webcrawl/APGTE/Book-3/tex/Ch-069.md.tex

\hypertarget{chapter-44-drop}{%
\section{Chapter 44: Drop}\label{chapter-44-drop}}

\begin{quote}
\emph{``The only thing more dangerous than being hated by a villain is
to be loved by them.''}

-- Dread Empress Regalia II
\end{quote}

That made it twice, that the Summer Court manoeuvred me into a situation
where there was absolutely nothing I could do. The golden banners flew
high, and with every moment they remained there my legionaries would be
dying. In tight ranks, with sappers and crossbowmen at their backs,
heavies might have a chance against the Immortals. But dispersed across
a dozen different mansions, spread out in pursuit? It would be
slaughter. And for once, we would be on the wrong side of it. A part of
me already grieved the death of those soldiers, though I knew that even
greater caution would have made no great difference. If I'd grasped the
enemy's intent here, Juniper likely had an hour ago -- and she'd still
sent us in, because this battle was against dawn as much as against the
fae. Another quieter, calmer part of me was already tallying how many
losses the Fifteenth would incur and assessing whether it would cripple
us before the fight against Diabolist.

I didn't always like the woman I'd become. It was a damningly short walk
from \emph{we need this whatever the cost} to \emph{one sin, one grace}.
That my shade of ruthlessness was different from Black's was cold
comfort. It sometimes occurred to me, in the dark of night, that if I
got my and settled Callow I'd be the last monster remaining in it. It
was an unsettling thought but remembering the girl I'd once been, the
one who'd once thought that there was no need for monsters at all,
brought as much disgust as it did rue. Keeping my hands clean clean
wasn't going to stop armies marching, or fields unburnt. It wasn't going
to do a single fucking thing except make myself feel more righteous. And
still, once in a while, I couldn't help but wonder what it would have
felt like to be proud of the tired woman that looked back when I stood
before a mirror. I clenched my fingers and let out a long breath.
Whining about the price I'd had to pay to get a seat at the table wasn't
going to change anything.

Blood had been spilled, there was a foe ahead of me. They would break or
I would, it was as simple as that.

``Combat formations,'' Nauk barked. ``Time to earn your
\emph{ghelsin'in} pay, children.''

Kharsum, that. Meant fuck, basically, though with the implication of
going at it from behind. Wonderful language, Kharsum. Had more
variations on `fuck' and `eat' than any other tongue I'd come across,
which honestly said quite a bit about them as a people. There were no
Immortals in sight yet, but a banner had risen ahead. Only a matter of
time.

``Catherine,'' Adjutant said, coming to stand at my side. ``We knew it'd
be bloody. This changes nothing.''

``Think about the tactic, Hakram,'' I said. ``This isn't jaws clamping
on our fingers, we lose a thumb and it's over. They'll drive us back to
the walls, then the Immortals will retreat and the regulars fill the gap
again. They're going to \emph{harvest} us, one push at a time.''

``That sounds bad,'' Archer whispered at Masego. ``You've been in wars
before, Zeze. This is bad, right?''

``Don't call me that, you horrid sweaty goblin. And she's Callowan,''
Hierophant whispered back. ``They love farming, do it all over the
country. It could be good.''

``It's bad, \emph{Zeze},'' I sighed, ignoring Archer's delighted
chortle. ``The Duke of Green Orchards, if it's really him in charge,
essentially turned the outskirts of this place into a meat grinder for
the Fifteenth.''

``What's the blades, in this tortured metaphor?'' Archer asked.

``The Immortals,'' I replied.

``So we kill the Immortals,'' Archer mused. ``There, problem solved.''

``It does seem a fairly straightforward issue,'' Masego agreed.

Though I had some truly cutting sarcasm to grace them with, I held my
tongue. Archer was, well, right might be a bit of a stretch and I
definitely wasn't giving her the satisfaction of saying anything like
that but there was a nugget of correctness hidden in that boulder of
aggressive ignorance. To pull this off, the Duke would have to spread
the Immortals in a thin line across the upper city. And if we broke
through that, he was in trouble. The castle would be wide open, save
possibly for him and a handful of other nobles. That meant either
betting this battle on him crushing us, which was risky for him given
our highly murderous track record against Summer, or pulling back the
Immortals to get in our way. The Woe could, in my opinion, feasibly deal
with either the Immortals or the Duke. Both would be beyond us.

``We punch through and he's on the backfoot,'' I said to Hakram.

``Even if all we manage is to keep the centre from collapsing,'' the orc
replied, ``it's a rallying point for the Fifteenth and a funnel for
reinforcements. It would turn into a match of attrition he cannot
afford.''

