The Path of the Storm (36 page)

Amber saw a huge structure of red stone, encircling the Eye like a wheel. Her escorts took her inside an open doorway and into a featureless corridor, slightly curved to follow the building's arc. Stairs led both up and down, while doors were set into the walls on both sides.

The soldiers led Amber to a bare room, with just two seats and a table, and told her to wait. She heard the guards lock the door behind her. A mirror on the wall showed Amber how she looked: haggard, worn, and filled with fear.

As she waited she tried not to think about Miro. She knew the chances of them making it out of Wengwai alive were slim.

The door opened, and a man in a black robe entered. He bore the same symbol of a circle bound by a triangle on his robe, and his hair was grey, his eyes dark. He sat down without a word and looked at Amber down a hooked nose.

"Who are you?" he said.

"My name is Amber."

"Where are you from?"

"I come from Altura."

"And where is Altura?"

"Across the sea, a great distance to the east."

The alchemist snorted. "Pish. There's no such place."

Amber glared at the alchemist. "I thought your Alchemists' Guild was supposed to have all the knowledge. At least I have the pleasure of seeing I was wrong."

"You said you're an enchantress. What is that?"

Amber took a breath, calming herself. She reminded herself she needed this man's help. "An enchantress uses lore to give items special properties. An enchantress might, for example, draw runes on a stone to project light. We call this a nightlamp. This is just one example…"

Amber looked at the alchemist's sardonic expression, and realised he was making sport with her. "Lord of the Sky," she whispered, "your city is falling down around your ears, and you're holed up in your castle with nothing better to do than make fun of me."

There was a knock on the door, and with an expression of irritation the alchemist stood up and turned the handle. He muttered angrily with someone for a few minutes.

"Wait here," he said, before once more leaving Amber alone.

Amber wondered how the soldiers on the walls were faring. The thick stone blocked the sounds of the cannon but she knew that out there people were dying.

The door opened, and looking up, Amber saw a different alchemist this time. He was older, with shaggy grey eyebrows and kind eyes. The triangle on his robe was bound by a double circle.

"Amber," he said in a quiet, winded voice. "Please, come with me."

Amber followed the old alchemist out of the room and down a winding set of stairs.

"Who are you?" Amber asked to break the silence.

"My name is Tungawa. I have to apologise for Mendak, he knows nothing of your people."

"He's rude."

Tungawa chuckled. "Yes, rude he may be. But he is also brave, and has volunteered to stay here in our chapter to the very end. When the enemy comes, which they will, he will ignite a device and ensure our knowledge is kept from the hands of evil."

"What about you? Will you stay to the end?"

"Most of my fellow Guild members have long departed. Some fight on the walls, while others have sworn to make the taking of our chapter a costly venture. A few, such as myself, stay because we need to learn more about our enemy. When the time comes, I will surrender, and I will keep my eyes and ears open. Perhaps the opportunity may come to learn this enemy's weakness and bring the knowledge to those who can best put it to advantage."

"Isn't that risky?"

The stairs wound down until Amber thought they must now be below ground level.

"Not as much as you may think. The Guild has knowledge this Lord of the Night doesn't possess. We did work for him once, before we knew his true nature, much as we've worked for gold for many others. He needed us then. He will have use for us now."

"Do you know what he is?"

Tungawa met Amber's gaze. "He is one of the Evermen, is he not?"

Amber sighed. "I'd been hoping to exchange that knowledge for something I need." She wondered how she would get the alchemist to help her now.

The stairway finally ended and Tungawa pushed open a door, gesturing for Amber to enter. As her eyes adjusted to the low light ahead of her she saw she was in a cavernous store room rivalling any of the huge storehouses she'd seen in Ralanast.

Shelves filled the interior from one end to the other. From where she stood Amber saw leather-bound books and brown-paper packets, bottles filled with coloured liquids and jars containing powders.

"Where are you taking me?"

Tungawa walked ahead of her. "Come," he said, "there is a passage from here that will take you out of the city."

