“Oh,” Raven said, suddenly distressed. “I’m so sorry. I feel terrible. I’m surely unworthy of your friendship. But won’t you forgive me, Quinn? I’ll do anything you ask if you will. Anything.”
“Strange, you don’t sound sorry,” he said.
“Doesn’t look too sorry, either,” Tane said, noting the mischievous glint in her eyes.
“Thanks a lot, Tane. And after I risked life and limb to get this fine padded gambeson for you,” she said. “But does anyone thank me? No. You just ridicule me.” She pulled a dagger and offered it to them, “Go ahead, cut out my heart and stomp on it. It’ll hurt less.”
Quinn groaned while Tane rolled his eyes. But Tane’s eyes quickly returned to the gambeson.
“I am ashamed,” Tane said, trying not to laugh. “I am unworthy of your friendship. I beg your forgiveness.”
“That’s more like it,” she said, then turned on Quinn. “You could learn a thing or two from Tane.”
“You wouldn’t respect me if I gave up so easily,” Quinn said, and took the gambeson from her hands. “Very impressive. You didn’t steal it, did you?”
“What! I’m shocked!” she said, snatching it back and handing it to Tane. “I told you, I won it fair and square at dice. For Tane, since he returned Tasheba to me after the battle. I owed him.”
“Thank you,” Tane said, flattered. In truth, after that first battle, he was afraid to go into battle again without armor. “I don’t know what to say.”
Quinn gave him an “oh, please” look. Tane just shrugged.
Well-pleased with herself, Raven said, “I just want all my friends to survive this Godsforsaken war. Besides, I have a birthday coming up in a few months, and I like getting lots of presents.”
“Not very subtle,” Quinn mumbled. Then he looked around and frowned. “Nothing for me? I lost my armor too, you know.”
Raven’s smile was pure sensual wickedness.
“Oh, I have something for you, lover,” she said. She kissed him long and deeply. “Do I ever have something for you?”
Chapter 42
Sunrise the next morning brought another assault on the walls, just as Quinn had predicted. The attack lasted just over three hours, followed by two hours of the zombies falling back and reassembling for their next attack. And attack they did. Time and time again they attacked, though never once did any of them reach the battlements, with few even surviving the moat crossing. The carnage sickened Tane, as it did even hardened veterans. Even the Tyrians were hard-pressed to find any humor in the situation. Only sunset brought a stop to their mindless charges.
By the middle of the day the moat was completely filled with dead bodies. Tane couldn’t even look at it. To see the face of a dead friend would be too much.
To Tane’s horror, the gray-robed priest didn’t seem to learn any lessons from their failure. The next day was a repeat of the last, as was the third, fourth, fifth...until the morning of the twelfth day.
“What is that?” Tane said as he and Quinn were posted together atop the wall.
The zombies were acting stranger than usual. Instead of standing silently in massed formations, the zombies were busy hauling stones, baskets of soil, and felled logs. The logs were being laid out in a series of squares to form a large rectangle from the walls back to the woodline. The areas inside the log squares were being filled with stones and dirt. Tane noted they had built up the end butting up to the walls more than that nearest the forest.
“They’re building a ramp,” Quinn said. “They might not have any idea of how to organize a proper siege, but at least they know how to make a stable ramp.”
“A ramp?”
“Yes,” Quinn said, pointing. “See how the logs hold the fill in place? That makes the whole thing more stable, so siege towers can be rolled up them to the city walls.”
“How long do you think it’ll take?” he asked.
Quinn paused, studying the zombies a long moment. Tane followed his example, and found the tireless efforts of the zombie slaves below disheartening.
“They work fast,” the half-elf said, echoing Tane’s own grim assessment. “But it’s an awful long and wide ramp, too. I’d say they can build a low ramp for siege towers in a few days or so, a little longer if they are trying to build a ramp to the battlements and attack on foot.”
“Shouldn’t we be doing something?” Tane said. He knew what he wanted to do, but running for his life was out of the question. He had friends to think about now, not to mention his family out among the zombie horde. To save his family, the horde had to be defeated, and their terrible God vanquished. “Maybe I should go tell the sergeant or something.”
