Sargatanas waved the trooper away and then turned to the massed soldiers.
"Legions," he shouted, his voice like a pure trumpet, "the first move in our campaign has been made for us! We are at war!"
And Hannibal heard a martial cheer spring from thousands of inhuman throats and rise to the heavens, a cheer as he had never heard before.
After conferring for a moment, Valefar turned away from his lord and looked back at the soul. The Prime Minister was shaking his head, an expression upon his bone-plated face that seemed amazed.
"The fruits of your boldness come sooner than you could have imagined, soul!" he shouted through the cheers. "Hannibal Barca, you are now a general in the active service of his lord Sargatanas, Brigadier-Major of the Armies of Hell, Lord of Adamantinarx!"
Chapter Fifteen
ZORAY'S THIRTY-FOURTH WARD
The flight to the border with Sargatanas, Faraii, and Valefar had been quick and easy. War had been imminent for some time, and Sargatanas had had his chosen troops in place long enough for their camp to be well dug in. Upon landing, Faraii headed off to join his Shock Troopers, while Sargatanas and Valefar joined the staff that had gathered beside a conjuring pit. Eligor, wings twitching in anticipation, volunteered to reconnoiter and chose six flyers from the Flying Corps. They took to the air and, after a few dozen wing beats, Eligor realized just how much he enjoyed being in his lord's service at a time as important as this.
Looking down through a heavy mist upon the remnants of the border outpost, Eligor saw Astaroth's Demolishers chewing their way through the remaining low buildings. Broad-backed and flattened, each slow-moving creature was, in reality, hundreds of souls compressed together to form nothing more than a giant mobile digestive tract. Myriad enlarged mouths bit off large sections of soul-brick wall and masticated them into pulp. Eligor saw the ruddy haze kicked up by the destruction and the long, straight reddish mounds that trailed behind them, the excreted remains of processed souls. The mounds extended for hundreds of spans, all the way back, he guessed, to the edge of the ward. The slickened ground they left behind was scoured and bloody, smooth and featureless.
The lower he and his half-dozen lightly armed scouts flew, the more distinctly he could see the buildings twisting upon their foundations in a futile effort to protect themselves and hear them crying out. When he had witnessed Demolishers in the past, Eligor had felt a sort of pity for those soul-bricks, mostly, he thought, based upon their complete defenselessness. The wailing only heightened this.
He flew on until he spotted the carpet of slowly marching soldiers that was Astaroth's army. Glyph-commands sprang up from its officers, guiding the Demolishers, opening the front so the legions could advance. Eligor counted twelve full legions but due to the mist could not find any evidence of Astaroth's Flying Corps. The more Eligor peered into the concealing clouds, though, the more convinced he was of their presence.
Eligor turned his flight back toward the massed legions of Sargatanas' advance army. A virtual legion of fleet mounted decurions had been dispatched with utmost haste to the region's lava-fields to conjure an army as quickly as possible in immediate defense of the distant ward. They had been marvelously successful; arrayed like a vast checkerboard, they only awaited orders to march on the invaders. Eligor knew that, once engaged, these few legions would serve as a delaying force until Sargatanas could bring his approaching ground army to bear.
Eligor descended and swooped in low over the legions, seeking his master's personal sigil amidst the many glowing unit commanders' emblems. He found the glowing emblem and, beneath it, his lord standing next to his mount discussing the terrain with the Decurion Primus, a scarred, battle-hardened commander named Gurgat. The one-armed veteran seemed just as interested in Eligor's findings as his lord.
"It is just as you thought, my lord," the Captain of the Guard said. "The town of Maraak-of-the-Margins is almost gone. Its inhabitants are scattered. A full dozen Demolishers have seen to that. Behind them is Astaroth's entire army; he is gambling everything on this move."
"He feels he has nothing to lose," Sargatanas said gravely, shaking his head. "We must show him that, in fact, he has everything to lose. Gurgat, rouse the legions. I have orders to issue. It is finally time for this to begin."
The Decurion Primus mounted a waiting soul-beast and trotted off. Already shrill horns could be heard. Sargatanas turned to Eligor. "I want my old friend Astaroth taken alive, Eligor. I have said as much to Valefar and Faraii as well. It is the least I can do for him. But as for his army, it must be annihilated to a demon."
"I understand, Lord."
* * * * *
A red, permeating blood-haze from the Demolishers hung low and heavy above the glistening rubble, making it difficult to see their looming forms as well as their relentless progress. Only Astaroth's protective guiding seals hovering over them could be seen easily, each slowly growing as they drew nearer. Eligor could hear the siege creatures masticating their way through buildings and streets alike, the cacophony of their thousand jaws mingling with the sound of crumbling walls and the diminishing cries of the bricks. The metallic tang of the pulverized souls' blood upon the hot air reached Eligor's nose. The winds were, largely, heading obliquely to them; otherwise they, like the landscape before them, would have been stained red from the mists.
Eligor looked at Sargatanas, who stood, impassive, as if rooted to the ground. His unblinking eyes were fixed upon the vaguely seen Demolishers. The plates of his face shifted, reconfiguring his visage into a rigid series of bony planes, barbed and heavily textured. Where there had been eight eyes only three remained, and these were mostly hidden behind protective sclerotic armor.
"Enough of this," he said softly, almost to himself. "They are close enough."
Sargatanas raised both hands and a blue effulgence grew between the floating horns above his head. It drew together, growing brighter, and became a quickly rotating ball composed of a dozen tiny repeated glyphs. Eligor could not discern their meaning, but in moments it became clear. The ball split apart and each twisted symbol sped away like a blue-flamed arrow shot at the center of each Demolisher's glyph. With a crackle of electricity audible even from where they stood, Sargatanas and his legion watched the short but fierce struggle for control that ensued. One by one the blue glyphs disassembled the great fiery-orange seals of Astaroth, casting aside and extinguishing the component glyphs until nothing remained to protect the lumbering Demolishers. Eligor saw the first tendrils of jagged blue lightning scratch at their backs, setting them aflame. It took only a few seconds before all of them were burning. Then, nearly simultaneously, they arched their backs in spasms of pain and burst apart, ripped into glowing chunks that tumbled into the few standing buildings, causing them, in turn, to explode.
A roar of approval rose from behind Eligor and Sargatanas as the front lines of the legions saw the empty expanse of terrain that now lay before them.
Sargatanas mounted his soul-beast and unsheathed the sword named Lukiftias-pe-Ripesol, Light of Heaven. With a flourish of the blade, he and the legions behind began to advance. Eligor and his chosen Guards spread their wings and took up position above him, measuring their wing beats so as not to outpace their lord.