Elves: Once Walked With Gods

by James Barclay

  ‘Some will be living in fear. Some will be tending to their people. Some will be plotting. We need names. This may not be simply an Ynissul betrayal.’

  ‘What can we do?’ asked Katyett. ‘Realistically. The TaiGethen numbered just a hundred and seventeen before the trouble began. We are few and this magic seems massively powerful. The Al-Arynaar are struggling to keep themselves cohesive let alone maintain order in Ysundeneth. If the threads truly separate we’ll be powerless to stop whoever it is from taking control.’

  ‘There is always hope, Katyett. Save the Ynissul gathered here. Have faith that the harmony is strong in the souls of elves and that it can never truly be broken, only hidden. We can return to peace. But only if we believe.’

  Katyett studied Serrin’s face. Something was missing from Serrin’s plan.

  ‘Where is Auum, my priest?’

  ‘Auum has gone to find Takaar.’

  Harbourside seethed. Seven different threads were represented by the time Pelyn reached the harbour master’s warehouse. Some carried makeshift arms - boathooks, chains and shovels. Most relied on the weapons with which they were born.

  She saw them trade insults across decreasing space. The knots of elves were closing slowly on the thin line of Al-Arynaar ranged across the front of the warehouse. Several hundred Tualis and Beethans had taken central positions. Gyalans, Cefans and Orrans were there too in smaller numbers. Ixii and Apposans, in tight knots of twenty or so, looked for opportunity on the flanks.

  The Al-Arynaar had withdrawn to secure the building. Pelyn was disappointed to see that they had arranged themselves to minimise the chance of fighting one of their own thread. She shouldn’t blame them, but the move, conscious or not, spoke much about the state of mind of her warriors.

  So far, the threads had not come to concerted blows amongst themselves, managing to maintain their distance from each other. But the gaps were closing. Each wanted first access to the warehouse. The Al-Arynaar were an impediment. Pelyn’s appearance took a little of the boldness from them and she was quick to bolster the confidence of the forty or so of her warriors who stood in crumbling defiance.

  ‘Al-Arynaar, I am proud of each of you. Wear your cloak with pride and remember the reason you took it. We stand to defend the harmony for all elves. I stand with you. I will not desert you. I know what you fear. You fear striking down one of your own. I am Tuali. Tualis stand before us. I will strike them down if I must. A Tuali who attacks me has betrayed both thread and harmony. We all know the sentence for such crimes.’

  Pelyn swung round to face the approaching mob. Her voice would not reach them all over the shouting, stamping and clashing, and the chanting of ages-old songs that had no place outside a lesson in the history of the bleakest days.

  ‘I am Pelyn, Arch of the Al-Arynaar. I and my warriors, drawn from every thread, are tasked by Yniss to defend our people, cities, buildings and streets. We defend every cobblestone, every pane of glass and every timber. We will not flinch from our duty. We cannot. Come no further. Return to your homes. Return to peace. The supplies in this warehouse are the property of the city and will be dispensed on the basis of need.’

  They paid her no heed. She knew they wouldn’t.

  ‘We will strike any who seek to harm us. You are so warned. Al-Arynaar. To ready.’

  The swords of the Al-Arynaar, held low until now, were all brought up and forward. Each warrior took a pace to the front to the ready stance. Those with shields moved them into defensive position. Pelyn walked along the thin single line, some fifty yards long. At every pace she spoke for their ears only.

  ‘None of these can fight. Remember your training. Fight for your brothers and sisters. No one before you can beat you.’

  ‘And if they fight among themselves?’ asked one.

  ‘Then let them. Those who remove themselves are doing the rest of us a favour. Any of you want any of these to bring up the next generation of elves? Think on it and temper your sympathy.’

  The space in front of the Al-Arynaar was disappearing quickly. In the centre the Beethans and Tualis closed on each other, both groups pressing forward into the inadequate space. There was no clear leadership and the formation was chaotic. The inevitable happened. Right at the back the two sides came together. Fighting broke out. Fists and feet. Pushing and shoving. For now.

  ‘Steady,’ called Pelyn. ‘Hold your positions.’

  The advance was immediately distracted. Heads turned. People began to move back. Elves stepped out of line. They collided with their foes. The two threads surged at each other.

