Red Tide

by Marc Turner

  Senar looked at him. “You thinking about breakfast again?”

  “Maybe I am. You join me?”

  The Guardian raised an eyebrow, searching the mercenary’s expression. The man was probably joking, he decided. Almost certainly.

  But he couldn’t have sworn to it.

  * * *

  Ebon stared along the waterfront toward the metal-clad ship. On the quay, two carts were being piled with corpses taken from the vessel. A crowd of amputees was clustered around it like someone was handing out new limbs. A cordon of Gilgamarian soldiers tried to keep order. As Ebon watched, one of the warriors slammed the flat of his sword into the face of a man missing both ears. Then he picked him up and tipped him into a cart. That didn’t seem to calm the other vultures, but why would it? Now there was just one more body for them to squabble over.

  Ebon rubbed a hand across his chin. He’d healed his jaw and stomach since Ocarn’s beating, but they still ached. Gods, how he hated this city. It was destined to be his home a while longer, though—at least until he tracked down Tia. He’d tried asking the locals for information on her whereabouts, but he’d been met with hostile looks. She’d seek him out herself eventually; Lamella and Rendale were too valuable an asset for her to squander. First, though, she’d probably want to let Ebon stew awhile so his desperation grew—and with it the bounty she could ask for her prisoners.

  Thereby giving Ocarn a chance to make contact with her first.

  If Lamella and Rendale died, Ebon would have no one to blame but himself. Since arriving in Gilgamar, he’d taken one half measure after another: the sailor he’d released when he could have silenced him; his decision to let Ocarn live. No doubt some would say that he’d done the right thing, sparing the Mercerien’s life. But right for whom? For Ebon’s kinsmen in Galitia, certainly. Maybe even for Ebon himself. What about Lamella and Rendale, though? He recalled the moment Majack’s walls had been breached by Mayot’s undead army. Faced with the choice of rescuing Lamella or going after the Fangalar sorceress, he hadn’t hesitated. Why was it that when the hard decisions came, it was always Lamella who lost out? Why did he always sacrifice her in favor of the kinsmen who feared and distrusted him?

  Vale had been talking to four men in gray cloaks near the carts. Now he walked over to speak to Ebon.

  “What news?” Ebon asked him.

  “Those men are mercenaries,” Vale said. “Revenants, they call themselves. For some reason they think I should’ve heard of them. Seems they’re working for the emira—that’s who we saw arrive yesterday before we questioned the Mercerien sailor.”

  Ebon stared at him. “Imerle Polivar is here?”

  “Imerle is dead. She died on Dragon Day, along with most of the other Storm Lords. Mazana Creed’s in charge now.”

  The prince held Vale’s gaze. Ordinarily he couldn’t have cared less about Sabian politics, but could he afford not to take an interest when the new emira visited Gilgamar just as Mottle warned of an attack?

  Vale must have been thinking the same, for he nodded and said, “I thought I should ask a few questions about what happened on that metal ship. Came in before dawn, apparently. The crew’s all been slaughtered. Whoever did the killing was on the ship with them, but they’ve since vanished. Revenants wouldn’t say anything about that, so I spoke to a couple of the locals. Seems the Gray Cloaks have been wearing out their boots tramping back and forth, looking for someone who saw the killers leave the ship. Killers with skin that looks like stone.”

  A whisper of cold passed through Ebon. He’d seen someone with skin like granite near the Mercerien embassy. “And did anyone see anything?”

  “No.”

  Of course they didn’t. No one ever did, remember.

  Before Ebon could say more, four Gray Cloaks pounded past him along the waterfront. A painted lady slow to get out of their way was caught by a shoulder and sent toppling into the harbor. From the western end of the port—the direction the Revenants headed in—came shouts of warning. When Ebon tried to see the cause, though, he found his view blocked by the hull of an Androsian galleon.

  The Gilgamarian soldiers protecting the carts abandoned their positions and sprinted toward the Harbor Gate. People started running every way, some toward the gate with the soldiers, some along the quays as if they were late to board a ship just departing. Another group of Gray Cloaks hustled past Ebon, and he exchanged a look with Vale before jogging after them. Ahead the waterfront curved south and west until it met the harbor wall at a tower—the Key Tower, he’d heard it called. Over the bow of a fishing scow he saw red-cloaked figures carrying spears and shields pouring onto the wharfs from a ship in the tower’s shadow. He couldn’t make out their faces from this distance, but he didn’t need to see them to know their complexions would be stony.

