The Dark Defiles (15 page)

“Fortress?” Hunger, cold, the bruising she’d taken. For the first time, she felt genuinely dizzy. “You found a … fortress? A
Kiriath
fortress?”

“Yes, my lady. I was about to tell you.” Chan shot a reproachful glance at the Dragonbane. “We saw it from the headland, out to sea at least a mile. It stands in the ocean exactly as the Helmsman described it.”

here were three fishing skiffs tied up along the causeway quay. The imperials found a couple of younger privateers cowering among the nets aboard the first, smacked them about a bit and threw them overboard. Splash and roil of waters as they were snatched down screaming—one or two of the marines looked a little queasy as they caught glimpses, but the rest seemed to be getting used to it.

Ringil cobbled together a rough-and-ready kindling spell Hjel had taught him early on and conjured fire from the damp timbers in the prow of the boat. It took a couple of attempts, the first one more smoke and smolder than flame. But second time around, the spell took. The damp wood snapped and crackled alight like desert scrub kindling. Ringil stepped back, splayed hands toward the flames, as if at once restraining them and warming his hands.

“Get out of the boat,” he suggested to the curious imperials rubbernecking at his back. “And somebody get that mooring cut.”

He clambered out after them. Watched somberly as the little improvised fireship drifted away from the causeway, spun about like a floated needle seeking north, then settled into an eerily rapid and accurate course across the harbor. The imperials clustered about him on the quay’s edge, but none got too close.

“There’s no current pulling that way,” somebody muttered at his back.

“Yeah, no shit,” came a low response. “What, did you just get here or something? You didn’t see those guys go into the water?”

Ringil turned about as if he hadn’t heard. Made for the second skiff. The rhythms for the kindling spell were thrumming in his head now, he had it down. Pretty sure he’d only need the one shot at it this time. More than enough spare attention to track the murmured conversation among the men who followed him.

“This is evil work,” he heard. “The Revelation is clear. It’s forbidden to have dealings with powers like these. Scarface there is going to—”

“
Keep your fucking voice down!
Man’s a sorcerer, isn’t he?”

Twitch of a grin at the corners of Ringil’s mouth. A fresh voice joined in.

“Yeah, Krag, we’re all real upset about how it’s turning out. We just kicked these pirates’ arses into the harbor thanks to
Scarface there.
I’ll take that over a barrel of invigilator’s indulgences any day of the week.”

“Yeah, you ever see an
invigilator
fight like that?”

Guffaws.

“Ever see an invigilator fight at all?”

“That’s blasphemy, Shahn! The Revelation’s our guide to salvation of the soul. The invigilators cannot mire themselves in worldly matters.”

“Yeah? Seen a couple of them mire themselves pretty deep in the girls at Salyana’s Yard last year.”

“What I hear, most of them prefer boys.”

“Man, now
that’s
just fucking obscene—”

“Oh, what—you really going to pull that face, Mahmal? After the way you snuggled up to little rosy cheeks from the galley aboard
Lizardlash
last year?”

“That’s different, man. That’s at sea. But when you’ve got the fucking
choice
… ”

They reached the second skiff. Showing off a little, Gil made the cast from the causeway this time, into the piled up nets in the bottom of the boat. Smoke and smolder, and for a moment he thought he’d fucked it up again. Then the flames broke out, pale and crackling in the bright morning air. He rested one boot on the side of the skiff, gave the fire a moment to really take, then nodded at the marine nearest the mooring iron. The man hacked a knife blade up through the rope and Ringil gave the boat a heavy, booted shove away from the causeway’s edge.

“My lord!” A marine, hurrying along the quay from the stairway end. “My lord Ringil!”

Gil turned to face him. The imperial bore the marks of the engagement just gone—he was limping somewhat, he’d been bandaged crudely about the head. Blood had trickled down from the binding and was starting to dry on his face. Still, he seemed pretty cheerful.

“My lord, Commander Hald sends word—he is ready to move on the town. Fresh men are coming up at the tower to support the push.”

