Hammer Of God (66 page)

Heard chanting and screaming, hooves on cobblestones, windows breaking, chimneys falling. Heard in the distance a great boom from Dmitrak's gauntlet. Smelled the choking stench of death. It seemed that half of Kingseat was on fire and the other half drowned in blood.

Did Rhian still live? Zandakar? Alasdair? Prolate Helfred? He didn't know, and couldn't leave to find out. It was all he could do to stand upright, to keep himself from suffocating beneath the weight of Mijak's evil. With luck he could keep this clinic protected. Ursa and her patients. That many, and no more. He didn't even know how long he could do that.

Long enough for a miracle, maybe. It was all they had left.

Zandakar wept as he searched Kingseat for Dmitrak. He wept for Rhian, who might even now be dead, who might have died believing he had betrayed her.

Live, Rhian hushla, so you can learn why I ran.

He had run to find Dmitrak, who would take him to Yuma and Vortka, so his mother and brother could learn the truth about demons. So he and Vortka could take them back to Mijak, and find a way to heal their demon-ravaged hearts. By saving them he would also save Ethrea, which could not stand against the might of Mijak. In saving his family he would keep his word to Rhian.

As he searched for his brother he killed many warriors. He had to kill them, he could not let Rhian's people die. He had to kill them with his scorpion blade, he dared not risk knife-dancing with Dmitrak's warhost. Aieee, the god see him, it was a hard thing to do. He did not look closely at those warriors' faces, if he saw someone familiar he feared his strength would fail. He killed the warriors and their horses, As they died he saw Hano, he saw Didijik his pony. As they died he wept for them all.

Everywhere in Kingseat, Dimmi's warriors killed Rhian's people like goats in a barracks' slaughter-pit. For every Ethrean he saved, twenty times that number died. He saw women dead, he thought of Rhian, and prayed the god would keep her safe.

As he searched the township he could see where Dimmi had used the god's hammer, there were buildings rubbled and others burned, but to his searching eye too few were destroyed.

If I were still warlord and wore the god's hammer, Kingseat would be razed by now. Aieee, Dimmi, little brother, I think you have not changed. I think you still like to kill with your snakeblade, so you do not use the hammer to kill Kingseat quickly.

It was not such a bad thing, that Dimmi hunted Ethreans for sport. It gave Ethrea a slow death, it gave him time to find his brother. He needed that time, he hunted Dimmi on foot in the twisty turns of Kingseat township, trying to remember where Rhian's traps were set.

He saw the warhost killing Ethreans, he saw soldiers killing warriors. He watched those killings, he did not help. It hurt to see those warriors die and yet he was pleased for Rhian's people. He had taught them how to fight Mijak, he had taught them well.

The most important thing he taught them was that a walking soldier could not hope to kill a mounted warrior, so Rhian had ordered Ethrea's glass-blowers to make thousands of marbles. They were put into buckets and left in every street, so when Dmitrak's warriors rode through Kingseat, Rhian's soldiers could roll those marbles and bring the horses down. Bring them down, and kill their riders. He watched Rhian's soldiers follow their training, he watched them slash and stab those warriors on the ground. Not one of them rose again. All of them died.

They died in other ways, also, but too many lived. So many dead Ethreans, he slipped on bloodied cobbles and tripped in spilled entrails. Kingseat had become a Mijaki battlefield. He searched for his brother, he was afraid he would fail. He did not know Kingseat well enough, he did not know these streets. He knew the castle of Kingseat, which Dimmi had destroyed.

Aieee, god, I need Dexterity, he would know the quick streets to walk. Dexterity is in the god's eye, he might even save Dimmi and Yuma as he saved Vortka in Jatharuj.

But he did not know where Dexterity was hiding, or how to find him, or even if he lived. There was no time to search for him, he had to find Dimmi before his brother tired of slow hunting and hammered Kingseat to the ground.

As I hammered Jokriel and those cities beyond the Sand River. Hammered villages and hamlets and people who did no harm.

But that was his old life, he must not think of that now.

So he ran lightly from shadow to shadow, through Ethrea's streets and the smoke and the screaming, he searched for his brother so Dimmi could be saved.

And while he searched, Kingseat echoed to the chant: “Chalava! Chalava! Chalava zho!”

After her sixth hairsbreadth escape from death, Rhian stopped counting. Either she'd survive this madness or she wouldn't. Worrying about it only got in the way of killing.

