"Why not? Sure, I accept."

The woman faded without another word.

Areth opened his eyes, found himself lying upon the greasy floor of his cell. There were no lights nearby to let him see. The stone floor was covered with his sweat and stank of rotting skin. A corner in the back was reserved for his waste, and bore an appropriate odor.

He was wracked in pain. It felt as if one of his lungs had collapsed, and his right arm had been pulled from his shoulder joint.

But as he peered into the darkness, groaning in pain, he could not help but remember for the first time in years the scent of sweet rye gra.s.s bursting from ground swollen by spring rain.

43.

BATTLE FOR THE UPPER GATE.

In a fight between flameweavers, everyone gets burned.

-a saying of Fleeds Thunder drums kept snarling as the warrior clans beat a hasty retreat from the lower wall. There were cries of pain, shouted battle orders. Amidst the bedlam, Rhianna raced over the paved streets of the market, hanging on to Fallion with her left hand while she struggled to hold her own staff and Jaz's weapons in her right.

The enormous graaks flew over her head and landed on the upper wall. Wyrmling troops slid down their scaly backs, then raced to take the upper gate, leaving a host of slaughtered defenders in their wake. The wyrmling troops moved too fast to be commoners.

They've taken endowments of metabolism, Rhianna realized.

There were cries of despair from the defenders on the upper wall, and all around Rhianna in the market streets below, human warriors began sprinting to meet the threat, jostling her, nearly knocking her down.

Fallion staggered beside Rhianna in a daze, trying to peer back at his lost brother.

With a sudden rattle of chains, a huge iron door slammed down on the upper wall, and there were groans of shock and despair from the defenders nearby.

The defenders had just been locked out of the upper levels of the city. Rhianna whirled and glanced behind. Wyrmling troops were swarming over the lower walls by the tens of thousands.

We're trapped! she realized. With wyrmling runelords manning the wall above them and a host charging up from behind, the human warriors were caught between a hammer and an anvil.

It was going to be a slaughter.

And she could see no way to beat the wyrmling runelords. There couldn't be more than four hundred men at the mouth of the warrens. If they charged out, they might might be able to take the gate-but in doing so they'd leave the warrens undefended. be able to take the gate-but in doing so they'd leave the warrens undefended.

The warrior clans weren't prepared for the wyrmling tactics. They had planned to make an orderly retreat, exacting a heavy toll from the wyrmlings for every step that they took.

But now, once the defenders in the city had been handled, the wyrmlings would be able to stroll through the warrens wiping out the women, the children, the elderly and the babes.

"Fell-ion!" a deep voice cried above the tumult. "Fell-ion!"

Rhianna whirled, saw King Urstone not a hundred feet away. He pointed toward the upper gate, gave a silent nod, then leapt into the air, flying rapidly.

Fallion just stood, his face a blank. He was still in shock.

"Fallion," Rhianna cried, "we have to win back the gate! Carry me up there!"

Rhianna pointed up. It was a short flight, but a steep climb. The guards from the outposts along the upper wall were all racing to the gate, but these weren't the city's grandest fighters. Most of them were mere boys, and they would be fighting runelords.

Fallion seemed to snap out of his daze. He grasped Rhianna around the lower belly and leapt into the air, flapping his wings for all that he was worth.

Rhianna peered down. Beneath them, the wyrmlings had breached the lower wall in twenty places; kezziards were climbing over it. The gate to the lower levels had come down, and the wyrmling hordes were rushing through. There seemed to be no end of them. A few human hosts, realizing the danger, had turned to meet them, but there wouldn't be enough of them.

Up ahead of her, the monstrous graaks leapt into the air and dove back toward the markets.

They're going to pick up reinforcements for the gate, Rhianna realized.

One monster winged straight toward them, as if it would attack. Rhianna let out a little cry of despair, and adjusted her sweaty grip on her staff and bow.

Fallion strained, flapping hard, and then went into a dive, veering beneath the oncoming monster. He struggled to pull out of the dive, then suddenly went swooping up like an owl.

Fallion didn't have a wyrmling's bulk, and his wings were made to fit the giants. Rhianna figured that together they weighed about as much as a single wyrmling. The wings could carry them, but sweat was streaming from Fallion's brow by the time they reached the upper wall.

As soon as he landed, he stopped and knelt, gasping for breath. Below them the thunder drums were deafening, and the cries of the warriors was like the roar of the sea.

"Fallion," Rhianna cried. "We have to clear the gates!"

