The Gate of Fire (87 page)

So, he had stayed overlong, days past when he had intended to return to Rome and his brothers.

Maxian started awake, hearing the rattle of a stone falling somewhere in the grotto. He stood up, feeling stiffness in his arms and legs. He laughed softly to himself and patted the flank of the boulder. With the warm ground and the constant faint rumble of the mountain, it was easy to fall asleep here. The heat of the rocks made the bowl a little warmer than the night should be, raising a faint dewy mist. Maxian cracked his neck and walked toward the southern end of the grassy lawn. It was time to depart.

"Khiron! Come out, dead thing. It is time to go." Maxian heard his voice echo from the rocks.

He reached the far side of the glade and turned, looking up at the rim of the bowl. Where was the creature? It never went far away, even when it nosed about for living things among the rocks.

"Khiron, attend me!" The Prince put a tone of command into his call.

There was movement in the darkness at the side of the bowl and a lithe figure slipped down out of the shadows. Maxian frowned at it—the creature's head was turning this way and that and it moved quickly and low to the ground. He looked around the great circle of rocks again. It was very quiet. Khiron passed through a bit of starlight, his glistening skin shining, loping along in a crouch.

"Khiron? What...?"

Fire bloomed in the night, a sudden sharp orange wash of light that stabbed at the Prince's eyes and threw the boulders and mossy trees into high relief. Something hissing and spitting flame tumbled out of the sky and bounced toward him on the grass. Gobbets of flame scattered, clinging to the stones. Maxian jumped back in alarm and saw Khiron suddenly straighten up, its mouth yawning in a scream of rage.

"Yaaaaaarrr!"

The Prince staggered, slammed back into the bole of a cypress tree by a cold slapping shock to his diaphragm. He looked down, stunned, and gaped at a length of arrow shaft that jutted from his stomach. Blood welled up from the entry wound, wicking down the length of the arrow and fouling the fletching. In the hissing red light of the flames, each drop of blood turned golden as it fell toward the ground.

Time slowed as the Prince watched his life blood spill out.

Another arrow slammed into his shoulder, punching through bone and cartilage with a broad triangular head, lodging in the tree behind him. Pinned, the Prince struggled against a flood of pain and shock to raise his head. Despite the mortal wounds, his mind still seemed whole and aware, though everything was moving so slowly that he was disoriented. With a great effort, he managed to look up.

Men rushed out of the gloom, their helmets and iron mail glinting in the firelight. Another of the burning pots had fallen from above, breaking on a huge looming boulder, and long streams of burning liquid sputtered and snapped as they flowed down its sides. The mist had blown back, leaving a glowing roof over the grotto. Khiron was in motion at the center of the space, though Maxian saw that a dozen heavy black arrows had pierced the
homunculus
. Shrieking, Khiron leapt toward the nearest man, talons outstretched. The man, a heavy-set fellow with a full helm, skipped aside and Khiron caught the tip of the man's spear with his shoulder. There was a gelid sound of razor-sharp metal punching through sinew and stitches of twisted gut, then a slap as the crossbar at the base of the spearhead arrested the passage of the weapon.

Khiron shrieked again, seeing his prey beyond his reach. The creature slashed at the haft of the spear, catching it and wrenching it away. The spearhead twisted in the wound, then popped free. The armored man scrambled away and Khiron reversed the spear with a flip. Bowstrings, somewhere above, snapped with a musical
twang
and more arrows suddenly stabbed from Khiron's back. The
homunculus
shrieked again, but ignored the pain and hurled the spear with a convulsive heave. The left arm flopped, broken and shattered, at its side.

Maxian blinked, suddenly feeling horrible weakness wash over him. The scream of the armored man as the spear tore through his mailed armor from back to front and pinned him to the face of a slab-sided boulder was lost on him. Chill flooded through the Prince and he patted fruitlessly at the blood welling from his stomach. It was hard, caught against the tree, to move.

I must call my power,
he realized dimly. Events had moved so fast...

A figure rushed forward out of the shadows, a long red braid gleaming in the firelight. A long stabbing sword was bare in her hand. The Prince looked up, taking an eternity to raise his head. A face swam forward out of the firelight, a strong oval with burning gray eyes, silhouetted by flame and smoke. A woman in armor, her mouth in a grim line, and the sharp point of an Indian-steel blade arrowing for him. Maxian tried to raise a hand in defense, but it was too late.

