S Farrell - A Magic of Dawn

“Get the lines formed behind the ramparts,” he said to those around him. “Tend to the wounded and set the watches. Send the a’offiziers to me, and get word to the Starkkapitan and the Commandant of what’s…” Happened here… The words were in his mind, but they didn’t seem to come out. The darkness was moving too fast even though the sun was still visible in the sky.

He felt himself falling.

There weren’t enough nahualli with Niente to create a war-storm. Ahead of them, in the golden light of late afternoon, they could see the Easterner troops arrayed on the hillsides on either side of the road. Their own numbers appeared to be significantly greater than that of the Easterners unless they had troops hidden in reserve on the far slope.

Tototl sniffed in disdain.

“This is all they bring against us?” he said, and the warriors closest to them chuckled. “Uchben Nahual, it’s time to do as we’ve discussed.”

Niente inclined his head to Tototl and turned his horse, riding back to where the other nahualli were sheltered in the midst of the warriors. He’d had them fill their spell-staffs the night before as usual, so that they could perform this spell at need and still be rested for the battle. They could not create the war-storm, but they could create cloud enough to mask them. That was what they did now, their mass chant pulling power from the X’in Ka, the energy rising into the air and becoming visible. Wisps of cloud began to sway in front of the warriors, from the road to nearly the banks of the river, a fog that thickened and became dense, a wall shaped by the nahualli so that the Easterners could no longer see them. This wall would not need to move with the troops, nor would it need to generate the lightnings of the war-storm. Niente gestured when he could no longer see the Easterner troops ahead of them nor the hills on which they stood, and the nahualli stopped their chant.

Niente swayed on his feet, as if he’d run from here to the river and back: the payment for the chant and his channeling of the energy, but he forced himself to stay upright, even though a few of the younger nahualli collapsed, panting. Using the X’in Ka this way-creating the spell without giving yourself time to recover from the effort-was costly; Niente didn’t understand why the Easterner spellcasters usually performed their magic this way, rather than storing the spells to be released later. “Get up,” he told them. “Take up your spell-staffs. There’s still a battle to be fought.”

With the fog-wall shutting off sight of the Easterner troops, Tototl shouted his orders, gesturing to the lesser warriors and the High Warriors in charge of them. Two companies slid away to the left, toward the river-they would outflank the Easterners and come upon them from the side and rear. Tototl waited as the flanking arm moved away and Niente rode back to him. “If this is all that is between us and the city, we’ll be there by evening, Uchben Nahual,” Tototl said. “It would seem that your son has seen well-sending us across the river was the path to victory. They weren’t prepared for this. We will push through their city and come upon the rest of their army from the rear as Citlali and Nahual Atl attack them from the front. We will crush them between us like a shelled nut between stones.”

The comment only made Niente scowl. He’d tried to use the scrying bowl the night before: everything was confusing, and powers moved on the side of the Easterners that he could not clearly see while the Long Path eluded him entirely. Tototl seemed to find Niente’s irritation amusing-he laughed. “Don’t worry, Uchben Nahual,” he said. “I still have faith in you. Is your spell-staff full?”

Niente lifted the staff, the ebony hardwood he’d carved so carefully decades ago with the symbols of power. His hands over the long years had polished the knobbed end and the middle of the staff to a gleaming satiny finish. The staff felt like part of him; he could feel the energy within, waiting for the release words to burst forth in fury and death. Yet even as he displayed the staff to Tototl and the warriors and nahualli around him gave a shout of affirmation, Niente felt little but despair.

There was no life in this victory, if victory it was to be. No joy. Not if it were to lead to the place he’d once glimpsed.

Tototl unsheathed his sword. He lifted it with Niente’s staff as the shouts redoubled. “It is time for blood!” Tototl declared. “It is time for death or glory!” He pointed the sword toward the cloudbank. “For Sakal!” he roared, and they shouted with him as they charged forward. Niente was carried along with the flood, but he was silent.

They entered the cold, gray blankness of the cloud, and emerged into sun and heat and battle.

Brie had positioned the troops on the two hillsides that flanked the road, with only a single company on the road itself, and the archers in position on either side-they would at least have the high ground to begin this battle. The Westlanders would have to charge uphill if they wished to engage them.

If they had chevarittai, they could have come charging down at terrible speed, like a gigantic spear thrusting into the Westlanders’ midst. But they had no chevarittai and too few archers, only three of the Numetodo-of whom Brie was rather suspicious, there being no Numetodo in Firenzcia at all; at least none who openly showed themselves-and no war-teni at all.

Allesandra had arrived a turn earlier, dressed in her own armor, and Brie had ceded field command to her, as was proper given that the Garde Kralji was hers. The Kraljica had given her approval of Brie’s placement of the gardai. “I see you’ve been taught well,” she said. “I expected no less.” Brie and the Kraljica, along with Sergei and Commandant cu’Ingres, watched the approach of the Westlander troops, under the banner of a winged snake. Brie was sobered by the frightening size of their force; she was even more concerned as they watched their spellcasters-safely out of the range of the archers they had-place a fog-wall between them to mask their formation.

Brie had not been able to conceal a shudder at the sight. “Kraljica, Ambassador, is there some better and more defensible ground between here and Sutegate? Perhaps we should try to harry them rather than stop them? We could send smaller groups against their flanks, create a defensive wall at the city…”

Allesandra had glanced at Sergei and cu’Ingres, neither of whom spoke. “It’s too late for that, Hirzgin,” Allesandra said. “We must stand here, we must hold them as long as we can, and we must make them pay for every stride of ground they take.”

Brie clenched her hands around the reins of her warhorse. “Then I’ll stand with you, Kraljica, at the front.”

“No.” Allesandra shook her head. “That’s my place and responsibility,” she said, “and Jan would never forgive me if you were hurt here. I want you to take the river flank with Talbot’s sparkwheelers,” she said. “They’ll need a steady heart and commander to guide them. Talbot can stay with you, but I need the other Numetodo here-we have too few of them, since most went with Commandant ca’Talin.”

Brie had wanted to argue-to her mind, the Garde Kralji would also need strong leadership or they would break, but she grudgingly inclined her head. “As you say, Kraljica…”

Reluctantly, she rode to the western side of the road and up the hill through the Garde Kralji-staring at her worriedly-to the rear flank where the sparkwheelers had been placed. She shook her head at the sight of them: clothed in whatever they already had on their backs. They had no armor at all, except for the few who wore scraps of rusted metal curaisses or ripped and ill-fitting chainmail. Except for the strange-looking devices each of them carried, they were armed only with ancient swords, farm implements, and cudgels. They looked more like a mob than a fighting force-a mob that a bare squadron of Garde Brezno would have been able to rout and send screaming into the streets.