Will Power Part 14

She looked from the enemy to me and back, then she nodded, rocked onto her haunches and up into a sprinting run toward the nearest tower. In seconds she was gone. I swallowed hard and glanced over the wall.

The goblins, who had emerged rather faster than last time, were now straightening up and moving toward us, their eyes flashing from the undefended walls to the heaped rubble and wooden scaffold where the repairs were. It was a narrow pa.s.s and would necessitate them climbing over the masonry-strewn foundation and timber frame, but it wouldn't take them more than a few minutes to get through. Perhaps I could pick them off one by one as they swung themselves over the scaffolding. ...

Right. Even if I can aim this thing better than I've ever done before, I'll still be lucky to get three of them before they break through and come up the stairs after me.

This was crazy. I wondered if by moving around and firing from different spots I could trick them into thinking the walls were stuffed with guards lying in wait. No. I couldn't fire anything like fast enough to make that work.

So, as is often my response to finding myself in a tight corner, I started to talk. Aloud. To myself.

"Are they close enough?"

"Not yet."

"Just a few more feet."

"Are they ready on the other side?"

"Yes. They won't know what hit them."

"Get that catapult ready. Pa.s.s me those bolts."

"Ready, sir. ..."

I was never that good at voices, really, but I figured I'd just created at least six different people with accents from various parts of Thrusia, Shale, and the Empire. One of them sounded drunk and another was mentally subnormal, but then, so was I for trying something this laughably destined to fail.

The fact remained, however, that Aliana's shots had come from the other side of the breach and this exercise in auditory puppetry, however inept, had the goblins slowing and gazing up at the other side of the fractured wall with sudden apprehension. There was a pause as words were exchanged between them. For a moment, nothing seemed to move, then several of the goblins turned back to the sh.o.r.e and my hopes were shattered as surely as the wall itself had been.

Another barge had landed. Its prow was a great door that fell heavily on the shingle with a dull splash. The goblins close by limped hurriedly away and turned to watch with their eyes cowed, their bodies low and nervous like jackals abandoning a carca.s.s to a lion. I stared fixedly at the barge and, from the darkness within, something huge began to emerge. I saw its eyes like glowing coals and the vast curl of goat-like horns that spread out and back, each wider than the span of a man's arms. I saw each forepaw's talons click on the gangplank like the claws of a great reptile and the waves of muscle that flexed and rippled beneath its thick and scaly hide. It gathered in a kind of crouch, and its form was something like a man's, but gargantuan and with b.e.s.t.i.a.lly deformed features like the devils in ancient prayer books. As it emerged, its tail rose behind it, lashing the air as it lowered its immense, bullish snout and snorted.

A low gasp slid out of the goblins and they spread still wider, now in total silence. The beast gathered itself, shrugging off the cramp of the barge, and raised its thick, cabled neck and shoulders. The fiery eyes rose twenty feet into the air until they seemed to be looking into mine. When it reached its full height it stood only six or seven yards below me, its muzzle clearly moist, and its horns coiled and spread like giant sh.e.l.ls, stretched and twisted by the hands of some terrible creator. For a moment, everything else was darkness and there was only me and that thing of night and malice, peering into my soul. Again it snorted-a deep, rolling thunder that seemed to shake the very walls-then it lowered its head. It took a step and the walls shook. A cascade of loose stone trickled down the splintered sides of the breach and the timber scaffold groaned. It seemed I could feel its thick breath on my face. Struck with a cold terror, I looked away and started to run for the tower door.

It clawed at me from below, a great sweeping reach with immense, ape-like arms covered with short, bristling hair and hands-hands-with fingers the length of my legs and nails like blackened sabers. I dived low behind the parapet and the monster tore part of the wall away. Blocks of granite exploded in a haze of lethal fragments and landed in a shower of stones, one of which fell hard across my shoulders and left me breathless. I rolled painfully onto my back and saw the immense clawed hand reaching over the shattered parapet and grasping like some blind, nightmarish spider at the s.p.a.ce where I had been.

Then it slid away into the air outside and there was complete silence, ominous and short-lived. I heard the rushing air as the hand came smashing in again. I scrambled up and, as the hideous paw tore through the wall by the tower door, found I had nowhere to run but to the breach itself. As the fingers crawled their way toward me, I scuttled to the end of the wall where the giant slabs of masonry were piled, lashed into place with guy ropes thick as my arms.

