wives for Empress Cieronna. That part was clever enough,
but the elaborate, involved story of staging an imitation
assassination-attempt was ridiculously excessive. Very clearly
the attempt was not designed to fail, as Chacole and Torellia so
piously proclaimed. Elysoun began to walk faster. She had to
get to her husband in order to warn him that his life was in
immediate danger.
‘Xanetia!’ Kalten said, starting back in surprise as the Anarae
suddenly appeared in their midst that evening, ‘can’t you cough
or something before you do that?’
‘It was not mine intent to startle thee, my protector,’ she
apologized.
‘My nerves are strung a little tight right now,’ he said.
‘Did you have any luck?’ Mirtai asked.
‘I gleaned much, Atana Mirtai.’ Xanetia paused, collecting her
thoughts. ‘The slaves are not closely watched,’ she began, ‘and
their supervision is given over to Cynesgan overseers, for such
menial tasks are beneath the dignity of the Cyrgai. The desert
itself doth confine the slaves. Those foolish enough to attempt
escape inevitably perish in that barren waste.’
‘What’s the customary routine, Anarae?’ Bevier asked her.
‘The slaves emerge from their pens at dawn,’ she replied,
‘and, unbidden and unguarded, leave the city to take up their
tasks. Then, at sunset, still uncommanded and scarce noticed,
they return to the city and to the slave-pens for feeding. They
are then chained and locked in their pens for the night to be
released again at first light of day.’
‘Some of them are up here in these woods,’ Mirtai noted,
peering out through the trees that concealed them. ‘What are
they supposed to be doing?’
‘They cut firewood for their masters in this extensive forest.
The Cyrgai warm themselves with fires in the chill of winter. The
kenneled slaves must endure the weather.’
‘Were you able to get any sense of how the city’s laid out,
Anarae?’ Bevier asked her.
‘Some, Sir Knight.’ She beckoned them to the edge of the trees
so that they could look across the valley at the black-walled city.
‘The Cyrgai themselves live on the slopes of the hill which doth
rise within the walls,’ she explained, ‘and they do hold themselves
aloof from the more mundane portion of the city below.
There is yet another wall within the outer one, and that inner
wall doth protect Cyrgon’s Chosen from contact with inferior
races. The lower city doth contain the slave-pens, the warehouses
for foodstuffs, and the barracks of the Cynesgans who
oversee the slaves and man the outer wall. As thou canst see,
there is yet that final wall which doth enclose the summit of the
hill. Within that ultimate wall lieth the palace of King Santheocles
and the temple of Cyrgon.’
Bevier nodded. ‘It’s fairly standard for a fortified town then.’
‘if thou wert aware of all this, why didst thou ask, Sir Knight?’
she asked tartly.
‘Confirmation, dear lady,’ he replied, smiling. ‘The city’s ten
thousand years old. They might have had different ideas about
how to build a fort before the invention of modern weapons.’ He
squinted across the valley at walled Cyrga. ‘They’re obviously
willing to sacrifice the lower city,’ he said. ‘Otherwise that outer
wall would be defended by Cyrgai. The fact that they’ve turned
that chore over to the Cynesgans means that they don’t place
much value on those warehouses and slave-pens. The wall at
the foot of “Mount Cyrgon” will be more fiercely defended, and
if necessary, they’ll pull back up the hill to that last wall that
encloses the palace and the temple.’
‘All of this is well and good, Bevier,’ Kalten interrupted him,
but where are Ehlana and Alcan?’
Bevier gave him a surprised look. ‘Up on top, of course,’ he
replied, ‘either in the palace or in the temple.’
‘How did you arrive at that?’
‘They’re hostages, Kalten. When you’re holding hostages, you
have to keep them close enough to threaten them when your
enemies get too close. Our problem is how to get into the city.’
‘We’ll come up with something,’ Sparhawk said confidently.
‘Let’s go back into the woods a ways and set up for the night.’
They moved back among the trees and ate cold rations, since
a fire was out of the question.
‘The problem’s still therer Sparhawk,’ Kalten said as evening
settled over the hidden valley. ‘How are we going to get inside
all those walls?’
The first wall’s easy,’ Talen said. ‘We just walk in through
the gate.’
