Will Power Part 26

"Quick!" I said. "They know we're here. They'll try to shut us in."

"They will try," said Toth, darkly, "but now that I have set foot in the city of our fathers, I will not leave it."

At this utterance, many of those gathered in the pa.s.sage made sounds of a.s.sent, but a glance up at where the statue had been told me that there were not many of them. About three dozen Stehnites and a pair of sleek gray wolves had come in through the pa.s.sage. The rest would lay siege to the walls with Mithos and the other chiefs. I doubted it could possibly be enough.

Orgos, taller than almost everyone else there by a hand, conferred with Toth, and the unit began to move quickly back the way we had come, their weapons drawn. For a second I found myself face to face with one of the wolves and I saw thought, or perhaps even recollection, in its yellow eyes. It was a huge, pale beast, its fur gleaming like brushed steel and with a white blaze on its throat. As I looked at it I knew I had seen it before, long ago in that mountain cave where we had met Sorrail, and that it also remembered. The wolf held me in its gaze, and I, overcome by a rush of guilty regret for a lot of things, swallowed hard and held my breath. It watched, considering, then moved off, following the others. I blinked the memory away as best I could.

We hurried through the monuments and sepulchers, past the open tomb which had so nearly been my last resting place, and into the circular chamber near the steep staircase. There we stuttered to a halt. Orgos, at the front of the line, had raised his palm in a call for silence. No one moved.

Over the sound of my heart I heard a slos.h.i.+ng sound, like barrels of ale being drawn up from the cellar, followed by a harsh splitting thud, like an axe biting lumber. An acrid scent drifted down the stairs. With it, trickling black down the steps and collecting in pools at our feet, came the oil.

A dozen of the Stehnites realized the same thing in the instant that I did and began shouting in their own language and jostling backward. We moved as a unit, panicked and erratic as the flames started rus.h.i.+ng down the steps toward us, bluish for a second, then red. A young Stehnite who had strayed to the front of the column found himself suddenly engulfed in the blaze. He came running toward us, screaming, but I suppose the shock was too intense, for he fell suddenly, and was lost in the fire. The heat followed a moment later. It filled the pa.s.sage like a wall, and our attack broke against it like water on stone.

SCENE XX

The Soul of the Arak Drul

"Is there another way out?" demanded Orgos. Toth shook his head.

"Not that I know of, but it's been generations since we were last here. There may be an exit that we don't remember."

"We can't go this way," said Orgos, "and if we wait for the flames to die down, the battle will be over and we will be at the mercy of our enemy."

"There is another way," I said.

"What?" said Orgos, wheeling.

"There are stairs at the other end," I explained. "I don't know if they go anywhere, but I saw them when Renthrette and I first came down here. They may also be burning, but if the enemy reacts to our actions as we think of them, we may have a moment's advantage."

"What do you mean?" Toth asked.

"I think that whatever it is that lives in the library senses our actions rather than truly reading our thoughts, and only when we are either physically close to him or unusually focused. It can feel the impulse behind an action, but nothing more complex. It didn't know I was lying to Sorrail when I came back. I'm guessing, and it would be too much to hope that it doesn't know we're here now, but I think it can only act through other people, so we may still have time. Follow me!"

And with this dangerously heroic cry I bounded off, a pack of Stehnites at my heels. The perceptive reader will need no reminding that running toward the stairs I had seen beyond the tombs was also running away from certain death in a blazing stairwell, so you can hold back the "hero" judgment for a bit. We retraced our steps for, it seemed, the dozenth time, pa.s.sed the gaping hole through which our companions had entered, and found the tight spiral staircase I had glimpsed earlier in the shadows beyond the rubble.

I didn't even have to point it out before Orgos and Toth had barreled past me like a pair of startled bison and bounded up the steps with their weapons drawn. I hesitated for a second, wary of getting caught in another cascade of fire, but we seemed to have a moment's advantage, so I joined the pack behind Lisha which was, I thought, as good a place to be as any.

The stairs went up for some distance and the whole unit began to slow perceptibly as we got higher. I slipped closer to the back of the column with each step, my breath coming in great sucking gulps as if I was a tadpole in a drying mud puddle. But unless I missed it somewhere, your average tadpole never has to climb stairs for the privilege of doing hand-to-hand battle with a vastly superior force, a prospect which rarely quickens my step.

