by Curtis, Greg
Now four thousand more souls no longer suffered under the reign of the false temple. They no longer had to fear being sacrificed to the demon king. And the beasts and their false priest masters were dead.
None had been spared. That wasn't a military decision that had been made. They would have taken prisoners if they could have, even though they knew it would be pointless. The thralls would have told them nothing. It was simply the fact that they had only been facing demon thralls and chimera. The chimera would always fight to the end, and since they were beasts they would then kill any of the wounded that still lived. And here the thralls had chosen to do the same. Though the truth was that they had chosen nothing. They like the beasts had obviously been commanded to fight to the end.
The thralls were loyal to their masters, if only out of fear of what their masters would do to them if they disobeyed. That fear ruled their lives. It wasn't surprising really when their masters were demons after all. They were less than servants. They were property. And they would always obey their masters no matter what. That was why in most civilised lands thralls were always killed.
Hard Flats was only just inside the border of the Regency, barely a couple of leagues in fact, and so as advances went it wasn't a large one. But still, thought Nyma, it was a start. After they had cleared out the last of the invaders in their own realm, something that had taken a little over a month, the dryads had begun their first ever invasion. And while the journey travelled might be small in terms of actual distance, the journey their people had travelled was far greater. In thousands of years the dryads had never entered another land with the thought of conquest. They had never even had an army before. Guards and soldiers, even custodians, but never an army.
Still, tomorrow another town would be freed, and the day after that a third. The war masters had come up with a plan; a simple one. They would use the advantages of mobility and misdirection. The army had a vanguard split into three arms, each comprised of fifteen hundred soldiers. That was the van. And each arm was sufficient to free a small town and then hold it. And while they held the town, another town would be taken, leaving the enemy with no clear target to attack. Meanwhile the main part of the army was behind them, slowly making its way west towards the nearest cities. It was hoped that the false temple would never even see the main army until they were under siege.
Until then the three smaller advance parties would draw their attention, meaning that while they came from three different directions, the false temple wouldn't even know where to send their forces if they chose to counter attack. And worse for the enemy, if necessary they could flee. They were much faster than the enemy. That was the benefit of coming from a land where horses were plentiful. Their infantry weren't marching but were in fact being carted to the towns, which had the added advantage that they arrived ready for the fight.
Their tactics were simple too. A quarter of their forces in each advanced group was comprised of custodians, lightly armoured and fast moving, there to harry the enemy's flanks and keep them disorganised. They had the honour of calling the battle and hopefully drawing the enemy out of their temples and out of position. Another quarter was made up of archers. Skilled bowmen and women who would take the enemy down quickly, from behind the infantry. Their task was to thin the enemy's numbers, and to make it too costly for them to stand their ground. They would force them to attack or run – and chimera didn't run. The balance of their forces were infantry and their task was to blunt the enemy's attack. They had adjusted their equipment and tactics to deal with the beasts. Now every soldier had a tower shield with spikes on the bottom that they could ram into the ground. In a matter of heartbeats they could line up and form a wall of steel.
The battle plan was simple but effective when the thralls had no understanding of warfare and the chimera no understanding of anything apart from savagery. And the lack of wizards and trained soldiers among the enemy played into their hands.
The infantry were heavily armed. They would advance first to the edge of the town and set up a defensive position behind a wall of shields. Even the furious strength of the beasts could not break down the tower shields once they were anchored into the ground. And any that tried would find themselves having to breach a defensive line of spears and pikes.
The archers and wizards would set up behind the shield walls ready to bring down as many of the beasts as they could, long before the enemy reached their lines. And when they were ready the custodians would begin the battle by riding through the town. They would draw the enemy out from their temples – the chimera would always give chase to what they thought were prey – and bring them to their forces. After that, while the enemy was throwing themselves against their steel walls, the custodians would sew confusion among the flanks.
The tactic had worked here just as it had worked in Inel Ison. But then without the wizards and any trained soldiers the enemy was vulnerable. It also seemed they didn't learn from their mistakes. Not quickly enough anyway. And the dryads were making certain that there would be no survivors left to pass on any information to those in other towns.
As with the battle for other towns the false temple in Hard Flats hadn't been prepared for the tactic and so the battle had gone well. Nyma was happy with that. But she was unhappy with herself. Or rather, with her performance.
She and the rest of her lodge had ridden through the town from the north side, and completely torn the heart out of the enemy's flank. But then fifty custodians were a powerful force. At least twice as many beasts had fallen to them, and they had lost only one of their number for that victory. A dozen were wounded and would need some attention. But they would all ride again. The other custodians had had similar success on the south side and two full lodges had ridden straight through the heart of the town, not doing any great damage but drawing the beasts straight on to the spears of the army.
