Empire from the Ashes

Chapter Thirty-Seven

Sean, Tamman, and Captain Harkah followed the vanguard as First Brigade marched down the North Way, one of the four principal avenues that converged on the Sanctum itself, and Sean marveled at the city's size and beauty. The Church had lavished Pardalian centuries of wealth and artistry upon its capital, and it showed. Yet for all the Temple's beauty, Sean sensed an underlying arrogance in its spacious buildings and broad streets. This was more than a city of religion; it was an imperial capital, mistress of its entire world, exulting as much in its secular power as in the glory of God. It made him uncomfortable, and he wondered how much of that stemmed from distaste and how much from knowing the trap this city could become if something went wrong.

He watched the Guard pikemen who lined the street as an honor guard. They were only a single rank deep, too spread out to pose any threat, but he noted the wary eye Folmak's officers kept upon them. Tibold had insisted that the negotiators' "bodyguards" should march with loaded weapons, and Sean hadn't argued. Now he wondered if he should have. If someone thought he saw a threatening movement and opened up...

He snorted at his own ability to find things to worry about and reminded himself every man in Folmak's brigade was a veteran. Poised on a hair trigger or no, they knew better than to fire without orders—unless, of course, some maniac was crazy enough actually to attack them!

He turned his head and smiled at Tamman, hoping he looked as calm as his friend, and made himself relax.

High Priest Vroxhan stood on the Chancery roof and gazed impatiently up the axe-straight North Way. He'd chosen this spot for the parley because it stood on the south side of the Temple's largest square, the Place of Martyrs, and despite his tension he smiled grimly at the aptness of that name.

The van of the heretic column came into sight, and the high priest's hard eyes blazed. Soon, he thought. Very soon, now.

"Sean!"

Sean's head snapped up as Sandy screamed his name. Not over the com—in person!

He whipped around in the saddle, and his face twisted in mingled disbelief and fury as a very small figure in the breastplate and body armor of an officer spurred her branahlk forward.

"What the hell do you think—?" he began in English, but then her expression registered.

"Sean, it's a trap!" she shouted in the same language.

"What?"

Her branahlk sent the last few men scampering aside as she forced it up beside him.

"Aren't you using your implants?!"

"Of course not! If the computer picked them up—"

"Damn it, there's no time for that! Kick them up—now!"

He stared at her, then brought up his implanted sensors, and his face went pale as they picked up the solid blocks of armed men closing in down the side streets which paralleled the North Way.

For one terrible moment, his brain completely froze. They were ten kilometers from the gates, halfway to the city's center. If he tried to turn around, those flanking pikes would close in through every intersection and cut his column to pieces. But if he didn't retreat—

He jerked his mind back to life, and his thoughts flashed like lightning. The column was still moving forward, unaware of the trap into which he'd led it, and so were the Guard formations closing in upon it. They were almost into a huge, paved square—it was over a kilometer and a half across, and he could see the enormous fountains at its center splashing merrily in the sunlight—and the Temple's intention was obvious. Once his men were out into the open, the ambushers would close in from all directions and crush them. But no attackers were following behind them, so if the Guard wanted to hit them—

"Warn Harry and Stomald!" he snapped, and turned in the saddle. "Folmak!"

"Lord Sean?" Folmak's face was perplexed. He couldn't understand English, but he'd recognized their tones, and his combat instincts had quivered instantly to life.

"It's a trap—they're going to ambush us when we hit that square up ahead." The captain paled, but Sean went on urgently. "We can't go back. Our only chance is to go ahead and hope they don't guess we know what's coming. Drop back and pass the word. They're still several streets over, keeping out of sight, and they'll probably wait to close in until most of the column's into the square, so here's what we're going to do—"

"A trap?" Tibold Rarikson stared at the Angel Harry in horror. She couldn't be serious! But her strained face and the fear in her single eye told him differently. He stared at her for one more moment, then wheeled away, shouting for his officers.

High Priest Vroxhan smiled triumphantly as the heretics began entering the Place of Martyrs. He could just see the first Guardsmen moving into position, and other troops, invisible to him here, had closed the North Way far behind the demon-worshipers. So "Lord Sean" was a war captain without peer, was he? Vroxhan barked a laugh as he recalled Ortak's whining warning.

If the heretics believe "Lord Sean" and "Lord Tamman" unbeatable, they're about to learn differently! And let us see how their morale responds when we drag their accursed "angels' " champions to the Inquisition in chains!

His smile grew cruel as the heretics continued into the square. In just minutes, Lord Marshal Surak's handpicked commanders would send their men forward and—

His smile died. The infidels had stopped advancing! They were— What were they doing?

"Form square! Form square!"

