Princeps: A Novel in the Imager Portfolio (73 page)

After studying Deucalon’s defenses, with the ranks of pikemen across the front, Quaeryt could see why the Bovarian mounted units weren’t moving at a faster pace. They’d wait until the foot engaged the pikemen … or until Deucalon sent mounted companies to stop the foot. Even as Quaeryt recognized the situation, a mounted battalion moved out from the west end of the Telaryn line and charged the Bovarian foot.

In turn, the foot companies split, half moving toward the pikes on the east and half toward those on the west, while a mass of Bovarian mounted charged forward to meet the Telaryn cavalry battalion. At that moment, flights of arrows arched from the rear of the Telaryn forces down into the Bovarian mounted, while the Bovarian archers targeted the pikemen on each end of the Telaryn forces.

Before long, Quaeryt suspected, the entire slope would be a confused mass.

“We may need to attack those foot,” Skarpa said.

Both looked to their right as an undercaptain rode toward them.

“Commander! The Bovarian forces on the triangle have split. Half are moving to engage the bridge defenses. The other half are moving toward our rear. You’re to take Third Regiment and stop those moving to our rear.”

“Third Regiment!…” Skarpa began to issue orders.

In moments, or so it seemed to Quaeryt, the entire regiment had reversed itself and was riding northward. Quaeryt and his company rode slightly behind and between Second and Third Battalion, close enough so that Quaeryt, after a fashion, could see Skarpa’s command group.

He glanced up. While the clouds had continued to thicken overhead, the raindrops falling remained scattered and intermittent.
For now.

Before long, Quaeryt could see the dull gray-blue uniforms of the Bovarians—all mounted—as they charged up the back of the ridge. The riders of First Battalion ended up meeting the charge almost two-thirds of the way up the slope. Second Battalion attacked the middle of the Bovarian charge, and it appeared as though Major Aluin’s men would leave the leading Bovarian units isolated.

At that moment another Bovarian unit rode uphill, directly toward Quaeryt’s force.

“Sir!?” asked Zhelan.

“Charge them!” replied Quaeryt. One thing he had learned was that standing still in the middle of a battle was usually the prelude to a disaster.

Zhelan’s company moved downhill, and although Quaeryt rode with them, he let others lead the charge, which in less than half a quint had stalled into a mass of hand-to-hand fighting.

Quaeryt used his staff as necessary, trying to save his shields and energy until imaging might produce some results, but there were so many men and mounts that he didn’t see much point in trying anything except in using the shields for self-defense.

At some point, the Bovarians withdrew to the east, re-forming on the river road, but facing the ridge. Skarpa ordered, chivvied, and pushed Third Regiment back into formation on the east end of the ridge.

Quaeryt stood in the stirrups and tried to get a sense of what had happened as the rain began to fall more steadily, with large warm droplets splatting on his exposed skin. The Telaryn forces formed a unified front from the bridge approach across the ridge. The Bovarians began to form into a wide wedge.

Quaeryt looked farther south, where he could see yet another Bovarian foot regiment, possibly two, marching northward to join the massed Bovarian forces.

Where did that regiment come from? How many regiments do they have?

Quaeryt eased the mare forward, until he was positioned at the front edge of the defenders, then turned, “Shaelyt, Desyrk!”

Neither imager undercaptain looked particularly pleased, but both rode up beside him.

The rain began to fall even more strongly, still remaining warm.

Quaeryt looked to the road below, a narrow stone-paved strip in the middle of what was turning into a sea of mud.
The weather is going to turn this against us, and we’re outnumbered. The frigging rain, hot warm rain.

He stiffened in the saddle, as the words of Vaelora’s letter came to him.…
the warmest rain can turn to ice, and ice can imprison the unwary …
Warm rain turning to ice? Was that what she had foreseen?

Could he and the other two imagers imprison the Bovarians in ice? But he couldn’t very well just image ice. The ice came as a result of imaging something else, something massive.

“Desyrk, Shaelyt … you need to image a stone bridge, from the lower ground south of the point of the triangle over to the far side of the Vyl.”

“What?”

“Don’t argue with me. Not now. We need a stone bridge over the Vyl. Make it two spans with a single central pier. I want you to concentrate on that when I give you the command. Do you understand?”

