The Assassins of Tamurin

by S. D. Tower

  I frowned. “We’re a lot closer to Lindu than Tamurin. If Terem changes his plans, the news won’t get from us to Mother in time for her to do anything about it. What good is that to her?”

  Again the shrug, a reminder that unlike me, Dilara never puzzled over Mother’s intentions. She was too single-minded; she followed instructions with perfect fidelity but remained indifferent to the reasons behind them.

  “I don’t know,” she said. “But listen, we’ve got at least one battle ahead of us. If things go badly, find me. We can probably fight our way out together, if we have to.”

  I’d tried not to think about being on the losing end of a battle, but she had a point. “I’U bear it in mind. But now I’d better go back where I belong. Keep yourself safe.”

  “And you. But try to find some mending fi-om time to time.”

  “I will,” I said, and after a surreptitious squeeze of her hand, I hurried away to the castella. Terem never noticed I’d been gone.

  Twenty-four

  Th e next morning the main body of the army crossed the Savath. I rode with Terem just behind the three thousand men of the Iron Shield Brigade who had the honor of being the first infantry unit to enter Lindu. Ahead of us lay the conquered lands we had come to free.

  I’d heard about the misery of the Durdana under Exile rule, but nothing had prepared me for the reality. Because only Exile settlements were allowed within ten miles of the Savath, these were all we saw at first. They were rough, wattle-built farmsteads with thatched byres and outbuildings, and each had a good-sized horse corral, fenced with thombushes or palisades. Before the Partition there had been Durdana villages here, but all that remained were green mounds with the stubs of walls here and there. Nor were there any crops waiting to be harvested, for the Exiles had tumed all the land over to pasture for their horse herds.

  But for many miles we saw no barbarians, for they’d taken their families, horses, and possessions and fled before our advance. Some had bumed their farmsteads to deprive us of shelter, or so they thought, although none of us would have willingly entered such stinking places. Sometimes we saw their roughly constructed tower tombs, dark stone fingers poking nastily into the sky, but their only decent buildings were the wooden temples they built to their bizarre single god, who condenmed our Beneficent Ones as demons. Terem had forbidden looting or wanton destruc-tion—^because it encouraged indiscipline, not out of any regard for Exile sentiments—^but whenever we came across one of these temples, he ordered it bumed. So the army’s path was marked by rising columns of black smoke, and I began to perceive the desolation that hes beneath war’s glitter, its brave music, and its rattle of dmms. But the desolation was happening to the enemy, so it seemed very good to me.

  Later that moming I saw my first Exiles. Our patrols brought in a pair of stragglers, who were hauled before Terem and our interpreters. I’d always had a vague idea of the Exiles’ appearance, but the reality took me aback even so. They weren’t the giants their fearsome reputation suggested, being of common height, although they were very burly. Their hair was straw yellow, like that of the Daisa, wom in thin braids that swung at neck and cheeks, and their eyes were so dark they were nearly black. They had fair skin, much of it covered by swirling multicolored tattoos. Exile women are not allowed these designs, but any barbarian could tell a man’s station by the hues and pattems he wore. I’d never seen anything so alien, and winced at the thought of such creatures enslaving my people.

  The men were interrogated but knew notMng useful. I expected them to be executed, but Terem said through the interpreter, “Go and tell your kin that I will spare those of you who leave our soil. The rest I will kill, without exception.” Then he pointed east and they fled across the meadows, followed by hoots, jeers, and flung stones. He was very clever in this, for by making them mn away he tumed the Exiles into cowards and objects of derision, and thus strengthened our soldiers’ confidence.

  In early aftemoon we reached territory where Durdana were allowed to live, and then I wished that we’d bumed everything the Exiles had built, not just the temples. After the conquest, their Kings had given estates to all their soldiers, so that even the lowest cavalry trooper had a good acreage, tilled for him by the local Durdana, who became his serfs. Exile nobles got bigger estates, which included villages and towns, and many of the Durdana citizens were forced into serfdom, along with the farmers who had already been on the land. This ruined the trade of all but the largest cities, and even these decreased in size by more than half. In the cities. Exile officers took over the best residences and the most profitable businesses, and disposed of the former owners as they pleased.

