by Robert Brady
The boom of kettle drums disrupted all of it. Jack had seen these—almost as tall as a man, born on wagons by draft horses, women with huge hammers beating skins pulled tight across them. They rang ominous from their hills to the city.
Jack couldn’t imagine what the people in the city were thinking now.
At the gate to Volkha, all of those peasants and tradesmen they’d seen were suddenly armed warriors, and all of the carts loaded with wares were suddenly spewing armed Volkhydrans.
Karel of Stone was bravely leaving the scene, as fast as his pony could carry him, and a few mounted warriors were taking off after him. The pony might be feisty and Karel very light, but he wasn’t going to get far before he got a sword in his back.
Jack didn’t know exactly why he did it, but he couched his lance and drove his heels into Little Storm’s side and, hearing Vulpe calling after him, lit off to the rescue.
The giant black stallion dug his rear legs in draft-horse-style and leapt into a full gallop. Amazingly smooth for so large a horse, Little Storm devoured the distance between the retreating pony and the advancing Volkhydrans, now five in number.
Jack didn’t kid himself—he knew from personal experience that the distance he’d cover in just a few minutes would take an hour for their army. He had no skill with his sword—he could barely handle the lance, in fact. The best he could hope for was that the other warriors would break and run, and that didn’t seem very likely.
He could stall them, and then Karel could get some distance. If they couldn’t keep up with Little Storm, then he could play a dangerous game of cat and mouse until Karel had some legroom, and then run.
He closed on the pony, Karel looking wild-eyed, the pony’s mane flying in the wind and the other five horses closing fast. He rode close enough to Karel to look him in the face, then he leveled his lance at the nearest warrior on the left.
The lance caught the armored Volkhydran squarely in the chest. Jack turned the weapon and pulled back on it in an attempt to save it, but the end snapped off like a dry twig, leaving him with little more than a large club. A warrior on his right closed in with his long sword drawn and held low, going for his horse instead of him.
Jack hauled on the reins and pulled the stallion hard over to the right, cutting across the other rider’s path. The Volkhydran’s horse, a stallion, reared in anger, the off-balance rider flying to the left side.
Jack turned Little Storm as if he would pursue Karel. The other warriors changed directions and came for him instead. Now, he thought, he might at least turn them away from the army; run them out on the plains, and then turn in a slow arc back to the protection of the Eldadorians.
No such luck. The slower horses stayed between him and the troops, on the inside of his circle. They couldn’t catch him until the terrain got more rugged, but they could keep him away from his allies until then.
Jack toyed with cutting back to the city and trying to arc around in the other direction when arrows whipped out from behind the Volkhydran warriors. First one, and then the next, and then the third fell peppered with shafts in their necks and armor joints. Sensing they bore dead men, their horses started bucking and rearing, one taking off back to the city dragging a dead warrior by the stirrup.
Jack turned to see Karel and his pony on a tiny rise, barely a hill, with a bow in his hand. Jack didn’t know the Scitai could shoot so well, but he was glad of it as he wheeled the big stallion to the right to go collect the errant Scitai.
Karel descended from the rise and dismounted by a dead Volkhydran. He knelt by the Man’s waist and cut his purse from his belt. He weighed it in his hand and then he threw it to Jack.
“Here you go,” Karel said, offering it up, hilt first. “Spoils of War. If you’re going to go riding that horse to the rescue, you ought to be paid for it.”
Jack took the pouch and poured the coins out into his hand, mostly copper. “Not so much in pay,” he grumbled amiably.
Karel grinned his characteristic grin, climbing back onto his pony. “Like as might,” he said, “you could add it to the coin I gave you when you left Galnesh Eldador, way back when.”
Jack shook his head. “Guess you’re a wise man, made a down payment on his own rescue.”
Karel nodded, reining in next to Little Storm. Together they could see the Eldadorians slowly approaching the besieged city of Volkha, where the single Millennia had taken both sides of the city gate and were formed up in a circle, half on either side. Volkhydrans were throwing themselves at the warriors, but couldn’t break their shield wall.
