The dark was the time of the Taken. Their passivity ended.
I could see little initially, so cannot for certain say who did what. Shifter, I suspect, changed shape and crossed into enemy territory.
The stars began to fade behind onrushing storm clouds. Cold air rushed across the earth. The wind rose, howled. Riding it came a horde of things with leathery wings, flying serpents the length of a man’s arm. Their hissing overshadowed the tumult of the storm. Thunder crashed and lightning stalked, jabbing enemy works with its spears. The flashes revealed the ponderous advance of giants from the rock wastes. They hurled boulders like children throw balls. One snatched up a bridge beam and used it as a two-handed club, smashing siege towers and ramps. The look of them, in the treacherous light, was of creatures of stone, basaltic rubble cobbled together in grotesque, gargantuan parody of the human form.
The earth shivered. Patches of plain glowed a bilious green. Radiant ten foot, blood-streaked orange worms slithered amongst the foe. The heavens opened and dumped rain and burning brimstone.
The night coughed up more horrors. Killing fogs. Murderous insects. A beginning glow of magma such as we had seen at the Stair of Tear. And all this in just minutes. Once the Circle responded, the terrors faded, though some it took hours to neutralize. They never took the offensive. The Taken were too strong.
By midnight all was quiet. The Rebel had given up everything but fill work at the far trench. The storm had become a steady rain. It made the Rebel miserable but did him no harm. I wriggled down amongst my companions and fell asleep thinking how nice it was that our part of the world was dry.
Dawn. First view of the Taken’s handiwork. Death everywhere. Horribly mutilated corpses. The Rebel labored till noon cleaning up. Then he resumed his assault on the trenches.
The Captain received a message from the Tower. He assembled us. “Word is, we lost Shifter last night.” He gave me a look meant to be significant. “The circumstances were questionable. We’ve been told to stay alert. That means you, One-Eye. And you, Goblin and Silent. You send a yell to the Tower if you see anything suspicious. Understand?” They nodded.
Shapeshifter gone. That must have taken some doing.
“The Rebel lose anybody important?” I asked.
“Whiskers. Roper. Tamarask. But they can be replaced. Shifter can’t.”
Rumors floated around. The deaths of members of the Circle had been caused by some catlike beast so strong and, quick even the powers of its victims were of no consequence. Several score senior Rebel functionaries had fallen victim as well.
The men recalled a similar beast from Beryl. There were whispers. Catcher had brought the forvalaka over on the ship. Was he using it against the Rebel?
I thought not. The attack fit Shifter’s style. Shifter loved sneaking into the enemy camp...
One-Eye went around wearing a thoughtful look, so self-engrossed he bumped into things. Once he stopped and smashed a fist into a ham hanging near the newly erected cook tents.
He had it figured out. How Catcher could send the forvalaka into the Bastion to slaughter the Syndic’s entire household, and end up controlling the city through a puppet, through no cost to the Lady’s overextended resources. Catcher and Shifter were thick then, weren’t they?
He had figured out who killed his brother-too late to extract revenge.
He went around and beat on that ham several times during the course of the day.
I joined Raven and Darling later. They were watching the action. I checked Shapeshifter’s force. His standard had been replaced. “Raven. Isn’t that Jalena’s banner?”
“Yes.” He spat.
“Shifter wasn’t a bad guy. For one of the Taken.”
“None of them are. For Taken, As long as you don’t get in their way.” He spat again, eyed the Tower. “What’s going on here, Croaker?”
“Eh?” He was as civil as he had been since our return from the field.
“What’s this show all about? Why is she doing it this way?”
I was not sure what he was asking. “I don’t know. She doesn’t confide in me.”
He scowled. “No?” As though he did not believe me! Then he shrugged. “Be interesting to find out.”
“No doubt.” I watched Darling. She was inordinately intrigued by the attack. She asked Raven a stream of questions. They were not simple. You might expect their like from an apprentice general, a prince, someone expected to assume eventual command.
“Shouldn’t she be somewhere safer?” I asked. “I mean...”
“Where?” Raven demanded. “Where would she be safer than with me?” His voice was hard, his eyes narrow with suspicion. Startled, I dropped the subject.
Was he jealous because I had become Darling’s friend? I don’t know. Everything about Raven is strange.
Stretches of the farther trench had vanished. In places the middle trench had been filled and tamped. The Rebel had moved his surviving towers and ramps up to the extreme limit of our artillery. New towers were a-building. New mantlets were everywhere. Men huddled behind every one.
Braving merciless fire, Rebel pioneers bridged the final trench. Counterattacks stalled them again and again, yet they kept coming. They completed their eighth bridge about the third hour after noon.
Vast infantry formations moved forward. They swarmed across the bridges, into the teeth of the arrowstorm. They hit our first line randomly, pelting in like sleet, dying against a wall of spears and shields and swords. Bodies piled up. Our bowmen threatened to fill the ditches around the bridges. And still they came.
I recognized a few banners seen at Roses and Lords. The elite units were coming up.
They crossed the bridges and formed up, advanced in fair order, exerted heavy pressure on our center. Behind them a second line formed, stronger, deeper, and broader. When it was solid its officers moved it forward a few yards, had their men crouch behind their shields.
Pioneers moved mantlets across, joined them in a sort of palisade. Our heaviest artillery concentrated on these. Behind the ditch, hordes ran fill to selected points.
Though the men on the bottom level were our least reliable-I suspect the lottery was rigged-they repelled the Rebel elite. Success gave them only a brief respite. The next mass attacked.
Our line creaked. It might have broken had the men had anywhere to run. They had the habit of fleeing. But here they were trapped, with no chance of getting up the retaining wall.
That wave receded. On his end Moonbiter counterattacked and routed the enemy before him. He destroyed most of their mantlets and briefly threatened their bridges. I was impressed by his aggressiveness.
It was late. The Lady had not come forth. I suppose she had not doubted we would hold. The enemy launched a last assault, a human wave attack, that came within a whisper of swamping our men. In places the Rebel reached the retaining wall and tried to scale or dismantle it. But our men did not collapse. The incessant rain of arrows broke the Rebel determination.
They withdrew. Fresh units filled in behind the mantlets. A temporary peace settled in. The field belonged to their pioneers.
“Six days,” I said to no one in particular. “I don’t think we can hang on.”
The first line shouldn’t survive tomorrow. The horde would storm the second level. Our archers were deadly as archers, but I doubted they would do well hand-to-hand. Moreover, once forced into close combat they could no longer punish the enemy coming up. Then the Rebel towers would do them as they had been done.
We had cut a narrow trench near the rear of the pyramid top. It served as our latrine. The Captain caught me at my most inelegant. “They need you down on the bottom level, Croaker. Take One-Eye and your crew.”
“What?”