The sword slipped sideways through his ribs, transfixing his heart. The Prince stared, his eyes wide in surprise and recognition. She was close—he could feel her breath on his face—and she jerked the sword from his chest with a little grunt. It came away black and wet. The woman's hand moved and Maxian felt his throat constrict, crushed by powerful fingers. He could barely feel his body, there was only an encompassing, numbing cold. He saw the blade rise, shedding blood in a fine spray, for a slashing cut.

Khiron spun and leapt in one motion. Its powerful legs flung it into the air, over the head of a startled soldier, missing the spear that stabbed at it. Firelight gleamed on its flesh and it struck the ground running. The thicket of arrows that jutted from back and side and thigh did not slow it. The
homunculus
did not feel pain, only hunger and the driving fear of dissolution. Before it, two men turned to meet it, their blades glittering in the flame-shot air. They were armored, too, with heavy iron plates covering their chests and stout helmets of steel. Khiron did not care; all it knew was that its master was just beyond, on the verge of final death.

Heedless of the sword blades hacking for its joints, Khiron bulled into the two men, crashing into one with its ruined shoulder. The man grunted and was thrown back sprawling on the turf. The other hacked deeply into the other arm, but Khiron spun inside the man's reach and smashed its head into the face of the man's helmet. Bony ancient skull rang on metal and the soldier crumpled to the ground. Khiron rushed through the opening.

Thyatis leapt aside, reversing the stroke that would have cut the Prince's head from his body, and slashed the longsword across the face of the horror that lunged at her out of the night. The fire-pots continued to burn brightly, and the flames licking up from them had caught among the trees and undergrowth at the sides of the grotto. Smoke billowed up from the damp grass and wood. More of her men were rushing forward, though the archers had stopped firing once things had reached close quarters. The tip of the water-steel blade slashed across the creature's nose, tearing through cartilage and bone. The vaguely reptilian head jerked aside, but the ruin and wound did not seem to slow it. Thyatis dropped into a crouch, finding her footing, and circled.

In the ruddy glare, the naked body of the thing seemed a disaster, torn with arrows and covered with ragged wounds. One arm flopped at its side, though the other was still outstretched, diamond-bright talons winking in the air. The thing scuttled to one side like a crab and Thyatis gave ground, though that meant it was now between her and the Prince. Her ears roared with the blood-fire and she felt very light, almost floating on the grass.

Thyatis attacked, feinting at the thing's eyes, then weaved aside as its claw lashed through the air where she had been. She tumbled aside and it barely snatched a leg away as she tried to drive the sword into one of its kneecaps. It spun, slashing with a taloned foot and she had to block, feeling the strength of it slam into her shoulder. Her arm went numb at the blow, but the blood-fire roared up and everything disappeared into a tunnel of swirling gray, focussed on the grinning charnel face of the thing.

Nikos staggered up, levering himself upright with a gloved hand. With a gasp, he tore the helmet from his head. Half of it was caved in by the creature's blow, and blood slicked his face and blinded him in one eye. The world seemed unsteady, but he managed to gain his feet. Men were shouting at him and he looked around just in time.

Thyatis and the creature were a blur of limbs and blades, surging back and forth across the grassy field. As he watched, she sprang into the air, going into a sharp side-kick that clipped the thing's head with the iron-shod toe of her boot. It fell away into a roll and then came up again, lashing out with its remaining good arm. The woman, her braids flying behind her head, slid the blow with a forearm, then countered with an elbow strike to the creature's chest.

The thing shuddered, but was not rocked back. It twisted like a snake and caught Thyatis in the chest with its shattered arm, swinging it like a club. The woman, caught out of balance, was flung back to bounce off of one of the boulders. The sound of her impact rang like a wagonload of kettles dropped in the street.

"Fire!" screamed Nikos in panic, seeing the horror lurch forward toward his commander. He scuttled back, groping for a weapon on the ground. "Fire now!"

