Into the Storm

  A terrible thunder sounded as the storm throwers fired another barrage, and then the other squad’s Stormblades let out their shorter-range electrical discharge. The Menite battle cry turned into an incomprehensible roar as the two sides clashed and steel rang out against steel.

  He resisted the urge to look back and kept moving. He probably wouldn’t have been able to see his squad through all the stalls, tents, curtains, and flags anyway. It was a very confusing place—he really should have been in an office neatly filing papers. Forcing himself to focus on his training, Cleasby picked out a nearby bell tower to get his bearings and used that to navigate the aisles.

  The insulated armor was heavy, but he was used to it now. His body was fit and his mind was running so quickly that the armor didn’t seem to matter. He leapt over a discarded pile of produce just as a Protectorate soldier came around the side of a wagon. They saw each other at the same time.

  Apparently the Menite commander had followed the same idea about flanking through the market as Madigan had.

  The Temple Flameguard reacted just a bit faster, jabbing his flame spear at Cleasby’s chest. Cleasby didn’t even think about using the buckler on his left arm to swat the fire-heated spear point aside; the motion was instant, automatic, ingrained by thousands of drills. The galvanic blade in his right hand was already charged with magical energy, and Cleasby swung.

  The glaive caught the Menite low in the side. The sharpened steel alone would have been enough to end the man’s life, but the crackling release of electricity made it certain. There was a flash, a vibration up Cleasby’s arm, and then the Menite was spinning away in a flash of sparks.

  The sharp smell hit him, burned hair and ozone, and he gagged. For some reason, he hadn’t expected the stench.

  Several more Flameguard had shoved their way through the hanging curtains, having seen their companion felled, but the other Stormblades had been right on his heels, and the battle turned into a chaotic melee, squad against squad, as the two groups collided. Thunder boomed and wooden walls exploded into splinters as electricity was discharged. A Protectorate soldier crashed backward through a tent, taking the whole thing down as a Storm Knight followed, slashing wildly through the fabric.

  There were Menites everywhere. The two squads had blundered right into each other. Thornbury, who had claimed no inclination to soldiering, savagely attacked another Menite, but the Flameguard simply shield-slammed him into the ground. Before the enemy could finish the aristocrat with a spear thrust, Pangborn lowered one armored shoulder and crashed into the Menite hard enough to put him through a stall filled with caged chickens. Pangborn fired his storm thrower into the stall, and there was an explosion of feathers. The big man began to laugh, then ran another Menite through with the thrower’s bayonet.

  Too late Cleasby realized other Flameguard had come around the wagon, and they were already on top of him. Three figures with three flame spears, all aimed at his heart. There was a flash of blue and gold as Acosta flew past, a movement to one side, and then the other, and suddenly the merchants’ tents were splattered with blood and two more Menites lay dying. The third stabbed at Acosta, but he simply moved out of the way, flowing like water around the spear, and drove his storm glaive through the last soldier’s guts.

  Except for Cleasby’s pulse pounding like a drum, the market was quiet. Private Allsop helped Thornbury up. The entire clash had been decided in a few brutal seconds. They were alive, and their opponents were dead. It was a lot to take in.

  “Hells.” Acosta kicked the dying Menite off his sword. “I forgot to turn on the storm chamber.” He twisted the haft and the blade began to hum. “Such complicated things.”

  Cleasby had studied with a Corvis duel master, but that was the fastest he had ever seen a mortal being move. “How did you do that?”

  “You study books; I study weapons. Now we will see what this marvelous device of Nemo’s really does! Come, my friends.” The Ordsman continued on through the market.

  “Maybe Wilkins is right,” Pangborn whispered. “Acosta has given his soul to Thamar in exchange for power.”

  By all rights, Cleasby knew he should have been impaled on a Menite spear. “I don’t care who he prays to, as long as he’s on our side.” The battle was continuing in the street. The Sixth needed them. “Keep moving.”

  They came out the far side of the market. The smoke was thicker here, and several nearby homes were being consumed by fire. They were close enough he could feel the heat. It was hard to ascertain the situation with such poor visibility, but the Menites had their backs to them. The Temple Flameguard were focused on the main body of the Sixth, trying to force their way through the halberd line. The Menite’s impressive shield wall wouldn’t do them much good from this angle. Cleasby pointed his storm glaive. “Attack! Attack!”

