The Heretic Land (42 page)

I have to give
them
a chance
, Aeon said.
They choose to call me a god, but it’s their own actions that will define them.

How much of a chance?
the old thing asked.
How long can you give? Crex Wry
cannot
rise again. It
must
not. Last time it froze the heart of a thriving land; next time
…

It will not rise again
, Aeon assured.
But if I did stop them this time, they would have more reason to see me as an enemy. And they would try again, and again. Better I give the humans time to halt their own folly.
A silent nod, as Aeon agreed with its own thinking.
And imagine the results should they triumph?

And you’re weak
, the dead thing said.
Even the tools of magic, the Engines, repel you.

Yes
, Aeon admitted.
But the humans are stronger than you think.

The dead thing mocked without speaking.

You never did admire them
, Aeon said.

They’ve had their time.

Perhaps
, Aeon said.
But should they make all the right decisions, they will move on. The advance will be huge. And I will be able
… It trailed off, and Venden sensed the things that made it not quite a god. There was selfishness there, in its desire not to be involved. And there was a dreadful weariness.

You have existed for so long
, the old thing said.

Alone
, Aeon said.

Something changed about the dead thing’s appearance tangled in the roots of that ancient fallen tree. The skeleton yellowed
and crumbled in places, the tree fell to rot, and a distant volcanic explosion splashed it with reflected red light, like flowing blood. Venden saw it as it really was – dead, and long, long gone.

Aeon fell silent.

Father will triumph
, Venden said, every sense determined.

Far to the south, his father’s burden increased a thousandfold.

Bon was having trouble keeping up with Leki. He suspected it was her Arcanum training. They probably told her how to ride shires. Showed her how to send a racking. Revealed to her every cursed secret of every inner working of the Alderian empire and every creed, state and people. She galloped her mount ahead, and had not once looked back to make sure Bon was following. Maybe she knew. Maybe she was inside his head right now.

I thought I might love you.
He wondered if she heard that, or knew it. Still she did not turn around.

Bon had ridden much smaller shires on Alderia. There had been a route that led from their village of Sefton Breaks and along the Ton River, heading towards Gakota but then veering across a shallow part of the river and snaking out towards a huge spread of farmland beyond. It had been a favoured walking and riding path for many villagers, and for the space of two or three years he and Milian had taken Venden with them. They’d borrowed shires from a neighbour’s farm, setting out early morning, lunching by the river, then exploring the farmland into the afternoon and evening. They’d watched crop gathering, and sometimes helped. Venden had caught insects on the wing and told his parents about them. Once, their son had gone swimming in a tributary of the Ton, and Milian and Bon had made surreptitious love beneath a blanket.

Those
shires had been small and tame, used to being ridden. These, he was certain, were wild.

The beast beneath him bucked and snorted, spraying foam across its head and back as it ran. Bon held onto its mane, legs tight against its sides, his pack hugged around his stomach and pressed between him and the shire. His jacket was tied, the pocket containing Venden’s gift securely closed. Bon had not looked at it since, but it was the centre of his attention.

Leki rode with ease, sitting up on her shire and steering it, urging it on. Bon suspected that his mount was simply following Leki’s, and he did not attempt to interfere.

He could feel the great power of the beast beneath him, and could not sense any lessening of speed or energy. But several smears of foam spattered across his hands and against his cheeks, and when he wiped them off he saw specks of blood, thick and heavy in the mess.

He thought of calling to Leki to stop, but she was too far ahead to hear. And if he somehow managed to slow or halt his own shire, he would be lost.

Skythe was white, and growing whiter. Snow fell heavier. Their race south was almost silent, but for the muffled impacts of the shires’ hooves through thick snow and the creatures’ grunting and snorting.

They carried Aeon’s message with them.

For a people supposedly denuded of civilisation and existing as savages, the Skythians launched a staggeringly effective attack.

We are so wrong about them
, Sol thought, but he had no time to dwell on the mistake. Every moment, every ounce of his experience and determination and will to survive, was given to his command. His soldier’s mind took over completely, and Sol Merry became a machine of war.

