Chapter 9

Hawkbluff, Thenol

The rain worsened as the legions marched, turning to fine razors that drove through mail and flesh to chill the bone. The ground softened to greasy, foul-smelling muck as the trees thinned to scatterings of scrub and bracken. The soldiers' progress slowed as the ground sucked away their boots, or held fast to the butts of spears. In places, it gave way to marshland, tufted with cutting clawgrass and riddled with deceptively deep ponds covered with sheets of algae the color of dried blood.

The Hawkvale. Forlo knew the march well. This was not the first time he'd dreamt of it. The Sixth had spent an uneasy, sleepless night watching for more Thenolite ambushes and listening to strange, distant sounds that carried across the long valley. Moans and screams, mostly, but something else—something that could have been cats yowling, or babies crying. He shuddered, closing the door on that memory.

In spite of it all—the noises, the weather, the very land that seemed to fight them—the minotaurs and men of the League would not be deterred. This was it, they all knew: the fateful day, doom at long last for Thenol. Horns of brass-bound ivory and drums of polished copper sounded the advance, driving them on through sleet and muck. The regimental battle-standards hung heavy and dark, water running off their bottoms in sheets. Somewhere, miles away, thunder growled.

"This dreck could be a blessing," said Grath, marching at the center of the Sixth, at Forlo's side—where else? "It will hamper their archers more than our crossbows."

Forlo grunted, not wanting to grant that much. By his experience, foul weather never favored the attacker. He looked up through the gloom to where the lights of the temple of Hawkbluff glimmered. The temple perched on a cliff of white rock half a league away, lonely, with neither trees nor boulders around it. It was carved out of the rock itself, its fluted walls and curving towers resembling nothing so much as a giant rib cage, the remains of some long-dead giant, a slim, central tower like a spur of bone jutting up from its midst. Gargoyles perched on its heights, as well as worse things—banners made from what could only be human skin, rotting bodies dangling from every battlement and rooftop, and heaps of skulls everywhere. This was the greatest church of the dark god Hith to be found in Taladas. Looking upon it, half-lost in the gray, rainy pall, Forlo vowed silently that the Bishop's great temple would fall.

"I'm surprised we haven't seen any of their scouts yet," he said. "Ondelos is no fool. He wouldn't have left this approach unguarded."

"Maybe we've hurt him worse than we thought," Grath replied, shrugging his massive shoulders. "We certainly left the way behind us washed in enough Thenolite blood."

Forlo shook his head, troubled. It looked too easy: the word trap kept echoing in his head. If the Bishop had any last dice to cast, it would be here. Had to be—there was no place left for him to go.

"Send word to the other marshals," he commanded. "Double the watch on our flanks and rear—and keep eyes on the skies, too, as best we can."

"The skies?" Grath replied, and laughed. "You expecting swarms of dragons to descend on us?"

"I don't expect anything," Forlo snapped. "Except my men to carry out my orders."

Grath drew back slightly, looking hurt. Then, clamping his hand around his forearm in salute, he wheeled and strode off among the columns of soldiers, bawling for messengers. Forlo watched him go, regretting his tone. In all his years in the legions, he'd never had a truer sword-brother than Grath. He hoped the minotaur would understand how frayed his nerves were. With the entire army to lead, and the-emperor-knew-what lying in wait, he had good reason.

The sky darkened to the hue of slate. The thunder muttered more fervently, with flashes of violet light kindling in the clouds. The storm was not natural. It could only be Ondelos's doing, or that of some warlock working with him. Forlo considered asking the clerics who marched with the legions to call upon their gods to drive the darkness back—but doing so would be costly, and he had the feeling the priests would need their strength for more pressing matters, soon. Matters like a few thousand dead men.

He knew from what his scouts had told him that at least a few regiments of the Thenolites' corpse-soldiers remained. They formed the bulk of the fell realm's army—no one who died under the rule of Bishop Ondelos went to the grave or pyre. With Hith's power, he made their bodies—or their bones—arise anew, as mindless hulks that obeyed his commands without question or fear. They needed neither food nor sleep, and their morale never flagged. They even fought on through wounds that would cripple a living man. And their effect on living opponents was not something to be dismissed. It was one thing for a soldier to confront a foe who might put a sword through his heart. It was another to be faced with ghouls who would rend him to pieces and devour his flesh.

