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It wasn’t true at all.
Erida stood at the edge of the bridge, resplendent in her armor and green cloak, the emerald of Galland winking on her finger. Her hair was braided around her head, set with jeweled pins to mimic a crown. Her toes curled in her boots, set beyond the range of bowmen. But no arrows fell. The Rouleine garrison were either dead or in hiding, long driven from the high walls. She looked at the ramparts, bleary-eyed from smoke and exhaustion. She had not slept all night and could almost feel the shadows ringing her eyes. Rouleine was quiet now, but the screams still rung in her head. They pealed like the bell of some distant church, inexorable and impossible to silence.
Despite her lack of sleep, her ladies did everything they could to make her look the part of a conquering queen. The others were just as regal, drawn up in their finest armor and clothing. Lady Harrsing leaned heavily on her cane, weary but eager. Lord Thornwall wore his full plate armor for the occasion, the steel of it glowing in the morning sun. He wore a green cloak over one shoulder and fidgeted in place, uneasy. Erida watched him from the corner of her eye. It was not like her commander to be so unsettled, not before the gates of victory.
Even Taristan had made an effort, his own armor freshly polished. It gleamed like new, matched only by the Spindleblade secure at his hip, and the imperial red cloak around his shoulders. He had even bathed, his dark red hair slicked back and his cheeks shaved clean. To the untrained eye, Taristan looked like the other nobles, a spectator instead of a soldier. But Erida knew better. She saw the wolf in him, the mercenary, the dark hand of a distant god. He returned her stare evenly, his expression grim, the long lines of his face set.
Ronin was the same as always, huddled in his red cloak, but today he smiled, his small white teeth reminding Erida of a rat in the cheese.
She kept her focus on the city, even as the whispers continued among the nobles. Some of them cowered behind her Lionguard, while others craned their necks for a better view.
What happened in the night?they murmured, trading theories back and forth.Fires, assassins, traitors in the city?Each explanation was more outlandish than the last, but never as impossible as the truth.
Erida steeled herself, raising her chin. She took a step forward, onto the bridge and into the range of archers long dead. The nobles gasped behind her, and Thornwall reached to pull her back.
“Your Majesty—” he said, reaching for her arm, but she shrugged him off gently.
“Rouleine, will you kneel?” Erida shouted up to the ramparts. The sun danced on her face, bouncing off her armor, warming her cheeks.
As expected, no one answered. Not even a rooster crowed.
“Where is the garrison?” someone muttered among the nobles, sounding afraid.
“Is it a trap?” another said, to a chorus of whispered agreement.
The marsh below the moat buzzed with flies, a sour smell rising with the sun’s heat. Erida covered her nose against the odor and looked down to see a few broken bodies in the moat, half hidden by weeds. She avoided their faces, but their identities were easy to guess. Two soldiers, judging by their chain mail. A serving woman in a rough woolen dress. All three had jumped from the walls, escaping flame or blade. They’d met death anyway.
Erida set her jaw against the sickness twisting in her stomach. She extended a hand, waving her retainers forward. Taristan was first among them, striding without fear, while the rest edged out reluctantly.
Thornwall eyed the bodies beneath the bridge and pursed his lips.
“Not a trap,” he said, pointing at the corpses. “Bring up the ram.”
Wheels creaked and chains sang, the long battering ramswinging on its frame as it rolled into position. The garrison had not even dropped the portcullis of the city gate, leaving the wooden doors exposed without so much as an iron grate to defend them.
The capped iron nose of the battering ram splintered the gate too easily, shattering charred wood. The doors burst inward after a single blow, the gates dangling from their hinges. Erida’s heart rose in her throat as she caught her first glimpse of Rouleine.
Thornwall’s ram team went first, career soldiers all, grizzled in their armor with proven swords and hard eyes. Whatever they found was to their liking, and they shouted for the Lionguard, who passed through the gate next.
Erida breathed hard through her nose and out through her mouth, counting the seconds. Waiting for her turn.
The knights took longer than Thornwall’s men. A few minutes passed in odd, stilted silence, quiet but for the buzzing of corpse flies and errant whispers. Even Ronin kept his mutterings to himself, his lips pressed together into a thin white line.
When the all clear came, Erida’s nerves fired under her skin, jolting in fear and anticipation. She almost motioned for Taristan to go first but forced her own steps forward.This is my victory. I must be strong enough to see it.
Her boots hit the bridge with a hollow thwack, one foot in front of the other, each step like the hammer of a nail.But in what?Erida wondered.My coffin or my throne?
The smell hit first. Smoke, mostly, with blood beneath, and something fouler. Erida took her first steps into Rouleine with as much resolve as she could, her head held high as she passed through the gatehouse. She was keenly aware of the murder holes aboveher head, bracing for a surprise attack or a splash of boiling-hot oil. But the grates in the passage were empty, the guardians long gone. The Ashlanders did their job well.
She emerged into the smoky light of the main avenue through Rouleine, where houses and shops crowded either side of the wide thoroughfare splitting the city. Doors dangled on their hinges, with shuttered windows beaten in or splintered. Bodies clung to the shadows. She spotted a woman collapsed across a doorway, her skull a ruin of bone and matted hair. Madrentine soldiers lined the road, fallen in their formations, overwhelmed by the Ashlanders as they rolled through the city in a hungry plague. Everywhere she turned, Erida saw evidence of the night’s battle. It had ended as quickly as it began, the besieged city overcome by an attack no one could have ever predicted. Ash coated the ground in a thick carpet, broken by footprints and drag marks. The silence was most disturbing of all. Thousands of people had walked these streets only a few hours ago. Now they were quiet as a graveyard.
Her knights, stationed through the street, peered out from beneath their helms, both to guard the Queen and to take in the impossible sight. Erida saw the surprise in them and the wariness too.
“Where are they?” Erida muttered, feeling Taristan’s warmth at her side.
He surveyed the main street, and the many roads branching off. “Waiting,” he said quietly.
Erida pursed her lips, agitated by the lack of explanation.
