by Melvin, Jim
“Yama . . . Mala . . . is doing something to the stones,” Utu said.
“He’s touching each pile with the trident,” Palak said. “Even I can see that.”
“And the stones are glowing,” Churikā said.
“This is not done for show,” Kusala said. “We must be alert!”
“For what?” Madiraa said.
“For the worst.”
BUNJAKO, SON OF Gulah and grandson of Slag, was the first to lift one of the fiery coals of obsidian in his scaly hand and shove it into his mouth. The Stone-Eater’s tongue, which was the consistency of thick canvas, cradled the nearly molten stone, taking pleasure in the fervent heat. When he swallowed it whole, the acidic contents of his stomach came to a raging boil. A golden belt, a personal gift from Invictus given to him and the five-score of his kind who stood nearby, glowed in response. Bunjako felt his stomach expand, causing the belt to stretch. Though it was agonizing almost beyond his ability to bear, it was a pain he welcomed. A desire for revenge was a trait common to Stone-Eaters—and Bunjako craved vengeance more than any. To him, the fall of Nissaya would be just the beginning of a long-due restitution that would end in the death of The Torgon, murderer of his father and grandfather, the two greatest of his kind ever to live.
Bunjako spread his arms wide. The fibrous muscles of his neck, chest, and abdomen swelled to four times their normal size. Then his mouth opened impossibly wide, his jaws unhinging. Black smoke oozed from his flat nostrils and pointy ears. Bunjako gagged, softly at first, but then violently, arching his back and flinging his face forward, his upper torso snapping like a striking snake. From his mouth came a sphere of fire that flared when it met the air, then quickly expanded to the size of a boulder. The sphere soared upward and outward, as if the most powerful trebuchet ever built had flung it, and it whistled toward the first bulwark of Nissaya.
Bunjako leaned over and placed his hands on his knees, taking several deep breaths. His insides were seared but—because of the magic of the golden belt—not permanently damaged. Invictus, and therefore Mala, knew what they were doing. He and his fellow Stone-Eaters had chosen the right allies.
“Come on, you ugly little dwarfs! Don’t stop now. More! I want more!”
Bunjako sighed. Mala was as obnoxious as he was powerful, but for now the Stone-Eaters needed him. Without the Chain Man, Nissaya would not fall. Nor would Jivita and the horrid Death-Knower.
“The first one was for you, Father,” he whispered. He picked up a second chunk of obsidian. “And now, Grandfather, it’s your turn.” Then he swallowed it, again relishing the pain.
THE FIRST OF the fiery spheres plummeted onto the battlement. Kusala and the others could only watch, helpless to prevent its descent. The sphere struck a merlon and exploded into a thousand fiery shards that pierced anything in their path, including black armor. The defenders were scattered and several dozen killed, and yet ninety-nine more of the broiling balls already were on their way. Soon the battlement was a place of chaos.
In a panic, several defenders launched counter-attacks with the trebuchets, but the balls of pitch fell short. Mala had placed his army in the perfect position to take advantage of the Stone-Eaters’ superior range. The only way to stop them would be to drop over the wall on rope ladders and counterattack on open ground. And that would be suicide, even for the Tugars, especially without The Torgon to aid them.
A second sphere fell, and then a third, each with devastating results. There were occasional misses, but most of the spheres struck along the battlement within five hundred cubits of the gate. The stone of Balak withstood the barrage with minimal damage, but its defenders were routed.
To Kusala’s dismay, even a Tugar was killed when a shard entered his mouth and exploded, and at least half a dozen other desert warriors were injured sufficiently to require attention. If the Kantaara Yodhas were afflicted, then the black knights stood no chance. Kusala and the other Asēkhas fled out of range of the concentrated attack. Henepola, Madiraa, Indajaala, and even Utu were forced to follow. Soon a wide area above the gate was undefended, and several trebuchets and more than a dozen cauldrons of oil were destroyed or abandoned.
Mala and a thousand of his monsters, accompanied by five thousand Pabbajja, rushed the gate. Though it was not yet noon, the Chain Man had scored the day’s first victory.
