Nights of Villjamur (56 page)

'Blavat!' Brynd looked around for the cultist woman, then waved her towards him.

She dismounted, clutching some relics, placed them to one side. The red-haired man was attempting to speak, but produced only staccato puffs, and Blavat then examined the wound whilst Brynd examined her face.

'What d'you think?' he finally asked her.

'I think I can extract it, but it might have penetrated his lung.'

'Just do whatever it takes. What about the enhancements we have? Weren't they meant to help with things like this?'

'It's not that easy, since I have no idea what material the enemy's shells are composed of. It's nothing I've ever seen before, and might not be responsive to my relics.'

'Commander!' Nelum drew his attention, gesturing towards one of the creatures they had just vanquished.

He turned to Blavat. 'Just see what you can do here.' She responded only with a subtle head movement that could have meant anything. He was constantly prepared for his friends dying in combat, but it wasn't something Brynd wanted to face now, and not Apium.

Brynd strode over to Nelum, noticing Lupus standing next to him, bow in hand. Two of the creatures had survived, looking like crustaceans strayed from the sea. In some ways they looked partially human, each with two arms, two legs, but replacing skin were those carapaces which made them so formidable. They appeared charred, melted. So this was it then, these were the terrible creatures causing the genocide on Tineag'l. Right now, sitting in a mire of their dead and dying, they didn't look so impressive. Their bulbous eyes were lid-less as they twitched in sharp movements. But what interested Brynd most was their reaction as Jurro stepped alongside them with a book, some kind of bestiary, in his hand. 'New creatures, how exciting! Let me see if they are included in here . . . Damn this index.'

The two captives raked their heads round with
clicks
to acknowledge the Dawnir's presence, then seemed to motion with their limbs in a manner Brynd didn't understand.

It was perhaps a salute, or perhaps some religious gesture. Seemingly they recognized Jurro, which Brynd pointed out to the Dawnir.

'They know
me
?' Jurro stared dumbly.

'From their reaction to you, they're familiar with either you, or your breed.'

Brynd wondered what this might mean to one who spent so long hidden in a dark chamber away from prying eyes. Now, to have another creature actually
recognize
him.

Nelum, ever curious, said, 'Say something to them, Jurro. See how they react.'

As Jurro bent forward the pair of aliens shied away from his direct gaze.

'What do you think, Nelum?'

'Obviously they know what he is, so I'll bet that wherever they came from, there are more of Jurro's lot.'

'Want us to kill them, sir?' Lupus enquired.

Brynd shook his head. 'Probably more useful alive.'

Thunder sounded on the horizon and he walked away to squint through the snow. In this monochrome landscape, it was difficult to locate the direction of the plangent sound.

Then he spotted, to the north, a thin line of black.

Barely noticeable, on the furthest hill.

The only patch of darkness against the grey landscape and pale sky.

'Nelum.' Brynd summoned him and pointed. 'More of the same, d'you reckon?'

Nelum regarded the horizon. 'It looks that way . . . shit. They'll destroy us, that number of them. We'll have to get back to Villiren. Fast.'

'It'll take us hours to reach the ice sheets again.'

'Not necessarily so. We took a meandering path here, took plenty of stops.'

'Yes, fair point.'

Brynd gave the orders for the two surviving creatures to be bound, alive, but requested Blavat to use some relic to knock them unconscious. All she could really manage was to reinforce the chains that confined them. That would have to do for the moment.

He returned to check on Apium, who was now fading from consciousness. Brynd had noticed that the shell had been removed.

'You got it out?' he asked the cultist.

'No, it disintegrated while we tried to extract it. The remaining part's still inside him. I'm sorry.'

Apium opened his eyes as if hearing this news. 'Commander.' The word emerged as barely more than a breath.

'Hang in there. We'll get you strapped on your horse and you'll be all right.'

Blavat tugged at Brynd's shoulder, hissed, 'But he's going to die. We'll never get him back in time. He'll die.'

Brynd stared into her eyes with a feral intensity that made it perfectly clear who was in charge.

'But the serious wounding is internal. It's his lungs and--'

'I don't give a fuck. I'm not leaving him here. Numb his pain.'

With that he returned to mount his horse, then rode around the remaining group giving orders for an immediate retreat to Villiren.

*

Apium coughed blood onto the horse's neck, and when that happened you knew things weren't looking good. The rhythm of the gallop was making him feel even sicker, and he had to keep stopping, holding the others up. Brynd was constantly looking round to check if his friend was all right. Truth be told, it was as if he was thieving every last breath just to stay alive, and Apium hadn't a clue how many more hours he would last.

A piece of shell. Just a piece of fucking shell.

It was funny, in a strange way, now that Apium himself knew he was dying, how it seemed to trivialize these final moments. Another irony was that he didn't feel inclined to tell them about the hole in his boot, or about the frostbite that must be destroying his left foot almost as quickly.

'You want to get up behind me?' Brynd asked at one point.

'No, I'm fine. Leave me behind if you need to.'

'Leave you with that lot? You must be joking.' Apium followed Brynd's gaze off into the distance.

The black-shells had now gathered behind in enormous numbers, a huge line of them now clearly visible. If fifty had taken so much effort to kill, the thousands in pursuit would surely destroy them. Apium was desperate not to hold up the others.

The effect of Blavat's relics consistently failed, and it felt as if he was inhaling knives.

They didn't train soldiers for this shit.

*

It went on for hours, this stop-start nightmare chase through the dark. The creatures just kept on coming, and as the Jamur soldiers finally arrived at the ice sheets, the number of enemy had merely increased.

