Chapter Twenty
“IT’S A COMBAT SORCERER’S TRICK,” CAT said, as they watched the lines of evacuees slowly walking westwards. “They call it Bagehot’s Web.”
Emily glanced at him, sharply. She’d managed to get a few hours of sleep after her return to Cool Waters, but she’d been woken up to join the evacuation far too early for her peace of mind. Her body was crying out for a good meal, a shower and at least eight hours of solid sleep. She was grimly aware she wasn’t going to get any of them.
“And why,” she asked finally, “was I never told about it?”
Cat looked oddly embarrassed. “It’s not always shared with the really powerful magicians,” he said. “Certain people... don’t want them to know that there is a way to trap them, to bring them down, if they get too far out of hand. Anyone short of a necromancer would be unable to escape if the spell was cast properly. You got quite lucky.”
“They kept the spell to themselves,” Emily mused. “Who are they?”
“The White Council,” Cat said. “They like to keep a few things to themselves.”
He shrugged. “I suspect the tutors were told never to discuss it with us, even if we started figuring out the principles for ourselves. And they had a point. You know how... unpleasant... some magicians can become, when they think that no one can stand in their way. Or when they become addicted to dark magic. There’s probably quite a few spells hidden away in forbidden tomes, kept in the shadows until they’re needed. They’re not wrong.”
“I suppose,” Emily said, reluctantly.
She could see the logic. Grandmaster Hasdrubal had called magicians minor gods and, while Emily knew magicians were not gods, she knew there was some truth in his words. Even as a First Year, who hadn’t known that magic existed for sixteen years, she’d had enough power to make a town of mundanes very miserable indeed. Having a few tricks up one’s sleeve to deal with a magician with too much power and too few scruples might come in handy. Yes, she could see the logic.
But she wasn’t pleased. She hadn’t realized the trap – she hadn’t even realized the potential for a trap – until she’d walked right into it. Her story could have ended with her being killed by a far less powerful magician, her throat slit and her body left to bleed out. Or she could have been shipped east, to Randor. She doubted Cat would have realized that something was wrong – again – to save her. She made a mental note to use memory charms to study what she’d seen of the web’s spellware. It might be possible to learn how to cast the spell for herself, or devise a counter. Perhaps she should just take a battery with her the next time she went into combat.
If I had time to charge one, she thought. I might not have the time.
She put the thought aside and watched the evacuation. Small clumps of people made their way down the road, their eyes downcast as they left their lives behind and walked into an unknown future. Cat’s troops were doing their best to screen them, and keep them all moving in the right direction, but there was little true order to the march. Emily had no doubt that Lord Burrows would have little trouble scattering the refugees, or killing them. Some of the stories coming from the east were horrific. Randor seemed determined to make the peasants pay for being unlucky enough to belong to the Noblest.
“It was the beginning of the rout of civilisation, of the massacre of mankind,” she quoted.
Cat glanced at her. “What?”
Emily shook her head. “Never mind,” she said. “Let’s just keep going.”
The sun seemed to grow hotter as they made their way down the road. Emily had been relieved, at first, to discover that her horse had been assigned to pulling a cart of wounded, but as the long march wore on, she started to miss the beast. She told herself, stiffly, that she shouldn’t complain, even as her legs began to ache and sweat poured down her back. She was lucky, compared to the refugees. They were carrying bags of food, water and clothing, but they’d had to leave most of their possessions behind. Cat had decided not to burn Cool Waters, in the end, yet Lord Burrows would hardly be so kind. The refugees would never see their homes again.
And Cat decided to assign his own horse to help the refugees too, Emily thought. She wasn’t sure if it was a smart move or not, although it would definitely help with morale. The soldiers would not be inspired if they saw their leader riding on horseback while they were marching down a dusty road. But it will also make it harder for him to coordinate the march.
She shook her head, dismissing the thought. There was no hope of coordination, no hope of doing anything more than keeping the refugees pointed in the right direction. Cat had assigned a handful of men to serve as rearguards doing everything in their power to slow Lord Burrows down when he realized the town was being abandoned, but there was little hope of keeping the loyalists from snapping at their heels. Emily liked to think that Lord Burrows wouldn’t push matters if it were up to him, but she doubted Randor would let him have the choice. The king wanted blood.
The day wore on as the refugees made their way onwards, passing through a handful of minor villages. Cat and Gus stopped to talk to the headmen, telling them what was bearing down on them; it didn’t surprise Emily, not really, when the majority of villagers chose to join the march. They were a little better prepared for it, she noted. They drove their pigs and cows ahead of them, while carrying their chickens and seed corn on small farm carts. But then, anyone in a war zone with half a brain would have a plan to bug out if one of the armies approached. It wouldn’t matter who was in command. To the peasants, all armies were equally hostile.
She was relieved as the sun finally started to fall behind the horizon, but there was little room to stop and sleep. Clusters of refugees lay along the roadside or half-hidden in the trees, superstitions forgotten in a desperate bid to rest before the sun rose again. Cat barked orders, directing his men to set up a proper camp, but the refugees seemed broken. They slept where they fell or stumbled onwards, into the darkness. Emily couldn’t help wondering how many of them would be lost somewhere along the way.
