Jim Butcher - First Lord's Fury

Count Calderon’s expression turned bleak at this, and he looked away.

“Your Excellency,” Ehren said, “in my opinion, there is every reason to believe that she is still alive.”

Count Calderon frowned, without looking back. “Why?” He spoke between clenched teeth. Ehren winced in sympathy. The Count’s swollen jaw obviously made it painful for him to speak.

“Well… because she was abducted to begin with, sir. If the vord wanted her dead, there was no reason for them to go to the trouble to arrange a covert entry into a secured building. They would have killed her on the spot.”

Count Calderon grunted, frowned, and looked at Amara.

She nodded to him and passed along the question she could evidently see in his face. “Why would they want her alive, Sir Ehren?”

Ehren winced and shook his head. “We have no way to know that. But the vord went to a lot of trouble to secure her. We can hope that she is valuable enough to the enemy that they will not have harmed her. At least, not yet. There’s hope, sir.”

“I’ve seen what the vord do to those they take alive,” Calderon growled, the words angry and hardly intelligible. “Tell me that my sister is alive and in the hands of those things …”

Amara sighed. “Bernard, please.”

The Count looked back at her. He nodded once and pulled on his horse’s reins, guiding the beast a few paces away. He stood with his back to them.

Amara bit on her lower lip for a few seconds. Then she turned to Ehren, her composure regained. “Thank you, Sir Ehren,” she said, “for trying. We need to speak to Princeps Attis.”

Ehren chewed on his lower lip. “I’m not sure… he’s seeing any visitors.”

“He’s seeing us,” Bernard said roughly. “Now.”

Ehren arched an eyebrow. “Ah?”

“Before we arrive, we need to discuss in detail how best to employ the defenses of the Valley,” Amara said. “No one knows them better than we do.”

Ehren wiped rain out of his eyes and raked his hair back on his head. “That seems reasonable enough to me. I’ll ask him. I can’t promise anything.”

“Please,” Amara said.

Ehren nodded to her, then swung down from the wagon and ran ahead, toward the command group. It was not difficult. The entire group could travel no faster than its slowest members, and as a consequence they hadn’t been pushing half as fast as a Legion on the move. Half a dozen singulares recognized him on sight, and one of them waved him past the invisible barrier their presence represented.

Ehren knocked on the rear door to the covered wagon, still jogging to keep up. Lady Placida opened the door a moment later and offered Ehren her hand. He took it and clambered up into the wagon. “Thank you, Your Grace.”

“It was no trouble, Sir Ehren.”

Ehren’s glanced past her, to where a nearly motionless form lay on a rough mattress beneath a wool blanket. “How is he?”

Lady Placida grimaced. “Not well. I was able to restore some of the proper blood flow, but… with cauterization like that, there are limits. He’s well beyond them.”

Ehren’s stomach twisted. “He’s dying.”

“He’s also lying right here, listening to you,” came Attis’s voice, weak and amused. “I’d ask you to quit speaking over my head, but in my current condition you have little choice.”

Ehren tried to smile. “Ah. Apologies, Your Highness.”

“What Aria means to tell you,” Attis said, “is that the backstabbing bitch filleted me. The lower half of my body has been sliced open from groin to ribs. My guts are an unholy mess and will doubtless begin to stink in short order. My heart is laboring too hard because apparently being bisected does terrible things to one’s blood pressure. The injuries are too severe and extensive to be healed.

“I can’t eat anything. Without all the proper tubes in my belly, the food would simply rot in any case. I can drink a little, which means that I will die of starvation a few weeks from now instead of from thirst a few days from now. Unless, of course, an infection takes me first, which seems likely.”

Ehren blinked several times at that. “Y-your Highness. I’m sorry, I didn’t realize.”

“There’s hardly a need for you to apologize, Cursor. Life ends. You can hardly blame yourself for that.”

Ehren regarded him for a moment, then lowered his eyes and nodded. “Yes, Your Highness. Are… are you in pain?”

Attis shook his head. “I am managing it for now.”

“Maybe you should rest.”

“I’ll have a vast surplus of rest, presently. For now, I have a duty to perform.”

“Your Highness,” Ehren protested. “You are in no condition—”

Attis waved a dismissive hand. “I am in no condition to fight. But in a conflict of this scale, I will contribute the most to our cause by coordinating the efforts of others and determining sound courses of action. I can do that very nearly as well from this wagon as I can from my horse.”

Ehren frowned and glanced up at Lady Placida.

She shrugged one shoulder. “Provided his thoughts remain clear, I believe he is correct. He’s the best we have when it comes to tactical and strategic decisions, his staff are already in place, and his structure and methods are already established. We should use him.”

Are you sure you didn’t mean, “use him up,” Your Grace? Ehren thought. There is little love lost between you.

Not that Ehren had any right to be casting stones. He inhaled deeply and guarded his tongue. “I… see. Your Highness, Count and Countess Calderon came to me. They urgently request that you meet with them to discuss how best to utilize the Calderon Valley’s defenses.”

“No rest for the wicked,” Attis murmured. “Yes, I suppose they’re right. Please send them to me, Sir Ehren.”

Ehren bowed his head. “As you wish.”

One of the legionares in the rear guard collapsed when the long column of refugees and soldiers were within sight of the entrance to the Calderon Valley. Instantly, vord warriors rushed into the break in the Aleran defenses, not pausing to attack. They only pushed ahead, bringing ever more of their numbers into the weak point of the broken Aleran line.

Ehren realized what had happened when he heard refugees begin to scream.

He stood up on the wagon’s seat and stared back behind them. They were currently moving up a gentle grade, and he could clearly see the mantislike warrior forms plunging left and right through the column, scythe-arms whipping about to sprinkle blood and death on the defenders. Horns called wildly. Legionares marching on the column’s flanks formed up to engage the enemy.

The vord were not executing their typical, gruesomely enthusiastic assault. They never stopped moving, even when they struck a badly aimed blow. Casualties were far lighter than they might have been—but the sheer, screaming presence of the creatures among the refugees was doing something far more deadly. Terrified refugees scattered, racing for the shelter of the tree line.

Horns cried out in answer from the vanguard, and High Lord Phrygius turned his Legion in its tracks to begin marching double time back to the battle. An instant later, several forms leapt skyward from the command tent. Ehren thought he recognized the Placidas, old Cereus, and a figure that might well have been Countess Amara. The High Lords and Lady went west. The lone flier turned east, and shot off like an arrow from the bow.

“Rally!” Ehren cried. “Sound the rally here! Get those people out of the forest!”

The teamster on the cart fumbled with his bullhorn for a moment, then lifted it to his mouth and blew three long, surprisingly mellifluous notes, before pausing and repeating the process. The wagons immediately began hurrying to catch up with Ehren, forming into a double column to compact them into as little space as possible as the First Phrygian went by. Once they were clear, Ehren and his driver completed the maneuver, the carts peeling off from the road and forming an enormous circle, a makeshift fortress of dubious wooden walls.