Last Battle of the Icemark (23 page)

Thirrin smiled as she thought back over her meetings with the Polypontian general. At first they'd been frosty, formal affairs, but eventually Andronicus' natural exuberance and friendliness had broken down her reserves and she'd even begun to acknowledge to herself that she quite liked him. He really wasn't that bad, for a Polypontian.

A sudden noise from the depths of the spiral staircase caused her head to snap up, and she listened intently, head on one side and frowning in concentration. There it was again; a soft dragging sound, like bare feet on stone. Quickly she seized the lantern that sat beside her on the crate and lit the candle inside it. The panels were of red glass, and when she doused her torch, only a faint glimmer lit the area around the head of the stairs.

She held her breath and continued to listen. Nothing for almost a minute, and then the unmistakeable sound of a cough echoed up from the black depths. She almost called out, but forced herself to stay quiet. If she startled him, he could lose
his footing on the treads, which were worn and broken in several places.

The footsteps were coming regularly now, even if they were a little slow and hesitant, and she quietly stood and waited. The cough sounded again, and once she thought she heard a gasp, as though he'd just seen the light. For another five minutes she waited, in a quiet frenzy of anticipation, then suddenly he was there, stepping into the dim light and shielding his eyes from the glare.

“Oskan!” she whispered.

He turned towards her and lowered his hands, but his eyes still squinted in the glare. He was completely whole and regenerated, and as she gazed on his face she realised that all the signs of aging had gone. His skin was unlined and his hair was jet black again.

He looked at her blankly, as though trying to remember who she was, and when she stepped towards him, he stepped back. Forcing herself to remain calm, she held out the flask of brandy, and after a moment he took it and swallowed a long draught. The strength of the spirit took him by surprise, and he went into a long paroxysm of coughing and spluttering that forced him to his knees.

She rushed forward and put her arms around his shoulders, and he grasped her wrist in a grip of iron. His black eyes focused on her and suddenly he relaxed and smiled. “Hello, Thirrin. Bit cold in here.”

She hurriedly fetched the clothes she'd brought with her and helped him to dress, while he took another, smaller drink from the flask of brandy. “How long have I been . . . away?”

“A week. You were burned black. Even your bones were charred.”

“Yes. I remember.”

“What happened?”

“I fought . . . the sorceress, and I suppose I won . . . the kids! How are they?”

“Unharmed. They said you just suddenly appeared in the sky above them, and the next thing they knew they were in the Great Hall.”

He nodded. “I broke her hold over them.”

“Is Medea . . . is she dead?”

“No. Just injured. I can't kill her, Thirrin. There's a price to pay if an Adept kills another who's a family member. But I can say no more about that; the Goddess has imposed a sanction. So Medea's probably back to full strength again, just like me.”

“But she tried to kill you.”

“Yes. And she nearly succeeded. Clearly my magic may not always be enough to protect us.”

Thirrin stopped and looked at her husband. It was one of those moments when she wished they were just an ordinary couple somewhere, perhaps farmers or bakers, or maybe merchants of some sort with no worries about wars or evil magic. She settled a thick cloak on his shoulders and then she kissed him. Just a small peck, but Oskan suddenly gathered her in a hug and returned the kiss with a passion that surprised her.

“Excuse me! I thought you'd just recovered from horrendous burns and a coma!”

“And so I have, but
everything's
restored and I've just realised the sheer wonderful joy of life!”

“Well, good,” she said primly. “But you seem to have come back younger. How ever am I going to keep up?”

“Oh, you don't have to worry about that. There's not a
speck of grey in all that glorious fire of hair, and not a line or wrinkle anywhere.”

“I should hope not. Some of us have a country to rule.”

“Well, just for tonight it can manage on its own. Come on, let's see what we can find to eat. I'm so hungry I could beat Tharaman in one of his pie-eating competitions!”

Thirrin sighed. “I'll have to see if there's anyone still in the kitchens; it is three o'clock in the morning, you know.”

C
HAPTER
17

S
harley and Mekhmet were relaxing in their room. Neither of them had yet got used to the idea of easy access to food again, and they were just finishing off a huge plate of cheese and pickle sandwiches.

“You know, if we'd had a few pounds of this Southwold Stinker to give us strength on the Plain of Desolation, I'm sure we could've fought off any number of elephantas,” said Sharley, nibbling appreciatively at a hunk of the cheese.

“Well, either that or we could have used it as a chemical weapon,” said Mekhmet. “The smell's enough to drive off an army of demons. Still, it tastes good.”

“Pickled onion?” Sharley enquired, handing over a jar.

The Prince of the Desert Kingdom was just spooning two of the fiery pickles onto his plate when a knock came at the door. “Come in,” he called, and then stared in amazement as Cressida appeared.

The Crown Princess never knocked on any door, and Mekhmet had often found himself holding a small face-flannel in a very strategic position and having a conversation with Cressida while otherwise completely naked.

