S. Turney - Interregnum

There were almost a score of crossbowmen and a dozen good soldiers from Sithis’ elite unit, as well as Tythias himself, standing on a rock be the side of the trail. At this point the path narrowed before it entered a stretch known as snake canyon. Here the trail was only wide enough for a single cart or three men in safety and the southern side of the path fell away into a steep scree slope that tumbled down to the river far below. Tythias was sure a fall from here would be fatal since, though the fall was sloping rather than vertical, it was long and jagged shards of rock stood proud from the scree in places. A man would be lucky to reach the bottom alive, let alone intact. And of course, the chances of making it back up to the path afterwards were less than good. The other side of the trail was often sheer cliff face, occasionally dropping to low boulders and small fissures that disappeared up from the trail toward the mountains.

The one armed, one eyed prefect pulled from his pocket the spyglass he’d been given by the Pelasian prince and extended it, raising it to his eye and scanning the rocks to the north. Here, one of the wider fissures ran up into the rock. With a cluck of irritation, he compacted the device and sheathed it once more in his pocket.

“Still no sign of life,” he said in a low voice to the sword captain alongside him. “I think we need to move up into the mountains now and work our way around the back.”

The captain nodded. “As you say sir,” he repeated in an equally low voice. They’d been as quiet and unobtrusive as possible during their journey down from the gate, hoping not to disturb the mysterious visitors until they could determine what they were doing.

With a sigh, Tythias dropped down from the rock and the party of soldiers began to pick their slow and difficult way among the boulders and rocks up into the mountains above the trail. It was slow and painful going and the sun was starting to get very low on the horizon. Tythias cursed both Kiva and himself for agreeing to take a group out down the trail this late in the day. It was stupid and dangerous and they should both know better. Still, they were here now and, if necessary, would have to camp among the rocks. At least the army had been trained in the traditional fashion and marched with everything they needed to set up camp strapped to their backs.

He sighed again and made a low whistling noise, a prearranged signal to gather on the prefect and take a rest. He’d not realised how much he missed his left arm until it came to things like climbing among rocks. He took a swig of something sharp Athas had filled his flask with and, wincing, watched the men catching up from behind and crawling back down the slope from ahead. He made a quick head count to check they were all there as he took another pull from his flask and one of Sithis’ swordsmen came jogging energetically down the slope and across to where he sat.

“Signs of life just up ahead, sir” the man whispered. “I can hear voices and sounds like there’s a work camp up there. I don’t think we’re in danger of being heard with the noises going on.”

Tythias frowned. A work camp? What the hell was going on here? He nodded at the swordsman. “Good work. We’ll take a ten minute rest and then we’ll all creep up there and take a look.”

They sat around in virtual silence, taking the occasional swig from a skin or flask and a bit of the emergency rations they carried. Tythias regarded the men around him. While he had no love for the crossbowmen, they had proved to be very good with their weapon of choice and had shown nothing but loyalty to their new commander. The swordsmen Sithis had trained and selected as the best of the recruits were as good as Tythias could hope. With the two groups he should be able to deal with anything short of a small army.

He leaned back for a moment against the rock and relaxed for a few minutes as best he could before standing once more with a stretch and whistling.

“Time to move on gentlemen. Let’s get up to that point.” He gestured at the man who’d informed him of the noises. “You take the lead and get us up to where you were. Everyone else stay behind him and as soon as you sight anyone, get down and into cover.”

As the swordsman moved off at the front, Tythias and the others came up behind him and began once more the tedious and unpleasant crawling between boulders. Time dragged and the sun dipped lower, now touching the peak opposite. Another fifteen minutes or so and there would be only a difficult half-light. He was still grumbling when he noticed the front men up ahead dropping to the ground among the rocks. Picking up speed, he rushed ahead of the men around him and dropped to the rocks at the top with the lead men. Lifting his head, he peered over the rocks.

There were perhaps thirty or forty people around below them in a large depression separated from the gorge by a rock of immense proportions that must reach most of the way back to the gorge. Many of the men were around small camp fires in the depression and wore a black and silver uniform. The rest appeared to be barbarians in their dishevelled furs and leathers who stood guard around the edge end disappeared around the sides of the rock for minutes at a time before returning.

“What the fuck are they doing?” Tythias grumbled as he reached into his pocket and once more removed his spyglass. The swordsman next to him shuffled back from where he too had been scanning the area.

“They’re quarrying, sir.”

Tythias blinked. “They’re what?”

The two poked their heads above the crest once more and the swordsman started to point. “I worked in the quarries at Carira sir. That’s how you quarry; or one of the ways anyway.” He gestured to the sides of the gargantuan rock. “You can just see the glow from the fires if you really strain. It’ll be easier as it gets darker. They set fires all over the cliff face and heat the rock up for days until it almost glows itself and then douse the rock with huge amounts of cold water. The rock just cracks and falls away. Only real way to quarry hard stones like granite. See?” he gestured to another place. “Loads of barrels of water and they’re being hauled up to the top ready to split the rock. They probably won’t do that ‘til the morning, cos it’ll be quite dangerous and they’ll have to be able to see what they’re doing.”

Tythias peered at the swordsman beside him. “You’re an absolute mine of information. And can you tell me why they’re doing that?”

The swordsman tapped his finger against his lip. “Well you’d think they’re trying to block the pass, but there’s no way the stone from the sides of this rock is going to come down on the trail. Unless…”

Tythias blinked in surprise and then frowned in annoyance as the soldier plucked the spyglass from his commander’s hand and scanned the area closely. The man grinned.

“They are going to seal the pass. They’re not trying to use this rock to block it, but if they’ve set their fires where I think they have, they should just get it right to collapse that entire rock against the next one.”

“And?” asked Tythias in annoyance, snatching back his spyglass.

“And this rock is granite, I think; or something like. The ones by the gorge are much softer rock. If they bring this big bastard down against the next one, they’ll both fall across the trail.”

“Shit!” Tythias compacted his spyglass again. That would delay us for weeks and give Velutio the chance to get prime position on the plains and deal with all the other lords before we get there. We’ve got to stop them destroying that rock.”

He turned to the others clustered below and behind him.

“There’s quite a few people down there and we need to get rid of them all. This must be the only way out, cos the next fissure upwards isn’t for a mile or more down the gorge. I want all you crossbowmen to get to high points and find yourself a good position as quietly and unobtrusively as you can. I’ll give you twenty minutes to get in position. Then I’ll give a hawk’s call. That’ll be your signal. You should each mark a man and fire as soon as you hear the signal. Then reload and try to get another shot off. It’s quite likely they’ll get into cover after the first shot, but by then the rest of us will be making our way down there. Try to take down the men in black and silver first. They’re Janus’ spearmen and they’re good. If you spot a man dressed like them but with a red cloak, take every effort to kill him. Captain Janus gets you fifty corona when we get back as a reward. We’ll move round the edge and deal with these barbarian hirelings of Janus’.” He looked around the faces of the dozen swordsmen. “We need to take them out and then we’ll split into two. Half of you will stay with me and we’ll cover this exit so they can’t get away while the crossbowmen still pick off any target that presents itself. The rest of you will go with…” He looked down at the man next to him that had explained the quarrying. “What’s your name?”