The Scarab Path (63 page)

One of
her hunters fell, a stubby arrow protruding from the man’s lean body, having
punched through his woven armour as though it were not there. Her own archers
kept loosing over and over. She noticed a bright flash from somewhere, a bolt
of golden flame that she danced aside from.

There
was a bowl of blue-burning oil nearby, by which light the foreigner had been
working. She snatched it up and poured the contents into the orifices of the
weapon. She could not tell if it did any harm, but the burning oil was flooding
across the surface of the machine now, and perhaps its innards would be more
vulnerable to flame.

The
Scorpions were now rallying, alerted to the killers in the heart of their camp.
Teuthete saw a shambles of a charge, a score of half-dressed men and women with
axes and swords, but it was cut down by her archers before they got within a
spear’s reach. Another three of her people were now dead to the Scorpions’ own
bowmen.

She
found more burning oil to splash over the covers of the remaining weapons. The
heavy canvas smouldered fitfully.

Her
people called a warning to her. There was a much greater Scorpion force
forming: at least half a hundred of them dressed in piecemeal armour, with a
scattering of their guard-beasts as well. Arrows lanced into them, each shot
exacting a death, but they gained in numbers all the time, and then rushed
forward in a single body.

Now we come to it
. Teuthete and her spears confronted the
onslaught. They did not even wait to receive the charge but launched themselves
into the Scorpions’ midst, half-leaping and half-flying. The spears were lost
instantly, each through the body of a foe, and they resorted to their spines,
dancing and cutting. driving the bony spikes of their forearms into faces and
throats. The Mantis archers were still loosing into the throng, impossible to
miss at this range.

Teuthete
killed: it was what her kinden did. It was the red heart of all their rituals
and mysteries, their oaths and honour. It was what they put up all their
masquerade of customs to hide. She killed because that was what she was made
for. It was not glorious or noble, merely efficient.

Scorpions
were not slack in that regard, either. They, too, had mostly cast aside their
axes and blades. They had an understanding, their two kinden:
unarmed is best
. There was a pleasing simplicity in it,
unmatched by the later layers of civilized war. Claws against spines, they
slashed each other, Teuthete’s handful a blur of blood and motion within the
Scorpion host. The archers were not shooting now, but engaged in their own
close combat.

It was
over, and she knew it. She could feel it in the surge and swell of the melee,
as each of her followers died. Not one of them departed before their path had
been smoothed by the death of many enemies. Her own time was coming, and she
accepted that without question. If she was Chosen, this was what she had been
chosen for.

There
was sudden thunder out of a clear sky, and she felt a mighty hand take hold of
her, take those around her. Most were thrown flat, but she, with her wings
momentarily outstretched, was hurled into the sky.

One of
the weapons had died. Its death-agonies, instantaneous but colossal, had
wrecked a space of the Scorpion camp and broken open the weapon next to it. It
had been the same one she had poured burning oil into, she realized.

So that is how you kill them
. It was too late now to
exploit this knowledge.

The air
was abruptly busy with stubby machine-shot arrows sleeting up at her. The
moment had gone. She saw three others of her kinden also airborne, although one
was picked off as soon as she noted him.

She
darted higher, labouring her way into the air. Her kinden were not strong
fliers but the darkness cloaked them. The three survivors swooped over the
camp, heading towards the city walls. Something tried to follow them, some
flying foreigner in banded armour, but she turned in the air with her bow ready
in her hands and spiked an arrow through him.

I live
.

It was
unexpected and she was not sure how she felt about it. The shackles of
Khanaphes were still fastened upon her, but that would not last long. Amnon
would find other ways for her to die. It was what being Chosen meant.

*

In the
dawn’s first light, Hrathen surveyed the damage. Angved and his engineers were
picking over the damaged artillery. The bodies were being looted and then
hauled off into the ravaged farmlands to rot. Scorpion-kinden were not
sentimental.

‘Give me
a report,’ the halfbreed growled. Angved clapped one of his men on the
shoulder, telling him to carry on, and stood up.

‘I
counted around a hundred Scorpion dead,’ he said. ‘Half of those fell in the
initial ambush.’

