As they slipped over the sides of their skiffs and moved silently toward the squat munitions building, Nikandr heard a wailing. It sent shivers down his spine. He’d heard that sound before, on Ghayavand and then again on Rafsuhan. It was the sound of the akhoz.
The sound had come from the northeast, in the rough direction the column of fire had been in.
Soroush stood nearby. He was unmoving, stiff, as if the mere sound of the akhoz terrified him.
Another call came-more like the bleating of a goat than the cry of a child. It was higher pitched than the first, and the cry was longer, more desperate. Nikandr could only think that it had been released from the throat of a misshapen creature that had once been someone’s daughter.
“Quickly,” Nikandr whispered.
They moved. The building was not guarded, a bit of good fortune no doubt granted them by the battle that raged in the streets of Baressa.
They broke in the doors and found the powder room at the back. The place was silent, eerily so, as if Vihrosh had been abandoned centuries ago and they were the first to return.
Two men at a time rolled the barrels out of the building and toward the skiffs. As Nikandr was returning from loading the first barrel with Styophan, he heard the call of another akhoz, much louder now. It was followed by one that was closer yet, a long keening that sent shivers down Nikandr’s spine. He could see their dark forms against the white snow at the base of the hill. One of them reared back and cried out to the nighttime sky. The other did the same.
It sounded like a warning. A call that the enemy had been found.
Styophan slung his musket off his shoulder and sighted along the barrel. As the pan flashed, Nikandr looked away so he wouldn’t be blinded. When he looked back, slinging his own musket into position, he saw that the nearest of the two had been felled, but it was already up again, and now it was charging toward him, calling in a high-pitched squeal as it came.
Nikandr had been in many battles, but something about the darkness and the sound of the creature staggering toward him made him shake, made the hairs on the back of his neck stand up.
“To me!” Nikandr called.
With the two akhoz coming closer and closer, the men of the Grand Duchy rushed forward.
Nikandr sighted carefully down the length of his musket and pulled the trigger. The musket bucked, and he saw the akhoz go down again.
It rose one last time before three more musket shots felled it.
Some of the Maharraht came forward, including Soroush, but Nikandr waved them away. “Keep loading! We need more powder!”
As more musket shots tore into the other akhoz, calls were taken up by their brothers and sisters, some from afar, but many nearer.
“Go!” Nikandr said.
Soroush did, and the Maharraht moved as quickly as they could with their heavy loads.
More akhoz reached the base of the hill, a dozen at the least.
“Another five minutes,” Nikandr shouted. “That’s all we need! Hold fire! Be ready, and give them two shots each!”
No sooner had he said this than musket shot zipped over his head.
“Down!” Nikandr called as he dropped to the snow-covered ground.
The first shot was followed by another, and another. The strelet next to him took a meaty shot in the center of his chest before he could lie down. He grunted, long and hard, and fell to the ground.
The rest dropped as more musket shots punched into the earth around them.
The akhoz were nearing their line now.
One of the Maharraht behind Nikandr cried out. He dropped the barrel he was carrying and fell heavily to the ground.
“Fire!”
Their muskets rang out, not in quick succession, but staggered so that they could see if an akhoz was down or not. Soon, though, the akhoz were coming too close, and the shots were released in a frenzy.
Nikandr fired. The akhoz he’d sighted fell, but there were two more behind it. He came to a kneel and reloaded-powder, shot, and ramrod-and fired one more time before the first of the akhoz reached the far right of their line.
It crouched and belched flame from its mouth even as it was struck by four musket shots that had been fired in desperation. The akhoz collapsed, but more took its place, breathing gouts of flame. One of his streltsi was caught in the blasts, and then another, both of them screaming as the flames licked their woolen cherkesskas and black kolpak hats.
One dropped to the snow, trying to douse the flames, but the other threw aside his musket and took up his berdische axe. He swung it high over his head, his death cries rising high into the nighttime sky as he brought the axe down on the nearest of the akhoz even as the creature blasted him with another column of bright, searing fire. The akhoz was split from neck to navel. The strelet, amazingly still aware and able to fight, tried to pull the axe free, but then another akhoz leapt on him from the side and bit deeply into his neck.
“Close!” Nikandr called. “Close!”
And then the akhoz were among them.
Nikandr drew his sword and cut one from behind that had just begun to gout flame. It cried out and arched backward. Fire licked Nikandr’s sleeve, but he stepped away and batted it out.
The Maharraht were still pulling barrels toward the skiffs, but a dozen had now joined the fray. Several were dropped before they could reach the fight, however-victims of musket fire coming in from the base of the hill.
“Pull back!” Nikandr shouted in Anuskayan. “Pull back!” he shouted again in Mahndi.
They retreated, though many fell before they’d made it halfway to the skiffs.
A shout drew Nikandr’s attention. He looked beyond the chaos before him and by the light of the akhoz’s flames saw a low form-naked and childlike-gallop like a mongrel dog into the building.
“Run!” Nikandr bellowed. “Run!”
He turned and sprinted for the skiffs. Sensing the danger, his men followed, as did most of the Maharraht. They’d gone only ten strides before an explosion ripped through the night. It tossed him like a rag doll onto the snow.
Groaning with the pain running through his chest, he turned and saw stones flying outward from the rear of the building as a fireball, black and roiling, curled up into the air.
He scrabbled backward as stone blocks and burning wreckage plowed into the ground around him. Some sizzled against the snow. A piece of stone the size of a mastiff fell on top of Jonis, the young boatswain, killing him instantly.
More musket shots rained in as the few soldiers who’d made it to their feet descended on the remaining akhoz. Their mewling cries rose above the sounds of the fire. The acrid smell of their breath mixed with the bitter smell of burnt gunpowder.
“Hurry, My Lord!”
Nikandr turned. It was Styophan, and he was pointing toward the skiffs.
“You’re coming with me.”
“ Nyet, My Lord. You’re needed on the skiffs”-he pointed to the Hratha coming slowly up the hill-“and I’m needed here.”
Nikandr looked to the Hratha. They were many, and if they weren’t slowed, they would overrun the skiffs before they had a chance to leave.
“Retreat when you can,” Nikandr said. “Lose yourself in the forest, and then meet us at the Spar.”
“ Da,” Styophan said as he reloaded his musket, “now go!”
He turned and ran forward, pausing once to fire toward the line of dark-robed men that were now halfway up the hill.
Nikandr moved to the skiffs where Anahid waited. She began calling upon her dhoshahezhan immediately.
Two more skiffs were loaded, each holding fewer men than before. Part of this was out of necessity-each barrel weighed nearly a stone-but part was the sheer number of men that had died in the furious battle.