The Wanderer's Mark: Book Three of Imirillia (The Books of Imirillia 3) (25 page)

***

“Go! Go! Get the far lines lit!” Aedon yelled towards the miners near him. Basaal came running back to Aedon, hitting the ground beside his friend.

“The east—” Basaal was out of breath. “The lines to the east are being lit.”

“What of the central barrels the Marions planted?” Aedon screamed over the sound of a close explosion, dirt raining down over their heads. “Why have
they
not gone off yet?”

“They should—” The sky sounded as if it would snap and collapse in on itself. With a flash of light, the entire eastern line exploded into turmoil. Horses screamed in pain. Another sound, louder than thunder, rang from the center of camp. Men were shouting in terror. As their cries hit Basaal, his heart sank, and he ducked his head against his arms to protect himself from another explosion, trying not to think of the devastation.

“There went some of the Marion barrels,” Aedon shouted, sounding relieved and irritated at the same time, shaking his head for the ringing in his ears.

It had been an accident; the lines were not to be lit for another two hours. But somehow, somewhere, a spark must have grabbed at a line, and the explosions had begun. Basaal and Aedon both knew that if an explosion went off early, they would have to light every line immediately to bring the necessary devastation. So Aedon had sent his men to rush the attack, hoping that Crispin would soon lead the army out of the woods.

Explosion after explosion continued to flash throughout the Imirillian camp. The men were throwing Thistle Black’s devilish instruments. There was screaming, yelling. Confusion. As another barrel lit, the earth rumbled against it. Basaal’s ears screamed in pain. Several fires were rushing through the Imirillian camp.

There it was. Basaal turned to look back down onto the plain, surprised he could still even hear it. The sound of more than twenty-five hundred horses roaring across the earth. Explosions still rang out, especially on the western lines, where their Marion counterparts continued to follow the Aemogens’ lead.

“We must get back to our horses,” Basaal yelled, “or we’ll be trampled underfoot!” Basaal tried to pull Aedon away as the councillor was searching for any unlit lines.

“There’s one more!” Aedon shouted, striking his flint.

“Time is gone!”

Aedon pulled free of Basaal’s grasp.

“One more!” Aedon shouted again. He ran forward three steps, and lit the last line.

There was a fizz that almost seemed to sputter out, then the snap of a thousand pieces of metal ringing out with the bright light. Basaal and Aedon dove to the ground.

“Up!” Basaal lifted Aedon, and they began to run out of the way of their own cavalry.

“The rest of the men?” Aedon shouted, blinking as he ran, his eyes blinded by the flashes. Then several more explosions rang out in the night. Trumpets were sounding, the Imirillian camp was mobilizing.

“The men know to drop back to their mounts.” Basaal practically shoved Aedon forward. Basaal could still hear the warhorses’ shrill cries.

“It’s too early!” Aedon yelled as they dropped down into the ravine, running in the darkness to where their horses were tethered. Above them, the Aemogen army came pounding by them like thunder across the spring plain as they rode up into the edges of the Imirillian encampment. The men were screaming as they rode by.

Refigh was spooked, frightened by the endless explosions. Basaal spoke hastily to the horse as he mounted, urging Refigh to trust him. Responding to the familiar feel of Basaal’s touch, Refigh settled into a nervous energy and sprang forward. Basaal pulled out his sword and glanced at Aedon before they galloped upward, into the tumult.

They rode onto the plain, falling in with the Aemogen cavalry. Basaal lost track of Aedon among the shadows of the other riders. He called out to Aedon, but it was of no use. The sounds of the Aemogen cavalry rushed over his shoulders, spilling across the ground below.

He focused on the dark wave before him. And, for a moment, Basaal saw every country he had ever ridden into in the name of war and conquest and family, and he felt as if the terror of every soul who had ever cried out in fear was upon him. He screamed, forcing the fear away. Basaal lifted his black sword above his head. The sounds of clashing metal had begun to lift up through the darkness.

Basaal rode into the tumult of war.

