by David Hair
‘Who’s attacking?’ Latif hollered to the Keshi officer.
‘No one knows,’ came the response, ‘but they’re coming from the east.’
More men poured in, scared Keshi conscripts who tried to stop when they saw the arrayed Lakh spears, but many more were pushing in behind them, so the Lakh lifted their spears and tried to let them through, despite the officers bawling at them to hold formation.
Then something hit the rear of the Keshi lines and total panic broke out. Dark figures were slamming into the milling soldiers, many too large to be human. The impact rippled through the square, men breaking around Rani like water around a rock, while the keening grew in volume, swelling in horror as if Heaven itself were appalled.
‘Hold—’ the officers bellowed in vain.
‘Move – now!’ Ashmak shouted to Sanjeep. ‘Get us to the gates.’
Sanjeep hauled on Rani’s reins, sending her wading through the wavering defenders, trying to force a path downslope to the north road, but a wall of ragged dark-clad men was assailing the soldiers, the ferocity of their attack cleaving a wedge through the press. When a giant figure with a shaggy hide reared up and engulfed the commanding officer, horse and all, the line completely disintegrated. The attackers were both men and constructs, black-eyes gleaming with malice, and that hideous cry pouring from every mouth.
The daemons – they’re here!
It occurred to Latif that he and Waqar had triggered this: Xoredh had realised resistance was forming and decided to strike early. ‘Go, go,’ he urged Sanjeep, ‘we’ve got to get out!’
But another horde was coming up the road to the north, pulling down the fleeing men before battering against the first lines of determined resistance centred around a Keshi mage and some veteran soldiers who’d organised themselves with spears extended in serried ranks, the front line crouching, presenting a wall of jagged steel. It recoiled at the impact, but held.
We’re cut off from the north gate, Latif cursed. ‘Sanjeep, try going west—’
Once again Sanjeep pulled Rani around and they tried to ram a path through the panicking defenders. Trumpeting, the elephant lurched into a run, battering men aside, even as more of their unit entered the square from the south, knocking dozens more off their feet. Even stalwart Rani staggered, trying to find firm footing as man after man was crushed under the press of bodies.
Ashmak roared a warning, Latif automatically swung about, drawing back his bowstring, as a big shaggy shape leaped onto the shoulders of the packed bodies and sprang at them.
His arrow buried itself in the creature’s blackened right eye: the best shot of Latif’s life and it tumbled into the press below, a droplet of triumph amid a sea of disaster, for the men were falling in swathes. The elephants were being targeted now and their thrashing and rearing was spoiling their own archers’ aim. Ashmak and his fellow magi were firing mage-bolts as fast as they could, but still the enemy kept coming.
‘Dear Ahm, what is it we face?’ Ashmak wailed.
‘Death,’ Latif called back. ‘Sanjeep, get us out!’
‘I’m trying,’ the mahout hollered, turning Rani’s head yet again, for a path had opened where a brick wall had collapsed at the southern edge of the square and the men were flowing towards it like water from a punctured barrel, carrying Rani with them.
They slammed their way through a wrecked shop, but the curve of the tight-packed streets forced them to keep heading south – towards the Copperleaf walls and further from safety. With thousands of fleeing men sweeping them along, they had little choice but to follow.
‘West,’ Ashmak shouted to Sanjeep, ‘take us west, you idiot Lakh—’
‘There is no west – this road only goes south,’ Sanjeep shrieked back.
Ashmak glared – he’d never learned how to take contradiction – then he called, ‘Chod – then just keep us moving.’
They’d been climbing as they went and now they could see smoke rising a quarter of a mile away at the gate they’d been making for. Dark figures were crawling all over the tower and shimmying up the walls like ants. An immense banner unfurled beneath the setting sun: a red wolf on a black background. Latif looked in all directions, but options were fast evaporating. Above them rose the Copperleaf walls, where brazen Rondian trumpets were blowing the call to arms.
We’re trapped between the daemons and the walls.
‘Where’s the sultan?’ Ashmak raged. ‘Where’s that matachod sultan?’ Xoredh’s banners were nowhere to be seen; only those wolf banners were visible on all sides. ‘We’re trapped,’ he groaned. ‘There’s nowhere to run.’
