Elves_ Once Walked with Gods Part 45

A helmet.

Auum glanced left and right. His clear view across the street afforded him the sight of TaiGethen elves soaring above their enemies. Faces were turning up, but those who had seen them were already too late to stop them, much less follow them. Marack was turning a somersault next to him, Takaar another of his horizontal flights, fierce and graceful. Grafyrre and Merrat were hand in hand, coming down on their left feet and pushing off in perfect balance.

Auum landed. The helmet's occupant grunted and ducked at the brief weight on the top of his head but Auum was already gone. Like running the sucking mud of the Mouth of Orra at the outflow of the River Ix, or the quicksands out at Palynt Reach. Quick steps, minimum weight down and the whole body canted forward at a steep angle. Always pushing away, never levering forward. Olmaat used to describe it as nothing more than a controlled fall.

A wave of incredulous fury followed in their wake. By the time soldier or mage had reacted, the elves were past him. Swords waved ineffectually and belatedly overhead. Fists punched empty s.p.a.ce. Fingers grabbed at nothing.

Auum bounced left and right as he ran. His eyes searched four moves ahead, his mind trusting his feet to land without error. The TaiGethen pa.s.sed across the heads of their enemies like the last mist blown from the surface of the ocean. Felt and gone.

'Cover on landing. Left turn. Orsan's Yard for muster,' said Grafyrre, his voice carrying across the soaring line of elven warriors.

Auum saw the back of the human lines. It was loose there and they could see what was coming at them. Auum growled a warning, his panther voice focusing the eye of every TaiGethen. He selected his landing point, straightened his body and slammed down hard with both feet on the head of his last mark.

The mage collapsed beneath him. Auum dropped, rolled and rose in one movement. The TaiGethen moved forward, a single unit. Auum drew his second blade. He jammed his left into the gut of a hapless soldier and spun past his falling body. He whipped his right blade into the neck of the man next to him, dragged his left clear and buried it to the hilt in the chest of the man behind. Takaar hurdled a body, Marack in his heel prints, and took the next man two-footed on the point of the jaw. Marack ran past him and tore the throat from a fifth with the ends of her fingers. Auum came to her left, blocked a wild slash and chopped into the hamstrings of a sixth.

Clear s.p.a.ce but the mages would be turning and clear of the bulk of the army.

'Go, go,' said Auum, pressing a hand into Takaar's back.

They headed for the left turn to take them into Keeper's Row. Grafyrre and Merrat were ahead of them, the bulk of the TaiGethen around them. Ten yards to the turn, the first way off the Path of Yniss from the mouth of the temple piazza.

'Casters ready!' called a voice. 'Move!'

Takaar pulled Auum and Marack along, practically threw them around the corner. A freezing wind howled past the opening. Auum felt his hair crisp with frost. His blade gleamed with ice. The TaiGethen were already pounding away to the south, heading into the warren of the Grans.

Auum and Marack followed in Takaar's wake just in front of the rear cells. Abruptly, Takaar stumbled. He reached out a hand, which Auum was able to grasp.

'Takaar?' he asked.

Takaar carried on running but he'd slowed dramatically.

'Something's growing,' said Takaar. 'Something ugly and evil. Like Gyal building to a storm of wrath but beneath my feet. In the energy lines. In the magic. I don't think we have much time.'

'What are you talking about?'

'If Ystormun really wants to commit genocide on the lesser threads of elves he isn't going to do it with the sword,' said Takaar.

Auum remembered the mages flying fast overhead. He shuddered.

They ran into Orsan's Yard and faced fifty and more blades and axes. The two groups faced each other for a moment before Merrat broke and ran forward, dragging Pelyn into a fierce embrace.

'Yniss bless you and the axes of the Apposans. We need you now.'

'Couldn't quite bring myself to follow Katyett's last order,' said Pelyn. She frowned. 'Where is she?'

No one needed to speak the words. The first line of a lament to the fallen was whispered by every TaiGethen. Pelyn closed her eyes and tears escaped down her cheeks. Takaar, the nausea rising within him as the magic built in intensity, walked forward still using Auum for support.

'There will be time for grief, Pelyn,' he said. 'Tell me what you had planned to do here. Quickly. Time is short.'

Pelyn's stare was quick and angry but she could see there was no arrogance in his face. Only the pain of what was growing underfoot.

'There are more Apposans here. Others that will want to get out. We came to help them.'

Takaar nodded and there was smiling among the TaiGethen.

'You have chosen a path more vital than you know. And your Apposan axes will be the difference between life and death for hundreds, maybe thousands.' Takaar paused and breathed deeply. 'There will be fire and there will be panic. I will explain, but we must use these to our advantage. Grafyrre, we need to split to reach all the most vulnerable threads at once.'

Grafyrre's nod was curt and his eyes held the pa.s.sion of the wronged. He turned to the elves and began to talk.

Garan knelt beside the body of the elf and turned her burned, wrecked face to the rain. He rubbed at his stubble and sucked in his bottom lip.

