The Pity Stone (Book 3)

by Tim Stead

  The major nodded. “Good thinking,” he said. “Good work, too. We’ve secured the main gate, so I’ll leave the fifty men with you. You can keep the command, and the rank, I should think, but the duke will have to confirm it.”

  “Thank you, sir.”

  The major turned to go.

  “Sir?”

  “What is it, lieutenant?”

  “Permission to attack them, sir.”

  “Attack? You’ve got seventy men, Fane. There’s over two hundred out there.”

  “We’ve got horses, sir.”

  “Aye, you have, and a gate that’s barred and won’t open. Have you ever led a cavalry charge before, Fane?”

  “No, sir. Never held a wall either.”

  The major laughed. Jerac wasn’t sure he’d ever seen the major laugh before.

  “I like your thinking, lieutenant,” he said. “But just hold the wall for now. There’s no need to go seeking glory.”

  “I was thinking of the villagers, sir. If that lot run they’re not going to leave the country be, are they? We should stop them before they get started.”

  The major nodded. “True enough, but I can’t risk losing the gate. Get the portcullis up again and then send for me, and we’ll see if we can spare a few more men.”

  “I’ll do that, sir,” Jerac said. “Thank you.”

  He watched the major leave and then went down to examine the portcullis. It was quite intact. The problem was the chain that was used to haul it up and down. The chain attached to a rope that was normally tied off on the south side of the gate, just outside the gate house. When Bisalt had cut the rope the gate had fallen, but the rope was no longer the required length. It had been dragged into the stone channel that was cut through the wall. It could no longer be reached.

  Jerac put his eye to the hole and used his sword blade to reflect light so that he could see. It was there. Not so far, really, just a couple of feet. He tried to push his hand in to grasp it, then stopped. It was futile. However strong he was he couldn’t raise the portcullis with a couple of fingers gripping a frayed hawser.

  He looked about him. The fifty men had gone up onto the wall to await the next Seth Yarra assault, if it came. The mouth of the gate was empty. He was alone.

  He stood as close to the portcullis as he could. He bent his knees and crouched down, getting a firm grip on the bottom cross bar, shifting his hands until they felt comfortable. Then he lifted. He lifted with all his strength.

  Nothing happened. He stood up again.

  “There’s an easier way.”

  He turned round to see Bisalt, who had just emerged from the gatehouse. The man was grinning, as if he was pleased to see that there were some limits to Jerac’s abilities.

  “And that it?”

  “Look,” Bisalt pointed to the top of the gate arch. “You see the bar that runs across at the very top? It’s designed for just such a purpose. We can attach a block and tackle to that and it makes the lifting easier.”

  A block and tackle. Of course. Jerac had used them hundreds of times as a carpenter. He’d used one to move the heavier pieces when he’d rebuilt the Seventh Friend bar for Cain Arbak.

  “You know where we can get a block and tackle?”

  “I know where we can get three, sir. We keep them in the guardhouse. Never thought to use them, though.”

  “Show me.”

  There was a cupboard in the guardroom that he’d never opened, and the pulley blocks were hanging on pegs on the wall. Ropes were carefully coiled beneath them. It took ten minutes and the loan of a ladder for them to get the blocks hung and threaded, the ends tied to the bottom crossbar of the portcullis.

  “Get me thirty men,” he told Bisalt. And another rope to thread the chain when it shows.”

  Bisalt came back a few minutes later with a mob of volunteers happily rolling up their sleeves. They’d heard the conversation between Jerac and the major, and they fancied their chance of a slaughter, a chance to be at the Seth Yarra with a significant advantage.

  Bisalt organised them, lined them up in three groups, and told them to pull. The portcullis came up slowly but steadily. Jerac hooked the rope out of its slot and fed it through his hands until he came to the point where it looped around the chain. He told them to stop, cut away the old rope and attached a new. He tested it, heaving on the rope with all his might, and it held.

  “Lower it,” he called.

  Someone had taken the opportunity to drag the Seth Yarra bodies away from the gate mouth, and now all that remained was to remove the blocks and all would be ready. He pointed to one of the men.

  “You, go and find the major. Tell him that we are ready.” Jerac looked up at the sun. It had taken a couple of hours to regain control of the portcullis, but now they could attack. He ran up the steps to the wall. Looking out he could see that the Seth Yarra soldiers were still there, perhaps thinking to besiege Bas Erinor by stopping up the road. Well, he would teach them differently.

  He waited impatiently atop the wall, eyeing his intended victims. They had not even had the sense to retreat as far as cover. Half a mile beyond their position was a copse of trees. It was nothing special, but would have shielded them from the full horror of a cavalry charge. He willed them not to move, not to see the danger.

  The major came quickly. He climbed the steps to the wall and stood next to Jerac, looking out.

