by Jim Butcher
"We can't win," she said. "We can't hold."
"Against that?" He shook his head. He took his helmet off and wiped sweat from his brow, replacing it as arrows buzzed through the air.
She bowed her head, her shoulders shaking. The tears were hot and bitter. A stone-headed arrow shattered on the merlon above her, but she didn't care.
Amara looked up at the Marat, at Atsurak about to take the gates, at the enormous number of Marat still fresh and unbloodied, now moving quickly over the plains toward the fortress. "Hold," she told Giraldi. "Hold as long as you can. Send someone to make sure the Civilians have started running. Tell the wounded to arm themselves to fight as best they can. Tell them-" She swallowed. "Tell them it looks bad."
'Yes, Countess," Giraldi said, his voice numb. "Heh. I always figured my last order would be 'pass me another slice of roast.'" He gave her a grim smile, turned to swing his sword at a climbing Marat almost absently, and headed off to follow her commands.
Amara climbed back down off the wall, taking absent note of the courtyard. Fidelias and his men were nowhere in sight, probably gone again, safely lofted up by their Knights Aeris. At the barricade, more Marat had pushed through, and though they had trouble advancing over the corpses fallen on the ground, yet they came on, despite the desperate cries of the Alerans pitted against them.
She drew her sword, the sword from the fallen guardsman in the Princeps Memorium, and stared at its workmanship. Then she looked up, at the Marat pushing through the gates, sure that in time she would see their hordemaster, here to claim the fortress for himself.
Bernard stepped up beside her, still looking tired, but holding a double bladed woodsman's axe in his broad hands. "Do we have a plan?"
"The hordemaster. I saw him. I want to take him down." She told him about the dagger at his waist, the second horde coming on.
Bernard nodded, slowly. "If we get to him," he said, "I'm going to try a
woodcrafting on you. Take the knife and run. Get it back to the First Lord, if you can."
"You're exhausted. If you try to work another crafting it could k-" She stopped herself and took a slow breath.
"Pirellus was right," Bernard commented. "The good part of being doomed is that you have nothing left to lose."
Then he turned to her, slipping an arm around her waist, and kissed her on the mouth, with no hesitation, no self-consciousness, nothing but a raw hunger tempered with a kind of exquisite gentleness. Amara let out a soft sound and threw herself into the kiss, suddenly frantic, and felt tears threaten her eyes again.
She drew back from the kiss far too soon, looking up at him. Bernard smiled at her and said, "I didn't want to leave that undone."
She felt a tired smile on her own mouth, and she turned from him to face the gates.
Outside, there came a blaring of horns, deeper, somehow more violent, more angry than the first ones had been. The ground began to shake once again, and shouts and rumbles outside the walls rose into a tidal wave of sound that pounded at her ears, her throat, her chest. She thought she could feel her cheeks vibrating from the sheer volume.
The final defense at the gate began to crumble. The Marat began to force their way into the courtyard, their eyes wild, weapons bloodied, pale hair and skin speckled with scarlet. One armed holder went down before a pair of enormous wolves and a Marat fighting with nothing but his own teeth. A great herdbane pinned a crawling Aleran to the ground and with a birdlike bob of its head seized the Aleran's neck and broke it with a quick shake. The Marat poured in, and there was sudden bedlam in the courtyard, lines disintegrating into dozens of separate smaller battles, pure chaos.
"There," Amara said, and jabbed her finger forward. "Coming through the gate right now."
Atsurak strode through the gates, his beasts all around him. With a casual motion of his captured Aleran spear, he thrust it through the back of a fighting legionare and then, without watching the man die, withdrew the spear to test its edge against his thumb. Several Alerans rushed him. One was torn to shreds by one of the huge birds. Another dropped to the earth before he got close to Atsurak, black-feathered Marat arrows sprouting from both eyes. No one got within striking distance of the hordemaster.
Bernard growled, "I'm going in first. Get their attention. You come right behind me."
"All right," Amara said, and put her hand on his shoulder.
Bernard gripped the axe and tensed to move forward.
