The Fall of the Dagger (The Forsaken Lands) (37 page)

“
S
o we meet again, witan.”

Saker stared at the speaker standing under the canvas cover strung between two trees. There were other armed men there, talking to one another, and a field table strewn with maps of the area, but Saker had eyes only for the man who’d spoken to him.

This was the primary field post of the Dire Sweepers now that they had crossed the River Ard, and the man facing him was Sir Herelt Deremer, their general. He’d probably been good-looking once, but now his face was lined and drooping with fatigue. This was the man he’d known as Dyer, who had ordered his death, for no apparent reason, in a tiny Lowmian fishing village. His first taste of the Dire Sweepers. A hellish week of being confronted with the Horned Death and not being able to help its victims, then being attacked by Deremer’s men: it wasn’t a pleasant memory.

“Sir Herelt,” he said, with only the slightest inclination of his head. “It was dark last time we met. I would not have recognised you.”

“I have changed.”

“So I would hope, considering what happened last time. I can’t say I’m all that pleased to meet you again, even though we are now on the same side.”
This
, he thought,
is a daft conversation
…

“There is a discussion we must have, but it can wait. Right now, I’m glad to see you alive and well. Fritillary sent word of Valerian’s death. You did what I never could!”

“There were five of us in that room, confronting him. We were all needed.”

“She told me Barden died.”

“Did she also tell you she can’t walk now?”

He looked stricken. “No. She didn’t!”

“I doubt she’ll ever walk again.”

“She’s not
dying
, is she?”

“No. But she paid a high price for our victory.”

Deremer took a deep breath, then exhaled. “She says your people can help us locate the remaining sorcerers. And that there’s a particularly dangerous one abroad, a fellow called Ruthgar Fox. But I am remiss. Do you have tents and supplies with you? How many are you?”

“Two hundred and twenty-eight. We’re the last batch of the Pontifect’s witchery folk. Some of your men are already helping us to set up our own camp about a mile to the south. We have everything we need.”

“Good. Let me guess your witchery – something to do with birds, I imagine?”

“Indeed.”

“One of my men lost his life that night in Dortgren,” Deremer said. “Had his throat ripped out by an owl. Another was blinded by a bird’s claws. They were formidable weapons.”

“You may recall that I almost lost my life too.”

“Let’s hope our cooperation is more beneficial than our enmity.”

He shrugged. “It was your actions which were those of an enemy, not mine.”

“Enough of the past! Tell me the details of what you’ve got, so I know how best to deploy you all.” Deremer signalled to several of his officers to come and listen.

For the next hour, the conversation was impersonal as Saker outlined their plans to use witcheries and learned more about the fighting that had already taken place. When he’d finished, Sir Herelt conducted him personally to a vantage point to view the disposition of the Grey Lancers’ army.

From the spur of a ridge overlooking the floodplain, they could see the swift, cold snow-melt of the Ard churning its way to the sea. Between the ridge and the river, the Grey Lancers’ army sprawled for a mile or two in each direction, the full extent of it indicated only by the smoke of campfires curling up through the scrubby line of trees.

“Even without Valerian,” Sir Herelt said, “victory should be easy
for them. They have the larger army by far, and most of their soldiers are ruthless, hardened killers used to travelling in small companies led by the most brutal among them. With sorcerers who can coerce the enemy to turn their swords on themselves, or persuade an enemy officer to give the wrong orders, how can they lose?”

“I suspect you think they can be beaten nonetheless.”

“Of course. As you can see, we have them pinned down along the riverbank. We hold the ridge above them. To break out, they have to run uphill under a shower of arrows and gunfire, or retreat across the river – which would be costly to them in men, weaponry and supplies.” He smiled. “We spent days manoeuvring them into this position.”

“You tricked them by crossing the Ard in a place where it should have been impossible.”

“How did you know that?”

“An eagle told me. You said they’ve charged you, up this slope, twice?”

“And we had sufficient guns to repulse them. We’re now low on ammunition, though. One of those Fox sons infiltrated our lines after dark. He coerced our own sentries into killing our men. It was a mess until we managed to kill him. A lucky shot in the dark, quite literally.”