“Are you busy at all?” she asked quietly.

“No, sit down,” said Sharley, waving at a chair.

She sat and smiled. “I just thought I'd drop in and see how things are going after all the time you spent on the Plain of Desolation.”

“Fine. We must all be as tough as old boots,” said Sharley, but then his face clouded as he remembered how they'd been rescued. “I'm just worried about Dad . . . I mean, did you see the state he was in . . .?” He fell silent and shuddered.

“Yes, horrible,” Cressida replied, her face a mask of worry. “But I'm sure he'll be all right. He's been put into the cave where he was regenerated during the first war against Bellorum, and the Witches caring for him expect him to make a complete recovery.”

“I know,” said Sharley. “It's just that it was such a shock seeing him like that. I mean, can he
really
come back from such horrible injuries?”

“Yes, he can,” said Cressida with characteristic firmness. “By all accounts his injuries were at least as bad when he called down the lightning in the war against Bellorum, but he regenerated perfectly.”

“But how can we be sure he'll make the same recovery this time?”

“We can't,” she answered brusquely. “There's no such thing as certainty in this world, Sharley. You know that. All we can do is hope.” But then her manner softened and she went on: “Look, Sharley, we're all soldiers here and we know that the end could come at any time. Dad knows it too. All we can do is be ready for any eventuality, and make sure there are no loose ends in our lives. So with that in mind, there's
something else I want to say . . . something important.”

She paused and shot a glance at Mekhmet, who immediately took the hint. “I . . . er . . . I think I'll just go and check on the horses,” he said. “They seemed to be recovering nicely the last time I checked, but you can never be too careful. A good bran mash should help to build them up.”

Cressida watched him leave, and waited until the door had closed behind him before turning back to her brother. Then with the sudden determination of a warrior confronting her fears, she leaned forward and took his hand. “Look, I, er . . . I just wanted to say that I'm . . . 
really
pleased you're safe, and that, er . . . you know, I'd miss you quite a lot if anything had gone wrong on the Plain of Desolation.”

Sharley smiled; he was much more in touch with his emotions than his older sister, and he knew what making such a statement must have cost her. “That's all right, sis. I'd have missed you too. You might be a bit of a battleaxe at times, but we all know you mean well.”

“Do you?” she asked plaintively. “I know I can be blunt, but that doesn't mean I feel the less for any of you, in fact for
all
of you: Mum, Dad, Eodred, Howler, Maggie, Grishmak, Tharaman, Krisafitsa, Kirimin, Mekhmet . . .”

“All right! All right! I understand what you're saying,” Sharley interrupted. “And we all know how you feel. You don't have to spell it out.”

“Good. It's just that with another war approaching, and all
that
entails, I didn't want anyone thinking I didn't care.”

“Nobody thinks that, sis,” he replied, and standing, he kissed her.

“Fine!” she said, becoming brisk. “Well, I won't take up any more of your time. There are things to do.”

“Stay and have a sandwich – the Southwold Stinker's really good.”

“No, no, thank you. There are supplies to check and troops to drill. I must get on.”

“Fine,” said Sharley and smiled. “But you know where I am if you want to talk again.”

“Yes, I do,” she replied and standing abruptly, she crossed to the door, wrenched it open and stormed off along the corridor, completely unaware that her capacities as a fully rounded human being had been expanded enormously.

Erinor rode at the head of her army, As far as the eye could see, rank upon rank of infantry, cavalry, chariot regiments and Tri-Horns advanced towards their next objective. They were now on the boundaries of the Polypontian heartland and had spent the last week reducing six border fortresses to rubble. Admittedly they'd hardly been the latest design in military architecture, being over three hundred years old, but when the Polypontian government had realised that the homeland itself was in danger of attack for the first time in more than four centuries, they'd spent huge amounts repairing the crumbling walls and sending the few remaining cannon to help in the defence. But it had all been to no avail; Erinor had arrived and picked off each fortress one by one. None of them had been able to resist the ferocious onslaught of shock troops, elite regiments and the Tri-Horns for longer than a day, and so in less than a week Erinor had turned her attention towards the heartlands of the Polypontus, and its glittering prize of the capital itself.

The city of Romula had stood for more than two thousand years and had never fallen into enemy hands. It was surrounded
by four circuits of massive curtain walls and a complex system of ditches, and during its long existence it had been besieged only twice. Both times the enemy had been annihilated by the defending Polypontian soldiers, and soon it had become a byword for impregnability. Over the centuries many other enemies had marched on the city, but each time the sight of its huge walls was enough to make the attacking armies turn about and go home.

But this would not be the case with Erinor and her Hordes. She had sent out many spies, who had returned with detailed reports of the walls' decrepit state; the masonry was crumbling, and it was also pierced with dozens of gates in woefully indefensible places. In the four hundred years since Romula had last been attacked, the defences had been neglected, and the money that would have been spent on their maintenance had been used to lay out pleasure gardens and to construct beautiful soaring buildings of marble. Worried military planners and engineers had pointed out the dangerous condition of the defences to the Emperor and his Senate, but they'd simply replied that Romula's walls were the Imperial Legions that had built an everlasting empire, and that its gates were the fighting spirits of her citizen militias.

