A Time of War and Demons

by S E Wendel

  A rousing bout of applause went up despite the mist working into a light sprinkle. No one seemed to notice as they came forward, ready to be separated into groups.

  After being introduced to the woodcutters, she dispatched them with several others to set about felling marked trees. Behind them she sent the carpenters and their daughters to scrape off bark and limbs, making the poles smooth. Two women, each with three mules, were assigned to haul the logs out of the forest.

  And finally, with the remaining fifteen women, Ennis and Kenna began the task of hoisting the poles. There were seven in a neat pile not far from the end of the wall, a reminder of how suddenly Manek and his own volunteers had had to give up work.

  Shedding her cloak and laying it with the other women’s outerwear, Ennis rolled up her sleeves as Kenna began sectioning off rope. She watched carefully with the rest as a woman named Sabella instructed them on the best knots for the job.

  Lining up, the women found it a slightly easier task to drag the pole into position thanks to the slick grass, though Ennis did have to dig her nails into the rope to make sure it didn’t get away from her.

  A shock of anticipation went through her, and she saw similar feelings in the eyes of the other women. She donned a confident smile, nodding at some, giving encouragement to others as she jumped over the ditch they were about to lever the pole into. Assuring herself the pole was where it needed to be, she gave the signal.

  The rope was passed back. With a shout from Ennis, the women heaved.

  The wet rope chafed her palms, little nicks and cuts burning into her skin. But she pulled. Pulled, even as the rope tightened enough for water to come dripping out. Pulled, even when, halfway up, the pole tottered and almost tumbled back to the earth. Pulled, until finally, the pole bounced into place.

  The women cheered as they rushed forward to help the spotter move it snugly into place beside its neighbor. From the edges of the forest, Ennis spied the other groups, come from their work to see the first pole up. They waved and clapped at the fine job.

  Ennis ordered a ladder be raised, and Kenna herself set about working warm sap onto the side of the newly raised pole with a wide paint brush, so that when the next pole was raised, they would stick together. As she worked, Ennis and the others tried their hands at tying Sabella’s knot and began dragging the next poles into position.

  Before they stopped for a midday meal, the clouds had broken and they’d raised four poles. And when they stopped for the day, pride shining in their eyes at having felled four trees, skinned three, and raised ten, the women enthusiastically agreed to return the next day.

  Ennis walked with Kenna, arm-in-arm, back to her house in the square, daydreaming about the meat pie Kenna had described in delicious detail.

  “You’ll be a warlord yourself before this is done,” Kenna said.

  Ennis laughed. “You already have two.”

  “The men do,” said Kenna with a devilishly arched eyebrow.

  Kenna’s praise, and pie, helped Ennis into the finest sleep she’d had in sennights. She woke before Irina or Lora the next morning, invigorated.

  “What are you doing up?” Lora croaked as Ennis shoved her feet into her boots.

  Ennis smiled. “Working!”

  Lora rolled her eyes, smiled, and stuck her head under her pillow.

  On her way to the stairs, Ennis passed a rather bleary-eyed Renata, just risen. She blinked in surprise at Ennis but could barely get her mouth open before Ennis bid her farewell with a chipper, “Ta!” and went hopping down the stairs.

  When she rounded the wall this time, the woody spiciness of redwood and coastal pine filling her nostrils, she didn’t find forty volunteers. She found two hundred. With a little encouragement from Kenna and happy tears shining in her eyes, she mounted the slope to give another speech.

  “Good morning, ladies,” she said. “And what a fine morning it is, to see all your faces! In truth, I couldn’t have dreamed of anything better than seeing so many of you here. I see you all and I know we will finish this. We will build this wall.”

  And so the women of Rising built their wall with their own hands. Hundreds came to work, enough that they could work in shifts—one day working, two at home. Women from the countryside heard and came to help, knowing they’d be welcome behind its defense if there was need. Over the sennights, they became a skilled workforce—felling trees, stripping bark, weaving rope, cooking for those laboring, collecting and heating sap, leading horse and mule teams, constructing ladders, cutting planks—all while faithfully led by the Highland woman with a mane of golden hair.