And suddenly the company stuttered to a halt. I crawled up to them and lay wheezing on my back while the Stehnites above me relayed the message: The way ahead was blocked. A heavy slab of stone (at the very least, since no one knew what was on top of it) lay over the stairwell. We were stuck. I sat on the steps, breathing heavily. I was wondering whether it said something about my heroism that I had started at the front of the unit and was now at the very back, when something sounded below.

I had not minded being the last of the group on the stairs since the fire had cut off any possible pursuit, but now something was moving a bit below us. It was an unhurried, shuffling sound, but it was getting louder. Uneasily, I took a cautious step down, but the spiral was too tight to see anything more than a few feet away. I took another step, then another, and was considering going lower when a figure half-dragged, half-lurched around the bend in the stairs.

It was large and it bore an ancient sword, and though the light was too low to see detail, I needed no time to consider the nature of what was facing me. I had seen its hand, the pale bones wound tight round the sword hilt. As I fled upward, I looked over the rail of the stairs down to where the ancient Stehnite tombs were emptying one by one, their bodies moving with single and uncanny purpose.

For a moment my voice forsook me, and I ran headlong into the Stehnites on the stairs before they had even seen me coming. "Move!" I managed, unhelpfully. "They're coming. The dead are coming after us."

I didn't need to say more, because the first was already upon us. I pushed past one of the Stehnites and then turned, astonished at his lack of response to what he saw. But then, I don't know what he saw. He looked on the foul and ragged skeleton and he did nothing. None of them did. Only when it leaned forward and precisely thrust its rusted sword through his lungs did any of them react.

In the screaming that followed I took the scimitar which fell from the dying Stehnite and hewed the arm from the ancient corpse. It came on and its bony fingers reached for my face. With an instinctive and horrified surge of emotion, I cut wildly at its neck and the head tore free in a s.p.a.ckling of dust and tiny bone shards. The body fell under the feet of those that followed it and we, pawing desperately to get away from them, climbed over each other in the madness of fear.

Then Renthrette pa.s.sed me going down and her sword sang on their dead crowns. After they had got over the initial shock, some of the Stehnite turned to aid her. I, on the other hand, kept moving until I was in sight of Toth and Orgos, their shoulders set against the slab of marble above them and sweat glazing their features. Others pushed along with them, and one of them counted, trying to time their surges of energy.

"Dead goblins!" I sputtered. "Coming from behind."

"We heard," said Orgos. "But we're kind of busy. ..."

"Try harder," I said, glancing behind to see if the corpses of the ancient Stehnites were cutting through our ranks yet. "It can't be that that heavy." heavy."

"You'd be surprised," said Orgos, with commendable patience.

"Too bad you didn't bring one of those immense beasts that you had with you the last time you attacked the city," I said.

"Alas," gasped Toth, "she was the last of her kind. Her aid now would indeed be ..."

"She?" I repeated, aghast.

He glanced at me and a question rose in his face, but whatever he was going to say was forgotten as they heaved at the slab once more. With a great shout they all strained at the rock and something seemed to s.h.i.+ft. More joined in, pus.h.i.+ng upward, levering with the hafts of their weapons until a crack of light appeared around the stone rim and spread like the sun breaking from clouds. With one great surging roar, the slab was pushed up and clear and gray light fell into the shaft.

Toth was the first out, swinging himself up and into a crouch like a hunter. Orgos followed, with a brace of Stehnites on his tail. Then me, and I needed only a second to see where we were. Ranged about us were shelves of books, and two vast staircases led up to a gallery that skirted the great translucent dome which arched above us.

We were in the library, and there were soldiers everywhere.

They seemed to be coming from all sides, running fast like hounds converging on a wounded sheep. Arrows whistled through the air and skipped off the marble floor. One of the Stehnites fell clutching his leg and rolling, as the others spewed out of the hole like water from a geyser. I ducked and scuttled toward a pillar, thinking vaguely that this is where I would normally be taking leisurely shots with my crossbow. But the crossbow was lost and I was left diving for cover, clutching a rusted scimitar and wondering what the h.e.l.l kind of use I could possibly be, even if I could stay alive for another five minutes.

