Revenant

by Bevan McGuiness

  Keshik led them through the alleys at speed. Moving with confidence, he made turn after turn, avoiding people wherever possible, while overhead, the aerial bombardment continued. Missile after missile whistled through the sky, followed by the crashing impacts that heralded more suffering and death. After a while, the screams seemed to all blend into one continuous sound as the people of Asnuevium sought cover.

  In a slightly wider gap between the houses, Maida caught a glimpse of the city wall ahead. As she looked, another dark object flew over it, on its way to create havoc somewhere deep in the city. Keshik ran on, making for the wall. Around them, the Habigga kept pace until, without breaking stride, Keshik gave a series of complex hand gestures, sending them peeling off in different directions. In moments, Maida was alone with Keshik, running along still another of the apparently endless alleys in the poor quarter of Asnuevium.

  The alleys came to an abrupt end. Maida and Keshik ran out into an open paved area, beautiful old buildings set on one side, an unexpected splash of greenery in the shape of a garden to another, and the ramshackle poor quarter at their backs. The city wall was beyond the garden. Keshik did not hesitate, heading straight through the lush garden towards the wall. He trampled plants and flowers, unheeding in his rush, but was brought to a skidding halt by the sound of a crossbow being cranked.

  ‘Don’t run through my garden, you barbarian,’ a querulous old voice said.

  Keshik raised his swords, and turned towards the voice. An old man stepped out from behind a large, broad-leafed plant, a crossbow levelled at Keshik’s chest. An ordinary bow, even from that range, would not trouble Keshik, but the extra speed of the crossbow bolt, together with a faster release that gave less warning, made it a fearsome weapon.

  Keshik made a show of sheathing his blades, indicating that he was no threat to the old man. Maida seemed to be out of his line of sight. Either that, or he had dismissed her, seeing only the threat posed by Keshik. If that were so, he was an idiot.

  ‘What are you doing, crashing through my garden?’ the old man demanded. ‘Who do you think you are?’

  Keshik did not speak, he just kept slowly edging to his right, taking the man’s attention further away from Maida. When Keshik would not speak, the old man became agitated.

  ‘I asked you a question,’ he snapped. ‘Do you know who I am?’

  Keshik grunted as the man’s attention seemed to be wavering. Maida was closing in on him from the other side, her dagger in hand. She had no wish to kill the man, but if he made the wrong move, she would put aside her qualms.

  ‘I have no idea who you are, fool,’ Keshik snarled.

  ‘I will have you impaled at dawn, barbarian,’ the man barked.

  Keshik winced as another massive missile whistled overhead.

  ‘You may not see another dawn,’ Keshik countered.

  ‘Don’t be even stupider than you look, little man. Do you know where you are? This is Asnuevium — no one can take this city. It has stood here for longer than you know, and will stay here forever.’

  Keshik grunted again, still carefully moving to his right. The old man had been all but turned around so that his back was to Maida. She was barely three paces from him, dagger outstretched.

  ‘I wouldn’t,’ came a hard, deep voice from immediately behind her. Maida froze, her mind racing. How had he caught her so easily? She hadn’t heard a thing. It was as if he had just appeared.

  A sharp blade touched the back of her neck. ‘Put down the knife,’ the voice said.

  Maida was puzzled by the accent. The man’s voice was like nothing she had ever heard before, holding no trace of any familiar accent. She loosened her grip on her knife and allowed it to fall.

  ‘You too, fighting man,’ the voice spoke louder, addressing Keshik.

  Keshik gave a noncommittal grunt as he raised his hands away from his sides.

  ‘On your knees, slag,’ the man said, pushing harder on the blade at Maida’s neck.

  Maida sighed and lowered herself to her knees. ‘Can’t you boys come up with a new word?’ she said. ‘I’ve heard that one so often, it’s getting stale.’

  She didn’t hear the man shift his position, but the kick caught her hard in the small of the back, sending her falling forward, gasping with the pain. Maida lay flat on her face, struggling to breathe, fighting to keep back the nausea from the sudden agony. There was a cry, the sound of a body falling followed by rapid footsteps. She was in too much pain to look up, but recognised the smell of Keshik’s leather armour as he leaped over her to engage her attacker. He hit the man hard and the two of them went down. Maida tried to pull herself away from the sound of the fight, but felt the pain as the two men rolled onto her legs. They rolled off again as they continued to pound at each other.