  ‘Hold!’ shouted Pelyn. ‘Hold!’

  Bodies were hitting the ground. With a massed roar, Tuali and Beethan let fly at each other. Pelyn saw a boathook buried in the top of a skull and blood fountain into the air. The wielder was engulfed in furious Tualis. Chains whirled and crashed down. Feet stamped on bodies that lay in the dirt of the cobblestones. Fingers raked across faces. Fists ripped out clumps of hair. Knives flashed in the fading light as the rains closed in.

  Behind the warring factions another group was on the move. They headed left around the conflict. Running hard. And from the right, others moved to mirror them.

  ‘Flanks, brace for attack. Centre, hold your ground. Facing forward. Jakyn, with me,’ said Pelyn.

  Pelyn ran to the right. The Apposans and Ixii closing there were well armed and fierce. They moved in an organised unit, ten wide and four deep. Swords and axes to the front and sharpened staffs and javelins to the back. Al-Arynaar turned to face them. They did not flinch in their approach.

  Elven blades clashed outside the harbour master’s warehouse. The Al-Arynaar line bowed inwards but held. Pelyn ran to its centre. She could feel the reluctance all around her. Jakyn blocked a straight thrust aside, exposing the flank of an attacker. He shoved the iad back rather than disembowel her.

  At the far right of the line an Al-Arynaar fielded an axe on his shield. Again, he shoved forward when a thrust above the shield would have finished his attacker.

  ‘Bring them down!’ shouted Pelyn. ‘Fight, don’t play.’

  She pushed between two of her people. Three Ixii faced her. One ignored her, aiming a blow at the Al-Arynaar on her right. The other two came at her, both meaning to strike overarm. Pelyn swayed inside one blow and blocked the other up and out right. She smashed her left fist into the face of the first Ixii. He staggered back, unbalanced.

  Pelyn twisted her blade out from under the hilt of her enemy’s, leaving his body entirely open. Pelyn did what she had to do. She rammed her sword into the Ixii’s throat. Arterial blood sprayed out. The ula clamped his hands to his neck, trying to scream. He collapsed forward.

  Pelyn locked eyes with the iad behind.

  ‘Flinch and perish,’ she said.

  She stepped up and thrust her blade into the Ixii’s chest. The iad stared at her in mute shock. Pelyn was aware of a roaring around her. Fury. Indignation. Pelyn dragged her blade clear.

  ‘I warned you!’ she shouted. ‘Disperse.’

  But it had gone far too far for that. The Apposan and Ixii alliance surged again. An Al-Arynaar Second Reverent lost an arm to a huge chopping blow. Another was stabbed in the midriff and fell forward, taking her attacker down with her. And everything Pelyn’s words had failed to stir was brought to the boil in an instant. A third Al-Arynaar deflected a strike to the neck. He riposted, bashing his shield out into the Ixii’s face and driving his sword in waist high.

  Pelyn ducked a wild swipe, dropping to her haunches. She swept out a foot as Katyett had taught her, tripping the Apposan. He fell sideways, unbalancing another. Pelyn rose, lashing a kick into his face, and disengaged from the fight. She backed into the small space in front of the warehouse doors and looked out over the harbourside.

  The fighting Beethans and Tualis battered into the rear of the thread allies attacking the Al-Arynaar. To her right, Apposan and Ixii were simply swept away. To the left it was a little harder going. Out towards the ha
rbour, twenty or more bodies lay on the ground and bloody smears tracked through pools of blood.

  ‘Jakyn!’ The lad ran to her. ‘I want those doors open. We need a place to go. Quickly now.’

  The Tualis and Beethans turned on the Al-Arynaar. The full force of hundreds of enraged elves was focusing on a tenth their number of Al-Arynaar. Pelyn made for the centre of the line. Three boathooks flew in on lengths of one-inch rope. The sharpened ends snagged cloak and armour. Two warriors were simply upended and hauled into the enemy. Fingers tore and teeth ripped. Tualis streamed into the gap.

  ‘Fall back!’ shouted Pelyn. ‘Fall back to the doors.’

  The enemy came at her. She was alone for the moment. Four of them with many more behind though her surviving warriors were closing, narrowing the breach with every heartbeat.