  The Exile word for Durdana was fath, which could mean either “farmer” or “worm.” This was how they saw us: as worms squirming in the mud, but they treated worms less harshly. During the early years after the Partition, many Durdana in the subjugated lands killed themselves to escape their misery; to halt this loss of their serfs, die Exiles decreed that the suicide’s immediate family must all die by slow disembowelment. Many others tried to escape to the free lands, whereupon the Exiles applied the disembowelment penalty not only to the fugitive’s parents, spouse, and children but also to his relatives of the first and second degree. Given our tradition of filial loyalty, this slowed the escapes to a trickle.

  I cannot begin to describe all the misery I saw between the Savath River and the walls of Bara, so I shall let the city of Sila stand for all. The main colunm of the army marched around it, but Terem and I and the Iron Shield Brigade went through by way of the central street.

  The Exiles had allowed only a few cities in the conquered lands to keep their walls, and those of Sila lay in broken heaps where the barbarians had pulled them down. Where the main gate once stood was a wide gallows, with a dozen bodies hanging by the heels; all had been flayed and gutted. Within the town, pavements had disappeared beneath a century of filth, the arcades of the municipal market were ruinous, and the roofs of the public baths had fallen in. From the shrines of the Beneficent Ones, the images were long gone, and the shrine to the Lord of Starlight was now the garrison’s stables. A handful of the best old residences had escaped only because the local Exile lords lived in them. Every other building, be it of stone, wood, or brick, was decayed to the point of collapse.

  And the inhabitants? The Exile overlords and their households had decamped, no doubt expecting to retum once Garhang had disposed of us. As for our fellow Durdana, I’d expected them to flood into the streets, shouting in rapture at their deliverance, but they didn’t. Instead, they crept from rotting doorways and stood blinking at us, like ragged prisoners too long from the sun. All looked wasted and drawn. Not one had ever had enough to eat, and through the rents in their rags I saw, on many, the marks of whips.

  A few raised tentative cheers, but these were not taken up by the others. “What’s the matter with them?” I asked Terem, who looked grim.

  “They don’t believe it yet,” he said. “When they do, they’ll kill any Exile they can lay hands on. And they’ll look for Durdana traitors who worked for the overlords. I’d rather fall into a fire than be one of those.”

  A temple to the Exile god stood on the central square. We didn’t bum it because the rest of the city might táce fire— which might have been the best thing to do with it—^but Terem ordered the pottery image taken out and smashed. I’d never seen one before. It was a nasty combination of man and some kind of bird, glazed a poisonous green. A crowd had gathered in the square by then, and when the hammers came down on the image the townspeople finally awakened and spoke—^not with a cheer but witii a snarl. I’d never heard anything like it, and it chilled my blood: a sound of fury and hatred, swelling with every stroke of the hammer.

  When the hammers fell silent, so did the mob, and Terem spoke.

  “People of Durdane! Brothers and sisters! I am Terem Rathai, Sun Lord of Bethiya, and here with me is the Army of the East. For a hundred years the Exiles have enslaved and opp
ressed you, but the justice of Durdane is now upon them, and you are free. We are the doom of the barbarians.

  and I swear to you by the Beneficent Ones, and by the Lord of the Dead, that I will not rest until the last invader is driven from the sacred earth of Durdane.”

  I watched them as he spoke, and I saw the light of faith awaken in their faces. It was a kind of sorcery he had, to banish doubt and fear by his mere presence, and those who heard him speak of our future believed in it utterly, because he believed so utterly in it himself.

  And his words moved me as well, for as I listened to them I thought: Isn Y this what we truly need? Someone to lead us out of this wretched world of Despotates and Kingdoms, someone to restore to us our stolen inheritance?

  Where these musings might have led me I don’t know, for the crowd roared as he ended his speech, and somebody screamed about Exile riches. Then the mob was streaming out of the square toward the nobles’ quarter.

  “Perhaps, for once, they’ll find enough to fill their bellies,” Terem said. And then to his second in command. General Ajirian: “That’s all here, get the men moving.”