  His squad rushed forward. The Temple Flameguard never knew what hit them. They plowed into the enemy, glaives swinging, blood flying. Flesh scorched and clothing caught fire. The air was filled with crackling energy that rippled across the steel of their armor, but the insulation beneath kept it from their vulnerable skin. The cobblestones were singed as the lightning danced from body to body.

  The shield wall broke apart, and the entire street dissolved into a general melee, soldier against soldier, stabbing and slashing, invader against defender, in a savage fight to the death.

  Madigan had been right. This was nothing at all like the stories.

  Cleasby lifted his sword and brought it down on the shoulder of a Menite. The man screamed as his collarbone was split in half. The sergeant wrenched the glaive out and turned to the next target. Already the Temple Flameguard were reacting, turning to face this new threat. One of Cleasby’s men cried out and collapsed to the ground as a flame spear pierced his armor. Cleasby couldn’t even tell who it was in the confusion, but he pushed forward and slammed his buckler into the attacker’s face before he could finish the Storm Knight, then grabbed his fallen man by a strap on his armor and dragged him back toward the market.

  It was Private Crispin, screaming and trying to hold in his guts with his hands.

  He had to get him away from the fight. “Hang on, Private!” Cleasby shouted. The ground shook beneath his boots. Something big was coming their way. He turned in time to see a great, white shape smashing its way through the market stalls as if they were made of paper.

  “Incoming warjack!” someone cried.

  The Protectorate ’jack seemed impossibly tall as it loomed over them. One giant hand held a shield bearing a scarlet Menofix, the symbol of Menoth seen throughout the Protectorate army, and the other hand was pulling up a length of heavy chain. Dangling from that chain was a horrific ball of spiked steel as big around as Cleasby’s torso. The chain rattled as the warjack lifted the massive flail, preparing to swing.

  “Look out!” Cleasby ordered as he threw himself to the ground, but it was already too late for some of the others. Metal joints rotated smoothly as the warjack’s arm moved in a wide arc. The chain whistled by inches above Cleasby’s visor. The flail stretched outward, tearing effortlessly through friend and foe alike, sending bodies flying in every direction. The ’jack pushed forward, swinging again, heedless of who it was tearing through.

  It was almost like it was clearing a path . . . but for what?

  Cleasby rolled over and forced himself up as quickly as he could. The Protectorate ’jack was practically on top of them. Crispin had gotten to his knees, the lower half of his breastplate covered in blood, but then he disappeared as the flail struck again, obliterating the young knight and driving him into the ground.

  “No!” Cleasby shouted, and before he realized what he was doing, he was hurling his body at a heavy warjack.

  The flail head was yanked from the hole it had made in the road, but Cleasby was already past, rushing beneath the giant machine’s boxy head. Dirt and stones pelted him as the ’jack lifted one metal foot to smash him, and his glaive struck the thing in the leg. Electri
city sparked and the plate scorched and buckled. The machine barely seemed to notice. It swiveled at the waist and its huge shield crashed into Cleasby.

  It was like being hit by a train.

  Cleasby spun through the air and then hit the ground hard, bouncing and rolling, armor clanking. His storm glaive went skittering away across the cobblestones.

  He could taste his own blood. The Protectorate ’jack took a halting step forward. Lingering sparks fell from its leg. Flakes of burning paint floated away. Then it took another step, and the steel toes hit the ground only inches from Cleasby’s visor. He tried to scramble away, but the other foot rose, ready to stomp him flat—

  CRASH!

  The Protectorate warjack went tumbling away, falling and tearing through the cobblestones.

  A huge shadow fell over Cleasby. He looked up to see the massive figure of the Sixth’s Stormclad standing over him. The head rotated slightly as it studied him through the two glowing yellow slits that served as eyes, and for the briefest moment Cleasby could have sworn the great machine was considering stepping on him. He flinched as it lifted a foot over his body, but tons of steel touched down carefully just past him, and then it was moving after the fallen enemy ’jack. The Stormclad’s generator blade, a gigantic version of the knights’ storm glaives, positively churned with electrical energy as it went after the Protectorate warjack.

