Legacy of Moth Read online

  Kota, Prince of Sania, panted at Neekeya's side. He wiped his sweaty brow. "The air here in Daenor is so moist. I don't know how you can stand it."

  The tall, dark-skinned man wore no armor as he fought; his bare chest gleamed with sweat, and he tugged off his helmet, letting his black braids spill down to his shoulders. The blood of his enemies coated his sword and arms.

  My betrothed, Neekeya thought, staring at him, missing her fallen husband. The man I had to marry to win this battle.

  Thousands of other Sanian soldiers were moving through the marshlands and climbing the pyramids, making sure all the Radian defenders were fallen. Elephants trudged through the marshlands, feeding upon the brush and drinking from the water; on their backs rode many Sanian archers.

  "Thank you, Kota," Neekeya said softly. "Thank you for helping me reclaim my homeland."

  She looked up the staircase. Only two steps above loomed the archway of Eetek Pyramid, leading into her old home. No more defenders emerged, and she heard no more enemy chants or taunts. Holding her sword before her, Neekeya climbed the last two steps, passed through the archway, and entered the hall.

  She grimaced.

  The Radian commander, governor of the occupied marshlands, lay dead on the floor, fallen onto his sword.

  When Neekeya looked past the dead Radian, she gasped and covered her mouth. Tears leaped into her eyes.

  Many smaller archways lined the hall, affording a view of the marshes. A skeleton was chained within one archway, arms and legs outstretched. The crows had picked the bones clean, but Neekeya recognized the skeleton's jeweled breastplate.

  "Father," she whispered.

  Kota entered the hall after her and winced. He pulled Neekeya into his arms and turned her head away.

  "I'm sorry, Neekeya," the tall prince said, head lowered.

  Princess Adisa, his sister, entered the hall next. The Sanian warrior-princess fought with a spear and a wicker shield, and her many braids chinked, strewn with beads of silver and gold. Behind her walked Sanian soldiers, armed with feathered spears. When Adisa gazed upon the scene, her eyes softened. The princess understood. She too approached Neekeya and joined the embrace.

  As they walked down the staircase, back toward the swamps, the people of Daenor emerged from hiding—fishermen and farmers, a few thousand in all. At first they cheered; their land was liberated, the Radian forces slain. But when they saw Neekeya and Kota carrying the litter, the bones of their lord upon it, the people fell silent and lowered their heads.

  Neekeya placed her father's bones into a sheh'an, the small reed boat of the marshlands, and covered them with a blanket of lichen. She waded alongside the sheh'an, the water rising to her waist, guiding the boat through the swamplands—her father's last journey. All around her, frogs trilled, herons hunted for fish, and the roots of mangroves rose in tangled webs. Dragonflies and fireflies flew above the water and between the branches. Mist floated.

  She took her father to a stone platform that rose from the water, engraved with mossy birds and reptiles. Columns rose around the platform, supporting baskets of wilting flowers. Here was the place where Neekeya had married Tam, where her father had given her away to her sweet prince. Now here she would part from them.

  She docked the boat with her father's bones, and she climbed out of the water onto the platform, lilies and moss clinging to her legs. Kota and Adisa rose to stand at her sides, and many others gathered upon fallen logs, boulders, and islets of grass—Daenorians and Sanian soldiers alike. All had come to pay their respects, to mourn with her.

  Neekeya spoke softly. "The people of Daenor dig no graves, for our land is watery. We build no funeral pyres, for our wood is wet and will not easily burn. We do not entomb our dead in mausoleums of stone, for stones are things of life here, covered in moss and sheltering many small animals. To us in Daenor, life is precious, and our dead are given to the living, to the fish and birds and insects, so that our bodies may return into the land, become part of living things." She stared at the lichen blanket covering her father's bones. "The enemy chained my father in the air, letting birds feed upon him, and they meant it as a disgrace, but to a lord of Daenor to feed life, even in death, is an honor. And now I return my father's bones into the water, for from water all life has sprung, and to water all life must return." She tilted the boat over, letting the bones slide into the marshes. "From water to water. From life to life."

  They all spoke around her, repeating the prayer. "From water to water. From life to life."

