Second Guard (35 page)

“They paint their boats red after their new queen’s hair,” Drayvon said, putting the glass to his eye. “Her enemies in the Far World call her the Queen of Blood and
Bones, for the destruction she’s laid across her neighboring kingdoms.”

“And what of the Treaty of Cordova her father signed?” Tali said, remembering her history lessons from Saavedra. “She can decimate the Far World for all I care, but how dare
she bring her war to Tequende!”

“She will not get past the Alcazar,” Drayvon said calmly, pressing his lips together. “Her men may outnumber us, but we fight on our own ground, with stone walls to protect
us.”

“
Some
of us have stone walls,” Tali murmured, glancing back at the boulder that would be her team’s only protection against two thousand Andorians.

Chey walked toward them then and Drayvon gave him a long look. “Chey,” he said in simple greeting and handed him the spyglass. If Chey was surprised to hear Drayvon call him by name,
he did not let on.

Chey aimed the glass out onto the lake and whistled softly. “Our plan remains the same?” he asked, turning back to them.

Zarif nodded. “We are to remain hidden while Jessa’s archers and catapults take out as many Andorians as they can. When—
if
—any of their warriors make it to
shore, we are to wait until they run past us, then attack from behind, pinning them against the walls of the Alcazar.”

The four of them fell silent, contemplating the impossible task ahead.

“May Elia watch over us this night of nights,” Zarif prayed.

“May the light of Intiq burn inside us,” Tali and Drayvon continued.

“And may Machué make our enemies her own,” Chey said, completing the blessing, hand over heart.

Intiq disappeared behind the mountains and Elia took her place in the dusky sky, though only a mere sliver, as if even she laid in wait for the enemy. The longboats, which had
been visible to the naked eye for some hours, loomed ever near, cutting through the water like knives. From her hiding place behind the boulder, Tali heard Jessa’s voice from atop the wall,
commanding her forces to wait for her signal. Tali’s knees ached from her crouched position, the sharp sand biting into her skin. The gentle sound of the lake as it hit the shore seemed to
mock Tali with its calm lullaby before the storm. When Jessa finally yelled “Fire!” Tali felt a rush of relief, followed immediately by gut-wrenching terror.

Overhead, the catapults launched, heaving their huge stones through the air. Tali instinctively ducked down farther, though the sound of cracking wood and screaming men let her know that several
stones had hit their targets. She peered around the side of the boulder. Seven boats had collapsed in on themselves, their oarsmen floundering in the water under the weight of their weapons and
armor. The catapults continued, some missing the boats, but still deadly to the men in the water. Jessa called upon her archers next, and a volley of arrows shot across the night sky. Though some
hit their mark, many more were deflected by the round shields the Andorian oarsmen used to cover themselves.

Minutes later, the Andorians neared close enough to loose arrows of their own. Though they flew high over Tali’s head, her body still tensed each time she heard the
thwack
of a
bowstring. The screaming came from both sides now, a sound more horrible than Tali had ever known.
If only to be deaf like Nel for one night.
She realized she kept holding her breath, and
she struggled to control her breathing.

Time seemed to play with Tali, and she could not tell whether hours had passed or moments. The volley of arrows streamed across the sky in both directions, deadly shadows in a sea of stars. Tali
feared the arrows from the Alcazar would soon run out, while the longboats kept nearing like snakes spilling from their dens. The first boats will be ashore within minutes, Tali thought. And then
this boulder will feel as small as the pebbles underfoot.

Chey nudged her, pointing at the lake past the longboats. Her eyes scanned the darkness, and then she saw them: six large shadows on the water, heading straight for the Andorians. Some kind of
vessels, she thought, but whose? She jerked upright as flames sparked from each of their hulls and she gasped in recognition. Tradeboats! What are traders doing here? And why have they set their
own boats on fire? The Andorians had now noticed them too and began loosing their arrows at this new threat instead of the Alcazar.

“Intiq have mercy,” Tali whispered as she watched shadowy figures dive off the tradeboats into the black waters of the lake. The tradeboats, now fully aflame, headed straight for the
middle of the Andorian fleet. The longboats, desperately trying to avoid the approaching infernos, slipped into chaos. Cheers from the Tequendians on the wall erupted loudly and hope bloomed in
Tali’s chest for the first time since putting her eye to the spyglass earlier. The boats acted as enormous floating torches, lighting up the night with their orange, dancing flames. Tali
caught sight of a familiar striped flag atop the leading tradeboat. “No!” she cried, nearly choking on the image of her home aflame. “No!”

Tali scraped her hands down the boulder as she watched
Cora’s Heart
slam into the column of longboats with a great cracking noise, instantly setting two of them afire. Screams
from the Andorian oarsmen echoed across the lake as the other five tradeboats hit their marks. Tali looked desperately into the dark water, searching for the traders who had sacrificed their boats
to the flames. Were it not for Zarif and Chey on either side of her, clasping her arms, she would have run into the lake herself.
Mercy, Intiq, mercy,
she prayed over and over again.
Let Father and Nel be far from these bloody waters.
Her father would never have given Nel permission to do such a thing. But what if she had done so anyway? Nel, who was afraid of the
dark…

“Longboat ashore!” The words fell from the wall, doom arriving in two clipped words.

