The Last Bastion (9 page)

The other Fateguard kicked at the doors. Ruined iron
buckled and twisted and then the hinges snapped and the bolts shattered. The gates fell, the iron turning to powder, doors and rusting Fateguard both. Inside the gatehouse the Vathan soldiers hurled their javelots and fired their cross-bows. Bolts struck iron and did nothing. A well swung axe severed an iron hand at the wrist but the Fateguard barely seemed to notice. The axeman had enough time to see there wasn’t any blood, to feel the horror rise inside him before a sword slammed into his belly, doubling him over, and then came again, point first down on the back of his neck and out through his mouth. He spewed his own blood over his feet as he died, and there on the floor right in front of him was the severed hand, still in its iron skin and not a drop of blood at all. Nothing but old dead meat.

Andhun’s gates were already opening as the last of the Vathen died. Back outside the gatehouse, shadows began to move – Lhosir, running out of the darkness, their king leading the way. They poured through the gates and swept as fast as they could through the upper city, straight for the castle. The Fateguard retraced their steps toward the sea, down to the foot of the cliffs and along the shore.

This time they turned for the caves.

9

THUNDER AND LIGHT

A
crash woke Gallow in the night. His eyes flicked open but the rest of him stayed perfectly still. The sky was dark, just starting to grey where the sun would rise in another hour, as shouts spread through the horse market: ‘Arms! To arms! Forkbeards!’

A Vathan ran past him, throwing mail over his head. The riders who’d been his guard were scrambling to their feet, snatching up their javelots, casting their eyes around wildly in the dark, searching for the enemy. Gallow rolled into the far corner of the yard and curled up in the moonshadows, trying to make himself small. Trying to be unseen.

‘Get up! Get up!’ He recognised the voice. One of the men who wanted to be bashar in place of Mirrahj. Josper, was it? Something like that. ‘Forkbeards inside the walls! Arm yourselves! To your horses!’ Three Vathen ran past heading the other way, then more and more spilled out into the yard, and now Mirrahj was screaming at them to stay together, and right in the middle of the chaos a dozen Lhosir burst in through the market gates and launched themselves at the Vathen, who almost broke even though they had three times the numbers. He saw Mirrahj and Josper both hurl themselves at the Lhosir, stalling their charge as the men around them wavered; and then at last the Vathen rallied and the Lhosir pulled seamlessly back behind their wall of shields and spears and withdrew to leave a dozen Vathen dead in the yard. Josper screamed at the Vathen to charge
after them and Mirrahj screamed at them to hold and for a moment the two of them stood nose to nose ready to fight, but by then the Lhosir were gone. Josper swore something and spat. The Vathen dragged their horses into the yard and threw themselves into their saddles, some of them barely dressed but all of them furious. They hurtled away in dribs and drabs, Mirrahj’s last cries echoing back: ‘The castle! The castle!’

Forgotten, hobbled and with his hands tied behind his back, Gallow was alone. A quiet settled over the yard. In the distance he heard shouting and screams. He waited a moment in case the Lhosir came back or any last Vathen came rushing through, but none did. The sounds of fighting were fading.

Among the fallen lay one dead Lhosir. Gallow rolled across the yard towards him. Vathan javelots – light things for throwing from the back of a horse – were useless for what he needed, but a Lhosir spear was heavy with a good sharp edge that sliced and slashed as well as stabbed. He fumbled with his fingers, sliding the haft behind him, easing the bladed head against the ropes around his wrists and then rocking back and forth, slicing them thread by thread. The spear kept slipping and he kept having to find it again and line it up right, but one by one he felt the strands of rope snap, more and more pieces of it tickling his fingers. He felt the rope give, a bigger jolt this time, and then the spear slipped again and the rope unravelled and fell apart and his hands were suddenly free. A few seconds more and he’d untied the other ropes. He scrambled over to the fallen Lhosir and took the soldier’s belt and his boots and all his weapons bar one. The last was a knife. He wrapped the dead Lhosir’s fingers around it. ‘I don’t know this man, Maker-Devourer, but I saw him fall. His death was brave and worthy of your cauldron.’