The Stehnites were a valiant group and they ran at the enemy with the kind of self-restraint I was used to in Orgos, meaning none. Orgos himself was in the thick of things, of course, his sword sweeping in great lethal arcs. I think only Toth, who had hacked his way past at least a couple of the tall, pale soldiers, showed a similarly furious dignity. But there were dozens of the immaculately dressed and trained Arak Drul, and they burned with a deep, smoldering hatred for the goblins. High on the gallery stairs, an officer arranged his mail-clad archers and they showered us with arrows in audible sheets. Beside him was one of those who I had seen on the city walls during the battle. He was dressed in flowing pale vestments, his eyes shut but his fingers moving rapidly, as if he were drawing out invisible thread.

"Get down!" I shouted.

The arrows came again, but this time we were blinded by the flash of brilliant emerald flame that came with them. A cry of despair rose up from those around me, and the Stehnites that had survived the first wave of the flaming missiles scattered and ran for cover.

Except Toth. He sprang up the stairs four at a time, his great cleaver before him. The archers turned their sights on him, but by luck and speed they could not find their mark, and the volley was weak and erratic. Then he was almost upon them and their line quivered in panic as several fumbled for their swords. One of the wolves, the paler of the two, bound up after him and burst upon the line of soldiers, which buckled, then broke. Some fled, others just dropped in horror as their ancient enemy tore into them. The priestly figure's eyes snapped open and he staggered back, his spells forgotten in the face of those ravenous lupine jaws.

Then Orgos leaped from the bal.u.s.trade into the fray, and Lisha, seeing how the scattered Stehnites had taken heart, attacked the stairs, her dark spear flas.h.i.+ng its electric blue fire before her. The Stehnites followed her lead with a shout of defiant unity, forcing the Arak Drul soldiers back up into the domed gallery. Renthrette, who had held off the skeleton soldiers almost singlehandedly, now emerged from the hole in the floor, looked briskly about her, and leaped after the rest. I broke cover and joined the pack. At the top of the stairs, the Arak Drul sentries were fighting a losing battle, many having fallen to the Stehnite onslaught. Those that remained were white-faced and wild-eyed. Several cast down their weapons in desperate submission, and it seemed it might be over.

But as I climbed the stairs to join the victors I heard the library's great external doors clang wide and heard the unmistakable sound of horses-many horses. I turned, suddenly cold. Below me, polished and grim, came the pride of the Arak Drul cavalry, pouring in through the huge doors, riding two abreast. There were too many to count, and, at their head, still and resolute, rode Sorrail.

He wore silver armor made of rings and riveted plate, but he bore no helm and his hair was brushed back like spun gold. A cape of fur varying from gray to black was draped about his shoulders, and at its hem the pelts ended in half a dozen wolf heads, snouts hanging down around the flanks of his mount, eyes sightless in defeat. His face was hard and cold but his mouth held a hint of disdain, even amus.e.m.e.nt, that such rabble should dare to challenge him. He led his horse toward us, and his cavalry followed, a study in confidence and unnatural composure.

Their horses hesitated at the foot of the stairs, but only for a moment. Then-implausibly-they were coming, lances lowered like a gray thicket of death, and there was nowhere for us to go. I had never seen horses move like that. It was like they weren't actually horses at all, or had been taken over by some controlling mind. The Stehnites shrank back and even Toth and Orgos lowered their weapons and stood watching as the horses clattered up the steps toward us.

"Any ideas?" Orgos asked me, a lightness in his voice that did not register in his face. "Any pearls of wisdom you picked up in their company that will give us an edge?"

"They're afraid of cheese," I suggested.

Through one of the high ecclesiastical windows I could see the city walls, where tall, pale soldiers fired volley after volley of arrows onto the army that boiled around the city. Mithos was out there with the Stehnites, but their only hope of victory was if we could open the breach to them. The walls-ironically, the walls they themselves had made-were too strong. I looked desperately around, but we were badly outnumbered, and fighting was useless. It was only a matter of time now before the Stehnite attack outside the city failed, our little incursion having been utterly contained before we could even threaten the walls from the inside. Now we would be captured or slaughtered, Sorrail would return to the siege, and the ancient mind that lived in the library would vanquish the Stehnites once more.

The mind in the library. The force that was guiding those horses and making the army behave as if it had one conciousness. The heart of the Arak Drul, their purpose, their guardian angel, their guiding, blinding light ...

