Beyond the Mists of Katura

Chapter 33

As soon as they were around the first long bend and out of sight of the Xeteskians, Takaar had been freed to run with them. Gilderon was shaking. The moments between Takaar’s perceived slights and the seemingly inevitable retribution were becoming shorter and shorter. Where it had been days in the festering while his damned other self got to work on the increasingly small rational part of his mind, now. . Well, this latest outburst spoke eloquently enough to his state of mind.

The only mercy was that Takaar had retained enough to inflict that cruellest of deaths on the horse not the man. Gilderon wondered if they had chosen to rededicate themselves to Takaar prematurely, though the next moment he was certain their decision had been right. After all, who else was capable of seeing Takaar to his target? The question now was whether he chose to do as he planned or do something utterly beyond reason.

Helodian had sprinted on ahead to a spot illuminated by the dim light of lanterns. The smell of woodsmoke filtered along the pass, which was about fifteen feet high and wide enough for a carriage and horses flanked by riders. It was an astonishing feat of construction.

Takaar ran beside Gilderon. His face was clear and calm and he was focused on the path ahead as if what he had just said and done was no more than a dim nightmare from centuries past. Gilderon had been with Takaar for so many hundreds of years and thought he’d seen all there was, but for the first time Takaar actually scared him, and he was forced to consider what he would do if the once-great elf lost the last vestiges of his control.

Helodian came trotting back.

‘Significant presence four hundred yards ahead. Once this gentle left turn has straightened, we’ll have eyes on them. They’ll see us for the last thirty yards or so in their lantern light.’

‘How many?’ asked Gilderon, slowing them all down.

‘Twenty that I can see backed by eight or nine of their shamen. They’ve built a barricade that may well be hiding many more. Our advantage is that the pass is tight and we can fill it and wear them down.’

‘No,’ said Takaar. ‘Your advantage is that you have me. You have battles to come; I shall deal with them.’

Gilderon stopped them as soon as he could see the lanterns and the warriors leaning on spears or resting against the walls or the wood of their eight-foot-tall barricade. The shamen were in a group around a fire, talking and gesticulating. As he watched, an opening in the barricade was unbolted and he caught a glimpse of a great deal more Wesmen behind it.

‘We can deal with this, Takaar,’ he said. ‘Our role is to protect you.’

‘The shamen will kill you before you get within ten yards. Don’t question me.’

That last was said as if from another mouth. Gilderon was about to protest further but Takaar was clearly wrestling with himself and his expression was of ill-controlled impulse.

‘Show them mercy,’ was all he could manage.

Takaar moved off along the dark passage towards the Wesman lantern light. Gilderon pitied them, hearing one side of Takaar’s conversation.

‘Fire can only be drawn from the fuel already there. It is not enough. . You are showing your ignorance as always. To use the air is terribly draining. . Now you’re thinking. The raw material surrounds us and we have only to prod in the right place.’

Unconsciously the Senserii had drawn back from Takaar and had moved together, unsettled by the energies he was beginning to marshal. Inside the tight confines of the pass Ix’s power felt multiplied, and it roared through their bodies on its way to do whatever Takaar required.

Takaar was walking forward steadily, his head twitching from side to side as if seeking something minute, his hands trembling and his fingers jerking, closing and opening while he teased at his target. Fifty yards from the barricade and deep in shadow he stopped.

‘It will be loud,’ he said. ‘Cover your ears.’

Takaar moved off quickly, his hands outstretched in front of his face, palms away from him. Gilderon led the Senserii forward at a run. Ahead, the Wesmen began to make out dim shapes in the gloom beyond the light of their lanterns and fire. Warriors plucked weapons from where they rested and the shamen were ready to cast should they prove to be enemies.

The first effect of Takaar’s spell was a series of dull cracks from up ahead. Takaar’s fingers wiggled in what would have been comic fashion in other circumstances but to Gilderon, it only made what came next all the more terrifying. The shamen moved to cast. Warriors lined up to give them cover.

They should all have been running.

Takaar, not breaking stride, drew his arms back, jabbed them forward hard and closed his fists. The roof above the Wesmen collapsed, smashing their bodies into the ground and extinguishing the fire and lanterns. The noise ripped into Gilderon’s head despite the hands clamped over his ears and he roared a curse as much at the sight as the sound.

Down and down came the rock, splintering the barricade. Through the clouds of dust and debris thrown up into the pass Gilderon saw Wesmen turning to run. It was impossible to hear their screams but they must have been loud until shut off by the torrent of mountain battering their bodies, bursting their skulls and crushing their limbs from their twitching corpses.

