Dan Chernenko - The Chernagor Pirates

But Ortalis answered, “I’m going to throw it away. I’ve got no more use for it now.” He strode down the hallway. Lanius stared after him. Ortalis still didn’t see that he’d done much out of the ordinary. Lanius sighed again. Bubulcus, could anyone have asked him, would have had a different opinion.

When Grus breathed in, he felt as though he’d fallen into a vat of cold soup. The sky had gone from black to gray, but he still couldn’t see a hand in front of his face. The fog felt as thick and smothering—though not nearly as warm—as wool batting.

“Hirundo!” he called softly. “Are you there?”

“Right here, Your Majesty,” the general answered, almost at his elbow. Grus had to lean forward and peer to see him at all. Chuckling, Hirundo said, “Our prayers are answered, aren’t they?”

“Too well, maybe,” Grus said. Hirundo laughed again, though the king wasn’t at all sure he’d been joking. Fog was fog, and this was excessive. It seemed like the boiled-down essence of every fog Grus had ever seen in all his life. “By the gods, we’ll be lucky to find the walls of Nishevatz, let alone storm them.”

“We may have fun finding them—true enough,” Hirundo said, though fun was the last word Grus would have used. “But just think how much fun Vasilko and the Chernagors will have trying to keep us out once we do get up on the battlements. We’ll have a whole great lodgement before they even realize we’re anywhere close by.”

“Gods grant it be so,” Grus said. He and the Avornan army had spent weeks waiting through what passed for a heat wave in the Chernagor country. Now the usual mists were back, with a vengeance. Grus hoped the vengeance wouldn’t be excessive.

“Your Majesty?”

That was Pterocles’ voice. “I’m here,” Grus said, and the wizard blundered forward until they bumped into each other. “Can you guide the men to Nishevatz?” Grus asked. “And can you keep the Chernagors from hearing them as they come?”

“Well, Your Majesty, if we all splash into the Northern Sea, you’ll know something has gone wrong,” the wizard replied.

“Heh,” Grus said. “You will be, able to do it?”

A glow that somehow pierced the fog where nothing else would illuminated Pterocles’ hands. “I will.”

“Good.” Grus hesitated. “Uh—I hope the Chernagors on the walls won’t be able to see your sorcery.”

“So do I,” Pterocles said cheerfully. “And yes, I just might be able to muffle things, too.” Grus gave up. Either the wizard was teasing him or the whole campaign would unravel in the next few minutes. Grus chose to believe Pterocles was joking. One way or the other, I’ll find out soon, the king thought.

“There’s the light.” At least a dozen Avornan officers, spying Pterocles’ glowing hands, said the same thing at the same time. They all sounded relieved, too, no matter how the fog muffled their voices.

“Let’s go,” Pterocles said. “Nishevatz is… that way.” He pointed with a gleaming forefinger. Grus wondered how he could have any idea of the direction in which Nishevatz lay. Looking down, the king couldn’t even see his own feet. As far as he could tell, he disappeared from the knees down.

But Pterocles spoke with perfect confidence. And when he moved out in the direction he thought right, the Avornan soldiers followed him. They could see his hands through the fog. A party of men carrying a scaling ladder almost ran over Grus. He heard no cries from the walls of the city. Evidently, the Chernagors really couldn’t see Pterocles.

Or maybe he’s going the wrong way. Grus wished that hadn’t occurred to him. He was committed now. He had to rely on Pterocles. If, for instance, the Banished One was fooling the wizard… Grus wished that hadn’t occurred to him, too.

“Guards!” he called.

“Here, Your Majesty.” The answer came in a chorus from all around him.

“Let’s go forward,” Grus said.

The guardsmen formed up in a tight knot, completely surrounding the king. They seemed under the impression that if they didn’t, he would yank out his sword and swarm up a scaling ladder ahead of every ordinary Avornan soldier. He was glad they were under that impression. He’d done a lot of fighting in his time. By now, though, he was coming up against soldiers who weren’t just half his age but a third his age. He knew more than a little pride that he could still hold his own when he had to, but he wasn’t such an eager warrior anymore.

Not only the guards but Grus himself stumbled more than once on the way to the walls of Nishevatz. They might see Pterocles’ sorcerously glowing hands, but they couldn’t see rocks and holes in the ground under their own feet. Low-voiced curses and occasional thumps from all around said they weren’t the only ones with that trouble.

Grus craned his neck to one side, trying to listen for shouts of alarm from Vasilko’s men. He still heard none. His hopes began to rise. Maybe this would work after all. Maybe…

Then he did hear the unmistakable thud of a scaling ladder going up against a wall. Soldiers rushed toward the top of the ladder. Someone up on the wall called out in the Chernagor language—a challenge, Grus supposed. Pterocles hadn’t managed to hide that noise. The answer came back in the Chernagor tongue, for Hirundo had thought to put some of the men who’d stayed loyal to Prince Vsevolod at the head of the storming party.

Whatever the response meant, it quieted the defender who’d challenged. That meant the Avornans got onto the wall without any trouble. Then more shouts rang out, and the clash of blade on blade. But Grus knew Vasilko’s men were in trouble. If the attackers managed to seize a portion of the wall, they had an enormous advantage on the men trying to hold them off.

“Up!” shouted officers at the base of the wall. “Up, up, up! Quick! Quick!” They sounded like parents trying to keep unruly three-year-olds in line. No child took seriously something said only once. Repeat it and it might possibly sink in. Soldiers were often the same way.

Men cursed and grunted as they swarmed up toward the battlements of Nishevatz. More curses and screams rang out up above on those battlements. So did the sound of running feet as the Chernagors rushed to the threatened part of the wall. Then frightened shouts came from another part of the works around Nishevatz. Grus whooped. He knew what that had to mean—the Avornans had gotten up there, too.

A body thudded to earth at the kings feet. It was a Chernagor; the black-bearded officer had gear too fine for a common soldier. He writhed feebly and moaned in pain. One of Grus’ guardsmen raised a spear to finish the man off. “Wait,” Grus said. “Maybe the healers can save him. He’s no danger to us, and we may learn something from him.”

The guard said, “Whatever you want, Your Majesty, but I don’t think you’re doing him any favor by keeping him alive.”

Blood ran from the Chernagor’s mouth. One of his arms and both legs splayed out at unnatural angles. Grus decided the guardsman was right. “Go ahead,” he said. The Avornan drove the spear into the injured man’s throat. It was over quickly after that.

Up on the wall, the Chernagors began to sound desperate, while the Avornans’ shouts grew ever more excited. “We’re going into the city!” someone yelled in Avornan. That was even better than a foothold on the wall. If the Avornans could cut Vasilko’s men off from their last citadels inside Nishevatz…

Grus felt his way to a scaling ladder. “I’m going up,” he told his guards. “Some of you can go up before me if you like, but I’m going up now.” He’d known the guards would protest, and they did. But the king managed to have his way. Half a dozen guardsmen did precede him up the wall, but he went.