‘There is no “thusly”, Lord Lorca. It is extremely simple; the gate stays shut.’
‘He’s locking us up here to use us as hostages when Rivil wins,’ Lorca wheezed. ‘Just like his father did.’
‘Why would Rivil want you?’ Tara asked, genuinely confused. ‘Unless you are to be the first sacrifices to the Red Gods.’
Lorca blanched even further but forced himself erect. He shook a finger in her face. ‘He will do anything to save his own hide, much like Durdil would’ve if a fucking wall hadn’t fallen on him. Strange, is it not, that Rastoth was wounded with only Durdil Koridam as witness? That when he died, Durdil was present yet again? And now Mace steps from his father’s shadow and takes on a position he is not entitled to? Conspiracy, I tell you. Conspiracy and villainy, and I will have no part in it. I will not bow to the arbitrary whims of a jumped-up soldier from the west, and I will not stay here to be bartered away in return for the lives of the peasant stock. Now step aside, woman.’
It was the ‘woman’ that did it. It always was, especially when it was sneered at her with the intimation that possession of a fine and perky pair of tits automatically reduced any associated brain function to the overriding imperative of finding a husband.
Tara drew her sword. The chamberlain goggled and tugged at his oily hair, scampering back to burrow among the women and children, adding his own voice to their strident cries for help. Tara needed to shut them up, but more than that, she needed to ensure the city remained sealed.
‘No one leaves the city, not you, not anyone. We fight.’ She was stepping in front of the tunnel entrance when movement dragged at the corner of her eye. Tara ducked, and the arrow vanished into the night over her head.
‘Run, milords, go now, before the Mireces murder us all in our beds!’ They moved in a many-legged, bellowing mass of nobles and servants, slipping past Tara as she dived for cover and vanishing into the tunnel.
‘The fuck are you?’ Tara grunted as she sped for the palace door. It was locked. ‘Shit.’
Tara held her breath and jerked her arm out of the doorway’s paltry cover. The man loosed and she was running as soon as the arrow hummed past. He was in the tunnel himself, loosing through the gate to force her back, when the light from a palace window struck his face. The second of recognition nearly killed her. He grinned and loosed a final time before vanishing into the dark. The arrow slammed into the chainmail covering her belly.
She staggered back a step, ripping at the shaft. It came out with a grating noise and she threw it away, sucking in air and feeling for blood. A dribble, no more. A scratch.
Tara tightened her grip on her sword and wished she walked around with a great heavy shield all the time. ‘I’m going to kill you, Galtas fucking Morellis,’ she shouted. The blackness of the tunnel was almost complete and she crept in and flattened herself against the wall, holding her breath, mouth open slightly to better her hearing.
She could hear the scuffling of boots and the drag of boxes, and a click and shuffle she couldn’t identify, but nothing else. No taunting or shouted obscenities, which would’ve been really useful. No blazing torch held in his hand to show her where he hid, which would’ve been even better. Tara slid her sword back into its sheath and pulled a dagger. In this darkness, any fighting she did would be up close and personal. Unless she was skewered through the throat by an arrow she didn’t see coming. There was the dull orange of a torch up ahead, brightening slowly as she moved; everything else was shrouded in utter dark. Fuck it. Tara broke into a run, speeding along the curve of the passageway, thinking only of catching up with the torchbearer.
The end of the tunnel led up and into a small courtyard at the base of East Tower, with the door out of the city nestled into the curtain wall. The chamberlain was already at the heavy iron-banded door, while Lorca and Silais remonstrated in loud voices with the captain in charge of East Tower, ordering the man to stand aside. Confused faces peered down from the tower itself.
‘’Ware!’ Tara yelled and the captain debating with Lorca jerked his head in her direction. ‘Don’t open that door,’ she screeched.
‘Must get out, must get out,’ Chamberlain was panting, his hands flapping at the lock, key skittering over the iron.
‘You there, stop this minute,’ the captain shouted, plainly relieved that a superior officer was taking charge. He pushed Lorca out of his way and shoved through the crowd of servants. ‘Keep that door closed,’ he echoed and soldiers began clattering down the stairwell inside East Tower, yelling, while others on the allure called out a warning of their own.
