Petrodor: A Trial of Blood and Steel, Book 2 (62 page)

He turned back to Aisha and Sasha backed up, blinking. Her knees wanted to give way. She had twenty summers, and it was the first time she'd been properly kissed. She could hardly complain of the intensity. Yet still…one
hell
of a time for it, she couldn't help think. She recalled Errollyn's last words, and was suddenly angry.

“No, I'm
not
!” she snapped at him. “You have Aisha. Look, you have Elra.” Pointing to the other bed, where little Elra stared with wide eyes at the scene they made. “You have all the spirits-blasted Nasi-Keth! This whole dockside, in fact, those who aren't completely stupid. Don't you do this stupid, defeatist thing to me, I liked you much better when you were arrogant and annoying!”

She turned to stride out, heart still hammering, and realised that it was not the final parting she wanted, not after what had just happened. She spun back around, grabbed him, and kissed him as hard as she could.
Then
she stormed out.

Palopy House, fully ablaze, was beginning to collapse when the last of the oil ran out and the fires that had filled the gaps on the defensive wall began to die. The first of the mob to brave the dying flames fell instantly, shot through the neck or heart. Rhillian waited, in the smouldering wreckage of small trees and bushes that had once been a lovely garden, and tested the pull of her bow. She'd wrapped a cloth about her face, yet still her mouth tasted of ash and irritation rasped in her throat when she breathed. Her broad hat, too, she'd dunked in water to keep the burning embers from her hair. Behind, another wall collapsed with a great roar and a billow of thick, white ash that rolled across the fire-blackened front garden. At least now, with an attack imminent, the artillery had stopped.

More serrin crouched about the open yard, barely visible through a haze of smoke, drifting ash and falling rain. Stones sailed through the air and clattered on the pavings, or thudded on the black stalks that had once been grass. Beyond the wall, the chanting now rose to a frenzy: “Death to serrin.” Rhillian had long since ceased listening to the words—it was only rhetoric, that most foul of human creations.

With a final roar, they came through the smoke—a torrent of men, the leaders carrying the shields from the first wave of fallen. Rhillian fired low and they fell screaming, clutching their legs. More hurdled them. Bows thrummed and arrowfire buzzed, men falling in a flail of arms and legs,
punched off their feet by the power of serrin longbows. Others fanned out, running crazily, trying to clear the killing zone. Most fell, as Rhillian struggled to keep pace with the reloading speed of her comrades, pulled and killed a man coming down the gravel gate path.

Ahead of her, several serrin nearer the gate were forced to drop their bows and pull swords. Across the yard, several more did likewise. The volume of fire reduced, yet the numbers coming only seemed to increase. Rhillian kept firing, and killed another four. The next were too close, and she dropped the bow and drew her blade.

The rioters were no swordsmen. Most did not have swords. She killed more than seemed civilised, her precise, slashing strokes in brutal contrast to the thrashing lunacy that passed as attacks. Corpses and bits of bodies thudded to earth about her as she made new space for her footing, backing slowly across the yard. Swivel, slash, fade and cut, the improvised dance of master performer amidst a throng of clumsy pretenders, she laid a trail of gore and blood in her wake. Only now, the numbers grew greater and she was running out of space.

Not far away, she saw Arele hit by a wooden pole and stumble. He killed the next who lunged at him with an axe, hacked the pole in half, but off balance, failed to see the knife from behind. That man also died, but Arele fell to his knees, and two more simply threw themselves on him, and more piled on, striking and cutting.

Another attacker, barely more than a ragged boy, did not attack, but stood off and threw stones. Rhillian fended a spear thrust and took its owner's hand on the reverse, swivel-stepped into an onrushing club wielder and cut him nearly in half, then took a hard stone to the chest as the boy threw, cradling his armful and reaching for another. She parried a slashing hand-scythe, which caught about her blade and twisted the hilt in her hands. She sidestepped and missed the reverse, tried to lunge at the stone thrower but he danced back. A running madman tried to tackle her, but she spun away, his arm knocking her off balance once more. An axe-wielder tried to split her down the middle, and she rolled backward, recovering to kill another who came at her side, only to take a stone to the side of her head. Half stunned, she whipped a knife without thinking and killed the young stone thrower with a knife through the throat. And was fighting for her life before she could so much as pause and register the horror she'd just performed.