Under-Captain Harkah twisted around in disbelief as Sean's amplified voice bellowed the command and whistles shrilled. Two companies of Folmak's lead battalion—primed by quiet warnings from their officers—faced instantly to the left and right and marched directly away from one another. The rest of the regiment advanced another fifty meters, then spread across the growing space between them in a two-deep firing line. It wasn't a proper square—more of a three-sided, hollow rectangle, short sides anchored on the north side of the Place of Martyrs—and it grew steadily as more men double-timed out of the North Way and slotted into position.

"Lord Sean!" the Guardsman cried. "What do you think—?!"

His question died as he suddenly found himself looking down the muzzle of Sean's pistol at a range of fifteen centimeters.

"In about ten minutes," Sean said in a deadly voice, "the Temple Guard is going to attack us. Are you trying to tell me you didn't know?"

"Attack—?" Harkah stared at Sean in disbelief. "You're mad!" he whispered. "High Priest Vroxhan himself swore to receive you as envoys!"

"Did he?" The muzzle of Sean's pistol twitched like a pointer. "Is that his negotiating team?" he grated.

Harkah whipped around in the indicated direction, and his face went bone-white as the leading ranks of Guard pike companies suddenly appeared, filling every opening on the east, west, and south sides of the Place of Martyrs. There were thousands of them, and even as he watched, they flowed forward and fell into fighting formation.

"Lord Sean, I—" he began, then swallowed. "My God! The hostages! Bishop Corada! Uncle Kerist!"

"You mean you didn't know?" Despite his fury, Sean found himself tempted to believe Harkah's surprise—and fear for his uncle—were genuine.

"This is madness!" Harkah whipped back to Sean. "Madness! Even if it succeeds, it will do nothing to the rest of your army!"

"Maybe High Priest Vroxhan disagrees with you," Sean said grimly.

"It can't be His Holiness! He swore upon his very soul to protect you as his own people!"

"Well, someone wasn't listening to him." Sean's voice was harsh, and he nodded to one of Folmak's aides. The Malagoran rode up beside Harkah, and the Guard captain didn't even turn his head as his pistols and sword were taken. "For the moment, Captain Harkah, I'll assume you didn't know this was coming," Sean said flatly. "Don't do anything to make me change my mind."

Harkah only stared sickly at him, and Sean turned his branahlk and trotted into the center of his shallow square. He was too outnumbered to hold back a reserve; aside from individual squads to cover the smaller streets opening onto the Place of Martyrs in his rear, all three regiments of the First Brigade were in firing line, and the Guardsmen had paused. Even from here he could see their surprise at the speed with which the Malagorans had fallen into formation, and he swept his eyes over his own men.

"All right, boys! We're in the shit, and the only way out is through those bastards over there! Are you with me?"

"Aye!" The answer was a hard, angry bellow, and he grinned fiercely.

"Fix bayonets!" Metal clicked all about him as bayonets glittered in the morning light. "No one fires until I give the word!" he shouted, and drew his sword. "Pipers, give 'em a tune!"

Vroxhan cursed in fury as the heretics snapped from an extended, vulnerable column into a compact, bayonet-bristling square in what seemed a single heartbeat. He'd seen the Guard at drill enough to recognize the lethal speed with which the demon-worshipers had reacted, and he snarled another curse at his own commanders for their hesitation. Why weren't they charging? Why weren't they closing with the heretics to finish them before they got set?

And then, clear in the stillness, he heard their accursed bagpipes wailing the song which had been banned since the Schismatic Wars, and swore more vilely yet as he recognized the wild, defiant music of "Malagor the Free."

"Here they come!" Sean shouted as the Guard pikes swept down. "Wait for the word!"

"God wills it!"

The deep, bass thunder of the Guard's battle cry roared its challenge, and the phalanx lunged forward in a column eighty men across and a hundred men deep. That formation wasn't even a hammer; it was an unstoppable battering ram, hurled straight at the heart of Sean's square in a forest of bitter pikeheads driven by the mass of eight thousand charging bodies. Something primitive and terrified gibbered deep within him with the sure and certain knowledge that it couldn't be stopped, that it had to break through, shatter the formation that spelled survival, and he felt the pound of his heart and the fountains' spray on his cheek as his eyes darted to where Sandy sat taut and silent on her own branahlk at his side. A terrible spasm of fear for the woman he loved twisted him, but he drove it down. He couldn't afford it, and his eyes hardened and moved back to the oncoming enemy.

"All right, boys!" He raised his voice but kept it calm, almost conversational. "Let 'em get a little closer. Wait for it. Wait for it! Wait—" His brain whirred like a computer as the range dropped to two hundred meters, and then he rose in his stirrups and his sword slashed down.

"By platoons—fire!"

