The Crown of the Usurper (The Crown of the Blood)

by Gav Thorpe

  Ullsaard watched Allenya's reaction turn from disbelief to belief to true understanding, her expression becoming more and more alarmed as realisation crept up on her. She looked at Ullsaard with something bordering on disgust, and took a shuddering breath.

  "All of this time," she said, backing away. "Is that why you abandoned me? That is why you pushed me away?"

  "Allenya, I could not share you with him," Ullsaard said. He wanted to reach out to her, but would not let go of the sword while Erlaan was a threat.

  "These are lies, concocted by you to save your life," said Erlaan.

  "How?" snapped Ullsaard, letting the frustration of three years fuel his words. "How will these lies save me? Will they turn into a spear and shield for me? Why would I invent such madness?"

  Erlaan shook his head and looked away, rubbing an inhuman hand across his brow.

  "No, it cannot be true," said the Prince, but there was no conviction in his words. He glowered at Ullsaard but his chest was heaving, not from anger but agitation. "I must… I will find the truth. The empire will be mine."

  Erlaan ran towards the window and leapt out with a loud grunt. Ullsaard dragged himself across the room in time to see him leaping over a wall before disappearing into the darkness. The sword dropped from his fingers with a loud clatter and he fell to one knee.

  "I need a surgeon," he muttered, turning to where Allenya had been standing but he was alone in the room. It seemed somehow fitting. He closed his eyes and concentrated, but he could sense nothing of Askhos, banned from the king's conscious thoughts though still locked inside his mind somewhere. Using the sill to help, Ullsaard pulled himself up to the window and called for Houran.

  He really did need a surgeon, and quickly.

  MARRADAN, ERSUA

  Spring, 213th year of Askh

  I

  The frantic clanging of a gong woke Gelthius. He rolled over and sat up on his bunk, pushing away his thin blanket. Around him the other men in the prison dormitory were rousing from their slumber, groans and complaints breaking the early morning stillness. From the bed beneath Gelthius, Muuril put out his legs and pushed himself onto the bare stone floor. The lower bunk now vacated, Gelthius swung over the side of his bed and lowered himself to the ground using the edge of Muuril's cot as a step.

  The dorm housed forty men in twenty double-bunks, with barely enough room between each for the prisoners to fit. There were no windows except for a few grates in the ceiling that had been letting in light, rain and snow in roughly equal measure since Gelthius' incarceration had begun. Directly above the prison chambers was the drilling space of the barracks and occasionally a witty legionnaire would ensure an abada stood over the gap, to let a stream of pungent piss into the cell.

  It was dark through the openings, and the gong was not the wake up ring of Dawnwatch, but a more insistent, alarmed clamour. There was light from the doorway as lanterns moved past at quick intervals, carried by legionnaires mustering from the company barracks adjacent to the prison. There were a few men at the door calling out to the passers-by for information, but their shouts went unanswered.

  Knowing that it was unlikely that he would be left in peace to go to sleep again, Gelthius pulled on his kilt and tunic and fished out his sandals from the open-topped box at the end of the bed. Muuril and most of the others were also getting dressed, expecting the worse. It was not the first time Captain Lutaan had called out the companies in the middle of the night for surprise drill. Even though they were in the punishment battalion, the men of the Thirteenth and the miscreants of the Twenty-first would be expected to turn out in due course to take their place in the muster.

  Soon enough, a gaggle of blackcrests appeared at the door, shining a lamp through the narrow grille of bronze bars. More figures appeared behind them and Gelthius was struck by how many soldiers there were when the door was opened – at least twenty.

  "Stand by your bunks!"

  The order was snapped out and the men in the dorm complied, though not with the vigour and pride they would have once shown. When each pair of men was standing beside their beds, four blackcrests came in, two of them with their spears ready and shields held up, two with spears and lanterns.

  Much to Gelthius' surprise, the guards were quickly followed by Captain Lutaan. He had his sword belt on, his shield slung on his back and a spear in his right hand; Ullsaard's golden spear. There came a barely audible growl from Muuril but the sergeant said nothing out loud.

  "This is not a drill or a punishment," Lutaan said sharply. "Scouts have returned with warning that an army of Salphors is marching on Marradan. I need every man to defend the city. All of you swore oaths to fight in the legions to protect the empire. Today, despite your transgressions, I will hold you to your oaths. As laid down in the code of the legions, from the Book of Askhos, each of you has the choice to fight, earning commutation of your sentence, or you may submit to summary execution. If you agree to accept the king's pardon, you will be subject to full legion law once again and if you are found derelict in your duty or otherwise insubordinate, mutinous or cowardly you will be summarily executed. Any infraction of the legion code will be punished by death."

  "Which sort of shit do you prefer?" whispered Loordin from the bed behind Gelthius'. "Sheep shit or cow shit? It's all the same when it's on your foot."

  "Shall I accept it that all here are willing to fight?" Lutaan paused for a moment and there was silent agreement from everybody in the dormitory. "Good. You will form an ad-hoc company with the rest of the prisoners; one hundred and twenty men. Captain Caaskil will be your commander. Muuril and Gelthius will be the officers, all other rank positions to remain as before incarceration."

