Heirs of the Fallen: Book 03 - Shadow and Steel (24 page)

Sumahn and Daris had come closer to Ulmek and Leitos, and Sumahn shook his head. “We should just leave them, here and now. We know where Ba’Sel and the others are being held, and should go to them straight away, and then—”

“What is that?” Daris interrupted, pointing toward the east. Four heads turned to observe a man running in their direction, frantically waving a Fauthian sword overhead. A shout drifted across the distance, and though the words were indistinguishable, the voice was not.

“My father!” Leitos cried. He jumped to his feet, as the Yatoans spun to peer at the closing figure. Those with bows nocked arrows, and made ready to fire.

“Hold, damn you!” Ulmek growled. “He is one of us.”

“Perhaps he was,” Damoc said tensely, “but we do not know if he is now in league with Adu’lin. Feather him.”

“No!” Leitos shouted.

Closer now, Adham’s voice pierced the morning quiet, but was still indistinct.

Head cocked, Sumahn’s eyes suddenly went round. “Ambush. He said
ambush!
”

Damoc looked over his shoulder, doubt written over his features. “I did not hear that.”

“Then you are as deaf as you are stupid,” Sumahn snapped, nocking his own arrow and aiming it at the elder. “Tell your people to hold, or I’ll stick a feather in your throat.”

“Treacherous dog!” Damoc roared. Nola joined him, sword poised, green eyes afire. Belina shook her head and backed away. Those Yatoan bowmen closest by, abruptly turned their arrows on the four Brothers.

Where relative calm had held, now confusion reigned on the wall. Ulmek began shouting furiously, and Daris joined Sumahn in bending his bow. Leitos counted at least half a dozen arrowheads aimed directly at his chest. There was nowhere to go, no way to escape.

Belina moved between Leitos and her people. “Stop! To kill him, is to destroy hope for us!”

Spittle flying off his lips, Damoc raged, “I’ve heard enough about your accursed visions, girl. Stand aside.”

“I will not. If you kill him, then you might as well kill me, and all the rest of us.”

“Heed me, daughter, or by the gods of old I will—”

A hissing sound, followed by a seemingly insignificant thump, cut him off.

Leitos whirled to find a young, dark-haired woman with an arrow lodged in her throat topple off the wall. An instant later, a hail of shrieking arrows sliced through the Yatoan ranks.

“Archers in the watchtower,” Leitos warned, at the same time Ulmek shouted, “Take cover!”

Sumahn and Daris followed Ulmek in jumping down to a slate-roofed storage shed built against the inside of the wall, and then they bounded off that and rushed into the shadows of a nearby building.

Leitos did not hesitate. He caught Belina around the waist, and together they dropped to the shed, rolled off the roof, and crashed against hard-packed dirt. Leitos took the brunt of the impact, with Belina landing mostly on top of him.

He groaned as he got to his feet, ribs aching. Above them, as his people died in droves, Damoc cursed and flung himself off the wall. Other Yatoans followed, some missing the shed to sprawl on the ground. Too many to count, pincushioned with arrows, did not regain their feet.

Leitos pulled Belina toward Ulmek. Damoc yelled some command, but Leitos kept on until he reached the safety of the building and his Brothers. Only then did he let go of Belina.

Damoc ran toward them, eyes bright with fury. An arrow jutted from one shoulder, and another from the opposite thigh. He did not seem to feel his wounds, and rushed near with his sword raised. “Betrayers! You led us into this trap!”

With blurring speed, Ulmek spun and batted away Damoc’s blade, caught the man’s throat, and slammed him against the building. His free hand ripped out the shaft buried in the elder’s man’s shoulder, then jammed the barbed head half the width of a finger into the skin above his heart. “Your enemies wait in the city, not among us, and the only trap is the one you stepped into with all your proud bluster.”

Unsure which enemies to address, the remaining Yatoans split ranks, half focusing on their surroundings, the other half aiming at Ulmek’s back.

“Call off your warriors,” Ulmek advised, “or I will end you before you see the deaths of your people avenged.”

