Cry of the Falcon (Falcons Saga Book 4)

by Court Ellyn

  “It doesn’t matter,” Aisley muttered, staring at the floor. Her face and throat were blotched red with sobbing. Her raven-black hair clung to wet cheeks. “It would hurt the same.”

  “I’ll tell Lady Ruthan you can share my room. I have another in the Bastion anyway.” And to be honest, when she needed a break from the stench of blood and death, she’d sneak down the corridor to Rhian’s suite. Seems she owned more willpower than he did. She had outlasted him, much good it did them now. Denial, ignoring one another, what a farce. She didn’t want kings or lords; she wanted only her pearl fisher. The fact remained, they might be dead tomorrow. Their secret was worth the risk. Carah winced, wishing she hadn’t extended her invitation so hastily. Aisley might catch her sneaking around. “I won’t bother you except to change and bathe. But when you’re up to it, you should find something to do. A distraction. You’re talented with a needle. We could use you in the infirmary.”

  Carah’s words seemed to swirl off into empty fog. Aisley looked up at her. “Do you know what happened to him?”

  Right. Stop trying so hard. “My father can tell you.” She had heard it wasn’t pretty. “Drink up.” She fetched a blanket from a chest and was bundling it around Aisley’s legs when she heard feet trammeling along the corridor. Both directions. Panic.

  With determined calm, Carah said, “Try to get some sleep. I’ll be back soon.”

  In the corridor Carah bumped into Eliad’s auburn-haired mistress. Oh, what was her name? Lyana? She was noticeably pregnant, and her pretty face was pale with terror. Narra shoved past, lugging their belongings into their quarters.

  “What’s happening?” Carah asked.

  “Those monsters!” Lyana cried. Carah suspected someone had insulted the two mistresses until she realized the woman was talking about ogres. “Someone said they’ve come from Bramoran. We’re not safer here. We’re not safe anywhere!” Her hand wrapped protectively across her belly as she fled into her room and slammed the door.

  Carah ran from the keep. In the courtyard, she accosted the first soldier she found. “Where are my mother and father?”

  The woman pointed toward the north wall. “I saw them heading for the skybridge.”

  By the time Carah raced up to the inner battlements and across Ruthan’s Skybridge, she was winded and sweating. The commanders had gathered around Da atop the northern gatehouse. Bryden darted off quick as a hare into the nearest tower and out of sight; Lady Ulna and Lord Johf sped after him, the urgency of a mission in their step.

  Mum separated herself and took Carah by the hand. “I was brave a few moments ago,” she said.

  “Oh, Mum, if you’d been an hour later, they might’ve caught you.”

  “No, they wouldn’t have.” She patted the dagger on her belt.

  Such a thing didn’t bear thinking about. Carah and her mother rejoined the others in time to hear the last of the War Commander’s orders: “…your dranithion up here with the archers, Falconeye. I’ll take the Regs with me.”

  “Us too?” asked Dagni.

  “You’ve been on the march for a couple days. I want you refreshed, but if you’re willing, keep an eye on the main gate. Position your companies on the dike, if you like.”

  “Cover your rear?”

  The War Commander nodded. Dagni saluted and headed down the tower.

  Lady Athmar in travel-dusty armor made no move to carry out an order, nor did she seem all that interested in the planning. Da must have considered her too exhausted to march as well, and he had lost trust in her nephew. Daxon stood at her side, and the two whispered like spiders.

  Rhian leaned on the crenels nearby, cool and collected as he waited for instruction. In stark contrast, Captain Reynal sweated and paced and grumbled about what should be done. Separate from the rest, Uncle Thorn tapped his staff lightly on the stones, counting out something as he gazed east. And farther along the wall, half a dozen Mantles surrounded King Arryk and Lady Ruthan. They too looked to the east. Carah craned her neck and saw a vast cloud of dust rolling along the highway, the same highway that cut toward Bramoran. The thump of drums, the groan of horns rolled from the cloud.

  Screams pelted the wall like stones. Through the crenels, Carah watched the highlanders dismantle their tent village in seconds. Cattle and goats stampeded toward the open plain. Women and children fled toward the north gate, but the outer moat was a cruel barrier. Only the main gate had bridges over both moats. But at the north gate, the ogres had burned the boathouses and ferries that tradesmen used to deliver wares. Still, a few highlanders tried to swim across the fetid water.

