* * *
In the light of the flames from the burning west palisade wall Lieutenant Rillish could make out figures struggling atop the east. He stood behind the piled sacks and lumber of a last redoubt abutting the stone barracks at the centre of the fort. Already the wounded filled the barracks. The Wickans, Sergeant Chord had informed him, had withdrawn to the large dugout storage vault beneath. Somehow this intelligence disheartened him. But he did not have the energy to think about it; instead, it took all he could muster to stay erect. A javelin lanced out of the dark from the north wall and he threw up both swords to deflect it. The parry staggered him. The two guards Chord had posted with him steadied his back, their large shields raised. Arrows followed, thumping into the shields’ layered wood, leather, and copper sheeting. Damn them, they had the advantage now. Rillish gestured for Sergeant Chord.
The sergeant came jogging across the no-man's-land of the central mustering grounds, whisked by arrows and tossed flaming brands.
‘Not much longer now,’ he bellowed over the inferno of the tarred east timbers, the clashing of swords and the roar of the besiegers. His idiot grin of delight in battle was fixed at his bearded mouth.
Rillish shouted: ‘Send the word. Torch the rest and withdraw.’
‘Aye, aye.’
Rillish tapped the guards. ‘Remain here. Everyone holds to cover the retreat.’
The marine guards saluted. ‘Aye, sir.’ They rested their shields against the piled timbers, took up their crossbows. Rillish backed away, limping and bent, for the barracks door, and it occurred to him that with men like that he could win any battle – provided he had enough.
Within, in the gloom, the stink of rotting flesh and old blood made him wince and press a hand to his face. His vision slowly adjusted, revealing a madman's image of Hood's realm. Blood and fluids glistened on the timbered floor, draining from a pile beside that door that slowly resolved itself into a heap of naked amputated arms and legs. Men sat hunched at the slit windows, bows and crossbows raised – those with two able arms. The rest supported them, holding pikes and arrow sheaths. A man struggled one-handed to crank his crossbow. Appalled, Rillish took it from him and wound it. ‘Fessel?’ he bellowed. ‘Where are you, man! What is the meaning of this?’
‘Healer's dead, sir,’ said the crossbowman.
‘Dead?’
‘Aye.’
‘What happened?’
‘Old Fessel refused to use his Denul all night, sir. He was cryin’ an mumblin’ and then he just fell dead. His heart, sir. Seemed to just give out.’
‘What was it – was he sick?’
‘Don't know. He was bawlin’ like a baby at the end there, savin’, “Please stop. No. You have to stop. Soliel's Mercy, please no,” while he was fixin’ us up best he could. Strangest thing, sir.’
The Wickans?’
‘Downstairs, sir. Quiet as mice.’
‘Very good.’
Rillish crossed to the open trap door and dark earthen passage leading down flagged in flat river stones – a construction someone had put a lot of effort into since he'd last seen the subterranean vault. ‘Udep? Trake himself is on his way! This is it, man!’
Darkness. The flickering of what might be a single torch somewhere in a far corner of the cellar. Staring down into that dark a shapeless dread tightened the lieutenant's throat. The stink of old blood seemed even stronger here. He thought of the hetman's and the shaman's strange manner during their last meeting. How Udep seemed to be attempting to warn him of something – Clearwater's bruised, almost crazed gaze.
No. They couldn't have. Their own children. Yet was not slavery a worse fate for any Wickan? He backed away from the dirt passage and the horror that it promised. Perhaps they were all to meet their end this night – they in their way, and he and his command in theirs.
‘They’re fallin’ back, sir!’ someone called from a slit window.
‘Yes.’ The lieutenant shook himself, cursed the fools beneath his feet. Damn them! Too impatient to meet Hood, they were. There's hundreds without more than happy to lend a hand for that. Why not go down with your iron warm? Rillish took a deep breath, ‘Aye! Cover them. Show them how a soldier fights!’
‘For the Fourth!’ a woman shouted.
‘For the Empire!’ Rillish countered.
A great shout went up from the men and women lining the walls, ‘The Empire!’
A thunderous roar and a blinding gout of flames announced the eruption of the flammables gathered at the base of the remaining palisade walls. For moments the screams of the besiegers stranded upon them rose even above that conflagration. The churning gold light illuminated the passage and in its bright glare Rillish forced himself to descend.
At the bottom his boots sank into yielding damp earth. Kneeling, he felt about with one gloved hand and brought up a fistful of the loam. He squeezed and the flame-light revealed a dark stream dripping from his fingers – earth soaked in blood.