BY THE TIME the Stone-Eaters launched their attack, Whiner and the other golden soldiers had lost the ability to produce intelligent-sounding words. Of the almost one hundred and sixty thousand newborns that had made it to Nissaya, ten thousand had already died and been dragged onto festering piles by the Mogols and wolves. Most of the survivors remained standing on trembling legs, the intense heat baking their golden armor until it seemed to burn through their padding and into their skin. Quite a few had fallen on their faces, but if they still breathed, the Mogols left them where they lay.
Whiner watched Mala and the monsters storm toward the gate. He and his buddies, Left and Right, stared through the slits of their helms with glazed expressions, no longer cognizant of their role in the proceedings. They had gone beyond thirst and hunger, into hopelessness. For whatever reason, the Chain Man intended to use them not as proud fighters, but as a tortured audience. The man next to Right fell and was dragged away. Whiner didn’t care. He just watched . . . and waited.
WHEN THE MONSTERS charged, Gruugash and five thousand Pabbajja rushed along with them. Their high overlord ordered his cabal into position, as Invictus and Mala had long planned. The black granite floor that slowly ascended toward Balak was slippery, causing Gruugash to fall several times. Bizarrely it felt like the days of his youth, almost sixty millennia before, when he and his brothers and sisters would skate on frozen ponds within the heart of Java. How beautiful their lives had been—and innocent. Now everything was twisted, except for their memories. Gruugash and his people would attempt to sabotage Mala’s efforts. But in order to wreak the most havoc, the timing had to be right.
The intense heat had little effect on the Pabbajja, their thickly matted hair shielding their flesh from the sun. They approached the bulwark and formed a V-shaped wall that encased Mala and the other monsters. When they lifted their tridents, a sheath of magic shimmered upward and then turned inward, creating a protective roof over Mala’s head. Just like that, the Chain Man had gained control of the precious area at the foot of the gate.
A shower of arrows crashed into the magical shield, each incinerating on contact. Mala and the other monsters paid the arrows no heed. The next stage of the Chain Man’s plan consumed all his attention. The assault on the gate of Balak was about to begin.
Gruugash watched as two dozen dracools waddled forward bearing Warlish witches on their backs. The dracools sprang from the ground, flew just beneath the ceiling of the magical sheath, and landed on the battlement. The witches hopped off, raised their staffs, and added their own magic to the shield, closing off the battlement from the front and sides. Balls of pitch, launched from Ott, smashed against the shield without result. Meanwhile, the dracools returned to the ground to transport more witches, as well as Mogols and other monsters, onto the battlement.
Soon after, the entire contingent of cave trolls, five score in all, was called forward. Though not as large as Kojins, they were huge nonetheless, standing eight cubits tall and weighing more than one hundred stones. Each carried a golden hammer with a long shaft. Besides weighing twenty stones apiece, the hammers were imbued with ores Invictus’ scientists had smelted. As the trolls approached, Mala touched each hammer with the tines of his trident, causing them to glow the color of crimson. Orkney, greatest of his kind, was chosen to strike the first blow.
Gruugash, who was about half the size of one of Orkney’s legs, cringed. The high overlord of the Pabbajja was not sure what to do. It was within his power to lower the shield and expose thousands of monsters to a barrage of arrows and bombardment from trebuchets. But at this point, such a move would have little effect. The monsters would flee
out of range and regroup, and then they would turn on the Pabbajja. Despite the destruction that was about to occur, Gruugash decided to bide his time a while longer.
Orkney’s hammer smote the gate with a boom. Liquid fire from the head of the hammer crackled along the surface of the black granite, creating a web of crimson tendrils that clung to the stone. But the massive door did not yield.
Gruugash knew that Mala didn’t expect the first blow to destroy such a masterwork. But the Chain Man commanded one hundred trolls with one hundred hammers, and as long as they could operate freely beneath the gate, they could bombard the door with a relentless barrage of titanic strokes.
