by Kari Cordis
She let fly.
Breathless, Ari watched the arrow fly, true and straight as love, far over the angry, swelling sea of Tarq below, piercing the left rope that held the gate up on the far wall. The gate lurched drunkenly, but enough strands still held to keep it in place. All kinds of Sheelmen rushed in under its uneven edge, if nothing else faster than before.
“Archer!” Rheine cried, “Get that gate down!!”
“Empress!” Kai shouted over his shoulder at the same time, forced to take a step back as the Sheelmen within blade reach suddenly rushed him.
Where was the Empress? She was guaranteed to be here, to meet them. Another part of the plan crumbled around Ari’s hopes. “Let me go!” he cried frantically, tearing at those iron fingers, just as he heard the thud of feet behind him. He whirled awkwardly, heart in his throat, but it was only the relief team, Voral’s face one big grin of glee as her boots hit the ground.
She skipped up toward the altar, her voice rising in a thunderous, exultant roar, “THE LI-I-I-I-GHT!!!!” He lost sight of her, but suddenly a thin, curved blade, brilliant and cool and white, gleaming like the moon against a sultry red sunset, appeared in the air at the front of the room.
Rox and Nerissa, who’d landed beside her, were not quite as theatrical. Faces grim and set, they sprinted in a team out behind the small group around Selah and Ari, and, gaining speed like they were leaving orbit, shot out feet first, a good four feet off the ground, into the mass of Tarq.
Dorian was right behind them, and as she landed in front of him, graceful as a gazelle, there was a bare second when their eyes met. She looked gravely into his, all their long weeks together flashing between them, then she was gone.
Rodge and Loren were still standing with Ari, eyeballs bulging, but the arrival of the relief seemed to galvanize them. Loren grabbed a sword and wove determinedly around Ari to help Kai, and Rodge…Rodge picked up a bow. He stared at it stupidly, but at least he’d picked it up.
“Arrows,” Ari urged him, smiling encouragingly. “Find a quiver or some arrows.” There were still weapons and equipment all around them from the fruitful steel resupply from overhead.
Something drew Ari’s eye to the front of the Hall, he was never sure later what. Perhaps it was the sound, because as soon as he looked, he realized he was hearing it: a deep, angry, subterranean kind of groaning—in perfect time with the newly agitated roiling of the Triele. He swallowed. Raemon. Raemon was waking.
And then something more terrible came into view. Irise, delicate, china-doll Irise, walking as quickly as her stiff gait would allow, had left their group. She appeared up at the front, behind Voral—whose energetic defense had sanitized the area of any foolish Sheelmen. Irise was headed right toward that seething Triele, as focused as if she was under a spell, and as Ari watched, she reached out to touch it.
“NOOO!” Ari screamed at her in warning. But it was too late. She was gone, vanished instantly as soon as her hand made contact with it. Eyes huge, mouth hanging open, he stared at where she had been.
Melkin, blade already busy a yard or two in front of the group, whirled around, grabbing Rheine’s arm. “They cannot touch the Triele!” he cried angrily, his face wild. “It will destroy them!” How did Whiteblades, with all that they knew, not know this!
The Chieftess threw him off coolly, parrying a sword thrust. “See to your blade, Wolfmaster,” she advised and moved a little deeper into the fray. Melkin, face fierce as a wolverine, grabbed Banion and Traive, and headed toward Voral…and the altar.
“Reinforcements!” A Whiteblade bellow carried over the sound of the rising tumult. Vashti had got the other rope holding her gate parted, and was drawing for a final shot at the last stubborn side, but it wasn’t from there the shout had come.
Ari scanned quickly, the room a blur of Tarq, both dusty and oiled, the Whiteblades buried within knots of them and marked only by the swift, elegant encryptions of their shining white swords on the livid air. He couldn’t believe it when he located Rox, already down by the main gate. Whether Ariella had gotten the guards already or not, he couldn’t tell. There was such a mass of bodies down there he could barely make out anything. He hoped it was Rox that had shouted, hoped the decoy team had come in sight. The entire Hall was almost packed with Tarq. He didn’t see how it could matter whether the gates were closed or not; there wasn’t room for any more Enemy.
