The Black Coast

by Mike Brooks

  “Throw them back!” she yelled, raising her axe, and her warriors broke into a sprint. The invaders looked up in alarm and tried to set themselves to receive the charge, but they were too disorganised to form a proper shieldwall. The Brown Eagle clan smashed into them, and for the first time in fifteen years, Saana found herself using a weapon in anger.

  Or, more accurately, in terror.

  She’d not even tried to engage with Asrel Blackcreek when he’d come at her on the salt marsh, because memories of Njivan’s death had been running through her head and her warriors were already on their way to help her. She’d merely been trying to stay alive for long enough to make him someone else’s problem. Now she was leading a charge, and needed to show her clan she was willing to fight for their new home.

  Saana screamed and aimed an overhand, diagonal cut at her opponent’s head, but he got his shield up to block it and her momentum carried her into him, shield-first. He fell backwards; she stumbled over him, turned as she passed him and stooped to catch the axe-slash aimed for her calves on her shield. The woman following Saana swung with all her might at where the man’s shoulder met his neck, and her axe cleaved down to his collarbone. Blackstone might not cut metal, and it might be brittle, but there was a reason the clans of Tjakorsha used it to edge their weapons.

  She spun around to face in the direction of the charge again, sweeping with her shield to knock aside anyone approaching to strike her. It was almost her undoing: a warrior with red hair nearly as bright as Zhanna’s stepped back from her swing, then lunged in to try to catch Saana’s exposed ribs.

  Saana knocked the sword downwards just in time and tried a stab with the toe of her axe, but her opponent batted it away with her shield. She wielded a metal blade, longer and thinner than the one Saana had been left by her father. It tapered to a point from the cutting edge, and she held it with a flowing grace. She lashed out with two cuts at Saana’s face, as fast as winter rain. Saana caught the first on her shield and the second skittered off her helm, then the other fighter stepped back before Saana’s counter-cut could find her and smiled viciously. She was smaller than Saana and astonishingly beautiful, with a scattering of freckles across her nose and cheeks like the tiniest droplets of blood.

  “You’re the chief,” she said, with a glance at Saana’s belt, and chuckled. “Saana Sattistutar, yes?”

  “What’s it to you?” Saana snapped, watching for an attack. She wasn’t going to get distracted by the other woman’s words, but perhaps she’d see an opening.

  “I’m supposed to leave you for Rikkut,” the warrior said through a shark’s smile, “but he’s not here. Perhaps he won’t be The Golden’s favourite after today.”

  She flicked her sword up so quickly that Saana barely saw it, even though she’d been looking for it. The point ripped into the flesh on her chin despite her backstep, and she felt the sting of its edge and the warmth of newly dripping blood. Saana’s enemy was faster than her, and more experienced in battle, and had realised it.

  Saana stepped forward and feinted another overhand cut, then reversed direction and swept her axe first down and then up instead, a ripping blow towards her opponent’s crotch. It was a powerful swing, and had it landed then it would have unquestionably opened the other woman up the middle, but she blocked it with her shield almost contemptuously, and the blackstone teeth lodged fast in the unrimmed wood. She wrenched the shield aside, seeking to pull Saana off-balance and create an opening for her long, thin blade to puncture Saana’s sea leather and slide between her ribs.

  Saana let her weapon go immediately and, instead of being dragged stumbling to one side, she drove the rim of her own shield straight into the other woman’s face.

  There was a cracking noise that could have come from one of the Songs of Creation, when Father Krayk was lifting the lands above the waves. The other warrior staggered backwards, her nose ruined and several teeth now missing. She swiped across herself with her sword, but it was a blind, panicked blow. Saana let it pass in front of her, took a step, let her enemy swipe the other way, then stepped inside her guard again. The other warrior raised her shield to defend her face, and Saana stamped sideways at her right knee.

  It gave way. The other woman collapsed backwards to the ground with a cry of agony and tried to cover herself with her shield and sword, but Saana kicked her sword loose from her hand and snatched it up. It was lighter and more comfortable in the hand than her father’s, and she hacked down with it at the woman’s exposed legs.

