After a hundred paces, the lane ended in a left curving stair with many of the risers along its right side still in place. This was the extent of the efforts of the engineers thus far, and once she had climbed the stair, she found the galleries and court beyond filled with sediment and scrub brush. A second floor of the half-buried villa on the east side was mostly intact, undamaged columns and vaults supporting the crumbled remains of the third, but the upper stories of the villa on the opposite side were a heap of weed-grown skree with a single twisted pine and its clawing roots perched at the top. At the north end, the enclosing high curtain wall had a breach about a manheight and a half up and a slope of rubble leading down from it.
"Not much use going on through, my lady," Scahll mentioned from a little way down the stair. "It's all just like this. Nobody's lived here since way before the empire."
Bear, alongside him, scratched his beard. "Quaestor Eishtren said that folks have come across a good many snakes."
Telriy tucked one corner of her mouth in a not quite frown. "I can deal with snakes. I think I'll climb up over there to get a view."
Ignoring the militiaman's mumbled complaint, she forged on, following an indistinct trail of fresh footprints across the court. Her two bodyguards followed, but when she began her ascent, both looked entirely content to wait for her at the base. Others had also mounted the slope before her and she followed their scuffmarks as she climbed. Large, solidly set stones protruded from the slope at near regular intervals and she had no trouble gaining the top. There, in the weed-covered eye of the breach, she was rewarded with a panoramic view of a large section of the ruins.
The ancient architects had favored graceful pointed domes and there were numerous examples still standing, including one magnificent ten manheight specimen close to the center of the plateau. Surprisingly, it retained a hint of a dull ivory color, where most of the buildings, towers, and arcades had the muted, homogenous gray tones of weathered stone.
She marveled at the extent to which so many of the structures remained whole, despite being abandoned for perhaps millennia, but then reflected that the isolation provided by the deep forest and the plateau's inaccessible height had kept passersby from harvesting its stones for newer construction, a common practice with destitute building sites in all parts of the world.
As the sun began to rise higher in the sky, she spent another few minutes gazing out, then, somewhat as an afterthought, extended her nascent magical sense. Expecting nothing other than the normal background ether, she was surprised when she noticed the faintest sign of modulated flux not far to the south on a level area that might once have been a courtyard or plaza.
"My lady," Scahll called from below. "Don't you think that our breakfast might be getting cold?"
"Alright, I'm coming." Her own stomach had begun to growl, so she turned about quickly, but as she climbed down, she firmly resolved, once she had the time, to return, find the source of that hidden flux, and discover what magic it might hold.
NINETEEN
Three days after he recruited the trainees, it being the middle of the afternoon, Mar was resting half-asleep in his tent when Trea and Ihlvoh crashed the rowboat down through the trees overhanging Number Three. At the last moment, they braked, but still smacked the ground with enough force to make the rowboat bounce. Just missing the fire pit after it struck the second time, the rowboat skidded sideways across the cleared area of the camp, leaving a long rut across the raked earth. Shouting and waving animatedly, the brothers leapt out and -- quite literally -- ran into the two large marines stationed outside Mar's tent.
Mar followed their arrival through the ether, but did not stir until it was clear that the two guards could not suppress their insistent complaints. Blearily, he rolled from his cot and staggered toward the commotion.
The marines, Chaer and E’hve, the first dark and the second ruddy, were holding the shouting boys back and trying to quiet them. Though only at most five years older than Mar, the armsmen had both been in the service of the Principate for more than a decade. The two were quite unbothered by flying -- E'hve in particular seemed to have an almost suicidal carelessness concerning heights -- and had become essential members of the official crew of Number Three. Though Berhl had not said so, Mar had taken as a given that the vice-captain had assigned them to also act as a portion of his permanent guard.
"Sorry, m'lord king," Chaer apologized. "We tried to get 'em t' wait, but they had to go an' wake y'."
