Daughter of Blood (51 page)

“What's happening out there?” the marine captain asked, when Kalan finally located him.

“Nothing at present,” Kalan said, smiling as Faro finally joined him. He had removed his gauntlets on entering the pavilion and now gave the boy's shoulder a brief, careful squeeze. Beneath his hand, the bones felt fragile as a bird's wing. “I'm sorry. For getting you into this,” he added, when Faro looked puzzled. “I should have had Che'Ryl-g-Raham return you to Grayharbor.”

Faro shook his head, his expression indicating that he would not have gone. Tyun smiled, despite his obvious pain. “He's Derai. He has a right to be with his own people.”

Who exactly Faro's people were, among the Nine Houses, was still moot, Kalan reflected. “If Kion can spare you,” he told the boy, “I need Madder's armor from my tent.” Faro's eyes widened, but Kalan checked him before he could dash away. “Ask Kion first.”

Tyun's look was wry. “Your lad's no fool, Khar. Like everyone else, he knows what we're facing.”

“He's still a child,” Kalan said.

Tyun nodded. “As you say. But we won't hold through another round like the last.”

“I was surprised we held through that.” Kalan kept his voice low. “We rallied at the end, but if they had pushed again—” His shrug finished the sentence. They both knew that although the enemy might have taken heavier casualties than perhaps anticipated, they would almost certainly have
prevailed. The only rationale for withdrawal that Kalan could think of was that the opposing commander, while prepared to expend were-hunters and the former Blood Honor Guard, wanted to preserve the main Darksworn force. Especially, he thought now, if they can't rely on either reinforcements or resupply—which suggests they didn't get here by using portals. The Darksworn numbers, too, made portal use unlikely. Breach or not, the magnitude of power use and number of gates necessary to ferry a force that size would have triggered every residual ward and psychic defense left along the Wall.

From the Sea Keep to Swords, Kalan reflected grimly: I hope.

“They don't like taking losses.” Tyun spoke slowly, partly because of his injuries, Kalan guessed, but also as though he were puzzling out an enigma. “I've seen it when we've fought their incursions at sea. Whenever victory means heavy losses, they'll pull back.”

“We do the same to protect our ships,” Nimor observed, arriving at his captain's side.

Preserving a scarce resource, Kalan thought, as he rose to acknowledge the envoy. He repeated the thought aloud. “But if so, why not let the were-hunters overrun the camp when they attacked the herd? Why allow those stranded here to prepare even a limited defense?”

The look Nimor and Tyun exchanged was as expressive as a shrug. “A divided command,” Tyun said, “or decisions made for other than logical reasons, like an enemy that likes to toy with the prey. Or the kill being promised to one commander over another.”

“We've seen how ready they are to expend the were-hunts,” Nimor agreed. “It may be that a were-hunter victory is not palatable to those in command.”

Emerian history, too, had its share of such accounts, where pride or personal differences between commanders had given aid to their enemies. Kalan only hoped that whatever was driving the Swarm's inconsistencies would continue to work in the camp's favor. “I'd better get back.” He clasped
Tyun's hand, before turning to Nimor. “You and Murn will be vital next time, I suspect.”

The envoy nodded. “We'll be ready,” he promised quietly.

Kalan looked around for Lady Myr as he left, but like Kion, she remained absorbed in her work. Faro was waiting outside with an armload of Madder's caparison, the armor stacked at his feet. “One of the horsegirls helped me with it,” he said. His eyes met Kalan's. “Some of the orderlies were saying we're doomed, but I told 'em you'll find a way to save us.”

Kalan wished he could share his confidence. Even if Taly and Namath had gotten through, and Adamant was already marching to the camp's aid, the defense would be hard-pressed to hold until a relief force arrived. Regardless of the enemy's attitude to sustaining losses, the numbers involved were too unequal, but he could not say that to Faro. “We all have to play our part,” he said instead, “and not give up. Don't forget your primary orders,” he added, picking up the armor.

Faro scowled. “She's got the whole camp. I don't see why she needs me as well.”

Despite assault, injury, and death, Kalan still had to suppress a smile as he hefted the caparison over his shoulder. “Be worthy, my page,” he said, and left—first to equip Madder, then rejoin Jad on the outer defenses. “Still quiet?” he asked.

“Ay but this lull reminds me of when a Wall storm's brewing.” By tacit agreement, they stepped away from the wagons before Jad continued. “We've lost around ten percent of our total complement, more in some companies. I've reassigned defenders to even the squads up, but still . . .” He shrugged.