The veins in Damoc’s neck bulged, and he flung his head back and screamed. His grief washed over everyone who heard it, and Leitos shrank back, knowing too well such pain.

When that cry cut off, the elder’s agony fled him all at once, and he went limp. Had Ulmek not still held him, Damoc would have collapsed.

“Call them off,” Ulmek urged. “Set them to defend us, or we are all dead. Do you understand me?”

With a pained expression, Damoc looked from Ulmek to his few remaining clansmen, and finally to his daughters. “Belina?” he whispered. “Nola?”

“We are alive,” they said together.

“The time to grieve those you lost will come,” Ulmek said, “but that time is not now. You must command the living. Fight, Damoc, and bring judgment upon those who would end your clan.”

Damoc looked over the Brother’s shoulder to his clan. “Heed this man in all things.”

As Yatoan bows began to lower, Adham skidded to a halt at the edge of the building, eyes wild, face dripping sweat.

“We must flee,” he said. “Adu’lin has archers ringing us about. Sea-wolves and Mahk’lar advance, tightening the noose, with the aid of Alon’mahk’lar—two score, at the least. As well….” He trailed off, glancing between Ulmek and Leitos, Sumahn and Daris. In a grave voice he finished, “As well, your brothers march with the enemy. They are men no more, but demons sheathed in the flesh of the men they once were.”

Leitos and the others stared in open shock at Adham’s revelation.

“What can he hope to gain by that course?” Ulmek seethed.

Damoc’s eyes lit up, as if discovering the answer to a puzzling riddle. “
That
is why Adu’lin so eagerly came to your rescue! He knows that Mahk’lar cannot possess us, and so serve no purpose in defending Armala against our attacks. The Kelrens are a threat, but no more than any man. As well, Alon’mahk’lar can be killed.”

“What has any of that to do with my brethren?” Ulmek’s dark eyes never stopped moving, but the elder held the largest part of his attention. By now, the Yatoans had taken up defensive positions to secure their bare scrap of ground.

“Had you not come,” Damoc said, “it was only a matter of time before we would have destroyed the Fauthians. But now these Mahk’lar can harness the deadliest skills of your men. With such warriors—those who can do us great harm, even in small numbers—he hopes to crush our rebellion.”

“How could Adu’lin have known we were more than just another group of slaves caught by the Kelrens?” Ulmek asked.

“Adu’lin, as does most of the world, serves the Faceless One,” Damoc said. “It is likely that he found out where you were, and sent the Kelrens to capture you, intending to use you against us.”

“There must be a way to force the demons out of our brethren,” Daris said.

Adham shook his head. “Once a Mahk’lar entrenches itself within living flesh, that flesh dies or is transformed, and the soul which controlled that flesh passes beyond the mortal realm.”

That truth pressed in on Leitos, but he fought despair by thinking of those yet alive. “What of Ba’Sel? You spoke of freeing him … is he with you?”

“After cutting Ba’Sel loose,” Adham said, “I went after Adu’lin, intending to slay him. That’s when I discovered what he had done. When I returned for Ba’Sel, he had fled. I had no choice but to leave him.”

“Ba’Sel was many things,” Ulmek said, “but he was no craven wretch. If pressed, he would have fought.”

Adham took a deep breath, collecting himself. “Doubtless that is true … but in the end, he was not himself.”

“What are you saying?” Ulmek questioned.

“It is a rare thing,” Adham said hesitantly, “but I have seen it before.”

“Tell us what you are going on about, Izutarian!” Ulmek demanded.

“The father of your order has lost his mind,” Adham said bluntly. “He began raving about his homelands, of his mother. If he survives, maybe he will become again the man he was. But last I saw him, he was as a fearful child.”

“We must find him,” Ulmek said, searching faces for those who might join him. Daris nodded eagerly, but Sumahn narrowed his eyes in unspoken refusal. Leitos recalled Sumahn’s talk of Ba’Sel’s uselessness aboard the
Bloody Whore
.

Of the Yatoans, none so much as batted an eye. Ba’Sel was unknown to them, and their fealty rested with Damoc and their clan.

