Sorcerers of Majipoor m-4

by Robert Silverberg

  Forty-seven miles of muddy riverbank separated them now from Farholt’s encampment.

  “Now,” Prestimion said, “we begin our march.”

  There was no dry moment all the way south; slipping and sliding through the mud was the only mode of progress, and yet they marched. When they made camp, it was in miserable sodden mud; when they marched again, it was through driving rain. Yet they were all of good cheer.

  Septach Melayn was in place by now; he had made his first feint across the river; Farholt, if he had any sense, would have his strongest forces lined up along the riverbank, looking outward toward Septach Melayn’s camp and ready to beat off the lunatic onslaught from the west whenever Septach Melayn actually deigned to launch it.

  But first—first—

  Under cover of darkness and storm Prestimion advanced steadily down the eastern shore until he was within striking distance of Farholt’s encampment. It was a heavy gamble: would Septach Melayn be a sufficient distraction? And would he, once he began his crossing of the river, be able to make it safely to the other side? And would the rest of the army be in the right place at the right time for the culminating stroke? Prestimion could only time his own attack with care and hope for the best.

  He led the troop of archers himself, with Taradath at his side. Gialaurys, on his right flank, had charge of the javelin-men, and to his left were the long spears, under Thurm and golden Spalirises. Duke Miaule would lead the cavalry, holding back in the rear until the question of the mollitors was resolved, for even the finest war-mounts were in dire fear of mollitors and would be useless if the great monsters were to charge.

  “Come now,” said Prestimion, and led the way forward against Farholt.

  * * *

  It was almost a perfect surprise attack.

  Farholt indeed had deployed the heart of his force along the river-bank, waiting for Septach Melayn. For two nights the false crossings had put Farholt’s men on full alert, and then the supposed attack had come to nothing, so that it began to seem to the royalist forces that Septach Melayn intended merely to feint night after night. There was, inevitably, a decline of vigilance on Farholt’s side; but still he kept his line intact along the river, with the bulk of the mollitors in readiness to hurl the rebels back into the river if ever they attempted to come ashore.

  This night, though, Septach Melayn’s attack was no feint. And while he led his boats past the midpoint of the river and toward the waiting royalists, Prestimion’s band of archers came down into Farholt’s camp from the other side. If it had been a complete surprise, the battle might have ended with a route in its first minutes; but some men of Farholt, happening by chance to be following some strayed mounts into the woods that lay just north of the camp, saw by the light of a lightning-bolt Prestimion’s men descending a low hill toward them, and ran screaming back to camp to sound the alarm. And so Farholt was granted just enough time to redeploy one segment of his force to meet the unexpected incursion from his rear.

  “Look, brother,” said Prestimion to Taradath between two great thunderclaps. “They come running to their deaths.” And he drew and put an arrow into one of Farholt’s captains; and Taradath, aiming right after him, felled another.

  The slaughter was fearful. A hail of arrows fell upon Farholt’s bewildered men as they charged uphill through the mud in the darkness. Of the mollitors, there was no sign: it seemed they were still down at the water’s edge, waiting for Septach Melayn. So it was safe for Prestimion to bring the cavalry into play, and he sent word to Miaule to move his division forward.

  Farholt, aware now of the magnitude of the unexpected attack behind him, was desperately dividing his forces, sending battalion after battalion to meet the thrust of Prestimion’s men. Plainly, he had underestimated the size of the rebel army, nor had he expected them to come upon him from two sides at once; and most of his own men were still camped for the night, struggling slowly to make ready for battle. Prestimion now signaled Thurm and Spalirises to swing into action with the spearmen, and Gialaurys from the other side to enfold the royalists with his javelins. “We have them!” he called out to Prestimion in a great booming shout that could be heard from one side of the battlefield to the other. “Prestimion! Prestimion! All hail Lord Prestimion!”

