Pyramid of Blood (Swords Versus Tanks Book 3) (8 page)

Wisdom-at-Night shifted to huddle into the angle between the walkway and the turret, giving Jasmine a clear shot.

Bright girl.
Jasmine strained to drag the mount round the last few degrees. The machine guns clanged to a halt with the cross hairs pointing at sky. Of course, the turret had the new governors to stop you from shooting up your own ship.

The Tolmecs edged down the gantry. Wisdom-at-Night rose and – in one catlike motion — clambered on top of the turret and spread-eagled herself over the Flexiglas dome like a bug on a windshield.

Really bright girl
. Jasmine glanced up – mentally filed the sight away for later… if there was a
later
— then kicked the turret back around. She threw open the hatch and sprang onto the gantry. Hot rain prickled her skin. The honeycomb aluminium scoured her lacerated soles.

The first warrior approached, eyes blank with concentration, the rain pinging off his obsidian axe blade. The airship dipped slightly as the weight of his comrades altered the trim, putting Jasmine further downhill from her attackers.

She unsheathed her combat dagger and gripped it pick-fashion, the blade pointed down. She took a moment to savour the after-image of Wisdom-at-Night. Blinking away the rain, she dropped into a fighting half-crouch and reached for her battle rage.

#

Ranulph’s boots splattered mud as he ran.

The sky lit up. Thunder crashed.

A native turned, confusion on his face. Ranulph bowled him over, and kept going. Behind him, his Northmen formed a tight wedge, trampling anybody stupid enough to get in the way. As ordered, they swung their looted obsidian axes only at warriors and priests.

Slowly, the pyramid’s treasure-chest shape emerged from the curtains of rain. The airship floated above it like a massive loaf of bread suspended by some invisible giant. Had Ranulph doomed his men by trusting Jasmine? He broke into a sprint, churning the mud with each step. The damp air wheezed in and out of his lungs. "Come on gentlemen!"

The airship hung less than a hundred feet from the top of the pyramid, drifting through the rainstorm. If Jasmine was abandoning them, she was making a poor job of it.

A figure detached itself from the airship. Trailing feathers, it plummeted the short distance and vanished behind the pyramid.

Shielding his eyes from the rain, Ranulph traced the body back to its origin: the latticework spur at the prow of the aerial behemoth. As he watched, Tolmec warriors advanced single-file over the walkway towards a naked, woman. “
Jasmine!”

A warrior swung his axe
down.

Ranulph winced. There was nowhere for Jasmine to dodge. No room for manoeuvre at all.

Jasmine back-stepped just enough.

The heavy-bladed weapon swung past.

She lunged. Her short blade flashed in the dull light. Blood sprayed and the man sprawled on the walkway.

Another warrior stepped over the body and tried a lateral cut. Jasmine leaned out of reach, then pivoted forward. The warrior turned his axe and made a second cut.

Ranulph held his breath.

As the airship wheeled, Jasmine’s left hand shot out and caught the smaller warrior’s elbow. She vanished out of sight behind the mass of the black silk hull.

A brown figure plummeted from the underside and smacked into a flat temple roof. Ranulph remembered to breathe. Despite the oppressive heat, a shiver went down his spine. He’d misjudged her prowess. Now he knew the truth, he wanted her as much as he did Lady Maud. "God's teeth!"

"Lord!" said Thorolf. "What now?"

Ranulph’s barbarian warband stood in the mud, waiting for him to move. He glanced around. Still no sign of opposition. The pyramid of the Dancing Earth Fish was the best defensive position. It was also – according to Jasmine — the only possible mooring. He would have to trust her to have some sort of plan. "This way," he ordered.

As they mounted the steps, the rain eased off. A strong sea breeze swept away the muggy air, taking with it the drifting airship.

The top was strewn with bodies, not just Tolmec warriors bearing the distinctive wounds given by the guns of the Invaders, but also Northman bodies. The ten-man guard Ranulph had left behind had all fallen.

He paused at Sigurd’s body. The runes on the young Northman’s helmet evidently worked against iron and other metals, but not against glass or stone. Had Ranulph
not
given the young warrior a knee injury, would he have been able to avoid the axe blow that had split his skull to the teeth?

Ranulph frowned. They might be barbarians, but they were
his
barbarians.

“By Odin!” exclaimed Thorolf. “Our war gear!”