The heat of roaring flames seemed to singe her clothes, her feet stumbling now on debris from the collapsed walls. Her attackers were a sea of mad shadows in the ash and smoke, arms and faces and flailing weapons lit orange in a hellish glare.

She hacked another, then ducked and sprinted clear of a flanking move, her boots tripping on charred rubble. Ahead, falling back to the gap between the house and the western cliff, she saw several serrin fighting desperately. One fell even as she ran to them, yet the smaller space made it more defensible. She arrived at Terel's side, hurdling the half-dozen corpses of those he'd felled, and killed two more from behind as they tried to press Terel's flank.

Now they fell back along the western side, the cliff-facing wall of the house long since fallen, what remained of the stately building now a mass of flaming masonry and pancaked floors. Attackers darted through the gaps between defenders as they retreated, only to fall to crossbow fire from behind. Some of the house staff tried desperately to reload those few crossbows—not a preferred weapon of Saalshen, though its relative simplicity meant several of the staff could use it. The attackers were now not quite so suicidal in their charges, yet they pressed hard, thrusting and jabbing with spears, hook-poles, halberds and other long weapons, forcing the four remaining serrin on this side back step after step. Others with lesser weapons tried for the gaps that opened up. Rhillian knew that if the defence was pushed back past the end of the burning house, and into the open rear garden, all was lost.

Terel knew it too, and risked a spin past a thrusting spear to fell its owner and took the arm of another in retreating. But more took their places. One threw a spear at Rhillian, and she ducked aside just in time. She went low beneath a halberd swing, took that man's legs, and slashed open another who came at her side. A spear thrust grazed her ribs as she danced back. She saw a scythe come swinging, and cut it in two.

Terel made another forward dance, killed a pole wielder, yet caught a spear thrust to the arm. One-armed, he parried hard, but a blow sent him off balance. Rhillian leaped to his defence, but an axeman cut at her with a hack she had no choice but to duck, and then Terel was surrounded. He killed another, but a blow from a club sent him to a knee, and a flashing blade sent blood spurting. They fell on him like seagulls on rotten bread, stabbing and screaming. A gap opened in the line and then they came pouring through.

Suddenly, Rhillian was no longer being attacked. Men ran past her instead, howling at the top of their lungs. She saw the staff wielding crossbows go down beneath the surging mob. She saw Carla, the funny girl with the slow speech and a cheeky grin, trying to defend herself with her crossbow as the blows and thrusts came raining down. The mob poured over paved paths and gardens, leapt the little rocky steam, and sprinted at the pitiful little circle on the fountain courtyard, where terrified men and women who had no business in any fight made a futile defence about the wounded.

Even through the horror, Rhillian spotted something beyond the far
wall. Smoke, rising above the Vailor residence. It came from the far side, where the Vailor gate opened onto another road. Vailor too was under attack. A tiny, faint hope dawned. She sprinted into the rear garden, leapt down to a paved path, beheaded a man who got in her way, and thrashed through a flower garden onto the main courtyard. Pick one, she thought. You'll only get one chance. Choose well, or there's no hope at all.

Deani was holding his own with his sword. Elesa the cook swung a blade with less assurance, pivoting on her one good leg. Big Anton the doorman had the smarts of an ox, but swung his halberd in huge arcs, felling several and sending others scampering sideways. But none could serve. Rhillian saw Teri, also swinging his sword. Teri was a dark-haired lad of fifteen, quick as a mouse and deaf as a stone. But he weighed little, he was fast, and he was quick-witted.

She ran for him like an arrow, cutting an arm off Deani's opponent in passing and hurdling several wounded. Teri was backing away from the courtyard, confronted by three attackers. Rhillian killed two fast from behind, danced aside the slash of the axe-wielding third, then sent his head bouncing across the lawn. She grabbed the terrified Teri by the arm. “Run!” she yelled into his face.

