God Within Us

The sound of neighing horses and shouts rose from beyond the stone walls of the towerhouse.

Yesugei scrambled up the battlements, keeping his head low as he crept towards Marmun and Valishin who sat crouched behind one of the crenellations. As he peeked over the walls, it seemed for a moment that there were dozens of fireflies floating along the streets and over the walls of the town.

But as he squinted through the darkness, he could make out the silhouettes of horses and cavalrymen galloping through the cobblestone streets - gleaming metal helmets and speartips bobbing up and down as their wielders ran from empty house to empty house.

A bright flame bloomed to life in the night as one of the houses on the outskirts of the town caught fire, its dry thatched roof set alight by one of the raiders’ torches. Then another, and another. Soon it seemed Balai had been transformed into a great field of burning orange flowers, their petals licking hungrily up at the night sky.

Yesugei nocked an arrow into the bow as he heard several others make their way up onto the battlements. Rudin slipped beside him, his helm reflecting a splash of bright orange from the glow of the flames. Vasilisa knelt down at his other side, her fear hidden by a mask of anger as she looked out at the burning town.

“How many are out there?” whispered Vratislav as he limped over to the battlements, wielding the old woodman’s ax.

Yesugei tried to count the bobbing silhouettes, the torches, but in the darkness of night and the shadows of the fires they all blended together into a single mass. “Two dozen? Maybe three? Too many.”

Over the roaring of the growing flames and neighing of horses Yesugei could hear the raiders shouting in the Klyazmite tongue, and the stream of bobbing torches began to grow closer towards the keep. Now everybody was at the battlements, staring in terrified awe at the town below as more and more buildings erupted into flame.

“Valishin, Gastya, take the women and head down to the pier,” ordered Vratislav. In the glow of the fire, the boyar’s face looked hollow and skeletal - his eyes shrouded in shadow. “Stay low and see if you can get the riverboat out into the water.”

“But the others left it behind, what about-”

“If we can’t get out onto the Cherech, then we’ll all die,” spat Vratislav. “Go, your boyar commands it!”

The peasants hastily scrambled from the battlements, Valishin holding onto his wife’s hand in a death grip as they made their way across the courtyard to the hidden exit. Nesha made to follow after them, then turned to face her husband, who gave a reassuring smile.

“Remember your duty to me, Vratislav,” said Nesha, her eyes watery with tears she stubbornly refused to shed. “I will not be a boyar’s widow, understand?”

The boyar knelt down to kiss his wife on the forehead, and for a moment it seemed as though Nesha might have been able to pull Vratislav away with her. But the moment passed, and the boyar gently placed Nesha’s hands in hers, squeezing them tight before commanding, “It’s all by the will of the gods. Now go. Run. We’ll follow soon.”

As Nesha reluctantly made her way down the battlements, Yesugei saw Vratislav’s eyes fall on Vasilisa, who remained at the battlements - dagger in hand and cleaver strapped across her back.

“My lady-”

“No,” interrupted Vasilisa, her gaze resolute as she looked back at the boyar. “I’m staying here. As your liege lady, I command myself.”

“But your father-”

“My father isn’t here.” Vasilisa stuck her jaw out in defiance. “But I am still a daughter of Belnopyl, the lineage of Raegnald. Our blood has always defended our subjects and vassals, and everyone here is among them.”

“We can’t hold these walls forever,” retorted Vratislav, gesturing over the gathered peasants at the walls - Marmun, Gastya, Doru, and Khavel wielding their tools, and Rudin with his spear. “I won’t risk you dying in the retreat from the walls. Of any of us, you should be the first to escape.”

“The arms-masters always said a lord who commands respect is the one first in battle, and the last in the retreat.”

“The ones who held true to that advice were the ones who died, my lady…” Vratislav’s voice grew desperate as the torches drew ever closer to the base of the keep’s walls. “Please.”

Before the boyar could say more, Marmun hurriedly beckoned them to glance over the walls, where several of the cavalrymen had stopped at the gates. Yesugei clutched the feathered shot tight in his fingers as he glanced carefully down. A dozen riders stood outside, clad in heavy plated mail hauberks and wearing decorated helms - armed and armored as sworn warriors, not brigands. One of the riders carried a large banner, but in the half-light of the torch-illuminated night he could scarcely make out the banner’s color or symbol.

One of the horses - a powerful courser bred for war - reared up and gave a loud neigh that echoed out over the keep.

“Open the gates!” shouted the horse’s rider, a lancer wearing a tall pointed helmet decorated with silver. “Come out and fight, you cowards!”

“Hold down there!” called down Vratislav as he leaned out over the walls. “This town’s been abandoned!”

