‘We will crush these invaders, sir-’
‘Of course we will, once we meet their sorcery with our own. That too is not relevant.’
‘I do not understand, sir.’
Triban Gnol glared at the man. No, you don’t. Which is why your rank will never rise higher, you pathetic thug. ‘When you are done with silencing the other soldiers, Sirryn-oh yes, and the promotion for our enterprising young corporal-I want you to deliver, by hand, a message to Karos Invictad.’
‘Sir?’
‘An invitation. He is to come to the palace.’
‘When?’
‘Immediately.’
Sirryn saluted. ‘Yes, sir.’
‘Go.’
As the door closed a second time, Triban Gnol stared down at his desk. Down into the box with its dislodged lid. Wherein sat a small, squat bottle. A third of its contents remaining.
Triban Gnol often drew satisfaction from the sight of it, the very knowledge of it when hidden within its box. He would recall pouring the contents into the vessel of wine from which he knew Ezgara Diskanar would drink, there on that last terrible day. In the throne room. Ezgara, and that pathetic First Eunuch. Nisall should have followed. Not Brys. No, anyone but Brys Beddict.
Regrettable, that.
Every field of battle holds every cry uttered
Threaded like roots between stones and broken armour, shattered weapons, leather clasps rotting into the earth.
Centuries are as nothing to those voices, those aggrieved souls.
They die in the now
And the now is for ever.
Fire had taken the grasses. Wind and water had taken the soil. The level stretch where the two drainage channels debouched was a scatter of button cacti, fist-sized cobbles and fire-cracked rock. The Letherii outrider’s corpse had rolled down from the ridge leaving a path of spattered blood now black as ink on the rocks. Coyotes, wolves or perhaps Awl dogs had chewed away the softer tissues-face and gut, buttocks and inner thighs-leaving the rest to the flies and their maggot spawn.
Overseer Brohl Handar-who knew he should have died at Bast Fulmar, had indeed believed at that last moment that he would, absurdly killed by his own sword-gestured to two of his troop to remain on the ridge and waved the others to the highest rise thirty paces away, on the other side of one of the gullies, then walked his horse down onto the flat. Steeling himself against the stench of the dead soldier, he forced his reluctant mount closer.
The K’risnan had reached him in time. With the power to heal, a power pure-no stain of chaos-that was, Brohl Handar now understood, a blessing. Kurald Emurlahn. Darkness reborn. He would not question it, would not doubt it. Blessing.
The stub of an arrow jutted from the outrider’s throat. His weapons had been taken, as had the vest of fine chain beneath the light tanned leather shirt. There was no sign of the Letherii’s horse. The buzz of the flies seemed preter-naturally loud.
Brohl Handar wheeled his mount round and guided it back up onto the ridge. He spoke to the Sollanta scout. ‘Tracks?’
‘Just his horse, Overseer,’ the warrior replied. ‘The ambusher was, I believe, on foot.’
Brohl nodded. This had been the pattern. The Awl were collecting horses, weapons and armour. The Atri-Preda had since commanded that no outrider scout alone. To this Redmask would no doubt add more ambushers.
‘The Awl rode southeast, Overseer.’
Days ago, alas. There was no point in pursuing.
Eyes narrowed against the harsh sunlight, Brohl Handar scanned the plain on all sides. How could a warrior hide in this empty land? The drainage gullies had seemed an obvious answer, and as soon as one was spotted a troop would dismount, advance on foot, and plunge into it seeking to flush out the enemy. All they had found were bedded deer and coyote dens.
Areas of high grasses were virtually attacked, both mounted and on foot. Again, nothing but the occasional deer bolting almost from the feet of some startled, cursing soldier; or ptarmigan or thrushes exploding skyward in a flurry of feathers and drumming wings.
The mages insisted that sorcery was not at work here; indeed, much of the Awl’dan seemed strangely bereft of whatever was necessary to shape magic. The valley known as Bast Fulmar had been, it was becoming clear, in no way unique. Brohl Handar had begun with the belief that the plains were but southern versions of tundra. In some ways this was true; in others it was anything but. Horizons deceived, distances lied. Valleys hid from the eye until one was upon them. Yet, so much like the tundra, a terrible place to fight a war.