As
the fighting began, he assessed their enemy’s numbers. Perhaps a score had risen from the snowscape beyond the other end of the bridge, squat shapes that shrugged off their snowy camouflage and came straight for the bridge. Others had been hiding below, their numbers unknown. They slung spiked grappling hooks on the ends of ropes, the twisted, sharp metal impacting the snow-covered bridge and scraping across the stone surface. And behind them, closing on Gallan and the soldiers defending the bridge’s southern end, perhaps twenty more attackers.

Tamma crouched down not far from Sol, screeching her orders at the lyon.

He remembered what they’d been told of the Skythians. Once a proud, advanced, civilised people, they were now little more than savages, less advanced than most of the Outer tribes. The cause of such regression – the lies, the truths – were a moot point right now. There was no industry on Skythe, and society was feudal, consisting of small communities sparsely scattered across the vast southern plains. The northern lands were barren and uninhabited, so they were told. The Skythians lived in caves and basic reed huts, scraped a living from the land and died young. So they were told.

They’re very little threat to us
, General Cove had announced to a thousand Spike soldiers on their last briefing before the fleet departed.
It’s the bastard thing they worship that we sail to destroy once again, and once and for all.

The familiar coughs of steam weapons discharging sounded all around. Several Skythians on the north bank fell, blood blooming around them as they caught rifle shot. Two more climbing over the bridge’s crumbling parapet flipped back into the river. Shot ricocheted from stone, whining and hissing as if upset at missing its intended home of flesh and bone.

A Spike screamed as a grappling hook arced down and buried
itself in her shoulder. She grabbed the rope and tugged, but then whoever had thrown it out from beneath the bridge swung from cover, and the rope thrummed as it tensed. The soldier slipped and slid across the snow, crashing against the parapet. She growled in pain and frustration. Her blood speckled the snow.

Sol stepped forward and swung his sword, slicing through the rope as he felt an arrow flit past his ear, parting his hair. A splash below, and he looked down in time to see the attacker carried away by the river.

‘Can you fight?’ he asked, and the woman did not even answer. She stood and nodded her thanks, then rushed along the bridge towards the Skythians coming their way. She trailed rope and blood behind her, and the grappling hook clung like an ugly parasite, still stuck in her shoulder.

The lyon was standing its ground towards the northern end of the bridge. It had one enemy already beneath its heavy front claws, and the victim’s ruined head still bubbled and spat from the fire the lyon had breathed upon it. Several Skythians stood beyond the range of its flames, firing arrows which the creature ducked and twisted to deflect from its thick hide, or batted from the air with a big paw. Sol had seen lyons in battle many times, and they never ceased to amaze him.

He looked away from the furious, fiery animal.

Spike soldiers had spaced themselves along both sides of the bridge and were hacking at ropes as they appeared. A couple were stabbing at attackers who had managed to gain the bridge parapet, and who soon fell bleeding into the river. One Spike had fallen part-way through a damaged section of the bridge and hung there, trapped. He screamed. Something was happening to him below, out of sight, and he jerked back and forth in the hole as he was attacked, spent pistol clasped in
one hand. He spat blood. When the screaming stopped, the movement did not.

‘Tamma!’ Sol shouted.

She turned to him, wild-eyed and breathless from screeching instructions to the lyon.

‘Launch the ving wasps!’ Sol called.

Tamma nodded, then signalled with both hands back along the bridge.

Sol looked that way as well, and quickly assessed the attack against their rear. Gallan had pulled the remaining troops on the southern bank back towards the bridge, forming a defensive line which was successfully repelling the assault. The Spike were engaged in hand-to-hand fighting with Skythians, metal clashing on metal, and several of the enemy were already down. Spike weaponry was far superior to the uneven arrows, rusted sword and carved spears Sol had seen thus far.

Gallan glanced back at Sol and nodded once. He had the situation there under control.

