I found the problem.
A gang of armed men controlled the bridge’s approach. Bared steel and nocked arrows gave them all the authority they needed. They let a trickle of people through, making sure panic wasn’t going to get anyone crushed.
I would have applauded their efforts, save that they were charging for passage.
I squeezed through and made for their leader. One of his underlings planted a hand in my chest. Dunos emasculated the bandit before I had a chance to take that hand off at the elbow.
I stepped past the screaming man, my eyes hard. “I haven’t the time to draw a circle, so you have a choice. Die where you stand, or follow my orders. Choose. Now.”
The man, whose eyes had widened at the mention of a circle, bowed his head. “How may I serve you, Master?”
“How high can you count?”
He looked at his hands. “Through the Nine Gods and one for me.”
“Good. Pick nine people. They go.” I nodded to Dunos and Eron. “Pick nine and send them. Stagger it.”
Word of what I’d said passed back through the crowd. People took heart and grouped themselves in sets of nine. They started moving quickly over the bridge, which was just as well. Looking back into the city, seeing the smoke rise and the growing crowd heading toward the bridge, getting them all across was going to take a long time.
And we were going to run out of time long before we ran out of people.
TheNewWorld
Chapter Forty
30th day, Month of the Eagle, Year of the Rat
Last Year of Imperial Prince Cyron’s Court
163rd Year of the Komyr Dynasty
737th Year since the Cataclysm
Moriande, Nalenyr
Ciras Dejote leaped over Tyressa’s body and smashed both feet into Pravak’s face. The vanyesh giant stumbled back, unable to free the sword in Tyressa’s belly. The swordsman landed and dashed forward. His slash rang loudly, notching Pravak’s thigh.
The tentacle swept out, but Ciras sidestepped it. He twisted away from a cuff by Pravak’s open hand, then blocked a slash aimed at his back. He forced the blade up and over his head, then slashed again and scarred a shinbone.
“Ciras, get away from him.”
“No, Keles, I know this one. Get free.”
Pravak, bootprints still denting his profile, withdrew and settled himself in fourth Scorpion. “You show me no respect, attacking without warning.”
“You deserve none, conspiring with Turasynd and fighting against the Empress.”
“And I thought you truly were Jogot reborn.”
Ciras raised his sword in a salute. “I am, in more ways than you could ever imagine.” He invoked jaedun and set himself. “And I am your better.”
“Don’t do this, Ciras!” Keles screamed at him.
“I have no choice, Keles.”
Pravak launched himself. He came hard, raining blows down on the swordsman. Ciras retreated, step by step, dodging some blows, parrying others. The few he blocked sent shivers down his arm. Ciras’ ripostes would have sliced muscle from arms and legs, crippling a normal foe. Against Pravak the worst of the cuts only curled silver off bone.
Ciras ducked. A wild cut lopped a branch off a tree. Ciras exploded through the shower of leaves and kept low. Pravak’s sword whistled above his head. Ciras cut around, then slashed at the giant’s knee, carving through the silver bands that bound the joint together.
The woven silver band snapped, then jaedun pulsed, and the tiny metal threads wove themselves back together.
Pravak spun and laughed. “I remembered how you defeated me before. I have taken precautions.”
“Ciras, leave him alone!”
The swordsman ignored Keles’ plea. He drove forward, his blade a blur. A cut swept through a knee and even before it had begun to heal, he slashed at the ankle. His sword came up and around, denting the smaller arm bone, then poked a vertebra to the side and chopped through a low rib. He disengaged from every parry, eluded every thrust, and constantly attacked, forcing Pravak to devote time to straightening limbs and repairing joints.
It became a battle of attrition. Pravak became battered; Ciras just became tired. Yet even as his muscles ached and his lungs burned, the magic filled him. He moved more swiftly than ever, reading intention in the slightest movement and countering strategies before they had even begun. Pravak could not defend and repair himself in the same moment. It would be a matter of time before the vanyesh lay scattered over the garden.