Tali held her breath as one of the longboats rowed through the fiery wreckage into the shallow waters of the island’s western shore. Dozens of Andorian warriors splashed up the beach
toward the Alcazar, weapons and grappling hooks in hand, passing directly between Saraky’s team to the south and Drayvon’s team to the west. They are so…big, Tali thought. She
had known, of course, that the Far World armies enlisted only grown men, and no women, but she had always thought this a weakness of the Far World, a stupidity. Now that she saw the size of the
Andorian soldiers, she felt small and somewhat ridiculous.
We are an army of children.

Zarif had poked his spyglass through the covering brush, and now he held up a hand to his team. “Saraky has signaled. We are to hold our position.”

The ten pledges crouched tensely, watching the scene unfold in front of them. The Andorians were nearly to the wall now, though some of them had been felled by arrows and spears. Their leader
gave a loud war cry as they began to twirl their grappling hooks in the air, seeking purchase atop the walls. Tali bit her lip so hard she drew blood. As she sucked on her wound, praying
Saraky’s plan would work, Drayvon and his team emerged from their hiding spot.

“For Tequende!” Drayvon yelled, leading the charge.

As planned, the Andorians, still dodging the arrows and spears from above, had not counted on an attack from behind. Drayvon’s team felled a dozen before the Andorians could regroup, but
now the well-trained soldiers had assembled themselves again and turned on Drayvon and his team of pledges. The clash of weapons was unbearably loud, the groans of the injured worse. One, two,
three pledges fell. “We need to help them!” Tali cried, but Zarif grabbed her shoulder and spun her around to see what was coming on the other side.

Surviving soldiers from the burning longboats now splashed their way onto the nearby shore. Tali inhaled sharply, then ducked behind the boulder once more. She glanced quickly back at the wall.
Drayvon and his team had all fallen, their Andorian foes stepping on their broken bodies and flinging hooks atop the wall.
No no no.

Tali thought of all the defenseless servants inside the Alcazar. Brindl. Ory. Varah. Tippy.
They won’t stand a chance.
She heard Jessa yell for cauldrons. She watched
Saraky’s team emerge from their hiding spot, charging the Andorians who had emerged from the lake like sea monsters.
There are too many. This is the end.

“Now!” Zarif cried. “For Tequende!”

Tali’s body flew into action. She set her sights on two Andorians running to the wall.
Do it, Tali,
she told herself.
If you do not kill them, they will kill you.
She
unsheathed her mother’s sword and let it swing. The two Andorians fell, one after the other, and she grunted as she pulled her sword out of their bodies, stepping on them for leverage.
Tali’s sword swiped over and over again, as she dodged and darted her way through the bedlam. With every furious slash of her sword, Tali chanted, whether aloud or in her own head, she
couldn’t say. “For Tequende. For Saavedra. For Saraky!” she screamed, as she watched her beloved centurio throw a rapid succession of throwing knives at the grapplers on the wall
before falling himself, an Andorian longsword in his back.

Though she lost sight of Chey and Zarif several times, she could feel their presence close by. They were still alive. And she would not let them down. Left cut, right, dodge, spin, strike. Her
sword struck on its own, her body constantly moving as if it knew better than her mind what needed to be done. It rolled away from strikes, slid through legs, leapt over bodies, as she fought her
way to the wall. No matter how many soldiers she took down, there was always another waiting.
For Tequende. For Saavedra. For Saraky. For Rona!
the voice in her head screamed, watching the
Earth Guild girl fall, a sword in her belly.
For…

“Zarif!” she cried, as she saw her friend disarmed by a charging Andorian, his face covered with soot from the tradeboat fires. Zarif spun away from the war hammer hurtling toward
his head, only to have the weapon land on his knee instead. His kneecap shattered with a sickening crunch and Zarif collapsed. The Andorian lifted his hammer again over Zarif’s body. Tali ran
toward them, as did Chey, his barbed club raised high.
We will not make it. Mercy, Intiq! Mercy!

Just then a dozen riders galloped into battle in triangular formation, led by a magnificent black stallion breathing steam. “Surrender!” commanded Telendor, stopping all in their
tracks. “Put down your weapons, the Queen is taken!”

T
he fighting completely halted as if Telendor had cast a spell. Warriors held their weapons mid-strike on both sides.

“My guards hold the Queen in Fugaza,” Telendor yelled up at the wall, his warhorse dancing skittishly among the felled warriors underfoot. “Surrender now, Jessa, and no more
pledges will die.”

Tali looked back and forth between Jessa and Telendor, trying to comprehend the commander’s words.
Of course he holds the Queen; he went to Fugaza to protect her. Why does he ask Jessa
to surrender?

The truth hit her like a blow to the chest. Intiq save us, she thought, the sword nearly slipping from her hands.
Telendor’s a traitor, too!
Together he and Jaden had smuggled
gold to Oest Andoria to build the longboats. Then they sent the Second Guard north, emptied the Alcazar, and captured the Queen. They had orchestrated everything. They had fooled everyone.
Tali’s shock was replaced by instant rage.

Jessa clearly felt the same way. The centurio raised her bow and aimed it at Telendor. Although Tali could not make out Jessa’s face from the ground, she could only imagine the depths of
her fury over Telendor’s betrayal, the bloodshed he had laid at her feet after she had served him so faithfully. “The blood of children stains your hands today, Telendor,” Jessa
yelled, her voice cold and brittle with fury.