The sky to the east was growing lighter as dawn approached, and Althalus grew edgier by the moment. He almost jumped out of his skin when Gher said “ghre” from just behind him.
“Don’t sneak up on me like that, Gher,” Althalus scolded.
Gher’s expression was absolutely blank, and his eyes were vacant. He pointed at a scrubby bush. “Ghre,” he said again. “Say it, Althalus!” he snapped.
Althalus stared at him in total bafflement. “Ghre?”
“Don’t ask, Althalus—say it!”
The tone was so familiar that Althalus suddenly laughed.
“You’re starting to make me cross, Althalus. Look at the bush and say ‘ghre.’ ”
“Whatever you say, Em,” he said, grinning broadly. He waved his hand almost negligently at the bush. “Ghre.”
The bush instantly sprouted new shoots and leaves as it very visibly became larger and larger, growing on command.
“Now that was very sneaky,” Althalus said admiringly.
“What was?” Gher asked, his face puzzled.
“You don’t know what just happened, do you, Gher?”
“Nothing happened, Althalus,” Gher replied. “I just came over here to tell you that I think Mister Khalor’s wrong. What are we talking about here?”
“Nothing all that important, Gher,” Althalus lied. “Just stay sort of close to me this morning. I think I’ll feel a lot better if you’re around.”
The sun had not yet quite risen when the steady barrage of stones from the shepherds’ slings brought a different sound. The clatter of rocks striking rock was replaced by the metallic ring of rocks striking steel. Then a horde of armored men holding shields in front of them came spilling out from behind large boulders scattered across the last fifty yards or so of the slide.
“They’re right on top of us!” Bheid shouted.
Gebhel’s men, however, didn’t appear to be unduly alarmed. Almost casually, they levered loose what had appeared to be their defensive wall of boulders, sending them bounding down the slide directly into the teeth of the charging enemy.
“Fall back!” Gebhel roared, and his army turned and ran up the slope to their defensive wall in front of the cave mouth.
“Oh, that was clever,” Khalor said admiringly to his bald friend.
“You didn’t really think I’d try to hold that slide, did you, Khalor?” Gebhel said.
“I thought you might pretend for a while.”
“I don’t waste men just for show, Khalor. The cave’s where our food and water are. I’ll concentrate on protecting the cave. If our enemies want the top of your silly hill, they’re welcome to it. The only part I want is that crag where the cave is.”
“Why aren’t they doing anything?” Bheid asked about an hour later, when the sun had fully risen and Gebhel’s men were all emplaced behind their defensive wall at the foot of the crag.
“They’re baffled, Bheid,” Khalor explained, “and probably more than a little afraid. Gebhel’s outsmarted them at every turn. He hasn’t once done what they expected him to do. He holds positions when he shouldn’t, and he retreats when there’s no reason for it. They have absolutely no idea of what he’ll do next.”
“Except that whatever it is will probably cost them a lot of their soldiers,” Chief Albron added.
“Use ‘twei,’ Althalus,” Gher, wooden faced and vacant eyed, said in a firm voice.
“I was going to use ‘dhigw,’ Em,” he disagreed. “I don’t think an earthquake’s a very good idea up here on top of this tower.”
“There’s a crack running from east to west about fifty paces to the south of that crag, Althalus,” Gher explained woodenly. “If you widen that crack with an earthquake, it’ll give you the ditch you want.”
“It won’t work, Em. I want the ditch just in front of Gebhel’s fortification. If I put the ditch that far away, Pekhal’s troops will just swim across and continue the attack.”
“You’re going to do this my way, Althalus—eventually. Save your breath and do as I tell you.”
He threw his hands in the air. “All right, Em,” he gave up.
“Then use ‘ekwer’ to pour water into the ditch.”
“Yes, dear. I was going to do that anyway, but it’s nice to get some confirmation.”
“Oh, hush!”
The air seemed to shimmer about halfway down the slope from Gebhel’s fortified position, and a huge army of Regwos infantry came charging through Khnom’s door.
“Not yet,” Gher told Althalus.
