Sacrifice: The First Book of the Fey (17 page)

Monte nodded—then waited, hands behind his back.

“Well, get to it, man,” Alexander said. “I am your King, your commander, and you will do what I say.
You will all do what I say.
”

“Yes, Sire.” Monte started toward the door and then stopped. “But we’re sworn to protect you.”

“Leave a contingent on the stairs,” Stephen said. “That should be sufficient if our other plans fail.”

Alexander glared at Stephen for a moment before realizing that the elderly swordmaster wasn’t rebuking him, but actually helping him. Monte was staring at both of them, and Alexander suppressed a small sigh. “Do as Stephen says.”

“And use your swords,” Stephen said. “Do not let any of those vermin touch you. Some of them can kill with simple touch.”

“Yes, Sire.” Monte backed out of the door, then pulled it closed. Alexander turned to the others. They were still scattered about the room. Some were watching the empty door as if Monte would come back and save them from Alexander’s scrutiny. Others were staring at the floor.

A sorrier bunch he had never seen. Why did it take a crisis for him to realize that his help was insufficient? “Stephen, you will stay with me. Lord Holte, you will coordinate attacks on the third floor. Do not let those creatures get beyond that level into the towers. Lord Stowe, you have the second floor. If the Fey have already entrenched there, work with Holte in preventing them from getting any higher. Lord Powell, you will concentrate on the first floor. Lord Oast, you will work on the yards and grounds. The rest of you shall serve as runners and messengers between those commands and our post up here. The goal is to drive the Fey from this castle. Once they are back in the streets, then we will worry about getting them off Blue Isle.”

“Sire,” Powell said, extending his hands, “we have no military training. We don’t know what we’re doing.”

“Then you’ll learn in the thick of battle. And, Powell, that’s the third complaint. You will help Lord Oast on the ground, and Lord Enford will take the first floor. If there are any detail problems, deal with them yourselves. The key is to be leaders here. Give our people something to rally around. I will not let those marauders take over Blue Isle, and anyone who helps their cause even inadvertently will die by my hand. Is that clear?”

The men were staring at him now. Powell’s face was red, but he did not make another protest. Alexander’s throat was raw, his muscles tense. If someone touched him wrong, he would spring. This was a long shot. He knew it and they knew it. But he couldn’t hide in the tower room and allow the Fey to overrun his country without putting up a fight.

“When we have this palace back, we will reconvene up here and make plans to drive them out of the city. Until then I do not want to see any of you again. I expect to be victorious.” He took a deep breath. No one else attempted to speak. The sounds from below had grown louder. “Now, I want this room cleared except for Stephen.”

“Before we leave, Sire,” Powell said, “I would like the swordmaster to tell us what we should know about the Fey.”

More stalling. Alexander was about to start into them again when Stephen put a hand on his arm. “I can tell you nothing about the Fey that you can’t learn below,” he said.

Powell nodded and turned, hands clasped behind his back, walking slowly as if he expected Alexander to rescind his orders. But Alexander wouldn’t. He didn’t need to be questioned, especially now.

It took only a moment for the men to leave. The last one closed the door behind him. The latch clicked in the silence. Alexander waited a moment, then sank into one of the chairs.

A faint cry he had never heard before echoed from below. It had a victorious sound. He closed his eyes and for one moment allowed himself to be a person instead of a King.

“We will need more of a plan than that,” Stephen said. His voice was soft. He had moved closer; Alexander could feel the heat of the man’s body, smell the faint odor of sweat that surrounded him.

Alexander sighed, then opened his eyes.

“They’re too powerful for us to drive them from the palace.” Stephen was leaning on the table. “Once they’re in, they’re in.”

“What can they do?” Alexander asked.

“That we can’t?”

Alexander nodded.

“They can kill with a single touch. They can enchant. Some even say they can take over a man’s body and make him do their bidding.”

“They can’t be all-powerful,” Alexander said. “If they were, they would have been here sooner.”

“Oh, they can die.” Stephen rested his hands on his knee. Even though his voice was calm, his hair was mussed, and half a day’s growth of white beard covered his cheeks. “In fact, they can die as easily as we can. Pierced properly with a sword, too much blood loss. They’re not superhuman, Sire. They simply have more talents than we do. It’s as if they are conquering us with bows and arrows and we haven’t even learned how to use a stick yet.”

Alexander leaned back in his chair. He had been a fool to think that Blue Isle’s natural defenses would be enough to keep creatures like the Fey away. He had had warning from the day they’d captured Nye. The Fey had gone as far east as they could. The next stop on their campaign had to be Blue Isle.

“What do we do now?” he asked, not sure he really wanted to hear the answer.

“We make it until nightfall,” Stephen said, “and hope we live to see another day.”

FIFTEEN

Rugar had created a garrison not too far from the Cardidas. Early in the fighting he had commandeered an inn, allowing owners and guests to flee on the theory that the fear they spread would be more valuable than the blood they shed. Terror won campaigns more quickly than death did. Killing sometimes made the defenders angry, made them rebel. But a bit of mercy now and then, heavily laced with fear and supposition, gave a troop strength.

