'Barodov,' he said. 'From Atreska originally.'
'Thank you, Barodov, all of you. I appreciate your efforts. Now go and drink and rest. I guess I'd better head for the walls and take a look, hadn't I?'
Barodov grinned, a flash of white from a filthy face, if you put the magnifier backwards, they'll look further away.' The group of men laughed. So did Moralius. 'Sound advice.'
Moralius hurried to the east gate. Stairs there took him up the side of the gate and onto the rampart. It was largely empty but for the standing guard. One of them was looking at the approaching lot, whoever they were. Moralius could see the cloud clearly enough. A brown smudge floating above the southern edges of the Tharn Marches.
Like as not they'd followed the highway down the river and were coming in on the secondary road that led directly to the east gate. Strange they weren't using the river system all the way but peihaps transport was in short supply. Like everything else.
One of the guardsmen saw him approach and the trio turned and came to attention. He waved them to ease.
'How far away, do you think?'
'Not far, sir,' said one, handing him the magnifier. 'Half a day. They're only just beyond the first rises, I think.'
'You have sent out scouts. We aren't going to find this is an invasion force, are we?'
'Yes sir. And no, sir, it isn't. Our scouts have seen legion standards and a number of carts. Looks like they're coming on foot.'
Moralius shook his head and put the magnifier to his eye, smiling as he did. The dust cloud looked very close. The guard was right. The Bear Claws weren't far away.
'Ah well,' he said, handing the magnifier back and feeling a little irritable. 'Better go and see how much we can actually give them.'
Moralius tutted all his way back down to the ground and into the artillery yards. The open spaces were crowded with pieces. Mighty onagers lay in their component parts while workmen shaved at wood, reworked hinges and refreshed ropes. Ballistae, scorpions and more onagers stood in finished ranks, their surfaces gleaming with fresh oil, their metalwork polished to a shine.
To his left, the lumber yards were stacked high. The Sirraneans were, if nothing else, very prompt with their deliveries and word had it that prices might be coming down, due to some form of alliance struck by Roberto Del Aglios. That would please the Exchequer. The Gatherers always grumbled about raw material prices. They'd go on grumbling about metal and mineral prices though. It was a long way to Hasfort from Kark and nowhere provided better quality.
Smoke belched from the eight furnaces, casting soot and acrid odours into the otherwise clear sky. Ahead, a group of men were hammering bolts into the side of an onager base. The steel sled was next to the wooden frame, back to the sky and on supports, being beaten into shape.
Moralius headed for the site office, hoping to find good news of progress since his shift had ended only five hours previously. He felt the weight of exhaustion begin to settle on him even before he reached the door. He needed water and a few moments of relative peace. A couple of engineers glanced at him and then away again as he put his hand on the doorknob. Anxiety was not something he liked to see in his people's faces. He opened the door, walked in and closed it behind him. The shutters were still across the windows and the din was muted. It was almost blissful.
The office was not big. Every plank of free wall space was covered in parchments showing the progression of their multitude of jobs. The single desk was impeccably tidy just as he had left it. Mess was not to be tolerated. Moralius could lay his hands on any figure in a matter of moments. It was a while before he noticed the man sitting in his chair, reading the shift reports.
'Can I help you?' he asked.
While he was used to having people waiting for him when he went into his office, they weren't normally treating the place as their own. The man looked up. He had some form of bizarre colouring on his face. Green and brown, arranged a little like tree bark.
‘I
think you can help me a very great deal,' said the man, and colours swam across his eyes.
Chapter Forty-Seven
859th cycle of God, 46th day of
Genasrise
There was screaming coming from beyond the yards. Moralius barely registered it but even in his confusion, he could hear the hammers and saws falling silent one after another, to be replaced by the shouts of men, the tolling of bells and the running of feet.
'Sounds to me like you're under attack,' said the man, an Ascendant to judge from his eyes. His tone was frighteningly calm.
The dread that filled Moralius was like nothing he had experienced before. He backed away towards the door, fumbling for the handle behind him. The Ascendant watched him, nodding.
'Good idea. Get your people on the streets. Fight back at the invaders.'
invaders.'
'Presumably.'
The Ascendant gestured towards the outside and the town where the screams and shouts were punctuated now by the sound of weapons clashing and the bawling of orders. The air was heavy with fear. Moralius couldn't think straight. Couldn't think at all. None of it made sense. The Beat Claws were coming to get their artillery. Who could possibly be attacking them. River raiders hadn't been seen for twenty-five years. No Tsardon had ever got this far, not even a decade ago when they were marching free across great swathes of the Conquord.
'Who?' he said, his head thick, his mouth unwilling to move. The Ascendant rose from his chair. 'Go and look.' Moralius nodded. 'Go and look. You are here to help?' 'That depends on your point of view.' The Ascendant waved his hand. 'Go.'
Moralius opened the door, ran outside and felt a wave break over him. His mind cleared. He looked back at the office. The door was closed again. He couldn't remember if he really had seen and spoken to an Ascendant but one thing was sure: Hasfort was under attack.
Engineers ran for the yard gates, heading for their homes and families, their weapons. Legion guards were moving to close the gates. Forty or fifty of them, spears held vertical. Moralius could see smoke from north-west of the town. Maybe the invaders had come from the forest. He began to run too. His wife, his children, were out there without him.
'The west, muster to the west!' Moralius turned at the sound of Captain Lakarov, the garrison commander's voice. 'Close the East Gate. Riders to the Bear Claws.'