Banion let out a roar and Ari’s head swung back the opposite direction like he was watching a ball match. He couldn’t keep up with what was happening and he was standing still! Banion was at Voral’s side, swinging with outrageous enthusiasm at anything that approached, while Traive was at the base of the altar dealing with anything that got through the Merranics in front of him—which tended to be only the thin and bloody. Melkin had dashed up the steps, fingers flying over the ropes securing that thin, so-quiet figure to the altar.
“Never mind, it’s Rach!” Rox’s voice roared faintly again from the far end of the room, and sure enough, into Ari’s amazed sight came a small company of bare-chested, leather-clad, lean, bronzed wolves. Savagely, with the energy of twice their number, the Rach fought through the chamber. They were not reinforcements for their party, either, Ari realized quickly; their progress was too focused, too intensely narrow. They were interested in nothing but the front of the Hall. What were Rach doing here?
There were only about a dozen of them, their bodies already slashed with steelscore, breeches soaked with blood and sweat. It was apparent they’d been fighting a while already, and judging by the onslaught of the Tarq trailing behind them, snapping at their rearguard, they hadn’t made many friends.
A crashing boom shook the whole Hall, and Ari’s head snapped in that direction. Finally, that side gate was down. He couldn’t see it on the floor for the mass of bodies, but it was clear that no more were coming in from that direction. Like it could possibly matter.
“Decoy!” someone bellowed faintly, and, by straining on tip-toe, his eager eyes could just see Ash and Yve appearing at the main Gate, towering over the smaller Sheelmen. Within minutes those huge doors were groaning, and the fighting grew thick and heavy as Tarq rushed in from outside to try and keep it open.
If only he was free! Ari ached to join in, somewhere! There were so many places that needed an extra blade. His eyes caught on the Rach, who had already worked past his little personal spot of captivity and were close enough to the defenders of the altar space that it was getting pretty hot for the Tarq trapped between the two groups. Ari recognized the lead Rach—the last time he’d seen him, he’d been staring at Ari with a snarl in the underground hall of the Kingsmeet, hand hovering over a sword that fortunately wasn’t there.
He was still snarling, handsome face alight with ferocity and pushing through Tarq by pure force of will, it seemed. The Rach, losing some along the way, finally joined Voral, who greeted them with a companionable, very Merranic, bellow and politely made way for the leader to slip between her and Banion. The others—there were considerably fewer after that push through the very thick of the Tarq—tirelessly joined the two Merranics. Traive had found a bow somewhere and was shooting arrow after arrow into the growing press below him. The Rach had brought a lot of interest to the front of the Hall, and Sheelmen seethed like a dusty wave around the steps.
Melkin had just gotten the limp sacrifice up off the altar when the lead Rach leaped up beside him. For a split second, he cradled her white face—which did look dreadfully similar to Queen Sable—before taking her from Melkin and throwing her effortlessly over his shoulder. Quick as he was, he was still just barely in time. A great wave of Sheel-colored Tarq broke through the thin defense, rushing up the steps like a sickening swarm of insects. Melkin leaped down by his side and then they disappeared under the rush.
Ari was in agony, still trapped by a woman drifting inexplicably into lunacy while his friends—and sovereign—were being overrun! “Selah, Selah,” he said desperately, stopping his frantic squirming a
nd trying to reach her by word. She paid him no attention, lost in almost a trance of concentration.
“Thou art at thy end!” she cried as he paused, her voice a great and powerful sound even in the chaos of battle. He stared at her, an uneasy suspicion beginning to stir in his mind. In unmistakable response, Raemon sounded out up at the altar. He swallowed. Her face…the face he’d thought he’d known as well as his own, that he’d studied surreptitiously for hours, that plain, steady face…was different. It shone, like the Whiteblades’, with a light that had nothing to do with vision. The quiet, meek, dependable little mouse…had become a shining beacon. Her eyes were luminous, as if lit from within, blazing green where once they’d been obscurely dark except in the strongest of light.
It couldn’t be.