  So we left Sila and marched on toward Bara. During the next several days there were more scenes like that, but to describe one is to have described all. Suffice it to say that by the time we were a day from Garhang’s capital, we’d acquired another thousand camp followers from Lindu, mostly young men, and also a few young women, eager for revenge and loot. Thousands of others, released from bondage but unwilling to believe that the Exiles wouldn’t come back, were streaming west toward the Savath. The army was moving so fast in the other direction that I hardly had a chance to speak to Dilara. Twice I managed to slip away and find her, but there were too many people around for us to talk much.

  By the time we were a day from Bara, Terem was becoming annoyed. Garhang had not offered battle, thus depriving us of the chance to defeat him a slice at a time. Terem was sure the King was in his capital, though, and a captured enemy officer confirmed this. He also boasted that no matter how enormous our host, Garhang’s horsemen would finish us off in a day. Terem sent the man back to Garhang with a message: If all Exiles left Bara by the following evening, they could do so unmolested; if they remained, he would give them no quarter. The answer, predictably, was silence.

  Terem next decided on a stratagem. The Army of the East had trained in night marches, and there was a füll moon, so we set out for Bara after dusk, and were very near it by the middle of the night watch. Then we rested until daybreak, whereupon we made our final approach to the city. This took Garhang by surprise, and he didn’t get his men into the field until we were less than two miles from Bara’s walls.

  I could easily make out the city’s ramparts across the plain that lay at the bottom of a large oval valley. The heights around the valley were thickly forested, and Terem sent out cavaky patrols to make sure that no enemy lurked in ambush. The rest of us marched in from the northwest, and even now I wonder what Garhang and his men thought when they saw us pouring down upon them: our infantry deploying into massed squares of pikes and crossbowmen, with hordes of cavalry trotting on the wings. I like to think they felt a cold premonition, for Garhang had sent half his forces east to watch Ardavan, and we outnumbered them three to one. However, they’d beaten us at worse odds in the old days, when they fought under Pakur One-Eyed, so they probably thought they still could.

  But despite then confidence, they weren’t the warriors then great-grandfathers had been. Then nobles had become soft, and half the warriors they commanded were no longer cavalry. Their ancestors of those had so looted and mined their stolen estates that their descendants couldn’t afford the expense of horses and harness and went to war on foot. Yet even in their decline, no Despotate army would have been a match for them. Only the Amiy of the East was their equal, or so Terem believed and the rest of us hoped.

  A mined stone bam stood on a knoll near the center of our infantry line, and we established our headquarters in the grass-grown barnyard. Dispatch riders came and went; Terem and his officers issued orders. It takes time to put a large army into battle formation, and the sun was well up before all the brigades were in place, with the baggage train and the camp followers a quarter mile behind the lines. It was a cool bright day, the air smelling of autunm leaves and dry grass, with a breeze from the northwest; above the helmets of Terem and his officers the Rose Standard glittered in the sunlight. Half a mile to our front, Garhang had settled his troops into their ranks. His line was as long as ours but thinner. And we had a lot more horsemen.

  At length Terem left his officers and came over to me. “If anything goes wrong,” he said, “stay with Captain Sholaj. I’ve ordered him to get you out of here if he has to.”

  I glanced toward the captain, a long-jawed young man who was watching the Exile lines with blood in his eye. “I’ll be all right by myself, Terem. It’s not fair to make him my nursemaid.”

  “He’ll follow orders, like everyone else, and so will you. Do as he says until I come back.”

  This wasn’t the time or place to argue, so I said, “All right.”

  “Now we start,” he said. “Wish us luck. You’ll be able to see most of it from up here.”

  He retumed to the standards and gave an order. Soon a signal hom blared, and the brigade signalers repeated the notes along the battle line. Pike heads glittered. The homs blared again and our line began to move.

  Few events are as confusing as a big battle, although historians talk of them as if they were as easy to follow as a game of Twelve Lines. But nobody involved in one, including the commanders, can tell much about what’s going on once the fighting starts. As for me. I’ve never been much interested in how a battle worked, only in who held the field at the end of it.