  There was another cry, followed by a choked, snarling, animal sound. Maida rolled over, ignoring her pain, to see Keshik struggling not with a man but with an animal: a reddish brown, shaggy-haired thing that looked like a cross between a dog and a lizard. It had a doglike face but the long, heavy tail of a xath lizard. Keshik had it by the throat and looked to be slowly choking the life out of it. Its tail lashed around, pounding at Keshik’s back while its rear legs raked across Keshik’s chest as a cat’s would. It seemed to be struggling as Keshik’s iron grip kept tightening.

  ‘Stop it!’

  Maida looked around to see the old man, standing again with the crossbow in his hand. But it was not aimed at Keshik.

  ‘Leave him or I will shoot the woman,’ he said.

  Keshik flicked a glance up at the old man, then released his grip on the animal, pushing it away before standing. His leather armour was slashed and his face was covered in blood, but he did not seem badly hurt. Maida struggled to her feet and stood beside him.

  ‘Are you hurt?’ Keshik asked her.

  Maida shrugged. ‘Just a bruise, I think. I’ve had worse.’ She tried to hide the wince her words caused, but failed. ‘But not for a while,’ she added.

  ‘Stop talking,’ the man with the crossbow snapped.

  Keshik fixed him with a stare and growled. It was not that different a sound to that made by the animal lying at his feet, slowly recovering its breath.

  ‘Who are you?’ the old man demanded.

  Keshik did not even offer a grunt.

  ‘I am Viggo Hadjimalakinas.’

  ‘So?’ Maida said.

  ‘That means nothing to you?’ Viggo said with disbelief etched on his features.

  ‘Should it?’

  Maida winced again, but not at the pain this time, but at the sound of yet another of the heavy missiles screaming overhead. This one was higher than the others she had seen, heading further into the city. She shifted her stare back to Viggo. His eyes, too, had been drawn upward to watch the dark object hurtle over his city.

  ‘Barbarians,’ he muttered. He shifted his gaze back to Maida and Keshik. ‘Now you two. Running through my garden, pretending you don’t know who I am, attacking my servant. All punishable by death, of course.’

  ‘Your city is under attack, your army is defeated and you are offended that we don’t know your name?’ Maida asked.

  ‘I told you — this is Asnuevium, she will never fall. And you two will be impaled with the dawn’s light tomorrow.’

  Maida frowned, about to say something, make some protest at this bizarre situation when a shatteringly loud explosion rocked them all. Viggo staggered and almost lost his footing, allowing the crossbow to slip from his grasp. Keshik, alert as ever, sprang forward and snatched it up. As he levelled it at the old man, Viggo regained his balance and started shouting.

  ‘Guards,’ he cried in his unsteady voice. ‘Guards! Alarm, intruders!’

  Dust from the nearby explosion started to settle on them, but it did not seem to make any difference to Viggo at all as he continued shouting. Keshik gave him a strange look, half pitying, half contemptuous, and turned to run on. Maida looked down at the barely conscious animal on the ground,
just in time to see it shimmer and shift, changing back into a compact, hairy man. He looked up into Maida’s eyes.

  ‘Go,’ he rasped through his damaged throat. ‘I will look after him.’ Maida shook her head and ran after Keshik, leaving the strange deluded man to his garden.

  The wall was beyond belief. It had looked massive from the outside, but Maida had been too distracted by her need to get through the gate to truly appreciate the scale of this massive construction. She stood at the edge of the garden and stared up. It rose and rose, soaring above her like a small cliff. Allowing her eyes to drift over its ancient yet solid stone work, she made a slight correction. Maybe not such a small cliff.

  Movement caught her eye. She turned to see a black-clad Habigga scaling the wall like a fly. More movement. More Habigga. She counted six of the Silent Ones scurrying up the wall as though it were a floor. Keshik touched her shoulder and, when she looked to him, indicated a steep, narrow stair that extended from ground level to the top of the wall.

