Lescari Revolution 03: Banners In The Wind (41 page)

'Lord Rousharn,' Tathrin interrupted. 'Lady Derenna's husband. Won't you spare his life for her sake? Or will you hang her alongside him?'

Reniack continued as if he hadn't spoken. 'When you've proven your good faith, turn over your forces to my command. Once we march on Marlier to cut Duke Ferdain's cowardly throat, along with all his spawn and his treacherous bitch, Lescar will truly be free!'

He knew they would refuse. Tathrin saw that. All Reniack wanted was some justification for the day's bloodshed. But the pretence of reasoning with him would draw out this conversation.

'Is Aremil to go to the scaffold?' he protested. 'You condemn a crippled man for an accident of parentage?'

Reniack took a wrathful step. 'He deceived us from the outset--'

'Something's wrong.' Jettin looked over his shoulder.

Tathrin nudged his horse forward a pace. 'You lied and dissembled and--'

'They--' Jettin sank to his knees with a cry of pain. 'I can't see!'

Reniack drew his sword. 'Call off your adepts!'

'No adepts of ours abuse Artifice like Jettin.' Now Tathrin coaxed his horse backwards.

That left Reniack at a clear disadvantage if he ran down the bridge to challenge three mounted men.

'This parley is over!' As Reniack retreated, dragging Jettin, the third man drew his sword and spread his arms wide to bar their way.

'They have horses.' Gren had edged aside, to see the road beyond the embankment.

Someone hidden behind the bridge yelled out. Reniack's man turned. Then something caught his eye and he looked down into the lode.

'Shit.' Sorgrad spurred his horse up the steep bridge.

'The water!' The man managed a baffled shout before Sorgrad's sword slammed into his head. The man staggered against the low parapet. He toppled over, screaming as he fell into the water with a resounding splash.

'Come on!' Tathrin urged his horse forwards.

Reaching the crest of the bridge, he saw Reniack's allies staring aghast into the lode. It wasn't the loss of their comrade that appalled them. The water was sinking fast, to leave the dark walls glistening in the sunlight.

'They're getting away.' Gren pointed with his sword.

Reniack and Jettin had mounted. Tathrin lashed his horse with a rein. It sprang forward as his command troop galloped after him, every man hand-picked by Sorgrad and Gren.

Captain-General Evord wouldn't approve. But Tathrin was the man with this particular task, here and now.

He spared a backward glance to see Deflin's contingent take control of the bridge, and Lescar's army surging up the banks of the lode, yelling abuse and defying Reniack's men to attempt the crossing.

Looking ahead, Tathrin saw Reniack's forces appear. As he'd suspected, they'd hidden in the ditches on either side of this road. He ducked, the bristles on his unshaven cheek catching his horse's mane as arrows sliced the air overhead.

These fields were glistening. Water seeped through tangled dead grass and the straight line of a ditch blurred beneath a rising flood. Now the road ahead was crowded as Reniack's warriors sought drier ground. Men cast aside their heavy cloaks and sodden cloth fanned out like the wings of fallen birds.

Tathrin and his galloping men forced a path through their confusion with brutal boots and swords. They were gaining on Reniack now and Jettin rode close beside him, one hand pressed to his head. Tathrin guessed Branca was repaying him for Aremil's woes.

Ahead, the next bridge was a simple affair of planks and rails crossing a ditch heading for a distant lode. Now seething water washed silt across the boards.

Jettin's mount shied, fighting its bridle. All the adept's horsemanship had deserted him. The horse reared with alarm as the first plank was ripped loose from the bridge by the flood.

'Surrender!' bellowed Tathrin. 'You have nowhere left to go.'

The rabble-rouser wrenched his horse around to face them. Blood dripped from its mouth. 'What have you done?' he screamed.

'Broken the pumps and blocked the sluices.' His eyes white-rimmed, Jettin subdued his horse with violent hands.

Sorgrad and Gren flanked Tathrin. The rest of his hand-picked troop were beating back those trying to rally to their leaders' aid. Most of Reniack's men were floundering down in the fields where the water was now thigh deep. It lapped at the edges of the roadway.

