The Right Hand of God (48 page)

Telling them that it was safe to pick up the Arrow, as long as it was held tightly? Is that the sort of thing the Fire might say, or could it be the invention of- of a mind taken with madness?' The boy raised his face to meet his, his features filled with an uneasy mixture of hope and fear.

And with these words it became clear to Phemanderac, scholar of Dona Mihst, that the Gift of Fire had indeed fallen again. He had been there to witness it, but had thought it a dream.

Obviously at least one of the people in the basement had opened himself enough to receive the Gift, and it had been speaking to him ever since. So. The Jugom Ark had attuned itself to the Fire within Leith. Others of the Company may also have received the Fire. Had he, Phemanderac of Dhauria? Could he reach out and take the Jugom Ark in his own hand?

'Phemanderac? Phemanderac!' The youth tugged at the sleeve of his coat. 'What is happening out there? Look!'

The tall scholar looked out from the rock, far too late, to see two columns of Bhrudwan wizard-warriors, one column

to the left, the other to the right, both aimed at the rock on which he stood.

For the first time Phemanderac came face to face with the bane of Dhauria, the massed Maghdi Dasht, the Lords of Fear. And as he realised what was about to happen, terror turned his spine to ice.

The horns were heard everywhere across the field, announcing the arrival of that which Jethart feared. The Bhrudwans are doing something, he thought; and, abandoning his chart, he ran from the tent and called for his mount. I do not remember my legs aching like this! His aides struggled to keep up with him as he galloped towards the lines of battle.

Mahnum heard the horns, and at the same time felt something akin to a thickening of the air.

At first he thought it might be the weather - a snowstorm, perhaps; it was certainly cold enough - but poking his head out of the tent revealed a high overcast sky, definitely lighter than earlier in the day. Yet the air continued to thicken, making it harder to move, harder to think. And with the thickening came a dread, unspecified but powerful and growing.

Maendraga and his daughter Belladonna laboured at the southern end of the front lines, alternating between the First Men of Deruys - who had taken a fearful battering, for all their undoubted skill and courage - and the losian Army of the North, who had done somewhat better. At the sound of the horn the magician jerked his head up, as though he smelled something in the air; a moment later, his daughter sensed it also. They abandoned their magics, and a whole troop of illusory soldiers disappeared, leaving a number of bemused Bhrudwan warriors searching for their enemies. The two former Guardians of the Arrow glanced at each other,

then ran for their horses. And as they ran, the horns continued to sound.

Te Tuahangata of the Mist gave the horns no thought, so completely had the lust of battle taken him. Together with Wiusago of Deruys and Perdu of the Fenni he rushed to wherever the Falthan lines were thinnest, and many warriors followed them. He had slain dozens of the enemy through sheer speed and recklessness, allied with his skill with the warclub, and was pleased to observe that the enemy soldiers ran from him; though he was unaware that his blood-covered face under a shock of black hair made him look like nothing other than an avenging angel. Most of the blood was his own, flowing from a shallow wound on his left temple. He was also completely unaware that he laughed as he slew, a mirthless laugh filled with portents that drained courage from his adversaries. Even Wiusago and Perdu, professional soldiers who killed out of necessity, looked at him askance.

They heard the horns, they felt the air thicken, and their hearts seemed to grow smaller in their chests, troubled by doubts. But Te Tuahangata seemed untouchable as he laid about himself with a vicious extravagance, and those around him recovered some of their courage. Yet soon all heads turned towards the centre of the battlefield, drawn by some sense, as they realised something dreadful was happening.

Hal exchanged a quick glance with Achtal. There was no need for words. They had been expecting something like this, and had waited patiently, hidden in a rockfield some distance from the front line. No one would have understood this reluctance to fight, especially since Achtal would have been so valuable with his sword in hand; moreover Hal had been viewed with a strong degree of suspicion since the night Leith accused him of complicity with the Bhrudwan cause.

They bounded out from behind the rocks, Hal strangely lithe for one so crippled, and ran towards the place where the magic was being raised.

They were halfway there when the horns blew a second time.