  “Go around, fools,” Eliad muttered. “You still have time.” But there was no accounting for panic. One woman beat frantically the water, sank, and didn’t surface again.

  Da grabbed Eliad by the scruff. “Go sort that out. And get your warriors into formation.”

  Mum cried out, pointing. Near the base of the dust cloud, the air quivered, and row by row the ogres stepped out of the veil.

  “I’m not doing that,” Thorn declared.

  Da snapped open the brass spyglass.

  “I’ve counted ten companies,” Thorn said.

  “Two banners,” Da said, squinting through the lens. “One with a red claw, the other a purple triangle. A mountain, maybe. Who leads them?” He passed the spyglass to Laniel. “Is that Lothiar?” Surely he hoped for a view of his enemy’s face at last, as much as Carah did.

  Laniel refused the spyglass. He hadn’t earned his name for nothing. “No. His name is Da’ith. He’s … off-kilter. When he disappeared some years ago, no one was sorry to see him go.”

  All Carah could make out was a horse and shiny armor, and two flapping bits of pale fabric. She doubted the War Commander would share the spyglass with her.

  “The town militia is too green to face that,” exclaimed Captain Reynal. “They started training only yesterday.”

  Carah scowled at the man. Da didn’t need Reynal’s puny militia anyway. He had faced five thousand ogres with the host he had. What was one thousand?

  Da handled the castellan more diplomatically. “I agree. Stay with them. Choose a team to move the ballistae into position, here along the north wall, and keep the machines supplied.”

  Palpable relief washed over Reynal’s jowly face. Coward, Carah thought as the castellan hurried off.

  “Rhian!” Da called. The avedra pushed himself from the wall. At his side, his fists clenched and opened, clenched and opened, the only sign that he was excited. “Break them up like you did before? But once we engage, no lightning.”

  “Sure I’ll think of something.” His eyes grew distant; he was already imagining.

  Da turned to Thorn. “Brother, you’re free to do whatever you like.”

  “Good, I’ll stay up here and watch the show.”

  Da gave him an abandoned sort of look.

  Thorn chuckled. “Don’t worry, I’ll scorch a few hides.” He curled a finger, beckoning Carah. Her heart lifted; she thought she’d be overlooked. “Are you needed in the infirmary?”

  “Not yet.”

  “Then watch and learn.”

  “Don’t I always,” she replied broodily. Since summoning fire to fend off her would-be captor, the flames had eluded her. Try as she might, she couldn’t do more than light candles. What good would that do her father today?

  Da kissed Mum, then entered the tower and was gone. Rhoslyn pressed her fists to her mouth, closed her eyes and heaved a shaky breath. The temptation to imagine what could happen was just too great. She needed a distraction. “Mum,” Carah called, “come watch Uncle Thorn work.”

  Rhoslyn raised her chin and straightened her shoulders. “I think I’ll see if His Majesty needs anything.” She strode from the gatehouse battlements and out along the wall.

  A tramping of feet announced the arrival of the archers, human and Elaran. Upon Laniel’s order, they spread out and filled the crenels along the north wall.

  Carah eased in between Rhia
n and her uncle and watched the lines of ogres maneuver onto the plain. When the banner-bearers were directly in front of him, Thorn made a gesture, like tossing a leaf to the wind. A thin finger of fire stretched out across the ogres’ path, halting them.

  “Give us room, love,” Rhian said, raising his arms. Carah noted the careless slip. If Uncle Thorn heard it, he gave no indication. Mist rose from the brown waters of the moat, and the stink of sewage with it. Clouds formed, thick and gray over the heads of the ogres. Lightning crashed, blasting ogres off the ground like ragdolls. Carah pressed her hands over her ears.

  “Draghilë!” Laniel shouted. Arrows flew long and peppered the nearer half of the enemy phalanx. With a deep rattling thwump, a pair of ballistae released four-foot long garrots. Three catapults launched round stone shot. If only the rest of the engines were complete…

  Still, the lines began to shift. Carah laid her bet on Rhian’s lightning.

  A horn sounded from Tírandon’s main gate, and the black banner blazoned with the red falcon snapped into view. It followed the curve of the moats onto the plain. Da rode beneath it. Lord Haezeldale and Lady Blue Mountain rode beside him; their cavalries pranced grandly behind. Farther back, the Regulars advanced, then the Fieran infantry and the highlanders.