“Let me do this, Em. I still think the ditch won’t be in the right place, though.”
“Trust me.”
The enemy foot soldiers, howling triumphantly, charged up the slope toward Gebhel’s crude fort, even as archers and shepherds lining the top of the crag showered them with arrows and stones.
“Now, Althalus!” Gher barked.
“Twei!” Althalus said sharply, pointing at the ground directly in front of the charging army.
A deep, booming rumble came up from the ground, and the entire tower seemed to shiver, almost like a wet dog. There was a hideous cracking sound that ripped from east to west across the tower, and the loose earth fell into a wide gap that suddenly opened directly in front of the enemy. The resulting trench was perhaps twenty feet wide and quite nearly as deep.
The enemy charge halted immediately.
Then Pekhal came raging out onto the slope directly below that new obstacle. “Attack!” the brute screamed. “Charge! Charge! Kill them all!”
The soldiers who were carrying scaling ladders rushed forward to push the ladders down into the ditch, and Pekhal’s force streamed down into the trench Althalus had just opened.
More and more ladders were pushed down to the men already in the trench, and they were quickly placed against the forward wall so that Pekhal’s army could continue its attack.
“What are you waiting for, Althalus?” Bheid demanded. “They’re still charging!”
“Let’s get as many of them as we can in that trench,” Althalus replied calmly.
“You blundered, Althalus!” Chief Albron exclaimed. “Your ditch runs all the way to the edge of the tower on both sides! Your water’s going to drain out as fast as it comes in! Those men in the ditch won’t even get their feet wet!”
“That sort of depends on how much water I pour into the ditch, doesn’t it?” Althalus replied bleakly. He squinted down the slope. “That looks like most of them,” he observed, watching the rear ranks of Pekhal’s army scrambling down into the ditch. Then he swept his hand down. “Ekwer!” he shouted.
The front side of his improvised trench suddenly exploded as a new river burst through into its carefully prepared channel. Unlike most rivers, however, the one Althalus had just created ran both ways, streaming off to the east and to the west, and when those rivers reached the edges of the tower, there were two spectacular waterfalls thundering a thousand feet down to the rocky slopes at the base of the tower.
Pekhal’s army, of course, was caught in the savage current, and they were swept to the brinks of those two thundering waterfalls to plunge shrieking in despair to the rocks far below.
“Dear God!” Bheid exclaimed in horror as he saw Pekhal’s army literally melt away.
“Look!” Chief Albron shouted. “It’s Dreigon! He’s coming out of that cave!”
Althalus spun quickly to look in astonishment at Chief Delur’s silver-haired captain leading the men of his clan out of the cave to join Gebhel’s troops behind the fortifications.
“You didn’t expect that, did you, Althie?” Gher said smugly, his voice almost perfectly matching Dweia’s.
Pekhal was shrieking insanely on the other side of the raging river that had just swept his army away. He lashed out with his sword, blindly killing any of his men unlucky enough to be near him.
And then, to everyone’s stunned disbelief, Eliar emerged out of empty air. The young Arum was fully armed, and he brandished his sword menacin
gly. “Pekhal!” he roared. “Run now, while you still can! Run, or I’ll kill you right where you stand!”
“But you’re dead!” Pekhal gasped.
“Not quite,” Eliar grated at him. “Choose, Pekhal! Run or die!” And then he started toward the startled savage, his sword held low.
Screaming curses, Pekhal scrambled over the bodies of the men he had just killed, swinging his huge sword.
Althalus shook off his astonishment at this unexpected turn of events to watch very closely as Eliar neatly parried the brute’s first massive blow and then lightly flicked his sword across Pekhal’s cheek.
Pekhal flinched, his face spurting blood.
Eliar swung again, and Pekhal was only barely able to ward off the blow with his shield.
Without so much as a pause, Eliar swung again. The clanging of the swords quickened, and Althalus found it difficult to separate one swing from the next. Eliar was obviously the better swordsman. Pekhal relied almost entirely on brute strength and rage, but he grew more frenzied and desperate as Eliar blocked or parried his every stroke. Eliar continued to lightly flick his blade across Pekhal’s face, drawing blood each time.