  “Come on, boy!” Strong hands grabbed Cleasby’s armor and pulled. It was Neel MacKay. At some point he had lost his helmet, his face was blackened with soot, and his mustache was singed. “Get back into the fray.” MacKay turned to run after his ’jack. “Get him! Thrash that Protectorate junker!”

  The twin smokestacks on the Stormclad’s back belched black smoke and tufts of fire as it burned hot. The huge generator blade rose and fell, striking the Protectorate war machine as it struggled to stand. There was a blinding flash and a boom. The Protectorate ’jack got to its feet, but the arm holding its flail remained on the ground. Oil was pumping from a severed line. Heedless of the crippling injury, the machine collided with the Stormclad and the two fell into one of the burning houses.

  He found his storm glaive. The street was pandemonium, blue and gold desperately clashing with white and red. Cleasby didn’t know where his squad was. At this point he wasn’t a leader and he certainly wasn’t a scholar or a gentleman; he was just another soldier with a blade. “For Cygnar!” he shouted as he threw himself back into the fight. He knocked down an enemy soldier and began hammering against the man’s tower shield as he tried to hide beneath it.

  There was the pounding of hooves and the noise of wheels being driven far too fast. Cleasby looked up to see a wagon carrying several passengers and a driver who was whipping the horses like mad. Riding alongside the wagon were several mounted Protectorate soldiers wearing what had to be the heaviest and most intricate armor he’d ever seen. His stomach lurched as he realized they were some of the dreaded Exemplars, elite knights of the Protectorate.

  Then he realized they weren’t here to join their comrades at all but were retreating through the gap created by the Protectorate warjack.

  They were fleeing . . . ?

  He had studied everything he could about all of the knightly orders of the Iron Kingdoms. The fanatically obedient Exemplars were not the running type.

  A single Storm Knight cut his way through the mob, trying to intercept the horsemen. A few of the Exemplars were armed with crossbows and launched bolts at the brave soldier. One missed and the knight caught another with his buckler, and then he was among the galloping horsemen. He triggered an electrical blast, which caused one of the horses to rear in terror, exposing its unarmored underbelly. The knight slashed with his glaive and the horse toppled over, taking its rider to the ground.

  The lone Stormblade was Enoch Rains. The apostate leapt over the kicking, thrashing horse and went after the other riders. A sword fell, striking Rains in the shoulder, but his armor held. Rains inexplicably hurled his glaive. Another horse screamed and its two riders, one masked and unarmored, were thrown from the saddle. Then Rains was knocked aside by another armored warhorse.

  The Exemplars could have easily finished Rains, but they were focused on protecting the occupants of the wagon. In the space of a few breaths they were free and riding hard away from the battle, eastward, deeper into Sul.

  He’d been so distracted by Rains’ display of suicidal courage that he’d nearly lost track of the man he’d been trying to kill. The Temple Flameguard had been protected by his shield, and he was trying to maneuver himself up enough to stab his spear at Cleasby’s legs.

  Lieutenant Madigan lopped the fallen man’s head off. “Pay attention, Cleasby. The battle’s almost over, so don’t get murdered now.”

  “Sorry, sir.” He pointed. “Rains is down. Over there.”

  The old knight lifted his visor so he could see more clearly. He scowled when he saw the wagon. “It can’t be . . .” They lost sight of the wagon behind a wall of smoke. Looking like he’d seen a ghost, Madigan shook his head and flipped his visor back down. “The Flameguard are routed.” Cleasby hadn’t realized it, but the Menites had sounded a retreat. The Stormclad, its banner still on fire, had come lumbering out of the wreckage and was chasing after the running enemy. Wilkins’ squad was still fighting a group of Flameguard who were standing their ground as a delaying action. “Don’t just stand there. Go help Rains.”