“You know, where I come from, we have a saying about Men,” Karel said. “Would you like to hear it?”
Chapter Twenty
Perceptions
Melissa found herself back in a little park, by a little stream, dipping her toes in the cool, clear water. They’d just been done, and they looked fabulous.
She’d been here before. She remembered the two hills upstream. A doe munched clover on the nearer one, on her side of the stream. The sun beamed down warm and inviting, her skin was already browning under its glow.
She lay naked—she worried for a moment that someone would happen by—someone like Bill, the love of her life, or one of these new friends, whose names she couldn’t remember right now.
But she got over it. So they saw her naked? None of them were bashful virgins.
“So this is what you do, now, girlie?” a familiar voice asked.
She remembered the timbre, the slight shake of age. She smelled the Sunflowers perfume without having to turn around.
“Hello, Eve,” she said. “Are you going to go for a swim?”
Eve clicked her tongue at her. “No, and I don’t think you have time for this foolishness, neither,” Eve scolded her. “You been using your power too easy, and now you’ve hoed yourself quite a row.”
“That’s me,” Melissa said, dipping her toes in and out of the water. A warm breeze blew across her body and gave her goose flesh. “A ho’ with a row.”
Up out of the water, a girl stepped onto the shore. She had a weathered face, snaggly hair, some of it missing. She had scars, and track marks on her arms. Deep black circles lay under her eyes. She dressed in a yellow t-shirt, tied at her hip, and a fluorescent green mini with no shoes.
“No, missy,” Eve told her, “that’s you, if I hadn’t o’ turned you from the path you was on.”
Melissa sat up straight. She barely recognized herself. The girl smiled through dry, cracked lips, revealing a few missing teeth.
“What?” she demanded. She turned, but Eveave wasn’t there behind her. She was alone here, with this image of herself.
“That’s the you what was left of you,” the goddess’ voice informed her. “Mike broke you worse’n you remember. That first time, you was seen by a local boy who was waiting for you on that street corner and, if you’d gone back there to get money for another night’s hotel stay, then he was goin’ to turn you out.”
The girl, this other Melly, knelt down by her toes, between her legs, and laid her dry, cracked nails on Melissa’s shaved legs.
“Twenty bucks,” she said, her voice a hollow sounding croak.
Melissa scooted back in horror.
“This what you want, girl?” Eveave’s voice asked her. “This what you want me to put you back to? Cuz’ if you need, I’ll do it.”
“N—no! God, no,” Melissa gasped. “Why—why are you showing me this? What are you doing?”
And then the goddess Eveave stood there, to her left, not friendly Eve, but the imperial goddess, her lips pressed in a thin line of judgment, her eyes flashing with her power.
“You use your power without thought of consequence,” Eveave stated, brooking no argument, pointing an accusing finger at Melissa’s bare breast. “You float along; do you think I brought you here to watch?”
“N-no!” Melissa gasped. The other Melly touched her feet again. She tried to draw away, tried to stand, but the force of Eveave’s presence kept her naked on
her back.
“The time has come for you as My instrument to act,” Eveave thundered. “You will be tempted, and it will be up to you to keep the balance on My behalf.”
“How—how can I?” Melissa asked, before she could think better of it. “You—the song! The song! We can’t keep the people—the weapons—together. We lost Xinto, we lost Jahunga—Bill left us.”
Eveave’s lips remained in that firm line. “I am not here to provide you answers you already have,” the goddess informed her. “However I am woeful of your ignorance, and of your unwillingness to fully analyze My word.”
Melissa’s mind raced. She didn’t know what all of this meant. It was like listening from under water.
“Steel yourself, Raven,” Eveave informed her. “Heed the companion whom I have sent to you. Enforce my will, enforce my way—achieve what you were brought here for!
“I am the balance,” she thundered, expanding in size, towering over a shrinking Melissa. “I am the way!”
With that, Eveave was gone. The other Melly pushed away from her, sank back into the stream, disappearing beneath its surface.
The damaged smile and the sallow eyes haunted her.
