The Spider

by Leo Carew

  Aramilla had frozen. She had known her father would be disgusted to learn of her relationship with Bellamus, but not thought he would entertain her execution. “I am your daughter,” she said, the shock in her voice real.

  The earl gave an enraged laugh. “Indeed. Do you love him?” he asked suddenly. “The upstart?”

  “No,” she said through gritted teeth.

  “Well that’s something,” said the earl. “If you are to stay alive and our family is to survive this, our only option will be to kill him. For now, we may as well make use of his information.” He let out a breath. “Well, Daughter, here is how we shall conduct this affair from now on. If I can possibly avoid this family falling to your actions then I shall. Every message you receive from the upstart will come directly to me and I will use it to banish the Anakim. You will not tell him that I have discovered your secret. And if you behave, if you can restrain yourself, perhaps I will be able to keep this from the king.”

  “But all you have is a senseless piece of paper,” objected Aramilla. “I am a queen, Father. You cannot blackmail me with that.”

  “Yes,” said the earl grimly, “I definitely can. You have noted how exceedingly suspicious His Majesty is. An encoded message that you have tried to destroy will be more than enough proof for him.”

  “If you—”

  “Yes, yes,” said the earl, waving a hand dismissively and turning away. “You’ll be able to make me sorry, I’m sure. I will assume you’ve said all that.” He strode to the door and turned back to her, gripping the handle. “You have always lacked a sense of perspective, Daughter. So subtle and sophisticated, able to string men and women along as marionettes for your whims. But for all that, you are still a child, driven by fickle and insubstantial desires. That is why you have compromised yourself. I have never expected much from you. But I expected more than this.”

  Aramilla blinked at that. “We are family,” she said. “Connected whether you like it or not. This secret will keep, and as you say, we need Bellamus.”

  “I do not need him,” snarled the earl.

  Aramilla changed tack. “But we are connected, Father,” she said. “What makes you think you would survive my fall?”

  Amusement diluted the earl’s rage. “Look at you twist. There is no part of you that I trust not to turn on me when it suits you. I watched you grow up a vengeful snake and am fully aware that all you’ve managed since then is to construct a mask between you and the king. A forked tongue still passes between your lips. We will be doing things my way. Write me a report, everything Bellamus has told you in full. If at any stage I suspect you are holding something back from me, I will see to it that your husband finds this message. You must hope Bellamus keeps you well informed.” He cast her one last look of contempt and opened the door, passing into the corridor outside, his shadow slipping after him just before the door rattled shut.

  “You are mistaken, Father,” she said coldly to the closed door. “I am not a child any more.” She retrieved another piece of parchment from the far side of the room, and began a message to Bellamus.

  22

  The Rock

  It was a wolf of a day; grey and fierce. Beneath iron clouds so thick that the grass and trees were drained of colour, Bellamus lay on his stomach, peering across a valley. “Are we ready?” By his side, Stepan gave a brief nod. Beneath them, a wagon train crawled along the valley, accompanied by eighty clanking legionaries: a fully armed and armoured century. Each wagon was dragged by a pair of massive Anakim horses and rocked and jolted over the stones in the track. The sound was of a stream: the squeak and trickle of axles and iron-rimmed wheels. Their loads were covered, but Bellamus knew that the wagons carried armour and weapons fit for giants. Thousands of them.

  Across the valley was a small golden dot. It was Garrett’s blond shock. Invisible from the small column below, he raised a spear, holding it horizontally over his head. He was ready.

  On either side of the valley, Bellamus had positioned a hundred mounted Thingalith. Their horses’ hooves were wrapped in leather to silence their approach until the last minute. Though they outnumbered these legionaries two to one, they must be swift and sudden when they attacked. Otherwise Bellamus might lose a hundred men, irreplaceable under the circumstances. They would wait until the wagon train had reached the next section of the valley, which had sides shallow enough that they could ride down them with their leather-wrapped hooves and not risk falling. Bellamus would lead a group from one side, Garrett the other, and they would smash the wagon train between them.