Panting, coughing, bleeding from slashes on her left arm, her left thigh, her right wrist and her back, she led her small band of soldiers along the alleyways of Kingseat, playing hide-and-seek and dance-you-to-death with the warriors of Mijak.

There was hardly a stretch of cobbles or paving-stones empty of violence. She faced severed Ethrean heads and spilled guts and puddles of blood without flinching; the carnage inflicted on her people had lost its power to shock. She'd only been sick twice, and not for several hours, which was more than could be said for half her soldiers. She looked at every dead face they passed, just in case one of the bodies was Alasdair. It hadn't been so far, but she didn't dare let herself hope.

She and her soldiers had one bucket of marbles left between them. Once she'd tried to collect some that had been thrown, to delay the inevitable moment when their bucket ran dry, but that had resulted in her second close escape. After that she decided to live without more marbles.

They crept along stinking Bloodnbone Alley, which ran the backside length of Butcher Street. On the other side of the butcher shops with their remorseless, relentless buzzing of flies, came the sound of horses, of warriors, of chanting.

“Chalava! Chalava! Chalava zho!”

Directly ahead of her, a narrow passage connected alley to street. She held up a clenched fist, warning the seven men behind her, and stopped. Held her hand out for the bucket, and eased into the passage. The horses were closer…they were closer…they were—

She leapt out and threw the last handfuls of marbles beneath the horses' hooves. The beasts skittered and thrashed and crashed to the cobbles: blue-coated and roan-coated with tigerish black stripes. Their horsehide-wearing riders fell hard with them. Two out of eight were crushed to pulp. The other six danced to their feet, teeth bared, their long braids ringing with those brash silver bells.

“Ethrea!” she screamed, and her soldiers rushed out of hiding. As they fell upon the warriors, indiscriminate, she picked her first victim. Looked him in the cold eyes and started to dance.

Sandcat leaping…falcon stooping…warrior dying…

He died, his brothers and sisters died, she lived, she lost two men.

No time to mourn them. Three of the horses had shattered their legs. With the ease of a butcher she put them out of their misery, and led her surviving five soldiers on to more hunting.

Dmitrak at last tired of killing with his snakeblade, and began to hammer Kingseat to the ground.

Weary now, no closer to finding his brother, Zandakar saw the bolts of crimson in the distance, smelled the fresh smoke, heard the new screams, the falling brickwork, the loud wild chanting as the warhost sang its praise.

“Chalava! Chalava! Chalava zho!”

He was in some laneway lined with deserted houses. No people, only corpses, they would not care what he did. Scorpion knife in his hand, pulsing blue, he entered a house with two storeys, climbed the stairs and looked through the highest window, across Kingseat's sea of roofs.

He could not see Dimmi, but he could see the hammer, he could see the path Dimmi rode by the crimson fire in the air. He stood at the window and watched until he was certain he had read his brother right.

With lowsun approaching, Mijak's warlord swung in a wide arc, turning back for the harbour. Zandakar knew that once Dimmi reached his warships there would be no more killing, not until newsun. Instead his brother would plunder food and drink from the township, if there were women alive he would look for a fuck. When his appetites were sated he would sit with his warriors, they would laugh and tell tales of the kills they had made. When he and Dimmi had ridden together, killing cities, that was how his brother had celebrated with the warhost.

Dimmi is the warlord, I do not think he has changed.

Zandakar watched a little longer, he would not have another chance at this. When he was confident he knew where he would meet his brother, he left that sad and empty house, he ran into the lane and past all the staring corpses, he ran and he ran and saw no-one alive.

Many streets in Kingseat were lined with purple-flowering trees. Rhian called them yeddas, and complained they made her itch. If they made him itch he would not care, he climbed a tree and waited for his brother.

Dimmi came with his gauntlet and his shells of warriors. He came laughing and smiling, killing always made him smile. Zandakar looked down, his smiling brother made him sad.

He does not know he smiles because of demons. I will change his heart. I will.

As Dimmi rode his red stallion beneath the yedda tree, Zandakar dropped out of concealment, landing like a sandcat on the horse's warm loins. In one swift move he had the gauntlet pinned between his brother's back and his own belly and with his other hand pressed the scorpion knife to Dimmi's throat. He let a little of its power flare along the blade. Dimmi gasped as his throat burned and his flesh smoked. He gasped at the voice whispering kindly in his ear.

“The god sees you, Dmitrak. It sees you in its eye. Take me to Yuma. I have something to say.”

“Zandakar?” said Dimmi, his voice was shocked, he was not pleased. “How are you here? Why aren't you dead?”