“Clear a path!” he heard Voral’s roar, and his head snapped up. He couldn’t believe anyone was still standing up there, but she was definitely up and kicking, laying about with that glowing white blade with a pugnacious look on her face. Rhoda, sweet-faced, pure-voiced, came out of the crowd before her, literally trotting over Tarq bodies—some of them still swinging—to throw herself against the Triele.
“No!” Ari shouted again, thrusting out a hand imploringly, as if to bring her back. Almost panting in his anguish, a heavy, senseless thought occurred to him…were they doing it on purpose? What was going on? Why would they knowingly commit suicide with all that was happening here? It wasn’t just the mission; what about the Queen’s rescue?
Anxiously, he searched for the group on the steps, which were mounded with bodies. Voral was trying to boot some of them aside even as her blade dipped and swirled and thrust at the incoming press. There! There was Banion, rising like a shaggy bear literally out from under a half-dozen clinging hands. They were too close to do him much harm, though he had blood running down the side of his face. Melkin and Traive, too, appeared at the very back of the press, and Ari saw with a sinking heart that the steps in front of them were littered with unmoving Rach that had died to protect them. The one, the leader, was still alive, but barely. Rheine waved them quickly back towards Ari and Selah—and Kai, who still had refused to move away. The Chieftess and Jordan moved in line with Kai, making a wall behind which the northerners could regroup. Traive joined the line almost immediately, and Banion moved off the steps to guard the far end. Ari strained to see what was going on, darting his head around Rodge, who stood stupidly in the way, face white as a ghost. He didn’t even like the sight of blood, and here it was flowing in rivers from his friends all around him.
From what he could tell, Melkin was unhurt. The Wolfmaster was virtually holding up the leader of the Rach raiding party, who was a bloody mess. Staggering sickeningly and barely upright, he still held the precious body of the Imperial ruler over one shoulder. He collapsed and didn’t move as soon as Melkin dropped his arm and lifted Sable off his shoulder. Ari couldn’t watch then, couldn’t look at that beautiful, motionless white face that had been his Queen. If she was dead, he didn’t want to know. He heard Cerise half-sobbing as she darted out of their protected little group and over to her mistress.
Looking desperately for distraction, pouring all his effort into fighting off growing despair—what here was going right?—his eyes swept the chaos of the Hall of Sacrifices. He was almost sick at the sight of Rowena, her soft loveliness set into firmness, determinedly run past Voral and up to the stormy Triele. This time, as she deliberately smacked her palm onto it, Ari heard a definite responsive roar from Raemon. He was getting stronger, or more awake, or whatever. And Ari was getting more hopeless and distressed by the minute. If only he could fight, stay focused, give him something to think about besides all this escalating sorrow.
Then another horrid cry broke through the tumult; he never would have heard it over the noise except that it was just in front of Kai. “Sylvar’s down!”
No, no, no. Not Sylvar.
Kai still did not leave his post, twin blades biting into only what came tearing into them, and Loren, on his left side, was barely able to handle what was sneaking through. At least he was helping, Ari thought in anguish, tugging helplessly at his tether.
Then a long, lean body broke through the group of Tarq in front of him, forcing her way out with Sylvar’s limp body over her shoulder. The Dra Atlanta. Ari felt a rush of warmth for her, which turned abruptly to nausea when he saw the flapping steak that had been Sylvar’s shoulder pass in front of his eyes. She hung as limp as the Queen, fine, silky white hair soaked crimson on one side and hanging almost to Atlanta’s knees. Fleet to the end, the Dra sprinted through the thinning Tarq around the front of the Hall, leaping like a stag over the bodies in the way and throwing herself on the Triele.
Sorrow seemed to squeeze Ari in two, made worse by its meaninglessness. Were they just giving up? Fleeing to the new life Illians claimed waited them at death? Distracting as the raging senselessness was, Ari was still alert enough to notice yet a new development. Raemon was actually talking now. He had been for several minutes, when he thought about it. But when the two girls disappeared, his voice dipped abruptly—it came roaring back, more powerful and angrier than before, but it had definitely distracted him.
