03 - Liar's Peak

by Robin D. Laws - (ebook by Undead)

  “There is no transaction so worthy that good timing will not enhance it,” said Franziskus.

  “Try to kill a barbarian or two while you’re out there. Your elevation will go smoother once you’ve proved yourself.”

  Trepidation fluttered in Franziskus’ breast.

  Jonas marched off, to find his own squad.

  Angelika came toward Franziskus. Her squad, Mattes and the rest, stood at a remove, waiting for her. “Stay behind,” she said.

  “What?” asked Franziskus.

  “Stay behind. The camp will only be half full. And Jonas has them worked up into a panic. They’ll be staring at the hills for swarming Kurgan. You can stand lookout while I go through Jonas’ things.”

  “You must go with your squad.”

  “I don’t have a squad. I’m a scout, not a warrior.”

  Franziskus edged away from her. “And I’m about to be a lieutenant again, in the Stirland army.”

  “Good for you, but did you have to pick this minute to do it?”

  “Angelika, Jonas needs our help.”

  “He needs more than we can give.”

  “He’s brave but unsteady. You need to tutor him, like you did me.”

  “Anything you learned out here, you picked up on your own.”

  “Surely you don’t believe that.”

  “There’s no teacher more surly and impatient than me.”

  “That I agree with.” Franziskus dropped to near inaudibility. “He’s afraid, Angelika.”

  “Fear’s the first step toward common sense.”

  “He has the makings of a good leader. A heroic one, even. We must do our part, and nudge him toward his destiny.”

  Angelika stared at his undefended tent. “I’m staying here.”

  “I beg you. If he took the ring, he did it only to secure your aid. Give it to him, and you’ll get it back.”

  “What a beautiful world you live in, Franziskus.”

  “I’m not asking you to strangle a child or burn down a nunnery. I’m asking you to do good.”

  “Eloquent words—lieutenant.” She said it like it was an insult.

  Angelika tried to break from him, but, as the men bunched up into their squads, there was nowhere she could stand that was not conspicuous.

  “It was a lieutenant I should have been, all along,” said Franziskus. He stomped off to join his squad.

  Angelika moved toward Mattes and the others. They knew about the ring. They wouldn’t object if she stayed behind to find it, then caught up with them. Not if she worded it in the right way.

  Jonas intercepted her. “No, Mattes will lead that squad. You’re coming with me.”

  She shrugged. “It’s all the same to me.” Inwardly, she was cursing. “But shouldn’t you, as commander, stay behind?”

  Jonas’ brow wrinkled up. “On what account?”

  “You’re the leader. The men can’t afford to lose you.” She wasn’t exactly sure what good it would do, to have him remaining in camp, but it would be better than tramping off into the hills with him. The lieutenant was unpredictable, and Angelika could think of no trait she valued less in an ally.

  “Fraulein Fleischer, I can never tell when you’re jesting with me.”

  “Think of the blow to morale, if you were to fall beneath a Kurgan axe.”

  “What kind of army would this be, if its noble leaders eschewed personal combat? No officer ever won a spot in the chronicles by hanging back to let others fight for him. Now let us go. There’s Kurgan in need of killing.”

  Jonas had picked his squad personally. Angelika did not want to know about them, so she would suffer no unwanted consternation if their lives were threatened. She couldn’t say this, though, so Jonas introduced them. Caven stood tall and broody beneath a heavy brow and thick sheaves of black, leathery hair. Egerer was a hungry assemblage of protruding bones. Hertwig perpetually petted a long, forking goatee and regarded his surroundings with a beady stare. The fourth man, Kollek, wore a knotted gold ring on each finger of his left hand, and an even larger silver one on each of the right.

  Angelika estimated their value at just under a hundred crowns, making him the one she’d most want to find dead on an abandoned battlefield. All four of the men were Gerolsbruchers of long-standing. From the pride in Jonas’ voice as he announced their names, Angelika gathered that these were among the company’s best soldiers. He meant to have a glorious encounter with the foe, and had brought with him the right men to accomplish that.