The hand swept toward me, wrenching the crenelations from the walls as it did so, so that I had no choice but to go down before it reached me. I clambered over the wooden rail and felt desperately with my feet for the rungs of a ladder. The giant hand clutched at empty s.p.a.ce a yard in front of me and I heard the scythe-swing of its talons. One of them found the ropes that held the enormous stack of blocks for the wall repairs and slashed through them so that the tower of stone shifted ominously. Reaching lower, desperately feeling with one foot, I found the ladder and slithered down to the planked structure below, which straddled the rubble like a bridge to the other side of the breach. An arrow soared past me and another slammed into the pine rail in front of me. I ducked into a precarious crouch and looked out to the sh.o.r.e.

The goblins were preparing to enter the breach four or five abreast, and they were going to march, not climb. Whatever was in their way-foundation, fallen rocks, scaffolding; even me, if I stayed there-was going to be plowed aside by that creature, that thing, that blasphemy of all that was natural. And there was nowhere for me to go, nothing for me to do. In a pair of strides the size of a coach and horses, the beast was on the sh.o.r.e again. Then it turned toward the breach and lowered its immense horns to charge. There was a sigh of satisfaction from the goblins, then the sound of its footfalls, pounding and reverberating like thunder in a canyon.

There was no ladder on the other side and the narrow plank bridge had no way down to the ground. Unthinkingly, I dashed back the way I had come and flung myself back up the ladder as the animal, if animal it was, smashed into the breach like a dozen elephants. Stone and lumber exploded and the entire bulwark seemed to roll backward, hang in the air, and crash to earth. It took several hacking seconds for the dust to settle. Where the breach had been dammed with its own fallen weight, the rock and mortar had been thrown backward into the city. There was still a pile of rubble, but it was half what it had been and I found myself hanging over a fifteen-foot drop. Of the timber bridge and frame which had run over to the other side, there was no sign. Knowing that it could reach up and tear me away from the wall if it wanted to, I grabbed the rung above me and dragged myself up as the ground shook again and the monster came on.

This time I was looking up when it tore into what was left of the wall. The tower of granite slabs at the top of the ladder shuddered and a rope snapped free, whipping back on itself like the monster's tail. I didn't look down at the great horns which were surely below me; I just scrambled up as fast as I could, grabbed the shortsword from my belt and hacked at the first rope I saw.

The goblins were closing in on the breach now, but the clearance wasn't complete. The ground trembled again and with a noise like a bursting drum, the beast rammed its way through. One rope gave and lashed my face as it did so, though I was too busy hewing madly at the next to feel the blood run down my cheek. The stone blocks squealed and groaned and I looked up, sure I would be pinned beneath the tower. Below me, the beast was worrying the remains of the shattered wall, grunting as it stooped its huge, bullish shoulders and plowed at what remained with its horns. It clambered into the breach, its great clawed hands pushing through like a swimmer parting the waves before him. A cheer went up from the victorious goblins. It stopped and looked up and, in the sudden silence, it heard the song of the last straining rope, tight as a harp string, before my blade bit through it. I rolled out of the way and waited.

Nothing happened. The tower of stone rocked slightly, but it did not fall. I sat up and peered down into the dust that rose from the breach. The creature looked up very slowly and saw me. I rolled backward, leaped to my feet, and charged the pile of blocks with all my weight, slamming my shoulder into it. Again, nothing happened; I merely sagged, clutching my shoulder. I heard it coming before I saw it. When I looked down, it was climbing.

It scaled the rubble pile in the breach in under a second with an astonishing, gorilla-like reach and agility. It lunged at me and its claws cut the air inches from my abdomen. I stepped back, but the beast had, for whatever reason, stopped. I peered cautiously over the edge and it looked back at me with eyes that smoldered with hatred and anger. It was clinging to the shattered wall like a great bat, its claws biting deep into the very stone. Apart from a sudden flare of its vast nostrils, it was quite still.

