Moontide 03 - Unholy War
Page 27
There must be somewhere …
A mile wasn’t far: 1760 yards, and easily traversed. She searched frantically, terrified that Wornu might appear before she’d found the refuge she needed.
Hessaz’s skill-set was too much like her own, but Wornu’s was not and that gave her a chance. She and Zaqri had agreed that she had to find Wornu’s blind spot or die. Of course, it also meant she was going up against someone who could crush her with a single blow – but the plan was to not give him the chance, instead, to disorient him with unfamiliar gnosis until Zaqri arrived to finish him off.
My life’s in the hands of the man who killed my mother. Sol et Lune, how did I get into this?
She scrambled over a small rise and couldn’t stop herself from glancing back when she heard a jackal yowl from the north, where Hessaz had started. It sounded horribly near. Then she spotted what she’d been seeking: a crevice just wide enough to slide into. She used Air-gnosis and glided over to it so there would be no tracks, landed at the edge and lowered herself inside. This crack in the land was barely two feet wide and it smelled of dead animal, but she wriggled inside until she was out of the light and lying flat.
The next step was harder. She crossed her arms over her chest and closed her eyes, trying to slow her frantically beating heart. She needed to be calm for this exacting task. It took far too long, minutes when it should take seconds, but she was entirely self-taught in spiritualism, the art of travelling outside the body – she’d only unlocked it by accident, when she’d awakened from a deep sleep to find herself looking down on her own body, lying with the other girls asleep in the maiden’s wagon. Her body had looked so lifeless beneath her she’d thought herself dead and she’d panicked, screaming as her insubstantial astral body flickered about the confined space – but none of the other girls woke; no one else heard a sound she made. She raged and wept and pleaded; she shook them and found their bodies as immovable as stone, her hardest blow unfelt. Only the rising sun had driven her back into her body.
She’d learned a lot since then, all by trial and error, and if she concentrated, she could now leave her body at will. She was too scared this morning to achieve it easily, but finally there came that tearing and she pulled free like a seabird rising from the water. Her spiratus flowed upwards, leaving her body behind, unmoving, barely breathing, but alive. She flashed out of the crevice and into the shadow of a rock-fall. Normally she avoided sunlight when doing this – it burned, a dreadful searing pain – but this time she had no choice.
By now she could feel Wornu’s approach: he was like a rolling boulder to her gnostic senses, loudly trundling closer and closer. He was making no effort to conceal himself – she guessed he was doing it on purpose to show her how little he feared her. She flitted from shadow to shadow until she was in his path, and prepared to face him.
He came out of the east with the sun behind him, casting him into silhouette. He bore a huge hunting spear, just as Zaqri had predicted, fashioned in a few minutes from stone and wood and the gnosis. No doubt Hessaz and Zaqri had done the same, but she didn’t have the Earth- or sylvanic-gnosis to do the same.
But I have other skills …
She willed a small rock-fall with telekinesis to draw his attention, then stepped into the light as if blundering about helplessly and pulled her spiratus half into the world of substance, allowing him to see her.
The dark shape went still. ‘Cymbellea?’
She froze in surprise. It wasn’t Wornu.
It was Zaqri.
*
The plan wasn’t ideal, but it was the best Zaqri could come up with under the circumstances. In a stand-up fight Cym would be useless, and he was not certain he would prevail one-on-one with Wornu, let alone if Hessaz was involved. They needed an edge: something that would enable them to take down one of their enemies fast. Despite being the stronger, Zaqri believed Wornu was the more vulnerable, especially to the surprising ability Cymbellea had revealed last night.
Cymbellea. Her name shivered through his spine; her restless face and windblown hair tangled up his thoughts. An unbroken colt with brilliant eyes and a piercing mind. He refused to believe that beneath the armour of her blood vendetta she did not feel for him what he felt. He’d wanted her so badly that he had almost disgraced himself, not once but many times these past few months. And yet the moment of consummation had been spoiled by its necessity, and her coldness to him.