  “Do we attack?” Jerac asked. He could feel the tension in the men around him. They were keen. He could feel their eyes on him.

  “Come with me,” the major said.

  “Sir?”

  “Come.” The major led Jerac back down onto the street and mounted his horse. The major didn’t speak, but waited patiently while Jerac unhitched one of the guardsmen’s horses and swung up into the saddle.

  They rode through the city. It was quiet. The streets were unnaturally clear of folk. There should have been a market today, but the square that they rode through was empty. They turned up an alley, then onto the broad road that led from the foot of the Devine Stair to the main gate. It, too, was unnaturally empty, though here and there he could see wagons hurrying in both directions.

  Now he could see the smoke, still billowing in the wind above the gate, the smell of burning was strong and tasted bitter in his mouth. Up ahead he could see a line across the road, and as they drew closer he could see that it was a line of wagons turned on their side – a makeshift defence. There were not many men on this barricade, and those that were there seemed relaxed. This was safe, then.

  Closer to the gate he could see that it was closed, the portcullis – a much larger affair than the one at the river gate, was down.

  They passed bodies laid out on the side of the road. There were dozens, perhaps hundreds. One side street seemed paved with them. He recognised some of the dead – they were men he had eaten with only yesterday, guardsmen. But there were others laid out here as well. He saw the bodies of men, women and children, civilians, citizens of Bas Erinor.

  The city around the gate seemed flat from a distance, and as they approached the gate itself he realised that many of the houses had been burned. This had been a good neighbourhood, too good for Jerac Fane – and even too good for Alos Stebbar. He could never have afforded even the cheaper houses that clustered possessively close to the landmark that was the main gate. Gateway, they’d called it, he remembered. Now they were little more than rubble. Charred beams lay at odd angles among the half tumbled walls, still smoking.

  Jerac remembered the soldier who’s spoken to him earlier. A proper war, the man had said. Now he understood.

  “How many men did you lose, sir?” he asked.

  The major turned in his saddle. “Two hundred,” he replied. “About three hundred citizens, too. We’ve been ferrying the wounded back to some of the buildings close to the stair.”

  Jerac knew the strength of the garrison well enough. It had been stripped to deal with the Seth Yarra incursions east and west. Only five hundred men
had remained to defend the city. With two hundred gone and more injured their situation was perilous indeed. He realised that the major was teaching him, demonstrating to him the burden of command.

  “We cannot attack,” he said.

  “I’m glad you see it that way, lieutenant,” the major said, but he didn’t smile.

  A man ran up as they approached. “No movement, sir,” he said.

  “How many are out there?” Jerac asked the man.

  “Three hundred, give or take. They’ve taken up positions about two hundred paces down the road.”

  Jerac turned to the major again. “Prepared positions?” he asked.

  The major almost smiled. There was an upward twitch at the corner of his mouth. “We think so,” he said. They kept archers back on the assault, almost as though they expected to fail. Now they wait.”

  “If we charge them we will not achieve the result we hope for,” Jerac said, almost to himself. “We will lose many men and we will not destroy them.”

  “It would be a gamble,” the major said. “But the stakes are very high. If we lose, we lose Bas Erinor.”

  “So we must wait and they must wait.”

  “Eventually they will attack. They cannot wait as long as we. Colonel Arbak is in the south and we have thousands of men approaching from the north. Both will eventually get here, and either will finish it in our favour.”

  “Can we send for help?”

  “We have. A rider left as soon as they withdrew out of bowshot. We cannot say if he got through, but he was watched until he was out of sight. Even if he gets through it will be at least two days before help arrives.”

  It was a trap. It was a trap that Jerac had very nearly fallen into. If he had not sent for the major, if he had just attacked because he knew it was what he wanted to do, then his men would have been cut down by arrows, his charge broken on some kind of defence, and he would have struggled to hold the wall against another assault, which would surely have followed. It was a lesson he welcomed, and he appreciated the way in which the major had taught it. He had been allowed to see the truth for himself, to draw his own conclusions.

  “I will go back to the River Gate, sir,” he said. “I will hold it.”

  The major nodded. He looked pleased. “Do that, lieutenant,” he said. “Do exactly that.”

  Thirty Five – Skal

  Lissman came to wake him before dawn. It was bitterly cold, and Skal was wrapped in furs and blankets, his head too. He was dreaming of his father. It was an oddly unaffecting dream. He was watching, it seemed from a distance, as his father was building something – a wall perhaps. His father looked old, older than Skal had ever seen him, and he looked tired, but he kept putting one stone on top of another.

  “My lord, there is movement. Wake up, my lord.”

  He felt Lissman’s hand on his foot, heard his voice, and the image of his father dissolved into the frozen darkness.

  “Movement?”

  “Seth Yarra, my lord. They are on the move.”