But that had only been true before Scipio Bellorum and his ruinous wars with the Icemark. Since then the powerful Polypontian economy had collapsed, broken by the demands for more and more armaments to fight the countless rebellions that had erupted throughout the empire after the general's defeat. And since then the Polypontus had lost many of her trade routes and access to raw materials as many of her former colonies had regained their freedom and turned against their old rulers. In less than three years the empire had
become bankrupt; there was no money to make or buy weaponry, or even to pay the soldiers of the Legions. Almost all of the armament and munitions factories had closed; no new cannons or muskets had been made, and even the manufacture of gunpowder had ceased. There had been huge stores of the explosive, but these supplies were now dwindling and firearms were no longer the chief weapons of the army.

The empire was wounded and exhausted, and when Erinor and her newly unified Hordes had broken out of the land of Artemesion, destroying the Polypontian fortresses and walls that had kept them imprisoned, the Imperial Legions were too weakened to stop her. She'd rampaged through the provinces and countries of the empire, even destroying those who'd recently thrown off Imperial rule themselves. Some had offered to join with her in an alliance against the hated Polypontus, but she had rejected every overture of friendship and peace, sending the headless bodies of their ambassadors back to their governments and smashing their gifts to glittering shards. Erinor had no need for alliances. Why should she care? Her ambitions allowed for no equality amongst neighbouring states; she was destroying the Polypontian Empire only to remake it, with herself as Empress.

And once that monumental task had been completed, she would then have the leisure to invade the Icemark and destroy those who dared to call themselves the Hypolitan, and every one of their allies. Their so-called Basilea would die, along with Queen Thirrin, who was herself the daughter of the treacherous peoples who had fled the ancestral home of Artemesion centuries earlier, when the land was beset by enemies.

Erinor's corrupt and debased interpretation of the Goddess
allowed for no compassion and brooked no thought of forgiveness. In her view the Goddess was vengeful and judgemental; She was stern and unloving. Those who broke Her laws died, suffering slow and painful deaths, and Erinor had appointed herself as the Mother's weapon of retribution on earth. What greater proof of her right to fulfil this role was needed than the fact of her unending military genius and her victories against all who dared to take the field against her? Erinor was Basilea of her people, the true Hypolitan, and she was, in her opinion, undeniably the Mother's General. Let all who looked upon her tremble and fall to their knees in homage; and let those who carried the burden of guilt, be it centuries old, die before the justice of her striking hand.

But even though her power was undeniably great, Erinor was aware that her brilliance came directly from the Goddess, and she was determined that she would never forget this. Ever since she'd been a little girl she had offered sacrifice to the Mother, and she'd found that the greater her love for a possession, the more powerful it was as an offering. So it was that as an eight-year-old, she'd sacrificed her favourite puppy, cutting its throat herself, and pouring its blood over the altar. She believed that her prayers had been answered almost immediately when the tribal elders had chosen her, from amongst dozens of other girls, to be groomed as the old Basilea's successor.

Erinor smiled at the memory, and turned in her howdah to survey the great army that marched with such power and resolution behind her. She had achieved much, and now the greatest prize of all lay before her: the very heart of the Polypontian Empire, the city of Romula itself. Once it had fallen, she would undeniably be the successor to the power
that had conquered almost all of the known world. But in her heart she knew that to achieve such a prize, a truly great sacrifice would need to be made. And what possession did she own that was greater than her pride, greater than her glorying joy in the victories she'd achieved? She had made her decision, and when the camp had been set for the night, she would call together her commanders and announce it to the world.

With this in mind she brought her Tri-Horn to a halt and waited quietly. Immediately orders were bellowed and the entire army stamped to a standstill. With a single nod of her head, her people then scurried to set up the camp, and she watched quietly as streets and walkways, parade grounds and smithies, kitchens and stables began to grow from the wide plain around her like a city of hide and of wood. Soon her attendants bowed low before her Tri-Horn and announced that the royal yurt was prepared. Digging her goad deep into the hide of her beast, she waited until it lowered itself to the ground, and then she stepped lightly down and waited until her usual complement of body servants had gathered in an obsequious ring and escorted her to the huge hide-covered tent.

She took supper alone that night; she had no time or inclination for small talk with Alexandros. Her every thought and act was concentrated on, and dedicated to, her interpretation of the Goddess. Even chewing and swallowing her food was offered in homage to the Mother, as she nourished the body that existed only to do Her bidding; the body that was the instrument of Her will on earth.

But at last her hunger was satisfied, and, calling the guards, she gave instructions for her generals and councillors to be called. They arrived within minutes; nobody dawdled when
Basilea Erinor sent out a summons. They gathered in a silent, watchful ring about her.