  Ennis could feel their accomplishment best when Kasia came down from the great house to see the final pole hoisted into place. A great cheer went up as the pole eased beside its neighbors, the sticky sap keeping it in place while women with wet clay filled in any large holes.

  They feasted for three days straight, a sight Ennis hadn’t seen since Highcrest. She ate more than her fill, drank perhaps too many cups of the Lowlands’ particularly sweet wine, and even learned several of their merry dances.

  But when the sun rose on the fourth day, she and the others returned to work, for a gate still needed to be constructed, and she’d already drawn up plans for ramparts so that archers could patrol along the wall.

  Two sennights later, on a pleasant summer evening, Ennis led Kierum and Kasia up the northern stairs, built beside the great gate, its arms open wide to let in the last of the daylight. From the raised vantage point, she looked upon a sky flushed pink and lavender. Below, the Lowlands sparkled, a riot of color, the emerald meadows festooned with pale moon lilies, shy bluebells, and boisterous larkspurs.

  Kasia made a little noise of surprise when she saw the view. Ennis took her breathless silence as approval.

  Kierum stepped onto the ramparts after his wife, resting a hand against the wood parapet. He tested his weight on the catwalk, eyeing the craftsmanship. Ennis raised her chin, knowing he could find no fault. His silence, however, made her nervous. She searched what she could see of his face, anxious to know what he thought. It was, of course, too late for him to stop the project, but he could easily destroy what the women had worked so hard to build.

  When he turned to her, the sinking sun reflected in his glassy eyes.

  “Thank you,” he said.

  Thirty-Six

  Everywhere Dea stepped, destruction did follow, and the mortals feared her most of all. Weeping over the death of so many of his mortals, Themin raged against the malevolent force. Each time their godly weapons clashed, great bolts of lightning rained down and scarred Mithria. Calling his divine children to him, Themin overpowered Dea and banished her from his blessed sight. Though sent away, Dea, to this day, relishes making trouble for the Father and bringing suffering to his mortals.

  —When War Started

  Manek woke to a cold creeping up his body like a claw, clutching for his throat. He blinked, and the last remnants of his dream faded away, replaced with the stiff canvas of the tent wall. Closing his eyes again for one moment of luxury, he recalled the fading image of Ennis lying beside him, could almost remember her smell and the warmth of her skin beneath his fingers.

  It was a simple dream, always the same. Perhaps the worst thing about it was that he’d never know what it was truly like to wake up beside her. He hadn’t known how much he’d wanted such a thing until he was denied it; perhaps that was why he’d been so angry when she tried to sneak away with the dawn. But the feeling of her warm body tucked against him, fitted perfectly to his own, had no place in this camp of death.

  Manek swung his legs over the cot and sank his fingers into his hair. His knuckles tugged against knots, making his eyes water. Just like every morning, he drew back the flap of his tent. Just like every morning, he wasn’t quite prepared for the sight. Or the smell.

  Spring had come and gone, and soon summer would flee as well, yet they still hadn’t captured Dannawey. The walls stood defiant, mocking him. They dare
d him to try something else, dared him to show them something they hadn’t seen before. He’d failed so miserably that sometimes he wished he could ride Oren north, straight into the De’lan, and let Adain take him wherever his whim fancied.

  As if the torment of Dannawey’s defenses and Larn’s mounting temper weren’t enough, each morning Manek rose to find the gods had cursed them tenfold. Plague had settled comfortably over the camp, claiming men who should be fit and healthy, leaving the maimed and the young to march into battle to face death at Dannawey’s wall.

  The once orderly camp had broken down into pockets of plague victims. At first quarantine was imposed, but there wasn’t a point anymore. The plague skipped one tent but drove full force into another, and there was no stopping it. For whatever reason, Dea had abandoned Larn and instead cursed his men.