He picked up the Lhosir’s shield and saw its design,
painted like the Crimson Shield of Modris the Protector. The last time Gallow had been in Andhun, the Legion of the Crimson Shield had been Prince Medrin’s personal soldiers. He stared at it and at the dead Lhosir on the worn stones. Did that mean that Sixfingers was here? Until now he’d had every intention of running, caught between Vathan and Lhosir armies, none of whom were friends. But if Sixfingers himself was here . . .

A terrible purpose swept into him. He hurried through the horse market. His sword hand itched.
Medrin
. If Medrin was here they could end it between them. One of them would die, and either way Arda and his sons would be safe. A snarl curled his lip – best if it was Medrin who was the dead one. He crouched in the black shadows of a doorway. No one would hunt him if Medrin was dead. The two of them could finish it; and even if the war wasn’t done and the fighting wasn’t over, he could leave all this far behind and go back to who he was, throw away his sword and hammer his spear into something more useful. Arda would have him again if he could promise her that was how it would be. Forget the red sword. Leave it with the Marroc in Varyxhun or lead the Vathan woman to it. He didn’t know, didn’t care. But Medrin had to die first. Right here and now nothing else mattered.

He picked up his Lhosir spear and walked out of the horse market, turned the first corner and was almost ridden down by a dozen Vathen.

‘Forkbeard!’ One of them threw a javelot. Gallow lifted his shield to knock it aside and then dived into an alley too narrow for the horses to follow. Jeers came after him. ‘Coward!
Nioingr
! Sheep lover!’

‘Leave him!’

The voice that rose over the others was Mirrahj. Gallow ran back to the end of the alley. ‘Mirrahj Bashar!’ The horsemen were disappearing back into the market, half-lost in
the shadows cast by the houses pressed tight around them; but as he stood and watched she came back. She kept her distance on the back of her horse, spear levelled at his face, while Gallow kept his back to the alley and his feet ready to run.

‘My pet forkbeard! Fortune smiles on you.’

‘I mean to look for King Sixfingers so that one of us might kill the other. These are his men here. Where might I find him?’

‘The forkbeards are at the castle. I’m sorry to tell you that they’re already inside, so you might find it hard.’ She lifted her spear. ‘I’m glad the ardshan won’t be ripping you apart, forkbeard. I’ll look for you on the battlefield so I might do it myself.’

‘I mean to kill him, Mirrahj Bashar.’ Gallow saluted and backed away. ‘You were a fine enemy. Better than many a friend.’

He turned, letting the night swallow him, and ran uphill, always uphill towards the castle. The alleys of Andhun, all too narrow for a man on a horse, made it easy. Now and then he darted across open streets, and sometimes there were riders and sometimes they saw him and shouted and threw their javelots but they were always too slow and they never gave chase. Some of the streets were empty, others he had to wait while dozens of Vathen cantered past, but they never looked down or to the side, always up and towards the castle. In one small square he had to creep around fifty riders. He could hear the Lhosir by then, their battle shouts splitting the night, barked cries of men with weapons ready, and he heard the beating of swords and spears on shields and the bellows of men readying themselves to fight and then the clash of arms, the animal howls, the screams of horses and of the dying. Yet as he drew close to the castle square, the sounds of fighting dropped away. For a few minutes the city fell quiet, and in that stillness Gallow reached its heart.

In the grey gloom of almost dawn, dead Vathen littered the cobbles. A hundred Lhosir barricaded the castle gates, shields pressed tight together, spears arrayed over the tops. They had their own dead too, dragged back through the ranks by now, but Gallow could see them through the thin line of spears, the Lhosir who were too wounded to fight dragging the dying back into the castle yard, talking among themselves to see who knew each man to speak them out. Scores of Vathan horsemen rode back and forth in front of the shield wall, just out of reach, taunting with words and javelots. The Lhosir held their ground, howling insults of their own and throwing the Vathan javelots right back at them. Fists clenched, spears shook, horses snorted and men bellowed, each side firing itself up for the next crash of iron.