"You obscenity," I said. "You filthy, twisted aberration! You unholy and unnatural-"

I doubt it understood me, but it leaped at me with a bellow of rage, clawing at me with its hands and splintering the stone where I stood with its horns. I jumped back as the monster reared up, and the great stack of masonry finally began to sway out over the breach. The beast roared again, but now the tower of stones was falling and the monster could not get out of the way. The pile fell as a single unit, a great slab of granite that only broke into its component parts on the creature's back and shoulders. The earth shook. The beast crumpled, broken by the weight of the stone, and almost filling the breach. Its breath escaped in a last roar that turned into a whine and trailed off into nothing. Then there was silence again.

A chill wind broke over the city wall and, still squatting on the shattered rampart, I shivered, suddenly conscious of the sweat which had broken out all over my body. A coa.r.s.e, gray dust stuck to me like sand and, when I brushed my arm distractedly, it sc.r.a.ped the skin away. I stood and looked down into the half-filled hole where the dark, almost unbroken skin of the beast was growing pale and indistinct as the same dust settled all over it. Then a wail went up from the goblin force on the beach, a keening cry of confusion, fear, and even-it occurred to me-grief.

Some of them were already scurrying back into their boats; others stood motionless, staring at the giant carca.s.s and considering the odds against their continuing the a.s.sault unaided. Then there was a new sound: a blanket of drumming hooves, so many hooves that their individual staccato was lost in a long, unbroken roar. I turned to see a column of hors.e.m.e.n rounding the far corner of the forum and galloping toward me. They wore plate armor and heraldic shields. At their head was Sorrail.

The goblins heard them, too, and their indecision vanished. In seconds they were scrabbling up the slick prows of their war barges, pushing, struggling, and climbing over each other to get in and away. A pair of the larger ones waited, glancing uneasily at the city walls, while the rest boarded. Then they put their shoulders to the slick timbers and shoved the vessels back into the river, all the while shouting over the confused din of the others. As their oars folded out in an erratic wave and began to stab desperately into the water, I turned and raised both arms to greet the cavalry. Relief, gladness, and triumph blended, and I bellowed over the retreating goblins.

SCENE XIII

Stranger Still

So the battle was won, and many more goblins fell to our hors.e.m.e.n as they fled into the woods. I say "our," but I felt like a part of the victory only inasmuch as I was not on the losing side. You might expect that I would be hailed as a hero for playing so instrumental a part in the triumph, showered with honors and wealth, given the keys to the city's extravagant larder (I couldn't believe the king and his cohorts ate the tasteless muck we'd been fed so far), and surrounded by beautiful court ladies all anxious to touch my greatness. As you will have realized by now, I am not one to let minor scruples stand in the way of serious reward, and I was more than ready to sit back and wait for my golden goblet to be filled without pausing to explain that my actions were more self-preservatory than heroic, more accident than valor. I didn't get the option.

The soldiers who relieved me at the walls were delighted to see the monster fall, but an odd hush came over them when they saw me clinging to the shattered parapets. Sorrail gave me a long silent look and then led the charge on the goblins, his face troubled.

The news of my actions spread round the troops quickly for a while and then, though I wasn't sure when the change took place, there was a conspicuous lack of interest in my doings. By the afternoon the news was dead and I wandered alone through the marketplace where many soldiers were marching back to their garrisons amidst cheers and applause from the townsfolk. I was ignored. I caught some soldiers talking to each other about how Sorrail had led a unit of crack guardsmen from the king's palace to pull the stone ramparts down on the invading monster, as if it had been planned that way from the outset. I thought this a bit much, and said so.

"That's not the way I heard it," I cut in. "I was under the impression that Sorrail was on the other side of the city and that the monster hadn't even been seen until one of the Outsiders ..."

"You mean, one like you?" said one of the privates with something akin to contempt.

"Very like me, actually," I replied, curtly. "Yes."

"Oh, yes," said the other, a tall young man with mocking eyes. "I heard that, too. You met the black fiend and wrestled it to death by yourself."

"Of course not," I began. "But ..."

"Of course not," said the young man coldly, "that's what I thought."

They turned on their heels and walked away, smiling grimly to each other.

As I was considering this, Garnet and Renthrette appeared.

"Can you believe I'm not even getting credit for this?" I demanded.

"For what?" said Garnet.

"My brave defense of the city!" I said. "Who do you think dumped ten tons of quarried stone on that goblin wall-crusher? Who do you think stalled the enemy as they boiled around the walls and leveled their h.e.l.lish champion moments before victory was a.s.suredly theirs?"