  The approach to the Key Tower was guarded by a ramp and a gatehouse with a raised portcullis. The Gilgamarian soldiers stationed there had evidently been caught out by the speed of the enemy offensive, because the lead red-cloaked figures were already swarming beneath the portcullis and into the stronghold beyond. Not a single sword had been raised against them, though there were archers on the tower’s battlements shooting down at the foe. Ebon saw a man lean out so far his helmet slipped from his head. A red-cloaked warrior took a bolt through the leg and went down. None of his companions stopped to help him. From within the tower came echoing screams, a clash of metal on metal. Then a bare-chested Gilgamarian soldier emerged from an archway onto the harbor wall. A spear thrown from inside took him in the back, and he pitched forward.

  Red-cloaked warriors appeared in the archway. They hurdled the prone figure and dashed along the wall, sunlight glinting off their spear tips. Ebon looked from them to the Gilgamarian soldiers remaining unmolested on the battlements of the Key Tower they had left behind.

  “They’re not attacking up the tower,” he said to Vale as he ran across the drawbridge linking the two halves of the harbor.

  “Not enough men, not enough time,” the Endorian said. “They’ll want to take as much of the wall as they can while the surprise is with them.”

  Ebon nodded. They were going for the chains.

  Before they could reach the monstrous Chain Tower, though, they would first have to negotiate the smaller Buck Tower halfway along the wall. It was toward this tower that the stone-skin frontrunners now raced unopposed. The doorway offering access to the fort was unbarred, but as the enemy drew near, a portcullis began to inch down over the opening. Why so slow? The first stone-skin fell to a crossbow bolt shot from the tower’s battlements, and the warrior after him too. But the next attacker reached the gate when it was only half down, and slid into the gloom beyond. A second red-cloaked man followed him under, then a third. As a fourth tried to duck through, though, the portcullis dropped onto him. Its spikes crushed him, screaming, into the ground.

  Ebon drew up. Farther along the waterfront the flow of stone-skins coming ashore from their ship had dried up. The last handful now toiled up the ramp, and snapping at their heels were the eight Revenants who had preceded Ebon along the harbor. A look back revealed more Gray Cloaks coming up behind the prince, but their progress had been halted at the drawbridge Ebon had just crossed. That bridge was being raised by a group of Gilgamarian soldiers, no doubt anxious to isolate the Upper City—and therefore themselves—from the fighting. A sharp exchange of views ended with the severed head of a Gilgamarian guard on the ground. Harsh, perhaps, but with the city’s fate in the balance, this was no time for careful diplomacy. The dead soldier’s colleagues saw the error of their ways and lowered the bridge again. The Gray Cloaks ran over.

  Ebon swung his gaze back to the second tower. With the portcullis down, the red-cloaked attackers were bunching up on the wall, and the ones with crossbows among them started up a withering fire to pin down the Gilgamarian soldiers on the battlements. Just three stone-skins had made it inside. And how many Gilgamarians to face them? Surely more than enough, Ebon told himself,
but then a burst of fire-magic lit up the windows. Was one of those three stone-skins a sorcerer? Screams sounded inside.

  “How many stone-skins do you count?” Ebon asked Vale.

  “A hundred, maybe.” The Endorian looked at the Chain Tower. “Not enough to take that fortress.”

  “Are you sure about that? And even if you’re right, what about the fleet that’s no doubt waiting outside?” Ebon couldn’t see anything of that fleet along the Neck, but it had to be there, didn’t it? Else why were the stone-skins intent on lowering the chains? “Those ships can provide covering fire for the men on the wall, maybe even cross more fighters over to join the attack.”

  Vale looked back along the waterfront. More Revenants rushed across the drawbridge spanning the canal, but there were only a dozen of them, and the Gilgamarian soldiers showed no signs of wanting to follow.

  “Where the hell are the rest of the Gilgamarians?” Vale said. “This can’t be all the men they’ve got.”