Quinn gave him a fatherly clap on the shoulder. “Don’t worry about it.” He turned around, facing into the city and pointed to a nearby warehouse. It was huge, easily the largest stone structure Tane had ever seen that wasn’t a castle or other fortified structure. But to his surprise, he saw scaffolding being erected hastily around it. “If you look closely, you’ll see those men are soldiers. They are about to start tearing that building down, to use it as a quarry, and then we all get to help build up and reinforce the wall facing the ramp.”
“But won’t the zombies just raise their ramp?”
“Probably. But then we’ll raise our wall again to counter them,” Quinn said. “We’ll keep it up until one side gives up, or either our wall or their ramp collapses under its own weight. Then we’ll all start again somewhere else on the wall and do it all over again, or they’ll try a new gambit.”
“You make it all sound boring,” Tane said, feeling some of his fear being bled away by Quinn’s matter-of-fact tone and manner.
The half-elf shrugged, “I’ve been in dozens of sieges, on both side of the moat. Truth be told, we have a pretty good chance of survival here. Our rear is the river, allowing us to receive supplies and reinforcements almost uncontested. And while we might be a bit pinched for food and rest, the zombies will likely be hard-pressed to feed their massed thousands. There’s only so much forage available.”
“We’ll lose anyway,” Tane said, surprising himself with his confidence.
“How do you know that?” Quinn said.
“I just do,” Tane said. He cast a grim look at the horde below. “My dreams have changed again. They aren’t as frightening, but scream for me to escape the city while I still have time. He is coming.”
“Dakar?”
Tane nodded.
Quinn was quiet a long moment before asking, “Do your dreams say what to do? Or how to escape the city?”
Tane looked at Quinn in surprise. “You...you believe me?”
“I’ve never known you to lie,” he said. “And if your dreams are prophetic, as both Joelle and Raven seem to believe, then I would be a fool to ignore them, as would you.”
Tane barked a short, nervous laugh. “As if I could ignore them! Great Kamain, what I’d give if I could ignore them!”
A great shout rose up further down the wall. Tane whirled around to see untold thousands of zombies storming the wall. The city walls were sparsely populated at the moment, since only minutes before the zombies weren’t formed up anywhere. They had forgotten how quickly sorcerous control of human minds could mount an attack. And how eerily silent the zombie attacks were conducted.
“They’ve made the battlements!” Quinn shouted, starting along the wall.
Alarms bells began ringing all over the city. Men and women, soldier and citizen alike, charged through the streets toward the nearest wall. Then signal fires blazed to life atop the curtain towers framing the sections of wall under attack.
Tane, following Quinn, stopped suddenly as the tower before them lit its signal fire. He turned to glance through the battlements as a dozen grapnels arched over the walls and clanged on the stone catwalks. In an instant they were pulled tight and the ropes began to creak under the strain of zombies climbing up.
“Attack the ropes!” Tane called, yanking Quinn to a stop.
More grapnels were flying over the battlements even as Tane hacked at the first taut rope. He was surprised to find his sword wouldn’t part the rope in a single cut. He had made that sword, and knew it to have an incredibly keen and durable edge. But Bearclaw just cut a few strands with each stroke.
“Sweet Mother preserve us!” Quinn bellowed, not unlike a Tyrian warrior. “The bastards are learning!”
A beam of sunlight hit the rope just right, and flashed bright light into Tane’s eyes. Steel! They had woven steel wire into the rope. And good steel, too, if Tane was any judge.
“Axes! We need axes up here!” Tane shouted down to the soldiers heading towards the walls.
“Stand aside, boy!” a huge Tyrian ordered. His battle-axe rested lightly on his shoulder as his golden brown eyes twinkled with battle delight. “Watch how I send these craven dogs to their pox-ridden God!”
His axe flashed out, cleaving the thick steel and hemp rope cleanly. Bellowing with laughter, he marched down the catwalk joyfully severing the ropes. But even as he did so, three more grapnels came over the wall for everyone he cut. And in places the zombies had already made the battlements and were fighting with soldiers. A moment later, the Tyrian was also embroiled in the fight.
