death's knight 20

 sorry to be late, I could not sleep for ages, it was so hot. 

Chapter 20

 

 

Thyella and Phaedros had left Kaz, Rynn, and Hraazaz when they emerged from the temple.

“Harkon needs us to add advocacy,” said Thyella. “And he’s hurt so I want to go to him.”

“It’s a routine journey back to Mesolimnos,” said Kaz. “Though, I must say, heroic travel would be useful.”

“You need to concentrate on lifting your body with your kormajeia and carrying it,” said Thyella. “It’s a question of practice.”

“And I am relying on Thyella, because I haven’t mastered it yet,” said Phaedros.

Kaz did not say so, but she hoped she would be able to manage things a little more quietly than Thyella.

“Dear one, I suspect you should consider practising merging with shadows, and moving from shadow to shadow,” said Alethos.

“Good idea,” said Kaz. “I will doubtless exhaust myself, however.”

“There was a plaintive request not quite made in that.”

“I will want a nice Alethos-shaped cushion to sleep on and have nice dreams.”

 

oOoOo

 

 

Thea Drex was not a woman who believed in dreams, especially not the sort of lustful dreams for unattainable men which entertain many a girl through her puberty. Thea had foresworn men to turn herself into a fighting machine for her goddess, and when she looked at a man, it was to assess his ability as a soldier under her command. She had slept with such men as made her path easier, and who could get her into a position where she might prove her worth on her own merits, and they had an unfortunate propensity for dying after she had moved on. This was not entirely Thea’s fault; she did not go out of her way to kill them, at least, not after the first two, whose bedroom activities had disgusted her so much that she wanted to obliterate them. Thea, however, carried an unfortunate chaos taint of being bad luck. Bad luck never fell to her, but it did blight those to whom she was close. It had taught Thea not to ever become fond of anyone, and to subjugate any carnal needs in her duty.

Thea was, therefore, unaccustomed to waking up panting and needy from the dream about the handsome warrior, with the exotic features of the far north. A broad, muscular man, who carried his musculature well, being tall, with blue eyes accustomed to laughing, and neatly cut beard and moustaches, not wild like most northerners, but tamed as many noblemen of her own kind trimmed their face furniture. He was a man who one might see was accustomed to command, and a momentary aberration of thought had Thea wondering whether he could command her.

Thea was herself one of the northern folk by birth, brought to the empire as a child slave, and earning her way up in the world as a gladiatrix and then general, earning a second name. This dream was some half-forgotten memory and of no account. The Empire was a place where even slaves might rise, if they were clever and determined, and gave themselves to the worship of the red moon. Thea was both clever and determined; and could remember little of the gods of her ancestors.

She put the dream to one side, and rose to perform her usual exercises; and worked on banishing the handsome face when it intruded on her thoughts.

There was trouble in the city states and it was time for the empire to put them down properly. She studied the map of the city which had instigated most trouble, Mesolimnos.  The main map merely showed it to be on a river between two lakes, which should not have caused a problem at all to the besiegers, but a runner had returned with a map drawn using the familiar spirit of Allenna Dren.  Such things were never entirely satisfactory as spirits saw in a different way, but it was easy to see that a siege was close on impossible, since the city stood not on the river, but on a number of islands which lay in a braided waterway, all joined by broad, heavy bridges.

They would have to build or requisition enough ships to make an effective watergate above and below stream of the city as well as get troops round to the west of it.

What Allenna Dren’s familiar could not see were that the heavy bridges also carried sewer tunnels, as the city fathers of Mesolimnos had provided for the disposal of sewerage into the swamp, rather than into the river; and that as well, there were huge numbers of storm drains to deal with the rain on low-lying islands, and that the storm drains ran to secondary water courses rather than adding to the spate of the river on which the city ran. Though the Solosi were in charge of law, it had been the military engineers of the Alethosi who had built the city, including lock gates, run-off pools, emergency water venting channels, and a defensive design which was second nature.  Adding the trógling familiarity with underground places was a bonus. And there were fewer islands than there had been, since spoil from the mines in the mountains of Kyrios had been used to build up foundations and build land, and some of the broad streets of the city had once been bridges. And trógling found uses for the caissons of their one time piers, and merged stone to keep water from seeping into the spaces left where once had been arches.

