Furrowing her brow against an incipient headache, Salia Mavere called a recess until the following day and dejectedly trudged from the assembly chamber, praying that she had the strength to see everything through, to do what must be done.
And that, in the end, it would all prove worthwhile. BESIDE A SMALL COPSE OF TREES, abutting the slope of a rocky hill, a stone-lined pit held grey ash and bits of charcoal that were the cadaver of a cooking fire. A faint breeze wafted through the night, rustling branches and cooling the skin of the man who lay slumbering by the fire pit, twisting and muttering in the grasp of rapacious dreams.
Much as it had in the center of Nenavar's house in Denathere, the wind picked up, lifting loose leaves skyward, clashing and swirling against the natural currents in the air. Sticks crunched into the soil as a massive weight appeared atop them, and then Corvis Rebaine, the Terror of the East, stood beside the sleeping Baron of Braetlyn, the blood of Jassion's servants dripping from his gauntlets.
Or at least Rebaine's armor did.
The image wavered, and then that armor-and the blood-were gone. Kaleb stood in their place, clad in his mundane cloak and leathers. A quick look around, just to ensure that nothing had disturbed the camp in his absence, and then he knelt beside his supposed ally. Without ever quite touching him, Kaleb ran a hand over Jassion's face, removing a phantom film of magic that had kept the man in deep slumber. Jassion snored once and rolled over, unaware that anything was amiss.
Exactly how Kaleb wanted him. Suppressing a grin, he reached out and shook Jassion's shoulder, waking him for his turn on watch.
Chapter Eight
THE ROYAL SOLDIERS of the Black Gryphon of Cephira never did learn precisely what happened on that muggy summer night. Or rather, they ascertained most of what happened, but never why.
The blush of dawn hadn't fully covered the face of the eastern sky, and the nighttime breezes had faded into sputtering, wheezing breaths. Pre-morning dew was swiftly coalescing on the grasses, the leaves, and the eaves of Rahariem's homes, courteously making room in the air for the new day's coming humidity. The soldiers on night duty stifled their yawns, struggling to keep alert or maintain proper cadence, grateful that the rising sun would soon signal the end of shift and the opportunity to get breakfast, get drunk, and get to bed-probably in that order.
Until a scream of inchoate rage shattered the calm, a rock rudely hurled through the brittle glass of silence. From atop one of the engine platforms, a Cephiran guard leapt upon a passing patrol, naked sword in hand. Maddened spittle spattered the shocked soldiers, followed immediately by the warm blood of their commanding officer. The crazed attacker was already lunging at his next target before the officer's head fetched up against a wall, and two more men were down before the remainder had so much as pulled steel.
Drawn to the hideous shrieks and the clash of battle, soldiers from neighboring posts came running, ready to aid their brethren against any attack, stunned briefly into immobility when they realized just what form that attack had taken. The murderous warrior seemed driven by a fury not even so much "berserk" as "utterly inhuman." Blades rebounded from mail, bruising flesh to the bone, yet he barely staggered before launching a blistering counterattack, more raw fury than training or skill. The tips of swords dug into thighs and arms protected only by leather-backed padding, and still he remained oblivious to their efforts. One soldier, already wounded, ducked under his guard and ran her broadsword across the back of his knee; only then, as tendon separated and his leg buckled, did he finally slow. Staggering in a tight circle, dragging his now useless leg, he fought on until the limp and the blood loss finally took their toll. Face paling, he wavered, his body quivering, and a Cephiran morningstar crushed the life from his skull.
And it was then that the Cephiran soldiers-panting hard, bleeding, horrified at their maddened brother-discovered that the entire affair had been only a terrible diversion. For it was then, when the tumult of battle and the groans of the dying had faded, that they heard the ominous creaking of wood and hemp from above.
All unnoticed in the tumult, the rest of the man's squad had heaved a three-hundred-pound block of masonry from their ammunition stores into the trebuchet's great sling. Far too late to take any action save an openmouthed gape, the troops below could only watch as the massive weapon ratcheted into position and heaved its monstrous payload.
End over end the missile tumbled, a child's block hurled in a divine tantrum. In a perfect arc, calculated by a skilled team of operators, it sailed over the roofs of Rahariem for more than two hundred yards…
And finally plummeted to crash, in a cloud of dust and timber and debris that blotted the moon and every star from the sky, upon the city's western gate.
Against such a massive assault-had it come from without-the thickest of the city's walls might have held fast. Against the gates themselves, from the direction opposite that which they were braced to hold, the boulder might as well have been punching through bread crust.
Wood and stone exploded. The walls of neighboring structures cracked beneath the shrapnel, or merely from the shuddering of the earth. Panicked citizens clogged the streets, fleeing the devastation raining from above. The guards-save those at the gate itself, who formed a trail of broken bodies in the tumbling masonry's wake-dived for cover, emerging only long minutes later when the dust began to settle and it was clear no further projectiles were inbound.
The first soldiers to reach the platform found the trebuchet's crew lying dead, scattered near the base of the engine. All had weapons in their hands and protruding from their bodies; they appeared to have murdered one another in a savage rampage of shared insanity. Strewn around were charts of the city and its surroundings, inked by the invaders when they'd first set up their defenses. Carefully indicating angles and distances, those charts ensured that the engine crews were practically incapable of missing any attacking forces-or, as they'd just proved, any targets within Rahariem itself. Physicians and alchemists examined the corpses, their food, their water, and found no signs of drug or poison that might explain their behavior. In the end, though it satisfied no one at all, the officers of the Royal Soldiers were forced to conclude that these men had gone mad for reasons unknown, and unleashed their terrible weapon upon the city before turning on themselves and their fellow Cephirans.
That the entire sequence of events might have been orchestrated purely so a band of insurgents could depart the city via the shattered gates, during the few precious moments when the soldiers were cowering against further attack, was a notion that wouldn't occur to anyone for quite some while. ON THE FLOOR OF THAT same broken house, Cerris lay shaking. The remains of everything he'd eaten that day pooled across the room, congealing into a harsh, pungent sludge, and still his stomach lurched, distending his jaw in dry heaves. His head pounded as though last night's dreams sought to batter their way free, and his entire body shivered beneath a sheen of feverish sweat.
Only once before had his body been so terribly ravaged by the casting of that ancient spell, on the day he'd arrived in Mecepheum-well disguised-to ensure the election of Duke Halmon to the regent's throne. Then, he'd scarcely escaped the Hall of Meeting before the illness overcame him, rendering him naught but a quivering, agonized wreck for a day and a half. That time, he'd extended his mystical influence over a score of men and women, a strain that he truly believed had come close to killing him. He wasn't remotely powerful enough a sorcerer to be fiddling with such magics, and well he knew it. Tonight, he'd needed to command only six, but forcing them to betray their nation, to slay their friends and even themselves, had taken more effort than he'd anticipated. This was only the fourth time he'd ever used the spell-and only the second time on more than a single individual-and he couldn't help but idly wonder if a fifth attempt would finish him off entirely.