The sudden, stupendous concussion rocked the Temple, and a pall of smoke choked the morning. First Brigade had sixteen hundred men, a total of eighty platoons, in a line four hundred meters long and two ranks deep, and the standard reload time for Sean's riflemen was seventeen seconds. But that was the minimum the drill sergeants demanded; an experienced man could do it in less under the right conditions of weather and motivation, and today, Folmak's brigade did it in twelve. The fire and smoke started at the line's extreme left and rolled down its face like the wrath of God, each platoon firing its own volley on the heels of its neighbor to the left; by the time the rolling explosion reached the line's right end, the left end had already reloaded and the lethal ballet began afresh.

One hundred and twenty shots crashed out each second—all aimed at a target only eighty men wide. Only superbly trained troops with iron discipline could have done it, but First Brigade was the Old Brigade. It had the training and discipline, and cringing ears heard nothing but the thunder, not even the wail of the pipes or the screams as whole ranks of Guardsmen went down in writhing tangles. Sheer weight of numbers kept the men behind them coming, but the shattering volleys were one smashing, unending drumroll. Waves of flame blasted out from the square like a hurricane, and the Guard had never experienced anything like it. The shock value of such massed, continuous, rifle fire was unspeakable, and the Guard's charge came apart in panic and dead men.

High-Captain Kerist's head whipped up. The whiplash crack of massed volleys was faint with distance, but he'd seen too many battlefields to mistake it. He jerked up out of his camp chair, wine goblet spilling from his fingers, and twisted around to stare in horror at the Temple's walls.

He was still staring when another sound, lower but much closer to hand, snapped his eyes back to his immediate surroundings, and he paled. The sound had been the cocking of gunlocks as an entire regiment of heretics appeared out of the very ground, and he looked straight into the muzzles of their bayoneted weapons.

The honor guard froze, and sweat beaded Kerist's brow. Horrified gasps went up from the priests and bishops, but the Guard officers among the hostages stood as frozen as Kerist, and unbearable tension hovered as a Malagoran officer stepped forward.

"Drop your weapons!" The honor guard hesitated, and the Malagoran snarled. "Drop them or die!" he barked.

The guards' commander turned to Kerist in raw appeal, and the high-captain swallowed.

"Obey," he rasped, and watched the Malagoran riflemen tautly as his men dropped their weapons.

"Move away from them," the Malagoran officer said harshly, and the Guardsmen backed up. "Any man who's still armed, step forward and drop your weapons. If we find them on you later, we'll kill you where you stand!"

Kerist squared his shoulders and moved forward. His sword was peace-bonded into its sheath, and he slipped the baldric over his head and bent to lay it with the discarded pikes and joharns, then turned to his officers.

"You heard the order!" His own voice was as harsh as the Malagoran's, and he breathed a silent prayer of thanks as the senior Guardsmen walked slowly forward to obey and no shots were fired. The Malagoran waited until every sword had been surrendered, then raised his voice once more.

"Now, all of you, back to the central pavilion!" The hostages and their disarmed guards obeyed, stumbling in fear and confusion. Only Kerist held his position, and the Malagoran officer's lip curled dangerously. He advanced on the high-captain with sword in one hand and pistol in the other. "Perhaps you didn't hear me." His voice was cold, and metal clicked as he cocked the pistol and aimed it squarely between Kerist's eyes.

"I heard, and I will obey," Kerist said as levelly as he could, "but I ask what you intend to do with us?"

A faint flicker of respect glimmered in the Malagoran's eyes. He lowered his pistol, but his face was hard and hating.

"For now, nothing," he grated. "But if Lord Sean and Lord Tamman are killed, you'll all answer with your lives for your treachery."

"Captain," Kerist said quietly over the distant musketry, "I swear to you that I know nothing of what's happening. Lord Marshal Surak himself assured me your envoys would be safe."

"Then he lied to you!" the Malagoran spat. "Now go with the others!"

Kerist held the other man's eyes a moment longer, then turned away. He marched back to the huddled, frightened hostages, his spine straight as a sword, and men scattered aside as he made his way directly to Bishop Corada. He could smell the terror about him, yet there was no terror, not even any fear, in Corada's eyes, and somehow that was the most terrifying thing of all.

"Your Grace?" The high-captain's voice was flat, its very lack of emphasis a demand for an explanation, and Corada smiled sadly at him.

"Forgive us, Kerist, but it was necessary."

"His Holiness lied?" Even now Kerist couldn't—wouldn't—believe God's own shepherd would perjure his very soul, but Corada only nodded.

"We are all in God's hands now, my son," he said softly.

The shattering roar of massed musketry faded into a terrible chorus of screams and moans as the last Guardsman reeled back, and Sean coughed on reeking smoke. He hadn't really thought they could do it, but the First had held. The closest Guardsmen were heaped less than twenty meters from his line, but none had been able to break through that withering curtain of fire. Thank God I listened to Uncle Hector explain how the Brits broke Napoleon's columns! This was the first time he'd actually tried the tactic, and sheer surprise had done almost as much as the weight of fire itself to break the Guardsmen.