The Sixth slogged on, slowing with each step. Even the scraggly bushes gave way, leaving nothing but great fields of mud, churned by the passage of numerous feet. The Thenolites had been here, maybe as recently as that morning. Without the sun, it was hard for Forlo to know the hour, but he guessed it was wearing on midday. Noon would pass before they reached the Bluff.

At last, the great promontory loomed out of the fog. It was jagged, all sharp angles of pale stone, its sides curved to form figures: leering skulls, horned demons, and mad-eyed fanatics with wicked sickle-swords. A narrow path wound up its sides, leading to the temple high above. There were other ways up, Forlo knew—two they knew of, a third they suspected, and who knew how many others? There was only one true road, though. The rest led into mazes of twisting tunnels, alike enough that getting lost was far too easy.

And there, at the base of that ghostly escarpment, waited their enemy.

They are so few, Forlo thought, gazing upon Thenol's last defenders. It was difficult to get a true count, with the rain, but surely there could not have been more than two thousand men gathered there, a mile away. Less than a third of what remained of the League's legions. Most of the Thenolites were soldiers, living men in bronze armor and horned helmets, gripping bows or leaning on long-hafted waraxes. They were the hardest foes for Forlo to fight, for they were not much different from him—career soldiers, or conscripts drafted from the fields and cities to defend their realm. They were not evil men—not most, anyway.

Not like the fanatics who had ambushed the camps last night, with their foully enchanted arrows. They were easier to kill, for their minds were gone, lost when they swore their oaths to Hith. They wore no cloaks, nor anything more than loincloths and skull-masks. Many had slashed their bare chests with sickle-shaped knives, letting blood wash down and mix with the mud underfoot. They howled in wild rage, dancing forward to taunt the disciplined legions.

"Hold!" Forlo shouted, raising an empty hand. "No one shoots until I give the signal."

At his command, the army ground to a halt. The crossbowmen cranked their weapons and stood ready, awaiting orders. They were still too far away, too far for bow or crossbow—but some of the crazed Thenolites were loosing arrows anyway, to arc high and fall well short of the mark, into the muck. The commanders of the enemy did not stop them.

We have numbers, we have discipline, Forlo thought. They have him.

Bishop Ondelos stood on a grassy hummock, toward the rear of his troops. He was a hugely fat man, hairless and pale save for a wine-colored birthmark that covered the left side of his face. Robes of white and red draped over his girth, and a scarlet miter covered his head. He leaned on a staff of polished onyx, its headpiece carved into a grinning skull. The carving's eyes were huge garnets, glowing with magic. Around him crowded his disciples, the lesser priests of Hith's church, armed with sickles and flails, men and women both with their heads shaved bald and dusted with powdered bone.

"What of the dead?" Grath murmured. "We know they're still around. Why wouldn't Ondelos have them here?"

"I don't know," Forlo admitted. He had been thinking the same thing. "There's trickery at work here, I think."

He took off his helm and ran a hand through his shortcropped, graying hair, trying to think. In all his days, he had never met a foe so cunningly evil as Ondelos. He didn't know how it would happen, but he was sure if he gave the order to attack, it would lead his troops to slaughter. Still, he could only hold off for so long. The minotaurs craved battle; it was in their blood. The longer he kept them from the fight, the harder it would become to control them.

What, then? What was Ondelos's advantage?

There was a craggy rock nearby, a blade of stone jutting out of the bog. Forlo turned toward it, intent on climbing to get a better view—but when he tried to take a step, the muck clung to his boots and he stumbled. Angrily—this wasn't the first time he'd gotten stuck today—he bent down and tugged his feet free. First left, then—

When his right foot pulled out, it brought something with it. Something long, hard, and pale. He stood staring, his heart lurching against his ribs as the rain washed the grime away. The thing at his feat was a human thighbone.

Grath saw it too, and bent down at once, digging with the haft of his axe. The wet earth yielded more remains: a pelvis, ribs, a skull. The minotaur's yellow eyes went wide as he straightened back up. Together, he and Forlo looked around at the League's grand army, the thousands of soldiers waiting for the battle to start.

All of them standing shin-deep in mud.

"Khot," Grath swore.

Forlo nodded, numb. They knew where the dead army was.

