Beyond the Mists of Katura

Chapter 15

Ystormun howled in the mind of his host body, driving the shaman to his knees.

‘You will not retreat. You will never retreat! How dare you speak your fear? Victory is close if only you have the wit to grasp it.’

‘My lord,’ managed the shaman, his hands pushed into the ground to keep himself from sprawling face down in the mud. The tribal lords and their elder shamen were gathered about him, fearing to touch him in case they should suffer similar pain. ‘You cannot combat their speed. We touched so few and they killed so many of us.’

‘Where were your guards? Did they stand or did they run?’

‘You can only run from what you can see.’

‘Idiot!’ Ystormun fired pain into his host’s mind. ‘I will speak with them.’

Ystormun flowed across the shaman’s mind and dragged the body to its feet. He stalked around the eight gathered before him, seeing them shrink from his gaze. He stopped before a tribal lord whose name he had to recall from the mind of his host.

‘Gorsu, explain your failure.’

‘Not one of my warriors turned and fled. Run down by cavalry, burned by spells and cut to ribbons by elves moving at evil speed, they stood their ground and tried to defend their charges. It was not failure, it was brave defeat.’

‘Defeat is failure,’ said Ystormun. ‘And you will not fail again. Now you are aware of their speed, you know what to expect. At dawn you will concentrate your forces on the gates and you will break them. You will enter the city and hunt down every elf. I will have Auum’s head mounted in my chambers and you will bring it to me or you will die trying. Our power will not be denied. The city falls tomorrow.’

‘But-’

‘You question me?’

Gorsu held out his hands in a placatory gesture. ‘Please, no. But our efforts have so far failed to break either gates or walls. Your powers are not enough to shiver stone.’

‘Then you must break them by other means. Scale the walls, shoot the mages from the ramparts. But you will not retreat. I will not suffer cowardice.’ Ystormun stared at Gorsu. ‘A lord who hates magic should be honoured to perish seeking its downfall.’

‘I am one such,’ said Gorsu.

‘Then. .?’

‘We will do as you command, Lord Ystormun.’

‘Naturally.’

Ystormun left the host body and it slumped to the ground on hands and knees, retching and shuddering. Gorsu watched it convulse a few times before concluding that Ystormun was definitely elsewhere. He landed a savage kick into the shaman’s gut, spinning him onto his back, clutching at this new pain with both hands.

‘If he was before me now. .’ said Gorsu.

‘Then you would be cringing and begging for another breath of life,’ said Jhalzan, lord of the Northern Marches.

Gorsu spun to face him. ‘And you would be on your belly like the snake you are. Care to have me put you there now?’

Jhalzan stared at Gorsu with cold eyes. He didn’t make a move towards a weapon.

‘We are all afraid when a Wytch Lord is among us,’ he said. ‘Kicking young Navar is akin to kicking your horse because you fell from his back.’

‘He spoke Ystormun’s words.’

‘But he is not Ystormun,’ said Lorok, Gorsu’s own elder shaman, a Wesman clad in bone and hide and tattooed so heavily it was hard to tell the age of his skin. But he was old, unnaturally so. ‘And we have until first light to plan an assault. Perhaps we should pray to calm ourselves, break bread, eat meat and find a way to do as Ystormun bids.’

Gorsu looked down at Navar, who was staring at him as if waiting for the next blow.

‘What was he doing inside you? Why is he here?’

‘Because the elves are here and he hates the elves above all things,’ said Navar, gasping for breath. ‘His touch is far harsher than that of Belphamun but his mind is not guarded.’

Gorsu snarled. ‘It sickens me that we are forced to do his bidding. We are Wesmen! Why do I find myself tethered to the whim of a creature with no skin?’

‘Must we have this again?’ asked Jhalzan. ‘Without them we would all be dead by now, burned or frozen or worse. Have patience, old friend. When eastern magic is gone, we can build free of its stink. We won’t need the cadre then, and there are only six of them.’

‘But with such power,’ said Lorok.

‘Only because it comes from the fingers of every shaman,’ said Jhalzan. ‘How will they dominate this world when you refuse to be a conduit for them?’

Lorok said nothing, but Gorsu saw the look that passed between him and Navar. The young shaman got to his feet and brushed dust and debris from his cloak. He looked at Gorsu as if expecting an apology. Gorsu pointedly turned his back on him and looked at Julatsa’s walls. They were more than forty feet high, but the Wesmen had ladders to scale them.

