The Year of Our War (15 page)

Through a gathering cloud of black smoke I choked my way out, shut the door and touched the Wheel insignia daubed across it. I ran back a safe distance and with juvenile jubilation watched our base rise in flames. My life in Hacilith was ending, the same feeling I experienced when leaving my valley. I was on a knife-edge a hundred times sharper than the icebound cliffs. These are children, by god, and highly dangerous. But how could I explain to my master? Take everything and leave without explaining? Forget him—how in Darkling could I explain it to the
gang
?

Watching the smoke I decided it would be easy to climb on that thermal and fly back to Galt, rather than risk running all the way through East Bank again. I stripped off my shirt and stretched my long wings strung with muscle. The fourth and fifth fingers were joined together, the thumb rigid and unopposable, the bones swept back into aerodynamic curves, shaped by the stresses of airflow throughout their growth. Right, let’s ride Felicitia’s funeral pyre home.

“You do and you’re dead, darling,” said a voice behind me. I started and looked round. The angelic archer was sitting on a mooring, leveling her little bow at my face. “How distressing,” she commented. I had to agree, folded my wings to show I wasn’t going anywhere, but also to keep them out of harm’s way.

“Felicitia?” she asked. She had a shrill voice, which with her pipe-cleaner legs and broomstick arms was that of a child prodigy in the music hall. She was half my height.

“I’m unarmed.”

“Parently you don’t have to be armed to leave a trail of fucking destruction. You’re coming
with me
.” She spoke loudly, over the fire’s roar and hissing molten lead dripping from the warehouse roof. Yellow flame reflected on stagnant green water all along the docks.

“My lady,” I said, images of glory and fortune dissolving before my eyes into a vision firstly of Dotterel shouting for me to bring his breakfast, and secondly of me being nailed to a waterwheel, unable to brew coffee let alone cat. “Would you let me go for a hundred pounds, which I have right here?” I tapped one pocket hopefully; she giggled.

“No, but I’ll have the money as well.” She walked toward me keeping the crossbow bolt pointed sometimes at my eyes, then at my chest, and efficiently relieved me of Aver-Falconet’s cash. “What did you do to him?” she asked.

“Drugs,” I said glumly.

She was unable to keep the excitement from her voice. “There’s another hundred waiting for me at Peterglass’s base when I bring you in. Kindly accompany me.” I ignored her terse gesture with the bow. It was delicate enough to be held in one hand and although the point was sharp it didn’t look powerful. “No!” I shouted, feeling the intense heat feed my fury as it was scorching my wings. “I am going back to Galt. So sod off, flatlander!”

“These are poisoned,” she informed me.

“My master knows the antidote to every poison!”

“There’s a grown-up involved?” she shouted, shocked.

“He will be if you don’t let me go!”

“An
adult
?”

“My master could end all our games for good.” Winning an award for bravery I took the hand not engaged in stroking the crossbow’s hair trigger and patted it soothingly. “I can almost hear him calling,” I added.

“You’re my prisoner!” she shrieked. Rain was bouncing off the shoulders of her leather jacket. Sudden tears of confusion turned her soft-fruit face bright red; strands of wet hair stuck to her round cheeks. The arrow point wavered as her hands shook and I watched it carefully. This girl knew The Bowyers, I knew The Wheel. If we could work together, Hacilith would be ours.

I shrugged, saying, “By the way, I bet this is worth a million in blackmail.”

“What?”

“The Governor’s son, Lord Aver-Falconet—vanished somewhere in the East Bank slums. Murders, drugs, sex. The list is long! I think the gossip column would pay well, but his father would pay better.”

“I’m warning you, cat-eyes…Um…”

“Come with me and we’ll make a million.” I ventured a smile. “We’ll leave Hacilith. Travel the world. See the Castle, even. That’s better than The Bowyers’ gang, isn’t it?”

“Blackmail…?” The blond girl removed the bolt from her crossbow and stuck it in her wide leather belt. She sniffed and tentatively offered me her hand. “I’m Serin. Apart from being a wily assassin, I dance at the Campion Vaudeville. You are
still my prisoner
.”