Sudden thunder shook the air in a roar that made what came before sound like nothing more than the rumbling of an empty belly. Screams, frantic, howling cries, rose in a symphony. The walls themselves shook, just beside the gates. They shook again, beneath a thunderous impact, and a web of cracks spread out through them. Again, the thunder rammed against the outer walls, and with a roar an entire section gave in. Alerans on the battlements had to scramble to either side, stone tumbling down in huge and uneven sections, dust flooding out, light from the newly risen sun pouring through the dust in a sudden flood of terrible golden splendor.
Through the sudden gap in the walls came a thunderous bellow, and the vast shape of a black-coated gargant, a gargant bigger than any such beast Amara had ever seen. Bloodied, painted in wild and garish colors, the beast seemed something out of a madman's nightmare. It lifted its head and let out another bellowing roar and tore down another ten feet of wall with its vast digging claws. The gargant bellowed again and shouldered its way through the wall and into the courtyard itself.
A Marat warrior sat upon the gargant's back, pale of hair and dark of eye, with shoulders so broad and chest so deep not even the largest breastplate could have fit him. He bore a long-handled cudgel in his hand, and with an almost casual sweep he leaned to one side and smote it down onto the head of a Wolf Clan warrior strangling a downed Aleran, dropping the Marat to the earth with a broken skull.
"ATSURAK!" bellowed the Marat on the back of the maddened gargant. His voice, deep, rich, furious, shook the stones of the courtyard. "ATSURAK OF HERDBANE! DOROGA OF GARGANT CALLS YOU MISTAKEN BEFORE WE-THE-MARAT! COME OUT, YOU MURDEROUS DOG! COME AND FACE ME BEFORE THE ONE!"
Whirling with insane grace, the gargant spun to one side, great forelegs rising together. The beast brought his clawed feet down on top of a charging Herdbane Clan warrior, simply smashing him flat against the courtyard's stones. At that, though the din outside the walls continued to rise, the battle in the courtyard fell into a sudden, shocked silence.
As the great beast turned, letting out another defiant bellow, Amara saw, in the golden light pouring through the breached walls, the boy Tavi clinging to Doroga's back, behind him on the great gargant, and behind the boy sat the scarred slave, clutching at him and gibbering
Tavi looked wildly around the courtyard, and when his gaze flicked toward them, his face lit with a ferocious smile "Uncle Bernard! Uncle Bernard!" he shouted, pointing at Doroga "He followed me home' Can we keep him'"
Chapter 41
Isana took a pair of quick steps back, pressing Odiana along behind her, and lifted her chin "I've always thought you a pig, Kord, but never an idiot Do you think you'll get away with a killing, right here in Garrison'"
Kord laughed, a rough sound "In case you didn't notice, they've got bigger fish to fry I just walked right on in like all those other fools who came to die here "
"It doesn't mean you can escape, Kord Assuming that one of us doesn't get to you when you try it "
Kord laughed again, the sound of it dry, rasping "One of you Which one would that be? Come here, bitch "
Isana faced him evenly and did not move
Kord's face flushed red and dangerous "I said come here "
"She can't hear you, Kord I saw to that"
"Did you'" His eyes moved from Isana to the huddling woman behind and beside her Odiana flinched, even at the glance, haunted eyes widening
"No," Isana said, though she knew the words were useless "Don't look "
But Odiana glanced up at Kord The murderous expressio
n on his face, a finger he jabbed at the ground in front of him, were apparently enough to activate the discipline collar Odiana let out a sudden breathless shriek and fell to the ground, clawing at the collar Even as she did, she struggled against her own convulsing body to crawl closer to Kord, to obey the command he'd given her. Isana reached down to hold her back, but the sudden wave of terror and unbearable anguish that washed up through that touch nearly blinded her, and she stumbled back and away.
Kord let out a harsh laugh and took a step forward, taking the woman's face in his hands. "That's better," he said. "You be a good girl. I'm going to break your pretty neck and then put that collar on Isana. Hold still."
Odiana whimpered, body still twitching, and did not struggle against him.
"Kord, no!" Isana shouted.