  Blood, screaming, a flash of white bone as the flesh parted. Saana’s enemy brought her shield down instinctively to protect her legs, and the point of Saana’s new sword took her in the neck instead.

  “Thank you, Daimon,” Saana muttered. It had been a risk to let herself get disarmed like that, like Daimon had sacrificed his longblade against Rist, but the other woman would have cut her to shreds in a straight fight.

  “Saana Sattistutar!”

  It took Saana a moment to pick out who’d shouted her name. Was it an ally? Another enemy looking to challenge her to single combat? Then she saw him, and a new chill gripped her.

  A young Tjakorshi man, barely more than a youth, was advancing towards her in the midst of a new rush of attackers. He wasn’t the tallest or the widest, and his red-brown beard was scraggly rather than full, but his eyes were fixed on her, unblinking. She met them, and shivered. She’d seen expressions like that before, and it had never been a pleasant experience.

  “You’re a long way from home, boy,” she called to him. He wore no armour, but he had good weapons; a metal-tipped spear, and even a metal shield…

  A metal shield that bore the symbol of Blackcreek. And the spear was a sar’s wide-bladed spear, the same as Daimon had been carrying.

  “Where did you get those?” she yelled. The youth grinned at her.

  “I never knew Flatlanders rode monsters. It seems they die as easily as krayks, though!”

  “You expect me to believe you’ve killed a krayk?” she demanded, but her throat was squeezed tight and her voice came out thin and panicked. Perhaps he’d managed to pull Daimon down somehow, had merely disarmed him? But he wasn’t carrying her husband’s longblade, and surely he’d have taken that…

  “They call me Rikkut Krayk-Killer,” he said, spreading his arms mockingly. He was ten paces away from her now. “That, or Rikkut Fireheart. You’ve earned no name except what your mother left you.”

  “Rikkut,” Saana said, nodding grimly. “I just took this blade from a woman who mentioned you. Friend of yours?”

  “Kovra.” Rikkut’s eyes strayed to the sword she now held. When he looked at her again he was no longer smiling. “I was going to offer you a quick death if you gave up your belt. Now I’m going to make this hurt.”

  He charged, crossing the distance left between them in a few quick steps and leaping into the air, jabbing at her head. Saana jerked back from the spear thrust and raised her shield to bat it away, but he’d already withdrawn the weapon and when he landed he stabbed at her ribs, forcing her to desperately knock the point down with her sword. She took a step in and cut at him but he slid away, staying out of range, the spear point wavering in small circles near her eye level.

  A thrust, which she took on her shield. Another one aimed at her legs, which she stepped back hurriedly from, then a third up at her face. She got her shield up and the point scraped over it, slashed along the side of her helm. She lashed out with her sword but caught only the haft of his spear, and he laughed at her.

  Saana stepped in towards him, guessed he’d go for her head and deflected the blow upwards with her shield, then stabbed upwards for his gut. He drew his own shield in and caught the point of the blade on it, jarring her arm, but he was sliding his spear over her shield at the same time and then he ripped it down and to the side as he backed away—

  Saana screamed in pain. Her left ear and cheek were suddenly in agony, a searing counterpoint to the throbbing ache of her chin.
>
  “I told you I’d make it hurt,” Rikkut snarled, and came at her again. Thrust, thrust, sidestep, thrust, backstep, always quick, always staying out of reach of her blade. The spear was heavy, designed for killing thrusts with the dragon’s momentum doing most of the work, but it didn’t seem to sap his strength or slow him.

  Then Saana stepped in once more, trying to angle the point of her sword over his shield, and the tip of his spear dipped down to find her shin. She cried out in pain as the edge sliced through her skin and ground along the bone, and her lunge became a desperate hobble to keep her balance. Rikkut circled in, like a krayk scenting blood. He made his own lunge, side-on and twisting, and suddenly his spear-point was somehow around the rim of Saana’s shield and stabbing her in her right shoulder. Her sea leather took the brunt of it but the tip parted her flesh before she could knock it away with her shield. She tried to raise her sword and a flash of pain down her right arm brought her to a halt, gritting her teeth in agony.