I took this with a pinch of salt. “I’m Jant,” I said. “And I can fly.”

Suspicion flickered in her eyes. “If you trick me I’ll hunt you down through all Hacilith. I’d enjoy it—” She jumped, startled as a section of the warehouse collapsed behind us. She threw one arm up to shield her eyes as a tidal wave of glassy heat rolled over us. “Meet me at the Kentledge at six tonight,” she yelled. “It has to be six because curtain-up is nine.”

“At six o’clock, my lady,” I said. She executed a perfect curtsey, with a supple chorus girl’s grace, and then watched with amazement little short of adoration as I tested the rizing air and took off for home.

T
hat’s all I’m going to say about my past for the moment, because I keep receiving unhappy letters from the Hacilith Tourist Board.

L
ightning was listening to a hasty report from a tired soldier who had plunged over the frosty fields to reach us. I was kneeling to buckle Swallow’s hauberk because her fingers were too cold to manage. The time before battle is known as the “drinking hour,” and the men were washing down their breakfast with mouthfuls of rum. There would be no more venison—the deer had been disturbed by our presence, and we were reduced to eating half-cooked salt beef and bread. I saw a cask of wine being hacked open; the frozen wine was broken with an ax, and carried away in baskets and helmets. Planks were laid as pathways through the mud.

The scout’s face was reflected in the bracer on Lightning’s arm. I addressed him: “You were with Tanager’s fyrd?”

“Yes, Messenger. I’ve been as far as Lowespass and the villages are empty.” He had a heavy eastern Awian accent and a splendid beard.

“Have you seen the fortress?”

He paused. “The Insects are building a wall round it.”

“Can’t Tawny stop them?”

Lightning related the beginning of the report. “Vireo and Tawny haven’t enough troops to face so many Insects. I think they might run before the wall closes, and come south to meet us. If not they’ll be trapped, San help them.”

I knew they had some food supplies, and remove a half a million arrows in the armory, so if we could reach them we would be able to replenish our own stocks.

The scout bowed his head. “The valley is full of Insects. They were roused by some men from Rachis who chipped the Wall trying to pull their friend out.”

“It’s forbidden to touch the Wall,” I remarked. The scout shrugged as if to say that Castle’s rule meant little in Rachiswater now. He said, “Insects are moving south. They’re on their way. They’re coming.”

“How many?” I asked, fiddling with Swallow’s buckles.

“Many, many Insects.”

“Can’t you be a bit more specific than that?”

“Hundreds of thousands.”

I looked up in disbelief.

T
hree trumpet calls were sounded; at the first every soldier had to pack his gear. Most of the tents were left standing since they were stiff with ice. At the second, the fyrd were to join with their manors, which did not take long as there were only the manors of Awndyn and Micawater. At the third trumpet call the troops took their designated positions, with the banners, and the host began to march.

The fyrd were organized to advance open order, the lines of men being spread out and keeping a good space between them. The scout and a number of archers stayed behind to guard the camp, wagons, and trenches. Those who remained behind were mainly soldiers who had seen the Insects recently and I did not want to mix them in with the fresh, spirited troops.

Swallow’s horse left hoof prints in the thin sprinkling of snow on the ground; she rode biting chapped bits of skin from her lips and blowing on her frozen fingers. The morning sky was a mixture of pallid colors like the mother-of-pearl guitar. Passing metal-gray clouds dropped wet sleet on us. At the cloud edges a lemon-yellow light came through occasionally in bright patches—then we sighed and stretched and tried to dry off in the sparse sunlight, but the sky was gradually filling with the color of steel.

10
A.M
.: Swallow rode away from an argument with Lightning and myself. She vowed to lead her men into battle and was determined to ride at the head of the rectangle of troops. I explained that if the men had to form a shield square she would simply not be strong enough to survive in the tight crowd. She hated the thought of being a weak link physically, but as she was not built like Vireo, she had to accept it.

Lightning told me that the war had killed Swallow’s father, and she believed that he couldn’t possibly have died for an unjust cause. So Swallow rode, resolute, behind the first division of infantry, with the cavalry following. The marching lines snaked and contorted as they broke the ice on the frozen fields.