  Sweat beaded on Bellamus’s brow and ran down his back. He signalled to Garrett with a horizontal sheathed sword—Continue—and crawled back from the rim of the valley. He passed the sword back to Stepan, and when they had retreated far enough, rose to a hunched run, making for the band of horsemen who waited a hundred yards back from the valley’s edge. Each of them wore overlapping Anakim-bone plates, a helmet with a long horsehair tail and carried a spear.

  Strangely, there was a muffled pounding blossoming behind Bellamus. It grew nearer and resolved into rhythmic hoof beats. He and Stepan threw each other an aghast look as a roar like a waterfall enveloped them, and they realised what the noise must mean. “He isn’t?” said Stepan.

  “He’s insane,” said Bellamus.

  Garrett was attacking early.

  One thing to do. Bellamus turned to the horsemen before him.

  “Go!” he shouted. “Go, go, go!” The horses lunged forward, driving straight at Bellamus and for the valley rim at his back. One rider stayed behind, reserving two mounts for Bellamus and Stepan. Bellamus outstripped Stepan in his rattling bone plates, buffeted by the tawny flood thundering past, heading for the valley rim. He reached his horse and was not sure how he mounted it. One moment he was running towards it and the next he sat in its saddle, as though he had flown onto his mount. He and Stepan had agreed that when the need arose they often did things with no idea how to repeat them in calmer moments. He spurred forward, passing Stepan and pursuing the Thingalith who had begun to drop out of sight, into the valley.

  Bellamus could not quite credit what Garrett had done. This was no mistake, the cloven-nosed monster simply could not resist the imminent savagery, and now their attack was a mess.

  Over the lip of the valley he plunged, into the chaotic slash below. The hoof-wraps were too slippery for the gradient here and five horses stumbled as he watched, spinning, collapsing and sprawling down the valley sides; rolling over their riders and whinnying frantically. Opposite, Garrett’s band had already streamed down to the valley floor and streaked through the wagon train, spears lowered like lances. Bellamus saw two legionaries hurled flat; three Suthern horses felled by Anakim long-swords and Garrett, helmetless and blond, marauding alone ahead of his men.

  Then Bellamus’s horse slipped.

  There was a desperate, plunging sensation and images snatched through his head. The ground rushing towards him.

  The sky above.

  Two flailing hooves, jerking past his jaw.

  The flank of his rolling horse, clods of grass flying up after it.

  A hard, flat rock, rushing towards him.

  It smashed into Bellamus’s cheek and set his head spinning on his shoulders. Either the images ceased, or he ceased to register them, but he kept tumbling down the valley, aware of the ooph and impact of his chest as he bounced and rolled. There was sound too: shouts, screams, his own desperate grunting, the ring of swords, and hooves falling all about him with the force of shooting stars. The tumbling finally ceased and he sprawled somewhere flat and grassy. His mouth was full of the taste of blood and dirt, and his face pressed into the earth.

  He tried to breathe, but could not. It was as though his chest was contained in a tight sheath of leather. Winded only, he prayed. He twisted onto his back and tried to haul in a breath, but still it would not come. Only then did he realise that he could not see. He scrabbled at his eyes, trying to clear them of blood, but
something was wrong. The blood kept coming and whatever was beneath his left hand did not feel like an eye. It was rough, irregular, hot and soaking. But he could see with his right now, as the blood was scraped clear. There was a figure drawing towards him.

  Bellamus sat up, scrambling back as the figure grew huger and huger, dark-haired and unmistakably a Black Legionary, a heavy blade grasped at its side. Bellamus clutched at his belt and realised he had no weapon. He tried to stagger to his feet, but stumbled, and twisted back to face his attacker.

  Abruptly, the legionary was hurled to the floor. A horse. A careering horse had ploughed into him, smashing the warrior to the ground, and a bone-armoured hero jumped from its back. It raised a heavy two-handed sword, decapitating the legionary at his feet with a fervour that suggested it might rise supernaturally if its body retained any connection to its brain.

  It was important to Bellamus, very important, even through his efforts to breathe, that he should hold a hand protectively over his left eye. He did so, staring up at his rescuer, who turned to him. “Can you stand, Captain?”

  “Stepan.”

