The thunder redoubled. Oxen lowed. Wheels rocked side to side with alarming creaks. Sunrise looked skyward, saw nothing but a solid golden veil of dust. ‘We got us a damned storm-where’s Bavedict? Sweet-go find ’em, will ya?’
‘Thought you wanted my help?’
‘Wait-get Hedge-get the commander-this guy’s sweating blood all over his skin! Right out through the pores! Hurry!’
‘Something’s happening,’ Sweetlard said, now standing directly over him.
Her tone chilled Sunrise to the core.
Captain Ruthan Gudd drew a ragged breath, savagely pushing the nausea away, and the terror that flooded through him in its wake had him reaching for his sword. Roots of the Azath, what was that? But he could see nothing-the dust had slung an ochre canopy across the sky, and on all sides soldiers were suddenly milling, as if they had lost their way-but nothing lay ahead, just empty stretches of land. Teeth bared, Ruthan Gudd kicked his skittish horse forward, rising in his stirrups. His sword was in his hand, steam whirling from its white, strangely translucent blade.
He caught sight of it from the corner of his eye. ‘ Hood’s fist! ’ The skeins of sorcery that had disguised the weapon-in layers thick and tangled with centuries of magic-had been torn away. Deathly cold burned his hand. She answers. She answers… what?
He pulled free of the column.
A seething line had appeared along a ridge of hills to the southeast.
The thunder rolled on, drawing ever closer. Iron glittered as if tipped with diamond shards, like teeth gnawing through the summits of those hills. The swarming motion pained his eyes.
He saw riders peeling out from the vanguard. Parley flags whipping from upended spears. Closer to hand, foot-soldiers staring at him and his damned weapon, others stumbling from the bitter cold streaming in his wake. His own armour-clad thighs and the back of his horse were rimed in frost.
She answers-as she has never answered before. Gods below, spawn of the Azath-I smell-oh, gods no-
‘Form up! Marines form up! First line on the ridge-skirmishers! Get out of there, withdraw!’ Fiddler wasn’t waiting, not for anything. He couldn’t see the captain but it didn’t matter. He felt as if he’d swallowed a hundred caltrops. The air stank. Pushing past a confused Koryk and then a white-faced Smiles, he caught sight of the squad directly ahead.
‘Balm! Deadsmell-awaken your warrens! Same for Widdershins-where’s Cord, get Ebron-’
‘Sergeant!’
He twisted back, saw Faradan Sort forcing her horse through the milling soldiers.
‘What are you doing?’ she demanded. ‘It’s some foreign army out there-we’ve sent emissaries. You’re panicking the soldiers-’
Fiddler caught Tarr’s level gaze. ‘See they’re formed up-toss the word out fast as it can go, you understand, Corporal?’
‘Aye sir-’
‘Sergeant!’
Fiddler pushed his way to the captain, reached up and dragged her down from the saddle. Cursing, she flailed, unbalanced. As her full weight caught him, Fiddler staggered and then went down, Sort on top of him. In her ear he said, ‘ Get the fuck off that horse and stay off it. Those emissaries are already dead, even if they don’t know it. We need to dig in, Captain, and we need to do it now. ’
She lifted herself up, face dark with anger, and then glared into his eyes. Whatever she saw in them was hard and sharp as a slap. Sort rolled to one side and rose. ‘Someone get this horse out of here. Where’s our signaller? Flags up: prepare for battle. Ridge defence. Foot to dig in, munitions spread second trench-get on it, damn you!’
Most of the damned soldiers were doing nothing but get in the way. Snarling and cursing, Bottle forced through the press until he reached the closest supply wagon. He scrambled on to it, pulling himself by the rope netting until he was atop the heaped bales. Then he stood.
A half-dozen of the Adjunct’s emissaries were cantering towards that distant army.
The sky above the strangers swarmed with… birds? No. Rhinazan… and some bigger things. Bigger… enkar’al? Wyval? He felt sick enough to void his bowels. He knew that smell. It had soaked into his brain ever since he’d crawled through a shredded tent. That army isn’t human. Adjunct, your emissaries-
Something blinding arced out from the foremost line of one of the distant phalanxes. It cut a ragged path above the ground until it struck the mounted emissaries. Bodies burst into flames. Burning horses reeled and collapsed in clouds of ash.
Bottle stared. Hood’s holy shit.
Sinter ran as fast as she could, cutting between ranks of soldiers. They were finally digging in, while the supply train-the wagons herded like enormous beasts between mounted archers and lancers-had swung northward, forcing, she saw, the Letherii forces to divide almost in half to permit the retreating column through their ranks.