“They're coming,” Aisha panted, in Torovan, for the humans’ benefit. “A great column up the Saint's Walk. There are priests with them, holding stars on poles. They carry fire and chant words of Verenthane greatness and other, filthy things I shan't repeat.” She accepted a cup of water from one of Gaordin's sons and drank thirstily. The others exchanged looks. “They appear quite well armed, there are hoes and scythes, in addition to the more usual weapons.”
She leaned on the table and stared at the map, calculating distances in her head. There was not enough time. Fear gripped her, worse than any time since Enora.
“Hoes and tools do not make them quite well armed,” Kiel said coolly, his clear grey eyes impassive. “We should not overestimate the capabilities of ignorant peasants with farming implements.”
“How many, Aisha?” Rhillian asked quietly.
“Thousands,” Aisha whispered. “I've never seen so many thousands. I had quite a good vantage on the temple tower, the column stretches all the way up the Backside slope.” When she met Rhillian's eyes, her gaze was haunted. “It's just like Enora, Rhillian. Like the day the mob came to Charleren, and burned all the houses, and killed all the…” she broke off, looking at Patachi Gaordin. He looked scared. So did his sons. “We must get the families out. Rhillian, we cannot hold back so many. We should concentrate our defences on those properties that can be defended. In Charleren, they came with knowledge of all those families who were most friendly to serrin, and most especially where the half-castes lived. Those got the worst of it.”
Aisha had seen the aftermath of that, in her not-so-distant youth. Pretty Charleren, a typical, picturesque Enoran village, close to her parents’ farm. She had gone with her parents or her siblings to Charleren on many occasions, to buy or sell at market, or to call on her uncle and cousins. Charleren had had pretty stone cottages, a lovely old temple, a bustling market, and a view from its low hill across rolling green and yellow fields of maize and wheat.
Aside from her uncle, aunt and cousins, Aisha had known and liked many of the villagers. Gruff Tazian the mayor, who liked to dress in his old infantryman's surcoat and strut around like an officer, but would reduce children to squeals and giggles when they marched in his wake until he would turn and chase them, growling like a monster. Fat Romaldo, the butcher, who called all little girls “princess,” and whose bellowing laugh and dangling sausages were Aisha's most prominent memory of the old market. Old Mrs. Ishelda, always tending her flowers in her cottage garden, or baking sweetcakes that she would give away to village children. And her cousins’ friends, with whom she would play games, and take turns riding her uncle's two fat ponies.
The mob had risen from Andulan, a larger town, and had been driven by a gang of infiltrators from Larosa across the border, it was later found. Why Charleren, it was never discovered. Perhaps being small, relatively undefended, and near the border, its availability alone made it a target. Aisha recalled the alarm in the night, and the sight of fires aglow on the dark horizon. Her father had raced off, forbidding his wife or eldest son to follow. Both had fumed, but had stayed behind with Aisha and her siblings. At the first light of morning, word came that the mob had gone, and local riders were pursuing them into the fields. Aisha's mother had determined to take her children to Charleren, so that they could see the enemy's face.
She recalled walking the streets, smelling ash and smoke, seeing the remains of cottages-just bare, blackened walls about a pile of charred and smoking beams. Bodies on the street, some laid in rows where others had collected them for dignity, and others yet unclaimed. Blood on the paved road, as thick and red as after Papa had slaughtered a sheep. Mayor Tazian, hanging from the market courtyard tree by his neck, with several others, like some strange, horrid fruit. The ruin of Mrs. Ishelda's cottage, and the blackened, twisted corpse amid the beams, the carefully tended flowers twisted and brown from the heat. Romaldo the butcher had been the worst. Mama hadn't let her see him, for his cottage remained mysteriously unburned. Only later had she overheard children from another village telling how he had been tied to a chair, and forced to watch as his wife and children had been slaughtered before his eyes with his own butcher's knives, before suffering a slow death of many cuts. Romaldo had married a serrin lady, just like papa. Like Aisha and her brothers and sisters, Romaldo's children had had colourful hair and shiny eyes.