Stella ground her teeth together in frustration as the twin Bhrudwan columns met on the far side of the rock upon which Leith was clearly trapped. Now the grey-cloaked men spread to the left and to the right, making space for more fighters to move forward. Perhaps five hundred Falthan soldiers were trapped within the narrowing inner circle: for a moment Stella held hopes they might resist, but they seemed to have been frozen into immobility, and were cruelly cut down. She wept where she stood, shaking with impotence as if she, too, were frozen, awaiting the fall of the axe. Beside her the awful figure breathed deeply, eating and drinking in the scene below them. She longed to hurt him somehow, as she had hurt Deorc, even if it cost her an eternity of pain.

Phemanderac finished his counting: thirteen thirteens. He knew what that meant, he could have given them a name even if their magic was not clearly evident. These were the Maghdi Dasht, the order that had invaded Dhauria a thousand years ago, laying siege to Dona Mihst, retreating only when word came to them of their master's defeat in Instruere at the hands of Conal Greatheart. Phemanderac had been instructed in their ways, as were all Dhaurian scholars, and knew what they were capable of.

What was I thinking, spending a comfortable session with the Arrow-bearer here on this rock in full view of the enemy? Why did I not sense the danger as it drew near?

He knew the answer, but he didn't want to examine it.

A second trumpet blast came from the top of the slope, instantly answered by action from the encircling Bhrudwans. The Maghdi Dasht stepped back, allowing sword-wielding soldiers to drive into the Falthans they had pinned down. So tightly had the binding magic pinned them that all the hundreds of Falthans could do was to stand in abject terror and await the blades that chopped and hacked their way towards them.

On the rock Leith roared with frustration. So his Arrow was not a weapon? It flamed high into the air, a light so strong it flickered along the base of the clouds above, a fire so fierce that Phemanderac cried out in pain as the hair on his face and forearms was singed. 'Leith!' he cried, sucking in a blast of hot air as he did so. 'Stop! You will slay me!'

The chanting continued, an abrasive sound that seemed to bore into the minds of all Falthans who heard it. Leith could still move: maybe the Jugom Ark provided a measure of protection against Bhrudwan magic, or - as was more likely - the Lords of Fear had yet to reveal their full strength. Slowly he stumbled from one end of the rock to the other, and all around him the same scene met his gaze. His soldiers stood like statues until they were felled with a series of pitiless blows, a field of precious grain harvested by a callous farmer. One by one they died.

One by one. The numbers kept ticking over in his head; and the weight on his shoulders grew heavier and heavier. One by one. The slashing of swords, the droning of one hundred and sixty-nine throats, a dirge to accompany their deaths, numbers, numbers, numbers.

Leith thought he would go mad.

'Make a space!' Hal cried. 'Whatever you have to do, clear a space!' Taken aback, burdened with unnatural fear, the nearby

Falthan soldiers found something of courage in the words. For a moment they could move freely, and set about driving the Bhrudwans back. Within a few moments Hal and Achtal stood in the centre of an open space twenty paces wide. In answer to Achtal's quizzical look, Hal smiled tightly. 'They'll come.'

Within moments a horse burst Into the clearing. 'The Destroyer isn't interested in defeating us!' cried the rider, who leaped from his mount like a young man. 'He's just holding us here until—'

'Until he can capture the Jugom Ark,' Hal finished.

'Who are you?' Jethart asked him. 'I'm sorry, but I do not have time for niceties.'

'Hal Mahnumsen, son of Mahnum and brother of the Arrow-bearer, who is in trouble. The Destroyer has sent the Maghdi Dasht after him.'

The old man nodded curtly. 'I'm sorry, I didn't recognise you. The help of any scion of Mahnum will be welcome. Tell me, how do you know of the Maghdi Dasht?'

'My knowledge of their existence matters less than my knowledge of what they are doing,' Hal replied curtly. 'They are imprisoning him with words of binding. If you are here—'

Maendraga and Belladonna appeared in the clearing as if by magic, followed by Modahl and a tall woman he had never seen before. A few moments later Mahnum stumbled his way in, clearly out of breath and bleeding from a gash to his arm: he glanced around the clearing, smiled at his son but took a pace backwards when he saw his father. Indrett followed him, a dazed look on her face. Soon a dozen or more people milled about in the clearing, protected from the Bhrudwan soldiers by the increasingly sluggish efforts of Falthan fighters.

