The king nodded. “We’ve already begun the shifting of stores and livestock. We’ve destroyed some bridges but, so far, we’ve not fired villages. We can do that, however.”
“That will be good. The second thing that needs to be done, as Will suggested, is to keep the dragonels out of range of the walls. Your situational information makes this possible. We can set up ambushes and defenses at key points. We hit the lead elements of the Aurolani force, stop them, and wait for them to bring their heavier troops up to blast through. Our defenders fade before them, which means our people have time to destroy supplies while, at the same time, we force the Aurolani to wait on land where there is nothing for them.”
King Bowmar ran a hand over his bearded jaw. “So elementary I should have seen it. We have taken pride in the strength of our walls, and the skill of our mages. Cities have become the focus for our defense, but when faced with a force that can overwhelm our cities, defending those cities is just waiting for destruction. I am not certain this defense in depth will defeat Chytrine, but it will slow her forces down.”
Alexia shook her head. “No reason you should have seen it. This war is unlike any we’ve faced before.”
“And yet all this was clear to you.”
She shrugged. There was no way to explain to him that her entire life had been spent learning how to defeat conventional forces. From her earliest days she knew of the destructive power of dragonels, and knew they rendered any city into rubble. If a force was stationary, it invited destruction, so the only antidote to the dragonel was to be found in a highly mobile force that made the enemy’s advance grind to a halt. Since she had always believed Chytrine would return, dragonels had to be accounted for and countered. Here, in Muroso, she had a perfect landscape for providing a solid defense.
“What we need to do, Highness, is to determine which forces you have that are best suited to their roles. We need a city force to defend and reinforce the cities. We need a mobile defense force that will hit, hold, slow, and fade before the enemy. And we will need…”
“You’ll need your hunter-killers.” Resolute’s voice echoed strongly. “Crow and I will organize that force. We have spent a quarter century harassing Chytrine’s troops. There is no one better suited to it.”
Alexia smiled. “I have some experience at the kind of tactics you are talking about.”
The Vorquelf’s silver eyes locked on her and sent shivers through her. “Princess Alexia, please do not think I doubt your abilities or harbor any doubts about you, but you will not be coming with us.”
She tried to cover her surprise. “Why not?”
Crow smiled. “Because, Princess, only you know what you have in mind for your mobile defense forces. They will be your responsibility. If they are successful, you will know why. If they are not, you will make them successful. There is no other way.”
Alyx caught the reluctance in Crow’s voice and took solace in it. In her mind she’d seen herself off riding with Crow. They would be out there, free, slashing at Aurolani troops. People without nations attacking an enemy that would destroy all nations. But that freedom, the exhilaration, were illusions. She wanted to slip the responsibilities for which she had been trained and just fight at the side of the man she loved.
In his voice she heard that Crow did not want to be parted from her either, but she hid the smile that realization sparked. Both of them knew their own desires had to be subordinated to their duty. Until Chytrine’s troops were defeated and she was slain, any peace and happiness they might know would be a fancy that could be easily torn asunder.
Will looked up at her. “Don’t worry, Highness, I’ll take good care of Crow.”
Bowmar frowned. “I had thought, Lord Norrington, that you would remain here to rally my people.”
“Probably not a good plan.” Will sighed. “Chytrine wants me dead, so having me standing around in one place means that place is a target. I’ll be with Crow and Resolute. Only thing worse for her troops than having me waiting for them is having me hurting them.”
Crow glanced at Resolute, then shook his head. “That decision, Will, is not final. We will talk about it.”
“I figured that, Crow.” The thief shrugged. “We can talk lots, but it comes down to this: we have a plan to stop Chytrine and folks who can do it. Anything that stands between us and spilling blood is just a waste of time.”
49
The piteous notes in the screams echoing through Porjal were what unsettled Isaura. She fully understood the need to pacify the city. The siege had been successful, but the resistance had been fierce. Lord Neskartu had been forced to work hard to counter the magicks that rebuilt the shattered walls. The dragonels had to pound them into gravel and then dust before her mother’s troops were able to enter the city.
Once they were poised to do that, a heavily armed force burst from the city and headed away, westward along the coast. The Aurolani troops entering the city had become overconfident, and assumed there would be no one left to fight them. In a sense they were correct, for very few people remained. Those who did, however, were clever, suicidal, and adept at setting up and springing ambushes and booby traps that mangled, maimed, and occasionally killed.
Given the casualties among the sorcerers Neskartu had brought south with him, Isaura found herself pressed into duty aiding the wounded. She joined Trib in trying to heal some grichothka. One had fallen into a pit that had been lined mostly with upward-pointing spikes that impaled him as he fell in. Others at the bottom of the pit pointed down, holding him as his fellows tried to pull him free. Yet others had arms smashed or severed, shoulders crushed and legs broken as stones fell, or logs rolled. Any number had their feet punctured by a pair of iron nails bent at right angles and welded together in the middle. With all points sharpened, they could be tossed on the ground and a spike would always point upward.
She’d shaken her head when first she saw a collection of the wounded.
Isaura had actually heard the pained puling and mewing, but not even that had prepared her for blood-matted fur, rent flesh, and eyes wide with agony. The weapons used against the gibberkin clearly had not been meant to kill them. The spikes in the traps were too short to stab all the way through. The traps were meant to wound, and that made no sense to her.
Trib, his white fur reddened up to his elbows and dappled crimson over his chest, explained carefully. “They have no desire to kill, my lady. A dead warrior requires only a hole in the ground. These require care and food and housing until they are recovered enough to go home or back to war. A corpse can be abandoned, but a wounded comrade must be rescued, often putting the rescuers at risk.”
“But that is so cruel.”
“This is why we fight them.” The kryalniri looked about him at the living carpet of wounded. “If we do not stop them, they will do this to our people when they come for us.”
Retribution and reprisals had come hard and fast. Much of the outer ring of the city had been reduced to rubble, but the interior and the seaside remained virtually intact. Squads had roamed through the city, flushing out humans and herding them into squares. Some had been burned alive, the thick, nauseating smoke swirling through the city, while others were crucified and left to suffer. Their cries lacked the shrieked urgency of the burned, but took on a hideous tone as they subsided.
And there were always more, stronger cries ebbing slowly to replace them.
She could understand the repression and punishment of the city’s populace. If they were not discouraged, they would continue in their cruelty. While she could even understand their desire to protect their homes, their conduct—in the way they lived and in the way they fought—showed them to be lacking in the ways of civilized behavior. It is not possible to reason with the unreasoning.