And would, but for the mages up there by the hundred and those elven warriors who moved so fast and fought so hard. By all accounts they were few, perhaps only a hundred, but their skills were already known to every warrior, and the stories would become taller around the fires tonight. Gorsu needed a way to combat them.

‘Lorok, a question.’

Lorok came to his shoulder. ‘Yes, my lord?’

‘Combined casting is the only way to achieve long range, is that right?’

‘Yes. The joining of so many minds lends distance and strength.’

‘My problem is that we will need multiple castings as we scale the walls. How close must you be for each shaman to target individual elves or mages?’

‘Well within spell range of the enemy,’ said Lorok.

Gorsu shrugged. ‘My warriors too. We are all throwing ourselves headlong into battle at the behest of your masters.’

‘Our masters,’ corrected Lorok.

‘There is no one alive who is my master,’ said Gorsu tersely. ‘How close do you have to be to target those on the walls? We must have time to climb and space to fight when we reach the ramparts.’

Lorok looked at him blankly. ‘I understand the basics of taking the walls, Lord Gorsu.’

Gorsu managed a smile. ‘Of course. But the Wytch Lords have provided you with nothing but their demonic fire, and I would not send my warriors into battle without shields for those who wish them.’

‘Making a shield is simple. Developing a casting to protect from magical attack is not,’ said Lorok. ‘Do your hide barriers deflect magical fire?’

Gorsu growled. ‘Ystormun wishes us to take a college city with inferior weapons. Perhaps he should be standing with us.’

‘Perhaps you should be careful what you say, Lord Gorsu.’

‘Why?’ Gorsu turned to face Lorok. ‘Are my words being relayed to your masters then?’

Lorok shook his head. ‘That is unworthy of you.’

‘Is it? I am not the only tribesman wondering where the loyalties of our shamen really lie. Nor am I the only one wondering if you can really turn your backs on the power they grant you.’

‘How long have I been your shaman?’ asked Lorok. ‘And in all that time have I given you one reason to doubt my loyalty to you and our tribe?’

Gorsu shrugged.

‘Then why do you question me now? I and my brothers are going to support you tomorrow and many of us will lose our lives doing so. We are proud Wesmen, we are the shepherds of your spirits. It saddens me that you’re suspicious of us.’

‘The world has changed, Lorok. I do not feel master of my own destiny, and that makes me suspicious. Your masters have ordered us to mount an attack that is ill judged and unnecessary. Should we win we will be weakened, and should we lose we will rot, and Ystormun and Belphamun will merely look for more fodder. This is not our way.’

‘It is our only chance to break human magic,’ said Lorok.

‘We will never break it,’ said Gorsu, and he felt a shameful pang of hopelessness.

‘Never speak such words,’ hissed Lorok.

‘The truth is inconvenient, is it?’ Gorsu turned away from Lorok. ‘My Lords Jhalzan and Hafeez, my cook fire is hot and the stew is strong; the drink is stronger still. Join me and let’s plot our victory.’

Gorsu glanced back at Lorok.

‘And you know what you must do. See that your brothers are ready.’

Auum flexed his left hand and sensed the weakness in his arm. He felt lost and alone. The Wesmen might have been bruised but they had not fallen back, and tomorrow would bring another battle. More TaiGethen would die, and Auum needed to run with them, even if he couldn’t hold a blade.

Doubts crowded his mind. He needed Drech but Drech was gone. Takaar too. That should have pleased him, but he could not shake the feeling that he had made the wrong decision. Stein and Ulysan had no such worries, but Takaar was out there beyond any sort of control and, for all Gilderon’s assurances, would do exactly as he pleased.

‘We had the right to kill him and we didn’t,’ he said. ‘Why not?’

‘Because he’s Takaar,’ said Ulysan.

Auum turned sharply from his vantage point on the highest balcony of the Julatsan college tower. It gave him a view across the calm city all the way to the furthest Wesmen campfires. Dawn was only a couple of hours away, and Auum had long since given up on sleep.

‘It comes to something when I can’t hear your heavy boots,’ said Auum. ‘Is that why we showed him mercy?’

Ulysan shrugged. ‘Why else? Deep down I still hope that he’ll come back to us and be the elf he once was. Stupid I know, but it’s what I’ve always hoped.’