Enraged, Pekhal seized his sword hilt in both hands, casting away his shield. He swung a massive overhand blow at Eliar’s head, but it slid harmlessly to one side as Eliar neatly diverted it with his blade.
Then Eliar quite suddenly took the offensive, swinging heavier and heavier blows at Pekhal’s head and shoulders. In a desperate attempt to protect his head, Pekhal raised his sword and held it in a horizontal position to fend off Eliar’s blows.
Then Eliar swung wide, and his sword edge cut smoothly through Pekhal’s wrist, sending his sword and hand spinning away.
“Kill him, Eliar!” Sergeant Khalor shouted.
But to everyone’s startled disbelief, Eliar dropped his sword and drew the Knife from his belt. He raised it to hold the flat of the blade directly in front of Pekhal’s eyes.
Pekhal shrieked, trying to cover his eyes with his remaining hand and the blood-spurting stump of the missing one.
“Go!” Eliar thundered. “Go now, and never return!”
Just then, the terrified Khnom was suddenly thrust violently through his flickering doorway. He dashed forward, seized the maimed and shrieking Pekhal, and dragged him backward.
And then the both of them vanished, and the shimmering flicker of Khnom’s door was no longer there.
Part Five
ANDINE
C H A P T E R T W E N T Y - N I N E
How did you get up here, Dreigon?” the kilted Sergeant Gebhel demanded of Chief Delur’s silver-haired Captain as they met at the edge of the river that ran both ways to plunge off either side of Daiwer’s Tower.
Dreigon shrugged. “Through the caves, of course,” he replied. “You did know about all those caves under your mountain, didn’t you?”
“I know about the one you just came out of,” Gebhel said. “Are you trying to tell me that there are more?”
“You must be getting old, Gebhel,” Dreigon observed. “This whole mountain’s honeycombed with caves. You’re lucky I’m the one who found them instead of your enemies. If they’d known about them, they’d have come out right in your back pocket. You didn’t even bother to take a look, did you?”
“Don’t grind my face in it, Dreigon,” Gebhel said sourly. “I’ve had a lot on my mind in the last few days.”
“That earthquake definitely made things exciting down in the caves, let me tell you,” Dreigon said, rolling his eyes upward.
“I can imagine,” Gebhel agreed.
“Sergeant Khalor,” Eliar said as he and the fiery-haired Salkan came over from the eastern waterfall to join them, “your friend Kreuter’s down below running all over the top of the Ansus.”
“Well, finally,” Khalor said as they all trooped over to the edge to have a look. “I wonder what took him so long? He should have been here the day before yesterday.”
“I didn’t know we had horse soldiers,” Salkan said to Eliar.
“My Sergeant fights good wars,” Eliar told him.
“Sometimes he has a little trouble telling the truth, though,” Salkan replied. “He had me convinced that you were dying.”
Bheid stepped in smoothly. “It was sort of necessary, Salkan. Our enemies had quite a few spies in our trenches, and we didn’t want them to find out that Eliar was getting better.”
“You could have told me, your Reverence,” Salkan replied. “I know how to keep secrets.”
“It worked out better this way, Salkan,” Bheid told him. “Eliar’s your friend, and we wanted you to be very angry about what had happened to him. You might not have been quite as angry if you’d known that he wasn’t dying. We weren’t really lying to you as much as we were using you to send false information to our enemies.”
“You Black Robes are a lot sneakier than our priests are,” Salkan observed.
“Sometimes we have to be, Salkan,” Bheid told him. “Church politics can get very complicated sometimes.”
“I think I’ll stick to taking care of my sheep,” Salkan replied. “Every so often, some priest comes by and tries to persuade me to join the priesthood. I’ve never been very attracted to that sort of thing. I know how to take care of sheep, but taking care of people . . .” He spread his hands. “You know what I mean.”
Bheid nodded. “Indeed I do, Salkan,” he agreed.
