Motioning for his wife to sit down, James said, “Let me tell you of the time I first met this fellow, when people kept trying to pick fights with me up in Tannerus because they thought I was him.”
Lysle laughed and said, “It’s a good story.”
James began, starting by explaining the odd mission Prince Arutha had sent him on, with his old friend Locklear, a young son of a local noble who happened to be an apprentice magician from Stardock, and a renegade moredhel chieftain. Gamina knew the story as well as James did, having heard it a dozen times, but she sat back, next to her husband, leaning her head on his shoulder, and let him tell it. The soldiers and thieves hiding in the gloom would be diverted from the terrible future that bore down upon them, and for a while they’d hear of better days, when the heroes were victorious and the forces of evil vanquished. Besides, she thought, as Lysle had said, it was a good story.
Calis watched. There was something within the Lifestone. He had noticed it within minutes of Pug shifting the Lifestone in time so that all could see it. He could sense energy inside, and as he watched for hours on end, after a while he believed he could see it.
The Oracle’s companions, when they were breaking from their mystical lessons, would approach and some would stand watch with him for a time. They shared their food with him, though he couldn’t really recall much of what they ate. He was preoccupied with the gem.
Calis relaxed and let his mind wander, and from time to time, flashes of images came to him. He saw people, beings looking much like his father, and he saw things: occurrences in places impossible distances away, creatures and beings from some other time. And he saw hints of forces moving behind those images, and those were the most compelling.
Hours stretched into days, and Calis lost track of time as he went deeper and deeper into the mystery of the Lifestone.
* * *
Erik shouted orders and his men began their orderly withdrawal. The enemy was less than a half mile down the road, in strength, and word had come from Greylock that the next fallback position had been secured.
Erik had decided the best way to gain back some of the time lost in the fall of Krondor was to do it a day at a time, rather than try to hold at the first defense for the extra three weeks. The original battle plan had called for them to hold the first defensive position for seven days; Erik had held it for nine.
There were seven more defenses until they reached the mountains at the pass to Darkmoor, and if he could add three or four days at each defense, they would have gained back much of the time they had lost. But Erik wasn’t optimistic about realizing that goal; the plan for the defense of the West had the northmost and southmost defensive positions being unyielding, while Erik’s center was the “softest” defense, withdrawing to lure the enemy along. The northern and southern flanks would funnel the enemy into the center, putting the bulk of the Emerald Queen’s army on the King’s Highway and within five miles of either side. The problem with that plan was that as the days wore on, more and more enemy soldiers would be thrown at Erik’s position.
More than once in the first week of fighting, Erik wished that Calis hadn’t been called off to whatever crisis needed his presence, and that Greylock had been in charge of the center. Erik would rather have had his original mission, holding the northern flank. Fighting from behind a strong defensible position was far easier than this delaying action.
Now his forward observers had seen battle flags going up, as the enemy prepared for a major offensive against his position. He had planned on being at least another mile down the road when the enemy got here. Erik used hand signals to order his men out of the area, while instructing the archers to fall back. Originally they were to harry the enemy along the line of march, but reports indicated there were too many gathering to risk exposing the bowmen. He’d improvise and find another location along the way to set them up, so that they could slow the enemy’s advance, yet have a fair chance of getting away.
The difficulty was that during the first phase of the withdrawal, if the enemy attacked, they’d have little time to prepare themselves. If they could steal a march on the enemy, get far enough ahead, then they could quickly dig in and defend if they were overtaken, but if they were hit while they were in the process of withdrawing, the superior numbers of the enemy would prove devastating for Erik’s command.
He had to get his men moving, down the road, and into the next prepared defensive position, where Greylock and his command were waiting. The two units would defend that position until the enemy pulled back, at which point Greylock’s men would move out, falling back to the next position after that. That would be the pattern for the next three months, or until they reached Darkmoor. As the enemy withdrew from the extreme north and south flanks, those units were scheduled to move down the line, adding fresh soldiers to the center, but that phase of the operation wasn’t scheduled until next month, and if the enemy didn’t withdraw from the flanks, the support wouldn’t materialize.