Adham gave Ulmek a pained look. “Have you heard nothing else I have said? We are besieged. In moments, Adu’lin’s horde will fall upon us. Ba’Sel, whether he lives or not, is lost. We must flee … or we must fight.”

“If we flee,” Damoc said, “it could be months—if ever—before Adu’lin lowers his guard enough for us to attack again. And now that he has turned your brothers into the weapons he needed, he will fortify Armala, and eventually destroy my people.”

“Why Armala?” Leitos blurted. “What is so important about an empty city?”

“It is Adu’lin’s fortress,” Damoc said.

“That is not what I mean,” Leitos said with a shake of his head. “Why does Adu’lin not simply leave Yato? He would find many other lands safer, without the constant threat of the clans looming over him.”

Damoc gave him a quizzical look, but Belina’s face brightened. “It is not Armala he wishes to protect, but the Faceless One.”

“The Faceless One is here?” Adham barked, his voice mingling with those of the other Brothers.

“I have faced him,” Leitos admitted, “but he is no man.”

“As he is without flesh and thus unassailable,” Damoc added, “I would say his
spirit
alone resides within the Throat of Balaam.”

“Then we must destroy the Throat,” Ulmek said decisively, “in order to keep Adu’lin from him.”

“This is all well and good,” Adham said, “but we still face the same choices as before. Fauthian archers watch the wall, and worse foes are drawing nearer. Our death is all they seek.”

“Then we fight,” Damoc said with quiet ferocity. “For those taken from us over long generations,” he said, voice rising, “for those ravished by Alon’mahk’lar, for those who have died this day, and for ourselves, we fight.”

Chapter 35

After Damoc’s defiant words rolled over those gathered about him, the elder looked to Ulmek. “Your order is known, even in Yato, as men of war. How can we push past our enemies?”

“You five,” Ulmek snapped, rapidly pointing out those he wanted, “will join Leitos in drawing the attention of the archers. While the Fauthians and their allies are distracted, the rest of us follow Adham back the way he came.”

Robis, one of the chosen Yatoans, shook his head. “I will be no sacrifice.”

“You will do as ordered,” Damoc snarled, “or I will cut you down myself.”

Robis swallowed, tried to speak, but no words came. He reluctantly nodded under the stares of his fellows.

Satisfied, Ulmek glanced at Leitos, silently conveying to him the leadership of the small band. Only when the Yatoans had turned their attention to Leitos, did Ulmek lay out his plan.

“Once the Fauthians have turned their attention on you, you will have only moments to find cover. I will position another handful of our archers to watch over you, then wait for a twenty count for you to rejoin the rest of us. If you are not there in time, you are on your own. Do you understand?”

Leitos swallowed his doubt. “We will be there.”

“Very good,” Ulmek said, and picked out another five archers from among the Yatoans. When he finished, he glanced at Leitos, and bared his teeth in a stony smile. “Noise, little brother, will work best to attract our enemies.”

Understanding what Ulmek meant, Leitos nocked an arrow to his bowstring, took a deep breath, and burst from cover with a crazed shout. The Yatoans came at his heels, screaming like demons escaped from the Thousand Hells.

Leitos had taken three long strides before the first volley of Fauthian arrows rained down. A shout became a shriek behind him, then another, but he did not falter. Still howling, he aimed at a shadow lurking within an arched window, a hundred paces distant and four stories above the ground. For a single instant between strides, his bobbing arrowhead steadied, and he loosed the shaft. Before the arrow ripped into that darkness, before the shaded figure dropped from sight, he had nocked another arrow and drawn the bowstring to his cheek.

No longer focusing on targets, he sought an opening in the wall flashing by at his side. Of windows there were plenty, all boarded over. Midway down the side of the building, he found a wide stair rising to a portico before a set of massive wooden doors. Pitted and splintered with ancient rot, they slumped on their hinges.

He loosed his second arrow at another figure, then darted up the stairs, taking them three at a time. Running full out, Leitos cradled his bow protectively, and tucked his shoulder. The impact was harder than he expected, and despite looking ready to fall apart at the slightest touch, he bounced off with a stunned grunt.