  Pelyn drew a dagger with her left hand and moved into a fluid fighting position. Both blades were forward and she bent slightly at the waist to increase her reach while maintaining her balance. The quartet came at her in a rush. None had blades. One had a chain which she circled high over her head. A second carried a pickaxe that appeared too heavy for him. He was young yet, immature.

  The chain wielder brought her weapon down overhead. Pelyn leapt back, thudding into the timbers of the gatehouse. She hadn’t realised she’d strayed so close. The chain struck sparks from the ground. Pelyn pushed herself off the wall and jabbed her dagger into the pickaxe chain-wielder’s gut, leaving it where it lodged. A hand raked in from the right. Pelyn swayed back, feeling nails tear into her cheek and across under her nose.

  Pelyn slashed her blade out and right, feeling it glance off the Tuali’s skull, ripping his scalp open to the bone. The second unarmed elf hesitated. Pelyn straightened. The iad did not know what to do. Pelyn kicked out into her groin and battered the pommel of her blade into the back of the iad’s neck, sending her thudding onto the cobblestones, her head bouncing unpleasantly.

  Pelyn turned to the pickaxe carrier. The Tuali youth was staring at a blade deep in his stomach right below the breastbone. Jakyn pulled his weapon clear and stared at Pelyn.

  ‘We were at school together,’ he said.

  ‘Well he didn’t listen well enough.’

  ‘Door’s open.’

  Pelyn nodded. ‘Al-Arynaar. Disengage.’

  The Al-Arynaar shoved forward and paced back, buying themselves a yard of space. The Tuali and Beethan alliance of convenience held. They paused for breath.

  ‘Into the warehouse. Now. Jakyn, the door.’

  Pelyn and Jakyn rolled the big single door open. Jakyn ran to its other end, ready for his next order. Al-Arynaar sprinted in. The last four came in backwards, swords fencing away at the press of the enemy. One tripped over the rail. Beethan and Tuali ran inside.

  ‘Jakyn, close it.’

  The youth pushed hard. The door slid quickly, beating into the body of an unlucky Tuali. The door bounced back a little. Al-Arynaar dragged her inside. Jakyn closed the door.

  ‘Brace it. Seal it. Anyhow.’

  Jakyn kept his weight on the door, which juddered with the blows of the enemy without. Al-Arynaar were at work on the inside bolts. Others killed the enemy inside. A moment’s respite.

  ‘We won’t stop them getting in for long,’ said Jakyn.

  ‘Then let’s find ourselves a way out,’ said Pelyn.

  ‘If there was one, surely they’d have entered through it by now,’ said a warrior.

  ‘You’re thinking too big.’

  Pelyn turned away from the door, which was heaving under blow after blow. Axeheads were already biting through its timbers. The warehouse was huge. Racks stood against each wall and ran away for a hundred yards in six columns. They carried pretty much every conceivable item of any use to the city. Meticulously laid out and organised. Such was the mind of the harbour master.

  From ship’s masts, anchors, hawsers, sheets and sails, through every kind of pot, plate, mug and server in tin and clay, through a myriad plumbing and guttering joints, through carts, saddles, yokes, barrels, hoops, locks, keys, medical supplies . . . You could wander the shelves, racks and nets for ever.

  But the prize lay on shelves to the right, above nets so the mice and rats could not gain access. Tons of it. Food. Dried, sealed and preserved. Meat, fruit, grain and rice for the most part. Barrel after barrel of wine and spirits. Endless pots of dried herbs. Emergency supplies to keep the city alive in the most extreme of times. Times like now.

  Pelyn stared at it all and weighed the measure of her failure. Not enough Al-Arynaar to keep the main supplies safe. Supplies they’d all assumed burned in the first hours after the denouncement that were going to be utterly vital in the days to come. Hours when she had focused all her energy on keeping the temple of Yniss safe. Another failure.

  The timbers of the door were beginning to weaken. Pelyn’s people backed off, bodies tense, hands gripping swords nervously. Those they had protected only yesterday were ready to rip the faces from their skulls. How had it come to this? Pelyn shook her head. The Al-Arynaar were no more than a guerrilla force and the ringleaders of all this knew it. Just like they knew what the TaiGethen would do if the Ynissul were put under threat.

