She felt better than she had done in years. It was a pity she was going to die today.
Though, being sure she was dying today seemed to have become a habit for her, but she still lived. How much longer could her luck hold out?
“Chyi, give me one more day,” she said under her breath and looked around at those who had come through the stone with her. She hoped they had not heard her call on her god, though she did it more from force of habit than belief. The northerners had no love for Chyi, and no reason to love them. But no one had heard her from the looks of them, all preoccupied with their own worries as they hid within the shadow of the taffistone.
“Shall I light the smoke pots, Trunk?” She turned to Vir, behind him her remaining twelve soldiers. Behind them the two warriors they called the Reborn, swathed in yellow wrapping that covered elaborate and expensive armour. They set her teeth on edge.
“Not yet,” she said and peered round the edge of the stone. One of the Rai was on the other side of the rope bridge, then she slipped behind one of the dullers. There were maybe thirty more of the enemy, a mixture of Rai and soldiers in the stand. A woman at the top dressed all in white.
“That’s a lot of Rai,” said Vir.
“Could be worse,” said Dassit, though she was not sure how. Vir shrugged. At the edge of the Slowlands two more guards held a woman. Furin, thought Dassit. She must be pretty special for all this fuss.
Past the stand were two more dullers. The woman at the stand was gesturing at a figure who looked very far away, obscured by the heat haze. Dassit wiped sweat from her face, wished she could take her helmet off but if she did her soldiers would and they needed all the protection they could get. The woman was saying something, to the man, Dassit presumed it must be Cahan. She couldn’t hear it even with the circle wind blowing towards her. She closed her eyes, tightly. Hoping when she opened them all this would have gone away and she would wake in her bed in Seerspire.
She didn’t.
Instead everything was worse.
The prisoner, Furin, pushed away one of the guards and ran straight into the Slowlands. Cahan screamed her name, running forward. Then Dassit stopped watching. Not the time for it. Her job was to create a distraction when the time came, and it just had.
“Smoke!” she shouted. “Smoke!” Vir was there with a sparker, lighting the fuses and her soldiers were out, throwing the pots to the edge of the crevasse, sending up huge clouds of fragrant smoke.
“Can’t see an Osere-cursed thing,” came a voice from behind her. She turned, thought it was the Forestal Ania who spoke, she was with the big man, Ont, bows ready in their hands. The Reborn passed her at a run.
“Neither can they,” said Dassit and she raised her voice. “This is it! Grab your spears and into them!” She ran, leading her troops through the smoke. The Forestal behind her shouting, “Put arrows in those dullers, we don’t want them holding Cahan back!” A heartbeat of darkness, then into the light. Reborn already across the swaying rope bridge, the crevasse yawning beneath her as she followed, making her head spin. She put it aside and ran on. The Rai on the stand were drawing power, fire dancing round them.
“Throw when you’re in range!” she shouted as the Reborn warriors launched spears at the stand. Four, five, six steps and she threw her own spear. Where was that Rai who had been guarding the bridge? Dead? Hiding? Behind them? No time to think.
Fire in the air, burning the spears to ash as they flew. She heard Vir shouting.
“Separation! Separation!” And she knew that behind her troops would be spreading out. Fire hit. An explosion behind her, a blast of heat that knocked her to the floor and sent her tumbling across the hard, dusty ground. The smell of burning hair and she slapped at her face in panic, but it wasn’t hers. Someone was screaming. She shook her head. Forced herself up. Soldiers were coming from the stand. The Reborn had already engaged them, Chyi’s blood but those women could fight. “Into them, into them.” She could hear shouting, screaming. Didn’t look back, daren’t look back. How many were left? In the stand one of the Rai was raising a hand, fire dancing around it and something hissed past her head. The Rai fell back into the stand, an arrow in their chest. Other Rai were taking cover. Dassit could feel power in the air. She glanced back.
Don’t count the bodies, she told herself. Don’t look for Vir.
The archer, Ania at the edge of the smoke, drawing her bow. By her the big man, Ont. Bodies on the ground near the bridge. The old man, Fandrai, dragging one back. More fire arched over her. Arrows wouldn’t be enough. Her people wouldn’t be enough.
A scream cut the air.
So much pain in it.
Even the wind felt like it stopped for a moment.
The noise was like nothing Dassit had ever heard, and she’d been at many a cruel execution performed by the Rai. Seen and heard the slow bleeding-away of life for power. Watched people beg for death but still never heard anything like this.
The Reborn no longer fighting, as if life had fled from them and they stood there while enemy soldiers stabbed and slashed and cut at them until they fell.
