The Mad Giant (Shioni of Sheba Book 3) (14 page)

A
s if cheerfully ignorant
or uncaring of the desperate struggle transpiring on the ground, the early sunshine smiled across the battlefield. Shading her eyes against the glare, Shioni followed the tilt of Anbessa’s chin up the slope leading down to the Mesheha River. If she had jumped into the iciest mountain stream, she would have felt no less chilled by what she saw.

On the hillside overlooking the bridge, hidden from where she had been standing by a
stubby outcropping of rocks, stood three dark-robed people–male or female, she could not tell, for their faces were shadowed by heavy hoods and they all seemed alike to her. Each held aloft a shining orb. Weird, blue-tinged energies crackled around their upraised arms. The air around them shimmered like a mirage over the Danakil desert.

“We
attacked them,” said Anbessa, “and lost several who were good friends as well as allies. You and I need to speak–at a better time. Promise me?”

“
I promise.”

“
For now, whilst I lead the lions against our enemy, will you see what you can do against Kalcha’s apprentices?”

“I–yes, my Lord.”

And with that, Anbessa bounded away to rejoin the battle.

Zi pointed at the apprentices.
“Each of whom has more power in the fingernail of their little finger than we have between us. Are you crazy? What–hey!”

A Wasabi warrior sprang at her! Shioni ducked into his legs
. With the force of his dive he somersaulted over her body. His head struck a boulder with a sickening crack.

Dusting off her palms, Shioni rose
at once to pilfer his weapons. “That was handy–look, a sword and arrows. He must’ve been waiting for Anbessa to leave.”

“Stop being smug and get on with the task!”

“Right. You think tactics whilst I rescue Thunder.”

Ignoring the ‘you’re lucky
I’m your friend’ comments being muttered next to her ear, and Azurelle literally swinging off her hair as she moved, Shioni drew and let fly a clutch of arrows in quick succession. The first two missed–unfamiliar Wasabi arrows or some other no-good excuse, she thought in irritation–but the third and fourth struck their targets and Thunder was able to dart out from between two spearmen, who had been attempting to drive him backward into a culvert amongst the rocks where they must have hoped to finish him off. One more! Her fifth shot zipped right between the horse’s hind legs to thwart a hyena who was trying to sink his fangs into Thunder’s rear leg. Thunder jumped as though he had been stung by a wasp.

Shioni wiped her brow
with the back of her hand. “Too close.”

Zi asked,
“Can you break that barrier down with your mind?”

“Zi! I talk to animals! I’m not a witch!”

“Try, will you?”

Shioni glanced heavenward
as she attempted to gather her scattershot thoughts. What did Anbessa honestly think she could accomplish against those apprentices, who were tearing the air apart with their power? Dear God! The skies above were dark with vultures. Hundreds of wheeling, swooping doom-mongers. They could smell a battle from a day’s journey away. And there was a feast developing for them here.

She
forced herself to shut out the noises of battle; baboons screeching, cats hissing, men shouting, hyenas barking and yapping to each other; the clash of sword upon shield and the groans of the injured. Talaku was roaring triumphantly somewhere down near the bridge. She heard Tariku bellowing orders nearby, rallying his men. Where was Captain Dabir, she wondered? He was supposed to be the leader of this expedition.

But after a minute,
Shioni shook her head. “I’m sorry, Zi, but all I sense is the animals. Those three may as well not be there.”

“
Then move us closer,” the Fiuri urged her. “We
must
think of something.”

Spotting a loose trio of Wasabi warriors
heading her way, Shioni ducked into a patch of giant heath and belly-crawled away from the narrow trail, hiding herself amidst the twisted roots. She hissed as a branch scored bloody furrows along her ribs.

“Get up and help Tariku!” snapped Azurelle.