10
:30: Lightning took me aside and asked me to watch over Swallow. Misgiving was written clearly on his face. “Stay with her,” he said. “Please.”

I clapped his shoulder. “Yeah, don’t worry.”

“Jant, I’m serious. It’s agony for me being on the flank; I can’t see her half the time.”

I was irritated. Lightning didn’t believe in me. “I swear I’ll guard her as closely as you would yourself! From the Insects and the men, should they rebel against wet feet and Insect bites.”

“I’m afraid for her,” he admitted. It wasn’t exactly what I wanted to hear. “When fighting begins you must try to move her out of the way.”

I thought how Swallow had bested me in the duel; her big shoulders seemed more muscular by the minute. “If fighting happens I’m going to get behind her and plead for protection.”

“I
am
serious.” Strained, Lightning sounded as if he was holding a breaking heart together. I swore strongly I would protect her—surely he knew I was capable? He nodded, placated, and went back to his division.

10
:45: Lightning changed the structure of his entire division so he could ride slightly closer to Swallow.

11
:00: The men grew more cheery as the marching warmed them. They had permission to speak so bursts of conversation—about swords, axes, and how best to maim Insects—drifted back to us. Some shared tobacco and sips from their hip flasks. They were allowed to change position in an open order march, since men walking in close formation in harsh conditions suffer low morale. We marched into driving flurries of snow, our fronts white as it stuck to us. The soldiers’ waxed cloaks flapped; they wore felt scarves wrapped around their faces and carried their shields edge on to the wind. They leaned into the wind and walked, starbursts of flakes driving into their eyes, legs aching from marching against the intermittent gale.

M
idday: Marching is repetitive and I, who have studied movement for so long, found the ride soothing, not boring but hypnotic, so that I was calmed, my fear-knotted muscles relaxed and I actually began to enjoy it. Each kilometer we rode was recaptured land, which formed a secure strip behind us. It was not too far now to the Lowespass trenches.

Swallow and I sped up at the foot of each field, forcing our horses to jump the hedge, which the men climbed over or slashed through, before reforming their lines. Swallow kept glancing at her pocket watch. She looked around with a sighing expression, bowed her head and bit her lip. I thought she was missing her guitar, but when I offered it to her she refused: “Jant, you know what I said. Not until we reach the trenches. Not until I drive the Insects back behind the Wall.”

Eleven thousand feet, two thousand hooves smashed through the ice. Cracked it to shards. Splattered grassy water. Squelched in freezing mud, as we rode on.

2
:00: After midday we entered a more hilly landscape, crags and limestone pavements at the tops of the hills. We’re nearly there, I told Swallow. At one point Lightning took the lead and Harrier’s division moved behind us because the ravine was too narrow for the archers to ride on the flanks.

Several times we saw single Insects running along the road or small groups in the scrubby woodland. None escaped; our men rounded them up and slew them all. The land we left behind was free from man-eaters.

I watched my shadow lengthen as the day progressed and still we marched north.

3
:00: The Archer came over and said, “We’re losing the light already. We should camp here.”

Swallow disagreed instinctively: “I would like to reach the end of the ravine. Jant says it opens into Lowespass. We can see the fortress from there. It would give the men a good feeling of achievement.”

“Jant says, Jant says.” Saker flicked his reins angrily. “The Rhydanne may be happy to blunder around in the dark but I’m not.”

“It’s true there’s only two hours till nightfall,” I said to Swallow.

“Could we reach Lowespass in half an hour?”

“Yes, but that doesn’t leave us much time!”

“We should at least try. How can we camp in this tiny ravine anyway? How could we maneuver?”

“You’re right,” Lightning conceded. It would be easy to make a shield wall across the gorge, which would prevent the Insects passing, but then we would not be able to use our numbers to defeat them. Lightning knew the archers needed space, and we thought of the massacre that would happen at night if we were caught without room to move. “We should try to secure the end of the valley. Swallow’s quite correct,” he said. After that nothing I could say would convince him that his sweetheart might in any way be wrong.

3
:30: We came out of the valley under the last throes of a fantastic sunset, and there before us lay all Lowespass. Seeing the Fortress Crag, the men gave a triumphant yell. Then just as suddenly, they fell silent.

