The Battle of Ebulon (10 page)

Khendam blushed, and lost
some of his bluster. "I suppose it was something like that. But we
aren't serving any great purpose. We're just trudging through the
snow in a deserted city because some rich foreigner asked us
to."

4.

The gate reared up before
them, hewn from gigantic planks of strange wood. Beside it, on
either side, dark doorways suggested ways to reach the top of the
wall.

They were closest to the
left hand door, and as Vardan began to lead them towards it,
Chirath tugged at his shoulder.

"Please, let us choose the
other gatehouse," Chirath muttered urgently.

Vardan stopped, eyebrows
raised. "What do you mean?"

Chirath looked embarrassed
to have to explain himself. "Among my people, the left hand side is
a bad omen. Let us choose the right side, Friend
Vardan."

Vardan smiled. "If we were
beyond the gate, wouldn't the left one be the right, and the right
be the left?"

Chirath nodded,
uncertainly.

"So surely, if right can
so easily become left, similarly a bad omen can become good?"
Chirath nodded. Vardan continued, "So if bad omens are so fleeting,
let us chase it away with our ascent." Vardan strode confidently
towards the nearest doorway, on the left side of the gateway, and
Chirath trudged sullenly after him.

The gatehouse was dark on
the lower levels, and the immense chain mechanism stretched through
floors and ceilings as they climbed. Everywhere the snow had
drifted, and nowhere did they see any bodies, or any clue as to why
the city was deserted.

The higher levels had
small windows, but these were as narrow as slits on the outer face
of the wall and wide hollows in the inner face. They would have
allowed defenders to launch a ranged attack while staying mostly
hidden.

"These windows face only
into the city," Chirath said. "Why would they defend against their
own people?"

"Perhaps it is rather that
they are prepared for the taking of the gate?"

"Aye, and such windows in
the outer wall would be a weakness against bombardment."

They continued upwards,
the stone staircase folding back on itself with each successive
level. The snow began to drift more heavily as they climbed, and a
light came from above showing them their climb was almost
concluded.

The sky gaped as they
climbed the final set of stairs, and they had to fight their way
through the drifting snow and take care not to lose their
footing.

They came out into the
open, and the cold wind blasted them. The city was spread out
before them, immense, stretching into the distance, the far edge
hidden by fog, or by falling snow. The great stone walls reached
out in either direction, holding the city in their embrace. The
central part of the city rose up with taller, grander buildings,
but much closer than the distant core was a small square bustling
with little figures and a shimmering light-filled maelstrom, the
thing which had delivered them here.

Vardan thought of the warm
fires of home, and the warm women, bundled in furs, that were his
to call upon as he pleased. His stomach grumbled. He was more
interested in food than women right now.

Chirath called out to him,
and he turned. Another storey of stonework covered the gate, and
would offer an even greater vantage point than the level of the
walls where they now stood. But Chirath was at the outer face of
the wall, where the castellation offered periodic protection from
the bitter gusts of wind.

It was what lay beyond
Chirath that took Vardan's breath away.

"By all the gods of Manar
and Alfar..." Vardan murmured as he approached Chirath, as if in a
trance.

"The Alfar have no gods,"
Chirath pointed out.

"Yet they will offer the
same protection as those of men."

A great range of
snow-capped mountains encircled the horizon, enclosing a nest of
hills and a rough plain. The sight was majestic, and would have
been more beautiful in fairer weather. But it wasn't the natural
beauty of the scene that awed him. It was the shuffling horde of
dark shapes that covered the ground like a world-filling nest of
ants, a teeming mass of living beings, as numerous as the leaves in
a summer forest.

"This is the reason," said
Chirath.

Vardan could only nod.
This was an invasion force, and it would prove overwhelming to a
few hundred of the Kinnon's best warriors and mages. This was the
afterlife, a punishment for all their sins. The gods were real,
after all, after all his mockery and derision, and his punishment
would be a grisly end, very close to this spot.

"It loo-" began Chirath,
pointing out across the vista. If he'd not turned his head, the
great black arrow would have skewered it like an apple, but he had,
and the arrow had instead cut a gash from brow to neck, slicing off
the top of his right ear in the process. Blood rushed down
Chirath's face, as they both ducked behind the protective
stonework.

A few other arrows sailed
past them, but it must only have been an opportunistic attack. They
had been fools to stand so long atop a wall before an
army.

Vardan crawled through the
snow to Chirath, and scooped up fresh snow from the drift, to wash
the wounds of blood.

"Don't coddle me, Friend
Vardan," said Chirath.

"It's quite a gash you
have."

"Aye, and that is my ear
on the ground, but we must return and tell the others."

Vardan nodded, and they
crawled and stumbled to the safety of the stairwell, retrieving an
arrow from the snow.

"I told you it was a bad
omen," Chirath chuckled.

"On the contrary, you lost
only a little blood, and a superfluous ear part. I'd call that a
good omen, just as I told you."

They laughed
together.

5.

They said very little to
each other. It was clear that neither of them appreciated being
stuck with the other.

Kalummenon had decided
that Pereg was incompetent as well as a young fool. Pereg seemed to
have no sense of stealth. Kalummenon kept to the shadows, while
Pereg walked straight down the middle of the snowy street.
Eventually, Kalummenon couldn't take it anymore. "Come here!" he
hissed.

Pereg turned a startled
face towards him, and after a moment's hesitation, approached.
"What do you want?"