And suddenly our path was clear to me, though the thought was dreadful and I immediately wished I could put it back and forget it, unsee unsee it in my head somehow. Through the throng of anxious Stehnites huddled together on the great dome-lit landing, I could see the corridor that led down to the bra.s.s-paneled doors where I had met and wrestled with the guardian of Phasdreille. I pointed through the crowd and shouted, "That way! Run! Open those doors. Quickly!" it in my head somehow. Through the throng of anxious Stehnites huddled together on the great dome-lit landing, I could see the corridor that led down to the bra.s.s-paneled doors where I had met and wrestled with the guardian of Phasdreille. I pointed through the crowd and shouted, "That way! Run! Open those doors. Quickly!"

Toth was the first to move and he was down the pa.s.sage before I had taken a step. But as he stretched out his arm to the door handle, a throbbing pulse of light coursed up and down the bra.s.s and, in a brilliant flash, he was thrown heavily backward. One Stehnite ran to him, and another tried the door, with the same effect.

"Degenerate fools," said a voice.

I turned and found Sorrail, still mounted, only feet from me, and watching us with a scornful leer distorting the features that had once seemed so perfect.

"Do you think we would leave our holiest shrine open to their defiling hands?" he snarled.

No one spoke. The Stehnites shrank back from him and his men, sensing that they were heavily outnumbered. Sorrail continued, still smiling nastily. "No one can enter there unless the soul of our people permits it."

"I wonder," I said, aloud.

"I thought I might find you here," he said, "blending in with the sub-humans. And I see your lies have dragged the fair Lady Renthrette with you. That is unfortunate, but I suppose it was inevitable: Corruption cannot be washed away. Now, throw down your weapons."

There was a moment of silence, then an irregular clatter as some complied. I knew beyond any doubt that he was lying about the door, but I didn't want to prove it. I didn't want to go back in there with whatever it was that looked like a hooded man but wasn't. I couldn't bear to let him inside my head again, let him tear out my thoughts like some creature scooping out my brains and entrails.

So stay right here, I thought. Surrender. You're not a goblin. They may still spare you. It's not your war. You don't even belong here. You're an Outsider.

And then I realized that those weren't my thoughts at all. They appeared in my head, but they came from inside the chamber.

That rather changed things. I launched myself against the bra.s.s doors and threw them open easily. Before I even looked inside, I turned back to the astonished faces, Stehnite and Arak Drul alike, and I shouted, "You lie, Sorrail. Your whole world is a lie. The doors are guarded only against those who belong in your war. I, however, am an Outsider."

He spurred his horse at me, and a dozen of his cavalry came with him, charging me down. I stood in the doorway of the huge ruined chamber with its wrecked furnis.h.i.+ngs and devastated ma.n.u.scripts, and in the same instant Orgos leaped out between me and the hors.e.m.e.n, engaging them with a great swinging flourish of his sword. I permitted myself only the briefest glance at the clash which followed as Sorrail stormed into the fray before turning and stepping through the doors and into the great, ravaged room.

He was there, waiting for me, the ancient hooded figure whose mind I had felt moments before.

His thoughts caught me like a dozen hands and pinned me where I stood. Toth tried to come after me, but the moment he entered the chamber he was caught up, as if seized by a great wind, and flung heavily back against the wall. His weapon splintered at the handle, and he cried out in rage and pain. The cloaked figure in front of me had barely moved, and his eyes were still on me. Dimly I knew that only the Outsiders were a threat to him for the same reasons that only we could pa.s.s the great bra.s.s doors. We didn't belong here in their world, their war. But what we could possibly do to him, I didn't know. How do you harm someone you suspect is really a spirit or, worse still, an abstraction, an idea which holds a culture together? Even if I hadn't already been paralyzed, my own indecision would have prevented further action.

Then the grip on my mind and body fluttered for a second, and I became aware of another figure entering the room. Actually, there were several. Half a dozen or more of the Arak Drul cavalry burst in, their horses oddly placid, as if sleepwalking, and with them came a disordered rabble of Stehnites. These were lifted and scattered by invisible hands, but one kept coming, cutting at the hors.e.m.e.n as he did so: Orgos. I felt the mind that held me struggling, but it was momentary. Whatever threat my sword-master friend posed to the hooded figure evaporated almost immediately. Immobile though I was, I heard the distinctive snap and rush of a crossbow. Orgos fell to the ground, clutching his midriff. In the second of semi-freedom which followed, my eyes flashed up to where the sound had come from. There, poised on a stone balcony over the central throne, was Aliana, methodically fitting another bolt into her weapon.