  Manek tried not to hear the wheezing and gasping of the dying, tried not to see the abandoned, festering corpses of the dead, tried not to smell the putrid excrement, filth, and rot. This plague was like nothing he’d ever seen. First came a fever, quick and unyielding, then the eyes turned yellow and the hands shook. Men could keep nothing down as their gums turned blackish and their nail beds bled. It was a slow disease, cruel. The quickest death Manek had seen was three days. A Highland arrow to the head would’ve been kinder.

  Gnawing on a hunk of stale bread, Manek mounted Oren and slowly they made their daily sojourn to Larn’s section of camp. If Manek could find any small kindness in their situation, it was that the Midlander camps had been struck harder than the Lowlander. But it wasn’t comfort enough, his heart already sick as it was; dirt still rimmed his nails from helping dig a mass grave yesterday for those of his men who’d been claimed.

  As he rode, Manek’s eyes were drawn to the walls of Dannawey. He drove himself mad wondering what the inside of the city looked like, wondering if he’d ever know. Those walls, as Lord Gowan had promised what seemed an age ago, held firm. There were sections that had seen damage, some holes made, but the closest they had ever come to breeching it was mounting an occasional iron ladder and getting men up onto the ramparts. It’d quickly become Manek’s least favorite strategy; the Highlanders pitched hot tar on the men climbing up any successfully mounted ladder. Manek himself had killed one tarred man after hours of stripping tar and skin made him beg for death.

  His path took him past a shattered catapult, lying abandoned along the outskirts of Larn’s camp. They had only one left, and even when all of them were in use, they’d barely shaken Dannawey’s wall. Having long since run out of sizeable boulders to hurl at the wall, they were reduced to flinging balls of tarred grass and igniting them just before launching. Whatever damage they inflicted on the city within was negligible.

  It seemed no matter what they used against the city, the Highlanders only raised their chins a little higher in challenge. In some ways it was admirable, but no less maddening.

  Dismounting, Manek handed Oren’s reins to the young page waiting to take them. The boy was pale, his lips rimmed in blue, and he shivered against the cold Highland mist that settled on them each night. Drawing the last hunk of bread from his pocket, Manek offered it to the boy, who took it greedily.

  Assembled in Larn’s tent were the customary group of captains and warlords. But the tent had long since lost its warmth and gusto; now it stood gaunt, like the dwindling men who gathered there each day.

  Larn’s eyes flicked up to mark Manek’s entrance but then returned to the map spread out before them. Dannawey was barely visible anymore under all the marks and stratagem.

  “Tell me you have something,” Larn said in a hoarse voice as Manek walked over to join the others.

  He came to stand beside Waurin, who gave him a nod. Long lines ran beneath Waurin’s eyes, which seemed to have sunk further into his skull. His gray pallor and unkempt hair wasn’t unique, the other captains wearing similar badges of fatigue and defeat. Some looked to him as they awaited a new strategy. A few seemed to beg him to tell Larn the truth.

  When Manek said nothing, Larn, not looking up, began making a circle with his forefinger around Dannawey. “We still haven’t discovered their supply chain?” he said.

  “The scouts you sent haven’t returned yet,” said Dorran.

  “For all we know they could be dead,” said one of Larn’s warlords, Harvad.

  “We’ll send more,” Larn said.

  “Destroying their link with the north would be the surest way to demoralize them,” said Manek finally, his voice sounding as if it came from someone else. “However, there’s no telling how long it’d take to bring the city to its knees that way.”

  “It’s a large city—over sixty thousand, if your estimates were correct,” said Larn. “A city this size can’t bear such a burden for long.”

  “But we can never account for the spirit of its people. They’ve stood against us this long. It’s reasonable to assume they’d resist us until the last rat was eaten, and maybe even longer after that.”

  “I’ve no mind to let any of them live,” said Larn. “A city of dead suits me just fine.”

  “Our best hope would be to starve them out through a winter, but we ourselves can’t last that long.”

  Larn’s finger ran down to Scallya. “A new caravan should be arriving any day. Our supplies won’t run out.”

  “Perhaps, but the men will.”

  A flash of anger lit Larn’s eyes, and it was the first show of emotion Manek had seen from Lord Midland in some days. Behind him, Verian made a sound that Manek could only call a hiss.