Neither could we, we were both aware, but what other options did we
have?

``Nauk,'' I called out.

``Warlord,'' he grinned. ``We got a plan?''

``Smash through everything until we've won,'' I said honestly.

``Ah, the Foundling gambit,'' he gravelled. ``It's never failed us
before.''

``Don't say that where people can hear, and that's an order,'' I
hurriedly replied.

That kind of stuff had a way of spreading. Legion humour was, uh, more
than a little dark. Four hundred men already standing in tight ranks
across the breadth of the avenue began their advance after a few yells.
The Woe took the lead and I sharpened my senses to watch for the likely
ambush that awaited further down the road. Though darkness was hardly
bar to my sight, the smoke that was spreading across the sky was. Balls
of magelight hovered above the two cohorts, kept going by our mages, but
I barely noticed them: what was most visible in my eyes was the bevy of
standards in the sky. Which was why, when one disappeared, I immediately
noticed. \emph{Far left}, I thought. Hadn't seen much of what was there,
though I'd noticed trees from a distance. Had my legionaries managed to
turn back the -- ah, Thief was still on the prowl. And aiming to
complete her collection, by the looks of it.

``Archer,'' I said. ``How many of the standards did you two manage to
take?''

``Half, maybe?'' she shrugged. ``After the first few they noticed and we
had to be more careful, but there couldn't have been more than twenty in
all.''

And I was currently looking at eight still giving off that golden hue.
Thief might not have been much of a fighter, but she was far from
useless. I abandoned the train of thought without lingering, as moments
later we'd finally come across the enemy. Ahead of us was a roundabout,
though a fancier one than any I'd ever seen in Laure. It was wide as a
plaza, the avenues circling the statue garden in the centre wide enough
for two carriages to share it. Among the alabaster statues of what
looked like past rulers of Dormer and a noticeably larger depiction of
Eleanor Fairfax -- though the sculptor had taken liberties there, since
I doubted a knight of her calibre would have ever worn armour that left
so much of her tits out in the open -- the Immortals had formed a
textbook perfect square. Even simply standing around, they were wrecking
the greenery of the garden: the trees that weren't already outright on
fire were all smouldering, and the grass looked like a mage training
yard. The Summer Court's elite had not changed since I'd last seen them.
Gold plate set with rubies glimmered under closed armet helmets of the
same, heater shields so well-polished they could serve as mirrors
filling one hand and ivory halberds the the other. Facing them, my
legionaries spread across the roundabout. The Gallowborne took the
centre, Nauk's cohort split to cover the flanks.

``Summer Triumphant,'' an Immortal from the front ranks called out.

Two hundred halberds slammed down in perfect unison, flickers of flame
spreading from where they touched the ground. The words had not been
spoken in any language I knew, and hardly been words at all. They'd been
the crackle of wildfires, the clash of steel and the spilling of blood
on hungry earth. \emph{Summer's the season of war}, Archer had once told
me. Their words rang of that truth, a boast that rattled the night air.

``KILL THEM,'' Nauk screamed.

``TAKE THEIR STUFF,'' the Fifteenth screamed back.

We charged, wings enveloping their flanks as smoothly as if this was a
practice battle. \emph{Like sea against rocks}, I thought. The halberds
rose, the halberds fell, and there went the first rank of my
legionaries. As streaks of lightning filled the air and sharpers were
thrown in long arcs, Adjutant and I rammed into the enemy. It was not
like fighting the regulars. They did not give, when my sword struck
their shields. And there was no slapping aside a strike of those
halberds. No match for me in strength, perhaps, but not that far either.
\emph{No wonder they broke the Sword of Waning Day, when they fought.}
Winter's sharpest blades were rusty knives compared to these. Hacking my
way into their formation was like taking an axe to an oak. My first blow
hit a shield without purchase and bounced off, the halberd taller than I
was sweeping down to tear through my shoulder in answer. I had to stick
close to the Immortal to avoid it, and doing that felt like rolling
around in a pile of embers. They heat they gave out wouldn't melt my
plate, maybe, but it would heat it until it scalded to the touch given
long enough.

