Chapter 78
February: 3,389 BC
Earth: Mesopotamian Plain
Mikhail
He sat across the chessboard from the small, dark-winged Angelic. Beside them a timer counted out the seconds until the boy had to make his move. The boy did not speak, but then he never did.
"Tá sé do bhogadh, Gabriel," Mikhail said. He pointed to the timer. "Tá tú beagnach as am."
Those sullen blue eyes were angry because he did not yet understand the game. With a chubby little hand, he picked up his black bishop and made an L-shaped move across the chess board to capture Mikhail's white queen.
"Mo banríon!" Mikhail pointed to the black bishop. "Ní sin an tslí go bhfuil píosa fichille ceaptha a bhogadh."
He stared at the timer ticking at the side of the chessboard, counting out the seconds until he could crush his opponent. The boy's lower lip quivered as he projected an image of him being -mean- directly into his mind. With a chubby arm, the boy stood up and swept the chess pieces onto the floor.
There was a knock upon the door.
"Mikhail?'
The dream faded, leaving him only with the memory of those sullen blue eyes.
"Son? There is a messenger at the door."
His mother-in-law stood in the doorway, the white streaks of her hair appearing blonde in the faint, yellow glow of the tallow lantern. He rolled upright and grabbed his boots, suppressing a groan as the too-tight scar tissue over his chest screamed in protest at the exercise he'd put himself through yesterday. Ever since they'd gotten word the lizards had attacked Nineveh, he'd taken to sleeping in his combat fatigues.
"Thank you, Mama," Mikhail said. He rubbed his eyes, still disoriented from his dream. He remembered having the dream before, but what it meant he had no idea. It was frustrating to remember so much more about his past, and yet have no memory of who he was except other people telling him who he was because he, himself did not remember his childhood history.
He tucked his wings wearily against his back and stumbled down the stairs, regretting he'd pushed himself so hard yesterday, trying to rebuild his endurance. He did his best to appear pain-free as he approached the warrior who stood in a not-too-terrible semblance of Alliance attention.
"What is it?" Mikhail asked.
"Sir! The signal fires have been lit. Gasur has been attacked!"
Needa cried out with dismay. Gasur was where she had grown up and her parents still lived there.
"Did they kill anyone?" Needa asked.
"We don't know, Ma'am," the warrior said. "All we know is that Gasur has lit the signal fires to invoke mutual aid."
"Has the Chief been notified?" Mikhail asked.
"We sent a second sentry to inform him, Sir."
Mikhail glanced to see if Immanu had come home last night, but there was no sign of his father-in-law, only the weeping Needa, worried that she might have lost her parents.
"Chief Jiljab was advised to hide his excess stores and when the lizards came, to pretend to capitulate and let them take their tribute," Mikhail reassured Needa. "He's a smart man. He won't let the hotheads give the lizards an excuse to destroy his village."
"If they were attacked," Needa said, "they may need fresh medical supplies. I'll put together a package for you to carry."
Mikhail didn't have the heart to tell her that, in his still-weakened condition, it would be all he could do to fly there, much less carry packages. Thank the goddess he had lost nearly a third of his body weight, or wouldn't be able to get off the ground!
Schooling an unreadable expression so the Assurians wouldn't see his fear, he trudged through the darkened village. As usual, his little prodigy had beaten him to the central square. Pareesa pranced in front of her B-team, barking orders like a miniature drill sergeant. Her manner was bossy, the bounce in her step enthusiastic and youthful, but beneath it all, he could see she handled her command with the confidence of a much older person. She came bouncing up to him like an eager little dog.
"We're almost ready to move out, Sir!" Pareesa saluted.
He stared down at his young savior and marveled at how so much spirit could be contained within the form of such a slender girl? But sometimes, as he'd found out the hard way, it took more than bravery to defend those you loved, but also cunning, especially when dealing with an enemy as devious as the Chief's son, who knew just how to hurt them without ever hitting them directly.
