‘Then you’ll die, you fool!’
Amber scowled, straightening up for a moment and looking Vesna straight in the eye. ‘I’m Menin,’ he said angrily, making it clear that was the end of the matter.
Then he added, ‘Promise me one thing.’
Vesna felt the words catch in his throat. They didn’t have time to talk; already he could see more Devoted cresting the hill and moving to attack them.
And yet… and yet what other time do we have left? Might be we’d already have fallen if this man hadn’t killed himself reaching us. He could have seen to his own, led his remaining troops away from this slaughter, but he chose to stay and die with us.
‘What is it?’ he asked.
‘If any of us live,’ Amber panted, ‘lead them home.’
‘Home?’
The Menin general’s face was now white with pain. Vesna realised in that moment the man’s injuries might be greater than just broken ribs; Amber might be bleeding inside too.
‘You’re their general now,’ Amber whispered. ‘You’re their God. Lead them home. Fulfil my promise.’
Vesna bowed his head in acknowledgement and the movement seemed to instil a flicker of new life into Amber. ‘I’ll die with my sword in my hand,’ the Menin declared.
‘You’re not dead yet,’ Vesna warned as the line of Ghosts parted to incorporate Amber and the handful of Menin with him. ‘We’ll take them together.’
Amber gave a brief nod, still wincing at the injury to his side, but there was no time for further words as the enemy arrived.
A spear shot towards Amber’s cuirass and glanced off, but the Menin appeared not to even notice. With a roar he hurled himself into the melee and Vesna went with him, the two men bearing death in their wake.
They ran as fast as the dark allowed, the ground shaking underfoot, groaning like the Land itself was assailed. The upheaval spurred them on. Legana led with her Crystal Skull in one hand, the flames trailing from it lighting their path. On one side of her jogged Daken, on the other Ardela. Close behind were King Emin and his Brotherhood, Carel and the two Farlan Ascetites, with the eighty remaining Sisters of Dusk following.
After the initial shock and pain of having her clothes set alight, Legana had wrapped her hand in magic and allowed the Skull to burn there, though she was unable to stop and work out why flames licked over the Skull’s glassy surface. Not long after they’d entered the tunnel a God of the Upper Circle had died; as soon as she’d told them, Legana had upped their pace, careless of her own poor balance, the injuries others carried or the chance of ambush. Whatever had been done to the Skulls must be part of Azaer’s plan. Time was running out.
The tunnel widened a shade and up ahead an opening appeared, lit by a faint crimson glow from the chamber behind. Daken didn’t break stride but sprinted ahead of the rest, his movements blurring as a blue shadow-image appeared in front of him. At the opening he checked himself and let Litania’s shadow whip through, to be met by swords flashing out from either side — but they cut only mist. Then Daken smashed one weapon from its owner’s grip while Ardela, beside him, smacked down the other, bringing her Harlequin’s sword back up in one smart movement to cut into the ambusher’s neck. Daken didn’t bother finishing off his; he left the disarmed Acolyte to those behind him.
From the lee of a stalagmite a slender figure danced, diamond patchwork clothes suddenly bright in the light of Legana’s flames. A long-knife flew through the air and caught the Harlequin in the shoulder, slowing its lethal lunge just enough for Daken to be able to parry the sword and bring his axe-blade down on the Harlequin’s leg. Still the white-masked figure turned and slashed at Daken’s face, and the edge scraped across his cheek-guard as Daken barged into the Harlequin’s shoulder. The impact knocked it off balance and Legana moved even faster than a Harlequin to open its throat.
More Acolytes converged on Daken, trying to pick him off, but King Emin and Doranei reached his side in the same instant. The sight of Doranei’s star-lit sword made them hesitate, and then the rest of the Brotherhood had come through, Veil leading the charge.
