by Martin Davey
Then the darkness again and the arrows slowed and stopped, held in the air like leaves on oil. This time Ysora stood straight against the suffocating, cloying darkness and she saw that Laraine had her eyes fixed on the darkness above, her horse rearing and wide eyed, but still Laraine held her staff aloft and fixed her eyes on the shield of darkness above them. Finally she lowered her staff and the darkness relented and retreated and sunlight returned and arrows fell about the army like dry leaves in the fall. Nobody cheered their salvation from the rain of arrows. The tainted, smothering nature of the blackness was too strong for them to celebrate it. Instead the army batted away the arrows like matches, picked them from the floor, looking at the feathers, turning them around in gauntleted hands before snapping them like firewood and throwing them to the ground.
Ysora watched Laraine wheel her horse about, her face grey and ashen, the black paint around her eyes even more stark, her grey hair blowing loose of its bonds in the breeze. “The power is strong here!” she shouted, but her voice was weaker now. She sat a little less straight in her saddle as she raised her staff once more, kicking her great white horse into motion, mud and grass flying behind her, “They cannot hurt us! They will come and they will fall!” She shouted more, her voice mingling with her distant brother’s until the words were lost with the wind and the sound of the army behind Ysora.
She looked out to the army of Keeper Reioshar. The god was here and he watched the arrows fall to the floor, his mask expressionless. He sat tall in his saddle, arms and hands hidden inside his long shapeless robe of blue, and his long extravagant wig of green flowing in the wind like seaweed in the waves. The black horse was perfectly still beneath him and watched them, as devoid of expression as its Master. The Keepers were supposed to bring joy and glory with their presence. Ysora only felt coldness as she looked at him.
The army behind the god was a thing of beauty in the rising sun, like a reflection of the glory of the god they followed. Two banners swam in the air above them, one bearing the crest of the Keepers, and one of Keeper Reioshar, a white wall under a red sky with a sword of vengeance over it. And below these banners were rank upon rank of steel-clad warriors, silver and red and green with long spears and long swords. A line of darker men in leather of brown and green and black knelt at the front of the army, bows in hand and quivers on their backs. They looked as though they were going to fire again, until the robe of Keeper Reioshar shifted with a wave of a long, many-elbowed arm and a tilt of the mask. A soldier with a helm fashioned with a coronet of green leaves nodded and spoke something to a boy close to him and the boy turned and sprinted before the archers, with his passing, the archers stood and slipped back inside the body of the glorious army.
A glorious army fighting for the glory of the gods under a rising sun and Ysora faced it across a field of green with a quiet road and trees with birds singing in branches with leaves the colour of ancient paper. How did it come to pass that she faced the Keepers in battle? She watched the Keeper lean in his saddle to speak to the knight with the coronet of green and the knight stood in his stirrups and raised his fist and a thousand spears and swords waved in the air in answer.
Why was she here standing against the might of the Keepers? Standing against the glory and the justice of the Keepers? She thought of Cioran teaching of the love of Keeper Liotuk, the way his shy smile glowed as he spoke of the love of the Keepers. She thought of Cioran dead at the hands of Phailin, thought of Gerard pawing at her, brought to justice at the hands of the Clerk, brought to justice by Captain Landros. And then, last of all, as her breath caught and she watched the army begin to move forward in giant ranks of steel, last of all she thought of the Nameless One, his face peeling and decaying as he stole Cioran’s body in death.
“Ysora! Ysora!” She heard Landros calling her name even over the songs of the army of the Keepers, even over the men around her calling to each other, shouting at each other to hold the line, calling out the names of King Phailin and Queen Laraine. How honest Landros had looked when he said he wouldn’t take her to the Clerk. How young, almost innocent in his honesty. But where could he go if not to the Clerk? Phailin and Laraine would have him killed for his faith to the Keepers if they survived the battle, and Landros had said the Clerk would kill his friend if he didn’t return her to him.
“They come!” Laraine’s horse was loud and giant this close to her. “We chose the ground! We have nothing to fear!” She held the staff aloft, her face ashen and grey, her mouth set in a grim line. “Stand tall!” Her horse kicked and spun, shook its mane. “For the line of the Black Prince!”
And the army of the Keepers was coming. Line after line of it, seeming to swallow the grass and the bushes and the hedges beneath the steel ranks. The army sang of the glory of the Keepers, sang of past victories in the ages of Kings and Queens. Ysora thought of the books Cioran had shown her, books where Maronghavian had spoken of armies thirty thousand strong, where arrows had blocked the sun from the sky and knights on horses had clashed in numbers enough to shake the ground miles away.
What a sight that must have been. The army of Keeper Reioshar was perhaps four thousand strong at the most and it came on foot. And it was the most terrifying thing she had seen in her life. She had seen the Nameless One, felt its cold hand touch her arm, saw its decaying face and ageless eyes, but still the sight of that army of steel, cruel and cold weapons glinting in the rising sun, made her stomach cold with terror.