“Your young Eliar’s very good with his sword, isn’t he, Khalor?” Dreigon noted.
Khalor shrugged. “He shows some promise, yes,” he replied.
“What was all that business with his dagger, though? He could have split that frothing maniac right down the middle with his sword. Why’d he throw his sword away and go for his dagger?”
“The dagger’s an ancient Ansu relic, Captain Dreigon,” Althalus lied smoothly. “The Ansus are a superstitious lot, and they all believe that coming within fifty miles of that dagger’s just about the worst thing that can happen to anybody. Young Eliar waved it around in front of Pekhal and then let him get away so that he could go back and tell everybody in Ansu that we’ve got the silly thing. I can almost guarantee that nobody in Ansu’s going to come anywhere near the Wekti border for at least ten generations—no matter who tells them to.”
“Using the other fellow’s superstitions is a slick way to do business, I guess, but how did you get involved in this particular war? Chief Delur tells me that you’re an official in the government of Osthos.”
“It’s all part of the same war, Captain,” Althalus explained. “There’s a fellow in Nekweros with imperial ambitions, and he’s been making alliances with assorted half-wits for quite some time now.”
“Have you ever met this so-called Emperor of the World?”
“Once or twice, yes. He and I don’t get along very well.”
“You should have killed him when you had the chance.”
“And put all my Arum friends out of work? That wouldn’t be very neighborly, would it, Captain?”
“What I don’t understand is how there’s suddenly a river in that ditch,” Sergeant Gebhel declared, “or how that ditch just suddenly appeared all by itself.”
“Oh, that,” Althalus replied deprecatingly. “It was nothing, Sergeant. I just reared back and passed a miracle, that’s all.”
“Oh, really?”
“Haven’t you ever seen miracles before?”
“I’m serious, Althalus. What really happened?”
“You’re not going to let me take credit for it, I gather?”
“Not hardly.”
“You’re taking a lot of the fun out of this, Sergeant. Actually, though, it appears that it was sheer coincidence. This tower’s sitting on some very unstable ground, I guess. We should have realized that as soon as we saw it; something had to push it up out of the surrounding meadows. Then, too, we didn’t bother to explore that cave where the spring is. If we’d gone in a little deeper, we’d have found those caves C
aptain Dreigon came through. When you’ve got unstable ground—and caves—you’ve got a landscape that can change right in front of your eyes. When the roof of a cave collapses during an earthquake, you suddenly have a ditch—without even touching a shovel.”
“I guess that makes sense,” Gebhel admitted, “but where did the water come from?”
“The same place that spring comes from, probably.” Althalus shrugged. “Who cares where it came from, Sergeant? It saved our bacon for us.”
“Water doesn’t run uphill,” Gebhel said stubbornly.
“Not usually, no. This is just a guess, but I’d imagine that there’s some huge underground river hereabouts that comes down out of the mountains of Kagwher, or someplace. Since the ground around here’s unstable, that river was most likely dammed up by an earthquake a few hundred years ago, and the pressure’s been building up ever since. This new earthquake turned it loose—just in time to carry off the troops who were attacking your position.”
“Pure coincidence?” Gebhel said skeptically.
“We can go back to miracles if coincidence bothers you so much,” Althalus suggested.
“Up your nose, Althalus!” Gebhel snorted.
“Why, Sergeant!” Althalus said in mock chagrin. “What a thing to say! I’m shocked at you. Shocked.”
As soon as the sun goes down, I think you and the rest of the family should come home, Althalus, Dweia suggested.
Truly, another voice agreed.
Althalus blinked. The second voice in his mind was Andine’s. What’s going on here? he demanded.
The family’s getting larger, that’s all, Dweia told him. It gave us something to do while Eliar was recovering. I hadn’t really planned for this to happen, but I think it might work out rather well.
It made Leitha more comfortable, Althalus, Eliar’s voice added. She wasn’t very happy about being alone with me, so Emmy invited Andine to come along. It was very crowded inside my head for a while.
The Redemption of Althalus Page 47