At the edge of the square Gallow watched them all, and then he stepped out from the shadows and strode between them. Spears and eyes swivelled to greet him as he ignored the Vathen, stopped a pace short of the Lhosir wall and lifted his spear over his head and let out a roar: ‘Medrin! Medrin Sixfingers! King
Nioingr
! Gallow Truesword waits for you!’

The Lhosir looked at one another and cocked their heads and shook them. One of them started to laugh and soon they all were. ‘You just stay there calling for him.’

Someone threw a stick. A stone pinged off his shield. Then the ground under his feet was trembling – he could feel it tickling his soles – and the Lhosir weren’t looking at him any more, they were looking across the square to the wide road down to the harbour.

‘Medrin!’

The rumble of hooves grew louder still, and with a great roar another hundred Vathan riders thundered into the square and hurled themselves towards the Lhosir line, veered away from the spears at the last second and hurled their javelots. Stranded between them, left to choose whether to run or to be trampled, Gallow ran, and as he did he cast a glance
back. The reluctant sun was creeping over the horizon now and the tops of the castle towers lit up, suddenly bright. In the square the Lhosir bellowed and roared their taunts, the Vathen howled and hooted back, javelots flew into shields, spears reached out to stab at man and horse alike. Animals and soldiers screamed and the air reeked of blood. Back in the shadows Gallow looked wildly for another way through, a weakness in the Lhosir wall. Then he saw the rising dawn light the balcony over the castle gates. Men stood there, and Gallow stared at them until the sun touched the square and struck his eyes, dazzling him, pulling him out of its shadows.

‘Forkbeard!’ A Vathan horseman pointed a spear at him. In a flash, a group of riders had turned towards him. He was still dazed by the light and the figure on the balcony. He turned to run and a javelot hit him between the shoulders hard enough to hurl him forward and sprawl him across the cobbles. The horsemen came up behind him. He could barely move. For a first helpless moment he couldn’t tell whether his mail had held and turned the point or whether the javelot had driven right through him and he was about to choke on his own blood. He’d been kicked by horses a few times and that had hurt far less less.

Spears prodded at him. And then they stopped. ‘Where is it, forkbeard?’

He laughed. When his mouth didn’t fill up with blood, he hauled himself to his hands and knees and Maker-Devourer damn the pain that came with that. ‘You followed me here to ask me that?’

He could hardly move his sword arm at all. He pushed himself up and rose shakily to his feet. There were half a dozen Vathen around him, all with their spear tips an inch from his mail. Mirrahj looked down at him. It was a cold look. ‘Where is it? Tell me and walk away.’

His back was agony but he still looked up past the Vathen, back to the castle and the men standing on the balcony over
the square. He squinted until he was sure, but he’d known it right from the start. Medrin. Medrin had taken the castle. The Lhosir had won Andhun. Which meant there was nothing to stop them from marching on Varyxhun.

The Vathen followed his eyes, even Mirrahj. ‘The ardshan,’ she whispered.

‘It’s in Varyxhun,’ said Gallow quietly. ‘I left it in Varyxhun. Did you hear me?’ He looked from one Vathan to the next to the next. ‘Your sword Solace. It’s in Varyxhun.’

Mirrahj leaned down and hissed, ‘And where is this Varyxhun, forkbeard? Tell me!’ It hadn’t even crossed his mind that she wouldn’t know.

‘I’ll do better.’ He offered the hand that still worked. ‘Keep your word, Mirrahj Bashar, and I’ll show you.’

She smiled and laughed again, though it was a bitter sort of laugh. Once he was on the back of her horse, she turned and rode for Andhun’s gates.