“Excellent.” Ringil nodded at the last remaining skiff. “Everybody in the boat, then. Tell Commander Hald we’ll see him on the other side.”

He watched with some amusement as the men around him looked at each other in alarm. Then he strode to the third skiff, threw in his borrowed shield and jumped down after it. Looked back expectantly at the marines.

“Gentlemen, if you please.”

They came without much enthusiasm, nine men in all, lowered themselves in with wary care. They sat gingerly away from the sides, while he took station at the prow and waited for the bandaged marine to cut them loose. Out ahead in the harbor waters, the other two skiffs were well ablaze and heading steadily for the League man-of-war tied up at the main dock. In the brightening light of the morning, the fireships looked harmless and toylike, but he could already hear voices raised in alarm along the dock.

Good enough.

They made good time across the harbor - stood at the prow, Ringil glanced down and saw the lead akyia just below the surface of the water, swimming effortlessly on its side, long, fronded limbs rippling. One claw-tipped hand trailed back to caress the keel, as if guiding the vessel by touch alone. The creature’s head was tilted up, one fist-sized eye seeming to watch him through the water, huge lampreylike mouth irising open and shut in the boneless lower face.

They’re talking about you.

Seethlaw’s words, the first time they saw the akyia, watching them both from shallow waters, just offshore in the Grey Places. At the time, he’d dismissed the dwenda’s words as a joke. But he was pretty sure there’d been an akyia in the river when he came out of the crumbling temple at Afa’marag. He was pretty sure it had left him his dragon-tooth dagger, pegged in the mud on the riverbank. And somewhere in the twisted morass of nightmare and memory he carried from that time, was a flicker-lit recollection of taking the Ravensfriend out of a webbed and clawed hand that offered it like a gift from the water.

I see what the akyia saw, Gil. I see what you could become if you’d only let yourself.

He wasn’t sure what he was becoming, but he knew they’d shadowed him northward. He’d seen them cavorting in the surf one night at Lanatray when he went out to prowl the battlements of his mother’s summer retreat. He’d seen them at play in the bandlight-dappled wake of
Dragon’s Demise
on more than one occasion, though no one else up on deck those nights seemed to share his vision. And when the kraken came calling, hauling itself up meatily on deck one questing tentacle at a time in search of prey, it was the akyia who swarmed it, tearing at its bulk with claws and mouths, dragging it finally back down into the ocean before Ringil had the chance to do more than hack at it a half dozen times.

They featured in Naomic myth, more often called the merroigai, though the focus in those tales was usually on their sleek, womanlike bodies and seductive ways with mariners. Not so much mention of the nightmarish bone structure and feeding apparatus of the face, or the rather intimidating claws. But for all that, they were seen as creatures of power. There were legends that made them minor gods, close relatives of the Dark Court nobility. In other myth, they were linked specifically with the Salt Lord Dakovash. In some versions they were his eyes and ears across the ocean, in others his handmaidens.

Seethlaw had been reticent, told him nothing meaningful or useful, but one thing had come across very clearly. The dwenda lord and his sister Risgillen were both obviously wary of offending the akyia, if not actually scared of them. And anything that worried the dwenda, well, that had to be worth something.

We’ll take what allies we can get,
Akal the Great told his court bluntly, when news of the alliance with Trelayne against the lizards was proclaimed.
And we’ll not question our good fortune in finding them.

Ringil had never much liked the man, but he couldn’t fault the thinking.

They were coming up on the shingle beach now, at the end of the quay. No sign of a reception committee. In the wake of the fireships and Hald’s encroachment along the far side of the harbor, no one had had time to notice them arrive. The lead akyia let go the boat’s keel, executed a slick dive-and-turn that would have broken the back on any human swimmer, and was gone, back into deeper waters. Through his own grip on the prow and his boots, Gil thought he felt the release of multiple claws from the underside of the skiff and a faint slackening of the boat’s momentum.

