Blood of War (57 page)

Soon, the Salosian forces began to gain confidence that he would not, in fact, cut them down as thoroughly as he did the Soldiers of God and they joined him in attacking the attackers.

To Jurel it was as if a dirty window had been opened and light, sweet and pure, poured in banishing shadows, stripping away the lies and the obscured truths, and revealing what was, what had always been.

He fought, and he rejoiced, his battle cry a greedy call for blood that would not be denied, his paean. All the raging screams shook the air, melding, merging and urging him onward like his own personal hymn, the smell of blood and fire and death, like a powerful narcotic that drove him ever further into a frenzy.

He felt powerful, invincible even.

He leaped, sword held overhead, landing in the middle of three Soldiers of God who fought back to back, his sword hissing forward, cutting a shining arc. Mystic metal met mundane armor, sheared through the helm and deep into the torso of the Soldier in front of him. With a wet gurgle the Soldier slid to the flagstones. Jurel did not take the time to notice. He was already twisting with a broad side sweep, the glowing blade once again disappearing into the armor and viscera of the second Soldier.

By then Gaven and the others had managed to catch up and they were fending off more Soldiers as they swarmed over the wall. The last Soldier facing Jurel barely had the chance to widen his eyes in surprise before Jurel kicked him solidly in the chest, sending him flying back over the wall wailing a strangely childish wail.

His attack run continued; he rushed the flank of those cresting the walls, leaving Gaven and his troop enough space in front to continue their defense while he slammed into the side of the first Soldier in his way. With a broad sweep of his arm, he plowed his hapless opponent over the wall and drove forward with his sword. That Soldier dropped like a bag of stones too.

Gaven and his troop, meanwhile, made a good account of themselves; the remaining Soldiers in this pocket fell. But Jurel did not even notice. He was already sprinting down the battlements toward the next embattled group where he again waded in, sword singing.

The blood flowed. Screams choked the air. It was as if he had spent all his life only partly awake, a ghost who watched his own reality from outside, able to see everything that happened but unable to do anything to affect the outcome of events. But now, now...

Now he was fully awake. Now he was most definitely no longer a ghost. He laughed long and loud as his sword mowed enemy Soldiers down like a scythe.

Soon, his sword cut deep into one last Soldier who fell back over the wall with a stunned look in his already lifeless eyes and Jurel stood uncontested upon his ramparts flanked by Gaven and a dozen soldiers. He scanned the ramparts quickly and saw only his own forces continuing to pepper the field below with arrows, stones, boiling naphtha and anything else that came to hand. There were no white capes, there were no scaling ladders, Jurel's instincts were not screaming at him to be somewhere
right now
.

Mystic lights continued to flare malevolently in the air, crackling and snapping. The day, though only mid afternoon and with not a cloud in sight seemed dark, heavy. The sun tried valiantly to break through but in the end it had the appearance of an eye squinted in judgement.

In the field below, the sea of white seemed to have stalled, though Jurel thought they were just regrouping, preparing for another assault. Bitterly, he noted that for all the death he and his forces had inflicted, the sea below did not seem much smaller. From which of the hells were they spewing from?

The bulwark had repelled the invaders for a short while; several stakes still sported shredded cloaks and broken armor, but the sheer weight of numbers made a breach inevitable. The forces that had manned the bulwark had retreated inside the walls. The moat had been bridged by whole trees cut down and brought hastily forward from the surrounding forest, the traps, well a few of them anyway, had been bridged by the broken, gored, and now trampled bodies of those who had first discovered them.

A wave of exhaustion rocked him back on his heels. Dizzy, he clutched a crenelation, closed his eyes. He was overdoing it. He had been warned to keep control, to not exert his new powers too much until he grew stronger. His armor flickered momentarily, threatening to leave him unprotected. He concentrated through the wave of torpor that threatened to drop him, felt the comforting weight solidify again.

The dizziness held him, spun him, nauseated and disoriented him. It was quite a shock, then, when he opened his eyes and found himself facing the opposite direction, right into Gaven's rage fueled eyes.

“
Where the hells have you been?” Gaven shrieked. “You bloody coward. Why did you abandon us?”

And just like that, Jurel felt like he was ten years old again, and Daved was upbraiding him for yet another foolish boy's stunt. Like the time he and Darren and Trig had used the massive piles of corn in the silo as a slide. Oh, they had had a rip-roaring good time clambering up the golden slopes and throwing themselves over the edge. It was bumpy and sometimes none too comfortable but after the first couple of slides, which had amounted to little more than tumbling head over heels until they reached the floor, they had built a good layer of corn juice on themselves and their slide. That was when it had gotten really interesting. Until he had arrived home and Daved had demanded to know where the hells he had been and why the hells was he covered in corn.

“
That's food, you dolt!”
he had shouted after Jurel had excitedly explained.
“What the damned hells were you thinking?”

His answer then was the same he offered to Gaven now. Sheepishly, ashamedly, he looked at the worn flagstones between his feet. “Well, I-I...” and he trailed off, looking up to stare plaintively into his friend's fevered eyes.

His instincts kicked up. It felt like a sudden cold wind on a hot day, or maybe like an itch he could not quite reach. It was not very comfortable; he still had to get used to the feel of it. He glanced over Gaven's shoulder and saw the ends of a ladder slam into the stone wall.

The boyish feeling fled, chased off by his new metal determination, his exhaustion evaporated as a new wave of adrenaline coursed its fiery trail in his veins.

“
Never mind that now. Can you let it lie until the end of this?”

Gaven looked over his shoulder, hesitating for an instant as several soldiers rushed to meet the new threat.

“
Look, Gav, if we survive this, I promise I'll tell you everything.” He extended a hand.