Any awareness of what was happening around me was promptly shattered by a voice in my head, ancient but clear and hard as gla.s.s, which broke in upon my thoughts like a brilliant light. The words bit like steel into my brain: "Outsider, I am the Soul of my people, a people as strong as they are beauteous, a people immune to the corruptions your kind bring with you. But you and your dogs have dared to challenge your betters, and you must therefore be educated in courtesy. You will not like the lesson."

I think he was laughing, though the scornful amus.e.m.e.nt was overshadowed by his terrifying hatred. But then the impression of his voice flickered and I could see and hear the hors.e.m.e.n methodically lining up in front of him. Around the room I glimpsed crumpled figures: Orgos, Toth, other Stehnite warriors. Whether they were paralyzed or dead, I could not say. Among the hors.e.m.e.n was Sorrail, stern and implacable as before, his dark cape of wolf hides making him grotesque, nightmarish. But I was temporarily free, and, turning, I could see why: Lisha and Renthrette were walking purposefully into the library. Whatever had held me had bigger fish to fry.

I moved quickly. There was a narrow flight of steps up the dark stone, and I headed for it, blinking away the lingering slowness which still gripped my legs, focusing on the stairs and running up them. I broke out from the top as Aliana was leaning over the low, carved rail to shoot.

She spun to face me, her eyes cold and narrow as they brought the heavy crossbow in line with my chest, her full mouth pursed into a crack of concentration. I shouted desperately, but it was a cry of rage as much as of panic, and as I did so I threw myself at her, arms outstretched. At the same instant her finger tightened on the crossbow trigger. I felt the bolt tear through my jerkin under one arm, grazing my side with a rush of heat, and I thought I was dead. For that briefest of moments, I didn't care.

I suppose she had been entirely focused on her shot, and not on planting her feet properly. I don't know. In any case, I caught her off balance somehow, and before I knew it, she was falling. She didn't even cry out as she toppled over the balcony and dropped the twenty or so feet to the stone floor below. I drew myself up in shocked horror and looked down.

Lisha and Renthrette stood paralyzed a matter of yards from the figure that had called itself the Soul of the Arak Drul. Lisha's eyes were closed and her mouth set tight as if her mind was trying to wrestle free, but Renthrette's eyes were open and in them was pain, fear, and burning anger. Sorrail and the cavalry had dismounted, and the soldiers were slowly approaching the two women, their weapons drawn. I stood watching, powerless. Aliana's crossbow had fallen with her, and there was nothing I could do to prevent the slaughter which would inevitably follow. I focused my thoughts on the cloaked ent.i.ty below, whose back was to me, struggling to grapple with him and set the others free to defend themselves, but his mind was like a wall of ice and though I could sense it, I could not penetrate its defenses.

Sorrail took a step toward Renthrette. His spear burned white at the tip so that its light reflected in her wide, upturned eyes. Then he turned to the soldier by his side, and I noticed for the first time the sharp emerald green of the Arak Drul officer's eyes beneath his silver helm: It was Garnet.

"Wait," Sorrail commanded the soldiers. "We two will strike together. I will deal with the traitor, Captain Garnet with the she-goblin."

A hush fell upon the chamber as the soldiers stepped clear, leaving room for the two officers to complete their task.

"Garnet," I screamed. "It's Lisha and your sister, for G.o.d's sake!"

He turned sharply and looked up at me. "Take that traitor," Sorrail said, and a pair of soldiers broke from the rest and began to climb the narrow steps to the balcony.

"It's all lies, Garnet," I called down. "They have lied to you. They are not what you think they are."

"How dare you, of all people, accuse them of such a thing?" he replied, scornfully.

"It's true," gasped a voice.

I looked back to where Orgos, still stuck against the wall, struggled to speak. "Will's right," he managed, before the soldiers moved to silence him.

"Is this your idea of honor, Garnet?" I shouted desperately. "To stab them while they stand paralyzed by a sideshow magician?"

"The creatures of darkness are beyond honor," said Sorrail.

"The creature of darkness you are about to hack to death is Lisha," I yelled at Garnet. "Look at her! Look ..."

And then the soldiers were on me. One of them punched me hard in the stomach. I doubled up, but my eyes stayed fixed on what was happening below us as if my life depended upon it. Garnet was looking at Lisha, axe in hand, but his back was to me and I could not see his face.

"Strike," said Sorrail, raising his weapon over his shoulder like a javelin, his deathly cape of fur rippling with the movement, "Strike as I do."