What inhuman will … He wiped his gloved hand on the wall then yanked his hand away. Warm. The dirt walls fairly radiated a strange heat. The fires? As his vision adjusted he made out the low shapes of legs lying straight out from either side forming a kind of aisle leading straight to the opposite wall where the lone torch cast a fading light on a single figure, waiting.
Rillish walked the aisle. To either side lay the elders, heart thrust, every one. No sign of any child, nor of any struggle. Their slack features appeared calm, resigned. His boots slipped and sucked in the soaked, mud-slick earth. A strange humid warmth assaulted him while an impenetrable darkness seemed to hover just beyond the torch and motionless figure.
Drawing close, he recognized the shaman, Clearwater, sunk to his knees. Horribly, two spears supported him, thrust downward through his back and crossed beneath his chest, impaling him on his knees. Blood ran drying in rivulets down the wood hafts, pooling beneath him.
incredibly, the shaman's head rose, sending Rillish backwards, gripping his swords. ‘Greetings, Malazan,’ the apparition breathed, wetly.
Rillish could not speak. Above, boots stamped the timber floor, shouts for relief for the bulwark beyond the door sounded. Should they yield that, he knew, the end would not be far behind. He found his voice. ‘Clearwater – what have you done?’
The shaman's smile was ferocious, and victorious. He glanced to the eerie darkness past the torchlight. ‘Forbidden one fight, we found another. And succeeded, though the cost was dear. Go now, bring your men. A way has been bought.’
‘What do you mean? Bought? What kind of bargain is this?’
A shudder took the shaman and his torso slipped a hand's width down the shafts. The man spoke through lips drained pale. ‘An escape, fool. Life for our children and your men. This site was holy once. To our ancestors. Blood called, just as it always did. But hungry! So hungry … there were barely enough of us. Now go, send your men. I hold the way.’
‘A way where?’
A clipped laugh cut off by an agonized grunt. ‘Not far. Go.’
Rillish ran to the stairs, his boots slipping and sliding. He roared up the passage, ‘Send Sergeant Chord down here!’
In the end he managed to evacuate thirty-two men and women of his command before the building's burning roof forced him into the passage. His last act was to help those wounded who volunteered to carry out the ones who couldn't walk. Bent over, his leg stabbing with pain, he could wait no longer. A soldier rearguard steadied him on the stairs. Together, they pulled shut the trapdoor against the furnace roar of the barracks.
‘Sergeant Chord?’
‘First through, sir,’ she said.
‘Very good. Our turn now.’
‘Yes, sir. After you, sir.’
‘No. I'll go last.’
The woman smiled – dark, Talian or part Dal Hon, her mailed shoulders as broad as any man's. ‘Not the sergeant's orders, beggin’ your pardon.’
A glow licked its way between the thick timbers of the trapdoor. They backed away, hunched. ‘No time for that, soldier. After you.’
A salute. ‘Aye, sir.’
At the darkness, the soldier drew her shortsword, readied the wide shield from her back. ‘Good luck, soldier,’ Rillish said.
‘Aye. Hood spare me,’ she spat, muttered a short prayer, then launched herself forward, disappearing.
Rillish turned to the now still form of Clearwater; the shaman's head was sunk to his chest, his greasy hair obscuring his face. He knelt beside him. ‘Clearwater? Can you hear me? I don't know what to say… Thank you. Thank you for my men.’
‘Thank not for a fair bargain,’ came a hoarse whisper. ‘Honour it.’
Rillish straightened, ‘Yes.’ He faced the darkness, a hand on the grip of one Untan duelling sword, stepped forward …
… And walked into a forest – tall conifers, birdsong, sunlight shafting down through boughs, movement between the thick trunks, a kind of large deer? – then one more step and into cool night. Hands steadied him, Chord and the female soldier. He looked up and was reassured to see familiar constellations: the Twins, the Wolf, the broad Path of Light. ‘Where are we?’
‘Just west of the fort, seems,’ supplied Chord. ‘You can see the flames from the hilltop.’
Rillish peered about, getting his bearings. They were in a deep gully, a dry river bed. Around them was – no one. ‘Where is everyone? The children?’
‘Headed off north-west already, sir. Couldn't stop them. Said they had directions from Clearwater. I sent the men with them.’
‘Very well, Sergeant.’
‘Shall we go?’ East, a pale orange glow backlit a hill. Rillish watched it for a time. ‘Care to take one last look, sir?’
Wincing, Rillish squeezed his leg and brushed the night flies from his face. ‘No, Sergeant. It's all right. We best go.’
‘Yes, sir. There's our guide.’ Chord gestured up the gully where the dim figure of a Wickan girl stood waving them on impatiently.
The female soldier slipped her shield to her back, offered an arm. Rillish accepted.