  “Your clan’s dying, Saana,” Rikkut sneered. Saana didn’t dare take her eyes off him, but she didn’t need to. She could still hear shouts and the clatter of weapons on shields, but she could see bodies with green or red rags tied around their arms on the ground amidst the corpses of their enemies. The Golden had simply sent too many warriors for her clan of fishers and farmers to fight off, even with the Naridans’ help.

  She felt a sudden, deep pang of sorrow that had nothing to do with the throbbing of the wounds she’d taken. She’d hoped for a new life on this side of the ocean. She’d tried so hard, so hard to make everything work, and all she’d achieved was to bring the vengeance of a mad draug down onto a different shore.

  “Finish it, then,” she spat at his arrogant smirk. “If you can.”

  Rikkut danced forward, light over the ground, feinted first one way then the other, and thrust his spear full force at Saana’s chest. She took it on her shield, but the sheer force of the blow knocked her staggering. Her wounded leg wouldn’t take her weight properly, and it buckled beneath her. She fell to the ground and the impact sent a jarring shock up her spine. She tried to get her legs under her, tried to get back to her feet, but Rikkut was already looming over her with his spear drawn back to strike—

  His eyes bulged, and he stiffened. A high-pitched whine escaped his lips, his arms suddenly drooped, and a hand’s span of a sar’s longblade burst into view through his chest.

  New shouts filled the air: young voices, higher-pitched and shrill, but raised in battle cries rather than screams. Rikkut jerked as the sar’s blade withdrew again. Blood leaked out to stain his tunic, but he began to lurch around despite his wound, surely dying but not yet dead…

  Saana shuffled clumsily and lunged with her blade, crying out with pain as her arm screamed at her. It was an awkward swing, but the blade of her sword sliced through the back of Rikkut’s left calf. He fell to one knee and his shield arm came down to catch himself.

  The longblade flashed again, and took Rikkut Fireheart’s head off his neck. There was a spurt of blood as his body lolled sideways, his heart still trying futilely to keep him alive, and then he slumped to the ground in front of Saana. She looked up, hoping against hope that it would be Daimon who stood in front of her, not his brother. Let him be alive…

  “Mama?” Zhanna asked, lowering the bloodstained blade and looking at her with wide eyes. “Mama, you’re hurt!”

  “I—Behind you!” Saana shouted, as another shape charged into view. Zhanna spun on the spot and the longblade flashed through the air. An arm wielding a blackstone axe was severed at the elbow, although the momentum of the warrior to whom it had belonged still sent him crashing into Zhanna. She staggered backwards, he tried to strike at her and realised he no longer had an arm at the same time as Saana managed to stab her sword up into his crotch. He screamed and folded up around the blade, and Zhanna’s next swing opened his throat. He gurgled in surprise and fell backwards with red sheeting down his chest, and Zhanna knelt down next to Saana.

  “Mama?”

  “Help me up,” Saana said through gritted teeth. Zhanna hauled her back upright by her shield arm and Saana looked around, ready to defend herself again.

  Something had changed. The invaders who’d accompanied Rikkut, who’d been cutting down her clan so mercilessly, were now being brought down in their turn. Saana gaped as she spied not only her own clan’s Unblooded but also youths—both Tjakorshi and Naridan, some barely more than children—attacking the invaders from behind. Even the best of warriors would have little chance if beset from both front and back, and although the Unblooded’s blades didn’t always fell their targets, the distractions allowed Saana’s hard-pressed fighters to land telling blows.

  “Some of them were getting weapons at the stronghouse, others were hiding there,” Zhanna answered her unasked question. “I told them to follow me.”

  “And they did? The Naridans as well?” Saana asked, amazed.

  “I asked them if they were going to fight for their home with us, or sit and cry like children,” Zhanna said with a shrug. “My Naridan was good enough for that.”

  “Our clan has many stories of how children got blooded and became adults,” Saana said in wonder, and no little admiration. “I don’t think anyone’s done it quite like you.”

  Zhanna beamed at her. The tiny spots of blood on her daughter’s face looked incongruously like new freckles.