The inn was a two-story wooden structure, with a large common room that hadn’t been cleaned in this century, and a kitchen so filthy he didn’t want to touch the cooking tables or the dishes. The straw-filled mattresses in the five rooms upstairs had lice: if his people were to stay the night there, he would make certain the mattresses were burned, and the place cleaned.

He had wiped off a large wooden table when he had arrived, moved it closer to the door, and used it as his base. He sat cross-legged on the top and dispensed orders as if they were food rations, allowing his officers to consult before they made a move or altered his original plans. The realities of Jahn pleased him. The invasion was even easier than he had thought it would be. The Islanders gave in to their surprise and ran in terror instead of righting back. Only at the palace had he heard of any coordinated efforts to stop the Fey—efforts that showed just how inexperienced the Islanders were.

Outside, the shouts and screams of various battles floated across the air. An hour or so earlier he had heard the ringing thuds of the battering ram against the palace gate, and the cries of triumph once his people had broken through. It would be only a matter of time now before the Fey held Jahn. Once the palace was taken, these spineless people would capitulate to their new rulers.

Dust had risen in various parts of the city from the scuffling and the fighting. The air had a raw smell to it—blood and fear and sweat overlaid the city scents of baked bread and sewage. The activity all around him made him restless. He had been planning this attack too long to stay cooped up in a makeshift garrison on the edge of the city.

He climbed down off the table, feeling the air cool his legs. He ran his hand through his black hair. No one had come to see him for some time now. His duty as coordinator was done, unless there was some crisis, which he did not expect. His troops were spreading all over the countryside, seeding terror everywhere they went. They were to capture each house, each village, each town they went through until they reached the Isle’s edge or until the Islanders surrendered. His orders were to keep the actual destruction to a minimum: the Fey had come to Blue Isle because it was rich, and that prosperity had to be maintained, or the Isle would be worthless to them.

His guards flanked him as he stepped outside: Rusty and Strongfist had been with him since he’d been a boy. They had always protected him, and he had always watched over them. They were getting older, but their bodies were still lean and trim, their actions quick and full of strength. They would go with him wherever he went.

He took a step forward when suddenly the scene in front of him disappeared. His mouth clamped shut, although he had to scream. Something was burning his face, seeping into his nostrils, filling his eyes. He couldn’t breathe. He clutched at his face and fell forward, and then the scene shifted again. He was in a wooden room with benches overturned, thirty Fey on their backs with their faces melted away, their bodies already turning stiff with death. A black-robed Islander male was running from the room, small glass bottles cradled in his arms.

Water, falling from the sky, made him feel weak. The more that landed on him, the weaker he grew until he was little better than an Islander himself. That extra muscle, the one in his mind that created something out of nothing, had burned away to an ash, and the cinders scattered to the winds.

He was lying facedown on the muddy ground, his face half-buried in muck. He had to turn so that he could breathe. Rusty was kneeling beside him, his sun-wrinkled face creased with worry. Rugar eased himself to his elbows and wiped off his nose and mouth. “I’m all right,” he said, his voice harsh, as if he hadn’t used it for a long time.

He looked up and into the blinding rays of the sun, he saw hundreds of Fey, scattered on roads and around buildings, their faces gone, their bodies twisted. Nearby, Islanders were digging a large hole and filling it with limestone. Horror filled him as he realized that the hole was a mass grave. No Fey were left to retrieve the dead.

His chin was wet and his mouth dry. His back ached. He was lying half-in, half-out of the mud hole, his mouth open and drool running down his face. He must look like an idiot. Fortunately, Rusty and Strongfist had seen the Visions overtake him before.

Only never like this.

“Tell me I blacked out,” he said, pushing himself into a sitting position. “Tell me that the exhaustion finally got me and you let me dream.”

“Your eyes were open,” Rusty said. His normally dark skin was ashen. “You had the Look.”

“I have never seen you do this before, though,” Strongfist said. His voice was shaking. “It was as if an unseen force assaulted you and laid you flat.”

Rugar’s eyes had been open. His mouth had been open. He had felt, tasted, and smelled the Vision. He closed his eyes and reviewed the scenes in his mind. Jewel had not been among the dead. Neither had he. Except, perhaps, at first. But he didn’t know if that moment of great pain was his own death or simply part of the Vision, being able to feel what that black-robed Islander had been doing to the Fey.

Chills ran through him. Some of that had to do with the mud. He was encased in it.

“Are you all right?” Strongfist asked.

“I’m fine,” Rugar said.

“Let’s clean you off,” Rusty said, taking one of Rugar’s arms.

Rugar shook free. “No,” he said. “I need to think. Leave me here and let me think.”

“We can’t leave you alone,” Strongfist said.

Rugar glared at him. They would do what they were ordered. Strongfist backed away. Rusty glanced at Strongfist. They had been with Rugar long enough that they didn’t need the words.

“We will be near the inn’s entrance,” Rusty said. “We’ll be able to see you from there.”

“Fine,” Rugar said. He didn’t care what they did as long as they left him alone. He bowed his head, letting his brow rest on his mud-coated knees. His body was shivering with emotion. He had to separate the emotions raised by the Vision and the emotions he was feeling.