Of her uncle, aunt and cousins, only Dashi, the youngest, had survived. Mama and Papa had adopted him as their own, and from that day, he'd become Aisha's newest brother. He'd cried every night for months, and sometimes Aisha would take him into her bed and hold the little boy until he slept.
“We will stay,” said Patachi Gaordin, without conviction. “We will defend our home.”
Aisha stared at Rhillian. Rhillian looked down at the map, her eyes moving fast over the winding lines of streets, lanes and landmarks. “You must go,” she told Gaordin. She turned to the small man and put both hands on his shoulders. “Your family have been loyal friends to Saalshen for more than a hundred years. Your grandfather was a good friend to the first talmaad to arrive in Saalshen. We have done much for your family since then, my friend, and we would fight to defend your home if it were possible. But it cannot be done, not if we had ten times the talmaad that are available. Not against the numbers that march against us.”
“Where do we go?” Gaordin asked, anguished. “Where will be safe?”
“Dockside,” said Rhillian. “Take your family to Dockside. The Nasi-Keth prepare defences there. The lower slopes will resist with everything they have.”
“We have properties across southern Petrodor,” Kiel observed, eyeing the map. “Most of them will have little chance of reaching Dockside before the mobs arrive. Perhaps we should call in our debts with Patachi Maerler and see if his pledges of friendship are anything more than just words.”
“Can you run some more?” Rhillian asked Aisha.
Aisha nodded. “I'll be quick.” She'd always been a good runner, preferring that even to horseback on her parents’ farm. The cold, rain-wet stones of Petrodor seemed suddenly a world away from that old life, and she wondered quite how she had managed to come from there to here. Serrin, an old saying went, never stopped travelling long enough to be homesick. Well, aside from her recent detour to Lenayin, Aisha had been in Petrodor for three years now. She had stopped travelling for long enough. She only hoped to live long enough to see Enora, and her family, once more. The column moving up the Backside slope had been enormous. She didn't like her chances.
Alythia rolled the broken old cart wheel down the Dockside lane, past running men with weapons both formidable and improvised, past mothers with anxious expressions ushering their children, past old folk watching from their doorways with grim, wary eyes. Others too were carrying old refuse, or dragging it, toward the edge of the flat ground, before the Petrodor Incline began to rise.
At the end of the lane, a barricade was forming. At its base was an old, lopsided cart, over which were stacked broken stones and bricks, old wooden beams, a disused fishing boat mast, broken furniture, and piles of old barrels and crates. Fishing nets had been draped to hold the debris in place, and those nets in turn were tied to neighbouring window frames. Alythia's wheel was quickly tossed on the barricade by a young boy. He wore a short blade on his back, as did two others, and an older man gave directions. All Nasi-Keth, and all local Dockside folk.
On the roofs above, a man with a bow watched the incline, a dark figure against the cold, grey sky. Further up the slope, Alythia could see smoke rising. Occasionally, she could hear distant cries and fighting. She thought of Gregan, and her knees threatened to shake. She could not go through that again. This was not what she was meant for. She was a princess of Lenayin, though little chance that anyone would recognise her for such with her plain dress and bruised face. She thought wildly of escape, of running along the dock to North Pier where the wealthy families guarded their warehouses and loaded their big ships…but Steiner ru
led North Pier, and Steiner had killed Gregan.
Or she could head to Angel Bay where House Maerler and their southern allies ran a similar dock mostly out of sight behind Sharptooth…but there was no way around Sharptooth at sea level. She would have to climb, and that would take her straight into the mobs and the fighting. Perhaps she could grab a boat and sail out across the harbour…but that was crazy, she had no idea how to sail. If she had money, she could surely pay some sailors to take her, but she had not a single copper to her name.
Sasha had money, came the desperate, bitter thought. Sasha and Kessligh had money, stashed away somewhere. Not that they'd ever tell her where they kept it, nor let her have any if she asked. She was a prisoner here, amidst these rough, smelly common folk. Of course, she'd been a prisoner in Halmady Mansion, too, but at least those had been people of class and breeding.
