. "I… I don't know if I can be him again."

  "You were him at Calderon," Tavi said. "You saved my life. We'll work something out with your brother, Fade. I promise that I'll do everything I possibly can to help you both. I don't know the details of what came between the two of you. But you're his brother. His blood."

  "He'll be angry," Fade whispered. "He might… I couldn't hurt him, Tavi. Not even if he killed me."

  Tavi shook his head. "I won't allow that to happen. No matter how angry he might be, underneath it he loves you. Anger subsides. Love doesn't."

  Fade folded his arms over his chest, shaking his head. "You don't understand. I c-can't. I can't. It's been too long."

  "You must," Tavi said. "You will. You gave me your sword. And you didn't mean it as a present for me to hang on my wall. You meant it as something more. Didn't you? That's why Gaius was so disapproving when he saw it."

  Fade's face twisted with some new agony, but he nodded.

  Tavi did, too. "With or without you, I'm going back up those stairs," he said, "and I'm going to fi
ght those animals until I'm dead or until the First Lord is safe. Take up your sword, Fade. Come with me. I need your help."

  Fade exhaled sharply and bowed his head. Then he took a deep breath, lifted his right hand, and took the sword Tavi offered him. He met Tavi's eyes, and said, quietly, "Because you ask it of me."

  Tavi nodded, clasped Fade's shoulder with one hand again, and they rose together.

  Chapter 50

  "They're forming up again," Amara reported, staring out at the taken holders. A score of them held long, rough spears of raw wood, crude points hacked into them with knives and sickles and swords. "Looks like they're using the legionares shields, too."

  Bernard grunted and came up to the front of the cave to stand beside her. "They'll use the shields to cover the spears from our archers. That volley must have been worse than they expected." The rain came down in steady, heavy drops outside the cave. Flashes of green-tinged lightning continued to dance through the clouds veiling the summit of Garados, and the air had grown steadily thicker and more oppressive, a sense of old, slow malice permeating every sight and sound. "And the furystorm is about to break, if I'm any judge. We'll have windmanes coming down on us in half an hour."

  "Half an hour," Amara mused. "Do you think it will matter to us by then?"

  "Maybe not," Bernard said. "Maybe so. Nothing is written in stone."

  A wry smile twisted Amara's mouth. "We might survive the vord to be killed by windmanes. That's your encouragement? Your reassurance?"

  Bernard grinned, staring out at the enemy, defiance in his eyes. "With any luck, even if we don't take them, the furystorm will finish what we started."

  "That really isn't any better," Amara said. She laid a hand on his shoulder. "Could we wait here? Let the furystorm take them?"

  Bernard shook his head. "Looks to me like they know it's coming, too. They've got to take the cave before the storm breaks."

  Amara nodded. "Then it's time."

  Bernard looked over his shoulder, and said, "Prepare to charge."

  Behind him, waiting in ranks, was every legionare still able to stand and wield a blade. Twoscore swords hissed from their sheaths with steely whispers that promised blood.

  "Doroga," Bernard called. "Give us twenty strides before you move."

  The Marat chieftain lay astride Walker's broad back, the cave's ceiling forcing his chest to the gargant's fur. He nodded at Bernard, and said something in a low voice to Walker. The gargant's great claws gouged the floor of the cave, and his chest rumbled an angry threat for the enemy outside.

  Bernard nodded sharply and glanced at the archers. The Knights Flora each held an arrow to the bowstring. "Wait until the last moment to shoot," he told them quietly. "Clear as many of those spears from Walker's path as you can." He fit a string to his own bow and glanced at Amara. "Ready, love?"

  She felt frightened, but not so much as she had thought she would be. Perhaps there had simply been too much fear over the past hours for it to overwhelm her now. Her hand felt steady as she drew her sword from its scabbard. Really, she felt more sad than afraid. Sad that so many good men and women had lost their lives. Sad that she could do nothing better for Bernard or his men. Sad that she would have no more nights with her new husband, no more silent moments of warmth or desire.

  That was behind her now. Her sword was cold and heavy and bright in her hand.

  "I'm ready," she said.

  Bernard nodded, closed his eyes, and took a long breath, then opened them. In his left hand, he held his great bow, arrow to the string. With his right, he drew his sword, lifted it, and roared, "Legionares! At the double, forward march!"

  Bernard stepped forward into a slow jog, and every legionare behind him started out in that same step, so that their boots struck the ground in unison. Amara followed apace, struggling to keep her steps even with Bernard's. Once the legionares were all clear of the cave mouth, Bernard lifted a hand and slashed it to his left.

  Amara and the Knights Flora immediately peeled away, to the left of the column's advance, making their way up a low slope that would allow them to shoot over the heads of the column almost until they engaged the taken.

  Once they were clear of the column's path, Bernard lifted his hand and roared, "Legionares! Charge!"

