Angelslayer: The Winnowing War (53 page)

“Sir!”

“Do it! Now!”

Ranulf turned, nodded toward the right tower. In it, one of the youths stood. He was tall and slender, and Rhywder had given him a Galaglean cloak. He leveled his bow. The arrow whistled soundless and pierced the Unchurian's breastplate with a
whrang.
The Unchurian swayed, but kept in his saddle, so the youth, obeying orders, sank two more shafts. Finally the captain fell to lie facedown in the dirt, the tips of arrow shafts pushed out his back plate. Wind blew his dark cloak over the back of his head.

The second highborn stared down at his captain's body. He looked back up. “We came in peace!” the Unchurian shouted. “Even offering the sign of greeting!”

“I have witnessed your greetings firsthand, highborn. Tell your death lord he can drink my piss!”

He spoke quietly to Ranulf. “Now the one on the left.”

Ranulf grimaced, but nodded to the same archer. The boy's arrow sang once more, his mark this time through the neck, taking out the horseman quickly.

“Stay away from my gate!” Rhywder shouted at the last Unchurian.

The Unchurian circled his spooked horse to keep it in rein. “Ah, your gate. We are coming for your gate! Here, you mark the path of the sun. When it has passed the shadow of the canyon, your gate will be ours. I thank you for your offer of piss, however, my lord Azazel prefers flesh—which we will take.” He rose in the saddle. “And you,” he said, pointing to Ranulf, “you boy, shall be the first.”

He then twisted hard on the reins and galloped away. Ranulf shuddered, backing away from the edge. There was a faint whistle and suddenly, as though someone had yanked him from behind, Ranulf jerked from a tug at his neck. He staggered, off balance, and dropped over an archer's port.

He heard Satrina scream. She had just come up the stairs again.

He ran for her. An arrow struck the stone near his foot; he felt the spark of the arrow's iron tip. He grabbed Satrina, jerking her into a run, then threw her and dove beside her to the cover of the causeway wall. A second arrow whispered past as he did.

“What are you doing here! You said you were returning to the garrison!” he shouted.

“I … I was coming to …” she paused, wordless, staring at the bloodstain left strewn across the stone where Ranulf had been hit. “They killed that boy, Rhywder.”

“They intend to kill more than him,” Rhywder said, holding her close against him by one arm. He searched upward. It was almost impossible to see where the arrows were coming from. The rock above them was sheer, but an archer had apparently scaled it from the southern side and found a pocket in which to hide.

The siege had begun.

A
gainst the wall!” Rhywder cried. The youths scrambled. An arrow sank into the head of a Galaglean corpse, through the visor, and Rhywder stared, amazed as the briarwood stand wobbled, then toppled over. The corpse lay on its side against the rock. Rhywder held his breath. A second arrow buried itself into another propped-up Galaglean in the tower. The corpse shivered, then stilled, still standing. Before a breath, another arrow passed through the ribs and skittered up the rock of Hericlon. Then a third and then nothing. Other Galagleans were clearly in view, but the archer was no longer taking dummy bait.

“Damn,” Rhywder swore. He paused, then glanced to Satrina. “Listen to me, Satrina. I am going to draw out his fire. When I do, you run for it. Take the west stairway; it is the most hidden from above. When you get to the courtyard, find a horse and ride north. You have got to find Quietus. The Galagleans are close. We will hold as long as we can, but you need to tell the Falcon the Unchurians are coming and we are going to need help, as fast as he can move his men and horses.”

“Rhywder …”

“For the love of Elyon, Satrina, this is no time to argue! When the time comes, you run! Do as I say!” She nodded, swallowing.

Rhywder glanced to the left and right. The youths were pressed against the stone.

Rhywder crept slowly along the wall, Satrina following, until he was close enough to speak to the boy in the west tower, the archer who had taken mark at Ranulf's order. The boy was not much past ten and four years.

“Your name?”

“Aedan.”

“You know these rocks very well, Aedan?” “I know Hericlon as well as any rock, my lord.” “Can you climb?” “Yes, my lord.”

“That dagger in your belt—can you use it?” “I can, my lord.”

“As you may have guessed, there is an archer in those rocks, somewhere straight above us. I want you to climb up there and kill him, Aedan.”

