Chapter
14
Taniel rubbed at his eyes and tried to remember what it felt like to sleep.
Five times in three days he’d fought in a bloody melee on the front lines. Five times he’d been the last one to leave the earthen defenses when the Kez proved too strong. Five times he’d been forced to make the long trek across the corpse-strewn fields dragging the wounded and dying, furious that they’d once again let the front fall beneath a Kez onslaught.
How many times could they retreat before the army was nothing but dead and wounded?
Taniel paused to look to the south. Budwiel was getting farther away every day. The front – or what had been the front until half an hour ago – was about a quarter mile away and obscured in powder smoke. The Kez soldiers were already leveling the earthworks and carting away their dead.
This last offensive had been a bad one. The infantry from the Seventeenth Brigade was mostly green and they’d broken and run before the retreat was even sounded. Taniel wondered if there was a single man unharmed after that mess. The groaning of the wounded in the surgeons’ tents made his skin crawl.
He found Ka-poel sitting by the fire next to their tent. She stared at the coals, absently cleaning beneath her fingernails with the tip of one of her long needles. A pot of water boiled over the flames. She looked Taniel over once, then stared back at the fire.
Taniel dropped to the ground next to her. His whole body hurt. He was covered in countless cuts and bruises. A particularly nasty Warden had almost done him in, and he had a clean slice across the side of his stomach to show for it.
Ka-poel stood silently and moved around behind him, where she began to pull him out of the jacket. He didn’t like when she undressed him – well, he liked it, but he’d heard officers muttering about the impropriety of their relationship already – but tonight he was far too tired to argue. She unbuttoned his shirt and cleaned his neck and torso with a hot, wet washcloth.
He lay on his side while she stitched the wound on his stomach, wincing every time the needle went in.
“Pole,” he said while he lay there, “do you remember something being mentioned about Tamas putting together a school for powder mages in Adopest?”
She drummed two fingers on his arm. Yes.
“I think Sabon was in charge of it. I wonder if he’s still up there. Pit, I could use his help.” Taniel paused to think. Sabon’s face floated in front of him, perfect teeth standing out against his black skin. Sabon was the only one Tamas ever listened to. He’d taught Taniel to shoot. A good soldier; a good man. “Damn it, I should have asked Ricard. Even if Sabon is with Tamas, there had to be a couple other powder mages left in Adopest. We need them on the front.”
Ka-poel finished the stitching and Taniel climbed to his feet. His shirt was nearly black, stiff with dried blood. He smelled like a slaughterhouse. He left it on the ground. Ka-poel would find someone to wash it for him. He fetched his one spare shirt from the tent and buttoned it up.
His tent was on the side of one of the mountain ridges that frames Surkov’s Alley. It meant he had to sleep at an incline, but he also had a vantage over most of the valley, and right now he watched the Wings of Adom camp. The Wings’ camp sat closer to the front than the Adran, and they held the east side of the valley with their flank against the river.
Reports were that the Wings were holding their front every day, but were forced to withdraw when the Adrans retreated so that the Kez couldn’t flank them.
Tamas would have been furious had he been here to see it, that the mercenaries were putting forth a better defensive than the Adran army.
A pair of Wings brigadiers were making their way from their own camp toward the big, white-and-blue command tent at the rear of the Adran army. A few other officers seemed to be heading in the same direction. A meeting, it seemed. If Tamas were here, Taniel would be at that meeting.
A great many things were different with Tamas gone.
Not far from the command tent was the mess tent. In most armies the cooking was done by soldiers for their company, or sometimes even their squad. Here at the front, all the cooking was being done by one chef, or so the rumor went.
Mihali.
It wasn’t hard to pick out the tall, fat figure making his way between the cookfires, checking on his small regiment of female assistants. Taniel frowned. Who was this man who claimed he was a god? Taniel had seen a god’s face – Kresimir’s – and put a bullet through his eye. Kresimir had looked like a god. Mihali did not.
Taniel took his jacket and headed down the mountainside toward the command tent.
Soldiers seemed to watch him everywhere he went. Some tipped their hats. Some saluted. Some just stared as he walked by, but Taniel didn’t welcome the attention. Was he some kind of curiosity for them to gawk at? For years he’d always felt at home in the army, but now, with Tamas and the powder mages gone, Taniel felt alone, a foreigner.
