by K. J. Parker
Valens nodded. He knew all that already. “In that case,” he said, “if we can’t chase them away before they get here, and we can’t hold them off when they come here, I believe our only option is to leave here and go somewhere else. In which case, the only question we’re left with is, where do we go?”
He paused and looked round, but he knew that nobody was going to say anything, which was what he wanted, of course.
“As I see it,” he went on, “the Mezentines are maintaining a large and very expensive mercenary army in hostile territory. Thanks to the efforts of Orsea’s people, their lines of supply are painfully long and brittle, and living off the land isn’t a realistic option. They need to finish this war quickly, before their own political situation gets out of hand. We know we can’t fight them and win. Seems to me, then, that our best chance lies in not fighting, and the best way of doing that, I think, would be to keep moving. They can have the city and do what they like with it. We evacuate to the mountains, where we know the terrain and where their artillery train can’t go. We dodge about, making them follow us until they get careless and give us a chance to bottle them up in a pass or a river valley. Meanwhile, our cavalry stays on the plains and makes life difficult for their supply wagons. Possibly we could also make trouble for the army of occupation in Eremia, just to give them something else to think about. It comes down to this: We can’t beat the Mezentines; neither can Orsea’s people or anybody else. The only people who can beat the Mezentines are the Mezentines themselves, by losing the will to carry on with this war. For them, it’s a balance sheet. The point will come where the certain losses will outweigh the potential gains, and the political opposition will have gained enough strength to overthrow the current government. Our only hope is to hang on till that point is reached. I think evacuating, avoiding them, making life difficult, and costing them money is the best and safest way of going about it. Furthermore, I don’t think we have an alternative strategy worth serious consideration. If I’m wrong and I’ve missed something obvious, though, I’d love to hear about it. Anybody?”
He sat down and waited. He had a pretty shrewd idea who’d be first. Sure enough, Orsea got to his feet. As usual, he looked nervous, as though he weren’t quite sure whether he was allowed to speak or whether he needed to ask for permission.
“For what it’s worth,” he said, “I agree with Valens. I think I can honestly say I know the Mezentines better than any of you. I ought to, after all. It was my stupidity that got us all into this situation in the first place, and as a direct result of what I did, I’ve had to watch them invade my country, burn my city, and massacre my people. If it wasn’t for Valens here, I’d be dead. Now, because Valens rescued us, you’re facing the same danger. It’s my fault that you’ve got to make this decision, and all I can say is, I’m sorry. That’s no help, obviously.” He hesitated, and Valens looked away. It pained him to see a grown man making a fool of himself, particularly someone who was his responsibility. “The point is,” Orsea went on, “we mustn’t let what happened at Civitas Eremiae happen again here. It’s bad enough having to live with the destruction of my own people. If it happened to you as well — ”
“Orsea,” Valens said quietly, “it’s all right. Sit down.”
introducing
If you enjoyed DEVICES AND DESIRES,
look out for
WINTERBIRTH
Book One of the Godless World trilogy
by Brian Ruckley
Two years ago the warriors of Gyre had been one of the finest bodies of fighting men in all the lands of the Kilkry Bloods, but the unremitting carnage since then had consumed their strength as surely as a fire loosed upon a drought-struck forest. In the end virtually every able-bodied man — and many of the women — of the Black Road had taken to the field at Kan Avor, drawn not just from Gyre but from every Blood: still they had been outnumbered by more than three to one. Now barely fifteen hundred men remained, a battered rearguard for the flight of the Black Road into the north.
The man who rode up to join his Thane was as bruised and weary as all the rest. His helm was dented, the ring mail on his chest stained with blood, his round shield notched and half split where an axe had found a lucky angle. Still, this man bore himself well and his eyes retained a glint of vigor. He nudged his horse through the crowds and leaned close to Avann.
“Lord,” he said softly, “it is Tegric.”
Avann stirred, but did not raise his head or open his eyes.