  Tam's body was lost in the mines, and Neekeya's only memento from him was her wedding ring. Here upon this platform she had wed him, and so she lifted a stone that lay at her feet, and she placed it into the water.

  Goodbye, Tam, she thought. May your spirit find rest here in the marshes and in the plains of your distant home. I will always remember you. I will always love you.

  She did not wish to linger in the marshlands, not with her home desecrated, her family fallen. She turned and left.

  Only a turn later, she was riding up Teekat Mountains upon the back of an elephant. Once more she wore armor of the marshes, the steel breastplate carved into the likeness of crocodile scales, the helmet shaped as a crocodile's mouth, and a necklace of crocodile teeth chinked around her neck. Before her in the saddle, Adisa sat armed with spear and bow. Behind them, all along the mountain pass, stretched a convoy of many elephants and warriors, both warriors of Sania and liberated Daenorians armed with whatever weapons they could spare.

  Neekeya looked across this army and toward the distant pyramids rising from the haze. Again she was leaving her homeland, heading into danger. Perhaps this time she would never return.

  She looked ahead. She kept riding. The army crested the mountains, and there in the distance she saw it—the plains of Mageria.

  "Very soon, Serin, I'll knock on your door," Neekeya whispered, the cold wind fluttering her cloak. "Very soon we'll meet again."

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN:

  THE WALLS OF MARKFIR

  Like lumbering giants of wood and metal, the siege towers advanced toward Markfir through a hail of arrows, cannon fire, and hurtling boulders.

  Torin stood atop one of the siege engines, firing arrows toward the city walls. Five stories tall, the tower moved on wooden wheels. A dozen men stood behind it, pushing it forward, and dozens more filled the structure, waiting to attack the city walls. When Torin peered between the wooden battlements, he saw a dozen other wheeled towers rolling forth across Eldmark Fields, their front facades coated with metal plates.

  "Remember, boys," Torin said to the soldiers who stood around him. All wore armor and held swords. All stared back solemnly. "We race onto the city rampart. We find the courtyard. We open the city gates and let everyone else in. No matter what happens, we must reach the gates."

  They nodded silently.

  The siege tower shook as arrows peppered it. One arrow even drove through the metal plates and wooden planks, its tip stopping only an inch away from Torin. Several archers within the siege engine stood at arrowslits, firing back toward the walls.

  "Catapults, fire!" rose a shout from the city ramparts.

  Across the walls of Markfir, catapults swung, hurtling boulders into the air.

  "Answer fire!" rose a cry from far behind—Cam's voice back in the Alliance's formations.

  Boulders sailed through the air. From here inside the siege tower, Torin couldn't see much through the arrowslits, but he glimpsed one boulder slam into a wooden tower to their right. Beams snapped, iron plates dented, and men fell screaming to the ground.

  "Hold on!" cried an archer in front of Torin.

  A shadow fell.

  Through the arrowslits, Torin glimpsed a boulder flying their way. He grimaced.

  An instant later, a blast of sound pounded in his ears. The siege tower shook madly. Wooden beams snapped. The boulder crashed through metal and wood, scraped along Torin's arm, then plunged down the middle of the tower, crashing thro
ugh each of the five stories. Men screamed. Blood sprayed. Torin clung to a piece of wood, dangling over the pit the boulder had left.

  "Keep shoving us forward!" Torin shouted at the men below. He clung to the siege tower, feet upon a wooden beam. A great hole gaped ahead, and many of the tower's beams had snapped, but the shell of the structure still stood. "Keep going, we're still standing!"

  One soldier, a Verilish youth of perhaps fifteen years, grabbed Torin's arm. "Sir Greenmoat, we . . . so many dead." He pointed at a man beside him; the soldier lay across a beam, crushed, lifeless.

  "We keep going," Torin said. "Now fire! Fire at the walls!"

  The boy swallowed, and Torin noticed liquid dripping down his leg, but the soldier dutifully raised his bow and nocked an arrow. Torin joined him, firing his own arrows through the gaping hole the boulder had left. He could see the city walls clearly now. They were only a hundred yards away, rising beyond the moat. Hundreds of Magerian troops stood atop the ramparts, breastplates emblazoned with the Radian eclipse. They were firing arrows and chanting for victory.

