Beyond the Mists of Katura e-3

by James Barclay

  Auum felt so confused. In the rainforest it was all so clear, yet here where you could see everything laid out, it was all obscured. He put his face in his hands.

  ‘If we break the siege, what then? I can’t agree to fight alongside Xetesk.’

  ‘Stein says it’s our best chance of success.’

  ‘I know the numbers, but in my soul it feels wrong. The Wytch Lords were spawned from the type of mage that now inhabits Xetesk, weren’t they?’

  ‘That was hundreds of years ago. In the lifetimes of men that’s an eternity,’ said Ulysan.

  ‘Then why do I feel we are being dragged in the wrong direction? I don’t like not knowing what’s ahead.’

  ‘I think we have to trust Stein and Kerela and the other Julatsans.’

  ‘Why?’ Auum rubbed at his left arm. ‘Stein maybe but the rest. . well. . You know what I think.’

  ‘Let’s take this a day at a time,’ said Ulysan. ‘We’re nowhere if we can’t break the Wesmen here.’

  Auum felt a fractional release of tension.

  ‘Any ideas on that front? We have to think of something different.’

  ‘Just one,’ said Ulysan. ‘Think about it the other way to today’s battles. We need to get our mages and Il-Aryn close enough to threaten the shamen, because we know we can take the fighters. The question is, whose casters have the greater range?’

  The door to the antechamber opened. A soldier, out of breath and red in the face, came in.

  ‘My Lord Auum, General Harild wants you on the walls at the main gates,’ he said in stilted but passable elvish.

  ‘I am no lord,’ said Auum, smiling at the young human.

  ‘Why didn’t he get a mage to relay a message?’ asked Ulysan.

  The soldier blushed scarlet. ‘I asked to come. I wanted to meet you, speak to you in your language.’

  Auum felt an unexpected rush of warmth and took the soldier’s hand, shaking it as was the human custom before kissing his forehead.

  ‘Well done, although I can’t imagine why you should want to meet me.’

  If it was possible, the soldier’s red cheeks reddened further. ‘You are Auum. Your freeing of Calaius is famous. And I saw you fight out there. Can I learn to be that fast?’

  Auum laughed and stepped back. ‘What’s your name?’

  ‘Tilman,’ he said. ‘My family’s mostly farmers.’

  ‘Well, Tilman, your elvish is impressive and you can improve upon it until your dying day. But our speed is given to us by Yniss and no human will ever be so blessed. I admire your ambition, though.’ Auum winked at Ulysan. ‘That’s two humans I like now.’

  ‘What’s going on out there?’ asked Ulysan. ‘Why are we needed on the walls?’

  ‘The Wesmen are gathering. It’s a change of plan for them. They have brought, um. . I don’t know the word. . to climb the walls.’

  ‘Ladders?’ said Auum. ‘Good. That spares me a few awkward decisions, doesn’t it?’

  ‘I suppose,’ said Ulysan. ‘But unless they’ve chosen to sacrifice themselves in an ocean of mage fire, they must have thought of some way to protect their warriors during the assault.’

  ‘Well, there’s only one way to find out. Lead on, Tilman. I want to know more about you before the spells start to fly.’

  Chapter 16

  No one can understand the joy of the shetharyn who has not experienced its touch. To lose it once found would be to die.

  Faleen, TaiGethen

  A network of mages linked by a Communion casting was positioned all around Julatsa’s walls to warn of forces approaching from any direction. Down in the city the emergency plan had been put into operation, taking vulnerable members of the population inside the college grounds, organising fire and stretcher teams and setting up ambushes at key points in the tight streets.

  Harild’s college army and the militia were on the walls or behind the gates. Hundreds of bows and thousands of arrows were ready, as they had been every day of the siege. The cavalry were on standby to charge the gates should they be breached or to hasten a rout should the Wesmen be beaten back.

  Auum had split the remaining thirty-one TaiGethen cells between three points along the walls to match the concentrations of Wesmen warriors mustering on the open ground below. The Il-Aryn and college mages were in casting groups spread along the walls and around thirty of them stood behind the gates ready to launch orbs.

  Auum stood in the gatehouse with Harild, Stein and Ulysan. His left arm ached terribly but at least he could use it to balance himself, if not to hold a weapon or close his fist to punch. It would have to do. He stared at the gathering enemy forces and shook his head.