Unexpectedly, Gruugash felt a surge of magic assault the shield from somewhere above, but it was not powerful enough to destroy it. Then another surge. And another. Still, the shield held. A long time passed before Gruugash felt a concussive blast that dwarfed the others tenfold. In agonized unison, the Pabbajja cried out—as did the witches on the battlement. And then there was another blast, even more powerful than the first. Without the aid of subterfuge, the shield collapsed.
Suddenly the monsters were exposed.
WHEN THE PABBAJJA raised the magical shield, Kusala and thousands of others were cut off from the portion of the battlement that framed the top of the gate. The transparent shield was barely visible, except for a yellowish wobble that betrayed its location. Archers bearing powerful longbows loosed iron-tipped shafts at the monsters, but the arrows were incinerated as soon as they struck the enchanted barrier.
“I thought you said the Pabbajja were our allies,” Madiraa snapped at Kusala. “I’ve told everyone.”
“Don’t give up on them yet,” Kusala said.
“Mala has secured the battlement above the gate,” Commander Palak raged. “And he did it with ease. What fools we were!”
“Fools?” Kusala said. “Do not use that word so lightly. Asēkhas are not fools. Tugars are not fools. Better to say that evil has won the first round. But we are not beaten yet. The battle has only begun.”
“The chieftain speaks wisely,” Henepola said. “We must find a way to defeat the shield. If so, we can drive the monsters from the gate and smite them as they retreat.”
Indajaala stepped forward. “Sire, fifteen conjurers are with me on this side. Shall we make the attempt?”
“Quickly!” the king said. “And I will aid you.”
The conjurers pressed forward and joined together their staffs of Maōi. A milky mass of energy flared to life, converging on the head of Henepola’s black staff. The king flung it against the shield, but it easily absorbed the assault. Henepola struck again. And again. With the same result.
“Sire, there are less than a score of us, and yet the Pabbajja number in the thousands,” Indajaala said. “If all our conjurers were gathered here together, we might be able to break the shield. But we are scattered, with a few also on Ott and Hakam.”
“What of Utu?” Kusala said.
The king’s eyes brightened. “Will you try?”
The snow giant stood motionless.
Henepola walked over and stood at his feet. “Will you try?”
Utu finally spoke. “I question the value of resistance.”
In a rage, Madiraa rushed to her father’s side. “What do you mean? In all its history, Balak has never fallen. And you question value?”
“Hatred is never appeased by hatred,” Utu said.
“Have you gone mad?”
“Madiraa . . . please!” Kusala said. Then he turned back to Utu. “Don’t forget your original purpose. Mala is down there, still tormenting Yama-Deva.”
Utu’s ring blazed. The snow giant gasped, as if he had been unexpectedly struck.
“Very well. I will try.” Utu stepped forward and sniffed the sheath with his broad nose. Then he pressed the ring of pure Maōi against it. The concussive result knocked Kusala and many others off their feet. Yet the shield held. The snow giant grunted and then pressed the ring against it again. This time, the shield crackled into nonexistence.
When the magical shield collapsed, Kusala rushed along the battlement to greet the enemy. First he encountered a Mogol wielding a stone war club. Kusala ducked beneath a sweeping blow and stabbed the warrior in the abdomen, driving the point of the uttara beneath his ribs and up into his heart. Kusala yanked out his blade and nudged the already-dead warrior off the battlement.
A witch, in her beautiful state, came next, waving a tall wooden shaft ablaze with wicked power. Kusala avoided a bolt of crimson fire, rose up, and punched his uttara between her alluring cleavage, twisting the blade to maximize damage. Her scream was followed by a gush of putrid smoke. He kicked her off the wall too.
By now, other defenders had joined the fray. Two more witches, in their hideous state, swept past a pair of black knights and closed on Kusala. The magic emanating from their staffs caused Kusala to cringe, but then Utu appeared and slammed both of them off the wall with one sweep of a gigantic arm.
Churikā and several Tugars leapt past them both, attacking the monsters that remained on the battlement. Henepola, Indajaala, and Palak were close behind.
“You make that look so easy,” Kusala said to Utu, temporarily ignoring the fighting that raged around them.
The snow giant shrugged. “And of what benefit were my actions? Have I cured all woes? A pool of water will not quench your thirst if it is choked with silt.”
