Ash: The Lost History Part 150

"Call down the lightning," she said. "Do it now."

Her voice sounded flat, in the still, bitter air. She had a second to smear her eyes clear, to think, b.l.o.o.d.y idiots he and I are going to look if this is all for nothing- In the centre of her soul, G.o.dfrey Maximillian spoke.

- By the Grace of G.o.d, and by the love I have had for Your creations, I implore You to hear me, and grant my prayer.

It is the same voice that she has heard hundreds of times, at Lauds and Vespers and Matins; heard in camp and on the field, where men fighting have gone to their deaths listening to it. And it is the same voice that talked her asleep as a child, in the months after St Herlaine, when any darkness had the power to keep her awake and shivering until sunrise.

"I'm here," she said. "G.o.dfrey, I'm here."

His voice in her mind is unsteady; she feels the flood of fear in him. He prays on: - Though I die, I shall not die; I shall be with You, Lord G.o.d, and Your Saints. This is my faith, and I here proclaim it. Lord G.o.d, before Whom no armour can stand, Thou who art stronger than any sword - send down the fire!

"G.o.dfrey! G.o.dfrey!"

What she remembers from Molinella, a child watching a battle from a church tower, is how the appalling explosion of cannon-fire knocks the moment of impact out of memory. It must be reconstructed later. She tastes brick-dust in her mouth again, smells poppies. A fang of pain bites at her hand. She s.n.a.t.c.hes it back - from fire; from the burning wood in the hearth in the company's tower. Not Italy and summer, but Burgundy and the bitter solstice of winter.

She put one hand down to push herself up, realised that she was lying on her face, that she had soiled herself, that blood ran stickily down from her bitten lip.

"G.o.dfrey . . ."

Blood dripped down on to the mattress, staining the straw's linen cover. Her arms began to shake. The muscles would not take her weight. She fell down on her face, shaking; the rub of cloth against cloth gratingly loud in the tower room where no explosion has taken place. Her ears sting: her whole body shakes with an impact that has not happened here.

"G.o.dfrey!"

"Boss!" Rickard's boots clattered on the flagstones. She felt his hands on her shoulders, rolling her over on her back.

"I'm all right." She sat up, fingers trembling, body shaking. The boy has seen what happens in battle; she is not ashamed that he sees her now. Stunned, she gazed around at the stone hall. "G.o.dfrey . . ."

"What's happened?" Rickard demanded. "Boss?"

"I felt him die." Her voice shook. "It's done, it's done now. I made him do it. Oh, Jesu. I made him."

A great pain went through her chest. Her hands would not stop shaking, though she clenched them into fists. She felt her face screw up. A sob forced its way past her rigid jaw.

She was not aware of Rickard running, panic-stricken, for the door of the hall, or of anyone else coming in; the first she knew of it was when a man grabbed her, hard. Weeping, stinking, incoherent; she could say nothing, only sob harder. The man put his arms tightly around her, gripping her close to him. She put her arms around his bulk and clung to him.

"Come on, girl! Answer me! What's happened?"

"Not-"

"Now," the voice insisted. A voice accustomed to orders. Robert Anselm.

"I'm okay." Hollow, every breath still shaking her, she pushed him far enough back that she could grab his hands in her own. "There's nothing you can do."

As her breathing steadied, Robert Anselm looked at her keenly. He was without armour, a stained demi-gown belted around his beer-belly; had obviously been s.n.a.t.c.hing what hours asleep he could. The light from the fire illuminated, grotesquely, his shaven head and ears; and put deep shadows in his eye-sockets.

"What's this 'G.o.dfrey'? What's happened to G.o.dfrey?" he rumbled.

"He's dead," Ash said. Her eyes glimmered. She gripped Anselm's hands hard. "Christ. Losing him twice. Jesu."

What Anselm said then, she ignored. There were other men crowding in at the far door: Rickard, her officers. She ignored all of it; clamped her eyes shut.

She feels cautiously in the part of herself that has been shared, since Molinella, with her voice.

"G.o.dfrey?"

Nothing.