‘I loved him,’ said Auum, feeling suddenly on the edge of tears and cursing himself for the weakness. ‘I so wanted him to see past his guilt and his paranoia, but he can’t, can he? You aren’t stupid, Ulysan. We all wish for the same and we’re all disappointed so often, aren’t we?’

‘But your hope hasn’t died, has it?’

Auum shook his head. ‘No, curse him. And try as I might to hate him, I can’t maintain it. I can’t dismiss him.’

‘So stop wasting your energies on Takaar. Concentrate on our real enemies.’

‘I do, and I fear their magic. Even under the shetharyn I was hurt, and we lost seven. Seven. Their black fire is an indiscriminate power and its touch is so harsh. We can’t play such a game of chance again, and I can’t see another way to take the fight to them.’ Auum walked back into the antechamber and sat on a bench. ‘And if they choose not to attack us, what then? Yniss preserve me, I wish we’d never left Calaius.’

Ulysan followed and sat next to him. For a time the two of them stared at the tapestries and paintings hung around the room. They were dour images of the building of Julatsa and the council in session.

‘You know we had no choice.’

‘I tell you something else: if I ever see Calaius again, I will deny I was ever here. And should I ever decide to board ship to this barren, stinking country again, you have my permission to kill me.’

Auum felt so confused. In the rainforest it was all so clear, yet here where you could see everything laid out, it was all obscured. He put his face in his hands.

‘If we break the siege, what then? I can’t agree to fight alongside Xetesk.’

‘Stein says it’s our best chance of success.’

‘I know the numbers, but in my soul it feels wrong. The Wytch Lords were spawned from the type of mage that now inhabits Xetesk, weren’t they?’

‘That was hundreds of years ago. In the lifetimes of men that’s an eternity,’ said Ulysan.

‘Then why do I feel we are being dragged in the wrong direction? I don’t like not knowing what’s ahead.’

‘I think we have to trust Stein and Kerela and the other Julatsans.’

‘Why?’ Auum rubbed at his left arm. ‘Stein maybe but the rest. . well. . You know what I think.’

‘Let’s take this a day at a time,’ said Ulysan. ‘We’re nowhere if we can’t break the Wesmen here.’

Auum felt a fractional release of tension.

‘Any ideas on that front? We have to think of something different.’

‘Just one,’ said Ulysan. ‘Think about it the other way to today’s battles. We need to get our mages and Il-Aryn close enough to threaten the shamen, because we know we can take the fighters. The question is, whose casters have the greater range?’

The door to the antechamber opened. A soldier, out of breath and red in the face, came in.

‘My Lord Auum, General Harild wants you on the walls at the main gates,’ he said in stilted but passable elvish.

‘I am no lord,’ said Auum, smiling at the young human.

‘Why didn’t he get a mage to relay a message?’ asked Ulysan.

The soldier blushed scarlet. ‘I asked to come. I wanted to meet you, speak to you in your language.’

Auum felt an unexpected rush of warmth and took the soldier’s hand, shaking it as was the human custom before kissing his forehead.

‘Well done, although I can’t imagine why you should want to meet me.’

If it was possible, the soldier’s red cheeks reddened further. ‘You are Auum. Your freeing of Calaius is famous. And I saw you fight out there. Can I learn to be that fast?’

Auum laughed and stepped back. ‘What’s your name?’

‘Tilman,’ he said. ‘My family’s mostly farmers.’

‘Well, Tilman, your elvish is impressive and you can improve upon it until your dying day. But our speed is given to us by Yniss and no human will ever be so blessed. I admire your ambition, though.’ Auum winked at Ulysan. ‘That’s two humans I like now.’

‘What’s going on out there?’ asked Ulysan. ‘Why are we needed on the walls?’

‘The Wesmen are gathering. It’s a change of plan for them. They have brought, um. . I don’t know the word. . to climb the walls.’

‘Ladders?’ said Auum. ‘Good. That spares me a few awkward decisions, doesn’t it?’

‘I suppose,’ said Ulysan. ‘But unless they’ve chosen to sacrifice themselves in an ocean of mage fire, they must have thought of some way to protect their warriors during the assault.’

‘Well, there’s only one way to find out. Lead on, Tilman. I want to know more about you before the spells start to fly.’