Nakor held Bek back. Bek was dressed in the strangely disturbing armour of the Talnoy, a look very familiar to Nakor from the time he had examined ten thousand of the things hidden in a vast cavern on Midkemia, an experience bordering on the mystical. But there was nothing remotely mystic about these Talnoy, for each was simply a fanatic, loyal to the TeKarana, wearing ancient armour. The red-trimmed black armour of the palace guards was far less ornate than the gold-trimmed monstrosity now worn by Bek, and both were far gaudier than the real Talnoy armour Nakor had seen. It was as if the Dark One’s servants had felt the need to be more impressive in appearance than those they had replaced.
Nakor had heard the summons to the palace before Bek could respond, and had simply ushered his young companion into an alcove off a storage room, as hundreds of Talnoy guards hurried to answer the call. Bek had not questioned Nakor’s instructions, but Nakor could tell he was getting restless after sitting silently in this tiny room for hours. Softly Nakor said, ‘Soon. They’ll be here soon.’
‘Who will be here, Nakor?’ asked the hulking young man.
‘Pug and the others.’
‘Then what will we do, Nakor? I want to do something.’
‘You will be able to do something soon, my friend,’ whispered Nakor. ‘It will be something you like a lot.’
Miranda could feel the fatigue threatening to overwhelm her, yet she forced herself to cast one more spell of scrying. Then her eyes opened wide and her head jerked back as if someone had slapped her.
‘What is it?’ asked General Alenburga. His eyes narrowed in his sunburned face as he studied her.
‘That hurt.’
‘What hurt?’ asked Kaspar of Olasko.
‘They’ve erected some sort of… barrier against scrying inside that thing.’
Two dozen additional magicians had gathered since the end of the first phase of the battle, just before sunset, and they were a welcome sight when the Dasati started their second assault an hour after sundown. The Tsurani had used a different tactic this time, convinced that the Dasati would not err again and try to charge a fixed position where the Tsurani could surround them.
Alenburga had ordered a company of Tsurani engineers who had arrived towards the end of the battle to erect as many barriers as they could across the opening where the river trail emptied into the plain. The Dasati could still come through, but not in numbers unless they first stopped to remove the barriers, or tried to swim downriver.
Then a dozen heavy ballista and a pair of trebuchets were unloaded from the wagons and erected, just as the Dasati again advanced down the trail. As their vanguard reached the end of the trail, Tsurani archers high in the hills overhead fired down on them, every fifth arrow being aflame, while those operating the trebuchets hurled huge barrels of flammable oil into the pass. The barrels each held fifty gallons of oil, and they were designed to disintegrate on impact, spreading the oil in every direction. It took a few minutes for the fire to begin in earnest, but after it caught hold began, it quickly erupted into an inferno that forced many Deathknights into the river where they were pulled under the fast-moving water by the weight of their own armour, or helped to their death by Tsurani spearmen who used their long pole-arms to hold the Dasati underwater as they attempted to reach either riverbank.
After an hour of this, the Dasati beat a hasty retreat up the path.
Now they were attempting to anticipate the Dasati’s next move, hence Miranda’s attempted scrying. ‘I was never very good at that sort of thing, anyway,’ she said.
The four young captains were waiting nearby, all of them showing evidence of fatigue. Zane was nearly asleep on his feet and Tad had to nudge him a few times to keep him alert. General Alenburga noticed and said, ‘Pass the word to stand down. Set pickets at the edge of the hills, a mile in each direction, and we’ll wait. Find whatever comfort you may and get some rest.’
The four young officers hurried off to discharge their duty and take a break.
Alenburga said to Miranda, ‘I don’t have any idea how you do what it is you do, but you look as if you could sleep for a month. Go. I have a tent set up a mile or so to the rear. There’s food and a sleeping pallet there.’ He detailed a soldier to escort her, and added, ‘My thanks to you and the other magicians. I doubt we’d be standing here if it wasn’t for your amazing skills.’
Miranda gave him a wan smile. ‘Thank you. If you send for me, I can be here in minutes.’
Alenburga cast his gaze in the direction of the Black Mount. ‘I doubt we’ll be hearing from our new friends before dawn. They may see in the dark like cats, but we’ve given them a lot to think about.’ As he watched Miranda departing with the escort, Alenburga said to Erik and Kaspar. ‘That’s what I’m the most worried about.’
‘What they’re thinking?’
‘Yes,’ said the General.
Erik said, ‘Something occurred to me during this last struggle.’
‘Out with it then,’ said Alenburga. ‘You don’t strike me as the shy type.’
Erik smiled. ‘I didn’t want to speculate until I saw if they were going to come at us a third time.’
‘What is it?’ asked Kaspar.