  Mount Gander was Jonas’ hill—the rockiest, and closest to the distant mountains. Its rough shelves of pitted rock and thick patches of pine forest would make a good hiding place for lurking enemies. When the introductions were done, they hiked its way, passing other, less imposing hills. To reach its foot would take half an hour of hard treading, and during that time Jonas allowed the men to calm their nerves with jokes and banter. They discussed the soldier’s perennial topic, food. The skeletal Egerer got onto a naming jag, listing the name of every soup he could think of. His fellows attempted to steer him to a different subject, but could not help adding to Egerer’s roll call of broths, as they thought of obvious items they’d so far omitted.

  Angelika hung back, surveying the slopes of the hills as they walked between them. They could just as well be attacked on their way to the hill as on it. The movement of a black shape up on the slope to her left stopped her momentarily before she realised it was only the shadow of spruce branches, jostled by a gusting breeze.

  Jonas spoke. “You think I took your ring.”

  She’d detected him, coasting up behind her, into her blind spot. “What makes you say that?”

  “Franziskus says so.”

  “The two of you have formed a pact, I hear. That is good.”

  “He needs looking after, as you said. He’ll need a future, when you get that ring back.”

  “Your confidence is most encouraging.”

  “I did not steal your ring. I’m surer than ever that the big Kurgan has it.”

  “Let’s hope he’s up on Mount Gander, then, so you can kill him for me.”

  “Oh, I’ll kill him. If you’re certain of nothing else, be certain of that.”

  Angelika did not reply to this.

  “I require your allegiance as well as his.”

  “Good thing I’m looking for a lost ring, then.”

  “Not just in your deeds, but in your heart, as well.”

  “Don’t use that word.”

  “Which word?”

  The one that starts with H.”

  He chuckled ruefully.

  She slowed down, letting the men go ahead. “You truly want my allegiance, Jonas? Learn to be honest with your men. That’s heroic—to blunder, and admit to it, and then do better.”

  “An officer must maintain his authority.”

  “If you have to call on your authority, you’ve already lost it. Once your men start to suspect your honesty, they won’t believe you even when you tell the truth. They don’t want a man they can worship. They want a man they can trust.”

  “I’ve not thought of it that way before.”

  “You’re right to battle the barbarians, yes?”

  “They’d burn the whole world. There’s no cause more righteous.”

  “Then you don’t have to lie for it.”

  An arrow appeared in the side of Caven’s neck. He dropped down onto the trail, dead.

  Kollek clutched his throat. It, too, was pierced by an arrow. It was crudely fletched with thick tufts of dark leathering—the work of the Kurgan.

  Egerer and Hertwig had Kollek under each arm before he could fall. They dragged him down to a meagre depression by the side of the trail and pushed themselves into it. Hertwig could not go fully prone, the angle of the arrow prevented it. A third arrow landed in the dirt before them.

  The shots came from a slope to their left. Angelika ran toward it, pressing her back to its side. Jonas did the same. They watched as more arrows saile
d down to the depression where the three men lay. Kollek shuddered as he was hit again, this time in the calf of his right leg.

  None of Jonas’ men were archers; they could not return fire.

  Angelika gauged trajectories: the arrows came from a band of bushes covering a wall of sheer rock, about six feet high. Above this modest cliff hung a stretch of sloping hillside, surfaced in a thick coating of dry soil, dotted by the occasional hand-sized stone. The bushes were thick enough that she could not see the barbarians behind them. That was good: it meant they might not be able to see her, either. So far all of the arrow shots had been made at the soldiers, who’d been a good dozen yards ahead of her and Jonas. If they were lucky, they hadn’t been seen.

  Jonas seemed ready to bolt toward the soldiers, to shield them with his body. She pointed to the slope overlooking the rock wall. “Have you got a throwing knife?”

  “I’m not good with it.”

  “Then you won’t mind lending it to me.” Angelika had only two daggers; those leaves enshrouded at least three archers.

  Jonas wore his knife strapped to the back of his cuirass. She unsheathed it and tucked it into her belt. “I’m going up there. Kill them from a safe remove. Stay down here. If it looks like they’re going to spot me, distract them.”