I’ll not lie with her again until she is willing – or until we are together in the grave.
He scooped up a handful of twigs and stones and hurriedly forged them into javelins using sylvan- and Earth-gnosis. No doubt Wornu would have created a war-spear and Hessaz a bow. Once armed, he began to trot southwest in long, loping strides, aiming to intercept Hessaz. It pained him to face her: Hessaz and Ghila had been so alike that she could as easily have been his mate as Ghila. In the end Ghila’s more impish nature had appealed more than her fiery, tenacious sister, and he’d never regretted the choice, for all Ghila’s faults.
I didn’t pick this fight, Hessaz.
He had run less than half a mile when suddenly there came a rumble like thunder from the southeast. He frowned at the heavens. Thunder usually presaged a dust-storm, which would make this Noose messy indeed. But there was no wind, and the sky was clear all the way to the southern coastal ranges.
If it isn’t thunder, what is it? He paused as the very earth seemed to go still, opened all his gnostic and natural senses and listened. If he really, really concentrated, he could hear a pin drop. Or the cry of a young child, more than two miles away …
No—!
As he realised what was happening he dropped his javelins and fell into lion-shape without breaking stride, pelting back towards camp. The Noose was forgotten in his desperation to protect his people.
The blow was like a punch to his side: an arrow hammered into his flanks, through his ribcage and into his lungs. For about two seconds he barely felt it, then the force of the blow made him stagger sideways. His legs went from under him and his forward momentum threw him into a face-grazing slide. Dust filled his mouth and nostrils and eyes, and all his gasping couldn’t inflate his lungs. Blood bubbled up into his throat and his ribs started grinding in agony against the wooden shaft, each movement sending the jagged stone point ripping deeper inside.
He blinked his eyes clear and tried to stand.
He couldn’t.
Hessaz appeared, another arrow nocked and her face pitiless.
*
‘Cymbellea?’
She waited as Zaqri jogged towards her, his face splitting into a satisfied smile. ‘Wornu didn’t see me coming. I flew low in eagle form and took him from behind unawares.’ He hefted the war-spear, kissed the shaft in his right hand. ‘The big bastard wasn’t the man he thought he was.’
Could it really be so easy? She sagged in relief, her arms opening as she forgot in the relief of the moment that she hated him, even as some nagging part wondered at his uncharacteristic gloating, and how his voice sounded strange …
He bent back his arm and hurled the spear right at her chest.
She gaped at him, fatally frozen by the sudden violence. The spear took her between the breasts with full force …
… and passed right through her spiratus.
It still hurt like Hel: the spear had substance and she did not, so its passing tore a hole right through her aetheric form and out the other side. She clutched the hole in her spiritus like a death wound.
Then it closed, she staggered, flickered and was whole again.
Wornu! How could I ever have been so stupid? His true face emerged as he lost concentration and stared at her, baffled.
She silently berated herself. He can shape-change, stupido! She darted into the shadows again and tried to regain her composure, to keep herself here. Thunder rolled in the distance, but neither Cym nor Wornu noticed. Ten feet apart, they locked eyes, and Wornu’s big brutal face went slack as he struggled to reconci
le what he had just seen.
Cym threw a burst of light at his face and made herself vanish.
*
Hessaz stared down at Zaqri, a single tear running down her left cheek. ‘You were the only one I wanted,’ she whispered. ‘Did you even know?’
The camp … He tried to forge the thought into something she could hear, mind to mind, then tried to speak, but all that came was a gurgle and his mouth filled with blood.
‘You made me envy my sister. My own sister.’ She drew the bow to full power, took aim. ‘Then when she died, I thought …But no. You’d seen that damned gypsy and it was all her-her-her. You bastard. You’re not worthy of my love.’
He tried again.
This time she heard him. She looked around wildly, then focused. ‘No,’ she whispered, as the realisation struck her. She lost her grip on the arrow and it fell into the sand. ‘Pernara!’ she screamed, and in an instant she was gone and a giant raven was tearing out of the dell and across the sky.
