Faith, he says. Marcus had kept faith once before, waiting in a Khandarai church while cannonballs rang off the walls like bells. That time, Janus’ arrival had turned his desperate last stand into a glorious victory, though the cost had been higher than Marcus cared to think about.
Is he going to come and rescue me this time as well?
Giforte slipped back into the room. They were in one of the tower chambers, a much lighter and airier space than the dungeon, with high ceilings and gun slits that threw lines of sunlight along the floor. It was unfurnished except for a couple of chairs and a table made from a plank and a pair of barrels. Dust motes danced and spun in the lances of light.
“I’ve sent the messages, sir.”
“Good.” Marcus rubbed his forehead with two fingers, but the pounding only got worse. He sighed. “Have you gotten anything out of Danton?”
“No. He’s got some sort of idiot act going. All he does is ask me to find the princess and if I can bring him beer.”
“Saints and martyrs. You’d think he’d know what’s going to happen if that lot outside tries to storm the walls.”
“I’ve tried to tell him.”
“Well, make sure we keep a few men up here, too. If Ross gets his hands on Danton while he’s still playing games, it’ll be red-hot pokers and thumbscrews.”
“He’s that bad?”
Marcus paused. He was spared the necessity of answering this by the arrival of Staff Eisen, breathless from a sprint up the stairs.
“Sir!”
There was only one thing it could be. “I’m on my way.”
—
The ladders were ready, but the mob was not storming the parapets. Not yet.
“Whoever’s in charge up there,” a voice boomed from below, “come out! We want to talk to you!” A background roar from the crowd added punctuation.
Ross caught up to Marcus and Giforte at the base of the wall.
“We don’t need to negotiate with them,” the Concordat officer said. “It may be a trap. If they’ve got a decent shot with a rifle somewhere—”
“I’ll take the chance,” Marcus said. “Feel free to stay here.”
“But—”
“They outnumber us five hundred to one, Captain. I think it’s worth making the effort to talk, don’t you?”
Marcus hurried up the narrow stone staircase to the fire step, Giforte and Ross close behind him. The orders he’d given Giforte had already been carried out, and half the Armsmen on the wall had been replaced by black-coated Concordat troops. All were armed, and Marcus suddenly wondered if his impulsive act of chivalry had been such a good idea. One shot would be one too many.
“Ross,” he said, when they reached the top. “Make sure your men know they’re to fire on my command, and not before. Anyone who takes an early shot will have the Minister of Justice to answer to.”
“Yes, sir.” Ross went to talk to his lieutenants, and Marcus stepped up to the parapet and looked down at the crowd.
Ominously, it was considerably better organized than it had been this morning. Six enormous ladders had been completed, and each lay near the base of the wall in the midst of a knot of people. The crowd was a mixed bag of fishermen, laborers, menials, and even women, but the ladders were conspicuously flanked by a crew of burly dockworkers, who looked more than capable of lifting them into position. Everyone in the teams by the ladders had acquired some kind of weapon, too, though this amounted to little more than wooden clubs or improvised spears. Here and there a sword gleamed, looted from who knew where.
In the center of this impromptu siege party stood an enormous man in a fisherman’s leather apron, flanked by a pair of young women. He was the one who’d spoken, his deep voice easily cutting through the excited babble of the crowd.
Marcus took a deep breath and cupped his hands around his mouth.
“I’m in command,” he said. “This is an illegal armed gathering. I’m going to have to ask you to disperse!”
Ripples of laughter ran through the crowd. The big man spoke briefly to the women, then said, “I’m afraid we still have business here!”
“What do you want?”
“Open the gates and release your prisoners! If you offer no resistance, you and your men can go in peace.”
“My orders don’t allow that,” Marcus said. He saw Ross returning out of the corner of his eye. “However, if you would like to nominate a delegation to come in and negotiate, perhaps we can reach an accommodation?”
This seemed to cause some confusion. The two women fell into a heated conversation, with the giant listening intently. Marcus watched nervously. If I can get them talking, I can buy time. And time was all he could hope for—time for the government to do something, either decide to give in to the mob’s demands or summon the nearest Royal Army unit to crush them. Either way, it won’t be on my shoulders.
“No point to negotiating,” the big man said, coming out of the huddle. “Either open the gates or we’ll open them for you.” He put his head to one side. “You’re an Armsman, aren’t you? We have no quarrel with you. Do you really want to die for Orlanko’s dogs?”
Not at all, as it happens. Marcus glanced back at Ross, who was beckoning urgently.
“Ranker Hans is an excellent shot,” he said. “He’s certain he can pick off the leader at this range.”
“And how would that help?” Marcus said.
“It would throw them into confusion! Then a few volleys into the teams by the ladders—”
“Hold your fire until my command.”
“But—”
“Armsman!” said the man outside. “We would like an answer.”
Marcus glanced at Giforte, but the vice captain was looking away, down the line of Armsmen and Concordat soldiers. The men in green looked decidedly shaky, crouched against the parapet with muskets in hand. Most of them had probably never fired a shot in anger.
“I can’t let you in,” Marcus shouted. “If you would just agree to talk—”
“Forward!” the big man shouted.