Aieee, Dimmi, little brother, so much gone wrong for both of us.

“I am alive because I live in the god,” he whispered. “I live with my scorpion knife pressed against your throat. Breathe too deeply, try to fall, try to kill me and you will die.”

“Warlord!” cried a warrior. “Warlord, is this—”

“This is no-one!” snarled Dimmi. “You did not see him. Ride on.”

The warriors pressed their fists to their chests, Dimmi was their warlord and they were well-trained.

“Good,” said Zandakar, as the warriors rode away. “Now we see Yuma. Remember my words, warlord. One mistake and you will die.”

Of course he was lying, he would not kill his brother. Dimmi did not know it, he was safer that way.

“No, Zandakar,” said Dimmi. “I will kill you. I should have killed you in Mijak, that was my mistake.”

Aieee, Dimmi. Dimmi. Still full of rage.

“Ride,” Zandakar told him. “The empress awaits.”

Hekat woke to feel arms around her, she could not understand it. She slept alone. Raklion had slept with his arms around her. Tcha, she had hated that. It was good when he died. She opened her eyes and saw there were shadows. The sun was sinking, it would be lowsun soon. She was outside, in Vortka's arms, they sat on the ground beside her beautiful warships.

Why was she outside? What was this place? Then she remembered, this was the demon island Ethrea. Dmitrak warlord was killing it for the god. She remembered, she remembered, her heart slowed its beating.

I am old, I am not dying. I am Hekat in the god's remembering eye.

“Let go of me, Vorkta,” she said, and made herself sit up. Aieee, tcha, the pains in her body, she breathed and it complained, she would smite it if she could. It had complained since birthing Dmitrak, she was tasked without end. “I am the empress, why am I sleeping? Why am I on the ground with you? Why—”

And then she remembered something else. Disbelieving, she looked at him. She pulled away completely, fingers reaching for her snakeblade.

“You made me sleep, Vortka?” she whispered. “You used the god to make me sleep?”

“You used it to make me sick, once,” he said, there were tears in his eyes. “Do you remember, Hekat? I was so sick.”

She should have used it to kill him. “You made me sleep?”

“You were weary, Hekat. You needed to rest.”

“Is that for you to say, Vortka? I am the empress, I think it is not!”

He shrugged, he looked away. He would not meet her eyes.

How long have I known him, how many seasons has it been? We were slaves in Et-Nogolor, I gave him my bread and corn. I gave him food and now he makes me sleep? I should smite him, I should smite him.

But she could not smite Vortka, she would be smiting herself. She took her hand from her snakeblade, she punched her fist to his leg. She laughed to see him wincing, she was old but she was strong. She could not stay angry, she had known him too long.

“Aieee, tcha, you Vortka.”

He touched his fingers to the old scars sunk in her cheeks. “Aieee, tcha, you Hekat.”

He smiled, and so did she. He was Vortka and she loved him. “What does the god tell you, Vortka? Is Ethrea dead yet? Is it slain for the god?”

Pain in his old eyes, pain in his face. “Hekat, you must listen, we must speak of the god. There is something I—”

She had heard it too, hoofbeats at the harbour, a single horse come back. She turned, she looked…

Zandakar.

She was walking, when was she walking? She walked along the harbour dock, she walked beside the water. She walked in silence, her heart was beating. Her eyes were full of Zandakar.

He sat on the horse behind the other one with red slave hair. His hair was blue. He was her true son, he was Zandakar.

Zandakar slid from the horse, and the other one slid with him. She reached her son Zandakar, she pushed the other one aside. She pressed her hand to her son's face, it was wet with his tears.

“Yuma,” said Zandakar. “Yuma. You are here.”

“Zandakar,” she whispered, she stroked his blue hair. “I knew you were not dead. I knew the god would find you and return you to my eye.”

“Yuma,” said Zandakar. “We must—” Then he smiled, aieee, his smile was sweet, her heart had hungered for his smile. “Vortka.”

“Zandakar,” said Vortka, joining them. “The god sees you. I fear it does not see me, I fear I have failed.”

Puzzled by Vortka's words, she did not take her eyes from Zandakar. Her eyes had been empty but now they were full. Like her empty heart they were full of Zandakar. There was a knife in her son's hand. A blue power pulsed through it as power pulsed through the god's hammer. He pointed it at the other one. He was not stupid, he knew Nagarak's spawn.

I do not know that knife, where is it from?

“Yuma,” her son said, his fingers touched her scarred face. “Yuma, listen. I hear the god.”