Sanjeep winced, raising his eyes to the heavens, but Latif was still looking left and right, seeking an answer. I saw Rashid die: I heard his last words and was avenged for my wife and son and my beloved Salim, so perhaps I have no right to demand more of life than this. But he thought about what Rashid had confessed – what he’d unleashed upon his own people.
No, it can’t end like this . . .
He rose and stepped to the edge of the howdah, threw an apologetic look at his comrades – no, my friends – and said, ‘I have an idea. Don’t wait for me.’
Then he dropped to the ground and ran up the rising path to Copperleaf.
*
‘Sir, sir,’ Andwine Delton called from the door, amid the blasting trumpets, ‘the enemy are under attack.’
Seth was conferring with Justiciar Detabrey, Vann Mercer and those of the Noros nobility who’d distanced themselves from Governor Myron enough to earn a degree of trust. They’d been trying to work out how to deal with Myron’s captured cronies when Delton burst in.
‘Show me,’ Seth replied, hurrying from the room, relieved to escape the tense negotiations.
He and Delton took horses and cantered to the walls, then climbed a watchtower where they found chaos unfolding below. ‘What the Hel’s going on?’ Seth demanded of Era Hyson, whose Royal Guards were on duty here.
‘We don’t know,’ Hyson admitted. ‘Suddenly there was this Kore-bedamned wailing noise, then the enemy started attacking each other. It’s slaughter down there,’ he added, in awed tones.
The sun was setting, its scarlet glow streaking the scene in blood. From what Seth could tell, all the movement was from the north and east, as if the attackers were herding the Shihadi soldiers southwest. But the western gates were under a new banner, one he’d not seen before. The red wolf on black reminded Seth of Ramon’s tales of the wars in Rimoni.
‘The Lord of Rym,’ he breathed. ‘I think the Lord of Rym is attacking our enemy.’
Is it possible he’s on our side?
From the east, a blast of Keshi horns announced the sultan’s own cavalry, white-horsed and gaudy. They thundered along the Kingsway leading from the main gates to where he stood; but half a mile away they veered and ploughed into a horde of their own men, cutting them down in a bloody swathe.
‘What—? The sultan’s helping to slaughter his own men?’
‘There’s been a schism,’ Delton exclaimed. ‘Should we attack?’
Attack? Should we? But there’s ten times our number out there . . .
‘No,’ Seth decided, ‘We hold the walls but don’t intervene. We must remain secure.’
*
Waqar stood beside Ali Beyrami on a rooftop overlooking what had been a marketplace, the latest fall-back position against this sudden assault. It was ironic that a man he’d always regarded as a dangerous lunatic was now his best hope. A few hundred yards to the east, their lines were being ripped apart and it was too late to reinforce. They’d made a fatal error and now thousands of men would pay . . .
We should never have shown Beyrami the possessed man, for of course Xoredh saw everything – but how else could we have convinced him?
‘Take courage in Ahm,’ Beyrami was calling in his stentorian voice to the massed soldiers below and the archers on the roofs. ‘The Prophet blesses you.’
I wish that mattered, Waqar thought, but to his
surprise, he could see that it did. That belief was palpably stiffening the resolve of the men below.
For the past hour, he and Beyrami had been rallying units to reinforce their makeshift bulwarks as they were driven westward through the city. The Lowertown lake divided their forces, but it also helped them, for the artificial reservoir was forcing Xoredh’s daemonic forces to attack on two narrower fronts. Though man for man the enemy were stronger and more savage, smaller lines were easier to defend. They’d been spreading the word too about the need to decapitate, and to use silver if they had it – but most of these men had never been paid, and what few silver trinkets they’d once owned had been traded months ago for bread.
We’re still losing, and now they’re behind us, too. The sunset end of the city was aflame and he could hear fellow magi in the aether confirming that they too were trapped. And the Yurosi defenders were sleeting arrows into them if they deployed too close to the inner walls. Perhaps as many as eighty thousand men were packed into a couple of square miles, but they were being overrun.
