The matt-dark helm inclined a slow acquiescence. ‘Very good, High Mage. She will be sent.’ Borun ducked from the tent.
Ussu turned to his aides, pointed to the body. ‘Get rid of that. Prepare the table.’
Yurgen bowed. ‘Yes, High Mage.’
When the captive was delivered Ussu was disappointed by how tiny she was. Not much room in the chest cavity to reach the heart. He gestured for his apprentices to prepare her. She was gagged, her arms stretched out to either side and strapped, legs bound straight. Ussu found himself studying her face much more closely than he had any prior subject. Hazel eyes bored into his, full of animal fury. Spirit. And tawny. Were you of Tali perhaps? A soldier? But so gracile! A scout, possibly. Yes, probably so. Still, there is hope. This conceit some have of males being stronger than females — not borne out by the evidence. Women always endure longer than men. Through privation, stress, even wounds. And so perhaps my efforts will bear fruit.
Taking his sharpest instrument, an obsidian-bladed scalpel, he cut open her ragged shirt, exposing her side. Then, feeling his way with his fingers, he slit down vertically between the ridges of two ribs. He held out a hand: ‘Spacer.’
The wood and brass instrument was set into his palm. Probing with his fingers he found purchase on the ribs. The subject convulsed, gurgling an agonized scream; Ussu flinched away. Damn. Have to start all over again. ‘Stop her from moving!’
‘Yes, High Mage.’ Yurgen and Temeth leaned on the slight woman, using their weight to steady her torso.
‘Very good. Let’s begin again, shall we…’
At the first turn of the spacing screws the subject let out a lacerating incoherent howl of anguish then slumped, unconscious. Thank the Lady! Now I can concentrate. He pressed ahead with the procedure while he could. When his questing fingertips brushed the woman’s heart he felt his Warren come to him with a power he hadn’t felt in decades. Head down close to the subject’s naked shoulder, eyes shut, his inner sight pierced the edges of Mockra and flew free.
And almost immediately the Lady was there to greet him. It was as if a cat had taken him by the nape of his neck. Her voice seemed to stroke as if searching for the perfect place to clench.
Ussu. My loyal servant. What blasphemy is this you practise in my name? Abandon these false delusions and join me!
He could not speak; was utterly helpless. And she knew it.
You trust too much to my affection and forbearance. It is only…
The voice broke off. He sensed a swirling shift as crushing pressures built around him. He glimpsed something bright amid mist. A blade. A bright blade.
Another is here… An interloper! She is here. This is intolerable! How dare she!
Something snapped round his neck like a vice. Blinking, he forced open his eyes to see that the subject had somehow slipped an arm free of the strapping and was now strangling him with an inhuman strength. Yurgen! Temeth! Where are you!
I will destroy the bitch!
The subject’s head rolled over to face him, the eyes open but empty of life. Something fell free round the neck, a leather strap and pendant. The simple stone bore an engraved image: an open hand. Emblem of the Queen of Dreams! An image flickered in those staring glassy eyes, a presence. And Ussu felt soul-crushing shame.
You have betrayed me, Ussu, another voice whispered to him. The sadness and regret borne in those words brought tears to his eyes. He felt himself fading from consciousness but behind the voice came faintly the rush of running water.
No! This one’s mine!
A blow and the iron band at his neck was yanked away. Someone supporting him. He clasped his throat, gasping for air. Borun, arm round him, sword bared and bloody. Ussu looked down: the woman’s torso, headless.
‘Speak,’ the Moranth commander demanded.
Ussu was massaging his throat. His apprentices all lay fallen round the table as if slain where they stood. Stiffly, he knelt beside Yurgen, turned the youth’s head to peer into his eyes. Not lifeless. Alive. But blank. The mind wiped clean. Perhaps, as they say, Mockra is a child of High Thyr. Perhaps, as they whisper, the Enchantress knows no boundaries. ‘The bridge, Commander,’ he said, still kneeling. ‘I heard… water.’
‘Guards!’ the Moranth bellowed, storming from the tent.
Ussu could not look away from those empty orbs. What was your last sight, Yurgen? Who did this? Was it truly the Enchantress? Perilous indeed is my… research. Yet I am helpless without it. What am I to do? Betrayer to both sides? In the end, is there to be no sanctuary, no refuge, for me?
*
The first Suth knew of any trouble was a change in tone within the general noise of the Roolian forces. Traffic over the bridge grated to a halt. Then a great many footsteps came thumping over the bed. Along the river’s shores a crowd of soldiers pressed down to the silt and gravel bars. He noted with a sick feeling that they all carried bows.
Then pointing, yells, bows raised, fired. A storm of arrows flew to the tops of the most shoreward piers. ‘We’re spotted, lads and lasses,’ Twofoot called — just to make it official.
No fucking kidding. Suth felt that his backside was now very exposed and very fat.
‘We gonna go for a dive?’ Fish called.
Twofoot frowned a negative. ‘Naw — we’d all just get shot.’
Scraping sounded once more high among the timber bracings and a black-armoured figure appeared, sword out, rope snaking up from its shoulders. Everyone stared, amazed. A Black Moranth?
‘Get the fucker!’ Twofoot bellowed.
Suth launched himself up, only to be yanked backwards by the rope at his waist. He flailed like an upturned beetle, almost falling off the timber. Fish and the others of the 6th made for the Moranth while he, or she, scrambled hunched among the crossbeams for the saboteurs.
Before any of the 6th could close, a crossbow bolt took the Moranth in the chest and it slipped from its perch to fall swinging and spinning from its rope. Lorr raised his crossbow from his shoulder, regarded the emptied weapon, then, with a shrug, dropped it to the milky-blue water below.
‘Ain’t you two finished yet?’ one of the 6th yelled.
‘Shut your Hood-damned mouth,’ Thumbs answered.
Suth slit the rope at his waist, readied his weapon. Arrows pecked at the timbers around them. They were hiding amid the under-structure and it was a difficult shot for the archers as they had to aim high to make the distance. ‘Now what?’ he shouted to Twofoot. The 6th’s sergeant ignored him.
Someone was yanking on the Black Moranth’s rope, attempting to raise it. But the body just kept banging upwards into a horizontal beam. After a few goes whoever was trying must’ve given up as the rope suddenly slithered hissing through the maze of timbers and the body plunged to disappear into the Ancy.
‘Boats,’ Fish noted laconically, and he raised his chin upriver.
Suth shifted his seat. Sure enough, a whole flotilla of boats was being readied upriver on both shores. Archers were pouring into them. All my homeland gods damn them! Now what? They were completely trapped! Couldn’t go up. Couldn’t go down. Couldn’t stay. Whose bloody plan was this anyway?
Thumbs swung free of the timber he’d been lying prone upon. A fat sack hung from his waist and a big grin was pasted on his broad face. ‘We’d better-’ An arrow appeared at his side, driven all the way up to the fletching. He grunted, peered at it amazed. ‘Just my friggin’ luck.’
Lorr lunged for him but he let go and fell, looking up at them all, his face a pale oval. He disappeared into the opaque turbulence around the pier’s base.
‘Damn!’ Twofoot snarled. ‘Things are gettin’ discomfortable.’
There’s an understatement. ‘Should we just jump?’ Suth called.
Twofoot chewed on that. ‘You could jump on to one of the boats an’ sink it like the big sack of shit you are. Now keep your mouth shut!’
Funny bastard. Wait till we get out of this. I’ll find you. And to think I didn’t even bring my shield!
Everyone tried to scramble even higher into the crossbeams to find cover from the bow-fire. Suth was shifting
