As Iron Falls (The Wings of War Book 4)

by Bryce O'Connor

  That didn’t help his nerves, though, as his attention was drawn earthward again by the rumbling of their enemy, innumerable and seething, across the vast expanse of the square.

  The slaves had spent the night wreaking havoc across the quarter, chasing residents from their homes, burning down shops and food stores and granaries, and freeing their fellows from the other camps scattered about the sector. With each compound razed their numbers had swollen, until now Dulan and the other generals faced well over fifteen thousand desperate rebels armed with anything they could get their hands on. Most wielded nothing more than bars of wood and iron they ripped from buildings and palisades, but a fair number bore stolen and scavenged swords and shields, a few even looking like they’d learned at some point in their miserable lives how to use them. At his back, Dulan could feel the nervousness rippling throughout their own ranks, cascading like a wave as muttering and prayers spread through the soldiers. The plaza was a massive space, but it wasn’t near large enough to house either force, much less both of them. The roads and side-streets that webbed out from the square were as packed and churning as the main bodies of the armies, the only clear space in sight being the twenty meters of open ground between the generals and the front line of the mobbing slaves. In every direction, shouting and screaming and the ring of steel were steadily gathering, like the skirmishes that had plagued the evening and early morning when starting up again. It did little to settle Dulan’s uneasiness.

  Nor—apparently—the other generals’.

  “What in the Sun’s name is going on?” Enaro Sulva, Lord General of the Tash’s army, snarled under his breath from atop his speckled charger, the plume of his spiked helmed swaying to and fro as he tried to casually glance left and right. “We should have received orders an hour ago! Where are the First’s runners?”

  “Lost to the outskirts, undoubtedly,” Abul Haro, one of the Lord General’s two deputies, muttered in response from over his superior’s right shoulder, frowning as he looked west. “Those clashes sound like they may be getting out of hand…”

  “Agreed,” Zale Ima, commander of the south gate, pitched in from off to Dulan’s left. “Whatever orders the honored First might have for us may not reach us in time, Sulva. You will have to make a field decision.”

  The Lord General stiffened at Ima’s informal address of him, but said nothing in rebuke. He might outrank the man, but no one ever forgot that the lower general was also the elder brother of the Second Hand, and that alone came with some clout.

  Dulan had never liked Ima—the man was a shame to his uniform, taking advantage of his position to openly run a successful smuggling operation in and out of the city—but he couldn’t help but admire his gall sometimes…

  “So be it,” Enaro Sulva growled, tucking his chin as he scanned the mass of slaves ahead of them, some of whom had started to yell and throw stones, bits of bricks or wood, or whatever else they could get their hands on. After a moment, the Lord General reached around his hips and unsheathed his sword, roaring his command as he thrust the weapon into the air.

  “DRAW!”

  As Dulan and the other generals followed his lead, the lieutenants on foot along the front line of the army behind them echoed the order, and within seconds the hard sound of thousands upon thousands of blades being freed rang about the high walls of the buildings that surrounded them.

  Over it all, though, the sounds of fighting to the west still appeared to be growing louder.

  “SLAVES OF KARESH SYL!” Sulva boomed, heeling his horse forward several yards as he addressed their enemy. “THIS IS YOUR LAST CHANCE TO SURRENDER! DROP YOUR WEAPONS AND RETURN TO YOUR CAMPS, AND YOU HAVE MY WORD AS LORD GENERAL THAT ALL PUNISHMENTS WILL BE MINIMAL! STAND AND FIGHT, AND WE WILL NOT HESITATE TO SUBDUE YOU BY ANY FORCE NECESSARY!”

  The response was instantaneous. If Sulva had hoped for an easy victory, he was sure to be disappointed. At once, the mob of slaves swelled and rippled, roaring and jeering in infuriated unison as they pelted the man with debris, forcing him to drop the reins of his animal in favor of raising his shield overhead. With a curse, he guided the horse around with his knees, still protecting his neck from behind as rocks, heavy iron horseshoes, and even a few vegetables continued to rain down about his shoulders.

  “Moon take them all,” he raged as he returned to their line, his cheek bleeding from where a projectile looked to have caught him across the face. “Enough is enough. The South’s slavers will have a wealthy business these next few months.” He reached up and straightened his helmet, then brushed dust and pebbles from his greying beard, glancing nervously westward as he did.

  “Time to end this,” he said finally, pulling his horse around again and bellowing out once more. “SOLDIERS! READY!”

  “SOLDIERS READY!” the generals echoed in unison, looking to their lieutenants, who repeated the command yet again. As the thundering clunks of shields being lifted and interlocked vibrated around the square, the Lord General lifted his blade once more.

  “SOLDIERS!” he boomed. “MARCH!”

  And with that, the Tash’s army started forward, a bristling wave of white-and-gold leather, shields, and raised swords splitting around the generals in a steady wave to slowly close the gap between themselves and the gathered slaves.

  Before the soldiers even made it halfway across the plaza, though, a voice unlike anything Dulan had ever heard ripped through the thrum of boots on stone and the taunting and shouts of the revolting slaves.

  “HOLD!”