  Torin aimed. He fired an arrow. But the defenders kept rushing to hide behind merlons, and Torin could not hit them.

  A boulder sailed toward the city, thrown from the Northern Alliance host. It flew over Torin's siege tower and slammed into Markfir's walls. Defenders rained down. A merlon cracked and crumbled, revealing more enemy archers. Torin fired and hit a man. To his left, men screamed as an enemy boulder slammed into another siege tower, smashing through it, sending attackers plunging down. Arrows filled the sky, tipped with fire. Another boulder slammed into Torin's siege tower, denting a metal plate and cracking more wooden beams. They kept moving forward, tilted and smashed but still rolling.

  Through a hailstorm of arrows and boulders, they reached the moat.

  "Drop the gangplank!" Torin shouted.

  Typical siege engines had short planks, only a few yards long, a quick passageway from tower to rampart. To attack moated Markfir, the Alliance had built gangplanks as long as bridges. Around Torin, soldiers began sliding out their plank; it expanded section by section, unfurling like the wooden tongue of some great chameleon, spanning the moat below. Arrows flew toward them. One soldier screamed, an arrow in his chest, and fell.

  "Remember, boys," Torin said. "Onto the rampart. To the courtyard. And open the gates. Once the others are inside the city, the hard part's over."

  They stared back and nodded solemnly.

  The gangplank slammed down onto the city wall, crossing the moat. With battle cries, soldiers raced onto the makeshift bridge and began running toward the wall's battlements. Torin raised his shield, gripped his sword, and ran with them.

  The gangplank was wide enough for only two men to run abreast. The moat spread below, and Torin could see the boulders buried under the water. The height made his head spin. He looked back ahead, concentrating on the city rampart. A dozen men ran with him, shields and swords ready.

  A storm of arrows flew toward them. Most shattered against the attackers' shields. One arrow glanced off Torin's helmet, and another scraped across his greave. The man who ran beside Torin lost his balance, screamed, and plunged down toward the moat below. He splashed into the water and slammed against a submerged boulder. He did not rise.

  Torin kept running. More arrows flew. More attackers fell.

  "Keep going!" Torin shouted. "To the rampart!"

  An arrow slammed into his shield. Another man fell. More replaced him, rising from the remains of the siege engine. When Torin glanced left and right, he saw a dozen more wooden towers drop their gangplanks onto the walls.

  Hope sprang in Torin. We can do this. We can cross the wall. We can open the gates. And then forty thousand troops of the Northern Alliance will take this city.

  He was only a dozen yards away from the wall when the Radians tilted over the cauldron of oil.

  The sizzling liquid spilled against the edge of the gangplank, forcing Torin to leap back. He tilted, nearly falling, and windmilled his arms. Before he could steady himself, the Radians on the walls dropped a torch onto the gangplank.

  The oil caught fire, exploding with heat and sound and fury. Torin leaped another step back, slamming into a man behind him. The gangplank ahead blazed, a great wall of fire. Torin could not cross. More arrows flew from the inferno, slamming into his shield and armor. One punched through the metal, scraping his chest, and he cried out.

  Through the flames, he glimpsed the Radians swinging axes against the blazing gangplank. Torin's heart sank.

  He spun around, facing the siege engine and the men behind him. "Back!" he shouted. "Back into the siege tower, go—"

  The gangplank creaked and began to crack.

  Torin cursed, stared down at the boulders in the water, and took two steps forward, one to the right.

  It was all he had time for. The plank collapsed. Wooden slats rained down. Torin fell with them.

  In his last couple seconds on the bridge, he had managed to move over a spot of clear water. He splashed down between boulders and plunged underwater. At his sides, men crashed onto boulders, breaking apart, their blood splashing. Guilt exploded through Torin, as painful as the wounds, to see his comrades die as he lived. He kicked underwater and tugged madly at the straps of his breastplate, finally tearing it off. He kicked, swam, and his head rose over the surface.

  Arrows hailed down. Torin cursed, dived underwater again, and swam to the edge of the moat. He climbed out by the ruins of the siege engine and ran behind its wheels for cover. Arrows peppered the land around him.

