by Ari Marmell
And that was time enough for Vorona to sweep through the barbican and make a mad dash into the concealing haze.
Had any of the sentinels actually tried to take her down, they could have landed several shots before she vanished. They were, however, too busy looking for the source of—and occasionally ducking—the haphazard incoming fire.
Once Atherton, Dignity, and the others poured into the gatehouse, in pursuit of the woman they’d scarcely even noticed, it might have occurred to the guards that they’d been had. By then, there was precious little they could do about it, though.
Atherton thought he could just barely make out figures moving in the distance, beyond the many veils of winter, from which those shots were coming. He drew both pistols, fired a pair of runebullets that sent whole showers of earth and snow erupting upward where they struck, and whoever was shooting at them wisely stopped.
The snow wasn’t falling so rapidly that they lost Vorona’s tracks—though they could probably have followed her anyway. The spy was making a beeline, never varying from one specific heading. A heading that would take her straight to . . .
The Oldwick River hove into view. The flow was largely unimpeded, though a few small chunks of ice bobbed near the banks. Atherton could see Vorona again, albeit as nothing more than a nebulous silhouette.
Prow beached on the nearest bank was a large paddleboat. Even had Vorona not been racing directly for it, Atherton would have known it to be no innocent traveler. Few merchants had traveled this stretch of river for days or even weeks, and few would likely do so for days or weeks to come.
With Khador squatting over the waterway at Riversmet, where the Oldwick became the Black, there wasn’t much of anywhere to go.
A large door in the wheelhouse flew open, and Vorona . . .
Vorona flopped to the snowy earth, arms covering her head.
“Down!” He saw Dignity shout the warning, though he couldn’t actually hear it over his own identical cry. And then he, too, was frantically diving, barely skating beneath a withering barrage of gunfire.
Raising his head as high as he dared, peering between frost below and hot lead above, Atherton watched as figure after figure poured from the wheelhouse. It was almost ludicrous, something out of a clown show; clearly the structure contained a passage to the hold below.
So, okay . . . Winter Guard soldiers, already a dozen and counting, their blunderbusses spitting swarms of lead shot. That was bad.
Apparently, the Khadorans were not content with standing on deck and defending their vessel. No, the soldiers poured out onto the slushy banks, axes or sabers in the fists of those who had already discharged their guns, advancing in a staggered charge toward the woefully outnumbered Cygnarans. That was worse.
And misfortune wasn’t done with them yet. Hulking figures of red-tinted steel clunked and clattered from the hold and took to the banks, following their swifter Winter Guard comrades. Smoke and steam poured from grated tubing on their backs; enormous and unwieldy pole axes, shield-mounted cannon, or motorized chain-bladed swords, too large for any normal man to carry, were their tools.
Khador sent a godsdamn Man-O-War unit!
Cygnar, like most nations of Immoren, regularly utilized two separate classes of warjack: the heavy ’jacks, ponderous but inexorable juggernauts of brutal weaponry; and the light models, such as Wolfhound or Shepherd, less fearsome but far swifter and more maneuverable.
Khador’s military mechaniks produced some of the most fearsome and overwhelming of the former variety, but had shown precisely zero interest in the latter. Instead, where other armies fielded light warjacks, Khador deployed the Man-O-War soldiers: zealous troops, highly trained, wrapped in steam-powered armor that granted inhuman strength and resilience. A single Man-O-War could potentially take on a small squad of normally equipped soldiers. In teams, they could give even warjacks something to worry about.
Here, now, in addition to the contingent of Winter Guard, there were four of them.
“Fall back!” Atherton ordered, scrambling to his hands and knees.
“No!” Dignity looked ready to either spit nails or chew them, Atherton wasn’t sure. “Damn it, she’s right there!”
“You know your enemies; I know mine.” He was backpedaling toward the walls of Leryn, glancing frequently over his shoulder to ensure that his people—Dignity included—obeyed. “We fall back or we die.”
