The Queen of Wolves (39 page)

Many were heroes of this fight, and many its fallen, but no matter whom I slaughtered, I thought only of that son I had not known, stolen from me by the Myrrydanai. As we fought, some of the dead Disk soldiers rose up, possessed by those spirits that Calyx had warned me of. And to these, I brought second and third deaths, and took their swords and sliced them so that even if they rose again, they could not return to combat. I felt the pressure of spirits all around as I flew down among the White Robes. Drawing out the Nameless, I sent many into the Veil that was their home, but I knew this would be temporary, for the Veil was thin, and if Medhya came through, all would be lost. I tore a White Robe from his Lamiades mount, singed him with that Nameless fire, and as the shadow separated from the robe and stolen skin and whispered into nothingness, I glanced to the other riders among the White Robes. Ghorien was my only goal, though it felt good to take down the other whispering shadows.

Snow and ash mixed along the high walls of the city, and from the watchtowers of the North and East Gates, stones rained down upon those who stormed against the great broad doors. Knights of the Disk, their standard raised high to show the circle of their faith and its Virgin of Shadows, rode beside the canals, driving handfuls of the Akkadites who fought alongside my tribe into the oil fires. Hundreds of flaming arrows flew in graceful arcs through the snow-illumined sky.

All was lit by the fire canals that flowed between and among us. The shadows of men and horses and vampyres were like burning ghosts through the smoke, backlit by flames. There was no visible moon, but the earth itself gave up light, and those ancient kings who fought this day brought the pale-blue light of death with them.

If this were the last day of the Earth, I would believe it. I felt a trembling between this world and the next, and the interplay of red and blue and green light in that terrible, dark place made me feel as if I were again in Myrryd itself, but at the height of its glory and horror.

Then it all stopped—all movement—my brethren of the air seemed to hang from the sky with their wings spread and cupped. The horses at a gallop seemed pinned to the earth through their hooves. Lances that flew in the air froze, held by invisible hands. Arrows in the sky, stopped in the arc of their aim; the fire in the canals distilled into jagged and perfect bits of yellow glass.

Ghorien,
I commanded the momentary stillness in my mind.
Show yourself to me.

In a whisper at my ear, he said,
You will find me in the place of your visions.

Quickly, all movement returned, and I pressed my boot into the Lamiade that I rode.

The lizard screeched and snarled, trying to turn its head to tear my legs off, but I kept to the saddle and drew on the reins, pressing the talons of the Raptorius into the creature’s shanks. I raised the staff and the sword to many—shaping it by will into the long, curved blade with its sharp teeth, or into a double-bladed long sword that cut to the left and the right as I swung it between the oncoming soldiers. The lizard wished to turn around and go with the others of its kind, but I drove it forward. When it refused to budge, I thrust the sword into its skull to stop its life. I shouted for the vampyres to take out the Lamiades—to aim for their legs with their swords, or to push the blades into the skulls as I had done. I did not want the remaining White Robes to have the creatures for escape.

Our enemy poured oil across the canals, and fires burned upward, their flames licking the roof of the sky, which in the dark of solstice night seemed white from the falling snow.

All along the watchtowers, the quicksilver arrows were shot among us, and some found our tribe and slowed them down. The best of the Disk knights found the hearts of our warriors and jabbed into them, for they knew of that method to send us to the Extinguishing. But we fought long and bravely, and Enora and her remaining wolves went into the city, protected by the walls and guard, and as I looked up along the battlements, I saw a White Robe upon a Lamiade, signaling to others of his kind to follow him. The lizards moved rapidly up the walls, crushing the crenel above as they went.

Yes, in retreat they were, for our warriors had done much damage to our enemy. Fewer than fifty soldiers remained outside the gates as we approached them, and we vastly outnumbered them. Many of these soldiers tore the Disks from their throats and fell forward into the snow, praying for mercy; but others fought us to the death, and all of these fell to the jaws of my tribe and the sword of the Akkadites.

The fires along the canals burned uncontrollably and blackened the sky, which was pierced with lightning, while many knights poured from the south and the north, having come from the farthest gates. Still we took them, and I watched good and bad fall, and what was of our side diminish as these fresh knights came at us with the courage of mortal valor. Yet they had no good in them, and many of my tribe leapt upon these riders and tore through their visors to get to the flesh at their throats.