  Bleeding and cursing, he quickly surveyed the battle. The other siege towers all burned. The other gangplanks too had crumbled. A few of the attacking troops—a group of Oridian fighters—were raising great ladders across the moat and climbing, but arrows plucked them down, and soon fire and axes sent the ladders crashing down.

  Torin's heart sank as surely as the men in the moat. Not one man of the Northern Alliance had managed to reach the city's ramparts, let alone cross them.

  He stared back toward the east where most of their forces—swordsmen, elephants, and horses still stood, waiting to enter the gates, those gates Torin and his men had failed to open. Upon his horse, Cam raised a horn and gave two short blasts. Fall back.

  "Fall back!" Torin shouted to the survivors around him. Men were hunkering behind burning debris, and some survivors crawled out from the moat, limbs shattered. Most of the attackers lay dead, and arrows kept flying. "Fall back!"

  Torin lifted a wounded man, slung him across his shoulders, and began to run. Around him, a handful of others rallied and ran with him. Arrows plunged down like fiery comets. One slammed into Torin's back, and he cried out, hoping his armor shielded him. He kept running. Arrows pattered down around his feet. An Oridian fell dead before him. A Verilish woman screamed, three arrows thumping into her back, and fell. Torin kept racing, the last few survivors of the assault around him.

  Finally he was out of range, and he reached the rest of his army. Only twenty others had returned with him.

  Cam dismounted and rushed toward them. Torin placed down the wounded man he carried, then stumbled toward his friend, nearly collapsing.

  "I hate war," Torin said miserably. "I'm a gardener, not a soldier. I don't know why you keep dragging me into these messes, Cam."

  Back at the city walls, the remains of the siege towers burned, and the enemy cheered.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN:

  THE RED FLAME RISES

  Serin stood upon the guard tower, gazing across the field toward the enemy forces.

  "The raven flies back to its nest," he said. "The orca swims back into the depths. The bear retreats to his den. They were foolish to attack these walls."

  Over a hundred towers surrounded the city of Markfir, walls stretching between them—the greatest fortification in the world. Serin stood on the tallest tower among them, the Sun's Eye. From these heights, hundreds of feet above the ground, he could see all of Eldma
rk Fields and the bleeding army from the north.

  "Did you enjoy seeing that, Lari?" Serin asked, turning toward his daughter. "Did you enjoy seeing the bloodshed, the bodies burning, the arrows and boulders tearing into them? Look below, Lari. Do you see the corpses floating in the moat?"

  His daughter trembled. She wore bright armor filigreed with gold, an eclipse upon the breastplate. A helmet topped her head, and she held both spear and sword. And yet her eyes still dampened, and her lips still shook.

  "I enjoyed it, my lord," she whispered. "If you free my brother from the dungeon, I promise to enjoy every battle. I promise to be Lari, not Ariana anymore. My lord, please, I—"

  He lifted his hand to strike, and she flinched and bit her lip. Instead of backhanding her, Serin caressed her cheek, his gauntlet scraping the skin like a razor.

  "Call me 'Father,' my darling. I'm your father now."

  She nodded, blinking tears away. "Yes, Father. But my brother, I saw him in the dungeon, I—"

  "You have no brother, Lari!" He laughed. "But some turn you will bear me a grandson, a boy to become my heir."

  A gagging, scraping sound rose behind Serin. He turned to see Headmaster Atratus clearing his throat; it sounded like a vulture regurgitating a mouse. The mage's bony fingers clutched the battlements like talons. The stooped, beak-nosed man stared off the tower, indeed seeming like some vulture gazing from an eyrie, waiting for a wounded animal to die before it swoops.

  "Master," said the balding mage, "there are many powerful men who would marry the girl. The King of Eseer, a barbarian, perhaps would enjoy her. The Jungle King of Naya, barely more than an ape, would be glad to take her into his bed." He glanced toward Lari and licked his small, sharp teeth with a white tongue. "Yet it would be a shame to allow such a pure, beautiful daughter of Mageria be defiled by a lesser race. You've already sold your sister, the fair Iselda, to a foreign man from the Oridian backwater, and we saw how the Oridians repaid you. Your own daughter deserves a man of Mageria. Your grandson should be pure of blood."