“I don’t understand . . .”
“That doesn’t surprise me . . .”
“The ring has changed you,” Kusala said. “When the time comes, will you confront Mala?”
“‘When the time comes?’ An appropriate choice of words,” Utu said. “Perhaps you are wiser than I give you credit.”
“Wise? I know little of wisdom. I care only about duty.”
“What is your duty?”
“To prevent the fall of Nissaya.”
“If that’s your duty, then you are doomed to fail,” Utu said, his voice sounding sad. “Nissaya will fall, if not today then tomorrow. Or ten thousand millennia from now, when the stone has crumbled to dust. Is there a difference?”
“I don’t understand . . .” Kusala repeated.
“That doesn’t surprise me . . .”
FROM THE BATTLEMENT of Ott, Podhana watched with fascination as the snow giant broke the shield. Instantly the Asēkha shouted orders, reinforced by the black knights’ high commanders, to bombard the monsters. Thousands of arrows were loosed, and the thirty nearest trebuchets launched balls of pitch that exploded on impact. The monsters were besieged, including two dozen witches, twice that many Mogols, and a slew of vampires and ghouls that were trapped on Balak’s battlement. From where he stood, Podhana saw the defenders of Nissaya close on the monsters from both sides. Dracools attempted rescues, but they too were overwhelmed. Even Mala was forced to retreat.
Podhana raised his sling above his head, whipped it in a circle three times, and flung a bead with deadly accuracy. The largest of the trolls grasped his boulder-sized head, then collapsed. The Asēkha loaded another bead and took aim again, this time at Mala.
AN ARROW STRUCK Mala’s chain, incinerating on impact. Another bounced off his chest. A third skimmed the tip of his nose. Thousands more fell all around.
A ball of pitch landed behind him, spraying him with molten shards that clung like glue. A Tugarian bead struck him in the temple, which really hurt. Mala was not in lethal danger, but such means could slay many of the monsters that had come with him to the gate. A dracool fell from the sky and squished a pair of ghouls. A troll—Orkney was his name—had already dropped his hammer, grabbed his boulder-sized skull, and collapsed. The witches, Mogols, and other monsters on the battlement were under assault by sword and magic. He watched one of the damnable Asēkhas stab a witch in the chest and then heave her off the wall. She fell fifty cubits, struck the hard stone at its base, and splattered. Then the mysterious snow giant knocked two more witches off the wall with a sweep of his hand
.
Though a part of Mala yearned to stand and fight, a wiser part realized it was time to retreat. He fled from the gate, calling for the others to follow. Another bead struck him on the buttocks, causing him to howl.
With arrows and balls of pitch on their heels, Mala and the monsters thundered away from the bulwark. The majority of the monsters had remained in the field beyond reach of the barrage, and they watched the withdrawal with a combination of shock and hidden amusement. When Mala’s raiding force was safely out of range, he stomped about like a bully who had lost his first fight and had no idea what to do next.
“Where’s that hairy little squirt? The Pabby guy. Gruely. Grugee! Where is he?”
“Do youuuu mean Gruugash?” the Warlish witch named Wyvern said.
“I thought you were dead,” Mala said.
“A dracool came to my resssscue,” she said, her face beautiful despite black smudges on her delicate cheeks. “But at least ssssix of my sisters did not ssssurvive. I am appalled.”
“Do you think I give a crap about your sssssssssssisters?” Mala said mockingly. “Where the hell is Grudack?”
The Pabbajja overlord came forward and bowed. Some of his hair had been singed, revealing a portion of diseased-looking scalp. “May I be of service, General Mala?” Gruugash said.
“May I be of service, General Mala? Yes, you may, asshole! Tell me what the hell just happened!”
“The shield was broken, general.”
“The shield was broken, general. Thank you for clearing that up. I feel so much better.” Then Mala pointed the prongs of his trident in the direction of Gruugash’s protruding eyeballs.
“Tell . . . me . . . what . . . happened.”
If Gruugash was afraid, he didn’t show it. “A force stronger than the Pabbajja—and the witches—broke the shield.”
“I thought you said the conjurers were not strong enough.”