by Simon Brown
This was the third such place they had found like this since leaving Koegrah with his small unit of a hundred foot soldiers and fifty cavalry the week before, moving up into the highlands searching for something – his instructions could not specify what he was expected to find, just that he was to investigate the area – and instead finding desolation, as if a plague had swept through the region leaving nothing behind except starving or dead stock, small animals like dogs and rats, and fields with wasted, withering crops. Most farms were very large, to take advantage of the poor soil, and usually a day’s march or more from one another. They had expected to buy supplies as they went, so had not taken much with them, and Mikhel was wondering if they should return to Koegrah to resupply. He was even thinking about leaving the infantry behind in the port city so he could move faster with just his cavalry. Then another thought occurred to him.
‘Ouncel, you’re from hereabouts, aren’t you?’
‘Yes, sir, Koegrah itself.’
‘What’s the coastline like? Would we cover more territory by sea? Landing every longmile or so for a closer look?’
‘Mostly cliffs, Commander,’ Ouncel said, shaking his head.
Mikhel nodded, not surprised. Everything about this commission, which he had so eagerly accepted to prove to General Second Prince Rodin Kevleren – and through him the empress herself! – that he would take on anything no matter now menial, was making him think he should have stayed in Omeralt. He did not like not knowing what was going on; unexpected mysteries were anathema to a soldier. Show him an enemy he could attack or defend against and he was in his element. This ruined landscape preyed on him like a bad dream, and he did not like it at all.
Still, he had his duty. ‘One more farm, Ouncel,’ he said. ‘We’ll try one more time. If we still come up with nothing, we’ll return briefly to Koegrah and return with just horse and more supplies. There are answers here somewhere, and I am going to find them.’
Ouncel nodded, not even trying to hide his relief. ‘Camp here for the night, sir? We could use the farmhouse maybe.’
‘Yes, set camp here. But keep everyone out of the house. It looks as if it could collapse the first time a gust of wind hits it. And set a watch.’
Ouncel looked around himself in disbelief. ‘Here, sir?’
*
‘Try harder,’ Yunara urged.
‘I’m trying as hard as I can,’ Lerena muttered. There was something vaguely recognisable at the end of her vision, but nothing she did seemed to bring it into focus.
‘Has the fleet reached the New Land yet?’
‘Be quiet,’ Lerena ordered. There. Pretty. A stone.
‘I can feel you’ve found something,’ Yunara said, her voice excited. ‘I knew you could do it!’
Lerena’s whole body was shaking with the effort one moment and then fell in on itself the next. She glared at Yunara. ‘Shut up!’ she shouted in frustration. ‘I bloody had it! Why couldn’t you just shut up?’
Yunara recoiled from Lerena’s fierceness, her edge trembling, losing cohesion, forming again.
‘I had something, sister!’ Lerena spat. ‘All that work and your yapping spoiled everything.’
‘Try again,’ Yunara said placatingly. ‘Just one more time.’
Lerena moaned. ‘It’s too far. It’s just too far.’
‘You did it easily before,’ Yunara pointed out.
‘Yes, when I had that grammarian Albyn helping me, and your blood. And even then I didn’t do it “easily”.’
‘Well, I can’t give any more blood,’ Yunara said. ‘It’s not as if I’ve risen from the dead. What if you sacrifice again?’
‘No. The Sefid is there, I can feel it, waiting for me. It’s the distance. It’s too far. I thought I might be able to hook onto one of the minds in my fleet, but none of them is a grammarian let alone a Kevleren. It’s no use.’
‘But you said you had it,’ Yunara persisted. ‘What did you have? Could that help?’
Lerena frowned in thought. ‘Yes. What was that? I almost . . .’ All expression left her face, all worry and stress. ‘Yes. Of course. She must not have been wearing it when we killed her.’
‘What are you talking about?’
‘Kitayra Albyn. To help me connect with her I gave her a birth chain. It must have been nearby when I used her, but not actually on her.’
‘So it’s still there?’
Lerena closed her eyes again. ‘Wait.’ There was a long pause and then she said in a very small voice, ‘Yes. Something. There it is. A pretty stone. Now more than one.’
