The Blinding Knife
Page 173
And as might be expected of men whose primary loyalty was to their purse, they’d been willing to come to an understanding with the Color Prince. They had refused to fight for him, fearing that a reputation as turncloaks would interfere with future contracts. But they did agree to grease the skids for Liv’s team in return for leniency when the Blood Robes took the city.
Like every leader, the Color Prince hated mercenaries and still had to use them. He was convinced that the pirate lord Pash Vecchio had betrayed him. The weedy pirate had sworn that his great ship would hold the south shore, herding the Chromeria’s fleet straight into their trap. They’d had word that his ship had been seen, so maybe he’d show up at the last moment. More likely, he was waiting at the outskirts like some of the other pirates, hoping to swoop in on the wounded ships after the battle and take slaves and plunder.
The sound of distant guns, rumbling over the sea, came before dawn did. Liv wondered if people she knew were dying out there. She turned back to look at the wall, watching the sunlight creep down its face.
“I thought this was impossible,” she said to the orange-eyed khat chewer.
“Chromeria trained, aren’t ya? Chromeria lies, princess.”
Of all the colors, only the Color Prince’s orange drafters were better than the Chromeria’s. Their illusions crafted into the depths of other luxins were as good as Chromeria students’, but they also did something that Liv had heard rumors about, but that the Chromeria denied was possible: they cast feelings. You had to see the object on which they’d cast the hex, and you had to be susceptible to such things—the more emotional you were, the more powerfully you would experience the hex. But this wall was their masterpiece in two parts. First, the Color Prince’s men inside the city had cast hexes on every building and street and on the wall itself for several blocks around here. The hexes could be cast thin enough that the eye wouldn’t even pick them out, especially against backgrounds with lots of colors or patterns. But the effect remained—going right past the mind, straight to the guts, blanching the liver, putting water in the stomach. In one small neighborhood on the opposite side of this wall, everyone felt dread.
It wasn’t an alien feeling for someone to experience in a city under siege, and it accomplished what it had been intended to—people avoided this area. That meant they studied the wall less closely than they would, which meant the illusion held.
Liv asked how they did it. They said they cast their will into the creation, the same way golems were made. It made the magic alive in some sense. Forbidden by the Chromeria, of course. The luxiats thought that tearing part of your will off to make magic tore part of your soul off, and that such lost parts of your soul were never regained.
The Blood Robes knew better. So they said.
The trebuchet on the Red Cliffs above threw its great stones on every quarter hour, and it threw stones close to this neighborhood. The oranges had reached the wall, and when they set their charges, they timed them to go off when the trebuchet’s stones rocked the earth.
One Atashian captain had been assassinated, and another bought off, guaranteed safety for himself and his family when the city fell. They’d burrowed a hole in the wall, then covered it with an illusion. Blue luxin, overlaid with red and yellow and orange, twisted into illusions that looked nearly the same as the wall itself. It would fool a quick glimpse from twenty or thirty paces, but not a close inspection.
The drafters and sappers had worked through every night, with thick wool blankets draped over them to hide the light of the mag torches, emerging exhausted and coated in sweat every morning. But in mere days they’d made an unseen gate, with supports drafted to hold up the wall above them, wide enough for five men to pass abreast.
It wouldn’t be wide enough to let in the entire army, and it was too short for horses to pass, but that wasn’t the strategy. An hour after Liv’s team entered the city, the Color Prince would send five hundred of his best drafters and warriors through this tunnel, with instructions to open the city’s south gate and let his armies in.
Ultimately, Liv didn’t see how it could fail. The Color Prince hadn’t been so sure. He’d wanted to deal with the Chromeria’s fleets on one day and Ru the next in case the fleet landed ashore and attacked him from the rear instead of trying to bring supplies directly in to Ru. But he’d made his gamble: to spring his trap, he needed to do both things today.
If things didn’t work out, Liv was going to find herself very, very alone in a hostile city.
“Time!” the orange barked. As the sun drenched them, he and a blue and a yellow all touched the wall in slightly different places, reaching the control nodes that they’d left on the surface. They pulled back the illusion like a curtain.
“Remember what our prince has said,” Liv said. “What we do today, we do for mercy. The price of freedom is always paid in blood. And if the price must be paid, better that it be paid by few. Let us be swift and implacable.”