“My scouts have come up, lord,” the warrior continued. “The enemy draw near. Kilkry horsemen are no more than an hour or two adrift of us. Behind them, spearmen of Haig-Kilkry. They will bring us to bay before we are clear of the Vale.”
The Thane of Gyre spat bloodily.
“Whatever awaits us was decided long ago,” he murmured. His voice was thin and weak. “We cannot fear what is written in the Last God’s book.”
One of the Thane’s shieldmen joined them, and fixed Tegric with a disapproving glare.
“Leave the Thane be,” he said. “He must conserve his strength.”
That at last raised Avann’s head. He winced as he opened his eyes.
“My death will come when it must. Until then, I am Thane, not some sick old woman to be wrapped warm and fed broth. Tegric treats me as a Thane still; how much more should my own Shield?”
The shieldman nodded in acceptance of the reprimand, but stayed in close attendance.
“Let me wait here, lord,” said Tegric softly. “Give me just a hundred men. We will hold the Vale until our people are clear.”
The Thane regarded Tegric. “We may need every man in the north. The tribes will not welcome our arrival.”
“There will be no arrival if our enemies come upon us here in the Vale. Let me stand here and I will promise you half a day, perhaps more. The cliffs narrow up ahead, and there is an old rockfall. I can hold the way against riders; spill enough of their blood that they will wait for their main force to come up before attempting the passage twice.”
“And then you will be a hundred against what, five thousand? Six?” Avann grunted.
“At least,” smiled Tegric.
An old man fell in the crowds that surrounded them. He cried out as a stone opened his knee. A gray-haired woman — perhaps his wife — hurried to help him to his feet, murmuring “Get up, get up.” A score of people, including the Thane and Tegric, flowed past before she managed to raise him. She wept silently as the man hobbled onward.
“Many people have already died in defense of our creed,” Avann oc Gyre said, lowering his head once more and closing his eyes. He seemed to shrink as he hunched forward in his saddle. “If you give us half a day — if it has been so written in the Last God’s book — you and your hundred will be remembered. When the lands that have been taken from us are ours again, you will be named first and noblest amongst the dead. And when this bitter world is unmade and we have returned into the love of the Gods I will look for you, to give you the honor that will be your due.”
Tegric nodded. “I will see you once again in the reborn world, my Thane.”
He turned his horse and nudged it back against the current of humanity.
Tegric rested against a great boulder. He had removed his tunic, and was methodically stitching up a split seam. His mail shirt was neatly spread upon a rock, his shield and scabbarded sword lying beside it, his helm resting at his feet. These were all that remained to him, everything he had need of. He had given his horse to a lame woman who had been struggling along in the wake of the main column. His small pouch of coins had gone to a child, a boy mute from shock or injury.
Above, buzzards were calling as they circled lower, descending toward the corpses that Tegric knew lay just out of sight. His presence, and that of his hundred men, might deter the scavengers for a while longer, but he did not begrudge them a meal. Those who once dwelled in those bodies had no further need of them: when the Gods returned — as they would once all peoples of the wor
ld had learned the humility of the Black Road — they would have new bodies, in a new world.
From where he sat, Tegric could see down a long, sloping sweep of the Stone Vale. Every so often he glanced up from his stitching to cast his eyes back the way they had come. Far off in that direction lay Grive, where he had lived most of his life: a place of soft green fields, well-fed cattle, as different from this punishing Vale of Stones as any place could be. The memory of it summoned up no particular emotion in him. The rest of his family had not seen the truth of the creed as he had. When Avann oc Gyre, their Thane, had declared for the Black Road they had fled from Grive, disappearing out of Tegric’s life. In every Blood, even Kilkry itself, the blossoming of the Black Road had sundered countless families, broken ties and bonds that had held firm for generations. To Tegric’s mind it was a cause for neither regret nor surprise. A truth as profound as that of the Black Road could not help but have consequences.