'Both moons at their full bring the highest tides between now and For-Summer,' Tathrin shouted. 'The rains cannot flow to the sea so they've flooded all the drained land behind you as far as the Inchra Road. Your way back to Parnilesse is blocked. Your allies from Brynock cannot reach you.'

'Our Hardrew men will cut you to pieces,' the rabble-rouser hissed.

Tathrin shook his head. 'Not before the Carluse militia company hamstrings them from behind.'

'They went west!' Jettin choked. 'To hunt bandits in Marlier!'

'That's what Kerith had you think.' Tathrin looked at Reniack again. 'Just as Branca stopped your boy seeing the Chinel men taking barges down the Asilor, to land north of Parnilesse once you had passed by. Quirton men showed them how to raise this flood and still leave a path to pursue you. You're the ones trapped like rats in rising water.'

Reniack's eyes blazed. 'Our allies in Parnilesse Town--'

'Will surrender to the Quirton militia, if they have any sense.' Tathrin curbed his own horse's disquiet at the creeping water. 'Emperor Tadriol doesn't want your kind ruling Parnilesse. His galleys have carried Quirton guildsmen into the pool beneath the town, along with boatloads of those who've fled your vision of freedom for sanctuary in Tormalin.'

For the first time, Reniack's certainty faltered. He glanced over his shoulder to see the wooden bridge now reduced to four barren posts. He glared at Jettin. 'Get us out of here!'

The younger man stumbled over the cadences of some aetheric enchantment. 'I can't!' He looked at Tathrin, desperate. 'I never imagined things would go this far!'

Tathrin hardened his heart. 'Surrender and you'll stand fair trial for the murders of Orlin and Sherista.'

'Or I can save the hangman a length of hemp.' Gren levelled his sword.

'I bend my neck to no man!' Reniack spurred his horse at Tathrin.

Tathrin gripped the saddle with his thighs. He hated fighting on horseback, so he had practised every day. Gren had been beating him black and blue while he got the measure of this skill.

Reniack's sword met his with a scrape of steel and they exchanged a flurry of blows. Tathrin swiftly realised Reniack was merely hacking at him, blind with fury. Tathrin easily parried his strokes. What he needed was a decisive thrust. But whenever he saw an opening, Reniack's steed involuntarily frustrated him, even though it was no warhorse, terrified, snorting bloody foam.

Tathrin's mount snapped viciously at it. This bay had come through more battles than he had, according to the Shady Moth's erstwhile horsemaster. As Tathrin parried and thrust, the horse deftly shifted beneath him.

Reniack's blows became more ragged. The rabble-rouser was red-faced and breathing hard. Tathrin saw that he had lost a stirrup and spurred his own horse harder. Reniack's steed shied away.

Tathrin drove his sword at Reniack's face, only for the man to throw up his arm. Tathrin's blade skidded across the links of the rabble-rouser's mail, ripping into one of his mutilated ears.

Reniack's roar of pain was too much for his panicked horse. Bit clamped between its teeth, the animal reared up. So terrified, it reared too high. Its hooves slid in the mud, skidding beneath its hocks. Screaming, it toppled backwards.

Reniack threw himself from the saddle for fear of being crushed and fell hard onto the road, the water too shallow to soften the impact. The horse crashed down, hooves flailing as it rolled into the flooded field.

Amid the chaos of the skirmish, Tathrin contemplated Reniack in an instant of cold clarity. If he surrendered, he would be an unspeakably troublesome captive. Friends and allies would smuggle his writings out of whatever prison held him. When he was tried for his crimes, his self-justifying speeches would breed more confusion and discontent.

Would that end even after he was hanged? That was the only possible outcome. Tathrin saw Duke Orlin's brutal murder, Duchess Sherista fighting for her children.

His vision cleared and he saw Reniack grope for his sword. The man struggled to his knees. Tathrin rode forward, prompting his horse to a trot. As Reniack staggered to his feet, Tathrin drew back his arm. His horse broke into a canter and Tathrin swung the blade with all his strength behind it.

