Both marshals straightened at that. “Corvus,” Teresian began.
Corvus held up a hand. “We do not vote on these things, brother. Those are my orders.” He turned to Druze.
“You, my friend, will also detach a thousand of your Igranians to help Rictus. You will then take command of the reminder, plus the other two morai we have here in this camp, and you will work with Parmenios and his machines.”
Druze looked thoughtfully at the little man who was Corvus’s secretary, now clad in a linen cuirass reinforced with bronze scales. It was ill-fitting, made for a taller man. But Druze only nodded. “I am with child to finally see these things you’ve made in action, Parmenios. Will you join me on the wall?”
Parmenios met Druze’s black eyes. “I will be supervising the advance of my command from the rear. I am not a soldier.”
“Well, we’re agreed on something then,” Druze said, and winked at him.
“I will be with Demetrius and Teresian and the Companions, south of Rictus’s positions,” Corvus said. “I will meet the relief army and defeat it, and then turn around and help Rictus’s command force an entry to the city.” He watched the men about the table. They were all staring at the outline of Machran on the map as though picturing to themselves the blood and chaos of the morrow.
“If you have questions, brothers, I’ll listen to them.”
“Not a question, but a fact,” Fornyx said. He stared at Corvus with undisguised hostility. “If you are defeated by the relief army, then Rictus’s command will be utterly destroyed – it cannot retreat.”
“I’d best not be defeated then,” Corvus said.
That night the army abandoned its camps to the west and north of the city, the men leaving their tents standing and the campfires burning behind them. They marched in quiet columns through the darkness, following the lines of the stockades that ringed the city. They carried only the arms and armour they would be needing in the morning, skins of water, a few dry flatbreads to gnaw on before the sun came up.
The position of the army and Corvus’s plans for it had been disseminated to all centurions, and it filtered down to the men in the long files in whispers as they marched. Slowly, the knowledge seeped through the army that this was the end. In the morning they would either take Machran, or they would face utter defeat. But one way or another the long siege would be over.
“The rumours are true, then?” Kassia demanded. She clasped her hands together, knuckles as white as her face.
“They are true.” Karnos kissed her. “Parnon must have the oratory of Gestrakos. A boy from his column made it through the lines yesterday. The League army will be before the walls in a few hours. When the sun comes up, we will open the gates and go out to meet it. Corvus will be caught between us like a nut for cracking.”
The light in her eyes faded. “You’re going out with them? I thought Kassander -”
“I will be with those men, Kassia. I would have it no other way.”
She leaned against him and buried her head in his chest. “There is no need for it – what is one more man?”
“I have been hiding in a box-chair for weeks now, afraid to walk the streets of my own city, Karnos, the Speaker of Machran. But I am also a citizen of this place. I am entitled to carry a spear in its defence.”
Kassander appeared in the doorway. “Karnos!” he stopped short at the sight of his sister in Karnos’s arms.
“Kassia, for God’s sake leave him alone – you can kiss him all you want after you’re married. Karnos, we must go. The morai are assembling down at South Prime.”
“You go on, Kassander. I have one or two things to clear up here.”
“Well, make it quick – it’s two hours until sunrise.” He disappeared from the doorway, and was back again two seconds later. He clanked into the room, already in full armour with his helm in the crook of his arm. He bent over Kassia and kissed her on her forehead. “You be safe, sister.”
“Look after him for me, Kassander.”
Kassander snorted. “He’s big and ugly enough to do that for himself. Karnos, hurry!” He was gone again.
“You might have wished your brother well too, you know,” Karnos said with a smile.
“He knows me, and all that I wish him, Karnos.”
“Come with me.” He took her by the hand. “I want your help with something.”
The long room, with the cabinet of Framnos at one end. Every lamp in the house had been lit, and the household were all up and about though it was still the middle of the night. Polio was there, and all the household slaves. In a corner Rian stood with Ona at her side, and by them was Philemos. He wore a soldier’s cuirass.
The cabinet door was open, and the Curse of God that had belonged to Katullos stood within like some icon of shadow. Karnos lifted it from its place and held it out to Kassia.
“Help me put it on.”
She was reluctant to touch it, but as he settled it over his shoulders, she clicked shut the black clasps that held the halves of it together, and pulled down the wings that settled snug into place over his collarbones.
Karnos exhaled. The cuirass seemed to settle on him. He was no longer fat, and the black stuff of the armour closed in against his torso and gelled there, a black hide matching the contours of his chest perfectly.
“Now you are a Cursebearer at last,” Kassia said. There were tears in her eyes.
He gripped her arm a moment, and stepped forward to the table upon which the rest of his panoply lay. A plain bronze helm, a shield emblazoned with the sigil of Machran, a spear, and a curved drepana in a belted scabbard. But he did not touch these, taking up instead a small iron key.
He walked over to Polio, and set the key in the old man’s slave-collar. With a click, he loosened it, and carefully took it from his neck.
“You are free, my friend. I am only sorry I did not do it sooner.”
Polio rubbed his throat. He looked down on Karnos like a stern father. There was a gleam in his eye, though his face never changed.
“I was never a slave in this house,” he said.
Karnos gave him the key. “Free them all, Polio -they can come or go as they please. I will own no more slaves.”
Something like a smile crossed Polio’s face. “You have grown, Karnos.”
Karnos tapped the side of his black cuirass. “I thought I had shrunk.”
The two men stood looking at one another. Now that Karnos had become thin and gaunt they could almost have passed for father and son.
“I shall be here when you return,” Polio said. “This is where I belong.”
Karnos nodded.
He turned to Philemos and the children of Rictus. “Stay here. The streets will not be safe – better to stay behind stout walls tomorrow, whatever happens.”
“I’m coming with you,” Philemos said, and Rian clutched at his arm.
“You are needed here,” Karnos told him. “Stay in my house, and look after those you love. You will do more good here than in a spearline.” He half-smiled. “That is my order, as Speaker of Machran.”
Then he went back to the table, and set the bronze helm on his head.
The sun began to rise, and with the dawn a stillness fell across the city. The walls were lined with spearmen of Machran and Arkadios and Avennos, and gathered together in the square within the South Prime Gate a mass of spearmen, thousands strong, had formed up and stood silently, looking at the grey lightening of the sky.
On the blasted plain before the walls, the army of Corvus formed up, massing to the east and south of the city. They stood in ordered ranks, waiting like their foes within.
And over the hills to the south a third army came into view. It shook out from column into line of battle, and as the sun cleared the Gosthere Mountains to the east, so the men who marched in its ranks took up the Paean, the death hymn of the Macht, and the sound of it rolled over the plain and filled the air like the thunder of an approaching storm.