  High above, on the gantry built to maintain the roof of the warehouse, were a number of skylights. Pelyn pointed up.

  ‘Get lengths of rope and get climbing. Our way out is not going to come to us.’

  Chapter 17

  Patience wins more battles than courage and strength combined.

  Katyett felt as if she was going to collapse. She sensed a rush of heat across her body and deep in the pit of her stomach. Her feet tingled and her breath gasped in. Of all the things she might have expected the priest to say, that was the most inconceivable.

  ‘What sort of madness is that?’ she managed eventually.

  She didn’t know if she was thrilled or furious. Didn’t know what to feel. But whatever it was, it had sent her pulse soaring. Takaar. The prospect of seeing him again made her shiver. Memories of his face fell through her mind so real she could grasp at them.

  ‘It is a chance we have to take.’

  ‘Who made this decision?’

  ‘In the rainforest there are no councils,’ said Serrin evenly.

  Katyett shook her head, trying to clear the buzzing and fog that encased it.

  ‘You and Auum have taken this massive risk on behalf of us all?’

  ‘Auum is acting on my order.’

  ‘How will he find Takaar, assuming there is anything to find?’

  Serrin smiled a little indulgently. ‘Takaar spoke to the priesthood before he went into exile.’

  Katyett nodded. ‘I see.’

  ‘I’m sure you don’t.’

  ‘Don’t patronise me,’ she snapped.

  ‘I am sorry, Katyett. I meant no offence.’

  Katyett sighed. ‘Me too, my priest. You have taken me completely unawares.’

  ‘It is not often I do that to a TaiGethen, least of all their leader.’

  ‘I just don’t understand what good this can possibly do.’

  ‘You say you have no way to revive the harmony if the threads separate. I’m giving you that way.’

  Katyett scoffed. ‘You think he’ll be accepted like he was before? You’re out of touch, Serrin. I can’t even say all the TaiGethen will embrace him. The populace of Calaius certainly won’t. Most of them were born here and have no real knowledge of the influence and charisma he used to wield. And those that do remember, hate him for all the lives he sacrificed. Auum is wasting his time.’

  ‘I’m sorry you feel that way. And I think you are mistaken.’

  ‘Well, we’re going to find out, aren’t we? Just what exactly did you have in mind? Parading him through the streets of Ysundeneth with an honour guard of TaiGethen and any Al-Arynaar who survive that long? Or perhaps you think he might head an army to sweep the invading men and their magic from our shores. All we need now is an army.’

  Serrin m
ade to retort but thought better of it.

  ‘I thought you’d be pleased,’ said Serrin instead. ‘You of all people.’

  Katyett almost laughed but she had no wish to insult Serrin further.

  ‘Takaar literally ran out of my life ten years ago, Priest Serrin. I’ve spent those ten years trying to get used to the idea that I would never see him again and that the ula I swore my loyalty to, that I loved so utterly, had failed our entire race. I had just about reached a place where I could move on, where I could consider a union with another. An Ynissul ula because my offspring must have the opportunity to join the TaiGethen.

  ‘I was already confused, Serrin. Proud of what Takaar achieved and hating him because his cowardice triggered all we now face. Now this. You want to bring him back. In the face of all that is sane you want an elf ten years in exile to return and save us all. It cannot work. It cannot.’

  ‘It cannot or you don’t want it to?’

  ‘That is an unworthy comment.’

  Serrin contemplated her again. There was no apology in his eyes this time.

  ‘We must attempt every means. I do not have to see the streets of Ysundeneth to know how desperate the situation is. I have seen enough of the nature of elves to know the depths to which some will descend.’

  ‘Will? Some already have.’

  ‘Rape will seem insignificant unless we can turn the tide. I have no desire to relive some of the things I witnessed on Hausolis.’

  It was easy to forget how old Serrin was. So youthful of face. So at ease in the rainforest.

  ‘I’ll do all I can.’

  ‘That has never been in doubt, Katyett.’

  ‘So what’s next? The rest will look to you for leadership, you know that.’

  ‘I am uncomfortable with the thought,’ said Serrin. ‘But I will do my best. We must do as we said. Secure the Ynissul and bring Takaar to the city.’

  ‘I’ll bring him,’ said Katyett. ‘He is my Arch. It is my responsibility.’