Amber abruptly stopped.

Tungawa turned, surprised. "This is why you came here, is it not? You guessed we would have a way out of the city, and you came here hoping to share your knowledge for this secret."

"No," Amber said. "That's not why I'm here. I'm here because someone from your order built a device for our enemy. This device was not only explosive; it was built to release a poison as part of the blast. The device looked like a golden shrine, but in actuality was timed to explode at a certain hour of a certain day." Amber felt the anger rise to her cheeks and wetness burn behind her eyes. "That day was my wedding day, and that poison took my son. I'm here to find the antidote, and I won't leave without it."

"Why would he attack your wedding?" Tungawa whispered.

"You know about this?"

"I told you we did work for him once, before we knew his true nature. A man in a grey robe came to us with gold. He gave us his requirements and we accepted his money. We took the device down to the river and it was loaded aboard a ship. A man watched and waited nearby, staring at me with eyes that sent a chill through my body. That was the first time I saw Sentar Scythran."

"It was you!" Amber said.

Something inside her snapped, and her arm lashed out. She slapped the old alchemist across his face as hard as she could. A tear spilled out of her eye as she moved to hit him again.

Tungawa caught her wrist. "I suppose I deserve that." He sighed, rubbing his face with his other hand. "I know it is no consolation, but we've learnt our mistake. Please," Tungawa released her hand and turned away, "follow me."

He led Amber along one of the rows between shelves, and then turned sharply, the old man moving so quickly she had difficulty keeping up. He finally stopped at a shelf no different from the others. He took a flask from the shelf and handed it to Amber. From the sloshing sound, Amber knew it contained liquid.

"Here," he said. "Remember, everything is a poison, there is poison in everything. Only the dose makes a thing not a poison. Never more than one mouthful each day until his health is improved. When the spots leave his fingernails, cease treatment immediately."

Amber looked at the flask in her hand. She couldn't believe they'd come this far and now she had it. Please, let Tomas be alive to receive his cure!

"I would thank you," Amber said, "but I'll save that for when my son is well again. Can you show me how to get back to the city? I need to get to the walls."

"Are you sure that's where you want to be? Past this chamber is a way out of the city."

"Yes, I'm sure. I need to find my husband."

~

T
HE FIRST
sensation Miro felt was pain as consciousness slowly returned. He ached from head to toe, but the strongest pain came from his temple and his left arm. His right eye was crusted shut, but he managed to open his left eye enough to see.

He'd awakened in a pile of dead bodies. He didn't know how he'd come to be thrown with the mangled corpses of the fallen defenders; someone must have pronounced him dead and thrown him in the heap.

He couldn't hear anything, just a constant ringing in his ears. He tasted the metallic flavour of blood in his mouth, and ran his tongue across a loose tooth.

An armoured soldier lay across his chest while another Gokani covered his legs. He tried to move but he knew it would be some time before he could wriggle out from underneath.

After a while the ringing faded, and he heard screams and cries, shouts of rage and moans of agony. Tilting his head back he could see the clear blue sky, and it wasn't until he turned his face further to the left that he could see part of the battle unfold.

He saw soldiers fighting revenants, their faces filled with fear as they battled decayed corpses with white eyes, corpses that needed to be hacked into pieces to keep down. Miro heard a great crash, like a wooden door slamming open, and suddenly the wall he watched was filled with revenants, too many of them to count, easily outnumbering the defenders.

A man in black robes ran forward, an alchemist by the emblem on his breast. He threw a flask into the midst of the revenant warriors and flame rolled forward in a searing red cloud. A revenant came from behind the alchemist and a sword suddenly protruded from the black robe, jutting out from the man's chest and then pulled out again, releasing a gush of blood.

Miro struggled, but still couldn't find the strength in his limbs to get up.

The horn blared, two long blasts coming from the soaring tower in the middle of the city. "Back to the next wall!" soldiers took up the cry. "Retreat to the next wall!"