Lisha stirred, twisting free of the mind grip for the briefest moment, and her eyes opened and fell on Garnet. Her mouth moved and I thought she said his name, but her voice was a mere breath and I could not be sure.

Kill the goblins, commanded the voice in my head. Kill them all. Kill them all.

Sorrail pulled back his spear to strike and Garnet took two sudden steps backward, spun around, and brought his axe down heavily on the hooded man. You could hear the steel bite into flesh and bone, but then the robes folded in on themselves and the body vanished. The mind, or soul, or whatever it was, became an absence that stood out like a sudden silence after the unnoticed drumming of rain on the roof. Renthrette's sword arm came to life. She struck at Sorrail's spear as he lunged, deflecting the glowing tip from her breast. Then there was a blur from the chamber door and the great pale wolf, flas.h.i.+ng like silver, streaked toward them and leaped, jaws wide, at Sorrail's chest. He staggered under the weight of the great beast, but did not fall. It snapped at him, and its guttural growl slid into a menacing hard-edged bark. Sorrail jabbed with his spear and the wolf scuttered back, biding its time. Then the man froze. For a long moment he seemed to just stop as if lost in thought, then he turned his head fractionally so he could see Renthrette pulling her sword from his bleeding side. He stared at her as if amazed before slumping to his knees. Then the wolf was at his throat. I averted my eyes.

The other soldiers turned toward Renthrette, but Lisha's spear spun in her hands and she warded them off as if with a charm, and in truth it was no longer clear that they meant to attack. A slow confusion was settling on the enemy and the library felt as if a great cloud bank which had obscured the sun had unexpectedly stirred and melted away. The soldiers' grips on my arms relaxed, and they peered at me as if unsure of who I was or what they were supposed to do with me. Around the room, fallen Stehnites were cautiously picking themselves up. Toth, bruised but otherwise unharmed, moved quickly to where Orgos lay and began to tend his wounds, then-bizarrely-one of the blond men who had been conjuring fire for the Arak Drul archers joined him and held his hands over Orgos's belly as if warming his hands at a flame. Orgos's eyes flickered under their lids, then opened, and he smiled weakly at Toth.

All around us things were changing, and not just the people. Horses were waking up and moving like animals again, s.h.i.+fting and breaking ranks in casual disinterest. The Arak Drul troops looked at each other, their faces bewildered, and many of them laid down their weapons as if they were unsure of what they were or where they had gotten them.

Garnet embraced his sister, then Lisha, but his face was serious. I wondered what he was thinking and, more importantly, what had changed his mind so completely. That Garnet could act decisively when he was clear on what he thought was right had never been in question; the problem was that I had not seen enough to account for a change. Had it all been a ploy, a cleverly staged ruse in which he lulled them into vulnerability and then struck? I doubted it. He had come in as one of them, and then he had changed and cut them down. I couldn't explain it beyond proffering the woolly and inadequately obvious: that the sight of his sister and his friends about to be slain by his new comrades had forced an instant and dramatic reappraisal of his values and allegiances. Or perhaps Sorrail's attempt to make him see Lisha as a goblin had backfired, forcing an altogether different conclusion. But I remembered how Orgos had once come running to greet me and I had seen him as a goblin bent on murdering me where I stood. I just didn't know what to think.

I turned and found the huge wolf, its face streaked with Sorrail's blood, looking thoughtfully at me. I swallowed hard and reached out uneasily to pat its head. But as I did so, a low rumble came from its throat, and I s.n.a.t.c.hed back my hand as if bitten. I opened my mouth to say something, but could not think of suitable words, so I closed it. At that moment, something came across the wolf's face and it took a step toward me, briefly brus.h.i.+ng its thick fur against my thigh. I gasped, but stayed quite still. The animal, if that's the right word, looked up into my face once, its deep yellow eyes fixing me as before, and then slipped away into the crowd.

I was mulling this over in the heavy and confused silence which followed the flurry of activity when, from outside the city, a great rolling shout broke out. Everyone raised their heads, listening. The sound continued and, one by one, we remembered the battle outside, which would define the fate of this land.

I ran from the library and through the unnaturally silent streets down to the gatehouse, and found the same bewildered inactivity: soldiers of all ranks standing there unsure of themselves, bows and spears held idly as if they had just awoken and couldn't recall what they were doing.