A pair of horsemen galloped through the gate and it was swung shut. Moralius fell in beside the commander, both men running towards the east-gate barracks a few hundred yards away. Bells were ringing across the town. Already, citizens were flooding back up the main street from the forum and basilica. More and more smoke smudged the skyline.
'Where did they come from?' shouted Moralius.
'I have no idea. I was waiting for the Claws outriders,' replied Lakarov. 'Go to your family. Stay inside.'
'Like hell,' said Moralius. 'The engineers do not cower behind the skirts of their mothers.'
Lakarov smiled. 'Good. Find me, stand with me.'
Moralius split away to the right and headed down his narrow cobbled street. There was panic spilling from the tight lines of terraced houses. Children crying, men and women shouting at each other. Doors and shutters slamming. Moralius ran in through his front door, tearing off his apron. In the bright light spilling through the open shutters at the back, he saw his wife and children standing in the centre of the room, waiting. His son held out his gladius for him. Eight years old but with the Moralius chin jutted forward proudly.
Moralius knelt and took the scabbarded weapon from him and crushed him into a hug.
'Look after your mother until I get back, Lucas.'
'I will, father.'
He mussed the boy's brown hair and stood. He bowed his head and let Maria place his breastplate on his shoulders. She began to strap it up while he belted on his sword.
'Keep quiet and keep the back way open,' said Moralius. 'They won't know the alleys.'
'Just don't let them get this far,' said Maria.
'They won't get past the forum.'
'Sounds like they're already inside the walls.'
Moralius kissed her. 'Lakarov trained us for this. We always thought he was playing at soldiers. We'll all be kissing his feet when this is done.'
'Come back to me,' said Maria. 'Always.'
Moralius ran back out of the door and heard it thump shut behind him. The bar was pushed across. He nodded to himself and set off towards the forum. The streets were crowded with people. Lakarov would be pleased. Nearly all of them were following his standing orders.
Stretcher parties were moving to their positions. Every man and woman trained in the gladius, bow or spear seemed to be heading towards the conflict, there to find a legion captain or centurion to place them. Twenty youths trotted past him, each carrying a bucket. They looked scared but determined.
At the head of his street, Moralius glanced back towards the yards. The gates weren't yet closed. He frowned but had no time to find out why. Lakarov would have his plans. Perhaps they were to act as a fall back point should the town be lost. It didn't matter now. A little further down the road, the barracks was emptying. Moralius ran to join them. Grim-faced legionaries in shining armour and carrying weapons unsheathed, greeted him.
Lakarov was at their head.
'We will form our line at the second marker. Secure the forum. Move at a run. Go.'
The legion militia set off. Three hundred here, bolstered by reserve from the citizenry. Another three hundred at the west-gate barracks. Their steady footfall rang from the buildings on the way down to the forum. Others fell in with them. More engineers, carpenters, blacksmiths. Hasfort had a proud population. Never mind their personal feelings about the change in their town, it was theirs and they would die to keep it that way.
Moralius saw the young blacksmith Barodov among them. The humour of a little earlier was gone from his face, replaced by anger. Moralius ran to him, fell in beside him.
'No rest, eh, Barodov?'
'The wine will be sweeter when I put my bloody sword on the table next to my goblet,' he said.
'No heroics. We don't even know how many there are.'
The street widened out around Hasfort's central fountain, affording them all a view down a gentle slope into the forum. It had been cleared of stalls and already on station were armed traders, stretcher and bucket chain parties, doctors and surgeons. Some of Hasfort's own artillery was rolling into the eastern end of the forum. Just a couple of scorpions and ballistae so far. Lakarov wouldn't allow heavy artillery to be used in his town. Moralius found himself wondering why the onagers on the wall mounts hadn't been used when the invaders first appeared.
He ran around the fountain and followed the legion militia into the forum. At a barked command, they broke into their defensive line. Like a reverse battle formation, gladius to the centre, spears to the flanks, able to turn in or defend approach routes left and right into the forum.
Moralius felt the dread return and knew he shouldn't be this scared. He could see fighting beyond the forum in the streets closer to the west gate. Or he thought it was fighting. The din of voices and weapons had an odd ring to it. He trotted right to get a better view and his fear grew. Walking down the side of the forum, as if out for a stroll in the sunshine, was the Ascendant. He was with them at least. Perhaps it was about time he did something to help, do one of those things they were reputed to be able to do to break enemy armies.
The Ascendant turned and smiled, sending a shiver through Moralius, like the first ice of dusas. The Ascendant spread his arms and spoke, his voice seeming to carry over the forum, echoing from ahead like it issued from a thousand mouths.
'Come forward, my people, and welcome into your embrace all those you see before you. Join the march that will turn the world and bring the new order to power.'
Across the forum, the march faltered. Legionaries looked to one another, grasping for confirmation that they had heard confusing words carried on the thick accents of others they could not see. As if the words had formed in the air spontaneously. None of them had seen the Ascendant speak. Moralius found himself walking towards him.
'Who are you?' he said.
‘I
am Gorian. I am the bringer of a new truth and a new glory. Behold my people.' 'Your
...?'
A scream taken up by a hundred mouths gripped his heart. People were flooding into the forum. They were not falling back. They were running. Running for their lives and howling in a terror that shook his body where he stood. No one was moving forward now. Lakarov could not find the words to shout an order. It was inhuman, the sound of the citizens of Hasfort. Reacting to what, he had no desire to see. But he could not move to hide either. Strength drained from him.
Behind the fleeing citizens, legion militia retreated in some form of order. Not all could contain themselves but enough moved back into the forum with their weapons still towards the enemy to stop a rout. Moralius gaped at what came after them.