Below, behind swirling clouds of black stinging ash and fire, much of which was now being blown up at us as well, rebels on the ground persisted with their great hooks. Now I understood their purpose as the metal teeth bit into mortar and cracks in the wall and with coordinated effort the troops hauled on the rope, pulling out hunks of stone each time. Screams and cries sounded regularly as arrows found marks. The wall shook with the regular droning pound of the ram. Smoke from the flaming tower and ash carried up from our own trap below stung my eyes. And the brutal clash of fighting on the battlements continued.
We had one set of tricks left: the sedative pouches. Some were sewn and some twisted closed; the former would react with vinegar to release gas and the latter would simply burst on impact and spread powder. However, if we released them into the fray, our own people would be affected as well.
“The top platform,” someone suggested, and I nodded; if we could hit the rebels still emerging from the structure we could stem the tide of attackers over the wall and buy ourselves more time to destroy the tower. But there was no clear line of sight between us and the platform. We’d never make it through the fighting to get close enough to throw.
The smallest of our team, a young woman with beautiful decorative tattoos across her shoulders and hands, shoved the pouches into her satchel and slung it on. “Wish me luck,” she said, then clenched the neck of a vinegar bottle in her teeth and leaped up onto the parapet.
The rest of us were too shocked to protest. As we watched, terrified for her, she scramble-climbed and leaped her way along the stone, bypassing the clashing troops on the walkway. Surely, any moment she’d be shot down.
But the rebels weren’t firing at this section of the wall, presumably to protect their own people. Still, any moment someone on the battlements could spot her and knock her off.
“By the fortunes, the kid’s brave,” someone said.
She was. Fearless, she scampered like an animal into range of the tower. As we watched, she doused the cloth bags in vinegar and threw them in quick succession onto the platform. Then the paper ones followed, sending a temporary cloud of pale gray rising into the air. She gave us a quick wave of triumph, then just as suddenly she was gone, out of our sight, dropping into the crowd fighting below.
“What happened? Did she fall?” The chemist beside me clutched my forearm. “Did she … Was she…?”
I shrugged, helpless, unable to answer. It was impossible to see through the thicket of bodies. But my heart felt like stone in my chest. She hadn’t been armored. I wasn’t sure she’d had any kind of weapon. Then the hand on my forearm became a claw and my companion pointed wordlessly at the sky.
The rebels’ catapults were firing again, and this time they aimed higher; as we watched in horror a huge, boulderlike stone powered into the north watchtower with an enormous crash. Fragments of rock spread almost as far as us, and as the debris cloud cleared it exposed the missing corner of the tower.
“Time to get off the walls,” I told my remaining companions. “We’re out of ways to help for now.” The roar in my head drowned out my own words, and it was hard to take my own advice. As I urged my team toward the stairs in the distance, somewhere in the orchestra I recognized animal screams. It took a long moment to figure out from where. I leaned through the battlements to see the siege tower, aflame and steaming with gaseous clouds, jiggling like a boiling pot on a stove. The tower must have been propelled by oku or some other beasts harnessed in the base, and the poor desperate beasts were trapped and cooking in fire and stinging ash. Though the stream of people through the top had stopped, the ram kept pounding at the walls with its menacing, repetitive swing. Our pendulum had punched a widening hole in the side, exposing one of the support beams, and the persistent flame from resin-assisted oil spread inside the tower. Arrows streamed past me with a gut-churning whistle, but I was fixated on the sight as the siege tower shook and burned.
Then two things happened at once: another shot from the rebel catapults struck the north tower, this time blistering through the parapet and into our own machine. And the top half of the seige tower, engulfed now in foul black smoke, collapsed from one corner and with two or three shuddering crashes, crumpled like a collapsible fan.
Someone grabbed my arm and pulled me along, and I tried my best not to throw up on my shoes as I ran, blinded by smoke and a choking mix of fear, relief, and sadness.
Stingbark
DESCRIPTION: Swamp tree with loose bark covered in fine “hair” resulting in a painful sting when touched. Stinging exacerbated by touch and cold temperatures.
SYMPTOMS: Localized pain at exposure site; if left untreated will build into high fever resistant to cooling, hallucinations.
PROOFING CUES: Currently no evidence of toxicity in a disguised form.
16
Kalina
The shroud of smoky haze and the distant sounds of conflict were detectable even from the upper city, where I had spent an anxious morning assisting with the evacuation of children and the elderly. On Marco’s heavily worded advice, Tain had refrained from participating in the fighting at the wall; perhaps finally, after two attempts on his life, he was making smarter decisions.
I felt his frustration, though. Evacuating the city was as important as repelling the attackers; the damage to the wall made it only a matter of hours before it was breached. And I was no use as a fighter. Still, the helplessness of being far from that last desperate defense, not knowing what was happening, was a constant low ache in my bones.
An-Hadrea had appeared at Trickster’s Bridge earlier with a procession of children and their caregivers from the caverns. They milled behind her in groups, linked at the elbows, like rattling beads, bright and brittle, looking around with suspicion and anxiety.
“Thank the fortunes,” I told her. “And thank you.”
“They will be safe, you have promised,” she had said to me fiercely, and I surprised her for once by embracing her as I reiterated my promise. She took it stiffly and stepped quickly away from me afterward, but I took no offense; I’d observed that she and her mother were used to a greater space around them than Silastians.
I would have preferred to take guards to lead them, but everyone was at the wall, and in the end perhaps they found a lone woman less intimidating. “I know it’s far from glamorous,” I said to An-Hadrea when we arrived at the first of the halls that had been set up with supplies and sleeping pallets. “But it’s safe.”
“We will take safety,” she said. Then she smiled at me without warning, a warm beam that transformed her face. “You can help with the glamour later, Kalina. You have some very fine jewelry.”
I laughed.
Tain arrived soon after, and took the time to move around the quarters, meeting people and reassuring them. His natural self-deprecating charm, coupled with genuine relief that they had come, made the young Chancellor a success among this group, at least. Perhaps things would change if or when the rest of the adult Darfri from the caverns arrived, as most of the potential danger of treachery came from that group. Still, it boded well for the future if we could find peace with the army outside. Tain could bridge the gap between the city and the country if anyone could.
He was still there when the messenger arrived to tell us that we had lost our north tower catapult but destroyed one of theirs and half of the siege tower. “They had to abandon it in the end,” Erel said breathlessly. “It wouldn’t stop burning. But they’re still going with the hooks and smaller rams, and the Stone-Guilder said to tell you the wall won’t hold much longer. Warrior-Guilder Marco says we need to start full evacuation.”