‘Ambush?’
Hrathen spat. ‘How can we have an ambush occur in our own camp?’

‘Well,
whatever the word is.’

‘What
loss to your artillerists?’ Hrathen pressed.

‘Of the
Scorpions? Three or four. They’d expected our crews to stay with their
machines, I suppose. In that case, they don’t know how much of a shambles this
camp is. No great loss there. However, one of my better engineers got himself
killed. One of the shotters had a jammed cartridge and he was working
double-time trying to sort it out. Shows what you get for being too keen. Oh,
and one of your Slave Corps lads got killed because he was stupid enough to
chase their survivors into the dark.’

‘Enemy
dead?’

‘Seventeen
bodies recovered. Some kind of local Mantis-kinden, like we saw in the battle.
I fought Mantis-kinden in the Twelve-year War: this could be a nightly
occurrence.’

‘Camp
security is very much on my mind,’ Hrathen assured him. ‘What about the
engines?’

‘We’ve
lost two, neither repairable. Our guests cleared the jammed cartridge by
setting fire to it, and of course it was chock full of the good stuff,’ Angved
confirmed. ‘Thankfully we’d managed to drill it into the Scorpions not to leave
the shotters loaded overnight. Otherwise we might just have lost the lot.’

‘Well
done,’ Hrathen told him. ‘I want those walls down by evening.’

Angved
looked away from him over to the city, that yesterday’s festivities had
confirmed to be within easy bombardment range. ‘Quite possible,’ he said.
‘Normally you don’t have the luxury of setting up this close, what with enemy
engines on the walls and the like. Because we can, we have all the benefit of
our ranging practice of yesterday, without having to spend two hours finding
our mark again. I reckon we can organize a concerted barrage on the walls and
gate, and punch through in good time. Or I can give you three breaches by the
end of tomorrow. Just one breach might become a big choke-point.’

Hrathen
nodded, conceding the thought. A moment later a man dropped to earth next to
him, making his claws twitch with the suddenness of it.

‘Captain.’

‘Report.’

‘The
streets are full of people, sir. Absolutely packed full,’ the scout told him.
‘They’re all on the move.’

‘They’re
going to fight? What are they doing?’

‘On the
move away, sir. Looks like everyone who can is shifting across the river. I saw
what must be a hundred boats, of all sizes, ferrying people over.’

Hrathen
stared at the scout for a moment, with Angved waiting at his elbow, and then he
laughed. ‘I see it,’ he said. ‘I see it plain. Jakal’ll love it. We’ve scared
them to death already. They’re giving over half the city before the walls are
even down.’ His face darkened. ‘And it isn’t necessarily a bad move for them.
They’d never keep us out, and they know what will happen to every man, woman
and child once we get inside. We’ve been guilty of thinking like an Imperial
army.’

‘The
river,’ Angved agreed.

‘Quite.
It wouldn’t stop an Imperial advance for a moment. We’d just send the airborne
over to take the far bank, worry about the rest of it later. But of course, we
have no airborne, and I don’t think our friends here are good swimmers.’ Hrathen
chuckled, the sound of a man whose day has become more interesting. ‘Get me a
single breach as quick as you can,’ he ordered Angved. ‘Clearing half a city of
people takes time. Even if they started yesterday, there’ll still be some sport
left for us if you can have the walls down by dusk.’

‘And
what about tomorrow night?’ Angved asked him. ‘More attacks?’

‘There
was a tribe responsible for keeping watch, last night,’ Hrathen told him. ‘By
midday they will be extinct. The Warlord has taken their failure as a personal
insult. That will give the army something to enjoy while they wait for you to
do your job. Tonight our watch will take their jobs more seriously.’

At dawn, Amnon sought out the Iron Glove factora, eluding his officers
and advisers. The Ministers had been making demands to see him, and he had a
pressing invitation to the Scriptora to explain his decisions. In the meantime
the evacuation of western Khanaphes had been going on all night, the discipline
of his troops managing to control the panic and fear of the people. Every boat
that could take to the water had been transporting the people of Khanaphes to
the east bank of the Jamail, the sailors and fishermen and traders shuttling
back and forth across the river. They stopped only if their boats were in
danger of sinking or falling apart.