“We can put Peregrine Clary on watch at night.”

“That’s a good idea,” Deremer said, turning to look at him. “But he’s only one lad. We all have wax to block our ears, but the men are reluctant to use it. They hate being deaf.”

“It’s a stalemate, isn’t it?” Saker said. “You can’t attack because you fear their sorcerers and they can’t attack because you’re up here on the ridge.”

“We’ve been whittling away at the sorcerers. A lucky shot every now and then. We estimate fewer than ten remaining.”

“Perie thinks five. Scattered along the valley from one end to the other. One of them is Ruthgar Fox. We followed him from Vavala, immediately after Valerian’s death. He left the usual trail of smutch that Perie senses. In fact, I think you were very lucky we were hard on his tail, or he might have cut a swathe through your lines last night. It could have been your undoing, but Perie was able to warn
your men, and our dog-charmer sent a pack of hounds after the fellow. He escaped down the slope about midnight.”

“Oh. So that’s what that skirmish was all about.” He heaved a sigh. “Sorry to hear he got away. Ruthgar is a sneaky varlet if ever there was one. Clever, manipulative, always one step ahead of us.”

“He’s Valerian’s chosen heir. He knows how to extend his life and gain power. He killed three children between Vavala and here.”

“Sweet Va.” Deremer turned to stare out over the valley once more.

“Perie knows exactly where Ruthgar is at the moment. Two miles to the south of where we are now.”

“If the lancers know Valerian is not coming to lead them into battle, it will damage their morale. Does Ruthgar know Valerian is dead?” Deremer asked, his frown deepening.

“I should think so. The lancers are in for a bad night, anyway. A plague of rats will be on their way at nightfall, to eat into their supplies. Cockroaches, midges, fleas, snakes, spiders and ticks are already making their lives a misery. And wasps. Mustn’t forget the wasps. Tonight, Fritillary’s witchery clerics are arranging a diversion to distract their sentries while woodworkers sneak into their camp.”

“To do what?”

“To weaken or break all the wood they find. Lances, pikes – they usually stack them up outside the tents at night, right? Kegs, barrels. Carts. Tent poles. Boats. Anything they leave unguarded.”

“I like your way of thinking! What happened to the idea that you lost a witchery if you misused it?”

“Who says this is misusing?”

Deremer tilted his head thoughtfully. “What about using birds, the way you did back in Dortgren?”

“I won’t do that except as a last resort.” Deremer raised a questioning eyebrow, but Saker didn’t want to explain his reluctance.

The eagle called then, high above their heads. Saker thought it a haunting sound of loneliness, for there never was a reply; there never could be, not here.

“Is that yours?” Deremer asked.

“In a manner of speaking.”

“Can you send it to see if it can pinpoint precisely where the sorcerers are?”

“I can try. How best can I tell them apart from their soldiers? Are the lancers still wearing only grey coats?”

“No, these days they wear whatever they can get their hands on. They don’t wear jewellery, though, because they don’t like anything ornamental, whereas I’ve yet to see a member of the Fox family who wasn’t adorned with enough gold to please the greediest of bawds.”

“Perie and I will see what we can do.” He inclined his head and, without waiting for an answer, walked off.

By the end of the day, with the help of the sea eagle, he thought Perie was right. There were five sorcerers down in the river valley, and no more. That night, two of them attempted to climb up out of the valley on to the ridge. Perie knew they were on their way long before they were close enough to coerce the sentries into betrayal. He directed Deremer’s archers, and in the morning the bodies lay on the hillside, and the crows gathered to pick out their eyes.

The next few days crawled by after that, with very little happening.

Gerelda muttered that she had no idea war could be so boring. She was also worried about Perie. They all were. He spoke less and less to any of them, and spent much of his time under a young oak tree growing about a mile away. It wasn’t a shrine-oak, and when Gerelda asked why he spent so much time there, he replied, “Because it was born on the same day as me,” and lapsed into silence once more.

“He could be right,” Saker said later, after he’d seen the tree. “It would be about the same age as he is.”

“I’m losing him,” Gerelda said. “I can feel him slipping away, day by day.”

“You think he’s dying?” he asked, alarmed.