The nobles’ hired guards squared up to the advancing Rankers and Tara tried to think of some way to calm the situation. Nothing sprang to mind. ‘Gate stays shut,’ she yelled again, ‘Commander’s orders.’
The captain barged through the press, tripping over boxes, heaving servants out of his path. Then he drew his sword. ‘Stand away from the door or die,’ he bellowed. ‘Stand away!’
‘Fuck,’ Tara swore as the nobles’ guards drew steel.
Tara was quartering the courtyard – where is that cock-weasel, he’s got to be here somewhere – when Galtas limped out of the tunnel behind her, bow in hand and arrow clamped to the stock with his finger, other hand wielding a crutch for his splinted leg.
She turned as she heard him and realised she must’ve run straight past the clever little bastard, and then he clubbed his crutch into her face. Tara distinctly heard the breaking of her nose and hit the stone like a stunned salmon. Galtas hobbled past, avoiding her clutching fingers, and began loosing arrows at the East Tower defenders.
‘The gate,’ he roared, ‘quickly.’
‘Don’t,’ Tara bubbled, trying desperately to work out which way was up through the spinning in her head. The square was in uproar, servants and nobles screeching, soldiers running for Galtas, and Tara was contemplating puking up her entire meal when the chamberlain gave a great heave and dragged open the heavy wooden door. Night air and the sound of the river flooded in, followed an instant later by armed men.
Mireces.
Tara gaped. Some quick-thinking Tower soldiers were shoving at the door, pressing against the tide of flesh straining to get in. Others formed up against those Raiders already inside, and Tara saw at least one vanish back into the tower and race for the warning bell at the top.
The nobles’ guards took one look at the advancing Mireces and decided they weren’t being paid enough to die. As one, they surged off north, into the tanneries and the maze of alleys and stalls, losing themselves in the dark and the stench.
Tara staggered to her feet spitting blood as the Mireces cut their way through servants, nobles and soldiers alike, the leader clapping Galtas on the arm when they met in the centre of the carnage as though it had all been planned.
It has been fucking planned, twat. Why else would that little shit be in the city?
‘King Corvus,’ Galtas said. ‘You lead the forces yourself?’
‘The Dark Lady has returned through the veil and into the world, Her Brother with Her. I have seen Them with my own eyes. What is there to fear now our gods walk the world?’ He indicated the splinted leg. ‘You are hurt?’
‘It slows me but will not kill me. Not yet anyway.’
‘Get back to camp. We’ll be moving fast and I can’t wait for you.’ Galtas nodded and vanished through the gate that was guarded now only by the dead and the dying.
There was nothing Tara could do against numbers such as these, though her fingers twitched with the urge to kill as many as she could. But there weren’t enough Rankers to hold the gate closed, and though the bell was ringing from the top of the tower, reinforcements from North or South Two wouldn’t reach them in time.
She eased sideways, slid into the tunnel and began to run back the way she’d come. It’s bloody Corvus himself. I need soldiers. I need lots of soldiers.
The tunnel was longer than it had been before, she was sure of it. Longer, and darker, and more tr
eacherous underfoot, or maybe it was the blow to her face that was confusing her, or the horror of the breach, or Lorca’s spilling intestines as a Mireces opened him up, or Galtas’s cool, amused smile. Or all of it.
She ran on through the endless black of the tunnel, stumbling and bleeding, her breath harsh in her throat, until eventually there was the faintest lightening of the inky dark ahead and she put on a last, desperate burst of speed, hands outstretched for the gate, and threw herself at it.
It flung her back on to her arse, shuddering. Locked.
‘No!’ Tara scrambled to her feet, clawing at the gate, rattling it in its frame. ‘Help!’ she screeched. ‘Let me out! Let me the fuck out right fucking now! Breach! Breach, you bastards!’
She could hear them running behind her now, gaining on her, and her with nowhere to go but into death. She pressed her back to the gate and drew sword and dagger, bubbling blood at them. ‘Come on then, cunts. Come on, you miserable heathen bastards, I’ll fucking kill the lot of you, starting with King C—’
The gate shifted and hands grabbed her by the shoulders and dragged her through, spun her on to the cobbles and lunged back for the gate. Renik.
