A Shout for the Dead (74 page)

'Do I look finished to you?' Iliev knelt and grabbed him by the collars of his furs. They stank. The man's eyes began to roll back in his head. 'He speaks through you, I know he does. Can you hear me, you bastard? The Isle is mine again. And I am coming for you, burning and sinking every ship you have taken on the way. Fear me. Fear the Ocenii.'

Iliev dropped the Tsardon back to the ground. He was still breathing but it was ragged. The cut to his waist was deep and he was bleeding to death. Iliev got up, unlocked the doors and kicked them open. The dead faced him.

'Gentlemen, I'll be needing my papers,' he said.

And he closed the doors behind him.

'Hammers and axes!' roared Kashilli. He smashed his fist into the face of a dead man and pitched him over the cliff wall to tumble two thousand feet over rock and into water, if just one of you bastards gets away from here, tell them we need more hammers and axes.'

The flags were flying on the eastern turrets of the Ocetanas Palace. Kashilli had led his squad onto the walkway and wall that marked the length of the Isle's inhabited area. It had watch towers every mile. Four in all. And the same along the western edge where Iliev should be emerging. One flag was raised on the skipper's side and they were fighting hard, he could see that at a glance.

And a glance was all he could spare. The dead had boiled up the stairway from the first watch tower and rushed them down the path. More had emerged from nowhere behind them as if on some prearranged signal. He had lost three good men. Now it was his turn. Ocenii with axes were at their rear. He was at the head, a wood axe gripped in one big hand.

'Keep moving forwards. Don't let them stall us.'

Three abreast they stood despite the risk of injuring each other. Kashilli on the outside, swinging his axe in. Twenty dead stood in front of them. There were more, many more on the lawns and in the gardens below. Most weren't moving but some were bunching and walking towards the steps.

Kashilli battered his axe into the side of a dead man. He felt the ribcage shatter. Kashilli growled and kept the swing going. Heaving the dead off balance.

'Push them over! Go, go.'

The other two turned and helped the dead on. Three more tumbling, this time into the gardens. They'd be back. Kashilli had a moment's space. He grabbed the axe in both hands and swept it low and very fast. The blade carved through the legs of a Gesternan dead and deep into the knee of the second. The one fell, scrabbling with his hands. The other collapsed forwards. Kashilli barrelled into him, shoving him backwards into others. One fell from the path. Gone without a scream to the mercy of Ocetarus.

It gave him an idea.

'Stand back. Follow in my wake. Heave them over. Cut at the legs.' He grasped the axe firmly. 'I want that tower. There's oil and wood to be had there.'

Kashilli stared over the blade at the dead. They were coming on again. Two abreast but clumsy. Some behind walking faster than the damaged ahead. It gave them a stumbling, undisciplined look. But effective enough because they showed no emotion or distress from the horrific wounds some of them carried. It was bad work but someone had to dish it out.

'I will deliver you to mercy,' he said and shouted to clear his mind. 'Ocetarus awaits you.'

The dead in front of him had one eye and half a face. Brain oozed from cracks in his skull. Kashilli sheared his axe through the unfortunate's neck, catapulting him into the wall. His head flew out over the ocean, the body spasmed but did not fall. It tried to move but the legs would not coordinate.

Kashilli did not pause to let the fear grab him. He swung the axe back and forth, each time taking a pace or a half. He turned the blade a quarter, electing to use it as a flat edge, beating a path.

'Get them off our path,' he called. 'Move.'

Dead blades swung at him. He ducked, jerked back. Another nicked the axe shaft. A third clipped the top of his gauntleted hands. Kashilli yelled out. The cut was deep. He gripped harder. Blood pulsed down inside the glove. He struck again. A dead was crushed against the low wall. He could hear his men surging in behind him. The sick crunch of bones being broken. The odd silence as a writhing, grasping dead was thrown out over the rock.

'Keep on coming.' Kashilli spat in their faces. 'Fear the Ocenii.'

Kashilli took another pace. The axe caught a dead under his arm as he readied to swing his own weapon. He careered left. Kashilli paced forwards, kicked out and up, snapping the man's head and sending him teetering on the wall. Behind Kashilli, hands sent the dead back to God.

The big Ocenii spat blood ftom his mouth. It tasted sour. It was cold and thick. Another sweep of his axe. Another. And the way was clear. Below him. More dead grouped to head for the stairs up to the watch tower. Kashilli growled and ran ahead. The Ocenii behind him chanted victory and pushed harder,- opening a gap between them and those dead who pursued them.

'Get fire down those stairs to the gardens. Keep them back.'

Kashilli charged up the stairs. Magnifiers lay on the single table. The stove and brazier sat under canvas. Beneath the small table, on which sat three tin mugs and a water pan, was a wooden chest carved with eels and seaweed. He threw open the lid, sorted through the flags and found what he was looking for. It was the largest flag the Ocetanas possessed. Blood red and with a white circle dead centre. It was crossed black on the diagonal. Quarantine.

'Get this up the pole,' he said, thrusting it at the nearest Ocenii. 'Five stay and guard our backs, keep the fires going. The rest, with me. There's a lot of running still to do.'

Away across the great gardens, fire leapt into the sky. Kashilli looked over. The flames came from the palace doors and tumbled down a set of steps, scattering dead who thought to ascend. Ocenii were running towards the first watch tower. Kashilli waved. It was returned. Satisfied, he ducked his head and forced his way back down the stairs past his own men.

'One down, three to go. Let's go, squad seven.'

Iliev packed his parchments and charts into leather tubes and stowed them in a leather satchel that he slung over his shoulder so it hung down his back, leaving his arms free. Two of the dead in his office still twitched. They had weakened quickly under his assault. Breaking the spine of one had seen him collapse. He still moved feebly, hands clutching at the rug on which he lay, trying to pull himself forwards.