Yunara hung over the empress like an outstretched hand. ‘Yes? Yes?’
‘I see water and stone . . . ’
*
‘What net are you on about?’ Kadburn said. ‘I wish you would just talk straight to me.’
Galys surprised herself by laughing despite the seriousness of the situation. ‘I’m sorry. It’s in my nature. I am a strategos, after all, and we deal in uncertainties and possibilities, not much that is set in stone. We end up talking the same way.’
‘The net?’ Kadburn reminded her.
‘Our good commodore, Avier, of course,’ Galys said. ‘With any luck he heard the longgon and will come to investigate. If we get him between the enemy and the sea we may be able to bottle them up, catch them between Avier’s command and the delta. Maybe even get a few shots in from here if the enemy is stupid enough to get that close.’
‘Maybe we should let off a few rounds anyway,’ Kadburn said. ‘Add to the enemy’s confusion.’
‘Good idea,’ Galys started to say, then, ‘Oh!’
Kadburn looked at her with concern. ‘What’s wrong?’
Galys had one hand over her chest. ‘It’s . . . no, it can’t be.’
‘What is it? Are you ill?’
Instead of answering, Galys lifted from around her neck a chain made from many small and beautiful stones. Some of the stones were pulsing with a blue glow.
‘Kitayra’s birth chain!’ Kadburn said, who had seen it once before. ‘It’s the Sefid! Throw it away, Galys! Throw it away!’
But Galys seemed to be frozen. She stared at the glowing stones as if they were speaking to her.
‘Kydan and Frey!’ Kadburn cursed, wrenched the chain from Galys’s hand and threw it over the side of the Citadel wall.
Galys turned on him in fury. ‘What do you think you’re doing?’ she screamed. ‘That was Kitayra’s!’
‘It was glowing!’ Kadburn shouted back. ‘Just like Maddyn’s birth chain before he died!’
All of Galys’s sudden anger instantly bled away. ‘Maddyn?’
‘He kept his birth chain around his neck, too. We were standing together just like this, on the Citadel wall, when I saw it glowing like that but a hundred times fiercer, and then his whole body lit up like one of the stones. Then he died.’
Galys looked over the parapet. The birth chain had fallen onto the paving between the Citadel and the Assembly. Its stones were still glowing. A woman, one of the few civilians still in the open, saw it and stooped to pick it up.
‘Leave it alone!’ Galys shouted down.
The woman looked up, searching. Then she saw Galys and recognised her. ‘Strategos? It is beautiful! Is it yours? I will return it to you –’
‘No!’ Kadburn ordered, and the woman stepped away from the chain. ‘If you touch it you will be hurt! Leave it alone!’
‘I will go down and get it,’ Galys said to Kadburn. ‘Make sure no one else touches it.’
‘What will you do with it?’ he asked.
Galys hesitated. ‘I don’t know. But I can’t leave it there.’
*
Lerena roused and blinked as if coming out of a deep sleep.
‘Well?’ Yunara asked.
Lerena could only bow her head. ‘I am exhausted. I need to rest.’
‘But what happened?’ Yunara demanded impatiently.
Lerena stared at her almost balefully. ‘I could not hold it. I
t was Kydan. That is all I know. But then I was pulled away, violently. I don’t know what happened.’
‘Did you see the fleet?’
‘No. But whoever was wearing the birth chain felt threatened, I’m sure.’
‘By the chain? Or something else?’
‘By something else, at least at first, but I don’t know what. Now leave me. No more questions. I need to be alone.’
‘You are never really alone, you know.’
‘I need to be alone,’ Lerena said. ‘Do not disappoint me.’
Yunara was silent, and Lerena sensed she was gone. At least, gone far enough not to impinge on her consciousness. She closed her eyes again, lay down on moist, green grass and drifted away.
*
Admiral Erom Agwyer tapped his knee impatiently with his glass.
‘Well?’ he demanded of Captain Oble.
The captain fidgeted nervously under the gaze of his superior. ‘The ships are almost in position now, sir.’