Teri ran, Rhillian clutching his arm, past the garden benches and through the lush bushes before the rear wall. The ladder was still there. Rhillian urged him up it. “Don't go over!” she insisted, making him look at her. His frightened eyes watched her lips. “Wait for me, don't go over yet!”

Teri nodded quickly, then scampered up the ladder. Rhillian dashed back, but over the bushes she could see the courtyard was a seething mass of armed men. She saw Deani, falling, then impaled by a scythe as he lay on the ground. She saw Elesa the cook pinned by several men, who began hacking off her limbs, while she screamed. She saw big Anton with a man on his back and another hanging to his arm, thrashing and punching whilst spears and blades sliced through his legs, his stomach and back. She saw their wounded hacked to pieces where they lay on the ground and a severed head stuck on the end of a spear, and thrust into the air. She saw many armed men running her way. Ahead of them, she saw Kiel, bloodied and limping. He was yelling at her and waving for her to go.

She backed up, waving Kiel past her. He got up the ladder fast enough, despite a bloody leg, and Rhillian followed. She leapt for the top of the wall just as armed men reached the ladder below. Kiel kicked the ladder away as Rhillian pulled herself up. Teri lay atop the wall alongside the spikes.

Rhillian squeezed between several spikes, eyeing a soft patch of dirt on the other side…movement caught the corner of her eye, and she saw a
Vailor man with a crossbow, barely fifteen paces away, aiming straight at her. She dived, clutching a spike to avoid falling, and the bolt whizzed overhead…and hit Teri, who was just rising.

He fell forward. Rhillian thrust herself back between two spikes, catching at him desperately. Teri hit the top of the wall and slipped from the edge. Diving forward, Rhillian caught his flailing arm and grabbed it with both hands. Teri hung there, staring up at her in disbelief. The bolt protruded from his side, beneath the ribs. Below him, the men who had chased them now came running to the spot beneath his dangling feet.

“Kiel!” Rhillian begged, hauling with all her strength. “Help me!” Teri was only a lad, but her arms were tired, and even the svaalverd could not disguise a woman's disadvantages here. Kiel crawled along the wall and reached down for Teri's other hand. Grabbed, and began pulling. Rhillian strained until her arms seemed nearly to dislodge from their sockets, finding no leverage in their position. But the boy rose and Kiel grabbed his collar with one hand.

A huge baling hook atop a long pole swung up from below and tore into Teri's shoulder. The boy had enough time to meet Rhillian's eyes one last time, and show her his astonishment. The pole pulled, and Teri was torn from their grasp.

“NO!” Rhillian screamed, and would have hurled herself off the wall had not Kiel grabbed her by the hair. Somewhere in the fight, her hat had come off.

“Rhillian!” Kiel yelled at her. “Live! LIVE, Rhillian!” She did not have her blade, she realised. It had fallen on the Vailor side of the wall. Beneath them, Teri was impaled by spear, then sword, then knife, again and again. There was blood everywhere.

Rhillian slid back, then jumped onto the Vailor side. She hit the dirt hard and rolled, then scrambled for her fallen sword. The crossbowman was still struggling to reload, that being rather the problem, with crossbows. Rhillian came out of the bushes and he tried to defend himself with his crossbow, but Rhillian took his hand off at the wrist. Then she pulled her second knife, just to make it personal, and thrust it hard up beneath the man's jaw. The horror in his eyes, the gurgling in his throat, the sticky blood that gushed over her hand, all were an intoxication. She'd never known herself so savage. She'd never known it would feel so good.

Rhillian remembered only a little of what came next. She and Kiel crept through the bushes against the walls, encountering several more guards with fatal consequences. The attack on the front of Vailor House seemed ferocious, and had drawn most of their defenders that way. Kiel and Rhillian had climbed onto a rear balcony, then onto the roof. From there, they watched the attack on Vailor's front wall, as thousands of rioters tried to storm the property,
probably to attack Palopy from behind, and make sure none escaped. But the road on this side was narrow—only a few attackers could assault the wall at any time and there was no room for artillery.