The door suddenly rattled on its frame. There was a hesitation, and then it rattled again, as though someone was trying to get in and hadn't expected to find it bolted. Kord whirled to face it.
Desperate, Isana cast the globe of the furylamp in her hand at Kord. It struck the Steadholder in the back of the head. The furylamp shattered, the spark imp inside it flashing into brilliant light for a moment, and then gone. The interior of the warehouse sank into darkness, and Kord began to curse viciously.
Isana swallowed her terror and hurried forward, through the darkness. There was a horrible, frantic moment of feeling in the dark, listening for Odiana's whimpers and Kord's heavy, snarling breathing. Her fingers found Odiana's hair first, and she dragged the slave woman against her. She got the woman to her feet and started dragging her farther back into the warehouse, hoping that she moved in the right direction. Odiana began to whimper, and Isana clapped one hand firmly over the woman's mouth.
"Don't do this, Isana," growled Kord's voice, from somewhere in the dark, back toward the door. "You're just drawing things out. We both know how this is going to end."
Isana felt a ripple in the ground beneath the wooden floorboards, but knew that Kord's fury would have difficulty locating them through the wood, just as it had through the ice. She continued to draw Odiana deeper back into the warehouse, until she bumped against the back wall. She felt her way with her hands, and though the predawn light was showing through cracks in the wall, there still was not enough light to see. She pressed the woman down into the dubious shelter between two crates, then lifted Odiana's own hands and pressed them over the woman's mouth. The slave shook almost violently, but managed to nod. Isana drew her hands away from the woman and turned to face the darkness.
"Come on, Isana," Kord said, his voice more distant. "The collar's not so
bad. Once you put it on, you won't have any more doubts. You can see the good part of it, too. I'll do that for you."
Isana swallowed, revolted, and debated her options. Simplest was to shout for help. There were hundreds of people within Garrison. Surely some would hear her.
Surely. But at the same time, she would be giving her position away to Kord. She did not know how long it might take help to break down the barred warehouse door, but it surely would not take Kord long to break her neck. Though it made her seethe with frustration, she could do little but remain silent and try to find a way to escape the warehouse or to deal with Kord directly. She crouched in the darkness and struggled to think of other options.
The ground rumbled and shook for perhaps a minute, and then there was a sudden round of cheers and blowing horns from outside. Useless. She didn't know what had happened, but she would never be heard over that din. She had to find out where Kord was and either circle out to open the door or attack him herself-and that would be mad. Even if she could find him, he was far stronger than she. She could loose Rill on him, but what if she wasn't fast enough? No, such a confrontation was a last desperate resort.
A calculated risk, then. She took a breath and tried to keep her voice monotone, droning, to better conceal the direction. "You think that will make me happy, Kord?"
His reply came from much nearer to her, perhaps down the same row of crates. "Once I get that on you, whatever I want makes you happy."
"I suppose a man like you needs something like that," she said, moving back, trying to circle around to another row to slip past him.
"Keep talking. Just going to make it sweeter when I get my hands on you." His voice was on the move as well.
From outside, there was a series of shouts, a trembling in the ground, as of thousands of feet striking it. Horns blew the signals to engage, and Isana knew that the Garrison was under attack.
Kord spoke again, and his voice came from not ten feet away from her, in the darkness, so close that she could suddenly feel the cloud of rage and lust around him like a hot, stinking mist. "See there? Bigger fish to fry. Leaves me all alone with you."
She didn't dare reply. Instead, keeping her movements as quiet as she could, she moved across the row to the far side, to press against the crates there. If she strained, she could hear Kord moving slowly down the row of
crates, within a long arm's reach, now, but even more, she could sense him against her, the churning muck of his ugly emotions. It drew even with her, and she held her breath as it crept on past, the pressure on her senses slowly changing, as though something warm and moist brushed over her left cheek, then her mouth, then her right cheek, as Kord crept past.
But he hesitated there, and Isana held her own position. Had he sensed her, somehow? Did he know she was there?
"Smell you," Kord murmured, his voice very close. "Smell you. Smells good. Makes me hungry."