It took Adjutant and I working together to pry the line open. His shield
got a halberd stuck and the tip of my sword pierced just over the tip of
the enemy's, sliding into the opening between the helmet and the gorget.
The blood that coated my blade when it withdrew was smoking, but the fae
was dead. I kicked the enemy down and forced my way into the gap even as
the Immortal behind that one advanced, trying to force me back with his
shield. From the corner of my eye I saw Adjutant's knees give as the
shaft of a halberd struck his shoulder and that distraction cost me. The
side of my shield caught the halberd's point at the very last moment,
hard enough to change the angle from my chest to my forearm. The ivory
went through plate and I screamed as fire burned in my veins. I would
have had to give ground, if Archer hadn't come to back me. Slithering
around my shield she struck high, plunging a longknife in the Immortal's
throat and spinning to throw herself at the man at his side. I ripped
out the halberd the corpse still clutched and let Winter loose, the
flame smothered by impossibly deep cold. I let the strength linger, and
took full advantage of the room she'd carved me.

The Immortals were meant to fight in ranks, the enemy in front, and from
the side they struggled. Not the most flexible of weapons, halberds. I
slammed my shield in the flank of the Immortal to my left and when he
turned snarling Adjutant's axe smashed through his helm and splattered
blood. Now that my second was at my side, we began to widen the gap. One
of us baited, the other struck. I learned at the cost of what was going
to be a nasty scar under my eye that anything but a killing blow was
useless on them -- they did not seem to feel pain, and baldly ignored
wounds. Being on the other side of that was a lot more infuriating than
I'd thought it would be. With Archer weaving in and out of our side,
knives always moving, we forged a wedge of corpses in the centre of the
formation that the Gallowborne filled without prompting. The rest of my
legionaries were not doing nearly as well, I saw when I got a rare
moment of respite. Hierophant had seen the flanks were failing badly in
the face of the opposition and lent them a hand, but the two spells he
was working simultaneously took up all of his concentration. A hovering
ball of shadow had sprouted tendrils that struck like sledgehammers on
the left, while to the right a panoply of small silver circles flew
around and shot beams of pale sorcery that not even the shields of the
Immortals could withstand without twisting.

We'd killed maybe a fourth of them, fighting tooth and nail for every
corpse, and already taken over twice that in casualties. I grit my teeth
and pressed on. Attrition would grow more to our advantage the fewer of
them were left, and though only the wrecks of two cohorts would emerge
from this fight we would emerge victorious nonetheless.

``Sons and daughters of Summer, stand deathless under the sun,'' a voice
thundered.

Oh shit. Did that mean what I think it meant? Behind me, the dead
Immortals proved the truth of the name. Great gouts of Summer flame
poured out of the wounds, and they rose to their feet -- most of them in
the middle of the Gallowborne. A dozen of my retinue died in the first
heartbeat and I screamed in fury.

``HIEROPHANT,'' I yelled. ``KILL THAT STANDARD.''

Before I'd even finished speaking a handful of runes formed just before
my eyes, shining blue, and transmuted into a word: warded. Fuck. We
weren't the only ones who could use those.

``BATTER IT DOWN,'' I screamed.

We were way past conserving power for the Duke of Green Orchards. At
this rate we'd never even reach him. The detonation that followed rocked
the entire plaza, statues flying in pieces and even Immortals being
thrown to the ground. I widened my stance and was only blown back a few
feet, though Hakram was thrown straight into two legionaries and had to
extirpate himself from the mess of limbs and armour. To my horror, when
I looked up, a globe golden light shone around the standard as it
remained unharmed. Oh, this was bad. I ripped the halberd out of the
grasp of an Immortal swinging at me, dropping my shield, and swung it
around so that the edge of the blade tore into his skull. He dropped
dead like a stingless puppet, but how long would he remain like that?
The fae might not be able to pull that trick as often in Creation as
they could in Arcadia, but how many times would that mean? Four, nine?
My legionaries couldn't even afford for it to happen twice. I would have
called out to Archer, asked her if she had anything in her quiver that
could take care of that, but she was busy trying not to get skewered by
a pair of very angry Immortals.

It was a shiver, or at least that was how it felt to see it. It spread
from the left flank, slithering through the thick ranks of Immortals and
only turning into something real when the silhouette emerged out of thin
air. Thief put a foot on a shield meant to smash her down, using it as a
foothold to move to the shoulder of another Immortal. The fae tried to
shake her off but she was already moving, jumping off the helm of an
Immortal and somersaulting in the air. She went through the golden globe
like it wasn't there at all, hand snatching the standard at the apex of
her leap and spiriting it away in a heartbeat. I felt the impact before
she'd even begun to come down, the way every Immortal on the field
flinched. I grinned, right up until the moment she was engulfed in
apple-green flames and began screaming. Wings ablaze with eerie light,
the Duke of Green Orchards stood atop the battlefield with mild
disinterest writ on his face. A single hand held up, her kept Thief
aloft and burning seemingly without effort.

