Chapter 5

“Renata,” the Arceal elect answered when Woden demanded her name. She was a small woman, tanned face soft with age, her curly brown hair watered down by grey. She looked more the sort to slip extra honey into your oat porridge than to be overseeing the trebuchets at Ansehen. On her knees, hands bound with kir, she kept her eyes on Woden’s boots.

Better those than the two archers I’d ruined. They were already drawing flies on the rain-dampened street.

“Look at me,” Woden commanded in Arceal, and she looked up. “You know who I am.”

“Saint Woden of Wodenberg, la.”

“If you doubt us, you’ll be taken to the east gate to see what we deal to our enemies, and how else my elect will defend their people.” Woden pointed at Kiefan, and she looked to him. Then her gaze slid to me and she looked away with a shudder. She shook her head.

Just as well. If she’d broken free and tried to fight, I could hardly light a spark charm for all my bone-weariness and pain. I only managed to stand beside Kiefan, despite the weight of my damn mail tunic, by force of will and the strength of another kir-ration from Saint Qadeem.

“Wodenberg does not force binding,” Woden told Renata. “Neither do we cast aside those willing to serve. Consider what you can offer and where your loyalties lie now that you’re rid of your saint’s bond. But do not take too long.”

Renata looked up at him, her teeth working against her lower lip. “Does Wodenberg value crafters?”

He folded his arms across his chest. “Saint Aleksandr was a brother to me — one that Arcea murdered. His skill was without price.”

“Will you tear elect from their forges, conscript them as wood-smiths?” Renata cast a sneer toward the trebuchets. My tired brain tried to wrestle with the image of this soft, mousy woman working a smithy.

“Only if they wish it,” Woden said.

“Might be I have something to offer, la.”

Our saint looked to Kiefan, who gave a nod; she told the truth. “Will you be bound?” Woden asked Renata, putting out one hand.

Her brows rose. “Or die?”

“If your saint will not bargain for you.”

Renata’s voice fell to a mutter. “Little more than a hound to its master.”

“We will speak on what might happen.”

Woden touched her forehead and she slumped unconscious; on his instructions two of my King’s Guard pulled her up and carried her off for safe-keeping. Once she was away, the saint turned to me.

“Will he hear?” he asked. I took a moment to check my bond, and nodded. Qadeem’s touch shivered through my Blessing. Woden said, “Kiefan broke a division. Twenty-third, I think the standard said. Half of them routed into our cavalry lines. Half routed into the town and threw the seventeenth division into disarray. A number of companies have surrendered already. One battle elect is dead, one crafter elect captured. It remains to be seen if they’ll need another Shepherd’s knife to convince the rest to surrender. There may well be more elect.”

Qadeem’s opinion came to me and I said, “He wishes you to allow the officers to negotiate for the lives of their men.”

Woden didn’t think much of that, by the set of his mouth. “Centaurs and minotaurs, perhaps they’d bargain for those, but the Empress won’t give a pip for the enlisted. And we can’t feed them. We expect word from downslope soon, as well. Take stock of our men outside the walls and tell Vysokov to bring up the reserve.” That was for Kiefan. My orders were, “Patch what you can on our men. Check these Arceal for blessed — most make officer, but not all.”

Rostislav had an arrow in his shoulder; shot at close range, it had punched through his mail and gambeson. Once I’d cut that out and stitched him, he was all but tied to my side by Kiefan’s stern glares.

He stood watch while I gnawed my share of a rack of half-roasted beef ribs. We had worked our way deeper in Ansehen, where the houses were still intact, checking kir-gifted prisoners and flushing out small knots of misplaced Arceal armsmen. A kitchen had been abandoned with pots still boiling on the fire and the meat still roasting. My Guard and I had the food readied, as well as we could, in what seemed a few heartbeats and we fell to without hesitation. A hand of hawk-eyed archers who happened by helped us finish off the huge pot of mashed potatoes with roasted garlic.

Kiefan found me again soon after that. Word had come from Rangers sent down the hairpin road into Suevia and we were to ride with an escort to meet the Caer. Kiefan had found a bucket of water and washed his face, and his hands, clean of the drying blood. Its brown-red still dulled his mail, though, and stained the white-moon sigil on his black tabard.