'You are all here because something called you,' Hal told them, an urgency in his voice Indrett had never heard from

him before. 'For a hundred days we have all been anticipating a physical battle, but that was never the real battle to be fought here. You feel the power being exerted by the servants of the Destroyer, but unlike those around you, you have been able to resist. You are the real warriors here today.' The Hal she had always known, the calm, serene child, had been broken by the accusations from his brother. What remained seemed more vulnerable, more human, but still had steel. 'There is something inside you that responds to the call, something that fights the magic of the Maghdi Dasht.' She shook her head, rubbing her temples, trying to clear the thickness that settled on her like the snow at Vulture's Craw.

'What is happening?' Modahl asked, his voice troubled.

'Leith and the Jugom Ark are surrounded by the Lords of Fear,' Jethart replied, pointing to the north where the sound of chanting continued to abrade across the battlefield. Hal nodded to him, then added: 'Phemanderac of Dona Mihst is trapped there with him. It is his call you feel.'

'Enough of the discussion,' Indrett cried. 'What are we to do?'

The Destroyer spun to his left, facing the girl he believed totally under his control. 'What are you doing?' he screamed at her. 'I can feel the power within you!'

Stella smiled through gritted teeth. She could not wipe the sweat from her face, could not control the way her body shook, but she could turn her head enough to see the face of her enemy.

'I'm fighting you, fool,' she whispered between clenched teeth.

* * *

A third trumpet volley rang out, heralding a change in the incantation that seemed to be winding cords of steel around Leith and Phemanderac. The philosopher had been driven to his knees, his voice little more than a whisper. 'Can't. .. breathe ...'

Leith knelt beside him, taking his face in his hands. 'Phemanderac! If the Bhrudwans are of Water, how can they hurt us with their magic spells? They can't, can they?'

'It's an illusion,' Hal told them, 'though a very powerful one.'

'So it can be defeated,' Belladonna said confidently. 'Though it does not feel like any illusion I've ever encountered.'

'The horns were the key,' her father said. 'They convinced us something real was about to happen. We participated willingly in their illusion.'

'It can be defeated,' the cripple confirmed. 'Powerful resistance has already been raised against the Lords of Fear. Somewhere out on the field a great wizard opposes the Destroyer's plan.'

'Reject the binding, not those doing the binding,' Achtal said, and adopted a look of intense concentration. 'Pick on their weak place - right there.' He flung a muscled forearm towards a section of the Bhrudwan encirclement. 'We break it there.'

'We break it now,' said a figure that had just joined them. Casting aside her cloak, the Ice Queen of the Sna Vazthans added her will to that of the group. 'I have resisted his plans for years.'

'Come closer,' Hal called to them. 'Let me show you how.'

'Curse you!' the Destroyer shrieked at Stella. 'What have you done? From where do you get the strength?'

Her mouth was dry with the effort she had expended. Somehow she'd known to focus on just a few of the robed figures. Or, more accurately, on what they were doing, a binding akin to what the Destroyer had been doing to her since he had captured her. Stubbornness! Resist the binding! Months of pent-up fury, terror and frustration combined to give her a power she never knew she had. It felt as though a great flame surged up from deep within her. And down on the plain, just to the south of the rock, something happened in response to her efforts.

Others - she could not see who - began to pour their resistance at the same figures she had chosen.

Her mouth was dry, but she still had saliva enough to spit in the Undying Man's face.

With a roar as deep as caverns the Destroyer struck out at her, his fist exploding on the back of her head, knocking her forward so that she pitched a few feet down the rocky slope. He cried something after her, but she did not hear it.

He's not breathing! Not breathing! Leith shook the blue-lipped form lying prone on the rock before him. Breathe!

'Use the Arrow. '

Sobbing with relief at the sound of the voice, Leith laid the Jugom Ark on Phemanderac's breast, then poured all his soul into the fire within. Breathe!

He was so filled with joy when the philosopher drew a ragged breath, he didn't notice the pressure around him decrease.

'Forward! Now!' Hal set off crabwise towards a narrow gap in the Bhrudwan ranks. At his side strode Achtal, who drew his sword and cleared a path for them. The others followed behind, not knowing where they were going, trusting in a cripple publicly spurned by the Bearer of the Jugom Ark. It