Thirteen voices echoed in the tent, thirteen forms clicked and clacked to life as they sped into that chaotic night.
In that moment, Rudolfo heard Gregoric cry out.
Vlad Li Tam
Vlad Li Tam did not sleep that night. He rarely did during key moments of strategy. He sat in his tent without the kallaberry pipe and huddled in his blanket, waiting for his aide to bring word.
He’d given his fiftieth son the work he’d trained him for. Of course, when he’d first adopted this particular strategy, his fiftieth son had not been born yet. He’d had no idea which arrow he would fire at this particular target. Ordinarily, a Tam would use others as his arrows, manipulating their environment until they became the right weapon at the right time. But in this regard, he could not afford to let an unknown quantity in the vicinity of Rudolfo after so much work over so many years. So it fell to the only resource a Tam could trust: Family.
He’d sent his son away to earn the knotted cord of a lieutenant in Sethbert’s army, setting him apart for the task. And in the fullness of time, Vlad Li Tam raised that hammer in his fist.
So it was that he drove one more nail into Rudolfo’s soul-the last one that he would drive, he thought. The rest of it would ripple out now as repercussions, and what he built into his forty-second daughter would be enough to carry things forward.
Their unborn child would inherit the center of the world, and would protect it better than the Androfrancines could.
The tent flap rustled and his aide spoke, thrusting his head into its warm confines. “Your fiftieth son’s last words have arrived, Lord Tam.”
Last words. Vlad Li Tam reached out and took the rolled parchment. He unrolled it, read it slowly, and then tucked it into his shirt, nestled against his hairless chest. “It is a poem,” he said, his voice heavy, “about a son’s great love for his father.”
aligis The aide bowed his head. “I am sorry for your loss, Lord Tam.”
Lord Tam nodded. “Thank you, Aetris.”
The tent flap rustled closed and he stretched himself out on his back, staring at the ceiling of his tent as it shifted beneath the snow. It would be at least another hour before he received any confirmation from another source. But his fiftieth son would not have released the bird bearing his last words unless he was certain of the implementation of his own strategy.
He reached up and pressed the note to his chest. His son was certainly dead by now, and he felt the grief licking at him. When others could see, Vlad Li Tam wore a face of stone, unreadable and unyielding. But here, alone in his tent and without the kallaberry smoke to cut the edge of his pain, Vlad Li Tam wept silently for the son he had killed.
He knew the outcome was worthy of the sacrifice, and he knew his son would have agreed as well, if he’d known what he died to save. But still, Vlad Li Tam felt the ache of that loss, and he hated the powerlessness it visited upon him. It reminded him of another loss that still lay ahead of him on this road.
When the next bird arrived, it bore the news that Vlad Li Tam had expected. He’d gone outside for that one, his breath steaming out into the cold night air as he stamped in the snow. He pressed that message into his aide’s hands. “Reply to Petronus with condolences for Rudolfo’s loss,” he said. “And send the bird to my forty-second daughter.”
His aide nodded. “Yes, Lord Tam.”
“And spread the word. We strike camp at first light and ride for home.”
Vlad Li Tam turned south and east, staring out in the night. The War Sermon had started up at long last, and far away he could see the fires in the Entrolusian camp.
“It is finished,” Vlad Li Tam said to the night.
Petronus
Petronus stood with Meirov’s rangers and the half-squad of Gypsy Scouts near the crater where the Great Library once stood. They heard them before they saw them, like a wave of sound across the night, a sound like nothing Petronus had heard before. Bellows chugged, gears hummed and oiled legs pumped. It was as if a room of farmers all worked their shears in perfect time together, low and steady amid the chaotic sounds of combat.
He squinted in the direction of the sound, and saw what could have been the dancing of ghost-lights or fireflies if he hadn’t known better of this part of the world and time of the year. And if they hadn’t flown in thirteen perfect pairs, moving in formation at the same speed.
Petronus watched as they drew near, moving twice the speed of a horse… possibly faster. The moonlight washed them in tones of blue and green, casting an eerie light around them as they moved sure-footed across the snow.
They spilled into the crater before halting, and Petronus raised his hands as the rangers counted them. “Behold,” he said, “I am called Petronus, King of Windwir and Holy See of the Androfrancine Order.”
“Petronus,” one of the mechoservitors started, “sixty-third in succession, was the eighth Pope to be assassinated in the Enlightened History of the Androfrancine Order.”
“A deception,” he said. He held up the ring. “I bear the ring of P’Andro Whym.”
The mechoservitors bowed their heads. Petronus had never seen anything like them. Tall and slender, they stood just half a head higher than a man. Their long arms ended in equally long fingers, and the metal plating that lay over the top of their metallic skeleton shifted and moved with the working bellows underneath. A small grate in the center of their backs emitted gouts of steam.
Back when young Charles had worked on them, Petronus remembered that the power was the biggest challenge. How long had that enormous fire gotten them? Three minutes? Five? He couldn’t remember now, but it was a massive amount of energy just to power the head and torso.
Somehow, they’d solved it. Something inside of these mechoservitors burned hot enough to boil the steam and power them.
Petronus looked out on the crowd of metal faces. “I am commending you to the care of General Rudolfo of the Wandering Army. All that remains of Windwir’s Great Library is housed in your memory scrolls. Rudolfo will take you to Isaak-Mechoservitor Number Three-and you will work with him for the restoration of the library. Do you understand your instructions?” He held up the ring, and their amber eyes followed it.
“Yes,” they said in a single voice.
“Which of you is familiar with the cartography of the Named Lands? Step forward.”
Four of the mechoservitors stepped forward.
“Should trouble arise along the way, you are to rally at the seventh forest manor of the Ninefold Forest Houses. Do you understand?”
They nodded.
“Very well. Until Lord Rudolfo returns, be seated and close your eyes.”
They sat, and the dim light of their eyes went out as they simultaneously brought down their metal shutters.
Petronus turned back to the south, waiting.
Thirty minutes later, the first of the Gypsy Scouts returned. They breathed heavily, coughing into the cold air. Surgeons from the Queen of Pylos did the best they could to wash and wrap wounds they could not see, their hands slick with invisible blood.