Shioni sprang to her feet, tearing a strip off her forearm this time; having to balance on the toes of her infected foot. Tariku and his men were facing a burly Wasabi warrior, who had a two-handed hammer and was employing it with devastating skill. Tariku’s shield dangled off his forearm in two pieces–split by the hammer? He sidestepped a tremendous overhand blow, but then slipped and fell to one knee.

She nocked an arrow so fast, she hardly even sensed her hands moving.

“Fly true!” cried Zi.

Twang!

When the Wasabi’s follow-up strike never arrived, Tariku blinked twice in comical surprise. But he was too much the warrior not to take advantage. Darting forward, he sent the unfortunate man to his maker.

Azurelle patted Shioni’s neck. “My dear girl, you must have a thing for backsides!”

Shioni turned bright pink!

A moment later, Tariku
spotted Shioni standing chest-deep in the heath not fifteen paces beyond him, and flipped her a droll salute. “I might have known you’d have something to do with this!” he called.

She grinned
back. “Let me know if you need any further saving!”

“If you could kindly do something about the baboons, we’d be indebted! This side of the river is safe apart from them.”

Along the river, a violent, running scrap had developed between the Gelada baboons and the Sheban Elites, supported by a powerful group of lions and leopards. Sheban warriors were now clearing the bridge, she noticed, securing the banks, and shifting the wounded to safety. But on the far side, Shioni saw the Wasabi horde was pressing in hard. Hyena-faced Wasabi against the dense, armoured clusters of Sheban warriors; discipline restored, the Shebans were putting up a fierce resistance. Their short stabbing spears rose and fell with a peculiar rhythm; a dance of blades slipping between the interlocked shields with guile and deadly effect.

But sheer numbers were against them.
If they were driven back much further, they would have nowhere to go but to throw themselves into the river.

“I’ll try
!”

Tariku and his troop
sprinted back down the trail, their sandals slapping the hard ground urgently. Soon, all that was left of their brief encounter was a dead Wasabi, and the cast-aside remains of Tariku’s shield.

“Zi
–what would you say to trying your blood again?”

She shook her head. “I’ll try anything–but those energies they’re wielding remind me of
Fiuriel’s wild magic. If Kalcha has discovered a way of harnessing wild magic…”

Troubled
beyond words, Shioni held an arrow up so that Zi could pierce her skin with its barbed point. It took no magical savvy to recognise how powerful the orb-energies were. She had already observed how the baboons were fighting with a savagery and purpose beyond the normal–utterly fearless. And the hyenas too were working in teams, harrying the Sheban soldiers in patterns that clearly pointed to an underlying intelligence. That must be the apprentices at work. She took careful aim. It was a long shot, but it would tell them much.

Her
arrow described a beautiful arc across the sky. It seemed to pause slightly before gathering speed as it descended towards Kalcha’s apprentices. Lightning sparked off their shield. Shioni blinked. There was nothing left of that arrow but dust.

“It never reached the enchantment,” said Zi, sounding shaken.

“How are we supposed to… to even get close?”

Shioni was about to slam her fist angrily on the branch nearest her when she saw a chameleon standing in her way.
Her hand stopped mid-air as if held by an unseen, shouted command. Undeterred by the chaos all around, the chameleon was stalking a praying mantis. Shioni’s whole awareness focussed in on the unfolding drama. The chameleon’s tongue, protruded slightly as it took aim; the praying mantis, spying its doom for the first time; the shot of the tongue, to her heightened senses appearing ever-so-lazy, but in reality over in an eye-blink. The chameleon chewed beatifically upon its meal.

A million thoughts scrambled for prominence in her mind.

“What? What, Shioni? You have an idea, don’t you?” cried Zi, hopping so much with excitement that Shioni felt her fall and tug her hair sharply as she caught herself. Ouch! She should have tied back her hair! No mind… “What… oh. But you can’t fight them with bugs and earthworms, you crazy, sheep-brained–”

“No, not worms,” Shioni said dreamily.

