Brian Staveley - The Providence of Fire

He turned his head.

“I said-”

The words withered in her mouth. She had locked gazes with her kenarang hundreds of times-over a shared pillow and a bared knife, in lust, love, and furious distrust-and she thought she understood the range of his emotion. She thought that she had fought past his lies and betrayals to finally understand something of the creature to whom she had tied her fate. Staring into his face, however, she realized for the first time the depth of her error.

Gone was the wry amusement she had seen so often, gone the wolfish hunger. All emotion had been scrubbed from those eyes, all expression Adare might have recognized as human … gone. His face was the face of a man, but for the first time she saw the mind behind in that unwavering stare: a mind cold and alien and unknowable as the dark space between midwinter stars. She wanted to shrink into her cloak, to turn away, to flee. For half a heartbeat, the terrifying drop from the tower seemed to offer escape rather than certain death.

“Stay,” he said, the word quick as a knife nicking a vein. “But do not speak. It is a near thing, this contest.”

“What-” she began, then faltered.

“I am what you kept alive to wage your wars. Now you will see why.”

Adare nodded numbly. She felt that if she looked into the emptiness of those eyes a heartbeat longer her mind might unhinge. Far below, blood ran heavy as spring snowmelt in the town’s crude gutters. The fight crashed up against the base of the tower. Men fought, and screamed, and died, but she no longer feared the battle. That, at least, was a fight between men, courage matched against courage, will against will. She was no warrior, but she could understand their hope, terror, and rage, emotions that seemed warm as summer rain, soft as a down bed when compared to the eyes of the creature beside her.

“One runner to the bridge,” il Tornja said. He didn’t turn to look at his messengers, nor did he raise a hand. “Tell them to abandon spears. Use swords.”

A man darted through the trapdoor without a word.

Adare searched desperately in the madness for the Annurians holding what was left of the bridge, found them, finally. There couldn’t have been more than two score, holding what looked like a desperate defensive position, their thicket of bristling long spears the only thing keeping the attacking Urghul at bay.

Fulton, following her gaze, shook his head slowly.

“They’ll be slaughtered,” Adare breathed. “Without spears, they’ll be slaughtered.”

She glanced at her Aedolian, hoping she was wrong, but he nodded grimly. “They need those spears.”

“Most will die,” il Tornja said, voice smooth as unscratched ice. “Some won’t. Two runners,” he went on. “One to the fourth street, one to the fifth. Archers on fourth to retreat. Archers on fifth to charge. Redirect the fourteenth squad to support that Kettral woman and her companion, the woman in red.”

The runners saluted briskly, then bolted down the stairs.

“Kettral?” Adare asked, staring at the young girl in blacks she had seen earlier. “She’s Kettral?”

“Yes,” il Tornja replied flatly. “And she and the woman beside her are all that holds that entire street. That street anchors that flank. If they go down, we lose.”

“Can they do that?” Adare asked, hands clenched at her side. “There are only two of them.”

“They are doing it,” the kenarang replied. Then, shifting his focus to a different quarter of the town, “Signal arrows. Two red. One green.”

Bowmen stepped forward, lit oil-soaked rags at the tips of their arrows, waited for the unnatural flames to catch, fired high into the air, then stepped back without a word. Adare had no idea what the signals meant. She tried to find some corresponding movement in the battle below, found nothing but death and terror. Over by the burned-out bridge, the first messenger had reached the spearmen and convinced them to abandon their long shafts. As Fulton predicted, the Urghul pressed close, slaughtering the soldiers from the backs of their horses. After a few dozen heartbeats the entire position collapsed.

“They’re dying, ” Adare protested.

“Yes,” il Tornja replied.

“Why?”

He shook his head, the barest hint of a motion. “It’s too complex.”

Adare spent the hour that followed in a kind of horrified trance, watching as the kenarang sent runner after runner into the chaos below, listening as he uttered order after inscrutable order. Hold this street, retreat into this alley, burn that building, charge. Twice he sent soldiers into the fray to do nothing more than wave Annurian flags above their heads. He instructed his archers to light the docks on fire, despite the fact that there was no one on the docks. He even ordered several dozen troops in three different locations to surrender. None of it made any sense, not the insanity below nor il Tornja’s response to it. He was like a madman commanding the troops at random, only there was no madness in those impossibly blank eyes, and despite the Urghul numbers, despite the fury with which they attacked again and again and again, despite the chaos engulfing the Annurian soldiers, he held the horsemen back.

Finally, as the sun began to settle in the sky, the kenarang rose smoothly and unexpectedly to his feet.

“It is finished,” he said, gesturing over his shoulder, suddenly indifferent.

Adare stared at the carnage below. She could see no slackening of the battle, no shift in the violence. Exhausted soldiers heaved their weapons over and over into the flesh of their foes, screaming as they killed and were killed in turn. Il Tornja paid them no mind. Instead, he faced his signalmen and messengers, then bowed.

“You men have done well,” he said as he straightened. “Thanks to you, the day is ours. You are dismissed.”

It took the bowmen and messengers just a few moments to file back into the tower, leaving Adare alone on the roof with Fulton and il Tornja. When the trapdoor had clattered shut behind them, she turned to the general.

“What do you mean, it’s over?” she demanded, voice cracking as she spoke.

“The battle is done. The rest is…” He paused. “You have seen a chicken struggle after the head is parted from the body?”

Adare nodded, horrified.

“This is that-a last spasm of blood and emotion. The real work is done.”

She stared. “Where is Long Fist? The Urghul chieftain?”

“Not here.” There was something in his voice, something Adare couldn’t place. Not regret, certainly. Hunger, perhaps. A great hunger held in check. “He refused to take the field.”

“It doesn’t look done to me,” Fulton growled. “Those horsemen are fifty paces from the tower.”

Il Tornja shifted his gaze to the Aedolian. “That is why I am the kenarang and you are a guard.”

“How do you know ?” Adare demanded.

He fixed her with that hollow stare and once again she felt that dizzying vertigo, as though she teetered on the very lip of a bottomless well, as though if she fell forward, she would fall forever. Finally, he turned away, gesturing to the far bank.

“How many trees?” he asked.

Adare stared. “What?”

“The trees. How many are there?”

She shook her head, staring at the dark ranks of fir and pine. Even as she watched, the Urghul were slipping into the shadows between those trunks. Retreating, she realized. They were pulling back.

“I’ve no idea,” she said. “Why does it even-”

“Two thousand six hundred and eight, between the mouth of the river and the stone point.”

Adare stared.

“You’ve been counting trees this whole battle?”