“Wake up,” she said quietly. Beneath the brown home-spun, the sleeper jerked awake, then groaned. “Come on,” she said, dragging the cloak aside. “It’s light already. The raiders will be coming soon.”
Amero lifted his head and squinted against the early morning light. He stretched and flexed until the blood began to flow again in his tired limbs, then got stiffly to his feet. He smiled at Lyopi, but the smile changed to a wince as he put weight on his right leg. The thigh wound he’d received in battle still ached.
“Any word? Any movement?” he said, peeking over the top of the ramp. Six steps away, a hasty barricade of stones and wood blocked the parapet. On the other side was ten paces of open wall, littered with the casualties of the night’s battle. Bracketed by twin columns of smoke was the north baffle, firmly under Zannian’s control. The tops of his tree-ladders could be seen sticking up above the baffle wall. In the midst of death, the trees were already leafing out in tender green.
“No movement so far. They had a hard night, too,” Lyopi said with a snort. “Shall we let them sleep?”
“I wish we had the people to charge down there and wake them properly,” Amero said bitterly. His beard was no longer neatly trimmed, but long and uneven. Dark circles ringed his hazel eyes, and like the rest of the survivors in Yala-tene, he’d lost so much weight that his clothes hung loosely on his frame.
He looked out over the north end of the valley. All there was to be seen were raiders’ horses and tents clustered around the captured baffle. No Nianki. No Duranix. How he longed to see either of them riding or flying over the intervening mountains, ready to strike the enemy and scatter them to the winds!
Montu and Tepa arrived on their hands and knees, anxious not to expose themselves to the raiders’ deadly throwing sticks.
“What’s the enemy doing?” whispered the cooper huskily.
“Snoring,” said Lyopi in a normal tone.
“Shouldn’t we be getting more of our people out of the village?” Tepa asked. “While things are quiet, I mean?”
“Most of the young children are out,” Amero said. “The older ones want to stay and fight.”
“You must order them to go, Arkuden!”
“How can I? We need every pair of hands we can get.”
“They’ll be slaughtered.”
“We survived the ogre attack, didn’t we? And everything Zannian has thrown at us?”
“But can we continue to hold out?” Tepa wondered aloud.
“Yes, we can,” Amero said, helping the exhausted old man stand erect. “Go wake the others, and see if there’s any water to be had. Don’t give up, my friend. Our enemies are strong, but they’re not without weakness. We thought Jenla was dead, and she still lives. They thought they could murder me, but I survived.”
“Unar didn’t.”
Amero sighed. Unar, Lyopi’s brother and one of Amero’s foundry workmen, had died in his place, slain by the Jade Men who’d mistaken him for the Arkuden.
Since the night of the Jade Men’s attack, however, Amero had kept out of sight. If the raiders thought him dead, they wouldn’t make other attempts to kill him. Moreover, Zannian and Nacris no doubt believed the people of Yala-tene would crumble without their headman. Their continued stout resistance must have taken some toll on the raiders’ fighting spirit.
“Many good people have died, Tepa,” Lyopi said quietly, her grief for her lost brother evident. “But the only way to save the rest is by saving Yala-tene. Do you want to surrender?”
Tepa shook his head dumbly. Leaning on Montu, he turned to go and rouse the others.
At that moment, a brace of throwing spears banged into the barricade, and hoarse shouts rang out.
“Hurry,” Amero urged the men, hefting his spear.
Raiders on the baffle pelted the barricade with missiles for a short time, shouting dire threats. With quiet determination, thirty villagers filed in behind the barrier, spears ready. From the edge of the wall, Amero could see scores of raiders milling about beneath the baffle, waiting for their chance to climb the trees and join the attack.
“I’d give all the bronze in Yala-tene for just six jars of oil!” Amero cursed softly. He knew there was none to be had. Hekani had the town’s remaining few jars on his side to use against the ogres.
Spearpoints thickened below the parapet as the raiders mustered. Amero had his people leave small holes in the barrier, just large enough to run a spear through. Another thirty villagers crouched on the ramp, ready to reinforce the line if the raiders pressed too hard.
A raider’s face, chillingly painted to resemble a grinning skull, popped up above the parapet. He raised his spear and shouted, “Go!”
Leather-clad men with similarly garish visages poured over the wall and ran helter-skelter at the makeshift barrier. Villagers lobbed stones and lumps of broken pottery at them, felling a few. The rest came on, howling for blood. The lead raiders threw themselves on the barricade, bracing their arms against it so their comrades could climb their backs.
“Now!” Amero yelled. Villagers shoved javelins through the prepared chinks in the wall, spearing the human ladders where they stood. When they collapsed, the raiders on their shoulders fell too, some tumbling right off the wall. Furious, those remaining pounded on the barricade with fists and spearshafts, making the hastily erected structure shake ominously.
Amero stuck his foot in a likely niche and climbed the barrier. Keeping his head below the top, he held on with one hand and reached over with his spear, jabbing at heads and shoulders. He wounded several raiders, and the attack fell apart. Still screaming threats and obscenities, the raiders retreated to the baffle.
They attacked twice more before midday. On the third attempt, the villagers came under fire from spear-throwers on the ground. Raiders thrust the butt ends of their spears into the holes in the barricade and tried to lever it apart. Timbers and stones fell on both sides, and the struggle degenerated into a contest of grunting, straining muscles and unyielding stubbornness.
Zannian, masked and helmeted, appeared on the wall behind his men. He recalled his troops to him, and the raiders withdrew, panting in the heat of the day.
Amero thought the raider chief might want to parley, but this hope died almost instantly. At Zannian’s nod, two raiders raised ram’s horns to their lips and blew a loud, bleating signal. The plain below filled with horsemen.
The villagers’ hearts fell. They were barely a hundred strong, and Zannian had just called in twice that number of reinforcements. Up and down the lines, spears were lowered, shoulders drooped, and heads bowed.
Amero knew what he had to do. He’d been saving a last trick, a final stratagem, for their most desperate hour. This was it. He climbed the barricade again. This time he kept going until he reached the top, and he stood upright. Dropping the hood from his head for the first time since his reputed assassination, Amero stood in clear view of the enemy.
“Zannian!” he cried. “Zannian, here! I am here. Come and get me if you can. It’s Amero, Arkuden of Yala-tene!”
The horn blasts died away. The raiders stared up at the shouting man. More than one took a step back in surprise, as if facing an apparition.
Zannian slowly removed his mask. “So. Mother’s little pets failed after all?” His youthful face, scratched and streaked with soot, split into a grin. “Good! A man like you should not die in bed, stabbed by green-faced children. Your blood belongs on my sword!”
His words brought a frown to Amero’s face, but the Arkuden forged on. “Will you parley?” he called.
“This is our parley. Speak your piece! It’s the last chance you’ll have!”
Amero glanced at his gray-faced, exhausted followers. Taking a deep breath, he said, “Let’s speak of surrender.”
The raiders broke into ragged cheers. Zannian tossed his skull-mask to one of his men and strode forth until he was only few paces from the barricade.