Witch King, page 19
It didn’t matter. Kai had known there was no way out of this. He turned and jumped up to grip the wide sill of the window again. “I’m going down there.”
Tahren said, “I’ll hold them as long as I can.” She vaulted the stair railing and dropped into the room below.
Kai dug his sandals into the rough stone wall, heaved himself up and through. Before he could think too much about it, he rolled out of the narrow window into the sick misty air of the Cageling Demon Court. He turned the fall into a flip and landed feet first on the edge of the gallery roof. The slate was slick with water and he crouched to keep his balance.
The mist had almost dissipated. With it gone, Kai saw the arched ceiling overhead for the first time, the carved designs of clouds. The whole space was taller than he had realized and there were open balconies above the viewing gallery that he had never noticed. The light rain was now barely a dampness in the air, though the eaves still dripped. He felt his feet slide, turned it into a controlled fall and landed on the wet paving below.
He had never been able to stand up in the court and it looked different from this angle, like an unknown if equally horrible place. The floor was dotted with what looked like heaps of ragged soaked clothes, attached to clumps of dark tangled hair, brown limbs. The demons who were sitting up were curled in on themselves, their heads drooping. There were around fifty captives, but that was counting those who looked as if their borrowed bodies were abandoned. And Bashasa’s poor dead sister.
Kai had no idea what happened to a demon who tried to leave their body when a return to the underearth was impossible. The idea that it might be less painful than the court was unlikely.
Kai’s heart pounded and every instinct in Enna’s body screamed at him to run, to jump for the gallery and fight his way out. Instead he pulled his coat open and dug out the cutting tool. He threw himself down beside the nearest slumped figure.
The stench of rotting waterlogged skin, the feel of the wet pavement made his hands shake. He fumbled for the demon’s chains. It felt like an endless stretch of time but it was really only a few heartbeats before he figured out the trick of cutting at the joins. He snapped the three connections, to free ankles, wrists, and neck, of the unmoving demon. Then he remembered he should be talking to them. He shoved to his feet and went to the next. “I’m a Prince of the Fourth House, late Enna of the line of Kentdessa Saredi.” Kai raised his voice to carry, speaking Saredi so the legionaries on the gallery wouldn’t understand. “Two Hierarchs are in the Temple Halls. We’re going to kill them, and ask you to fight with us!”
Alarmed voices shouted from the gallery. Kai ignored them, frantically cutting chains, moving from one huddled demon to the next. Some faces turned to him, crusted eyes opened, but he was too frantic to do anything but cut their chains and move on. Bashasa had expected him to know how to convince them to fight but he had no idea what else to say.
As Kai stood to reach the next demon, something slammed into his back. The shock of it knocked him forward. His forearms hit the slick paving and the tool jolted out of his hand and clanged on the stone.
Kai snarled, tried to shove upright and found his right shoulder stiff and unmoving. Pain grew in it like a hot poker under his skin. With a wince, he reached back and groped for the source. His hand found metal and he pulled; it hurt even more coming out. Hissing in fury, he found himself holding a metal crossbow bolt, fired from somewhere on the gallery.
He tossed it aside and crawled forward, grabbed up the tool again, and cut two more chains. Another bolt clanged off the paving somewhere to his left, then a second thumped into his lower back. From the new tearing agony, it had just missed his spine. Enna’s body was held in a kind of stasis while Kai was in it, and any hurts would heal almost instantly, once he could get the bolts out. But Enna’s body could be torn apart, or peppered with so many metal blades that it collapsed and left Kai trapped.
He got the last chain on the current demon, who tried to crawl away. Kai reached back and managed to pull the new bolt out. Two more thudded into his hip and lower back. I don’t have time for this! Kai half lifted himself and shoved with his feet to reach the next demon. At least there was movement in the court now, freed demons scrambling or dragging themselves toward the walls, others struggling to their feet. Something thumped his left leg and he threw a look over his shoulder to see another metal bolt. Kai growled and yanked it out.