"Sorrail," said Renthrette, with a shrug that suggested she thought I was joking around and found it only mildly amusing at best.

"No, I'm serious. It was me. Sorrail was with you lot at the front."

"Only for a short time," said Garnet. "Then he led his men to encounter the horned beast at the breach."

"But it was dead by then!" I protested. "I killed it."

"No, Will," said Renthrette. "You didn't. You know you didn't."

She said it almost kindly. I stared at her.

"I'm sure you tried to help. ..." she began.

"Oh, right," I said. "I tried to help but failed because I am-you know-incompetent and degenerate. And then Sorrail-who is a hero, virtuous and mighty-showed up to save the day. All hail Sorrail!"

Garnet scowled and looked at the floor.

"Must you always try to belittle whatever you are too unworthy to look upon, Will?"

That little mouthful of acid came from Renthrette's slim lips. Her eyes held mine and I stood there speechless. She went on. "Sorrail is a man of virtue and valor. I think the very least you could do is give him credit for his victories instead of trying to poach them like some petty thief. But maybe that's all you are. A petty thief. I thought you were past all that. In the future, if you're going to lie, at least try to choose something remotely plausible."

I was too amazed to speak and stood there spellbound as they turned and stalked away as if poles had been jammed up their rears. This made no sense. Not that bit about poles up their rears. That made all the sense in the world. But this erasing me from the story of the battle wasn't just irritating, it was odd. b.l.o.o.d.y odd, in fact, and I was going to get to the bottom of it.

I would begin with Aliana in the library. She had seen everything and would vouch for me, so I would salvage a little dignity yet, if only from Renthrette and Garnet. I must admit that this Sorrail character was really beginning to wind me up as well. If I could take him down a peg or two, so much the better. And if I could prove my account of things, that would help: the virtuous and heroic Sorrail taking credit for winning a battle at which he wasn't present? Oh, yes, that would make him fall in the estimation of a certain streak of blond misery; fall like a ton of rocks had been dropped on his head.

But not yet. I didn't want to think about the battle right now because it just made me mad, and I figured I needed a level head to prove Sorrail the duplicitous fiction-monger he clearly was. I decided to take a walk and take in the sights of the city properly.

I wandered in the direction of the library, aiming to leave the bustle of the marketplace behind me. On the way out, I spotted a weaponsmith's. The place reminded me of Orgos, so I went inside, wondering if Sorrail or Garnet had put that raiding party together yet. It would have been delayed by the attack on the city, no doubt, and I found myself impatient and baffled by how long it was taking to mount the rescue attempt. I wondered if something was being done in secret, that I was being kept in the dark about it on purpose. I wouldn't put it past Sorrail-maybe even past Garnet and Renthrette-to a.s.sume I wasn't sufficiently trustworthy to be let in on their plans. Well, that was fine, so long as they actually did something and so long as it actually worked and quickly. If I didn't have to be involved in the actual crawling about in goblin caves, so much the better.

The weaponsmith's was full of the usual bits and pieces, but it quickly became apparent that its wares could be divided into two groups: the old stuff, which was elegant but unadorned, beautifully simple, and looked like it would be around for centuries; and the new stuff, which was often tricked out with gold and jewels but looked flimsy and poorly made by comparison. Orgos would have been very unimpressed. The new stuff, the shopkeeper a.s.sured me, was all the rage in the city. I didn't doubt it.

I was about to leave when I caught sight of one of those huge two-handed swords such as I had seen over the fireplace at the Refuge Inn. I remarked on this and the shopkeeper, a tall man in late middle age, replied, "Similar, perhaps, sir, but this is a special piece."

"Really?" I said. "How so?"

"It has been in our family many generations," replied the shopkeeper. "My great-grandfather bore it when Phasdreille was besieged by a vast goblin horde which crossed the river to sack the White City."

I had hardly been listening, but something made me stop and turn to him. He carried on his tale. "He rode with a cavalry force raised in the borderlands, and they met the goblin ranks as they lay outside the great city. The hors.e.m.e.n caught the goblins unawares and routed them, though many tall and fair soldiers fell in the battle. My great-grandfather survived, but he was killed shortly afterward, and that was the last time he wielded this mighty sword. With it he struck down many dozens of goblins, cleaving a path through their ranks until he came upon their chieftain: a huge brute dressed in red and black, great ugly spikes on his helm and a weapon like a vast cleaver in his ma.s.sive claws. My ancestor faced the beast and, after many blows were struck on both sides, felled him, cleaving his skull in twain. But the goblin was wearing an iron collar and the great sword was notched, as you can see."