  ‘Unless they’ve got a new trick, I can’t see any way they’ll avoid a slaughter on the approach. How do they even propose to get a single foothold on the walls?’

  The warriors were singing and chanting. Auum had counted sixty wooden ladders, all wide enough to allow three abreast. A large proportion of the Wesmen carried hide shields and those who didn’t had bows. Spread among them were the shamen no longer in large groups but in ones, twos and threes. They were a powerful force but were about to attack into a storm of human magic.

  ‘The shamen must be planning something,’ said Ulysan. ‘Have you seen them spread out like this before?’

  ‘No,’ said Harild.

  ‘It makes them more difficult to target.’

  ‘But they have to be our focus,’ said Harild. ‘Without the shamen, the Wesmen are totally exposed.’

  ‘And there’s really nothing elsewhere around the walls?’ asked Auum.

  ‘No. It’s so empty I was thinking of sending the cavalry out through the rear gates.’

  Auum nodded. ‘And why did you decide against it?’

  ‘Because there’s too much open ground to east or west coming around the walls and into view. Too much time for the shamen to target them. We’re better keeping them here as a shock force or perhaps as a diversion.’

  ‘Agreed,’ said Auum.

  He stared at the enemy again. The chanting beyond the gates ceased. Four thousand and more Wesmen faced the city in silence, their shamen moving among them, laying hands on them, muttering prayers and invoking their spirits for victory. The silence was unnerving. Auum could feel the tension rise inside the city. Everyone knew the time had come.

  ‘Keep your heads down when you see the shamen preparing,’ said Harild, his voice booming out. ‘Get the message along the walls. Get the spotters up in the sky. Make this day glorious.’

  ‘No parley flag,’ said Ulysan.

  ‘They don’t want us to surrender; they want us dead,’ said Auum. ‘Stay on my left. I’m weak there.’

  ‘I shall be like glue,’ said Ulysan.

  ‘Perhaps not quite that close,’ said Auum.

  The Wesmen howled like wild dogs and rushed across the open space of a hundred yards and more, scattering into ladder teams flanked by archers. Shields were held out against the inevitable rain of spells and arrows. The shamen ran among the warriors.

  ‘Archers. Loose at will!’ roared Harild.

  Arrows whipped away but not enough, not nearly enough. Auum looked along the walls. He could see shock on the faces of mages, Il-Aryn and bowmen alike. Only the TaiGethen displayed no fear.

  ‘Stein,’ said Auum, ‘get among your people to the right. They’re waiting too long. I’ll do the same left. Come on, Ulysan.’

  Auum ran from the gatehouse, jumped down the steps to the ramparts, where Ollem was waiting for him, and sprinted along behind the nervous defenders. He heard another order from Harild. There was a brief pressure of human magical power across his shoulders before a volley of bright yellow orbs of fire soared out from behind the gates, trailing smoke and plunging into the ground just in front of the foremost Wesmen.

  The multiple detonations ripped up the ground and scattered fire in every direction, slowing the advance of the enemy centre, but they flooded forward undaunted elsewhere across the line, h
owling and roaring.

  Now was when they missed Drech. The Il-Aryn were leaderless under their reluctant figurehead Ephemere, whose voice was quiet and had no carry. To the right of the gatehouse, Auum didn’t even know the name of the nominated leader.

  ‘Deploy the barrier,’ ordered Auum. ‘Keep their fire from our rampart.’

  More arrows flicked out, meeting a wall of shields with only a few finding gaps. A couple of warriors fell. A second volley of orbs drove into the ground outside the gates. This time they struck flesh, wood and leather. Wesmen were hurled backwards and sideways, wreathed in fire. Ladders were reduced to ash.

  ‘More!’ yelled Auum. ‘Target the ladders. Cast! Cast!’

  Beside him three mages were standing and preparing. Below, the Wesmen were scant yards from the wall. Ladders were raised ready to be laid against the stone. Arrows flew thick from the walls while Wesmen archers knelt, nocked shafts and fired.

  ‘Down!’

  Wesmen arrows struck home, punching mages and human archers from the walls.

  ‘Get fire on the archers!’ Auum stood. ‘Look for the shamen.’

  Along his section of the wall, his TaiGethen were marshalling those around them as best they could. The mages next to Auum cast, and a wall of flame sixty feet long sprang up in the midst of the advancing line. Wesmen dived in all directions, some wrapped in flame and screaming. More and more spells were flying down from the walls now. Wesman shields raised in defence were frozen by gales of super-cooled air. Flechettes of ice sliced into unprotected flesh and ripped through leather armour.

