by Tom Lloyd
‘Snipers!’ Kas yelled. ‘Into the way-station!’
‘Hold!’ the lieutenant roared back. ‘None of you enter!’
More guns appeared on the way-station wall. Here on the border of Brethren territory it was a stopping point for travellers but also a garrisoned fort. The Cards might outnumber the troops there, but they were out in the open.
‘We’re being shot at!’ Anatin shouted back.
The lieutenant wrenched his horse around, waving his troops back to the way-station. ‘No one enters when there’s gunfire!’ he replied. ‘If you try, we will kill you all!’
‘Lynx,’ Toil wheezed, lurching drunkenly over her horse’s neck. ‘Pocket.’
He stared at her blankly for a while, hand pressed over the wound in her shoulder. Then another icer zipped past, the white trail flashing barely a foot past Anatin’s face. It stirred him into action. Lynx fumbled at her coat, knowing what she meant, and pulled something from it. Without waiting he gave a shout to attract the lieutenant’s attention and tossed the object over. The man impassively watched it fall before his eyes suddenly widened.
‘What? Is that—?’
‘It is. That’s what we’ve brought you – lots of ’em!’
The young man gasped. ‘You’ve brought us war with the Knights-Artificer!’
Anatin gave a mad cackle. ‘Then give the fucking thing back and we’ll take our chances elsewhere.’
‘No! Wait.’ He paused only a moment, shock and the implications clashing with the realisation setting in that before him was an actual piece of the god he worshipped, Veraimin. It lay on the ground, dull and faintly yellow in the daylight. He scrambled from his horse and snatched the God Fragment up.
‘More?’
‘Lots!’ Anatin yelled. A horse screamed as he spoke and staggered sideways before finding its balance. Lynx looked behind them but could see nothing. Clearly they were shooting at the edge of their range, but whoever it was had to be good.
‘Veraimin forgive me,’ the lieutenant muttered before waving them forward. ‘Come on, inside!’
‘Ah fuck,’ Toil groaned. ‘I don’t feel so good.’
With that she started to topple again. On the other side of her Aben had ridden up and he grabbed Toil by the scruff of the neck, hauling her across his lap. Lynx shoved her backside to help and disentangled one leg from a stirrup before grabbing the reins of her horse.
The rest of the Cards were already running for safety.
Chapter 7
The Cards clattered into the way-station’s oblong yard. Open-faced stables big enough for wagons took up three-quarters of the ground around a central shrine to Veraimin. A warehouse and bunkhouse occupied the far side, behind which were the tower and garrison barracks.
The clatter of an attack alarm had started to peal before they were inside and, as Lynx looked around, a few whipcracks of return fire snapped out from the wall. He slid from his horse and abandoned the beast as he made to draw his gun. Before he could, Anatin yelled out.
‘Red Scarves – hold! Stow your guns!’
Lynx glanced around, frozen in motion. The Brethren troops running for the wall had stopped, mage-guns levelled and uncertain what was going on. There was a moment of confusion – space enough for all of the cold hells to break out – before a Brethren officer bellowed for the men and women to get moving.
‘Lieutenant, what’s going on?’ the officer roared, storming down the wooden stair from the wall. ‘Who are they?’
‘Mercenaries, Major, but …’ The lieutenant faltered. ‘Sir, look.’
He waited until the major had reached him then opened his hand to reveal the God Fragment.
His superior stopped dead. She was a big woman, as big as Lynx but with a rather more tailored fit to her uniform. A scarred face showed she was no stranger to battle, but the sight of a God Fragment left her momentarily dumbfounded.
‘Veraimin’s breath,’ the major gasped at last. ‘Can it be true?’
‘She says they have others,’ the lieutenant went on, pointing at Toil. ‘Then the gunfire started.’
‘Who’s out there?’ the major roared, half-turning back to the wall.
‘Can’t see, sir,’ shouted back a woman who stood hunched low at an embrasure. ‘They’re well hidden.’
‘They’re Knights-Artificer,’ Anatin supplied. ‘Followed us all the way from Siquil.’
‘What sort of howling insanity is this?’ the major yelled back. ‘You’ve ripped off the tinkers and dragged an army to our door?’
