Haven: A Trial of Blood and Steel Book Four (62 page)

Suddenly there were yells and clashing steel. Men with her echoed it, as all about the roar of thousands of men rose above Jahnd's roofs, and they ran into the yard. Fighting erupted. Sasha stayed where she was, with several Ilduuri, concerned about a countering flank onto this narrow road. Sure enough, within moments, men-at-arms were racing out this way in numbers, getting clear of the crowded main road. Ilduuris ahead sprang from the shadows and attacked.

Men rushed from the adjoining alley, and Sasha killed one before he saw her, a fast move from a blind side, a lesson learned in Petrodor. Others came at her, and the Ilduuris with her hit them, felling several, and then there were more breaking through, and Ilduuris from the yard falling back, and everything was chaos.

“This way!” Sasha yelled as horsemen came up the alley, and they fell back down an adjoining alley, then across a closed courtyard, pursuit close behind. In the courtyard Ilduuris made a second ambush as pursuers crashed into that line. Sasha raced ahead and checked the new street, where fighting had not yet reached.

One of the horsemen rounded the corner just then to cut her off, a knight in gleaming armour, but with visor down at night, how could he see? He charged her, and Sasha darted across the front of his horse so he swung on the wrong side. A cavalryman was with him, and sprinting men-at-arms behind. The cavalryman crashed into Ilduuris emerging from the alley behind, and then Sasha had fully ten men-at-arms coming about the intersection at her, with shield, sword, and spear.

She danced right again, out into the intersection, as Ilduuris behind engaged. She tore the sword from one man's hand, forced another to defend with his shield, then went low and slashed his leg. His balance failed, his shield dropped, and she removed his head, but another nearly impaled her with a spear as she ducked away, backward down the road.

Suddenly the spearman fell, an arrow in his side. Sasha took the opportunity to entice another swordsman into attacking, ducked across and split his exposed side. Another man shrieked as an arrow took him, and the others were now spreading out, looking about in fear. Sasha attacked another, and he defended three straight blows, scampering backward past a comrade who did not adjust in time, so she killed him instead.

But she'd advanced past one more, who circled behind…and fell with a shaft through the neck. Sasha was laughing. She did not know this humour, she had never laughed before to see men die. But there was only one man with such archery in a close melee, and she could feel him with her now.

One more backed against a wall, hoping the shadows would hide him, and was skewered there by a shaft that pinned his neck to the planks, leaving him gruesomely hanging. The survivors ran, and a last man fell with a shaft through his back.

Still grinning, Sasha turned and saw a dark shape emerging from the shadows, broad-shouldered and shaggy-haired, a huge bow in hand and a big quiver at his hip. His eyes gleamed green in the dark. He stood before her, and his breath was warm on her lips.

“Hello, lover,” said Sasha with a smile.

“You told me to wait for you,” he murmured back. “I did.”

Sasha stared into those amazing eyes. She had told him to wait for her. She'd thought maybe he was dead at the time. Had he heard her?

“Where were you?” she asked.

“I lost my horse. I hid for a day on the far valleyside, cut off. When dark fell, I came back.”

“And how did you find me?”

Errollyn smiled, a gleam in the dark. “I have no
vel'ennar
with other serrin, it's true,” he replied. “But I share it with you.” Sasha felt paralysed. His nearness was intoxicating. But it did not seem as before. She could
feel
him, somewhere beyond where senses could perceive. “I see you, Synnich-ahn. You are a beacon in the dark. You are hunting for blood this night, and I have answered your call. Let us spill some together, and save our peoples.”

They returned to the road where her Ilduuris had fought and found them triumphant over both mounted riders. The knight had been pulled from his horse, and now they sat on him to hold him still while another sought to find a gap in his armour, and finish it messily.

Then they returned to the main fight. Errollyn remained slightly behind, preferring his bow to the sword on his back. He and Sasha fought together, and even in the worst confusion, it was as though they had one mind. Two men attacked them, and while he shot the left, she killed the right. There was no wasted energy, no miscommunication. She was the right hand, and he was the left. Together they made a tally such that the Ilduuri men fighting with them would tell tales of it for generations, and which Lenays would repeat and say proudly that they were there too.