  With this bare statement delivered, Lutaan turned on his heel and strode from the chamber, soon replaced by the squat, broad form of Captain Caaskil, a thirty-year veteran of the legions with a hook for a right hand and more scars than Gelthius had seen on anybody. He had been the drill officer throughout their imprisonment, and Gelthius was actually pleased to be fighting under him – many of the Twenty-first's officers were untested and undertrained.

  "You heard the first captain, fall in," barked Caaskil. "Muuril, Gelthius, get here."

  The two men of the Thirteenth approached with brisk steps and stopped a couple of paces form the officer, rapping their fists to their chests in salute.

  "You've had good experience of butchering these Salphor cunts, don't let me down," said the captain, seemingly oblivious to the fact that Gelthius was, in fact, also a Salphor. He raised his voice to address everybody in the dorm. "Fall in, two lines, to report to the armoury. You have your shields and spears back, lads. Don't fucking dishonour them again."

  II

  Though Caaskil's company was under strength, it contained a fair number of veterans from the Thirteenth and was positioned to hold the flank on the right-hand end of the line as the Twenty-first Legion formed up in the dark. Coloured lanterns were used to denote the mustering areas and in the gloom Gelthius could see kolubrid-riding messengers moving back and forth between the companies as Lutaan tried to get his line in order before the Salphors arrived. Bodies of men marched out, armour and spearpoints gleaming in red and green and blue and yellow, depending on where they were gathering.

  The noise of the army was louder even than the sound of people evacuating their homes just a few dozen paces behind the line. Lutaan had made the brave, or possibly duty-bound decision to protect the whole city – Marradan had a wall to defend the inner reaches where the palaces, precinct and nobility were found, but it had outgrown those defences several years before. Gelthius approved of the decision, not only for the sake of those whose homes would have been sacrificed to the Salphors, but also because it would force the enemy into a decisive attack. One way or another, the Twenty-first would have to be beaten tonight; no drawn out sieges. With the empire is such disarray, there was no guarantee of aid from the other cities or provinces had the enemy been given the chance to encircle the
city to starve the people of Marradan.

  That the enemy were attempting a night attack spoke either of brilliance or utter stupidity. Gelthius knew from personal experience that most Salphors liked to raid other tribes after dark, but it was a long stretch from a few hundred men descending on neighbours' pastures and farms to executing a full battle in the pitch black. The defenders of Marradan had been taken surprise by the approach of the Salphorian army, but even the Twenty-first, now bloodied at Menesun, were more organised than your average Salphorian raiders.

  "This is a bit of overkill for some hairy bastards that have come down for a bit of fun," remarked Loordin. "How many of them do you think there are?"

  "About ten thousand, give or take a few hundred, the scouts said," said Caaskil, emerging from the darkness having overhead the legionnaire's question. "We need you pig-worriers because the Twenty-first is only four thousand strong."

  On hearing this, Gelthius started to have second thoughts about taking sanctuary behind the city wall. His face must have shown his concern, as a cruel smile twisted Caaskil's lips.

  "Don't worry yourself, Second Captain Gelthius." Caaskil put sarcastic emphasis on Gelthius' rank. "If we each kill two men, we'll win. On the other hand, if you want me to slit your throat now and save your friends the trouble, then just speak up."

  "These ain't my friends, right enough," answered Gelthius. "Free country peoples, I reckon. I wonder what's got them so heated up they think they can come into Ersua and have a go?"

  "Not a question to be asked now," replied Caaskil. "Don't know, and I don't care. Feel free to take some prisoners to ask later, if you like. Let me know if you see anyone you recognise."

  Realising that any meaningful discussion with Caaskil would be fruitless, Gelthius simply nodded and lifted his spear in salute. Sensing that the Salphor would not give him any further sport, Caaskil moved on towards the back ranks, speaking to the men from the Twenty-first, ignoring those who had been taken from the Thirteenth.

  It was not chance, Gelthius realised, that the front ranks were filled with prisoners from the Thirteenth. Not only were they the toughest fighters in the company, they would be the first to fall.

  After shifting position twice more, as the line extended further duskwards to respond to the latest reports of the scouts sent into the night, the prisoner company finally found themselves about three hundred paces from the outlying buildings of Marradan, with the rest of the army stretching out at an angle to hotwards and dawnwards. A brief calm settled on the legion and Gelthius felt again the sense of foreboding that had marked the beginning of every battle in which he had participated.

  It did not help that this particular struggle seemed entirely pointless. He was, by oath, a man of the Twenty-first. But Captain Lutaan, this city and this enemy, meant nothing to him. At least the Thirteenth had saved him from Aroisius' rebels and he had felt some comradeship with them; Ullsaard had also favoured him and was worthy of his service.

  "What's the point?" muttered the captain.

  "We're still Thirteen, all the way to the bone," replied Muuril, sensing Gelthius' mood. The two of them had hardly swapped words since the episode when they had been clearing the snow; they had nothing to say to each other except such communication as was required for two men sharing a bunk bed. "I'm fighting for you and Loordin, and the rest. I fought for the general and the king, but first always for the man behind and next to me."