Lynx blinked at the nickname he’d never heard before, but before anyone could respond Toil gave a howl.
‘Someone find me some bloody brandy!’ she demanded as Aben eased her from his horse. Lynx went to support her while the man dismounted. Between the two of them they eased her to the churned earth floor.
‘Who’s this? Where’s Doctor Nonan?’
The major’s questions went unanswered but a balding, bearded man in his fifties rushed over, still tying a white apron around his waist as he went. Himbel appeared a moment later and joined him.
‘I’ll fetch Sitain—’
‘Shut up and get some fucking brandy!’ Toil broke in. Himbel blinked at her then nodded, realising even in her pain their leader had worked out they shouldn’t advertise there were mages in their midst. The surgeon, Nonan, probed her shoulder and provoked a scream of pain, followed by a litany of threats.
The Brethren major watched impassively. ‘What did you think was going to happen when you stole from the people who make the best long-range guns in the Riven Kingdom?’
‘I thought I was going to ride faster’n them,’ Toil spat back as her jacket was cut open.
‘Is it true – do you have more?’
‘We do,’ Anatin answered for her. He pulled another from his pocket, this one pure white – a fragment of Insar. ‘The whole contents of Siquil’s charnel vault, or at least most of it. We might have missed some.’
‘How many?’
‘Twenty-six.’
‘And what do you intend to do with them?’
Anatin gave him a bright smile. ‘They’re a gift, didn’t you get that bit?’
‘A gift?’ the major echoed, not hiding her suspicion. ‘For the Brethren of the Shards? Was it going to be a gift before the Knights-Artificer tracked you down and started shooting?’
‘Always the plan,’ Toil croaked from down by their feet. ‘They’re priceless in both senses o’ the word, unless you’ve got someone willing and able to pay for them.’
‘And what if we now hand you over to the Knights-Artificer?’
‘We’re not what they want, not really. So yeah, you could, but what then? The Brethren ain’t got the biggest army and I don’t know if you noticed, but some of the Orders aren’t playing by the old rules.’
‘Some Orders, not all of them,’ the major corrected in a strangely prim tone for a veteran soldier. ‘Until now, that didn’t include the Knights-Artificer – or the Brethren.’
‘Aye, your lot are a bit slow it’s true, but we won’t hold that against you,’ Anatin said. ‘We’ve given you a little nudge into the new age. That’s all.’
‘There’s no putting this devil back in its bottle,’ Toil added through gritted teeth. ‘The sooner the Brethren realise that, the more likely they are to survive.’
‘You make decisions on behalf of the Brethren of the Shards?’ she growled. ‘Are you truly so foolish?’
Toil laughed at that, though from her face it was plain the movement cost her dearly. ‘We’ve been called worse,’ she agreed. ‘But mercenaries need to know which way the wind’s blowing if they’re going to survive.’
‘Ain’t that sailors?’ Anatin asked, unable to resist.
‘Same thing,’ she said. ‘Similar morals an’ hygiene. Same instinct on when to jump ship. Point is, Major, that your friends out there, the tinkers, are done. They just don’t know it yet.’
‘Done?’
Toil n
odded. ‘The Orders are turning on each other. We hear Jarrazir’s changed the game and there’s no space for honour between … well, whatever you call a dozen armies of priests with mage-guns. The Charnelers are already on the move and swallowing up their neighbours. Word is the Knights of the Sacred Mountain took Gazhan City last month. The Knights-Scholar of Althain have been subsumed and every city of Lake Salathir has a direct governor now – no pretence of independence from the Protectors of Light.’
‘And you choose to make this worse?’
‘Best thing for everyone is that the Knights-Artificer don’t have any God Fragments once the Charnelers chew through them.’
The major was quiet a long while. Even in the security of their position, which spanned a dozen cities throughout the lakes, Lae Valley and away to the north-east, the Brethren couldn’t afford to ignore what was going on. The Knights-Artificer strongholds would indeed be vulnerable to Charneler aggression.
‘Why get involved? Why you? To win a commission from my Order? There are other ways. Easier ways.’
‘Yeah, but I’m impatient,’ Anatin said. ‘This way’s quicker.’