Gaven's hard eyes bored into him. He seemed on the verge of demanding the explanation
right now
but his eyes flickered, he gave one curt nod, and gripped Jurel's wrist.

“
Fine, but you will tell me everything.”

He was still angry. Jurel understood that. He had a right to be angry. They all did. Jurel had not understood before. He had run like a coward. He had been a fool. But now...

Now, he was no fool. Now he was rage and fire. He was the storm. He was divine vengeance. He would see his brother's gate in the underworld had a very long line-up before this day was done.

With a feral grin Jurel raised his sword, calling the blue fire, sending it licking up the blade.

“
Let's do this.”

And they, along with the rest of the squad with them, rushed to rejoin the fray, swords high, one blazing like a star, bellowing their war cries like a hymn.

He had been mistaken earlier, he thought as his sword found its next target. It was not that he was finally fully awake. It was that he was finally fully
alive
.

* * *

The battle progressed as battles do. Men and women rushed forward, through the smoke and blood, over broken bodies of comrades and opponent alike to meet with a clash in the middle. After the swords and pikes stopped their brutal work, some staggered away to join in the next fray, some stayed to join with their comrades and opponents on the cold ground.

The sea of white moved inexorably forward, the sheer numbers brought by the prelacy inexhaustible. More ladders went up and siege towers rumbled forward, emerging from the choking fog and smoke like demon lords from the lower hells. No one, not even the most hardened veterans, looked too closely at the ground where the massive timber towers covered in hardened and wet leather passed. A few of these towers burst into spontaneous flame, or exploded, or simply collapsed in on themselves, sending those tasked with moving the great, lumbering beasts running...unless they collapsed as fire engulfed them, or sword-length shrapnel impaled them.

But more and more towers reached the walls as the Salosian priests grew tired and had to concentrate their remaining energy stores on staving off the Gaorlan priests. More and more Soldiers of God made the battlements, and though the defenders remained successful in repelling the attackers—with a great deal of help from Jurel and his mobile crack force—they were beginning to flag both from sheer exhaustion and from loss of numbers. It took them longer and longer each time their defenses were breached to wipe their walls clear.

Jurel's constant presence and devastating efficacy had buoyed their spirits, and lent them the strength to cause incredible casualties to the Grand Prelate's forces. When the sun dipped beneath the trees in the west and night blanketed the world, the Soldiers of God fell back to lick their wounds and rest for the next day's continuance.

That reprieve, however, gave the Salosians ample time to discover just how badly things looked. They had managed to stave off the beast for one day, but with their forces cut in half—and Mikal's force still waiting for the call, a call that, more and more seemed likely to be made out of desperation than for any tactical advantage—things did not bode well for the coming dawn.

The evening and night were spent cleaning up the bodies and the blood of friends and foes under the bone cold moon, shoring up dwindling supplies, seeing to the wounded who filled not only the infirmaries but the Council Hall with moans of pain, and the occasional call for a mother.

Occasionally, someone would look over the crenellations, past the bloody churned earth, hidden now by night's cloak, and quail at the number of fires that flickered in the distance, fires that flickered like a night full of stars, that still spread for miles end to end.

The general consensus—never spoken, no, never made real by giving it voice—was that Jurel's presence, no matter how powerful, was not enough. They needed reinforcements. A lot of them. Now.

But hard on the heels of that thought always followed a bitter question, an inevitable question, one that each exhausted fighter or healer or wielder of arcanum tried to suppress even as it took form in his or her mind: who would support a dying army of outlawed heretics against an overwhelming force sent lawfully by the kingdom's sanctioned church?

And some few, a very few, wondered deep in their heart of hearts if Jurel had been worth it.

Chapter 52

Jurel's room was dark. He had not bothered to light any candles, though knowing what he did now, he could light every damned candle in this damned building—set them all to blazing like the fires beyond the wavering defense perimeter in the forest beyond—with little more than a thought.

He had spent a year living in this room, and it was sparsely furnished. A bed, a rickety chair near a small table, a bookcase; he did not need light to navigate safely. Besides, along with a distinct lack of need for nourishment, he found he could see much better in the dark than he used to, as though the moon was always out for him.

The absence of light suited him, matched his mood. In darkness, all the joys and wonders of the world were muted, hidden. Each night, that which is laid bare in the brightness of day becomes a mystery again, an enigma buried like a lost civilization in the sands of time. It was the perfect time for the worries and the angst that ever lurk, peeking furtively from just around the first corner of the soul, fearful of the scouring sun, to come out and play.

Weak, shaky with exhaustion, Jurel raised his cup to his lips and swallowed the last of the water. Just water. This was not a time to be drowning his miseries. There was too much at stake.

An image of Metana floated up from the burial ground deep in his mind before he could stop it. He growled, pushed her image away. It could not be. He understood that now. It just could not be. Because of who he was, or, more precisely, who he had to be.

How could there possibly be room in his life for love and laughter when he was the god of all things hate? Metana did not deserve that kind of life. She did not deserve to be with the monster he had become. So filled with light and life and grace, while he was blood, violence, darkness. No, she did not deserve that.
He
did not deserve
her
.

Besides, he thought that by the end of the next day, at least one, and probably both of them, would be dead.

A timid knock at his door sent ripples through his bruised thoughts. Shaken more by his not having anticipated the knock—his senses had heightened to a point that he enjoyed a vague form of prescience—than by the knock itself, he focused. And though he should have anticipated this, he had not and was shaken all over again.

As if she had been summoned by merely thinking of her, she now stood outside his door, uncertain, hesitant. It was a Metana he had never before encountered. The Metana he knew always moved, spoke, did
every
thing with an air of confidence that often bordered on belligerence. It was one of the things he loved about her—
had
loved, he corrected himself viciously,
had
loved. And there she was, hesitance and second thoughts notwithstanding. Of course.