Chapter X. More Red Than Grey
X
MORE RED THAN GREY
“SLAUGHTER.”
The Last Liathe sat on oily stone, staring into dark water.
“I have read tales that chilled my blood to ice, or made it rush like molten gold. I have listened to poetry so beautiful it left me weeping. Looked back across time through the histories of folk long dead and known those days as if I lived them. Words are an elixir, Marquis. Perhaps the only true magik left in this misbegotten world. We find meaning in them. Purpose. Joy and sorrow and solace.”
She hung her head, staring at empty hands.
“But they are such weak and woeful things, sometimes.
And while words like butchery and massacre might paint the vaguest picture, they cannot hope to encompass the horrors we saw on the walls of Rive Nord that night.
The shriek of steel and screams. The stench of blood and bowel.
It lasted hours, that carnage. Hours that felt like years.
The stones were so slick with blood by the end, it spilled in waterfalls off the ramparts.
The bodies piled so high one could almost climb them up to heaven and escape this hell.
The air was filled with wailing cries, shouted prayers, bubbling whispers for God or wives or mothers. Snow more red than grey.
“And still they came.
“As we fought, side by side with some young Callum against that endless tide, we began to see our brother’s dreadful enemy at work. The cruelty of simple math. The Dead were stronger. Fearless. Tireless. Remorseless. And the ones who stood against them were only men. Brave, oui. Bold, true.
“But just men.
“We lost thousands. Good soldiers and archers and battlepriests all, who fought and died for a wall, of all things. But just as Gabriel promised, we lost it, breakthroughs cracking the battlements and spreading like a bloodstain on silk.
“‘Back now!’ he roared. ‘Fall back!’
“And so we did, elbow-deep in blood, our red blade cutting Dead flesh like smoke. Unbound spilled from the highwalk at Gabriel’s command, he and Phoebe fighting to cover their flight, Dior dragging the wounded with her.
We found ourselves alongside the fleshwitch, cleaving and weaving among the foe.
I reached out to her mind, trying to move in symphony with her as we’d done with Reyne at the Battle of Lastbridge.
But Phoebe snarled at me to get the hell out of her head, and unable to blame her, we retreated.
“The Golden Host did likewise, Duke Maarten bellowing for the withdrawal.
Men fled down the highwalk stairs to the ringing of horns, dozens pushed off by the panicked fellows behind, crunching to the flagstones below.
Blood turned snow to sludge, archers and riflemen pouring on shot to cover the escape.
Even as I say the word, I feel how completely it fails to convey the experience. But the only one I can find is chaos.
“Utter chaos.”
“And where were your eyes during all this?” Jean-Francois asked.
“Still blind,” Celene replied. “That dark was deep, and that storm was hungry, and our mote was still struggling through it. But though the battle had raged for hours, our wings almost frozen solid, still we’d not found the place Voss kept camp.”
The historian dipped his quill, glancing to Gabriel.
“So. The first hand had been won by the Ironhearts. What of the second?”
“Wasn’t so much a hand of cards.”
The silversaint finished his pipe, exhaled a plume of crimson.
“More a game of chess.”
Jean-Francois turned a new page and raised one expectant brow.
“A rout is a dangerous thing, Historian,” Gabriel said, coughing red.
“You’re never more at risk than when your back is to your enemy.
But with the Golden Host in full retreat, the legion didn’t press.
Instead, the foulbloods broke down the gates to let Ettiene and the other highbloods inside, and they lowered the drawbridge for Voss’s thrallswords to march across.
The road to Rive C?ur was officially open.
“But, in the time that all took, we’d pulled back to riverside, joining up with the reserve force there.
Lastbridge loomed at our backs—a broad span of stone arching over the frozen Béni, toward the C?ur’s walls.
I could see men up on those ramparts, thousands, looking down on us with nothing close to envy.
Our battlements were packed with troops, bloodied and weary.
But the miraculous victory Dior had won the last time she fought here was on the mind of every soldier, and spirits were still high. Except of course for mine.
“‘We should pull back,’ I hissed. ‘Retreat over the bridge, they’ll be—’
“‘I do not remember asking your advice, de León,’ Maarten growled.
“‘Consider it a gift freely given, Fontaine.’
“‘And worth every coin, I am sure.’
“We were stood in one of the gatehouse towers, a map of Rive Nord laid on a table before us. Maarten’s staff were a blur of motion and shouted orders, men forming up as best they were able on the ramparts outside.
I’d no wish to upstage the Duke’s command—I’d come in private with my concerns, and kept my voice low.
But you could count the fucks Maarten gave for my opinion on no hands.