He wondered what he looked like to them. He smelled like the alley behind a butcher, and he probably looked like one too. His body was covered in nicks and cuts, his black hair singed from a powder blast yesterday, his face dirty and bruised.
And he wondered what he was. He’d managed to escape serious injury in five hard, bloody fights. He’d been grazed by bullets seven times in the last two days. He’d been inches from being run through on half a dozen occasions. Was he just that fast? Or something else?
That kind of luck didn’t happen. It was uncanny. Had it been like this in Fatrasta? No, he’d never been in an ongoing fight this bloody. He remembered ripping a rib from the Warden in Adopest and wondered if this luck was somehow connected to his newfound strength.
He reached the command tent, ignoring the guard who asked him to stop.
The tent was filled. There were perhaps twenty officers inside – what seemed like all the Wings brigadiers and Adran generals and colonels. Voices were raised, fists being shaken. Taniel slipped along the edge of the tent, trying to make some kind of sense of the argument.
He caught sight of a familiar face and moved up through the crowd.
Colonel Etan was ten years older than Taniel. He was a tall man with wide shoulders and brown hair cut short over a flat, ugly face. Not that anyone would tell him that he was ugly. The grenadiers of the Twelfth Brigade were the biggest, strongest men in the Adran army and one word against their colonel would find you at odds with all two thousand of them.
“What’s going on?” Taniel whispered.
Colonel Etan gave him a quick glance. “Something about…” He paused to look again. “Taniel? Pit, Taniel, I heard you’d joined us at the front, but I didn’t believe it. Where have you been?”
“Later,” Taniel said. “What’s the argument about?”
Etan’s welcoming grin faded. “A messenger from the Kez. Demands that we surrender.”
“So?” Taniel snorted. “There’s nothing to argue about. No surrender.”
“I agree, but some of the higher-ups don’t. Something has them scared.”
“Of course they’re scared. They’ve been retreating from every fight! If they’d hold the line just once, we could break these Kez bastards.”
“It’s not that,” Etan said. “The Kez are claiming they have Kresimir on their side. Not just in spirit, either, but that he’s there in their camp!”
Taniel felt his whole body go cold. “Oh, pit.”
“Are you all right? You don’t look well.”
“Kresimir can’t be there. I killed him myself.”
Etan’s attention was now fully on Taniel. “You… killed him? I heard some wild rumors of a fight on South Pike before it collapsed, but you…”
“Yes,” Taniel said. “I put a bullet in his eye and his heart. Watched him go down in a spray of godly blood.”
“General Ket!” Etan shouted. “General Ket!” He grabbed Taniel’s arm and shoved his way through the assembled officers. They all scrambled to get clear of him – no one stood their ground before a grenadier of his size.
“No, Etan…”
Etan pulled him out into the opening in the middle of the room, where the unfriendly faces of two dozen officers waited in tense expectation. “Tell them what you told me,” Etan said to Taniel.
Taniel was once again terribly conscious of his frayed, bloody clothes and dirty face. The room seemed to spin slightly, the air hot and close.
He cleared his throat. “Kresimir is dead,” Taniel said. “I killed him myself.”
The clamor of voices made his head hurt worse than the sound of a musket volley. He looked around, trying to find an ally. He saw General Ket in the group, but she was no friend of his. Where was General Hilanska?
“Let him speak!” a woman shouted. Brigadier Abrax, of the Wings mercenaries. She was ten years younger than Taniel’s father with a face twice as severe and short hair cropped above her ears. Her uniform was white, with red-and-gold trim.
General Ket took the sudden silence to sneer at Taniel. “You can’t kill a god.”
“I did,” Taniel said. “I watched him die. I fired two ensorcelled bullets. I saw them hit. Saw him crumple. I was on that mountain when it began to collapse.”
“Oh?” Ket demanded. “Then how’d you get down?”
Taniel opened his mouth, only to shut it again. How did he get down? The last thing he remembered was cradling Ka-poel’s unconscious body as the building they were in began to buckle and fall.
“That’s what I thought,” Ket said. “The powder has gone to your head.”
“He’s a hero, sir!” Colonel Etan said.
“Even heroes can go mad! Provosts! Get him out of here! This meeting is no place for a captain.”
Taniel was shoved to the side by someone, and he heard another voice say, “Kresimir isn’t here! What kind of poppycock is that?”
“I’ve seen him.”