Everyone was beginning to fear that they would never make it to the longships in time, and Apium felt the burden of Brynd's soft glances towards him.

'Blavat,' he wheezed, unexpectedly.

Surprised, the cultist woman steered her horse closer to his. 'Yes, captain?'

'Those
brenna
devices,' he whispered.

'What about them?'

'They're primed for our men to use them, aren't they?'

'They're ready to use, yes. What about it?'

Another deep breath that sliced through his insides.

Apium said, 'They work in a chain reaction, yes? I think I might be of some use. In getting you lot away from here.'

'I can adjust them so as to work in unison, sure. You really fancy taking that lot on by yourself?'

Nothing in her tone to suggest she cared too much, but then why should she? Only Brynd was keeping him with them. 'Yes. Now we're on an ice sheet . . . once I let you all get far enough away, I can detonate the devices so as to cut them off. Once we've put water between you and them, you're safe to get back to Villiren.'

'And you?'

'We all know about me. Now, line up those devices.' He painfully steered his horse towards Brynd.

Apium told him briefly of his intentions.

'That's insanity. We'll get you back.'

'Who's the crazy one, Brynd? Who's the one kidding himself?'

The look in Brynd's eyes said everything that Apium already knew. He didn't want to fail a friend, but it just wasn't practical.

'What do you want me to say?' Brynd grunted.

'You're supposed to commend me on a good plan. At least this way my fat carcass will be worth something.' Then, seeing Brynd's expression of dismay, 'We're fucking soldiers, Brynd, just pull yourself together.'

They shook hands, holding their grip longer than necessary.

'Now . . . fuck off out of here while you still can,' he wheezed, forcing a smile.

Apium said brief goodbyes to the men, who stared in confusion. Then he accepted the
brenna
devices from Blavat, who quickly instructed him in their subtleties.

Into the darkness, he rode for a quarter of an hour until he was face to face with the enemy, with nearly every sharp breath seeming penultimate.

He unwrapped all the
brenna
devices. He dropped one to the ground, hearing it ping on the ice. He turned his horse sideways, dropping the others in as straight a line as he could manage, while the pain became unendurable. He deposited the last
brenna
device in the snow, knowing they were all linked up in whatever way Blavat had configured them.

From the clinking and rustling sounds, the enemy had begun to approach.

Sliding from the saddle, Apium gave the last-placed device a gentle twist at its top, barely able to see it in the pitch-black of night.

And with snow whipping against him, all alone in this bleak vista, with his lungs finally collapsing, he wondered vaguely what, if anything, would be waiting for him on the other side.

*

Behind them, the night sky lit up with an unholy fire.

The ice sheets rocked and lurched and cracked.

The survivors were now close to the longships, where a handful of Jamur sentries stood guard. All of them stood watching this last noble act of Captain Apium Hol.

Nelum realized exactly what had gone on, and silently placed a comforting hand on Brynd's shoulder. A small gesture, but enough.

Tonight they had witnessed real heroism and who would have thought it would be Apium of all people. Chubby old Apium, more interested in carousing than soldiering?

No time for sentimentality.
Brynd muttered a bitter prayer for his dead comrade and gave the command to head south.

A fresh layer of snow, not that the landscape needed it.

That moment when it had just stopped.

A silence even the air appreciated.

The sun, wherever it was behind all those clouds, was setting - darker and quicker than Dartun had expected. They would make some form of camp here, a cluster of canvas tents pinned to the ice. But what comfort would sleep bring being exposed so far away from solid land?

He looked back at the map, then again regarded the terrain. They had travelled up the western coast without yet engaging with many forms of life. The remoteness appealed to Dartun. Maybe dying didn't seem to matter so much when he was surrounded by an environment so detached from normal existence - it was like you were halfway there anyway. Dogs barked into the wind. His cultist followers remained dutifully on their sleighs. Dozens of the undead stood motionless, waiting for further instructions.

They were now crossing the ice sheets somewhere to the north-west of Tineag'l. Just a year ago and they would have been walking on water. Instinctively, Dartun knew that he wasn't far from one of the Realm Gates.

Verain stepped up alongside, placed her hand on his lower back. Thick clothing, a fur hood, and beneath it all she looked so distant. 'How long, do you think?'

'Not far. Two hours, maybe three.'

'Are you getting nervous?' she asked.

'Nervous? Why?'

'I don't know . . . because of what we're discovering. Because we have no idea what to expect on the other side of these gates - if they exist.'

'They exist,' he said. 'They most definitely exist.'

'So why don't you
feel
anything, Dartun? You seem to have switched off your emotions.'

Verain moved to face him directly, placed her hand on his arm in a tender gesture. 'I no longer know what to make of you. You summon the dead to your side. You drag us all on an expedition to find another world. What am I supposed to make of it? You've stopped talking to us - to me. It's as if the Dartun I knew has died, and you're not
him
any more.'

Her words pitter-pattered on, and he tried to ignore them. He
was
dying: that was the whole point, wasn't it? But what did she mean, saying that he was already dead? Had he changed so obviously in the face of his sudden mortality?

*

Night, and a small fire had been built on the surface of the ice, transforming his cultists into strange purple silhouettes. The dogs had fallen silent, bedding down alongside the sleds so that the only sound here was of the wind, haunting and isolating. Undead men and women shambled in patrols around the periphery of the camp. Dartun explained his situation to Verain, and repeated his statement to the rest of the Order of the Equinox. He had never been clear about his immortality to them, but was now candid.