Takaar walked on, repeating his gestures. More boulders came thundering down. Smears of black appeared briefly on the walls before being eclipsed by the dust, which billowed down the pass towards the Senserii. Gilderon held his breath and turned away while the force of it rolled over him impelled by a gust of Ix-inspired wind, buffeting his body and tearing at his clothes.

He could barely see Takaar a few feet ahead of him. The mad elf circled his hands and pushed, adding more power to the wind, which now blew away from them, whipping up the dust into spirals and driving it away from the scene of his atrocity so all could view what he had wrought.

Immediately the air was clear, Takaar set off again, his hands cocked, ready to cause another rockfall. Gilderon stared for a heartbeat at the awful devastation and ran in front of him, turning and grabbing his arms.

‘Enough!’ he shouted. ‘Enough! Look what you’ve done! Yniss spare us from the wrath of Shorth, look what you’ve done.’

Takaar’s gaze, lost in the energies he manipulated, darted around Gilderon before settling on his face. He tried to move his arms but Gilderon held on tight, this time heedless of the risk he might be running.

‘Enough,’ he repeated. ‘You’ve killed them. You’ve killed them all.’

Takaar’s body relaxed, and the weight of energies dissipated, leaving a quiet broken by the rumbling of echoes. Gilderon looked to his Senserii.

‘Go among them. If any live, speed their passing and pray for their souls.’ His voice cracked and he stared back at Takaar. ‘No one should die like that.’

Gilderon walked with Takaar, who seemed in a daze. Whether he had any notion of what he had just done was questionable. They picked their way through the rubble and debris, which reached halfway up to the roof in places. Gilderon looked up at it, fearful of another fall.

‘Did you know that even the most solid of rock has tiny fractures? All I had to do was make them bigger.’ Takaar’s smile was ephemeral. ‘Simple, really.’

‘You can never do this again,’ whispered Gilderon. ‘It is not right. Yniss cannot countenance this.’

‘Where the rock is hard for a horse to pass I will make it dust. We must leave a path,’ said Takaar.

The Senserii knelt and rose as they searched. Nowhere did they find a living Wesman. Gilderon swallowed. They walked past a bloodied hand on the ground, fingers open. The arm disappeared beneath a fall of rock which must have crushed the body flat. Something was caught in the dead fingers.

Takaar knelt down and picked it up. In his hands lay a child’s doll in the likeness of a warrior. He held it up to Gilderon before his face crumpled, and he wailed for the lost, for what he had done and for who he had become.

Dawn on the day that would decide the fate of Balaia, Calaius and the Wesmen was chill and grey and entirely fitting. The feast of the night before had often been tense and the atmosphere occasionally aggressive, but Auum had enjoyed it nonetheless. He’d spent most of the evening with Sentaya and Tilman, putting together a series of commands they could all understand.

Stein had suffered almost constant abuse and sported a livid bruise on one cheek as testament to the only punch thrown. Sentaya had reacted furiously to it, halting the feast to reaffirm the nature of the alliance that would last until the battle was done. The offender had almost managed to pass Stein a cup of broth as a gesture of reconciliation but somehow it had fallen on his feet instead.

Stein might have taken renewed offence at the second affront but instead had chosen to tip back his head and laugh. Auum smiled at the memory. Stein was a fine diplomat, and there were probably a few Wesman warriors lined up behind the stockade this morning wondering quite why they hated all man’s magic so much.

Close to midnight the sound of many hundreds of voices singing had broken the mood in the village, and Stein, of course, had suggested a final event to boost the confidence of the Wesmen doomed to face their Wytch Lord-backed rivals at sunrise. A series of races and tasks of agility had been organised along with sparring and wrestling.

Grudgingly Auum had agreed to the notion, but the TaiGethen had won every challenge, their use of shetharyn drawing gasps and the laughter of the disbelieving in equal measure.

‘I ask you, do you wish to face any TaiGethen seeking your throat?’ Sentaya had roared, and following the cacophonous negative, he had jabbed a finger in the direction of the approaching enemy. ‘Neither do they!’

And so it came to this: Wesman Lord, TaiGethen warrior and eastern mage standing side by side. Auum stood between the other two, just in case. They had not exactly clasped hands on the alliance, but Auum had caught them speaking to each other as the feast broke up. Sentaya might have been smiling. Then again it might have been a panther’s grin; he had a very fierce face.