‘Plus we’re on the Charnelers’ shitlist after Jarrazir,’ Toil added through gritted teeth. ‘Best we find a patron Order with reason to like us – deepest fucking black, are you a doctor or a butcher? – best this war gets won by an Order that understands reason.’
‘You were at Jarrazir?’
‘Aye, hired by the Monarch,’ Anatin added while Toil writhed in Lynx’s grip. ‘We didn’t do a lot of fighting, but somehow the Charnelers have taken it personally.’
‘You seem to be building a list of Orders in that vein.’
‘It’s our lovable nature and gentle sense of humour,’ Anatin beamed.
The major grunted and stared off into the distance for a few moments. The gunfire had tailed off. Even snipers at a distance had to know they were tracing a line back to themselves. Whatever ingenious long-range guns they had, they couldn’t know if their enemies had some too. Lynx knew the weapons were incredibly expensive, but there was still the usual problem with selling guns – that they ended up in the hands of other people.
‘Show me the fragments,’ the major said at last. ‘Let me see what we’re risking war for.’
Lynx and Aben carried Toil into the nearby officers’ quarters where Doctor Nonan cleared the polished dining table for her. It was a wide room, well lit by two large windows that faced into the main yard and luxurious compared to the rest of the way-station. More like a nobleman’s hunting lodge than anything else. Paintings adorned the wall, cut glasses and gleaming crockery stood in a side cabinet above a variety of bottles imported from all directions.
The major finally introduced herself as Major Elsail. Names, real and fake, were exchanged as the various Knights of the company, now sporting sergeant stripes, came in carrying their packs. Toil had split the fragments after one night of disturbing dreams. Atieno had insisted that no one person carried many of the shards and Toil had agreed, muttering ‘Jang-Her’.
It’d taken Lynx a while to recall a conversation the mages had had in Jarrazir, regarding the first conclave of the Militant Orders at a place called Jang-Her. There, a huge number of God Fragments had been brought together and some people had gone mad, others had recalled ancient events or learned to translate the extinct and forgotten Duegar language.
‘Your shoulder’s broken,’ the surgeon told Toil as the last of the fragments was unearthed and set on a side table. ‘It looks clean though. I can wash and stitch the wound, but if there’s going to be an attack I need to get ready.’
‘Go,’ Toil said. ‘Himbel can stitch it fine.’
While Himbel investigated the drinks cabinet for something to disinfect the wound and probably his mouth too, Major Elsail did a count to confirm the number of fragments.
‘This is all?’
‘You think we’ve kept some back?’ Toil asked, having done exactly that. ‘If I had, they’d be buried out on the road. I’m hardly likely to walk in here with one shoved up my arse.’
‘Hmm.’ The major shook her head. ‘This is … wondrous.’ Her fingers brushed the largest of the yellow-tinted shards, as tentatively as a young woman taking her love’s hand for the first time.
‘Worth fighting for, I think you’ll agree.’
The Brethren officer straightened, as though rejuvenated by the reminder. ‘Yes,’ she declared. ‘Yes it is.’
Directing the lieutenant who’d first admitted them to remain, Major Elsail left to see to the defence whereupon the Cards sank into the chairs scattered around the room.
‘What do we do now?’ Safir asked.
‘We wait,’ Anatin said with a shrug. ‘Maybe give Himbel a hand too.’ He got up again and took a sniff of the bottle Himbel had used to soak his needle and thread in. Whatever was in there seemed to meet his satisfaction. Before the lieutenant could say a word Anatin took a swig from the glass Himbel had used.
‘Tastes a bit like needle and thread,’ he complained, going back for another swallow anyway.
‘Start in on the major’s personal stock and you’ll see yourselves outside these walls fast enough,’ the lieutenant advised.
‘Some of us should go out there anyway, mebbe,’ Lynx commented and gripped Toil’s shoulders as Himbel got ready to stitch the wound. She slapped his hands away and told Himbel to get busy.
‘To kill those scouts?’ Toil mused, trying to get her mind off the needle. ‘Or find out how far off the rest are?’
‘Dunno. I just don’t like being pinned down here.’