Melissa looked around her. Suddenly this place had no comfort for her. She pulled her knees up to her breasts and hugged her legs. The wind blew cold. The doe stood up straight, looked around her and trotted off down the far side of the hill where it fed.
Raven—she’d been called Raven. Raven is what they called her here. Raven had discovered magic, a power within her. Raven had found a way to meld the science she’d come here with, to the magic she’d discovered since arriving.
She focused her will, and concentrated on understanding this place, this park, this stream, wasn’t real.
* * *
“They what?”
Karl couldn’t believe his ears, and yet the wizard had repeated himself twice.
“The Eldadorian army has sailed past us, and made landfall at Volkha,” Avek Noir informed them. “I am contacted by our agent who advises your King, Gharf Bendenson, that the Emperor’s son, Vulpe Mordetur, and twenty-five thousand Eldadorian Regulars have sacked the port and taken most of the city. What little resistance is left is centered at the palace, which won’t hold.”
Angron Aurelias watched them from behind Noir, from his litter, his ambiguous silver eyes telling Karl nothing.
They were gathered in the otherwise empty throne room at Hydro. Karl’s cousin, Dragor, Duke of Hydro, presided over the Uman-Chi King and his casters, the obese Confluni Ymir, a Sentalan Chairman Ulminar and his people, a Dorkan Wizard of the Black Fist named Krendell, a gaggle of Andarans under Geeguh Digatish of Chatoos, and their own diminishing band, supposedly lead by Glynn.
They’d left Raven with Slurn and their dog in a tower Dragor had emptied for them. She’d barely moved in the two weeks since they’d come here, except to moan. Vedeen had called this a good sign—those with the black mind did nothing.
“I can still detect the Empress—” Krendell began, but Glynn waved him off contemptuously.
“You yourself said you couldn’t detect their people, just her,” she said. “We fell for a parlor trick, Sirrah, and one so simple it was beneath trying for anyone else. We summoned the Emperor, he played to our hubris, and now the Volkhydran capitol is lost.”
“Not lost yet,” Dragor insisted. “We still hold the palace—”
“Your King will make terms and quit the city,” Angron interrupted him. The wizened old Uman-Chi’s thin voice still commanded the authority of a King. “I have advised him through our agent, and he has agreed. The King of Volkhydro cannot fall to the Emperor, and the lives of his palace guard will be wasted in defense of the capitol. Meanwhile, he will send fast riders to Teher and Ulef and call out those garrisons.”
“The garrison at Sarn, as well,” the Ymir drawled from her padded lounge, “promises to relieve the city. We can deliver as many as thirty thousand.”
“Volkhydro has no interest in swapping Eldadorian invaders for Confluni,” Dragor said. Karl found himself agreeing. “Conflu is lucky enough to be here.”
The Ymir straightened, but Angron held up his hand. “Your Grace,” he said, “when the Emperor takes the city, he will have twenty-five thousand behind the walls of one of your strongest holdings. Unless you are interested in a siege of years, which he can relieve at any time with his own vast army, I must advise you to take what help you may, or at least defer judgment until your own King can advise you.”
Dragor crossed his arms over his stomach. He looked sideways at Karl, then clicked his tongue.
“As a resident of Eldador,” Vedeen said, “I can inform you in certainty that, if you report twenty-five thousand of the Emperor’s troops, then you have seen less than a third.”
“Less than a third,” Geeguh echoed her. He shook his head, his long, black hair brushing his shoulders, his mustachios brushing his chest. “With an army so vast, how do we stand against the Emperor? How do we march from any city, when he commands the sea as well as the land, and can strike anywhere?”
“Rancor Mordetur can take any city of his choosing,” Angron said. “However, he cannot take them all, Warlord, and this is his weakness. When the Emperor asserts himself here, he becomes vulnerable elsewhere, and our allies know themselves safe.”
“Safe to strike him at his home,” Krendell asserted. “I must agree with this plan of Angron’s. Let Lupus take the city, and then let us march on him in strength. When he asserts more troops to relieve them, then we will strike at him in his home.”