  Grabbing onto a jutting tree-root, Angelika hauled herself up onto the slope. She started by moving further away from the hidden archers, using the curve of the hill to conceal herself. She inched along slowly, so the dried grasses would not crunch beneath her feet. Only after she’d clambered to a point higher than their position did she creep back toward them.

  After a moment’s pause, the snipers resumed firing. Below, a soldier groaned. Angelika could not be sure, but it sounded like Caven. She checked to see that Jonas was still in place but he’d moved out slightly from the hillside. If the archers looked his way, they’d be able to draw a bead on him. She wished she could shout to him, urge him back to safety, but of course that would only expose the both of them. His foolishness gave her a new appreciation for Franziskus; he’d never be so rash. Unless those in need of rescue were children or ducklings.

  She reached the bare slope over the snipers’ roost. From there she would have to step even more cautiously, any dislodged stone could easily roll down onto the archers, alerting them to her presence. The slightest trickle of dirt would betray her. Angelika planted a testing foot into the dirt. The soil was firm and sun-caked, sufficiently deep to brace her as she eased along the slope.

  Another scream. She couldn’t tell which soldier had been hit.

  The curve of the hill hid her original position from her, just as it did the snipers. There was no way of knowing if Jonas had stayed safely put.

  She concentrated on her own slow progress down the slope. The cliff was angled unforgivingly. To get a clear sightline, she’d have to reach a point practically on top of them. She’d hurl two knives, then leap down with Jonas’ blade—it wasn’t properly balanced for throwing—to slit any remaining throats. If there were more than three or four of them, she’d be in trouble. The ledge didn’t look like it would hold many more than that, so her plan was risky, but not insane.

  Angelika had about a yard to go before reaching her mark. An ovoid stone stuck out from the dry soil near her toe. It was loosely anchored. To stop it from falling, she crouched to press it down.

  Then she saw it: she’d put herself in an even better position than she’d imagined. All the way down the slope, she’d been at pains to prevent a rubble cascade. Now that she was this close, though, it would be just the thing. The entire scenario played out in her mind’s eye with splendid precision.

  She’d kick a few rocks down. The barbarian archers would pop their heads up to see what was up, giving her a clear shot at them. If the archers moved back to take aim at her, they’d topple from their ledge. They’d have a tough time climbing up onto the slope. While they struggled, she’d have all the aiming time she needed.

  Angelika could scarcely believe her luck. All the angles were completely in her favour—she had a superb chance of taking them all, with almost no risk to herself. Seldom had she found herself in such an ideal position. She took her knife from her boot, transferred it to her left hand, and hauled back her foot, ready to dislodge a large and convenient chunk of quartz-laden stone.

  Thrashing sounds came from down below and the tops of the bushes shook. She heard Jonas’ voice, and the angry grunts of surprised barbarians.

  He’d charged their perch from the bottom of the hill. It was a terrible spot to fight from—they had the higher ground. Jonas would have to struggle up onto their ledge, through the bushes, as they fought him off. It would take the Chaos troops a few seconds to drop their bows and haul out the hand weapons, and then he’d be at their mercy. The blasted fool was about to get himself killed.

  There was little she could do about it, without exposing herself to the same danger. Now that they were under direct attack, a few falling rocks would do little to get the Kurgan’s attention. Jonas’ impetuosity had ruined her perfect opportunity.

  She’d stay safely on her perch and let him do it. He was a good fighter. He could take them.

  There were three of them, at the very least. And they enjoyed nearly every tactical advantage over him.

  She edged closer to the ledge to take a peek down at the melee. Jonas was indeed in trouble. His head poked up through the bushes; his off-hand desperately held a woody trunk of hedge. There were four Kurgan, not three. One had his boot planted solidly on Jonas’ sword-arm; the commander’s sabre lay flat on the ledge, his fingers still clamped around its hilt. A second Kurgan, axe in hand, jostled for the proper angle, preparing to saw at the lieutenant’s other arm.

  Angelika hurled a dagger into the back of the axeman’s neck. He fell back into the two men behind him. The three of them resolved into a protesting tangle of limbs. The fourth barbarian, who held Jonas’ sword-arm, committed the fatal error of looking back. This presented Angelika with her favourite target; her second throwing knife squelched deep in his eye socket.