"This could be a trap," Mikhail said. "These attacks are too deliberate to be anything but an attempt to bait us into rash action."
"Siamek will stay behind to guard the village!" Pareesa's eyes glittered with eagerness. "He said you should have somebody you trust to watch your back."
Mikhail glanced over at the tall, silent warrior who had refused to discuss anything but military tactics since his odd outburst about the girl who had committed suicide. His conversation with Yalda and Zhila had left him with no answers, only questions. Such as why, if he could not remember anything about the girl, then why, when he shut his eyes at night, was it not Ninsianna he reached for in his sleep, but the source of that song he kept hearing in his dreams?
The warriors parted to allow his father-in-law and the Chief to make their way to the center.
"As we anticipated, the enemy has hit another ally," Chief Kiyan said. "They are toying with us, circling closer to let us know we are next."
"You mean Jamin is toying with us," Pareesa muttered from behind his left wing, her voice muffled by his feathers.
A ripple of agreement moved through the warriors. Yes. Jamin toyed with every village he attacked, undermining their frail alliance with a combination of promises of good things and outright terror. Qishtea had just barely survived his beating, and only the fact he was a hothead prevented him from doing the sensible thing and ordering his village to submit to Sata'anic rule.
The Chief stood in front of him, his bandages now off, but with ample evidence of still-healing burns.
"I would feel better if you let her tag along," Chief Kiyan said, his voice low. He pointed at Pareesa.
Mikhail's jaw clenched, irritated at his change-in-duties from people's champion to pampered pet.
"She is too young to be saddled with such responsibility."
"That may be," Chief Kiyan said. "But she is the best natural warrior I have ever seen, and only she can speak to that Cherubim god of yours to hear warnings about the enemy about to pull a fast one."
Mikhail didn't mention that he wished he could hear the Cherubim god, too. His little protégé had surpassed him in every way, including learning skills which had exasperated Jingu when he had mastered his lessons without ever hearing the 'voices of the gods.'
"You must remember that it is your knowledge we need, son," Immanu added. "Not your abilities as a champion. If any one of these young men and women die, it will be a loss, but if you die, we shall not find another who knows how to get back my daughter."
Mikhail gave his father-in-law a grim nod. Siamek was right. Pareesa, he trusted with his life, and right now, with his body still far weaker than at any time he could remember, he was easy prey if somebody decided to single him out. He would position her behind the line of scrimmage, where he could put that deadly aim of hers to work.
Mikhail signaled the warriors to circle around.
"You know the plan," Mikhail said. "Our intelligence indicates the lizards carry the tribute to a staging area. I shall fly the perimeter to locate this area, and then we shall creep around them and lay in wait for the next shuttle to fly in so we can steal it."
Attempt to steal it. He'd stolen enemy spacecraft before, but it was never easy, especially given the lizard's tendency to close up the hatches and take off the minute trouble started. Three times already his men had failed to get there in time. If he didn't capture it this time, he feared what was left of the Ubaid alliance would throw their support behind the Sata'anic Empire for real.
The warriors jogged to Nineveh's enormous river barge, lo
aned to them by Qishtea to enable them to ferry the warriors in a single group. Gasur sat just east of the juncture of the Zab River, which this time of year was navigable, but the men would need to push the barge up the Little Zab using poles.
Mikhail pounded his wings to pull himself away from gravity's bosom. The wind whistled a cold, winter tune through his feathers, singing a song of freedom, of open skies and limitless journeys. He leveled off in a weak updraft and veered up over the hills which separated the two villages with a great distance on foot, but not so far for a creature of the air.
Cresting the hills and slipping back down the other side, he spotted a bonfire which was not in line with two lines of signal fires stretching towards Arrapha and Assur. He banked his wings, changing course as he spread the long primary feathers on one wing and tightened them on the other to glide with as little effort as possible. Already he felt exhausted. If he pushed himself too hard, he risked passing out in the thin air of the high altitude of the mountains.
