Days of Blood and Fire - Katharine Kerr [158]
He gathered his strength and ran, leaping downhill, letting his momentum carry him through the shallow water, racing uphill with his heart pounding and his breath coming in big gulps to plunge at last into the relative safety of the copse. There he could pause to catch his breath and look ahead. Sure enough, Cengarn’s familiar hills rose about a mile away, topped with their walls and towers. Yet, far off in the distance across the plain he saw what seemed to be a cloud of dust or smoke ringing the city round in one vast swirl, moving and pulsing, glittering with points of light reflected from metal. For a long time he stared, bewildered,until he realized that he was seeing an army. The siege of Cengarn had begun.
“Carra!” He forced himself to whisper, though he would rather have howled like a madman. “Carra!”
He turned on his heel and trotted off downhill, heading south to rejoin his men. Though he had only his rage alone to guide him and his men and keep them safe during their long hard ride to Calonderiel’s camp, he knew it would be enough. If the gods had any heart for justice, soon he would ride back at the head of an army. He vowed it deep in his very soul, that his dead men would be avenged—a hundred deaths for each of theirs.
“There’s one thing I simply don’t understand,” the chamberlain said. “How do these creatures think they can possibly win this siege? My lord Cadmar’s called in his alliances—two other gwerbrets in Arcodd alone, and another in northern Pyrdon, and in this grave need, they’ll be gathering all their vassals. And if they can’t lift the siege, then the High King himself will march. It’s not just a question of his highness honoring obligations, though we know he will. His interests demand a secure northern border.”
“We know it,” Jill said. “They don’t.”
“But Lord Tren—”
“Is probably being ignored. I wouldn’t be at all surprised if he’s good and sorry that he betrayed Gwerbret Cadmar, now that he’s seen who his new allies are.”
The old man turned to give her a look of pure surprise. In the hot summer sun Jill and Lord Gavry were standing on the catwalks of Dun Cengarn, looking over the town and out to the besiegers beyond. The army spread out round the walls in a vast flood of men and horses. Red banners fluttered; armor and swords winked and glinted in the noontide. Jill estimated that there were at least three thousand men, though many of those at the rear would be servants and horse handlers. For all that she’d survived many a war, every one of them had taken place on the kingdom’s borders in poor provinces, and she’d never seen such a large army in her life.
“I doubt me if Tren knew before,” Jill went on, “about his fellow devotees of this new goddess not being ordinary men like him. Weren’t we all taken by surprise when we found out that the Hordes were real enough and still a threat?”
He nodded, sighing a little in agreement. Jill shaded her eyes with her hand and peered into the enemy camp. So far, at least, no one had seen one single piece of siege equipment, not one ballista or catapult, not so much as a ram. Whether this was a good omen or an ill one, she didn’t know.
“How fares the Princess Carra?” Lord Gavry said.
“Better. She steadied down somewhat when I told her that her husband still lived, and breakfast seems to have done her some good after all those hysterics.”
“My good sorcerer, please! Don’t be so harsh with the lass, because, truly, a lass she still is, and carrying her first child, too.”
“Well, that’s true spoken. Tell me, how long do you think the town can hold out?”
“Months if we have to. The trouble will come later, if the farmers never get to plant the year’s second crop.” All at once his voice cracked. “It’s going to be a hard winter for Cengarn, a hard, hard winter indeed.”
“How long before—”
“A turning of the moon, no more, or so the yeomen tell me, if we’re going to get a full yield at harvest. We have a few weeks