by Danie Ware
He let out a ragged cheer, echoed by those round him.
Beside him, a horsewoman shouted, “Hit them in the back! Now!”
It was all happening so fast. Jade shook himself, raised the banner, waved the order. Beside him, his mounted drummer hammered out the rhythm, throbbing through the smoke.
It was like a tavern-saga, unreal.
As the horses moved, the foot-fighters were being seized, flesh blackening under burning hands, their bones broken and torn from their sockets like meat at a banqueting table. They were people he knew, people whose greetings and families were familiar to him.
Denial screamed loud in the CityWarden’s head.
Ears back, his mare broke into an unsteady canter, then a run. Around her, a thunder of hooves, a rising of dust – a raw shout of defiance. The curve of Jade’s kite shield bounced at his knee. The drummer continued to pound out the rhythm – it sounded like bravery. Spears were couched. He found his voice and added his cry to the roar. A courageous sound, a futile one.
But they raced for the creatures ripping into the shield wall.
He caught a glimpse of the beasts that had got round behind it. They were skirmishing now, harried by lone fighters, arrow shafts bouncing back from their grinding, shifting stone. Smoke rose round them like shadows. Their reactions were startlingly swift. One lone spearwoman jabbed inexpertly, saw her spear tip shatter – and the thing was on her, bearing her to the ground in pitted grey silence.
Jade saw it for only an instant: it raised a stone fist over her, she struggled to push it away, her hands crisping. She shrieked in fury, a sky-ripping, emasculating sound. The thing punched clean through the front of her skull.
Got up, looked for another kill.
And the wall of horsemen hit.
In the dust, in the heat, in the smoke, in the stench and noise of fear, he kept his seat by sheer reflex. The mare was barging, haunches into stone – he could smell the burning of her hide. His spearpoint was useless. He hung grimly onto his pommel and reins with one hand, used the other to keep the banner aloft, a beacon of green and white. One foot lashed out at a creature. He jarred his ankle and it turned to eye him balefully from skull sockets full of fire.
He heard himself shouting, “For Roviarath! For the Varchinde!”
Chaos swirled round him.
But several creatures had reached the edge of the Fayre.
Jade’s hands were numb, his arms pricking with tension. Disbelief surged through him as the first uprights caught. This couldn’t happen to him, to his city, to his friends...
The Fayre went up round them like matchwood, blazing fierce and immediate. Flames caught and danced with the dusk breeze, smoke poured upwards into the darkening sky. His archers fell back, coughing.
Through the thumping of hooves, drums and heart, he thought he could hear the commander shouting to rally, but the sound was desperate under the spreading, flaring bonfire that was Roviarath’s wealth.
Then a voice, “My Lord! ‘Ware!”
In the smoke, there was a creature suddenly right on top of him, stone claws reaching for his mare, gouging at the flesh of her neck. She whinnied like a scream, teeth bared, danced crosswise nearly costing him his seat. Around him, the thunder of hooves was interspersed with shouts, snorts, the sharp sounds of terhnwood shattering on stone, the cries and slams of the shield wall.
He heard another horse scream – really scream. He heard the crash as it went over, the harsh clatter of its tack as it hit the ground. He heard it struggle, heard it grunt, repeatedly. He heard the rider bellowing swear words.
The spearmen fought on, shields slamming and feet stamping. Their commander was hoarse, his voice a rasp of coughing as he tried to hold the line together.
The drum thundered.
Before him, was the voiceless, faceless thing, the only awareness the vicious glow of red in its skull-socket eyes. Heat poured from its skin.
He had the oddest feeling it knew who he was.
Another horse went down. Somewhere in the smoke beside him, he saw the shape fold sideways. Get up, he willed it, get up! Through the wheeling, stamping chaos, he could see the woman who’d shouted, turning her mount in frantic circles. There were three of them round her – they’d had enough wit to separate her from her tan.
The beast in front of him paused, watching. Red eyes like twin flares of hate.