Quiet tears welled up and spilled over her lids. She felt them streaming down her face, hot in the freezing air. The ache in her throat tightened.

"Two thousand troops, in defence positions in a siege; three legions attacking: options?"

Nothing.

"Come on, you b.a.s.t.a.r.ds. I know you're there. Talk to me!"

There is no sensation of pressure. No voices that mutter in the language of the Prophet Gundobad's time; or rage, deafeningly, to bring down walls and palaces. There are no Wild Machines. Only a sensation of blank, numb, empty silence.

For the first time in her adult life, Ash is without voices.

An egoistic part of her mind remarked, I've lost what made me unique; and she gave a shaky smile, part self-disgust and part acceptance.

She opened her eyes, bent down, and hauled on her long gown to conceal her soiled clothing. She straightened up, facing the officers that crowded into the hall: Angelotti, Geraint, Euen, Thomas Rochester, Ludmilla; a dozen more. Facing them now only as a young woman with a skilled trade, war; remarkable only for that, and for nothing else.

She said, "The Stone Golem is destroyed. Melted down to slag."

Silence fell; the men looking from one to other, too stunned yet by the announcement to feel relief, joy, belief, victory.

"G.o.dfrey did it," Ash said. "He prayed down lightning on House Leofric. I felt it hit. I- he died in the attack. But the Stone Golem's gone. The Wild Machines are cut off utterly. We're safe."

Chapter Four."Of course," Robert Anselm said sardonically, "that's 'safe' from the Wild Machines' miracle. Not safe from the three Visigoth legions sitting outside Dijon!"

The better part of an hour had gone by in the top floor of the company's tower, more lance-leaders coming in by the minute, Burgundian knights and centeniers joining them; and Henri Brant and Wat Rodway between them breaking out a spirituous liquor that tasted like nothing on earth, but bit the tongue and throat and belly with heat. The frenetic celebrations spread down to the men on the lower two floors: Ash could hear the roaring racket below.

"The truce is still holding. I've told you. We're starting the fight back now, and we won't stop until we get to Carthage."

It was said largely for public consumption: for Jussey, Lacombe, Loyecte, de la Marche. Cleaned up and wearing borrowed hose, Ash stood and drank with her men, and felt nothing but numbness.

Celebration got into gear. The volume of noise rose. Faces flushed, Euen Huw and Geraint ab Morgan shouted joyously at each other in triumphant Welsh. Angelotti and half his gun-crew masters crowded closer to the fire, leather mugs full; someone called for Carracci and his recorder; Baldina and Ludmilla Rostovnaya began a drinking contest.

For them, G.o.dfrey died three months ago.

Ash touched Robert Anselm's arm. "I'll be up at St Stephen's."

He frowned, but nodded a.s.sent; too busy celebrating with two women from the baggage train.

Once outside the tower, the cold moved her to uncontrollable shivering. She huddled a cloak and hood over her gown, and walked, head down, shoulders hunched, at a pace brisk enough that her escort - who had been moderately warm in the guardroom - swore quietly to themselves. Black ice covered the cobbles; she almost fell four times before she reached the abbey.

Yellow light shone warmly through the high Gothic windows. As she stepped inside, the bells began to ring for Lauds. The men-at-arms crowding in with her, she knelt at the back as the monks filed into the main chapel to sing the office.

You said I was a heathen, she mentally apostrophised G.o.dfrey Maximillian. You're right. This means nothing to me.

She caught herself waiting for his answer.

With the office done, she made her way to the abbot's house.

"No need to disturb his reverence," she told a deacon who did not look as though he were about to. "I know where to go. If you have food in the almonry, my men will be grateful."

"That is for the poor. You soldiers have the best rations as it is."

One of Ludmilla Rostovnaya's men muttered, "Because we're keeping them alive!" and subsided at Ash's glare.

"I won't be more than a few minutes."

Climbing the stairs, she did not ask herself why she had come. As soon as the monk on guard outside the room gave her a lamp to take in, and she saw the Faris's face in its light, she knew why she was there.

The Faris stood by the window. The northern stars wheeled in the sky behind her. Her face in the golden light showed tired, drawn, but relieved.

