They dived into the trench. ‘Gettin’ hot out there,’ one said, an idiotic grin on his smoke-smeared face.
‘Just fire!’ Nait told him. As far as he could see all order had been lost. The lines were intermingled. No clear front remained. But hanging smoke, real and damned Mockra illusion blocked his vision of portions of the field – he knew when the smoke was Mockra because he couldn't smell it. Crimson Guard Blades stalked the field breaking all resistance where they found it. Since May's lucky toss with that melter took out that demon they'd been getting a lot of unwanted attention. So far the focused fire of Nait's squad had driven off three attempts upon them, blunted and deflected the Guardsmen to seek out softer targets. That, and the Moranth Gold who showed up out of nowhere to help defend their position. And speaking of fire, it appeared to be thinning to his left – Nait rose up out of the trench to squint down the line. Heuk was there, talking with Jawl and the boys at their lobber. What in the name of Hood's all-too-close breath was the damned fool up to? The mage then headed to him. ‘Will you get down!’ Nait yelled.
‘Drink this,’ the old drunkard said, shoving his jug at him.
‘Go to the Abyss.’
‘Drink!’ and crouching he pressed it into Nait's hands.
‘All right!’ Nait took an experimental sniff and pushed it away. ‘Gods, no!’
Heuk was unsympathetic. ‘You want help? This is it.’
Reluctantly, Nait raised the jug to his mouth, forced himself to take a mouthful of the cloying fluid, swallowed, gagging. He swiped his leather-palmed gloves across his mouth. ‘Gods! What is that?’
‘Horse blood, mostly.’
‘Horse blood? What're you trying to do? Poison us?’
The mage slapped him on the back, chuckling. Since the battle began the fellow seemed to come into his own; where everyone else ran ducking and wincing he strode straight and unconcerned. He motioned Nait up out of the trench. ‘Come with me. There's someone who wants to talk with you.’
‘Talk with me? What'd you mean?’
‘C'mon.’ And the man took hold of Nait's arm and lifted him from the trench.
Nait stared, rubbing his wrenched shoulder. ‘Take it easy …’ Heuk pushed him up the hill.
The wind that had been blowing constantly down the hillside now intensified. Something came throbbing overhead, a pressure, and he ducked, but Heuk gestured, muttering, and the pounding retreated. Nearby, the ground shuddered, dirt and ash flying into the air along with a few fleeing irregulars.
‘What in the Abyss …’ Nait gaped.
‘Never you mind – just keep the boys firing,’ Heuk said. ‘Here we are,’ and he pushed Nait forward. Suddenly, the air stilled and he saw that someone sat in the grass at the crest of the hillock. A very broad and heavy Dal Hon woman, a fan in one hand waving furiously at her sweaty, glistening, dark face. Sweat also drenched her silk clothes, darkening them and draping them over her wide bosom. Despite being absolutely terrified for his life, Nait was instantly captivated. Dear Gods, what a figure of a woman!
‘This is Bala,’ Heuk said. ‘She's the reason you're still alive.’
‘Yeah? Well, I'm the reason she's still alive!’
The mage's sweat-beaded, thick arms shook as she laughed a throaty chuckle that made Nait faint with desire. ‘Well said, soldier. Your fighting spirit remains, I see. Good – you'll have need of it. To be brief, I am exhausted. I have defied, deflected and blunted the Avowed mages’ efforts to turn this slope into one long killing ground all this long evening. But now I am done. Finished. I thought I was up to anything – that I was a match even for Tayschrenn, but now I find I must withdraw where before he alone faced down these and more. Heuk here will be taking over for me.’
At Nait's obvious alarm she threw up a hand up for silence. ‘If half of what he has shown me is true then you are in good hands. In fact, if any of what I suspect is true I am frankly glad to be withdrawing. So, soldier. Goodbye and good luck. I see from your stupefied gaze that you are of course entranced by our meeting. I would be pleased to remain to torture you with my unattainability but that will have to wait until we meet again.’ She snapped her fan closed with a loud snick like that of a sword sheathing and she disappeared. Nait stared blinking at the empty flattened seat of grass. Just my luck. Meet the woman of my dreams the day I'm gonna die. He knelt to press a hand down on the earth where she'd sat. It was warm to his touch. Lady, let me meet that one again!
