There was no possible way for them to destroy the ships. Perhaps if there were a sorcerer or two on board that would be a hope, but no, there was just Callan, a few of the Louron, and a crew of dead folk who seemed to share a similar goal to his.
“You’re certain none of you are proper sorcerers?” He offered Daivem his best smile, as if that might possibly make her change her mind.
“We are not, but we are willing to learn.”
“I’m afraid that might take more time than we have. So let’s see what we can do to cause chaos and then try to avoid dying for as long as possible.”
The Brellar ship he rode on moved forward as it had before, and Daivem nodded.
Ten minutes later they had reached the first of the great black ships. From above, on the decks of the ship, a dozen or more looked down at his vessel and seemed to stare specifically at him.
Whatever it was the people on that ship said, he did not understand the words.
Rather than turn away, Callan drove the prow of his ship into the solid side of the Sa’ba Taalor vessel. Wood shattered. The two vessels became one and the newly formed shape wept water as the river rushed past broken boards on both of them.
Callan smiled and reached for his sword. If he was going to die, he was going to do his best to avenge every last sailor he’d seen killed.
Near him, not speaking, but still unsettlingly active, the dead who’d sailed with him came forward and drew their spectral swords.
Tuskandru looked back the way he had come and smiled tightly. He was tired, but it was a good feeling, one of satisfaction after a day of hard slaughter. As far as he could see his people moved behind him, ready for more combat.
Stastha moved closer to him, her long-handled axe held over one shoulder, and nodded. “We have captured a few, those who surrendered. One says he is the lord of this city. It is his to rule. He would speak with you.”
“Of course he would. He wants to surrender or to parley.”
“Will you talk to him?”
He looked at her and studied her face. She had four new wounds on her chin and across the side of her head. She was smiling as much as he was. It was good to please the gods.
“Bring him to me.”
He leaned back into the side of his mount and smiled. Brodem grunted and rumbled but supported his weight with ease.
The man brought to him was wounded, but not dead. He was soft, and dressed in clothes that were for show and had little to do with anything but looking as colorful as possible, near as Tusk could tell. He had armor, yes, but it covered only his chest, and the metal was soft enough that it had been dented several times and showed every sword blow as if a knife had scraped at mud.
“What is your name?”
The man looked at him and held his head high. “I am Levron of Goltha. I am tasked with ruling this city.”
“You are not doing so good a job.” Tusk smiled. “The city is mostly mine now. And what I do not hold belongs to other kings.”
“Why have you done this thing?” Levron stared at him, lips peeled back and eyes narrowed. He wanted to kill Tusk. Tusk respected that.
“Because my gods told me to. Because the air here is sweet and I like the view when I look down at the lake. Because that city is coming here.” He pointed to Canhoon, which over the course of only hours had grown much larger and loomed above the far side of the lake. “And I want that city. I want to destroy it and the people who are there.”
“What has any of that to do with us? Why do you attack my people?”
Tuskandru looked down at Levron. The man was not restrained, and yet he did not attack. He wanted to. Tusk could feel how much the man wanted to attack him, to kill him.
“Why don’t you do it? Why don’t you attack me, Lord Levron of Goltha? I am here before you right now. You will never have a better chance to kill me in your life.”
Levron blinked at the notion. “Because I am surrounded by your troops.”
“Why should that stop you? What do you fear?”
“I would stand no chance.”
Tusk shook his head. “And so you do not even try?”
“To what end?” The man’s voice trembled with emotion.
“What are you afraid of? Failure? Death? Disappointing your gods?”
The man did not answer.
“Had you fought you might have won. I am tired and have spent hours in combat.” He held up a hand to show how the fingers trembled slightly. “Braver than you have fought me and some have bled me. They died, yes, but better to die trying than to simply fail because you will not.”
“You don’t understand.”
“You are right and I do not want to. My gods have tasked me and I obey. If I die, it is what the gods want. If I live it is to serve them.” Tuskandru shook his head. “Had you tried, perhaps I would have spared you. I might have offered you a chance at surrender. But to avoid fighting because you might not win? That is cowardice.”
He looked to Stastha. “Kill this dog. He is not worth my efforts.”
Stastha nodded her head and turned to the man. Her first blow rattled his eyes in his skull. She hit him again and again while he tried to fend her off. She did not waste her weapons on the task. He was not worth the effort.
Far to the north the palace was untouched.
“They have stopped throwing stones now. They should come down and join in on the actual fight.”
Stastha nodded her head and once again pulled her horn. She blew several sharp notes and waited. Soon enough other horns throughout the city responded.
Tusk nodded his approval. Then, “How did Tarag Paedori get across the river on the other side? I did not see a bridge.”
“There was a man there who took people across the waters on a boat as long as they could pay the coin.”
“I wonder if he paid.”
“If he did, it must have taken many trips across the river.”
Tusk shook his head. It was a question he did not want to think on any longer. The sun would be setting soon and he wanted to make camp and rest.
“Clear out the closest buildings and prepare. We will camp here.”
