The Grand Design

Praise for
The Jackal of Nar

“Absorbing, deftly plotted … with promising character development and a well-rounded, satisfying end.”

—
Kirkus Reviews

“Marco’s first novel offers an unusual and imaginative mix of well-conceived magic with a technology that includes gunpowder and trench warfare. Its plot is rife with twists and interesting kinks, and should captivate most fantasy fans.”

—
Publishers Weekly

“
The Jackal of Nar
introduces us to a world full of intrigue, villainy, magic, and technology, producing a unique fantasy tale … I can’t wait to see how the rest of the tale unfolds.”

—Michael A. Stackpole

“Introduces a marvelous new voice to the world of fantasy.
Jackal
is a stunning first novel and I eagerly await the next book of Nar.”

—Allan Cole

“A well-crafted military fantasy, fast-paced and underscored with believable characters and politics.”

—J. V. Jones

This edition contains the complete text of the original trade paper edition.

NOT ONE WORD HAS BEEN OMITTED.

THE GRAND DESIGN

A Bantam Spectra Book

PUBLISHING HISTORY

Bantam Spectra trade paper edition published April 2000

Bantam Spectra paperback edition / January 2001

SPECTRA and the portrayal of a boxed “s” are trademarks of Bantam Books, a division of Random House, Inc.

All rights reserved.

Copyright © 2000 by John Marco.

Cover art copyright © 2000 by Doug Beekman.

Maps by James Sinclair.

Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 99-36358.

No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

For information address: Bantam Books.

ISBN-13: 978-0-553-58029-7

eBook ISBN: 978-0-8041-8085-6

Bantam Books are published by Bantam Books, a division of Random House, Inc. Its trademark, consisting of the words “Bantam Books” and the portrayal of a rooster, is Registered in U.S. Patent and Trademark Office and in other countries. Marca Registrada. Random House, New York, New York.

v3.1

T
he night burned a pulsing orange.

General Vorto, supreme commander of the legions of Nar, stood on a hillside beneath the red flash of rockets, safely distant from the bombardment hammering the walls of Goth. It was a cold night with frost in the air. He could see the crystalline snow in the sky and on his eyelashes. The northern gusts blew the battle rockets up and over the city and bent the fiery plumes of flame cannons. Goth’s tall walls glowed a molten amber at its weakest parts, and in the city’s center small fires smoldered, the result of lucky rocket shots. Gothan archers rimmed the catwalks and battlements, raining down arrows on the thousand legionnaires encircling the city. High in the hills, rocket launchers sent off their missiles, while on the ground war wagons lumbered on their metal tracks, grinding the earth to pulp. Inside the iron tanks, teams of gunners pumped kerosene fuel into the needle-noses of flame cannons and blasted away at the unyielding stone of Goth.

The war machines of Nar were at work.

General Vorto pulled off a gauntlet and tested the wind with a finger. Southeasterly and strong, he determined. Too damn strong. A curse sprang to his lips as he pulled his metal glove back on. So far, the Walled City didn’t seem to be softening from his attack, nor had the winds abated to cooperate. It had only been a
few hours since he’d begun his attack but he was already growing impatient—not a good trait for a general. He ground his teeth together in frustration, and watched as the city of Goth withstood all he could throw against it.

“Resist, then,” he grumbled. “Soon we will have the ram in place.”

Nearby on the hillside, the gunners of a modified acid launcher awaited their general’s orders. They had loaded the first cannister of Formula B hours ago, when they’d first arrived around the city. Vorto had hoped the wind might cooperate, but the breeze had picked up and so the order to fire had never come. There were five more such launchers in the hills around Goth, all primed like this one, all awaiting Vorto’s order to fire. Vorto blew into his hands to warm them.

“They are strong ones,” said the general to his aide, the slim and dour-faced Colonel Kye. “I’ve underestimated them. They have a stomach for siege, it seems. I would have thought Lokken weaker than this.”

“Duke Lokken
is
weak,” corrected Kye. He had a rasping voice that Vorto had to strain to understand, the result of a Triin arrow through his windpipe. “When the dawn comes he will see what’s out here waiting for him, and he will surrender.” The colonel smiled one of his sour smiles. “I am optimistic.”

“Yes, you can afford to be,” said Vorto. “I cannot.” He pointed toward the city’s towering walls, thick with archers ignoring the bombardment. “Look. See how many men he has? He could hold out for weeks in there. And these damned winds …” Vorto halted, mouthing a silent prayer. God made the winds, and he had no right to curse them. He confessed his sin, then turned his attention to the giant launcher sitting nearby. Ten cannisters of Formula B waited beside the magazine, ready for loading. The bellows that would propel the cannisters was swelled with air. It groaned with the sound of stretched leather. Vorto reached down
and picked up one of the cannisters. His gunners gasped and inched away. The general held the cannister up to inspect it, turning it in the pulsing rocket light. The cylindrical container was no bigger than his head. Inside it, he could feel liquid sloshing around. There were two chambers in the cannister, one full of water, the other loaded with Formula B, the dried pellets the war labs had synthesized. Upon impact, the cannister would shatter and the components would mix. Any small breeze would do the rest.

Theoretically. Formula B had never been tested in the field. Bovadin had fled Nar before its perfection, leaving a handful of tinkerers behind to finish his work. Formula A had proved too caustic to transport, even in its dry state. But Formula B, the war labs had assured Vorto, was perfect. They had tried it on prisoners with remarkable results, and they were sure fifty cannisters of the stuff would be enough to wipe out Goth.

But the winds would have to cooperate.

Brooding, Vorto put down the cannister. Much as he wanted to, he couldn’t risk detonating the formula in such stiff winds. The walls of Goth were high, certainly, but were they high enough to contain the gas? And what if one of the cannisters landed outside the walls? If there was a safe distance from the caustic fumes, no one knew its measure. Maybe Bovadin did, but the midget was in Crote now, hiding with the sodomite Biagio.