There were at least a hundred wyrmling troops at the gate to their east, fierce creatures in black capes, with huge strange swords and battle-axes that glinted like molten metal in the torchlight.

King Urstone had landed on the far side of the gate, and now he gathered some young warriors around him, shouting battle orders. But there were not a hundred humans manning the entire upper wall.

Down in the lower markets, the human warriors were charging the gate to the upper portion of the city. The Wizard Sisel led the charge, striding boldly forward, his staff held high. Thousands of warriors marched at his back. A great cloud of fireflies swarmed among the human hosts, lighting the way.

Rhianna did not doubt that the wizard was preparing some spell to bring down the gate.

Fallion glanced up into the sky, as if afraid that one of the Knights Eternal would swoop down on him, but for the moment the skies were clear.

He reached out with his left hand, as if endlessly straining to grasp something in the valley below, something almost beyond his reach. Fires burned in the valley, hundreds of torches in their sconces, dozens of small brushfires.

Suddenly, nearly every torch and burning bush winked out.

Their energy came whirling toward Fallion in a fiery tornado, ropes of burning red flames that twisted in the air and then landed in his hand, forming a white ball that blazed like the sun.

He hurled the energy down among the wyrmling troops that bristled just inside the gates. A fiery ball whooshed into their midst and burst, incinerating a dozen wyrmlings, searing and setting fire to perhaps fifty more.

King Urstone shouted, and his young warriors leapt into battle. Some of them simply hurled themselves over the wall, down to the gate, leaping sixty feet to land atop wyrmling warriors.

It was suicide, but Rhianna saw big wyrmling runelords devastated by the a.s.sault, bones crushed by the weight of their attackers.

Fallion reached out again toward the few fires that had flickered back to life. The fires blacked out, and coils of burning energy shot toward his outstretched palm.

Just as suddenly, the coils arced up into the sky, like a fiery tornado that was upside down.

A Knight Eternal grabbed the energy, and came swooping toward them at astonishing speed, holding a glowing ball of molten fire.

"Watch out!" Fallion shouted, stepping in front of Rhianna, using his body as a shield.

Rhianna cowered, afraid that the fireball would take her.

But the Knight Eternal hurled the ball away at the last instant, sent it roiling into the castle's defenders. Young soldiers let out a wail of pain as they died.

The knight stooped from the sky and dove straight at Fallion, who only now drew his sword.

The knight's own black blade was in his hand. He winged toward Fallion at a falcon's blinding speed, his blade held forward.

Rhianna had wondered why Talon had called these creatures "knights." Now she saw: it was racing toward them like a lancer, but instead of a war-horse, it rode upon the wind.

"d.a.m.n you!" Fallion roared, "this is for my brother!" He leapt toward the knight, twisting his blade as they met.

There was a spark and a clang as metal struck metal, then the unmistakable snick of a breaking sword.

The knight blurred past Fallion in a thunder of wings-just as Rhianna leapt up and smashed the creature with her staff.

She'd expected the jolt to rip off her arms. Instead the Knight Eternal seemed to explode, as if she'd just hit a sack filled with dust. Bits of desiccated flesh and dry bones rained down all around her, messing her hair and getting grit in her eyes.

The remains of the creature landed in a heap not ten yards away, then went rolling and rolling until its corpse lay leaning with one wing dangling over the wall.

Fallion was on the ground. He moaned a bit, then rolled over. Rhianna saw fresh blood smearing his robes.

"Sword broke," he said, his face white with shock. He was patting his robe, as if to find the source of the blood. The blade of his own rusty sword was lodged just below his rib cage, somewhere between his right kidney and a lung. The point stuck out from him, as if he'd been run through. Rhianna realized that the blade must have been driven back and struck him when the sword shattered. He pulled it free. The last three inches of blade was b.l.o.o.d.y.

Not a deep cut, but it was three inches wide, and given its proximity to vital targets, it could be a deadly wound.

"Fallion," Rhianna cried, then knelt over him. She held her hand over the wound, fingers clasped tightly, trying to staunch the flow. Warm blood boiled out. She cast her eyes around, looking for someone to help, but the young soldiers on the wall had all run down into the fray, where they engaged the wyrmling troops.

Rhianna saw something flash past her-a second Knight Eternal diving into battle.

It swooped over the oncoming troops, diving through the cloud of fireflies that shone like a million dancing stars.

There its blade found the head of the Wizard Sisel, and nearly set it free.