“More… fading into a place I cannot reach. Oh, Saker, there has just been too much sorrow and death in his short life.”

He felt the cold pang of bitter failure. He was a witan, yet he didn’t know how to help Peregrine Clary. They all tried: Sorrel, Ardhi, the other clerics, but Perie remained distant and unconnected to life.

“Perhaps when this is finished…” Sorrel suggested. “This battle, I mean. Then things might be more normal. What’s Deremer
waiting
for? It’s driving us crazy!”

“He doesn’t want to relinquish the advantage we have, so we wait for them to come to us,” Saker replied. “And believe me, they will eventually. They are sleepless thanks to all the bites and itches. They are scared because they must now know Valerian is dead. They are hungry because no one is supplying them. The supplies they do have soon rot or are eaten by rats and other vermin. All they have is the fish they can catch.”

“So how do you think it will end?” Gerelda asked.

“I think the sorcerers will coerce their own men to embark on a frontal assault. All or nothing. And we are going to make it nothing.”

Even as he said the words, though, he felt ill. Deremer had made it clear that Saker was to stay out of the fight. His duty was to twin with the eagle and keep everyone informed of what was happening over the entire length of the river-flats. If Deremer had that information, he could command the placement of the archers and the men with arquebuses for the most effective result. Intellectually Saker knew that was good strategy; emotionally he felt like a coward. Gerelda, who could be coerced, would be fighting, and so would Ardhi. Sorrel could be out there on the battlefield too, but even with her glamour, there were still so many ways she could die.

All the while, he would be relatively safe.

“You don’t like Deremer, do you?” Sorrel asked Gerelda the next morning as the two of them broke their fast.

“Never had much time for noblemen,” Gerelda replied. “Too much good manners and not enough heart, or so I find. Deremer is worse than most because he was raised to
have
no heart. Then he found out it was all for the wrong reasons. He’s a mess.”

Sorrel took a sip of the hot drink the cooks had been ladling out and grimaced. She had no idea what had been used to flavour it, but it tasted like spinach. “You know what I find ironic? The Foxes were wealthy and powerful and respected, but what they wanted most of all was to live for ever. Yet most died young, killed by their own children, or by their fathers. Even the really long-lived ones didn’t die in bed of old age. They were murdered.” She shrugged. “Got to be a lesson in there somewhere, but they never seemed to learn it.”

“Oh, pox on’t.” Gerelda peered into her mug, her face screwed up. “This drink is horrible. Why didn’t you warn me?”

“It’s hot. I guess that has to be enough on a cold morning like this one.”

“I just saw Ardhi carting water, barefoot
and
bare-chested! Doesn’t he feel the cold?”

“Not often.” She smiled.
All I have to do is think of him, and I feel happier
…

Gerelda looked at her oddly.

She shrugged. “Can’t help it.”

“You’ve been travelling with those two for how long? Well over two years? Can I ask you an impertinent question – why Ardhi, and not Saker? I mean, you and Saker have so much more in common and I know you are fond of each other. You’re from the same faith, you’re both Shenat, both from farming families…”

“Well, I could say: for the same reasons that a Lowmian lawyer falls hard for an Ardronese witan.”

“Now who told you that?”

Sorrel grinned at her. “No one. But I think it’s true, nonetheless. It doesn’t have to make sense. You look at someone and something just…
fits
.” She was silent for a moment, before adding, “Saker never
needed
me, not to share his life, his dreams and troubles. Ardhi
does
need me that way. And I need him.” She thought about that, and then added, “Come to think of it, that applies to you and Saker. He needs
you
. Or someone like you. Someone… practical, political, knowledgeable. You share things that you both understand.” When Gerelda didn’t answer, she added, “Let me give you an example. When Ardhi and I look at Piper, we just see a child we love. That’s
all
. Nothing else matters. Saker loves her too, but he also sees a Regala’s daughter, a future Regal’s sister, a king’s niece, a potential sorcerer – and all the ramifications of that.”

Gerelda nodded. “Maybe you’re right. He’s certainly the only man who’s made me think settling down might be something to consider.” She shrugged. “But first, there’s a battle to win. Will you be fighting?”