The Sheening Of The Blades (Book 1) (84 page)

“Waylan,” he said gravely, eyes twinkling.

Waylan, manfully trying to keep discipline in the face of that infectious smile, said formally, “My Lord Rach.”

“You
’re on duty,” Kyr had said, voice rich with unlaughed laughter.

“Yes, my Lord Rach,” the lieutenant struggled, freckled face red with the effort of maintaining his bearing.

Androssan urged his horse faster.  It was half-Aerach, him being a General and all, and he’d never imagined anything that could best it…but the nimble stallions of the Rach, Kyr and his messenger, were drawing steadily ahead as the trail steepened.  It seemed to take a long time, that slipping, jarring, clawing up the side of the Prow (what else would a Merranic call such a mountain?), every minute of it filled with imaginings of the sight at the top.  Or, in Androssan’s case, every other minute—he alternated with sour reflections on the injury to his pride. 

There was quite a flat, clear, open space when they finally came out on top, the mountain rising up behind them another 100 yards or so into the air, but the view wide open in front of them.  Kyr was waiting quietly—he
’d been there several minutes already.  Once the Merranic horses had come laboring into view, he gave them all a meaningful look and led the way out on the exposed ledge.

It was plenty wide enough for them all; in fact, a whole troop of Ashbows could fit easily up there.  It was such an obvious vantage point that Androssan
’s mind began instantly churning on how they could use it, and it took him a second to realize what he was seeing spread out below him.

The light was fading fast, slanting weakly through sodden clouds, but it was still strong enough to see clearly the numbers of Enemy before them.  Even through the spyglass, they were far too distant to make out individuals, but in a way that made the vision even more alarming…that the space of leagues could not soften the impact of that massive force bearing down on them.  They were not making any attempt to camouflage themselves…indeed, Androssan thought numbly, why would they?  From the Eastern seacoast all the way across the world until the curve of the horizon hid them from view, they swarmed like black ants, a seething carpet of tiny movements and taunting, triumphant numbers.  Stretching out of sight to the south that had spawned them, like some vast, endless flood of malevolent insects, they had come.  The Enemy had come, down through generations, through Ages, through legends, through all the denials and scoffings the North could muster, and now they were here.

The other Realms’ leaders were talking, subdued and gruff, but Androssan didn’t join in.  What did it matter?  Now he realized why Kyr had been so adamant about limiting the viewing.  Now he realized why the Rach had been so strangely unimpressed with the enormous numbers of his allies amassed and waiting for him.

They stood there for a long time, watching the Enemy Army crawl forward.  They watched as it paused, halted, stirred around making camp.  They watched as a thousand thousand campfires blossomed out on the night-dark plain, too numerous to count, too distant at their edge to even fully see.

And when they finally turned their horses back down the slippery trail and hurried back to headquarters, Androssan barely noticed the driving sleet in his face.  For he had realized something else as the shock and the horror wore off…they could not win this war. 

CHAPTER 40

“So, I said—real gentle, so I didn
’t scare them—well, flames, I’d hate for you to get your robes dirty,” Spere said, so furious he was polite.  “And do you know what they said?”

“What?” Androssan asked absently, regretting that it had been Spere that had
had the duty of sending off the Councilmen, but rather busy with his concern about the survival of the Empire just at the moment.

“They said,
‘We all must make our sacrifices for the Empire!!!!!’  Smoking ash!”  His Point threw up his hands.  “So that’s what happened to our best wagons, General, if you’re wondering,” he said, so abruptly courteous after his outburst that it made one suspicious of his sanity.

“I wasn
’t,” Androssan told him, sparing a glance at the outrage on the other side of his desk.  “Find some other way, then, just get that firewood to the 28
th
.  With this cold snap, we’re going to be losing men if they don’t have fires.” 
We’re going to be losing them anyway in a day or so,
that still-appalled part of him interjected.

“We
’re also going to be losing Rach, soon, if we don’t take torching steps to stop it,” Spere noted, eyes fixed grimly on a spot in the tent wall just over the General’s head and making no move to get on about his business.

Androssan sighed, giving him his reluctant attention.  “Now what?”

“Well, Sir,” the sergeant said, still dangerously polite, “It’s their horses.”

“What about them?”  Where in the world was this going?