Heuk cleared his throat. ‘So you could see her.’
Nait turned on him. ‘Yeah, I could see her!’
‘Good. Look around. What more do you see?’
Wanting to tell the old man to stuff it, Nait reluctantly glanced away to scan the field. Lights moved through the dark of gathering twilight – bright glowing figures among those milling, running and fighting. ‘I see people all lit up.’
‘Good. You have a touch of the talent now. The blood has given you this, as it has everyone down in the trenches. You can see anyone with raised active Warren magics. Now get down there and use that arbalest to blow them to Hood.’
Nait did not have to be told the advantages of this. He grasped hold of his shoulderbag and jogged down the slope. ‘Kibb! Load the lobber!’
* * *
Laseen had been very strict in her last orders: do not enter the Imperial Pavilion. No matter what. And though Possum was dearly tempted to edge aside the thick layered cloths of its walls to peek within, he restrained himself. No sense offering myself as a target to whatever awaited hidden inside. Planted torches lit its outside perimeter, Malazan regulars stood guard at intervals. No messengers or attendants came or went. Possum watched, as before, hidden half in veils of Mockra and slanting shadows of Meanas. Night gathered, thickening. He would wait. Eventually someone worth his attentions would make a mistake; then he would pounce. In the meantime he entertained himself imagining tableaus of what was occurring within. Had Havva Gulen woven multiple layers of wards and Warren-sprung traps for any attackers? Gods knew she didn't seem useful for anything else; he hadn't seen her dirty, lank hair or stained robes since they'd arrived. Perhaps the Veils had already taken her out. How would they ever know? In any case, he could wait. The Hand-commanders all had their orders – the sum total of which amounted to little more than hunt down any isolated Avowed and take them out. What more could they do? Laseen had ordered no Claw bodyguards remain with her. Very well. Who was he to disagree? Technically, he wasn't really with her, was he? He was watching from a safe distance. And should anything untoward happen … well, someone would be needed to step in to take charge…
Movement of the thick overlapping cloths brought Possum to the balls of his feet. A shriek tore from within, inhuman, gurgling, bubbling down into the mewling of incandescent agony. Possum ran for the pavilion. Guards backed away, swords out, as something dragged itself out from under the staked edgings of the cloths. A demon, its limbs and taloned hands twisted, almost melted. Smoking patches ate at its shaggy pelt. It trailed smears of ichor and dustings of red earth behind as it writhed free of the pavilion. Possum knelt, touching the strange rust-red dust. He rubbed it between his gloved thumb and forefinger. Smooth, like chalk.
Sighing, the tortured thing expired. Its flesh melted into a bubbling, hissing mess before everyone's eyes. Possum backed away. Queen preserve them! What could do such a thing to a summoned creature – an inhabitant of Gods knew what Warren or Realm? Then the thought struck him: summoned! A creature of magic! As if stung Possum wrenched off his glove, turned it inside out and flicked it away like a viper. Gods! He'd almost … too horrible even to consider! He backed away further – at least none of the guards appeared to have perceived him – his Warren magics remained active. He found another vantage point, his back covered by the spear wall of an impromptu horse corral.
Pure Laseen. Vicious and efficient. A floor dusted in Otataral and she in the centre. The dust negates the magics of any entering, levelling the field. As to the fight that followed, we
ll, she had been mistress of the Claw after all. And the pavilion's thick cloth walls disguised the fates of all who entered from those who waited without. How many have fallen within? Five? Ten? And by dawn how many? How many would Cowl send before entering himself? And when he did … the vaunted Avowed High Mage would find himself crippled – as would that mystery female mage who'd got the drop on him before. Yet Cowl duelled Dancer in his time. It was a pairing Vd almost step within to watch.
Almost.
