Beyond the Bulwarks

by K. J. Coble

  “Go! Go!” Varya shoved Anzo from behind.

  Together they trudged into the chilling Lydirian. Anzo welcomed the cold, anything to keep his mind off the spreading warmth of his guts threatening to push out. The canoe bobbed for a moment ahead of them and then held, caught on an unseen sandbar.

  Endus’ camp roiled with violence. A horse ran free, wild-eyed, crashing along the riverbank and then into the trees. Behind it, folk were spilling through the wagon laager to the water. Arriaks loomed up behind them, tongues of firelight catching the hellish glee on their terrible, pale faces. Sabers rose and fell, rose again painted with crimson. Lances flashed out, skewering men, women, everyone.

  Anzo stumbled in the river’s uncertain footing, the bed clinging at every footstep, his strength flagging as pain swelled and the corners of his vision grayed. Water washed up to his armpits, shocked away strength with its terrible iciness.

  “Come on!” Varya was dragging him now. The canoe was only a few feet away.

  A blood-splashed rider with straw-colored hair angled between wagons to try to find space to maneuver. Endus, who’d fled the Battle of the Bulwarks, stood his ground now, the Lyrdirian frothing about his mount’s hooves as the Arriaks swept in on him from either side. He parried a saber swipe meant for his head, drove a return stroke into an Arriak’s neck. A plume of arterial blood fouled his recovery and another Arrak lunged in, lance driving up under his ribcage and erupting out his back. The former crony of Eyeloth stiffened, fingered the shaft run through his midsection numbly before his killer released the weapon and let him topple from the saddle into the foam of the river.

  Varya pulled herself into the makeshift boat and held her hand out to Anzo. With the last of his reserves, he forced himself, screaming in pain, over the side into the cramped cavity. Oars fashioned from tree branches waited for them. Varya grabbed one, looked at it dumbly.

  “Paddle!” Anzo reached nervelessly for the other, couldn’t seem to make his fingers grasp the handle. “Paddle, damn it!”

  “What about Heathen?” Varya leaned to the stern of the craft, half stood up. “Heathen!”

  The giant wasn’t there. A wake of foam showed his meteoric path back to the river bank, firelight from the churned camp blazing on his axe blade like hell’s fires.

  Varya beat the sides of the boat. “What’s he doing?”

  An Arriak charged into the river to meet the youth. Heathen ducked a slash and pivoted to the right, his axe lashing about in a stroke that took the Arriak steed’s leg off. The beast squalled and folded into the water, the rider rolling under it. A second launched at Heathen’s left, lance lowered for a gutting thrust. Heathen parried the lance point into the murk, turning the weapon into a pole that vaulted the unprepared Arriak from his saddle and over the giant’s head.

  More Arriaks surged into the surf on foot while fellows hung back, trying to control their horses. Heathen became a whirlwind, parrying, slashing, and wheeling. Any Arriak that stumbled into the circle he occupied found death, ripped open from shoulder to crotch, limbs lopped from joints, brains dashed back into their comrades’ faces.

  “Heathen!” Varya sobbed as the current of the Lydirian seized the canoe again, began to carry it free of the chaos. “Come on!”

  Anzo, wobbling with agony, tried to put his bloody hand on her shoulder. “No...don’t...”

  She whirled on him. “How can you? Heartless dog! How can you?”

  Anzo sagged into the cavity of the makeshift craft, sick with pain, sick with all of it. “It’s for us, Varya...he’s doing it for us...”

  “Aeydon!” Heathen shrieked to the god his folk had shunned him for adopting. Another Arriak tried to bowl him over with his horse. Heathen stepped directly into the steed’s path, rammed the spiked point of his axe into the animal’s chest. The horse reared with a squeal of agony. Its rider, flailing to regain control, had no defense when Heathen’s axe ripped through his guts and left intestines spilling into the foam of the Lydirian.

  “Aeydon!!!”

  The thrum of an Arriakan recurved bow could be heard from the boat. Heathen jerked back a step, a white-fletched arrow quivering in his shoulder.

  “No!” Varya folded over the lip of the canoe, convulsing as the oar dangled from her fingertips then fell.

