Aerie

“Nevertheless . . . it is a task I accepted. And this is a piece of that task.” Ari took a deep breath and reached for the diadem of Siris, as Nofret reached confidently for that of Iris. Blue-white light, a little darker for the crown of Siris, answered their touch.

I am holding the crown of Haras. I am about to become a hound on the game board of the gods. He felt a chill, a sinking feeling in his gut, and yet . . . now that it had come this far, he could not put down that diadem. He could not back away from the game. More lives than just his depended on this.

And the game had been put in motion long, long before he was born. If Aket-ten was to be believed . . . maybe it had been started, not by the gods, but by men. As below, so above, she said. He clutched the crown and willed himself to be steady. He was on the path now. There was no turning back.

That left only one crown, that of the wife of Seft, Nebt, the Lady of the desert, the Voice of Prophecy, the Dweller Between, unclaimed. Kaleth stared at it for a long time. Finally, he picked it up. It remained lifeless gold in his hands.

He placed it reverently back in the metal box. “Not today, I think,” he said, and put down the lid, which closed with a muffled click. Then he turned back to the Chosen of Seft. “I assume you know something of these objects?”

Rakaten-te shook his head, but he was smiling. “Only that they once existed and were lost. But the gods do not leave anything to chance when the situation is as grave as this one, and they will guide us as to what we must do next. I suggest all of you listen to your crowns. They will tell you what you need to know.”

Kiron shook his head, even as his fingers caressed the cool gold. Listen to the crown? That was ridiculous . . . . . . wasn’t it?

But he closed his eyes for a moment, and felt the weight of the thing that he held in both hands, felt its solidity, its power, and . . .

Blinked, as his head jerked up, as if he had been nodding off, and he knew in that moment exactly what it was he needed to do, and when. He didn’t know what would happen after that, but he did know that much. The crown was a conduit for Haras, somehow, and made it possible for the god to manifest when it was worn by a living human.

Provided, of course, that Kaleth knew what he needed to—these things required a ritual, it seemed—

“The crown has given me the ritual that we will need, Mouth of the Gods,” Rakaten-te said, with great formality. “I shall teach it to you as soon as may be.”

Kaleth looked around the circle of faces, lit from beneath by the softly glowing diadems on their laps. “You all know what you have to do?”

As he met the eyes of each of them in turn, they nodded.

He let out his breath in a sigh.

“Then teach me, Chosen of Seft, and let it be now,” he replied. “The gods have spoken. Tamat the Render is coming, the ravaging goddess of the Heyksin, and there is very little time to waste.”

The Chosen of Seft could not look at him, but Kiron sensed all of Rakaten-te’s concentration was focused on Kaleth, with a fierce heat like that of the sun on the Anvil of the Sun.

“There is no time to waste, Mouth of the Gods,” the Chosen said, in a very controlled voice. “No time at all.”

NINETEEN

THE tallest flat spot in Aerie—on the top of the cliffs overlooking the main chasm—was their rallying point. Whatever Tamat the Render was, she was not coming alone. The Heyksin were bringing an army, the like of which only the Heyksin could field. For the Heyksin had in abundance something that was rare in Tia and unheard of, practically, in Alta.

The Heyksin had horses.

Now, the Tian army did have chariots, about as many as they had dragons. Which was to say, formidable against foes afoot but nothing like what the Heyksin were bringing.

Orest’s wing was running scouting forays, and caught them just leaving the Anvil of the Sun, at the farthest point of practical scouting range. The Heyksin force paused and camped overnight, resting for the assault on Aerie, and Jousters continued to watch the camp until it was too dark to see anything but the occasional torch, for they camped without fires.

That morning, a final set of scouts had gone out to take actual numbers, if they could. Orest himself returned, white-faced and shaking, to give the report.

“I’ve never seen anything like it,” he stammered, balancing in his saddle as his blue dragon Wastet perched gracefully on an outcrop that really looked too small to support so much weight. “They cover the land from edge to edge. You can probably see their dust cloud from here. Thousands of them. And not like our chariots, no, these things have slicing blades on the wheels, and armor. They’ll mow down foot soldiers like so many farmers cutting barley.” He wiped his forehead with his hand. “Those blades and things weren’t on the chariots before. They must have had them all stored and put them on last night.”

The Chosen of Seft nodded gravely. “This was how they conquered before. But we will have no foot soldiers on the ground today. We will have archers, spearmen, and sling wielders on the cliffs of Aerie. And we will have the Jousters in the air—”

“Every Jouster that can drop a pot,” Kiron said grimly, shading his eyes with one hand as he peered toward the horizon, looking for the haze of a dust cloud. “We have had every pair of hands that can busy brewing Akkadian Fire and sealing it in beer jars. The Jousters, too, are trained with javelin and sling. And I hope that the Heyksin horses are not accustomed to dragons.”

“Do not count too much on that,” Ari cautioned. “They have had a very long time to learn about our dragons. They might not have any themselves, but they surely have some weapons to counter them.” He looked to Kiron. “Only our newest techniques are likely to work.”

Kiron nodded, and turned to Gan. “Tell the Jousters that they must stay out of reach of the ground. Ari is right; the Nameless Ones must be expecting dragons and plan on us using the old tactics. I don’t want anyone flying down to seize an officer. Stick to attacking from above, and choose your targets with care.”

Gan nodded, and strode off to the edge of the cliff. He whistled shrilly, and with a flash of green, his Khaleph rose up from a ledge below to land beside him. He swung himself up into the saddle and Khaleph pushed off, carrying them both to pass the word on to the Jousters.

And perhaps the diadems they all held in uncertain hands would not be needed. He could hope for that. Perhaps whatever it was that the Heyksin had in mind to conjure up this “Tamat”—whatever it was—wouldn’t work. Perhaps the real battle would be won by mortal hands, hands that the Heyksin had outnumbered by as much as a hundred to one.

And perhaps you will do as your mother wishes, take back the farm and house, marry whatever girl still living in your village happens to consent, and settle down to raise barley. One was as likely as the other.

The dust cloud that stretched across the eastern horizon grew nearer. And now Kiron heard it, felt it, a rumble like distant thunder, except the thunder didn’t end, and it grew louder, nearer. He felt the faint vibration of the stone beneath his feet. And the Heyksin army still was not in sight, only the dust they raised.

The dragons shifted, stirred, complained. Below him, in the valley and on the cliffs, they turned their heads to look at their riders. Those few that had been in battle knew what this meant, and they wanted to be off. The rest took their cue from those few.

But Ari’s—and Kiron’s—orders were explicit. Let the Nameless Ones wear themselves out to come to us. Let the sun and the heat be our weapons. For there was a small, an infinitesimal bit of luck on their side. The season of the rains was not yet come. The sun still burned his way across the sky in the fury of full summer. The Heyksin were driving chariots, not riding camels.

Down below, the last of the feverish preparations ended, and people retreated behind their barricades of stone. The way had been made as cruel for horses as possible with every handspan of open ground strewn with sharp-edged shards of rock. The ways into the city were barricaded with piles of thorns. There was not a drop of water to be had; what water was freely available came from within the city, and those water-courses had been