It wasn’t only Ysora who felt the fear, the men and women behind her shivered under the approach of the army of Keeper Reioshar, the army wavered and stepped and shied like a nervous horse. The songs of the approaching army grew louder at the sight of the nervous men and women before it. The giant man with the coronet of green led the army, his sword held by his side and his strides strong and sure. The Keeper didn’t move from his horse, he sat tall and shapeless in his robe, the green wig shivering down his back in the morning breeze. He watched his army pass him by, his body as expressionless as the mask that hid his face.
A pounding of hoof beats and mud and grass flying and scattering about her. “Hold the line! Hold the line!” Phailin’s horse reared and snorted and for a moment Ysora thought he must fall until he fought the reins under control once more. “Today we fight for the Kings and Queens! For the old gods! For the line of the Black Prince!” The cheer in reply was tentative to begin with until the sound seemed to steady those near to it and the cheer rose and swelled through the hundreds of fighters standing before the oncoming rows of steel.
Phailin leaned in his saddle and caught sight of Ysora, and when she saw his eyes, her heart quailed. The self-styled King looked terror-stricken, his eyes wide under the helm with the nose guard, his white cloak wrapped about his body, his face grey. This was no war leader, no leader of men. “You shouldn’t be here, Ysora,” he kept his voice low under the slowly dying cheers of his men. “You won’t like what you see here, flee child, and don’t look back.” His horse stepped and spun full circle, and Phailin held the giant sword aloft in a fist. “Come and find us when this is done,” he shouted over his shoulder as the great beast sprinted away in front of the army.
Half a mile away and the army moved so slowly but still it was upon them in no time at all. Ysora ran as soon as she heard Phailin’s words; the sound of Landros crying out her name could only be her imagination.
Men screamed in fear, in rage, in stark terror; primal screams and roars in anticipation of the battle upon them. Some men already fell under thrown knives and swords and axes. Steel crashed behind her, sword on sword, sword on armour, armour on armour as men and women fell into each other, arms limp with terror, somewhere far out of sight two giant white horses screamed against the noise. Mud and dust and gore flew into the air on the first impact of the two armies. Men screamed, women screamed and the two armies pushed against each other, the dead already trampled into the ground as the line of Phailin’s army quailed against the onslaught.
Yso
ra’s throat was raw. Had she been screaming? Now she sobbed as she saw the hopelessness of the cause. Already wild-eyed men and women, helms askew, breastplates battered, chins and mouths and arms bloodied, were spilling out of the battle like coins from a jar, staggering and spinning and reeling from the impact and the noise of fight. Some staggered and fell and lay dying on the ground, eyes and mouths open, staring up at a bleeding sky as they breathed their last. Others fell to the ground and cradled gaping wounds like dying babies as they wept and gibbered and bled. Screams coming from Farmer Mashin’s house as old and young watched from the windows and saw the horror of the fight.
Even here on the ground, slipping on the mud, running from the dead and the dying, Ysora could see that all was lost. The army of Keeper Reioshar was too big; squads of men, a hundred, two hundred strong, were marching out beyond the wings of the battle line, unhurried as they strode to envelop the army of the Kings. And the archers, held back by Keeper Reioshar, now ran closer, falling to one knee and readying their bows, arrows pulled from quivers.
All was lost and Ysora wept as she thought of Phailin and Laraine and their dreams of Kings and Queens. How confident they had been. But who had they been with their grey hair and their serious eyes, to think they could challenge the might of the gods?
More men fought and more men died and arrows flew through the air and Ysora turned to flee, slipping and sliding in mud or blood, her hands squelching in the stuff. Men, women and children ran from Mashin’s house, screaming and crying and watching the rain of death on the battlefield.
But there was something else, more screaming in the crush of the armies and Ysora stopped to look. She could see Laraine and Phailin riding in the midst of the battle, their horses not so white, their armour and their cloaks not so bright, and still Laraine held her staff aloft and still Phailin hacked and chopped on either side of him as his horse kicked and screamed. But there was something else, something pushing the army of Keeper Reioshar back, pushing them away in confusion and fear. More and more men had dropped sword and axe and were running back across the road, stumbling and falling across the hedges as they fled. Road and field were becoming scattered with discarded armour littering the ground like dead bodies. Their god watched their flight, expressionless on his horse.
More men fled, their screams terrible to hear, and then Ysora saw what it was they fled from and she wanted to scream and flee to the god herself. A man in armour, blood pouring from a gaping wound in his chest, his helm crushed on one side as though shattered by a giant mace, was fighting and dealing death to those about him with sword and dagger. He fought slowly, men falling before him like wheat under the scythe. And then he was lost to sight in the crush of battle once more.
Ysora knew no man could survive those wounds. There was a dead man fighting against the army of the Keepers. The Nameless One had come to war and men were screaming and dying and falling before his sword. Men cowered and fled before the horror fighting before them, helm crushed and blood spilling down its neck and shoulders, but still it fought and still it killed.
She remembered the tales of Maronghavian and the tales of Liandl, the warrior historian who had seen the Nameless One at the town of Karamir. They had spoken of a slight youth with short dark hair who had stayed away from the fighting, sitting on his horse and watching with his dark eyes and using his lies and deceptions to win his battles. And many battles he had won. But he had lost the war. Now he fought and bled and died with the rest of his men. Only when he died he rose again in another maimed body, bleeding and fighting and sending men screaming back across the road and the hedges. It was the most horrifying and beautiful thing she had ever seen, a man, a thing, a creature that couldn’t be defeated no matter how the few brave enough to face it hacked and chopped at the bodies, another corpse would rise and carry on the fight.