The three stood at the head of their forces outside the stockade which they hoped would provide brief but vital shelter when the time came. The ranks were lined up as bait for the enemy massing about three hundred yards distant. Ystormun’s men had already encountered the first of Stein’s wards, which had slowed their advance dramatically. Neither Ystormun nor his shamen were divining them, just as Stein had predicted.

‘They might as well run headlong for all the good it’ll do them,’ muttered Stein. ‘Going tiptoe across them makes you just as dead.’

‘I’ll be right behind you when you trot out and let them know,’ said Ulysan.

‘Are all your Communion minds open?’ asked Auum.

‘Yes.’ Stein indicated Sentaya’s outbuildings. ‘He wouldn’t let us in the house but the cattle don’t mind us. A quick shout and you can have your cells on their way in.’

Auum nodded and sent a prayer to Tual to bless his hidden teams with sure feet and swift strikes. The indefatigable Faleen was heading three cells positioned in the deep reeds bordering the lake about a mile north of the enemy. Merrat and Merke’s cells were waiting in a belt of woodland less than two miles to the east.

Auum watched Sentaya’s face as the tribal banners became clearer and the shamen’s garb stood out among the furs and leather of their warrior flock. Sentaya had about a hundred and fifty blades at his disposal, drawn from his village and from a cluster of small settlements around the southern end of the lake. His two elder sons commanded a third each as did he. All wore tribal marks on their faces, blue lines on their cheeks and white diagonals on their foreheads.

‘It’ll make us easy for your TaiGethen to spot when the lines are broken,’ Sentaya had said.

Sentaya was uncomfortable standing and waiting, and even more so at the notion of hiding inside his stockade when the spells started to fall. He knew it made sense, but it went against every instinct and felt like cowardice. Worse, he would be inside his stockade as the battle was joined because magic was being employed on his behalf. Auum understood his turmoil.

‘What do you know of them?’ asked Auum, nodding his head at the enemy.

Stein, as always, translated. Sentaya spat between his feet before he spoke.

‘I see banners from the Heconn, the Kistoi, the Rekine and the Calamet. Worthy fighters but they darkened the soul of all Wesmen when they bent the knee to grasp power they thought they could own. There is plenty of reason to hate them.’

Sentaya paused and scanned the undulating rock-strewn ground across which they were coming. A ward detonated to the left. Fire roared into the air, carrying two bodies with it. The screams were brief. Warriors paused but were ordered on, and the dead were left where they fell. Sentaya closed his eyes briefly and muttered what Auum understood to be a prayer of forgiveness.

‘Is what we are doing any different to the black fire the shamen will use to try and kill you?’ asked Auum.

Sentaya stared at him but did not reply. Instead he focused back on the enemy.

‘We must be wary of the shamen. These are not village holy men. So many of those claiming the robes are little more than vessels for Wytch Lord magic. They are not steeped in the spirits and have never studied or lived as they are required to. They are deep in the ways of the spirits and the Wytch Lords, though, shamen schooled inside Parve’s temples. Dangerous and powerful, able to channel far more effectively.’

Auum felt a moment of anxiety though he had to expect Ystormun would have brought the best that he could, the most loyal.

‘Have we had word of Takaar’s progress yet?’ he asked Stein.

‘Nothing. We know he’s trying to get here but no more.’ Stein turned a slightly nervous smile on Auum. ‘Don’t worry. We can send his spirit to cower in his temple and give Sentaya all he needs to ally the mass of Wesmen against the Wytch Lords. We’ll win this.’

‘You really believe that?’

‘You’re my brother, Auum, but if I didn’t believe it, I wouldn’t be standing here with a sworn enemy while facing one of Balaia’s most powerful creatures.’

‘You’re scared?’ asked Auum.

‘Terrified,’ said Stein. ‘This is a Wytch Lord in his own lands. He will draw directly on the power residing in his temple. The Ystormun you saw in Calaius was a child by comparison.’

In front of them the Wesman army stopped on a single command. They were in loose formation, wary of traps. They spread further to the left towards the lake and to the right, meaning to attack the village on three sides. Ystormun also knew they would clear the wards for his shamen in the process. Archers were among the axe and sword carriers. The shamen were clustered in groups of eight and positioned some thirty yards behind the warriors.

They were silent. A carriage rolled up onto a rise more than a hundred yards behind the broad single line. It was guarded by shamen and warriors.

‘Ready?’ asked Auum.

‘Always,’ said Sentaya, using an elven word he’d been taught the night before.