“Who've you appointed to replace Jaras?”

Jad's expression was half grin, half grimace: “Kelyr, with Orth as his second. Aside from the marines, they're the most experienced fighters available and they're used to working together. Rigan, Jaras's second, is badly wounded, too, so no one's being displaced—if we can even talk of that with companies that're less than a day old.”

“Kelyr and Orth are the logical choice,” Kalan agreed.

Jad glanced away, first to the perimeter, then the sky.
“Midmorning,” he began—at the same time as the psychic wake from a portal opening broke against Kalan's shield-wall. War horns blew again from the Darksworn lines, and Kalan wondered, as he whistled for Madder, whether the camp would survive to see noon.

M
aybe I was wrong about the portals, Kalan thought, swinging into Madder's saddle and turning toward the dike. Yet logic insisted the backwash of power had not been strong enough for a gate of any magnitude—and he refused to contemplate Malian's account of the demon, Nindorith, emerging through a similar portal in Caer Argent.

At first glance the Darksworn ranks appeared unchanged. But when Kalan stood up in his stirrups he detected a new banner, progressing from the legion's rear toward the front lines. The indigo standard bore the sun in gold, with a wash of red across its face, and Kalan recognized the device from Malian's description of that borne by Arcolin, the Swarm envoy to Emer. The Darksworns' forward ranks were opening now to allow a tall rider on an armored Emerian great horse to pass through. Not Tercel, Kalan reassured himself, identifying the coat beneath the caparison as gray, not bay. Despite the destrier's Emerian harness, the rider's black mail was Darksworn in style, and his indigo surcote also bore the red-washed sun. His visor, shaped into a raptor's beak, was closed.

An aura of power hung about the newcomer, and when Kalan looked more closely he could pick out calligraphy on
both the helmet and mail. No, runes, he amended, studying the power that glittered in each swooping stroke. They linked one to the other, armoring the wearer in sorcery. According to Malian, Arcolin's face and hands had been painted with similar runes when he confronted her below Imuln's temple in Caer Argent—which tallied, Kalan supposed, with the presence of the red-washed sun device.

The horse stopped in the center of the Darksworn line while the rider surveyed the camp. The defenders stared back, as silent as if the newcomer had cast a mesmerizing spell. Through the medium of his shield-wall, Kalan could sense allure reaching out to enfold the camp, and wondered if a similar working had been used to glamour the Honor Guard from oaths and honor. He frowned when a swift check confirmed that his shielding was still intact, reluctantly impressed that even without magic, the rider had the presence to compel the camp's attention.

The glamour met the shield-wall and recoiled, but returned almost at once, prying along the psychic barrier for weakness. A growl of power rumbled across the plain and many defenders looked uneasily skyward, hearing the sound as thunder. Kalan, watching the rider's right arm rise, suspected the truth was as much to be feared as one of the dry electrical storms encountered in this country. He thought the rider was shouting words through the visor: the voice sounded hoarse, even strained, but that could be an effect of distance and the power being channeled. The runes on the rider's armor had grown dark, and the darkness within each character began to crawl. Like wasps in a nest, Kalan thought, intrigued and repulsed at the same time.

The glamour exploring his shield-wall vanished. Simultaneously, the Gray Lands' wind swung to the rider as though called and began driving toward the camp, swirling up stones and grit into a flying curtain. The defenders muttered among themselves, because although they might not hear the rider's chant as Kalan could, even the most resolute New Blooders would know this was no natural wind. As if mocking the defenders' uncertainty, dust devils whipped into life across
the intervening ground—but a new breeze rose in answer, swift as dawn on the face of the sea, and blew away from the camp to meet the dust devils head on.

Kalan could have sworn the new breeze held the ocean's tang, and a quick glance back showed him Nimor and Murn by the inner barrier, with Reith and three more marines guarding them. He could sense the weatherworkers' focus on the sorcerer as the Sea wind strengthened, dispersing the dust devils and driving detritus back toward Darksworn lines. The runes on the sorcerer's armor writhed as the two winds buffeted each other, striving for mastery. Wildfire crackled toward the camp as the Sea breeze and Darksworn wind boomed together again, and many of the defenders cried out, clapping their hands over their ears.