  “Tucked up in the Upper City, most likely, happy to let someone else do the fighting.” The Harbor Gate had been closed, and the battlements above it were thronged with soldiers watching the struggle on the wall. “By the time they pluck up the courage to come out, this could be over. If the stone-skins take the second tower, they’ll be able to hold it with a handful of men while the rest attack the Chain Tower. You’ve seen the Gilgamarians in action. How long do you think the ones in the Chain Tower will survive?”

  At the first tower, the portcullis had been lowered to maroon a dozen red-cloaked warriors on the wrong side. A volley of crossbow bolts shot by Revenants landed like a clattering hail on their shields. Meanwhile, at the second tower, the portcullis barring entry to the stone-skins on the wall was rising. The corpse of the impaled man rose with it until two of his kinsmen tugged him free of its spikes. Smoke trickled from the fort’s windows.

  Ebon swung his gaze back to Vale.

  The Endorian grimaced, knowing what was in the prince’s mind. “This ain’t our fight,” he said.

  “You think I don’t know that?” Ebon snapped. “You think I want to be here?” Just the sound of combat so soon after Estapharriol had chilled the sweat on the prince’s skin. “I don’t care what happens to Gilgamar, or the League. But if Gilgamar is lost, then so are Lamella and Rendale. And until Tia contacts us, we have no way of tracking them down. If the stone-skins take the city, do you think finding them will get any easier? Do you think Tia is going to worry about keeping them safe if she’s busy dodging stone-skins?”

  Vale looked across to where the enemy were now entering the second tower. “Shit,” he said.

  That about covered it. Since arriving in Gilgamar, Ebon had made nothing but bad decisions, and now here he was being given the chance to make another. Join the defense and risk sacrificing his life—and Vale’s—needlessly. Or do nothing, and watch the Chain Tower fall. If it did, the rest of Gilgamar would probably follow. With Ebon’s record, maybe he should have left the decision to Vale, but when had he ever been content to be ruled by another’s judgment?

  “There’s only two of us,” Vale said.

  “Gunnar will be on his way here.” Ebon had sent the mage to keep an eye on the Canal Gate in case Ocarn tried to get a message to Tia, but he’d have heard the commotion at the harbor.

  “Three, then. You think that’s enough to make a difference?”

  “Against a hundred stone-skins on the wall? Maybe. Against an entire fleet if it makes it past the chains…”

  He glanced again at the Chain Tower overlooking the entrance to the Neck.

  The fort had to hold.

  * * *

  Romany lay back on her bed, rubbing her forehead where her mask had left impressions. She could hear the attack on the harbor, but that wasn’t what concerned her just now. Earlier she had respun the corroded sections of her web, only for the new threads to begin degenerating the instant they were woven. And at a faster rate than she’d detected previously, too. Clearly some form of power was clashing with hers, yet even knowing that, she had struggled to discern its nature. The key was not to concentrate on it, she found, but to relax her vision. Sometimes things were visible from the corner of your eye that were not evident when you looked at them directly. Such had been the case here, for she had become aware of a cloud of sorcerous particles extending through this entire wing of the Alcazar.

  Romany didn’t know what unsettled her more about that magical haze: that it had taken her so long to detect it, or that she still couldn’t say what it was. It didn’t seem to be affecting the Alcazar’s inhabitants. Hells, it didn’t seem to be affecting anything except her web. That raised the question of whether the mist had been fashioned solely to destroy Romany’s creation. Possible, she conceded, but unlikely. For in all her years, she had yet to encounter anyone with the wit to detect her network of ethereal strands.

  If the nature and purpose of the mist was a mystery, the source could not be in doubt. Hex. The stone-skin was back in his quarters, asleep. It occurred to Romany that his constant slumbers might hold a clue as to the nature of his power. It also occurred to her that his true mission here had never been to persuade Mazana to turn on Avallon. It hadn’t even been to sow distrust between the sides. No, his audience with the emira had been arranged so he could gain access to the Alcazar. Now he was where he needed to be to instigate his next move.

  So what would that move be? Something directed at the emperor, probably, though Hex surely wouldn’t pass up the chance to strike at Mazana too. Odds were, his friends from the Eternal would be involved somehow. They might even be here already. But no, her web would have warned her if they were inside the Alcazar. Where, then? Somewhere close? Another building in the Upper City?