A dark movement to his right alerted Tane, but too late. Expecting an attack by a zombie, he was unprepared to fend off the iron grapnel streaking over the wall straight at him. Only his helmet saved his life as the heavy projectile smashed into his right temple.
Light and darkness flashed behind his eyes, with pain lancing down to his feet. A second later, more pain as he fell heavily to the cobbled walkway. Countless men and women trampled him in their desperation to push the zombies back over the walls.
“Tane?” Quinn asked, shielding his friend’s body with his own and gently slapping his face.
Tane tried to answer, but couldn’t find the breath or control needed. He understood what was happening, and the danger to himself, but couldn’t even focus his eyes. The sounds of men and women dying around him demanded he get control of himself and help them.
Strong arms wrapped around his chest and dragged him for what seemed an eternity. By the time he was laid in the shadow of the tower, Tane’s eyes were becoming his to command again. The scene that came to him was hellish, and easily the most bloody and savage fight so far. The zombies were learning. Yes, slowly but surely they were learning how to fight with what little cunning they still possessed, and that scared Tane more than anything else.
The pinnacle of the tower looming over Tane and Quinn exploded in sorcerous fire. The priests and mages fighting there were consumed by arcane fires, with many choosing to fling themselves over the sides to escape the hellish fires torturing them.
A struggling pair fell from the tower to land at Tane’s feet in a cloud of black smoke. The vile stench of burning human flesh assaulted Tane even as he recognized the horror of what happened. The priest of Ashtar was clearly dead, his golden hair evaporating in the fire consuming his broken body. The zombie, though also being consumed by fire, was still alive and continuing to squeeze the priest’s broken neck. In a fit of tearful rage Tane found his feet and plunged Bearclaw through the zombie’s heart.
Dakar’s grey-robed priests were lined up just out of bow range, magically orchestrating the attack. Zombies in the thousands still patiently waited their turned to climb the ropes and join the battle. Many more zombies than Kestsax had soldiers, and more zombies were shuffling out of the forest all the time.
Suddenly, the scene before him changed. Instead of chanting and gesturing priests, of silent and grim zombies, he saw a dark road through a lush forest – and a gleaming city in the distance. A city he knew to be far to the south. A city he had to go to.
“Caeren,” Tane said, then shook himself out of the trance.
“Who?” Quinn asked, glancing back at him. “Who is Karen?”
Tane blinked at Quinn, momentarily forgetting who he was. Then it came to him.
“The city of Caeren, below the Thanir Mountains,” he said, brow creased in concentration. In truth, Tane knew he had never heard of any city by that name, but at the same time knew it existed. And he knew what he must do. “I have to go to Caeren. In Caeren I will stop Dakar.”
“You! You alone, a mere human, are going to stop a God, just like that?” Quinn asked, turning fully around to face his friend. Then understanding dawned on the half-elf’s face, and he gave Tane a fatherly smile. “Sit down, my friend. You have taken a bad blow to the head, and – ”
“And nothing,” Tane snapped. “Kamain is sending me south, to Caeren. Now I know, Quinn. There is a deed that I, and I alone, must do.”
Tane saw horror on his friend’s face. A soul deep fear his friend was throwing away his life.
“You have to go alone?”
“Yes,” Tane said, though knowing it was a lie.
His dreams, nightmares, had always shown him traveling with Quinn, Joelle, Armin, and Raven. But, they had also shown his friends all being destroyed. And at no time did he see any “benefit” to himself or humanity as a whole come of their senseless deaths. He couldn’t allow it to happen, so he would go alone to face Dakar.
A great soulful wail of despair rose up from the city. Tane and Quinn turned in time to see the iron-bound portal of the Stone Dragon Gate swing open.
“Shining Gods!” a familiar voice cried from below. “Get out of my way, you craven goat lovers!”
Tane looked over the side at the stairs leading up to his position. Halfway down Raven, Joelle, and Armin had stopped their furious fight upward, to stop and stare in disbelief at the open gate. Zombies and priests were flooding into the city, slaughtering anyone who dared to oppose them.