When the men were under way, Erik lingered at the rear, with his last line of skirmishers, who would hang back until the enemy was in sight. He looked to the west, to the late afternoon sky, and saw the smoke rising. Krondor was burning, and Erik wondered how William, James, and the others there were doing. He said a silent prayer to Ruthia, the Lady of Luck, that if the chance presented itself, those people might somehow get out.
Then he turned his horse and galloped off to overtake the front of the command. He knew he had roughly three hours to get to the next position, and another hour to dig in before night fell. He had no idea if the enemy would march until nightfall, then attack, or wait until dawn, but either way Erik intended to be ready.
Even in the bowels of the subbasement, the sounds of battle filtered down. The guards had been running to the various outposts in the sewers, and James had a rough idea of the enemy’s deployment in the city. The fires raged through the center third of Krondor, and fighting in the eastern segment was light and sporadic.
The bulk of the enemy waited behind the flaming wall as the fires burned out. The one scout who had braved a look said thousands of armed men waited amid the burned-out cinders that was the westernmost third of the city. The palace was a mound of charred stone, still smoking, and James knew that his brother-in-law was dead. Gamina had confirmed that she could not reach William with her mind speech. While it was limited in distance, normally, with her family the question of range was less restrictive. She had found her husband from miles away.
James held his wife as they sat upon the stone floor of the damp and dark room. Those inside had fallen into long silences, as the sense of approaching doom grew. The escape plan required a lot of luck, and everyone was feeling short of luck at the moment.
James gave instructions to the scout who had found a way to the west, and the man hurried off to do as he was bid. Gamina dozed against her husband’s shoulder while he waited, and at about what he judged was sundown, the scout returned.
Something in his manner alerted everyone in the room, and all listened attentively as he said, “M’lord!”
“Report,” instructed James.
“Ships are attacking the invaders.”
Gamina closed her eyes and said, “Nicholas isn’t there.”
James said, “Then it’s Lord Vykor’s fleet from Shandon Bay.”
He patted his wife’s shoulder, and stood up slowly. “I’m too old to be sitting on these cold floors.”
He helped Gamina to her feet and said, “It’s time.”
“What do we do?” asked Lysle.
“Try to stay alive,” he said, looking at his wife. He said, “Lord Vykor had a fleet in hiding down in Shandon Bay, and he was to link up with whatever was left of Nicholas’s fleet after it came through the Straits, and follow the invaders. Once the invader’s fleet was at anchor, they were to hit them as hard as possible, firing as many enemy ships as they could, while we set the city to the torch.
“As you can see, things didn’t work o
ut quite the way we planned. But if the bulk of their army, the key corps, are in the western third of the city waiting for the fires to subside, we can let loose the naphtha in the old sewers. That will blow the entire city under them, and with their ships afire, they’ve got no choice but to burn.”
“You say that with a certain amount of glee,” said Lysle.
“It’s my city,” said James through clenched teeth.
“So, what first?”
“Watch my men and stay out of the way,” said James as he signaled to his soldiers.
With silent efficiency, six of them moved to a large pair of wooden doors and opened them, while two opened the outer doors. As these outer doors to the sewer swung wide, the six men on the other side were rolling barrels out of a huge storage area. Another two were attempting to work an ancient, rusted iron lever.
“Make your lads useful and have them put some weight on that,” said James, pointing to the stubborn lever.
Lysle waved a hand, and four of his thieves hurried over and added their muscle to the effort. The lever began to move and they could hear the sound of running water.
James said, “There’s an ancient cistern behind that wall, and that lever will drain it, setting off a very quick flow out to the harbor.”
Lysle watched in fascination as the six black-clad soldiers began rolling barrels of naphtha down the ramp leading into the water. The current of the stream was noticeably faster, as the barrels were floating away from them at a good pace.