As the Akkadite men and women raised the great rocks thrown at us and carried them as ramrods to the gates, still more riders came, spear and sword gleaming, like a blur of light and dark in the blistering storm.

There was no dawn in sight, nor did I know the hour, for time had ended here, and we could not retreat, nor could we call a truce. It was a battle to the end of all—and either I would stand with the staff and Asmodh sword raised, a beacon of fire for my tribe, and the walls of Taranis-Hir would fall; or I would be in chains, and my Extinguishing would come when the storm had ended and the sun drew its own fire from beneath the eastern edge of the wilderness.

Fire and blood mingled between the canals and the barren snow-covered land. The clouds themselves seemed tinged with blood, and some dark magick had come to Taranis-Hir, for the light that came up within the dark was not of stars or sun or lightning, but of the horizon of the Veil itself, which sought us.

I knew what it was: a ritual of the Veil, for something was opening from the deep, and within the towers of Taranis-Hir, an ancient sorcery was being called by Ghorien and Enora, using the Nahhashim staff and the blood of my son.

I flew to my horse, which had been stolen by a foot soldier, and I scraped him from it, and rode forward toward the gates.

5

Red was the sky, and red the earth, and what was not red was the yellow-white searing of fire and the black ash of shadow. More knights poured in from all sides, some of who had been hiding in the woods, unseen by our spies. Others had ridden up from the quarries below the city. From the open culverts they came, splashing the icy water, their horses drenched with the filth of the canals, and soon, the spattering of blood. Several White Robes came back over the walls, their Lamiades leaping to the earth, the creatures’ jaws grabbing whoever was in their path, whether horse or rider, vampyre or mortal, friend or foe. These shadow priests had abandoned the skins, but held to their robes, and the darkness of their hands brought swords deep into the spines of Akkadites as they redoubled their efforts at slaughter.

Horses and soldiers moved like spirits through the towers of smoke rising from the flames around us. From nowhere, it seemed, a soldier would rush my horse. From out of the smoke, the last Morn or two that existed might leap out upon one of my warriors. The screams of men, mingled with the death cries of horses and the Lamiades, pierced the night.

As my sword hacked deep into my enemy’s shoulder, I heard a great clamoring, and shouts from my men—and I saw the gates of the city give way. The vampyres who had taken to the air had flown down into the city, and killed many soldiers there. Many a Myrrydanai blade had been thrust into the hearts of the warriors who had come from Myrryd to serve their kings, and many of these lay extinguished along the clattering streets of Taranis-Hir.

The huzzahs and cries of victory came from the Akkadites, and like a swarm, we rode along the streets, over the arched bridges, swiftly along, slaughtering all in our path. Victory was sure, I felt it, and I smote many with the staff, and by it, some were turned to stone, and others melted at its touch. Still other mortals went to death in calm, and more were touched by it and driven mad—such was the power of the Nahhashim. The Nameless I also used, and I rode ahead of my people, and any who showed resistance went down into the blood-drenched streets. Along the narrow and wide avenues I went, and behind me, the multitude, and above me, Ophion leading the night-flyers. The foundries exploded with fire, as the alchemists and foundrymen no doubt decided to destroy their industry rather than leave it to the conqueror. I felt the spirit of the Great Serpent within me, and held the hope that my daughter still lived, and that even the betrayer—
Anguis
—Pythia had survived the night, for I could not bear to lose any I had loved, whether they had offended me or not.

But as we reached the tower White-Horse, it was as if I had left the Earth’s sphere, and had ridden into a dream.

Into a vision.

You will find me in the place of your visions.

All slowed down, though I heard the cheers and cries of my men and women as they brought their merciless attack into the halls of that cursed city, and as the vampyres dropped into the pockets of resistance along the alleyways, and drank deep from the enemy who fought against them with waning effort.

Before the towers of the Lady White-Horse, had been erected a scaffolding, and upon it, a great stone that was blue as lapis, flat as an altar, and all about it, White Robes stood.