  Now Farholt’s men were falling back under the diabolical onslaught of Prestimion’s archers, while the infantrymen on both flanks herded the royalists toward the center of the camp. Septach Melayn was on shore now: that much was evident from the wild trumpeting of the mol-litors in the distance. Prestimion, standing in the thick of things, found himself wondering in an astounded bemused way whether they might be able to put the royalist army entirely to flight all at once, here at the very beginning of the struggle, as his force and Septach Melayn’s came together like the halves of a nutcracker with the royalists between them.

  But that would be too simple to hope for, he knew. He pushed such thoughts from his mind and gave all his concentration to his bow. The arrows flew forth, and nearly every one found its mark.

  Who these men were that he was bringing down, Prestimion attempted not to consider, though he could not help recognizing some. He saw the stunned look on the face of Hyle of Espledawn, and another who might have been Travin of Ginoissa, as he pierced them through. But there was no time to regret such things now. He aimed again, at a man holding an energy-thrower. There were a few such weapons in Farholt’s army, and very dangerous weapons they were; but they were wildly erratic also, for the art of making them, having been lost a thousand years before, was but newly revived and not yet with much skill. The man had the muzzle of his weapon pointed at Prestimion from fifty yards’ distance. But Prestimion put a shaft through his throat while he was still fumbling with the buttons and studs that controlled its beam.

  Shouts came from Prestimion’s left. He glanced down that way and saw that the momentum of the battle, which had been all with his forces at first, had begun to change. Farholt’s people were rallying; or, at least, were holding their own.

  No longer, now, was Prestimion’s band of archers gleefully advancing with utter freedom on Farholt’s camp. The sheer mass of Farholt’s army was too great. Caught between Septach Melayn’s landing-party and Prestimion’s rear-guard attack, they had no place to go; and now they were standing firm between the forest and the river. The suddenness of the double attack had turned them into little more than a mob, but they were an armed and sturdy mob, and they feared for their lives. So they held their ground, butting up against their attackers and refusing to yield an inch. They were locked face-to-face with them the way Farholt and Gialaurys once had been in that wrestling match long ago in the Labyrinth.

  Archers were no longer of much use in this sort of struggle. Preeminence had passed to the battalions led by Gialaurys, Spalirises, and Thurm, who needed less space for the use of their weapons. They prodded and jabbed with their spears and javelins, while Miaule’s cavalrymen rode about the outside of the melee, hacking with swords and axes at Farholt’s men from above.

  Prestimion made his way to Gialaurys’s side. “Clear a path for me to the waterfront,” he said. “My archers will be of more value down there.”

  Gialaurys—grinning broadly, soaked through and through with rain and sweat—nodded and drew a platoon of his javelin-men from the main fray. Prestimion saw his brother Taradath just to his side, and pulled at his sleeve. “There’s work for us down by the water’s edge,” he said. And off they went, with their corps of archers behind them, around the left side of the camp under cover of the javelin platoon, and down the gentle muddy slope to the river.

  It was madness down there. Septach Melayn had come ashore, as instructed, with his foot-soldiers only; the presence of cavalry battalions on the other bank had been intended only to mislead Farholt. But the invading force had been met, after its struggle with the roaring flood that was the river, with an implacable line of monitors. The ponderous war-beasts ranged up and down the shore, clawing, stamping, impaling.
Septach Melayn’s men were fighting back with spears and javelins, striking upward in the hope of hitting some vulnerable spot beneath their body-armor. But all was mud and blood and driving rain, and Prestimion saw fallen soldiers everywhere.

  “Aim for the mollitor-drivers,” he called to his men. For every molli-tor had its driver seated in the saddle formed by natural folds of the shoulder-armor, who by signals delivered with a mallet was able more or less to control his monstrous beast. Prestimion’s archers now began to pick them off, sending them tumbling one by one into the mud beneath their own animals’ clawed hooves. The mollitors, confused without their drivers and hemmed in an ever-narrowing space, moved in bewildered circles, trampling their own side; and then, unable to tell friend from foe, wheeled about and erupted in a charge away from the waterfront that carried them right into Farholt’s own cavalry, which was riding down to the shore in a counterattack.

