“Took the first machine apart,” the Shantasi said. “The Krote on its back was sliced in two. And then the rest…”
And now O’Gan breathed in stale pollen and prayed to absent visions that the serpenthals would act again. The Krotes they had destroyed were a small advance party, nothing more. There would be hundreds more on their tails. Perhaps thousands. And now surprise had gone.
“One escaped,” a warrior had said. “The serpenthals seemed unconcerned. We put arrow after arrow into him, but he rode away upright.”
The Krotes knew that the Shantasi were here, waiting for them, in exactly the right place. And O’Gan had little doubt that the full force of their attack would come soon.
He closed his eyes, reached out and pulled the circle of stones closer to him. They were meant to represent the unity of thought-back at the Temple they’d had the Janne plants themselves-but they were not working. “Because I’m the only one.” He suddenly felt more alone than ever before.
“MYSTIC,” A VOICE whispered. “They’re coming.”
O’Gan opened his eyes and stared into the frightened face of a young warrior. She bowed her head slightly, glancing down at the rocks set around his knees.
“How many?”
“Maybe fifteen, by air.”
“High or low?”
“Low. The spartlets?”
“Yes, the spartlets.” O’Gan stood quickly, brushed himself down and followed the young Shantasi out onto the plain. He passed dozens of Shantasi, all of them hunkered down on the ground, hiding themselves within its natural folds and creases. Some of them were gathered around piles of dried wood, nursing flame-sticks. The Krotes knew that they were coming up against an army. What O’Gan could only hope is that they did not know what this army had at its disposal.
“Let them make one pass,” O’Gan shouted. “Give them confidence. That way they’ll come much lower the second time.”
“Mystic,” the warrior said, looking away. She knew what the first pass would entail, and so did O’Gan. War is sacrifice, he thought. One of the Elder Mystics had told him that, before sacrificing himself at the first sign of war.
The warrior cupped her hands to her mouth. “Spartlets!” To their left and right a hundred fires came alight, and soon after the first small flames licked skyward there came a frantic clicking sound, like a thousand sticks being whipped at the air and broken at the same time.
O’Gan drew his sword and knelt. The fires made the darkness before them more complete. He did not see the flying machines until they were almost upon them.
“Not yet!” he shouted. The whistling, crackling sounds continued, louder than before, and more frenzied. After this first run, he thought. And the Krotes’ attack began.
The Mages’ fifteen warriors flew their machines low across the plain. They had already passed over the first few hundred Shantasi before they realized they were there, but then the shooting began. Arrows sleeked down in the dark, fired by the Krotes and ejected from holes and slits in their machines. Many wasted themselves on the ground, but a few found targets, and grunts and screams rose up across the plain. Discs whistled through the air. One machine gushed fire, a long slick that lit up the scene, flames dancing as Shantasi ran with hair and clothing burning. Their screams melted away with their lungs. Another came lower than the rest, trailing a dozen long chains adorned with hooks that bounced from rocks and stuck in soft bodies. Three Shantasi were picked up and carried away, their bodies jarring along the ground and leaving smears of blood. Others jumped out of their way, many using Pace to make sure they were not knocked aside by their own dead or dying friends.
The Shantasi returned fire, launching arrows and bolts skyward at the undersides of the intimidating machines. They had never seen anything like this. They had all read of magic, what it could do and how it aided the land before the Cataclysmic War. And they had all seen dead machines, before and after the Breakers had their time with them. But this was all new. Leathery wings flapped; metallic appendages swiped and cut; stone bodies deflected arrows; fleshy organs expelled gases as the machines passed overhead and turned for a rapid second approach.
“Spartlets in five heartbeats!” O’Gan shouted. He had turned to watch the Krotes’ return, lying flat on the ground with his sword resting before him on a sprig of dead bracken. Almost as soon as he shouted, the spartlets were released.
These were vicious creatures. Having spent decades as chrysalides beneath the sand, the touch of fire would burst their shell and set free the winged serpents within. Newly hatched spartlets were jealous things; any other species they encountered within their own airspace for several hours following birth would be set upon with claws and poisoned fangs. Though only the size of a man’s hand, they had the fury of a desert wolf.
When the fire pots were uncovered, several thousand spartlets rushed skyward in screaming, whistling clouds.
The Shantasi hugged the ground and watched. They had never used spartlets on this scale before, and they had no idea what to expect.
The winged serpents spread out, ignoring one another and expanding across the sky. And as the Krote machines powered in a dozen steps above the ground, the spartlets converged on them, attacking machines and riders alike. Arrows vented groundward, and the fire-shitting machine gushed more flames. But in seconds the Krotes became too concerned with their own exposed flesh to think about engaging the Shantasi below.
A machine passed directly above O’Gan, the Krote on its back slashing at the air. O’Gan rose and hacked with his sword, catching a trailing tentacle and parting it from its home. The flapping thing fell to the ground, a spartlet attached and jabbing again and again with its freshly exposed fangs.
“At them!” O’Gan shouted, but the call was not needed. The Shantasi were on their feet, loosing arrows and bolts at the confused shapes. The sustained firepower of almost two thousand weapons gave the Krotes plenty more to worry about.
The fire-shitting machine collided with another, and they impacted heavily into a copse of dead trees. Fire rolled along the ground as the machine ruptured, and its thrashing limbs were blasted across the battlefield as huge, flickering shadows. The survivor from the other machine dashed from the fire and took on several Shantasi, cutting them down with a slideshock and several throwing stars before more came to their aid. They drove him down with sheer volume of numbers, and O’Gan saw glittering swords dulled as blood smeared their blades.
Another machine fell farther away, rolling over the ground with the crumple of folding metal. Its rider was crushed beneath it, but the machine rose on unsteady legs, thrashing out with blades as long as five men. Several warriors ducked beneath the blades and went in close, their own swords at the ready. The machine glowed blue, light burst from it in a pulse and O’Gan saw the skeletons of the Shantasi crumple as the strange fire faded again.
He ran toward the machine with other warriors, sword and other weapons at the ready.
There were a dozen machines still circling above them. Several still poured hails of arrows or fireballs down at the Shantasi, but mostly they seemed more concerned with the spartlets attacking in droves. Another machine fell, its wings tattered, its rider drifting away and striking the ground a few steps from his mount. Neither rose again.
“Use poison sacs!” O’Gan shouted as he approached the heavily bladed construct. It was starting to glow again, a blue umber that cast strange shadows beneath its low stomach. “Don’t get too close! See if the poison will do it!” He stood back while three Shantasi lobbed poison sacs in carefully judged arcs. One of them burst on the machine’s slashing blades, but the other two struck its body, spraying across several globes that could have been eyes. It dipped as it tried to wipe the affected area against the ground. The Shantasi darted in with blades drawn.