When the words followed the curve of waiting soldiers and at last reached Yan Tovis, Sharl saw her flinch as if struck, and she turned to look upon her people, saw them straightening, readying, saw the look on their battle-aged faces.
Their queen stepped back, then, into the gap. One stride, and then another, and all at once all eyes were upon her. Lightfall streamed down behind her. It could have been a thing of beauty and wonder. It could have been something other than a manifestation of terror and grief. But it was as if it ceased to exist for Yan Tovis as she scanned the faces, as she fixed her eyes upon the last thousand subjects of her realm.
And then, with even her brother looking on, the queen knelt. Not to the First Shore – not to this horror – but to her people.
In the swirling wound eight paces behind her, a row of spear points lashed out, scything empty air. And then, pushing through the miasma, fully armoured soldiers.
‘Shit,’ muttered Brevity. ‘That’s heavy infantry.’
Yan Tovis rose, swung to face her ancient foe. For a moment she seemed deaf to her soldiers, shouting for her to rejoin the line. For a moment, Sharl thought she might instead advance to meet them, and she saw the flank behind bristling up, as if to rush to join her – one last, suicidal rush. To die beside their queen. And oh, how Sharl longed to join them.
Then Yan Tovis turned her back on the enemy, re-joined her soldiers.
The first row of Liosan stepped clear of the wound, another following. They were shouting something, those Liosan, shouting in triumph a single word – but Sharl could not make it out.
Yedan Derryg’s voice rang out above their cries. ‘All lines! Advance five!’
And there, four rows back of the Liosan front rank, a knot of officers, a single figure among them waving his sword – as if to cut down his own people – and they pressed back on all sides. And there, off to the right, another widening swirl of humanity, making space – and there, upon the left, the same. Sharl stared, unable to understand what they were—
The three isolated warriors then dissolved into blinding white light – and the light burgeoned, and inside that light, massive, scaled shapes, taking form. The flash of blazing eyes. Wings snapping out like galley sails.
And the dragon at the centre then rose into the air.
We all end somewhere.
We all end here.
As the centre ranks rose up to collide with the Liosan front line, Yedan Derryg, with Sergeant Cellows at his side, pushed forward. Five lines between him and that veering dragon. His only obstacle. But these were the elites, heavily armoured, perfectly disciplined.
He saw the other two Soletaken, one on each side, but there was nothing he could do about them. Not yet.
The Hust sword howled as he slammed into the front line. The blade was gorged on draconic blood. It had drunk deep the red wine of Hounds’ blood. It had bathed in the life-ends of a thousand Liosan soldiers. Now it shook off the chains of constraint.
So swiftly did it slash that Yedan almost lost his grip. He grunted to see the soldier before him cut through, shield, sword, chain, flesh and bone, diagonally down his torso, gore exploding out to the sides. A back swing split open the chests of the man to either side. Like a cestus, Yedan and the soldiers closest to him drove into the Liosan ranks.
The Hust sword spun, lashed out in blurs, blood sprayed. Yedan was tugged after it, stumbling, at times almost lifted from his feet as the weapon shrieked its glee, slaughtering all that dared stand before it.
All at once, there was no one between him and the Soletaken. The wreaths of white fire were pouring off the shining scales, the solid bulk of the dragon rising to fill Yedan Derryg’s vision.
Shit. Miscalculated. It’s going to get clear. Sister – I’m sorry. I’m too late.
The head lunged.
He leapt.
The sword sank deep into the dragon’s chest. The creature roared in shock and pain, and then the wings hammered at its sides, scattering Liosan and Shake alike, and the Soletaken lifted into the air.
Hanging from his sword, Yedan scrambled, fought his way on to the dragon’s shoulders. He tore his weapon free. Cut two-handed into its neck.
Twenty reaches above the melee, the creature pitched, canted hard and slammed into Lightfall.
The concussion thundered.
Yedan Derryg slid down over the dragon’s right shoulder, down between it and Lightfall.
The dragon’s neck bowed and the jaws plunged down to engulf him.
As they closed, the Hust sword burst from the top of the dragon’s snout. Wings smashing the wall of light, the giant reptile reared its head back, Yedan tumbling free, still gripping the sword.
He was caught by the talons of the Soletaken’s left foot, the massive claws convulsively clenching. Blood sprayed from the body it held.
Again the dragon careered into Lightfall, and this time a wing collapsed under the impact. Twisting, pitching head first, the creature slid downward. Slammed into the ground.
Yedan Derryg was thrown clear, his body a shattered mess, and where he fell, he did not move. At his side, the Hust sword howled its rage.
The journey through the forest by Rake’s last three Soletaken – Korlat, Prazek Goul and Dathenar Fandoris – had been as savage as fighting a riptide. Silanah was among the most ancient of all living Eleint. Her will tore at them, drove them to their knees again and again. Silanah called upon them, called them by name, sought her own summoning. Still, they managed to resist, but Korlat knew that to shift into draconic form would simply make it worse, the blood of the Eleint awakening in each of them, chaos unfurling in their souls like the deadliest flower. At the same time, she knew that there were Soletaken at the First Shore. She could feel them. And what could the Shake do against such creatures?
Only die.
The Liosan Soletaken would be able to resist Silanah – at least for a time – or perhaps indeed they could even defy her, if their own Storm, when it broke upon this world, was strong enough. And she feared it would be. This is not the taste of one or two Soletaken. No – gods, how many are there?
‘Korlat!’ gasped Dathenar.
‘I know. But we have no choice, do we?’
Prazek spat behind her and said. ‘Better to die in Kharkanas than anywhere else.’
Korlat agreed.
As they reached the rise, they saw a frenzied battle at the wound in Lightfall, and the Liosan soldiers now pouring from that breach vastly outnumbered the defenders. They saw a man do battle with a dragon rising skyward. Saw two Liosan warriors veering to join their winged kin.
They did not hesitate. Darkness bloomed, erupted like black smoke under water, and three black dragons rose above the strand.
As they closed, eight more Liosan veered, and the air filled with the roars of dragons.
Yan Tovis dragged herself over corpses, trying to reach her brother’s horrifyingly motionless form. The two witches were taking the last from her – she felt each sorcerous wave they lashed into the flanking dragons, heard the Soletaken screaming in pain and outrage, and knew that all of it was not enough.
But they were stealing from her this one last act – this journey of love and grief – and the unfairness of that howled in her heart.
Soldiers fought around her, sought to protect their fallen queen. Bodies fell to either side. It seemed that the Liosan were now everywhere – the Shake and Letherii lines had buckled, companies driven apart, hacked at from all sides.
And still he seemed a thousand leagues away.
Draconic sorcery detonated. The bed of bodies beneath her lifted as one, and then fell back with a sound like a drum. And Yan Tovis felt a sudden absence. Skwish. She’s dead.