  An Arriak swept in from Heathen’s left, leaning low in the saddle, saber poised to rake the giant from the flank. Heathen spun at the last moment, caught the Arriak’s sword arm by the wrist, and dragged the white-haired attacker into the roiling water. His axe shot up then fell with a thunderous, two-handed chop. Gore and foam geysered into the sky.

  Two more Arriak bolts slapped into Heathen’s back and his spine arched agonizingly. He pivoted as bow-armed Arriaks circled but held back, no more daring to get close to this prey, even mortally-wounded. Behind them, the camp of Endus’ folk glowed with flame as the dashed campfires spread to the wagons, their roar drowning out the screams of the dying.

  Heathen wobbled once and turned to the river. His face sought the craft, seemed to find it as a bloody smile wrinkled his too-young features. He held his axe high.

  “For Aeydon, my friends!”

  Half a dozen arrows converged on him. Heathen dropped to his knees, teetered, and slid into the blood-lathered waves.

  Quiet settled across the Lydirian, the crackle and wail of the dying camp receding. Through a haze of pain of sorrow, Anzo struggled to sit up. Varya’s sobs shook the craft. He held the remaining oar out to her. “Varya...Varya, dear...I don’t have the strength... you’ve got to...”

  She looked up at last, face ghastly with tears. There was no thought behind her eyes, only paralyzing anguish.

  “You’ve got to paddle. The current...it can still carry us back to them.”

  Numbly, she accepted the oar and began dipping it over the side. For a time, she worked their course, darkness, mists, and silence thickening about them. Anzo watched her, clutching his guts, feeling as useless as he could ever remember. His surroundings were taking on a swampy blur. He didn’t have long.

  “We’re not far,” she said at last, voice toneless. “There’s a fort. What do we do?”

  Sliding into numbness, Anzo slurred, “They’ll take us if...if they...” he shook back the grayness, the beckoning emptiness “...call to them, Varya...in Aurridian...call for help...”

  Faintly, he heard shouts from the far shore. Someone was bellowing orders, the oddly comforting sound of a Centurion roused from an early drinking bout.

  “Help us!” Varya shouted. “Please, for the love of the gods, help us!”

  Her voice was the last thing Anzo heard before oblivion.

  Book III

  Stand Against Darkness

  Chapter Twenty

  Fort Terminus

  Time lacked meaning for Anzo, his world awash in a gray haze as chill as the mists that rose from the cracks of the Bulwarks. There was pain there, but peace as well. His mother might have called him from the warm, sun-dappled clearings beyond the tangled forest of the world. Her voice grew until it was not her own, and the light of the Beyond went harsh, piercing the fog until it drew him out...

  “Anzo?” Varya’s face swam before blinking eyes. “Anzo Severnus?”

  His surroundings crystallized into hard reality. Anzo laid on a cot, swathed in rank, sweat-stained covers, in a room of stone, a shaft of sunlight glaring through a slit window with wooden blinders thrown back. Varya sat to his left, clothed in the simple, drab robes of an Initiate of Thoth, her hair tied up in a severe bun, but with a tendril loose, draping across a pale face. Her eyes shimmered and she clutched his hand till the nails bit.

  He grimaced till she eased up, then smiled. But it didn’t last. With awareness came memory and with that, images of fire, of death come to the banks of the Lydirian, of Heathen...

  “Damn...”

  A chuckle drew Anzo’s attention to a grinning, ebon-skinned figure near the door of the chamber. Enu Mbawa stepped close. “It seems barbaria
n blades were no match for an Imperial heart.”

  Anzo glanced at Varya. “What...where?”

  “Fort Terminus.” Enu took the seat to the right of Anzo’s cot. “We’ve been waiting on you. You’ve been out the better part of ten days.”

  Varya brushed Anzo’s cheek. “It was my turn to watch over you.” She offered him a smile fragile with uncertainty. “Your wounds festered and the fever held for some time.”

  “The Initiate’s powers were the way,” Enu said.

  She looked at the Tribune with a slight blush. “Rest, water, and clean bandages did most of the work. I merely dissuaded infection.”

  “Ten days...” Anxiety blossomed in Anzo’s chest. He tried to sit up. A dull ache below his ribs forced him back, as did Varya’s hand on his chest.

  “Not yet.”

  Enu chortled. “Like I said before; you’re mad. Give yourself time. You’ve got it.”