  “I didn’t know he meant to lead them personally,” said someone on Carah’s left. The White Falcon watched from the neighboring crenel. Mum and Ruthan occupied the next one.

  “Nor I,” Carah replied. She watched in horror as her father bypassed the command hill.

  Mum left her crenel and tugged Thorn’s arm. “Tell me he knows what he’s doing?”

  “Of course he does.” There was a lack of certainty in his eyes, but then he grinned. Even if the War Commander was a brave fool, he had a brilliant brother guarding his back.

  As the red falcon neared the firewall, Rhian let the clouds dissipate into ragged tatters. His fingers made a grasping gesture, and one of the wispy clouds tightened, spun itself into a spike of ice. It plummeted, struck the ground, crushed the ogres beneath it. Upon the wall, archers cheered.

  Near the enemy’s front line, the glow of fire formed, like an ember rising in the dark. Carah glanced at her uncle, but he looked alarmed. The fire wasn’t his. The spark brightened, broadened, gathered into a spinning ball, then launched toward the battlements.

  “Get down!” Thorn ducked behind the wall, dragging Mum down beside him. Carah dropped to her knees, wrapped her head in her arms. The fireball struck the upper edge of the battlements, somersaulted over the crenels and dissipated with a flood of heat. Half a dozen archers collapsed, writhing, their lungs seared.

  “I’d wondered what happened to him,” Rhian said.

  Carah recalled the battle inside Bramoran’s feast hall, the lightning booming, the fire swirling. The avedra with the foreign accent and unfriendly eyes had disguised himself inside the uniform of the Falcon Guard. What had he called himself?

  “Damn it, I thought I’d killed him,” Thorn snarled. He peeked over the wall but ducked fast. “Incoming!”

  A second fireball flew high. As it launched past the wall, it broke into a hundred pieces that went flitting about like birds. They landed on clothing, in hair, struck exposed skin. An archer spun wildly, engulfed, and plummeted from the wall. The ropes providing tension on one of the catapults burned and snapped. Lieutenant Rance flung his white cloak over Arryk. Carah rose onto her knees, swept an arm and whispered, “Cold.” Her breath fogged before her face, though the summer sun blazed overhead. A dozen of the firebirds disappeared in clouds of steam. “It worked!” In her excitement, she gave the lieutenant’s arm a vigorous shake.

  “Car, keep your head down,” Rhian ordered, even as he stood and flung something groundward. Air, ice, or fire, Carah couldn’t say.

  One of the firebirds careened across her bare arm. She shrieked through her teeth. A hand wrapped in white smashed over the flame and snuffed it, then someone seized her by the scruff and hauled her up against the wall. The white cloak ballooned in a tent over her head. Crouching against the wall, Arryk examined the blisters forming above Carah’s elbow. “It’s not bad,” she assured him, brushing aside his concern. She tried to rise; Arryk’s hand on her shoulder held her in place.

  “Stay put. Rance will tell you when it’s safe. And welcome to my world. Hiding under someone else’s clothes.”

  Carah grit her teeth against the pain. The fire seemed to linger in her flesh. “That bastard. How did he survive?” She inhaled deeply to quiet her rage and laid her hand lightly over the burns. She was good at closing gashes and lacerations, good at cleansing infection; surely mending burns wasn’t much different. Her skin tingled, a sensation that might’ve been pleasant if her nerves weren’t scorched raw. After a moment, the pain diminished, the redness paled to pink. She’d deal with the blisters later.

  Arryk’s green eyes blinked wide in wonderment.

  “Never tried healing myself before,” she admitted. “Silly me, and I let the queen give me stitches when those manacles chewed me up.”

  “More concerned about healing others.”

  She grunted, dubious. “ ‘Selfless’ isn’t a quality I’ve heard applied to myself before.”

  A brass horn sang. The thunder of hooves followed. Carah scrambled from beneath the cloak in time to see her father gallop into the enemy lines. Atop the wall, the catapults had gone still, and the archers could do nothing now but watch. Rhian bombarded the ogre rear with massive spikes of ice. And two cyclones of flame—Uncle Thorn’s handiwork, Carah assumed—whirled through the lines, wreaking havoc on the ogres’ formation.