It wasn’t much of a speech, but Liv had never done this before. Her men nodded, then they went into the wall first. She was second to last. If she died, their entire mission would fail, so they would protect her above all. The price and privilege of being a superviolet.
She ducked in behind them. The wall was eighteen paces thick at its base. Immense. This was the reason they hadn’t bombarded the wall straight on with the trebuchets—it would have taken them months to break through. Cannons could have done it, but they didn’t have the amount of powder necessary, nor easy access to saltpeter mines to make more. But whoever had told the Color Prince that five men could pass abreast had been lying. The space was so short that Liv had to stoop deeply to get through, and five men abreast? She could reach each wall with her outstretched fingers. It was enough for their purposes, and Liv was momentarily glad that she was going into the city first, rather than in the middle of five hundred men straining to get through this tiny hole while under fire and magic.
Grateful to be going alone into an enemy city. I’m mad.
And then they were out. Some of the men were dusty. One, a seven-footer named Phyros, was dabbing his head, which was bleeding freely from smacking it on the roof of the tunnel. They slapped off the dust from their faded blue shirts—the closest thing to a uniform the Blue Bastards had—and bound a bandage quickly around Phyros’s head.
“Follow me,” Phips Navid said. He was a cousin of Payam Navid, the gorgeous magister Liv and every other girl at the Chromeria had half loved. Phips had grown up in Ru, though his father and older brothers and uncles had all been hanged after the Prisms’ War. He’d been twelve years old, and narrowly avoided the noose himself.
They jogged through the streets. Near the wall, because of the dread hex, there was no one at all out. But soon they jogged past some soldiers, who merely nodded at them. They swung one block wide to avoid a troop of the Blue Bastards—only the top few commanders of the mercenaries knew their plan. Any underlings who saw them would ask what they were doing.
Most of the city was untouched as yet by the war. The Color Prince wanted a new power base for his war, not another drain on his resources, so he’d had the trebuchets on the Red Cliffs concentrate their stones on a few neighborhoods, and the artillery batteries. There were whole markets and palaces that remained untouched. The buildings were whitewashed adobe with flat roofs that served as extra rooms, especially on hot nights, just as they did in Tyrea. But here there were far more palaces built around central courtyard gardens. Whatever damage had been inflicted on Ru during the Prisms’ War had long ago been scrubbed away by their wealth.
Like every leader, the Color Prince hated mercenaries and still had to use them. He was convinced that the pirate lord Pash Vecchio had betrayed him. The weedy pirate had sworn that his great ship would hold the south shore, herding the Chromeria’s fleet straight into their trap. They’d had word that his ship had been seen, so maybe he’d show up at the last moment. More likely, he was waiting at the outskirts like some of the other pirates, hoping to swoop in on the wounded ships after the battle and take slaves and plunder.
The sound of distant guns, rumbling over the sea, came before dawn did. Liv wondered if people she knew were dying out there. She turned back to look at the wall, watching the sunlight creep down its face.
“I thought this was impossible,” she said to the orange-eyed khat chewer.
“Chromeria trained, aren’t ya? Chromeria lies, princess.”
Of all the colors, only the Color Prince’s orange drafters were better than the Chromeria’s. Their illusions crafted into the depths of other luxins were as good as Chromeria students’, but they also did something that Liv had heard rumors about, but that the Chromeria denied was possible: they cast feelings. You had to see the object on which they’d cast the hex, and you had to be susceptible to such things—the more emotional you were, the more powerfully you would experience the hex. But this wall was their masterpiece in two parts. First, the Color Prince’s men inside the city had cast hexes on every building and street and on the wall itself for several blocks around here. The hexes could be cast thin enough that the eye wouldn’t even pick them out, especially against backgrounds with lots of colors or patterns. But the effect remained—going right past the mind, straight to the guts, blanching the liver, putting water in the stomach. In one small neighborhood on the opposite side of this wall, everyone felt dread.
It wasn’t an alien feeling for someone to experience in a city under siege, and it accomplished what it had been intended to—people avoided this area. That meant they studied the wall less closely than they would, which meant the illusion held.
Liv asked how they did it. They said they cast their will into the creation, the same way golems were made. It made the magic alive in some sense. Forbidden by the Chromeria, of course. The luxiats thought that tearing part of your will off to make magic tore part of your soul off, and that such lost parts of your soul were never regained.