***

The explosions from Colun Tir had been a spectacular, terrifying sight. The immense wave of each blast rumbled off the mountains, crashing against the stones of Colun Tir itself. Eleanor had watched this with Hastian and Zanntal from the balcony, continuing to cover her ears as she heard the sounds of battle rising.

A trumpet sounded, deep and strong.

“The Imirillian trumpet of advance,” Zanntal said in Imirillian. “Shaamil has pulled his armies together.”

“What do you think he will do?” Eleanor asked.

“Push the Aemogens away from the camp, down onto the plain,” Zanntal replied.

“I wish this day were over,” the Queen’s Own muttered nervously at her side, not understanding the Imirillian words they had spoken. Eleanor turned to look at Hastian. His eyes met hers, his face grim, and she took his hand before staring back out over the darkness.

***

Battle, Basaal remembered, was thick work. He brought his sword down on an Imirillian foot soldier, his weapon catching, almost slipping, before he pulled it loose with a cry. Refigh stumbled, and Basaal guided his mount back to the steadiness of the plain below the camp as a wave of Imirillian soldiers forced the Aemogens back.

The air had lightened into the dimness of morning pulling away from night. From what Basaal could now see above the tumult, the Imirillian cavalry was nearly decimated, their horses had sustained the brunt of Aemogen’s attack. But they had thousands upon thousands of men on foot, now organized and pushing the Aemogen forces back from their camp, sweeping them to the south, in the direction of the pass. Basaal was swept with them. His only aim, beyond the struggles of battle, was to stay as far away from his own companies of red-clad Imirillian soldiers as he possibly could.

Basaal was jolted to the side as he pressed into another horseman then swung away. A pain rushed through his leg, and Basaal screamed out, bringing his sword down on the Imirillian assailant who had caused the wound with his own.

The plain was crowded, and fighting turned cumbersome. Basaal swung his sword, forcing his way through the foot soldiers as arrows began to shoot past him. He took down an archer; he did not dare look at his face as light now poured into the valley. He fought, and struggled, and prayed for the day to be over.

***

Light had revealed the state of the battle raging below Colun Tir. The Aemogens had devastated the Imirillian camp, and, even from the distance, Eleanor thought she could see the bodies of men and horses scattered throughout the destruction. There were two forces discernibly moving against the Aemogens: the deep purple of the emperor’s men and the red and black of Basaal’s own. As the conflict washed towards the south—a slow and bloody migration—hundreds of bodies were left behind, strewn across the abandoned field.

Eleanor forced herself not to think of it, watching the field like a chessboard. Pacing, arms folded, the sound of battle seemed to be an endless accompaniment to her life. As if she had never lived without the clamor of war in her ears.

That midday ever came was almost inconceivable to Eleanor despite the shadows again beginning to grow long. The battle now lay farther south than she could follow with her eyes. Standing atop the battlement, Zanntal held his spyglass to his eye, poised impossibly still, except for where the slight breeze of the day moved his deep blue robes. Hastian stood back, his face white, his jaw taut. He was no longer even trying to watch the plain below.

Just as Eleanor was about to ask Zanntal what he could see, the Imirillian soldier stiffened and looked back towards Eleanor. He put his hands to his lips and motioned for Eleanor to stand still as he listened. Something in the silence around them confirmed Zanntal’s suspicion.

“They’ve found Colun Tir.”

Eleanor spun towards the archway leading back into the tower as the sounds of metal rang up the stairs from the direction of the stable yard. They heard a man scream.

***

There was a flash of purple, and Basaal pulled his leg from the stirrup instinctively, shying away from the blade of a single Vestan assassin. Basaal heard a sickening sound, and Refigh jerked his head backward in pain. Grasping at the already disappearing reins, Basaal was thrown from his horse into the mass of battle below him as Refigh came crashing down with a shrill cry of pain. Basaal rolled away, escaping the crushing impact as his horse fell to the ground. The Vestan gave Basaal no time to even wonder after his horse, advancing on the fallen prince in three aggressive steps, bringing his scimitar down where Basaal knelt, dazed from the fall.

