The Jackal of Nar (106 page)

He brought his horse up to the warlord and grabbed hold of his golden robes, tearing him from his saddle. Shohar fell to the ground, stunned, and looked up at Lucyler with his maniacal eyes.

“How dare you!” Lucyler spat down at him.

Shohar casually retrieved his jiiktar, seemingly oblivious to the battle around him. He bowed deeply.

“It is the way it is, Lucyler of Falindar,” he said. “The way it must be.”

“I did not want this!” Lucyler roared. “Neither did Tharn! How dare you disobey me?”

Shohar smiled. “You may have my head when this day is over. But not before I take these skulls.” The warlord got back on his horse. “You will thank me for this someday, you and Tharn both.”

And then he was gone, driving his horse deeper into the city, leaving Lucyler alone in the carnage. Lucyler watched him go. Overhead the air thundered with the hot might of cannons. An arrow flew by him, followed by a hundred more. Lucyler ignored it all. Today they would avenge Ackle-Nye, and he was powerless to stop the slaughter. Soon Karlaz and his lions would join the battle, and there would be no stopping the unleashed beasts of Chandakkar. They would feast until their bellies were full. And if any Narens tried to escape, to flee into the Run, they would face the animal warlord Nang.

Lucyler felt oddly alone. Slowly, he turned his horse around and rode back toward his men.

• • •

“They’ve taken the western barricades!” Marlyle was out of breath and panicked. “The gogs are overwhelming the perimeters, and streets four and five. One and two are holding, but they won’t for long. We have to fall back, sir!”

General Cassis quelled his terror. He had already fallen back as far as he could. Much farther and they would be in the Run. Barely half a mile in front of them, the defenders of the city were fighting the Triin who had flooded into the city. It was bedlam now. Fire had taken over the outskirts and huge pyres of rubble sent oily plumes of smoke into the sky. The cavalry Cassis had sent against the gogs had been nearly wiped out, and riderless horses galloped wildly through the streets, frenzied by the flames and butchery. Marlyle put their numbers at well under three hundred now. In less than an hour they had lost half their men.

“We have to take cover in the buildings,” said Marlyle. “We can’t be out in the open.”

Cassis shook his head. “Take half my guard and seal off this street. We’ll make our stand here. If we must, we can still escape into the Run from here. Call the cannoneers back here, too. We’ll need them to defend our position.”

“Sir, if we recall the cannons the gogs will just gain ground. The hand-helds are the only thing stopping them.”

Cassis wasn’t listening. “Order the towers to concentrate fire in front of streets one and two. They won’t be able to reach us if they can’t make it down those roads.” Cassis spun his horse around and ordered twenty of his guard into the front. The horsemen obeyed without question, galloping out of sight around a corner. Marlyle didn’t move.

“Colonel, don’t go deaf on me. Carry out my orders.”

“Sir, we’ll die if we don’t take cover. Haven’t you heard what I said? The gogs are heading this way. What good are …”

Marlyle’s words trailed off. His eyes widened and fixed on something in the distance. Cassis turned to see what had silenced his aide, and was no less horrified for it. There, climbing over the rubble of the city’s western wall, was an army of the strangest monsters Cassis had ever seen. As big as greegans but a hundred times faster, they looked like prehistoric mountain lions, their ears pressed back against their heads, their mouths hissing as they sighted the soldiers.

“Oh, my God …” whispered Cassis. “What are those?”

“Chandakkar,” gasped Marlyle. “The lions …”

Now Cassis panicked. In front of him were a thousand screaming Triin, ready to pull his heart from his chest. He had thought he could retreat to the Run, but now that option had vanished. He was surrounded, and the thought made him tremble.

“Marlyle,” he said. “Engage them.”

“What?”

“Engage them!” barked Cassis. He drew his sword and pointed toward the coming cats. “Attack. Now!”

“General, no,” sputtered Marlyle. “How? We can’t fight them!”

General Cassis moved in closer to his aide. His eyes burned with all the hatred he had ever felt, all his lifelong regrets. “Soldier, I’m not ordering you to fight,” he said. “I’m ordering you to die.”