With a scream, a dozen venators came hurtling across the rooftops from the north. Waqar’s heart lifted – but only until the riders started blazing mage-bolts into his lines and he saw that they had also been possessed. A flight of his own roc-riders tried to intercept, but the daemonic possession made the enemy so much harder to kill.
He turned to Beyrami. ‘Keep them steady, Imam. We must hold here, or all is lost.’ He pointed behind them, to the west. ‘A quarter of a mile over there is our rearguard, facing the other way and already assailed.’
Beyrami, nodding his understanding, turned back to the soldiers below with eyes aflame with fervour and roared, ‘Ahm is waiting for you, my martyrs – his virgins wait to bathe your wounds—’
That eerie shriek sounded again and a mob of black-eyed men poured into the square, their wailing like claws raking the inside of Waqar’s skull as they stormed forward. A flight of arrows pierced flesh and sometimes eyes, killing outright, but most staggered on even when hit, striking the spear-wall in a berserk frenzy. The spearmen held firm, impaling the first wave, then slashing at necks and limbs with their scimitars. Waqar saw men wading in where survival was impossible to behead a construct beast.
And still the pressure grew.
He was so caught up in the struggle, preparing himself for his own moment of truth, he didn’t notice Tarita until she grasped his shoulder and pointed to a rooftop across the market-square some hundred yards away. ‘There,’ she murmured. ‘It’s your cousin.’
Waqar saw the Mubarak banner and the men beneath it on the opposite rooftop. He felt a mix of despair and cold anger seeing Xoredh’s gloating face lit by pale blue gnostic shields. The sultan gave him an ironic salute, then sent a mage-bolt searing into the air: a signal.
Keshi horns boomed and three squadrons of white-horsed cavalry came thundering into the square, the horses as black-eyed as their riders. They were preceded by a wave of kinesis that hammered into the lines, knocking men over and weapons askew, then the lances struck. The lines burst apart and suddenly Waqar’s position was under direct attack.
13
My Enemy’s Enemy
Makelli
Vico Makelli, the Lantrian philosopher, was chief advisor to three princes, switching allegiances frequently while keeping his neck whole in an era when political murder was rife. The princes all deemed him too valuable to kill. His career spanned forty years and his teachings have informed political thought ever since.
ANNALS OF PALLAS, 823
Norostein, Noros
Febreux 936
Waqar and Tarita stepped to the edge of the flat roof, spread their arms and hurled mage-bolts at a blinding rate into Xoredh’s possessed cavalry below, reeling in the intoxication of conjuring and releasing so much energy. The Hadishah protecting Ali Beyrami did the same, cutting a channel of flame through the men and horses. Daemons thrashed about, screaming as they were immolated, going up like torches.
But it wasn’t enough: the weight and momentum and sheer ferocity of the attackers overwhelmed the front rank of spearmen defending them and those behind, shouting in despair that all was lost, began to break.
Waqar and Tarita found their own shields battered by a torrent of energy from the opposite roof: Xoredh himself, forcing them on the defensive. Their shields went through purple to scarlet as his attack built, until Waqar could feel himself going under, just as those below were failing.
We need more magi – we need something—
But it wasn’t magi who saved the line – it was faith.
Ali Beyrami had been pulled to the back of the roof by his Hadishah for his own protection, but he descended to join the terrified, milling soldiers. Even over the daemons’ wailing, his massive voice, clear and fervent, filled the alleys.
‘MEN OF AHM, YOUR GOD IS CALLING YOU: TO ARMS, MY BRETHREN, TO ARMS!’
His voice penetrated the senses and slapped the soul. Even Waqar felt it, the sense that the sky was just a silk veil and Ahm Himself was beyond it, His gaze weighing every soul. He found himself needing to prove his valour, to rise above the terror and be worthy of Salvation – this despite a lifetime of healthy scepticism.