But she had been slow. In the attack she had been wounded, something that simply shouldn't have happened. A leonid claw had caught her riding arm and managed to cut right through her wardwood armour. The fault was hers; she hadn't been quick enough to dodge, and that upset her. Because she was quick enough normally.
The injury itself was minor, being no more than a run of scratches, but they were bleeding profusely and she knew that she should see the healers. But she didn't want to see them. Because then they would find out that she was with child and she would no longer be able to take part in the war. To ride with her watch. No woman with child was allowed to ride. It was the rule.
And once the news was out the rest would follow. She would have to tell her family. That would be tough. Not because they would be upset. They wouldn't be. They would be overjoyed. Children were a blessing among her people. And the child of a magus would be a cause for celebration. There would be singing and dancing. Her mother would cook spiced fish pie and endless bowls of runner beans.
It was the other part that would distress them. Where was the father? When was he coming to be with her? What were the prospects? And all she could tell them was what she'd already told them. That they had agreed to property rights. That they intended to build a home together. One day.
They already knew about Harl of course. But not much. She had spared her mother many of the details about him, because he was far from the perfect son in law her parents would want. He was too angry and bitter for that. Too suspicious and distrusting. Too hurt by the tragedy of his life. That would trouble them. They would worry for her and she didn't want that. But she couldn't hide the truth from them forever.
It was too soon. That was the thing that upset her. She had thought she and Harl would have had more time before this happened. Time to discuss the future. Time to decide if they should truly be together. Time for Harl to once more become the man he had always been meant to be. And he was slowly becoming that man again. But when the time for her monthly cycle had passed as she'd ridden to Inel Ison and she'd realised that nothing had happened, she had suspected the truth. When she'd started
feeling a little uneasy on the stomach each morning, she had guessed it again. And now, another month on, and another month without her normal cycle happening she was certain. Especially when she thought she could just begin to feel a slight thickening around her waist. In another month she suspected, it would be a bulge. And then she wouldn't be able to hide it from anybody.
Then of course there was Harl. He didn't yet know. And she didn't know how to tell him. Though she knew she had to. But how? It didn't seem right somehow to give him the news in a letter. Especially not in a tiny scrap of tissue that would be carried by pigeon to the fort at Whitebrook and then ferried by soldiers to his house. Not when the letter would be read by others before him. But she could see no other way and he had the right to know. More than that he had the need.
He had agreed to exchange property rights with her. She knew he didn't understand what that meant. Maybe some of the intent, but not the meaning. But she understood it, and though it had been a spontaneous thing for her when she'd spoken the words – as these things often were – she had meant them.
She had named herself as his and he had named himself as hers. And though he might not have understood what he was naming himself as, she had understood it and accepted his claim. Now he belonged to her, and she had to honour the commitment he had made. That meant among other things, fidelity in all ways and all matters. And fidelity included not just the absence of falsehoods, but also the revelation of all truths. So she would tell him. She only wished she could be there to tell him in person.
Still, she thought, maybe this would be the news that would bring him all the way out of his darkness. A child was a big thing. And no matter how damaged he was, he was still a good man. He still had a heart. He hid it behind his bitterness and doubt. Behind the wall of cynicism and gloom that was his way. But it was there.
“You should have the healers tend to that.”
Sidero startled her as his words rang out from just beside her. He'd obviously spotted the blood on her arm. And if he had the chances were others had too. They would insist that she saw the healers.
“I know. I will as soon as they're finished with the others.” In the end her decision had been made – though not by her.
Chapter Fifty Three
Blue Water was a mess. That was Erislee's first thought when she saw the town. And she guessed it might well be the one she kept with her.
It wasn't supposed to be like that. Her memory of it had been of a picturesque little town of twelve thousand people sited beside a large lake with some of the bluest water she'd ever seen. It was a warm place where the people lived in elegant wooden and brick cottages with proper slate roofs. There wasn't a thatched roof in the entire town. And the streets were neat and tidy and lined with elegant gardens.
Since then of course the false temple had come and the town had suffered, just as had all the others. Houses had deteriorated. The streets had been left to become filled with pot holes. Gardens had become overgrown. And then someone had built a massive, incredibly ugly temple in the middle of it.
But some time in the last couple of days that had changed again and the town looked like it had been torn apart. Some parts had been burnt down. The smell of the burnt timbers – and worse the burnt flesh – still hung in the air. Other parts of the town had been blown apart. And here and there the ground had actually opened up and swallowed sections of it. That she knew could only mean that there had been wizards fighting here. Wizards of fire, sky and wind.