The others had turned to run, leaving only the two of them making a slower retreat, hunched low to avoid the sporadic shots that still came their way from the advancing force.
“Gaust, we can’t let her get away. That formula—”
“I said we retreat.” A spark seemed to flash in Atherton’s eye. No, it didn’t just seem to, it did; a single sizzle of cobalt blue, echoed by a far larger array around the barrels of his guns. “I never said we let them get away.”
Atherton raised both pistols toward the distant sky and fired, round after round, emptying all six remaining barrels. Runebullets streaked across the clouds and plunged unerringly into their target—not Vorona, not the Man-O-War soldiers, but the riverboat itself.
The first two landed with the force of artillery, blasting open a huge swath of the deck. The other four plunged through that newly made gap . . .
To strike within feet of the boiler.
Nobody was shooting at Dignity or Atherton anymore. The Winter Guard, the Section Three spy, even the normally overconfident Man-O-War troopers, were too busy running—or, in the case of the latter, shuffling as swiftly as their weighty armored contraptions would permit—from the bank.
The agent and the gunmage had just reached Leryn’s gate when the boiler blew and the riverboat burst in a nova of twisted iron fragments and splintery wooden shrapnel. Small ice floes near the vessel ceased to exist entirely, and two or three riverside trees split across the trunk and toppled.
“As I said,” Atherton noted smugly, “they’re not going anywhere.”
It looked for a moment like Dignity was carefully weighing the ups and downs of smacking him. “Not by river, they’re not. Unless your magics are a lot more impressive than I’ve been told, though, their feet still work.”
“As do ours. And the sergeant’s. And Wolfhound’s. We’ve more than enough time to catch them up, and they’ll never know what hit them.”
***
Of course, despite Atherton’s blithe certainty, it wasn’t to prove so easy.
“. . . can’t possibly hold us responsible for any of this—”
“Can’t? Can’t? Sergeant, you’re absolutely responsible! If you and your people hadn’t elected to bring your war to Leryn—”
“Our war? It’s your city crawling with Section Three! Your bloody nation is the one being invaded! If your Prime Minister shares your opinion, I’m quite sure his Majesty would be delighted to discuss a withdrawal . . .”
Emerging from the barbican back into the light, Dignity and Atherton found Sergeant Bracewell and Minister Chalerynne toe-to-toe, red-faced and hollering, apparently having left diplomacy far behind. Beside the former stood a pair of the soldiers Atherton had ordered back to the city, having stepped up to support their commanding officer. Assembled behind the latter, half a dozen Crucible Guards leaned on pikes and peered through narrow visors. Neither group of warriors seemed particularly on edge or eager for violence, but their mere presence testified to the vehemence of the argument.
“Uh, Sergeant?” Atherton sounded as unsure as Dignity had ever heard him. “I’m sorry to interrupt, but—”
“Not at all, Corporal. We were done.” Benwynne stepped away, her first stride more of a stomp. Dignity almost expected her heel to carve a divot from the nearest paver. She didn’t order the others to fall in behind her; the order was pretty implicit as it was.
“Sergeant!” Chalerynne’s shriek rose higher than a whistling teapot. “Don’t you dare just walk away from me!”
“Minister, trust me,” Benwynne called back, neither turning to f
ace him nor slowing in the slightest. “Walking away is exactly what you want me to be doing right now.”
Dignity, who did glance back over her shoulder, saw the gawp of utter disbelief on Chalerynne’s face even through the snow and thickening dark of night. Under other circumstances, it would have been hysterical.
For half a block they marched in silence, before Benwynne’s frustration boiled over. “Morrow piss on all politicians!”
“Sergeant?” Atherton asked.
“Bastard doesn’t give one damn what’s actually happening in his city. He just wants to blame someone for the damages and chaos and security breaches, so none of the shit spatters back on him. Why couldn’t we have dealt with Minister di la Granzio? At least he’s supposed to have a working brain . . .”