  But still they came. Ladders thudded against the wall in ten places. . fifteen. Julatsan defenders fired down on the climbers while the TaiGethen stood ready to receive them. The second Wesman line slowed twenty yards from the walls. Shields were raised and, in among them, there was quick movement.

  ‘Shamen preparing!’ yelled Auum, but his warning was a moment too late. ‘Where’s my barrier? Get down!’

  Hands stretched beyond the shields sent black fire from every fingertip. The tendrils scoured the top of the ramparts. Mage, Il-Aryn, TaiGethen and soldier alike were caught in the storm. Fire wormed into bodies and faces, searing and drilling deep, piercing hearts and ripping open stomachs. Wherever it struck flesh, the fire fed greedily. Defenders fell by the dozen, some dead before they hit the ground.

  Auum rose and drew a blade, holding it in his right hand. Ulysan moved ahead of him, Ollem behind. Wesman warriors reached the tops of ladders. Axes swung and more defenders fell. The TaiGethen surged into the attack. Spells showered out into the attackers, driving the second line back a few paces.

  Auum had almost reached the head of a ladder. It vibrated with the movement of climbers on its rungs. The first Wesman over the top hacked his axe into the head of a soldier too slow to bring his blade to bear. In front of Auum, Ulysan thrust his blade into the Wesman’s chest and he fell.

  Another two appeared and, between them, an archer with an arrow nocked. He released, Auum swayed right and the arrow fizzed past him. Behind him, Ollem grunted and Auum turned to see him drop to his knees, the shaft jutting from his neck. Blood was flooding down his jacket.

  ‘Ollem!’

  ‘Fight,’ said Ollem, his voice thick with blood. ‘I’ll be all right.’

  Auum swung back. Ulysan evaded an axe, ducking under the blade and rising fast. Ulysan’s blades sliced into the Wesman’s gut and face and he tumbled forward. Auum stepped up and jabbed his blade into the archer’s face, tipping him back off the ladder. The other warrior thrust his sword at Auum’s body. Auum jumped back and left, coming in again hard, back-handing his blade into the neck of the enemy.

  Still they came. Shaman fire laced across the top of the walls again, driving defenders back and leaving the way clear for yet more ladders and Wesmen. Auum wanted to roar for his barrier again but it was obvious why it wasn’t going to happen. TaiGethen defending the Il-Aryn were moving them back away from immediate threat and indeed some were being directed to ladders to the ground to leave more space for fighting.

  Auum glanced at Ollem and thought to call for help, but the young TaiGethen was still and his chest had stopped rising. Auum felt a hot anger settle on him.

  ‘He never had a chance,’ muttered Auum. ‘Too young, too strong to die like this. .’

  ‘Auum!’ screamed Ulysan.

  Auum snapped round. Ulysan was fighting two Wesmen. The rampart seemed to be full of them. A blade was swinging towards Auum’s head. He used his anger and the threat alike. The axe head slowed before his eyes. He rocked back on his heels, simultaneously bringing his blade to ready.

  The look of triumph in the Wesman’s eyes faded. The blade moved past Auum and on to collide with a crenellation. Auum moved forward, pushed the warrior’s head back with his weaker left hand and rammed his blade into his throat.

  Auum dragged the blade clear, stepped over the falling body and headed for the ladder. A Wesman archer released a shaft, taking a soldier further along the wall through the shoulder. Auum grabbed his bow and pulled hard, heaving the Wesman onto the rampart, then stamped down on the back of his neck, moved on and buried his blade in the flank of another axe man, pushing the body over the wall, where it fell as a warning among his comrades.

  Auum reached Ulysan, dropping out of the shetharyn. Ulysan ripped a blade into the gut of a warrior and heaved his body over the wall. Either side of them TaiGethen and Julatsan soldiers fought to clear the walls of Wesmen and defend the mages.

  Spells were still firing out from behind the gates but elsewhere both arrow fire and castings were desultory. The shamen’s black fire played across the crenellations, daring the defenders to expose themselves to fire down.

  ‘We’ve got to force the shamen back,’ said Auum, ducking as a finger of black fire flickered on the stone a pace from where he stood. ‘Suggestions?’