Summoning up every ounce of her concentration, Shioni delved her mind into the dirt beneath where Kalcha’s apprentices were standing. Beetles, millipedes, larvae, earthworms; it was a whole miniature world down there. She took a deep breath. No, no, there had to be more. She rooted about for what seemed an age…
there
.

“
Of course,” said Zi. “Ants!”

“Yes, but how can I wake them?”

“Scents,” said the Fiuri, at once. “Not pictures or thoughts, they are simple creatures. You want the scent of food.”

“Yes…”

Somewhere close to the trio, just beneath the hard, cracked soil, between the roots of a clump of tan grass, was a lovely warm bivouac of army ants a little larger than her head. It registered on Shioni’s consciousness as a constellation of excruciatingly small pinpricks of life. And all they needed was the right prompt. A little encouragement to help them emerge. She struggled for what seemed an endless time, trying to understand their world and their needs, before she finally grasped the right straw. And then… nothing? Oh, yes! Now she could feel the pinpricks stirring… swelling… marching.

The army ants came boiling up from the ground, scattering every other kind of insect before them in a frenzy of terror–for as she knew, army ants eat anything that moves. In seconds, the dust was black with their bodies.

Up,
Shioni urged them with her utmost strength.
Up to your food.
And they began to climb, up the legs, beneath the robes of the apprentices, into all the inviting places where food was to be found.

“What’s happening?” whispered Azurelle, straining her eyes.

“Just a second…”

Locked into a trance of their own making, the trio of magic
wielders neither moved nor flinched as thousands of tiny feet rushed up their bodies. But then, one of the three felt something on their arm and slapped it. And that was the trigger.

As one, the
army ants sank their mandibles into the flesh of Kalcha’s apprentices.

It was horrible.

Shioni had no need of Azurelle exclaiming in her ear to feel sickened at what she had done. The three apprentices collapsed in a screaming, gesticulating heap of bodies, thrashing and rolling about in a desperate attempt to rub the biting ants off of them or crush them. But as she well knew, an army ant would continue to bite even if its body was broken off, and each bite stung like fire. Thousands? The pain must have been excruciating.

Her heart lurched as she saw Anbessa and two of his lionesses come racing past her toward the apprentices, fangs bared in fury.
Shioni averted her eyes from what promised to be a terrible mauling. She focused on the battlefield instead. But it was impossible to fully shut out the nearby sounds of snarling and shrieking, which was quickly cut off. She saw that the mass of Gelada baboons was breaking up. They were battling to escape the Sheban Elites rather than fighting against them. And across the river, hyena turned upon hyena; hyenas turned upon both their Wasabi masters and the Sheban warriors too. Talaku and Tariku were rallying the Sheban Elites, driving into the massed Wasabi until, with cries of fear, the hyena-painted warriors turned tail and scattered.

Turning once more to survey the hillside, Shioni observed Anbessa standing above his kill. Baring his great canines, the Lord of the Simien Mountains unleashed a roar of terrible majesty–announcing the victory.

Now the Sheban Elites could count the cost.

G
lare! Trussed like a
chicken bound for Mama’s pot, Shioni could do nothing but glare at Captain Dabir as he trotted self-importantly along the column of Sheba’s Elite warriors later that afternoon after the battle. Stuffy, self-righteous vulture! Egotistical son of a goat! She could think of a hundred names to call him as the warriors limped along the trail that would lead back to Castle Hiwot.

Thunder was glaring too. He had not stopped fuming ever since she had woken from her drugged slumber to find herself lashed to his back. He was tied to the back of a cart, to his vocal disgust. Talaku lay inside the cart, trussed even more firmly than she was, with the weapons belts of about fifty warriors. But at least he was not gagged. Shioni had been gagged with a bit of cloth which was as fragrant as a warrior’s sandals after a day-long forced march. Her hands, lashed behind her back, were aching
unbearably. She half-wished they would drop off and save her the pain, because she was a mass of bruises and hurts. And where was Azurelle?