It appeared that for the meantime Laseen had things well in hand. Perhaps there was time for a tour of the field fishing for targets of opportunity. Yes, perhaps so. And he ought to gather a feel for the engagement – in case the situation was such that discreet withdrawal was called for. Warren raised, half within natural shadow and half within Meanas, Possum jogged unchallenged on to the field.
What he found appalled him. Never had he witnessed such indiscriminate slaughter. Hanging curtains of Mockra drifted about, perhaps bringing to those it covered a crushing demoralization, or certitude of defeat. Thyr-induced walls of flames stalked the already burnt embers of the ravaged grassland. Skirmishers huddled in defensive knots firing on all who approached. Malazan regulars were digging in, forming shieldwalls against attack from roving bands of Crimson Guardsmen. Smoke wreathed all amid the dark. As far as he could make out things had descended into little more than chaos, murder and mayhem in which anything that moved was a target.
An enormous eruption of munitions battered his ears and buffeted him. He ran for the nearest vantage. The explosions rippled on in an incessant crashing that seemed to grow and grow in waves, climbing into a continuous roar. He reached the top of a modest hill to see down the slope toward the cliff to the Idryn valley. There, the Moranth Gold phalanx had been met by a Crimson Guard force ludicrously small by comparison. But it was not the mundane attack that captivated and horrified: the phalanx was under assault by ritual battle magics. A tornado of Sere squatted over the unit plucking up Moranth into its gyring maw. There they twisted, doll-like, limbs flailing, some being swept down to bowl over entire ranks. There they collided and, sometimes, erupted, disappearing in clouds of burst flesh and fragmented armour. Hood refuse this! This was not war. This was slaughter. And the thought clenched his chest, almost stopping his heart: they have no mages!
They have no mages. Stop this! Someone must put an end to this!
‘It's begun,’ a coarse, gravelly voice announced beside him. Possum leapt, spinning: an old bearded man in dirty robes hugging a chipped brown earthenware jug.
‘Who are you?’
‘Heuk. Cadre Mage. Sixth squad, Second Company, Fourth Division, Fourth Army.’
‘What's begun?’
Our duel.’
Possum eyed the man up and down as if he were mad. ‘Your duel? There are at least twelve Avowed mages out there.’
‘Less than that. The boys got maybe three. In any case,’ and his eyes looked directly into Possum's, ‘that's not your concern, is it?’
Possum could not help but back up a step: that smell, blood? The man's eyes – midnight black upon black? And at his mouth – blood? ‘Who are you?’ he breathed.
The fellow gestured to the south. ‘Look. They've broken.’
Indeed. The Gold phalanx was disintegrating under the pressure of the widening ravenous cyclone. Knots of soldiers fled in all directions.
The man's smile twisted, revealing black, crooked teeth. ‘We're next.’ His glance returned to Possum. ‘Who am I? Your recruiters named me a mage, but I am no mage. And now,’ he hiked up his jug, ‘you'd best fly away, little death crow. Keep to your games in the shallows of shadow. As for myself – I plumb the infinite depths of Night Eternal!’
Possum continued backing away. ‘No – that Warren is beyond us.’
‘Fool! As I said, I am no mage. I am a mere worshipper of Night. And as the old saying goes, my blood is up. Now flee, because I am about to call upon my God for he has returned and the time is long overdue for a demonstration of his gathering presence upon this world.’
While Possum watched, revolted, the man upended the jug over his head. Thick fluid – clotted blood, he imagined – ran down over the man's hair, face and shoulders. Possum turned away, his gorge rising. Madness! Utter insanity. And the night had barely begun! At the base of the shallow rise he stopped short as cocked crossbows in the hands of tens of soldiers kneeling and lying in the grass jerked to train themselves upon him. He froze.
‘Lower your Warren,’ someone shouted. ‘Or die.’
Possum complied. They see him. How could they see him?
‘Ach!’ someone snorted. ‘It's only a fucking Claw.’ The crossbows all swung away.