“Ready it, lads.” Shahn, the ranking imperial present, gruff voice raised. “I want a nice tight deployment behind my lord Ringil, soon as we hit. Blades out
after
you jump.”

They ran in to the shelving shingle with a sustained, grinding crunch. The boat jammed to a halt and tilted to one side along the keel. Gil leapt out, shield slung, splashing heavily through ankle shallows and up onto dry land. He stood and drew the Ravensfriend, sheer leadership bravado, there was nothing here to kill with it. But he heard the multiple scrape as the men at his back followed suit.

“Shields!”

They stalked up the beach as one. The soft breeze plucked aside his cloak, put a moment’s chill back in his damp clothing. He shivered, but it felt exultant.

Dad, if you could only see me now. Leading a pack of imperials in assault on a chartered League town.

Outlaw faggot scum, is it?

Fair enough.

They made the street to the quay unnoticed, traded shingle for cobbles with some relief. A couple of hundred yards off to the right, one of the makeshift fireships had lodged at the waterline of the League warship, flames licking upward at the rail and rigging there. Men swarmed the ship with buckets, trying to get the fire out.

Yeah, good luck with that.
Hjel had taught him well; nothing would quench invoked fire until the thing you’d set aflame was ash.

Meantime … 

The plan was pretty straightforward, a lopsided pincer to clear out the wharf of any hostile forces, then advance up into the town with general slaughter. But as they reached the quay, he heard yelling and the clatter of boots on cobbles, carried down from the street above in the still morning air. Reinforcements, coming down.

He whipped around to face the imperials, whirl of decision and hurried speech.

“Four men, with me, now. We’re going up there and block the next wave. Shahn, you take the others and hack your way through to Hald.”

Six of the eight imperials stepped forward on the instant. Assume the remaining two had to be the pious Krag and a like-minded pal. Ringil grinned and pointed at random with his shield.

“You, you, you and you. Thank you, gentlemen.” Briefly, turning to Shahn. “Tell Hald we’ll hold the slope as long as we can, but some backup would be nice. Okay, go. Get it done. The rest of you, with me. Let’s fucking chase them back up that hill, shall we?”

Grim laughter. They knew what they were being asked to do, they knew the odds. Five blades to stop up the street against who knew how many privateers, and the gradient against them, too.

He raised the Ravensfriend like a steel standard.

“For your comrades, gentlemen—for the Empire! Make it count!”

For the
Empire,
Gil? Where’d that one come from?

Hey, whatever works.

They rushed the corner, got there at about the same time as the privateer force hurrying down the street—to that extent, it was an ambush and quite effective as such. The descending soldiers literally stumbled over Ringil’s squad. Gil battered the lead privateer with his shield, knocked him down, kicked him in the head, and left him for someone else to finish. He cut low on the next man, chopped the legs out from under him almost before the privateer realized he was there. Then slip aside as the maimed and screaming soldier tumbled past, plant your feet, meet the third man with
hew
and
block
and
slice,
all the time looking for that opening. Watch those cobbles underfoot—the night’s fog and the morning dew had left them slick and treacherous.

The privateer he faced found out the same thing on too much downward momentum—he staggered on a parry, came around too far—the Ravensfriend scythed down, took off his arm just below the elbow. Gout of blood across the air, and the man bellowed like a slaughterhouse ox as he saw it happen. Ringil grabbed him roughly by the jerkin, shoved him aside. Caught some of the blood, warm and wet, across the side of his face as the man fell screaming.

The imperials had opened out around him like the petals on some malign black rose. Slam of shields and hack and stab—they scooped the surprised privateers in, set them stumbling about on the incline, had slaughtered a half dozen before anyone managed to back up and mount a decent defense. For long moments, panic and confusion swept the League ranks—they couldn’t see exactly what kind of force had got in their way, how strong it was, or how well armed. And this outlaw they’d come to take down, wasn’t he a black mage or something, was this some kind of sorcery … ?