“‘Why spend men here?’ I demanded. ‘The C?ur has better fortifications and guns. If we blow the bridge—’
“‘They simply stroll across the river! It’s frozen solid, man!’
“‘They’ll be forced to scale the walls! A hundred feet or more, under fire the—’
“‘I was charged by my Empress to defend these shores, and so I shall!’ Maarten was nose-to-nose with me now, spit on his lips and ’tache.
‘A vow may mean nothing to you, de León, but my word is my bond. This is not my first time fighting the Dead, and I am not without a plan to win this night! Now keep your godless mouth shut and your leech’s eyes open, and you may learn a thing or two! ’
“‘Well, unless you want Voss to learn it too, I’d stay out of sight this time, pigdick. In case you missed the missive, your enemy can read your fucking mind!’
“‘Get this honorless dog out of here!’
“I raised my hands to his guards, already backing out of the room. As I departed, Maarten turned to his second, a short, mustachioed wanker named Deveraux.
“‘Be ready. On my signal, Lieutenant.’
“Back out on the walls, I met up with Dior and Phoebe. The fighting had been brutal, but we’d lost only half a dozen Unbound, our wounded healed by Dior’s holy blood.
Yet the mood among the men was still grim—I could see those comrades of the Cup cared for each other in a way that put most other soldiers to shame.
“‘What did Duke Fuckweasel say?’ Joaquin asked.
“‘Don’t call him that,’ I growled.
“‘Why not? I’ve met some pricks in my time, but he’s the whole bloody hedgehog.’
“‘Show some respect. He’s a Sword of the Realm, boy.’
“‘Seems they’ll give knighthoods to anyone these days, Chevalier.’
“Joaquin smirked, and I looked him over, unsmiling. He was bloodied to the elbows, mail rent by Dead claws, but he stood tall, just as I’d seen him do at the battle of Dún Maergenn. He was Nordish born like me, dark of hair and eye. And he had some cheek.
“I’ll admit, I was starting to like the little bastard.
“‘We defend here,’ I said. ‘Fuckweasel’s orders.’
“Staring out across the city, into the depths of that storm-struck dark, we could see movement now—the first of the Dead come to gaze upon the secondary defenses. But at Maarten’s signal, a horn rang across the ramparts, and moments later, a dull WHUMP rang through the night.
More followed, dozens of them, flames now flaring in the streets of Rive Nord and spreading quick, the stink of woodsmoke and burning oil kissing the wind.
“‘We’re setting fire to our own city now?’
“I glanced to Dior beside me, the rising flames reflected on her eyes.
“‘He’s hemming them in, so their numbers count for less.’ I glanced toward the command tower, gave a grudging nod. ‘Not bad thinking, Fuckweasel.’
“We could see them now, illuminated by those rising flames, coming quick. Foulbloods in the vanguard, thralls and highbloods in the rear. With fires springing up east and west across the Nord, their approach was narrowed, most spilling down the two main thoroughfares toward Place San Antoine. But hemmed that tight, we could see the numbers we faced, and as Celene said, Endless didn’t quite cover it.
“‘Where the hells is that she-devil with the scythe?’
“Phoebe’s eyes were narrowed, searching the foe. She was right—I could see dozens of Voss’s knights, and I’d caught a glimpse of Ettiene. But of the Iron Maiden …
“‘Maybe she’s at the back of the line with Voss,’ Dior offered. ‘As a great poet once said, there’s nobody who fears dying more than things that live forever.’
“I smiled faintly, looking sidelong at Celene. ‘Have you found them? Is Kestrel…’
“‘Not yet. The storm blowsss fierce, and the dark is deep.’
“I nodded, gaze returning to the oncoming Dead. The walls we stood weren’t the finest—this was the Nord’s soft underbelly.
I knew we’d be in for a hell of a fight, and we’d likely be pushed back across Lastbridge at its end.
But I heard a clamor then; the whinny of horses and creak of barding and tack.
Looking behind, I saw a great cadre of men and horse sallying over the bridge toward our gatehouse.
They were clad in plate, tabards of blue stitched with the falcons of Fontaine—the cavaliers Maarten brought from Daggercoast.
“‘They’re going to fucking charge?’ I whispered, bewildered.
“‘Be ready.’ A sergeant in Augustin colors was creeping down the line now, murmuring. ‘Stay out of sight behind the battlements. Make no move until the signal.’
“‘We’re going to leave the walls we just retreated to?’ Joaquin asked, incredulous. ‘I thought fighting on them was the bloody point of them?’
“‘Just stay the hell down,’ I growled. ‘They can’t see you, they can’t read you.’