But the wizards hadn't been at war with each other. Nor had they been murdering the town's folk. Instead it seemed that they'd been fighting the chimera and the false priests, their former comrades in arms – who when she thought about it they had been pretending to be only a few short months before. But now it seemed they weren't pretending. Nor were they serving the demons. The bodies of the wizards they found – and there were a great many bodies – had all had their tattoos burnt off. She'd never seen so many blackened wrists in her life before.
Most of them had been torn apart. Many showed the obvious signs of harpy poison. As for the beasts and the false priests, they'd been burnt alive, blasted with lightning and sometimes smashed with enormous power into walls. Many also had wounds from swords and spears. Which told her that the wizards and the soldiers had been battling the beasts and presumably the demon king's thralls who were still robed as priests.
For some reason The enemy forces were imploding. It wasn't clear who had won and who had lost and in truth it probably didn't matter. What did matter was that the streets were filled with bodies, and few of them were those of the towns folk. They were mostly still in their homes, hiding. Every so often she could see a frightened face peering out of the corner of a window or from behind the edge of a house. But none of them came out to see them.
She guessed they'd been in hiding ever since the battle, none of them knowing what was happening or what to do, and none of them wanting to get involved. Not even to the point of clearing the bodies away. The fear that was their normal life was too deeply ingrained in them. These weren't people who ever showed their faces proudly.
This was new.
She'd heard rumours of course. Ever since Cloverfield she had known that the wizards and soldiers of the false temple had split with the demon king's thralls and beasts. And there had been reports from the scouts that some of the wizards returning to Lion's Crest had been attacked. There had been word from Inel Ison and Pariton that it was happening in the realms near them and that they were taking advantage of it. But this! This was something else. This wasn't minor skirmishing. This wasn't hunting down fleeing wizards. This was all out war. These wizards and soldiers by the looks of things were not from Blue Water and had come in fighting.
“We've got the counts High Priestess.” A soldier came up to her with the piece of parchment in his hand and she thanked him for it. But really she thought, should she be? Should someone have even done the counts? This wasn't a battle. Not one they'd been in anyway. It was something else. A civil war maybe.
A bloody one. When she read the numbers she knew that for certain. Six hundred soldiers and twelve hundred chimera. That was a lot of dead. Especially in a town of only twelve thousand. Assuming there were twelve thousand people left. She doubted there were. In most places they'd been to there had been less than half the original population remaining.
Erislee knew she should celebrate. Because even if this wasn't a victory for them it was a loss for their enemy, and all of them had been killed with absolutely no losses of their own. Sixty priests had also fallen, burnt and broken for the most part. But just as many wizards had died, and that was what really mattered. They were easy to make out in their colourful clothes. And they were just as dead as the rest.
What she couldn't work out was why the two halves of the false temple were at war? Certainly they'd seen one town after another without wizards, and they'd had reports of battles. But they were skirmishes. This was the first time they'd seen an all out war between the two sides.
“So what happened here?” Erislee turned to the few witnesses who had come forward when they'd called for them. A very few had, mostly the old and the sick. The ones that if they were killed wouldn't be so terribly missed. She understood that. The townsfolk didn't know who she and her army were. They thought at the least they were more trouble. And those who had little left to live for had sacrificed themselves to protect the rest. It was simply the sad reality of life in the five kingdoms.
“I don't know High Priestess.”
One of them, an old woman suddenly started grovelling in front of her and Erislee knew it was because of her robes. They believed she was a high priestess of Artemis – as she was. But they still hadn't realised that the others weren't. Not even when she had a dozen unicorns walking with her and the skies filled with griffins. And the woman probably wouldn't accept the truth for a long time to come.
“Some riders, wizards and soldiers of the temple came riding into town, all of t
hem wounded, and then when they rode into the temple everyone started fighting.”
“Some of them were injured when they rode in?” That seemed important to Erislee. Not least because it surely meant that they'd been fighting elsewhere.
“Yes High Priestess. Many were bandaged, some were draped over their horses as if they were dead.”
“And who won?” That was the other thing Erislee couldn't fathom. In any war there was a winner and a loser, and in a war like this sure the winner should have taken the temple in the heart of town. But the temple had been destroyed and there were no survivors anywhere.
“No one. Maybe a dozen of the riders who entered the town left. But they were mostly badly injured. They would not have made it far.”
No survivors then. If what the woman was telling them was the truth there were no survivors. The wizards and the soldiers, had – having already been through a battle – ridden into the town, attacked the false temple, fought a battle to the very end, and then ridden off without claiming any of the spoils. That made no sense at all. And yet the woman seemed truthful to Erislee. She might be mistaken about some things, but she wasn't lying.