Forlo pulled the bowstring back to his cheek and held it, waiting as he sighted down the arrow's length. Beyond lay blue sky, and below, darker water. The tides were high this morning, with Solis new and Lunis a waning quarter. He wondered idly what the black moon was doing. It wasn't in the same phase as the other two, for astronomers and navigators noted such concordances. One was due in a few months, by what he'd heard.

Once, before the Destruction shattered Taladas, Northern and Southern Hosk had been one landmass, stretching uninterrupted for nearly four hundred leagues, from the frigid wastes of Panak to the hot, misty reaches of the Blackwater Glade. When the rains of fire and stone came, however, a crack had split Hosk down the middle, and the seas had rushed in to fill it. So was born the Tiderun Straight—or the Run, as most folk called it. It was not a deep body of water, and the tides affected it more than any other. This became most pronounced when the moons aligned. Then, the high water would be higher than ever, overflowing waterfronts all along either shore, and hours later, the Run would be dry, and Hosk's two halves would be one again. Such days caused a stir among the local peasants, who ventured out onto the muddy flats to haul in fish that lay gasping and dying. There were even a few places where the ground was rocky enough for a man to ride across—or walk, if he moved fast enough.

For now, though, there was water in the Run. Forlo thought he might go for a sail in the afternoon, taking out one of the smaller fishing vessels. He was a fair mariner at best, but he liked the smell of salt as he skipped over the waves. And besides, he was desperate for something to do.

He hadn't figured retirement would be like this. With Essana running the Hold, every day was a struggle to keep himself occupied. He'd already read half the books in the keep's libraries, and went hunting so often the gamekeepers were nervous about the local stock of pheasants and deer. He'd ridden to Thera twice, to catch up on news across the League: no new emperor had been crowned, though the factions vying for the throne had narrowed from seven to three. There was scant word of the Sixth, but the local lords thought it likely that Duke Rekhaz would call the army back to the capital soon. Most folk thought a battle would be fought to decide the succession before the summer was out.

Whenever talk turned to fighting, Forlo's sword hand began to itch. He thought of Grath, and of the men he'd commanded, and wondered if he'd made the right choice. Several times he'd considered riding out to seek his old legion, but then he would think of Essana, and how good it felt to hold her while they slept, and he put such thoughts aside. She was his life now, not the sword.

And she would never give him nightmares.

There was movement now, beyond his arrow: small, white shapes darting down over the waves. He held steady, then lowered his sights half an inch and loosed. The string snapped forward and the arrow streaked away. He marked its path, watched it climb, then hit one of the white shapes as it started to drop again. There was a burst of feathers, and bird and shaft spun down out of sight. He smiled, and reached to his quiver for a second arrow.

"Barreth. What are you doing?"

Forlo started. Essana was coming up the steps from the manor, her skirts hitched up above her ankles. She was beautiful, as always, her raven hair shining in the sun. She had a cross look about her, though, and when she saw the bow in his hands she rolled her eyes in disgust.

"Starlight," he began, flushing. "I—"

"You were shooting gulls again, weren't you?" she asked, striding along the catwalk to stand glaring at him. "You know the fisher-folk hate that. They say it's bad luck."

"Maybe for the gulls," he said, smiling lamely.

Essana rolled her eyes again. "I don't think I can take it if you're going to spend the rest of your days rattling around, looking for amusement. You've got to find something productive to do."

"Like what?" he snapped. "Embroidery?"

That was a mistake. Essana turned pale, saying nothing. She was alarmingly cold and brittle when she was angry.

"I didn't mean it," he said. "Starlight, listen. I've spent the last three years fighting armies of dead men and maniacs. I'm having trouble with… this." He waved his hand vaguely. "I'll try harder, though. Maybe learn to fish."

For a moment longer she only stared at him, and he thought he'd annoyed her even more—then a smile broke across her face, and she shook her head. "Oh, very fine," she said. "Either you're going to shoot all the gulls, or you're going to starve them."

He laughed at that, set down his bow and pulled her to him. She pretended to resist, then yielded with a sigh as their lips pressed together. That was one thing he'd never tire of. Seeing the look in her eyes when they came apart again, he thought of another.

"I don't have any business until after luncheon," she said, one corner of her mouth crooking upward.

He grinned, his hands running over her. "Really. How shall we pass the time?"

With that, he scooped her up in his arms. She yelped in surprise, then laughed and laid her head on his shoulder as he carried her down the steps, the bow forgotten behind them.