Ghost in the Winds (Ghost Exile #9) (26 page)

The khalmir scowled at her but held out his hand. The first soldier passed him Agabyzus’s forgery. The khalmir scanned it, nodded, and shoved it back at the first soldier. 

“Are you an idiot?” said the khalmir. “We’re almost out of food. It’s about damn time someone sent us supplies. The idiot quartermaster and his idiot officers got themselves killed by the damned rebels. See to it that the food is loaded into our larder. If I don’t get my breakfast, I’ll take it out of your hide.” The khalmir shook his head and stalked away. “The damned world’s ending in mad sorcery and Hellfire, but at least I can have my damned breakfast.” 

For a moment the soldiers stood in silence. 

“We would be happy to unload the bread, sir,” said Damla.

“Fine,” snapped the first soldier, striding away. 

“Right,” said another of the men. “This way.”

The soldiers dissipated, returning to their posts, and Damla followed the last soldier to the gatehouse tower, her heart hammering in her ribs. So far the ruse had worked. The khalmir in command should have been more suspicious, but he did not seem to care. Damla supposed that the army’s defeat outside the wall had cost the men their morale…and more to the point, it had likely killed off many of the Grand Wazir’s lieutenants and officers. That would create chaos, and in the chaos, it was easier for the Ghosts to sneak into the gate. 

The soldier unlocked the door at the base of the western gate tower. “In there.” 

The room beyond was large and round, lined with empty tables along the walls. A flight of stairs curved along the wall, leading higher into the tower. “Put the bread on the tables. The amphorae of wine in the center of the floor.”

“Very well,” said Damla, and she helped the others unload the wagon, stacking the drugged loaves upon the table. Malcolm and Agabyzus carried the amphorae one by one into the room, and as Agabyzus set the amphora down, he paused next to Damla.

“Be ready,” he whispered. “When I open the amphora, close the door, and bar it behind you.” 

Damla nodded, drifting towards the door as Nerina and Tomazain brought in the last of the bread. 

“Quite a private army you have there, mistress,” said the soldier, eyeing Damla. 

“It is necessary in these dark times, honored sir,” said Damla, catching Agabyzus’s eye. 

“Perhaps you’ll join us in a drink,” said Agabyzus, reaching for one of the amphorae. 

“I’m not sure it’s allowed,” said the soldier. 

“The wine is for the soldiers,” said Damla. “You are a soldier, no? I see no harm.” 

She reached for the pouch holding the mask at her belt. 

“You are very persuasive,” said the soldier, lifting a wooden cup from one of the tables. 

Agabyzus nodded to Damla, reached down, and ripped open the seal from one of the amphorae.

A lot of things happened very quickly. 

Damla slammed the door shut, dropping the bar into place, and seized her mask, pressing the damp cloth against her nose and mouth. Around her, the others followed suit. Agabyzus leaped back from the amphora, pulling on his own mask, and as he did, a thick gray smoke erupted from the container, filling the room with a grayish haze.

“What?” said the soldier. “What is this?” He drew his scimitar and started forward, but Tomazain moved faster. He punched the soldier in the jaw, sending the man stumbling into a table. The soldier reeled, staggering. Tomazain hadn’t hit the man that hard…but the sleeping mist was filling the chamber. The soldier’s eyes rolled into his head, and he fell to his knees and then to the floor. 

“Quickly!” said Agabyzus. “Tomazain, Malcolm, and I will take the remaining three amphorae. Azaces, be ready to attack or defend as necessary. Nerina and Damla, be ready to shoot.”

“Shoot?” said Damla, but Nerina passed her a light crossbow, the weapon already wound and loaded. 

“Here you are, mistress Damla,” said Nerina. “I calculated your precise grip strength, and calibrated to the trigger and winch for optimal ease of use.”

“Ah…thank you,” said Damla. 

“Come!” said Agabyzus, heaving up one of the amphorae. “We do not have much time.”

They climbed the stairs to the next room. It looked like a barracks chamber, with beds along the wall, and six soldiers playing cards at a round table. The soldiers leaped to their feet as they entered, but Agabyzus solved the problem by ripping the seal from his amphora. The gray haze filled the chamber, and the soldiers collapsed into unconsciousness. 

“How long does that last?” said Tomazain. 

“I don’t know,” said Agabyzus. “As long as the mist doesn’t dissipate. It’s already leaking out through the windows. I suspect we have an hour before it dissipates entirely.”

“It will dissipate faster,” said Nerina, “once the soldiers outside realize that something is amiss and break down the door. I calculate the mist will dissipate,” her eyelids fluttered, “in approximately thirteen minutes.”