  Prestimion fought his way inward until he stood next to Septach Melayne. The tall swordsmen was fighting with wild exhilaration, slashing gleefully and to terrible effect. “I had not thought it would go so well,” he said, laughing. “They are ours, Prestimion! Ours!”

  Yes. The battle was won. And now came the final blow. The regiments of Zimroel had been held in reserve; now, under Gaviad and Gaviundar, these troops were crossing the river in a multitude of boats and descending onto a shore no longer guarded by mollitors. Eyes agleam, their hideous faces shining with the joy of battle, the two ghastly brothers seemed transported with ecstasy as they led their men ashore.

  What followed was butchery, not fighting.

  The royalist army—an army no longer—went into wild retreat as this newest and most utterly unexpected of reinforcements appeared in their midst. The battlefield had become a bedlam of fallen mounts and wounded men and maddened uncontrolled monitors, and rebel warriors rising up on all sides. Farholt’s forces swirled about wildly in an attempt to break into retreat while the rebels mowed them down on all sides. This was war of a ferocity no one had expected, and they were unprepared to hold their places in the face of such a bloodletting. When an opening appeared to the east, the royalist army melted away into it, first by the tens and twenties, then hundreds at a time taking to their heels and disappearing into the rainy darkness.

  Prestimion caught sight of Farholt himself, a gigantic furious figure wielding an immense sword and bellowing orders. Gialaurys had spied him too, and set out in his direction with murder in his eyes. Prestimion called to him to come back, but it was no use, for he had little voice left and Gialaurys was already beyond the range of it.

  But then Farholt vanished in a swirl of confusion. Prestimion saw Gialaurys standing alone, looking about, searching for the man who was his particular enemy, unable to find him.

  The first light of dawn was in the sky. It showed the muddy field red with blood, bodies everywhere, Farholt’s proud army streaming off in chaos toward the east, leaving mounts and mollitors and weapons behind.

  “All done,” said Prestimion. “And done very well.”

  7

  The battle by the riverbank had been a great victory for the rebel cause, but not without high cost. By brightening day, as the rains gradually halted and the warm sun appeared, the victors tallied their dead. Kaymuin Rettra of Amblemorn had fallen, and Count Ofmar of Ghrav; and one of the sons of Rufiel Kisimir was dead, and another gravely wounded. That useful guide Elimotis Can of Simbilfant had perished also, and the master spearsman Telthyb Forst, and many more. Nor was Prestimion any less grieved when he saw the bodies of those who had died on the other side, for though they had chosen to oppose him for Korsibar’s sake, nevertheless they were men he had known for years, some since boyhood, and once had looked upon as good friends. Among them was Count Irani of Normork’s younger brother Lamiran, and Thiwid Karsp of Stee, who was close kin to Count Fisiolo, and also such great men as Belditan of Gimkandale and Viscount Edgan of Guand and Sinjian of Steppilor. But Farholt, it seemed, had escaped, he and most of his commanders, fleeing back in disarray toward Castle Mount.

  “These are all grave losses, both ours and theirs, and I mourn them all,” Prestimion said somberly to Duke Svor after they had had the rites for them. “And how it galls me that they won’t be the last! How many deaths must there be, do you think, before Korsibar steps aside and allows us to prevail?”

  “Korsibar’s, for one,” said Septach Melayn. “Do you seriously think, Prestimion, that he’s merely going to resign in your favor now that he’s lost a battle? Did you renounce your hopes that time he smashed us at Arkilon?”

  Prestimion made no reply, but only stared. That this war could only end with Korsibar’s death, or his, was something that he had understood from the first; and yet he could not easily abide the reality of it. It was a formidable thing to contemplate, that Korsibar must die for peace to be restored. And when he thought of all else that must be accomplished before that time, it seemed to him as challenging as making the ascent of Castle Mount on foot.

  “And also a second army under Navigorn waits for us by the Jhelum to the north,” Gialaurys pointed out. “We’ll be back in the field before we have time to catch our breaths, and it may not go as nicely for us the next time.”