They did not stay in the buildings, but they made use of them just the same. They were good walls, made of stone and worked to help barricade any possible ways to attack.
Twelve
“The reports are not good.” Merros looked at the others around the table and shook his head. “The city has not been completely taken, but King Kordis is dead and a lot of the area is overrun with Sa’ba Taalor.”
Desh Krohan shook his head. “We have not heard from our messenger there, Theran. He has been the main source of communication with the royal house and as much as I dread the notion it’s very possible that he’s dead as we’ve heard nothing at all and cannot locate him.”
The sorcerer did not outright say that was why he wanted his people left out of the war but he cast a glance in Merros’s direction that made his feelings known.
There was nothing for that, Merros knew. They were beyond the point where anyone could choose not to be involved in what was happening. There were too many dead and dying and too many caught up in the growing maelstrom of conflicts.
“We are less than a day from landing, according to your calculations, Desh,” the Empress said. “I know that the air is warmer, and I can see that we’ve been descending for the last few hours.” Nachia stretched and rose from her seat, once again starting to prowl the throne room. “On the bright side at least it doesn’t look like we’ll just fall from the sky. That would put an end to the war, to be certain.”
The Sisters stood nearby, not speaking much, but listening. All three of them. Not that Merros wasn’t glad to see Goriah healthy, but there was that whole part about her being dead that made him feel less enthusiastic. Wasn’t it Desh that had told him there was always a price? If so, what had the price been? Who decided who could come back from the dead if not the gods?
When it came to that last, he
preferred the gods stay silent, for that matter. Dead should be dead.
Goriah looked his way, but her face was half hidden under her hood and he could not read her eyes.
“Goltha is falling,” Merros said. “We have committed a great deal of our ground forces and they are not enough. We can’t call any more to the city because there’s no one else willing to offer their soldiers.”
Nachia waved a dismissive hand. “Can’t blame them. In the same position I’d act the same way.”
“The city is literally attacked from all directions, and we are very likely going to be neighbor to Goltha within a day. Even with the chaos that causes, we cannot escape the fact that the Sa’ba Taalor are coming for us and so far our best defense is a gathering of statues that listens to no one but themselves.”
“Well, Merros, I can think of worse defenses. They killed a few hundred of our enemies near as we can tell.” Nachia paused for a moment and frowned. “Did we find the rest of the bodies?”
“Yes, Majesty,” Desh answered. “They have since been pushed out of the city by the City Guard. We took the time to move them through the tunnels we think they used to enter. It made more sense than trying to throw them over the Mid Wall.”
“How many were there, exactly?”
Desh shook his head. “Hard to say. Most of them were in pieces.”
“So the Silent Army has kept us safe despite the best efforts of the Sa’ba Taalor. That’s something.”
Merros shook his head. “The lake is our best bet. That is easily the biggest body of water I have ever seen outside the ocean. Have you considered what happens when we land? The water is very deep there. We might well sink straight on down and drown.”
Desh shook his head and frowned. “I have to believe otherwise, Merros. The Silent Army has lifted us into the air and taken us a very, very long way. I can’t believe that it’s an accident.”
“You said this happened before, Desh?”
The First Advisor nodded. “I’ve forgotten the details. I don’t mean completely. I knew that the city had moved before, but only as a sort of vague notion. It was close to six hundred years ago and no matter how much I have increased my own lifespan over the years, memories don’t seem to hold as well.” He shrugged. “Maybe the mind simply can’t hold on to everything. I had to look through volumes of books to be certain that the city used to be in Gerhaim.” Desh tapped the map in front of him. There was the image of Gerhaim and the scattered towns and cities around it. “I found an old illustration, so old that it’s crumbling now, but it showed Canhoon here.” He tapped the center of the lake. “Right in this spot. There were bridges. Three of them, that connected the city to different parts of the land around it. I can’t remember them clearly. I know they were there and if I try hard enough I can almost see them the way a word sometimes slides around in your mind without letting you catch it.
“It’s the most amazing thing. I had convinced myself that the city had always been there, back in the east. I painted over the truth and never even noticed.”
Nachia shook her head. “I can barely remember what I had for lunch yesterday. I can’t imagine holding as many years as you have in your head, Desh.”
Merros nodded and tried to push the notion aside. “So we can assume the city will float, or find the right spot, or that the Silent Army will move it into the proper location. What we cannot assume is that the Sa’ba Taalor will just sit back and wait for us to settle in properly.”
He shook his head and looked over at the Sisters. The little blonde that had latched onto Desh, Cullen, was there as well, though she was staring off at the far corner of the room and talking to herself again. Desh said she was important but he could not or would not discuss why.
Nachia shook her head and reached for a cluster of grapes. She was one of the only people he’d ever seen that just took the seeds and chewed them up as well. He wondered if it was because spitting wasn’t the proper way for royalty to be perceived.
“The thing to remember is that the city itself is ready to fight. We’ve seen that already. We have hundreds of the Sa’ba Taalor that were killed by the Silent Army. They may not be able to reach beyond the city, but thank the gods, they are perfectly willing to handle what happens here.”
