The Dark Lord

by Thomas Harlan

  Muttering old words, passed down from priest to priest from the time of the Drowning, Nephet slammed his staff into the earth, fist jerking in the air, clutching at emptiness, then opening in a hard, sharp motion towards the shifting, immaterial titan. A jagged arc flashed in the air, arrowing into the thing's side. There was an efflorescence of rainbow color—blotting out the sun, casting wild shadows in all directions—and the jackal screamed, overcome. The shape toppled over, crashing against the failing pale gold wall. Cracks rippled across the ephemeral surface, then the wards closed, adapting to the blow, sliding together again.

  Nephet gasped, feeling his old heart race, and found himself on all fours, sweat pouring from his thin body. That was too much, he thought vaguely. Mud under his fingers smoked and steamed. He was glowing, shedding a hot radiance from every pore. The pit of his stomach was cramping, his spine burning like a star. I've got to rest. Just for a moment...

  The jackal shuddered, splitting into three indistinct, wavering shapes for an instant, then rushed back together again. Those few Roman thaumaturges still alive attacked, whirling white sparks igniting in the jackal's shadow shape. Brilliant rays lanced out from each impact, eating away at the shadow. Again, the jackal convulsed, a broken mirror showing three distorted images. Nephet raised his head, snarling in delight. Clutching the staff, he forced himself to his feet, though the ancient, well-burnished wood charred at his touch. Now we have it! he exulted. It's not one monster, but three magi!

  Nephet felt another priest of Horus strike, then beheld a rippling distortion blur across the field, sweeping around the faint patterns of watchtowers, walls, the hot spike of a scorpion winding back to hurl an iron bolt into the Persian ranks. Swiftly, seeing his chance, the old Egyptian slashed the air with his staff, glowing green traces shining in the void as he etched a sign of power. A viridian glyph formed, spinning out of infinity, a triangle broken into three, then into three, then into... Nephet wrenched his perception away from the abyss opening before him. He felt thin, attenuated, and realized the native power in the earth around him had guttered out, exhausted by the conflagration. Oh, great god Horus, fill me with your strength! Strike down your old enemy, the father-murderer, the eater of the dead!

  The staff disintegrated, falling away from his hand as ash. His flesh withered, tightening to the bone.

  Nephet forced his hands together and down, the triangular abyss compressing in an echo of his movement. Then, straining, his will fading, he shoved at the air, the blazing glyph leaping away, flashing across the field in an instant. Iridescent with power, the Eye of Horus slammed into the jackal, even as it rose, reformed, shadow shape solidifying into ebon muscle and sinew. The white sparks splashed away, unable to penetrate the revivified colossus.

  Then the burning, lidless eye intersected with the dark god.

  A half-sphere of darkness flared into existence as the glyph collided with a glassy surface. Then the glyph separated into three, then three again. In the blink of an eye, the sphere was engulfed in blazing green fire. Nephet held his breath, woozy, unable to stand. A shockwave ripped through the hidden world as the glyphs condensed with a ringing bang! Nephet was thrown back, crashing into a fragment of the battle ward. He slid to the ground, blinded by a blue-green flare.

  The jackal was gone. The golden filaments of the battle ward scattered, driven by unseen winds. The old Egyptian blinked up at the sky, his eye drawn into the void behind the stars. Dizzy, his mind tried to grasp the totality revealed in the abyss, filled with whirling disks of glowing light, of great oblate spheres of fire, of endless darkness.

  Fool—making a student's mistake! Part of his mind gibbering in fear, he wrenched his attention away. The chaos of stars faded and Nephet realized his face was wet. A ghostly, barely visible, hand rose to touch his face and his fingers came away slick with glistening blood. The shape of the Caesar Aurelian loomed over him, a white outline against the jewel-bright sky. A crown of translucent golden holly gleamed on the Roman's head and shades hovered close around the prince, guarding him from evil. They smiled down at Nephet, lambent eyes shining, teeth white and sharp.

  Why didn't I see you before? he wondered, raising a hand to the mother wolf curling around Aurelian's insubstantial feet. A prickly tongue licked his fingers clean, her breath hot on his hand. Old grim-faced men, clean-shaven, hovered around the prince, ghostly javelins and swords making a barrier of steel. But the red-beard cannot see you, Nephet realized, his thoughts becoming vague, his limbs heavy with sleep. And I, only now...