She turned down a side street, leading the small procession toward a squat structure of markedly lower quality than its neighbors. The earthy tang of straw and manure announced it as a public stable well before Dignity spotted the sun-bleached equine silhouette painted above the door.
The spy assumed they were here because it was the nearest place that provided both shelter from the elements and relative privacy. Benwynne could have chosen it for some other reason, but Dignity decided that now wasn’t the time to ask.
The establishment wasn’t heavily occupied. All but three stalls stood empty; the trio of horses cast apathetic glowers at the newcomers before tossing their manes in dismissal and returning to the far more urgent tasks of transforming the heaps of hay in front of them into far less appetizing heaps behind them.
The rest of the soldiers who had accompanied Atherton and Dignity during their pursuit were already here. They’d dragged a few stools, saddles, and hay bales into a vague circle, and most were now seated, having claimed the most comfortable of the makeshift chairs.
At the sight of an old, worn saddle sitting atop a half-height wall between stalls, Dignity couldn’t help but wonder if Katherine was all right, had caught up with Muir’s delegation.
“So,” Benwynne began. “I see neither Vorona nor the formula. What the hell happened out there?”
Dignity remained mostly silent, letting Atherton provide a concise report of the pursuit, chiming in only occasionally when he skipped a detail or two she felt might be important.
Benwynne slowly lowered herself to sit atop one of the hay bales and gazed into nothing, seemingly hypnotized by a flicking horsetail.
“Corporal, Privates . . . Go find everyone else. I want the whole squad here. Yesterday!”
“Where—?”
“Most of them should be at di Meryse’s place, between there and the gate, or at the workshop where we’ve been storing Wolfhound.”
“And if anyone isn’t?” Atherton asked.
“Then you bloody well look for them!”
Even the horses jumped. Atherton and the others shot to their feet, saluted, and streamed toward the door.
“And fill them in on route!” Benwynne called after them. “I don’t want to sit through that report three more times.”
Dignity wondered, for a few minutes, if the sergeant had forgotten she was there, or had expected her to depart with the others, when Benwynne finally spoke once more.
“I’m tired, Garland.”
“You . . . What?”
“I used to love serving, but this army’s taken everything from me—my life, so many friends, now my family and even my faith—and it never ends. I’m just . . . tired.”
“I—”
“What the hell was Vorona’s plan?” It sounded like she wasn’t even aware she’d just been speaking on something else entirely. “What was with that performance at the textile factory?”
“It . . . Um.” Dignity actually had to fight the urge to shake her head and blink a few times, trying to keep up. “My best guess? Trying to kill us was just a bonus. The audience for the show was di Meryse.”
Benwynne blinked, then hmphed in understanding. “She was lying about having the formula.”
“I think so. Just claiming that these ‘secret allies’ of hers—who may or may not even exist—had thwarted all di Meryse’s efforts . . . No way he’d believe that. But make it look like she was trying to kill him, like she didn’t need him anymore? That sold it.”
“It was still a pretty big risk, wasn’t it?” The sergeant stood and drifted over to the nearest horse, absently stroking its neck. “What if he hadn’t gone straight to his hiding place?”
Dignity shrugged. “I suppose it was her only shot. There were a lot of us, but just her; she must have figured we weren’t going to let her walk away if she won the bidding.”
“No. No, we weren’t.”
“Di Meryse was a clever bastard, but he wasn’t trained. He thought she had the formula, and panicked—went to make sure she was telling the truth, or to try to figure out how she’d managed it, or maybe it’s just where he felt safest. You or I would have known better, but . . .”
“You think she’s heading for Riversmet?” Benwynne asked.
“Positive. The besiegers are the nearest Khadoran force of any size. At the very least, she’s passing through it; her attempt to use the river proves that much.”
“You know we’ve already lost, right?” Still Benwynne remained focused on the horse, refusing to look Dignity’s way.
“What are you talking about? Gaust—”
“Gaust kept them from taking the river, yes. Forced them to travel overland. So we’re supposed to chase them down, is that it?”