By the time the boom faded and debris began to settle, both the contending winds had been extinguished and Murn's head was bowed, his weight resting on his staff. Nimor remained intent on the Darksworn sorcerer, who sat motionless, his arm still held high, while the ranks around him were equally unmoving. Waiting, Kalan thought, but for what? “What's happening?” a nearby defender asked, and Kalan heard the question repeated around the perimeter with varying degrees of doubt and fear.

“Stay calm and keep to your stations.” He pitched his voice to project command and reassurance at the same time. “Keep your eyes on the enemy.” Because, he added silently, as Jad and the other company leaders reiterated his orders, whatever's coming next has already started.

Madder stamped, tossing up his head as the pulsing from the sorcerer's runes intensified. From this distance, the armor itself appeared to be moving. The effect was disorientating, but Kalan forced himself to concentrate on the penumbra building above the runes. From what he could discern of its pattern, the sorcerer was creating a summoning spell. The Gray Lands' haze thickened and crept forward in answer, despite the wind that had sprung up again, spiraling fresh dust as the were-hunters advanced through the murk. Power was building around them, too, except this time it crackled
rather than shimmered, as though infused with the sorcerer's wildfire.

Kalan had seen were-hunters use spells to increase their power before, when they sought to overwhelm the hill fort in Emer. Now their howls sounded in counterpoint to the rising wind, and the power surrounding them pulsed to the same rhythm as the runes. The grit thickened, whipping into whirlwinds that drove toward the camp like the earlier dust devils, only they were already larger and considerably more fierce.

The were-hunters were summoning a dust storm, Kalan realized—trying to break his shield-wall with a combined magical and physical assault. “Secure the perimeter,” he shouted, and all around the earthworks he heard the exiles' voices, quelling panic and shouting to get the defenses tied down. “Take Madder and look to the horses,” he told Tehan, dismounting and thrusting the roan's reins into her hand. “Have the envoy shelter them.” If he can spare the power, Kalan thought. He could hear Nimor and Murn chanting aloud, a low steady counter to the tempest as the salt breeze sprang up again. The whirlwinds began to diminish and Kalan experienced a momentary hope—before the wind off the plain bellowed and a dark front of dust, stones, and grit came roaring in, overtaking the whirlwinds and battering the Sea breeze back.

“Hold fast!” Kalan shouted, as defenders screamed and a handful broke toward the inner camp. The camp's perimeter defenses were still their best protection against the storm's onslaught, whether real or magic, and the Darksworn host would be poised to attack as soon as the tempest had done its work. The runners wavered, some returning voluntarily before Tehan and the reserve turned the rest back. Kalan could hear Orth, threatening to kill anyone else that ran, his bull voice rising above the storm's shriek as the company leaders reiterated Kalan's exhortation to stand firm.

Murn had staggered before the counterattack, and Reith was supporting him. Simultaneously, Nimor's staff bucked against his grasp and he fought visibly to steady it. The best the weatherworkers were likely to achieve, Kalan gauged,
would be to slow the storm's advance, rather than preventing the wall of murk from reaching them. The physical wind was already lashing the camp ahead of the tempest of power, tearing up everything that was not tied down, and the defenders were screaming, or cursing, or frozen, staring at the blackness bearing down on them.

“Remember you are Blood,” Kalan shouted, at the full capacity of his lungs. He wished he could infuse them with fortitude in the same way he had strengthened his shield-wall with earth and stone. Instead of taking shelter himself, he remained upright, angled against the force of the wind with one hand locked onto the wagon behind him. He was in the clear space beyond fear now, where time stretched and he could take in the storm's entire front while simultaneously noting every swirl of dirt and wind-blasted stone flying their way. Kalan was aware, too, of those nearby watching him. He saw headshakes and heard imprecations, but gradually his calm spread outward, infecting those nearby with a similar composure that spread around the defenders' circle.

The storm wall towered overhead now, and the wyr hounds leapt onto the crest of the dike, their eyes on fire as they bayed defiance into the vortex. “Bravehearts!” Kalan shouted, and sprang up onto the wagon bed, one hand still locked onto its metal frame while using shielding to protect his eyes from flying grit. He laughed into the wind's fury, aware of every inch of his shield-wall, just as he was of his body's sinew and bone. An instant later both breath and laughter caught as the tempest of wind, magic, and debris smashed into the invisible barrier, clawing for a fissure to chisel open, or weakness to batter apart. Power and debris hurtled high above the impact before crashing back down and eddying around the perimeter of the camp—exactly as Kalan had seen the ocean pound in against the Sea Keep, only to founder about its deep foundations.