Equipment lay piled up as if somebody — Jasmine? — had helpfully unloaded all their weapons and armour. Steelcutter lay half-covered by a mailshirt. What would have happened if they had cast it on the ground instead of the pyramid top? Would the Earth King have taken it?

Ranulph scooped up his ancestral weapon and flourished it. The keen-edged blade swished through the damp air. The grip smacked into his bare hand and he grinned. Things suddenly seemed simpler.

“Lord!” said Thorolf. He tapped Ranulph’s shoulder. "Look!"

Ranulph turned to face back down the pyramid’s steps. A dark wave swept up the temple avenue towards them. Lightning flashed and the black glass axeheads of the Tolmec army glittered like a frozen sea.

"God and steel," said Ranulph.

"What?" said Thorolf.

Ranulph raised his voice. "Gentlemen! I suggest you arm with haste." He grinned. "We are about to learn the Will of God."

#

Yet another Tolmec warrior charged at Jasmine. The gantry wobbled under her bare feet, turning him into a demonic blur of feathers and scars.

The axe descended.

Holding the dagger blade flat against her forearm, Jasmine windmilled the weapon aside. With a roar, she drove the heel of her left hand into the man’s nose. Cartilage crunched and hot fluid splashed her hand.

Without changing expression, he jabbed with the axe shaft's butt. Screaming, Jasmine parried against the wet skin of his forearms and kneed him in the groin.

A flicker caught her eye. Her left hand shot out over the wounded man’s shoulder. Her sticky fingers found a wrist and halted the next warrior's attack.

She shouldered past the first — sending him howling over the rail – and slashed the throat of her new opponent. Hot blood sprayed her bare flesh. "Bastard!" She used the return swing to drive her point into his eye. He sank between the metal rails like a rolled up newspaper crumpling in the humidity.

Gasping for breath, Jasmine edged away from the corpse. Best to give herself room and turn the dead man into an obstacle for her enemies. She flexed her aching muscles and drew more damp air into her lungs.

Three more Tolmecs filed onto the wet gantry. Behind them, in the gloom of the airship’s hull, yet more axes glinted.

"Have courage!" said Wisdom-at-Night, from her perch on the gun turret. "You have already slain… six of the best Tolmec warriors."

"I’m not afraid," said Jasmine between ragged breaths. She pushed the wet hair back from her brow. "I’m fucked… exhausted, I mean."

And the next man was on her. She fumbled for her rage, but she was just a naked city girl trapped on a wobbling metal gantry, facing a murderous savage, with nowhere to go but over the rail and down a hundred metres into the jungle below.

CHAPTER NINE

Thousands of Tolmec warriors swirled in the gloom around the base of the pyramid, yelling and chanting so that their voices resounded in Ranulph's chest.

“There’s only one way up, Lord,” said Thorolf. He gestured at steep steps.

Ranulph nodded absently. He mopped the sweat from his eyes and let them unfocus so that he saw the pattern of movement, not the individuals. Order rippled across the Tolmec army. Lines dressed, skull standards raised, and that order was spreading out from…

“There,” said Ranulph. “The feathered standard with the two skulls marks the enemy captain.”

“Aye,” said Thorolf. He twitched a smile. “So we kill him?”

“Not we,” said Ranulph. “
I
.”

Thorolf's mouth twitched. "No. We have already failed one lord. Besides, you have no mailshirt."

A column extended from the Tolmec army and swarmed up the steps ten abreast.

Ranulph grinned. He regarded the others. Twenty two Northmen with shields and armour. Some maintained a grim silence, others traded jokes, smiling but not with their eyes, all were pink faced with the heat, hair lank, skin sheened with perspiration.

The pyramid had over a dozen tiers, each narrow and about twice the height of a man. However, as Thorolf had observed, only a single stair led up to the platform with its sanctuary house and bloodstained altar. “Fourteen men to hold the stairhead,” said Ranulph, “two deep. I shall keep eight back in reserve.”

Thorolf’s eyes narrowed. “In
reserve
, Lord.”

“Of course.” Ranulph twirled Steelcutter. The four-foot blade swished satisfyingly. “As you say, I have no mail.”

Thorolf turned away and barked commands. He took his place at the top of the steps. Six men formed up on either side of him and locked shields. Seven more took their place in the second rank.

Osmund led his own seven men up to Ranulph and bowed his head. “What is your will, Lord?”