Neither Violante nor Adelize was asleep. The child seemed to be soothing the woman, as if there had been an outburst. The piebald rat scuttled across the pile of blankets, raised itself up on its hind feet, whiskers quivering, and niffed at the chill air that came in with Ash.

Ash pushed the door closed behind her.

The numbness in her mind felt colder than the winter outside.

"My voice is gone. There is no machina rei militaris. As if an explosion, in my mind-" The Faris came forward across the room. Boards creaked under her feet. Her steps were unsteady. "You heard it too."

"I gave the order."

The Visigoth woman scowled. She put her hand to her head. Ash saw comprehension come.

"Your confessor. Your Father Maximillian."

Ash dropped her gaze. She took a few steps closer to her mother, where Adelize sat in the blankets. She did not touch her, but she squatted down and held out her fingers to the piebald rat. It stood up on its hind legs and licked, twice, very rapidly, at her fingers.

"Hey, lickfinger. You can tell which are the boys, can't you? b.a.l.l.s as big as hazelnuts." Ash's tone changed. She said, "I've lost my friend."

The Faris came to kneel on the blankets beside her, putting her arm around Violante. The child's thin body was shivering. "I thought I was dying. Then -silence. The blessed, blessed quiet."

The liver-and-white rat elongated his body, stretching up to sniff at Adelize. She flicked a frightened glance from the rat to her daughter the Faris.

"I frightened her, I think." The Faris met Ash's gaze. "It's over, isn't it?"

"Yes. Oh, the war's not over." Ash jerked her head at the night sky beyond the window. "We could be dead tomorrow. But unless someone builds another Stone Golem before the armies of Christendom get to Carthage, it's over. The Wild Machines can't use you for anything. They can't reach you."

The Faris rested her head in her hands. Cut silver hair flopped over her brow. m.u.f.fled, she said, "I do not care how it was done. I am sorry for your friend. I only knew his voice. But I do not care how it was done. I thank G.o.d for it."

She straightened. Her familiar features, in the lamp's light, are blurred with tears; incongruous on that face as water on a knife-blade.

I had to be the one to bring you the news, Ash realised.

I had to see you realise that Florian has no reason, now, to have you killed. And every useful reason to keep you alive.

"You're safe," Ash said. To Adelize, and to Violante, she repeated: "You're safe."

The child stared at her uncomprehendingly. Adelize, rea.s.sured, picked up the rat and began to pet him.

"Well. I say 'safe'. Apart from the fact that there's a war on." Ash grinned crookedly.

"Apart from that," the Faris echoed. She smiled. "It's over. My G.o.d. I still don't know what you're doing with my face."

"It looks better on me."

The Visigoth woman laughed as if laughter had taken her by surprise.

A cold, very deliberate, and multiple voice said in Ash's head, 'THE FACE IS NOTHING. THE BREEDING IS EVERYTHING.'

Ash said, "b.o.l.l.o.c.ks," automatically, and froze.

A spurt of sickness went through her, sinking from her belly to her gut. Dizzy with it, she said, "No ..."

'THE SECRET BREEDING IS ALL.'.

"No!" Her protest is squealing outrage.

'SOME HAVE THE QUALITY0 WE NEED, SOME DO NOT.'.

"G.o.dfrey!"

Nothing.

In the part of her mind that is shared, that has been numb, only the voices of the Wild Machines sound - like a muttering of distant thunder; far off at first, and now perfectly distinct.

'-SOME DO NOT. AND SOME HAVE MORE.'

"He didn't do it. No. No: I felt it. I felt the machine die. He didn't destroy it all-?"

Ash became aware of the Faris shaking her arm. The Visigoth woman was staring at her in alarm.

"What are you saying?" the Faris demanded. "Who are you talking to?"

The voices of the Wild Machines speak in Ash's head: 'WE COULD HAVE NOT DONE THIS WITH THE FARIS-'

'---SHE NEEDED THE MACHINA REI MILITARIS---'.

'GONE, NOW. GONE!'.

'BUT WITH YOU-'