An old man, dressed in a ragged brown robe and leaning on a staff, came limping up the Vale. He was, perhaps, the very last of the fleeing thousands. Though they were close to the highest point of the pass, the sun, burning out of a cloudless sky, still had strength. The man’s forehead was beaded with sweat. He paused before Tegric, resting all his weight upon his staff and breathing heavily. The warrior looked up at the man, squinting slightly against the sunlight.
“Am I far behind the rest?” the man asked between labored breaths.
Tegric noted the bandaged feet, the trembling hands.
“Some way,” he said softly.
The man nodded, unsurprised and seemingly unperturbed. He wiped his brow with the hem of his robe; the material came away sweaty and dirty.
“You are waiting here?” he asked Tegric, who nodded in reply.
The man cast around, scanning the warriors scattered amongst the great boulders all around him.
“How many of you are there?”
“A hundred,” Tegric told him.
The old man chuckled, though it was a cold and humorless kind of laugh.
“You have come to the end of your Roads then, you hundred. I had best press on, and discover where my own fate runs out.”
“Do so,” said Tegric levelly. He watched the man make his unsteady way along the path already trodden by so many thousands. There had been, in the gentle edges of his accent, no hint of the Gyre Blood or the Glas valley where Avann had ruled.
“Where are you from, old father?” Tegric called after him.
“Kilvale, in Kilkry lands,” the man replied.
“Did you know the Fisherwoman, then?” Tegric asked, unable to keep the edge of wonder from his voice.
The old man paused and carefully turned to look back at the warrior.
“I heard her speak. I knew her a little, before they killed her.”
“There will be a day, you know, when the Black Road marches through this pass again,” Tegric said. “But then we will be marching out of the north, not into it. And we will march all the way to Kilvale and beyond.”
Again the man laughed his rough laugh. “You are right. They’ve driven us from our homes, cast even your Thane out from his castle, but the creed survives. You and I are not fated to see it, friend, but the Black Road will rule in the hearts of all men one day, and all things will come to their end. This is a war that will not be done until the world itself is unmade.”
Tegric gazed after the receding figure for a time. Then he returned to his sewing.
A while later, his hand paused in its rhythmic motion, the needle poised in mid-descent. There was something moving amongst the rocks, back down the pass to the south. He carefully set aside his tunic and half-rose, leaning forward on one knee.
“Kilkry,” he heard one of his warriors muttering off to his left.
And the shape coalescing out of the rock and the bright light did indeed look to be a rider. Nor was it alone. At least a score of horsemen were picking their way up the Vale of Stones.
Tegric laid a hand instinctively on the cool metal of his chain vest. He could feel the dried blood, the legacy of a week’s almost constant battle, beneath his fingertips. He was not afraid to die. That was one fear the Black Road lifted from a man’s back. If he feared anything, it was that he should fail in his determination to face, both willingly and humbly, whatever was to come.
“Ready yourselves,” he said, loud enough for only the few nearest men to hear. They passed the word along. Tegric snapped the needle from the end of its thread and slipped his tunic back on. He lifted his mail shirt above his head and dropped its familiar weight onto his shoulders. Like smoke rising from a newly caught fire, the line of riders below was lengthening, curling and curving its way up the pass.
The horsemen of Kilkry were the best mounted warriors to be found in all the Bloods, but their prowess would count for little where Tegric had chosen to make his stand. A titanic fall of rocks from the cliffs above had almost choked the Stone Vale with rubble. The riders would be greatly hampered, perhaps even forced to dismount. Tegric’s swordsmen and archers would have the advantage here. Later, when the main body of the pursuing army came up, they would be overwhelmed, but that did not matter.
He glanced at the sun, a searingly bright orb in the perfectly blue sky. He could hear the buzzards and the ravens, could glimpse their dark forms gliding in effortless spirals. It did not seem a bad place, a bad day, to die. If, when he woke in the new world the Black Road promised him, this was his last memory of his first life, of this failed world, it would not displease him.
Tegric Wyn dar Gyre rose and buckled on his sword belt.