The Night of the Swarm

‘I’ve fought dogs before, Olik.’

‘No you haven’t. Not like these.’

He slid his hand into the leather pouch that held the kryshoks, dealt out four upon the stone, as though preparing for a round of cards.

Taliktrum shook his head, frowning. ‘If they wait at a distance, for the rest of the pack-’

‘Silence,’ said the prince, ‘they are here.’

He caught the sound of their panting, the low huffs they directed at one another. Olik tried not to breathe. Four kryshoks beside him; one in each hand, three left in the pouch.

Wait.

A sharp yip: that was Nyrex. The brave creature was still on the mountaintop, somewhere, trying to draw them off. The athymars growled at her, but they were not really tempted. Sweat was running into Olik’s eyes. The panting drew nearer. It was on both sides of his rock.

Wait.

Three were here for certain, probably four. They were trotting in small circles now, orbiting him, the scent always returning them to this spot. He drew a finger along the knife-edge of the kryshok. Sniff, step, pant, sniff again. He could feel the pulse of his own blood. Then, all in the same moment, the pack grew still as stone.

Olik hurled Taliktrum skyward. The ixchel man shot away like a living, screaming arrow. The dogs’ heads turned — and Olik rose and struck.

A kryshok could pierce welded plate, cut through chain mail like straw. Olik flung his arms out, snapped his wrists, making himself want to kill them. One. Two. The third so near it sprayed his legs with blood. The fourth was airborne before he could draw another kryshok, but only its forelegs reached the rock, and he sent it tumbling with a kick. He whirled, drawing his sword, and plunged it into the chest of the fifth dog in mid-spring. It knocked him flat; it had found the ledge and used it. Even as it died the creature bit him, and he screamed with pain. Four fangs locked on his arm. Never mind, where was the other? Where was the dog he’d kicked?

Then he knew. He rolled over, in agony, and lifted the eighty-pound corpse. Its eyes still on him, he smashed forward, and caught the last dog as it leaped. But it was wiser now. It snarled and clawed and soon Olik was retreating, still parrying with the dead dog’s body, still trying to free his sword.

The dog came on, a burning fuse. There was no more room to retreat. Then suddenly the athymar whirled in place and there were two dogs, fighting, falling, dropping from the stone. It was Nyrex, fearless Nyrex, a dog he had purchased barely a week ago, a dog about to give her life. They rolled, cyclonic, a single entity at war with itself.

He couldn’t wait. Nyrex would be shredded; the athymar could not possibly lose. He drew a kryshok and hurled it blind into the tangle of limbs with all his might.

A death-howl soared above the bedlam for an instant. Then silence. Olik found that his eyes were pinched shut. He forced them open: Nyrex stood over the athymar, dripping blood. The kryshok had severed the spine of the larger dog.

The prince slid down the back of the rock, dragging the corpse of the dog whose jaws had locked. He inspected Nyrex: she had scratches and a torn ear. ‘A torn ear!’ he shouted aloud. ‘Finest beast, that’s a mark of honour! But you’re a disobedient bitch — I told you to stay clear of this fight.’

‘Just as well she had other ideas,’ said Taliktrum, landing on the rock once more.

Prying open the jaws of the dead athymar was a foul business. When at last the prince succeeded, he groped for his tiny medical kit and washed out the four fang wounds with spirits of copperwood, then bound his arm with gauze. He called Nyrex and began to clean her ear. She whined and turned her head sharply.

‘Those were fine kills,’ said Taliktrum gruffly.

‘They should never have happened,’ said Olik. ‘I should have seen to my own horse yesterday, not obliged a servant to do it for me. You can’t blame the man for disappearing with his steeds. Law or no law, Macadra’s wrath could fall on anyone who aids me.’

‘You are most forgiving of betrayal,’ said Taliktrum.

‘I prefer to see myself as pleasantly surprised by loyalty,’ said Olik. ‘My mistake was betting my life on it.’ He glanced up at the ixchel. ‘At the river I will disperse the pack entirely, except for Nyrex here. She will bear you until we take to land again. Hold still, girl! I’m almost done.’

The dog was squirming, pulling away from him. She had grown abruptly tense, gazing back the way they had come. Olik stilled his hand. He rose, and motioned Taliktrum to be silent.

There it was. More baying. More athymars. A dozen more, at least.

Olik dug the kryshoks from the corpses, wiped them hastily on their fur. He tore his shirt, gave the pieces to his own dogs, sent out in a fan shape across the mountain. Then he ran as he had not run in ages. His jacket chafed, but Taliktrum needed something to grip. Olik was lightheaded from the loss of blood. The ruse with his shirt-scraps might buy him a few minutes. And it might buy him none at all.

The trail returned to the cliffside. They had descended from the summit, but not very far; there were miles of high country yet. And the sea? It boiled and foamed below them — so very far below. If it came to that he would dive; Taliktrum could fly to some crevasse in the cliffs and hide until the athymars withdrew. Every healthy dlomu was a diver; and every Bali Adro prince leaped from the Hyrod Cliffs before his thirteenth year. But this jump would be from twice that height or more, threading a needle between rocks, and the wind gusts could toss him anywhere, or turn him sidelong at impact, which would be death. It was a leap Imperial champions would shy from. A very last resort.

He counted his blessings. Good shoes, good footing. Enemies who announced that they were coming to kill you while still far away. Taliktrum, this gruff comrade-in-arms. And the dogs, with their flawless loyalty, of the kind that worked so much evil between men.

A mile swept by. From a hilltop, well inland, two shepherds gazed at him in wonder, surrounded by their milling flock. Then came a stone wall. Then a meadow, and a patch of wild sage.

‘Smell that!’ said Taliktrum. ‘You should stop and roll!’ But the prince shook his head.

‘Not strong enough to hide my scent. Worse, it would give them two scents to follow, once they guessed what I’d done.’

Another ridge, another breathless climb. At the top he surprised a hermit poking a fire by the trailside. The man fled with a squeal, leaving behind his water jug. Olik drank deeply from it, then tossed the jug over the cliff. Better that way. The dogs might harm the old man if anything he owned smelled of the prince.

‘Heridom, I could have used a sip myself,’ said Taliktrum. ‘Never mind, keep moving; you’re too visible here, and — skies of fire, Olik, what is that?’

Something whirled overhead, dark and viciously fast. Olik turned, chasing it with his eyes as he groped for his sword. But what he saw was so appalling that for a moment he could only stare.

It was a smoke cloud, or a swarm of insects, or a nightmare fusion of both. It was miles above them, probably, and fast as a shooting star. Jet black, opaque, and yet writhing as it flew like a nest of maggots. To his horror the thing slowed momentarily, as if pulled in two directions at once. Then it resumed its westward course, and soon dwindled to a speck.

‘Blood of devils,’ said the prince. ‘Did you see it? Do you know what that was?’

The dogs were whimpering. The prince himself felt ill. ‘I don’t know,’ cried Taliktrum, shaken. ‘How could I know? Tell me!’

‘That was the Swarm of Night. That was the doom foreseen by the spider-tellers, the doom that travelled with your ship.’

‘There was no such monstrosity aboard the Chathrand!’

‘No, but there was the Nilstone, and a sorcerer itching to use it. Well, he has used it, my lord. He has brought the Swarm back to Alifros, to kill and to feed.’

A sudden howl. Olik started. Four or five miles back along the trail, upon a knob he’d crossed thirty minutes ago, stood an athymar. It was looking straight at him — but its eyes were not the equal of its nostrils, and Olik reflected that there was some chance at least that it did not yet know what it saw. He might