  Heedless of the pain in his legs, Cleasby ran as fast as he could toward where Rains had fallen. One of the horses was on its side kicking and thrashing, its armored rider partially pinned beneath it and taking blows from its flailing hooves. The other horse lay barely twitching on the street, bleeding heavily near its fallen riders, neither of whom moved. Rains was on his hands and knees, with the breath knocked out of him. Unable to get out from under the thrashing horse, the pinned Exemplar freed his sword, swung at its neck, and killed his mount. With the horse still, the enemy knight struggled to free himself.

  Cleasby swung his glaive at the Exemplar’s helmet. Surprisingly, his enemy got his sword up in time to block. Lightning flashed as the blades met. “For Cygnar!” Cleasby attacked again, but the Exemplar knocked that blow aside as well. Even pinned beneath a horse the man was a superb swordsman.

  Rains reached the Exemplar, and since he was missing his glaive, he slammed the edge of his buckler into the Exemplar’s helmet again and again, causing him to grunt and denting the helmet but not accomplishing much else. The Exemplar grabbed hold of Rains’ leg and pulled with a yell, sending the Stormblade down. Cleasby struck with a clumsy overhand blow, but the glaive was turned aside on the heavy steel of the Exemplar’s shoulder. The armor was so intricately carved it was practically a work of art, but it also worked infuriatingly well. The enemy counterattacked and the edge of his blade hit Cleasby’s knee. The armor plate stopped it, but the blow was enough to make his leg go numb, and he fell backward, off balance.

  “Allow me, Sergeant,” Acosta said as he walked past Cleasby. The Exemplar stabbed at the Ordsman, who calmly batted the tip aside, and then stomped on his opponent’s sword so it was pinned to the earth. The Exemplar cursed and tugged, but Acosta didn’t budge. “This is a good learning opportunity. You two have obviously never fought someone in such heavy armor before.” Surprisingly, Acosta turned the storm chamber on his glaive off.

  Cleasby tried to reply, but he was panting too hard.

  The Exemplar got both hands on his sword and pulled. Acosta’s glaive brutally struck the man in the hands, breaking his fingers. The Menite yelled in pain, and his sword fell into the dust. “You can’t just hack at your enemy. The hard part is knocking them down. Then you must be precise. Methodical. Think of it like opening a tin of meat.”

  The Menite put both of his injured hands on his armored horse and pushed, straining, trying to free himself before he could become a lesson in armor cracking. Through the emotionless mask of the man’s ornate helmet Cleasby could hear a prayer to the Lawgi
ver.

  Acosta continued, “This weapon is designed for cleaving rather than thrusting, but it will still serve, if you use the tip of your blade. Insert it into a seam like so.” He jammed the end of his storm glaive into the crease where the two halves of the heavy torso armor came together. Acosta shoved. The prayer stopped and the Exemplar bellowed in pain. “Yes . . . This is truly fine plate, very well fitted. In such a case you must work through it using the principle of leverage.” He placed one hand on his glaive, about halfway up the blade, and kept the other on the handle. “Your gauntlet will protect your palm. Then work the blade like so . . .” He began to lever the blade back and forth, prying the breastplate apart.

  The Exemplar began to scream as steel pierced flesh. Blood spilled from the widening seam. Still Acosta moved it back and forth, with no more expression than one of the butchers from the slaughterhouse next to the Barn nonchalantly performing a mundane task. Cleasby cringed.

  The Ordsman stopped. “I have had an intriguing thought.” He twisted the glaive’s hilt, charging the storm chamber. “Since I have this magnificent lightning device, let’s see what happens when we get to the delicate bits.” Acosta triggered the release. The Exemplar’s body jerked and thrashed, and he made a terrible gurgling noise. This lasted for several awful seconds before Acosta powered down the sword. The Exemplar’s helmet hung limp. Smoke came out the eye holes. “That seems to work too.”

  Cleasby felt dizzy and nauseated. He looked to Rains, but the other Stormblade had retrieved his glaive and was moving to the unarmored Menite. The other fallen Exemplar lay in a still, silent heap with his head at an odd angle from his body, but this one had landed flat. Cleasby could hear quick, shallow breathing, indicating the Menite wasn’t long for Caen. He’d seen a classmate die in such a manner back at the university, which was one reason he’d neglected his practice in horsemanship.