Lucyler had retreated to the hill, alone, to sit and brood over the battle of Ackle-Nye. He sat on the grass as a spectator might, watching the city burn for a second time and listening to the hoarse shouts of dying men. Some of them were Kronin’s men, he supposed, but the supposition didn’t bother him. Like Shohar and Praxtin-Tar, Kronin’s men had wanted this. They were warriors of a different ilk than himself. Lucyler had spent his life defending the Daegog, but he had hoped to erase some of those mistakes today. It would have made his remaining years so much easier.

“Oh, Richius,” he sighed. “I am glad you are not here, my friend.”

Richius would have been appalled. For all his blustery talk of revenge, Richius had a conscience. It was what made him special in Lucyler’s eyes, and in the eyes of Tharn. A moral Naren, a novelty. Lucyler laughed and leaned back on his elbow. It was cool up here on the hill and he was comfortable. The battle would last through the night perhaps, but by morning they would all be on their way home. Shohar would have a hundred more skulls to add to his collection, and Praxtin-Tar could brag over another massacre. Karlaz would satisfy himself knowing that he had avenged his village. And Nang? Lucyler shrugged. That monster would be sorry he’d missed it.

The only thing that gave Lucyler comfort was the thought of
Blackwood Gayle, burning. Even he wouldn’t escape the blade this time. He hoped Shohar would be the one to find him. The Skull-Taker could cut his head off, then present the gilded remains to Richius as a gift. Tharn would probably praise him for it.

Lucyler lay down on the earth, picked a blade of grass and wedged it between his teeth, then stared like a child into the sky, imagining shapes in the clouds.

Finally, it was quiet. All the world seemed to have dropped away behind him.

Cassis chanced a look over his shoulder. The city of beggars was gone, swallowed up by the mountains rising on either side of him. He could still see the trails of smoke reaching skyward, but the smell was gone, and the sound of screaming had stopped echoing off the canyon walls. He dared to slow his horse. The beast was lathered and exhausted from galloping. Cassis put his hand to his mouth and found it was trembling.

He’d done it. By God, he had really done it. Marlyle had seen him, but Marlyle was dead now, souring the stomach of one of those cats. Cassis had slipped out of the city while Marlyle and the guards charged the lions. If anyone else had seen his treachery, surely they were dead now, too. As Cassis was dead. He would ride to Talistan, bribe some peasant with the gold in his pockets, and General Barlo Cassis would be gone forever. He would be one of the heroes of Ackle-Nye, gone and soon forgotten. Like the rest of his garrison.

“To hell with you, Arkus,” he spat. The curse reverberated up the canyon walls. Here it was very narrow and the rocks amplified every sound. Cassis heard his breathing and the echoing of his horse’s hooves, but he heard nothing else and the silence was magnificent. He thrilled at it. He was alive!

“To hell with you, Arkus!” he cried again, lifting his voice higher and laughing. Maybe he would go back to Nar and spit on the old man’s grave. But no, Arkus would never die. Others died for him. That’s how it was for royalty. Cassis knew he would never be royal himself, but that was all right. He would become a farmer, or maybe a blacksmith. And he would leave Talistan and go to live in Criisia or Gorkney, somewhere far away. Somewhere that his face would never be recognized. He would hide
his sword, too, or maybe sell it. Cassis was tired of killing. He had given his last order and murdered a man whom he once considered a friend—if legionnaires had friends. They probably didn’t, he supposed, and that made him hate his old life even more.

He rode on, imagining the new life he would make. His horse was first to hear the sound. A scraping, up in the mountains. The horse twitched. So did Cassis. His eyes shifted to the place where the sound had come from. Or was it over there? Cassis mumbled a curse. There were animals in these mountains. He had seen a bear once. He put his hand to his sword pommel and listened.

An arrow came down, then another. Cassis swore. His horse gave a rattling whinny and collapsed, two shafts sticking from its neck. Cassis tumbled from the creature’s back, spilling onto the hard ground. The impact knocked the breath from his lungs. Panicked, he made to scramble to his feet as something big and white dropped down out of the mountains before him. Cassis looked up. It was a man and it was not a man. Naked and tattooed, its white head was bald but for a snake of hair pulled back in a tail. Cassis scrambled backward, falling over his dying horse and rolling onto his back. The man-thing stalked him. Others like it fell out of the canyon, surrounding him. Cassis reached for his sword but the big one brought down a foot, stopping his hand. Cassis lay very still.

“All right,” he said unsteadily. “Take it easy. Easy. Triin, right? You’re Triin?”

