They had numbered eighty-two when they had first set out from Q'os: the colonel and eight squads of ten men each, a full company in all; plus one more to their number, this strange Diplomat sent to them from High Command. Two of the men had fallen ill during the voyage and therefore had remained on the ship; two more had been left behind to look after the zels; another had wrenched his ankle on the hike up into the mountains. Such losses were less than the colonel might have expected. That left him with seventy-seven men in alclass="underline" not quite four platoons.
The colonel was worried, though. He had been worried even before they had set off on this hastily prepared mission. They faced upwards of fifty Rshun, according to their Diplomat guide. Fifty Rshun, on their own territory, defending their lives and their home. His Commandos might be the finest fighters in the imperial army, but he still disliked such odds.
Cassus had wondered why the Matriarch had not committed a full battalion of army regulars to back them up. A mission like this was surely best undertaken slowly, with large and overwhelming numbers. But he supposed the Beggar Kings of Cheem Port would have balked at such a force wishing to land at their docks, no matter how much gold was offered to them.
Besides, perhaps the rumours back home were true. Something was astir in the capital. Companies were being reformed out of the remnants of others; men from the quieter outposts of the Empire were being recalled to Q'os. The rumour-mongers had talked of only one thing, and Cassus judged them to be right. He had taken part in more than one invasion himself.
Che rose from his study of the bush and met the colonel's eyes at last. Once more, Cassus felt himself stiffen under the young man's cold and empty gaze.
'The morning, then,' agreed the colonel, speaking around his lump of tarweed.
Che nodded and walked away.
Cassus watched as the young man staked out a lean-to well away from the others, and threw his pack beneath it. The man sat in front of his crude shelter with his legs folded, facing the last of the light, his hands clasped together, his eyes closed.
He looked like one of those fool-crazy monks of the Dao.
A few of the men took notice of what he was doing, as they had back on the ship. They nudged each other, leering quietly.
He's a dangerous one, Cassus mused. I wouldn't like to cross him. The colonel turned away, spitting upon the grass as he did so. Well, soon we will face fifty of his like.
He filled his lungs with mountain air, scanning the snow-capped ranges around their camp. He knew they were out there somewhere, hidden in some high valley behind their monastery walls.
Surprise, he thought as he contemplated this mission once more. It will all come down to surprise.
*
Nico awoke with a start.
The room flickered with gaslight. Ash sat on the floor, still deep in meditation, his hooded eyes fixed to the same spot on the door. Nico rubbed his tired eyes. He had no way of telling how long he had been asleep. An hour perhaps?
Someone shouted outside in the hallway, complaining with the loud senseless words of a drunk.
It was the only warning they had.
The door burst inwards with a crash against the wall, sending out a puff of chalky plaster. Nico's body clenched with the sudden shock of it. He opened his mouth, perhaps to shout something, perhaps simply to gasp. Instead he found the strangest of things occurring: time slowed for him, hovering on the edge of that first instant.
From the corner of his eye, he saw Ash's hand reach for the blade by his side. But Nico knew that it would encounter only emptiness. The sword was stowed in a canvas roll beneath the bed, where he had replaced it earlier after his return. In the doorway, he saw the white press of Acolytes as they rushed through it one at a time. Their robes seemed caught in mid-motion, like a painting, the folds in them given depth with shadows and highlights, the curious silk patterns in the cloth shimmering in the light. He saw the naked length of steel in the grip of the foremost man, brandished like an extension of his arm. An oily sheen ran along the blade, sea blue, corn yellow, moist-earth brown; while a reflection of the gaslight shone close to the hilt, like a miniature sun. He saw the man's mask, and how its many apertures were in deep blackness save for the whites of his eyes – fixed now on the old farlander squatting on the floor, caught unarmed and unawares.
And then time whiplashed back to normal, and all was chaos and a great roar was filling Nico's ears, shocking the senses from him further, and he realized that Ash was the source of it, still squatting there and doing the only thing possible as the lead Acolyte lunged at him with his blade.
It was a primal shout, like nothing Nico had ever heard before, like nothing he would ever have thought possible from a human throat. It was shaped and directed with such commanding force that Ash's attacker was stunned for a moment, and dropped the weapon clean from his hand as though it had turned red hot.
It was enough to give Ash the second that he needed to jump up and grab the only loose furniture in the small room. A chair. He swung it full-force into the Acolyte's face. Bones cracked behind the mask, and the man reeled backwards into those trying to push in from behind. The farlander charged into him, shoved them all back, with his own momentum, through the doorway. Somehow he got the door closed against their weight. He rammed his back against it, holding it shut.
'Nico…' he said with a measure of coolness that frightened Nico more than calmed him. 'Throw me a coin, boy, quickly now.' And he jerked his head to the washbasin, now out of his reach, where they kept the change needed to feed the room's various coinslots.
Nico scrambled down from his bunk as Ash fought with the door, which shook violently and tried to jerk him out of its way. 'Hurry,' Ash hissed.
Nico reached the basin. He fumbled for a coin, not seeing any, and suddenly he feared he had already used their last – but no, his fingers found one where his eyes had not, and he plucked it up, tossing it to Ash.
Ash caught it in one hand and in the same motion twisted and dropped it through the slot on the doorframe. He turned the key, and relaxed his stance only slightly as the lock clicked into place; hammering could be heard against the quivering wood, and Ash still pressed himself against it, clearly not trusting much to the lock's strength.
Nico took a pace towards him, then turned and took a step towards the shuttered window instead. He stopped there, paralysed with indecision.
Ash frowned at him just as an axe blade cut through the door beside the old man's head, spitting a shower of bright splinters. 'The window, boy. The window!'
Nico didn't have to be told twice. It was their only way out. He rushed over and pushed at the shutters… except they didn't open, and refused to budge in his hands. They required a coin.
Nico cursed as he again fished in the sink for another one, though this time he knew he had used them all.
He turned to Ash blindly, wringing his hands, too panicked to think straight.
'The purse!' Ash hollered. 'There! On the bed!'
Sure enough, when Nico fumbled open the purse he found a quarter amongst the other coins, and he took it to the coinslot, and tried inserting it with shaking fingers into the hole; but then he fumbled and dropped it, and had to chase after the thing as it rolled back across the room all the way to Ash's feet.
Ash shouted something he didn't hear. Nico scooped up the coin and returned to the window frame. His aim was truer this time and the quarter rattled out of sight. Nico forced the shutters open. He took a vigorous breath of air. Outside it was dark and thick with fog. He stuck his head out to look down at the alley some four floors below. He couldn't see any way down, no fire escapes or nearby drainpipes.
'We're trapped!' he cried, and leaned his head back inside just as something shattered against the frame. He stared at the broken end of a crossbow bolt as it clattered off the sill. Someone was shooting down at him from the opposite roof.