  “Can you stand?”

  Bellamus tried to answer, but suddenly an arm was thrust over Stepan’s shoulder and wrapped around his neck. The knight was dragged backwards and hurled to the floor, a Black Legionary, unarmed, dropping on top of him and clutching filthy fingers about Stepan’s throat. Bellamus’s heart roared in fear and he staggered upright, directing his body at the Anakim who was choking his friend. He was so unsteady that he had barely any control and he began to topple over. In one last effort, he aimed himself at the Anakim, hand still clutched at his eye, hurling himself headlong at the legionary and clashing heads. The Anakim’s was like a lump of granite and Bellamus fell aside. His intervention had changed something though, and Stepan managed to produce a dagger from somewhere which he plunged again and again into the base of the Anakim’s neck. Blood was spurting over the fighters and the Anakim collapsed atop the knight.

  There was a whine in Bellamus’s ears from the vast noise about them, all of which he heard as though underwater. Before him, two panicked horses were straining and straining, tipping their wagon onto one wheel and then over in a great tumbling and clanking of metal. A Black Legionary was caught in the steel avalanche and crushed to the ground where his top half flailed and struggled, trying to prise himself loose.

  Stepan had risen and offered Bellamus a blood-drenched hand. “Rise, Captain!”

  Bellamus tried. It was slow, and he staggered, but Stepan caught him. Then he surprised Bellamus by lifting him bodily into the saddle of his horse: one of those achievements he would struggle to repeat in ordinary circumstances. But these were not ordinary.

  From the vantage point of the horse, Bellamus’s uncovered eye roved the mess this attack had become. His men could not move their horses properly, trapped between the tight valley walls and the wagons, and most were knotted together, unable to escape beyond their own comrades. Some of the Anakim fought alone, where they were surrounded and hacked down, but two score had condensed about a pair of wagons and resisted fiercely. They were corralled and probed by the Thingalith but retaliated savagely, lunging in waves to suck a horseman or two into their formation.

  Stepan mounted behind Bellamus, and between them they guided the horse towards the formation. “Surrender!” shouted Bellamus, voice a little slurred. “Lay down your arms, surrender!”

  “What language is that? Not Anakim, surely,” muttered Stepan. Bellamus had thought it was Anakim and then realised it had been the native dialect of Safinim. He thought, and the words came.

  “Surrender! Surrender! We don’t want your lives, only the wagons!” If the legionaries kept fighting, the Thingalith could take catastrophic casualties. Only a few enemies heard him, turning their faces towards the cry with terrible snarling lips. One of them, countenance twisted with hate, spat a vile swear-word and then began to swarm towards Bellamus, climbing over a wagon to escape the net of Thingalith. He ran along its top, batting aside twin spear-thrusts aimed at him with a broken and bloody sword, and then jumped down to sprint for the upstart.

  “Stepan!” warned Bellamus. One of the knight’s great hands manoeuvred the horse sideways-on to the attacker, defending the pair of them with his great-sword. But another Thingalith got to the legionary first, blindsiding him, thrusting a lance into his armpit and dropping him to the floor. The Thingalith was then knocked from his saddle by another legionary, who had appeared as though conjured from thin air. Bellamus realised he had been hiding in the shadows beneath a wagon-bed, and Stepan spurred them closer to help his downed comrade. He swung his sword at the legionary, who blocked and parried, Bellamus holding dazedly onto the horse’s mane as he leaned back to avoid the blow. Stepan had distracted the legionary long enough that the Thingalith lying at his feet had time to seize his spear, and he raised its bloody tip, jamming it between the Anakim’s legs. The legionary shrieked in pain, and Stepan finished him off with a hard slash at his neck, which knocked him flat.

  Bellamus’s offer of surrender had only triggered a renewed frenzy of violence, and hand still clutched over his left eye, he found himself disturbed and cowed by the ferocity before him. Every Anakim movement was in brutal, abrupt jerks; the movements of the Thingalith hesitant and restrained by comparison. The Anakim were matched by Garrett, who charged into the formation with his spear, Heofonfyr, lowered and liberating a horrible swinging twist of gore above the legionaries.