‘I do!’ Anatin interrupted, raising his glass. ‘This is decent stuff.’
‘You’re happy to just sit here?’
‘Until we’re being paid to fight? Abso-bloody-lutely. If there’s an attack we may offer our services, but we’ve handed over more’n enough for free today.’
‘How did you get them?’ broke in the lieutenant. ‘The fragments? You didn’t just barge in waving guns around, so how?’
Toil grimaced in a way that was probably meant to be a smile until a needle got pushed through her skin. ‘A lady never gives away her little secrets.’
‘The Conclave will want to know,’ he said. ‘The major too, if she’s to argue your case.’
‘Who says she’s invited?’
The lieutenant laughed. ‘Do you think you have a choice? This haul is a miracle – it will earn her a promotion most likely. She will make sure to accompany it all the way to the presence of the Conclave to make sure her prize isn’t stolen away by someone else.’
‘You religious types are an inspiration,’ Anatin muttered into his glass. ‘So selfless and devoted to matters of the spirit.’
‘It was a Duegar artefact,’ Toil said after a moment’s deliberation. ‘One that gave me an advantage they didn’t expect. I’ve done a bit of relic hunting in my time and found this toy a few years back.’
‘What does it do?’
‘I ain’t telling,’ she insisted. ‘And don’t bother searching our kit. I buried the thing on our way here. It’s a small advantage but it’s mine and I don’t mean to share.’
‘That’s for damn sure,’ Anatin added, filling his glass. ‘None of the rest of us have even touched the thing. She’s the jealous type.’
‘Aren’t you the company commander?’ the lieutenant asked, confused.
‘Yeah,’ Anatin said darkly. ‘You’d think that meant these bastards did what I said, but it hardly ever turns out that way.’
The lieutenant was quiet for a moment, digesting the information while the sound of shouted orders and boots came from outside. Eventually, he looked up again. ‘And you just walked into their charnel vault? It was as easy as that?’
‘Hardly easy,’ Toil exclaimed. ‘Almost got my face shot off for a start, but … well, we were lucky. They didn’t protect the thing properly because they thought it was a secret but I’d heard a rumour. When I got my toy I decided to dig a bit deepe
r.’
Anatin nodded. ‘Aye, secret vaults are best made by mages who’re never leaving the sanctuary anyway. No specialist equipment or engineers need to travel that way and Siquil’s factory produces a good number of earth-bolts.’
Major Elsail returned looking harassed, but she couldn’t keep the animation from her voice too. They all knew this haul could be the making of her career if she handled it well – and that would make her a valuable ally for the mercenaries who’d brought it about.
‘There’s no sign of the rest,’ Elsail announced. ‘The scouts are still there, but we’ve got snipers of our own so they’re keeping their heads down.’
‘What’s your plan?’ Anatin asked. ‘If you don’t mind me asking.’
‘Riders have gone through the rear gate,’ she said. ‘The garrison at Otsdan will relieve us soon.’
‘Not going to try to negotiate?’
‘To what end? They’ll want your heads, but that won’t satisfy them unless there’s a God Fragment shoved in each mouth.’
‘Which you’re not inclined to do?’ Anatin asked hopefully.
‘Not the latter part, certainly,’ Elsail said. ‘I’m sending squads out to flank them and force the snipers back – I want a squad of you mercenaries out with them.’
‘Does that mean we’re employed? I hate to be dull about these things, but …’
‘There are discretionary funds available for the time being,’ Elsail confirmed. ‘Either way, I’m going to kick ten of you out of the door soon. If I’m reducing my troop numbers here, I don’t mean to leave the armed strangers at full strength.’
‘I guess we’ll take the discretionary fund then. Plenty of time to haggle over prices afterwards. Safir, go represent our company’s good name out on the field. We’ll do the same here.’
The afternoon passed without incident or even a shot fired so far as Lynx was aware. The mercenaries got their horses stabled and kit stowed safely. Major Elsail ordered a few gunracks to be dragged out of the barracks for them, helpfully providing somewhere to store their weapons in plain view of the garrison. For his part, Anatin led by example and stretched out on a spare bunk to catch some sleep. It wasn’t long before half the company were doing the same.