Pravak clearly realized this. The swordsman’s blade slashed through the giant’s left knee. The shin fell away and Pravak’s femur jabbed into the ground. Ciras pivoted, bringing his sword back up for a strike at the monster’s head but, as he turned, Pravak’s right fist slammed into his face.
Ciras went down, landing hard on his tailbone, legs tingling hotly.
Pravak’s sword came down. Lacquered leather bracers snapped and ring mail pinged as the sword chopped through it. Blood gushed and bones cracked. Ciras’ sword flew as his hand spasmed, then Pravak bore down, using his weight to take Ciras’ right forearm off.
“Being a vanyesh reborn is still not being a vanyesh, Ciras.”
In shock, Ciras stared at his severed forearm lying two feet away. The hand still moved and clutched, but at nothing and weakly. Blood spurted from his stump, the severed artery pumping his life out with each thundering heartbeat.
I am dead.
Then a vine wrapped itself around his arm at the elbow. It just grew there, up through the ground, and tightened. The bleeding stopped.
Pravak grabbed his lower leg and fixed it back into place. Jaedun flared and the silver bands became whole again. The vanyesh patted the leg lovingly, then stood. “You tried, Ciras, and failed. No loss of honor in that.”
Then the vanyesh turned toward Tyressa, presumably to recover his sword, but he couldn’t lift his right leg. Vines similar to those that had formed the tourniquet had grown up through his feet and wrapped around his ankles. He tried to pull his foot up, but he couldn’t escape the plants’ tenacious grasp.
“What is going on here?”
“You murdered my mother.” Keles Anturasi stood deeper in the garden, his fists clenched, his face closed. “You’ve hurt my friends. You didn’t expect me to let you get away with that?”
Pravak turned, ripping one foot free. “You have no idea whom you are defying.”
“And you have no idea whom you have angered.” The cartographer raised a hand, then brought it down swiftly.
The carpet of tzaden vines fell in a wave from the tower. The green avalanche smashed Pravak to the ground. The sword flew, but vines rose and plucked it from the air. Then the whole plant flowed back up the tower, carrying Pravak’s head high, but leaving his feet on the ground, and spreading the rest of his parts in between.
Keles gathered up a book and stood. He clutched it tightly to his chest with both arms. He closed his eyes.
In garden beds behind him the earth boiled. Plants clawed their way out of the ground. The rootlets formed arms and legs. As tall as a man, they stalked from the beds.
Two of them marched to where Siatsi Anturasi lay and lifted her up. They bore her to the garden and laid her in the hole from which they had emerged. They covered her with dirt. In an instant, fiery red and gold flowers carpeted her grave.
Two more of the plants reached Ciras and helped him up. One recovered his sword, but left his arm on the ground. The other plant ground the nub end of its hand against a paving stone, scraping away purple flesh. Liquid oozed up, and the plant painted both Ciras’ stump and his punctured left hand with sticky darkness. Pain eased.
Ciras found concentrating difficult. “What is this?”
Keles opened his eyes. “ Xunling root. My brother brought it from Ceriskoron. My mother cultivated it-the only bhotridina to succeed this far north. She’d come for some when…”
The last two roots reached Tyressa’s side. They cut themselves on the sword
in her belly, letting their sap run down the blade to her wound. They also dripped fluid over her lips.
Keles nodded and plants grew thickly beneath Tyressa. She rose and Pravak’s sword came with her. Turning her on her side, the roots treated the exit wound as best they could.
The two that had buried Siatsi joined the ones tending Tyressa. Rootlets sprang from the ends of their arms and wove together into a thick mat, creating a litter. A few roots grew over to secure her to it, then the four bore her to Keles and Ciras.
“Come, Ciras, we must quit this place.” Keles looked back at the tower and Pravak glittering amid the vines.
Ciras pointed at the winged beast. “What about that?”
“Oh, right.” Keles gestured at the naranji tree. A branch stabbed out, impaling the beast. It flapped its wings, then collapsed. In the tree’s shade, fungus began to consume the creature’s body.