A handler ripped open a pack and fell to one side. At that, an uneven, pulsing cloud rose from the pack, hovered for a moment over the handler and then dispersed to the air. Ving wasps. They were vicious creatures, only the size of a thumbnail but packing a sting that could paralyse a limb and drive the victim to distraction from the pain. Sol hoped that each Spike soldier had smeared on his or her repellent gel that morning.

As they quickly spread out, the wasps became difficult to make out individually. But then they started stinging.

Skythians cried out and slapped wildly at the stings. Thus distracted, they were easily put down by Sol’s troops, with sword or spear. When the fight turned into a slaughter, the Blader turned back to the situation on the bridge.

Another handler had let loose the sparkhawks, and one of them
plummeted to strike a target on the northern back. The Skythian’s neck snapped with a sound audible to everyone, and he fell to the ground with sparks sizzling out in the snow around him.

Sol ducked another grappling hook and squatted by the parapet, waiting until its thrower had climbed and was reaching up onto the bridge before slicing the man’s arm across the elbow. The Skythian shrieked, but hauled himself higher onto the bridge, swinging up a stocky leg and lashing at Sol with a sharpened branch in his other hand. Sol sidestepped the blow and buried his sword in the man’s throat. He kicked at his face and held tight, the sword withdrawing in a spray of blood, the dying man falling into the freezing water.

Tamma ran past Sol, screeching her orders to the manic lyon. The creature dashed left and right, gasping fire at shapes that barely jumped out of its way in time. One of them cried out, and as she struck at the fire erupting in her clothes, the lyon pounced. It bit, bone crunching. Sometimes it ate.

But while it chewed, the lyon was a motionless target. Three arrows struck home in its side, and Tamma’s cry resembled one of pain. The lyon spun around and raced after the bowmen.

Sol moved forward, wary of arrows and scanning the landscape beyond the immediate area of battle. He moved to the centre of the bridge, feeling forward for loose stones, and looked over the heads of his defending Spike and the Skythians they fought. The enemy had come from out of nowhere, and the fact that they’d laid an ambush meant that the coastal bridgehead might now also be under attack.

But that was not his concern.

He scanned the snowfields on either side of the river. Nothing moved across them. There seemed to be no danger that far out, so he brought his attention back to the battle.

Several
soldiers were dealing with the few remaining enemies climbing onto the bridge from below. And so, sword in one hand, knife in the other, Sol ran to join the fight at its northern end.

Tamma was down on one knee, hand clasped around an arrow protruding from her neck. Still she shrieked her orders to the lyon – it had run wild upon being struck itself, but now it moved left and right according to Tamma’s calls.

‘Tamma?’ Sol called, amazed that she could still be functioning. But when she turned slightly towards him, he saw that the arrow had merely pierced a finger’s width of her neck. Blood flowed freely, but she would survive.

The woman with the grappling hook buried in her shoulder hacked and stabbed left and right, keeping several Skythians at bay. Other Spike soldiers did the same, forming two curved lines across the bridge and taking it in turns to harry the enemy. Many enemy had fallen, and several Spike were down as well, mostly victims of Skythians archers who hung back from the hand-to-hand fighting.

Sol parried a blow from a long spear, darted into the man’s fighting circle and buried his knife in his stomach. The man gasped and spat into Sol’s face. The spittle was warm, his breath stank, but this was the real fighting Sol had always trained for. He never concerned himself with the morals of what he was ordered to do. Even now, gutting the man with his sword and then slashing his throat, he did not consider why he was an enemy, where his family were and whether slaughtering him was right or wrong. It was kill or be killed, and in such an instance there were no such things as morals.

He pushed the dead man aside and squatted just as a heavy, rusted sword passed over his head. The Skythians were bent and malformed echoes of their ancestors, but their strength was
surprising. Sol took three steps and, as the Skythian backed away to swing again, stabbed at his stomach.

The man tensed back and avoided the blade. Sol drove onward, letting his own weight carry him forward as he stabbed out again and again.