To the true believers, the majority of the men below, it was balm to their terror and iron to their spines. They turned, screaming inchoate worship, and counter-charged. It was desperate, ragged and suicidal, but it felt like glory. With Beyrami’s booming voice filling their ears – now interspersed with instructions like ‘BEHEAD THE DAEMONS’ and ‘SILVER IS YOUR ALLY’, they struck back, sheer weight of numbers slowing Xoredh’s possessed riders, and as the silver bit, pulling them down.
‘We have to keep him alive,’ Tarita shouted in Waqar’s ear and she launched herself down into the press, landing beside Beyrami and joining her own bright shields to Shaarvin and his lieutenants to protect the imam. She held a gleaming scimitar, the one he and she had retrieved from Midpoint Tower, its blade harder than steel, though without the devastating effect of silver upon the possessed men.
For a few minutes, the daemon cavalry were driven back, possessed men and horses going down biting and thrashing, blood both red and black spraying. Heads were hacked from the fallen indiscriminately.
But Xoredh’s attacks were unabating: infected men kept pouring into the square as it became the new keystone of the defence. Spells burst and broke over the defenders and Waqar’s rooftop, taking their toll. Bipedal constructs resembling armoured bears were now entering the fray and the tide was turning again. Despite all the fervour and blind heroism, Beyrami’s men had no choice but to give ground. The square was so packed that no one could move any more; they just stabbed and hacked until they died on their feet and slipped beneath the surface.
We’re still losing. Waqar spared a glance at the Copperleaf walls above them, wondering if the damned Yurosi were laughing at this new chaos – or did they realise that they were next?
We’re all going to burn in the Pit. He set his jaw, and raised his blade – coated with Mollachian silver. It wouldn’t last long, he knew. So let’s all burn together.
*
‘Boss, this is insane,’ Vania di Aelno murmured. She and Ramon stood on the edge of the parapets, watching the Shihad tear itself in two.
Ramon understood the sentiment, but to him it was all too explicable. His legions had been fighting in Rimoni for four years and during that time the mysterious Lord of Rym had spread his influence from village to village, concealing his true strength or nature, never leaving living witnesses to reveal what it was they fought. Finally the Becchio Mercenary Guilds had fractured and turned on themselves.
‘It’s Rimoni all over again,’ he told Vania. ‘We only just got out alive and I still can’t rightly say what we faced. Berserkers, some said. Necromantic draugs, said others. Now we know. Clearly the Lord of Rym no longer fears to be revealed.’
The red and black banners of t
he Lord of Rym were springing up on all sides now while the air reverberated with that spine-sapping howl. They could see constructs of all kinds, every one black-eyed and savage and many wielding the gnosis, and despite the chaos their brutality was clearly controlled by an iron hand.
For now, Copperleaf remained unassailed, but below them all was confusion. Just a quarter of a mile away they could see a massive battle taking place on the shores of the Lowertown reservoir, and all the space between was filled with Keshi soldiers, all singing and chanting to Ahm as they rallied. But Ramon could see the defence on the far side of the lake had all but collapsed and the Lord of Rym’s banners were advancing from the west. The remains of the Shihad were trapped and doomed. Above them giant eagles tore each other to pieces in mid-air, while the remaining Keshi windships were burning on the ground.
‘We’re going to be facing a whole heap fewer Noories tomorrow,’ Vania observed.
‘Yet somehow I’m not comforted.’
Melicho joined them, his face anxious. ‘Boss, what’re the orders? We’ve got Noories straying into the killing zones as they run westwards and the lads aren’t sure whether to shoot or not?’
‘Only shoot if they try to scale the walls,’ Ramon told him. ‘There’s a plague out there, remember.’
A plague that turns men berserk, engineered by the Lord of Rym?
Melicho saluted, then invoked the gnosis to spread the orders. Ramon clapped Vania on the shoulder. ‘Come on, let’s get to the aqueduct tower. I want to make sure it’s secure.’
They passed along the walls westward, reassuring the men as they went, before joining a queasy-looking Tabia in the cupola of Aqueduct Tower overlooking the elevated water channel they’d crawled up only a few days earlier. Since then, rising temperatures had melted the ice and now the race was full. The sluice-gates had been shut to starve the enemy below of fresh water, trapping millions of tons of water in the mile-long race.