“Thank you for reminding me.” Keles headed down the stone steps toward a garden gate and didn’t look back. “Never again will Anturasikun be my home.”
A captain in the Prince’s Dragons found me on the south side of the bridge. “We have to bring this bridge down now.”
Stonemasons had already been lowered to pound away at keystones on the central arch. Once they were knocked out, the center of the bridge would collapse.
“Look at the people, Captain, they still need to cross.”
“It doesn’t matter; the order has been given.” The captain pulled a folded message from within his breastplate. “Prince Cyron’s seal.”
Muttering prayers and making all haste, people kept crossing. Most of the hale and hearty had already made it, and we were down to the sick, wounded, and lame. Carts lay abandoned, cargoes picked over. Somewhere, a child was crying.
“I’ve got my warriors out there, Captain. You can’t expect me to abandon them.”
“No, but they’re not going to cross the Tiger Bridge. I have my orders.”
I signaled Dunos to back away and the boy resheathed his knife. “What do I tell them?”
“The Dragon Bridge will remain open. We’ll hold it. Same goes for your men. I have no choice.”
“I have to get more across.”
“You have until I’m back on the other side.”
“Walk slowly.”
He nodded and departed.
We sent as many more as we could across, but it wasn’t nearly enough. While double the size of any other, the Dragon Bridge couldn’t handle all the traffic. Moreover, Nelesquin would have made taking it a priority. How anyone thought they would hold it against the war machines, I had no idea.
“Eron, I need you and your students to start herding people west. They have to go to the Dragon Bridge.”
He looked at the crowd, then back at me. “They will never make it. Look at the River Road. Twenty yards wide, a four-foot wall on the river side. It’s a slaughter yard. And if anyone decides to go over the wall, it’s a twenty-foot drop to the river.”
“I know-and that’s why you have to get them to the Dragon Bridge. I’ll see how close the invaders are.”
“Don’t lie. You’re going to buy them time.” Eron rested a hand on my shoulder. “Let us come. We can fight, too.”
“I know. I just need you here.” I shook my head. “I’m counting on you.”
“It shall be done. May the gods smile upon you.”
“I’d rather they frown on the enemy. Dunos, with me.”
We fought our way through the thinning crowd and raced into a tannery and onto the rooftop. In a city like Moriande, with so many buildings set so closely, one could travel swiftly from one point to another across the roofs.
Dunos stood beside me and slipped his right hand into my left. “This is bad. Very bad.”
A woman, naked and bleeding, had leaped from a tower window and hung herself. Soldiers-Men and kwajiin alike-pitched riches to people waiting below. Warriors fought, screaming and dying, and fires had accidentally sprung up in several places.
And here and there, glimpsed between buildings and along streets, the gyanrigot giants stalked victims. A small congress of the machines had gathered where Phoyn Jatan had destroyed two of their number. I dearly wished we had a trebuchet capable of hurling a stone into their midst.
I gave the boy’s hand a squeeze. “Let’s go, Dunos. We have to find the enemy, then convince them to stay away from the bridge.”
If not for the xunling warriors-for this was how Ciras had come to think of them-he would not have made it to the Dog Bridge. Their juice, which smelled bitter, had seeped into the wounds. A side from dulling the pain, it induced a mild euphoria, against which part of his mind fought. He’d lost his sword arm, but somehow that seemed of questionable importance.
The unlikely group moved quickly through the city streets, most of which had been left to the dead. Many of the dead had been looters. The valuables that lay beside them were scattered or smashed, and clearly not worth dying for. One dying thief had crawled to a Cyron shrine, offering loot for mercy.
That prayer had gone unanswered as dogs fought over his corpse.
They came around a corner and saw a lovely young woman sitting in a doorway, playing the necyl. She drew a bow across the five strings, creating a mournful sound that made dogs howl and even seemed to wilt the leaves on the xunling warriors’ heads.
Keles invited her to join them, but she never even acknowledged their presence. They moved on, yet as long as the melancholy notes echoed, they knew the girl still lived.