The crowd answered with a roar. Marcus could make out cries of “Danton!” “One Eagle and the Deputies-General!” and “Death to the Last Duke!” amid the general tumult. The dockmen hoisted the ladders and hurried toward the wall, with the armed bands following close behind.
“Sir!” Ross said.
Militarily, Marcus knew, he had already played things poorly. The men at the parapets ought to have been firing this whole time, forcing the attackers to stay beyond musket range and giving them a broader strip of no-man’s land to cross when the assault finally came. As it was, it could go either way. The defenders were grievously outnumbered, but it took more nerve than most green troops possessed to climb a thirty-foot ladder while balls whizzed and men fell all around you. A few volleys might break them. Or just make them angry enough to get up here and crack all our heads open.
If he gave the order to fire . . .
He would be remembered for it, he realized. No matter how things came out. Marcus the Butcher, who ordered his garrison to fire into the crowd.
The young woman with red hair had dashed forward to join one of the ladder teams. The other one was still staring up at him intently, as though she recognized him.
Balls of the Beast. I can’t do it, can I?
These were his own people, fishermen and porters and shopkeepers whose only grievance was with the men in black who had taken hundreds of their husbands, wives, and children in the middle of the night. Hell, if I didn’t have this uniform, I might be out there myself.
Once he’d come to that realization, he felt surprisingly calm. His objective, finally, was clear. Buy as much time as I can, without actually killing anybody. In which case, it was obvious what to do.
“Sir!” Ross said again, then turned away to address his own lieutenant. �
�Prepare to—”
“Back!” Marcus shouted. “Fall back from the wall. Back to the keep!” He turned full circle, making his voice loud enough to be sure the attackers below heard as well. “Everyone, fall back!”
“You can’t be serious!” said Ross.
“The keep is more defensible,” Marcus said blandly. “I don’t want to risk men in an engagement here.”
All around him, the Concordat men hesitated, but the Armsmen needed no urging. They headed for the stairs and the inner courtyard. The men in black, left with only half a garrison, were forced to follow.
Giforte, Ross, and Marcus were the last ones atop the wall.
Marcus held out a hand. “After you.”
“This is treason, sir,” Ross said coldly. “You may be certain I will report this to His Grace.”
“Feel free.” Amid cheering from below, one of the ladders clacked against the parapet. “But perhaps we should continue this conversation elsewhere?”
Ross spit an oath and took the stairs two at a time. Marcus, still looking down at the crowd, said, “He didn’t fall and break his neck on the way down, did he?”
“No, sir,” said Giforte.
“Pity.” Marcus took a deep breath. His headache was clearing at last. “Come on.”
WINTER
The man Jane summoned to deal with the door was called Grayface. This was not, as Winter originally guessed, because he was of Khandarai descent, but rather because he was a blacksmith with a habit of leaning too close to his fires and coating his face with ash and smoke. He was a stout man, not as big as Walnut but broader about the belly, and while his face was not gray at the moment it was nonetheless a bit terrifying. His eyebrows had gone long ago, and his cheeks and forehead were cratered with burns where stray sparks had landed.
“S’not too hard to make a ram,” he said, hands resting on his belly, in the confident tones of someone offering a professional opinion. “What you do, see, is get yourself a big iron pot. Or half a big kettle will do in a pinch. Then you find a nice big log, slip your pot over the end, and get it nice and hot while you hammer it into place. When it cools off it’ll shrink and grip the wood tight.”
“It’ll have to be a damned big log,” Walnut said, “if you want us to put a dent in that.”
That was the door to the keep, a solid-looking portal of oak banded with iron for strength and set deep in the stone with no visible hinges. It certainly looked formidable enough, to the untrained eye, but Winter had never considered it a serious obstacle, as the design of the fortress meant it couldn’t be properly defended.
If the Island as a whole was shaped like a squeezed lemon, the Vendre occupied one pointed end, covering a roughly triangular patch of land with its tip aimed downstream. The keep had the same triangular design. The two outer walls, facing the river, were three stories high and studded with gun slits and now-empty embrasures, and from their rear an awkwardly shaped slate roof sloped down to meet the single story on the landward side. There were no gun slits in those two rectangular towers facing the wall below.
In short, there was no way for the defenders of the fortress to harass an enemy once they were in the courtyard. And, as Janus had proven at the fortress in the Great Desol, there was no door strong enough to hold off an opponent with time, manpower, and tools. Jane’s forces were short on cannon and powder but long on willing hands and strong backs, so a ram seemed like the best bet.
What bothered Winter was what would happen after they broke the door down. Walnut and the others didn’t seem to have thought that far ahead, and Winter didn’t want to undermine Jane’s authority, so she quietly caught her friend’s eye.
“. . . probably need at least twenty men on it,” Grayface said. “Call it thirty, to be safe. Figure two feet per man, we need a beam maybe thirty feet long.”
“Right,” Jane said. “Do it. You’re in charge. Walnut, make sure everyone gives him everything he needs.”
Grayface blinked. “Where am I supposed to get a beam that long?”
“Plenty of houses out there,” Jane said. “Find one with a nice long roof beam and take it.”