‘Die old, not today,’ said Auum. ‘Stein, get the strike teams running.’

A call began at the far right of the Wesman line and rippled all the way along it, setting birds to flight and the hairs standing on Auum’s arms. It was a call for strength and courage.

‘It’s the coronyl,’ said Sentaya.

The call died away. Horns sounded and the Wesmen charged

The ground was firm, clear and easy beneath Faleen’s feet, allowing her to reach a prodigious speed. The temptation to drop into the shetharyn was great, but they would need that in due course if they were to escape with their lives. Her Tai of Haloor and Jyrrian struggled to keep pace and she looked across to the Tais of Oryaal and Dodann, seeing their strides lengthen as they coursed across the ground.

It was a thrilling run. Ahead she could see the tail of the Wesman force. The supply wagons were drawn up in a line, their backs to her approach. A few guards were scattered about them, but her prize was the Wesman reserve and Ystormun’s carriage, which lay beyond them.

Away to the east she saw swift movement over the grass. Merrat and Merke’s cells cruised towards the enemy. The picture was complete. All they needed from the village was. .

A rippling series of detonations eclipsed the war cries of the Wesman attackers. Smoke billowed into the air and flames grasped at the sky. There were screams of pain and roared orders. Bodies were flung high to land broken and burned on the ground. As one, the Wesman reserve force, over a hundred warriors, turned to stare at the carnage meted out to their brethren.

The three cells formed a fighting line on the sprint, racing around the right-hand side of the wagon line. Faleen drew her twin blades and attacked. She chopped a blade into the lower back of a guard, pacing on to smash her other blade into the buttocks of another.

She was past them both before they had a chance to cry out. Haloor spear-kicked another in the back of the neck, landed and swept a blade into the skull of a second, clearing his path to the reserve. Jyrrian hurled a jaqrui at his target, missing him by a breath. The blade mourned away, thudding into the shoulder of a reserve warrior.

The Wesman yelled his pain and turned just as his comrades awoke to the attack. At a barked command they drew their weapons and faced Faleen’s nine. Oryaal took his cell left and Dodann’s split right. Faleen crashed into the centre of them, and simultaneously Merrat and Merke hammered into their left flank.

Blades clashed and sparked and the Wesmen yelled for support; the shamen would not be long in coming. Faleen dropped to her haunches and swept the legs from her opponent. He fell heavily, and she stepped on the blade of his axe and thrust a sword into his throat.

She rose to her feet, blocked a sword strike to her midriff and stepped right, catching the flat of an axe on her right-hand blade. She forced the weapon up and thrust her second blade into the warrior’s armpit. Haloor’s blade deflected a stab at her exposed left flank. He kicked out straight, forcing a small space. Jyrrian came through into it, planting a roundhouse kick into the temple of his target and sending him stumbling back. Faleen followed up, opening his gut and dumping his entrails into the dust. She paced back and moved left with her Tai, leaving the Wesman to scream and fall to his knees, staring at his own innards.

‘Shamen incoming!’ called Dodann.

‘Break and cover,’ shouted Faleen. She ducked an axe swing and drove a kick into her attacker’s knee, forcing it backwards, breaking bone and ripping tendon and muscle. ‘Shetharyn at your discretion.’

Haloor and Jyrrian came to her shoulders. The Wesmen had backed up a pace. Orders sang through their chaotic lines. To her left the fighting remained intense where Merke and Merrat were pressing.

‘Don’t give them room to get the shamen at us,’ said Faleen. ‘Oryaal, push on!’

Faleen raced in again, her speed of foot and hand difficult for the Wesmen to counter. Haloor paced up and leaped, his heels connecting with an enemy chest, knocking his target over. He rode the fall, swiping his blades to the left and right, having one blocked and the other cut a Wesman face from cheek to cheek.

Faleen followed him in, Jyrrian at her left. Wesmen began to close about them, seeing in Dodann’s withdrawal the chance to bring pressure on the TaiGethen for the first time.

Faleen’s right blade struck the sword hand from a warrior aiming a blow at Haloor. Her left fenced away a quick stab to her groin and she swayed left to avoid another, feeling it slice her jacket and nick the flesh over her ribs.

Faleen gasped at the sudden pain. She ducked another swing. The blow was beaten upwards by Jyrrian, who followed it with a killing thrust to the chest. Haloor turned a backward somersault and landed next to her.

‘Tai, we need out of this press,’ said Faleen. ‘Where’s Dodann?’