10

SHADEWALKER

C
ome the morning, Reddic was still alive, barely. He was still scared too and there was no barely about
that
. None of them knew how long the shadewalker followed them. Certainly for a while after they left the farmhouse. Stannic had been happy enough to pace it for a while. ‘To see how fast this one goes,’ he said. Reddic had stayed at the back as he’d been told. Once he got over his terror he caught up with Stannic and his family. He could see by then that the shadewalker wasn’t about to catch them and kill them and eat them and rip out their souls and turn them into more shadewalkers or whatever it was they did. So he went to the front with Stannic because he was supposed to be a soldier of Valaric’s Crackmarsh men, hard as nails and ready to fight forkbeards, and so that’s where he ought to be. Stannic hadn’t been best pleased but he’d stopped moaning once he decided the shadewalker had given up on them. This was the third he’d met this winter and the fourth in his life, and yes, the first one had made him shit his pants too, thanks for asking. But they weren’t too terrible once you knew they couldn’t run, and any man with his wits and both his legs could escape. They’d follow a scent through the whole night sometimes, so a man had to pace himself, but they always stopped at sunrise and disappeared into the dark. Or the three he’d met so far had all done that. When Reddic asked whether this one might be different, both of them wished he hadn’t.

Come morning they were exhausted, blue with cold and half frozen, but Stannic had had the cunning to lead them in a great circle and so they weren’t that far from the farmhouse where they’d started. They all stopped for a bit and agreed that Stannic would stay where he was and keep watch for the shadewalker in case it was still following them, and that Reddic would go on to the farmhouse with everyone else because, well, because they were all blue with cold and half frozen but also because they were scared the shadewalker might have gone back to the farm, all of them except for Stannic, who said he knew better. So Reddic went with the others and felt stupid because he didn’t know the land and could only follow while they scrambled through trees and crossed streams and floundered in drifts of snow, and then it turned out that the shadewalker
had
gone back to the farmhouse after all, some time in the middle of the night, and eaten Torvic’s face. Or just possibly it had dragged Torvic from where it had killed him and left him hung up in a field and then gone away, and it was some wild animal that had come and eaten his face afterwards. Didn’t seem likely, but after he’d found Torvic and finished with puking everywhere, Reddic thought he liked that idea somewhat better.

‘What are they?’ he asked when Stannic finally came back, but he only shrugged.

‘Cursed men,’ he said. He followed the tracks the shadewalker had left around the farm. It had come back and taken Torvic and done what it had done and then walked around the farmhouse three times before heading away again. ‘South,’ said Stannic, squinting in the bright morning light. ‘Middislet way, I’d say. Walking pretty straight.’ He chuckled and punched Reddic in the arm. ‘Brave man could follow its trail in this snow. Find where it’s hiding from the sun and put an end to it if he knew how.’ Reddic shuddered and Stannic laughed. ‘Braver man than me, that’d be.’

‘There was a man in Varyxhun who did that,’ Reddic said. ‘An Aulian.’

They cut Torvic down. Wasn’t much they could do for him now. Couldn’t even bury him, not in this cold with the ground all frozen and covered by snow, so they took him out into the woods. Reddic said some words, though he didn’t know much about Torvic or who he was or why he’d thrown in his lot with Valaric and the Crackmarsh. He took Torvic’s mail and spear and his shield because Valaric would skin him for leaving good stuff like that out in the middle of nowhere. Not much else to do. Stannic seemed to know him better, so Reddic left the two of them alone with the winter trees and went back to the farm and tried to get some warmth into his skin again. When Stannic came back he gave Reddic some food and some kind words, and later that morning Reddic took his leave and headed south. Seemed like someone ought to warn the folk of Middislet there was a shadewalker coming. Didn’t follow its trail though, not for long.

He spent the next night under the roof where he and Torvic had stayed on their way north with a surly old farmer Torvic had known, like he had seemed to know everyone between Fedderhun and the Crackmarsh. They barred and barricaded the door and took it in turns to keep watch. None of them got much sleep but the shadewalker never came, and by the end of the next day he was in Middislet again. He went to the forge first, thinking they could spread the word and thinking too that it might be as well to load up the mules Torvic had left there, ready to leave in the night if that was the way it went, but when he got there and banged on the door, it wasn’t Arda or Nadric who answered but Jelira. Reddic stared at her, not sure what to say, and Jelira stared back and then turned bright red and looked away.