A shout, then a choked-off cry sounded from above. The next bolt went wild, clanging off a pillar across the court. The limp body of a legionary flew out of the gallery to slam into the paving. An instant later Tahren vaulted the gallery rail and landed in the court. She ran to Kai, sword raised, then twisted away at the last instant and leapt up to slash at something in the air. Her sword rang like a bell and another bolt clattered to the floor. She said, “He’s up in a balcony, I can’t get to him.” She glanced down at Kai, one brow lifting. He must look like a pincushion. “Is there anything I can do?”
“Pull them out!” he told her, crawling for the next set of chains.
Tahren spun to deflect another shot, then dipped down. She plucked bolts out of Kai like a child picking flowers.
It was like being torn open, but that was the only way to let Enna’s body repair itself. With the bolts gone, Kai shoved forward on his hands and knees to the next cluster of demons. “Is Ziede—” A freed demon reached for Tahren’s leg and Kai lunged toward them. He grabbed the demon by the scruff of the neck and shook them. “No! Don’t hurt her, she’s helping us! Any of you touch her, I’ll tear you apart!”
He tossed the demon away and they scrambled toward the wall of the court. Still-chained demons edged away from Kai and Tahren, staring. That had got their attention in a way his appeal for help hadn’t. Kai stumbled to the next demon, limping on his injured leg, his back aching as his flesh stretched to close the open wounds. As he reached the huddled shape, they lifted their head, shaking back a mane of tangled hair. “Kai-Enna?”
He stared down. The demon was in the body of an older man. His clothes were rags but pinned to the tattered coat was a small plainswolf carving, the sigil of Kanavesi Saredi. And then he recognized the face. “Arn-Nefa?” Kai flung himself down and hugged her. He almost hadn’t known her. Arn-Nefa’s cheeks were sunken, the skin around her eyes deeply bruised, she looked like a different person. Under the rot, she smelled like the grassplains, like the underearth in her veins.
She put her hand on his face. “I thought I heard you—I tried to call back to you, but…” Her voice was thick and raw.
Kai had no time for relief, no time to tell her how glad he was to see her, that she lived. “We’re going to fight. There’s a mortal, an Arike prince attacking the Hierarchs in the Temple Halls.” He pulled back and hurriedly cut her chains.
He helped her get upright and she stumbled toward the gallery, stopping to grab another free demon’s arm and haul them with her.
Encouraged, Kai raised his voice to carry. “If you want to kill Hierarchs and legionaries, follow us to the Temple Halls. Or you can lie here and rot like useless piles of shit!”
Kai cut more chains. More bolts peppered the court, striking the trapped demons. But some demons pulled the bolts out, helped others, staggered or crawled toward the walls. They were finally waking from the daze of their long painful captivity. Tahren followed Kai, her back to him as she covered him. She was trusting him to protect her, the way she was protecting him, he realized. As if his question hadn’t been interrupted, she said, “Ziede sealed the stairwell. She told me to help you.”
Ziede surely couldn’t maintain that difficult air manipulation for much longer. They had to work faster. “Can you cut the chains with your sword?”
Tahren didn’t answer and Kai spared a look up at her. Her expression was faintly troubled and he thought she was afraid of the other demons, afraid of a touch that could drain some of her immortal life away. He didn’t think that would happen, that the demons now understood she was helping them. Even if it did, it was a chance he was willing to risk to get the rest of them out. But she said, “You’ll be unprotected.” She punctuated this by twisting and batting aside another bolt.
“I’ll be fine, go! Please.” His desperation must have come through because Tahren gave a short nod and whirled away across the court.
She was faster than Kai, far faster when not having to watch out for him. Her sword struck chains with a sound too high and pure to be called a clang, she moved too fast for even a confused demon to try to catch her. Kai turned back to cut the next set of chains and immediately got struck in the back by another bolt.
But recovering demons climbed the wall to the gallery and as they swarmed up mortals started to scream. The legionaries on the upper balcony aimed their crossbows at the carnage there, which allowed Kai to move faster. He cut the last set of chains in this part of the court, saw Tahren would finish the other side faster without him. He turned to help the more mobile demons drag the others toward the walls. “We have to get them to the gallery,” he told the nearest, still using Saredi. “A Witch is holding the water back but she can’t do it for long.”
