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leaving anything for the norits to work on. Ildas nosed about and helped her
gather all the fragments. On her heels again, she looked around, regretting
Coperic s ada-mant stand. One was enough, he said and repeated his formula,
get in, do the job, get out and away. The other Minarks were sleeping
peacefully, the attendants not on duty sighed in their sleep from a familiar
exhaustion, but didn t wake. The sentries stood unmoving dead, though they
didn t know it yet. She lowered herself and went snaking away. Chances were
she could stand up and stroll over to Coperic, but she needed the practice and
she wasn t that sure of how well the web would hold.
When she reached Coperic, she saw Bella and Biel come slithering back, gliding
with a silence and grace she watched with utter envy, glad she d done her
practicing out of sight because it seemed to her she d never equal the skills
of that enigmatic pair and she d rather like to. Time to get out of here, she
thought. She gave her low breathy whistle to warn Coperic she was near, then
touched his shoulder to let him know how near.
As before, he nodded. Without a word, he started creep-ing toward the shelter
of the trees. With Bella and Biel she followed close behind.
V. The Battle For The Biserica
1
They climbed to the top of the west gatetower, Dom Hern and Yael-mri, Georgia
Myers and Anoike Ley, stood look-ing down at the army stretched out through
the low hills humping up toward the Pass, gazed at movement and form
half-hidden, half-seen through the glitter-haze of Nor magic. In a ragged line
along the barren flat where the hills stopped, a row of norits stood staring
at the wall, radiating a virulent hatred for the weapon women behind the
mer-lons, for the Stenda, the tar-folk and villagers waiting with bows, spears
or tending the fires under kettles of bubbling fat.
Hern nodded at the widely spaced dark figures.  Norits.
Georgia looked over the shorter man s shoulder.  They don t fancy y all that
much.
 They don t fancy anything that limits their power.
 Yeah. Knew a few like that back home.
Yael-mri stepped away from her slit.  Dom Georgia, domna Anoike, those men are
the greatest danger we face. She looked down at long slim hands that shook a
little until she shut them into fists.  It won t take them long before they
find out how to deflect your missiles. Two days. If we re really blessed by
fortune, three. We d appreciate it if you d concentrate on taking out as many
of the norits as you can. However many you kill or wound, that many weakens
them, she nodded at the slit, the army below,  more than a thousand men. But
as soon as you notice that you can t seem to hit any more of them, forget it
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and use your weapons where they can do some good.
Georgia nodded, then moved to one of the broader slits in the tower s side,
leaned out and looked along the wall, using the small dark forms of the
defenders to help him estimate the width of the walkway behind the merlons,
tried to determine how much shelter the stone uprights would give his people.
Anoike joined him in the opening, her elbows poking hard into his back until
he wriggled a little, tensed some muscles, and sent them sliding. She caught
at his shoulders, chuckled softly. He ignored that and the pressure of her
body against his, pointed to the walkway.  Wide enough, you think?
 For a wall, it s some wide. Not no expressway, more like a back country
two-laner, with them hot-pots for wide-assed road hogs, but yeah, I say Angel
could ride it. If he keep his head down. Horse s head it might show, might
not. Way he move, take a piece a luck for them suckers to get a shot at him,
specially with bows.
 Move the delicate bod, woman, I m coming out.
Chuckling again, she stepped away from him, stood in the center of the small
square room, hands in pockets, casually hipshot, looking from Yael-mri s
faintly disap-proving face to the bland round countenance of Dom Hern. The
glint in his eyes was familiar. She tried to look conspicuously uninterested.
Georgia pulled his head in, rubbed the back of his fist across his chin.  We
got a pretty wide front to keep an eye on. Seems to me the best thing would be
posting snipers along the wall. They d be spread thin. Need competition
quality shooters here to take out your norits fast and economical. Lay my hand
on fifteen maybe, counting An-nie Lee here. He grinned at Anoike.
She snorted.  You payin for that, Redneck. Wait till we in the sack, I show
you Annie Lee. She jerked her thumb toward the wall.  Split Angel s band,
half on each side the gate, use teletalks to send  em where they needed. How
many teletalks you pick up at the armory? Got some spare batteries, I do hope.
One a us up here with binocs, we could see the whole damn war. Like some crazy
board game. She shook her head slowly.  Weird. Hey man, think a the wars you
been hoppin around to where most the time no sucker got any idea what s
happenin, espe-cially some shithead general. She strolled over to one of the
front slits and looked down.  We got us a cozy down-home war. Almost makes
sense.
Hern s eyes moved from her rigid back to Georgia.  Teletalks?
 Yeah. Since you re running this thing kinda short-handed, you could do with
better communications than they got. We picked up a gross of  em, Anoike,
brand-new in the cartons, enough to tie everything into a good tight web. And
batteries sealed in plastic so they should be all right unless Procurement s
more rotten than usual. You know, this could be a bigger edge than rifles. He
turned to Yael-mri.  What re you doing about rock-climbers? When she
continued to look blank, he moved a hand in an impatient gesture.  Sabotage
teams flanking the walls. Going round through the mountains. Give me a cloudy
night, some rope and a half-dozen of my folk and five ll get you a hundred, I
get into the Biserica and make a dent in your Shawar. You re vulnerable there,
Yael-mri, and it don t take magic to do it, just a bit of work and the
motivation. Dom Hern here, he waved at Hern,  says you got something called
Sleykyn assassins with one big hate for you meien. If they half like the
contract killers we got back home, climbing s something they got a lot of
practice in. Whoever s running that show, another wave toward the army,  he d
have to be rock from ear to ear not to think of that. And don t tell me you
don t fight that way. He got  em, he s gonna use  em. Hate between you and
Sleykyn goes back hundreds of years, the Dom says, so he gonna have no trouble
getting volunteers for a suicide run. Up to you to keep it from paying off.
You better have spotters watching both sides of the valley. We got spare
binocs we can let you have if you want. He frowned.  No night-scopes, though,
what we got we better keep on the wall. He looked from Hern to Yael-mri,
shook his head.  Dumb. Me. You don t know what the hell I m talking about.
Teletalks, nightscopes, binoculars. I ve seen enough here. Anoike? She
nodded.  Right. Let s get back down to the camp, I ll walk you through our
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gear.
Yael-mri passed a hand across the gray-streaked brown hair cut close so her
finely shaped head.  War, she said.  I don t want to think about it and that
keeps me half-blind. She started down the stairs walking beside Geor-gia.  We [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]