Mar rubbed sleep from his eyes with the fingers of his good hand. The two brothers, as usual disheveled and windblown, looked frantic. "What is it? Aren't the two of you supposed to be scouting for lumber?"
"It's the Phaelle'n!" Ihlvoh warned urgently.
"They're just a few leagues away!" Trea added in a near screech.
The shock of the announcement jolted Mar physically. "Skyships?"
The brothers said practically together, "No, legions!"
Mar dodged around the two legionnaires, and snapped, "Show me!" As Trea and Ihlvoh bolted for the rowboat, which lay near sideways in the rut dug by their landing, he called over his shoulder, "Chaer, run and give the alarm to Captain Mhiskva!"
There proved to be two separate parallel columns of hard marching legionnaires bearing the readily recognizable Phaelle'n maroon and gray. The larger group, composed of perhaps five thousand armsmen, approached the encampment directly up the southern highway and was no more than a league and a half away. The smaller column, at least two thousand, was two leagues farther to the east, tramping across fields and pastures and ignoring the winding farm roads completely. This second column seemed intent on circling around to north of the Mhajhkaeirii.
Mar raced the rowboat back to the woodlot, paused at Number Three to shout orders to E'hve to make it ready to load passengers, then, thinking ahead, sped north toward the barn that sheltered Lord Hhrahld's barge, Revenge.
Not long after Mar had left Wilhm with him, the old pirate had declared the vessel to be the flagship of his corsair fleet. Most of the time, he could be seen on her deck, reliving the voyages of his memories, with Wilhm his constant shadow. This confiscation had forestalled the use of the barge during the nightly voyages to the Monolith and the Great Forest, but as it also tended to keep the Lord-Protector from charging unexpectedly across the camp -- and incidentally hacking at imaginary enemies in a haphazard fashion -- and a general but unspoken consensus had formed to forbear any attempt to dissuade his fantasy.
As Mar descended to the deck of the barge, he saw Hhrahld and Wilhm in a cleared space aft of the mast flailing at each other with staves, surrounded by cheering and shouting cutthroats. Climbing out, he gestured for the brothers to join him. The two boys had learned to steer the rowboat with little difficulty, but had not yet mastered control of one of the larger skyships at any appreciable speed. They had demonstrated, however, that they could make fair headway with a single, unloaded barge.
"I need you to raise the barge and take her due west. When you're out of sight, circle around to the east and make your best speed and altitude for the logging camps," he told them. "You must try to intercept Wloblh, Mrye and Srye before they return and warn the loggers that we are under attack. Can you do that?"
Starkly serious, both nodded.
"Get to it."
While Trea and Ihlvoh ran to the foredeck, Mar turned to deal with Lord Hhrahld, who had come across the deck, followed by Wilhm and the rest of his crew.
"Lord Hhrahld, I'm going to have Revenge taken east," he told the man, watching closely for any negative reaction. "The camp will soon be under attack."
A moment of incomprehension slid across Hhrahld's face and then, instead of the apoplexy that Mar anticipated, the pirate fell to one knee and gave the imperial salute. "We live to serve, my King!"
Wilhm might have been his reflection, mirroring Hhrahld's actions with preternatural exactness. Belatedly, the corsairs also knelt in obeisance.
Mar started to say something, th
ought better of it, then climbed quickly back into the rowboat and soared away. Hastening back south to the mooring tower, he gained only enough altitude to clear the ridgelines of the tents and temporary shelters by a bare armlength.
At the crossroads, he was pleased to see that the Mhajhkaeirii had already begun to gather the scattered skyships into position to form a train. With Number Five settled in place alongside the tower, gangs of men hauled the floating galleys and barges toward it by means of cables secured to their bows. Number Seven, completed by the shipwrights and enchanted by Mar only the previous evening, was swinging into line behind Number Five. Ulor, clearly identifiable on the bow steering platform, moved the skyship with swift confidence. Shepherded by marines and drafted shipwrights and workers, a well-organized and growing crowd of civilians had formed at the foot of the stairs. Other groups were pushing the numerous log rafts, already laden with passengers and cargo, into a line nearby. The rest of the encampment was in a general uproar, with civilians and armsmen alike running, striking tents, hefting bundles, and bearing equipment and supplies toward the tower.