Lenays and Ilduuris killed until those who were not dead were running for their lives. They ran into the night, and those who reached the Ipshaal began searching for boats. But these nights were filled with serrin, and the lessons of King Leyvaan echoed now as they had not done in two centuries since. All who attacked Saalshen must die, with none to survive to reach their homes, for if fear was all that humanity understood, fear must be Saalshen's final, awful protection.

The Ipshaal was wide. Beyond it lay Enora, filled with angry Enorans only too happy to assist in exercising Saalshen's final lesson. Perhaps a few, very lucky souls would live to return to the feudal Bacosh, but those could be no more than one for every few thousand who had marched.

And so the second great feudal army in two hundred years marched into Saalshen with much glory and fanfare, and disappeared with barely a trace. Gods and spirits and higher fates willing, the victors prayed, it would be the last.

Morning rose across the valleys, grey like dread. Smoke lingered in the air, and singed the nostrils. Damon walked, for he could not bear to make his poor horse take another step, the animal was so spent he would take a week to recover. It was in pasture now, belly full of grass and water, washed clean of sweat and dirt, cuts and bruises treated, and likely fast asleep. Damon wished that a prince of Lenayin might also take such liberties.

A King of Lenayin.

He walked across fields of dead. Tullamayne had spoken of such fields in many a tale, and though his tales were always steeped in epic melancholy, that melancholy had never felt quite so epic as this. Humanity lay as refuse upon the ground. Damon had always been like Sofy in that he loved the things that made life good, yet unlike Sofy in that he expected people to do everything opposite to achieving those things. Today, his view of affairs had triumphed over his sister's, yet the thought of it was only bleaker still.

City folk picked their way through the dead, many with wagons. Friendly wounded were already collected. Now they piled friendly dead, with as much reverence as one could accord a scene of mass slaughter. The enemy dead they ran over with wagons, and occasionally stole a piece of jewellery. The crows were following, and would soon arrive in swarms. Damon did not think there were enough crows in all of Rhodia to consume all this.

Finally he arrived at a scene. The Ilmerhill River was nearby, bubbling happily away. Great Lord Markan was here, as was Sasha, kneeling by a man who lay on the grass, two serrin arrows through his body.

Damon stopped beside the man, and looked down upon the dying King of Lenayin. Koenyg looked up, squinting against the overcast sky. And smiled, with bloodied lips.

“Brother,” he whispered. “You won.”

“I won a great pile of corpses and many dead friends,” Damon replied. “It's not much of a prize.”

Koenyg shook his head. “No,” he said, and coughed, weakly. “No. You have won a great victory. Now you must consolidate it.”

Damon frowned. He looked at Sasha. Her jaw was tight with intense emotion. He had not thought that Sasha would grieve for Koenyg. But now he kneeled, reluctantly, and took his brother's hand.

“There is no choice now,” Koenyg continued, weakly but with determination. “I do not like this path for Lenayin, but events have fallen your way, not mine. Saalshen must be the foundation of our future. Rebuild it. Rebuild the Saalshen Bacosh. Rebuild Lenayin in its image. Declare war on the north if you must. They will oppose you with every breath. Be steel against them. You have chosen your path, and Lenayin's. Now you must walk it.”

Damon swallowed hard. “You counsel me to attack your closest allies? The family of your wife and son?”

“Damon. Brother.” Koenyg's hand tightened with unexpected strength. “All that I have ever done, I have done for Lenayin. I tried to unite a divided land. I thought the north was central, and the rest should be made more like them. I still think it. But that is not to be, and now you must unite Lenayin
your
way.

“Let nothing stop you. No weakness, no fecklessness. No elder brother intimidating you, even beyond the grave.” He smiled. Damon struggled to hold his gaze. “Let not even the love of your other siblings stop you from doing what you must for your people. I never did. Not even when it caused me such pain as these arrows can only imagine.”

It hurt. Damon looked at Sasha, as she wiped at tears. She knew what he meant. Damon did too. They had never been friends, but family was not friendship. Family was family, even in hatred and feud. As leaders of nations, they did not always have the luxury to put each other first.

“Myklas lives,” said Damon. “Wounded, but recovering.”

“Sasha told me,” said Koenyg. “It is good.”

“Kessligh thinks to let the wounded live,” Sasha added. “To send them across Saalshen, to see what they attempted to destroy. A new convert is a more powerful believer than one born to the faith, he says. To gain thousands of such men, and send them back to their homes in the Bacosh after some years amongst the serrin, could be a strong example to others.”