“What tent?” someone asked him.
“Kentdessa. Kill the Hierarchs in the Temple Halls, not the Arike, they’re helping us. Tell the others.” He repeated this over and over, hoping they were listening.
Someone else pulled the bolts out of his back. Then the demons on the gallery wrested a crossbow from some dying mortal and the legionary archers on the upper balconies tumbled down to the paving stones.
Kai turned back for another demon to drag to shelter and found himself looking at an empty court. A muted thump shook the walls and water abruptly gushed down from above. Kai staggered, his limbs suddenly weak, all the strength knocked out of him in one hammer blow. He fell to one knee, gasping for air.
It wasn’t the deluge, a brief exposure shouldn’t do this. It was the memory of helplessness, of being trapped here … It left him stunned, froze his blood. He flailed, tried to struggle upright. Then Tahren was suddenly beside him.
She grabbed him around the waist and the world swung as she lifted him and slung him over her shoulder. He couldn’t see anything but the back of her tunic but he felt her take a long step. Then with a jolt they were in the shelter of the gallery.
She lifted him down and set him on his feet. Freed demons crowded near as the rain poured down into the court. Tahren plucked a last bolt out of Kai’s arm, then took his shoulders and shook him gently.
“What are you doing?” Kai managed. He was rattling around inside Enna’s body, like he might drift out of it any instant.
“Trying to revive you,” Tahren said. Her expression was grave and calm, not at all as if they had done the impossible.
“Stop, stop,” Kai said, pushing her hands away. “Please, thank you.” Water dripped from his clothes and hair onto the gallery floor. Demons watched him, battered, sick, angry. Mortal bodies lay underfoot, desiccated or bloody. Kai drew in a breath and made himself focus. “The Temple Halls. Which way?”
Tahren pointed. “Out that side, then the leftward hall.”
“Go!” Kai yelled. “Kill the Hierarchs in the Temple Halls! Leave the Arike, they’re allies!” He was a little shocked when the demons actually turned to stream down the gallery.
“There.” Tahren breathed the word in relief. Kai hadn’t heard her express that much emotion about anything and glanced at her in confusion. Then he saw Ziede floating down to the floor of the Cageling Court.
She must have crawled out through the narrow window like Kai had. Her clothes were soaked from the rain and disheveled, her gold eye-paint smeared.
Tahren stared at her as if stricken.
Huh, Kai thought. That was a surprise. But everything today was a surprise, like finding Arn-Nefa, like the fact that they were still alive for the moment.
Ziede drifted almost to the gallery railing and said, “What are you waiting for? Have you lost your minds? Get to the motherless Temple Halls! If I did this for nothing I will end both of you myself!”
Tahren seized Kai’s arm and pulled him along, until his brain caught up with his body and he pushed forward through the demons. Ziede’s appearance invigorated them, especially those who had been held captive longer, were more ragged and battered, their borrowed bodies worn down and closer to collapse. “A Witch,” voices murmured, in the dialects of the far western grasslands clans, of the borders of Erathi. “Witches are here, Witches are with us.”
By the time Kai and Tahren got out of the gallery and reached the leftward corridor, they were in the front of the pack. Tahren let go of Kai and strode forward to lead the way and he jogged to keep up with her.
Alarms must be spreading through the Summer Halls. Legionaries charged from a cross corridor and with barely any chance to scream went down under a pile of demons. Kai remembered Bashasa describing his plan, saying that the legionaries in the palace were not experienced soldiers, they were jailers and torturers. All they would know about demons was how to hurt them, when they arrived bound and helpless to be carted into the Cageling Court. Right again, Kai thought. For a grief-stricken madman, Bashasa had been right about a lot of things so far.
Tahren led them past a junction of smaller corridors, then took the next turn down a wider, taller processional avenue. The upper walls were lined with the banners of conquered places, the mounted heads and bones of defeated leaders, stolen treasures of gold headdresses, jewels, weapons, wooden masks, ivory icons, everything imaginable. Somebody angry had passed along this way before them. Trophies had been pulled down, a decorated shield discarded on the floor, scraps of fabric left spiked into the wall from where banners had been torn away. Then shouting and screams and the clash of weapons echoed from the end of the avenue. Kai ran faster.