‘Where’s the smith?’ he asked when he found his tongue again.

‘In the big barn.’ Jelira flashed him a glance. ‘Mam’s there too. With everyone.’

‘Right.’ So he ought to be there as well, to tell them about the shadewalker, but his feet weren’t moving.

‘You staying or heading off?’ asked Jelira.

‘Staying.’

She nodded. ‘I’ll make sure there’s some more furs airing then. Cold as the Weeping God’s tears these last few nights. Hard work for some keeping warm enough to sleep.’

She was smiling and Reddic wondered whether he was missing something, and then realised that yes, he was. He blushed furiously.

‘Your friends here too?’ Reddic shook his head, and she must have seen the death in his face because her smile vanished. ‘You best go up to the barn if you’ve got news.’

When he reached it, most of the village was gathered inside. As he listened, Reddic realised they were already talking about the shadewalker, except they were talking about at least two – two seen last night, one the night before. He said his piece and told them how one had killed Torvic and eaten his face. Half of them left before he’d even finished, off back to their farms to hammer their doors closed or to take what they could and get away, although where they would go in the middle of nowhere with the nights cold enough to freeze a man’s beard Reddic had no idea.

When they were done talking, Arda grabbed him and pinched his ear and marched him back to the forge. ‘Don’t know what you were thinking telling them about Torvic like that.’

‘But that’s what it did!’

‘Doesn’t mean people need to be hearing it. You saw them. They’re afraid enough.’

‘Aren’t you?’ She didn’t look it and didn’t sound it either, but when they got back to the forge she had him bring Torvic’s mules into the house and keep their saddles
on them, loose so they wouldn’t trouble them but still on their backs, and while Reddic loaded them up with Nadric’s arrowheads, Arda piled furs beside them. When they were done with that she put the children to sleep in the night room and then sat with him and Nadric. They both fell asleep, snoring curled up on the floor, but when Reddic closed his eyes he kept seeing the ruin of Torvic’s face, which was no good for sleeping, and that was why he was awake when the scraping noises started in the yard between the house and the forge. He sat there listening, chills like ice running through his blood, and it struck him hard then that there wasn’t any man in the house except old Nadric, who hardly counted, and that meant it was down to him to go and see what it was, and he was scared like he hadn’t been since that first night in the Crackmarsh when the ghuldogs were all set to eat him. He prodded Arda awake. Might have been a rat after all, or a dog or a mule broken loose or a sheep wandered into the village. Could have been any of those things but he woke her anyway in case it wasn’t.

‘Heard something,’ he hissed.

‘Might be a pig. Roddic’s keep getting loose lately.’ But she sat up, sleep falling off her like he’d thrown snow in her face. He tried to believe it was a pig. Nothing had come knocking on the door after all, not like Stannic’s place.

‘Well, go and look then,’ Arda said. Reddic looked at his mail and wondered if he should put it on, but then Stannic hadn’t had any mail and it hadn’t troubled him. He picked up his shield and opened the door a crack.

There were three of them crouched in a circle in the middle of Nadric’s yard, scratching at the dirt as though they were searching for something. Like one of them had dropped a coin. They didn’t look up. Reddic eased the door closed again, quietest thing he’d ever done. Then he nearly crapped himself. ‘There’s three of them.’

‘Three what? Pigs?’ She was poking Nadric.

‘Three shadewalkers!’

There was something sharp on her tongue waiting to come out but it died before it was given sound. The colour drained from her face. ‘Sure that’s what they are, boy?’ And he was, and she knew it too.

Boy?
Damn but he was fed up with people calling him that. He drew himself up, trying to find some courage from somewhere. ‘Yes, quite sure, old mother, may Modris protect us.’ He liked the way her eyebrow shot up when he called her
old mother
. Took his mind off the death waiting outside.