She was having a bad day.

The Sheban Elites, having spent the remainder of the morning binding up their wounds, paused for a midday meal salvaged from the remaining rations. Dabir had appeared like the proverbial piece of rotten fruit in a barrel to reassert his authority, which caused some noticeable muttering amongst the warriors that he quelled with barked orders and kicks where his orders were not obeyed swiftly enough. As for Desta, he had vanished as completely as Anbessa and his forces. Shioni remembered thinking her ration of vegetable wot had tasted a little odd, but had been far too hungry to be picky.

A donkey had more brains than her.

Now she could not even kick herself. Neither could Talaku, but that made her feel no better. To think Dabir was devious and farsighted enough to carry some kind of sleeping drug with him! Jaw-dropping. Creepy. She had utterly underestimated the Captain.

Hearing a new sound, she turned to see Tariku approaching on horseback. Hiding his hand from casual view by others, he made a gesture. Calm down? Be cool? Shioni felt as if she was a pool of lava threatening to bubble over.

Tariku reached over to loosen her gag. He yanked the wad of cloth out of her mouth. “Water?”

She nodded. He raised a water gourd to her lips.

“You’re frying in the sun.”

“I’m frying with fury, Tariku!”

“Shh.” He looked around quickly, and then muttered from the corner of his mouth, “Not a single warrior believes Dabir. He apparently got stuck under one of the carts during the battle. I’ve smelled meat so rotten even a hyena wouldn’t touch it, that stinks less than his story. Okay? But we’ve got to get you back in one piece first. The other Captains and I are–shut your mouth and keep it shut, hear me? Here comes old hyena-face himself.”

Unsnapping another gourd from his belt, Tariku began to smear aloe juice mixed with herbs on her face and neck.

“And how is the prisoner, Tariku?” Dabir sounded terribly pleased with himself.

“Suitably uncomfortable, sir.”

“What are you doing?”

“Giving the slave-girl a drink of water, sir. We would want the prisoner fit and well to face any interrogation, sir.”

Dabir stared suspiciously at Tariku for almost a minute, before sniffing, “Enough of that babying, soldier! Carry on with your duties.”

“Sir.” Tariku’s face was a mask. Once the Captain had moved on, he muttered, “We plan to give General Getu the real story. Now behave yourself and we’ll get you out of this, or I’m no better than an ulcer under a hyena’s tongue. Understand?”

“Tariku… thanks.”

He nodded. “Medicine? More water? How’s the foot?”

“Passable.” Shioni took a sip from the proffered gourd. Amazing stuff, Mama’s medicine! Her leg was visibly improved, but the painful throbbing in her foot remained. At least the medicine took the edge off that.

“Have to put this back. Sorry.”

“Wait. Thunder, where’s our friend?”

“In your bag,” she heard; the tiniest of whispers.

“In the cart,” said Tariku. “Drugged to the eyeballs. Dabir wasn’t sure how much to give a giant so he gave him masses. Like stunning an elephant.”

As Tariku retied her gag, Thunder harrumphed, “If General Getu doesn’t kill Dabir first, I think Zi will do that for him. She’s furious. Hopping more than you made Kalcha’s apprentices dance, I tell you. As am I. If that Dabir dares to come near me…”

Dance they had indeed, thought Shioni. Their final dance. It was an end grislier by far than she could have imagined. Only one orb had survived being dropped to the ground, and that was apparently safely ensconced in Dabir’s saddlebag. Along with her garnet. Well, not that a slave-girl could actually
own
anything!

After binding up their wounds, and realising that their dream of raiding Chiro Leba was the ashes of yesterday’s fire, Dabir had made the decision to march back to Castle Hiwot as quickly as possible. But not without a prize. His pride would not allow otherwise.

After all, Shioni fumed, he would have been disgraced. But Tariku’s words gave her renewed hope; hope that saw her through the day.