Lord of Ashes

TWENTY-TWO

There were bruises and scratches all over him but thankfully nothing needed stitching. He couldn’t remember where half his wounds had come from, but then you never could when you were in the thick of it. Nobul knew it wasn’t the cuts and scrapes would be the worst of it, though. He was tired, almost ready to drop, and if this went on for as long as he thought it might, eventually he would fall and not get back up again.

Still, he wasn’t in as bad a state as some of the other lads. It had only been one night, and the fighting had been relatively brief, all told, but some of the boys had been asleep all day. A few of them looked like they might not wake.

For Nobul the sleep never came easy after the fight. He was too alive with it, too needy for the killing. It had started now and he was filled with the anticipation of it. His hammer hand itched to be used. Besides, sleep had never been very kind to him. The shit he dreamed of was never pleasant. Memories he’d rather forget, too many deaths brought back all too vivid.

Yet still he yearned for it, fed on it like fresh cooked meat straight off the spit. Even now he could hear those bastard Khurtas winding themselves up for the night ahead. Singing their songs in the distance as the sun fell.

And they’ll be here soon, Nobul Jacks. They’ll be flooding to meet you, falling over themselves to taste that hammer of yours.

Nobul raised the weapon and looked at that metal head. It was the most finely crafted piece he’d ever made and it had taken him all day to clean the blood and brain and bone from the etched surface. His hammer was a thing of beauty, made for dirty, ugly work. The irony wasn’t lost on him.

‘Bet you sleep with that thing beside your pillow at night, don’t you?’

Hake was stood beside him. Nobul had been so wrapped in his daydream he hadn’t even noticed. The old man was bruised about his right eye and there was blood on his green jacket. There would more than likely be a lot more before this business was done with.

Nobul cracked a smile, a rare one at that. ‘I always like to sleep beside someone I can trust.’ He lowered the hammer, but didn’t put it down.

‘Reckoned you might need a bit of company. With the fact that the rest of these boys are too shit scared to talk to you.’

It was true. His legend from Bakhaus, and what he’d demonstrated the night before, meant most of the lads who stood beside him were as frightened of the Black Helm as they were of the Khurtas.

‘And you’re not scared, old man?’ Nobul asked, half joking, half wondering.

‘I ain’t scared of much these days. Even if the Khurtas don’t get me, the Lord of Crows ain’t that far away. I reckon you’re just about the least of my worries.’

‘I reckon I am,’ said Nobul, turning to look out through the waning light. To the north there was movement, but it was too far to make out.

Hake came to stand beside him at the battlements. ‘Last night was just a taster, I’d have said. All Amon Tugha’s young and inexperienced throwing themselves at the wall to soften us up. The ones he didn’t mind sacrificing the most. Tonight’ll be bloodier.’

‘I know,’ Nobul replied. He’d had the same notion himself. The Khurtas who had attacked the night before had charged in too fast and died too easy. It was obvious a lot of them were unblooded. Tonight Amon Tugha would most likely send his best.

Nobul glanced up and down the wall. They’d taken a lot of casualties. Whether those who were left would be up to the job remained to be seen, but if they were still alive after last night’s fighting, chances were they’d give it their best tonight, despite how tired they looked.

Over to the north a cluster of torches made its way towards them, bobbing through the dark like bright spirits floating in the night. The closer the torches got the more Nobul could make out — a massive group of Khurtas were moving with purpose, but they weren’t alone. They dragged prisoners with them, men captured in the weeks of fighting their way south, and maybe even some dragged off the wall the previous night. The closer they got the more he could hear; brutal, guttural language and pleas for mercy. Nobul could only imagine the horrors these men had seen during their time as Khurtic prisoners. He doubted their plight was about to improve.

‘What the fuck’s going on?’ asked Hake, looking anxiously towards the north.

‘Nothing good,’ said Nobul.

He walked east a way along the wall, hoping to get a better look. By now more of the wall’s defenders had heard the commotion and were staring out towards the gathered torches. When the Khurtas and their prisoners had reached Dancer’s Tree they stopped.

They set their torches around the base of the oak. Within moments they’d also lit a fire that illuminated the great tree so everyone could see it clear as day. Every man who stood on the wall was staring north and Nobul could feel their dread. They knew they were about to witness something terrible, but couldn’t turn their eyes away yet.

Dancer’s Tree stood just beyond the range of their archers, it was obvious the Khurtas knew that. As they watched, each of the savages bared his arse and his cock, screaming and taunting and laughing. And there was nothing anyone could do about it.

Then the slaughter began.