  “No, we don’t.” Anzo fumbled at Varya’s sleeve, pulled her close. “What have you told them?”

  “She’s told us enough.” Enu’s tone went serious. “The rest can wait until you’ve recovered.”

  “I’m recovered.” Anzo worked to lever himself up again, succeeded despite Varya’s protests. “We’ve got work to do.”

  “Oh, agreed.” Enu put his hand on Anzo’s shoulder. “But you’re no good to us if those stitches pop and bleed your guts out onto the floor.” He forced him back down, pressure Anzo in his weakened state could not resist.

  “I can walk.” Anzo breathed hard, worn by even the small exertions. “There’s more—gods, so much more—that we need to discuss.”

  “And we will.” Varya took up a rag and dabbed sweat from Anzo’s brow. “But the Tribune’s right, Anzo. You’ve got to heal.”

  “And I told you.” Anzo glared at her. “I’m healed enough.”

  Varya looked pleadingly at Enu.

  The Kharzulan Tribune shrugged and sighed. “I suppose you’re going to hurt yourself even worse if we don’t give you something to do, aren’t you?”

  Anzo smiled. “The Fifth is lucky to have so perceptive an officer.”

  “Right,” Enu snorted. “Maricius—the Legate—is returned from Dynium. He’s been waiting for your report.” He pointed. “But you’re going nowhere like that.”

  For the first time, Anzo realized his nudity under the soiled sheets. Glancing quickly at Varya, his brow inexplicable warm, he tugged the linens close.

  “We’ll get you a clean tunic, fresh bandages,” Enu said. “Anything else?”

  “A razor.” Anzo scratched at his whiskers. “I want to get this barbarous thing off of me.”

  ***

  Paulus Maricius, Legate of the Legio Saliensis, was a sunburned, brittle-framed man nearing his fifties, with iron-gray hair clipped short against a narrow skull and sour lips quirking tightly under an aristocratic nose. “And how many, did you say?”

  Anzo scratched his smooth chin, burning with a dozen fresh nicks. Figures jumbled in his mind. Grondomagnus had had over thirty thousand at the Battle of the Bulwarks—though as many as a third of those had perished—and Theregond had faced him with, maybe, fifteen. He shrugged. “I’d say it could be as many as forty thousand warriors, not counting possibly twice that many dependants and random camp followers.”

  “Aeydon and the Divine Aurus...” The Legate hissed and began chewing at a fingernail, a decidedly un-aristocratic habit.

  An aide’s stylus worked feverishly at a wax tablet on a small work table to one side of the Legate. Enu and a cluster of officers watched the commander from the other as he leaned back in his chair, his free hand drumming the top of a wide, scarred desk. Maps of the region spread before Maricius, small wooden tokens denoting units and outposts. Steely eyes wandered over the display. His nose flared again.

  “This Grondomagnus has been busy.”

  “Not him,” Anzo said. “Theregond of the Erevulans. It was always him. He was responsible for what happened to the Moravians. All the Vhurrs and more follow him now. He is—” Anzo shuddered “—one of the most dangerous men I have ever met.”

  “He’s a barbarian!” one of the officers beside Enu snarled.

  “It’s more than the man.” Varya stepped to Anzo’s side. “There are powers with him that go beyond warriors and numbers. These priests that he listens to have unearthed a being from the Age of Dreams, a dark demigod the Elder Tyrants harnessed—or birthed, we’ll never know—known as Arshann the Wanderer.”

  Maricius’ eyebrows arched incredulously. “The Wanderer? Wanderer of what?”

  “The planes of the cosmos,” Varya explained. “This Thing has no home, has been banished by the Gods and their mortal agents for all time. But He seeks a way into our world, to ravage and destroy, for those are the life blood of His existence. In the Barbaricum, where there are none with the knowledge to watch for entities like Him, He has found new purchase in the form of this cult. Their pleas and prayers have opened cracks in the material plane, have allowed fragments of that past, terrible age to seep forth and pollute our time.”

  She stepped past Anzo, put her hands on Maricius’ desk and drilled him with her stare. “These fools do not understand what they could unleash. They think only of the short-term. But when their atrocities are enough, when enough blood has flowed and the anarchy is at its worst, Arshann might be able to force His way through and then...” She trailed off, features paling.