“You know me, don’t you?” It was a whisper. “You know who I am.”
Then he remembered something – something from his tutor, long ago.
And in a rush, he realised what he should do.
* * *
On the wall, the archer commander fell back, visibility almost nil.
The smoke whorled and eddied – he could see the fires, spreading through the Fayre, see the spearmen falling back from skirmishing as the heat overcame them. The handful of beasts that were loose in the bared woodwork of the market were wreaking devastation – and there was nothing to touch them.
Almost nothing.
Upon the wall were stockpiled water barrels – a contingency that’d made his troops groan with the necessity of pulley-hauling them, hand over hand, to lay them in rows on the top of the bank.
He could see Jade’s green-and-white banner, fluttering, flashing, a flare of hope in the wreathing grey, the dancing sparks. He thought he heard the Lord shout, a bugle call of defiance.
He raised a shout of his own.
“Cohn, to me!”
The hefty shape of Cohn dropped his bow and lent his strength to the barrel. With a straining of muscle, a cording of tendons, an almighty heave that bit pain into their fingers, they hefted the thing onto the top of the defences.
And threw it as far out as they could.
* * *
“Yes, you know me!” Jade was shouting now, his idea bright in the front of his imagination. He could see the map old Master Atheus had laid out for him – the city, the docks, the walls, the Fayre – the three tributaries of the Great Cemothen River that fed into her vast, wide wash.
“Come on then! I’m Larred Jade, Lord of Roviarath. You want me? I’m here!”
The thing came forwards. From the corner of his eye he saw the horsewoman – he must learn her name – turn as the creatures surrounding her lumbered towards him. Several more sets of eyes burned through the smoke.
He raised the banner, waved it high and clear.
“I’m here, you stone bastards. You see me? Right here! You know who I am!”
They closed on him, smoke rising, the air shimmering, the heat making his mare sweat under him. He counted three, four, five of them – six – that was enough.
With a jab of his heels, he jumped the animal through the closest gap and ran her for the river.
And they came after him, needing to tear him down.
* * *
With a splintering crash, the barrel exploded, shattering like ribs upon the hard ground.
A wave of water hissed over burning uprights, wooden stalls, spread out through the packed-hard mud. Steam plumed into the air. One of stone creatures was caught by the outwash. It paused, as though confused, rocked back and forth on the spot for a moment, then tried to come for them.
One step, two – and there were cracks in the stone. The red light limning its muscles had faded, steam poured from the joints – and the supercooling rock cracked, split.
A third step and it crumbled, shapeless grey stones lost in the blackened mud.
Whooping like an idiot, the archer commander ran for the next barrel.
* * *
They were fast!
Waving the banner like a madman, he was upright in his stirrups, shouting at them – daring them to chase him down and tear his city from his very flesh. And they came on, driven, the fight around them forgotten – they were fixated by him, and they were going to rip him apart.
He broke out of the smoke, suddenly he was blinking in the dusk light. Ahead of him, the river sparkled, it ran wide and swift, fed
by waters from Irahlau, Vanskraat, Blinn, Aldarien, the very Kartiah themselves.
The map in his mind was so clear.
“Come on then,” he said to himself. “Don’t falter now.”
The city walls flashed by to his side – amazingly, there were spectators standing there – pointing at him and nudging their companions. Were they damned insane? He didn’t have time to think about it. Below the decorated stone, the empty skeleton of the Great Fayre tessellated slowly into the harbour – river boats bobbed, abandoned. Birds wheeled over them, crying mournfully at the smoke and the noise.
The scent of water filled the air – sweet, fresh.
Deep.
They were almost on him now – claws reaching for the mare’s rump. She jumped, flicked her heels at them. He fell forwards sharply, winding himself on the saddle pommel.
Reminding himself he wasn’t Banned, he sat back down.
“Come on then!” Waving the banner across the morning, back and forth, back and forth, he was shouting still. “I’m Larred Jade – and I’ll damned well teach you to burn my city!”