And sure enough, the blade was damaged, a v-shaped piece of the steel edge knocked out. I looked from it to the shopkeeper and back, confused.

"A diamond was taken from the dead goblin," said the shopkeeper, "and it was set into the pommel here."

I stared at it, then at him. Could this be the same sword I had seen at the inn? Could it be a popular local tale that everyone claimed, or was it just a ruse designed to drive up the price of the merchandise? Probably, but since I felt abused, I left and walked away from the marketplace, feeling slightly disoriented for reasons I couldn't pinpoint.

Quickly, the streets became quiet. The city was so clean, so carefully laid out, so beautifully carved, so crisp of corner, so graceful of curve, that if I hadn't just seen thousands of people cheering their conquering heroes (sic) I would begin to wonder if anyone actually lived here at all. It felt like a model made by some huge ent.i.ty as a home for storybook heroes, incredibly detailed but ultimately lifeless. I paced its impeccable marble streets and saw no more than a handful of citizens, all quietly going about their business, ignoring me as was-apparently-the law of the land.

Then I saw the gate. It was curiously ornate and gilded. I stepped through, and found a very different world on the other side. The streets here were, if anything, brighter and cleaner than the rest, but there the similarity ended. Where the walls of plain, elegant houses had been before, vast windows of polished gla.s.s now stretched, each pane opening onto a different display of gowns, jewelry, fabric, sweetmeats, trinkets, silverware, gla.s.s, feathered hats, candles, mirrors, carpets, handkerchiefs, cosmetics, perfumes-in short, everything I could have imagined (and many things I couldn't). It was all for sale. The street rolled seemingly for miles and it was lined with sparkling, dazzling, painstakingly laid out, mouth-wateringly luxuriant shops shops. In front of each window was a group of people peering in, their eyes flashing with desire, from whom rose a hum of chatter, like the emanation of a bee swarm at a rhododendron bush, each insect buzzing happily to itself as it moved from blossom to blossom sipping the heady nectar. Each was dressed in elaborately ornate finery such as the courtiers had been wearing. So startling was the array of colors, so bright and vivid their hues, that for a moment I had to shade my eyes. It was glorious!

And bizarre. It was, after all, only hours since the city had been under attack from a ma.s.sive goblin army. Now the great and the good were out shopping as if nothing had happened. And what shopping!

I moved among them, a thrill pa.s.sing through me as I brushed between their stiffened silk skirts, their padded shoulders with golden epaulettes, their lace shirtfronts, ruffs, and cuffs, their sheer stockings and jeweled slippers. It was breathtakingly excessive, like rolling in money. It was as if the entire population of the town had spent the evening planning how to wear all their worldly a.s.sets. They had succeeded, too. If the purpose was to announce your value, I couldn't see how it could be done better, short of taking your annual income in silver, melting it down and making it into a hat. It looked like some of them had done that, too.

At one corner a line had formed, and at its head a small crowd of sophisticates were watching with interest, making delighted observations to their partners as people they knew appeared in the line. I squeezed through the wall of satin and cambric to get a better view, and saw two small tables of wrought iron set outside the store front. At each sat a young couple, dressed as lavishly as everyone else and studiously ignoring the crowd which eyed them appreciatively from behind a single rope barrier some fifteen feet away. They seemed to be drinking from tall gla.s.ses of clear fluid, possibly water. I was bewildered. Then a man emerged from the shop and a hush you might call expectant fell on the spectators. He bowed to one of the couples and produced a velvet purse with a drawstring. He emptied this into the gla.s.s carafe on the table and the liquid glittered suddenly. The crowd sighed with pleasure and the couple, smiling at each other and continuing to act as if they were quite alone, poured and sipped. The crowd applauded politely.

"What did he put in the drink?" I asked of an elderly gentleman in a powdered wig. He peered at me through spectacles perched on the end of his nose with amused scorn.

"Gold," he said. "Obviously."

My mouth fell open. "Now that's what I call stylish," I said. Judging by the discreetly worded sign over the door, they brought their own gold to be ground on the premises.