The rest of the King’s Guard were with him as were the horses who’d been waiting outside the gate. Several strength-Blessed men with axes had gotten that open at last.

Boosted back in Jenner’s saddle, I rode beside Kiefan down the Southbound Road. His Guard and the squad of Rangers escorted us. Ansehen had been a fine town before the burnings, before the earthquake. I couldn’t help thinking it was ashamed to be seen in such a state. The stone wall that ran along the lip of the hill was Saint Aleksandr’s seamless work, high as the city walls around Wodenberg — where it still stood. The Southbound Road had run between two towers and a gate but those were only piles of rubble on either side now.

Past the ruined gate, we rode into the wall’s afternoon shadow and curved through a paved mustering-yard on our first of many sharp corners down the hill. Bare stone stood on our right for much of the way as the road snaked its way down. On the left was an open drop down to scrubby trees and a brackish, stagnant lake caught at the foot of these hills. When enough rain fell, it overflowed and fed into the Neva.

The road was wide and well tended. Brush lining the way was putting out green buds and a long stretch of dandelions on the right-hand slope greeted us when we rounded one sharp corner. Blue jays called — but so did crows, perched by the dozens on what few trees there were. Overhead, the clouds were breaking up and forgetting about rain but the wind was still chilly and the hill’s shadow cooler still. Vultures were circling, too.

Ordinary vultures, even though their wings flashed white on the underside just like the monstrous one that had carried off Anders. I touched my necklace again, murmured a bit of a prayer to the Mother.

Halfway down, we met the Ramsbridge. Two four-horned stone rams bigger than bulls guarded the bridge with their heads lowered in challenge. Even though storms had worn and pitted the stone, the four horns stood fearsome: two curled out sideways, two rising in a V. Their stone bridge joined one hillside to another above the brackish lake.

When I’d first crossed it, Elect Parselev had told me that this bridge was saint-made — but far older than Saint Aleksandr.

Kiefan and I looked up at the first pair of rams, and then the pair at the far end, as we passed between them. “Father Duty, lend me wisdom,” Kiefan said. That left me thinking of the duty I’d done already today; it was afternoon now and still plenty of day left for more. My first battle. I’d never thought to fight in one, or to kill men.

On the lower hill, the Southbound Road ran a little straighter but just as steep. Below, Suevia came clearly into view.

The Neva river churned down through a bed of rocks, frothing white, and stormed on for some miles more. Thin, rolling pasture stretched for some miles, too, studded with the faces of grey rocks among the grass. We’d fought Arcea here over a year ago, on the apron of pasture that the brackish lake flooded when it rained. Now rows of tents covered it — but many of them were on fire — and mustering-yards of supply-laden wagons stood to either side of the Southbound Road. They waited alone.

Against the angry river’s bank, a mass of men was hemmed in by a thin hedge of Caer.

Tadhlon’s twin-mountain-and-moon banner stood in the road, accompanied by two squads of Caer knights. Captain Mohra Fionmaen, who had first found us when we descended from Starknadel’s pass and who had come with m’lady Leix to break the siege, rode out to meet us. She still wore her brown hair boyishly short and her scout’s uniform of browns and greens, but her smile had thinned under the weight of losing m’lady Leix.

“Be welcome, King of Wodenberg,” she greeted us in our own language. “Be welcome, Elect Kate. Might I lead you to Elect Teleri and Captain-general Croícruach?”

We walked our horses into the Arceal camp, our standard-bearers at the front. Captain Mohra told us their journey across the Suevi side of the hills had gone well. Slowed by mud and avoiding tiny villages, but quickly enough. The Rangers assigned to scout for them had seen to it they passed in secret. Teleri had spent this morning learning the lay of the camp before signaling their readiness. When Woden’s flare had gone up immediately, the Tadhlon Guard attacked.

“Did catch these boys entirely unaware,” Captain Mohra said. “’Tis their supply line’s depot and their reserve force — ten thousand Suevi.”