The Khurtas took pleasure in hacking limbs and eviscerating the soldiers of the Free States. Screams crossed the short plain to the wall as every man watched with growing dismay. Prisoners were hung from the great branches of Dancer’s Tree, much like the days of old, only this time the guts of the condemned hung loose below them and their executioners roared with glee at every death. Some were nailed to the vast trunk, their screams rising over the sound of hammer blows.

Nobul could hear the despair in the rest of the men who stood to either side of him. Hake just stood there with open-mouthed horror, unable to speak. The Khurtas were doing their job well — before long the men on the battlements would be ready to turn tail and flee, allowing the enemy to surge up and over the wall with no one to stop them.

For Nobul, it only made his anger burn. Not because he felt sorrow for those men being slaughtered, but because under that tree he’d buried his boy only a few weeks earlier. Markus, who’d never done anything to anyone. Who’d been shot dead by accident because he was in the wrong place at the wrong time. Under that tree lay Nobul’s son and those Khurtic bastards were treading all over the grave like he didn’t mean a shit. It burned in Nobul, it cut him deep, and for every man on the wall who covered his eyes so as not to see it made his fury grow.

When they were done with the torture and hanging, the Khurtas took their burning brands and gathered their kindling and they set fire to that oak. Dancer’s Tree had stood there more than a hundred years and it took them no time at all to set it aflame.

A lad to Nobul’s right dropped to his knees, hiding his tear-streaked eyes from the sight. All along the wall were men with their heads bowed, trying not to weep at what they’d seen, shoulders slumped, all the fight beaten out of them, every man turning his eyes away as the prisoners, some with a bit of life still in them, burned on the tree.

It was about as much as Nobul could stomach.

He leapt onto the battlements, forgetting the hundred-foot drop behind him as he did so. Slamming his helmet on, he raised his hammer high.

‘Listen to me,’ he yelled. When only a few men looked his way he raised his voice higher. ‘Listen to me, you fucking bastards.’ More men looked to him; word began to pass down the line as men saw the Black Helm standing atop the battlements, hammer raised to the night sky.

So what now, Nobul? Rousing speech, is it? Most of the time you can barely string a sentence together. Best not fuck this up or you’ll only make things worse.

Nobul let his anger burn for a moment. Feeling it inside like a swollen fist, all bloody from the fight. It throbbed inside of him and for a moment Nobul knew he had to make words of that anger like he’d never done before.

‘Don’t turn your eyes away,’ he cried. ‘Don’t hide your fucking faces from them.’ He thrust his hammer out towards the plain where the great oak tree burned. ‘Look. Look at it and don’t turn away. Eat it up till you can’t eat no more. Fill your bellies with it. Fill your bellies with hate!’

Men were looking out to where he pointed now. And for anyone who didn’t look, there’d be a man next to him who’d strike him on the shoulder or turn his head and make him watch.

‘See what they are,’ Nobul cried. ‘They’re fucking cowards. They’ll torture and they’ll murder, but we’ve already shown them our steel. They’re gonna come again. They’re gonna come flooding over this wall and there’ll only be one thing to stop them.’ He struck the head of his hammer against his palm. It fucking hurt, but it hurt good. It hurt like the hate within him and made him grin that dead man’s grin. ‘I’ll be here. I’ll face them till I’m dead. Who’ll stand with me?’

Hake and some of the men around him shouted that they would, but it wasn’t enough.

‘Who the fuck will stand with me?’ screamed Nobul, raising that hammer again like it was a banner for them all to flock to.

More men shouted their support and now everyone on that wall had eyes on him, had heads raised and not an ounce of fear between them.

‘We’ll fight. And we’ll die. But not without taking our share of those bastards with us. For Steelhaven!’

‘For Steelhaven,’ one of them shouted. And the cry was taken up, at first a few, then dozens, then scores along the wall, all taking up the chant of ‘Steelhaven, Steelhaven’ till it rang out from the battlements and across the plain to drown out the Khurtas below.

Nobul stood there and drank it in, standing like he’d seen old King Cael stand at Bakhaus Gate all those years ago. There’d been speeches then, speeches aplenty, and all better than his, but in the end the words didn’t matter a shit. If what you said helped a man’s hate win over his fear then it was speech enough.

He jumped down as they chanted on, and Hake smiled at him. There was a strange look of approval in the old man’s eyes.

‘Do you think that was enough?’ asked Nobul.

‘Think we’re about to find out,’ said the old man, gesturing back over the wall.

Nobul turned. Through the dark, the Khurtas were coming again.