T
he wind, rudderless, roared back and forth across the plain. Most of the were-hunters had collapsed together with their conjuring, and the few who were still on their feet howled, a
prolonged ululation to defeat and doubt. The Darksworn sorcerer had lowered his arm but remained unbowed, so Kalan guessed that his magic could not have been tied to that of the were-hunters, possibly because he would have to relinquish his protective penumbra for that. Or allow the were-hunters within it . . . Both the runes and their associated swirl of power had faded now, but the sorcerer's raptor visor continued to regard the intact camp with the same savage expression.

Kalan felt the moment when the rider's attention fixed on him. One of the sorcerer's escort stepped close to the gray destrier, pointing from the oriflamme to the weatherworkers, but the rider's gaze did not waver. “He knows who his true opponent is,” Tehan said, very quietly, as she and the reserve closed in behind Kalan. He nodded, holding the sorcerer's stare, then on impulse raised his arm in the salute used between adversaries on the Field of Blood. A ripple disturbed the opposing ranks, but no one responded, either in kind or to voice insult or defiance.

“'Ware arrows,” Tehan murmured, and Kalan nodded again, jumping down from the wagon bed as the wyr hounds retreated from the dike's crest. The defenders were utterly silent, either staring at Kalan and the hounds or toward the weatherworkers. Murn was sitting on the ground with his head bowed, while Nimor leaned on his staff as though it was all that was holding him upright. Reith stood close beside the envoy, but his attention was on the Blood defenders. He had not stood the escort down, no doubt because he understood, as Kalan did also, that the camp's reaction to the tempest hung in the balance.

Clearly, the defenders must know that the storm sprang straight from what their House called fireside tales and it was only the old Derai power that had saved them. At another level, Kalan guessed that understanding was currently warring with five hundred years of Blood's fear and loathing for magic in any form. In all likelihood, too, the defenders would believe the Sea Keepers were solely responsible for the power that had protected them, reinforcing the Betrayal's deep divisions between the Houses.

Kalan frowned, weighing the frozen scene and its implications. He also registered Lady Myr's presence, standing with Faro in the entrance to the inner camp. They were both watching him and looked frightened. Not just because of the tempest they had survived, he suspected, but aware of the tension that could trigger at any moment, either to accusation or acclaim, relief or violence. Ignoring the strained atmosphere, he turned to Lady Myr and bowed—the same sword champion's bow, with the fingertips of his right hand laid against his heart, that he had made to her after his duel with Parannis. “Daughter of Blood,” he said, tacitly reminding the defenders of why they were all here. And then, straightening: “We keep faith.”

Lady Myr, as grave and graceful as though she still stood above the Red Keep's field of honor, did not let him down. Fanning her bloodstained skirt wide, she sank into a curtsey: first to Kalan, and then—as those around the perimeter turned to watch her—to Nimor and Murn, using the deep, deep courtesy the ruling kin reserved for those who had done the House of Blood great service.

Kolthis might have taken pains to emphasize her Rose heritage, but Lady Myrathis was still a Daughter of Blood and the Bride, and the gore on her clothing came from tending the camp's wounded. A single cheer sounded as she rose from her second curtsey: a hesitant, uncertain sound but a cheer nonetheless. Then everyone joined in, raggedly at first, before their relief and acclamation swelled into a roar. “Daughter of Blood,” the defenders cried, as they had shouted for their House earlier in the day. And then, as Kalan bowed to Lady Myr again, “Storm Spear! Storm Spear! Storm Spear!”

“So now you know,” Tehan said, to no one in particular and everybody nearby in general, “why we like to keep our weatherworkers close.”

“B
ut I'm only in the weatherworker reserve,” Murn said plaintively, before swallowing the contents of the vial Kion placed in his hand. “If I was powerful enough for the sort of
carry-on we just faced, I'd have been assigned to a ship, not secretarial duties.”

Kalan, who had arrived to confer with Nimor, grinned as he was supposed to and clapped Murn on the shoulder, but he did not like the young weatherworker's pallor. Power was no more inexhaustible than physical strength, which was why the were-hunters had collapsed and Murn was still sitting on the ground. Behind him, he could hear a group of defenders still trying to puzzle out exactly what had happened. “Was that all weatherworking, then?” a voice he did not recognize asked.