There was nothing to eat the following morning but hardtack and water. Emily ate hers without complaint, then stumbled to her feet and followed Cat as he chivvied the refugees and soldiers into some kind of order. Emily hoped that Hansel and Tobias had made some kind of preparation for the refugees, although she had her doubts about that too. She rather suspected they would have done as little as possible...
She heard a shout behind her and turned, just in time to see a group of cavalry charging down the road. Lord Burrows had realized that the town had been evacuated – he would probably have reached Cool Waters yesterday, no matter how much chaos she’d sown – and sent his cavalrymen to harass the retreating army. Cat bit out a curse, then glanced at her. Emily reached for her magic, bracing herself. She’d eaten as much as she could, but she was pitifully aware it wasn’t enough. And she was sure those men were wearing charmed armor.
“Archers, ready,” Cat barked. “Take aim!”
A dozen archers turned, raising their bows. They looked absurdly frail, compared to the juggernaut bearing down on them, but she knew better than to underestimate them. A single iron-tipped arrow could strike with greater force than a musket ball and kill its unfortunate target. And even if it didn’t kill the target, it would leave him permanently scarred. Emily had seen one man screaming in pain as the chirurgeons carefully removed the arrow from his shoulder. The sight had almost made her faint.
“Fire,” Cat snapped.
The archers fired. The arrows hissed as they passed through the air – the sound made Emily shiver – and struck their targets. Seven men tumbled to the ground as arrows punched through their armor, while two more managed to maintain their balance even though they’d been hit. A horse tripped and fell, letting out a ghastly sound as it broke its leg. Its rider fell off and started to crawl away. The remaining horsemen kept coming.
“Fire,” Cat ordered.
The archers were well-trained, Emily thought, as th
ey fired a second volley. They hadn’t waited to see the results of their handiwork before preparing to fire again. The remaining horsemen didn’t stand a chance. A lone survivor turned and galloped away, an arrow sticking out of his back; the others were either dead or mortally wounded. Their horses ran in all directions, frightened out of their wits. Emily saw one crash into a thicket, vanishing in the trees. It would be a long time before the beasts could be rounded up and put back into service.
She smiled as the archers cheered and slapped each other’s backs. They had something to celebrate, even if she knew the victory wouldn’t last. Lord Burrows wouldn’t make the same mistake twice. The retreating army wasn’t toothless, but it was short on supplies. And there was no time to even recover the arrows. The next enemy formation was already coming into view.
“We have to pick up the pace,” Cat said, grimly. “If we don’t get to Eagle’s Rest before sunset, we’re finished.”
Emily nodded as Cat started barking orders, encouraging the refugees to move faster while the soldiers covered their retreat. No one argued. They’d all seen the horsemen coming up the road, or the pickets that shadowed them in the distance. One of the archers loosed a bolt at a distant horseman, but missed. The horseman didn’t even bother to fall back a little further. Emily suspected he was being an idiot – she’d seen accurate shots at far greater distances – but none of their archers were good enough to hit him. The man had gambled and won.
The day wore on, with more and more attacks materializing out of nowhere. Archers shot arrows into the refugees, then vanished; horsemen charged at their flanks, gambling that the archers couldn’t shoot them down before they were amidst the mob of refugees. Emily had to kill one with a fireball – no one else could stop him in time – while another managed to kill a handful of people before he was dragged off his horse and brutally beaten to death. She didn’t want to watch what the refugees did. The sheer level of hatred was terrifying.
Lord Burrows is driving us forward, she thought, as she spotted a little girl staggering along the road, clearly on the verge of collapse. There was no sign of her parents, no sign of anyone who might take care of her. And how many of us are going to die?
She scooped the little girl up and held her gently, feeling the girl nestle against her shoulder. She was around five, if Emily was any judge, but was so slim that Emily could feel her bones even through two layers of clothes. It was possible – all too possible – that the poor girl wouldn’t see her next birthday, whenever it was. Food had been running short for years. Winter Flower had never seen the benefits of actually letting the peasants keep more than the bare minimum of their own produce.
Cat nudged her. “You can’t save everyone.”
“That doesn’t mean I can’t save someone,” Emily snapped. She felt a hot flash of anger. She couldn’t turn her back when someone needed help. “And if I can get her to the town...”
She turned away, trying not to look at the bodies lying by the roadside. The march was hard for her and she was in good shape. Great shape, compared to some of the townspeople. The old and weak, the ill and infirm... the march was killing them. She saw an old man collapse, his adult children stumbling over his corpse as they walked onwards. She’d always known that the peasants were unsentimental about death – they honored the memory of old people who had chosen to walk into the night rather than be a burden on their children – but she’d never seen it so clearly. A chill ran down her spine. There was something fundamentally wrong about leaving one’s parents to die.
And yet, she understood better than she cared to admit. The peasants had no social security network. There was no one who would take care of the elderly, particularly the ones who could no longer contribute. The peasants were constantly on the margins, constantly on the verge of starving to death. They had made a virtue out of something they could not avoid, if they wanted to survive. She swallowed hard, tasting dust in the air. It was going to change, she promised herself. The peasants would be able to keep their produce, which would allow them to feed their grandparents until they died a natural death. And no one would have to commit suicide so their children could live.