“Maybe in winter, when it ices up,” muttered Thea. The runner had also brought the unpalatable news that half the besiegers were suffering the fever and ague from the bad marsh air; but winter, too, would cure that.  And there was a prophecy about a long winter.

 

oOoOo

 

Selen chuckled as she joined her brother.

“You stink of that barbarian god,” complained Daze. “What has he got that I do not?”

“Dominion over winds and clouds,” said Selen. “Oh, grow up! I took what I needed, nothing more. I absorbed that silly little bitch of an ice spirit, and took her powers, but I can’t use them fully save locally. I used her appearance to gain his seed My daughter with Ombros will be able to spread cold and ice even as far as Mesolimnos, and keep it there.”

“But how long will we have to wait?”

“Patience! You know that the children of major gods grow fast; look at that little idiot, Phaedros, whose development you stunted; I wager few of his companions know he is only seven years old, and with chaos, I can speed things up. She will be born on the waxing moon this month and be able to help this very winter with wild childhood talent. If she is ill-treated she will react with producing snow and cold. I sense that this solstice will be significant.”

 

oOoOo

 

The Alethosi could do little but prepare for the likelihood of a more sustained siege. Chrysandion Lightspear, Lightfather of Solos, scoffed at first, but Harkon had proved reliable, so he listened, looked at maps Harkon showed him, frowned, and ordered that outlying farmers be brought into the city with their produce and stock for the winter, housing them on the banks of the Red River, inside the stockade thrown up in case of enemy incursion. Many hands willingly built housing for them, and the Solosi took charge of one seventh of all grains, to be held and rationed as needed, buying it from temple funds. It had been a good year for crops, and the farmers were glad to get a fixed rate when they had feared a glut rate; and Harkon was not alone in thanking Zea for her bounty and praying devout thanks to her at the harvest festival.

“We have prophecies too,” said Chrysandion. “This one was ‘make the most of Zea’s bounty for you know not when you will need it; let all rejoice when the lost daughter returns, and know that it is time to garner one seventh of all.”

“Well, that’s clear enough,” said Harkon. “Mycota is returned from the underworld, and restored to her father,  so she’s the lost daughter returning.  I’m going to take some watermen down to the swamp away from the sewerage and gather cat-tails; you can dry the root and make it into a nutritious flour, or bake it as a vegetable.  And better whilst it’s fully flavoured and fat, than half withered when we really need them towards spring.”

“You really do move in some exalted company,” said Chrysandion. He sounded half wistful.

“And we were on our way to the sun court seconds ahead of Tor himself, and I was not displeased to have missed him,” said Harkon.

 

Harkon was much relieved when Protasion led his party, including the new tróglings, into the city, having sailed straight down the lake.

“Those high toróg – who were they?” demanded Protasion. “None of the little guys is able to give me a coherent answer.”

“Remember when the Toróg tried to heal the first curse, which produced only great toróg, because their ceremony involved pre-curse high toróg women all of one clan being impregnated by a single high toróg who serviced his sisters and cousins? Well, that was one of them. Or it may have been both, and because they were twins they were symbolically one. The toróg don’t talk about it, and small wonder. I don’t know if they were the last surviving male high toróg, but if they were, I’m not about to lose any sleep over us having killed them.”

“I can’t believe I managed to wound one!” said Protasion.

“Oh, you’re nicely on the hero path yourself,” said Harkon. He thought, rather than saying, that it would be just as well to have several near-heroes, if Selen sent her heroine, Thea Drex, against the city states. “And I know what to do.  I need Thyella.”

“Yes, Harkon, but do get a room,” said Protasion.

“Oy!” said Harkon. “I need her tactically.”

Thyella appeared at Harkon’s side with a light fizzle.

“Are we going spying?” she asked.

“No, well, yes, but I need to go and see a man called Kurihor,” said Harkon.

“I know him. He’s a leader of leaders amongst the plainsfolk,” said Thyella.