He reached the archways a step behind Tahren.
They were at the top of a broad set of stairs, the vast Temple Halls spread out before them. It was a canyon with multiple levels of galleries lining its walls, the pitched glass roof letting in shafts of sunlight. Against the far side below the Hierarch banners was a set of raised platforms; they were empty now, all the fighting concentrated in the center of the chamber.
Kai expected a confused melee but Bashasa and his soldiers and a random assortment of other mortals had been corralled into the center of the room, and were completely surrounded. Kai couldn’t see any Hierarchs or expositors, just a few officers’ tails among the legionaries. Someone in Bashasa’s group waved a blue and purple banner, probably an Arike trophy taken from the processional hall. This was hardly the grand gesture of resistance to fuel rebellion that Bashasa had hoped for.
Kai felt his mouth shape a grin. Let’s see what we can do about that.
He plunged down the steps and sprinted across the marble floor. He didn’t care if the other demons followed or not. The only goal was to cause as much carnage as possible, to do to this place of honor for the Hierarchs what they had done to the grasslands.
Kai hit the first legionary from behind, caught hold of armored shoulders and pulled himself up, slapped a hand over the mortal’s face to rip his life away. As the man collapsed under him Kai launched himself forward. He landed on another legionary who fell under his weight; Kai took him through the gap between helmet and collar. Someone drove a knife into his chest and he gripped their hand, draining their life before they could pull away. Screaming, panicked shouting, the heady taste of enemy life filled Kai’s brain and there was nothing else.
Kai didn’t come back to himself until he stood in an open circle, dead legionaries scattered around him. His clothes were bloody, he had cuts and slashes he didn’t remember. The astonishing part was that the other demons were here, too. The fighting was everywhere now, decayed bodies scattered across the hall. He spotted Arn-Nefa, leading a dozen other demons, driving panicked legionaries across the floor like frightened ducks. The demons had broken the siege on Bashasa’s people, rolling over the Halls like an avalanche.
More legionaries burst in through an entrance in the side wall, but scattered groups of armed mortals poured in from the processional avenue. Some must be the other Arike from the Hostage Courts, but there were so many others of all different descriptions and dress.
Maybe Bashasa actually had ignited a rebellion, at least among the other hostages inside the palace.
The nearest demons looked at Kai and he realized they were waiting for orders. Uh-oh, he thought. Kai had never been a captain. He needed to find Bashasa or Tahren, somebody who knew how to organize the chaos.
Across the width of the chamber three legionaries suddenly flew up into the air, then slammed into a wall. That had to be Ziede. Kai spotted Bashasa and Tahren on the platform at the far end of the chamber, flanked by Arike soldiers. Bashasa fought with a short legionary spear, a torn remnant of the recaptured Arike banner wrapped around his chest. But Tahren fought like an Immortal Marshall, moving almost so fast all Kai could see was the flash of her sword. He started toward them.
He didn’t realize the nearest demons moved with him until three legionaries charged him and went down under the swarm. That explained why so many of his potential opponents seemed to be scrambling to get out of his path.
Kai reached the platform and climbed the stairs, draining and tossing aside the legionaries in his way. Other demons raced up the steps on either side and crashed over and through the resistance. Suddenly the way was clear.
On the platform Arike soldiers spread out into defensive positions around Bashasa. Others took advantage of the respite to retrieve their wounded. As Kai reached the top, Tahren lowered her sword. The only signs of how hard she had fought were the bodies piled on the surrounding platforms, the few beads of sweat on her brow, and the flecks of blood on her tabard. A bubble of quiet seemed to form around them as Kai stood beside Bashasa. He turned to the demons waiting on the steps below and said, “This is Bashasa, he’s your captain now.” He used the Saredi word that there was no real Imperial equivalent for, the one that meant more “leader in traveling to danger.”