A hand grabbed her arm, startling her. “You, girl.” She looked, and found a middle-aged woman with a worn yet strong face, and rough-curled hair streaked with grey. “Do you know medicines?”
“I…I can nurse,” Alythia said reluctantly. Even Lenay princesses had to learn to tend wounded men.
“Here,” said the woman, and handed her a small waterskin from the bundle she carried. Alythia saw that the woman wore a blade at her back and carried a broad leather satchel on one hip, opposite the waterskins. “I need strong young girls behind the barricades when the fighting starts, we'll have wounded men falling back and they'll need water. The older women are stocking cloth and medicines further back, but you'll need to help the wounded get to them. We won't have any men to spare once the fighting starts, do you understand?”
Alythia nodded mutely, accepting the skin, yet still thinking of escape. There were priests leading the mobs, it was said. Priests! Surely a priest would wish no harm to a Verenthane princess of Lenayin? But how would they know her for a princess? Surely it wouldn't matter? Surely a Verenthane mob would not kill Verenthanes? They were attacking and burning serrin properties upslope, after all…
The Nasi-Keth woman gave her a pat on the shoulder. “Don't be frightened, girl. I hear Yuan Kessligh himself has taken charge of our defences. Those Riverside idiots don't stand a chance.” She departed, with a final tap of the eight-pointed Verenthane star about Alythia's neck. The Nasi-Keth woman, Alythia saw, wore a similar star.
Verenthanes, it dawned on her, staring at the commotion of people around her. All were Verenthanes, including the Nasi-Keth. The mobs came to clear Petrodor of serrin, and reclaim the Shereldin Star from the Nasi-Keth of Dockside. But…didn't they know that the Docksiders were also Verenthanes? Didn't they care? What kind of Verenthanes were these, who would kill their own kind?
Beyond the barricade, midslope families were hurrying down the hill, frightened women clutching children, men carrying clubs or kitchen knives, or the occasional sword or spear. The Nasi-Keth man in charge of the barricade waved them through and asked for news of the mobs. Alythia heard only a little of the replies. She only heard the word “thousands,” repeated over and over.
She made her way back toward the Giana Family's residence, where Elra rested by the little courtyard. She'd barely gone ten steps when she saw one of the Giana daughters pointing her out to a tall man. He had long black hair, a bushy moustache and familiar-looking tattoos curling across his forehead. He wore a big sword at his hip, with a plain pommel and leather binding-big and brutal, with none of the decoration and lightness Gregan and his peers had preferred. Worst of all, he was now striding her way with something approaching glee in his eyes.
No…not worst of all. There was a small crowd following him, and Alythia realised in shock that they all seemed to be of a kind with the big, heathen man. For surely heathen he was, the tattoos gave him away, to say nothing of the sword and long hair. Highlanders, like herself. The sort of men whose company good, high born Verenthane women were supposed to avoid. There were perhaps fifty in all, and even strong Dockside men gave a wary sideways step to let them pass, for they looked fierce indeed as they came.
“Princess,” said the big man, halting before her with a bow. The other men did the same. “I am Tongren Deshai'in. I am a friend of your sister Sashandra. We here are men of the highlands, Cherrovan and Lenay alike, former enemies united to fight for a common cause. You are a princess, highland royalty. We bow to you and ask you to bless our banner, and to command us in our battle to come.”
Alythia gaped at him in absolute horror. “Me!” she nearly shrieked. “You…you…” She stared across the line of watching faces. There was no worship in their eyes as they regarded her, only a hard calculation. Alythia swallowed hard. “Master Tongren,” she said, in her most composed yet slightly trembling voice, “I fear you have me confused with my sister. I am no war leader. I cannot wield a sword, and I am quite certain that if I commanded you in battle, not one of you would survive to see tomorrow.”
There was laughter, at that. “Quite likely anyhow!” one man said cheerfully. “I hear there's thousands of ’em!”
