A great cheering rent the air. Tali forced her eyes open. The area was lit with lanterns and glowstones now, though it took a while to recognise what she was seeing.
The collapse had torn open the edge of the Empound and freed the trapped Pale who were streaming forth in their thousands. She could see the huge assembly area and some of the honeycomb cells, though there did not seem to be much damage there.
But there was massive damage in the other direction, where the Cythonian living quarters had been. The entrance tunnel was gone and hundreds of yards of the floor inside had vanished, drawn down into the annihilation hole. Much of the ceiling was gone as well, and the rest had fallen, destroying thousands of the small stone apartments in which the enemy dwelt.
“Most would have been unoccupied, their people long gone to Hightspall,” said Tobry, who must have sensed Tali’s horror. He put her down on her feet, but held her. “There might not have been too many killed.”
Tali blocked his voice out. She had made her choice, destruction over healing, and this was the result. She could not shy away from it. The victims, enemy though they were, were owed that much. And there would be many of them. Very many.
A great wailing arose from the passage to the right; she saw the enemy troops clustered there. The soldiers who had come so close to victory down below now faced a disaster they could not comprehend.
They made their slow way around the broken edges of the collapsed area and into their living quarters, crying out for the survivors, but they did not find many.
As the first of the injured Cythonians were brought out, the rescuers were confronted by ten thousand armed Pale. Many wore armour, and their numbers and new-found determination made them a formidable force. For the first time the enemy realised how the situation had been overturned; how drastically they were outnumbered.
“You can fight, or you can leave Cython,” said Radl quietly. “If you leave we will not hinder you, and you may take what weapons and possessions you will. But if you fight, know that we will fight you to the death.”
The Cythonians consulted among themselves, but they had taken thousands of casualties in the hours-long battle and all were exhausted. Now, as they looked upon the destruction of the homes they had lived in for the past fifteen hundred years, Tali saw the heart go out of them.
“Our matriarchs are dead, crushed in their apartments, and Lyf has abandoned us for a higher duty,” said a tall Cythonian with zigzag face tattoos. “We cannot make this choice.”
“You must,” said Radl, “or we will deal with you the way you planned to deal with us.”
After another long consultation, the tall Cythonian said, “We will go.” They began to gather their injured, and their meagre possessions, and then they went.
“Happy now?” said Radl to Tali.
Radl was covered in blood and had suffered many small injuries, though none marred her beauty nor hindered her determination to lead her people.
“No, I’m not,” said Tali.
It was a victory she had never dreamed of achieving, from an attack that had not been planned, but she could take no joy from it. Thousands of lives had been lost on each side, and not just soldiers. Old men and women had been killed, girls and boys and infants. She put her head in her hands and wept.
“It’s not finished yet,” said Holm. “You’ve got to go on.”
“No, I’ve done enough damage.”
“There’s still a war up above, and we’re losing badly.”
“What can I do about it?”
“The chancellor needs soldiers, blooded in battle. The Pale can provide them.”
“I’m not leading anyone else to their death. I’ve too many on my conscience already.”
“You’ve got to ask them.”
“Why me? Why can’t you do it?”
“If we don’t defeat Lyf, he’ll try to take Cython back, and the blood bath will make today look like a tea party.”
He was right — she had to go on. Tobry boosted Tali up onto a heap of rubble where she could see the Pale and they could see her. Holm banged on a shield until people looked her way.
“You have won your freedom,” she shouted. “But your people in Hightspall are in the thrall of the enemy and cry out for your aid. Today I’m marching north to Nyrdly, to the aid of our country. Will you march with me?”
No one moved. No one spoke. They just stared at her with hostile eyes.
“Why won’t they answer?” she said to Radl.
“You’re not wearing your loincloth.”
“I don’t understand.”
“You’re dressed. You’re not one of us.” Radl scrambled up onto the pile of rubble. “The battle has been won but the war continues. We have to fight Lyf, and defeat him, or he will come at the head of an army to take Cython back. Will you march under my leadership?”
Thousands of Pale raised their hands, though not nearly as many as Tali had hoped.
“Is that all?” she said.
“Hightspall sent our ancestors here as child hostages,” said a gaunt man with bloodshot, staring eyes. “Hightspall refused to ransom us, then made us out to be traitors and enemy collaborators. Why should we fight for a land that despises us, when we can have Cython for ourselves?”
“He’ll come back,” said Tali.
“And if he does, we’ll fight for our country. But we’re not fighting for yours.”
Tali climbed down, more exhausted than she had ever felt. “I want to go home.”
“You and I still remember our noble heritage,” said Radl. “We still think of ourselves as Hightspallers, and all our lives we’ve yearned to go home, but most of the Pale forgot their ancestors and lost their heritage long ago. Cython is their home, the only one they’ve ever known.”
“And even with all the destruction in this area,” said Holm, “the rest of Cython is warm, productive and safe. Why would they leave it for the bitter cold of Hightspall, and an uncertain war in a land that has long despised them?”
CHAPTER 105
“Did you kill Wil?” said Errek First-King late that afternoon.
“He eluded me,” Lyf replied, wincing as a healer finished binding his cruelly burned hands. “He crept down into cracks where I could not follow.”
“But you did brake the Engine?”
Lyf looked down at his bound hands. “Thank you,” he said to the healer. “You may go.” Once she had gone, and the door was sealed, he resumed. “As best I could, though it won’t last. I stopped the balance tilting all the way to disaster, but it can only be restored with king-magery. And — ”
“Lacking the catalyz…” said Errek.
“Where can it be? Unless it’s found, the balance can’t be restored, nor the land saved.”
“I would guess,” said Errek, “that it still lies in one of Grandys’ hoards, hidden before the time of his death, its true value never recognised.”
“But Tali knows our secret now, and so do her friends.”
“And a secret known to so many people cannot be kept. Sooner or later, Grandys will hear of it.”
“He’ll know where to go for the catalyz, and once he gets it, we’re lost.”
“Unless…” said Errek. He whispered in Lyf’s ear.
“I’ll call the ancestors into the temple,” said Lyf. Clumsily, with his bandaged hands, he inserted his nose plugs and led the way.
Within, the stench was now so foul that not even his hardiest workmen could enter. It was sickening even through the nose plugs. Did it presage the doom of his people, and the land as well?
“This sacred temple has been defiled beyond redemption,” he said to his ancestors, “but is that due to my crimes when it was the murder cellar, or to Grandys’ two thousand years ago?”
The ancestors did not speak. They were gazing at him in alarm.
“It should be torn down,” he continued, though the symbolism of such an act made him shudder. “But that would be like tearing down my own realm, my people, my land.”