“What
is
that?” Swallow trembled.

“I don’t know,” I said. “It wasn’t here before.”

“Saker?”

Lightning was shouting at the men to remain calm. A swath of infantry sat down in a spiky mass, staring at the view. “My god, I don’t know.
I’ve
never seen anything like it.”

Next to the fortress, and taller than it, there was a bridge. Half a bridge. It looked unfinished but it dwarfed the crag, arching up into the clear sky. The last rays of sunlight shone between its struts.

“How does it stay up?” breathed Swallow.

“
I don’t know
.” Lightning whirled. “Make camp here! Harrier—I want trenches on each side of the ravine and pavilions up right here.” The men moved obediently, muttering.

“It’s Insects,” I said.

“Well it bloody well isn’t human hand,” said Harrier.

“
Move!
” Lightning yelled at him.

The ground under the colossal bridge was covered in gray-white Insect buildings. Low, pointed roofs of their cells looked like frozen waves. From the foot of the bridge to the pale horizon was gray paper, with long sections of Insect walls emerging from the mass; walls the Insects had passed that were now redundant, and walls at the edge of their sprawling complex, which they were still constructing. I looked to where the friendly smoke plumes of Whittorn should be, and saw nothing but Insect buildings. The village had gone. The burned framework of Pasquin’s Tower stuck up from a cluster of walls. Lowespass Fortress itself was ringed with walls.

“Summerday?” I said aloud.

“Who?”

“I hope the Insects haven’t made it as far as the coast,” I explained. “There’s thousands of people in Summerday town.”

“How does the bridge stay up?” Swallow repeated.

“It can’t be a bridge. It’s not leading anywhere!”

It was gray-white like the cells, with thin, twisted struts. They must have been much stronger than they looked. They supported a walkway which curved up for perhaps a kilometer. At a height of two hundred meters the bridge ended abruptly. At that end there were no legs to hold the walkway up. “It’s beautiful,” she said.

Lightning was shaking his head. “Insects are coming down it.” I squinted into the twilight. He had great eyesight; I couldn’t see too well in the jester dusk. I could just make out the familiar low bodies scurrying down the walkway, which was truly vast. Insects were running down the bridge, into their city, but no Insects were moving the other way, toward the apex. My eyes hurt as I tried to spot the point at which they appeared out of the air.

“You could fit four coaches next to each other up there,” he said.

“Shall I go closer?” I spread my wings and my horse reared.

“In the dark? No, Jant, stay here and we’ll investigate tomorrow.”

3
:50: We had just set camp when the Insects attacked.

3
:55: Insects, one and two, cast about them like the lead hounds of the hunt. Then there were suddenly thousands, pouring down the valley, from ruined houses, tunnel openings, the paper cells.

Swallow swore. “They go on, and on, into the distance.”

“So do we.”

3
:57: I screamed at Swallow, “Put that fucking watch away!” Lightning was quick: “Out! Fan out, Select! Full draw! Donaise, central; Bitterdale, wings!”

No time to lose, I ordered the infantry, “Go forward!”

Shield-bearers ran out, dropped to their knees. Their great shields crashed into position, a sixty-meter interlinking line.

The archers darted past, moving forward. Two hundred archers ran off into the darkness on either side to form the wings. The first line shot straight out over the shield-bearers’ heads. Two lines behind sent volleys up into the air. Arrows hissed, rained down hard on the Insects’ backs three hundred meters away.

Stench of Insect blood began to fill the air, coppery, like old coins. Dim shapes grew clearer as they ran up against the hail of arrows. The stampede moved like a single creature; mandibles dripping septic spit, claws rasping on rock. Their legs razor-tipped, rake-edged, saw-toothed; the shape of every weapon there, adapted for slaughtering. Their antennae were flattened to their heads. They can smell us. Taste us! But I only saw ant heads emerging from the festering night. Paler gray, taking form and color as they got nearer.

Lightning’s voice on the left: “Slower, Donaise division. Six per minute is all I want.” He appeared next to me. “I’m saving arrows,” he gasped. “Half an hour at that rate and we’ll have none left.”