City of Masks (41 page)

“Alifur, Corfin!” he shouted, without any hope of being heard. A man’s scream rose as the Stalker lifted him off the ground to rend him apart.

Garet waved his sword at the Blues waiting along the ditches. They threw down their torches and the bridge was engulfed in fire and smoke.

THE TWO YOUNG
Black Sashes had seen the giant with the axe fall, and ran forward to find the demon responsible. It could not be seen in the mass of bodies and the broiling smoke that now surrounded the remaining defenders.

“Get up! Get up!” Corfin yelled in Maroster’s ear, but to no effect.

Alifur searched neareby, but the demon was hidden from them somewhere in the chaos. Giving up on that, they both tried turning Maroster’s head this way and that, but the man did nothing but moan.

“It’s no good,” Corfin shouted at Alifur. “These masks are only good for one way.”

Alifur examined the bodies lying around her. She pulled Corfin closer and said something that made his mouth drop open. He tried to protest, but then saw the look in her eyes. The boy dashed off between the legs of both defenders and demons. He returned quickly, a stone mask in his hand. It was flecked with blood.

Under Alifur’s directions, he tied it clumsily to the back of Maroster’s head, so that its curved frame overlapped with the first and all the strings were knotted together.

The big man shook himself and got groggily to his feet. He felt the new mask with his fingers and looked down at the two children. Corfin pointed to where his axe lay on the ground. Maroster picked it up, turned around in a complete circle, and gave a shout of joy. He ran at the Tunneler, bowling over smaller demons in the process. Reaching the armored monster, he swung from below, catching the creature under the beak and wounding it so badly that it reared, giving Vinir and Forlinect a chance to set their weapons in its throat.

Garet took a mask from a dead woman on the ground, looked at it, looked at the joyfully violent Maroster, and tied the stone face to the back of the King’s head. While he looked for more, the King raised his sword.

“Why didn’t we ever think of that?” His Majesty mused aloud, and stabbed a Basher in its side as it tried to run over Relict.

Garet fought on, trying to get the defenders back into a line that might hold. Even with the Tunneler down and many other demons killed, the beasts had scattered the Banes and the few remaining Masks.

Relict and Forlinect held the right side of the bridge deck barely a third of the way in. Maroster and Taron stood by them with a knot of ragged Golds and two Masks. The King and Garet held the left side near the same level, with the other Masks and three Reds. The middle of the bridge was now held only by the dead, and down it the Stalker Demon came, long-legged, into that gap, moving with a weaving single-mindedness towards the Gate.

“TOO MANY HAVE
turned to fight us!” Ratal said. He fought side by side with Cernot, knocking down demons so the Old Torrick Gold could finish the stunned creatures with his pick.

“He’s right,” Corix said. She punched a Shrieker with her bladed gauntlets, knocking it under Tarix’s trident. “Our line’s too stretched. When the fire is done and we are dead, these beasts will get into the city!”

“Then we’ll adapt,” Tarix said. She stepped back to see the situation. Corix was right. Trying to stretch a line from the tip of one wall to the other left them vulnerable. There was a better way to deal with demons, and she knew what it was.

“Form teams of five and help each other!” Tarix yelled. Corix passed the order on to Ratal and the others.

Tarix noticed a Green puffing and wheezing beside her. The young woman fended off a Crawler with her spear and watched it scuttle away towards the bridge.

“Dalesta! I thought you were tending the fires,” Tarix said. She rested for a moment, leaning on her bloody trident. Kesla ran past, chasing down a Shrieker before it could get past Ratal.

“Sorry Master, but the wood is all gone now, so we came in to help.”

“There’s a Bane in you girl, and no mistake,” said Tarix. She put an arm around her shoulders. “Now, let’s finish off these beasts!”

Dalesta swallowed and lifted her spear. With Ratal and Kesla, they moved forward as a team, isolating and attacking demons as they went, and slowly driving them towards a bridge they prayed was still defended.