‘How bloody long does it take to line up a few ships and deliver a broadside?’
Oble felt like saying, ‘As an admiral you should already know the answer to that question’, but knew that Agwyer was an admiral whose greatest military feat to date had been to circumnavigate the harbour at Somah in his private launch. Instead, what Oble did say was, ‘It is difficult to line up the fleet in the current from the Frey River, sir. There is a volume of fresh water making a strong tidal race.’
‘I am not interested in excuses.’
Oble turned away, having run out of things to say. Besides, the fleet was now almost in line, from the Hetha at the southern end through Richer and Kethleralt, ships as large as Hetha but carrying almost twice as many guns, and ending with High Alt and Ferberin, schooners with a small number of longgons designed mainly for escorting merchant ships. Between them they could fire a broadside of over thirty guns, enough to do any city some damage. Oble wished the admiral had not wanted it so pretty, which meant the fleet anchoring to keep their position, because it made it easier for the enemy to target his ships, as unlikely as a hit from the Citadel was. If Oble had had his way the ships would each have made a pass, fired one broadside, and returned the other way, allowing the reverse broadside to be fired, and then they could have been off home. But Agwyer wanted theatre, wanted the demonstration to be as physically imposing as possible.
‘The fleet is ready, Admiral,’ Oble reported.
‘I can see that,’ Agwyer said shortly. ‘Very well, what are you waiting for?’
Oble breathed through his nose in anger. He leaned over the rail and looked down onto the longgon deck, completely covered except for a wide hatch through which he saw the deck marshal looking up at him impatiently for the command to fire. Through his speaking trumpet, Oble said, ‘Commence firing. Target the foundry and shipyard.’
The marshal was about to salute to show he had heard and accepted the order, when Oble heard the admiral curse. Oble turned round quickly to see Agwyer pointing towards the middle island.
‘I think they are firing at us, you know!’
Oble looked east and initially saw nothing but a puff of smoke rising lazily above the Citadel. A low rumble, like thunder on the horizon, rolled across the bay. He thought it was just another signal, then he saw a water spout climb into the air not more than fifty yards from Hetha.
‘By the Sefid, that was a lucky shot, eh?’ Agwyer said. He had tried to sound jocular, but sounded only astonished instead.
‘Indeed, sir,’ Oble replied slowly, hoping it had indeed been just a lucky shot. Often a longgon’s first round, because there had been plenty of time to load it carefully, was its best. Just the same, that was a long way from the Citadel. None of the longgons on his ship had anything like that range, even accounting for the Citadel’s advantage of height.
As he watched he saw a flash from the Citadel wall, a stream of smoke rising into the air, and a small black dot that grew very slowly at first but then seemed to be rushing directly at him. Oble refused to duck. He had seen plenty of fighting against Rivald in the old days, and knew how shot, deceptively, could seem to be coming straight for you.
‘It’s falling away,’ Agwyer said.
Yes, thought Oble, but too quickly and far too straight to be accidental. He saw the ball hit the water, but this time there was only a little splash. Then he saw the ball rising. It had skipped along the water like a stone skipped by a child on the seashore. It skipped again. Oble felt the deck shudder under him as the ball hit somewhere below his feet. He did not hear the actual strike, but immediately afterwards there was splintering and then screaming. He leaned over the railing again and shouted to the deck marshal through his trumpet, ‘Now, blast you!’
Starting at the stern, Hetha’s broadside rolled out. The ship rolled a little with the force of it, and Oble counted the flashes and sparks as each cannon fired. Five. The enemy shot must have put at least one gun out of action. Following from Hetha, Richer fired its ten guns, then Kethleralt, and finally High Alt and Ferberin let off theirs. The firing rippled along the whole of the line, and a dense bank of smoke billowed out towards the city.
‘Well,’ Agwyer said tremulously, ‘that should show them.’
‘Permission to weigh anchor, Admiral. Sitting still like this we’re an easy target.’
Agwyer became livid. ‘One hit and you want to run away!’
‘No, sir!’ Oble replied, trying to keep his rising anger under control. ‘But free to sail we can use the other broadside and may well avoid being hit a second time.’