The few soldiers Miro could see on the section of wall turned to flee but were cut down from behind. Miro turned his head to watch the Gokani falling back. Some brave men at one of the cannon posts stayed to the end, sending shot after shot at a distant target below. When the revenants arrived, a final explosion ensured they destroyed both the cannon and themselves rather than let it fall into their enemy's hands.

The retreat was now nearly complete. The enemy now held the thick outer walls, and some of the surviving cannon were turned and pointed back towards the city.

Miro froze when a steady stream of white-eyed warriors ran past the pile where he lay unable to move. He fought to give his eyes the steady look of death as revenant after revenant ran past.

Amber was inside the inner walls, while Miro was now on the outside of the remaining defences. He wondered what to do.

~

T
HE GATE
posts were unmanned now, and Amber ran through the deserted residential district of Fairview, desperate to find Miro on the walls so they could flee this terrible place.

She passed through the gate leading to the area of merchant stalls, where the barricades had been set up to be one of the last defences against the enemy.

They were already fighting at the barricades.

Amber stopped running and put her hand to her mouth. A handful of Gokani soldiers held back an unstoppable tide of the enemy. At a mutual signal they turned and ran from a barricade to regroup and form a defence at the next. Soldiers were cut down as they fled, and now there were that many fewer defenders to man the next station.

High on the walls on both sides, archers shot arrow after arrow into the horde. Alchemists in black robes threw explosive flasks into the attackers' midst; these seemed to have a greater effect than the arrows.

As Amber watched transfixed, the defenders fell back to the next set of barricades, directly ahead.

"Miro," Amber whispered.

The tall outer walls had been overrun more quickly than she would have thought possible. Miro was one of the best swordsmen she'd ever seen. Surely he was all right? But swords couldn't stop cannon. Nor could they stop…

"Revenants," Amber breathed. "Lord of the Sky, no."

"What are you doing?" a soldier manning the final barricade cried at her. "Run!"

Amber drew the thin blade from her boot. She would have given anything for her green silk dress and an enchanted blade.

The soldier who told Amber to run was decapitated by a barbarian warrior; the revenant's decayed lips gave him a permanent grin.

With a surge the barricade was overrun, and with moan-like cries, the revenants swarmed ahead.

Amber turned. The gate she'd just passed through was behind her. She needed to close it, and give the defenders whatever chance she could.

She started to run, sensing the rushing attackers behind her, feeling their stench on her neck. The gate was fifty paces more, then forty. Amber turned to look back.

She wasn't going to make it.

A snarling woman was the first of the horde to reach Amber. The woman's throat had been sliced open, probably when she was first killed, for the cut was old and strips of skin were dry.

Amber held her stiletto in front of her, preparing to strike, noting her hand was shaking.

She thrust out, piercing the woman's breast, and the force of the revenant's momentum took her further onto the blade.

But the white-eyed woman displayed no reaction. Amber tried to withdraw the blade to strike again, when she felt a club strike the side of her head with a force that belied the woman's thin arms. Stars burst behind Amber's eyes.

Amber went down.

34

B
Y LATE
afternoon the battle was won. Sentar Scythran had conquered the great city of Wengwai in a single day.

The defenders fought bravely from gate to gate, ring to ring, inflicting a heavy toll, with each defender fighting to his last breath. But the numbers of the indomitable revenants were too great, they were too hard to kill, and support from Veldria never came.

With one final gasp of defiance, the innermost circle of red stone where the Alchemists' Guild had their chapter exploded as it was overrun, taking thousands of revenants in the blast. The detonation filled the sky with smoke and thunder rolled across the plains below the city. The soaring tower called the Eye slowly leaned, and ponderously toppled, before coming crashing down on the city below, crushing still more of the enemy as it fell.

Wengwai, the beating heart of Gokan, was no more.

During the final stages of the battle, Miro managed to free himself from the pile of corpses, finding his sword in the process. Checking himself for injury, he found his left shoulder was stiff and sore but he was surprisingly unscathed. Wiping his crusted-over eye, he managed to clear the blood away and could now open both eyes.