  Every Aleran throat opened in a roar of, "Calderon for Alera!" The legionares surged forward in a wave of steel, and their boots were a muffled thunder upon the rain-soaked earth as they followed the Count of Calderon into battle. At the same time, Walker emerged from the cave mouth, the bloodied gargant's battle roar joining that of the legionares as it accelerated into a lumbering run, deceptively swift for all its apparent clumsiness, his claws biting into the earth. Walker began to gain on the legionares at once, gathering momentum while Doroga whirled his long-handled cudgel over his head, howling.

  An unearthly yowl rolled out from the stand of trees, and the taken moved in abrupt, silent, and perfect concert. They formed into a loose half circle, shields in the front rank, while those holding spears set them to receive the charge, making the taken shieldwall bristle with the crude weapons.

  Amara beckoned Cirrus as she ran, struggling to exert the bare minimum of effort necessary for the fury to bend light and let her see the enemy. She had only one duty in this battle-to find the vord queen and point her out to Bernard.

  Beside her, the Knights Flora raised their bows. Arrows flashed out through the rain, striking eyes and throats with unerring precision, and over the next ten seconds half a dozen of the spearmen fell despite the use of the Legion shields. The taken moved at once, others picking up the spears and moving into the place of the fallen-but the disruption was enough to create an opening in the fence of rude spears, allowing the legionares to drive their charge home.

  Shield met shield with a deafening metallic thunder, and the legionares hewed at the crude spears with their vicious, heavy blades, further widening the opening and disrupting the formation of the taken.

  "Shift left!" Bernard cried. "Shift left, left, left!"

  The legionares immediately moved together, a sudden lateral dash of no more than twenty feet.

  And a heartbeat later, Doroga and Walker crashed onto the breach in the thicket of spears.

  Amara stared in utter shock for a moment at the gargant's impact. She had never heard a beast so loud, never seen anything so unthinkably strong. Walker's chest slammed into the shieldwall, crushing several of the taken who bore them. His great head swung left and right, slamming more of the taken around like an angry child with his toys, and Doroga leaned far over the saddle-mat with his cudgel, striking down upon the skulls of the taken. The gargant plowed through the ranks of the taken without slowing, leaving a corridor of destruction behind him, halted, whirled, and immediately laid into the ranks of the taken with savage claws.

  Before the charge was complete, the legionares roared together and slammed forward in a frenzied, all-out attack, catching the taken between them and the blood-maddened gargant.

  Amara bit her lip, sweeping her gaze around the battle, desperate to find the queen, to do something to help Bernard and his men. She could only watch the battle, seeing flashes of it in horrible clarity as she searched for the queen.

  After the initial shock of the gargant's charge, the taken moved together into a counterattack. Within a minute, several with spears had spread out to either side of Walker, and thrust the weapons at the gargant while Doroga attempted to parry them away with his great club. The others focused on the legionares, and though the men fought with undeniable skill and courage, the numbers against them were simply too great, and their momentum began to falter.

  She watched as Bernard ducked the swing of an axe wielded by an old grey-haired man, and the legionare beside him struck a killing blow upon his attacker with a downsweep of his sword. Seconds later, a child, a girl of no more than ten or twelve summers, hauled a legionares leg out from beneath him and twisted with savage power, breaking it. The legionare screamed as other taken h
auled him away and fell upon him with mindless savagery. An ancient crone thrust a wooden spear into Walker's shoulder and the gargant whirled with a scream of pain, swatting at the spear and shattering its shaft.

  And then Amara saw a flicker of motion, behind Doroga and Walker, something darting out of the shadow of the trees, covered by the folds of a dark cloak and hood.

  "There!" she cried to the archers, pointing. "There!"

  Moving swiftly, two Knights touched their last arrows, bound with oiled cloths just beneath the heads, so the embers in the small firepots on their belts set the arrows aflame. They drew and loosed, sending twin streaks of fire hissing through the rain. One arrow struck the shape directly, shattering as if it had impacted upon a heavy breastplate. The other arrow missed striking anything solid, but lodged in the folds of the vord queen's cloak.

  That was the signal. Bernard's head whipped around to trace the flight of the fire arrows, and he roared commands to his legionares, who wheeled and surged toward the vord queen with desperate power. Doroga whipped his head around as the vord queen leapt at him. He threw himself to one side, rolled off the gargant's back, and landed in a heavy crouch. The vord queen whirled and rushed him, only to alter her course when Walker threw himself into the queen's path.

  "Swords!" Amara snapped to the Knights with her. "With me!" They drew steel and sprinted forward, circling the chaos of the melee to head for the queen. Amara sprinted ahead of the Knights, swifter than they on foot, sidestepping a clumsy grab from one of the taken and striking it down as she flew past it. She saw the queen leap again, claws flashing in an effort to put out one of the gargant's eyes. Walker turned his head into the leap, gashing the queen with his tusks, and sending her bouncing across the earth not ten yards from Amara.

  The Cursor shouted a wordless battle cry, sword raised, and called to Cirrus for swiftness enough to challenge the queen. The queen whirled to face Amara, claws spread, and let out another shriek. Half a dozen taken peeled away from the fight to charge Amara, but the Knights with her intercepted them, swords raised, and kept them from moving forward.