There upon the altar, the same as visions I had been given since the Sacred Kiss had come to me—and yet, slightly different, as if the visions from the Veil, from the Priest of Blood, and from Medhya herself were transmuting, and changing as I had changed. As if my becoming Maz-Sherah within the Asmodh depths had touched the truth of these visions. I felt locked in the moment, unable to move.

The vampyre Pythia, bound to the flat-cut stone quarried from the Barrow-Depths of Taranis-Hir, seemed to wear a fierce golden sun upon her face.

Each time I had dreamed of this, seen it within a Veil vision, I had not truly understood that one day I would come to this perfect moment, when the vision became flesh and blood and fire and ash.

The sight of the altar and scaffolding; the towers beyond it, the smoke beyond the walls and the fires within the foundries; winged creatures in the red sky diving and rising and diving again like a war of the heavens; below them, the white-robed priests, and, upon her horse, Enora.

Pythia, held by the shadow priests, turned her mask toward me. Her wings drew out from her shoulders, great spurs at their bows, the dragon wings of our tribe. Yet she could not fly, nor did she struggle.

We were frozen in tableau—my wings curved for flight, while I sat astride the stallion, my enemy in his final breath of life.

The roaring host of others, swords raised, stones at midshot, those falling to earth in death and Extinguishing and those whose thrusts tore flesh—all were still as I heard the Dark Madonna’s voice:

“All is lost, Maz-Sherah, and you will see the Queen of Wolves raise the burning sword to your heart. You will know that your skin will be flayed and worn as a robe of victory as Medhya’s once was worn by the Myrrydanai. Your blood will be drunk as Medhya’s was by the Kamr priests. Your bones broken and thrown to the dogs, as the priests of the Nahhash did with our Dark Mother’s bones. You will understand—only then—what it means to be the Anointed sacrifice of your tribe.”

It was the mask upon Pythia’s face that seemed to speak those words.

The sky was red with a bloody night; the towers of White-Horse lit with human torches; the armies of night on either side; the smell in the air of defeat and terror; and the cries of mortal and immortal alike as we heard the great tearing of the invisible as it birthed the Dark Madonna.

Many of the Akkadites who survived to enter this inner sanctum had stopped fighting, and even the soldiers of the enemy looked upon the altar with awe. The three remaining kings of the Asyrr—Sarus and Illuyan and Athanat—and the two queens who still haunted the skies—Nekhbet and Namtaryn—had sheathed their swords and dropped the mortals from whom they drank. For we were in the presence of the Dark Mother’s touch, and we felt it as the breath of the Veil, like the Sacred Kiss itself burned down among us in heat and despair.

The golden mask covering Pythia’s face had grown as if it were a living thing. Radiant bursts off the brow formed a crown of glistening spikes, and the lower half had elongated so that it covered her chin. The ancient writing of Myrryd itself had been scrawled across its face.

She sat, roped to the altar stone. The White Robe called Ghorien—his rotting hand showing the birthmark to me as if he wanted me to know he was there—held his instrument of sorcery, the Staff of the Nahhashim, taken at last from Enora.

The mask spoke with the voice of Medhya, the Dark Madonna, mother of my race. She whispered to me, so close it was as if she embraced me as she spoke. “If you but bow to me, you will be my consort, Falconer. I will raise you up and fulfill your true destiny. You will become greater than the Serpent himself, who betrayed me as I lay in his arms. Do not fear, for you will be a god. We will give birth to gods. We shall undo all that mankind has wrought, and all of earth shall be our kingdom. All these you see will tremble before you, if you will sacrifice this traitorous creature and open the Veil.”

As I looked across at the kings and the queens of Myrryd, and at their many warriors and servants who had survived the night, I saw in their faces what was in my own: they too had shared this vision, although they had not understood in their long Extinguishing.

Ghorien’s skin sloughed off, dropping to the wooden planks at his robe’s edge. With a dark hand, he pointed to me. “You have known your destiny, Maz-Sherah.”

Maz-Sherah,
he whispered in my mind.
You have lost a son to the sacrifice.
He pointed to a golden bowl to the right of Pythia. It was thickened with blood.
You will lose a daughter to this as well.