“Thirty thousand in Ansehen sounded like an uncomfortable crowd,” Kiefan said. “It isn’t so large a town. Twenty above, ten below, then.”

“With surprise, we did drive them to the shore and gain their surrender. ’Tis a fine start to our alliance.”

The Suevi command pavilion was still decked with their division standards but the knights who stood at the door were Caer: Tadhlon’s dusty-beige gambesons under knee-long mail shirts, red cloaks and full, crested helms. They saluted us.

“In the pavilion,” Mohra told us just before we dismounted, “only elect or those drained of kir.”

“You’ve captured another elect?” Kiefan asked. She nodded.

The King’s Guard and Mohra stayed outside. Inside, at the map table, Elect Teleri looked up and grinned. With her stood a broad-faced, grizzled knight with a scar across her cheek; the captain-general saluted us. On the carpeted floor, wearing only braies, hands bound behind his back and a burlap sack over his head, knelt their prisoner. The afternoon sun streamed in through pinned-open flaps and all of the chests in the pavilion had been dragged into the pools of light to be opened and half-emptied.

In one long stride, Elect Teleri crossed to the prisoner and yanked the sack off his head. “’Tis ill fortune for you,” she told him. “They did send their butcher.”

He was Arceal, tanned a little browner than most and dark hair cropped short. His gaze shot straight to Kiefan and his bloody mail.

“Not him!” Teleri barked a laugh and pointed at me. “She’s the one to fear.”

Teleri had called me a butcher, after what I’d done to Elect Tannait. I kept my face serene as the prisoner eyed me, his brows crinkling in puzzlement. Let him wonder. I touched my saint’s bond and Qadeem saw him as well.

/ know? /

/ many elect / Qadeem sent that sense of muggy heat and fear by which he meant Arcea.

Kiefan paced around the prisoner, looming over him with a frown. “Name?” he asked in Arceal.

“DePesci Liandro.”

“Assignment? Your saint?”

Elect Liandro looked at the carpet under his knees.

“Consider what you’re worth to your saint. Consider what awaits you as an enemy of Wodenberg, as an invader of my kingdom,” Kiefan said.

“So think you, when I’ve set no foot in your frozen wasteland?”

Kiefan leaned closer, hissing, “You’re pawn to those who murdered my family. This blood doesn’t begin to pay the debt owed to Wodenberg.” He gestured at his stained tabard.

“When you refused all overtures, kidnapped royal blood, incited rebellion —”

“We incited nothing. My mother was marked for death,” Kiefan snarled back. “We rescued her from the likes of you.”

Elect Liandro, staring up at Kiefan, echoed faintly. “Mother? Oh, la. The grey eyes, as she said.”

“Suevia’s throne is mine by blood.”

He dismissed that with a shrug. “By blood did the Empress take it. Suevia’s throne is hers.”

“The Empress will pay blood for blood, for those she murdered.”

“For you will conquer us? This little gang of boys will best Arceal might?” A laugh lurked around the edge of Elect Liandro’s words.

Qadeem sent me an image of the Arceal saint who’d stood unruffled in the Order’s courtyard, despite the wreckage and death. “Gauvail,” I said aloud, and the prisoner’s head snapped to me. “You speak for him. His bound elect.”

Elect Liandro’s chin rose, considering me. “Qadeem. Thus our third round begins?”

I felt a nod, so I did. My instructions came as well. “I’m to take him up to Ansehen,” I told Kiefan in Alemannic. To Woden, specifically, but I wasn’t to say that.

Kiefan nodded. “I will see to the Suevi officers’ surrender.”

Once knocked unconscious, Elect Liandro was easily tied to a saddle and delivered up the hills. By then, dusk was settling. What rainclouds remained were painted scarlet by the lowering sun. Flock moons rose, one at a time, tinted ruddy orange. They winked among the clouds, wary of the battlefield below.

Ansehen still teemed with men; there were thousands of prisoners to disarm and organize. What would become of so many Arceal men, I didn’t know yet. I was too tired to care much. Saint Woden had dismissed me to rest once he’d cut Liandro’s saint-bond and that had been all I’d wanted to hear.