It came again. The noise. A man’s voice. Tested beyond anything Dassit could imagine. It came from him, from Cahan. He was in the Slowlands and it looked like every muscle in his body was tensed to the point his bones were about to snap. Hard, thin spikes were emerging from his armour, anchoring him to the ground. He screamed again. The air changed, like it was pressing down on her. She could smell rotten meat and ruptured bodies, felt like she stood in the centre of a week-old battlefield. Something unpleasant moved around Cahan. Something dark and liquid, purple-blue and black. A high-pitched whistling in Dassit’s ears and she felt the ground beneath her shake, a tremor passing through the land and the bridge over the crevasse let out an alarming creak, as if the uprights were straining to support it.
Dassit had never felt fear like this. Pure and animal. It pushed everything from her mind. All thought of battle and Rai were gone. And it was not just her. None were moving. No spears flew, no arrows or fire or ice.
All looking at Cahan Du-Nahere.
The impossible happened. Cahan Du-Nahere, who was stood in the Slowlands, moved. Not a tiny amount, not like he was slowed. He reached out and plucked the spear heading for the woman Furin away, threw it back towards the stand. As it flew, it split, into ten, twenty, thirty shimmering purple-black spears that cut through the air between him and the stand. Crashed into it. Screams of agony from the Rai and the soldiers as the stand came apart beneath them. Spilling them to the ground. Cahan reached out again. Found Furin and he pulled her from the Slowlands. Threw her out of them and, plainly unaware of his own strength, she sailed through the air, crashing into the ground, rolling and twisting like a broken doll. Cahan screamed again. His armour ragged and serrated, the axes he had thrown somehow in his hands once more. The solid spears of material that had come from his armour now waved around him, four deeply unpleasant tentacles that dripped something noxious and vile and moved like they thought for themselves. His head moved but she could not see a face, the visor of his helmet covered him, no eyes, no features, just darkness. He took a heavy step towards Furin. Out of the Slowlands.
Dassit came to her senses. Fought away the fear.
She was here for a reason. Furin. And bringing that woman back meant life for what remained of Dassit’s people. She glanced back toward the bridge. The three archers stood, bows at their sides, frozen by what was happening. The old man was with one of her people. Trying to help them up. She saw Vir, holding his side and struggling towards her. Some of her people were nothing but smoking corpses, the rest were as shocked and lost as the archers.
Cahan, huge, monstrous, took a step towards them. The ground shook.
“The woman!” shouted Dassit at Vir, pointing in Cahan’s direction, at where Furin lay unmoving. “Help me get the woman!”
It took all she had to run towards Cahan Du-Nahere, if you had asked her what the Osere were like then she would have imagined something like him. Maybe not how he looked, but how he felt. She tried not to see him, to hear him roaring, concentrated on the woman. Made it to her. Checked for a pulse. Weak but there. Arm broken, bone sticking out through flesh.
“She’s hurt,” said Vir.
“I’m not blind,” she snapped it, knew Vir didn’t deserve it but she could feel Cahan, feel his attention on her. “Pick her up.” Then Dassit was shouting: “To the bridge! Back to the bridge!” With the help of Vir, dragging Furin with them. Cahan following. His steps heavy, threatening. The land groaning and shaking as he moved. Fire burst against him from a brave Rai and he reached out a hand with a tormented scream. Something left his body, black and wet. The Rai took over the screaming. Dassit and Vir reached the bridge. The ropes stretched taut. It made noises she didn’t like but there was nowhere else to go. The others were already across. Archers loosing at the stand. Moving as quickly as she could. Behind them Cahan spoke.
“Furin.” It was like a thousand gasmaws burrowing through her head. She could feel him. She looked over her shoulder. He was leaving the Slowlands, monstrous, his steps shaking the land, making it hard to walk as she put her feet on the bridge. Running across. His form twisted, tentacles writhing around him. He was coming after her but he was slow, they had to hurry. He would bring the bridge down if he stepped on it, she was sure of it. She looked back again, struggling with the dead weight of the unconscious woman. Cahan was nearly at the bridge, then a figure stepped in front of him. The Rai, the one she had seen by the duller. Sword in her hand. Insanely brave. Something happened to Cahan as he approached her. The purple-blue liquid fire dying away. The writhing tentacles withdrawing into his armour, the black visor melting away.
“You and I,” said the woman, “we’re not finished.”
“No,” said Cahan, and he sounded more human, more real. His face looked haunted, scared, but Dassit didn’t think he was scared of the woman.
“Dass,” said Vir, “come on.” Then they were going as fast as they could, making for the taffistone that hid the rest of their small force. Archers covered their retreat, Ania and the big man, Ont. Fandrai was dragging a moaning body towards the stone. They picked up the pace. As she passed over the threshold of the door in the taffistone she heard the roar of cowlfire landing behind her, wondered how she had managed to live through another day, and how much longer her luck could hold.