  “Ghost stories,” growled the officer who’d spoken up before.

  “Not so!” Another, lesser officer sidled to Enu’s side to the blanching of the first. “My lord, we have seen strange things, these last few months. I believe her. Something is happening!”

  “Enough.” Maricius waved to calm a rising rumble amongst his men. “Thank you, Dargos. I agree.” The commander speared the doubting officer with a glare. “And we are not in the habit of doubting the Order of Thoth, young Antonus. Their word has been good enough for a dozen Emperors.” He looked again at Varya and Anzo.

  “Word must be gotten through to my Order in Aurid, Legate Maricius,” Varya insisted. “Alone, I cannot possibly be enough to face this.”

  “I agree, Initiate. But it’s not curses from a thousand years ago that concern me at the moment.”

  Anzo shared a glance with Varya. “My lord?”

  “You say forty thousand?” Maricius rose from his chair, a finger tapping one of the maps. “I have eight thousand to face that.” He turned to stare out an un-shuttered window, sunlight carving his face in wrinkles and shadow as he crossed his arms. “And that number is rather less than it sounds.”

  “It can be enough, Maricius—” Enu grimaced at a hard look from the commander “—Legate. They have to cross here. There are no better fords above or below the Cataracts. And they will have to cross on boats, under fire from our catapults and ballistae and archery.”

  “You know what the priestesses of Harrabhukka Harvest Mother have been saying, Tribune.” The Legate shook his head. “The river is running low, this year, and they predict a hot spring and summer.”

  “The Vhurrs believe the same,” Anzo said, shuddering with a memory of Theregond’s triumphant smile. “And this is where they intend to cross.”

  “We can stop them!” Enu clenched his fist. “When has barbarian lunacy ever beaten Aurid discipline?”

  Anzo grimaced, for a moment couldn’t look at any of them as recalled his training of the Hamrak. But that wouldn’t be enough. It couldn’t. “We can stop them.” They had to.

  “We will.” The Legate nodded sharply and returned to his desk, sat, and fixed Anzo with that sword’s edge stare. “But the situation is rather worse than when you left, Master Severnus. Of those eight thousand I mentioned, more than half are auxiliaries, men who’ve given good service to the Empire for better than a generation, but descended from Vhurrs, nonetheless. With their ancestral kin swelling the opposite bank of the Lydirian, I worry about their metal.”

  “They are men o
f the Empire now!” Enu declared.

  “The lay nobility of the Valley might disagree with you, Enu,” Maricius said with a bitter quirk to his lips. “They scoff from their villas and wallow in their ‘pure blood’.”

  “And they are part of the problem.” Enu stalked forward and put a fist on the Legate’s desktop. “Why should Vhurr-descended farmers side with overlords who squeeze them within an inch of their lives?”

  Maricius smiled coolly at his subordinate. “Careful, young Tribune.” With a chastised wince, Enu withdrew to the corner with the other officers. Maricius eyed Anzo again. “You see, the good nobles of the Valley quiver every time there is a raid—as there have increasingly been, though we have sealed the crossings and forbidden trade—and demand Imperial line troops to patrol their holdings, leaving us the auxiliaries to hold the river bank. I cannot refuse them.”

  “I see.” Anzo nodded. “And I do not envy you your task, Legate. But either way, we must send word to Aurid. Perhaps, with enough persuasion, reinforcements can be sent.”

  “Oh, we will indeed.” Maricius waved to the aide, whose stylus halted and who began bundling up his documents.

  “And why do we give this man’s words so much weight?” asked the doubting officer, the one called Antonus. “By the look of him, he’s part-Vhurr, himself!”

  Anzo glared at the patrician features. “You’re right. I am. I am also a member of the Imperial Courier Service, the Office of Barbarians, and operate under the seal of the Eye of Empire.” He offered the young fool an unpleasant smile. “Certainly, that is good enough for you?”

  Antonus blanched and looked away. The one named Dargos might have smirked.

  “We’ll send word,” Maricius said. “But help—if there is to be any—will be slow-going. There is still ice in the Lothos Gap and the Field Force that was being gathered to cross to Kharzul is in the process of being disbanded, if I’ve heard correctly.” He leaned back in his chair and sighed. “No, gentlemen, we must look to ourselves in the coming weeks.” His gaze went again to Anzo.