“That’ll take forever,” Grayface said, squirming under unaccustomed responsibility. “We’d have to pull the tiles off and brace—”
“Only if you care whether the roof falls in,” Walnut said.
“You want me to tear down someone’s house?” the blacksmith said.
“I want you to do whatever you need to do to get it done quickly.” Jane glanced at Walnut, who nodded and took Grayface by one arm.
“Come on,” he said. “I saw a Sworn Church up the street that looks like it has just what we need.”
“Try to make sure nobody’s hiding inside,” Winter called after them. She couldn’t tell if they heard.
Then she and Jane were alone, or as alone as they were likely to get. The inner court of the Vendre was full of laughing, shouting people. It had been home to a few small wooden stables and other structures, but the rioters had vented their anger on these and the remains had been appropriated for the giant bonfires that were starting to take shape in the street outside. Food was on its way, and drink had already arrived or been liberated from closed shops nearby. A carnival atmosphere was taking hold, and there was a general feeling that with the retreat of the Armsmen from the walls, it was all over but the shouting. The great mob was drunk on a sense of its own power, as though the easy victory had made it immune to potential consequences.
Jane was in charge, inasmuch as anyone was. At least, she could give orders, and most of the time they were obeyed. Min, the soft-spoken girl who’d organized cleaning rotas back at Jane’s headquarters, had set to arranging bands of fighting men with the same enthusiasm, with the rest of the Leatherbacks helping to round up work crews and get people pointed in the right direction. There had been a little bit of laughter at the expense of “Mad Jane’s Girls,” but it hadn’t lasted long.
“Well?” Jane said. “What’s the problem?”
Winter blinked. She hadn’t thought her worry showed in her face. “Why do you think there’s a problem?”
Jane laughed. “Come on. You have the exact same expression you did when you were trying to talk me out of throwing rotten eggs at Mistress Gormenthal, or stealing Cowlie’s underwear. I used to think of it as your ‘But, Jane!’ face. ‘But, Jane, we’ll get in trouble!’”
Winter forced a smile. “Far be it from me to be the killjoy.”
“But,” Jane prompted.
“But,” Winter said, “I think you’re not taking this seriously enough.”
Jane’s smile vanished. “Seriously? I just told them to start wrecking houses so we can get through that door. That isn’t serious?”
“The door isn’t the problem. If they fight—”
“They won’t,” Jane said. “If they were going to shoot, they would have done it at the wall. It doesn’t make any sense to start now, when they’re in a far worse position.”
“I’m not sure that they are in a worse position. If we have to fight our way into that thing, it’ll be a nightmare. If it comes to that, people are going to get killed. A lot of people.”
“We knew that this morning, and it didn’t stop us.”
“That was then. Now everyone’s acting like we’ve already won.”
Jane frowned, then looked carefully at Winter. “There’s something else you’re not telling me.”
Winter nodded, reluctantly.
“The Armsmen captain. It looked like you recognized him. Is that it?”
“His name is Marcus d’Ivoire,” Winter said. “He commanded my battalion in Khandar.”
“Did you know him well?” Jane leaned forward eagerly. “Do you think you could talk to him for us? If we could make him understand—”
“What?” Winter blinked. “No! No, you don’t understand. He does
n’t know about”—she gestured down at herself, dressed in trousers like Jane but still marginally feminine—“about me. I couldn’t talk to him without explaining what I was doing here.”
“Sorry.” Jane shook her head. “I got ahead of myself. Do you know him, though?”
“A little bit. More from hearsay than anything else. We weren’t friends.”
“What’s he like?”
“Tough. Not the most imaginative soldier, but stubborn. When he was fighting on the Tselika, he was ready to slug it out to the last man rather than give up the position he’d been ordered to hold. And he practically worships the colonel.”
“The colonel?”
“Count Mieran. The Minister of Justice.”
“Ah.” Jane looked speculatively at the door. “So you think he has something up his sleeve.”
“Not . . . exactly. I just don’t think he’ll give up easily.”
“He gave up the wall, didn’t he?”
“He had the keep to fall back to. If we really push him into a corner . . .”
Winter saw the door splinter in her mind’s eye, collapsing inward, cheering Leatherbacks rushing over the wreckage. And, inside, a makeshift barricade of furniture studded with musket barrels, dozens of muzzle flashes, the merry zip and zing of balls ricocheting from stone and the thwack when they found flesh. The blood, and the screams.
“You really think he’d do it?” Jane said.
“He obviously doesn’t want to, or he’d have done it at the wall,” Winter said, trying to clear the nightmare vision. “Tactically, you’re right—it would have been a better move. But if the colonel has ordered him to hold Danton, then at some point he’ll have to fight.”
“Damn.” Jane glared at the door. It was odd to think that there were men behind it, as remote as though they were on the moon, besieged and besiegers separated by only a few feet of solid oak and iron. “We’ll try to negotiate, once we have the ram ready. Maybe we can convince him to see reason. But you know we’re running out of time. Somebody up there”—she jerked her head north, toward Ohnlei—“will have to do something eventually.”
The Shadow Throne: Book Two of the Shadow Campaigns Page 29