  More Wesmen ascended the ladder, flanked by shaman fire. Ulysan round-housed the first, catching him on the side of the head and clattering him into the next. Black fire reached for the big TaiGethen, who dropped to his haunches, the tendrils clutching above his head. Both Wesmen fell.

  ‘Get the mages onto the ground and casting blind over the walls,’ said Ulysan.

  Arrows flicked over the ramparts. Defenders responded, firing blind from behind crenellations. The Wesmen were relentless, though. Thirty yards to the left they’d established a bridgehead and were forcing the defenders back. Auum saw soldiers fall and Faleen lead her Tai into the breach.

  ‘It’ll take too long. Got to create a diversion.’

  The two elves stared at each other. ‘Cavalry.’

  ‘Hold!’ yelled Auum to any who would hear him. Hassek nodded his assent and took his Tai directly to a new ladder laid against the walls.

  Auum ran back towards the gatehouse, ducking arrows and black fire and forcing his way through knots of fighting. He climbed the stairs three at a time and took a breath when he ducked through the door. Dead littered the gatehouse. Eyes were burned out, arrows stuck from chests and throats. Harild was crouched below the lip of the wall, glancing over and ducking back, roaring orders lost in the tumult. Black fire chased Auum and Ulysan down next to him alongside two aides, both of whom were too terrified to be of any use.

  ‘Can’t stop the Wytch fire,’ growled Harild.

  ‘How’s the right holding?’

  ‘Holding is all they’re doing, Auum. I’m sending mages down but it’s confused. They have no lines of communication. Stein is somewhere down there but I’ve lost my Communion mage. One shaman gives them ten fingers of fire at this range. They’re murdering us.’

  ‘We have to distract them,’ said Auum. ‘Get your cavalry in the saddle. Ride out through the centre and don’t stop. Then circle wide so you can hit the rear.’

  ‘They’ll pick the riders right out of their saddles. It’s suicide.’

  ‘No, it isn’t. Cast left and right as the gates open. Ride hard for open ground.’
r />   ‘What about your precious Il-Aryn?’

  Auum was stung. ‘I don’t know why they haven’t cast.’

  ‘Perfect.’

  ‘But the TaiGethen will not leave the cavalry defenceless. We’re going out too.’

  Harild frowned. ‘Through the gates?’

  ‘No,’ said Auum. ‘Look to your cavalry. We’ll be ready.’

  ‘Now?’

  ‘Now.’ Auum stared at Harild. ‘You are brave beyond duty. A third human I actually like.’

  Harild smiled. ‘Well, then this whole mess is worth the pain. You’ll be ready?’

  ‘Before you,’ said Ulysan.

  They watched Harild reach safety on the rampart steps down to the ground. Auum sent Ulysan to the right-hand door of the gatehouse, and he reported back a mirror image of Auum’s view of the left.

  ‘The TaiGethen are spread too thin and we’ve lost some. The Wesmen are attacking on a wide front. We’re barely holding them back. Mages are heading for the ladders, Il-Aryn too.’

  Auum leaned out of the back of the gatehouse. Ephemere was down there looking lost and frightened.

  ‘Ephemere! Ephemere!’ Belatedly, she looked up. ‘Report to Harild. Gather your Il-Aryn. Get a barrier up when the gates open.’

  ‘The gates?’ she said, her voice barely carrying.

  ‘Just do it. Do something! For the love of Yniss, we need you.’ Auum turned back to Ulysan. ‘Get out to the right. Have as many ready as you can. Wait for the castings and the cavalry before we move.’

  ‘And who’s going to save your sorry hide?’

  Auum laughed. ‘I’ll run with Graf, you with Merrat. See you out there and may Yniss save you for greater tasks.’

  ‘Like saving your sorry hide.’

  ‘Precisely. Go.’

  Auum leaped down to the rampart, feeling exposed without Ulysan by his side. He had been a constant presence for over eight hundred years and a friend for thousands. Ulysan was an extension of Auum — utterly indispensable.

  He pushed the weakness from his mind and headed along the rampart, sword in his right hand. The Wesmen were attacking on a front almost two hundred yards wide. From the gatehouse he’d seen almost thirty ladders. Where the TaiGethen cells fought, the Wesmen could not gain a foothold but at four other points they were making solid ground and the Julatsan soldiers were beginning to wither under their onslaught. Fighting with their backs against a drop of thirty feet should they slip, they were losing ground steadily.