Shaelyt nodded. After a moment, Desyrk nodded, although his eyes held confusion and puzzlement.

“Desyrk … when I tell you, just image the stone for the bridge, as much as you can.”

He looked again at the massed Bovarians.
Do you dare to try? Should you?

A horn call echoed through the rain, and as one, the Bovarians began to advance.

Quaeryt cleared his throat, extended his shields to encompass Desyrk and Shaelyt, then called, “Image the bridge! Now!”

He visualized the structure he imagined, with high slight arches to a central pier, and knowing he needed power, he didn’t limit himself to just the rain. So he attempted to draw warmth from the Bovarian mounts, with thin tendrils of thought, and from the river itself—it had to have heat somewhere because when it didn’t the water froze into ice. He even tried to link to the imagers who weren’t near them … somehow.

From everywhere came lances of pain, strikes like cold lightning.

In instants, the clouds darkened from thick gray to black masses … and liquid ice poured down like sheets in an arc around him.

Quaeryt could feel that pervasive chill trying to suck heat from himself, yet being blocked by his shields, but that intense cold impacting his shields, even though they were not against his skin, made him feel as though ice were building all around him and the other two imagers.

Brilliant lines of white ice-lightning flared through his skull, and his tears seemed to freeze for an instant on his cheeks, and white fog billowed below him …

… and icy whiteness froze him into stillness.

77

Hot rain swirled around Quaeryt, and he shivered, even as lightnings of jagged ice cut him, and blood dripped into scarlet icicles hanging from his face and arms and legs … and when he turned and looked into the fog, a stone span receded and vanished … and ice flowed over him once more …

Quaeryt shivered … and slowly opened his eyes.

He was lying in a wide bed. Quilts covered him, but he could feel sweat beginning to form on his forehead. He tried to push back the quilts, but his arms did not seem to want to move. He tried again. Every muscle in his arms quivered, and lines of pain flared from shoulder to fingertip. Slowly … oh, so slowly, he pushed back the covers, barely enough that he did not feel as though he were being roasted alive.

Then he turned his head, although the movement sent lightning through his skull, to see a young man sitting on a chair lean forward, his mouth opening—Shaelyt.

“You’re awake!”

“I … am,” Quaeryt attempted to say, but the words were muddled. He wanted to sit up, but wondered if he even could.

“No one knew…”

“Knew what?” His lips were stiff and chapped, and each word was an effort.

“When they found you in the middle of the ice … you were warm … but no one could rouse you, sir.”

“Help me … sit up.” Quaeryt hated to ask, but his body was anything but cooperative.

“Yes, sir.” Shaelyt stood and leaned forward, easing pillows behind Quaeryt and steadying him.

Quaeryt just leaned back against the pillows for several moments, not that he had any choice, weak as he was. “What … about … you … the others?” He found himself still unable to speak clearly because his mouth was dry.

“All of us … we made it. We were cold for a long time, but not like you.” Shaelyt handed him a mug. “It’s watered lager.”

Quaeryt eased himself forward just enough to be able to drink, glad that Shaelyt was supporting the mug. His stomach muscles ached as well.

“You did something—”

“No … all of you worked together. You must have,” Quaeryt added quickly, ignoring the furrowing in Shaelyt’s brow. “I just gave you the ideas.” He frowned. “You and Desyrk … how is he?”

“I told you. We all woke up. Even the others who weren’t with us collapsed. The last was Baelthm. He woke yesterday. We’re all fine. Well … maybe a little sore.”

“Yesterday? What day is it?” Quaeryt took the mug from Shaelyt’s hands and lowered it so that it rested on the quilt across his midsection.

“It’s Mardi … morning.”

“Mardi?”

“Yes, sir.” The young imager stepped back. “I’m supposed to send word to Lord Bhayar.”

“If I wake … or expire?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Send away.” Quaeryt’s tone was dryly ironic.

When the door to the chamber closed behind Shaelyt, Quaeryt took another long swallow of the watered lager, before setting the mug on the bedside table. His hands were trembling, and he almost dropped the mug. He could do little more than lean back against the pillows Shaelyt had put behind his back to prop him up against the dark wooden headboard. As he rested there, he noted as he did that he was in a spacious bedchamber and that he’d been undressed and put in a long flannel nightshirt. The small effort he had made in setting aside the mug brought another sweat to his forehead.

