Takaar stared at him for a long time. Fat from the deer hissed and spat into the fire.
‘What happened?’ he asked. ‘What happened when I ran?’
Chapter 23
The last refuge of he who has lost his courage is warm water and a sharp blade. The silence of Tul-Kenerit, the last bastion on Hausolis. Even the din of the approaching Garonin had not been able to mask it. Alone across the courtyard ran Takaar and the eye of every TaiGethen and Al-Arynaar followed him. Every pace he took bled will, belief and courage still further. Auum, like them all, refused to believe what he was witnessing.
Takaar did not pause, nor look over his shoulder. His hands slapped into the metal of the keep door. He bent his strength to it and slid it wide. He ran into the gloom and was lost to sight. The elves stared after him. Auum felt a desolation sweep him, like he was the only one left standing. He dragged his gaze from the keep, the still-open door, and looked along the rampart to Katyett and Pelyn, standing above the gates.
A whistling and whining.
The tumult of the approaching Garonin flooded his senses once more.
‘Brace!’ he yelled.
His shout was taken up across the bastion. Auum looked over the parapet. A hundred barrels had spat smoke and flame. A second volley was incoming and the first was yet to strike.
‘Yniss preserve us.’
Projectiles thundered into the upper section of the walls or flew overhead to drop in the courtyard. Heavy bow emplacements were obliterated. Timber shattered, splinters thrummed away, ripping into face, body and legs. Elves screamed. Impact after impact drove into the rampart wall. Steel bent and split. Stone was shattered. Bodies were flung backwards.
Auum crouched low behind the walls, his hands over his ears. If any orders were coming, no one could hear them. A great pall of smoke was rising from the gatehouse. He could see his brothers and sisters, ripped open and dismembered, lying on the parapet. Blood smeared every surface.
Another volley struck home. A projectile slammed into the wall right in front of Auum. Steel bent inwards, stone was shoved back. Auum was thrown from the rampart. He tried to orient his body as it spun helplessly under the force of the blow. The pitted ground of the courtyard rushed to meet him. He managed to turn into the impact, rolling over one shoulder, absorbing much of it. But his legs were not under control and they took him into a bruising tumble before he came to a stop fully seventy feet from where he had been crouched.
Auum pushed himself to his feet, staggering under sudden pain. He looked down. A thick splinter of wood jutted from his left boot. Blood seeped. He tested his weight on it. Not good. His hands were scraped raw and his leggings torn to shreds. His body armour had saved his torso from major damage.
Auum looked up at the rampart. Projectiles were dropping onto it and down into the courtyard. He kept staring as he moved towards whatever shelter he could find in the lee of the walls. There was no order up there. Elves were turning from the enemy, running to stair and ladder. Bodies were thick on the ground around him. Most were not moving. Others were already running for the keep.
The barrage ceased. Smoke wreathed the bastion, clearing slowly. Into the quiet came the cries of the injured and wails of the dying. Prayers were uttered to Yniss and Shorth. Those still largely unhurt were regrouping in the centre of the courtyard. A drumming sound came from without. Garonin infantry. Running.
‘Form up!’ Auum spun round. Fresh pain raced up his leg from the impaled foot. It was Katyett. Standing with Pelyn. ‘To me, brothers and sisters. Defend the keep.’
Auum hobbled towards them. A TaiGethen came to his shoulder, took some weight for him.
‘Thank you, Olmaat,’ he said.
‘Can you still hold a blade?’ asked Olmaat.
‘Both of them. Just don’t ask me to fight open hand.’
‘That time is past, I think.’
They hurried to the lines of elves at the door of the keep. It still stood open against what they knew was to come but which had to be delayed for every possible moment. Perhaps three hundred stood before the keep. Al-Arynaar and TaiGethen. Lines eight deep. Weapons ready.
Katyett stood front and centre. Her Tai was gone, Jaleea injured and surely unable to survive. Takaar fled. So Pelyn was next to her. Arch of the Al-Arynaar with the new Arch of the TaiGethen. Some strength still remained. Elves stood with them. Courage endured.
There was a metallic rattle, rhythmic. The steel plating on the walls of the bastion was shaking. The eyes of most elves were on the gates. They shouldn’t have been; the Garonin were climbing the walls. Gauntleted hands grasped the ruined rampart. Helmeted heads and armoured bodies appeared. Legs thumped down onto the parapet. Without pause, they jumped down into the courtyard and the flood of enemy stormed in like a wave breaching a dam.
‘Steady,’ called Katyett. ‘Steady. On my order, front four ranks move up to engage.’
The Garonin covered the ground with frightening speed. Weapons were level. Barrels spat short tongues of flame. Defenceless elves were cut down.
‘Engage!’
TaiGethen and Al-Arynaar ran forward. Unable to fight on the move, Auum stood with Olmaat in front of the door of the keep. TaiGethen, sprinting ahead of their Al-Arynaar comrades, flew at the Garonin soldiers. Blades flashed. Enemies fell. A roar rose among the defenders. A release of anger, an expression of frustration and shock.
Katyett slammed both feet into the face plate of a Garonin soldier, bearing him to the ground. One of her blades sliced across his throat. The other swept low, chopping into the ankles of another enemy. Katyett powered up, her first blade chopping into the gut of a third. Her second blade came down on the neck of the one she had crippled.
The Garonin could not track her movements. Her speed confused them. Her strength surprised them and her will baffled them. But the elves were so few, the TaiGethen fewer still amongst them. Weapons fire intensified. Garonin and elf alike were cut down in the blizzard. The Al-Arynaar in front of the keep made to move up.
‘No.’ Olmaat’s voice was strong. ‘Withdraw. Get inside the keep. This battle is done.’
And it was. But Katyett was deep in the fight. Pelyn, with ten Al-Arynaar, was forcing a path towards her. There was a shouted exchange. The elves disengaged, those that could.
‘Back!’ shouted Olmaat. ‘Back into the keep. Defend the bore.’ The gates crashed in. The Tul-Kenerit was truly laid open. The machines began to roll in. Weapons fire skipped and cracked off the walls of the keep. There were screams from within. The keep was full of elves waiting to leave.
‘We need someone down at the gate. We just need people through. As many as can travel,’ said Auum.
‘Go,’ said Olmaat.
‘Not me. Ferille?’ The door guard turned. ‘Get down to the gate. Do everything you can to get as many through as you can. Try to avoid panic. Hard, I know. Tell them we will give them as much time as we can. And Ferille. Don’t leave yourself behind. When the time comes don’t hesitate. Go through.’
The last of the TaiGethen ran in on a hail of fire. Inside, waiting to descend, ordinary elves were already falling prey to the panic Auum had sought to avoid. Katyett dived through the door, Garonin after her.
‘Close the door!’ called Olmaat.
He ducked a swinging fist and thumped a blade into a Garonin gut. The soldier staggered back, colliding with the closing door. Auum threw a jaqrui, the blade cutting deep into the top of his helmet. The enemy sagged down. The door clanged shut. Elves surged over the marooned Garonin. Brief silence in the entrance hall was punctuated by hard breathing echoing into the rafters.
Lantern light illuminated a cold steel room, circular and with a wide spiral staircase leading down into a brightly lit space, noisy with the voices of ordinary elves desperate to escape. They were packed in tight and the tunnels through which they had arrived would be crowded with more. Below them, the bore. A three hundred foot deep hole at the bottom of which was the gateway to Calaius. It was this that the Garonin desired and which the elves dare not let them take or Calaius would also be laid waste.