'We got one then,' said Keller, landing behind him and dismissing the spell at his back.

'No,' said Garan. 'We barely even nicked one of them. This one they brought with them. It's got Ystormun's sick signature all over it. She must have been important.'

Garan stood and turned back. Soldiers were filling the s.p.a.ce around him.

'No one touches this elf,' he said. 'No one moves her; no one p.i.s.ses on her body; no one takes anything from her. Do I make myself clear? Good. Pa.s.s the word. I will be checking back.'

'What's that all about?' asked Keller.

'Just a hunch,' said Garan. 'Tell you later.'

Keller shrugged. 'Whatever you say. Do you think they can do it? What Ystormun says they want to do?'

'I think that if the TaiGethen really put their minds to it, they could do pretty much anything they want. Their problem is there aren't enough of them.'

Garan turned to head to Shorth. The blackened walls and the smoking ruins of temples surrounding them saddened him. The elves had destroyed enough of it themselves. They hardly needed the help of men.

'Where are you going?' asked Keller. 'Action's this way.'

Garan didn't bother turning to look at Keller. 'I don't think so. I'm a soldier. I'm not a murderer of unarmed civilians. I will have no part in the ma.s.sacre. Why would I want to watch the helpless be slaughtered?'

'It didn't seem to worry you in the Park of Tual.'

'They were agitators, problems to be dealt with. What we have left now are those desiring only peace. Why would I want them dead?'

'Because they're only elves and this is the moment when we a.s.sure victory and compliance.'

Now Garan turned and he was surprised at the contempt that he felt for Keller. Mixed with pity that his sight was so short.

'I thought more of you. But you're just a lackey to the mage lords. You know what should be worrying you is where this power of his comes from and why it's so different from yours. One day you'll need to be sure you're standing on the right side of the conflict.'

'What conflict?'

Garan chuckled. 'Don't take the p.i.s.s. You're not that naive. You know the tension in Triverne. You know there's a struggle coming. The six are on one side. Every other mage in the circle is on the other. Has it really never occurred to you why Ystormun wants control here so quickly? Look at the resources. Look at the power they represent. One day, and it may not be for a hundred years, Balaian will fight Balaian for this place.'

'And what will you do in the meantime?' Keller's face dripped his scepticism. 'Keep your head down or resign your commission?'

'I doubt Ystormun accepts resignations with any grace, do you? No, Keller, I expect when I detail my men to shovel the ashes of the innocents away from the carca.s.ses of their homes, I'll be thinking of heading into the forest and taking my chances with the TaiGethen. What about you?'

The earth rumbled underfoot. Flames spat hundreds of feet into the sky. There was a concerted groan and a thundering crash of timbers. Detonations echoed away into the clearing sky.

'It begins,' said Keller.

'It certainly does.'

Chapter 41.

The TaiGethen need no shield behind which to cower, only the blessing of Yniss.

The TaiGethen ran. Apposans were with each of the three groups Grafyrre had detailed to seek and release, if they could, Gyalan, Ixii and Cefan prisoners. They did not know how they could achieve what Takaar desired but they did know they had to try. It was what the TaiGethen existed to do.

Auum ran with the cells closing on the museum. Pelyn had made a promise to Methian that she would try and help the Gyalans. And that was despite what had happened to a young Al-Arynaar at their hands just a few days before. This was not the time, Grafyrre had said, to be bothered by thread animosity. Elf could kill elf later, that was their right. It was not the right of humans.

They headed for the lights that bordered the quarter of the city where the Gyalans had made their homes for centuries. They were weavers, potters, artisans of all types. Famed for the verve of their creations and the flair of their construction. And now within moments of being dealt a potentially fatal blow. They were not an overtly fertile thread. They could not afford to lose such numbers from their stock.

Auum and Marack flanked a pale and shaking Takaar. Every pace brought a grunt of exertion. Every breath was pained and deliberate. He was not going to be of great use in a fight. Through the dark streets of Old Millers they came. Pelyn ran with them. Grafyrre and Merrat too. Thrynn and Corsaar guarded the Apposans. Ulysan brought up the rear. They were forty-five in all. Auum expected them all to die.

'Remember it'll be chaos,' managed Takaar. 'Use it. These soldiers need order. Take it from them.'

The museum of Hausolis itself was the centrepiece of the quarter. Houses bordered it on all sides of a square that saw celebrations every year on the anniversary of the closing of the gateway. Other days, markets and itinerant performers used the s.p.a.ce as their own. Other streets ran away to Old Millers, down to Mural and Glade and towards the spice market.

They rounded a corner into a street lined with torches. Swordsmen were patrolling and there were mages in groups along its length. The street let out into the museum square at the other end. Here it was houses and shops on both sides. A place where normal people lived. Every house was barred shut. Every shutter was closed and secured from the outside.

