Cassandra’s gaze shifted beyond the legion camp. Nijumeti fighters operating as glider tugs dipped low. A noise like tearing paper as cables hauling the wooden troop transports released, lines falling flailing to the ground. The engineless aircraft glided easily across Northhaven’s open wheat fields until the farmers’ wealth was left furrowed by the horde’s transporters. Hundreds of gliders tore up crops and soil, spending their velocity on landing. Some of them shed broken wings among the harvest before spinning around to a stop inside the fields. As the first gliders halted, their doors were kicked out. Ferocious riders spilled, whooping, into the open. They had been penned up inside, unable to do anything other than try to calm their horses and experience raw helpless terror while they watched their comrades’ craft disintegrate above Rodal. Now they were free. Alive. Born in the saddle and returned to the ground. They swept out, their fear transformed into a terrible breed of madness.
Alexamir crisscrossed the flats outside the town, Cassandra spotting for him, releasing their bombs on an armoured column trying to engage the horsemen. They left a fortune in ruined steel smoking across the town’s outskirts – the hardest part of the strike avoiding collisions with other fighters as they released their bombs into the carnage. From the air, Cassandra could see that the horde’s control of the sky was turning this engagement into a rout. Soon enough, the farmland and wilds surrounding Northhaven swarmed with blue-uniformed Weyland soldiers fleeing for their lives, no attempt to form squares and stand off the riders. Legionaries from the Vandian punishment fleet joined them, their armour little protection from lances cutting them down from behind, from screaming nomads flashing sabres and using war-trained horses to trample every fleeing soldier. A helo that had managed to take to the air came fleeting past Cassandra’s plane, either attempting to quit the battlefield or its ordinance unloaded – no attempt to fire on them. Alexamir banked their plane to put the helo in his gun-sights, but as his fingers settled on the trigger the clacking of empty gun-belts sounded from their wing. An ugly nomad fighter with four stacked wings spotted the Vandian gunship and swooped down, breaking the quadplane’s lowest wing against the helo’s rotors, sending the enemy spinning out of control into the ground. It didn’t explode, but then it didn’t need to. A squadron of horsemen pounded across the wreckage, spearing the two helo pilots while they attempted to draw their sidearms.
Alexamir shook his fist angrily at the quadplane, now corkscrewing uncertainly across the sky on its three good wings. ‘You dare cheat me of my prize! Pull the meat out of my teeth. Are you jackals or are you Nijumeti?’
‘We’re nearly out of fuel as well as bullets,’ called Cassandra.
‘Then let us land, my Golden Fox. It would be ill-starred to crash into the first kingdom Atamva sent us to conquer. The tickle of my dagger may yet convince the Weylander skyguard to pour fuel into my wooden pigeon’s tanks and thread fresh bullets for my talons.’
Cassandra stared at the burning airfields.
There isn’t much fuel left to requisition in that inferno
.
Alexamir dipped down, aiming for the railhead outside town. One of the Guild of Rails’ long three-storey-high trains remained at rest in the stockyards, partially unloaded of its cargo. And there the train would remain. Nomad bombs had blasted the tracks away heading south, a series of blackened craters where once had run rails. A line of tall wooden warehouses stood nearby, docks along the White Wolf River for riverboats to moor up. All of it swarming with horsemen. Many of the workers and townspeople had thrown themselves into the river and were allowing themselves to be swept west by the currents. They were headed towards the Lancean Ocean, knowing it was a rare nomad who could swim. Cassandra’s ungainly plane jounced once on the soil outside the railhead, taxiing to a halt. All around them nomad aircraft joined the ranks of landed gliders, out of fuel, bombs and shells. Many fighters made landings barely better than the unpowered gliders, shedding undercarriages, smashing their fuselage into the ground. Where pilots survived their clumsy landings, they climbed on top of their planes and yelled for thralls to come running from the gliders with their horses.
Alexamir, at least, had settled their plane down on the field proficiently enough to take off again if they could locate a cache of fuel. They both dismounted from the aircraft. Cassandra’s legs ached from an age in the cockpit’s confines, but she did not begrudge the sensation.
I can walk. I am healed. That is enough.
Alexamir checked inside the nearest glider, but all the horses carried by it had already been taken. Cassandra watched prancing warriors dancing on the wooden roofing of the railhead buildings. Both of them headed for the yard in search of fuel barrels.
As they got closer, Cassandra noticed a figure standing in front of the marshalling yard. Female. It was the witch rider Nurai, as though she had known they would pass through the railhead and here she was, awaiting their arrival.