And he ran the mare out onto the wharf.
* * *
Watching the CityWarden vanish into the smoke with six of the beasties after him, Rika wondered if the old sod had finally lost his mind.
Around her, all was wheeling, screaming turmoil. The cavalry had lost its formation almost instantly. She could see the remnant of the shield wall, still hanging together, though harried at both flanks. From somewhere in front of her came a second splintering wooden crash.
The creatures had scattered – they seemed to be everywhere. A flicker of red light, a flash of sullen eyes, a shout, a scream. Abandoning their useless terhnwood spears, many of the foot-fighters had resorted to shield bashing – haphazard and dangerous.
Even as she turned, trying to see what was round her, she saw a shield catch light, gutter and flare into angry life.
The fighter threw it from him, went for his belt-blade.
He was already dead.
Rika was impressed with her Lord’s courage and wit – but less sure that six of the creatures had made that much of a difference.
As the fighter scuttled backwards, breaking the line and slashing at the incoming creature, she wondered, with crazed clarity, if the city would live to see the morning.
* * *
Jade halted the mare at the very foot of the L-shaped wharf, her hindquarters dipping as she skidded on wet wood.
As she turned, river behind her sparkling in the sunset, the stone creatures were still piling forward, hard and fast, eyes fixed. They left charred, hissing imprints where their club feet slammed, echoing, on the heavy planking.
He waved the banner at them, taunting.
“You kill me, the city’s as good as yours. Come on, you bastards, I’m here.”
Noiseless but for the rapid thump-thump-thump of their step, they came on – swift, eager, burning, claws reaching to rend.
The wharf was shaking beneath them, wood charring and splitting. The mare teetered over the water.
She skittered her hooves as he gathered her to leap.
As they came for her, eyes red, he held her until the very last moment... Then they sprang sideways, skidding out of reach.
The hairs of her tail were caught in the stone claws of the lead creature.
It ran straight over wharf’s edge into the sparkling morning water of the Great Cemothen River.
And sank without a trace.
* * *
With a crash, the shield wall gave, shattered, splintered wood, staggering fighters, shouts of fear and fury. No longer defended, each fighter was alone, spinning to see what was round him, coughing in the smoke.
One man fell back, clinging to his broken arm – shards of shield still hung crazily from the handle and strapping.
Through the gap, an arrowhead of creatures came tearing, ripping to left and right. Broken now, the foot-fighters scattered, falling back. Some rallied into groups, huddled into mini-defensive formations, spears bristling, daring the creatures to come near.
And they did, stamping the shields down, ripping them loose and tearing into the soft flesh beneath.
Rika had dropped her useless spear, hung her big, kite-shaped shield on her arm. One savage slam from the shield rim and the stone creature before her was down.
She had no idea where Jade had gone. Grabbing the attention of the wild-eyed drummer, she roared at him to sound the regroup.
Roviarath wasn’t going down without a fight.
* * *
Tumbling, splashes. Two, three, four of them.
A hiss of angry steam.
He turned his mare in time to see the fifth creature hesitate – and the last one run slam into it, sending them both over the edge.
The waters parted, swallowed them whole. Steam billowed, a glow in the sunset.
And there was quiet.
Jade sat stunned, he thought he could hear cheering. Birds rose, crying, into the darkening sky.
For a moment that seemed endless, he wanted to cheer back. He waved the banner at them, could hear them, faintly, “Lar-red Jade! Lar-red Jade!” He found a lump in his throat – clenched his jaw, blinked.
But they were only six – the walls of his city were still beset, flame poured from the empty marketplace, smoke swirled thick through the air. He could still hear the screams and shouts of combat.
He touched his heels to the mare’s flanks, and, banner streaming, raced back into the mêlée.
* * *
Rika was screaming through the stamping of hooves, the drum-pounding, the mayhem.
“To me! To me!”