  Gelthius looked at Muuril and could not stop a smile.

  "The man next to me will be Captain Caaskil," said the Salphor. "Want to change places?"

  "We'll see everybody right, don't worry," said Muuril.

  The two of them fell silent again, made awkward by the threat of sentiment. Fortunately distraction was not long in coming. From between the buildings on the outskirts of the city, catapults hurled balls of twine and tar into the air, inside each a small flask of lava. When each missile crashed down, several hundred paces from the city, the balls exploded into flame, lighting the battlefield. Another salvo followed shortly after, spreading a line of fire almost half a mile long in front of the waiting legion. Between the flames advanced the Salphor warriors, beneath banners of tattered cloth, round wooden shields held up, axes and spears in their hands.

  "That's Aegenuis' colours," exclaimed Gelthius, pointing his spear at a large shaft at the middle of the army from which fluttered four ribbons, alternating red and green. "We could be in trouble. Captain Caaskil!"

  The company commander heard his name being called and returned to the front rank with a few more words of encouragement to his men.

  "What?" he demanded

  "You have to send word to Captain Lutaan. This is the king's army. Aegenuis' own army."

  "So?"

  "If the king leads, there will be more than ten thousand warriors around," said Gelthius, picking his words carefully. He did not want to sound frightened, but in truth he was. "Aegenuis is a canny commander; if the other men haven't been counted you can bet they're not far away."

  Concern appeared on Caaskil's face and he called out for a messenger. Moments later a kolubrid rider came around from the back of the company. Caaskil stomped away to converse with the serpent-borne messenger. When the captain paces away, Gelthius heard a whisper from behind him. He could not make out was said and turned around to Loordin, who was the second-ranker.

  "Play dead," Loordin said again, his voice barely audible.

  "What?" replied Gelthius.

  "Oh, for fuck's sake," said Loordin, rolling his eyes. "Ask Muuril. Pass it on."

  Confused, Gelthius turned to the sergeant, keeping his voice quiet.

  "What does 'play dead' mean?"

  Muuril was taken aback and he glanced over his shoulder at the ranks behind before answering. Leaning close to keep his voice low, he explained.

  "It's an old trick of Ullsaard's. When the company captain falls, the rest of the first few ranks start to go down as well. The enemy step over them to get at the rest of the ranks, thinking they're dead, and when the call's given, them that's pretending get up and attack them from behind."

  "And what good will that do?"

  "Just do it," said Muuril. Captain Caaskil had finished talking to the kolubrid messenger and was returning to the company. "If that cunt-hole Caaskil goes down, you go down just after."

  "What if I really get cut down?" said Gelthius, not sure whether Caaskil was part of the plan, or if he was meant to be genuinely killed. Gelthius was not convinced that the Salphors would simply ignore a man who went to ground.

  "Then you're not going to fucking care, are you?" Muuril replied quickly.

  When Caaskil had taken up his place in the front rank, Gelthius readied his spear and shield. He felt the presence of Loordin behind him as the rear ranks packed in. Ahead, the Salphors were organising into warbands, the men of each tribe gathering around their leaders. Skirmishers with bows ran ahead of the main line, moving in the shadows cast by the lava fires. Though they were silhouetted against the flames, they had little chance of seeing their targets; Lutaan had ordered the lights of the city and the mustering lamps put out where possible and so the Askhan legion was all but invisible in the night.

  The catapults and spear-throwers started the battle, launching bolts and showers of fist-sized rocks at the Salphors. The Twenty-first had barely enough kolubrids for their messengers and so the task of forcing the enemy into an attack fell to the war machines. As bronze-headed shafts plunged through their ranks and stones rained down on them from above, the Salphors edged closer and closer. The shouts of the war-leaders could be clearly heard along the line, urging the archers to move in and loose their missiles at the engine crews. The skirmishers were understandably reluctant to get too close to the Askhan phalanx. Gelthius translated this debate, much to the amusement of Caaskil and the others around him.

  "I don't like it, not this," said Gelthius, still looking ahead. "This ain't right."

  "What's the problem?" said Caaskil.
"Afraid for your friends?"

  "They're too bad, even for Salphors," said Gelthius, unable to articulate his worry any better than that. He could not shake the feeling that the army in front of him were being terrible on purpose, perhaps to ensure that they were the centre of attention. "Why do they keep advancing? Why not pull back and wait for dawn to even the matter?"

  "Don't fret, I sent word to Captain Lutaan about what you said," replied Caaskil, his mood becoming sincere. "If it is Aegenuis and he's got another army out there, it'll be spotted before they can do any damage. Right now, we have ten thousand Salphor bastards in front of us. Concentrate on them."

  The Salphors seemed convinced that their weight of numbers would carry the battle; despite all experience and past battles to the contrary. Under attack from the engines and their skirmishers all but useless, the Salphorian chieftains withdrew the archers and called for the advance to continue. The bowmen melted back into the warbands, swapping bows for knives and spears.