Basaal heard the sound of conflicting metal and spun away in time to see Crispin materialize next to him, bringing his sword up to fend off the Vestan’s scimitar. As Basaal stumbled to his feet and grabbed his own sword, Crispin advanced on the assassin, engaging him as Basaal came from the side, and, in one aggressive move, Basaal plunged his sword through the Vestan’s purple robes. The assassin stumbled back and sank to the ground. Crispin finished him off.

The sweep and movement of battle did not allow them to speak as they readied themselves for the next onslaught. Basaal’s legs were shaky from having spent all morning on his horse.

“Let’s fight back toward the closest Aemogen company!” Crispin yelled out across the din.

Basaal called back a word in agreement, swinging towards one of his father’s men, cutting him down just as he felt the skin on his own forearm break.

Hearing a scream, Basaal turned to find Crispin beside him, having taken down another Imirillian at Basaal’s back. Before any expression of thanks could cross Basaal’s face, he saw a knifepoint appear through the front of Crispin’s throat—a strange, unnatural image of steel protruding from flesh—and then the blood. Crispin’s eyes held onto Basaal’s for as long as he could—as though he were asking Basaal for deliverance—before he stumbled forward.

Basaal caught Crispin, laying his body down and letting go of him in the same motion as he lunged towards his friend’s assailant. Another soldier was upon him. Before Basaal could even think, his sword came around and caught one man in the neck while the other suffered Basaal’s knife between his ribs. A dark rush caught his eye as more purple closed in. And Basaal heard himself say something back to Crispin as he ran.

“I will come back. I will come back for you!”

He may have even screamed it.

***

Hastian raced to Eleanor’s side while Zanntal jumped down from the battlements and swept past her towards the open archway of the balcony.

“We must hide you or get you back to the tunnel!” Zanntal shouted in Imirillian. But sounds rang up the stairs, and, from the hollow echo of it all, Eleanor knew they had broken into the tower.

“They’re inside,” Eleanor said desperately. “It’s too late. How did they come to find the tower?”

Zanntal disappeared down the stairs into the fortress, and Hastian backed up towards Eleanor, his sword drawn, breathing fast, watching.

Eleanor drew her ornamental sword just as a sickening sound came from the stone stairway. Eleanor almost dropped her sword, its hilt warm for the sweat of her hands. She gripped it harder, moving her thumb across the metalwork of the handle, as she tried to pace her breathing and waited. Then Zanntal burst out through the door, the blood on his scimitar catching the afternoon sun.

“The Vestan,” he said. Eleanor gripped her weapon harder. “It is the Vestan.” Zanntal was out of breath. “Three, four of them,” he continued. “One is dead on the stairs. They must have picked up the trail and split away from the battle.”

Zanntal sheathed his scimitar and pulled his bow from off his shoulder, placing a thick arrow above the grip, pulling back the bowstring. He stepped towards Hastian and Eleanor. “There is no going down,” he explained in Imirillian. “Here, we must make our fight.”

Eleanor repeated Zanntal’s words to Hastian as she watched Zanntal train his arrow on the black archway. Hastian muttered something under his breath.

“We must assume the men in the courtyard are dead,” Zanntal continued in Imirillian.

Without any sound, a Vestan swept onto the balcony, his scimitar drawn, his expression grim and satisfied. Zanntal sent his arrow flying. With more finesse than Eleanor would have believed possible, the Vestan swung his scimitar, slicing the arrow in half, sending the pieces flying against the wall behind him. Zanntal had already reloaded his bow and released another arrow, and the scene repeated. But the third arrow hit its mark, catching the assassin beneath the collarbone. He stumbled back as two more Vestan rushed onto the balcony. They swarmed Zanntal as he pulled out his scimitar. Hastian rushed forward, and one of the Vestan turned on him.

“Get back! Back!” Hastian cried to Eleanor as he fended off the Vestan’s blows. Eleanor stumbled back, shaking. She could not think. Was she to run forward to help? Was she to stay back? Hastian almost fell towards Eleanor, and she could not see Zanntal save for the flashes of blue and purple on the far side of the balcony.