  Again she found herself regretting her decision not to extend her web into the rest of Gilgamar.

  What now? Warn Mazana of the threat? After Romany had just tried to kill her? Yes, that would make sense. A better option would be simply to sit back and ride out the impending storm. And maybe look for an opportunity to help the Augerans dispatch Mazana?

  A knock at her door roused Romany from her reverie, but she did not answer it. It was Kiapa, she knew, come to summon her to a midday meeting between Avallon and the emira. There’d be lots to discuss now that the attack was under way. Romany, though, had no intention of attending, because if she did so she might find herself in the open when Hex sprung his surprise. Better to remain in her quarters and prepare herself for whatever was coming. After all, just because she wasn’t going to go looking for trouble didn’t mean it would not come looking for her.

  Another knock, a pause, then Kiapa wandered off.

  The first line in Romany’s defenses would be a knot of spells in the corridor outside, aimed at dissuading anyone from approaching her door. Before she started on those, though, she had a hunch she wanted to confirm. Freeing her spirit from her body, she floated into the air and sped along her web to Jambar’s room.

  There were occasions when Romany hated being right. This was one of them. The shaman lay sprawled in death on the floor, clutching his bag of bones. There were no marks on his body, yet his face was frozen in such a rictus of suffering that Romany decided she could rule out natural causes as the manner of his passing.

  Hex.

  It should have been impossible to murder a shaman as skilled as Jambar. The priestess had a hunch regarding that too, which she would need to check later. Why had Hex targeted the Remnerol, though, of all the people in the Alcazar? Because he might have foreseen what the Augerans were planning, obviously. But if Hex was able to assassinate people with such ease, why hadn’t his first victim been the emperor or Mazana? Because Jambar wasn’t surrounded by bodyguards. Because to take down Avallon, Hex will need the help of his kinsmen.

  It struck Romany then that there was something absurd about the course of action she’d chosen. The Augerans looked more and more like a genuine threat to the League, and here was Romany about to take thei
r side against Mazana? Why? Because the emira is a danger to the Spider. Wasn’t she more of a danger to the stone-skins, though? How did Romany balance the need to silence Mazana against the emira’s value in a future war with Augera?

  Her spiritual face twisted. Not my concern. Spider’s blessing, hadn’t she vowed a bell ago to keep her mind free of distractions?

  A part of her wished the goddess were on hand to discuss her reservations. But then the Spider wasn’t the sort to change her mind once her course was set, or to welcome a debate on her orders. What was a priestess’s role, she would say, if not to carry out the wishes of her patron? What was the point in Romany being a priestess at all if she meant to second-guess the Spider’s every command? What point, indeed. The destruction of the Sabian League would be of no concern to the goddess. What had she said in Olaire? Empires rise, empires fall. What did it matter to her if Romany’s temple—or indeed Romany herself—fell too? The Spider’s game would just continue on a different board and with different pieces, for it was a game that had started long before Romany was born and would go on long after she died.

  And so the priestess must hold her goddess’s hand while she was led off the edge of a cliff.

  She sighed. With the Spider as a mistress, she should have known it would end this way.

  * * *

  The Key Tower loomed above Ebon. The ramp leading up to it had looked steep from a distance, but up close it looked all but unclimbable. At its base, around thirty Revenants were drawn up. The front rank held shields, while in the second rank Ebon saw two twin sisters wearing thin gauzy susha robes and precious little else. As Ebon approached, the women and a few of their companions turned to stare at him before looking away, uninterested. There was a reassuring calm to their manner, a readiness that said this was just another fight to them, and one they expected to win.

  The stone-skins they faced showed no more apprehension. Standing outnumbered at the top of the ramp, they must have known their position was hopeless. There weren’t enough of them to make a shield wall across the entire width of the ramp, so instead they had formed a wedge in front of the gate. Three of them held their shields high to protect the group from missiles shot from the Key Tower’s battlements. From where Ebon was standing, the stone-skins looked an imposing group, each fighter as large as any man or woman the prince had seen before. Perhaps that was just an illusion, though, created by their elevated position.