Next to him, Selah was answering the god…and Ari was beginning to feel like he wasn’t mentally competent enough to handle this.
The doors at the end of the Hall slammed shut and a feeble, raggedy cheer rose from the remaining Whiteblades. Actually, the doors had been inched closed whenever a moment free of swords availed itself, Ari knew; it was the great iron bar that had been released to slam down into its holding slot that had caused the noise. But it was one good thing in a whole lot of bad, and he was glad to have it.
He still couldn’t see what difference it made. The whole Hall was one seething mass of anger and swords and furious motion, distorted by waves of heat, polluted by the smoke of a charnel house, and rank with the smell of fear. Bodies, bladed, bloodied, and broken, littered the stone floor in piles, and still there were incomputable numbers assaulting the Whiteblades and the northerners. He had thought he had this all-important role to play—now he doubted he or the Empress would survive long enough to see it through.
And then the inevitable happened. A few Tarq got past the weak defense at the end of their little group. Ari tensed as he caught sight of them scurrying around the end that Atlanta had been covering. “Selah,” he whispered urgently, and raised his blade awkwardly. He was no Dra with his right hand, with his left…
Worse, he came to the conclusion as he parried the first vigorous thrust that these small, nimble, cloth-covered types were better fighters than the big, noisy, naked, oiled ones. They were quick, and though he noticed their blades gave under his, they were still steel and would still puncture through his increasingly fragile-seeming skin. He parried and thrust desperately, with no time to remember what he’d learned from Banion all those long weeks on the trail. Were it not for the fact that his space was so narrow, here next to the wall, he would have been overrun already—he was that slow. The couple quick sword strokes to dispatch a man and then move on to the next—that only happened in stories and to Drae, he was convinced. It was taking every ounce of his concentration just to keep that orangeish blade from cutting his throat.
Things went from bad to worse. The liquid flow of people around him (including everyone but Selah, who had him tethered like a hound) shifted to allow another Tarq in next to the original and Ari felt cold fear slide like a blade down his back. If he got to Selah…Frantically, he tried to engage the other blade, seeing another wrapped face pop up behind the two in front of him, ready to jump in as soon as one of them was down. A red hot tracery slashed his chest as one of the blades scored a mark, and Ari felt panic race around the edges of his mind. Lord Il, he screamed silently, for Selah’s sake!
Suddenly, an arrow sprouted out of the chest of one of his antagonists and Ari instantly pressed his attack on the other, spurred on by this new hope. The Tarq waiting in the wings moved up qui
ck as shifting sand, but he, too, grew an arrow before he could even trade steel strokes. Finally, Ari got his man, pushing him triumphantly off his blade back into the small group pressing in behind him. But there were more, and the fear and the rush of adrenaline and the frantic swordplay seemed to blend endlessly in his mind, until he lost track of which opponent he was on and it seemed like minutes and it seemed like days until there were no more. Panting, though he’d hardly shifted his feet more than a foot or two in any direction, he turned to thank whoever had been shooting those blessed arrows over his shoulder—and found himself staring at Rodge.
“It’s physics,” Rodge explained shakily, lowering his bow. “Trajectory, you know…and the interaction of mass with a mass of higher velocity.” He smiled weakly and Ari reached out a big hand to squeeze his shoulder. “You saved my life, Rodge,” he panted. But his friend, far from lighting up with joy at this proclamation, turned paler than ever. He muttered, “Uh, oh.”
Ari didn’t even remember telling his body to turn, he was just suddenly facing back in the direction of attack, roving eyes assessing the danger. The Tarq weren’t through, yet, but it wouldn’t be long.
“Selah,” he said seriously, whirling and focusing all his concentration on to that glowing face, “you’ve got to let me go. Our lives depend on it; I need my good arm—” She wasn’t listening. Raemon was talking loudly now, his voice bringing even more noise to the cacophony of his Hall, and she was engrossed with it. Her plain face was transformed with brilliance, the power of it so blazingly pure that he could hardly look at it. Shocked into stillness, staring unbelievingly at her, he finally whispered, “Empress,” unable to look at her and deny that earth-shattering fact.