‘Nothing good lies in this land,’ called Nurai when they were close enough to hear her. ‘Not for the horde. Nor for you, Alexamir Arinnbold.’
Alexamir stared suspiciously at the resentful witch rider. ‘What is it that you have seen?’
Nurai refused to say and gestured instead at Cassandra. ‘This is your fault.’
‘Alexamir is his own man. He makes his own choices.’
And he has chosen me over you
.
‘We are lost.’
‘This looks much like a victory to me,’ said Cassandra.
‘For you perhaps, but not for the horde. Not for the proud riders of the steppes.’
‘I am one of you, now.’
And how that must gall.
‘Do you think so?’ Nurai laughed, bitterly. ‘We shall see what you are and where you belong soon enough.’
Cassandra shivered despite herself at the warning.
Or is it a curse?
She put it down to sour grapes on the part of the witch rider.
Alexamir stared towards the buildings. ‘Where is your mistress? Where is Madinsar?’
‘Madinsar remains behind in the steppes with the young and the old and the infirm,’ said Nurai. ‘You have gone against our counsel and she does not wish to see the result of the clans ignoring our visions.’
‘Let her keep Nonna company, then,’ said Alexamir, walking away with Cassandra. ‘The Prince of Thieves shall pry open Rodal’s treacherous mountain paths and then carry them both back so much treasure that they will need to sow new tents for a decade to hold it all.’
‘Fly back home!’ pleaded Nurai, ‘Head back now to the steppes before it is too late.’
‘Enough!’ yelled a voice. It was Kani Yargul, emerging from behind the goods yard with a bodyguard of perhaps fifty warriors. ‘I tire of the witch riders’ dire predictions of misery and defeat. Where is my defeat here? I have smashed the forces of Weyland and their Vandian allies in a single day.’
Nurai shook her head sadly, but perhaps wisely offered no more warnings to her victorious ruler.
‘And this is said to be the most beggarly of the kingdom’s prefectures,’ whooped Kani Yargul, kicking over a tower of crates. One of the boxes hit the ground and broke open revealing dozens of rifles inside straw bedding. New lever-action Weyland weapons, the barrels well-greased. He seized a gun and tossed it to his warriors who examined the rifle with awe. ‘Greater riches lie to the south. And beyond Weyland . . . the other Lanca nations. One kingdom after another; each more fattened with treasure than even gods might dream of ! Did Madinsar dream of this?’ laughed Yargul for the benefit of his superstitious warriors.
A column of Nijumeti emerged from behind the grounded guild train’s carriages, flanked by lance-bearing warriors. And in their centre a sad-looking crowd of prisoners shambled forward.
‘Here are our foes’ high-born,’ announced a blue-skinned warrior, proudly, bowing before Kani Yargul. ‘The curs who did not flee fast enough!’
Cassandra started. Among the prisoners were Duncan and Paetro, standing to the side of Prince Gyal, Baron Machus and Apolleon.
High-born indeed. But why are Duncan and Paetro here if my mother’s ship has departed?
Cassandra knew the answer to her question even as she asked it.
They spoke up for me too loudly. They were held in the expeditionary force to learn manners.
Paetro spotted Cassandra first, then Duncan. Hope flashed in their eyes. Hope that they might survive this. Wonder at her presence here. Paetro whispered something and she read his lips.
‘By the ancestors, she can walk again!’
Cassandra tried to cross to the prisoners, but Alexamir held her back.
‘Be careful,’ Alexamir whispered. ‘If you speak for your friends, you will need to be heard as a Nijumet here, not a Vandian.’
‘Fine velvet cloaks and handsome gold breastplates,’ announced Kani Yargul, pacing in front of the prisoners. ‘But where is your Princess Helrena? She paid me a visit out in the steppes which I sadly missed. So I arrive in Weyland to repay her courtesy.’
‘I am Prince Gyal of the Imperium,’ announced Gyal. ‘I lead the empire’s forces here.’
‘A prince?’ laughed Kani Yargul. ‘What hostage price will your farcalled emperor pay for such a fine piece of quality as you?’
‘He will give you a life. Yours. Order your savages to quit the field and I will allow you to ride away,’ said Prince Gyal.
‘I do not enjoy the way you bargain.’
‘You will enjoy dying at the hands of our legions even less.’
Yargul grunted in amusement. ‘And foreigners claim we Nijumeti are arrogant.’ He bowed mockingly to Prince Gyal. ‘But I take lessons from your kind.’