“I figured that was the—”
“If we go for speed, we have to move without Wolfhound. We can’t run him more than about five hours or so. But without him, there’s no chance that what’s left of my squad can stand against those Man-O-War bastards—-certainly not with a dozen Winter Guard backing them up.
“If we do take the ’jack? That armor may be slow, but they’re already ahead of us. They might avoid us long enough for Wolfhound to run down. And if we do catch up? The M.o.W.s can hold us off at least a short time, even with Wolfhound, while the others make a run for it. And without those armored bastards, they can move a lot faster.
“So you tell me, Garland, option one or option two? I’m a soldier, so I’m not about to quit, and I’m ready to attempt the impossible. Which way do we want to fail?”
Dignity couldn’t remember how to form words, how to make her mouth actually function.
“Actually . . .”
Both women turned toward the doorway. There, silhouetted against the street lamps beyond, stood one of the trenchers Benwynne had dispatched to fetch the squad. With him were several other soldiers.
Including, at the front of the pack, Master Sergeant Habbershant.
“If we don’t have our hearts set on losing quite yet,” he went on, “I think I may have an option three . . .”
The boat didn’t even have a name.
Loumbard, the squat, surly tradesman who captained it, had never bothered to come up with one. So far as he, his crew, and his customers were concerned, it was just “Loumbard’s boat.”
Even beyond being nameless, Loumbard’s boat had little to distinguish it. It was worn and rickety without crossing the line into dilapidated; large enough to accommodate most reasonable cargo without reaching gargantuan; powerful enough without boasting a particularly intricate steam engine or fancy paddlewheel.
There had been, in fact, one and only one factor to recommend the craft over any of the others. When Benwynne, Wendell, and the bulk of squad five had stormed up to Leryn’s docks, demanding that someone carry them and their warjack down the Oldwick River, coming as near to Riversmet as possible without drawing Khadoran artillery down on their heads, Loumbard had been the only captain who had both agreed to their terms, and been ready to ship out immediately.
Well, almost immediately. Chalerynne’s petulance, and the diplomatic paperwork associated with it, had cost them additional hours they couldn’t spare.
Nor had their transport come
cheaply. The bank notes Benwynne turned over to Loumbard—drawn from the same accounts that had provided the payment for di Meryse, funds secretly arranged weeks before by Cygnar’s government—could have purchased the boat outright, with change expected. Given the risks they were asking the crew to take, however, to say nothing of the urgency, the sergeant hadn’t argued.
It was a solid plan; no reason it should fail. Traveling under steam and on the currents of the Oldwick, they should be many hours and many leagues ahead of Vorona and her team, just waiting for the signal to deploy. Knowing what should be, however, wasn’t remotely the same as knowing what was.
Now, Benwynne stood on deck, leaning out over a banister that groaned various complaints about holding her weight. Ignoring the crew shifting and scuttling behind her, she stared into the flashing lights painting the sky to the south and west, trying to summon up that signal by sheer force of will.
Or, barring that, sheer force of burning, frustrated impatience.
“You’ve been awfully quiet the past day or two.”
She couldn’t even be bothered to look at the figure who’d appeared at the rail beside her. “Seems to me we’ve had this conversation before, Master Sergeant. I don’t know that I care to repeat it.”
Wendell apparently chose to ignore the less-than-subtle hint to drop it. He tugged his coat a bit tighter over his shoulders—to protect against the cold, or against the words to come? “You need to stop flagellating yourself over all this, Ben.”
Now she did turn his way, and it was all she could do not to land a right hook to his chin. “Oh, do I, Master Sergeant? And which part should I be most proud of, then? Losing most of my people on the way here? Letting Vorona get away? Or just my own idiocy, in needing you to suggest we use a riverboat to get ahead of her?”
“You’ve lost soldiers before. It’s never hit you like—”
“Not over half the squad on one damn mission!”
Wendell, too, straightened, took a step until they were almost nose to nose. “You want to take a swing at me, Sergeant? You go right ahead, if that’ll snap you out of this!”