  The priest's heart stuttered, then stopped. Blood moved weakly in his body, but his mind was already falling into darkness. The shape of Aurelian pressed stout fingers against a frail, old neck—then shook its head. Nephet's physicality began to decay, even as he grew cold and still on the broken ground.

  Across the ramparts, fires raged where the glyph had shattered through black glass. Even in the physical world, the dead lay in windrows, the fighting wall toppled, bricks sizzling with heat. Three bodies lay where one colossus had struggled. Arad crumpled in a crater of vaporized brick and mud, his powerful limbs splayed on the ground, Odenathus and Zoë cast aside, faces slack in unconsciousness. Steam hissed from the earth, silt and mud boiling.

  The few remaining priests of Horus crept from the battlefield, wounded and exhausted, most barely able to move. Some—blessed with servants—were borne away in litters. Others lay fallen, struck down in the struggle or stunned by the tremendous blast. Only Zoë, sprawled on the slope of the rampart, head hanging over the lip of the canal, showed any sign of life, her breast rising and falling, hand moving weakly, as she tried to rise up.

  —|—

  Splinters dug into Sextus' hand, though the pain was barely noticeable against a rush of bloodfire coursing through him. Gasping for breath, he scrambled up the last section of ladder onto the mirror platform. The round, silvered disk was a man's height and blazed with a shimmering reflection of the noon sun. The metal surface was suspended in a wooden frame mounted on an iron wheel. Two Egyptian boys squatted on either side, faces wrapped with cloth, staring at him in surprise.

  "You two," the engineer snapped, "swing the disk 'round to flash the dam!"

  Stung by the fierce tone in his voice, the boys worked quickly, each working the arm of a screw mechanism to raise the disk. Sextus forced himself to lean back against the railing, out of the way, upper body hanging out over a dizzying sixty-foot drop. His knuckles turned white with strain while the boys rotated the screw, raising the disk a hand span. The metal ring at the base of the disk was freed from a locking pin on either side and one boy turned the disk—now rotating freely—toward the south. The other squinted across the muddy canals, over a huge, spreading swamp filled with glistening bogs, stands of green cane, acres of meandering waterway and drooping, thin-leaved trees.

  Away through the mist rising from the wetland, Sextus caught a flash of light, a bright spark cutting through dirty gray haze. The lookout yelped at the same time, pointing, and both boys began making delicate adjustments to the orientation and incline of the disk.

  A thudding boom echoed through the air and the engineer spun, heart thudding with fear, staring back to the north. From this southern elevation, even through trailing columns of smoke and dust, he could see both canals receding into the distance, straight as a plumb bob. The placement of the ramparts, their square-walled bastions, the even occurrence of watchtowers, the geometric efficiency of the fortifications was pleasingly regular.

  A wave of flame billowed into the air—to Sextus' eye, an expanding sphere of overpressure as clear as the sun itself—blowing back smoke and dust with terrific force. Watchtowers swayed drunkenly in the hot gale, and secondary fires sparked as it passed. He saw something enormous and dark—the god?—stagger, then collapse toward the ground, vanishing like dew.

  Within moments, while the boys sweated to adjust the disk, tremendous heat washed over the tower, making Sextus turn away, arm raised to shield his face
. The mirror tower trembled, logs groaning, the disk rattling in its frame. Both Egyptians cried out, startled, and threw themselves onto the iron supports, clutching for dear life. The engineer hunkered down, letting the hot wind blow past, then looked again to the north.

  Everything was in confusion. Even at this distance he could see tiny, still forms of the dead littering the ground. Sickened, his eyes darted to the breach in the first wall. A mass of Persians—their tan, yellow and brown cloaks clear to see—were forcing their way through the gap.

  Oh gods! What do I do now? Sextus looked desperately to Aurelian's command post. The inner bastion was shrouded in smoke. Flames leapt up from hidden fires. Are they dead? Has Caesar fallen?

  "Centurion?" One of the Egyptians clutched his arm. Sextus felt the world freeze, time sliding to a sickening halt. The boy's voice was hoarse with fear. "What message, Centurion? What message?"