Grafyrre made a hand signal. Cells of TaiGethen climbed walls either side of the street. He and Merrat ran on. Auum and Marack moved ahead of Takaar. Belatedly, the guards saw them, pointed and shouted for help while backing away towards their comrades.

Mages turned. Heads were bowed.

'Apposans to every house!' called Merrat. 'Get them away towards...o...b..ck. Shove them, push them. Anything.'

Auum ran to the rhythmic sound of doors being smashed by axes. To the sound of screams and urgent shouts. To anger and fear.

'Target the mages,' ordered Grafyrre.

Two mages lifted their heads and spread their hands.

'Doorways.'

Merrat's shout triggered the street to clear. TaiGethen and Apposan sheltered in doorways, crashed through timbers into houses and dived into shutters, shattering wood. Countless thousands of shards of ice flew along the street. A fine mesh to flay flesh from bones, to strip away life in an instant.

Apposans pushed fleeing Gyalan civilians to the ground. Sacrificed their own bodies to save those they had released. The hail of ice came on a howling wind that cracked timber and widened the cracks in stone and tile. Auum heard the whisper of feet above him.

Abruptly, the castings were exhausted. TaiGethen ran back out on to the streets, leaving terrified Gyalans behind them - clutching each other, waiting for the Apposans to see them to safety. Auum checked Takaar and glanced outside. TaiGethen dropped from the rooftops. Mages died.

Auum sprinted down the centre of the street. Marack was at his shoulder, Takaar a little way behind. Merrat and Grafyrre moved past them. Soldiers squared up. Above and left, Thrynn chased along their flank. More mages were preparing to cast.

Auum thrashed into the shaky human barrier moments after Grafyrre sank his blade into the midriff of a scared soldier. Auum's fist cracked into his target's nose. He kicked down at the enemy's knee, taking him off balance, and rammed his blade into the man's side, butchering vital organs. Blood sluiced onto the ground.

Takaar barrelled into another, wrapping his arms around the man's trunk and bearing him down. The two of them rolled. Takaar came up looking a little dazed. The man had dropped his weapon. He opted to punch. Takaar caught his fist in one hand and straight-fingered into the man's throat with his other.

Auum ran on. Thrynn and his cell pounded to the edge of their rooftop and dived off. Below them, mages readied to cast. TaiGethen engulfed them.

'Straight to the museum,' said Takaar. 'They'll want to take it-'

Takaar stumbled and fell, clutching his head and screaming. Auum slithered to a stop, Marack by him. The TaiGethen faltered.

'No,' said Takaar, grinding the words from locked jaws. 'Go. It's coming. Help them.'

Auum pushed back to his feet.

'The museum. Now. Get it open.'

TaiGethen and Apposan ran. They burst out of the street and onto the museum square. Pelyn was there by Auum, her feet slapping on the cobbles. There was a ring of soldiers around the grand building, and the lines of the Tul-Kenerit which it mimicked brought unwanted memories to Auum's mind. Beyond the museum, the Path of Yniss danced with light. The human army was coming.

Torchlight washed the square. There were mages overhead, shouting orders. Soldiers were turning, moving away from their mages, forming a defensive line. From the north, a ma.s.sive explosion rumbled through the ground and flames lit up the ocean sky. Auum swore. Even he could feel that in the pit of his stomach. He prayed as he ran that his brothers had been fast enough to beat it.

This time, the mages didn't turn. They were focused on the museum. Auum could see arms stretched out in effort. Limbs shook with exertion. Bodies trembled. A soft green light began to grow in the sky above. It coalesced, brightening quickly.

'Forget the warriors,' shouted Grafyrre. 'Two cells up and over. Apposans to ready. Pelyn, stand and face.'

Auum picked up his pace. He flashed across the square, feeling an increasing weight on his chest as the light grew and deepened. The casting was pulsating. Flashes of brown light could be seen within it. It was like one of the orbs only so much bigger. It would be seen right across the city.

Auum threw a jaqrui at the nearest soldier. He threw it high. The soldier ducked. Auum planted his right foot and sprang up. He tucked in his body, rolled in the air and came down on his left foot, already moving towards the first mage.

Auum took his sword in both hands and smashed it into the mage's lower back. The man pitched forward, dead before he hit the ground. Auum turned left, jabbed the blade into another's throat. Blood spurted out. The mage collapsed to his knees. Auum turned right. Marack beheaded one mage, spun and kicked out at the head of another, catching him in the temple and sending him sprawling. Merrat finished him, Above them, the casting guttered and blinked out.

Auum twisted and faced the soldiers. Pelyn and the Apposans were already on them with the balance of the TaiGethen. Above, the casting had begun to grow again. Grafyrre called for more to attack the casters.

'Right!' cried Thrynn. 'Force moving in on our right.'

Hundreds of men, backed by mages in the air and on the ground, poured into the square from the Path of Yniss. Auum cursed.

'To the doors. Apposans to the doors!' Pelyn shouted her order and led them across the open s.p.a.ce to the rear doors of the museum.