The
homunculus
turned, grinning, its shattered face lit by the flames. It hissed, a long dry sound, and rushed at Nikos like a lion. The Illyrian threw himself aside, feeling heavy and slow in the armor. There was a grunting sound behind him, the smacking sound of meat and steel and then a gelid pop. Nikos rolled up, wiping blood from his eye. His scalp cut was bleeding freely.

The creature stood frozen, pierced by a long heavy spear. Karhmi and Efraim had run forward at the same moment that Nikos had jumped aside. Between them they held a long pike, a
sarissa
, and when the
homunculus
leapt for the Illyrian, they caught it on the foot-long tip like a gar-pike on a hook. A bladder had been lashed to the crossbars of the weapon and the fluid inside, black and sticky, splashed over the creature's chest and arms.

"Fire!" shrieked Nikos and he backpedaled. The two soldiers dodged away as well, dropping the pike. The bowmen hiding atop the boulders had been waiting, fire-arrows at the ready. Now the air hissed with bowshot and flaming streaks of light flashed toward the creature. It moved abruptly, tearing the spear from its side, and sprang back, sending droplets of the black liquid flying in all directions. Arrows, burning with pitch, thudded into the ground where it had been. One struck at the edge of the broad arc of splashed liquid and there was a sudden guttural roar and blue-white flame leapt up from the turf.

Nikos ran sideways, one hand up to shade his eyes. The
phlogiston
splashed on the ground was burning furiously, filling the grotto with the sound of its combustion. He had lost sight of the creature, which was death in such a tight space as this. Bitter white smoke boiled up, obscuring everyone's vision.

Thyatis shook off the concussion and rolled up, feeling giddy. A bright lancet of pain crawled across her side, telling her that at least one rib had broken on the boulder's unyielding surface. She had lost the sword somewhere, but she still had at least one long knife. It was already in her hand, snatched from her sheath without conscious thought. Her men were shouting in alarm, but she ignored that for the moment. She darted to the right, toward where the Prince had lain against the tree. The
homunculus
was a deadly threat, but the Prince was the mission.

Maxian's eyes fluttered open, seeing a blinding white light. A sharp acrid smell assaulted his nostrils. He was tremendously cold. Blood bubbled from his lips, spilling down his chin.

What is this
? The Prince's mind shuddered with waves of pain.
Is this the ferryman? Where is the black river?

With an enormous effort, the Prince tried to raise a hand. He could not. He was too weak.

A silhouette suddenly came into focus against the actinic glare. It moved and sharpened into focus. It was the woman, her hair in disarray, soot smudged along one high cheekbone. There was steel in her hand, a long knife with a wicked edge. Her gray eyes bored into his, filled with intense determination. Her free hand grasped his hair, bending his head sharply back.

Maxian tried to speak, but blood clogged his throat and there was only a ghastly bubbling sound. The cold edge of the knife pressed against his throat. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw that the woman was wearing a brooch or pendant that bound her hair back. It had fallen to one side, and it gleamed brightly in the shuddering light. On it, incised in the bronze surface, was the sigil of an eye flanked by curved wings.

The Imperial Office of Barbarians
. The thought forced its way through the roaring pain.
My brother. Galen. Aurelian. The Emperor
.

Maxian's heart seemed to stop. Awareness flooded him. The well-equipped soldiers. The forbidden chemicals. The speed and ferocity of the attack. A vision of his brother's face swam into view, Galen's dark eyes hooded, face drawn and fatigued, that one lock of hair lying across his forehead. Metal sawed into the flesh of his throat.

You would kill me?
Maxian felt his heart crush under the weight of that betrayal. The vision turned, staring at him across the leagues. The nervous bright eyes were grim and filled with pain.
You would order my death?

This thing must be done
, said the vision.
The State must endure.

Then Maxian's heart did break.

Thyatis saw the man's eyes flutter closed and felt his pulse stagger and stop under her hand. She drew back the knife, hesitating for a moment. A shriek from behind her made her spin and drop into a crouch. The creature had suddenly bolted out of the shadows of a boulder and had ripped the throat from one of the soldiers. The men had moved out into the open ground, their spears at the ready, but no one had expected the thing to spring from atop one of the smaller boulders. The other men converged on the thing, and the air filled with burning arrows again. Thyatis ran forward, shying away from the pool of burning
phlogiston
.