“And if we should, for some reason, need to ever leave the city? If we should have thousands of those bastards come here on their black boats?”
“There are no solid promises, Merros. We know that. But it’s something. They’re made of stone. They killed more of our enemy than anyone else seemed to have managed, no offense to anyone in this room.”
“The trouble, Majesty, is that they are not following your orders or the general’s or mine, for that matter,” Desh pointed out. “They are following, according to what they already said, the orders of the gods.”
“Yes, but those orders include protecting the city.”
“And you, Majesty.” Desh nodded his acknowledgment. “What they don’t guarantee is that the orders from the gods won’t suddenly change.”
“I have no guarantee that you won’t try to take over the seat of power, Desh Krohan.” She took the time to chew on a grape before continuing, her eyes never leaving the First Advisor. “You have never attempted it in the past, but that doesn’t mean you won’t in the future. There are no guarantees of anything in this world, Old Man.” She pointed to the Sisters. “Not even death, apparently.”
Desh looked down at the table. There were laws against necromancy and while Merros was not sure if what he was looking at qualified, he knew that if she wanted, Nachia could have done something about Goriah’s presence.
She was not foolish enough to attempt it. Having seen what Desh Krohan could do, no sane ruler would consider attacking his loved ones.
There had been a trust once, between First Advisor and Empress. Merros didn’t know if it was merely wounded or if it was shattered. Only time would tell.
“We must prepare for whatever comes. Desh, you and your sorcerers can no longer remain as isolated from this as we would all wish.”
Desh stared but did not respond.
Unlike most people, the Empress continued despite his silence. “It might be required that you and your brethren live up to the standards of the past. I am counting on the Silent Army to handle the worst of what comes our way. I have faith in General Dulver and his troops, but the numbers we have already seen are…” She shook her head.
“What must happen will happen, Nachia.” Desh stood up. “We have already discussed the matter. We will do what we must. We have already killed one of their kings.”
Merros looked toward Goriah as those words were spoken. The Sister’s mouth pulled down in a scowl, and her hands clenched.
She looked back at him and moved in his direction.
“Has the death of one of their kings altered anything?”
Nachia’s question was the very one on Merros’s mind.
“Not in the least.” Desh shook his head and pointed to the marks on the map where they had had their one victory against the enemy. “I can’t say it has made them any more or less violent. The Sooth say that we killed a king here. We know that another king is dead by sorcerous means. But we have no way of knowing if they choose new kings by election or–”
“Their gods decide,” Merros interrupted.
“What’s that?”
“Their gods decide. I traveled with these people. I heard their stories. According to what they told me, Tuskandru was made king because his god, Durhallem, picked him.”
Desh looked at the map again for lack of anything else to look at. “Then I hope their gods make miserable choices.”
Nachia sighed and shook her head. “So far they seem to be doing well enough.”
Merros nodded and so did Desh.
A few moments later the meeting ended.
Merros headed for his quarters and realized that Goriah was following him. “How may I help you, Goriah?”
“You are angry with
me. With my presence.”
“No, milady, I am terrified by your presence.”
She nodded. “I understand.”
“I don’t think you do, respectfully. You work with sorcery. I have done my best never to know of its existence. I saw Desh Krohan destroy miles of terrain.” His voice shook and he did his best to control himself. “I saw him burn the night and the ground. Not ten minutes ago I listened to him talk about the fact that his mind can’t hold all of his memories because he’s hundreds of years old. He’s got so many memories that they no longer fit inside him.”
Merros looked at the striking beauty before him.
“He told me that all of the Sisters are unnaturally beautiful because it gives you an edge in listening to conversations and negotiation.” He shook his head. “I learned an entire language in seconds because Tataya and you felt I should.”
Merros was unaware of moving closer to her until he was looking into her eyes. “I’ve admired your beauty. I have been amazed by your grace. It hurt my guts to hear of your death, Goriah.”
His hand touched her arm. “You are alive and I am happy for that, but how are you alive? How are you back when I saw your body with my own eyes? How are you back, but others are not? Why is Wollis March still dead? Why is Emperor Pathra Krous still dead? Why did I not know that a gray-skinned bitch hid inside the body of Wollis’s widow? How could I fall for her? None of this makes sense to me, Goriah. None of it and I can’t sleep. I can’t make myself understand why nature itself bends to some people and not to others.
“I’m a soldier. It’s all I’ve ever been. What good is a sword against what you and yours can do?”
He was trembling. His voice shook.
Goriah nodded slowly and looked into his eyes. Her hand touched his, lightly, and he managed not to flinch.
She said, “I came back because Desh missed me too much. I came back so that he could not mourn me when he should be trying to save this city.” Her hand touched his face. “I am back because there was a rare opportunity. I killed one of their kings because he killed me and I wanted revenge. Without it I could not keep my mind whole. I wanted to burn that nightmare out of existence and so I did. I can do these things because while you mastered the sword I studied different weapons. I studied nature and the world so that I could learn how to bend them.”
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