He knew the lizards would watch for a shadow in the sky. He dropped down to the ground so he could cover the rest of the distance on foot He tucked his wings against his back and crept towards the anthill of activity which rumbled around a flat spot, the perfect place to land a shuttle even though none was currently parked here. He crept as close as he dared to assess the situation.
He counted the enemies trailing in and out until he had a rough estimate of their numbers. Three units, not quite an entire platoon. There were sentries carrying pulse rifles on each quadrant of the staging area, guarding the baskets of emmer, einkorn, and barley stolen from Gasur's granary. Mikhail assessed what cover was available to creep up behind each sentry position. Not a lot of cover, but some.
He crept backwards, his entire body screaming in protest at this extra exertion when he still hadn't recovered from yesterday's brutal workout, and then found a spot where the hill dropped off about five cubits, just enough that the pounding of his wings wouldn't alert the Sata'anic soldiers that an Angelic had flown into their midst.
The wind fought against him, and by the time he found the river barge, also fighting its way upriver against the strong current of the Little Zab, he panted as though he'd just run a marathon. Winded wasn’t the right word for how he felt right now. Beat? Ready to keel over? Dead?
Okay. Maybe not dead. He had come a little too close to dead twice already to ever bandy that term around loosely again. But who’d have thought a measly flight to Gasur would have exhausted him so badly?
He dropped down onto the overcrowded river barge.
"Mikhail!" Pareesa exclaimed.
Mikhail greeted his little protégé and the real leader on this expedition, Varshab, the Chief's man enforcer.
"I found them," Mikhail said. "About a league north-east of here." A league was about how far an average human could walk in an hour.
"In what state is Gasur?" Varshab asked.
"I saw no buildings burning or other signs of distress," Mikhail said. "Both sets of signal-fires were lit, so hopefully reinforcements are on their way from Arrapha as well."
"What is the most efficient way for a man on foot to get to this place we can ambush the lizard people?" Varshab asked.
"I found a shepherd's path from the foothills down to the river to water their flocks," Mikhail said. "It is only a little further upriver. Follow me, and I will set your feet upon the path."
Pushing back his fatigue, he leaped into the air once more, straining to get airborne and shivering as his body punished him by giving him chills. He flew a short distance upstream and waited for the barge to force its way against the current. Had he been in better shape he would have flown dragging the barge with a rope, but he was in no condition to do so.
He did not wade into the cold river to grab the rope the way he normally would have done, but waited for them to tie off the barge, mindful of the chief's admonition that they needed him to fly, not act as a draft animal. The warriors lined up as Pareesa shoved them into line, tongue-lashing anyone who got sloppy with her biting words. She pranced up to him, eager to be on her way.
"We're ready for action, Sir," Pareesa said.
As they trudged up the path into the hills, he tried to discreetly hide the fact he held a side stitch. Despite his best efforts, he panted like an old woman carrying a loaded basket. He hadn’t felt this exhausted since … since … he couldn’t remember ever feeling this out of shape. He hung back as Pareesa led the warriors up the path, trying to decide if it would be more pragmatic to stick with the group or fly ahead?
He glanced at Ebad who gave him a knowing grin. Now he knew how the B-team felt when the soft, out-of-shape sons of craftsmen and merchants had begun hard physical training for the first time in their lives. He could practically hear She-who-is laughing at the rude justice of not automatically excelling at everything he did. This was even worse than milking the goat!
He almost bumped into a large, bear-sized form which had dropped to the side to fall back to the rear of the line.
“Are you okay?” Varshab asked.
Mikhail sized up the Chief's most trusted man, a man at least fifteen years older than he was, barely winded from his jog up the hill.
“Been better,” Mikhail gave him a grim look. “But I’m not going to keel over, if that's what you're worried about. I just don’t know how much good I’ll be when I get there.”
“You’re not doing too badly for a dead man,” Varshab said. He gave him a warm grin in the moonlight. “Chief Kiyan sent me along to make sure you don't get yourself killed a third time. If it was up to him, he'd let General Needa drag your fluffy tail feathers off to bed where most men who'd spent six weeks at death's door would sensibly stay.”
