rear.
As Paks edged her way past those who had just come up, she felt the day’s fatigue like a smothering sack of wool. One of the surgeons stationed near the bridge from the siege tower waved her down next to a group of wounded. Paks sank down and tried to ease her helmet off. It wouldn’t come; she felt a dint in the front.
“Wait,” said the surgeon. “Just sit there—” he turned to one of the others. “We’ll need more torches here.” The man nodded and moved off, and the surgeon tightened the bandage he was applying. “There. Yes. Now let me see that helmet—yes. Quite a dint. Do you know what hit you?” Paks shook her head. “Did you fall down?”
“Not then.”
“Let me get it off.” He pulled it off and touched her head. Paks winced. “Tender, eh? I’m not surprised, with that lump.” Several men came up with torches. “Good,” he told them. “Hold one here. Now look at it,” he told Paks. She squinted at the bright glare. “Not too bad. Let’s see that arm—anything else?”
“Something stuck my leg.” Paks moved her left leg a little. Someone—not the surgeon—took off her boot. It hurt. She tried to see what it looked like.
“Hold still,” scolded the surgeon. “This arm needs work; I’ll see the leg in a moment.” Paks smelled the pungent cleansing solution and braced herself. It felt cold, then burned. Her head throbbed, and she closed her eyes. She felt the surgeon start probing the wound in her leg. She heard him mutter to someone else, and hands steadied her leg as the pain sharpened. She wanted to argue with him, but it was too late. She thought he must be sewing up the hole, whatever it was, but it felt much worse. She wanted to throw up.
“It’s the head, mostly,” said the surgeon; Paks opened her eyes. Kefer was there, staring at her, and Arcolin stood by the tent flap. Tent?
“I thought we were on the wall,” she said. The surgeon turned to her.
“You were. You’d been hit on the head, and you passed out while I was working on your leg.”
“Oh.” She couldn’t remember anything of that, just being on the wall, and fighting, and strange lights.
“Was there a blue light?” she asked doubtfully. “And a yellow one later?”
“Yes.” Arcolin stepped nearer. He was scowling. “That was clerics—theirs first, then ours.”
“Clerics?” Paks felt even more confused. She had never seen any priest or Marshal make strange lights.
“Never mind that now.” He turned to the surgeon. “How long?”
The surgeon shrugged. “A good night’s sleep, I expect. Maybe a day.” He brought Paks a mug. As her vision blurred with numbwine, she saw the surgeon follow Arcolin and Kefer from the tent.
She woke to broad daylight. The surgeon, busy with others, saw her test the tender lump on her head.
“How is it?”
“Fine.”
“Try moving around.” Paks sat up and winced as her bandaged arm and leg twinged. But these were minor pains; she could move easily. “Go on and stand.” She had no trouble with that, either, and he sent her out. “Get a new helmet—size or so too large, and use extra padding for a day or so. If you get dizzy, or your eyes blur, come back at once. And eat before you go back on duty.”
Outside, their camp was in turmoil. Paks could see more troops—Westland men—marching into Sibili through the breached wall. She wondered why they weren’t using the gates. Smoke rose over the city walls. As she headed for the quartermaster, she saw Dorrin’s cohort returning from the city, faces black with soot and grime.
Her new helmet felt unwieldy, even after she wrapped a cloth around her head. She tried again. Still odd- feeling. When she got to the cooks’ tent, she found Barra and Natzlin.
“We heard you were hurt,” said Barra, dishing up stew.
“Something hit my head.”
“Are you going back in?” Paks wondered if she imagined the edge in that tone.
“Of course. Where’s Arcolin—or Pont?”
“They’re inside. It’s a mess in there, too.”
“What about it?”
“They’ve got some kind of wizard or priest and just when you think you’ve got a group on the run, there’ll be a stinking black cloud all around; you can blunder into anything. Walls, a fire, their fighters—you can’t see your own nose.”
“And look out for the ones that don’t look armed,” added Natzlin. “They dress like rich folk, but they carry throwing knives.” She gestured to a cut on her cheekbone. “They’re good with them, too. You could lose an eye.”
“Who’ve we lost?” asked Paks.
“In Arcolin’s? I heard that Suri fell from the tower last night, and someone—who was it, Natz?—took a crossbow bolt in the eye.”
“Gan, that was—Gannarrion. And Halek—”
“Halek? What happened to him?”
“Sword thrust in the gut, on the wall.”
Paks finished her stew in silence. She had not liked Halek, not at all. But she wished she knew it had not been her sword, there in the darkness. She found her cohort; by the end of that day, the gate tower had fallen, and the attacking troops moved freely through the twisting streets of the lower city. Paks hardly noticed; she marched with the others back to camp, aware only of great weariness.
She woke early, just at daybreak, and was startled to find Volya beside her.
“You were acting strange, yesterday,” said Volya. “We thought someone should keep an eye on you.”
“I was?” Paks had only the haziest memory of the previous day. There’d been fighting on a wall or a gate or something like that. “I’m fine, now.”
“That’s what you told Barra yesterday.” Volya looked stubborn.
“It’s true now, anyway.” Paks combed her hair and rebraided it; the lump still hurt when she ran the comb over it. She was very hungry and wondered if she’d eaten the night before.
Although the outer part of the city had fallen, the inner citadel still resisted. Sapping teams were busy at those walls, now. Plas Group had repaired the damaged siege tower; Paks found herself once more hauling on a rope with others, and cursing the ungainly monster that lurched from stone to stone. Suddenly a shout made her look up. A black cloud rolled over the citadel wall and flowed down toward the sapper’s shelter. A man in glittering mail spurred his horse toward that part of the wall, raising a mailed fist over his head. Light streaked from his fist to form a web between the cloud and the sappers. When the blackness reached it, green flames sprang up and the cloud disappeared.
Vik nudged her in the ribs. “I heard that’s a paladin of Gird.”
Paks stared. “That?” She had never believed she would see one.
“Yes. There’s a High Marshal here too, and two Swordmasters of Tir, and more—I don’t know what—from Pliuni and Westland.”
Paks felt ignorant again; she didn’t know what a High Marshal was. “What have they got inside?”
“I heard it’s a temple to the Master of Torments—some southern god, I suppose. But their priest or whatever they call him has power enough. That’s what that blue flash and darkness was, the night we broke the wall. And these black clouds.”
Paks watched as the mailed figure rode away from the wall. Paladin or not, she had never seen such a warrior. Every bit of metal glittered like polished jewels, and the horse—it moved lightly as wind-blown down, yet gave the impression of strength and power. For an instant she pictured herself in that mail—on that horse—but that was ridiculous. She leaned her weight on the rope.
By the next afternoon, they were fighting their way through the citadel streets, upward and inward toward Siniava’s palace. At last Paks could see an open space behind the defenders. Foot by foot they pushed Siniava’s men back toward a broad paved court or square. Directly across from them, enemy troops poured from a high arched doorway in a tall building ornamented with balconies and turrets. Paks assumed it was Siniava’s palace. To the left she could just see a massive edifice with a pillared porch above the wide flight of steps.
Then their own reserves managed to force themselves to the front, and Paks and the others in front edged back. She leaned on a wall and caught her breath, watching. More reserves passed her. With them were two Swordmasters of Tir, in their black armor, and a High Marshal of Gird in chainmail under a blue mantle. Beside the Marshal strode a man in glittering chainmail under a flaming red surcoat embroidered with the crescent of Gird. The paladin, thought Paks. She had not seen him so close before. Without thinking, she pushed herself away from the