FINALLY FREED OF
the need to face in one direction, the King fought with a certain abandon, sweeping his sword in circles that held off the attackers for at least the moment. He knocked aside one of the Stalker’s long hands, then backswiped a twisted beast he had no name for. The thing went tumbling head over heels, howling out its pain like a wolf.

The Stalker hooted and swept its arms left and right, knocking back the King on one side and Relict on the other. It took a step forward, then another, and then stopped. It lifted its beak to the sky, and with the grace of a falling tree, toppled backwards, laying itself out the entire length of the bridge. Through the smoke, all could see a clawed hand gripping the shaft of a massive arrow sticking out of its chest.

Garet looked to the archers’ towers but they were empty. He had not seen an archer for some time, but there was a sharp clank, and another arrow cut by him to take a Basher in the shoulder. The defenders cheered and pressed in, sealing the gap. Garet looked back to the walls. A wheeled box of great dimension sat before the Gates. Branet stood beside it, pointing and yelling.

Garet ran to the Hallmaster’s side. The box was made of silkstone held in a wooden frame, covered on all sides as far as he could see, with a slot pointing forwards. The whole thing sat on two iron wheels with a single support sticking out the back. As he drew near, another arrow flew through the opening and arched over the defenders. Now he knew what was in the box: the messenger machine Andarack had used to send the King’s letters into the Thirteenth and Twelfth Wards. And he guessed these arrows were now tipped with steel instead of words.

“Another miss, Andarack!” Branet growled. “Can’t you aim this fool thing?”

Lord Andarack’s voice came muffled from within the box. “Not well, and not without sticking my head up and freezing!” he yelled. “That’s why I need a Bane to guide me.”

“I’ll stay,” Garet said. “Hallmaster, we are holding, but the battle is still to be decided. I beg you to bring out your reserves, for without them, we may yet lose.”

Branet looked to where the defenders hacked against demons emerging from the smoke wreathing the bridge. As each appeared, it was set upon by a diminishing number of Banes and Masks.

“I will,” he said. “You try to make this thing work better!”

And with that, he turned and ran back to the Gates.

“Andarack!” Garet called, but the noise of battle garbled any reply.

“Back here, lad,” a rough voice called, and Garet ran to the rear of the box, where an extension of the top and sides of the silkstone panels gave some protection from the continuous broadcast of fear. Three Ward Guards huddled there. One of them was Gonnect, Andarack’s Captain of the Guard and an old ally of the Hall. His arm was still strapped to his chest, but he seemed otherwise hale.

“What are you doing here?” Garet shouted. Even with the protection of the silkstone, it couldn’t have been very comforting to be so close to all those demons.

Gonnect clapped his good hand on Garet’s shoulder. “Someone has to be back here to push this thing forward and adjust the sideways angle for firing. Here, open this hatch and you can talk to the happy couple.”

“Couple?” Garet asked, and pushed open the little door. He looked within the box to see Andarack on one side of the arrow thrower turning a crank to raise it, and Dasanat on the other side tending to a strange collection of spark tubes and wires.

“Can this thing move closer and be more accurate?” Garet asked.

Andarack looked at Dasanat, who nodded.

“Closer, yes. Accurate, no,” she said to both of them. “We can fire quickly but it is impossible to aim between shots. And we need a clear space to fire through.”

The arrow machined clunked as the last missile fired.

“And we need more arrows,” she added. “They are stacked within the Gate.”

One of the guards, a young man, swallowed and took off at a run, trying to keep the silkstone box between him and the demons. He almost made it, but faltered to tumble down and twitch on the ground.

Garet stood to go and help him, but had to cope with the sudden return of the fear as he left the protection of the box’s shadow. While he caught his breath, two small Banes ran past to grab the guard and drag him slowly into the Gate. After a moment, they returned, each carrying a bundle of arrows.

They dropped them on the ground at Garet’s feet.