  —|—

  Scorching wind roared against Khalid's face, blinding him. Shocked by the massive plume of light and heat rising over the Roman fortifications, the Arab hastily threw himself to the ground. A long, drawn out, rumbling crack of thunder echoed over the ramparts and canals, finally dying into a mutter over the desert. Cautious, Khalid looked up into silence and saw the smoke and fog gone, cleared away by the rush of wind. Less than twenty yards ahead, the Sahaba cowering in the rubble of the fallen wall stirred. Like Khalid, they had flattened with the explosion. The Roman legionaries peered back at them from the shelter of their shields. Even the Roman archers had fallen quiet and the air was free of whistling shafts.

  "Men of Persia! With me!" Khalid bellowed into the silence, beating out the stentorian cry of a dozen Roman centurions by only heartbeats. The young Arab leapt up, shrugging the shield on his left arm into a secure grip, the ebon blade of the city whirling around his head. Hundreds of Persians and fresh Sahaban fighters surged up from the canal with a great shout and together they rushed into the breach. On the jagged ramparts to either side, more Persian diquans scrambled up the slope, a basso roar of "the Boar! the Boar!" ringing out.

  Jalal loped alongside Khalid, his great bow strung. The young Arab stormed into the midst of the melee, where legionaries and Sahaban spearmen grappled in combat. A swift gray arrow, then another, whipped past Khalid as he ran, taking a legionary in the throat and eye only instants before the blade of night sheared through the man's guard and into his upper arm. Khalid shouted with glee, flashing a quick grin of thanks at the giant bowman, then the ebon edge of the sword flicked up, driving away a Roman's thrust.

  The legionary overextended, his foot slipping on the broken ground, and Khalid turned sharply, arm lashing out, the keen edge of the sword cracking through a leather gorget and into the man's collarbone. Blood sprayed across the side of the soldier's face, then Khalid kicked him away. The Sahaba and the Persians pressed forward, driving back the stunned Romans. The young Arab saw the legionaries still suffering from the blast, which had struck them from behind, killing many and setting some afire.

  A huge wedge of Shahr-Baraz's pushtigbahn crashed into the Romans along the northern roadway, their lamellar foot-to-crown iron armor proof against the legionary spears and swords. The Immortals chanted in unison, a hoarse, booming roar like the storm-tossed sea against a rocky shore. Khalid grinned again—the pushtigbahn swept the disordered legionaries back, capturing another hundred feet of roadway and rampart. On his side of the breach, the Sahaba—now reinforced by Jalal and the more heavily armed and armored soldiers of the qalb—also gained ground.

  With the smoke and fog blown back, Khalid could see across the second canal. The bastion whose siege engines had been hurling stones, burning pitch and iron bolts into their attack was afire. The jackal-god was gone, leaving a huge, blackened scar on the earthen rampart. The Roman mangonels and scorpions were burning, their watchtowers wrapped in flame. New smoke billowed up into the sky. Confusion, it seemed, reigned along the second line of defense as well.

  He looked down, gauging the distance across the dry canal—another fifty feet of soft earth, spotted with muddy pools and wandering triangular fences of sharpened stakes—with a grimace. The Romans had planned well. He could lead his men across the canal, slopping through heavy mud and break down the obstructing fences, but this would take time. He squinted at the bastion and rampart opposite, then froze in alarm.

  Roman troops appeared along the wall, looking about in stunned surprise, the sun glinting from their helmets. Already, men were working in the huge scar, piling up earth and broken beams, hastily building a barricade of ashy brick and wagons. Below them, below their archers and sharp-eyed centurions, a pair of figures lay on the slope, unmoving, unnoticed.

  Zoë! Khalid thought, feeling his gut turn over with nausea, and Odenathus. Are they dead?

  —|—

  "Great Mars, how poorly we've served you today..." Aurelian wiped soot from his eyes, hands black with ash. A small, bewildered group of Praetorians clustered around him, long cavalry swords drawn, faces and armor dusted dark gray. They were nervous—no Roman soldier was pleased to face magic and no one had never faced anything like this. Aurelian felt ill himself, off-balance and out of his depth. Watching the life drain from the priest of Horus had been wrenching. The hawk-faced man had seemed solid as old granite before the jackal stormed over the rampart, all smoke and fire and its single burning eye. "Runners! Where are my runners?"