Everything went still. Taniel recognized that voice. General Hilanska.
Hilanska was still seated while everyone else stood. He wore his dress uniform, decked out in dozens of medals, the collar freshly starched, his empty left sleeve pinned to his chest. The general looked tired, his immense weight sagging over the edge of the chair, his face pulled down from weariness.
Hilanska went on, his voice deep and level. “You’ve all seen him! At the parley this morning. He was there, you bloody fools, and you ignored him. The man at the back, who didn’t speak. He wore a gold mask with only one eyehole. If any of you had bothered to listen, the Wings Privileged said he reeked of sorcery, more powerful than any they’d ever witnessed.”
“That was only a Privileged,” Ket said. “Not a god.”
Hilanska struggled to his feet. “Call me mad, Ket. I dare you. Tamas believed Kresimir had returned. He believed Two-Shot here had shot him. But the bullets weren’t fatal. Kresimir is, after all, a god.”
Ket regarded Hilanska warily. “And yet Tamas still led the Seventh and Ninth behind the Kez lines to their deaths.”
“He’s not dead,” Taniel said, feeling his blood rise.
Ket turned on him. “Says our dead field marshal’s whelp.”
“Whelp?” Taniel’s vision went blurry. “I’ve killed hundreds of men. I’ve nearly held that damned line out there by myself the last two days. I feel like I’m the only one who wants to win this war, and you call me a whelp?”
Ket spat at his feet. “You’ll take all the credit yourself? What an ego! Just because you sprang from Tamas’s loins doesn’t mean you have his skill, boy.”
Taniel could barely think. He’d been on the front line every day fighting for this? Rage took control of him. “I’ll kill you, you stupid bitch!”
Taniel felt his muscles tense to leap at General Ket, when something struck him in the side of the head. He staggered and tried to run at Ket. Hands grabbed him, arms pulled him away. He was hit again in the head. Thrashing and yelling, he was forced out of the command tent.
“Taniel,” he heard Colonel Etan say in his ear, “calm down, Taniel, please!”
It took the sight of a half-dozen sharpened pikes leveled at his face to bring Taniel back from the brink of rage. The provosts – Adran military police – behind those pikes wore expressions that said they’d poke him full of holes in an instant.
“That’s enough of that,” Etan said, pushing away a pike. He was able to get the provosts to back off a few steps.
Now that the rage had passed, Taniel felt cold, weak. His whole body began to shake. Had he really just called Ket a bitch in front of the entire General Staff? What had come over him?
“Are you trying to get yourself killed?” Etan demanded. “I’ve heard rumors that there was a powder mage out on the front each of the last few days, throwing himself into the teeth of the enemy like he wanted to die. I’d never imagined it was you. You’ll be lucky to get off with a flogging for this. Attacking General Ket! I can’t believe it.”
Taniel pulled his knees to his chest and tried to get his body to stop shaking. “Are you done?” Why was he shaking so much? It scared him worse than looking down the wrong end of a Warden’s sword. Was it the mala withdrawal? His powder?
“Taniel…” Etan stared at him, and Taniel could tell there was genuine concern in his eyes. “Taniel, you dragged me five feet before I managed to clock you in the side of the head. I’ve dropped men twice your size with that punch, and I had to do it three times to even faze you. Pit, I’m twice your size! I know that powder mages are strong, but…”
“I’ll take full responsibility,” Taniel said. “Hopefully you’ll not be reprimanded.”
“I’m not worried about me.”
“Captain?”
They both looked up. General Hilanska stood over them. The provosts were gone.
“Colonel, I’d like a word with the captain in private, please.”
Etan left them, and Taniel slowly climbed to his feet, unsure as to whether he’d be able to stand but certain that General Hilanska might be his only ally left in this camp. “Sir?” He swayed to the side and stumbled. Hilanska caught him with his one good arm.
“Ket wants your head,” Hilanska said.
“I’d imagine.”
“You know,” the old general said, “with Tamas gone, powder mages don’t have any pull anymore. Some of the ranking officers seem to want to pretend you never existed.”
Taniel leaned his head back and looked up at the darkening sky. Some stars were beginning to show, and the moon glowed bright on the eastern horizon. “Do you believe he’s dead?”
Hilanska began to walk, forcing Taniel to follow him on wobbly legs. Taniel’s hands were shaking a little less, now.