‘How do you propose to do that without being challenged?’
Kalten demanded.
‘People walk out of the city every morning and back again
every evening, don’t they?’
‘Those are slaves.’
‘Exactly.’
Kalten stared at him.
‘We want to get into the city, don’t we? That’s the easiest
way.’
‘What about the other walls?’ Bevier objected.
‘One wall at a time, Sir Knight,’ Talen said gaily, ‘one wall at
a time. Let’s get through the outer one first. Then we’ll worry
about the other two.’
Daiya the Peloi came riding hard back across the gravelly desert
about mid-morning the next day. ‘We’ve found them, your Reverence,’
he reported to Bergsten as he reined in. ‘The Cynesgan
cavalry tried to lead us away from where they’re hiding, but we
found them anyway. They’re in those hills just ahead of us.’
‘More of those big ones with masks on their faces?’ Heldin
asked.
‘Some of those, friend Heldin,’ Daiya replied. ‘But there are
others as well – wearing old-fashioned helmets and carrying
spears.’
‘Cyrgai,’ Bergsten grunted. ‘Vanion mentioned them. Their
tactics are so archaic that they won’t be much of a problem.’
‘Where exactly are they, friend Daiya?’ Heldin asked.
‘They’re in a large canyon on the east side of those hills, friend
Heldin. My scouts saw them from the canyon-rim.’
‘We definitely don’t want to go into that canyon after them,
your Grace,’ Heldin cautioned. ‘They’re infantry, and close quartors
are made to order for their tactics. We’ll have to devise some
way to get them to come out into the open.’
Atana Mans asked Neran a question in Tamul, and he replied
at some length. She nodded, spoke briefly to him, and then she
ran off toward the south.
‘Where’s she going?’ Bergsten demanded.
‘She said that your enemies have laid a trap for you, your
Grace,’ Neran replied with a shrug. ‘She’s going to go spring
it.’
‘Stop her, Heldin!’ Bergsten said sharPly.
It must be said in Sir Heldin’s defense that he did try to catch
up to the lithe, fleet-footed Atan girl, but she merely glanced
back over her shoulder, laughed, and ran even faster, leaving
him far behind, flogging at his horse and muttering curses.
Bergsten’s curses were not muttered. He blistered the air
around him. ‘What is she doing?’ he demanded of Neran.
‘They’re planning an ambush, your Grace,’ Neran replied
calmly. ‘It won’t work if somebody sees them hiding in that
canyon. Atana Mans is going to run into the canyon, let them see
her, and then run out again. They’ll have to try to catch her. That’ll
bring them out into the open. You might want to give some thought
to picking up your pace just a bit. She’ll be terribly disappointed
in you if you’re not in position when she leads them out.’
Patriarch Bergsten looked out across the desert at the golden
Atana running smoothly to the south with her long black hair
flying behind her. Then he swore again, rose up in his stirrups,
and bellowed, ‘Charge!’
Ekrasios and his comrades reached Synaqua late in the afternoon
just as the sun broke through the heavy cloud-cover which had
obscured the sky for the past several days.
The ruins of Synaqua were in much greater disrepair than had
been the case with Panem-Doa and Norenja. The entire east
wall had been undercut by one of the numerous streams which
flowed’ sluggishly through the soggy delta of the ArJun River,
and it had collapsed at some unknown time in the past. When
Scarpa’s rebels had moved in to occupy the ruin, they had
replaced it with a log palisade. The construction was shoddy,
and the palisade was not particularly imposing.
ekrasios considered that as he sat alone moodily watching the
sun sinking into a cloud-bank off to the west. A serious problem
had arisen following their disastrous assault on Norenja. It had
appeared that there were many gates through which the panic-stricken
rebels could flee, but their commander had blocked off
those gates with heaps of rubble’ as a part of his defenses. The
terrified soldiers had been trapped inside the walls, and had
therefore had no choice but to turn and fight. Hundreds had
died in unspeakable agony before Ekrasios had been able to
divert his men into the uninhabited parts of the ruin so that
the escape-route through the main gate was open. Many of the
Delphae had wept openly at the horror they had been forced to
inflict on men who were essentially no more than misguided