"Perhaps, perhaps," Geildarr thought aloud as he marched out onto his balcony. He could no longer see the behemoths; they were now close enough to the city walls that the angle hid them. In the town below, excitement spread as people dashed about in the early morning streets. "He probably made a deal with those ancients you discovered in the Star Mounts."
"But didn't you say he was determined to preserve Llorkh, so he could take it himself later on?" asked Ardeth.
"Yes! No!" Geildarr slammed his left fist down on his balcony rail. "Those damned Uthgardt are clearly involved somehow. The Thunderbeast tribe. Rouse Kiev. He needs to have a little chat with our friend the chieftain."
The rhythmic footfalls still sounded from outside the city walls, now so loud that Geildarr could feel them in his bones.
Ardeth nodded. "The Lord's Men will assail the behemoths with all they have. They'll stop them outside the gates, if they can. Perhaps we should join them… perhaps with our magic…"
"Some mages are down in the Merchant District, staying with a caravan from Darkhold. We'll see how they fare. If these behemoths should break through the walls, our magic will be needed to fight them here," said Geildarr. He shook his head in disbelief at the words he was speaking.
Ardeth reached out and clasped her small hand around Geildarr's right wrist. "What of the Heart of Runlatha?"
Geildarr looked down at it, its shimmering red energies radiating forth. "It is safe here. The Lord's Keep is warded and defended."
"This place may not be so safe after all," said Ardeth. "I can take it out of the city, deliver it to Zhentil Keep if you will it."
Geildarr peered into the artifact. He felt a hollowness in his breath, and he asked himself, Will all of Llorkh fall over this?
"Netherese magic," he marveled. "All those cities fell, all that civilization was lost. Yet this remains."
"Geildarr!" Ardeth protested. "Are you all right?"
The mayor looked down on her pale face, and a tear rolled down his cheek.
"What do we do?" Ardeth asked plaintively.
"We wait," answered Geildarr.
CHAPTER 20
The behemoths stepped over the ditch as if it were a scratch in the dirt. Each new thunderous step, with its hellish synchrony, kicked up clouds of soil, which the wind caught and blew into a brown haze. Clavel could feel each footfall, vibrating the stone walls all the way to the top where he stood.
Five or six dozen Lord's Men stood ready above the gate, their bows strung and arrows nocked. Without a bow of his own, Clavel stood behind the line of archers, facing outward, trying to stay out of the way, yet remain close to the action. He looked up and saw a murder of crows circling the wall, wings flapping. The birds settled into glides as they navigated the currents.
"Take aim!" the archers' commander shouted.
The crows were flying low. They were ready to pick the carrion, Clavel reasoned. Clever birds.
The archers took aim all along the line. Some hands trembled. The repetitive pounding of the behemoths' steps echoed up their spines, and they did not know if their arrows would even penetrate the behemoths' scales.
Then Clavel noticed something curious. At least two of the crows were holding objects in their feet. The items flashed as they reflected sunlight-they were made of glass. And they were directly over the archers. Clavel leaned his head back and saw another crow hovering right over him, a small glass flask in its feet.
"Get ready!" shouted the commander. The Lord's Men drew back their bowstrings.
Fear arising in his throat, Clavel tried to dive for cover, but there was none to be had. He fell on his belly and desperately tried to roll under the bowmen. He upset their feet and a few tumbled backward, landing on top of him. Two archers lost their balance entirely and fell off the wall with a scream of death.
All along the line of archers, Lord's Men turned their heads to look at the source of the commotion.
The crows released their flasks in unison.
"Fire!" the commander shouted, but not a single bowstring snapped in response. The flasks, which Clavel too late recognized as alchemist's fire, smashed on the archers and the wall. Leaping, roaring flames burst upward, crawling along the top of the wall and raining fire down each side. The Lord's Men closest to the impact let out cries of agony as their clothes erupted in fire, their bowstrings incinerating in their hands. Those farther from the blasts released their weapons and went running to help their fellows, slapping them in a vain attempt to put out the fires.
Clavel rose, a plume of orange flame leaping from his purple cloak, his screams unheard among the chorus of pain. He plunged off the wall, landing as a flaming wreck directly in the behemoths' unchallenged path.
Vell watched as flames decimated the mass of soldiers assembled on the wall. Blazing men tumbled to the ground like a fiery waterfall. He looked upward and saw the crows scattering away from the fires. He silently thanked Lanaal. Her plan had worked perfectly.
The behemoths behind him moved into a line, single file, as they approached the heavy wood gate into Llorkh. Vell stepped onto the flaming ruins of some fallen archers, barely feeling any pain as the blazes were extinguished under his vast feet.
Arrows flew down at them, but the missiles were few, and they bounced off thick behemoth hides or embedded, troubling the creatures little more than pinpricks.
Vell's mind reached out to his imprisoned fellows. He felt their excitement, felt them straining against their bondage even more strongly now that liberation seemed so close.
Shepherd, they seemed to say, give us our freedom!
Vell raised himself partly onto his hind legs and kicked the massive gates to the city, the last barrier between him and the behemoths, and the ancient wood groaned. He kicked again, and the whole gate shuddered. A crack raced to split the wood from the point of impact. With one more kick, the door splintered and fell apart.
Vell lowered his neck to pass through the gateway into Llorkh, where a whole city was ready to fight him.
Sungar lay on the floor of the cramped cell, its walls marking the edges of his world. With his ear to the ground, he could feel the vibrations of the huge thunderbeast steps. He smiled.
His two dungeon guards arrived at the cell door. He lay limp and clenched a fist under his body.
"Wake with the morning, chief," said one of the dungeon guards, unlocking the cell door. "Kiev requests another audience." He spoke faster than Sungar had ever heard him, the urgency plain in his voice. Looking up, Sungar could see that both soldiers had swords at their belts, though neither of them had their hands anywhere near the hilts.
The instant the first guard walked into the cell, the keys still in the lock, Sungar burst into action. He unleashed all of the anger he had kept in check till this moment. In his clenched fist, he hid all of the dust and pebbles that had fallen from his cell walls during his imprisonment, and he threw it into the guard's eyes.
As the guard tumbled back, surprised and blinded by Sungar's attack, the second guard stepped backward into the passageway and quickly pushed the cell door shut. Sungar grasped his fellow by the hair and slammed him face-first into the stone wall, then pulled him back and let him fall to the ground. With a swift foot, Sungar stamped on the guard's face, and with the single blow the guard's skull collapsed, his head smashed open on the cold cell floor.
In the corridor, the surviving guard desperately fumbled with the keys, glancing with fear at Sungar's raging eyes, gone wild and red with fury. The chieftain made a run for the cell door. The guard jumped backward just as Sungar rammed his foot into the door and sent it flying open, its thick iron hinges trembling as it smashed into the wall.