One of the rolling barrels struck the side of the door and cracked. The smell of Quegan oil filled the air. “A little on the surface is a good thing,” said James with a grim smile.
“If you say so,” said Lysle. “Now tell me again about the getting-away part of this plan of yours.”
“As soon as the barrels are all moving toward the docks,” he said. “We have an hour or so. Let’s just hope the fleet’s taking care of their part of things.”
Lord Karoyle Vykor, Admiral of the King’s Fleet in the East, shouted, “Fire!”
Another dozen catapults from the nearest ships lofted their flaming cargo high into the air, to come crashing down on the ships in the harbor.
“Mr. Devorak,” said the Admiral.
“Sir?”
“Wasn’t it cooperative of the bastards to tie all their ships together in a gigantic mass for us?”
“Sir, it was that.”
The old Admiral was from Roldem stock, born in Rillanon, and had never set foot in the West until he had sailed his fleet through the Straits of Darkness in late spring. He had lost two ships in the passage, an acceptable toll for the early run, and he had been fortunate to have encountered only one foreign warship on the way to Shandon Bay, a Keshian cutter that had been overtaken and sunk before it could carry word to anyone that the bulk of the King’s Eastern Fleet was now in the Bitter Sea.
Word of Admiral Nicholas’s death had been tragic news for Vykor, for while he had met the man only twice on social occasions in the capital, his reputation and deeds were well known. Vykor did feel fortunate that at least once in his life he was able to go at the enemy under sail, with engines of war blazing, his men ready to fight hand-to-hand if need be. For most of his career he had been chasing ragged pirates, showing the colors to fractious neighbors in the Eastern Kingdoms, or attending state functions at the King’s palace. Now he was doing what he had trained for all his life, and if what he had been told when he left Rillanon months before was to be believed, the fate of the Kingdom depended on this battle.
“Orders to the fleet, Mr. Devorak.”
“Sir?” asked the Captain.
“Press the attack, and no enemy ship is to be let free.”
“Aye, aye, sir.”
“By sundown I don’t want an alien ship afloat from here to Ylith. This is Nicholas’s ocean, by damn, and I won’t have them sailing on it.”
Elements of the Bitter Sea and Sunset Island fleets moved away, heading north, to find those ships beached between the city and Sarth, while other ships moved farther north. The ships that had been beached between Land’s End and Krondor had all been fired upon while Vykor’s fleet passed, and to the last each had been burned to the waterline or sunk.
The Admiral’s delight mounted as he saw his plan was working. He had ordered all fire to be trained upon the first row of ships, turning them into an inferno in minutes, before they could cast off from the ships farther in. Now the flames were moving inward, toward the city, as ship after ship caught fire. The missiles raining down on the mass of ships were adding to the destruction.
Vykor said, “Keep a sharp eye out for anyone attempting to get free.”
Captain Devorak said, “Aye, aye, sir.”
Lord Vykor watched as the Royal Dragon, under Captain Reeves’s command, led a flotilla to the north, to sink any ships they could find. “Signal to Royal Dragon,” said the Admiral: “good hunting.”
“Aye, sir,” said the Captain, relaying the order to the signalman.
Vykor knew that Nicholas had been buried at sea, on the way to the Sunsets, where the squadron had picked up fresh stores, repaired damage, and sailed back in record time. But the Admiral felt what any old sailor would feel, that Nicholas still somehow walked the quarterdeck of that ship. He saluted the ship and the memory of one of the two finest sailors he had ever known, teacher and student, Amos Trask and Nicholas conDoin.
Returning his attention to the matter at hand, he saw a small ship cut itself loose near the docks and make way toward them. “That ship, Captain Devorak. Please sink it, sir.”
“Aye, aye, Admiral.”
As they bore down on the enemy ship, Admiral Karoyle Vykor watched the Prince’s city, capital of the Western Realm, burn. A profound sadness passed over him as he saw greatness destroyed; then he put aside his feelings until later, for there was still a battle to be won.