"Would you care to sample some?"

"I'm afraid I'll have to pa.s.s," I said. He apparently thought this predictable. Another disdainfully minuscule smile twitched his thin lips.

"Quite," he remarked, turning away.

In other circ.u.mstances, this might have irritated me, but the place was so awash with color and splendor and, well, money, that I couldn't muster the appropriate indignation. On my right someone was selling ruby-studded hat pins and was making a fortune despite the fact that no one seemed to wear hats. Next to him was a jeweler selling delicate little cloisonne coats of arms filled with garnets, sapphires, and emeralds. It seemed that the buyers ordered them in advance according to the emblem of their house and then wore them on their collars. Another sold decorative badges shaped like flowers, made out of gold and silver wire and set with pearls like spots of dew. On the other side of the street, courtly lords and ladies gathered to watch portraits being painted of their acquaintances, who were dressed regally in fur and heavy gold chains. The jeweler next door was making a mint selling to those who would then have their pictures painted. I had never seen so many diamonds in my life: trays and trays of them in every size, cut, and carat you could imagine.

"Mined in the mountains not ten miles from here," said the jeweler, handing me a little magnifying lens and a velvet-lined box full of stones the size of b.u.t.tons. "Cut expressly to the most discerning taste of our most demanding customer. Name the tincture, carat, purity and my staff can deliver what you want to the smallest detail."

"What I can pay for, more like," I said, giving him what was supposed to be a matey we're-all-men-of-the-world kind of grin.

"Indeed," he said, his obsequiousness curdling a little about the edges.

I wondered vaguely about buying something for Renthrette, but I couldn't afford even the diamonds you needed the magnifier just to see. I walked away, thinking derisively about Sorrail, who seemed to have bunches of the things lying around and could thus throw necklaces and pendants at her when she stepped into the palace. I remembered getting her a silver chain back in Graycoast and wondered if she still had it. Probably not.

Parked close by was a pair of wagons painted cream, ornamented with a purple trim, and hung with bra.s.s and gold fittings. Beside the wagons stood a stall where two men, one dressed in a full, velvet cloak, the other in a buff leather jerkin, sold scented soaps.

"The finest way to cleanse the softest skin," announced the man in the cloak in a high, nasal drawl. "Release the delicate fragrance of rose petals and jasmine as you bathe. Suffuse yourself with the aroma of luxury as you rinse the cares of the day from your hands. The highest quality natural ingredients made by the best perfumiers. ..."

A cl.u.s.ter of women in taffeta conferred and began opening their purses. Soon they were sniffing admiringly and discussing how these were all the latest colors and featured a new range of shapes. A glance down the street, however, showed me that these two were only a small part of a convoy of such wagons all offering slightly different variations on the same theme, each proprietor attesting to their delicate perfumes, soft bubbles, and a dozen other qualities which left my head spinning. For someone whose approach to soap had been a reluctant encounter with a block of carbolic once a month, this was all pretty strange. But, as Garnet had told me, people here were pretty keen on soap.

Straight in front of me was a trim little stall where a trim little lady was selling trim little chocolate birds with what looked like real feathers in the tail. At first I was merely intrigued, but the elegant crowd who had already purchased her wares and now stood with rhapsodic looks on their faces and little poems of praise on their lips could not be ignored.

"How much?" I drooled.

"One silver piece," said the girl, with a doubtful look at my attire.

I paused, temporarily stunned. "A piece of silver?" I asked. "For a chocolate pigeon the size of a wren?"

"Vermilion hedge sparrows," she remarked with dry condescension. "Very rare. There are cheaper ones available from other vendors, but they are of inferior quality."

"They are indeed," agreed a lady to my left, who was daintily nibbling on a tiny area of wing tip. She was swathed in courtly, ultramarine satin fringed with lace and studded all over with pearls. Over her heart was a gilt-edged miniature of the king, which she wore as a broach. "Therahlia's were quite the thing last month, but these are so much finer," she said, then added amiably, "There is simply no one at her stall these days. It is thought that she will have to leave the market within the week! Ah, well, supply and demand, you know. Look at the detailing around the little creature's eyes! Superlative."

"Madame has exquisite taste," remarked the vendor. "These are specially handcrafted for the more discerning palate. Of course, if yours ..." she began, turning to me.