The
Ministers had not countermanded his orders, and in its own small way that
brought home to Amnon just how bad things had become. Their fearful forbearance
would not last, he knew, so he was determined to achieve as much as possible
before they confronted him.

And he
had promised this one indulgence to himself. It meant a lot to him.

Totho
met him within minutes of his arrival, already wearing half of his mail. All
around them was the sound of a company of mercenaries preparing for war.
Corcoran was already on the river with the
Fourth Iteration
,
helping with the general evacuation.

‘How’s
it going?’ Totho asked him.

‘Well
enough, but there is a great deal left to do. When they start attacking the
walls, we will have to make a choice.’

‘Priorities,
you mean,’ Totho appreciated. ‘People or foodstuffs.’

‘If we
strip the western city of food, we could starve the enemy, as you say …’

‘But you
won’t do that,’ Totho finished for him.

‘I have
a duty to the people, first of all. I am their First Soldier,’ Amnon said. ‘I
cannot leave them to the Many of Nem.’

‘I
understand,’ said Totho, and Amnon could tell that it was that particular
civilized brand of understanding that these foreigners seemed so adept at.
Totho could understand Amnon’s logic with his mind, but not feel it with his
heart. If it had been Totho in command, then the choice would have been
different.

And I am lucky to have a man on my side who can think like that
,
Amnon decided.
Or we might have simply sat here behind our
walls until they fell on us
.

There
was a distant concussion and he thought he felt the ground tremble slightly.
Totho had lifted his head, like a hunter listening for his quarry, and said,
‘That was all of them at once. It’s started.’

‘Then
make me ready,’ Amnon urged him.

‘Come
with me.’ Totho led him into the factora, seeking out that same room he
remembered. ‘How is the work at the bridge?’

‘Going
well. We will be ready,’ Amnon replied. It had been a nightmare, in truth. A
true nightmare for masons and labourers to carry out such precarious work in
the dark. They had set up a pair of hoists on the bridge, and thus lifted stone
blocks up on to its arching span, and then wooden boards and planks had turned
the stonework into battlements, narrowing the path across the bridge to only a
few feet across. Now the leadshotters had begun, that narrow gap could be
closed entirely, and the makeshift wall of stone and wood would block off the
bridge. A handful of good men and a scatter of archers could hold it. They
would have to, since it was the only chance of stalling the Scorpion advance.

How long?
Amnon tried to picture himself standing atop
that barricade, that had been put up so hastily.
They will
come in all the numbers the bridge will allow them. They will sink their claws
into the wood and tear it away. They will swarm up the stone
. In the
back of his mind was the thought that, even if they stood off the Many for a
tenday, it would not be enough. Two tendays or three, it was all delaying the inevitable.

Then we will delay them until we have no blood left to spill
.

‘Of
course you can destroy the bridge,’ Totho said, ‘or try to. I’m not sure if we
have enough explosives on the
Iteration
to manage
it.’

Amnon
did not need to think of the outrage such a suggestion would cause amongst the
Ministers. He felt an echo of it himself, rising unbidden. ‘The stones of that
bridge are amongst the oldest of the city, Totho. The Masters themselves
decreed its construction. It is like the Scriptora, the Place of Foreigners. It
is the genuine old city that the new city has grown within. It would be …
unthinkable to turn against it.’

‘The
Scorpions are going to tear down as much of your old city as they can get their
hands on,’ Totho pointed out harshly.

‘That is
why they are our enemies,’ Amnon said flatly.

They had
arrived at the arming room, where the black plates of aviation steel were laid
out ready for him. He remembered how they had felt: smooth, weightless, a
second skin of impenetrable steel.

‘Put it
on me,’ Amnon directed.

Totho,
with no further comment, set about the task like an artificer, taking up the
pieces in their precise order, and remaking Amnon piece by piece. He buckled
together the breastplate and backplate, drawing the straps tight, and feeling a
strange sense of triumph.
Logic and reason can grow even in
this soil
.