“It’s been over a month,” Mikhail said. “It’s time to get back to work.”
“Without you," Varshab said, "all of this falls apart." He pointed to the top of the hill, where Pareesa's silhouette could be seen against the starlit sky. "Why don't you fly ahead? I have traveled this pathway before. When we get close, I shall let out a call like a startled jackal. That will be the signal to creep back and tell us conditions in the enemy staging area."
With a nod, Mikhail took to the air and circled around once, just to make sure no enemy crept up on his men the way that they intended to sneak up on the lizards, before making the short flight back to where he'd originally hidden.
The Sata'anic soldiers loitered around baskets and urns full of pilfered items, joking and slapping one another on the back as they rummaged through the spoils of war. An uncustomary sensation of anger percolated in Mikhail's gut and touched that dark hunger he hadn't felt since the day he'd woken up from the dead. As he watched, two blue-skinned Marid came out of the shadows, hauling something large and dead upon their burly, over-developed shoulders. Mikhail sniffed the air. Blood. A deer. He noted the two Sata'an-Marid soldiers carried spears.
Spears? Since when did the lizard people arm their men with spears? And hunt while on a scavenging mission?
He scanned the camp, searching for similar weapons. Yes. A pig-like Catoplebas also had a spear, while a lizard-soldier carried a bow and arrows. It was common for Shay'tan to order his armies to live off the land, but to do so with primitive weapons? That didn't make any sense.
A whistle in the distance warned him the shuttle was returning to pick up its final load. He counted the number of soldiers versus the number of baskets stolen from Gasur. By his estimate, if they packed the shuttle tightly, all of the men and loot would fit onto a single shuttle.
Mikhail glanced in the direction where he had left Varshab and their troops. According to his estimate, they would not be here for another twenty-five minutes. He turned back towards the ship, cursing the fact these attacks were unpredictable enough that they never knew what village the lizards would hit next. If his men didn't get here soon, they would miss this opportunity just like they had the others.
He flattened his wings against his back and crept closer, h
is earlier fatigue forgotten as his heart sped up and began to pump oxygen to his tissues, preparing him for what would come next, sprinting towards the shuttle and fighting his way in, disabling the guards, finding the door control, and disabling the pilots, all while in a weakened condition and far slower than he'd ever been. Damantia! The last time he'd pulled something off such as this he'd been in peak condition and damned near gotten himself killed. There were four times as many soldiers milling about between him and that ship, and unlike the last time, he didn't have a Special Forces unit backing him up.
He cursed no one in particular as basket after basket of grain was loaded onto the shuttle. It was already halfway loaded, and by his estimate Varshab wouldn't be here for another fifteen minutes.
He drew his sword and crept closer to the shuttle like a stalking lion, his wings stretched out behind him. In peak condition, he was an even match for a lizard soldier, more than a match when you added flight and the element of surprise, but only yesterday none other than Ebad had thrown him to the ground.
That dark hunger gnawed at him to do something so badly it caused his muscles to tremble, eager to spring into action at the slightest provocation.
A tall, dark shape caught his attention at the ramp. He wore Angelic combat fatigues and a Sata'anic trench coat, his face scraped clean of its beard and his hair cropped short into an Alliance crew cut. A cold, dead hunger settled into Mikhail's tissues and whispered the name of the man he wished to kill.
"Jamin."
Thought escaped him, for so badly did he want to kill the man that nothing else mattered, not the mission, not his own life, not even his quest to rescue Ninsianna, for this man had hurt him, had hunted him and tormented him and stolen from him everything he loved, and he intended to kill him, to carve out his heart and watch his face as the light faded from his eyes and he opened up his veins and watched the blood drain out and violate the soil as he hacked him to pieces again and again and again.
That dark hunger which had been with him for as long as he remembered whispered to him: 'Get him. Go and get him, and make him tell you where he has taken your Chosen One…'
Sword of the Gods: Agents of Ki (Sword of the Gods Saga) Page 79