The Fall of the Wall

It was the most southern of the bastions, old as Bilbalo itself, an edifice of brick and mortar that had dominated the city skyline. It had stood proud though all three of the Great Sieges, but it stood no longer when faced with the Miremere. The marshland had grown irresistibly, turning the fields beyond the wall to mud and the mud to slime, and the southern bastion had begun to sink.

The stone and mortar had cracked and split, until that day when at last, with a terrible crash, it had caved in on itself and its rotted foundations.

Ferdano witnessed it. He had been riding back from Juristator Arelo’s house in the southern burgh district, and as the walls finally split his horse had shied, throwing him to the cobbles.

Consciousness wavered. He tasted blood on his lips, and realised it was running from a gash across his temple. His ears were ringing. The air was choked with dust, as though a marsh fog had suddenly settled over the Protectorate city.

He scrambled to his feet. His horse, Bartimaeus , had bolted. His vision swam, and he had to steady himself against the wall of a nearby bakery. There were other people around him, other people who were recovering from the collapsed of the Wall. Some had started towards the great ramp of rubble that had once been the southern bastion, and Ferdano realised that it was from there that he could hear the screams emanating.

“I helped pull them from the rubble,” he said later, before Duke Lorenzo. “One by one. I don’t know how many are still under there. Women and children as well as men.”

The master of Bilbalo said nothing, did not even look at Ferdano. The envoy was coated in a thick layer of dust, and had torn the hem from his doublet to stem the wound on his brow. Beside him Captain Gabrielle’s armoured bulk exuded pure disgust at the envoy’s ragged state.

“The miremere continues to expand,” Ferdano went on when nobody else spoke. “Despite what was promised. Despite reducing the Tanglewild to a third of its size these past years, despite the loss of thousands of men and the burnings of the Marcher settlements by packs of Werekynd... we have upheld our part of the bargain. So why haven’t the Miremancers upheld theirs? Why does the marshland encroach on our city more with each passing day?”

This final question was directed at Eduard, Lorenzo’s adviser. The wizened councillor said nothing, but his gaze was stony, his thin lips set. Ferdano looked from him to Lorenzo. The past decade had been hard on the Duke, harder than any previous Duke’s regin certainly. The lanky, stern boy had grown up fast. Aged fast, Ferdano corrected himself. Already grey tinged the sleek dark hair beneath the golden circlet, and lines crept along the noble brow in deepening furrows. He had not been a mere boy for a long time now.

“We must contact the Miremancers again,” he said slowly, voice echoing around the vast, chilly space of the Council Chamber. “We must seek fresh negotiations. This pact we made is long past.”

“Sire…” Ferdano said. He hesitated as councillor Eduardo’s expression turned from to one of outright distaste, but ploughed on regardless. “Sire, we cannot afford to negotiate on this matter any longer. The Great Pack under the Werekynd known as Vega is still amassing beyond the Tanglewild’s northern boundaries, and General Novo reports he hasn’t men sufficient to hold the Marcher borderlands any more. We must seek peace with the Werekynd, and withdraw from the Tanglewild.”

“What do you advise,” Lorenzo said to Eduardo, as though Ferdano hadn’t even spoken. The Duke’s old councillor remained silent, still glaring at Ferdano. Eventually Lorenzo turned back to him.

Ferdano opened his mouth as though to say something more, then thought better of it. He bowed and backed out of the Council Chamber, the heavy door slamming shut behind him.

“He is not to be trusted,” Eduardo said before the echoes had even died away. “I have been seeking guidance in this matter, sire. Night and day the matter of the Miremere has consumed my attentions. My conclusion is certain. We cannot now return to the ways of peace we once knew with the Werekynd. It has been ten years of toil and bloodshed, and even if we were to forgive them they know nothing to such emotions. We must see this course through, and then turn to dealing with the Miremancers once and for all.”

“We won’t be fighting the Miremancers at all,” Eduardo said. “Diplomacy can still be relied upon to win the day in that regard. But Ferdano is not to be trusted. I believe at best that he botched the last negotiations with the MIremancers.”

“He has betrayed us. He should be seized, and questioned. That may shed some light on the reasoning behind the Miremancers and their ongoing expansionism.”

“With respect sire, his family were too close to your father. What attributes has Ferdano displayed that make him so suitable for the post of Bilbalo Protectorate’s foremost envoy?”

Lorenzo frowned, an all-too common expression these days. There was a grate of plate mail as Gabrielle stirred, and a brash cough.

“With your permission, sire, I’d be more than happy to take him,” Gabrielle said, smiling grimly. “Just say the word.”

Lorenzo sat and said nothing. These past ten years had been a strain beyond words. He had watched his people sucked into a brutal war with the man-beasts, and all in the desperate hope that the curse of the Miremancers and their ever-expanding realm of decay could be appeased. Yet still the marshes crept further every day, consuming the outlying fields and hovels of Bilbalo and driving his people within the safety of the Wall. And now even that was breached. It would be repaired, but the rot would still spread.

He had to reach an accord. He had to halt the eradication of his lands, before pestilence and famine overtook the overcrowded city he ruled.