  But it appeared that they would have time to catch their breaths after all, for news soon came from messengers out of the east that Korsibar had withdrawn Navigorn’s army from its position along the riverbank, and was holding meetings at the Castle to discuss the best manner of prosecuting the campaign against the rebels. The winter rains were a hindrance to battle just now in any case. So there would be a respite. The next battle, whenever it came, would at least find Prestimion’s forces rested and ready.

  Prestimion set about now replenishing his army, and winning the support of the citizenry here in the hinterlands.

  Dantirya Sambail had failed to arrive as promised. That was a problem. The Procurator had sent messages instead: he was, he said, finding affairs at home more complex than he had expected, but he hoped to conclude matters there quickly and join the rebel forces no later than in spring. Meanwhile he offered Prestimion his felicitations over the great victory at the Jhelum, about which he had heard in full detail from his brothers, and expressed the firm belief that Prestimion’s road to the Castle and the throne would be marked by steady success all the way. Which was all well and good, but Prestimion found Dantirya Sambail’s absence troubling. He was capable of being on too many sides at once, was Dantirya Sambail.

  After waiting out the wet season by the Jhelum, gathering provisions and receiving an additional complement of mounts from the Marraitis breeders, Prestimion began to move in a generally northward direction into the Salinakk district of central Alhanroel, a plateau region of mild breezes, low hills, and a dry, sandy terrain. His goal was the populous city of Thasmin Kortu, the capital of the province of Kenna Kortu, which lay just beyond Salinakk. Duke Keftia of Thasmin Kortu, who was related by ties of marriage to the Princess Therissa, had sent letters to Prestimion by the Jhelum declaring sympathy to Prestimion’s cause and inviting him to use his city as his home base as he prepared his campaign against the usurper.

  Between the Jhelum and Thasmin Kortu, however, lay the many cities and towns of the Salinakk, and much of that region was loyal to Korsibar. The scouts Prestimion sent ahead had seen the banners of Korsibar widely displayed there.

  But there was little overt opposition, at first, to Prestimion’s advance into that province. For one thing, he had Farholt’s corps of mollitors with him. It hardly seemed prudent to let the terrifying war-beasts go roaming loose along the banks of the Jhelum when he could make use of them himself. So he had them all rounded up, and impressed Farholt’s surviving mollitor-drivers into his own army.

  The villagers of the Salinakk, seeing this formidable army approach, gave Prestimion a cordial enough welcome. At a place called Thelga they hailed him with seeming sincerity as Coronal, and showed him an easier route through the Salinakk than he had planned to
take, via Hurkgoz and Diskhema and past the dreary salt-flats of Lake Guurduur.

  There was only one engagement of any note along this way: at the hilltop fort of Magalissa, where a garrison of army troops was stationed. Prestimion sent word to them that as Coronal he claimed their services, to which they replied with a defiant shower of arrows.

  “We should not tolerate such behavior,” said Septach Melayn pleasantly, and went out with five hundred men to deal with them. It was a tricky task—an uphill charge against an entrenched position, and with no cavalry support, the hill being too rough and steep for mounts to ascend—but the Magalissa garrison turned out to have little real longing for battle and its surrender came quickly.

  After that the rebel force moved quickly northward over the sandy plateau, through a region of small streams cutting across bare tawny soil, and tiny villages screened by stands of narrow upright vribin-trees closely planted side by side. In time they came to Lake Guurduur, a grim dead lake covered by a whitish scum of salt. Baleful red-eyed salt-creatures with jointed legs and scorpion tails held high crawled slowly about there, defying them with clicking jaws to intrude on their domain; but Prestimion had no wish to be Coronal of the salt-creatures, and let them be. And in five days more he came to the crossroads town of Kelenissa, which guarded the approach to Kenna Kortu Province and the main road to Duke Keftia’s city farther to the north.

  Two rivers began here, the Quarintis and the Quariotis, one flowing east and the other west and both of them emerging from the same huge limestone cavern that sat like a gaping white mouth against the sandy soil. Above it on the hillside where Kelenissa town was situated, all was green and lush and blooming, a welcome sight after the mud of the Jhelum Valley and the barrenness of the Salinakk plateau.