"What do you think I want?
We are meant to be keeping out of sight, and you keep prancing down
the middle of the street like you're on parade!"

"I do not
prance!"

Kalummenon sighed. "Look.
We need to cooperate. We need to do what we've been asked to do.
All I'm saying is that you need keep to the edges of the street, so
that if we see someone, we can watch them without them spotting us.
That's not so hard is it, lad?"

"Don't call me lad! Why
does everyone call me - "

"How old are you?"
Kalummenon demanded.

"Seventeen. Almost
eighteen though, but - "

"That's why. You'll grow
up soon enough. If you survive long enough, that is."

"I'm a cadet -"

"In the King's Academy,
yes, I know, you told me. But the Academy teaches you how to act
like a soldier, and obey commands, does it not?"

"Yes," Pereg agreed,
feeling like a trap was being laid for him.

"So listen to me when I
tell you what to do. I'm considerably older than seventeen, which
makes me your commanding officer. Understood?"

The trap had been sprung,
and the tone of command was unmistakeable. "Yes, sir!"

"There's no need for that.
Don't call me 'sir'. Call me Kal. I just want you to listen to what
I'm saying. "

"Agreed."

Pereg followed meekly
along behind Kalummenon, keeping to the shadows, searching here and
there in open doorways and windows as they went. The tension
between them dissipated, as Pereg behaved in a way more acceptable
to Kalummenon, who took to command like it was the most natural
thing in the world, and Pereg was comforted by the easy confidence
of the more experienced man.

"I'm sorry I laughed, but
it really is an odd name," Pereg said eventually.

"Not to me it's
not."

"Where are you really
from? Originally, I mean?"

"I told you my father was
a sailor. I don't know if he was a pirate or not, to be honest.
There is a lot that adults don't tell young children. My father
died when I was little, and I was brought to Peledar, and that is
where I grew up. I barely remember any other place."

"You learned Abrilian on
the streets of Peledar?" Pereg sounded incredulous.

"Yes, and you learned it
at a military academy. I ... was acquainted with a courtier from
Maynar for a while. She taught me a thing or two..."

"I'll bet."

After a while, Kalummenon
took the bait. "And you?"

"Peledarri, born and bred.
My father died in the War, and Mother died a few years ago. I have
a sister, Aralda. She's in service to a noble family somewhere up
north. She keeps saying she'll come for a visit when she can. She
hasn't been able to."

"And that's why you're a
cadet."

"Yes, I suppose it is.
There'll be a place for me in the Royal House if I graduate with
good enough honours, and then I'll be set."

"Provided the Royal House
stays the Royal House."

"Well, the king is young.
I'll bet he's got a few years left in him yet."

"Provided the rest of the
Lords agree with the current state of affairs."

"He's a good King. Why
wouldn't they?"

"Politics." Kalummenon
shouldn't have been surprised that Pereg was a loyal subject of the
King, but it always got under his skin when people blindly accepted
the things they were told, without questioning them in the
slightest. Being an orphan made Pereg susceptible to being taken
advantage of, of course. "I'm an orphan too. My mother died before
my father did." It felt strange for Kalummenon to talk about his
past, even if he was still leaving out some key details. It was a
relief in some ways, but it also made him feel
vulnerable.

"I'm sorry to hear that,"
Pereg said quietly. "Being alone is the worst thing in the
world."

Kalummenon could
immediately think of several things that were much, much worse, but
he didn't name any of them, instead letting himself appreciate the
sentiment for what it was. "Thank you. And the same to
you."

Pereg nodded solemnly as
Kalummenon held his gaze for a moment. But then something tore
their attention away, ahead. There was a sound.

The street stretched away
into the distance, and curved away to the left. From that distant
hidden stretch of street emerged a procession. They watched it,
spellbound, as it came closer. At the head of the procession
floated a pale voluminous figure in flowing robes, and shimmering
with a magical light. Behind the floating figure marched a
battalion of armoured men, clad in furry hats and cloaks against
the cold. Between the soldiers trundled several covered wagons,
some of which were smoking ominously. The wagons moved without
being pulled by any beast. Perhaps the floating figure was towing
them with magic.

Kalummenon and Pereg
looked at each other, and understood without needing to speak that
it was time for them to return to the square.

6.

Making no further pretence
at stealth, the two Peledarri men sprinted down the last part of
the snow covered street into the square. The square was so full now
that it was difficult to maintain any speed through the huddle of
warm bodies.

The magical vortex that
had brought them here, and brought hundreds of others since they'd
left the square, had vanished. They were trapped, and the strange
procession was close behind.

Kalummenon and Pereg
pushed anxiously through the throng. "Vardan! Where is Vardan?"
Finally someone with the knowledge heard them, and pointed him
out.

Vardan was speaking with
the other scouts, and Chirath was sporting a thick red scar across
the right side of his head, which must have been healed by a mage
among those gathered.

"Apologies!" Kalummenon
said, and all conversation in this circle ceased at once at the
interruption.

"Ah, the Peledarri pair,"
smiled Vardan, in a way that made Kalummenon's skin crawl. This was
not a man to get on the wrong side of.

Kalummenon forged on with
his report, and any of the nobleman's annoyance ebbed away at the
news being delivered.

Vardan began barking
orders, and it became clear that the square was no longer a chaotic
rabble from all over the lands of the Kinnon, but had been tied by
time and proximity into something approaching a unity of purpose.
Vardan was in command, and in his element.

The scouts were ignored
for the time being, allowing them the opportunity to
confer.