The boy nodded. He stepped back, then looked up, through the tower port. Hericlon's side was smooth rock, there were few handholds, but Aedan laid his bow aside, then lifted off the quiver and set it aside, as well. Clearly he was frightened, his hands trembling, but without hesitation, he stepped off onto the edge of the tower, found a hold on a fissure of rock, then began to climb, slowly.

Rhywder remained crouched against the battlement. He lifted a large, oval Galaglean shield. Its face was pierced, a hole torn through the bronze plate.

“Listen to me!” he shouted to the other youths. “I am going to draw fire from above. Mark the path of the arrows, especially any of you to the east. He is somewhere on the western cliffside, so look for a cove, an outcropping of rock, something he is able to crouch on. When I give the word, fire back in force. The girl has to reach the canyon alive. The archer up there will try to prevent that from happening.”

He turned. Satrina was close, waiting.

“You keep moving,” he said. “Do not stop, not an instant, not for anything.” “How can I just leave you here, Rhywder?”

“That is not important any longer. If this gate falls, Satrina, we will all die—the cities, the villages—all our people. You have got to find Quietus; nothing else matters.”

“I will find him, then. But you, you just stay alive, Rhywder.”

Rhywder slid his hand through the leather arm brace behind the shield and glanced over his shoulder to the sky. “Satrina,” he said, softer, “I want you to know …” He paused, then caught her eyes for a moment. “I want you to know I have liked you better than I have liked most women.”

She stared back a moment, touched a finger to his cheek. “And I have liked you better than I have liked most women, too, Rhywder.”

Rhywder half-smiled but then grew serious. “Elyon's faith be with you, Satrina. Godspeed!”

“I will be back, Rhywder. Stay alive.”

“Aye.”

Rhywder drew a breath and stepped into the light. He turned and quickly brought the shield upward. An arrow thunked into the wood of the shield's face. Satrina gasped.

“Picked a good spot,” Rhywder shouted upward at the rock face of Hericlon. “I cannot see you at all. Hidden yourself well, have you not? Care to introduce yourself?” Rhywder lowered the shield, taunting him. The arrow came out of the black rock itself, from shadows. Rhywder spun sideways, angling the shield, making it appear as though he were catching arrow for sport.

“Take mark, lads,” he said, watching the rock. “Watch for his next dart—then make your guess and stagger your shots, keep your fire steady from wherever you see his arrow fly.”

No sooner had he spoken than another bolt skittered past his leg. The young archers turned, crouched, still keeping close to the battlements, and began to fire upward.

“Now, Satrina! Run!”

Rhywder then threw open both arms, baring himself, and started dancing backward across the causeway.

“Right here, you eagle-eyed son of a whore! Here I be!”

An arrow whispered death past his ear. Rhywder kept dancing backward, as though there might be music. He even started to sing.

“Oh, my mother were a tavern wench, and my father were a bastard's son!” An arrow kissed the skin of his thigh as it passed. “His thirst one night he came to quench and I was made ‘fore the day was done!”

The youth's arrows were dissolving everywhere into the rock above. “Run, Satrina! Run!”

An arrow came whispering straight and true, and Rhywder spun to catch it in the face of the shield. Its tip wedged through, intent on reaching his head. This time, Rhywder had seen the path.

“He is left of the sun!” Rhywder cried. “The high ledge a degree left of the sun almost exactly midway up! You can see the darkness he crouches in, a cavern!”

Another arrow flew, but this was not aimed for Rhywder. It angled against the side in a steep shot for Satrina, who had now reached the stairway and leapt down it, hair flying.

“Hey!” Rhywder shouted, throwing aside the shield. “Forget the girl! Here! I am naked! Prime meat! Take me out, you suckile frog!” Rhywder couldn't dodge the next shot. He hit the stone rolling, but the arrow still caught his side. The shaft snapped in him as he rolled over it.