“A good idea,” Koenyg whispered. “Myklas is fortunate. I should have liked to do that myself, had the
talmaad
's aim been less accurate.”

“I should have liked you to fight on our side from the beginning,” Sasha retorted, attempting stern reprimand. “I should have been proud to fight alongside
all
of my brothers.”

“For a moment there, you did.” He clasped her hand. Sasha nodded, mutely. “Damon. Two last things. Promise me you shall look after Lenayin as I have said.”

“I shall,” said Damon. “I promise.”

Koenyg sighed a little, and looked relieved. He gazed up at the grey sky above. “And promise me that you will not leave. I would not like to die alone.”

“I shall stay,” said Damon, and sat properly upon the grass to do that. “And I shall never forget that you made me who I am.”

Koenyg managed a smile, recognising a backhanded compliment. But he liked the irony, it was clear. “I shall see Father again,” he said dreamily.

“And Alythia,” said Damon.

“And Krystoff,” said Sasha.

“And hopefully,” Koenyg added, with fading strength, “none of the rest of you, for quite some time.”

King Koenyg Lenayin died gloriously upon the field of battle, surrounded by his siblings and the bodies of his enemies. By his death, a new world was born.

I
t was more than a year before Sasha returned home to Lenayin. But return she did, at the ripe old age of twenty-two, and breathed the crisp air of early winter as she rode with friends along an achingly familiar stream, icy with the white dust of recent snow on the ground. Two years away from home was a long time, she reflected as she rode.

More than half of that time, it was astonishing to think, had come after the great victory at Jahnd. Kessligh, as soon as the victory was complete, had begun pushing for attack and reconquest, as Saalshen had done following the invasion of King Leyvaan. Many had protested. Losses were severe, they'd said. The survivors were exhausted. The lands that Kessligh proposed to conquer were vast and powerful, even now that the cream of their warriors lay dead upon the field. Most wished to return to the Saalshen Bacosh, reclaim what they had lost, and begin rebuilding.

But Kessligh was adamant. The Saalshen Bacosh, he said, can rebuild no faster than its enemies can. Matters remain fundamentally unresolved. Perhaps you will have a decade of peace. Perhaps a generation. But soon, inevitably, the forces that had driven this invasion would lead to another, fought by men for whom this great defeat was but a distant tale. It had been so close this time, when the Regent had captured artillery and hellfire. Inevitably the knowledge to build such things would spread, as it was already spreading in Petrodor, as he, Sasha, and Rhillian could attest. The next time, they'd be back with artillery and hellfire of their own, and affairs would be even worse.

Empire was the solution, he'd said, and the serrin had protested. But not so loudly this time, shaken by events, and the realisation of just how close things had been. Rhillian was firmly on his side, as was Errollyn, the two serrin to emerge from the war with the most
ra'shi
of all the
talmaad.
They would follow Kessligh, they said, though few believed that what he claimed was possible.

Firstly, Sasha had returned to Ilduur with the survivors of the Ilduuri Steel. Those numbered about half of the men who had accompanied her, though that was a considerably better number than the Rhodaani and Enoran Steel had ended with. A good number of
talmaad
accompanied her—Errollyn and Aisha amongst them, and Rhillian, who had been found relatively unharmed in Koenyg's tent after the battle.

On the way back through the Saadi Maal country, they'd gathered a great many older Steel veterans and new volunteers. At Andal itself, they found the city risen to oppose them with a strong militia, yet it folded meekly when they realised what little chance they had. Sasha told them all that things would change. She sat with senior Ilduuris and serrin, and hammered out plans for a new council to replace the Remischtuul, for independent courts such as Rhodaan had made, and for the rebuilding of the Ilduuri Nasi-Keth.

The Ilduuri Nasi-Keth would be run by serrin now, brought in from Saalshen. It was the only way to ensure the nasty tendency of Ilduuri isolationism did not reinfect the Tol'rhens, and turn the Ilduuri Nasi-Keth against the very ones who created them. For council elections, no former members of the Stamentaast or other, tainted organisations need apply. New Steel volunteers would be armed, and left to garrison Andal. All involved in the previous uprisings against the serrin would be punished. It was colonisation, pure and simple, and far more heavy-handed than Maldereld's two hundred years before.