“And who are you?” yelled the lancer. “One of Crahask’s warriors? Busy pissing yourself behind stone walls while we burn your precious town? Tell that cockless fucker Crahask to get out here and fight - or did he run off with the women and children?”

“Damned if I know where Crahask has gone, but he isn’t here!” shouted Vratislav. “The place was abandoned when we got here ourselves, and we owe no allegiance to Crahask. Do what you want with the town, but leave us be.”

The lancer was about to retort when from the shadows of the night another cavalryman emerged into the glow of the pillagers’ torches, accompanied by several footmen with spears and axes. The lancers gathered at the gates looked to the man - clad in heavy lamellar and mail - with quiet deference as he rode up to the front of their column. So, this one is the leader.

The commander’s plumed helmet bore a metal faceguard styled to resemble a grinning mustachioed man, reminding Yesugei of his father’s keshik guardsmen. With the flickering shadows, the metal face looked as demonic as the masks worn by the silver-helmed cultists.

The druzhinnik chuckled as he lifted his mask. A ruddy and squashed face peered up at their band on the walls. “Vratislav. I believe we missed you at Yerkh.”

“Stribor?” gaped the boyar as he looked down at the commander. On the hanging shields of the pillaging footmen, Yesugei spotted the roaring griffon of Gatchisk. “Gods, what are you doing?”

“Waging war, I reckon,” replied the druzhinnik with a slim, feral smile. “The Khormchaks are coming, haven’t you heard?”

“It was you who attacked Yerkh, wasn’t it?” Vratislav spat, the veins in his neck bulging with rage. “I saw the banners, but I didn’t think…you wage war by turning your swords against your own people?”

“I’m foraging, like any good student of war should,” said Stribor. “Times will be tough - and when the nomads come for us, they will strike along Yerkh and Balai as they had before to take slaves and supplies. I’ll leave them with nothing but ash to pillage from the borderlands. And besides…”

The warrior adjusted his grip on the reins of his horse. “I no longer owe allegiance to that sunken cunt Gvozden. Only Prince Svetopolk still seeks freedom for our people - he's rallied the north and the city of Pemil to do battle against the nomads and throw off their yoke once and for all. A dozen boyars of the south, lesser and greater, have already sworn their shields to him once they heard of Belnopyl’s fall. And more flock every day to his warband.”

“You still swore an oath to serve Gatchisk,” muttered Vratislav. “I never thought you to be such a disloyal dog.”

“I’m loyal to my lands and freedom first,” shot back Stribor, his words dripping with long-contained bitterness. “Not some shriveled old fool who lets his own people be taken as slaves. The House of Gatchisk had fallen the moment Gvozden sent his own son into exile and bowed before that weakling Igor. All Gatchisk and Belnopyl’s princes want is peace, no matter how badly they must starve their own to appease the khans. But the boyars…we still yearn for the days when we were free. We want vengeance for our fallen, we want freedom, and we want blood. And whoever does not stand with us, stands against us.”

“Now,” the armored boyar drew his sword with a hiss - pointing the deadly steel towards the walls. “In the name of Prince Svetopolk the Bright Sun, open the gates and surrender.”

The peasants all looked to each other, then at Vasilisa and Vratislav, who stood in tense silence at the battlements. Surrender might have sounded favorable, once, but Yesugei saw the truth in the eyes of the gathered warriors as they waited for a reply.

The only people who might be taken as prisoners would be Vratislav and Vasilisa - nobles could always be held for leverage or ransom, especially the Princess of Belnopyl. But for the commoners and himself, their fate was spelled out in the cavalrymens’ clutched swords and lances. None of them are interested in extra prisoners slowing them down. They'll kill the rest of us here and now once we open those gates.

“I have my subjects here as well,” called Vratislav, thinking the same. Blindly hoping against hope he could still negotiate. “Can you guarantee their safety if we surrender?”

The reply from the druzhinnik was short.

“I'm tired of playing this game.” Stribor raised a fist into the air, and one of the cavalrymen twirled their spear in hand before launching it at the walls. The spear whistled directly for Vratislav, only to sail over his head as Vasilisa grabbed him by his tunic and pulled him down behind the walls.

“Over the walls. Kill everyone.” Commanded Stribor in a bored voice. A shower of javelins and arrows exploded forth from the darkness, forcing everyone to duck low and close to the walls as the missiles clattered against the stone crenellations or embedded just behind them on the catwalks. As the squall passed and Yesugei raised his head, he heard the sound of dismounting warriors and the rattling of armor and blades.

“Everyone!” Commanded Vratislav over the din of the coming battle. “Stand apart along the wall and hit whatever pokes its head over! We'll hold them here as long as we dare, then retreat out to the river.”