  The hybrid had more than a talent for killing. There was a note in him that tended towards chaos. Bellamus hated to be left alone with him. When he looked in his eyes, some deep and primitive instinct instructed Bellamus to turn away and gain some distance. He radiated a desire for disorder in all things. When he ate, every item before him was disassembled before it touched his lips. He never slept in the same location twice, invented onomatopoeic words which he was frustrated to find others did not understand, and made decisions that Bellamus would have associated with a drunkard beyond the stage of remembering his actions. At every level he was impulsive, hedonistic and destructive.

  Now, he was plunging Heofonfyr left and right at the legionaries, dividing them and providing an opening for the other Thingalith. “Leave some alive!” roared Bellamus, in Saxon. “We need at least three, capture them! Capture, don’t kill!”

  Garrett had ploughed his horse right through the legionaries and out the other side. He rode clear, his mount limping and staggering, but still obedient as it turned to its master’s wishes and charged once more. The Thingalith followed his example, redoubling their efforts and beginning to match the Anakim aggression with their own.

  Battle, Bellamus had observed, was about mindset. Numbers, tactics and logistics could all influence the mindset of the two forces before battle was joined, but once the blades had started to ring, the lines had mashed into one, and the bodies begun to fall, it was about mindset. Were you ready, truly ready, to give all that your opponent was? How much did you mean the swing of your sword and the thrust of your spear? Were you at that rare stage, beyond intimidation and fear, where you can commit fully to combat without a backwards glance? The Anakim, though surprised and outnumbered, had the right mindset. Sheer, unyielding aggression. The Thingalith, slightly chaotic and with too long to consider what they were about to do, had not been quite ready to match their savagery. Except Garrett. Suddenly, like sunshine beaming through the clouds above, his example made it obvious to the others that they could not shrink back or be conservative. They must attack.

  Legionaries began to drop, or were dragged back, kicking and thrashing, into the ranks of the Thingalith to be subdued. A miniature charge of three horsemen dashed into the Anakim formation, transferring huge energy from body to body and knocking a dozen to the floor where they were trampled by hooves. The Anakim mindset began to suffer as their friends dropped around them and their small island was eroded. Stubbornly, they refused to yield, but their aggression faded away.
The band of resisters began to flinch and hesitate. They were human after all.

  The Thingalith sensed their dominance and became cruel, chiselling into the survivors and ignoring Bellamus’s repeated cries to take them alive. This too, the upstart had learned: once you have pushed a man to killing, it is not easy to switch him off.

  “Stepan,” said Bellamus urgently. “I can’t walk. Keep the prisoners alive. Don’t let them kill all of them.” This fight was getting beyond his control. The terror of the Anakim fresh in their minds, the Thingalith were unleashing that fear on their dwindling enemy. He saw one Anakim drop his sword, fall to his knees and raise his arms in surrender to one of Bellamus’s men. Bellamus saw the Thingalith, a comrade with whom he had drunk and laughed, mouth the words “Too late, chum,” and pin the legionary to the ground with a spear. Another friend of his was digging his spear again and again into the face of a fallen legionary, teeth gritted in hatred as he reduced it to shreds. Next to him, a pair of Thingalith had fallen atop a legionary on his knees and were trying to strangle him: both Anakim and Thingalith red-faced and quivering.

  Behind Bellamus, Stepan dismounted and bullied his way into the fray, delivering blows with the flat of his sword to awaken the Thingalith from their madness. Slowly the crowd began to emerge from its rage. The pattern of movement before Bellamus changed, from frantic hacking and stamping, reeking with violence and desperation, to something more restrained.

  Then fell an odd silence, which slowly, horribly exposed the mood of the soldiers. The madness drained away, each Thingman staring at his bloody comrades, eyes wide and shocked. Some had worked the skin off their fingers with repeated punching, despite the swords they still clutched. Others had crimson teeth and blood-smeared lips. Bellamus had never, in battlefield after battlefield across Erebos, seen anything so ugly. He looked for Garrett and found the hybrid more coated with grime than any other man. His gaze lingered on the giant, quite certain it was his example that had ignited the frenzy.