  The voice was so fierce, so commanding, that a large portion of the front line of the advancing army faltered, almost tripping over one another. In the ensuing confusion, the march slowed, warping as the men along the west edge of the plaza came to a complete standstill, like they were afraid of pressing forward while the rest continuing on uncertainly. As one, Dulan and the other generals turned toward the voice, and with a thrill of fearful awe understood why.

  “All Her Stars…” one of the others cursed from Dulan’s left, and he couldn't blame them their astonishment.

  The Dragon of the North, after all, had himself just stepped out from an alley into the open space between the two armies.

  The appearance of Raz i’Syul Arro, the Monster of Karth, rocked the scene of the approaching battle as surely as an earthquake might have rent apart the square. There was a roar of enthusiastic excitement from the slaves, cheers ringing up from their ranks and building until it made Dulan’s head hurt. On the other hand, the Tash’s soldiers, apparently forgetting their vast number, balked as the beast strode past them, moving so swiftly across the now-mere thirty feet of empty space between the armies that he was in front of the generals before anyone had a chance to shout the alarm. At once the soldiers who stood in the vicinity of the officers' horses yelled and converged, encircling their superiors dutifully with body and shield.

  The Dragon, though, made no move to attack.

  The atherian had been described to every soldier in the Tash’s army a hundred times in the last month or so, but the depiction Dulan had built in his head didn’t remotely do the creature justice. He stood an easy seven feet tall, clad in exquisitely crafted steel armor that encased parts of his arms and legs, complete with a pair of plate gauntlets that ended in long metal claws. In one hand he held an odd pair of weapons, a silver staff and the strange, twin-bladed spear the whispers claimed he’d named after a murdered sister. In the other, a long-handled axe Dulan recognized as a sagaris, a common weapon of Perce’s eastern pirates. The Dragon seemed to have no distinguishing markings, but his golden eyes were bright against the blackness of his scales, more alive than any Dulan had witnessed among his kind. They smoldered with calm, confident danger, sharp and calculating despite the fact that the beast was on the verge of being pinned in the center of what promised to be a bloody exchange. Then, to his horror, Dulan realized that both armies had stopped , the sheer presence of the Dragon in the center of the plaza apparently enough to press both si
des into hesitation.

  Maybe it had something to do with the fact that the winged atherian looked a violent mess, hardly a square inch of him—from his clawed feet to the pommel of the straight sword slung across his back—not stained in dark blood, like he’d waged a one-man war to reach them.

  With this unnerving thought, Dulan glanced back toward the west alley the beast had emerged from, noting the sudden lack of battle sounds.

  That was when Arro started to speak.

  “Are you in command of these forces, officer?” he asked impassively, looking up at Enaro Sulva, his voice deep and utterly unflinching.

  The Lord General had been gaping at the atherian, taking him in with such utter astonishment the lizard might as well have been some gilded envoy of the Moon herself. He stirred, though, at Arro’s words, remembering his place.

  “Mind your tongue, creature!” he snapped, a muscle twitching in his cheek as his horse shuffled beneath him. “You speak to the Lord General of the Tash’s armies, second only to Yseri Suro, First Hand of His Greatness and—”

  “So you are in charge,” the Dragon cut him off with an irritated curl of his lip, revealing the white fangs beneath. “Excellent. I would have us discuss the terms of your surrender.”

  That took all the wind out of Sulva’s sails, at least for a moment. The man’s words choked off, and for a breath he looked utterly lost for words.

  Finally, anger got the better of him.

  “‘OUR SURRENDER?’” he roared indignantly, so enraged his horse half-reared in surprise. “Are you mad, lizard? Perhaps, given you're fool enough to stand between us and the swift ruination of this little revolt you’ve caused.” He swept his sword over the Dragon’s head, indicating the slaves still lined behind the beast, men and women and children and atherian of all ages and sizes. “I’ve had enough. You will regret showing your face here. We will crush you beneath our boots, just as we will crush your rebellion. SOLDIERS! MAR—!”

  “My men are at this moment in the process of assaulting the slave camps in the north- and southwest districts,” the Dragon interrupted him yet again, his voice carrying over the plaza like the boom of a massive bell. His eyes swept across the army before him. “If you wonder how many I could possibly have slipped into the city without your notice, it matters little. They have been reinforced by a large majority of the six hundred slaves once kept by the Tash.”

  Only the clashing of the outskirts could be heard after this announcement. It washed over the generals and their army with such force they were struck dumb, registering the layers of the atherian’s claim. The camps in the other districts? If that was true—if Arro’s men somehow managed to liberate even two of the three remaining districts—then the Tash’s army would be outnumbered five to one at least.

  More concerning, though, was the far subtler implication that he had already freed the slaves of the palace…

  Dulan felt a stone drop into his stomach as he considered that possibility.

  “Do not attempt to spread your deceit here, lizard,” Sulva finally managed to get out, eyes narrowed through the slots of his half-helm. “We will not fall for your lies so easily.”

  In response, Arro only looked left toward the alley mouth he had appeared from, waving something forward with his axe. At once a knocking, rumbling sound picked up, like wood on stone.