“Turn around! Turn around, you Godsforsaken oafs!” Raven ordered. “Can’t you see the real fight is down there?”
“Raven!” Quinn called. When she looked up, relief claiming her face, the half-elf waved, shouting, “Stay there! Tane and I will join the rest of you there! It’s important!”
Raven looked troubled, glancing between them and the torrent of zombies streaming into the city. But Armin waved for Quinn and Tane to join them, laying a hand on Raven’s shoulder.
“What are you doing?” Tane said as Quinn ushered him to the head of the stairs.
“Getting you out of the city in one piece,” he said. “For that, I’ll need their help.”
Within moments they joined up with their three friends. Quinn explained quickly their predicament. Joelle and Armin were shocked. Raven just frowned.
“Getting out of the city is going to be difficult,” Quinn said as they reached the bottom of the stairs. “I believe our best chance is to take a small boat and head downstream.”
“What?” Raven said. “Every man, woman and child in this Godsforsaken city is, or very quickly will be, heading for the docks to do just that. We’ll all be like a bunch of stinking rats jumping off a burning ship, and just as doomed.”
“You have a better idea?” Joelle asked just as harshly.
“Always,” Raven said. She smiled at the warrior witch smugly. Then more seriously, “Are you sure about this, Tane?”
He nodded grimly. “Just get me out of the city, and I’ll go from there. The rest of you must then head north, to warn the Jarland cities of the zombies.”
Tane had expected Raven, if no one else, to argue the point. Ashtarites, and Tyrians, too, never liked to run from a good fight. But to his surprise, she nodded and trotted away with everyone in tow. Strangely, Tane found himself disappointed no one had argued for accompanying him to Caeren.
Raven led them straight into a temple of Ashtar. It was large as temples go, towering high above all buildings in the area. It was made of a yellow-gold stone streaked with blood red, roofed in gray slate. Tane knew his entire village could’ve assembled inside its vast nave, with room to spare. Lining the nave were statues of Ashtar in her various manifestations, all small altars for private prayers. The High
Altar, beneath a towering statue of the Goddess, was only for the priests to pray and perform rites.
Raven started for a door in the back, to the right of the High Altar, then halted. Silently indicating they should wait, she hurried over to the High Altar and knelt. Laying her sword gently on the stone floor, she chanted a short mantra and bowed over it. Then Tane heard the faint sound of her whispered prayers, spoken in a feverish rush. When her head came back up, her face was soaked with tears.
“Follow me,” Raven said, bounding to her feet.
“What happened?” Tane said, grabbing her arm as she tried to pass by him. “You look upset. Did Ashtar say something?”
“No,” Raven said. “I couldn’t even feel Her presence. Not at all. It’s the first time that’s happened in a temple.”
Tane’s heart froze. Had something happened to Ashtar? Where the Arisen reeling as badly as Their human devotees?
“What could it be?” Quinn said.
Raven suddenly turned hostile eyes southward.
“Dakar,” she said between clenched teeth. “His sphere of influence has engulfed us, so He is able to block my prayers. Ashtar would have to make a supreme effort to break through, and She doesn’t even know I’m alive down here now. Our contact with the Gods has ended until we put an end to Dakar.”
With that, she turned on her heel and marched off.
“Where are we going?” Joelle said as they followed.
“To the crypts,” Raven said.
Tane felt his skin crawl. That was the last place he wanted to go.
“Aren’t we trying to escape the city,” Tane said, hating how peevish he sounded. “I mean, Kamain wants me to escape and do a deed for Him.”
Raven smiled fondly at him. “I know. And that is exactly what you will do.”
“A tunnel?” Quinn said.
“Exactly,” Raven said.
“How did you learn of it?” Joelle asked suspiciously.
“Most temples have them,” she said, not rising to the challenge in the Vikon’s voice. “At least the older temples have them. A throwback to the days when temples also seconded as fortresses in times of war. As for how I found this one, well, this temple is an exact replica of the temple in my home city where I was taught my priestly duties. and I did a little, ah, exploring on my off-duty time to see if everything was truly the same. It is.”
Belly of the Beast Page 18