She felt the girl shifting against her and looked down. The girl – Emily guessed she was a farmer’s daughter, from her clothes – was shivering, even in the heat. Emily hesitated, then applied a handful of healing spells. The generalist magic might be better than something more specific. But the little girl kept shivering until her body shuddered once, then fell still. Emily didn’t need to take her pulse to know she was dead.
Tears prickled at the corner of her eyes. She didn’t know the girl, but she’d died in Emily’s arms. Her family would never be identified, her family would never have the chance to give her a proper burial... she would vanish, somewhere between Cool Waters and Eagle’s Rest and any surviving relatives would never know what had happened to her. Emily wanted to put the body in a cart, to carry it to the city, but she knew it was impossible. She closed the girl’s eyes, then placed the body on the ground and incinerated it. The birds circling overhead wouldn’t have a chance to nibble on her flesh.
Cat rested a hand on her shoulder, just for a second. Emily was almost grateful, although she knew he didn’t understand. Not really. He’d been brought up in a world where petty pointless death was unavoidable. It was just a part of life. He had no sense that it wasn’t fair that a little girl should die, alone and unremarked; he had no sense that her death was a tiny tragedy amidst a whole sea of tragedies. Emily felt a surge of hatred – for Randor, for Lord Burrows, for everyone else who had plunged the country into war – that surprised her. They weren’t the ones who paid the price for their war.
And if they get captured on the battlefield, they get ransomed, she thought, sourly. The common soldiers get enslaved or beheaded or simply get their hands cut off before they are released.
She forced herself to keep trudging on as the attacks on the rear grew more frequent. Lord Burrows seemed determined to keep harassing the marchers, even though it was increasingly pointless. Emily wondered, nastily, if he was sending his enemies to their deaths. A man in his place would have a lot of enemies. But it would be one hell of a gamble. The man who brought Randor Emily’s head, unattached to her body, would probably be rewarded beyond the dreams of avarice. Baroness Harkness needed to be married to someone after the Noblest lost the war.
And she would probably prefer to be beheaded, Emily thought. Being reduced to a mere wife would be a fate worse than death.
Night was falling, again, when Eagle’s Rest finally came into view. Someone – Tobias, perhaps – had dispatched mercenaries to help cover the road, finally putting an end to the harassing attacks. Emily barely heard Hansel’s wittering as they passed through the gates and into the city. She was too tired to care what he had to say.
“He wants us to attend a feast,” Cat said, once they were back at the manor house. “Do you want to attend?”
Emily shook her head. “Tell him to preserve his food,” she said. It was hard to talk. “Lord Burrows will be here soon.”
“He’s already here,” Cat said. “If the scouts are to be believed, Eagle’s Rest is already surrounded. The river has been cut upstream. We are effectively under siege. It won’t be long until they bring the siege engines into position to take the city.”
“If he doesn’t try to starve us to death instead,” Emily said. Eagle’s Rest had been stockpiling food, but she had no illusions about how long the supplies would last. In hindsight, driving animals into the city might have been a masterstroke. “Will Randor give him the time?”
Cat shrugged. “I doubt it.”
Emily took a breath, then shook her head. “There’s nothing we can do about it now,” she said. She’d have to write Alassa a full report, but it could wait until the morning. “Right now, all we can do is sleep. And I mean sleep.”
“Agreed,” Cat said. He leaned forward and gave her a quick kiss. “I’ll see you in the morning.”
“THOSE ARE MY LANDS,” HANSEL SAID, the following morning. “And they’re going up in smoke.”
Emily said nothing as she peered into the distance. Smoke was rising all around the city, each plume of smoke representing a farm or a village or a town that had been thrown into the fire. Lord Burrows was systematically laying waste to the countryside, destroying all signs of human life. It was pointless barbarity, carried out against men and women who had no real power, but the king had presumably insisted. The rebels needed to be taught a lesson.
And it will clear the area so it can be resettled on their terms, Emily thought. They’ll bring in loyalists and make sure they have the population under firm control.
“He’s killing everyone who isn’t running into the city,” Cat commented. “And we have to take them in.”
“We should leave them outside,” Tobias snapped. “They’re a drain on our resources.”
“And they will die,” Emily said. “If they come here, they have a chance of survival. And if we don’t take them in, we’re as bad as the king.”
Her heart sank as she watched Lord Burrows’ army move steadily into place. It seemed to be bigger somehow, despite the chaos she’d wrecked. They had no cannon, as far as she could tell, but they had a sizable number of catapults and giant siege frameworks. The latter looked like mobile climbing frames for children, yet there was nothing funny about them. A determined aggressor could wheel them up to the walls and allow his troops to climb up and jump into the city in relative safety.
“The princess needs to come to our aid,” Hansel said. He glared at Emily. “Is she on her way?”
“She says she’s on her way,” Emily confirmed. Alassa hadn’t said much, beyond the bare minimum, but she wouldn’t have lied. “We just have to hold out until she arrives.”
The Broken Throne Page 20