‘Vandia’s sky mines provide wealth beyond mortal dreams,’ said Apolleon from the prince’s side. ‘Vandia’s legions are countless. Its science has raised the Imperium to be master of all of Pellas.’
Yargul shrugged. ‘Everyone has better weapons, sharper steel and more powerful sorceries than the Nijumeti. Yet our warriors are standing here victorious. While you,’ he drew his sabre, ‘are standing here and
here
.’ He lashed out with a blow so fast and powerful Cassandra could hardly believe she had witnessed it. Gyal’s head rolled severed across the grass, a look of astonishment still contorting his face. The decapitated body remained vertical, swaying for a second until the Great Krul booted it to the soil. Kani Yargul roared with laughter at his sadistic jape. ‘Have your emperor use his endless wealth to buy you a fresh head, my
prince
.’
Apolleon eyed the horde’s ruler coldly. ‘You can have no idea what you have just done. Decades of complex work building alliances wasted. All of it wasted!’
Kani Yargul raised his sabre, running a finger down the bloody blade. ‘Steel makes the best treasure. For when it rests in my hand,
I
am master of all Pellas. Your people will quickly learn this.’
‘No,’ said Apolleon. ‘You have yet to meet my people. They are away hunting for bigger game.’
‘Then I must remember to kill them later.’ Yargul turned to his lieutenants. ‘Vandians, it seems, make most insolent thralls. Take none alive. Put all of these cravens to the sword.’
‘Some of the prisoners were of my tent,’ said Cassandra, stepping forward and shrugging away Alexamir’s warning hand. ‘I claim them.’
‘You do?’ laughed the Krul of Kruls. ‘I change my orders, then. Have every captured Vandian tied between our horses and ripped apart!’
‘I
claim
them,’ insisted Cassandra.
‘And so you will claim them, girl,’ snarled the nomad ruler. ‘Five pieces at least for each prisoner. After their limbs have been torn off you can make a mound out of your dead countrymen and, if you are lucky, Alexamir will steal you a drove of fat pigs to feed on their parts.’
‘She has the right to speak,’ said Alexamir.
‘And I have listened to her prattle and denied her demands,’ growled Kani Yargul. ‘I have worked a lifetime for this victory. Do not sour my mood. Neither of you will enjoy your chastisement.’ He jerked a thumb at Cassandra and barked at his warriors. ‘Drag this young saddle-wife out of my sight. Suffering her complaints is akin to riding backwards through brambles.’
Two warriors seized Cassandra’s arms, starting to haul her out of the yard. This was more than Alexamir could stand.
No, don’t be a fool.
But it was too late.
Alexamir drew his sword and faced the ruler. ‘Did my father sour your mood, too? When you were out hunting and you tried to slip a dagger in his back?’
‘Someone has been feeding you lies, boy,’ snarled the Great Krul. There was an uneasy shifting among his warriors. Artdan Arinnbold had been a popular rider. One believed mauled to death during a hunt. There had been no honourable challenge to send him back to the grass.
‘My father lives,’ said Alexamir. ‘He survived your treachery. He fights as a mercenary among the baronies of the Burn.’
‘Does he now?’ growled Kani Yargul. ‘There is a small thing I did not know. I do believe you have been poisoned against me by the witch riders, young Prince of Thieves. They claimed victory would be found in the distant north, attacking Persdad.’ He indicated the smashed railhead. ‘But here is my victory. Beyond the mountains that held us at bay. Beyond the marshes that contained us. Beyond the long timber walls raised by the Empire of Persdad. Merely the first of many magnificent triumphs in rich lands.’
Alexamir pointed his sabre at the Krul of Kruls. ‘Then swear on your life before Atamva that you did not try to murder my father. Swear you did not betray him so you could steal my mother from his tent.’
‘Crawl back to your tame Vandian fox, boy,’ warned Kani Yargul, patting his blade. ‘Or I shall have to bear your mother’s sullen weeping for a year after I send you to the grass.’
‘Swear it!’
‘I swear I shall make your mother a present of your ungrateful false tongue,’ screamed Yargul. He leapt forward, his sabre a blur. Alexamir met the blow and there was a crash of steel like anvils smashing against each other.
There was no room for artistry or skill here; the two men flew at each other, sword hammering against sword. Somewhere in the fight both men had drawn daggers, although Cassandra hadn’t seen the move. They used their second blade as other men would use a shield . . . to block and counterstrike. All the watching nomads roared their approval, some chanting for Alexamir, others for the Great Krul. They seemed to treat this as a game laid on for their benefit rather than a matter of life or death.