Isana held her breath.
He moved, sudden and fast, the sense of him flashing across her cheek, mouth, cheek again, as he moved back toward the door. She lost him after only a second. He had moved beyond the range of what her crafting could feel.
But it came to her, suddenly, that she had a weapon he did not. His fury might be able to lend him tremendous strength, but he would not be able to use it to see. His power could reach no farther than his own fingers. But she could use her own crafting to locate him, even in the total darkness, if her reach had been longer. How could she extend it?
By provoking him, she realized. By stoking his emotions to a brighter blaze, he would radiate them more strongly, make himself more easy to sense. Dangerous plan, indeed. But if she could pinpoint where he was, she could slip past him to the door and go for help.
She moved, first, back to the far end of the rows, picking another at random, before she started down it and lifted her voice again. "Do you know how we escaped, Kord?"
Kord let out a growling sound, now several yards away. "Some damn fool didn't patch the roof right."
"Were you too drunk to remember?" Isana taunted, gently. "You sent Aric to patch that roof."
"No," Kord growled. "Wouldn't do that."
"You did. You hit his face right there in front of me and made him."
Kord's voice answered, harsher, panting, moving closer. "Happens. It happens. I get mad. He understands."
"No he doesn't, Kord," Isana said, even more quietly. "He helped us escape. He made holes in the roof so that meltwater would run in and give us our crafting back."
"Lying bitch!" Kord snarled His fist lashed out against one of the crates, and the solid wooden staves of its side broke with a heavy crunch At the same time, fighting erupted from very nearby, somewhere just outside the warehouse, in the courtyard itself
"He hates you, Kord Did he come with you? Is he here helping you? You've got no sons, now, Kord Nothing to come after you Bittan is dead, and Aric despises you "
"Shut up," howled Kord "Shut up before I break your lying head!"
And the sense of his anger, his mad, blazing rage, abruptly washed through the warehouse Isana pleaded silently with Rill to leave her even more open than usual to the emotions
She felt him Exactly where that rage was Ten feet away, on the next row of crates, and pacing swiftly toward her Isana moved silently, trying to get past him and back to the door, but as she came even w
ith him one row over, his steps stopped and he started reversing them toward the door
"Oh no," he growled "No, that's a trick Make me mad and make me come chase you, then you run while I find that slave bitch and break her bitch neck and you get away No, no You aren't smarter than me "
Isana paced him silently, frustrated, unsure of how near she had to be to make him remain within the circle of her senses She kept the row of crates between them, until they came to the end
Kord stopped, and she felt the surge of hope and lust in him as well, as he inhaled through his nose "Smell you, Isana Smell your sweat You're scared " She heard his knuckles crack He stood opposite her, standing while she crouched She reached out her hand and felt the stack of crates that was between them, one, two, three, four high, at least
"Smell you," Kord purred "You're close Where are you"?"
Isana made up her mind in a flash She turned to the top crate, leaned against it, and pushed with all her strength It felt like it took forever for the crate to tilt and then to fall, carrying the two beneath with it, but it could only have been a second The crates fell, Kord let out a short, sharp cry, and there was a shockingly loud crushing, crunching sound of impact
Isana scrambled back to the door of the warehouse, fumbling in the dark She found the bolt and threw it back, then opened the door, letting in pale morning light, though the warehouse remained in the shadow of the walls She turned and looked back inside
Kord lay on his belly on the ground, the wooden crates over him One of
them had struck him between the shoulder blades, and still lay half on him, unbroken. The other had to have clipped his head, because there was blood on his face. It lay over to one side.
The last had landed on his lower back, buttocks, and thighs. It had broken open, revealing the cracked and broken forms of heavy slate tiles used on the roofs of the buildings in the garrison. Isana drew in a breath. The tiles were each made of a heavy fired ceramic, and each of the crates had to have weighed close to three hundred pounds.
She watched as Kord tried to move, straining. He snarled and muttered something, and the earth beneath him stirred weakly. He tried again, but could not get out from under the crates. He subsided to the floor again, panting, whimpering beneath his breath.