Many protested to Sasha that it would not work, that Ilduuris would never accept it. They didn't need to accept it, Sasha had replied. So long as there was force enough in the Steel, and in the
talmaad
who reformed the Nasi-Keth and occupied Ilduur, the rest of the population could shut up and like it. The Steel would be back again soon, and in force. Any more trouble while they were gone would only lead to reinvasion and large-scale killings to make her present punishments seem mild. And then she'd gone, before the winter snows blocked the high passes, and marched north to Enora.

Enora had been a joy. Townsfolk had showered them with gifts and flowers along every road, and village choirs sang for them at every stop. They'd passed this time through Aisha's home village, and Sasha had met her serrin mother and human father, and heard wonderful tales of Aisha at age five, arguing with a local priest at communion about how the Gathering Prayer should be pronounced in Larosan.

They'd collected more veterans on the way through, and a great many young volunteers for the Steel. Many local serrin and part-serrin also volunteered for the
talmaad.
Yasmyn had asked why local human women could not volunteer for the
talmaad
as well, since light cavalry seemed a task serrin women did well. The Enorans said they'd think about it, but Sasha wasn't holding her breath.

Rhodaan was just as welcoming, though by now wet and cold with winter. At Tracato, the armies had mustered once more, Rhodaani, Enoran, and Ilduuri Steels together, with the Army of Lenayin and Carlito Rochel's Pazirans as well, who were cut off from Torovan and had stayed to fight. All had gathered many volunteers, and more poured in every day. It took a long time to train a soldier of the Steel to standard, and longer still to gather the means to provide and pay for them all, but Kessligh did not need them for battle, but rather for the occupation that followed.

In spring he took the Steels north into Elisse, and finished in a few weeks what the Rhodaani Steel should have finished alone the previous year. Elissian Lords either surrendered their powers or died, along with their armies. Elisse had lost most of their remaining forces at Jahnd, and Kessligh judged that if he sent enough force, he would barely need to fight at all. Most surrendered, and he left garrisons of serrin and volunteers behind. Lords and nobility likely to cause trouble were rounded up and taken to Saalshen. When Kessligh left Elisse and headed west, the Saalshen Bacosh provinces numbered four, for the first time since Leyvaan's fall.

Damon had been concerned about trouble in Lenayin, once news of events in the Bacosh reached them. But as Kessligh had pointed out, the only way home to Lenayin lay through either Larosa or Algrasse. In the end, it was Larosa. And of course, it always had to be.

This had been a real fight. Larosa had lost enormous manpower at Jahnd and was in disarray with the deaths of many lords, to say nothing of Balthaar Arrosh himself. But facing the loss of everything, the nobility had rallied in great numbers, and mustered all available men upon the field of battle. Nearly one hundred thousand gathered on the fields near Sherdaine, a force considerably larger than what attacked them.

But now they faced Kessligh, commanding three Steel armies replenished by retired veterans who knew this game well, a large mass of
talmaad
cavalry, Pazira, and the diminished yet still formidable Army of Lenayin. Also, they were back to the old days now, when the righteous side had all the effective artillery, and the feudals had none. It had been another slaughter, this time entirely one-sided, and Larosa had fallen to the Saalshen Bacosh.

Kessligh then pointed out to Damon that, if one looked at the map, Algrasse was also between Lenayin and Larosa. Damon had shrugged, and said, before a grand dining hall in Sherdaine full of Lenay and Steel men, “Why not?” All had cheered.

Algrasse had folded meekly, making the Saalshen Bacosh six provinces strong. The Army of Lenayin bade farewell, taking the Pazirans with them, and returned home before the northerners became truly restless—already there were reports of fighting on the borders, and northern lords refusing to accept the new, traitorous, pagan-demon-loving king. Sasha had been persuaded by her Ilduuris to stay around for the Tournean campaign at least, as Tournea promised to be the challenge that Algrasse had not been. Tournea, word was, had made frantic arrangements with southern power Meraine and westerly Rakani, to join forces and make a very big stand upon Tournean fields.

This they had done, with another force of more than a hundred thousand, but this time far more cunningly applied. A victory was won by the invaders, but a far less decisive one, with losses incurred and regrouping necessary. And then, inevitably, some of what Rhillian drily called “peace-mongers” had come from Saalshen bearing news of deals and agreements with Meraine and Rakani that would remove the necessity for further bloodshed, and Saalshen's already alarmed
uman'ilen
(as the great philosophical minds were called) went over Rhillian's head to declare that the
talmaad
would not commit to further conquest unless such proposals were carried out in full.