“I don’t want to believe it,” Hilanska said. “None of us do, despite how the others are acting. We all loved your father. He was a brilliant strategist. But all contact was lost. We haven’t heard from any of our spies in the Kez army for three weeks now. We have to face the facts. Tamas is likely dead.”
If Tamas was dead, so were Vlora and Sabon and the rest of the powder cabal and the Seventh and Ninth. Taniel felt his chest tighten. No tears. There wouldn’t be any of those. Not for Tamas. But for him to be gone forever…“And Kresimir?”
“Whatever you did to him, he survived it.”
“What of this Mihali? This god-chef?”
Hilanska shrugged. “Your father seemed to think he was Adom reborn.”
“And you?”
“I don’t have any evidence either way. His cooking is amazing. Supposedly, he and Kresimir have some kind of a truce. Something about letting the mortals fight it out.” Hilanska spit out of the corner of his mouth. “I don’t like the idea that we’re being used in some kind of cosmic battle.”
“No,” Taniel said. “Neither do I.” His head was starting to clear. Things weren’t spinning anymore. “What can Ket do to me?”
“She’s a general. You’re a captain. A roomful of people just watched you try to kill her.”
“I wouldn’t have killed her. And I’m not just a captain. I’m a powder mage.”
Hilanska said, “I know. Tamas kept you outside the rank system. If he was still here, you would have gotten away with it. Ket is a good general, but she has a narrow vision of things. Tamas knew that. You’re just a captain now, though.”
“Who has been ordering the retreats along the front?”
Hilanska stopped and turned toward Taniel. “I have.”
“You?” Taniel had to keep himself from stepping back.
Hilanska set his hand on Taniel’s shoulder, as a father might to his son. “We can’t hold them,” Hilanska said. “Up until you arrived, we had no answer to those Black Wardens. They just cut right through the infantry like nothing I’ve ever seen. They’re faster and stronger than regular Wardens, and powder won’t ignite near them. Even with you here, we can’t hold the line.”
“What about sorcery? The Wings have Privileged.”
“Sorcery doesn’t do a thing to the new Wardens. It’s baffling, really. I can’t imagine that the Kez Cabal would create something they might not be able to control.”
Taniel mulled over that for a moment. His brain was starting to work again. That seemed a good sign. The rage was becoming a distant memory. “Maybe they didn’t create them.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, we’ve never seen a Warden created out of a powder mage before. Maybe Kresimir did that. Maybe the remnants of the Kez Cabal have no say.”
“It makes sense.” Hilanska watched him for a few moments. “Where are you sleeping?”
Taniel looked up to the side of the mountain. “Have a tent set up there.”
“I’ll get you a real room,” Hilanska said. “You need some sleep. Come find me in an hour, and I’ll have something arranged. Now, though, I need to try to convince Ket not to have you hanged.”
Taniel’s heart had finally stopped pounding. He felt deflated, ill. “Thank you. General?”
Hilanska paused and looked back.
“I’ve been turned down for more powder by a dozen different quartermasters. They claim we don’t have enough black powder and the General Staff is rationing it. Is there really a shortage?” Taniel thought back to Ricard Tumblar. The union boss had mentioned something about the supply demands from the front being unusually high.
“It’s not as bad as all that,” Hilanska said quietly. “I’ll make sure you get what you need. Anything else?”
“Yes.” Taniel hesitated, not sure if he wanted to know the answer to his next question. “Are there any powder mages left in Adopest? I know Tamas was training some new ones.”
“They all went with him. Even the trainees.”
“Pit. I’d hoped that Sabon was still here somewhere.”
Hilanska’s face fell and he let out a soft sigh. “You haven’t heard?”
“Heard what?”
“Sabon’s dead, my boy. Took a bullet from an air rifle to the side of the head over a month ago.”
Hilanska patted Taniel on the shoulder and headed off into the night.
It was several moments before Taniel could manage to take another deep, shaky breath. He looked at the sky again. The daylight was only a sliver on the western mountains now; the sky above, a blanket of brilliant stars on dark blue.
Sabon, dead. His mentor. His teacher.
That had to have shaken Tamas. Perhaps enough that Tamas had made mistakes.
If Sabon was dead, then maybe Tamas was as well.
Was Taniel the last powder mage left in Adro? It seemed that way. The army retreated more every day. Kresimir was alive, and demanding their surrender. What could he do?
Fight.
The only answer.