Zaqri tried to move again, tried to change, but no matter what he did the shaft remained imbedded in him. His roar of agony came out as a whimper. For a few moments the world was touched with brilliance: a vivid, unbelievable colour. Then as swiftly it turned grey, then black.
*
Cym pressed her spiratus behind a boulder in a deadly game of hide and seek: keep Wornu occupied until Zaqri came, that was the plan. He couldn’t kill her, not unless he caught her full on with a mage-bolt, but Wornu hadn’t figured that out yet. Then an awful howl rose from all about her: a cry of terrible, awful fear and rage.
It was the sound of sixty Souldrinker warriors howling as one.
Wornu heard it too and backed away, his eyes round as saucers. ‘The camp, gypsy! The camp! We have to go!’
You might, but I rukking well don’t.
‘Peace, girl! Pax!’ He threw his hands up, searching for her wildly. ‘I must go!’
She wasn’t sure if he had heard, but either way, he turned and ran.
Thank you, Mater Luna! Thank you thank you thank you.
She cancelled the spiratus and her form dissolved into a streak of unseen mist that tore across the desert. All she could see was light, all she could feel was pain as her spiratus started fraying and burning as she sought the faint call of her own heartbeat. Closer, closer …
There!
She fell into her body and it jerked upright, almost hitting her head on the rock ceiling above. Her heart thudding, she wriggled out of the crevice and crawled into the open. Far above, giant ravens were streaking across the sky, flying southeast. If any of them saw her, they didn’t care.
Not a single part of her wanted to follow them. She turned her face to the north and ran for her life.
*
The greybeard and the Keshi girl had vanished by the time Malevorn was in position. The birdsong was gone and the air was deathly still. He twirled his longsword in his hand idly, facing the badlands and the risen sun. The terrain looked like the aftermath of giants having a pottery-smashing competition; the low sun turned his vision into a dazzling smear. Brilliant tactics, Quintius. Are you trying to get us killed?
Probably, was the chilling answer. They don’t want us – probably don’t need us. And Adamus can always find a new arse to fuck. He turned to Dominic, on his right. The young Acolyte looked jittery.
He saw Dominic blanch and urge his khurne closer. Beyond him, Raine and Dranid were holding steady, surveying the mess before them. There were any number of breaks in the rubble from where an attack might come. He glanced behind him to where Quintius’ men were slaughtering babes and pregnant women and no doubt calling it glorious.
Is Mercer in there? Is the Scytale?
He muttered instructions to his steed and edged closer to Dominic, wishing it was Raine at his flank. She would hold her nerve, but something had cracked inside Dom and it made him vulnerable to predators like Adamus Crozier.
He began to wonder if the flogging they’d get for disobeying their orders might be better than what was to come. What’s a few scars on my back if that’s the price for getting out alive? From out of sight came a chorus of howls and shrieks and deep-throated roars: a cacophony of bestial throats venting all at once. He readied his wards and kindled fire in his left hand. Somehow he felt calmer as the moment approached.
Maybe there’re just a dozen or so of them out there. Maybe I’m worrying about nothing.
Then with a yowl, a leopard came bounding between two immense smashed boulders and hurtled towards him, eating up the hundred yards separating them in huge strides. More creatures followed, most on all fours, but some were bipedal: immense, ape-like forms who bounded semi-upright. Massive birds zipped along above them, their cries rending the air as they came.
He raised his sword.
I am an Andevarion. I refuse to die here.
‘Mal, what do we do?’ Dominic called in a shaky voice.
‘It’s too late to run – they’re faster than us. Close up, Dom. We hold on until Quintius comes.’ He glanced beyond him and saw that Dranid and Raine were coming towards him at full-pelt now. He felt a surge of gratitude and loyalty. They were a Fist of the Kore: bloodied, depleted, but still strong. Still the elite.
‘Let’s give these animals Hel!’ he shouted.
He set sights on the leopard and hurled the ball of flame in his hand.