‘Run,’ he growled as he fumbled with the lock. ‘Fucking run. I’ll make sure they come to you at the palace, so gather any soldiers you can and make your stand there.’ He thumbed the latch on the gate, the latch Tara could easily have opened from inside if she hadn’t been blinded by panic. Renik wedged a heavy stick between the bars and the frame, trying to force it closed because the chamberlain had taken the keys, then gripped a long spear and took up position. He spared her a single final glance. ‘I fucking said run.’
‘I’m sorry, I’m sorry,’ Tara babbled, knowing she was leaving him to die. ‘Dancer’s grace.’ Renik nodded once and Tara left him there, sprinting along the side of the palace towards the northern entrance and anyone who might be in there who could help.
CORVUS
Beltane, night, day forty-two of the siege
Fifth Circle, Rilporin, Wheat Lands
Corvus pushed his way to the front of the crowd squeezed tight at the tunnel exit. The gate was shut and a man in armour stood on the other side, a long spear in his hands that he was using to poke away at the men crowding the gate. It stabbed for Corvus and he slipped sideways, let it slide past him into someone else – the Lady’s will – and then grabbed the haft in both hands. The man stiffened and yanked back on the spear, and Corvus resisted a second and then let go.
The man stumbled back three steps and Corvus slid his hand outside the bars of the gate and fiddled with the lock. It clicked open, but there was a bar, no a stick, jammed sideways between lock and frame. Corvus pulled the gate tighter shut, slid the stick out as the man lunged again, too late. There was a soft squeal of hinges, and it swung open.
‘Quiet.’
Mireces spilt out of the tunnel into Fifth Circle, into the very fucking heart of Rilporin, a small blue tide of righteous, silent fury. The soldier killed three before several weapons pressed against him. Valan pulled the spear from his hands, though he held on long enough that a blade had to part the skin of his neck in warning.
Corvus held up a hand and the weapons retreated. ‘I am King Corvus of the Mireces. You?’
The man hesitated, clearly torn between spitting at them and lengthening his life by a few more breaths. ‘Major Artem Renik of His Majesty’s Palace Rank. You can go no further, Sire.’ He drew a sword and a dagger and stood in front of Corvus, relaxed, coiled, and no doubt deadly.
‘On the contrary,’ Corvus said, flicking his fingers so that his men peeled away, blocking the roads to either side of the palace and cutting off Renik’s retreat, ‘I will go wherever I choose and the gods decree. Right now I want to go into the palace to find your Commander of the Ranks and kill him. Stand aside and be granted a quick death.’
‘I cannot allow you into the palace. Return through the tunnel and be granted the chance to see the dawn,’ Renik replied, his voice calm.
Corvus tutted. So keen to die for their country, their false gods. His legs were heavy from the swim across the Gil to reach the King Gate and then the charge along the tunnel, his clothing sodden and his chainmail beginning to chafe. None of it would stop him. The gods walked at his side. Mireces were still moving into position when Renik erupted and cut hard and low for Corvus’s knee, on his axe side.
Unexpected and very nearly effective, but Corvus danced sideways out of range. He slammed his elbow into a wall, caught a glint that was the knife coming up fast, under his sword arm, and twisted, pulling his shoulder back and away from danger, into the wall again, letting the momentum fling his axe hand forward. And the bastard’s sword was there, intercepting and flicking it away before a heavy boot slammed down on his foot with a sickening crunch.
Corvus grunted and the world split into colours and scents and the breath of wind and the stir of breath on his face. Everything slowed, torches swirling and smearing as the pain lanced up as far as his knee and Corvus saw his own death in Renik’s eyes. Inevitable. Unstoppable despite the promises of the Dark Lady Herself.
The sword arced upwards again and Corvus blocked with sword and hand axe. He squinted into Renik’s face. No triumph, no trickery, nothing to give away the fact that his knife was unaccounted for and hot in Corvus’s shoulder, stabbing deep into the flesh.
Corvus’s breath came out in a yelp that jolted him from the vision of his impending death and back into the real world. He was herded against the wall, his men waiting patiently, Renik a whirling mass of armour and edged steel blocking his every attack, stamping on his feet, squeezing him against the stone.
