His officers seemed as uncertain as he. “Titus. Can you hear me now?”
“Yes, sir. It’s only really bad if you get in front of the falcons.”
“You went through this with all the others. How did you know when they were done?”
“You just felt it. You knew. The earth itself seemed overwhelmed by sorrow.”
“Meaning we haven’t gotten our guy.”
“Not fatally. What came up out of the water wasn’t Rook. That was some local Instrumentality. Too big for a dryad. Maybe a water horse…”
A falcon spoke, someone having seen what he took for movement. In a moment every weapon discharged, mostly into the pit that had been the main target before. With the brush destroyed and the rock laid bare, now, the darts ricocheted, buzzed, and whined off in every direction. A man died and a dozen were wounded before the firing stopped.
Hecht asked, “Do you suppose he’s laughing at us? For being so panicky?”
“No,” Titus said. “I think he’s been hit so many times that he’s more scared than we are. He was right down there where we guessed he’d be. Because there was nowhere else for him to be.”
“And he didn’t fight back. An Instrumentality, a revenant deity, and he didn’t fight.” Shade had put up a fierce fight. Men had died. And the revenant had left a husk of a corpse that the Patriarchals ground in a mortar and scattered a pinch at a time.
“He was never that strong. And he’s been getting cornered and escaping now for more than half a year. Each time we get close we hurt him. This is the end. Stirring the undine, or whatever that was, was his last hope. If we thought it was him we’d killed…”
Consent was rattling. Stream of consciousness pouring out his mouth. Hecht had seen it before in men under stress. Had been guilty himself when he was younger.
A soldier yelled. Another did the same. A third called, “Hey, General, there’s some guy down there.”
Hecht squinted. Sure enough, he saw a bony, pale character in rags who looked like one of the Grolsacher fugitives Count Raymone and his bloodthirsty wife were hunting out of this quarter of the Connec. The man had both hands in the air. He kept bowing.
Hecht asked, “What do you think?”
Consent replied, “I think Rook is still with us.”
“Bring him up that gully. Rhuk, I want a whole battery positioned to rip him apart. Have him stop on that piece of white stone…”
Rhuk was frowning and shaking his head. Hecht saw the problem. If the falcons fired while the man was right there shot would ricochet into the troops on the far slope.
“All right. He stops a yard short. The ricochets will mostly hit him.”
The man seemed to be waiting for someone to come get him. “It isn’t going to happen, fellow,” Buhle Smolens called down from the head of the fall. He had a pair of falcons discharged in the man’s direction.
Hecht said, “Bonus for Smolens.”
A shadow flickered over the ground. “Raven,” Kait Rhuk said. “Landed in that big oak behind Sedlakova. Just to the left.”
No one knew how much power the revenant had over ravens today. The legendary Prince of Ravens had had a great deal. But the troops were ready.
A skilled crossbowman dropped the bird the moment it stopped moving.
That was the only raven seen, though they flew in mated pairs.
Vultures had begun to circle high above, though.
Moved by gestured orders, the man below waded the stream and started climbing toward Hecht. He was emaciated. Starved. Weak.
There was not one ounce of sympathy amongst the watchers. Grolsacher or Instrumentality in refugee guise, this was no one capable of generating compassion in men who had been in the field for more than half a year. Most wondered why the old man didn’t just kill him and be done.
“Stop him. Move a couple falcons to make the point.”
Rhuk did as directed.
Across the way, Clej Sedlakova repositioned his falcons to get a better angle of fire into the little shadow left down below. Buhle Smolens had his men drop firebombs, including some from the precious nephron supply.
Rhuk returned from moving the weapons. “He stinks, boss.”
“Probably has a religious problem with bathing.”
“A bath won’t help this smell. Never has since God created the world.”
The Instrumentality could not mask the stink of corruption.
“Before you do that,” the disguised revenant called, in a strong bass voice, as Hecht started to give the fire command, “a word.”
“Quickly.”
“A crisis is coming. You’ll need all the allies you can muster. Especially across the boundaries of the Night.”
Hecht rehearsed what he knew about the Old Gods and crises pending.
He made a hand gesture out of sight of the revenant.
Rook had some power in reserve. It prevented the match men from firing their falcons. All but one.
One was enough. Rook’s concentration broke.
The falcons began to bark. Raggedly.
Belatedly.
Rook collapsed into a seething mound of maggots.
Kait Rhuk did not need to be told. Injured wrists and all, he helped tilt a falcon so it could fling its godshot into that mess before many maggots could wriggle away.
Hecht felt the sensation Titus Consent had talked about earlier. An abiding, deep sorrow that an age had come to an end.
Ravens began to gather. Hecht said, “Take iron tools and mash those maggots. Throw coals on them. Do whatever it takes.” An Instrumentality as old as Rook must have had several ways of evading ultimate death. The evil always did in old stories.
This one would get no help from Piper Hecht.
Titus Consent said, “You didn’t consider his offer.”
“It would not have stuck to the bargain. It couldn’t have. That was not its nature. It would’ve turned on us.”
Everyone got busy destroying maggots and cleaning up. Hecht sat on a boulder and contemplated the pool. It had changed color. Maybe because of the changing angle of the light. Maybe because of something else.
That water was cold and uninviting now.
Something did not want to be disturbed.
Let it be. It would harm nothing now.
Hecht sensed that it grasped the “Or else” implicit in his clemency.
The men all talked about what they would do now. Everyone assumed there would be downtime. Maybe a lot. They might all be unemployed soon.
Not one man decided to go swimming.
The Patriarchal army left the wilderness, headed into garrison in Viscesment. From Viscesment Hecht intended to return to Firaldia, where he expected his force to wither. The Patriarch would start letting soldiers go, now. He had no need for them anymore.
Riders on exhausted horses came hurrying up the old Imperial road beside the Dechear. They caught the army two leagues east of Viscesment. Pickets brought them to the Captain-General. Who picked one out and snapped, “Pella! I told you to stay…”
“Dad, the Patriarch sent me! Bellicose himself! He thought I could find you easier than anyone else.”
Hecht saved his thoughts, including those about a boy so young being abroad with only four lifeguards in these anxious times. “What is it?”
Pella swelled with pride as he handed off a courier case bearing the Patriarchal seal. Hecht felt some pride