  ‘Easy way?’ he asked.

  ‘Easy way,’ Maida agreed.

  The stairs were steeper and narrower than at first sight, but Keshik took them at a run. Maida followed, but with more caution. Beneath her feet, the ancient stones were solid but worn, showing the signs of thousands of boots making their way up and down. From the ground, this wall had seemed monumental, but climbing it …? Maida cast a nervous look down, aghast at how high she was climbing. With some degree of disbelief, she looked to where she had seen the Habigga scale the wall, only to see that they had already reached the top. Maida pushed herself to catch up with Keshik.

  At the top of the wall, Maida stared out at the vista. Behind her lay the ancient city of Asnuevium, stretching out to the sea, a chaotic jumble of streets, buildings and fleeing people. Smoke rose from dozens of different locations and several buildings already lay in ruins. The destruction, while intense in isolated areas, was not yet serious. The city was vast, far larger even than the Hidden City of the Blindfolded Queen, dwarfing Vogel and every other city she had ever seen. Maida began to see the reasoning behind Viggo’s confidence about the city’s ability to withstand attack.

  Then she looked over the wall to see the approaching army.

  It extended all the way around the city, blocking out all land from the coast to the left to the coast on the right in an enormous semicircle. Within the heaving black mass of humanity were hundreds of the siege machines that were lobbing the never-ceasing stream of missiles into Asnuevium. As she stared, several more were hurled overhead.

  ‘What’s in those things?’ she asked Keshik as they both ducked instinctively.

  ‘Acid, mixed with mud. The acid dissolves whatever it touches, and the mud means it sticks to things and moves slowly, giving it a chance to work.’

  Maida shuddered, remembering the sight and sounds of people dissolving in screaming agony as the yellow slime clung to their bodies.

  ‘Even stone?’

  ‘Not all stone, but some.’

  ‘It won’t destroy the city, then.’

  ‘No, it’s designed to kill and terrify civilians.’

  The mention of civilians made Maida suddenly look around, seeking the defenders who had to be standing post on the wall. Scattered all along the wall were soldiers, all dead, all bristling with numerous arrows. There seemed to be not a single living person on the wall but the Tulugma.

  ‘Where is everyone?’ she asked.

  Keshik shook his head. ‘The defending army is all dead, wiped out in the first skirmish.’

  ‘So there are no more defenders? Just this wall?’

  Keshik looked along the top of the wall. It was about ten paces wide, with crenellated defences to the outside. Every dozen or so paces there was a heavy metal pike rising from the outer wall, atop which fluttered a different pennon. At intervals of what looked to be fifty paces stood idle projectile weapons, a mixture of catapults and ballistae, with plenty of ammunition, but no living soldiers nearby to fire them.

  ‘There’s plenty of defence, just no one to use it,’ Keshik said.

  One by one, the Habigga jogged along the wall to stand near Keshik. He held up two fingers. ‘Teams of two,’ he said. ‘Organise to fire those weapons, target the trebuchets. We need to take them out before the populace is panicked completely. Go.’

  The Habigga turned and ran. Keshik watched them go, seeing which of the heavy weapons they chose before heading off with Maida to a huge ballista. Maida regarded the enormous crossbow with a frown.

  ‘Have you ever fired one of these?’ she asked.

  ‘No. You?’

  ‘No.’

  Keshik was clearly done with the conversation, as he bent and lifted one of the massive bolts the ballista would fire. He hefted the length of sharpened wood. It was nearly three paces long and as thick as his thigh. The tip had been hardened in a flame. Anything receiving a direct hit from it would take heavy damage. Keshik carried it to the front of the ballista and slotted it in. The limbs had already been cranked back in preparation. He walked back to the release mechanism and raised the end, pointing the weapon out in the general direction of a trebuchet.

  Keshik grabbed the release lever and heaved it back. There was a terrific thud as the limbs of the ballista snapped forward, sending the tree-sized bolt hurtling out into the massed army below. It flew straight and true, but lacking the flights of a normal arrow, it dropped short, smashing into soldiers. Maida was grateful she was too far away to see any of the carnage that one missile must have caused among those it struck.