The Blood Robes knew better. So they said.
The trebuchet on the Red Cliffs above threw its great stones on every quarter hour, and it threw stones close to this neighborhood. The oranges had reached the wall, and when they set their charges, they timed them to go off when the trebuchet’s stones rocked the earth.
One Atashian captain had been assassinated, and another bought off, guaranteed safety for himself and his family when the city fell. They’d burrowed a hole in the wall, then covered it with an illusion. Blue luxin, overlaid with red and yellow and orange, twisted into illusions that looked nearly the same as the wall itself. It would fool a quick glimpse from twenty or thirty paces, but not a close inspection.
The drafters and sappers had worked through every night, with thick wool blankets draped over them to hide the light of the mag torches, emerging exhausted and coated in sweat every morning. But in mere days they’d made an unseen gate, with supports drafted to hold up the wall above them, wide enough for five men to pass abreast.
It wouldn’t be wide enough to let in the entire army, and it was too short for horses to pass, but that wasn’t the strategy. An hour after Liv’s team entered the city, the Color Prince would send five hundred of his best drafters and warriors through this tunnel, with instructions to open the city’s south gate and let his armies in.
Ultimately, Liv didn’t see how it could fail. The Color Prince hadn’t been so sure. He’d wanted to deal with the Chromeria’s fleets on one day and Ru the next in case the fleet landed ashore and attacked him from the rear instead of trying to bring supplies directly in to Ru. But he’d made his gamble: to spring his trap, he needed to do both things today.
If things didn’t work out, Liv was going to find herself very, very alone in a hostile city.
“Time!” the orange barked. As the sun drenched them, he and a blue and a yellow all touched the wall in slightly different places, reaching the control nodes that they’d left on the surface. They pulled back the illusion like a curtain.
“Remember what our prince has said,” Liv said. “What we do today, we do for mercy. The price of freedom is always paid in blood. And if the price must be paid, better that it be paid by few. Let us be swift and implacable.”
It wasn’t much of a speech, but Liv had never done this before. Her men nodded, then they went into the wall first. She was second to last. If she died, their entire mission would fail, so they would protect her above all. The price and privilege of being a superviolet.
She ducked in behind them. The wall was eighteen paces thick at its base. Immense. This was the reason they hadn’t bombarded the wall straight on with the trebuchets—it would have taken them months to break through. Cannons could have done it, but they didn’t have the amount of powder necessary, nor easy access to saltpeter mines to make more. But whoever had told the Color Prince that five men could pass abreast had been lying. The space was so short that Liv had to stoop deeply to get through, and five men abreast? She could reach each wall with her outstretched fingers. It was enough for their purposes, and Liv was momentarily glad that she was going into the city first, rather than in the middle of five hundred men straining to get through this tiny hole while under fire and magic.
Grateful to be going alone into an enemy city. I’m mad.
And then they were out. Some of the men were dusty. One, a seven-footer named Phyros, was dabbing his head, which was bleeding freely from smacking it on the roof of the tunnel. They slapped off the dust from their faded blue shirts—the closest thing to a uniform the Blue Bastards had—and bound a bandage quickly around Phyros’s head.
“Follow me,” Phips Navid said. He was a cousin of Payam Navid, the gorgeous magister Liv and every other girl at the Chromeria had half loved. Phips had grown up in Ru, though his father and older brothers and uncles had all been hanged after the Prisms’ War. He’d been twelve years old, and narrowly avoided the noose himself.
They jogged through the streets. Near the wall, because of the dread hex, there was no one at all out. But soon they jogged past some soldiers, who merely nodded at them. They swung one block wide to avoid a troop of the Blue Bastards—only the top few commanders of the mercenaries knew their plan. Any underlings who saw them would ask what they were doing.
Most of the city was untouched as yet by the war. The Color Prince wanted a new power base for his war, not another drain on his resources, so he’d had the trebuchets on the Red Cliffs concentrate their stones on a few neighborhoods, and the artillery batteries. There were whole markets and palaces that remained untouched. The buildings were whitewashed adobe with flat roofs that served as extra rooms, especially on hot nights, just as they did in Tyrea. But here there were far more palaces built around central courtyard gardens. Whatever damage had been inflicted on Ru during the Prisms’ War had long ago been scrubbed away by their wealth.