They reached the expanse of the River Road and stopped. Carts and boxes lay abandoned at the bridge’s approach. People, no more than eighteen of them, huddled against the wall, arms wrapped around their knees, crying. At first Ciras could not figure out why, then he looked beyond them.
The only thing left of the Dog Bridge was four sets of pillars rising from artificial islands in the river. The Bat and Eagle Bridges had been similarly destroyed.
Ciras straightened and flexed his left hand. It felt good. “My sword.”
Keles glanced at him. “There is no need.”
“The kwajiin will find us before we ever reach the Dragon Bridge. We might as well die fighting.”
“No. My mother has died today. I’ll not have you or Tyressa die.” He pointed to one of the xunling roots. “Go.”
The root left Ciras’ side and ran toward the empty bridge footing. At river’s edge, it leaped into the air, stretching its arms out. Even in his addled state, Ciras could see the creature would never make it, then rootlets shot out-slender filaments that reached the pilings ahead and back to the footing. The root thinned and reshaped itself, becoming a web that grew thicker with each heartbeat.
Keles addressed those who had given up hope. “If you wish to live, come now.”
Half of them roused themselves and followed him out onto the root web. At the next pillar another of the xunling leaped and bridged that gap. The first one contracted back into its original form, then created the next section of bridge.
They crossed the fourth section and reached the north bank unmolested. The refugees fell prostrate and thanked Keles. They begged to be of service, but he sent them on their way. Ciras watched them go, then followed Keles and lost himself in what was left of Moriande.
TheNewWorld
Chapter Forty-one
30th day, Month of the Eagle, Year of the Rat
Last Year of Imperial Prince Cyron’s Court
163rd Year of the Komyr Dynasty
737th Year since the Cataclysm
Moriande, Nalenyr
Finding the enemy was not difficult, but convincing them to stay away from the bridge was impossible. Though looting was prevalent, it seemed largely limited to the province of Men, not the kwajiin. The latter seemed more interested in combat than trophies.
The kwajiin leader, rather ironically, fought from within one of the gyanrigot tigers, looking the very incarnation of Chado. I wondered how long it would take for Nelesquin to resent that.
The kwajiin deployed his lightly armored skirmishers to fan out through the city ahead of his war machines. They flushed some of our ambushers and exchanged arrows with Deshiel’s men.
When their advance slowed, the war machines came up to break through resistance. More heavily armored foot soldiers followed them up. Their advance north was steady and inexorable. The tigers were definitely the point of the spear, and it was driving straight at the Dragon Bridge.
We did what we could to slow them, but it was like cursing lightning, for all the good it did. Deshiel and his archers could stop the skirmishers, then Ranai or a unit of Mountain Dragons would push forward and try to flank the kwajiin tigers. The war machines would smash their way through a building or two, accidentally starting fires, which conscripts came up and fought with bucket lines. We could have attacked and easily slain them, but they’d been enslaved, and none of us wanted to see the city burn.
Our foot soldiers had to be careful, however, lest the other forces moving through the city flank them. We would hit, then fade back, hit again and fade, always retreating toward the bridge.
Dunos proved most helpful in that regard. He scrambled over rooftops and climbed the highest pinnacles to report on the crowds and how swiftly traffic flowed over the bridge. Many people were making it across, but more showed up. It became clear that many people would be trapped in the south side. There was nothing we could do to prevent it.
So I pulled my people back as well.
I read the dismay and disappointment in Dunos’ eyes. For him and so many others, war is a simple thing: kill or be killed. You have orders and you carry them out, trusting the decisions of your leaders. If an order required you to make the supreme sacrifice, you did so, contented, knowing you would be revered for your bravery.
Dunos had an excuse for believing that-he was but a child of ten years. Adults who believed it had never fought, or had never had to make a life-or-death choice-at least never one that affected them directly. A minister might quarantine a village so some fever would burn itself out, but he did so at a distance, never having to hear the moans of the dying or see the haunted faces of survivors. If you have not seen blood, you do not know war. If you do not know war, you cannot make the right decisions in war.
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