“We’ll get some more,” Allifur said, and she and Corfin ran away. On the way to the Gate, they passed Branet and the remaining Golds and Greens coming towards the battle. The Hallmaster wielded an iron staff of prodigious proportions, and looked as if he could hardly wait to use it.

Gonnect wiped his brow. “I’m glad your little Banes helped my boy. He’s foolish, though brave.”

The young woman crouched beside him snorted. “No one’s as brave as you, Captain. Or as foolish!” she said, though her voice cracked partway through her jibe.

Gonnect laughed at that and said, “Since you’re my daughter, there’s a good chance you’ll outdo me in both measures. Now, let’s pass these arrows through the hatch.”

Garet looked to the gate and saw Corfin, then Allifur running back with even more bundes of long shafts in their arms.

“Drop them right here, and we’ll pass them through,” Gonnect’s daughter shouted at them.

Garet looked over the silkstone covering of the automatic bow. A desperate line of Masks and Banes fought off wave after wave of demon. Defenders and attackers were mixed in combat, allowing no easy shot. He swallowed. There was one trick, a desperate one that might work.

“Andarack, reload the weapon and wait for your chance to fire again, understand?” he said into the hatch.

Dasanat’s face appeared. “But we can’t fire effectively without a clear target,” she said, her voice no different than as if she were discussing the proper temperature of a forge.

“Leave that to me,” Garet said, “and congratulations again on your wedding!”

Dasanat actually blushed. “Married life is much more interesting than I thought it would be,” she said.

Garet grinned and ran to where Trax directed the remaining Masks, all of them doubly protected with masks of the fallen. A Shrieker lay at the King’s feet, and he stomped down on it with a booted foot until it stopped hooting.

“One step forward, please,” he shouted. “Pikes to the front! One more step. Drive them back!” he yelled, and thrust his great sword forward to bloody the snout of a Bull Demon. The creature swerved and gored Bixa’s shoulder.

Garet caught the falling Captain and yelled at the King, “Trax! We have to pull the middle of the line apart, and let them in!”

Trax shouted without turning, thought the mask tied on the back of his head made it seem he was speaking directly to Garet. “Are you mad? Without this line, they’ll get to the gate and inside the city!”

“Andarck’s machine needs room to fire,” Garet shouted in his ear. “Draw back left and right. They’re all on the bridge now, so none will get behind you. Look, the other Banes are joining you now.”

A glance showed Trax that the demons in the field were all dead. Corix and Tarix’s forces had chased down that last of them, and driven the rest onto the bridge. Now those Banes attacked the remaining beasts from the rear, and the raging fires below kept them from jumping over the stone railings and into the ditch to escape. At his back, Branet’s reserves swelled the ranks of the road’s defenders, yet people still died under the claws and teeth of their single-minded, bloody foes.

“Agreed,” he said, and swept the flat of his sword to hold back the defenders. “Captain! You take that half and line the road. I’ll take the other to this side. And watch out for arrows!”

Captain Bixa held her sword in one hand; her injured arm dangled by her side. She began to force her troops back. Garet saw Trax doing the same, and stood in the cleared space for a moment before he remembered the next part of the plan. When he did, he jumped to Trax’s side, waved his arms and yelled, “Now, Andarack! Let fly!”

The machine hummed, clanked, and spat out arrows again, faster than any archer could match and with far greater power. The Bull Demon went down, in the first two steps of its charge. Next fell the last of the Catchers with three arrows in its belly. A Snake Demon reared beside it, only to tumble again, and then more, each of them impaled by the machine’s arrows.

“
WHAT ARE THEY
doing?” Ratal shouted. “They’ve opened the line!”

He forced back a Squeezer Demon that had tripped Dalesta. Kesla whipped her flail down to smash in the side of the beast’s face.

The Gold signaled Ratal to crouch, and she climbed onto his back. From that height, she could see the opened line at the other end of the bridge, the demons going through it, and the first of the arrows firing into their midst.

“Everybody! Get down on the ground!” she screamed and dropped, sweeping out Ratal’s legs so that he lay beside her.