“Seems, Sir, the Cav are nervous about their mares.”  He was almost grinding the words out, face fixed in a rictus grin.

“What are you talking about?” Androssan was beginning to get impatient.  Spere rarely bothered him with nonsense, so there was obviously something of import here somewhere…

“I don’t know if you’ve noticed, Sir,” he continued, in a voice that said he could care less about the current topic, “but apparently those are all stallions on the other side of the Daroe.  Untethered stallions.”  He cocked his head, a glaringly insincere smile marring his features.  “The Cav are convinced those lusty little desert devils will be jumping the river any minute now to get to their sweet little mares—”

“Spere, are you jesting with me?  The Enemy could be upon us as early as
tomorrow
.  Those mares, the whole cavalry, could be dead,
tomorrow
.  Talk some sense into them, will you?”

His Point Sergeant looked deeply put upon.  “Burning cinders, General, they
’re officers,” he said, pained.  “They’re talking about marching over there and demanding the Rach tie up those stallions—or doing it themselves if the Rach won’t listen.  I thought you ought to know.”

Great.  Had it escaped everyone
’s attention that they were fighting a war here?  After almost two decades of wargaming, Androssan was beginning to think these sorts of things were the way some soldiers dealt with stress.  Resigned, he stood and followed Spere out of the tent.  He wasn’t really all that worried about offending the Rach—Waylan had already alerted him to several situations that made it clear that was almost impossible.  But he’d seen some of those stallions first thing in the morning, even with their own riders.  And that big red of Kyr’s was the meanest of the bunch—his officers went over there rolling up their sleeves with thoughts of securing them, they were likely to come back on stretchers.

Stumping towards Fulton
’s, the Cav Commander’s, tent, he saw a strange, misfit collection of people gathered in a little knot up the road, their union briefly punctuated by a flash and sharp little explosion.  They backed up, by all indications delighted, and he made out the looming Jarl, Steelmists, with those two youngsters…that had never been satisfactorily explained to him, come to think of it.  How had such a motley collection of personnel and Realms ended up in the ’Shard, rescuing the Queen?  Though it did not bother him near as much as the thought of that Merranic fooling around with that powder.

Down the road, Rodge said, “Chemical,” playing with his lower lip.  “Definitely a chemical reaction.”

“Who cares?  It was great—let’s do it again,” Loren urged.  Banion, who had caught the frown on the face of the Commanding General of the Imperial Armies, said hastily, “Once is enough.  Don’t want to waste it.  Might need it.”  He closed the oilskin bag as tight as he could against the rain—it was high-maintenance as a woman, this powder.

Loren sighed in disappointment, but Rodge said, continuing their previous conversation, “So, what else did you see from the Prow?”

Banion beamed, turning to gaze affectionately down the length of the Empire to where you could just see the Prow as a bump on the horizon.  “There’s plenty,” he rumbled in satisfaction.  The boys looked at each other.

“Plenty of what?” they asked almost in unison.

“Enemy…” he rolled out smoothly, like a man savoring a swallow of fine wine.

Rodge rolled his eyes.  “Oh, good.  I was worried.  After we went to all that trouble to stir the Sheelshard up, it would have been a shame if they didn
’t come to the party.”

“Melkin
’s still not back,” Loren noted, looking a totally different direction, back over the dirty white canvas town all around them.

“And he said he
’d be back in time for the war,” Rodge said, affecting a girl’s singsong pout.  “Let me see, Banion.”

The Knight had pulled out his famous Merranic looking glass—famous because the Northerners couldn
’t believe Merrani had figured such a thing out before they had—and was gazing intently at the distant mountain.  He took his eye away and handed it absently to Rodge, muttering, “Seems like there should be something we could use that ledge halfway up for…too far up for anything accurate, I guess…could just let archers rain down arrow fire…”

“Why don
’t you bring it down?”  Rodge asked, squinting mightily while his one eye roved.

Banion went still, the hand stroking his beard stopping mid-pet.  Slowly, he pivoted to look at Rodge.  “What?” he said quietly.

Rodge dropped the glass, making strange faces as his eyes re-adjusted.  “Why don’t you bring that big chunk of rock suspended off the front of the cliff down, preferably on the Enemy?”