Agabyzus nodded. “Let us put those minutes to use. This way.”

The next room was an armory, and it was deserted, its arrow slits looking down onto both the Bazaar of the Southern Road and the plains outside. On the opposite wall was a locked door leading into the room over the gate itself.

“Madame Strake,” said Agabyzus, but Nerina was already moving. She handed her crossbow to Malcolm, dropped to one knee, and produced a set of lockpicks, her thin fingers moving with precise motions as she manipulated the tools. “Damla, Malcolm, be ready to fire. The men in the mechanism room may attack at once.”

Damla nodded, gripping her crossbow.

Nerina kept mumbling something under her breath. A click came from the door, and then another, and Nerina smiled. She got to her feet, tucking her tools away, and seized the door handle as she swung to the side, pressing herself against the wall.

The room beyond was long and rectangular, and the wall facing the fields outside was full of machinery, interlocking gears and counterweights, all the various mechanisms necessary for the gates to open and the portcullis to rise quickly. There were also arrow slits looking at the fields outside the city, and a dozen men stood at those arrow slits, keeping watch. 

Every single one of those men turned to look at them.

“Ah,” said Tomazain, grabbing his shield. “Hell.”

Malcolm ripped the seal from his amphora and flung it through the doorway, the container spewing gray smoke. The soldiers charged with a shout, drawing their swords, and Damla aimed her crossbow and squeezed the trigger. The weapon bucked in her hands, and the bolt sprouted from the shoulder of one of the charging men. He staggered, and then fell coughing to his knees as he inhaled the sleeping mist. Malcolm’s crossbow bolt was more accurate, and it ripped out the throat of a soldier. Tomazain tore open his amphora, and the sleeping fog erupted forth, sheathing the armory. Damla and the others backed away, but it proved unnecessary. One by one the soldiers collapsed, knocked unconscious by the sleeping fog. 

“Madame Strake, the mechanism,” said Agabyzus, and Nerina jogged forward, Malcolm going after her.

“What about them?” said Tomazain, drawing his sword. “Should we kill them?”

Damla shuddered. She had never killed anyone in cold blood.

“No,” said Agabyzus. “There isn’t time. Drag them out of the gate room. We’ll barricade ourselves inside. That should keep the sleeping fog from dissipating for a little while longer.” 

“Azaces!” called Nerina. “I need you here!” 

Azaces ran to join Malcolm and Nerina at a massive steel windlass set into the floor, while Damla, Agabyzus, and Tomazain dragged the unconscious soldiers into the armory. Damla tried not to look at the bloodstains they left upon the planks of the floor. Once they had moved the unconscious men to the armory, they retreated into the mechanism room, locking and barring the door behind them. 

“This windlass,” said Nerina, pointing at the massive steel wheel. “Turning it in a complete revolution will open the gate and raise the portcullis. If we sever the chains here, here, here, and here, and remove that gear,” she pointed at each of the objects in turn, “that will jam the gate and portcullis open until the soldiers can repair the damage.”

“Very well,” said Agabyzus. “Azaces, Tomazain, and Malcolm. The wheel, please. Take…”

There was a thump at the door on the far side of the room. 

“Open!” roared a voice. “Open in the name of the Grand Wazir.”

“We should have used some of the sleeping mist in the eastern tower,” said Damla.

“Too late now,” said Agabyzus. “Hurry!”

The three men hastened to the windlass and turned it. It took all of their strength, their faces turning red and the cords bulging in their necks, but they forced the windlass to turn. As they did, the gears and chains along the walls rattled and slithered, the counterweights moving and sliding, and Damla heard the groan as the gates opened and the rattle as the portcullis slid upward. 

And almost in perfect time with the groan of the gates and the rattle of the portcullis, the pounding at the door got louder and louder.

“Damla!” said Agabyzus, pointing at a stone basin next to the windlass where Tomazain and Malcolm and Azaces strained. “The signal fire. Quickly!”

Damla ran to the stone basin. A pool of oil rested in the shallow basin, and she saw the copper pipe that linked it to the waiting signal fire on the ramparts overhead. A lantern waited next to the basin, and Damla reached down, opened the lantern, and touched the flame to the oil. At once the basin took fire, and she heard the whooshing noise as the fire traveled up the pipe, followed an instant later by a yellow-orange flickering from the arrow slits as the signal fire atop the ramparts caught flame. 

“Got it!” shouted Tomazain, and the windlass shuddered to a stop. “The gate is open!”