‘Go and see whether the way’s clear outside the other door.’ She scurried through the curtain to the night room and started shaking the children, whispering urgently in their ears. Reddic went to the front door and put his hand on it and then stopped. Something made his skin crawl. Instead of opening it he bent to peer around the cracks at the side. Couldn’t see much but . . .

It was right there. Standing in front of the door, waiting for him, still and silent as a statue. The one from Stannic’s farm. He whimpered and pointed. ‘Right. By. The door.’

In the night outside a scream broke the silence. It came again and again, a shrill cry of terror. After a bit another voice joined it, lower and deeper, shouting out the alarm. Arda was shushing the children, putting them into their furs, all urgent movement, leaving herself until last. She snatched up a bag of something from the corner of the house where she kept her pans and pressed it into Reddic’s hands. ‘Never mind swords and axes, the best weapon we’ve got against their sort’s in there. They come smashing in, throw it in their faces and run. Don’t you worry about us. Nothing wrong with our legs.’

He looked at the pouch. Opened it and sniffed.

‘Salt,’ she said. ‘The Aulian wizard from Witches’ Reach sent it to Gallow. For the shadewalkers. Suppose he knew
they’d be coming. Don’t know how, but that’s wizards for you.’

Reddic flinched. Salt? What use was a bag of salt? He scurried to the back door and peered through the cracks. The shadewalkers were still there, crouched together. Three in one place, four if you counted the one standing by the front door – he’d never heard of such a thing. The three in the yard looked like they were looking for something. He’d never heard of that either.

As he watched, one of them stopped scratching and cocked its head. It began crawling on all fours from the middle of the yard towards the forge, scraping away the snow and sniffing at the dirt beneath as it went. ‘What are they doing?’

‘As long as they keep doing it outside.’ There was a nervous edge to Arda’s voice, and the only thing that stopped Reddic from falling to bits was the way Jelira kept looking at him. She looked terrified and so he kept his face straight. Couldn’t show how scared he was in front of women and children and an old man.

The crawling shadewalker vanished into the forge. The other two followed. Reddic hissed at Arda, ‘They’re out of the yard. We can run now.’

Arda was already stuffing her feet into a pair of fur-lined boots. She hurried Nadric to the door, dragging the two oldest children after her. Reddic didn’t even know their names, only that the boys had been fathered by Gallow the forkbeard. You could see it in the older one. He had forkbeard eyes, ice-blue and cold as a winter night. Arda took the smallest in her arms and pushed the younger girl at Reddic. ‘You’ll have to carry her. She can hardly walk all night.’

Nadric stood by the door. Arda opened it and ran, hauling the mules out after her. She was carrying a pan, brandishing it as though it was an axe. Reddic pushed the two
older children outside. From the shadows of the forge the shadewalkers re-emerged. Each carried a piece of the iron armour Torvic had brought from the Crackmarsh. They moved quickly, not quite running but walking fast. Arda was still struggling with the mules. Reddic ran out between them. ‘Go! Quick!’ He lifted his shield and waved his sword, and for some reason the shadewalkers stopped short. Arda got the mules going and hauled them away from the yard. Reddic stayed close, moving as fast as he could, while the shadewalkers simply watched them go. Around the corner another one was striding towards them, the one from the door. Arda started to run, but this shadewalker ignored them too and turned for the yard and the forge instead. When Reddic looked back into the village he could see there were others. A dozen maybe. He followed Arda and the mules out into the fields.

The shadewalkers were converging on the forge, all of them. When she saw this Arda stopped to catch her breath. ‘What have you brought here?’ she asked in horror. ‘What have you done?’

A scream from the village spurred them on again. ‘Nothing. I didn’t bring anything.’ But Torvic had brought the cursed armour of the ironskin, and that was what the shadewalkers were after. Last he saw of them they were all gathered around it, sniffing at it, pawing at it.

And then they were gone, lost in the darkness.