‘Lucky shot!’ Agwyer answered, but could not stare the captain down. ‘Oh, all right. Do as you will!’
Oble ordered the anchor to be brought in and a signal given to the rest of the fleet to do the same.
‘Look at that now!’ Agwyer called, some of his bravado returning.
The smoke from the initial broadside had dissipated enough to see Kayned again. One corner of the foundry was ruined and red-hot metal could be seen spreading and glowing inside it, like a live thing. The shipyard, too, had been damaged, but not so badly it would not be back in operation inside of a tenday. It’s enough, Oble thought. The empire has slapped the city’s collective hand and warned it to reconsider its intransigence. Perhaps the next time he was ordered to sail here it would be to carry a strategos again instead of this incompetent admiral, with the intention of offering peace and absorption into the empire instead of round shot and ruin.
The lookout on the crow’s nest shouted something down, and pointed seaward.
‘More merchants or luggers for our longgons, I dare say!’ Agwyer claimed.
Oble only quickly glanced over his shoulder, more interested in getting the fleet away and mobile. What he saw almost froze his heart.
‘Cut the anchor!’ he shouted, rushing past the admiral to order the same command signalled to the other ships.
‘What in the name of the Sefid do you think you’re doing?’ Agwyer demanded.
‘They’re not merchants or luggers, sir, they’re warships!’ Agwyer squinted towards the new arrivals and frowned in confusion. Oble sighed in frustration and shouted almost in the admiral’s ear, ‘Big warships!’
*
‘Goodness,’ Kadburn said, not really meaning it. ‘I didn’t think we’d hit it this far away.’
Galys grunted. ‘No more showing off. I don’t want them running away –’ Her words were cut off by the sound of the enemy attack. The line of ships disappeared behind a growing cloud of gonblack smoke. ‘Impressive,’ she said under her breath, and wondered if calling Avier back had been such a good idea; after all, he only had two ships with him.
She saw black shot bounce on the shore of Kayned and bound into the foundry. Smoke and fire obscured her view for a moment, and when it cleared what she saw made her throat constrict painfully. ‘No,’ she whispered hoarsely, and could only imagine the terror of the poor workers caught as smelters burst, their red-hot liquid spraying over everyone n
earby. She thought she could hear the screams of the dying and burned and lacerated, but she was too far away for them to be real.
Already people on the island were running about to put out fires and help the wounded. It all seemed uselessly chaotic until one figure started stopping people and organising and coordinating them. Poloma, Galys thought with certainty; the man might not be much of a warrior, but he was the best leader she had ever known.
Kadburn stood silent beside her. ‘The shipyard’s been hit too,’ he said flatly.
‘Fire,’ she said, her voice unnaturally low. ‘Everything you can, Kadburn. Fire.’
She looked down at the birth chain resting in the heavy cloth she had just used to pick it up from the paving below. ‘Lerena Kevleren,’ she said, ‘this is your fault. Everything is your fault.’
*
‘I count five, Commodore,’ said the boy with the glass. Avier knew the lad had the best eyesight in his squadron and as soon as they had turned into the Bay of Kydan had called him to the bow and told him to report whatever he could see. ‘Two big ones, two small, like Annglaf . . .’ The boy quickly looked up apologetically; everyone knew how fond the old man was of his old command.
‘What else do you see?’ Avier said.
The boy went back to his viewing. And one . . . like nothing I’ve seen before. With a chimney or something.’
Avier frowned, took back the glass and looked himself. He could not see much past a few smudges, but there was definitely smoke coming from a stack in the middle of the largest ship. And he knew what that meant.
‘Hetha.’
‘Someone you know?’ the boy asked.
Avier smiled despite himself. He told the boy to go below decks. He was a thin, wiry, golden-skinned native of Kydan who loved the sea so much he had begged Avier to let him work aboard the Sorkro. Avier had been reluctant because of the boy’s age, then remembered he had been no more than nine himself when he had first sailed away from home.
The sound of many longgons firing brought his attention back to the Hamilayan fleet now attacking his new home.