1.

 

At first, Ayae did not react.

She remained on the stairs as Queila Meina rose, her voice ripping out through the dust and silence, her response immediate, seasoned, commanding. Her orders cut out the shapes of the men and women rising from the debris and drew the eye of those under her command to the leather they wore, the steel they carried. But beneath Meina’s voice—“Archers! Defensive positions!”– Ayae could hear a dull, repetitious thudding, the sound of something solid hitting a wooden ramp at a great speed and weight and her breath caught when she realized what it was—

“Horses!” Queila Meina cried. “Steel! Fall back to the streets! Fall back, Steel!”

The first horse burst from the dust as her final words tore across the mill’s now broken lot, its rider crouched low, a short, hard blade held at his side. Ayae could make out little else, for he was a shadow wreathed in dirt, a dark and terrifying figure followed by a second and third, each unfolding like a fan around the first.

“Archers!”

Ayae was wrenched to her feet as the mercenary grabbed her, dragged her off the stairs as she ran toward the entrance of the yard.

A small group of men and women from Steel were running toward them, armed with heavy crossbows. Releasing her, Meina pushed Ayae forward, pushed her past the mercenaries to take one of the weapons. Stumbling, Ayae turned to see her and the mercenaries drop into position as more riders swept through the yard. Emerging from the dust, she could see their mouths split into vicious, sharp-toothed grins as they cut off small groups of mercenaries, rode down those who did not move fast enough and hacked down with their swords.

“Fire!”

The first volley of crossbow bolts punched into riders and horses, but drew the attention of a group to Ayae and those around her.

This time, she moved of her own accord, sprinting to the left as the riders thundered toward her. She saw Meina hurl her unloaded crossbow at one, saw the other members of Steel drop the heavy weapons and pull out swords; then a rider bore down on her. More out of instinct than any conscious choice, the cartographer’s apprentice ducked beneath the wild swing aimed at her head, trying desperately to grab her attacker—

Who screamed suddenly.

His sword hit the ground before he did, and Ayae snatched it from the dirt. His screaming had not stopped when she turned on him, his sword-wielding hand clutched at his face. Blood was seeping from the ruined right eye his fingers were desperately trying to keep in the socket.

She heard shouts and screams and horses around her, but there was no indication of what had attacked him; but, with no time, Ayae gritted her teeth and slammed the sharp end of the sword into her attacker’s neck. The blade cut deep, but not all the way through, and she left it there in the man as she turned back to where she had last seen Meina.

The mercenary captain was pushing herself up from beneath the rider who had attacked her, the other man’s stomach a bloody mess from the dagger that Meina had thrust into him. She stumbled as she straightened and Ayae, moving quickly now, ran to her side.

“I’m fine,” she said, but leaned on the other woman’s shoulder. “Really, I’m fine. Better than most.”

The charge had broken against the small group, but half of the twenty members of Steel that had stood against the attack lay on the ground, injured or dead, surrounded by the remains of the small charge. Of the mercenaries, a middle-aged man had the worst wound, his hands holding his stomach together as he muttered to himself and tried to move backward with his legs. His killer was bloody from where she had driven her sword into him, her leather armor untouched but held together in strips, while through her hair were twists of twine and feather. The mercenary had crushed her face with the stock of a crossbow, but Ayae could still make out a tattoo that went from her left eye to her cheek.

“Raiders,” she whispered.

“Leeran raiders.” Meina limped over to the middle-aged mercenary, dropping down next to him. “You were a good man, Rel.”

The fallen man did not respond, and a second later could not.

“Gather up those you can.” The Captain of Steel rose. “We need to be at the gate, and we need to be there, now. Is your protector going to come with us?”

Ayae glanced to her right, following Meina’s gaze, and found a raven perched on the body of a horse.

“He’ll go where he wants to go,” she said, finally. “But—thank you.”

The bird’s head tilted slightly and then lifted into the air with an easy jump and glided to her shoulder.

“I should be so lucky,” the mercenary captain said beside her.

Ayae did not reply. For a moment, she doubted that she could. The memories—the distorted memories of her childhood—were rushing in against the reality before her. At the wall, the dirt had settled, and she could see the barracks surrounded, the closed doors holding, but under threat. Mounted raiders and others on foot moved through the lot in small groups, riding down soldiers and using the remaining two buildings to provide cover from archers who shot arrows and bolts toward them. In the middle of the yard, where there was no cover and where the men and women of Steel had been standing for the start of dinner, lay the bodies of three dozen men and women, not all dead. Their screams would not be easily forgotten.

Not by her.