James pulled the chain. A rumbling from above told him the mechanism was working. “The naphtha will filter down through the drains and culverts, and will sprinkle through the sewers. If we’re lucky, we have about an hour to get out of here.”
Lysle said, “Then let’s go.”
Soldiers moved quickly up the stairs to the upper basement. One moved to another short flight of stairs and hurried up that, peeking through the trap. The soldier signaled the way was clear and they hurried up into the evening.
The evening was darker than it should have been, for the air was heavy with black smoke. Men coughed, and the soldiers took out cloths, which they tied over their noses and mouths. The thieves tore rags off their shirts and did likewise, one of them handing a rag to Gamina.
They heard fighting all around, but no combatants were in sight. James’s scouts hurried ahead, peering around the corner.
He waved them back and everyone who could ducked out of sight; others fell facedown on the street, hugging the walls as closely as possible, in the hope they’d be lost in the smoky gloom of evening.
Riders sped by, tattered, bleeding, scared soldiers of the Kingdom, obviously in full rout. James whispered to those nearby, “We have to find another way. Whoever’s chasing them will be here in a moment.”
As they retreated down the entrance to their belowground hideout, James’s words proved prophetic: a thundering squad of Saaur riders came pounding hard after. It was James’s first sight of the lizardmen and he said, “Gods, Calis’s reports didn’t do them justice.”
The entire company made it back into the refuge without being discovered, and when they were safely into the subbasement, Lysle said, “Now what?”
“What’s the only other sewer exit likely to be unguarded?” asked James.
“North gate outfall, but that puts us north of the city, not east,” Lysle replied.
“True,” said James, moving toward the loading ramp that led down to the sewer, “but we have less than an hour, and that gate is a half hour’s walk from here. I’d rather be outside the city when it blows up than inside worryin
g about who’s out there. If we can get into the woods to the north of Krondor, we might be able to find a way eastward.”
He looked at the thirty soldiers and dozen thieves and knew it was probably futile.
But you must try.
James looked at Gamina. “Yes, we must try.”
He led them off through the sewer.
Lord Vykor’s eyes widened in astonishment. The creature seemed to appear out of nowhere, striding across the burning decks of the enemy fleet. Along the way to Krondor they had caught fifty ships on the beach, and fast-running cutters with men throwing bottles of oil, or larger ships with ballista or catapult, had burned all of them. Nearly twenty had been boarded, captured, or sunk, so that with the destruction of the ships in the harbor, more than half the enemy’s fleet was destroyed. By rough count he assumed another hundred and fifty to two hundred ships were strung out along the northern coast of the Bitter Sea or already engaged with Captain Reeves’s flotilla.
Now suddenly out of the inferno that was Krondor’s harbor a demon walked purposefully toward him, striding across the decks of burning ships. Calmly the Admiral drew his sword and said, “I think the creature means to board us, Mr. Devorak.”
“Fire!” shouted the Captain, and ballista and bowfire were unleashed on the creature.
Some damage was done, and the creature howled as the arrows struck his fifteen-foot-tall body, but he walked on through the fire and seemed more irritated than injured.
“Veer off, Mr. Devorak.”
“Aye, aye, Admiral.”
The fleet was withdrawing, but Vykor’s flagship, the Royal Glory, was closest to the burning fleet. The creature reached the outer railing of the last ship burning in the harbor, and stood up on the railing. With a prodigious leap and scream of anger, the beast unfolded its huge wings and sailed across the gulf between the damaged fleet and Vykor’s ship.
“Signal to fleet,” said Vykor as his personal doom sailed down upon his ship. “Make best speed!”
He never knew if the message got off, for Jakan, self-elected Demon King of the armies of Novindus, glided down upon him, scooping him up and crushing his spine as he bit off half his head. The Admiral had the brief satisfaction of driving his sword deep into the creature’s side as it neared, but never heard the howls of pain, for he was dead before Jakan felt the wound.
Rage of a Demon King Page 40