“Can you drop me down in front of him?” asked Harkon.

“If you wish,” said Thyella. “It may be an odd conversation, mind you; they think I’m male.”

“Which is why I suggested you dropping me in front of him, not trying to explain who you are,” said Harkon. “I want to offer him a couple of trógling miners to make underground caches for their grain to hide it from the Selenites.”

“If they set fire to the grass – or I do with a storm and lightning strike – they can claim their grain burned,” said Thyella.

“Brilliant,” said Harkon.

 

oOoOo

 

Kurihor jumped when a sizzling lightning bolt landed in front of him and became a figure he recognised.

“Harkon? I thought you were Alethosi, not with the Sky Horse,” said the rebel chief.

“I have an alliance with Pieran,” said Harkon.  “I come with a suggestion and a proposal.”

“Speak; I am listening,” said Kurihor.

“The empire is going to be marching men around both sides of the great lake,” said Harkon. “They’ll expect to live of your people’s food.”

“We can only carry so much as we melt into hidden valleys,” said Kurihor, “But I thank you for the warning.”

“Wait; if I provide you with trógling miners who will create underground caches for grain and hay, and some passages for escape, will you permit the firing of the plains to deny fodder to the Selenite army?”

“Permit? I’ll light fires myself,” said Kurihor. “Can this really be done?”

“Let me consecrate a temple to Alethos, and you will have your trógling,” said Harkon. He had prayed, and Alethos had been willing to permit Kaz to lead trógling, holding her hands, to use the hero’s path between temples.

It was why the Selenite temples in Mesolimnos had been formally desecrated, their bound spirits driven off or destroyed, as soon as they had been expelled for the second time. There was no room for Thea Drex to turn up in the middle of the city. Battling the powerful bound spirits of temple guardians had been a job for those questing for herodom; and to the chagrin of the Solosians, it had been a team of dedicated Alethosi who had taken on the job, lifting more than one of them closer to their goal in ripping the spirits for their power and glyphic association, to deny them to the enemy.

 

“Right; where do you want it?” asked Kurihor.

“Somewhere the Selenites don’t go?” said Harkon.

“Oh, a god of death will not mind our burial grounds,” said Kurihor. “Come this way.”

There were spirits guarding the place of the dead; and Harkon nodded to them respectfully. He pegged out the shape of the death glyph and dug out the shape, cutting his palm to bleed at each point, and setting the iron sword he had brought for that purpose at the centre.

“Let there be a structure put over this, where trógling can live when they are not setting up your caches,” he said. “I have volunteers who will ride with your people to other clans and do the same for them, across the plain from the trade road to the lake.”

“And when will they come?” asked Kurihor.

“As soon as I go back and begin to collect them,” said Harkon, calmly, who knew with certainty that he could walk the hero’s path.

“Not that sassy one, please,” said Kurihor.

“She will bring some, but she has her own duties,” said Harkon.

He saluted Kurihor, and walked through the sword embedded in the ground, and out into his own temple’s sanctum.

“I do love you, Alethos,” he said.

“You are an excellent hero of mine,” said Alethos.

 

Shortly after, trógling in pairs started arriving on the plains, with veils over their faces to guard against the still bright autumnal sun. A female saluted Kurihor.

“We met when you weren’t crucified, though I don’t suppose you remember all of us who guided you,” she said. “I am Arrag, initiate of Alethos, and I am leading the miners here. Let us know where you want us and we will hide your grain. It’s up to you to hide your cattle and other lifestock.”

“The plains are folded, there are places to hide,” said Kurihor. “It’s carrying grain and fodder with us that is a problem.”

“You will have to send sorties to collect it,” said Arrag. “I cannot guarantee to dig passages before they are needed, but we will do our best. I also pay worship to Zog, lord of dirt and stone. He is part of the shadowsphere now.”

“You do as seems best,” said Kurihor, who had not followed a tenth of that and did not plan to get involved in godly politics in any case. “What pay do you want?”

“A place to live and our keep and needs until the job is done, and acceptance,” said Arrag.

“That is easily promised,” said Kurihor. “You have our gratitude for keeping our meagre crops from the enemy.”