*
Huriya sucked in her breath as the Dokken flowed towards the four Inquisitors and their horned beasts. Beside her, perched on top of a great pile of boulders, Tomacz growled, his jaw reshaping into something more primitive. He hunched over as blood and drool began to run from his mouth. Above and behind were their kindred, swarming towards the enemy. Huriya recognised two of the Acolytes, the handsome young dark-haired male and the ugly woman: they’d been in the group which had assailed them at the Isle of Glass – so they were obviously still trailing them.
She bared her teeth at the effrontery.
Beyond them, the camp was in flames and Inquisitors were milling about in the middle of it, hacking into the women and pounding the children beneath their hooves. Only these four guarded the perimeter. The shapeshifters flowed towards them, an incoming tide – then fire and lightning blossomed from the hands of the riders and struck the oncoming beasts in a torrent of coruscating blasts.
She blinked, faintly dazed, even at that distance, as the front ranks of the attackers were engulfed. Amidst the fires she saw blue cones of light, the gnostic shields of her Dokken, winking out as the combined fury of the four Inquisitors burned through them. The heat and choking smoke rolled over the ground, blinding them all, and the attack faltered. Chasander, the leopard who’d led the charge, was a crisped husk, all those near him likewise burned to skeletons. The whole pack felt their agony, linked as they were in mind and soul, and they screamed together.
But the fallen had absorbed the first fires of the Inquisitors, allowing the second rank to leap over their fallen kin and into battle. And more were arriving all the time, coming in threes and fours from the other sides of the Noose, desperate to join battle. Some she recognised, like big Darice, goat-headed Kraderz, and Elando with his fanciful bat-form, but most were just bestial shapes, hurtling into the fray.
She saw a giant bear launch himself at the dark-haired Inquisitor, who cut the bear in half with one savage blow. A jackal flew at the woman and was skewered on a lance then hurled away. The older Inquisitor on the left spurred his steed into the press and as she watched, hooves and horn and blade were all dealing death. More fire bloomed about the fourth o
ne; he might look like a stringy weakling but there was nothing weak about his gnosis. Close-up images of the dead and dying, shadow-bursts of pain and all the psychic debris of wounds and deathblows resounded through the pack-link. She willed the link away and gripped the rock beside her for support. How do they endure it?
She saw other pack-members staggering as she was, overwhelmed by what was happening to their family. Beside her, Tomacz was completing his change. Great canines had sprouted from his mouth as his lips retracted and now he was dropping to his haunches as the wolf within him fully emerged.
Huriya concentrated her mind and prepared to take part. She focused her gnosis on the slender young knight, the vulnerable-looking one, who was preparing to face big Darice. She gathered her mental forces. ‘You’re first,’ she whispered.
*
Malevorn’s khurne reared up and drove its front hooves into the skull of a jackal. He clung on, as much with telekinesis and instinct as training, and hacked blindly at a dark shape looming up on his right. His gnostically enhanced blade crunched into the shifter’s skull and a black bear fell to the ground. He hauled on the reins, gathered more gnosis and blazed fire at a massive raven that raked at his head. The bird’s bones appeared, a shadow in the flare of red-orange, and he blinked and spun round in time to see Dominic go down.
Raine had just beheaded a ram-headed man wielding a battle-axe and Dranid was pressing back a whole snarling group of creatures. Dominic had been fighting confidently, taking heart from the feats of those with him, when suddenly he gasped and clutched his skull and his shields fell apart.
‘Dom!’ Malevorn spurred towards him, but the damage was done: he’d been rendered momentarily helpless and in that instant the Dokken surged forward, yowling like nothing he had ever heard. Jaws clamped on Dominic’s legs and those of his khurne. The construct went down, screaming like a human as jagged teeth ripped it open and its entrails spewed onto the ground. Malevorn bellowed, hurling beasts aside with his gnosis as he tried to reach Dominic, but he was already too late. Dominic’s boyish face had vanished in a spray of blood and fur as a giant she-bear ripped him apart.