One moment, the wizard was striding toward the city gates leading the charge, and the next instant he tried to duck beneath the Knight Eternal's blow. The sword glanced off Sisel's leather helm, and he slumped onto the cobblestones.

Cries of grief and despair rose from the human hosts as the Knight Eternal climbed back into the sky. A few black war darts followed in his wake, then fell pitifully in a deadly rain among the crowd.

Warriors swarmed around the wounded wizard, creating a shield wall. Sisel struggled to his feet, took a step, and fell in a swoon.

Rhianna stared blankly at the devastation. That steel gate was meant to hold off wyrmling attackers. The men below had no siege towers, no way to breach the city's defenses. Without Sisel to save them, they were trapped.

King Urstone's young warriors had thrown themselves into battle, and just as quickly they were dying beneath the swords and axes of the enemy.

Down at the lower gates, the giant graaks were lifting off, ferrying more troops to hold the upper wall. Kezziards were racing into battle with troops upon their backs, and the whole wyrmling horde now charged through the streets, wading into the human defenders.

Farther back, walking hills moved through the forest, crushing trees. Thousands of wyrmling troops rode upon their backs, and Rhianna could not guess what horrors these creatures held in store.

Fallion gave a wan chuckle. He was looking toward the dead knight, trying to keep his eyes from rolling back in his head. "You killed him? You killed a Knight Eternal?" Rhianna nodded silently. "Then, you've won your own pair of wings."

Fallion pa.s.sed out. The blood was still pumping from him, and Rhianna could not stop the flow. She reached under her tunic and ripped off a strip of cotton undershirt, then lay down atop Fallion, feigning death, and hoped that she could staunch the flow of blood.

She saw High King Urstone leap into the air, angrily brandishing an ax, hot on the tail of the Knight Eternal that had struck down Sisel. Urstone's flying skills were no match for those of his immortal enemy. He flapped clumsily, straining to catch up.

Seeing that the race was lost, King Urstone suddenly swooped and dove back among the troops in the market. He grasped the fallen wizard and flapped his wings in a frenzy, lugging Sisel into the air, well above the crowd, making for an open door high up on the mountain.

The defenders that had stood over the fallen wizard raised a cheer as he was carried to safety. But the cheer turned to cries of dismay as the wyrmlings charged into their midst.

In astonishment, Rhianna gaped at the battle raging below, a few thousand human warriors pitted against the might of the wyrmling horde. The wyrmlings were led by harvesters, boosted with extracts from the glands of fallen enemies. They raced through warrior clan's troops, chopping men down as if they were saplings.

In moments the battle would be over.

Rhianna realized, We are all as good as dead.

44.

AT THE BRINK OF RUIN.

It is when a man is confronted with eminent ruin that despair grows within him. And when overwhelmed by despair, he becomes pliant, and can be made a tool to fit your hand.

-Emperor Zul-torac Through the streets of Luciare, the Death Lord rode atop a walking hill, surrounded by his wyrmling captains. The great hill was the product of some strange world that he had never seen. Its back was armored with chitin, like a giant snail. It had thousands of strange tendrils hanging from its front, each like an elephant's trunk, and with these it harvested anything in its path-gra.s.s, trees, or wyrmlings, and shoved them up into one of its maws as it continued to trundle forward upon thousands of marching feet.

The walking hills were supposed to act as archers' towers, to help the wyrmlings breach the castle walls, but the walking hills would not be needed on this trip.

Up ahead, the wyrmling troops were slaughtering the last of the human defenders, who had found themselves trapped between the upper and lower walls.

Streets that once had been teeming with life now were filled with the dying and the dead.

The Death Lord reached out his hand and pulled the life from those human defenders who still gripped it so tenaciously, and then sent it to his own troops, lending them greater vigor, making them drunk on bloodl.u.s.t.

"Take off their heads!" the Death Lord cried. "There are still wounded among our enemy, and some feign death. Turn their lies into truth. Leave their glands for the harvesters!"

His troops raced through the small shops and houses, engaging any defenders that tried to hide. There were occasional shouts as a human was found alive and offered a last desperate battle.

His walking hill climbed the streets to the upper gate, but there could go no farther. The upper wall was too steep for the creature to climb.

The last of the human warriors were being slaughtered as his hill came to a halt, and now the guards began to raise the upper gate.

The Death Lord took a great leap, and went fluttering from the hill to the wall, a jump of some twenty yards. It was no great feat for the Death Lord. He was mostly spirit now, and only the weight of his robes dragged him earthward.