The Autumn Republic

On the ground beside Tamas, Andriya kept pace with the horses with little apparent effort, his eyes gleaming from a powder trance. He shouldered his rifle in one smooth motion, not stopping even for a moment, and pulled the trigger. Tamas looked toward the walls, trying to see Andriya’s target-only to bark a laugh as the officer on the parapets plummeted to the ground.

A cloud of smoke rose from the wall a few moments later as the royal guard opened fire. Rows of Adran soldiers went down beneath the volley.

Tamas drew closer and closer. A second series of cannonballs hit the wall in the weak section, and still nothing happened. His men neared the base of the wall, the foremost companies much depleted, and he could see them preparing hooks and ladders for the assault. At the gate, the very last splinters of the blackwood doors had been knocked asunder and the portcullis had been reduced to jagged edges. The entrance yawned like a mouth full of broken, black teeth. Tamas focused his gaze on that. This battle was in motion, and for victory or ruin he could do nothing but ride forward with the tide.

Tamas threw his hands up as a sudden wind tore against him, snatching the breath from his lungs. He sheathed his sword and raised his carbine, looking for a Privileged upon the walls, but was startled to feel something push at him from the Else.

Was this some kind of trick? Another of Ipille’s traps? Tamas opened his third eye and immediately felt the shock travel through his fingertips and into his very core.

The array of colors in the Else that indicated the ancient wards holding the wall together writhed. Like a carriage spring pulled into a straight line, they seemed to grow taut, and then with a snap that nearly blew him out of his saddle, the whole thing burst open.

He dropped his third eye, expecting to see the world in ruin, the wall a pile of rubble and his infantry scattered, but no one seemed affected by the blast, and the wall was still whole.

“Did you feel that?” he shouted to Gavril.

“Feel what? You almost fell off your horse.”

Tamas picked out a few infantrymen whom he knew to be Knacked and noted that several had stumbled-one had even fallen. Whatever had just happened, it had affected only those with sorcerous power. He looked to his side to see Andriya still keeping pace on foot, but the powder mage was shaking his head like a confused animal.

Tamas’s attention was brought back to the wall as the next round of straight shot pounded the ancient stone to dust. Green-and-tan-clad bodies tumbled from the heights, and chips of rock took down his soldiers on the front lines. Without the sorcery to protect it, the wall was but porcelain to the modern artillery. Silvia’s cannon all seemed to open on that one spot, and within seconds there was a rubble-strewn path through the wall.

Adran infantry rushed the breach, and that was the last Tamas saw of his front lines as the gatehouse loomed before him.

“Set lances!” he bellowed.

Lances fell into place and a dozen cuirassiers streamed around him to take point. Beside him, Gavril drew his sword, and as one, the whole company thundered through the shattered gate and into the maw of Kez bayonets beyond.

Tamas’s world became chaos. The sound of screaming horses mixed with the frightened yells of men, and the clash of steel on steel filled his ears. The first rank of Kez bayonets was down, but another moved forward to fill its place. The small courtyard beyond the gatehouse became a butcher’s pit of bayonets and lances. He felt a bayonet slash at his breastplate and turned to shoot a Kez soldier in the face with his carbine. In one motion, Tamas holstered the carbine and drew his sword.

A hole appeared in the wall of bayonets. Tamas urged his horse through and then turned against the Kez formation from the side. One Kez soldier turned to face him, and another, and then another, and within moments the Kez ranks were in disarray.

Tamas pressed forward-there were hundreds more cavalry behind him and they wouldn’t do any good in the courtyard. With the bayonet line broken he was able to push through in moments, and soon he was in the street.

The avenue behind the wall was jammed with Kez soldiers. They streamed up to reinforce the walls, shoved forward to fill the gaps, and dozens were already charging toward him. He reached out with his senses and detonated powder among the front rank, blowing them to pieces, letting his sorcery do the work.

There were too many, forced forward by the weight of their own comrades behind them. Even with his sorcery and cavalry, they wouldn’t be able to make a big enough corridor for the infantry to follow.

“Sir,” a cuirassier shouted, “our men are wavering!”

Tamas sheathed his sword. “Damn it! Gavril, give me the flag!”

Gavril paused to unlatch the flag from his saddle, his sword spattered with gore. He threw it overhand and Tamas caught it, leaping from his horse. “Andriya, make me a path!”