I needed to catalogue the day’s slaughter, fold up the memories and put them away before they could haunt me. The arrow hole through my arm and the burn on my thigh still throbbed. My stomach growled again despite the beef ribs and potatoes. My lonely camp bed was just the thing for my bone-weariness and gnawing headache, once this mail tunic was off.

Lieutenant Rostislav and my hand of Guards still shadowed me. One had been killed in trying to follow my chase of Elect Renata; he’d met two Arceal knights and as I’d accidentally drained him of kir, earlier, he’d had none to fuel his Blessings. That Guard’s blood was on my hands, both for his draining and for my haring off without warning and making him chase me. Sir Garrick had taken up the empty post.

I turned Jenner away from the armsmen and archers, the knights and their horses, that seethed around and through the open front gate. That was too much noise and bother just now. At a brisk walk, I led the way toward the side gate. All was silent, this way, but for some wing-flapping and caws.

Rostislav hurried up alongside me. “We should go out the main gate, m’lady. This’s far out of our way.”

“But quieter,” I said. “It’s not so far — the infirmary’s set up by the road, they said.”

“I’ll see you go through untroubled,” Rostislav said, leaning closer. “M’lady… please, let’s go out the main gate.”

“Corpses and crows don’t frighten me, sir.”

We passed into a half-burned neighborhood that still smelled of smoke. And death: blood and shit. Here and there, embers glowed on exposed rafters. Shadows deepened, strengthened by all the soot, but I still noticed the bodies. Jenner slowed and stopped, snorting. I tapped him and the gelding took a few careful steps.

Sir Garrick moved to my other side even though the road was narrow. He watched the cross-streets, hand on his sword, his usual lanky, gawky self remade as a sleek predator by his blood-stained armor and tabard. Even the ash-blond curls in his knight’s crest couldn’t touch that.

I drew out a globe of kir and lit it; the diffuse green glow reached far but made no heat in my hand. A squad of crows rose from a dead centaur just ahead, harsh caws punctuating the flapping of black wings. There were not so many of them, in truth. Crows roosted at night and most had gone to their rest.

Jenner stopped again and the warhorses were quick to do the same. Rostislav’s tossed his head and wanted to back up, but got a stern order to hold. Under more clicks and taps, the horse reluctantly advanced. I kicked Jenner, but he wouldn’t move until he was in the middle of the warhorses.

Beyond the centaur, two more corpses sprawled, one headless, the other’s belly cut open. A vulture looked up from that as we passed and judged that we wouldn’t trouble him. He returned to his work.

“With respect, m’lady,” Sir Garrick said, “it will be worse at the gate.”

We reached a solid carpet of men who’d fallen, while running, without a mark on them. Beyond them the street narrowed to a meandering path through the dead but the stink of blood eased. The warhorses walked a bit easier, picking their way through, and Jenner took his courage from them.

“Tell me what happened,” I said. These were Woden’s doing, the work of a Shepherd’s knife. The memory of the one that had chased me and Kiefan and Anders along the city walls was safely put away and couldn’t haunt me.

“When we saw how much of the Arceal division had gotten out into the fields,” Sir Garrick said, “m’lord Kiefan sent the knights to stop them a quarter mile down. He rode toward the gate with only we Guard and Saint Woden. He paid no mind to their archers. When we neared, Kiefan dismounted and ordered us to stay there until summoned. Captain Aleks refused. He snapped at her with such venom — and Woden told her to stay, as well. Kiefan walked toward the Arceal shield wall… sword and shield, wearing his kir. No more. I feared for him at first. But after the first few… I laughed at the slaughter — Mother Love forgive me — and once Woden joined in…”

Garrick didn’t need to say more; we were ten yards from the gate, but had to stop. Our horses would go no further. They only turned their heads away with ears pinned back when urged on. Those who’d been cut down bloodlessly by the Shepherd’s knife ended here. Beyond, the carpet lay thick: meat and innards. It took some staring to pick out the limbs, the torsos, the heads. Centaurs. Men. In the green light of my kir-lamp, their blood was black.

Everything was black.