“Bitch,” he hissed, backing into the cover of the causeway edge. He scrambled to squat and quickly ripped the broken tip free. Flinging it, he scanned the wound. It was a lucky graze. It would burn, but it wasn't deep enough to cause much trouble. “Any more holes in me,” he said to a youth nearby, “I will soon leak like a badly sown Galaglean mead skin.” He used his short sword to cut away a strip from his horsehair tunic. “You get a hole in your leathers, last person you want stitching it would be a Galaglean. But if the bastard ever offers to cook you up a pig, do not turn down the offer. They make good pig.” Rhywder cinched the tie about his wound.

The boy said quietly, “We are not to be leaving this causeway this day, are we, Captain?”

“Never toss the first stone on your grave, boy. Leave that for the ravens.”

Rhywder checked the angle of the sun. Daylight was closing. In the narrow passage, it would come early. If the Unchurians were going to make a move, it had to be soon. “Can you hear me, boys?”

Most shouted back.

“I want each of you, for this moment, to think on your mothers. Boys like you, coming here—taking this stand. By Elyon's grace, that kind of mettle … your mothers gave you that. Courage.”

Rhywder stepped from the edge, circling to grab the shield, and then came to a crouch behind it.

An arrow sang past him, angled over the causeway of the gate.

“It is fathers give us grit and anger, but it is our mothers give us courage,” he shouted, dodging another. “We suck it down in our blood from the womb. Without our mothers, we'd all wet ourselves and run like gutter rats right now. You boys be proud.”

Another one crossed the causeway in a slant. It was a screamer—the arrow's tip had been borne out, and air whistling shrilly just for its effect on the nerves. Rhywder glanced over the port. Satrina was running for the horses, and the screamer seemed to be searching her by scent—but she was too far now, the shot dropped short.

Rhywder threw the sword aside, quickly brought a bow up, aimed, then fired.

He was not sure if he took mark, but no more arrows came.

Rhywder heard the hoofbeats of Satrina's horse from below as she was clearing the edge of the garrison passage. But there was another sound now, deeper, a rumble.

He turned to the south passage, looking over the causeway. He had seen many things in his time, but this still made him shiver. For a moment he just stared. “What is it, my lord?” asked one of the lads. Rhywder glanced at the boy.

“Against the battlements!” Rhywder screamed. He leapt toward the causeway's ports. The young Kerrigans also scrambled to crouch tightly against the gray stone of the ports. They had been well trained. The rumble from the passage grew steadily. Something so heavy they could feel it through the rock of Hericlon's passage. There was a sharp, high-pitched whining, a sound Rhywder could not place, but that made him think of a cat being skinned still alive.

“There is some company on approach, boys.” Rhywder shoved proper weapons through his belt. “We have any supper to offer? They have surely been marching all day. Probably be coming hungry.”

He paused, catching several of their eyes.

“Well?”

“Aye,” answered one. He pulled a silver arrow to a stiff-gut bowstring. “Our mothers would not have us here without sending the Unchurians their supper.” Rhywder let himself laugh aloud.

“Hear that,” he screamed, throwing his head back, the muscles in his neck stretched. “You hear that, you mutant bastards! We got supper waiting! Hot and dipped in your favorite sauce!” He spit on the tip of his own first arrow.

There was light, nervous chuckling among the youth.

Rhywder then swallowed against the fear in his gut, and quickly stepped into an archer's port.

Machinery was coming up the passage, into the clearing of the gateway. They were tall towers, so high they were wobbly, with huge wooden wheels cut of massive trees. With the eastern sun going down behind them, they were left high, leaning silhouettes of assault towers, looking any moment as if they might topple, but with so many tiers, they would be able to breach even the gate of Hericlon.

There was a heavy thud against the causeway face. Pebbles bounced, spilling over the ports. A catapult had just sent a heavy rock against the wall, striking it so hard, bits of it were flung over the causeway in a spray of shrapnel.

“We will know Elyon this day, boys. You remember that,” he said. Monsters. Everywhere, on the towers. He could see them massed in the upper tiers, miscreants, Failures being sent in as fodder. If only the Unchurians knew there were but thirty lads manning the ports and causeway of Hericlon.

“Make yourselves ready,” Rhywder screamed. He pulled the bow taut while there was distance and took out a huge lump of flesh that made no sense, human or animal. It dropped over the edge of the tower, tumbling through the air, just a mass of flesh, here and there an arm or two.