Searching the tent for lamps and oil, the pair set a fire to burn slowly at first and then hotter, trying to arrange things so that it would conceal their activities as much as possible.
Emerging from the back, they were in time to see Skaven and Fellion emerge from the kitchen area and head back into the farmlands behind the army. Fellion seemed to be carrying something, but they were unable to make out what it was.
As they crossed the ditch where the two dead guards lay, Zamyr Silverweave's tent went up with a rush of flames. Grinning, they hurried away.
*
A few minutes later, the half-qhal met up, and Mehmet glanced at Skaven. "Success?" he queried. Skaven grinned. "You bet," he said, "just wait until they try and use their salt!" Fellion hefted the object he was carrying, revealing it to be the Marmarkans' salt cellar. Percinious glanced at the distant flare marking the fate of Silverweave's tent and his leman. "When he gets back, he will not be happy," he said.
Mehmet dropped
the small sack with the gold he'd looted in the tent directly in fromt of the
rest of the men. Gold coins spilled out and scattered. "Your share,"
he said casually. Big grins appeared around the circle, and Skaven started the
process of counting out piles for the others.
While this occupied the men, Nutbolter and Mehmet plotted their next step. To be effective, they had to do something spectacular. Killing the odd guard wasn't going to make a difference. The only tool they had for the job was the Chalice of Ryien. Its' powers of transmuting fluids from one form to another were yet ungauged, but all the signs were that it might hold considerable power. Both agreed that, given the three known sides - blood, wine, water - the best starting point would be blood. For that they needed a prisoner.
*
Some time later, one of the cavalry pairs patrolling the land around the Marmarkan camp noticed two figures stand up out of the grass, arrows nocked, and begin making offensive gestures. After a moment of startlement, both gripped their spears and kicked their horses to a charge; a flare of magic lit the spear of one of them. The two half-qhal stood their ground, and a second before the horses reached them, a taut rope lifted from the grass, gripped by Skaven and Fellion. Neither horseman stood a chance. One horse stumbled, throwing its' rider sideways, but the other went forwards, both font legs snapping with a hideous crackle, and its' rider crashed down with bonecrushing force.
The first rider rolled to his feet more or less unhurt, and scrabbled to draw a sword before falling back with one of Mehmet's arrows in his belly. The stunned one was captured and disarmed without a struggle as the wounded man and horse were despatched, but the unhurt horse was panicked and preparing to flee. Nutbolter stepped up to try and capture it, grabbing at its' reins.
His grip slipped, and the horse pivoted as if on wheels to knock him down and stamp savagely on his leg, reducing it to bloody jelly. Gasping, he scrabbled for his magic and worked a Heal, and another, and another, before falling back in relief as the pain eased.
*
The abandoned farmhouse was scant cover, and would be none if a cavalry pair were to ride up behind them, but it was the best they could do. A quarter mile from the gates to the west, it allowed them a good vantage point for their first serious experiment with qhalur sorcery.
A swift slash despatched the captured cavalryman, and hot lifeblood filled the Chalice, overflowing and painting Percinious' hand crimson. Holding it out towards the Marmarkan army, he fixed his eyes on the intricate spell matrix carved into the face of the Chalice and, drawing stored power from the Maugre Claw, invoked the magic.
The
energies flowed true, unlike the last time
he'd used the Claw, and for a moment nothing happened. Then, suddenly,
shockingly, a gout of hot blood arced out of the Chalice and splattered on the
ground several feet in front of him. The flow was continuous, and in a few seconds
a pool had formed, spreading slowly through the grass. All seven blinked at
it in surprise for a few moments, and then the realization dawned that the spikes
of grass sticking up through the crimson fluid were turning brown and dying.
There was a rapid backwards movement as the spectators increased their distance from the phenomenon, except Mehmet who held his ground. Sweat stood out on Percinious' face as he struggled to direct the effect. Slowly, the pool stopped expanding backwards and redoubled the speed of its' expansion towards the city.
Drawn up outside the gates were the Marmarkan reserves, two blocks of spearmen waiting patiently for the order to move forwards. Towards these Percinious directed the flow of blood, and his comrades leaned forwards expectantly to see what would happen.
At first, the enemy soldiers didn't quite realize what was happening. They brushed with increasing irritation at the strange feeling in their legs, and then the awful truth dawned that they were standing in a pool of blood. Revulsion turned to horror as they discovered that it was crawling up their legs, and then they backed away, leaving the unfortunate few who were already mired to struggle and thrash and eventually fall and be covered in the flowing gore.
Nearby, trees were falling as the blood drained the life force from them.