I furiously tried to break through the Immortals ahead of me, but their
ranks had tightened and the halberds were keeping me back. They weren't
going for a kill, just delaying me. It was Hierophant that managed to
step in.

A gust of wind blew out the flames and Thief's blackened body was
dragged back behind the lines through the air. Gods, her entire hair was
gone. She was scorched, but breathing and moaning in pain. Masego
immediately began healing her, but she was done for the night. For more
than that.

``Lady Foundling,'' the noble fae greeted me politely. ``It appears this
affair will come to close momentarily. \emph{Perish}.''

The nightmare began. Before he'd finished speaking I'd leapt off my
first ice platform and was about to land on my second, and Archer had
sent her first arrow flying for his eye. The shot went through the
silver flames that appeared when it got close, but it slowed enough the
duke caught it with his hand, crushing the wooden shaft to powder. The
other hand had lashed out with green flame, a small orb of it tumbling
towards me. The size of an apple, and the exact colour. Fuck. I'd
thought for sure he'd be more like the Count of Green Yew, and hoped the
torched trees would mean he was limited in his power, but he obviously
had a work around. That first hit on Thief had been nowhere as strong as
what I'd seen some dukes and duchesses pull out, but it was still
exceedingly dangerous. A twist of will had a platform to my side forming
and I took a turn there to avoid the throw, frowning when I saw the
apple kept tumbling down. Was he really unable to redirect those?
\emph{Oh Merciless Gods}, I realized. I lashed out with ice, trying to
keep the explosion contained when it hit the Gallowborne, but it was too
little and too late. Then dark globe of ice was torn through almost
instantly, green flame pouring out and consuming a full tenth. It moved
from there, devouring men as the Duke calmly moved his hand to guide it.

Hierophant struck directly at him, a dozen spears of what looked like
water-like shimmering iron getting stuck in the silver flames as they
kept pushing at it. The fae grunted and the green fire gutted out. I
should have advanced, but my eyes remained on the half-bare skull of
Tribune John Farrier. Most his body was gone, even bones turned to ash.
On all front of the melee the Fifteenth was giving ground, step by step
as halberds tore through mail and plate. I'd known John for over a year
now. Had fought by his side, bled with him and laughed with him. I'd
liked him and relied on him. And he'd been swatted down carelessly, like
a fucking insect.

Creation grew muted.

I could feel it all deeper now. Feel the night grow thicker, until the
sight of the moon in the sky was obscured. Feel the beating from the
shard of Winter that was my heart slow, and then cease entirely as I
drew deeper from that well than I ever had before. My breath came out
steaming and my plate crackled as frost spread over it. I peered at my
anger, at my fear and calmly picked them out. I fed them to the cold,
let them disappear into the flow until nothing was left at all. I'd
always held back, I knew that deep down. I'd ripped the mantle of a god
from its corpse and still acted the mortal. Wanted to be just Catherine
Foundling. All these worries of humanity and remaining someone I could
stand. \emph{The whining of a petulant child}. I would be whoever I
needed to be to keep my people alive, and damn me for flinching in the
face of that truth. Beneath me the Immortals stirred and I felt the
threads coming from them, those that had once bound them to the banner
even in death but now lay inert. I reached out for them, two hundred
threads growing into rivers as I forced the power of Winter through
them. There were screams, there were curses and shaking and clawing at
their armour. It made no difference to me. The Immortals died like
flies, falling to the ground under the weight of my mantle.

``Rise,'' I ordered, and they did.

Blue eyes burning behind their visors, the pride of Summer gripping its
weapons as wings of ice spread from their backs.

``Shit,'' Archer muttered, still among them. ``That doesn't look good.''

My gaze met the Duke of Green Orchards' and the man smiled.

``Ah,'' he said. ``And now we finally meet, Duchess of Moonless
Nights.''

The trees in the garden below burst into green flames, apples forming by
the dozens and dropping from the branches without missing a beat. I
moved with four hundred wings, my snarl on the lips of every Immortal. A
storm of green flame swallowed the world, and the battle began in
earnest. For the first heartbeat, it was only the two of us. I could
sense his will in the flames, shaping them as men and beasts to fight my
Immortals. They rose into the sky, pursued by Summer wrath, and
Hierophant struck again. I saw his will slip into the green, follow
along that of a lesser god and learn its workings.

``Shape is intent,'' the blind man whispered. ``Intent fractures.''