Malcolm ran to the wall, raising his massive hammer and a chisel. He began severing the links of specific chains with powerful blows, and Azaces produced a smaller hammer and chisel from beneath his robes and followed suit. 

“There!” said Malcolm, lowering his hammer as the last broken chain shuddered against the wall.

“Excellent,” said Nerina. “The doors are jammed open. They will be unable to close the gate without repairing the broken chains. A peril of relying on the mechanism to control the gate rather than simply pulling or pushing the gate shut or open with muscle power as circumstances require. I calculate that the lost time in…”

“Very good,” said Agabyzus. “You can explain the mathematics to us later. Through the western door, quickly…”

Someone started pounding on the western door, and Damla flinched. 

“How the devil did they get up here so quickly?” said Tomazain. “The sleeping fog should have knocked them out.”

“Someone must have realized what was happening,” said Agabyzus. “One of the Alchemists in the Grand Wazir’s service, perhaps. They likely prepared masks for the soldiers.” 

“What will we do?” said Damla. 

“Best reload your crossbow, mistress Damla,” said Tomazain, slinging his shield over his left arm and drawing his broadsword with his right hand. “There is only one thing we can do. Stand and fight.” 

Damla swallowed, but nodded and loaded her crossbow.

It seemed she had been right. She would die as a coffee merchant…and she realized that she would also die as a Ghost. 

She hoped her sons would live and thrive.

Damla set herself and waited for the end.

Chapter 16: Oath Shadow

In the predawn gloom, the army of Prince Kutal Sulaman Tarshahzon and the emir Tanzir Shahan prepared itself for battle. 

Kylon walked through the rows of tents, making for where the Padishah’s banner flew at the head of the army.

When they faced Erghulan Amirasku to the south, the emir’s army had arrayed itself in a traditional battle formation, with the Kaltari footmen and the heavy infantry in the center, the horsemen on the wings, and the skirmishers of the Istarish nomad tribes forming a line of archers before the main host. Here, the army prepared itself for an assault on the city. The horsemen formed up in the center in a massive column, with the Istarish nomads and mounted Kaltari warriors at the column’s head. Once the Ghosts opened the gate, the Kaltari would storm into the Bazaar of the Southern Road, hoping to secure a foothold for the rest of the army. The Istarish nomads would rush after and scatter into the streets of the Anshani Quarter, causing chaos and distracting the defenders. After that, the rest of the horsemen, both mercenary soldiers and the retainers of the rebel emirs, would charge for the gate. 

The footmen formed up in rows on either side of the horsemen, gathered around siege ladders. The infantry would charge the walls and throw up the siege ladders to the battlements, using them to storm the ramparts. With the defenders distracted by the open gate, hopefully, the infantry would reach the walls and scale their ladders.

But only if the gate was opened.

If the gate wasn’t opened, the horsemen would be useless. Tanzir would order the siege catapults into range and launch a barrage to cover the charge of the infantry and the ladders to the wall. That might work. It also might result in a catastrophic slaughter as the engineers upon the wall launched their own bombardment of Hellfire amphorae. In the face of such an inferno, the siege ladders would burn like kindling…and so would the men carrying them.

Kylon shook his head as he walked, his sword hand clenching and unclenching. Countless lives were at stake, and they were about to take a tremendous gamble, trusting in the cunning of the Ghosts of Istarinmul. Caina trusted them, of course. She had recruited all of them, and Nerina and Azaces had gone with Caina and Kylon and the others into the Inferno and come out again. 

Yet had Kylon asked too much of them? Damla was a coffee merchant. Nerina was a locksmith, and Malcolm a blacksmith. Could they possibly enter the gatehouse and open the gate? Or would they all be killed before they could succeed?

Kylon didn’t know. He supposed that not even Sulaman and the Emissary knew what would happen today. 

He stopped as he reached the banners of Sulaman and Tanzir, the captains of the army gathered around them. Sulaman sat atop his horse, having exchanged his simple robe for equally simple plate armor. Mazyan sat scowling next to the Prince, the Oath Shadow’s eyes looking in all directions for any sign of danger. Kylon spotted Tanzir, flanked by his bodyguards, Strabane, a dozen other rebel emirs, Lord Martin, Lady Claudia, Kazravid, and Tibraim. Nasser and Laertes waited next to Sulaman, Nasser with his usual smooth calm, and Laertes with the grim watchfulness of the veteran centurion. Laertes had mentioned that he had several daughters, and at various times he had plotted to marry one to Kylon or to Caina (before he had realized that Caina was not, in fact, a man). Kylon wondered where his wife and daughters were, and if they were safe.