  Where was Lothiar’s avedra? Had Uncle Thorn cooked him to a crisp? Carah assumed he lay among the bodies until fire sped through Da’s cavalry. Disks of fire, perhaps no bigger than dinner plates, spun like sawblades. One struck Da’s horse in the chest. The animal went down. Carah smashed a hand over her eyes.

  Mum shrieked.

  “Carah!” bellowed Uncle Thorn. “Take your mother below.”

  It was all she could do to tamp down the wave of panic. The urgency in her uncle’s order implied much. She grabbed her mother by the hand. “The infirmary. We’ll be needed.”

  “No, I won’t,” Rhoslyn said, wrenching her hand free. “What if—” What if he’s killed, disappears, seething mass, doesn’t come up again… Her thoughts screamed as loudly as a war horn.

  “Then we’ll be needed more than ever,” Carah said.

  In the infirmary, she set her mother to organizing supplies for the surgeons. Queen Briéllyn smeared a coat of salve on Carah’s blisters. The queen’s confident objectivity was contagious. The orderlies and nurses waiting on hand remained calm. Even Madam Sergeant refrained from raising her voice as she handed out orders. While they worked, they listened. The walls of the Bastion were thick, but the still air carried the muffled cries of men and brays of ogres, the bugling of wounded horses, the clash of steel, the booms of fiery explosions.

  Moths churned sickeningly in Carah’s belly. Mum must feel worse; she didn’t seem to be making much progress organizing things. Da… Don’t think about it. Don’t think about whose wounds you’ll be tending. Don’t think about Da…don’t! Had his horse crushed him? Had he bounded to his feet quickly enough? She was counting out bottles of herb-laced poppy wine when the volume of the battle cries redoubled. Horns sounded from afar, curved bull’s horns, ogre horns. Overhead, in the upper floors of the Bastion, a shout of alarm went up. A sentry’s horn blasted in reply. A lone catapult thumped into action. Carah abandoned the bottles and ran into the bailey. Peering through the three portcullises, she saw the dwarves lining up along the dike, hefting axes and spears. Dagni led one company at a charge, screeching fiercely. Veil Sight revealed a horde of ogres invading the western edge of camp.

  “Open the gate!” Rhian came running down from the wall, shouting. “Clear the road! Make way!” The War Commander had stationed Leania’s infantry amid the thoroughfare, in case they were ne
eded for a final push. Why should they abandon their position so hastily? Arriving at the gate, Rhian threw himself into the winch. The inner portcullis grinded upward. A few soldiers rushed to help him. When the first portcullis was raised, they ran ahead to raise the second.

  “Rhian!” called Carah. “What’s happening?”

  He grabbed a Leanian to take his place at the winch. “Take your mother and get off the ground floor.”

  “Yes, but—”

  “It’s an all-out rout. Ogres came from the west and attacked our rear. They hid themselves until they were right on top of us. Falconeye saw them, but by then it was too late.”

  “Will our people be cut off?” Carah muttered.

  “We’re trying to get everyone inside before that happens. Go! We’ve got to make room. You don’t want to be trampled.”

  Carah ran up the Bastion’s winding stair, her mother tight on her heels. Reaching the battlements, they found a gap between incomplete ballistae and peered down at a chaotic storm of combatants. Ogres pressed the human rear, cutting down anyone who fell behind. The Regs and Haezeldale’s cavalry struggled to hold back the tide, while the dwarves held the surprise ogres in camp, away from the gate. The archers, too, had kept pace with the rout and now filled the Bastion’s battlements and the northwest curve of the wall. Arrows rained down. Fire, too, great swirling maelstroms of fire, bombarded the ogre rear. Uncle Thorn was angry.

  The bridges, even widened as they were by earth, created a bottleneck. Highlanders and infantry shoved each other, desperate to reach the safety of the gate. Soldiers on the edge of the bridges struggled to keep their footing; many were pushed into the moat where they thrashed and went under, dragged down by the weight of their armor.

  “There!” Mum cried, pointing at the bridge that crossed the outer moat. Da scrambled up the mound of the dike. Relief surged through Carah. He was covered in mud and blood but was able to move all his limbs and shout orders over the heads of his people.

  As the infantry squeezed through the gate, the Regs, the cavalry, and the dwarves gave ground inch by inch, until they too reached the moats. The ogres pressed behind them. Victory heightened their blood fury. Their bellows were deafening.