“Just bless the damn banner, girlie,” said a squat, round man with a bull neck and blond braids. “Give us your Verenthane prayer and look pretty for us, and give us a kiss if we get killed, that's all we ask.”
Alythia glared at him. Highland pagans never had learned how to speak to royalty. “What my friend says,” Tongren explained patiently, “is that it is a formality, nothing more. But we are all a long way from home and it would gladden our hearts all the same.”
His accent was strange, unlike any Lenay accent she'd heard. “You're…Cherrovan?” she guessed.
“I am, as are my sons,” with a gesture to a pair of strong-looking lads, “and perhaps half our number. The rest are Lenay.”
Alythia made a helpless gesture. “Why…why would Cherrovans even want to be led by a Lenay princess?” she exclaimed. “I mean, we're supposed to be mortal enemies, aren't we?”
Tongren shook his head. “After a time in Petrodor, Highness, I've come to realise just how close Cherrovans and Lenays truly are. We are highlanders, with highland honour and highland beliefs, whatever our distance from home. It is the tradition of all highlands peoples to seek the blessing and leadership of the greatest amongst them before battle. Now, of the three Lenay princesses currently in Petrodor, you're the only one who isn't a self-confessed pagan, or currently fighting on the wrong side. Plus you're actually here.”
He seemed, to Alythia's consternation, unaccountably cheerful. Highlander though she was, she had never understood that in Lenay men. Now, she failed to understand it in Cherrovans. “But I'm Verenthane!” she pleaded with them. “I mean, you're not even…are you?”
“Jory's a Verenthane,” said one of the lads Tongren had claimed as his sons.
“But we don't hold it against him, much,” said another, and others laughed.
“Goeren-yai men are preparing to march to battle in the Bacosh for your father,” Tongren added, “and he's certainly a Verenthane, last time I looked.”
Alythia knew she was trapped. She spun around to stare at the barricade behind. There were many others, blocking all lanes and streets in and out of Dockside. They seemed to her less like barriers of defence than walls of a newly erected cage. The world conspired to trap her, to burden her with responsibilities she had never called for, to fight for people she had never loved against those she had no reason to hate. The Steiners had killed Gregan and ransacked Halmady Mansion, not impoverished mobs of the faithful from Petrodor's worst slums. If it were the men of Patachi Steiner and his allies who now marched upon them, she had no doubt she would have manned the barricades herself with whatever weapons the locals would entrust her with. But this…this was not fair. This was not the life she had chosen, nor the person that she was.
But if she refused these men, she would offend them. When trapped in a cage with angry beasts, she reasoned, it was safest to befriend them, if only to preserve one's self. And besides, she had to protect Tashyna. And Elra. She turned back to
the hard, highland men and struggled to regain her most princessly decorum.
“Please understand that I am not uncertain for doubting your honour,” she said sweetly. “I am terribly honoured. I only fear that I shall do you a disservice. I have never fought a battle before, and I am not a warrior like my sister.”
“You fought when the Steiners attacked Halmady,” Tongren countered. “You bear the bruises.” Alythia's eyes dropped, and she swallowed hard. “And you befriended a highland wolf. I hear she runs only to the sound of your voice.”
Alythia heaved a deep breath. She was a widow. She had nowhere to go but back to her father. One day soon, she would be with him again, back with her Lenay family. Then, she would be a true princess once more. Until then, she would grit her teeth, and suffer whatever burdens the gods laid upon her.
“I accept,” she sighed at last. “Please, what do you wish of me?”
The men had a banner with them, a black wolf's head against a blue background, fastened to a spear. Alythia kissed it and said a prayer over it, and then the men all dropped to one knee and she said a prayer over them too. Many Torovans stared as they passed, no doubt wondering what ill portent would follow these highland ruffians and their rituals.
Tongren then insisted that she carry a knife, even though her only previous use of one had been cutting steak at meals. Strangely, that notion offended her less than she'd thought it might. He showed her how to hold it and which part of her attacker was best to stick it into. Alythia watched with cold curiosity as men from her little highland army dispersed toward the barricades, leaving just Tongren and his two sons.
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