Out of the darkness on the other side of the cavern a dagger flew towards the king, who reeled away, crying out, as the air around him suddenly filled with white light. The dagger fell harmlessly to the floor and Legana stormed past the Brotherhood before any of them had found the new threat, kicking the knife away as she went.
A pair of dead blue eyes shone out from the darkness of a tunnel entrance, and as Legana advanced, a figure wearing a tarnished crown emerged into the half-light of the chamber.
‘You are too late,’ the Wither Queen rasped, malice shining out from her face. ‘Ilit is dead. They dare not oppose him now.’
Legana paused only to hurl a gout of flame at the Aspect of Death and the Wither Queen vanished backwards into the tunnel again, mocking laughter echoing in her wake. Legana started to head off in pursuit, until King Emin shouted after her, ‘She’s leading us off the path! You can’t follow her.’
Legana’s blazing emerald eyes turned back to him. ‘ She will dog our path. I must stop her,’ she said into their minds.
‘What about Isak?’
‘ You are all connected to him; you can find him without me. I will meet you there.’ And with that she vanished into the darkness, her bloodied long-knives ready for the fight to come.
King Emin muttered a curse and looked around at his troops. Ardela stood poised to run after Legana, but then she realised she would only hinder her mistress.
Instead it was Leshi who moved first. The Farlan ranger was gripped by a murderous fury over Tiniq’s betrayal. ‘This way,’ he said. ‘We’re running out of time.’
Swords crashed down on both sides, hammering against Vesna’s black armour. The dead were piled high around the standing stones; though his men had been greatly thinned by the repeated assaults, they were refusing to be broken. White light whipped around the Mortal-Aspect as he turned aside an axe and punched the man who’d struck him. A Ghost threw himself forward and dragged down the Devoted who was trying to stab up under Vesna’s guard; a Menin moved to Vesna’s lee and chopped down another soldier.
The Ghost fought his way on top of the Devoted and hammered at his face with the pommel of his sword, smashing teeth and bone with repeated blows until the soldier was still. He scrambled back towards the line, his feet slipping on the blood-slicked corpses, but a spear got him first. Vesna saw his mouth fall open in shock and pain, but all he could do was behead the Ghost’s killer and drag the dying man back.
Behind him Amber knelt, bleeding from half-a-dozen wounds but refusing to submit to death. The Menin general forced himself upright again, and the remaining Menin roared their approval even as Amber was forced to use his scimitar to keep himself upright.
Vesna scanned the ground, then grabbed an abandoned spear. He handed it to Amber in exchange for the blunted scimitar, which he hurled at the last knot of Devoted soldiers still fighting. It caught one in the side of the head and sent him staggering into the man beside him, the distraction enough for both to be cut down.
He looked around at the bodies lying around the circle they had defended. Some were crying out in agony; others gasped like dying fish, but all of them were aware their time had come.
‘We can’t face much more of this,’ he said, to himself as much as Amber. ‘There’s too many of them.’
‘Look,’ Amber croaked, pointing to the foot of the hill, where the white daemons of Ruhen’s Children fought on against the few remaining Kingsguard and Menin. There would be no relief, Vesna realised: what few troops left on the hill were dying by the hundreds in that horrific slaughter below.
‘Cavalry,’ shouted someone, and Vesna saw the Dark Monks, Suzerain Torl’s command, fully engaged with the enemy, outnumbered but pressing forward towards the rear of Ruhen’s Children with no regard for their own lives.
‘Torl’s buying us time with his own life,’ Vesna moaned, ‘but for what? There’s no one left-’
Further off there were other fights going on as the Devoted forced the mercenaries and battle-clans further and further away from where they were needed.
‘Not them,’ the soldier shouted back. ‘Who the fuck’s that?’
Even the weariest heads lifted at the surprise in his voice. Everyone turned to look where he was pointing, and there, behind the rise, were several legions of cavalry, advancing in an ordered line.
‘They’re not ours,’ Vesna realised with a sinking feel. ‘How in the name of the Dark Place did they hide those