  Skal rubbed his face with the blanket, ran a hand through his hair and scratched his scalp. “Can you tell which way they are moving?” he asked.

  “Too dark, sir,” Lissman replied.

  Skal had taken to sleeping in his clothes. It really was cold, and in the small dark hours of the night he envied the men sleeping packed together beneath the ground. It might be stuffy down there, but it was noticeably warmer than his tower room, despite the fire that was lit here every night.

  He pulled on his boots, pulled on a thick tunic and a heavy coat, and buckled his sword around his waist. He longed for a hat of some kind that would keep his ears warm, but he had not thought to bring one, and had to make do with a scarf. He followed Lissman down the stairs and back up again onto the wall.

  There were not that many men here this time of night, but a row of braziers burned brightly, and most of the men were close to them, seeking what warmth was available. These were the men he did not envy.

  “Still moving?” he asked one of them.

  “Aye, colonel,” the man said. “Not very good at being quiet, I’d say.”

  Indeed, Skal could hear them himself. It was like the noise of the sea, but punctuated with the odd clink of metal and the occasional curse. He listened carefully. It was difficult to tell what they were doing, but there was certainly no element of retreat. The sounds were not getting fainter.

  “Bring another fifty men up here,” he commanded. “Lissman, get the horses saddled – all three forts – and do it quietly.”

  The man set off down the steps, leaving Skal on the wall. He looked at Morianna’s calling ring. Was it time? No, there was a while yet. He must wait to discover where the Seth Yarra would strike. It may yet be that they would assail his own position, and he would have to fight on the wall.

  A man brought Skal a hot tea laced with honey, and he thanked him. It was a welcome distraction from the cold. He wrapped his hands around it and sipped it carefully, getting as much benefit through his fingers as down his throat. He shuffled from side to side, kicking his toes gently against the wall to try to preserve some feeling in them, and waited for dawn. Seth Yarra would not attack until dawn.

  More men arrived, filing up from the warmth below and taking up positions along the southern side of the fort. Their noise drowned out the tell tale sounds from beyond the wall, and he passed the word for silence. When he could hear again he was sure that the Seth Yarra noises were a fraction quieter, and that they had moved westwards. Yet still he waited. He did not want to be undone by wishful thinking.

  Dawn came, eventually. This deep in winter dawn was not too distant from midday, and this alone put Seth Yarra at a massive disadvantage. They had perhaps five or six hours in which their book would let them fight. Skal had twenty four. When it came, dawn showed Skal that his luck had held. The Seth Yarra army, or the certain majority of it, was drawn up in front of the western most fort: Hestia’s stronghold. His counter deception had worked.

  Skal trotted down the stairs to the courtyard. It was full of horses and men, all standing quiet. He found Lissman.

  “Have them stand ready,” he said. “There is something that I must do before we attack.”

  He had not shared the detail of his plan with anyone. Only Skal knew what help he could summon from Morianna. He ran up to his room and wrapped his hand about the ring he wore.

  “Now is the time,” he said. “The Seth Yarra attack the western end of the chain, and they will never be as vulnerable as they are now. Come to me, Areshi, and we will destroy them.”

  Nothing happened.

  Foolish to expect an instant response, he supposed. She might be bathing. She might be doing anything at all. He laughed at the idea. He sat and waited. After a while he went back down to the courtyard, and back up onto the wall.

  The fight had begun. He could see the Seth Yarra soldiers carrying their ladders to the wall, arrows pouring in both directions like so many black wasps. The still morning air carried the sound of steel on steel, and the ferocious war cries of the Telans. Looking around him he saw that he men were watching him, waiting for an order. They didn’t understand what they were doing.

  Lissman approached him. “Sir?”

  “I’m waiting for an advantage,” he told the man. He left the battlements and went back to his room. He sat on his bed, gripped the ring again, making sure that it was entirely covered by his hand.

  “I hope that you can hear me,” he said. “If we do not move soon the advantage will be lost, and the battle will go however it will go. This is the time. My men are waiting. They’re going to think I’ve lost my mind.”

  He sat and looked out of the window. Somehow he had been sure that she would not let him down. Yet here he sat. He was going to have to do something else, soon, something intemperate and unplanned. He had not thought to make a reserve plan.

  He had to use the cavalry, but so few of them could get out of the fort’s narrow gates that they would not
be an effective force. Perhaps he could attack the Seth Yarra lines – there were only about a thousand men left there by his estimate. But that would still be difficult. They would have the best part of half an hour to prepare before he could get sufficient men out and mustered for an attack. They would be ready, and his losses would be heavy against prepared positions thick with archers.

  No, his best ploy would be a mundane feint combined with reinforcements sent down to tunnels to Hestia. Whatever he did, he could wait no longer. He stood. But even as he stood he felt a draught on the back of his neck, a warm draught.