Like picks in stone, the Hierophant's will struck at the sorcery and
collapsed it. With a sound like a bell the flames reverted into apples,
hanging harmlessly in the air, and my Immortals buried the Duke in a
storm of blades. For a heartbeat all that could be seen was a pile of
armour and ivory, until branches grew out. A globe of wood was
spreading, swallowing the Immortals as it did, and I could feel them
struggling against the crushing pressure inside. It would not save him.
My will buried like a blade in the minds of the imprisoned corpses,
forcing Winter into them until their bodies were overfilled vessels. One
after another they burst, ice digging into the wood and tearing it from
the inside. It groaned and broke, then the Duke burst out from the top
in a shower of shards. Archer's arrow would have torn through his knee,
if he hadn't caught it. He raised a mocking eyebrow.

Then it blew.

Hissing in pain, his fingers shredded, he seized the floating apples
again. I ignored that, plaques of ice forming under my feet as I ran
across the sky to him. The flames exploded as I felt Archer tap the back
of one of the surviving Immortals. Without even glancing in her
direction, I sent the corpse aflight with her hanging on the back. We
reached the Duke at the same time. The fae pulled the fire to him, but
through ears not my own I heard Hierophant speak.

``Burning is transmutation set by boundary,'' he said. ``Boundaries are
mutable.''

His will rang like a bell and the fire intensified, beginning to burn
even itself until all that was left was a single flame that guttered
out. Archer and I leapt together as the enemy's face darkened and he
allowed himself to fall, the burnt out husks that were the trees below
us collapsing into a hunks of burning wood that gathered to him in a
protective shield. I grabbed Archer by the arm and tossed her at it,
leaping down from a platform to follow. Her blades dug into the shield
to no avail, and so did my sword. Frost spread from where I'd struck,
putting out the flames but little else. A hand lightly touched the
globe, Thief's scorched face grim as she leaning against Adjutant.

``\textbf{Steal},'' she coldly said, and the shield disappeared.

Beneath it the Duke of Green Orchard's eyes were wide. Seven wooden
pillars formed around the fae, followed by four runes linked by pale
light. The same binding Hierophant had used against the Princess of High
Noon. The duke's body grew rigid and Archer's blades dug through his
abdomen on both sides, straight into his lungs. I did not bother to
speak. My blade ran straight through his neck, spider webs of ice
spreading from the wound as life winked out of him. I panted, slowly,
and felt the remaining Immortals collapse one after another. Nothing but
corpses, now.

``Hierophant,'' I said. ``Destroy the corpse.''

He did not quibble. Hazy power devoured the remains, leaving nothing
behind, and slowly I returned to myself. I'd taken four hundred men into
battle. Sixty still lived, most of them wounded. All that remained of
the roundabout was a smoking, broken wreck.

``Nauk,'' I croaked. ``\emph{Where is Nauk}?''

I strode through the ash and corpses, shouldering aside a legionary and
glaring at the first officer I found. She paled, shivering.

``Where is your legate, lieutenant?'' I seethed.

``Ma'am,'' she stammered, ``he's\ldots{}''

I saw the few remaining mages attending to the wounded as best they
could, yellow light covering their palms. I could see Nauk among them.
He was not moving, his breath faint. The left side of his face had been
made a burnt eyeless husk, and the arm on the other side ended at the
shoulder. They were not healing him. Fury spiked, the pavestones under
me cracking.

``\emph{You},'' I said, hoisting the closest mage by the chest. ``Why
aren't you healing him?''

He only babbled uselessly, so I dropped him.

``There's nothing more they can do, Catherine,'' Masego said, passing me
by as he knelt by the legate's side.

``Then craft me a fucking miracle, Hierophant,'' I hissed.

He frowned, then drew runes over Nauk. The frown deepened.

``I can keep him alive,'' he said. ``Anything more is beyond me. Parts
of his mind were shredded by the fire.''

``Do it,'' I rasped. ``Who? Who can heal him?''

Pinpricks of light formed above Nauk, sinking into the body as Masego
murmured. The orc's breath grew steadier, but nothing more.

``Father,'' he said. ``Possibly Diabolist. Or\ldots{}''

He hesitated.

``Tell me,'' I said through clenched teeth.

``It was fae fire that did this,'' he said. ``Fae sorcery could likely
heal it.''

I clenched my fingers into a fist.

``Catherine,'' Adjutant said.

I hadn't even noticed him approaching. Thief was further away, leaning
on Archer. Neither of them met my gaze.

``Dawn is coming,'' he said. ``We cannot linger.''

I forced myself to grow calm.

``Can you do anything more?'' I asked Hierophant.

He shook his head.

``They'd already stopped the bleeding from the stump,'' he said. ``All I
did was restore the organs.''

``Then we go,'' I said, turning to the silhouette of the castle ahead.
``Let's end this.''