You’re weaker than you thought. Frig … you’re fortunate to be alive with what you tried.

Had it worked? He frowned. It had to have worked to some extent, because Shaelyt had looked more relieved than worried and Bhayar was still around. That suggested that they’d managed at least a standoff.

After a time he reached for the mug, his hand and arm trembling, and took another swallow before he set the mug down, afraid he might drop it.

The chamber door opened, and Bhayar stepped inside, closing the door behind him, but not before Quaeryt caught sight of the armed guard outside. That worried him, for more reasons than one.

Bhayar stepped toward the bed, shook his head, then looked at Quaeryt before speaking quietly in Bovarian. “I’ve never seen anything like it. Either that bridge or the desolation on the east side of the Vyl.”

“Did the bridge hold?”

“The engineers say it will last for centuries, if not longer.” Bhayar frowned. “You don’t know what you did?”

“I tried to have the imagers turn the rain that fell on the Bovarians into ice. I couldn’t think of anything else to do against so many troops.”

“You and your imagers slaughtered almost eight regiments of Bovarians. They were coated in ice and froze to death before they could move. Less than a battalion survived. You also killed some four hundred of ours. There was fog over the triangle and the river and the south of Ferravyl until yesterday.” Bhayar paused. “It will be called a great victory for us, and a tragedy for Bovaria.”

Eight regiments? Eight? More than twelve thousand men?
Despite the sweaty dampness on his forehead, Quaeryt shivered. “A great victory,” he repeated, hearing the words come out flat.

“The way matters were going it would have likely ended up with no winner, and just as many dead, except that half of them would have been ours.”

Quaeryt hadn’t thought of that, but it didn’t make him feel any better.

“What did the bridge have to do with it?” prompted Bhayar.

“Imaging it was the only way to freeze the rain.”

Bhayar frowned. “I can’t say I understand.”

“Neither do I,” Quaeryt replied, for he didn’t, not entirely, at least. “I just hoped that it might work.”

“Might work? It worked indeed. With what Pulaskyr and Claeph did to the three Bovarian regiments that came down from the north, Kharst doesn’t have enough men left in all of eastern Bovaria to stop a single regiment…” Bhayar paused. “Can you do that again? What you did here?”

Quaeryt laughed raggedly. “How often is there warm rain? How often are that many soldiers gathered in one place? How often could any group of imagers manage building a bridge like that?”

“That’s not an answer,” said Bhayar coolly.

“It’s … the best answer … I can give.” Quaeryt wanted to snap back, but that would have taken more strength than he had. “Do you think I like the idea of having imagers and scholars linked to the biggest massacre of troops in the history of Lydar? In fact, if you even mention imagers and scholars…”

Bhayar actually stepped back. “I beg your pardon.” His words were sardonic.

Quaeryt ignored the tone. “Even if we could do something like that again, do you really want it known? Second, if you suggest it, what happens when it doesn’t work? It might not ever work again. Imaging is never that certain. If you don’t believe me, ask the imagers you put me in command of.” He closed his eyes for a moment. Even those few sentences had been an effort.

“I did. They don’t know how they did it.”

“That’s why you’re better off claiming that the Nameless punished Rex Kharst with a mighty storm for trying to invade a neighboring land that never threatened him.”

“I have suggested something like that.”

“Keep suggesting it,” Quaeryt said tiredly. “It can’t hurt … if Kharst and Autarch Aliaro are worried … the Nameless is on your side.”

“What would you like to do now?” asked Bhayar, his voice deferential, or almost so, for perhaps the first time in all the years Quaeryt had known him. “After you’re stronger. You’re not going anywhere for another few days or maybe longer.”

“Visit my wife. I think I deserve that.”

Bhayar nodded slowly. “I thought you might have that in mind. About a glass southeast of here is a small estate—Nordruil. My father seized it years ago for failure to pay tariffs. I think you will find it more to your liking than traveling to Solis. Besides, you’re in no shape for a ride like that.”