Soon Ysora lost sight of where the Nameless One fought; it seemed as though every man screamed in horror or fled for his life, or lay on the ground, gasping and blinking and begging for an end to the horror.
But there seemed to be no end to the nightmare. However many men fled the battle, however many men died, there always seemed to be more pushing to the front, eager for the taste of blood, eager to be mercilessly slaughtered by those fighting for the return of the Kings and the Queens.
Ysora would never have thought there could be so much blood and gore in the world, never have thought there was so much hate in the world. She turned away from the battle and saw a knight approaching her, sword still in his hand, helm removed and hair plastered to his forehead and face with blood. Still more men fought and fled and died all about them. The knight’s eyes were only for Ysora as he strode toward her. He held his hand out to her. Perhaps he pitied the woman in the long skirts in the midst of the battle. Perhaps he wanted to lead her to safety. He was smiling at her. Somewhere far away she heard somebody calling her name. Landros come to take her to the Clerk. She couldn’t go there, couldn’t go to Katrinamal to have her dreams ripped from her mind.
The knight was closer now and he was smiling. He was young and he nodded to her, encouraging her to come to him. All around her men were dead and dying, and women too. More arrows flew through the air, and darkness descended on the field of battle. Somewhere far away beyond a field of the dead, a white horse raced and somebody shouted above the screaming.
Daylight again as arrows fell about them and the knight was closer now. He had a terrible wound on his temple, a fold of skin hanging loose, the blood still fresh and red, the skin white. And still he wanted to help her, still he held out a bloodied hand to her.
Ysora smiled and waited for her rescuer.
“Kneeling cunt,” the knight said, and he was still smiling as he swung, his blade flashing bright in the morning sun.
CHAPTER 36
The Blood Lord was dead. Marin was dead. Retaj let the sword slip from his fingers and fall to the ground, red blood falling from the blade and pooling with the blood running between the cracks of the stone on the ground.
It was over. But it couldn’t be over. Not yet. Retaj looked at Mari;. old and worn, the thin grey hair messy, spattered blood lining his bristled cheeks and his sagging neck. For the first time, there were no worry lines marring his forehead. He looked almost peaceful.
Retaj knelt next to him and drew his dagger, tested the blade on his thumb, a habit he had every time he drew a weapon, and pulled Marin’s shirt tight before cutting a strip from it. The strip was soiled and dirty and grimy, but at least it was free of blood. He scrunched it into a ball in his fist and looked about him. Dead gods, dead priests, and dead men and women from the army, brought here to sacrifice to the Blood Lord. Seekers they had been called. And what was it they had sought? A painful slow death in a stone tub in the name of a weak and forgotten god?
Retaj grimaced at the thought and straightened, letting Marin’s shirt fall back to his blood-smeared belly. What a foul, depraved thing the Nameless One had created with Marin. A poor creature who didn’t even know what it was. It had been almost painful staying his hand from putting the creature out of its misery before they found the god. And it had all happened as the Keepers had said it would. Retaj shook his head and strode over to the Blood Lord, how could anybody think to betray the Keepers? How could anybody think to challenge their might? The Keepers could see through the depths of time and space and yet still creatures and pathetic gods thought to find their way back into the world of men. The world they had almost destroyed with their greed and lusts and depravity.
Retaj supposed he should pity the dead, but he could only loathe them and glory in their painful deaths. When would man realize the glory of the Keepers? When would he learn to glory in the garden the Keepers had made for him? When would man learn of the dangers of the darkness that must be fought against in the likes of Marin and his Master?
He knelt by the side of the god. Not the first god he had slain, and no doubt not the last, but he couldn’t help but think they were getting weak
er, more pathetic. Like this one, scrabbling about on hands and knees, white and hairless and thin. It had sickened Retaj how easily the blade had slid into its flesh, like slicing a worm or a slug with a knife, almost as though the thing had no form at all. He grimaced as he remembered the thing slobbering over its own fingers for the tiniest sliver of sustenance. And people came to worship these pathetic creatures over the glory of the Keepers? The stupidity, the ungratefulness of his own kind never ceased to disgust him.
He dropped the strip of Marin’s shirt into the blood of the Paramin and pushed it with the tip of his finger until the cloth was soaked with it. Even the blood of the Blood Lord was weak and feeble. Would there come a time when there were no old gods at all? When the memory of them, the faith in them, the belief in them was so distant and tenuous, that they would one day all be gone? Retaj straightened, the bloodied cloth clutched in his hand, drops of pale red dripping to the ground. He looked down at the god he had slain; the pasty white flesh, the thin wasted limbs, the shrivelled cock under the hairless rounded belly, the fear and the pain still etched on its face. How could anybody worship such creatures, weak and foul and depraved with their needs and their sacrifices? What did the Keepers ever ask from their children? Nothing but obedience and worship.