  “I’m no fool, Lord General,” the Dragon said without bothering to turn back to the officers. “I would never expect you to believe me without cause.”

  As he said this, an odd pair of figures appeared from between the buildings, a female atherian with a patch of yellow scales beneath her neck, helping along a hobbling woman Dulan recognized at once. Syrah Brahnt did not bear herself with the calm confidence of the Dragon, though. He had imagined her as a tall, regal figure, standing in flowing white silks that matched her hair, with magic of fire and light twisting in her eyes. This woman, though, looked weighed-down and tired, the front and arms of her robes smeared and stained with what might have been soot, her face dirty and one eye covered by a crude swath of black cloth. There was something dangerous in that gaze, though, and she held her head high—with what seemed like great effort—to look the generals in the face.

  Still, none of the officers spent more than a few seconds studying her or the young atherian, their attention pulled almost immediately to what followed the pair of them into the square.

  A two-wheeled cart, clattering over the cobblestones beneath it, bumped steadily into view.

  It was a narrow, dirty thing, hauled by a pair of ragged-looking women in filthy smocks who looked simultaneously utterly terrified and distinctly proud to be present for this unexpected display. The smell that wafted from it almost made Dulan balk, but as it approached any revulsion at the thing was washed away by growing fear. The walls of the cart were deep, but from atop their horses the man had little doubt the other generals, like him, had caught a glimpse of what lay within as it bounced along. By the time the two women brought it to a creaking halt beside where Brahnt and the atherian had come to stand on the Dragon’s right, Dulan felt his body growing cold.

  When the lizard moved around to the far side of the thing, Dulan found his voice paralyzed, unable to shout out, to stop the man.

  “Lord General!” the Dragon called over the quiet of the plaza, dragging Sulva’s eyes to him and putting a clawed foot on the wall of the cart as the two slaves scurried out of the way. “Tell me… is this enough proof for you?”

  He gave the cart a massive shove, overturning it with a crash and allowing its horrid contents to spill over the plaza at the feet of the army of Karesh Syl.

  As one, there was a resounding wail of horror and denial from the soldiers.

  Among the putrid detritus and rotting food that must have half-filled the bed, a trio of bodies lay partially buried. Two were still and growing rigid as rigor mortis settled into their limbs, their corpses and clothes ravaged by what looked to have been some sort of fire. Still, their faces were mostly recognizable, and Dulan choked as he stared into their dead eyes.

  That was nothing, though, compared to when his gaze settled on the shivering, convulsing form of the last man.

  “Sun take us,” a soldier started muttering nearby. “Sun take us all…”

  Dulan, silently, joined in the prayer.

  The figure was the least recognizable of the lot but—by some terrible mercy of the Twins—seemed to have survived whatever flame or magic or dragonfire it was that had stolen away the lives of the other two. His face was raw and blistered, the skin of his cheeks bubbling up and peeling away. His torso and arms were little more than wet muscle and charred flesh through which bone gleamed white and black from the terrible oozing wounds. He was gasping as he convulsed, his mouth moving wordlessly, eyes flinching around to settle briefly on the Dragon, then the soldiers, then each of the generals. When the wild stare met his, it took all Dulan had not to vomit over the side of his horse.

  How else could one react, after all, upon witnessing the great Tash and His honored Hands dead and dying, strewn among the palace refuse like common filth…?

  “No…” Enaro Sulva could be heard to say, his voice breathless and weak. “By Her Stars… No…”

  Then, though, a louder, harsher shout rose up abruptly.

  “BASTARD! I’LL KILL YOU!”

  Before anyone could stop him, Zale Ima howled and heeled his horse forward into an all-out charge, seemingly not even remotely concerned for the soldiers his mount slammed out of the way. He broke through the front line in mere seconds, sword swinging above his head as he rode down the Dragon, who was just stepping back around the upended cart.

  “IMA! WAIT!” the Lord General shouted after him desperately, but it was far too late. The man and his horse barreled forward, thundering toward Arro, who watched him come almost lazily, even taking the time to settle his spear and the steel staff against the nearest upturned wheel.

  Then Ima was on the beast, his blade striking
down as he roared.

  “FOR MY BROTHER!”

  It was over in a flash of steel and the thud of a body against stone.

  No one saw the Dragon move. No one saw the axe flick up to trap the wrist of Ima’s sword-arm in the crook of its head and pull the blow away and earthward. All they registered was the general bearing down on the lizard in one moment, screaming in grief and hate, and in the next he was unhorsed, dragged from the animal’s back with a gasp as his mount continued on, forcing several of the slaves behind Arro to yell and throw themselves out of the way. Ima hit the ground with a sickening crunch, his helmet clanging hard against the stone. It was in that briefest of instants that people began to shout, voices from the Tash’s army yelling in alarm while the rebels howled in triumph.

  Then, in a blink, the Dragon dragged the axe still secured around the man’s wrist upward, flipped the general over onto his stomach as the man began to scream in pain, and brought a clawed foot down on the back of his neck.

  In less than five seconds, Zale Ima, general of the Tash’s army, commander of the south gate, lay dead in the dust beside his younger brother.