Haloor moved right to force a little room. Jyrrian felled another Wesman, whose overhead strike had left him off balance and exposed. The three of them took a pace back. Oryaal was a few paces to their left. Pannos, of his Tai, was bleeding from a cut to his head, blood running down into his eyes.

Oryaal pushed him from the path of an oncoming warrior pair. He fielded one blow; Jyrrian’s jaqrui lodged in the neck of the other. Oryaal nodded and his Tai fell back.

‘Dodann’s in the clear, running the right flank.’

In front of Faleen the Wesman line had solidified. They were well drilled and courageous. The bodies of their comrades littered the ground and they had barely touched an elf, but there was no fear in their eyes. They held their ground, waiting. Faleen frowned.

She backed up another pace, crouched and drove up, leaping as high as she was able. Over the heads of the reserve she could see why they were so confident. Shamen were moving fast to her right, obscured by the fighters. Others were moving through the lines. Dodann was running into deep trouble.

‘Shamen in the lines!’ called Faleen as she landed. ‘Oryaal, break to Merrat. Tai, with me to Dodann.’

Faleen sprinted right, drawing a response from some Wesmen who broke ranks to chase her despite the orders howled by their commanders.

‘Dodann, break off!’ shouted Faleen, but he could not hear her. ‘Get back into the fight. You’ve got to get among them. It’s the only way to be safe!’

She ran harder, the Wesmen beginning to break in larger numbers, seeking to cut her off.

‘If that’s the way you want it,’ she muttered. ‘Tai, break them.’

Faleen planted her right foot and drove back into the Wesmen. She could see Dodann, Valess and Myriin moving steadily on out of blade range. Faleen thrashed both her blades right to left, forcing the Wesmen to take evasive action. Jyrrian drop-kicked one in the gut and Haloor came up on the right, swaying beneath an axe before rocking back and flattening the nose of his target with a straight kick to his face.

‘Push!’ shouted Faleen. ‘Dodann! Turn!

Wesmen were at their backs as Faleen surged forward. The Wesman line ahead was thin and beyond them, shamen waited for Dodann’s cell. Faleen punched the hilt of a blade into the mouth of one warrior, knocking his head back, then she opened his throat with the same blade.

Faleen ran into the gap, shouldering another aside and onto Haloor’s swords. A third blocked her path. She took a pace and leaped above him, cycling her blades in her hands and chopping down onto his head and shoulder as she passed. Faleen landed behind Dodann’s cell just as he ran into the sight of the Shamen.

Black rods of energy, each thick as a fist, skewered his cell, each one finding the heart. She watched helpless as the TaiGethen were plucked from their feet and hurled back. The shamen held them in the air for a moment before tossing their bodies aside like discarded dolls. This was no broken black fire and its potency was extreme.

Faleen turned, and as she did saw the back cloth of the single carriage twitch.

‘Speed!’ she howled. ‘Tai, with me!’

Faleen called on the shetharyn, and the world slowed around her. The shamen were looking for new targets. The Wesmen were closing around her cell. Jyrrian and Haloor turned to follow her. She saw a Wesman with his back to her sweep out an arm. Jyrrian ran straight into it, his attention on Haloor. He tumbled to the ground, his speed gone.

Faleen began to turn. An axe came down slowly. Jyrrian was rolling aside, trying to get his feet under him. Faleen dived headlong. The axe blade passed in front of her face. She grasped at it but her reach was not enough. Jyrrian raised his hands but the blade took them with it into his chest.

Faleen landed, rolled and stood.

‘Shorth will take you all,’ she hissed.

She shot off after Haloor, tearing across the front of the Wesman lines. Beams of dark energy shot out, blistering the air. Faleen shivered, dreading the bite of the malevolent magic.

‘Oryaal! Break and go.’

On the left Merrat and Merke still fought, but ripples in the Wesman lines told of shamen approaching. Faleen fell back into the battle, her blades sweeping ahead of her. Wesman blood sprayed into the air.

‘Merrat! Merke!’ Faleen thrashed a blade into the neck of a Wesman, who collapsed forward. Merrat stood there, blood across his face and a cut on his left arm. His blade was cocked to strike. ‘Break and go! We can’t take these without magic.’

Merrat’s Tai fought around him, giving him a moment’s pause.

‘We’re among them,’ he said. ‘We can win this.’

‘No. Dodann’s Tai is gone, downed by a new power. Please, we have to get out of here and take the message to Auum.’

Merrat looked at the battle about them and back into Faleen’s eyes.

‘I trust you,’ he said.

‘Speed,’ whispered Faleen.