The razor-edged steel caught Reniack between his helm and the throat of his hauberk. His head bowled along the waterlogged road. The breeze snatched away a spray of blood before his body collapsed in the mud.

Cursing, Tathrin pulled his horse up by the wrecked bridge. Where had the head disappeared to amid those wild waters? Tadriol wanted it spiked on Parnilesse Town's gate. How much trouble could Reniack's cronies be if they could cling to some hope that he had escaped?

No matter. He had to win this battle and more men that Reniack would still have to die. But as Tathrin wheeled his horse around, he saw his command troop prevailing on the causeway. Beyond, all along the embankment, Reniack's men were surrendering. It was that or drown, just as Tathrin had intended.

A horse dodged and he saw Gren fighting Jettin on foot. To Tathrin's surprise, the adept looked as proficient with a sword as he was with his enchantments. He parried, once, twice, and even attempted a counter-thrust as he twisted his blade free of Gren's.

Tathrin looked for some hint that the Vanamese wanted to yield. If Kerith was right, if Jettin had been in thrall to Reniack on account of the Artifice linking them, now that Reniack was dead--

Jettin fell with a scream in a welter of scummy water. He clutched his thigh with bloodied hands. Gren kicked the adept's sword away and raised his own blade for a killing blow.

Tathrin's mouth was too dry to shout. Besides, misguided was still guilty under every law-code from Tormalin to Solura.

Though Tathrin didn't believe Jettin was misguided. Whatever Kerith might want to believe, Branca insisted Jettin could have resisted if he didn't like what he saw in Reniack's thoughts. The rabble-rouser certainly couldn't force Jettin to hack Duchess Sherista to pieces. Reniack wasn't the adept.

More merciless still, Sorgrad and Gren insisted their
sheltya
would kill the lad out of hand. How could they bring him to trial, before Raeponin's shrine or any other court, when he could twist the sympathies of those judging him? To go free to improve his aetheric understanding, to refine his attacks on vulnerable minds?

So Tathrin simply looked on as Gren lowered his sword and watched Jettin's struggles grow weaker. After an eternity that could have only been a few breaths, the young adept lay motionless in a slough of reddened mud.

Sorgrad appeared on foot at his horse's shoulder. 'Do you think Planir will understand if Jilseth starts telling tales?'

As Tathrin looked down, he saw a flash of green magelight in the flooded field. Reniack's head spun through the air to land beside his body, the last dregs of his lifeblood seeping into the rising water.

Sorgrad stooped to retrieve it. 'Do you suppose this little gift will persuade the Tormalin Emperor to ship some men to Marlier for us?'

'What?' Tathrin stared at him.

Sorgrad grinned. 'We've still got Duke Ferdain on our dance card.'

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Litasse

Marlier Castle,

26th of Aft-Winter

Ferdain's broad shoulders disappeared around the corner. 'Your Grace!' She hastened down the hallway.

The maidservant dogging her footsteps scurried after her with a strangled bleat. 'Your Grace?'

Litasse ignored the foolish girl. She had wasted half the morning looking for this 'chance' encounter with the duke.

Ferdain stopped and his escort of young nobles deftly withdrew to leave the sun-dappled carpet empty between them.

Most had their new doublets sewn from the same silver velvet as the duke's. If not, they copied other details of his dress; Aldabreshin opals on their buttons, silver Caladhrian shoe buckles. She hid her contempt for their fawning with her sweetest smile.

'Your Grace?' Duke Ferdain bowed. 'I trust you're keeping well?'

'Very well, Your Grace.' Litasse's curtsey graciously acknowledged their equality of rank. 'Though I would ask one favour,' she added quickly as he turned to depart.

'If it's in my power.'

Litasse detected a wariness in his dark eyes. She gestured towards the blue sky beyond the leaded windows. 'After so many days within doors, may I beg you for the loan of a horse?'

Ferdain smoothed his silky beard. 'The beasts will be fractious, my dear, after so many days in their stalls.' He wagged a playful finger. 'His Grace your husband would be justly furious if you suffered some accident while you are my guest.'