“Be ready in case they climb between levels,” said Ranulph. He hopped onto the fly shrouded altar to see over the helmets of the shieldwall.

The Tolmecs had passed the middle of their climb.

Ranulph scanned the clouds for sign of Jasmine and airship. He gave a mental shrug. She would come. "Gentlemen," he said, then continued in Northern, "This is no last stand. Their numbers will not help them. The steps are too steep, the space too narrow." Helmeted heads bobbed in agreement, but they needed more. "They have feathers," said Ranulph. "You have iron!" He raised his voice. "They have glass, you have well-tempered steel! Hold until Jasmine's return, and we shall feast in Castle Dacre, not Valhalla!"

The housecarls shouted in unison. Then Thorolf used his sword to drum his shield. The others joined in, and Northern thunder resounded from the top of the Tolmec pyramid.

The advancing Tolmecs were only two tiers below now.

Somebody yelled, “By Odin, here they come!”

“Ready…” cried Thorolf. The Northmen shouted in unison, building up for their traditional battle cry…

Ranulph shook his head. The heat made it hard to think. However, he expected something a little more professional. For all they fought with obsidian weapons and wore feathers, these little brown-skinned men were as disciplined as the Emperor’s Landmarchers.

Sure enough, instead of charging up the stair in column, the Tolmecs spread out over the final tier. For a moment it was like looking at a sea of reeds, then Ranulph understood that each man carried a bushel of javelins. He bellowed, “Shieldburg, by God, shieldburg!”

Obediently, the first rank of Northmen knelt. The second stepped forward and raised their shields to create a castle of shields.

Somebody tugged at Ranulph’s leg. “Down!” barked Osmund.

Ranulph dropped behind the stone altar.

Javelins darkened the sky, then the shields of Osmund’s men closed over him. Javelins thudded on the boards, made sharper sounds where they shattered on the stone platform.

“Ha! Like on the ramparts of Ilium,” remarked Osmund.

Ranulph crouched and peered around the altar. Javelins clattered off the carvings. Others ricocheted over the pyramid top. He flinched but peered around just a little further.

Scores of brown hands gripped the edge of the platform.

He ducked back into cover, heart pounding. “They’re standing on each other’s shoulders,” he said. “When they stop throwing javelins, Osmund, you go left, I’ll go right.”

“You should stay in cover,” said the Northman.

“Would you like to make me?” said Ranulph.

Osmund grunted. He told off four men to follow Ranulph.

The rain of javelins petered out. A final solitary missile cracked on the slabs, bounced then clattered to a rest.

Ranulph launched himself upright, “Come on!”

Feathered headdresses appeared over the edge, then dozens of Tolmec warriors sprang onto the summit, obsidian headed axes clutched in both hands.

Whirling Steelcutter, Ranulph hurled himself into their midst.

A tattooed warrior saw the incoming blade, blocked with the staff of his weapon.

Ranulph flicked Steelcutter up then down, sheared through the shoulder to the ribs.

A movement flickered to his right.

He pivoted away, whipped Steelcutter back up over his head.

An glass-headed axe swept past.

Before the new enemy could launch the return swing, Ranulph threw in a cut to his arms. The edge glanced off bone, bit flesh. Muscle flapped and glistened.

Ranulph kicked the dying man over the edge.

Around him, Northmen trusted their mail and cut down smaller warriors or simply used their shields to shove them off the platform. However, for every Tolmec they dispatched, two more clambered over the edge.

Ranulph glanced about. One of his men lay unmoving. However, nobody had yet attacked Thorolf’s shieldwall guarding the top of the stairs. Beyond them, Osmund and his Northmen struggled with their own Tolmec assault. Already two men were down.

A warrior slipped past a Northman and came at Ranulph, thrusting his axe like a spear.

Ranulph skipped to the side, flicked Steelcutter into the man’s hands then - with a step - up into his throat. The head spun off, shedding blood and feathers into the cloying air.

Three Tolmecs leapt forward to take his place and Ranulph knew that this wasn’t going to work for much longer. He picked out the double-skull standard rising from the press of warriors on the level below and grinned.

The three Tolmecs edged forward, spreading out. No fools these.

Ranulph threw a straight cut at the middle one, pivoting with the attack so as to put his weight into it. The blade struck the warrior in the forehead, clove the skull to the teeth.