The creatures were loosed, determined and silent, faceless and pitted and grey. She could see them through the smoke, red lines of heat, watch them as they slashed one way and then the other.
Their lack of expression was the most frightening thing of all.
The shield wall had disintegrated under their onslaught, the archers had stopped shooting. Scattered battles ranged round her – one on one, the fighters were no match for the stone claws of the monsters and they were being shredded, left to die in the mud. Jade had gone, they needed to rally.
“To me!”
Then she heard the drum cease as the lad was pulled, yowling, from his saddle. His horse fled in a clatter of stirrups.
Without a thought, she rode the creature down.
But the gelding under her baulked. He backed up, throwing his head and snorting, trying to drag the rein from her hand. As she fought to keep the bit out of his teeth, she felt a savage rip in her calf muscle.
The drummer was screaming like a young girl, high and terrified – then, abruptly, silent.
Biting back tears of frustration, sorrow, fury, she yanked her leg out of reach, tried to kick.
But it had her by the ankle, talons sinking into her flesh. Its other hand grabbed her thigh, crushing, claws penetrating the muscle and making her bite back a scream of her own.
She drew her belt-blade, slashed at its stone wrist, watched the blade crack and dangle uselessly from its central fibres. Spitting “No, no, no”, she jammed the remnants into the thing’s red eye socket.
Its claws dug harder. It was trying to drag her out of her seat, rending huge wounds, deep in the front of her thigh. The pain was savage, blood stained her breeches, blackness laughed at the edges of her vision.
The last thing she saw, as the smoke swirled and parted, was the glow of the sun, dying slowly upon the jagged peaks of the Kartiah Mountains.
* * *
Hooves thundering, Jade charged back into the smoke.
To ruin.
His defence was shattered, his Fayre in bright flame. Riderless horses cantered through the smoke and were gone. Spearmen, those that remained, huddled in groups, eyes streaming and terrified. Many had fled.
My Gods, Jade thought, what have I done?
His banner was dull in the smoky air, the grass around him was burning,
the mud underfoot a churn of death and gore. He heard groans, whimpers of wordless pain that tore at his heart.
How had this happened? How had this...?
The dusk breeze plucked at the banner, tumbled the smoke about him. Through a momentary eddy, he saw a cluster of the creatures converge on the gatehouse – on the massive, wooden double gates, closed and bolted for the first time in his memory. Archers ran to the muster-call.
He had no doubt the gates would burn.
And after them, the city.
“Samiel!” The cry was crazed, but he had nothing else left. “You can’t do this!”
And the Varchinde answered him.
He heard hooves: a thundering that shook the ground, flashed sparks from the grass-devouring flames. Through the wall of smoke and mist and horror, he could see shapes – hazy, mounted. And the air...
With a high, ululating war cry that echoed back from the city walls, they were there – exploding through the smoke, bridleless, savage, utterly disordered.
His black mare on her hind legs, bellowing defiance, Syke of the Banned wheeled his arm above his head and sent them as a flat-out run, slamming into the rear of the creatures assaulting the gates. They didn’t bother with weapons – the mounts fought for themselves, forehooves slashing, back hooves shattering stone with hammer blows that exploded dust into the air.
He heard a ragged cheer from the archers on the wall.
Reining his mare to a halt, the Lord of Roviarath stared at the war-Banned, heard their yowls and catcalls, wondered at the sheer viciousness of the attack.
He had the oddest feeling they were enjoying themselves.
One hand on his monster recurved bow, Syke brought his snorting, prancing mare close by.
Jade looked at him, stunned. Said only, “Why?”
“Triq,” the Banned commander replied. He gave the Lord a shrewd, narrow-eyed look, then turned to watch the ramshackle mess about him. “Her mare came back. I saw these bastards running, I figured she’d failed. She died – Ress and Jayr – because I didn’t rally when I should’ve done.” He let off an idle snap-shot at a lumbering stone creature, hitting it neatly in the eye socket. Its stone head turned to look at him. “Well, we’re rallied now.”