Kessligh and Rhillian complained, but there was little they could do—Tournea, Meraine, and Rakani were formidable enough that invading them further without
talmaad
support would be unwise, particularly in the precarious state of readiness that the Steels still found themselves in, and without Lenay support. Besides which, serrin volunteers now comprised a large part of the occupation force in Elisse, Algrasse, and, most worryingly, Larosa, and Saalshen was even threatening to withdraw support there also.

Sasha had left then, wishing to be home before the next winter, and not wanting to be mired in Tournea, enduring Kessligh's frustration as endless negotiations with scheming feudals served only to preserve a force within humanity that would be far better exterminated for good. And so, Kessligh observed wryly, the well-meaning men and women of peace in Saalshen laid the foundations for future bloodshed and suffering, by ensuring feudalism's survival in the southern Bacosh. But in truth, he was not too upset—Elisse and Algrasse were small additions, but Larosa was an enormous prize. It needed now to be transformed, as Rhodaan, Enora, and Ilduur had been transformed, two hundred years before. The task was enormous, and if successful, the remaining feudal provinces would be no match for its wealth and power in years ahead.

But neither, somewhat worryingly, would be the other Bacosh provinces. The same old Bacosh problem—Larosan domination—reared its head again, yet in a different guise. Rhillian, however, had only laughed at the prospect. “If the next generation's largest problem is a wealthy and serrin-loving Larosa wielding too much power through its elected councils,” she'd said, “then I welcome them to it.”

Sasha had thought it all a rather grand invasion and expansion of empire, whatever the wise heads of Saalshen thought. She was proud to be a part of a conquering army that brought freedom to the peasantry and promised to end the bigotry and hatred of the serrin that had led to these awful wars in the first place. Two centuries before, Rhodaan, Enora, and Ilduur had been transformed vastly for the better, and now Elisse, Algrasse, and Larosa would be too. She hoped. It would be an awesome task, requiring the labours of countless men and women, human and serrin alike, and a great deal of sacrifice. Free nations were hard to build, while tyrannies came easy. But if there was ever an endeavour that was worth the cost, this was surely it.

Staying a little longer had been tempting, but she had plans for Lenayin, too, and Damon needed her support. Besides which, she desperately wanted to go home.

She'd not taken the direct way home, however. She'd stopped first in Pazira, in the foothills of her native Valhanan, and called upon Duke Carlito and his family, and the Lenay garrison Damon had left there. The garrison was not especially large, but the message it sent the King of Torovan, better known as Patachi Steiner, was simple—hurt Pazira, and your reign will end. Pazira was now surrounded by hostile Torovan provinces, and a very hostile king in Petrodor, but even the king did not dare ignore the threat of Lenay invasion.

Damon could quite likely not deliver on his threat, given instability in Lenayin, but King Steiner was a merchant, and knew what constituted acceptable risk of profit and loss on his accounting pages. He would wait, and watch Pazira and Lenayin with a beady eye, if for no other reason than the death of his heir at Jahnd, Simon Steiner. Sasha's brother-in-law. Sasha would regret the losing of brothers for as long as she lived, but she would never regret the losing of this brother-in-law, whatever pain it caused her estranged sister Marya.

Politics and threats aside, she'd enjoyed Pazira immensely, and the hospitality of her friends the Rochels. Family Rochel were patrons of Lenayin now, like it or not, as was Pazira. Well, if Saalshen could have an empire, however reluctantly, why not Lenayin? But she kept the thought to herself.

Also in Pazira, she'd reclaimed her beloved Peglyrion, whom she'd been scared might not remember her. But he'd practically trampled her at the stables, which made her cry, to the amusement of all. Riding up the slopes of Pazira to the Valhanan border astride her favourite horse was serendipity. Doing it in the company of such friends was even better.

Errollyn was with her, knowing well that she'd need him, in more ways than the personal, in what lay ahead. He'd been to Lenayin briefly, loved it, and looked forward to settling down for a while somewhere far away from cities and crowds, while still doing something important. As Saalshen's senior representative in Lenayin, he would certainly be doing that, even were he not based in Baen-Tar, the traditional location of such ambassadors.