The city itself was fighting him, allying against its conquerors. Renik knew this city, he knew how to fight in these narrow streets, while Corvus’s shoulders and elbows and the back of his skull were raw from impacts with the wall as he moved instinctively into space that wasn’t there. And Renik pressed, and pressed, and pressed again, and now there was a flicker in his eyes, an acknowledgment that he too saw Corvus’s death looming at his shoulder.
‘Take him,’ Corvus roared and saw Renik’s face fall, saw a glimmer of betrayal in his eyes. Didn’t expect that, did you? You wanted an honourable death while buying your friends time to mount a counter-attack. But this is war, not the fencing yard.
But Renik surprised him again, fleeing as the others charged in, jumping backwards and giving Corvus room to chase him. So Corvus pressed, harrying him until his men crowded past, eager at the kill. Only Renik wasn’t quite ready to be killed, kept retreating, back to a little alcove in the wall of the palace with a door set in it. There was a handle in the wall and Renik grabbed it and pulled. Valan lunged for him, expecting him to vanish through an opening, but instead there was a thunk from deep inside the palace, the single deep toll of a bell, and the handle came off in Renik’s hand. He threw it and it hit a Mireces in the face.
‘What did you do?’ Corvus asked, stilling his men, curious and impressed despite himself.
‘Locked the door,’ Renik said. ‘Can’t be opened from this side. Only way you’re getting in now is through the main gates around the other side. Sorry.’ He grinned, not looking at all sorry, and Corvus felt a surge of admiration.
‘You’d have made a fine Raider, Major Renik,’ he said, and Renik laughed.
‘Not in this life, and not in death either,’ he replied, and readied himself in the alcove, his back and flanks protected by stone and wood. He exhaled, soft and slow through his nostrils. His shoulders dropped, fingers flexed on knife and sword hilt, and then he raised his knife hand and beckoned. ‘Come on then, you fuckers. Let’s dance.’
His voice echoed like the clattering of steel down the street. Come on then, you fuckers. Corvus bit the tip of his tongue and found himself smiling, dipped his head in a salute, and then watched as his men lunged forward, crowding the alcove, crowding each other, hurling blades and curses, jostling to be the one to bring him down.
&nb
sp; Renik held out for longer than Corvus expected, attacking only as far as his flanks were protected, but still far enough to kill four. Seconds stretched into what felt like days and Corvus watched the backs of his men, the frenzied pumping of their sword arms, knowing it was inevitable but still a little voice in him wanting Renik to live. To win. To beat them all, despite the odds. What a fucking song that would be.
And then he went down, and he didn’t scream, and he didn’t beg. He just died, as all men must and a damn sight finer than many.
The men stepped back, panting and smeared with blood, theirs and Renik’s. Corvus peered into the alcove and grunted, grunted again as Valan secured a wad of linen over the hole in his shoulder. ‘Let’s find a way into the palace. We need to find this fucking Commander of theirs and kill or capture him. Right now I don’t care which. This ends – tonight.’
They turned right and trotted down the northern side of the palace, weapons bright and ready. Distantly, more bells began to clang. The city knew they were coming.
TARA
Beltane, night, day forty-two of the siege
Guest wing, the palace, Rilporin, Wheat Lands
Is it actually possible to cough up a lung?
Tara clung to the door she’d burst through and coughed, her inability to get enough air lending a dazed and hysterical edge to her thoughts. She coughed some more, each spasm sending shards of pain through her nose, and swore again to never set foot in a burning building.
‘Help,’ she croaked, and was ignored.
‘You all watched it happen. You were there. I felt it happen. Crys is the Fox God. He is – has to be – our priority now. More even than the defence of the city.’ Ash was squared up to Lim, Dalli trying vainly to separate them.
‘Even if he is—’ Lim began and even from here Tara could see the cold fury, the refusal to accept, in his haggard face.
Ash ripped at his chainmail, dragged it over his head and pulled off his jerkin and shirt. ‘I don’t have one single bruise, let alone a cut. No strained muscles, no torn flesh. Look at this.’ He spun and Tara saw another scar, the same fresh-healed purple as the one on his face. ‘Galtas stabbed me in the back and then took my fucking face off with a knife. I felt it happen and then I died. I died and Crys brought me back. The Red Gods are back, and now the Fox God walks the earth. We have to protect him. He’s gone to the breach and I—’
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