Feeling rather piqued, Possum sought out the owner of that voice. He found the man – a sergeant – in a trench arguing with a Moranth Gold who towered above. ‘I don't give a rat's ass,’ the sergeant was saying. ‘Your orders are to stay, so you stay!’
’Our brothers need us,’ the Moranth rumbled. They are sorely pressed.’
‘They've broken,’ Possum said. Both looked over, annoyed, it seemed to him, by his interruption. The sergeant made a tossing away gesture. ‘There you go.’
‘You could have them rally to this position,’ Possum suggested.
The Moranth swung his helm down to peer to the sergeant who glared at Possum then waved the Moranth away. ‘Fine!’ And he muttered under his breath, ‘Might as well paint fucking bull's-eyes on our heads.’
‘Too late for that, Sergeant … ?’
‘Nai—’ The man took a deep breath. ‘Jumpy. Sergeant Jumpy.’
Ah! Of course, the man crazy enough to go out into the night to try to stalk Ryllandaras. Who else would it be? ‘You already have the Guard's attention. I can guarantee you that. You have a lunatic mage, or priest, above your heads with delusions of omnipotence. And with the Moranth broken, yours and the centre are the last remaining Imperial strong-points in the field.’
The man was scanning the dark field before the trench where mixed Moranth and Malazan regulars held lines defending coalesced skirmishers against probing Guard infantry. ‘Then I guess you best run away,’ he said, offhanded.
Possum's mouth clamped shut; his hands twitched to fill themselves. ‘Do not presume to be beyond the reach of the Empress,’ he ground out.
‘Don't you presume yourself safe.’ And he pointed down the trench. Possum glanced aside: four saboteurs held crossbows trained upon him, each set with a sharper. ‘We're in the trench and you ain't,’ the sergeant observed laconically.
Possum straightened, carefully adjusted his dark-blue tunic. ‘Continue defending this position, Sergeant,’ and he stepped over the trench, raising his Warren to pass through the lines of assembling Imperials. The sergeant called after him, ‘No kidding! Like I was going to go for a blasted swim or something.’
Impertinent shit. Possum calmed himself with the certainty that – even with the deluded priest's claims – they would all be dead by the dawn. He just hoped they would savage the Guard brutally enough for the Claws to then at their leisure pick off the remaining exhausted and drained Avowed.
* * *
Her Blades found the west flank in a shambles. Shimmer sent her lieutenants ahead to organize what scattered forces remained. All that stopped a solid Imperial advance was the lack of support from the rest of the field – the Guard centre still held and the appalling display of battle magics on the east was a pause for every ordinary soldier.
Shimmer advanced with Greymane, Shell and Smoky, gathering to her a growing following of Avowed, most of which she sent ahead to help firm resistance. The closer they got to the front, or scattered sections of the front, the thicker became the punishing flights of crossbow bolts. Every Avowed, and many regular Guardsmen and women, had picked up a Malazan heavy infantryman's solid rectangular shield, which they hunched behind like moveable walls. Shimmer had to occasionally sweep away the bolts hammered into hers in order to keep it usable.
An Avowed, Daneth, waved her over to a pile of fallen Guardsmen. ‘Look at this.’ On her knees, she raised a corpse to rest its head on her lap. Despite the man's mangled features Shimmer recognized him as an Avowed, Longlegs. The body displayed a number of wounds, as one would expect, but what was surprising was that fatal head wound: it was singular. Someone, or something, had struck him a blow on the face shattering his nose and jaw, driving the fragmented bones back into his brain, killing him instantly. ‘A club or mace?’ Shimmer opined.
‘The heel of an open hand,’ Daneth said, her flat tone matching her set grim face.
‘What? Who could possibly …’
‘Urko!’ Smoky gasped as if the name itself were a curse. ‘He's here.’
Urko – the man who needs no weapons. No wonder the west was in such disarray; no unit could hold against him. She glanced around, caught the gaze of nearby Avowed. ‘Halfdan, Bower, Lucky! Find him and kill him.’
Return of the Crimson Guard: A Novel of the Malazan Empire Page 80