The tattooed man smiled, baring teeth filed down to fangs. He hovered over Cassis curiously, inspecting him with his animal eyes. Cassis let him trace a finger over his face, studying his lines. The man laughed savagely, then pointed to himself, poking a finger at his own bare chest.

“Nang!” he barked. “Nang!”

Cassis fought to still his fear. “Just take it easy,” he tried, hoping his tone would relax them. “I’m no one. I’m just on my way home. All right? Retreating.”

The creature bent over him and studied his features. He ran his hands over Cassis’ skull, feeling its shape and studying it with astute eyes.

“Mmmm, Shohar,” he commented. “Shohar min taka.”

Cassis watched in horror as the fanged Triin took a knife from his belt. He tried to fight his way to his feet, but hands were all over
him, holding him down. He screamed and kicked but they ignored him, and the one with the knife inched closer, put the blade to his throat, and carefully began carving off the general’s head.

I
t took over a week for Richius to make his decision, but in the end it seemed the most natural of choices. He wanted to fight Nar, and Tharn wouldn’t let him. But there was a place he could go where Tharn had little sway, and where they might just welcome a man with his outlaw reputation. The Dring Valley was no place for him and he knew it. Besides, since Tharn had returned he was seeing Dyana only at mealtimes. She was back to her sad, respectable self, and Richius thought better than to try and change her. Her husband was alive again, maybe even immortal. It was time to give up.

When the day of his decision finally came, he awoke with a grim smile. There were tasks at hand, preparations to be made. He would have to tell Tharn to make Jarra warlord. Worse, he would have to say farewell to Dyana and Shani. He breakfasted alone that morning, rehearsing his good-bye speech in his chamber while he ate, wondering if they were missing him in the dining chamber. He supposed so. It was the only time Dyana could really speak to him, if only to give him a surreptitious wink while Tharn’s back was turned. She would certainly be disappointed in his choice, maybe even beg him to come with them to Falindar. But Falindar was no home for him. There was only one home for a Vantran, and that was Aramoor.

He finished his breakfast and left the plate on the bed, then dressed himself in a clean shirt and a pair of breeches made for him by the women of the keep, who had been treating him with unfamiliar deference since his confounded ascension to lordship. He decided he would see Tharn before speaking to Dyana, asking the cunning-man’s permission for a private talk with his wife. The baby would be with her, he hoped, and he could say a proper, if unintelligible, farewell to her. But before Tharn there
was one other person he wanted to see, someone he had almost forgotten about since Tharn’s return.

As always, he found her reading a book, this time in the garden. She smiled as she saw him coming toward her.

“Kalak!” called the spritely Pris, leaping off the cracked fountain rim she used as a seat. She closed the book and waved at him, bidding him to hurry. Richius smiled at her from across the garden and quickened his pace. He adored Pris. She was the kind of child he hoped Shani would become. The girl’s white head bobbed excitedly as he approached.

“You were not at breakfast,” she scolded. “Why?”

“Am I to explain everything to you now?” he laughed. “Were you so insolent with your father?”

Pris frowned, and Richius realized she was slowly deciphering his words. “Insolent,” he said. “It means rude.”

“Father never let me question him,” she admitted. “But you are not like Father.”

“True,” said Richius. He sat down on the edge of the fountain gently, testing its sturdiness. “I was busy this morning, Pris. I have something to tell you, and I don’t know what you’re going to think of it.”

Pris hopped back onto the fountain and looked up at him. “Bad?” she asked.

“Not really,” he assured her. “I’m going away. I’m not going to be warlord here anymore.”

Pris’ eyes widened. “Away? Where away?”

“Have you ever heard of Liss?”

“Yes,” said Pris. “Father told me once. They are far away, on an island. Is that where you are leaving for?”

Richius nodded. “Sort of. They have ships around Lucel-Lor, helping us. They fight against Nar. I’m going to help them now.”

“No, no,” said Pris. “You cannot go. Father made you warlord. Chose you, Kalak. He liked you.”

“And I liked him,” said Richius sadly. “But it was an accident, Pris. I was the only one around when your father died, and he wanted to make sure someone would look after you and your family. I know he would have chosen Dumaka Jarra if he could have, but there wasn’t time. So now I’m just doing what he would have done himself. Tharn’s back and he will make it all right. He will make Jarra warlord.”