Iliev knelt by him. Those eyes bored into his. They showed no pain, no recognition. Blood dribbled and bubbled from his mouth. He said nothing. Iliev picked up his chin and examined the face. He had died of disease, not injury, this one. There were sores across his cheeks and eating into his eyes.

'Bitter's Plague ate you, my friend. But why won't you die now? Why won't you stop?'

Iliev let the head drop and walked to the window looking out over the back of the palace. The gardens held hundreds of dead. Where they'd come from, he had no idea. Cover was good. Hedges, trees. Easy enough to conceal yourself if you knew how. But that indicated some form of sentience beyond the single apparent desire to kill.

Something gave them direction. Or someone.

Beneath the dead standing outside, the vegetation was blackened. Wherever they moved, so that blackening continued. Iliev looked instead at the wall pathways. His squad and Kashilli's were both making good progress. Almost at the second watch tower now. Dead tracked them along the ground but didn't climb up the steps until the last moment.

Iliev looked back at his victims. Only one moved now. He had inched closer to Iliev.

'Don't like the stone so much, do you?' he said. 'Interesting.'

He walked past the dead and back out into the main rooms of the admiralty. The Tsardon still lay there. Blood was on his lips too and not just from the cut on his face. Iliev stood over him.

'Nicked a lung, did I? Well, such is the price you pay.' He shifted to his other foot, leaving his right free. 'It's you, isn't it? It's you that keeps them focused. Keeps them standing, maybe. Let's see, shall we?'

Iliev's right foot stamped down on the Tsardon's neck, crushing his windpipe. The tattooed man thrashed briefly, clawed at his throat and then was still. Iliev cocked his head, listening.

The fighting continued.

Gorian sat back hard against the side of the wagon as it jumped and jolted on a poor section of road. He felt like he'd been punched. And he felt loss. They would stand and move for a while but there was too little for them there. They would fall soon enough. He took his hand from Kessian's head and the boy relaxed but looked round, concern on his face.

'What happened, Father? Who were they?'

‘I
told you not to piggy-back the energy trails,' said Gorian, impressed again at the boy's ability nonetheless. 'You should be concentrating on keeping our people here walking and well.'

‘I
did that too.'

Gorian had no doubt that he did. He smiled briefly,
‘I
shall have to watch you, shan't I, Kessian? Never too young to be the pretender, eh?'

Kessian's frown merely deepened,
‘I
don't understand.' 'Good,' said Gorian.

He rubbed his hands over the hard green and brown skin of his face. It had got a little worse these past few days. So much to do, keeping the advance going. The sea was the hardest place. Energy everywhere but every person one step removed from it. He was lucky to have got them through the stone of the isle and onto the grasslands atop it.

But it hadn't been enough. That idiot Kathich had wanted too much time. And he hadn't been watching like Gorian had told him. Gorian growled deep in his throat. That boot coming down was an insult too far.

'Who were they, Father?'

'Enemies. And they took what I needed.'

'Were they the Ocenii, Father? Like Arducius was always talking about?'

'But even they will
learn to
fear me.' it isn't what that man said.'

‘I
know what he said,' snapped Gorian and Kessian flinched. 'Just leave me alone. I need to think.'

So much was going so right. But he was alone. If only Mirron had come to help him bear the burden. Kessian was still too young; the Karkulas remained reluctant conduits and the Dead Lords could only hold the complete attention of the dead if Gorian was there to help them personally. It was hardly worth the effort. But it would have been. Should have been.

Gorian thumped the side of the wagon and looked out. The Gaws at Neratharn were next. Once the Tsardon king had orchestrated throwing them down he would join his son, marching under Gorian's

banner. The living were almost beyond their uses. Most of them. 'I can help you,' said Kessian. 'Not now, boy. I'm tired.'

'Then let me take this day on my own,' said Kessian. 'We only march. Don't look over me. See what the rest are doing. Help the ones on the sea to find what you want.'

Perhaps the boy did understand after all. Gorian gazed down on him and saw him shrink away a little. But then, a rest from being linked to every one of his subjects might not be a bad idea. Little harm could come to them out here. Still a long way from Neratharn. And he needed to find more new ways to keep his subjects from simply dropping where they stood. Decay was becoming a real problem.

'You really think you can do it?'

Kessian nodded. 'I can, Father. Please let me show you. And you might be able to rest more when I do. Perhaps the green will go away. It scares me that it is on you.'

'It is nothing to fear. It is the touch of the earth upon God, remember that. All right then. You try and hold them. Use the Karkulas as much as you need to. And if you are struggling, tell me. I won't be angry. Just don't let any of them fall. Then I would be angry. Raising is so much more draining than maintaining.'

'I won't let you down, Father.'

'See that you don't.'

Transferring overall control of the Work to Kessian was technically easy but it felt like handing over a helpless child to a clumsy adult. The Work sat in Kessian's consciousness with great comfort and Gorian watched as the boy, surely not consciously at all times, adapted to take on the new load.

Simultaneously, Gorian felt a great release of energy. He let it surge through him and he became more alive, more awake, than he had been in days. It cleared his mind. Kessian sighed and sat back against his cushion.

'Are you secure, Kessian?'

'Yes Father, but it is a weight.'

'Then consider how much more I bear on my own and be happy. I'll stay beside you, in case you need me.' 'Thank you, Father.'

Gorian smiled again but his mind was already far away. South to the Tirronean Sea. South to Estorr and beyond. The Ocenii were on the water and waiting for his people. He had to find ways to stop that. Only one Karkulas with them but four Dead Lords. It would have to suffice.