  Angelika hoped that Jonas would have the elementary sense to let go, dropping down away from the ledge. Then the remaining Chaos troops would have to jump down through the bushes to pursue him, allowing her to remain safely on the slope above.

  Jonas did the opposite, capitalising on the confusion to haul himself further up onto the ledge. The two unharmed Kurgan freed themselves of their injured comrade, tossing him aside to crash through the foliage and out of sight. Given little room to swing long blades, they instead drew their hunting knives, nine inches long and improbably serrated. Jonas batted his sword at them, hitting the bushes, filling the air with fragments of shredded leaf. His shorter blade, the one he’d need to win this fight, was in Angelika’s hand.

  The bigger Kurg lunged at him, ducking under his sword to butt him in the face. Jonas’ feet wobbled drunkenly under him. The Kurg sheathed his dagger and got behind Rassau. Immobilising the lieutenant’s arms with his own, he wrenched him over, so his mate could stab him. Jonas kicked out; the knife-wielding Kurg slashed at his legs.

  Angelika pulled in a deep, involuntary breath and leapt down onto the Kurg with the knife. Both of her hands were wrapped around the hilt of Jonas’ dagger; her momentum drove it deep into the shoulder of the shrieking Kurg. Angelika hoped he’d lose his footing, so she could land on top of him, but he remained upright. She bounced off him, sticking one hand out behind her to brace herself against the ledge as she fell backwards. Pain jabbed through her wrist as it caught the brunt of her weight.

  Seeing that the Kurgan she’d hit had dropped his knife, she let herself drop to the floor of the ledge, then rolled to snatch it up. The Kurgan, a dagger lodged in his beefy, naked shoulder, tried to stomp her, but missed. Angelika curled up onto her knees, got partway between his legs, then pushed her back up against his left leg, shoving him off-balance. He toppled backwards, his head hitting the bushes on the way down. They broke his
fall, preventing him from breaking his skull on the rocky ledge.

  She spun; the big Kurgan still had Jonas in a sturdy grapple-hold. He bulled forward to smash Rassau’s body into the cliff wall. Jonas stuck out a leg, to blunt the impact, but still winced in agony. Angelika sank into a crouch, the Kurgan knife in her hand, readying herself for a good opportunity. She couldn’t get at the barbarian while he had Jonas as his shield. The ledge was too small for her to get around him.

  The Kurg puffed with the effort of keeping the well-muscled Jonas suspended; he tightened his grip on his captive but let his feet touch the ledge. Jonas slumped down, then pushed off, and the two of them disappeared through the rough, thumping onto the slope below.

  Angelika felt sour breath on the back of her neck and ducked just in time to miss a blow aimed at her jaw. Her Kurgan had risen again and was ready to fight her unarmed. He was three inches taller and fifty pounds heavier than she; his torso a riot of defined and writhing muscle. Across his face crawled a pair of open-mouthed snake tattoos, their reptilian bodies intersecting on the bridge of his nose. A long tail of dark hair swayed from his top-knot as he swung his blocky fists at her. With each move he made, droplets of blood from the wound on his shoulder flecked from it. The dagger still protruded from the wound, apparently doing nothing to slow his rage.

  He feinted a blow at Angelika’s gut; she whirled under it to cut a superficial wound into his forearm. With bruising force, he elbowed her into the rock wall. He caught her weapon-arm with his knee and ground it into the wall. Her hand opened and the knife dribbled from it. The Kurgan grabbed her by the fabric of her tunic, intending to throw her into the bushes. She jumped up onto him, pincering his waist with her deceptively spindly legs. Angelika climbed him like a cliff, grabbing onto the dagger in his back. She wrenched on it and the serpents on his face constricted in pain.

  She felt the tension drain all at once from him and, before she could slip aside, his slack, but weighty body was tumbling on top of her. Angelika hit the ledge first, landing painfully on her back. An instant later came the leaden form of the unconscious Kurgan, pushing the wind from her lungs. She lay helplessly pinned for several long minutes, as her exhausted body refused her instructions to it. On the other side of the hedge, axe clanged against sabre, as Jonas’ fight against his barbarian banged on.