  One of the Praetorians turned, face white, his mouth tight with fear. "Dead, my lord."

  Aurelian cursed, then took a breath to steady himself and scrambled up onto the remains of the fighting step running around the bastion. The explosion in the sky—whatever had struck down the jackal—had been devastating in the enclosed space below. Aurelian guessed he lived only due to luck and stout armor, but the crews on the siege engines, his couriers, and the priests had been without protection. Many now lay dead in heaps across the smoking, cracked earth.

  Worse, the slope before him was stripped bare of stakes and entangling brush and a huge crevice split open the earthwork. The core of brick and wood had collapsed, the packed dirt falling away. Huge sections were fused into brittle, yellow-green glass. The fighting wall on the summit of the rampart was either on fire or blown down. Cautiously, Aurelian peered around the shoulder of a broken timber. Persian soldiers scrambled down into the dry canal, tan robes bright against the dark, muddy earth. The fighting in the breach on the first wall was dying down—the Persians driving back the legionaries on either side and pouring through the gap in a huge crowd.

  "You'll have to do then," Aurelian barked, sliding back down the fighting step. "Manius, run to the seventh and eighth cohorts, they're waiting in reserve on the old road—get them here now. The enemy will try and rush the bastion, try to break through the broken section of the wall. Gnaeus, there are reserves on the first wall..." The prince pointed north, across the canal. The nearest forward bastion was already under attack from the inner road, robed figures climbing the sloping sides under a flitting cloud of arrows and javelins. "...in each strong point. Tell each bastion commander to detach one cohort and rush them to the breach. Titus—you go south of the attack—tell those commanders the same."

  The three guardsmen sprinted off without a word. The other Praetorians leaned close, faces grim. The prince felt a strange disassociation between his thoughts—a swift torrent of considerations and decisions, his mind leaping ahead across hours, days, weeks—and the smoky air, the screams of the wounded, the peculiar brittle quality in the sky. He glanced over his shoulder again—the Persians were toiling across the canal in a mob. "The rest of you... gather up all the men you can find... shore up that wall; one of those scorpions is unharmed, get it working!"

  Aurelian felt surety seize him, his confusion vanishing in a hard, bright instant of decision. His voice cleared, the hoarseness fading, ringing out. Everywhere within sight soldiers stiffened, looking towards him. The fear and confusion in their faces disappeared.

  "Archers t
o the wall!" he boomed. "Don't let the Persians reach us in good order! Get the wounded back and hale men forward!"

  —|—

  Khalid gasped for breath, feet slipping in the loose, muddy earth. Persian diquans climbed past, the sun—slanting through clouds of dust and smoke—blazing from their swords and maces. The Arab took hold of a charred Roman stake and levered himself up another yard. A crowd of Sahaban fighters and pushtigbahn clambered past, silent and grim. A lone arrow snapped overhead. Behind Khalid, horns wailed in the heavy air. A glance over his shoulder revealed golden banners pouring through the break in the outer wall. Thousands of fresh Persian troops were coming up.

  "Shields!" A cry echoed down from the top of the fortification. Metal and wood clashed, and a sudden wall of legionary shields appeared, horsetail helmet plumes dancing above the square-edged scuta. Khalid gathered himself, then sprinted up the slope, ash puffing up as he ran. The pushtigbahn and the Sahaba rushed forward as well, cloaks slapping against armor, breath loud and hoarse in the suddenly still air. The Romans tensed as well, the edges of their shields clanking one against the other.

  "Throw!" a deep, bull-voice shouted and the Persians and Arabs threw themselves down, pressing against the earth, crouching behind their shields. Javelins flickered in the sky, falling among the attackers with a ringing clang. Immediately, the Arab soldiers rose and rushed forward again. Down on the floor of the canal, hundreds of their fellows raised a wild shout.

  "Allau ak-bar!" the Sahaba screamed, charging up the last yards into the Roman lines.

  Khalid scuttled sideways, ducking instinctively as a flight of arrows flashed up from the canal. The Arab archers were shooting blind, lofting their shafts high above the rampart, letting the arrows fall into the space behind the line of battle. Khalid ignored them and the men struggling along the crest of the wall—everything but the shattered earth in front of him. He slipped over the lip of the crater, wincing at the heat radiating out of the burned, glassy earth.