  Larn himself chose not to respond, but Verian, ever watchful of a chance to please his father, took a step forward and said, “There will be men enough. Plague comes and goes.”

  Manek bit the inside of his cheek to keep the retort firmly in his throat. Why had Dea seen fit to spare Verian of this plague?

  “We’ve lost some men, but—”

  “Two thousand and fifty-six,” Manek told the Midland lordling, though he looked at Larn instead. “Over a tenth of our forces.”

  “I’ll send for men from Scallya.” Larn nodded at his warlords from the Gray Hills. “You’ll do the same.”

  If it was possible, the warlords turned grayer at the prospect.

  “With reinforcements, we’ll choke Dannawey and bring it to its knees.”

  “We can’t wait that long,” Manek insisted again. “Even if the plague claims no one else and you bring thousands more men, we’ll have given them time to send for reinforcements of their own. Just because King Dunstan is here doesn’t mean his whole army is. And what of the other Highland cities?”

  “Enough,” Larn growled.

  But Manek had already begun, and there was no stopping it now. Not when his heart beat painfully in his chest from knowing to stop now would condemn them all. “They know we’re weak—they’ve only to look down from their walls and see the plague pits. Waiting may weaken them, but it will hurt us more. If their reinforcements come, what’s to stop them from overpowering us? It’s too much of a gamble.”

  The tent was silent as everyone held their breath.

  Slowly Larn raised his gaze to fix him with an ugly glare. Manek tried to keep his face impassive but knew it was flushed with heat.

  “To stay and wait,” he bit out, despite feeling Waurin tense beside him, “is to kill us all.”

  Larn’s hands slammed down on the table in a shock of noise. “Then think of something!” he roared. “Don’t stand there and preach—find me a way in, conquer this damn city, or so help me, I’ll turn this army south!”

  Even with Waurin’s hand on his shoulder, Manek stepped forward, his own hands slapping onto the table. “Have you considered this city wasn’t meant to be taken? Look at your army,” he spat. “Defeated, disease-ridden. The gods are against us, and soon the season will be too.”

  “The only one against us is you!” Verian accused with flashing eyes.

  “I’m starting to think you don’t want to take Dannawey, M
anek,” agreed Larn. His eyes narrowed. “Have your Highland women been whispering in your ear?”

  “You’re supposed to stick them, not the other way around,” Verian said with an ugly upturn of his mouth. “Father, really, this dog has outlived his usefulness.”

  Larn gave Manek an appraising look, eyes flicking from his head to his toes.

  “If this campaign has any hope, it isn’t here. Do you want to take the Highlands?” Manek hissed.

  Larn’s frown was his only answer.

  “If you want to keep some of your men alive, head east,” Manek said, jabbing a finger at the Gray Hills. “Go east, regroup, restock on supplies, then swing north. Find a place to cross the De’lan, and then flank Ells itself. With luck, we’d catch the city without King Dunstan and unprepared for an attack.”

  “You’d have us run? Abandon Dannawey?” Verian demanded.

  He ran an agitated hand through his hair. “It won’t matter if you take Ells!”

  “I won’t bow to this city—it won’t defeat me,” Larn bellowed. “If you can’t take it for me, then I don’t need you.” He pointed a finger at Waurin. “You’ll assume command of my Lowland forces. I strip Manek of his rank. He’s to be in the front lines for each attack—do you understand?”

  Waurin said nothing, only looked at that accusing finger still pointed at him with a sort of choked horror. It was a death sentence for Manek at best.

  “Keep your Lowlanders in line, and I’ll take this city myself. If we can’t afford to wait them out,” he said as his eyes met Manek’s, “then we’ll speed the process. Gather the dead out of the plague pits and put them in the catapult. We’ll see how long they last with this plague for a bedfellow.”

  “You can’t do—”

  “I am warlord here, dog. Now get out of my sight!”

  Manek turned on his heels and stormed from the tent. Already bile burned the back of his throat.

  This was no longer a siege. If plague-infested bodies were flung across the wall, then this became a race. The victor would be the last to succumb. Until then, they could only wait and die.