“Then we will have him,” Zarshar said. “That is when my people can swarm up from Toor. Let the Empire be weak, and Swamp Devils will feed on its entrails.”
As they had one hundred years ago, the Uman-Chi were rallying the people to their cause. Then the Foveans had been at each other’s throats, this time they cooperated against a nation and a Man who didn’t even exist before.
Dragor shook his head. “You’re all eager to fight this battle in my nation,” he said. “But my cousin’s father and I are pledged to the defense of Volkhydro, and we have fought both with and against the Emperor, and we have employed and fought against the Daff Kanaar.
“And we have seen, time and again, with everything arrayed against him, the Emperor prevail and his enemies fail, even when he faces superior numbers and superior magic.”
Glynn actually stepped up at that. “This is why,” she said, “the goddess Eveave herself has seen to gift us, not just with prophecy but with champions, these, aligned alongside you.”
She crossed the room and stood next to Angron. “This King, with the wisdom of nearly one thousand years, guides us. Surely, you must believe as he does, that we are blessed and will prevail.”
“You lost four men out of five in Eldador,” Dragor told her. “When you faced the Emperor’s Regulars, you failed. Not Wolf Soldiers, Regulars. Theran Lancers and Angadorian Knights, then Daff Kanaar.
“The Emperor’s warriors have Wolf Soldier training,” Dragor said, and slammed his fist down on his throne. “How do we face that, except at terrible loss?”
Karl had had enough. Dragor and Karl’s father had been sworn to the defense of Volkhydro, in his grandfather’s tradition, but Karl had taken that oath, too.
“You know me, cousin?” he said, stepping forward.
It galled him. He’d run from this his whole life. The way the eyes turned, the way the room fell silent, for what he’d done, so long ago, not out of his bravery but, as he knew in his heart, in cowardice.
“I know you, cousin,” Dragor said.
“Who am I?”
Dragor’s eyebrows dipped. “You’re Karl, Son of Henekh, son of Dragor, my grandfather, for who I am named–”
“No,” Karl said, and put his hand on the hilt of his sword. “Who am I?”
“You’re the Warlord of Teher, I know—”, he began.
Karl interrupted him. “No,” he demanded. “How do most Men, m
ost Uman, even the Uman-Chi know me.”
Dragor sighed. “You’re the Hero of Tamara,” he said. His scowl spoke louder than words.
“He turned the Battle of Tamaran Glen,” Ulminar of Sental said. An old Uman even by Uman standards, he leaned on a wooden cane, his back bowed, his white hair limp and fine like Angron’s.
“We must turn our armies over to him, and march on Volkha. By the end of that march, they’ll have Wolf Soldier training. Before you’re going to stop this war, you need to match the troops that can out-fight ten times their number.”
He pointed at Karl. “There’s the one who knows how.”
* * *
Lee Mordetur sat the cold, stone throne of Galnesh Eldador, where her father had sat, and fought the urge to kick her feet as some boring Earl droned on about wanting to raise levies to protect his land.
Lee knew already that any Earl could raise as many levies as he wanted or was able, but this one wanted the Eldadorian state to pay for them, and the Shem Hannen had told her three times a day, every day since the end of Weather, that this movement by the Emperor was too expensive, and they couldn’t spare any gold.
Of course, the more she couldn’t spend it, the more they wanted it, and the louder and more boringly they complained, as if they could wear her down.
Her little brother had more skill at this than they did. He’d even sing to her to get her to steal plums for him from the larder. If one of them sang now, she’d likely give him some wealth, just to break up the monotony.
To her left, Hectaro stood at attention in his Wolf Soldier uniform, his sword over his shoulder and his eyes set forward. She’d come to wonder what must go through his mind during these boring times at court. At least she got to sit down.
“And so, as you can plainly see, my elegant Lady,” the Earl of Lee’s Hope informed her. He’d even named his city after her. Her father called this ‘sucking up,’ but she didn’t understand why.
She waved her hand. “Raise levies as you will, your Excellence,” she informed him. “We cannot, however, recompense you. We are, after all, at war.”