  Keshik did not watch. As soon as the bolt flew, he was hurrying forward to start the reload. He grabbed a new bolt while Maida started the arduous task of winding the heavy crank that pulled the limbs back. While he was feeding the bolt, Keshik asked Maida if she had seen where the previous shot had landed. At her reply, he suggested she fire the next one, making suitable corrections.

  Maida raised the ballista on its pivot, trying to remember the exact angle Keshik had held it, then lowering her end a bit, to lift the point of the bolt, giving it more elevation. She held her breath and heaved on the release.

  Two things happened: first, she was completely unprepared for the sheer power released on firing the bolt. The whole weapon bucked and surged like a wild animal, kicking back with a ferocity she could never have expected. Maida’s hands were thrown off the release lever, but not before the shock jarred up her arms, sending a wave of pain through her whole body. For a heartbeat, her chest thrummed with energy before settling into a dull ache.

  Second, the first bolt alerted the army below to the fact that once again, the wall was patrolled. A sheet of arrows, thousands strong, arced upward, seemed to hesitate at the top of their trajectory, then dropped onto the wall like a metal hailstorm.

  ‘Cover!’ Keshik bellowed.

  Maida threw herself under the ballista, curling herself up into as tight a ball as she could while Keshik dived in alongside her. An instant later the arrow storm struck with the sound of a rockfall. Thousands of metal-tipped arrows slammed into the stone wall all around them. Sparks flew as the arrows shattered, sending splinters of wood flickering through the air like darts. She was struck by dozens of tiny slivers, some drawing blood. Keshik gave a pained grunt as he pulled a long splinter from his arm.

  Maida went to move, but Keshik grabbed her arm, pulling her back.

  ‘Wait,’ he hissed. ‘Listen.’

  Maida froze as she heard the distant whistle once more. Another wave of arrows was on its way. The hiss built as the arrows fell from the sky until once again the air was full of splintered wood, tiny chips of stone and the shattering sound of metal arrow points slamming into the obdurate rock wall. The ballista that sheltered her from the aerial assault gave a shuddering creak.

  Keshik slid out from under the massive weapon. He crept to the crenellated edge and peered over. There were no more arrows in flight. What he did see, however, made him cry aloud in disbelief.

  3
6

  Flickering light suffused the cave, bringing with it an edge of icy blue cold like a wind screaming down off the Sixth Waste. Slave shivered. He was still in the crouching position as his master had commanded, ignoring the cramping in his knees, awaiting his return. It had taken much of his mental discipline to keep from panicking, but not enough to prevent him considering the impossibility of his situation. How had his master found him? What was he doing here? What was this place? Had he indeed been somehow magically transported back to Vogel as the Elbar had moved them all from the Kuriltai?

  The questions ran through his mind, unfettered by the discipline he used to maintain control. This incipient panic was worse than anything he had ever faced from the vast open sky above him. This was not the fear of the unknown, this fear had its roots in actual pain and suffering, it was based on reality. Imagined fears, he realised with surprise, were bad but remembered fears were worse. Thus, when soft feet approached him, he was insufficiently focused to realise they were not his master’s.

  The light came closer until the whole cave was brightly lit by dancing blue flames. Slave did not need to look up to know they were flames; the inconstant nature of the light, the way it cast chaotic shadows that swept across the walls, gave enough information. He had never seen flames cast this sort of light before, but who knew what strange things sorcery could bring? His whole body tensed, fear rising once again to dominate his mind as the feet came close. A hand rested on his shoulder. His entire body was tight like a bowstring at full draw so that even the light touch was almost enough to send him sprawling on his face. He regained his balance, resting a hand on the sandy floor of the cave.

  Shame flooded him, battling with the fear. How had fear so unmanned him, so stripped him of his skills that he could almost fall at a touch? The feel of the gritty sand beneath his fingers gave him a moment’s pause. He took up a handful of the sand before allowing it to trickle through his fingers. The tiny crystals sparkled in the dancing blue firelight. Oddly, the act calmed him enough to regain his balance.