Spotting Lord Ghorn, Lord Purhlea, and Mhiskva forging through the hectic throng, he swung to intercept them.
Still buckling on armor, the prince, his voice loud and clear, strode to the center of the crossroads, and told Mhiskva, "We assemble here. The Defenders will form square and march out first. Lord Purhlea, your Reapers will follow in reserve. Captain, have half of your marines prepare the remaining civilians for evacuation and send the other half to screen the northern end of the encampment against an attack from the rear."
As Mar brought the rowboat alongside the officers, Mhiskva saluted and sprinted away.
"My lord magician," the prince questioned, "what are we facing?"
"The main group is four or five thousand and is little more than a league away. You might have an hour before they reach the south edge of the encampment. There's also a group of a couple thousand that looks like it's trying to swing around us on the northern side."
Lord Ghorn's expression became bleak. "Foolishly, I have disregarded the threat of an overland attack, thinking that the monks would focus on the advantage of their skyships. We have no precautions in place for a normal defense. Is there anything that you can do to delay them? We cannot strike the camp and load all the skyships and rafts in an hour."
"It will take at least two to get everyone remaining away," Lord Purhlea judged.
"I'll see what I can do." Mar launched the rowboat upward and swept back south at a screeching speed. The Phaelle'n, lead by a small screen of mounted scouts, had gained almost a third of a league toward the crossroads.
With no sand spheres prepared, he did not know exactly what he could do to slow down the enemy. He had planned on numerous occasions to take time to manufacture more of his enchanted ammunition, but had always been diverted by the press of ferrying timbers, people, and supplies, of attending to requests to enchant rafts and perform other magical chores, or of the unavoidable necessity to rest. Like the prince, he had not lately considered it likely that the monks would bother crossing twenty leagues by land when the skyships gave them an unmatched and deadly advantage.
With no defensive works for protection, he could hardly attempt to face them on the ground. More than twenty or thirty at once would overwhelm his ability to keep them at bay by enchanting their armor, and he would need to constantly deflect arrows and quarrels, something he had not previously done. The simple crush of numbers would almost certainly be his undoing.
Of the other magic that he had learned, only Telriy's charm had any offensive application but it seemed unlikely to have much success in stopping the Phaelle'n legions. They need only move beyond it -- as they were almost certain to do -- to reveal the deception and thereby destroy its effectiveness.
He scanned the nearly level terrain ahead of him. About two-thirds of a league in front of the column and perhaps a little farther than that south of the crossroads, a thirty paces wide stream cut a two manheight deep course that ran from the northeast to the southwest. Other than that, there was little that he might use as a natural defensive line. The low hedges, scattered thickets, and occasional stone fences could not offer much of a hindrance to the Brotherhood's armsmen, be they afoot or mounted. The road spanned the stream by means of a sturdy, covered bridge. Fully as wide as the highway, the bridge would permit the main column to march straight across without missing a step.
Could he remove the bridge? While the steam was relatively shallow and could be forded with little trouble, it seemed certain that tearing out the bridge should delay them, if only for a few dozen moments that it would take them to spread out, work their way down, wade the water, climb up the other side, and then regroup.
He swooped down and floated alongside the bridge at midstream, about four armlengths above the meandering clear water. No siding had been applied to its sides and he could see all the way through the open cross-braced uprights that supported its roof. The main supporting joists of the floor of the bridge were three span thick, but were anchored at both ends in solid brick headwalls that stretched back along the crumbling loam banks for ten armlengths in each direction. At first, he tried simply infusing the bigger timbers, but the bridge did not budge, creaking loudly in painful complaint as the center flexed slightly. Then, desperately focusing all his concentration, he made ready to infuse the entire structure.