The walls were high and rough, but the hill upon which the keep sat was low and sloped enough for the warriors to climb it bare-handed. Yesugei saw the warrior at the lead of the attack scrambling up with one hand, and clutching his shield and sheathed sword in the other. He drew his bow, and placed his first shot into the man's shoulder. He couldn't even hear his target give a cry over the howling and warcries of the approaching armored horde - the warrior simply toppled from the hill, and disappeared into the darkness.

As more and more warriors rushed to climb the hill, Yesugei saw Khavel and Marmun push a large empty barrel over the walls - it tumbled along the uneven slope of the hill, and struck down several more climbing warriors into the darkness. Rudin pulled the javelins free from the catwalk, and hurled several down at the gathered warriors, but Yesugei didn't see whether he hit his mark.

There seemed to be no end to the charging killers that climbed to reach the walls - their armor was sturdy, and those struck by hurled barrels and rocks or even Rudin's javelins were simply stunned and scrambled back up from the bottom of the hill after regaining their bearings. Like a surging swarm of black ants the enraged raiders pressed on and upwards, until eventually a pale hand clasped over the edge of the walls next to Yesugei as he was taking aim, followed by an armored face and a sword.

Before Yesugei could draw back Vratislav slashed his axe down, and a spurt of hot blood shot from the hand as the warrior gave a squeal and fell from the walls. The warrior's sword clattered to the ground, and the boyar hurriedly passed it to Doru.

“I don't know how to swordfight!” shouted Doru as he gripped the decorated blade, his eyes large and frightened.

“Watch yourself!” cried Rudin.

Another warrior was halfway up the walls, his shield awkwardly held aloft as he swung one leg over. Doru nearly dropped his sword in terror at the sight of the man but Rudin charged forward, his spear braced firmly as he threw himself bodily at the climbing warrior. The heavy boar spear buried itself all the way up to the wings inside the hauberk, and its wearer gave a rattling gasp before Rudin pushed him and forced the dying man to fall from the battlements.

More warriors now began to climb up over the walls, plunging into the desperate push. The world began to swirl before Yesugei as it had at the White Pinch. The smells of smoke, blood, iron, and death filled his senses until it became a single smell - the smell of battle. The only rhythm that anchored him was the nock-draw-loose mantra he repeated in his head as he loosed arrow after arrow at the swarm of warriors ascending the walls - soon a half-dozen of the raiders were left writhing in agony on the ground where his shots found their unprotected legs, armpits, or faces. But it was not enough to stem the armored tide.

The rotund Marmun pulled a warrior down to the battlements by his belt, and Khavel smashed the dazed man's head with his hammer until he was left a twitching, groaning mess on the ground.

Vratislav clumsily swung his axe at another warrior's helmet, wrenching it off his head with the force of the blow. Before his foe could strike back at the boyar, Vasilisa leapt out from behind and drew her dagger across the warrior’s throat. As he fell into a limp heap, the princess snatched his sword from his failing grasp and hurriedly joined the battle before the boyar could yell at her to run.

A strangled cry came from Yesugei’s side, and he turned to see Doru fall to his knees as a longaxe ripped across his chest with a spray of crimson. The axe’s wielder was the largest, stockiest man he had ever seen in his life, towering over all his other comrades who swarmed onto the walls in his wake. The man charged forwards along the battlements with a berserk scream, barrelling over the injured mason’s apprentice with his axe raised high. Rudin stood firm and thrust his spear out, but the tip scraped off the axeman’s iron chestplate. The warrior didn’t bother to stop his mad dash - he simply smashed the scrawny poacher across the face with the haft of his axe and shoved him off the battlements into the courtyard.

Only Vasilisa remained between himself and the charging warrior, and Yesugei scrambled to nock another arrow as the screaming axeman bore down upon the two of them. Their weapons clashed with a metallic screech as Vasilisa blocked the warrior’s wild overhead swing. Longaxe and sword scraped and dipped down in the clash, and then the crescent of the axe-head hooked on the hilt of Vasilisa’s sword. The blade wrenched free from her grasp with a mighty pull, and tumbled over the walls into the darkness below.

With a swift kick, Vasilisa toppled backwards as the warrior gave another loud scream and raised the axe high above his head once again to cleave her in half.

Yesugei nocked another feathered shaft, but it was too late.

The axe seemed to hang in the air for an eternity. Dark droplets of blood welled up and fell free from the blade, further staining the slick battlements crimson.

Yesugei’s breath caught in his throat. He pulled back the bowstring, but no amount of desperate hope could stop what was to come.

Too late.

The axe swung down, and the sickening crunch of steel biting into flesh and bone filled the world.