  Half a dozen of the invaders had been backed into a circle now, hemmed in on all sides with their shields facing outwards. Saana’s clan and the Naridan youths crowded around, but none seemed to want to make the first move. The invaders might have been outnumbered and cornered, but they were still warriors.

  “Move aside!” Saana snapped, limping forwards. The bodies in front of her parted obligingly and she found herself staring at grim faces, eyes wide and watchful.

  “I’ve had enough of killing,” Saana said bluntly. She could hear fighting elsewhere in Black Keep, but she needed to deal with these invaders first. “I’m chief here. Yield, and you’ll live.”

  “The Golden doesn’t forgive cowards,” the man facing her replied.

  “The Golden isn’t here,” Zhanna said, shouldering her way past Saana and holding something up.

  It was the head of Rikkut Fireheart, dangling by its hair and leaking blood onto the ground.

  The man who’d spoken looked at it, and Saana saw the recognition in his eyes. He took a long, deep breath, drew himself up, and dropped his shield and blackstone axe.

  “I yield,” he muttered.

  “Tumezhkan!” the woman next to him snapped, not taking her eyes off the fighters in front of her.

  “That bastard Fireheart’s dead,” Tumezhkan said, “and the Golden’s on the other side of the Great Ocean. Fuck this, I never wanted to come here anyway.”

  “Fireheart’s not dead!” shouted a man with his back to Tumezhkan’s.

  “There’s a girl here holding his head, and it’s not attached to his body,” Tumezhkan replied. “If he’s not dead, he’s a fucking good actor.”

  The woman risked a sideways look. Saana saw her jaw clench when she saw Fireheart’s head.

  “It’s true, Kozh.” She dropped her weapons too. “I yield.”

  One by one, three of the other four warriors imitated her. The last one, Kozh, turned on them, his eyes flashing.

  “Cowards!” he bellowed, and raised his axe, then cried out as two of Saana’s clan cut him down from behind before his blow could land.

  “The rest of you, on your knees facing each other!” Saana ordered. “Khotia, Evruk, watch them. If any of their friends approach, kill them and defend yourselves, but otherwise they’re not to be harmed. Everyone else, with me!”

  She turned away as Rikkut’s warriors knelt sullenly but obediently next to Kozh’s body. Zhaana stayed by her side, Rikkut’s head still dangling from one hand and her longblade in the other.

  “Where did you get that sword?” Saana asked her, dreadin
g the answer.

  “I—” Zhanna’s answer faltered as brassy wails split the air. The warriors with them halted as well, looking around. “What’s that?”

  Saana’s mouth dried. She’d heard that sound before, and it still haunted her dreams to this day. Here and now, though…

  “It could be help,” she said, trying to sound hopeful.

  “Could be?” Zhanna asked.

  Saana’s face was throbbing, her right arm hurt to move and her right leg was threatening to collapse under her again if she wasn’t careful. She’d seen friends die this day, people who’d counted on her to lead them true. She didn’t have the energy left to lie to her daughter, especially given that Zhanna was newly Blooded.

  “Those are sar warhorns,” she said heavily, “and they’re coming from the north. It could be death.”

  EVRAM

  EVRAM HAD NEVER expected to meet a lord other than his own. He’d certainly never expected to meet one of the High Marshals. The moment when he’d been brought forth in the hall of Darkspur and ordered to speak had been, in its own way, as terrifying as when he’d taken hold of his knife and had set his sights on the huge Raider who’d killed Tan. Once that was over he’d expected to be dismissed. He’d hoped he might be able to tag along with the High Marshal’s force back to Black Keep, but had miserable visions of being put back into his room that had been a cell in all but name, and forgotten about.

  Instead, Marshal Brightwater had ordered that Evram should ride in one of the supply wagons instead of being forced to struggle along in the wake of the foot soldiers. Even more astonishing, the High Marshal had instructed Evram to attend him several times in the evenings. On those occasions, with Evram barely able to speak through his nervousness, the High Marshal had ordered him to be served wine to calm his nerves, and had asked questions about the layout of Black Keep.