  A light drizzle had fallen before dawn, just enough to lay the dust that can obscure a battlefield, so I had a fine view. The fighting began as Garhang, in foohsh overconfidence, ordered his infantry to charge. His foot soldiers quickly became disorganized, and our crossbowmen maneuvered out of their protecting pike squares and felled hundreds of them. When the Exile cavahy tried to break our squares, they met a steel thicket of pikes, and the crossbows shot down their mounts by the score. And then, at the moment of their greatest disorder, our horsemen charged their wavering ranks and cut them down like grain; the remnants fled in terror for the shelter of the city. Unsupported and outflanked, with our cavalry in their rear, the enemy foot was lost; perhaps one in five reached Bara’s gates and safety.

  Garhang’s army had collapsed so quickly that the sun seemed barely to have chmbed in the sky. Our joy and exhilaration can scarcely be imagined; even Dirayr, the most dour and crusty of Terem’s staff, was jumping up and down in excitement. Never before had Durdana soldiers destroyed the army of an Exile King. We knew now that the conquerors could be conquered.

  But our elation lasted only a little while. We saw a rider come racing toward us along the valley, and behind him, up on the valley’s forested brim, there was a small clot of cavalry. I thought at first that it was one of our patrols. But as I watched, the horsemen tumed and vanished into the woods.

  Terem and his officers stopped talking. In growing apprehension, we watched the lone rider approach. Soon he was a bowshot from our knoll, his horse at full stretch, sweat gleaming on its flanks. He had lost his helmet, and when he was fifty yards away I saw blood on his armor; his shield arm dangled uselessly.

  He reached us and dragged his exhausted mount to a halt. Captain Sholaj grabbed the horse’s reins, and the young trooper leaned over his saddlebow, breathing in great gulps and dripping blood from a slash along his jaw.

  “What is it?” Terem asked, perfectly unruffled.

  “Exiles,” the trooper gasped. “Coming from the south.

  through the woods. Thousands of them, foot and horse. They had screening riders. Killed everybody but me.”

  “What standards? Garhang’s?”

  “No, lord.” He swayed and almost f
ell from the saddle. “Their shields had the red scorpion.”

  A silence. Terem’s face became very thoughtful and his eyes narrowed. Finally he said, “It’s Ardavan, then. Very well, trooper, you’ve done fine work. Go to the baggage train and have your wounds seen to.”

  “Yes, lord.” The young man pulled his wheezing mount around and trotted away.

  “Now we have some busy hours at hand,” Terem said, sounding almost jaunty. He began to issue a stream of orders, messenger after messenger galloping away to deliver them. I didn’t pay much attention, because I was watching the south rim of the valley. After a short interval the horsemen reappeared from the trees. More followed. And then, like waves breaking over a sea wall, came Ardavan’s Exile battalions.

  There seemed no end to them. Hordes of infantry and horse moved steadily down the slope, and still they came. I hadn’t imagined, when they first appeared, that we might be outnumbered, but after a while I began to worry. Terem seemed unperturbed; he’d sent off all his orders now and watched intently as our Army of the East tumed to meet its new foe.

  In that hour, had it not been for the relentless training of our men, we would have been staring into the maw of disaster. But when Garhang’s army broke, our infantry squares had remained in place instead of dissolving into a raggle-taggle pursuit of the vanquished. Thus our line was intact, and, once it tumed south, was capable of facing the enemy. Our cavalry was in disarray, unfortunately, but the troop commanders had seen what was approaching us. They had been trained to use their heads and they did so; I could see hurrying bands of horsemen re-forming into larger masses and streaming toward their positions on the wings.

  But we would still need all the luck we could get. Ardavan’s force had completely emerged from the woodland now, and it was at least as numerous as ours. It proceeded remorselessly down the valley toward us, rank on rank, column on colunm, with clouds of horsemen roiling excitedly around it. The barbarians’ drums thumped and thudded, and with them came a droning bray like that of some weird and furious ghost. It was the wail of Exile war pipes, so alien that I shuddered to hear them.