“How?” Banion said, small eyes bright as a ferret
’s with its tail curled around its face.

Rodge gestured at the bag of powder at Banion
’s overworked belt.  “With
that.
  An explosion at just the right place up on top and that thing should shear off like a piece of flint—see how narrow the neck is that holds it on?”  He offered the glass back and Banion grabbed it. 

“Can you do that?” Banion asked hurriedly.

“Me?” Rodge said in surprise.  “No, you’d need…well, first you’d need a surveyor so you knew just where to dig the powder in—”

“Got one,” Banion beamed.  Rodge raised his beetle brows.  “It
’s the Imperial Army,” Banion waved a hand at the sea of tents.  “They have one of everything.”

“Yeah, but I have no idea how much to use or…” Banion had put one gigantic arm, roughly the size of a six-year old child, across his skinny shoulders and was shepherding him encouragingly towards the tents, head bent attentively.

“Wait, I’m in on this,” Loren chortled and trotted after them.

Ari woke suddenly, heart pounding, the stench of burning flesh in his nostrils and his mind’s eye brimming with the sight of the dead and dying.

“It
’s just a dream,” the Empress said sleepily from a few feet away, but she rose to a sitting position, too.  They slept and got up whenever they wished, since there was no way to gauge time.

“I was back in the Hall,” he said huskily, the vivid images fading only slowly from his consciousness.  The smoky torch, planted firmly in the ground next to him, lit her face with eerie yellow light, but even it couldn
’t erase the tranquility glowing off of it.  They had no way to relight a torch, so they kept one burning all the time, despite the fact that the stock piles of replacements were now few and far between.  They were all very, very dry, as if they had been collected uncounted years ago.

Ari didn
’t mind the light—it warded of the increasingly oppressive leagues of passageway—except for times like this, when the smell of smoke and the greasy flames brought back memories he’d rather let stay dormant.

They rose and picked up their few burdens without having to discuss it, munching on raw potatoes.  They almost always walked as they ate, driven by the urge to cover as much ground as quickly as possible and certainly not hindered by the requirements of preparing a meal.  Ari had no idea how many leagues they had already covered, but his chest wound had scabbed over and was almost completely healed, and the stab he
’d taken to the arm was closing quickly.

The worst part was, they didn
’t know how far they still had to go…and Ari had only the vaguest idea of what they were going to do when they got there.  “What are we looking for?” he asked, stewing over this.  She’d been as vague as Rheine about the next step of this mad plan.  So surprising.  Did Illians take a vow of uncommunicativeness?  He couldn’t believe they’d gotten as far as they had.  Couldn’t believe any of the northerners had made it, let alone all of them plus the Queen of the North and half a Rach.

“I
’m not sure,” she admitted around the crunching of potato.  “We’ll know when we see it.”

He sighed.  He had successfully surmounted disbelief and was now on to dim uneasiness.  It was as if habit was forcing him to ask—he wasn
’t sure he cared.  The Sureness swam like a blissful bubble just beneath the surface of his mind.  If he died here, well, he would die with the memory of that Great Presence indelibly etched into his soul…and with the woman he wanted to be with right beside him.

“Why did you stow away on that raft on the Kendrick?” he asked slowly.  She offered him a shriveled apple and he took it, heart jumping when their fingers brushed.

He could hear her munching.  Finally swallowing, she said, “When Rheine found out about you in Swamp Town, we decided someone should keep an eye on you.  I volunteered myself,” she shrugged, casting a winsome smile up at him, “We were going the same place anyway.  I was right behind the mercs that ambushed you and the boys at the University…fortunately, Kai was there ahead of them.”

Ari stiffened.  “You knew him before?” he asked casually.

“Who, Kai?”  She was rummaging over her shoulder in one of the sagging food bags.  “No, I met him with the rest of you.”

“So, he didn
’t know who you were?” Ari pressed.  It would be nice if there were a past history there, something to explain the intense looks they seemed to always be exchanging.

“No…though…he may have guessed it.  He
’s an extraordinary Dra.”

“Yeah, everyone seems to think so,” Ari said a little touchily.

“He is.  Very extroverted.”

Extroverted? 
Kai?

“Very concerned about the Realms…I wouldn
’t be surprised if he has a major role yet to play in this battle shaping up.”