And still the blood gouted from the Chalice, a seemingly endless flow, horrifying and deadly. Nutbolter was sweating heavily now, terrified to move or speak lest he lose control; the effort of dominating the Chalice growing every moment. As they watched, the crowning terror unfolded.
The fallen
Marmarkans' corpses struggled upright, dreadfully transformed. Their skin was
gone, leaving a hideous surface of exposed muscles and tendons, constantly running
with blood which flowed to and from the pool in which they stood. As the pool
expanded, these creatures - a memory that he was unsure was his own whispered
blood ghola in Nutbolter's mind - fell on their erstwhile comrades and
clubbed them down, to fall in the blood and be absorbed. As these rose again
in their turn as ghola, the last of the Marmarkan reserves' courage broke,
and they fled through the shattered gates into the city.
For a little while Percinious considered trying to guide the blood in search of Silverweave, but finally had to admit that it was beyond his abilities. Desperately, he forced the qhalur word for 'Stop' into the forefront of his mind - and the flow cut off as if sliced by a knife. He dropped to his knees, gasping and dazed by the experience, as the sun set in a ball of flame. All the blood vanished, leaving seared black ash where soil had been, and the ghola collapsed into piles of etched bones.
His exhaustion was such that they had to make camp. The stables of the third farm house they tried were relatively intact, and Percinious, muttering incohererntly about fog and blood, was asleep before he hit the hay as the others set guard.
A few hours later, a second searing stroke of lightning drove down into the midst of the racked city.
Just before dawn, the watchers were alerted by the sound of several men approaching, accompanied by the jingle that indicated armour. Hailed, they turned out to be Cormarans from the city; the battle was won, and the Marmarkans had been driven off.
Apparently three Archen had appeared at a critical moment, and attacked the Marmarkans, seeming to be trying to reach Silverweave himself. One was killed in slaying Silverweave's horse, but in the confusion after the lightning strike no-one knew what happened to the other two. The effect was the last straw for the Marmarkans, who cut their way out of the Horsegate and retreated to the east. Three companies were being readied to pursue.
Having
reported to Dorall - still alive despite the decimation of his Company - the
pair set off in pursuit of the retreating Marmarkan army. Following them was
not hard, as the trail they left was plain enough. Mehmet and Percinious looped
around ahead of them, though, and came up to them as they bivouacked after the
second day's forced march.
After a degree of reluctance from the perimeter guard, they were finally able to get Silverweave himself to come and meet them. Close up, even defeated, filthy, exhausted and covered in small wounds, Zamyr Silverweave had immense presence.
"Didn't quite work out, did it?" inquired Mehmet quietly. "The purple sisters were a bit of a surprise, I suppose." Zamyr smiled slightly. "Oh, the Archen have been after me for years," he said. Mehmet adjusted his approach.
"Why?" he asked, "why do you wage war like this?" The huge man shrugged slightly. "One does what one can in the place one is. This is what I do; I do war." Mehmet looked levelly at him. "There are other worlds," he said. "Not accessible ones," retorted Silverweave, "the Archen have seen to that!"
"We are not part of the army that pursues you. We are the same," pointed out Mehmet, "you, and I, and my company; different from the humans. Better."
"You can't deny that the blood was you! A good trick that. Not what I was expecting. In any case, this is idle speculation. The Gates are closed forever."
"What would you do," asked Mehmet carefully, "if they were not?"
"I would march on the Gate, take it, hold it against all comers, and leave this doomed land," answered Silverweave instantly, but with the tone of a man answering an academic question.
Mehmet changed tack again. "All my Company are half-qhal," he declared, allowing a slightly false impression of its' size to be formed. "Yet you work with mainly humans."
"Half-qhal are unstable. Humans are so much easier to control, to predict, to dominate," answered Silverweave. It struck Percinious, as he listed to this, that Silverweave himself was not immune to this instability. It seemed very unlikely that such as he would ever accept a secondary - or even equal - role in the Company Mehmet was planning.
"Where will you go?" asked Mehmet, "we've destroyed your boats," he followed up untruthfully.
"Then we'll fight our way into one of your harbours and take some. I respect the Archen; they are persistent. But neither they nor you will stop me."
There was a pause. Then Silverweave seemed to make up his mind about something. "Come!" he boomed, "Be my guests tonight. I have no tent," the pair carefully looked blank here, "but you may share my campfire such as it is."
"Have we your word we'll be safe?" asked Mehmet in fair Qhalur. Silverweave beamed. "You have my safe conduct until the morning," he replied in perfect, fluent Qhalur.
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