The first crossbow bolt struck the gunnel, skipped, and slashed a furrow through the outside of his right forearm. His reflexive drop to the garboards of the rowboat saved him from the second, which passed not a fingerlength over his head.
He landed on his left shoulder and gasped as his weight bore on the splints and bindings. Shaking and unable to see anything but the sky above him, he drove the rowboat up and away from the bridge. Two more bolts struck the bottom of the craft as he rose, with the wickedly sharp steel barb of one penetrating half its length through a futtock. He did not stop climbing until he was a hundred manheight or more up and only then did he rise to a crouch and venture a look over the side. Near the south end of the bridge, he caught a glimpse of a handful of black armored men as they ran from a thick patch of roadside brush to concealment under its roof.
He banked the rowboat sharply and sped west, following the stream. When he had gained better than a thousand paces from the bridge, he plunged once more into the streambed and, with a spray of water plowing away from the hull, lurched to a halt next to a raised stretch of the strand. Heedless of the blood dripping down his gashed arm, he leaned out and dug his fingers into the grass and weeds, manically scooping out clumps of the damp marl of sandy clay and gravel and flinging them into the boat. He stayed only a moment and then retreated skyward as he pressed the muddy soil into hard lumps, fighting to infuse the inconsistent admixture with an overload of flux.
The mud rebelled, shedding the flux within mere seconds and completely refusing to take a driving modulation. Determined, he clenched one lump tightly in his hand, striving to hold a bastardized, horridly keening crimson flux in place. Spinning the rowboat, he accelerated back toward the bridge.
To get the lump to detonate on the bridge, he knew he had to get extremely close before he released it. Aiming directly for the center of the span, he dove in at an altitude that would barely clear the lengthwise peak of the shingled roof. When he was less than a hundred armlengths away, he saw the armsmen sheltering behind the cross braces raise crossbows to take aim at him.
Drawing back his arm, he waited until bolts began to thud into the rowboat and whizz by overhead. Then, in one single heart-stopping motion, he rose and threw the mud lump at the side of the bridge.
The keel of the rowboat scraped the ridge roof with a loud grinding squall and he hunkered down, expecting a tremendous eruption. The basal thump of the explosion was shockingly small and the anticipated burst of light only a quickly faded orange strobe, but the concussion was strong enough to lift the stern of the small craft and tip it
into a wobbling spin. Hanging onto the edge of his bench, he fought it back under control, gained altitude once more, and twisted to see what he had wrought.
The blast had carried away a large portion of the center of the roof and smashed some of the braces and uprights, with tentatively smoldering debris thrown all about and some bits still coming down to splash into the stream and strike along its banks, but the deck of the bridge looked almost undamaged. The crossbowmen defending it seemed mainly unharmed, though one had been ejected into the stream and was struggling drunkenly ashore.
Cursing, he turned his eyes southward. The leading elements of the Phaelle'n, several quads of the mounted scouts, were now less than two thousand paces from the stream.
Grabbing another fistful of mud, he zoomed north over the tassels of a cornfield, rose up to a height that he judged was beyond the effective range of the crossbows and tossed the lump overboard.
He was too high. The magic dissipated before the lump struck and it disappeared impotently into the lush greenery of the stalks. Wasting no time, he dropped down a couple of manheight and tried again. Only on his third attempt was he rewarded with an explosion, and by then he was little more than ten manheight above the ground, well within the lethal range of the monks protecting the bridge.
Maintaining the same height beneath his keel, he slid off his bench, laid in a cramped position in the bilge between the center and forward bench so that he could barely see over the bow, and directed the rowboat back toward the stream. Bolts slammed into the hull from below as he approached and continued to strike at regular intervals as he took a position directly over the middle of the bridge. Several burst through the planks and one passed completely through, making a splintered hole between his sprawled legs.
Key to Magic 03 King Page 14