Which means the bastards won't be as easy to break next time, but—

"Lord Sean!" He turned in surprise as Captain Harkah approached him. The Guardsman was pale as he stared out at the carnage, but his mouth was firm.

"What?" Sean asked shortly, his mind already trying to grapple with what to do next.

"Lord Sean, this has to be some madman's work. Lord Marshal Surak personally assured my uncle you and Lord Tamman would be safe, and—"

"Time, Captain! I don't have time for this!"

"I—" Harkah closed his mouth with a click. "You're right, Lord Sean. But the last thing my uncle told me to do was guide you safely to the Chancery. Whatever's happening here, those are my orders—to see to your safety. And because they are, you have to know that the Guard maintains an artillery park only ten blocks in that direction." He pointed east, and Sean's eyebrows rose in surprise, for he was telling the truth. Brashan's orbital arrays had mapped the city well enough for Sean to know that.

"And?" he said impatiently.

"And if they bring up guns, not even your fire can save you," Harkah said urgently. "You can't make a stand here, My Lord—not for long. You must move on, quickly!"

Sean frowned. Improbable as it seemed, perhaps the young man was telling the truth about his own ignorance. And perhaps it wasn't so improbable after all. Harkah and, for that matter, all the hostages, could have been sacrificial lambs, sent to the slaughter themselves to lead him to it.

But whatever the truth of that, Harkah was right. He might be able to hold off pikes here—as long as his ammunition lasted—but it was a killing ground for artillery.

"Thank you for the warning," he said more courteously to the captain, then waved him back and brought up his com. "Harry?"

"Sean! You're alive!" his twin gasped.

"For now," he said flatly.

"How bad—?"

"We're intact and, so far, we haven't lost anyone, but we can't stay here. We have to move. Are you in touch with Brashan?"

"Yes!"

"What's our rear look like?"

"Not good, Sean." It was Brashan's voice, and the Narhani sounded grim. "It looks like they've got at least ten thousand pikemen filling in to cut you off from the gates. You'll never be able to cut your way through them."

Sean grunted, and his brain raced. Brashan was right. A street fight would cramp his formations, preventing him from bringing enough fire to bear to blast a path, and once it got down to an unbroken pike wall against bayoneted rifles his men would melt like snow in a furnace. But if he couldn't retreat and he couldn't stay here, either, then what—?

"What's Tibold doing, Harry?"

"We're going to storm the gates," Harriet said flatly, and Sean winced. the Temple's curtain wall was ten meters thick at the base, and the tunnel through it was closed by three consecutive portcullis-covered gates and pierced with murder holes for boiling oil. He shuddered, but at least he hadn't smelled any smoke when he came through. If Tibold moved fast, he might get through and take the gatehouses before the defenders got set.

Might.

He bit his lip, weighing his own fear and desire to live against the terrible casualties Tibold might suffer, then drew a deep breath.

"All right, Harry, listen to me. Tell Tibold he can go ahead, but he is not—I repeat, he is not—to throw away lives trying to get us out if he can't break in quickly!"

"But, Sean—"

"Listen to me!" he barked. "So far only one brigade's in trouble; don't let him break the entire army trying to save us. We're not worth it."

"You are! You are!" she protested frantically.

"No, we're not," he said more gently. He heard her weeping over the com and cleared his throat. "And another thing," he said softly. "You stay out of the fighting, whatever happens."

"I'm coming in after you!"

"No, you're not!" He closed his eyes. "Sandy and Tam are both in here with me. If we don't make it, you and Brashan are all that's left, and you're the only one who can talk to the army. Brash sure can't! If they get you, too, the bastards win!"

"Oh, Sean," she whispered, and her pain cut him like a knife.

"I know, Harry. I know." He smiled sadly. "Don't worry. I've got good people here; if anyone can make it, we can. But if we don't—" He drew a deep breath. "If we don't, I love you. Take Stomald home to Mom and Dad, Harry."

He cut the com link and turned back to Tamman, Sandy, and Folmak.

"Tibold's going to try to storm the gates." Folmak didn't ask how he knew that, and the other two simply nodded. "If he makes it in, he may be able to fight his way through to us, but in the meantime, we've got to fort up. There's a Guard artillery depot to the east. If they bring the guns up, we're in trouble, and it's as good a place as any to head for for now. Tam, you know the spot?" Tamman nodded. "Good. Folmak, give Lord Tamman your lead regiment. He'll seize the depot, and the rest of us will cover his back. Clear?"

"Clear, Lord Sean," the Malagoran said grimly.

"Then let's move out before they come at us again."